Chapter 21
Buffy’s wide eyes moved from face to face in Giles’ living room. Her big, toothy smile never faded as she tried to lighten the mood after telling them the entire story, save the dirty parts.
“Not working, love,” Spike mumbled from her side, giving her an apologetic pat on the knee.
She sighed. “Look, I know this is a little weird, but—”
“I can’t believe this. This is a joke, right?” Joyce said. She looked as if someone had poured her into the armchair. Every limb hung off the sides except for one hand that had been rubbing her temple for the past twenty minutes.
“It’s not a joke,” Buffy said seriously. “Spike and I are…well, we’re…” She looked at him, tilting her head as she tried to think of the words.
“Married?” she finally settled on.
“Don’t like that. Marriage implies we went to a priest and the hell I’d ever do that. How about claimed?”
“But that sounds really stuffy, doesn’t it sweetie?”
“Since when do you call me sweetie?”
“I could start.”
“You could make me puke.”
“Guys,” Xander interrupted, not finding anything sweet or amusing in the couple’s banter. “Focus. Can we possibly go back to the part of the story where Buffy lost her damn mind and let Spike bite her?”
“Hey!” she said with a pout. “I’m not crazy!”
“I can’t believe that my seventeen-year-old daughter got married without my consent!” Joyce stood up and folded her arms across her chest as she glared at the both of them. Spike visibly shrank and Buffy looked at the ground ashamedly.
“And you,” she continued, pointing an angry finger at Giles. “I should…I should…well, I should do something to you!”
“M-me? But Joyce, I-I—”
“No, sir! You said you were her watcher, whatever that means, so you should be responsible for her when she does her little slaying activities.”
“They aren’t activities, Mom. I’m the Chosen One!”
“And I’m your mother, and you, Chosen One, are grounded!”
“But mom! You can’t ground me, I’m married!”
“Claimed,” Spike said.
“Shut up, Spike!” both Summers women said in unison.
He pursed his lips and huffed, grumbling quietly.
“Buffy, I wish you would have told me about this yourself. I had to find out from your librarian that you were clear across the country and that you kill vampires for a living!”
“I don’t get paid,” she muttered.
“Young lady, you know how much I hate mumbling.”
“Mom, I’m sorry, ok? I’m sorry I didn’t tell you but to be honest, I didn’t think I’d live long enough to get a chance. Slayers don’t have the longest life-expectancy.”
“Oh!” Joyce gasped, her hands coming up dramatically. “Well, that makes me feel so much better.”
Spike raised his hand as if he was a schoolboy in class and Joyce turned to him angrily, not finding anything funny about this situation. “Yes, Spike?”
He lowered his hand but made no apologies for interrupting as he brought it closer to his eye line to inspect his nails casually. “She’s got a better chance being with me.”
Giles barked a laugh and stood up to walk to his hutch where he kept the good scotch.
“It’s true! Long as she’s mated to me, she’ll live as long as I do and since I have the built-in mayday if she gets into some mess, she’ll always be protected.”
“I don’t need your protection,” Buffy said defiantly.
Spike pursed his lips. “On your side, remember?”
Xander and Willow felt like they were watching a tennis game, their heads whipping back and forth between them. Xander finally shook his head and blinked hard.
“I am very tired. So very, very tired,” Joyce said, closing her eyes and inhaling slowly as she hoisted her purse over her shoulder. “I don’t want to hear the words blood or vampire or marriage for the rest of the night.”
She walked to the front door, distressed and frayed around the edges, talking to no one in particular. “I am going to draw a hot bath, soak for an hour, drink some wine, and then I am off to bed.”
“Mom—”
Joyce held up a hand to silence her. She smiled gratefully. “Thank you. You and I are going to have a nice, long, private,” she said pointedly as she looked at Spike, “chat in the morning. Ok?”
“Yes, Mom.”
“Spike?” Joyce called from the door right as she put her hand on the doorknob.
“Yes, Mrs. Summers?” He straightened up in his seat like a proper man.
“She has a ten o’clock curfew. See to it that at least one rule of mine is followed.”
Buffy groaned and Spike nodded ruefully. “Ten o’clock. It’s a party.”
Joyce left and Buffy let out a sigh of relief. “Thank God that’s over with.”
Willow chewed on her lip and Xander glared at Spike while Giles was busy drinking straight from the bottle.
“It’s not over with, is it?” Buffy’s face scrunched up sadly and she sat back down.
“I just…you went off and…Spike! And then…” Xander was unable to form coherent sentences, it seemed.
“Spit it out, whelp.”
“I think it’s totally groovy.” Willow nodded her head curtly once, smiling brightly and sitting up like the supportive best friend she was. Her smile faltered when Xander shot her an incredulous look. “What?”
“What does this mean, Buff? Is he going to be around all the time?”
Spike snickered, folding his hands behind his head. “What’s the matter? Don’t like me?”
“No, I don’t like you.”
“Aww, I might cry.”
“Like you even could, you soulless—”
“Guys!” Buffy said, holding up both hands. “This is a lot of information to take in at once. We’re all tired and a little bit emotional. Maybe it’s a good idea to call it a night.”
“Never should have sent you on that mission,” Giles said quietly to himself in the corner. He laughed a bit. “It’s over. It’s all over.”
Spike rolled his eyes, having heard him. “Need a tampon, watcher?”
Everyone in the room made some sort of balking noise at that and Spike laughed gleefully. “You’re all so uptight. See? You need me. Loosen your britches, gang. Life’s not that bad.”
Buffy shook her head with a sigh. “Come on, Spike. Let’s go before you make it worse.”
“Oh, it can’t possibly be worse,” Xander said, lowering his head when Buffy gave him a sad smile.
“Guess I’ll see you at school?” she asked hopefully, mostly looking at the back of Giles’ head and wishing he’d at least say something to her.
“Yeah! We’ll talk,” Willow said, hoping to boost her spirits as she nodded eagerly.
When neither Xander nor Giles answered, Buffy’s shoulders sagged and she looked up at Spike. “Ready to go?” It was evident that she was on the verge of tears and barely holding it together.
“Sure, love.” He glared at the group in disappointment as she walked past him to the door. “Sleep tight, kiddies. Watcher,” he said with a cocked eyebrow when Giles finally looked up.
Giles would definitely be erasing Spike’s invite that evening. There was no mistaking the vampire’s meaning in that death glare he’d given him.
Once the couple made their exit, Giles felt comfortable enough to say, “Liked him better when he was in a wheelchair.”
* * *
“Shh, love, it’s all right,” Spike said softly as he tried to soothe his crying mate.
“This is so bad. So, so bad!” She buried her face in his chest, hiccupping as she tried to control her tears. She’d tried to be strong, she’d tried to suck it up and be brave but she knew it was coming all along. She wasn’t stupid. There was a small part of her, though, that had clung to the ridiculous idea that maybe they would understand, put a little faith in her, and be more supportive. Willow, out of all of them, was the only one who seemed to be sympathetic though Buffy wasn’t holding her breath. All it would take was a powwow between Giles and Xander to get her on their side.
“Just give it time. And Red’s solid,” he said, knowing where her mind had wandered off to.
She raised her red, puffy face to his and sniffled. “You think so?”
“Course, sweetheart.” He kissed her forehead, smiling when she took a deep breath and pulled herself together. “That’s my girl.”
“I’m really emotional today.”
He chuckled a bit and it managed to drag a smile out of her. “Got reason to be. You know, I could take ‘em out for you.”
She laughed then, wrapping her arms around his waist. “Better not. I’ll kick your ass.”
“Don’t tease.”
“You are so twisted.” Oh, but she loved it, too. He knew when her heart rate sped up.
“Please? What about the git?”
“No.” She pulled back, her eyes twinkling as she giggled. “Stay away from my friends.”
“I could just maim him.”
“No!”
“Break his leg?”
“Spike.”
“What if I wrote him an official letter that told him he was adopted?”
She was silent for a minute and she tilted her head. “You know…that might have the opposite effect you’re going for.”
They started walking together, hand in hand, hoping that the small time left together that evening didn’t go by in a hurry.
“I could make sure his milk was always spoiled.”
“Now you’re plotting like an evil vampire.”
He slung his arm around her shoulder and kissed her forehead. “I love you, you know. Might not be much, but you’ve got me.”
That was really saying something, she thought. God, how did she get here? How was she going to deal with the aftermath?
Her mother would take a few days to come around, and Buffy wasn’t so much concerned about that. As long as Spike behaved and loved her and treated her the way he had been these last days, Joyce would be hard-pressed to keep up the disappointment. Not like she had a choice, anyhow.
But her friends? Giles? She had no clue. At least she had Spike in all this madness, and at least she wouldn’t have to deal with the repercussions on her own. She knew he’d stand by her, and holy moly was that a weird thing for a slayer to admit.
At least her life was never boring.
She smiled up at him, stood on her tiptoes, and kissed him. “That’s more than I could ever ask for.”
Spike turned away abruptly, hiding his face. “Don’t make me blush, woman.”
She laced her arms around one of his and giggled, leaning into him as they walked down the street. “Tough guy.”
“Now it’s ruined.”
“You love it.”
“I do.”
“Let’s take another road trip.”
“Name the date, Buffy. I’m yours.”
The End
A/N: Yes, the end! It just needed to end here and I’m sorry for the delay on this chapter but I just wasn’t feeling what I had written and finally decided that the reason for that was because it was finished. I like the open-ending, personally. Anyway, thank you to everyone reading and to Dusty273 for her help on a lot of these chapters. I hope you enjoyed this silly-fic and that you continue to enjoy my stories. *hugs*