Chapter 3: Musings
Holding hands, Spike thought to himself.
How many times had he wanted to just hold her hand? To reach out and grab it, and not because he was helping her up or forcing her to go somewhere with him – though he enjoyed the contact then even – but holding it. And it would be mutual, for her to hold his hand back. He thought about it a lot lately, hell – thought about it even before he got his soul, when all she thought he cared about then was which position hurt in the best way possible, or what words to whisper to get her to take her clothes off. Even then he longed for the warmth of her hand on his, him being love’s bitch and all – self-proclaimed love’s bitch, matter of fact.
And now they were. And she initiated it. What did it mean? Who knew. He never knew with Buffy. Not some time ago she was kissing Angel, so if he were to assume this meant something, then he had to admit that that meant something. And that was something he didn’t want to do. He knew it did mean something to her though. After all, she’d said hello to Spike plenty of times without that kind of tongue usage. “There was no tongue.” Yea, well – still. He still remembered what he said to both of them – Buffy and Angel – those few years ago. “You’ll never be friends – you’ll be in love ’til it kills you both.” – they would always be in love with each other, he knew.
No matter what Spike did or didn’t do – he was compared to Angel. Not just by Buffy, but by the whole bleeding lot of them – all of the Scoobies. Spike was an evil, soulless thing. Didn’t matter that he no longer fit into that close-minded mold seeing as he had a soul, and hadn’t been evil for a few decent years. Didn’t matter he fought beside them, didn’t matter he was ’bout near beat to death by Glory protecting Buffy and Dawn – didn’t matter if he were to save the whole bleeding world – he’d still be just a vampire to them. The only good he ever had done was because of the chip, never mind that the chip only prevented him from hurting people. It wasn’t some tempa-soul that leaked bits of humanity into him, didn’t serve as some sort of Jiminy Cricket guiding him towards the light of sodding Goodness. He made the decisions to help. And yea, he inititally did so to impress Buffy, to show her he was capable of turning his back on evil. Never mind he wanted to kill the whole bloody lot of the rest of them. Well, besides the Bit of course. But in time he had begun to change, on his own free will, because he wanted to.
When Buffy died…after Buffy died. He didn’t always want the Scoobies dead – maybe just…gone. When Buffy was gone – he fought demons right alongside of them – saved their pathetic lives plenty of times without asking for a thing in return. He watched Dawn, kept her safe when no one else would. Then Buffy comes back – they bring her back – and suddenly he’s the evil vampire that they all just “put up with” again. Never mind all he bloody did for them. And yea, so ok – at one time he had maybe tried to kill them all, to kill the Slayer, and sure, even when he was chipped he on occasion conspired with more capable demons to get them killed, but hello –vampire.
With Nancy Boy though, it was always different. “Oh, but he has a soul!” Yea, in his case it’s also referred to as a “curse”. That “soul” of his, ya know – that thing he never fought to get, never cared to get back? “But it’s different!” S’not different – the only bloody difference was the spelling of the name of the killer. “It’s not Angel, it’s Angelus!” Like hell. That same demon Spike had in him, Angel had in him. Only no one seemed to care or notice, because when that demon showed itself in Angel they all filed it under “Angelus”. Spike didn’t have himself a sodding soul just a few months ago and he was no where near the level of Angelus. And ok, chip – but still. When they look at Angel – when she looks at Angel – she sees a man cursed with a demon inside of him, thinks of “Angel” as who he is, who he’s supposed to be. When she looks at him, at Spike, she sees a vampire with a soul. Doesn’t think of him as a man, ‘least not in the same way she did the Champ. It’s not bloody right, to compare the two vampires all the time but to do so selectively. When Angel lost his soul, he fought to keep it that way – fought to keep it gone, as far away from him as possible – but Spike went out and sought his soul. He fought to get it, to earn it. He was nothing like his nancy boy grandsire. Not in the way he lived, or unlived – with or without a soul, and not in the way he loved. Not in the way he loved Buffy, anyways.
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Holding hands Buffy thought to herself.
She couldn’t believe she was holding his hand – Spike’s hand. Hand of Spike, wrapped within hers. She couldn’t believe even more that she was the grabber – she took and held his hand, the “nail polish” stuff just an excuse. He was sitting there next to her, staring straight ahead like she was. It took a bit for her to process that – to process this moment. What did it mean? She knew what it meant to Spike, she could always tell. She could tell just by looking into his eyes. She knew when it hurt, knew when he was lying, knew when he loved her. She knew now that he was probably doubting all of her subtle gestures. Knew that no matter how much she tried to show him otherwise, he’d think she’d always think of him as that “evil, soulless” thing that she called him last year. And that wasn’t true. She didn’t think that now. Partially because he was no longer of either the “evil” or “soulless” kind, but also because she saw him change.
It wasn’t even so much a “Soulless: Bad. Soul: Good” thing. She believed in him last year, maybe even the year before that. She trusted him with Dawn after all. Because he was the only one strong enough to look after her when Buffy wasn’t around – but she believed he’d do anything to keep her safe. She knew that after Glory tried to beat him to death during her “Key Conquest”. When she saw just how bad Spike looked – how long and how much he’d suffered – she knew that she could trust him.
But then, that night, in her bathroom. He’d come in, her in her robe to take a shower. He was apologizing for sleeping with Anya, and then started up with the redundant, “You feel it, too” stuff. She felt something for Spike then, but it wasn’t the “it” he was talking about or wanted. And then he tried to rape her. Just like that. After she had kicked him off of her, they just stared at each other from opposite ends of the bathroom, both looking like any minute they’d be sick. He started to explain, make excuses – but she cut him off each time. He decided the best thing to do was leave, run out of there as fast as he could. And she just sat there on the ground. Sat there crying. Because she had trusted him. Because she was the Slayer, not some defenseless girl – he shouldn’t even have been able to get as far as he did, to hurt her like he did. But he did. Because Spike was the evil, soulless thing she’d accused him of being. Because he was nothing but controlled by his demonic urges, he was nothing but a demon. Eventually Xander found her, and duty called. Spike had tried to rape her, but even so she went to his crypt. She hated the hell out of him, probably wouldn’t have even been able to look him in his eyes when she saw him – but he could protect Dawn. He would protect Dawn. When he wasn’t there – when it was Clem she found in his crypt – she was relieved. Scared for Dawn, but sort of grateful that she didn’t have to see Spike so shortly after…after earlier. But Spike? Just up and leaving?
Eventually over the next few weeks she learned to deal with what happened. Not particularly forgive Spike, but she knew the context of the situation more than Xander or Dawn. She saw the look in his eyes when he’d realized what he was doing, as he fled, and she knew it was something he had never intended to happen. Not that that made it ok, excused what did happen, but the fact that Spike felt any remorse at all made it easier to put past her.
And that’s what she did. She moved on, forgot about it – buried it in the part of her brain that she filed those painful memories in, alonside Angelus, alongside Riley. Until Spike came back. Until the first day she saw him in the school basement. His hair was a bit grown out and curly – dark brown roots slowly fusing into that golden yellow color of the tips. And he was all sorts of crazy. First time she saw him, she was shocked. Beyond shocked. She had gone down into the school basement, and he was there. And for how long? Why hadn’t she known? He had these scars on him, and she didn’t know what they were from. How they got there, or how he got there.
Then, a few days after seeing him then, he shows up at her house, all Joe Normal and wanting to help. And different. He was different. Different in the most obvious of ways – his hair cut, his duster gone, he was wearing a blue shirt. She’d never seen him in anything but black and occasionally a dark red, maybe some purple that one time…
But he was different then in the way he talked to her, the way he moved beside her, the way he looked at her, or didn’t look at her. He didn’t apologize for that night in the bathroom, and she didn’t want him to. She wouldn’t have accepted it if he’d have tried. She didn’t want him around, but she needed his help, because that’s the way they went. That was the definition of their relationship, in all of it’s dysfunctional glory. She wanted to know why he was back, too. Why he was so different. She wanted to know where the swagger went, where the smug Spike was – why he was so openly vulnerable with her then.
She found out why when she followed him into a church that night. A declaration of his love in between spouts of craziness. He got a soul – fought on the other side of the world to get him one, to earn him one. Fought to be a man that didn’t try to rape those he loved, fought to be someone worthy of being loved back. Fought for her.
Slowly from then, the trust was re-built. It came more easily with the whole him-having-a-soul, but it went beyond that. She depended on him for stability as much as he depended on her for sanity. She used to seek out Spike’s company because he was the only one who made her feel alive. Back when her friends first pulled her out of Heaven – brought her back – she felt nothing. But being with Spike, she could feel, even if at times it was just intense loathing. He understood her. He understood without prying questions, without expectations. He sat beside her in appreciated silence. He let her use and abuse him. He was the only one who knew how she felt, he was the only one who could relate in a relatable, “And I’m not just saying that to make you feel better” way. He knew her. Knew when she needed quiet and knew when she just needed him to shut up and stop talking and kiss her, take her mind off of her friends and work and bills and the drowning. He knew when her friends were smothering her and knew that she was too good to work at the Doublemeat Palace. Everyone else was all, “Yay Buffy! Nice hat! Can I have a free meal?” [that last part was Xander], but Spike was the only one who told her she was better than that.
Now-a-days she felt like he was the only one she could be honest with, the only one she could trust to not be Happy!Buffy or Seargant!Buffy around. The only one she could trust to let her guard down around. She wanted him there – she needed his support, and selfishly needed [and maybe wanted] his love. And she realized it now, that now, much more than ever, she needed him. Not only because he was the only capable amulet-wearer-er, but because on an emotional level, he gave her the strength she seemed to be lacking lately. He gave her the confidence when it had decided to desert her those couple of nights ago. He gave her the big speech about her being “the one”, and he held her all night. All night after her friends had kicked her out and deserted her. And he gave her the strength to forget that, to accept it even.
There was something there with Spike, something aside from this “I got your back” relationship they seemed to have. She cared for him now, in a way she hadn’t allowed herself before. When he told her he loved her now, it meant something to her. She knew with Spike it would never be white picket fences and happily ever afters, but she knew that was her life anyways, with or without him. There wassomething there between them. When Spike got hurt, her instincts were to help him, to aid him. She noticed now the pained looks he gave her whenever she got close – she saw the look when she went on that date with Principal Wood, that “this girl is always going to break my heart” look. And it hurt her that it hurt him.
She’d told him she believed in him, but she knew that on some level he was making up excuses for that, twisting up her words into a lie more easy to believe. She treated Spike for so long like he was unworthy of any reciprocated kind of love – she was sure he was almost incapable of believing the opposite now. They all treated him like that, even now – with the soul. Xander was sure to never let Spike forget what happened that night in the bathroom, always willing to remind everyone of Spike’s previous murderous ways – never mind the fact that he dated and almost married a vengeance demon who afflicted as much “vengeance” as Spike did. And yea, so that’s a pretty petty argument – but the point isn’t “Well! You do it, too!” – it’s that eventually you come to a point where that doesn’t matter anymore. Not an acceptance or an approval of their past, but a realization that that’s not them anymore. Xander knew that – Xander saw first-hand things Anya did as a vengeance demon, and he still loved her.
And then there was Giles who had conspired to have Spike killed, which was just insane troll logic. Yes, previously, Spike was an unsouled vampire – but the last time he killed a human being was years ago. At least of the “Not under The First” kind. And he couldn’t help that, it’s not like he didn’t feel bad about it. Not that that excused it, but still – the point was, he felt bad for it. Remorseful. To kill Spike, one of their strongest fighters and one of the only people she could trust? She just didn’t understand how he could rationalize that. Never mind that it was Spike who had killed Wood’s mom or killed just recently under The First’s brain-screwing – but Spike had fought alongside Giles for years. He was there and saw how bloodied up and beaten Spike was from Glory, saw him fall from the tower Glory had built trying to protect Dawn. When Giles up and left shortly after Buffy’s death, Spike stuck around and took care of Dawn. He saw what Spike was capable of doing when Spike had no soul – to try and kill him with one? She’d never understand.