Buffy closed the door behind her and leaned tiredly against it. Two thirds of the nerd trio were safely locked away, and Warren, well this one she could take care of tomorrow … or the day after tomorrow … or … any other day.
The house was quiet, nobody seemed to be at home. She was alone. As usual. With a sigh she mounted the steps. Then she saw it. The coat. She stopped in mid-motion. Heard her screams. Felt the bathroom curtain she was clinging to give way. Felt the cold tiles beneath and his hard body above her. Felt his weight press her down, his knee thrust between her thighs and his hand rip her gown.
Xander must have left it on the stairs. Xander … disgust and loathing on his face when he looked at her … and fury. For him there was only black and white. He had no idea of the many shades of grey existing in between.
She stooped to pick it up. A cloud of tobacco scent - blended with a different, not clearly nameable but strangely familiar fragrance - paralysed her and she dropped onto the steps. How could it have come that far? How could she manage to save the world when she wasn't even able to keep her own life from falling apart?
The coat was lying on her knees. Her gaze fixed on her wrists, on the bruises his fingers had left. She pulled the sleeves of the sweater down to cover them.
It was ridiculous. There had been nights when she climbed up these steps with more than just a little effort. When every bone in her body was aching, when her skin was covered with scratches and bruises, her lips were swollen and sore, and a faint smile played on her lips.
She closed her eyes and breathed shakily. Violence. Pure. Unreigned. Uncovered. That had always dragged her to him. She could shout at him. She could hit him. She could draw blood from his skin with her nails. He let her work off all her frustration and her rage while she was straddling him, his cock buried deep inside her.
Rage, white-hot boiling rage: at Willow who had brought her back; at Dawn and her growing impudence; at the Council for simply having her declared the Chosen One; at him who finally had her flat on her back; at herself for crawling to him night after night. She hit him but he didn't fight back. And that made her even madder. She called him names and offended him but he only laughed and offered her his huge vocabulary when she ran out of words.
But as soon as her rage melted into tears he pulled her down, kissing her until her vision turned into a shiny haze. He was in command then, and he didn't hold back. He wasn't tender, neither with his body nor with his words. His grip always left marks, the crypt's stone walls always scratched her back and his teeth - pointy or not - always broke her skin. And she climaxed harder and harder.
Her fingers dug into the soft leather. But, what had happened in the bathroom was completely different. That had nothing to do with lust. Or love. Only with despair.
She wondered why it took her so long. Why for god's sake did it take her so long to kick him off? Because even that was better than the overwhelming loneliness she was living in. The cold loneliness that wrapped around her every night when she closed her eyes. She had been aware that it was wrong to use him just to escape this feeling for a few hours. But she hadn't been aware how hard it would be to live her decision day after day, night after night.
With a bitter taste in her mouth she finished that thought. Was she really that perverted to make him take her violently? To not be responsible because she didn't allow him to touch her?. To make it his fault, so she could despise him and blame him and … " well, he's nothing but a monster, a heartless, soulless creature, that's his nature, can't help it …"
And there was something else. He had pressed her to the ground mumbling like crazy, "you felt it when I was inside you and I'll make you feel it again," but his body, a body she knew better than her own, hadn't reacted to his words. Or to her. Her body instead … Christ, she wouldn't follow that thought.
Instead she remembered the shock on his face when realization hit him. And then he was gone. A small voice told her he stood on the verge of doing something that would change all everything, not only for her, not only for him, but for each and every one of them. It was only a faint notion, but it brought Buffy to her feet.
* * *
In front of the crypt she steeled herself and grabbed the coat tightly. She took a deep breath and tried to calm down, to get the tension out of her system. He won't hurt you, he won't attack you, she kept repeating in her mind.
He sat on the floor resting against the tomb, a bottle of whisky in his lap and didn't acknowledge her.
Carefully she went closer, taking in the broken glass on the floor and an open travelling bag. Her heart stopped. All the beautiful lines she had prepared escaped her mind.
"You want to leave?" she managed to say.
He nodded.
"You promised to never leave me," the raising panic echoed in her voice.
"I also promised to never hurt you." He still kept staring at the floor.
She threw the coat carelessly aside and knelt next to him. "You didn't hurt me. Actually, nothing has happened, let's forget the whole thing and start …"
He pulled the bottle to his lips. "What a child you are."
For the first time he looked at her and the void expression in his eyes turned the ground beneath her feet into quicksand. She had to say something, something that would make him alter his decision. She had to convince him. Words. Where the hell were those damned words. They had never been on her side and she never had known how use them. She reached out to touch him, but he flinched. Desperately trying to think logically she leaned against the tomb.
"You are right. I feel something when I'm with you. When you're inside me I get feelings I can't name. I feel. I live." She paused. "But it doesn't stay. It's over the moment I close the door of the crypt, the door of my room. And everything is like it was before." Only worse, she added to herself. "Therefore I know I don't love you. If I loved you, these feelings couldn't disappear within an instant, they would stay for hours, for days even if you're not with me."
She watched him pour more whisky into himself. "Believe me, I really wish I could love you. Everything would be less complicated if I loved you."
He shook his head. "When will you stop lying to yourself? You couldn't tell your friends that we're having sex. Do you really think you could have told them that you're in love with me? With a soulless, evil creature? You are pathetic."
"William ..."
The bottle crashed with a nasty sound as he threw it against the opposite wall. "Stop it, bloody hell. I'm not William, and I'm not Spike. William never would have done this and Spike never would have stopped before he had drained you dry. I'm a thing, a thing without a name. A nothing. And you've been knowing it all the while."
He stood and went to the bag. With a final move he closed the zipper.
Buffy pulled up too, eyes wide with shock. "You can't leave me like this. I need you here."
He put on his coat and headed to the door.
Frantically she tried to find an argument to make him stay. She couldn't say she loved him, because it was a lie and he knew it. But she had to give him a reason to stay. "I trust you, let's start all over again, I trust you, do you hear me?" She didn't realize that she was screaming.
He stopped but didn't turn and shrugged. "Fine. But I don't trust me anymore."
She dropped on the edge of the bed. "Will you come back?" Now her voice was nearly too low to be heard.
The silence cut her mind into little pieces.
"I don't know."
The door slammed shut.
Disbelieving, Buffy gazed at the closed door. He couldn't leave like that. He loved her. He was her slave. Her wish was his command. He couldn't leave her alone.
She caught the imprint of his head on the pillow and started to punch it angrily. "You can't do that to me, you damned bastard, you can't leave me like that." Again and again she yelled the words like they were a magic incantation to bring him back. The pillow split and the feathers flew around her head gluing to her wet cheeks. Ineffectively, she tried to wipe them away.
Then she broke down and rested motionless on the bed. There was no more pain, no more rage, no more despair. Only well-known, never ending loneliness.
~ fin ~
Author's Chapter Notes:
Thanks to G. - sister in arms - for letting me have my twisted ways