*****

Dear Diary,

Well Diary, I promised you that I would do some soul-searching...and I did. That's not something that is easy for me to do. There are too many landmines inside my head to make it a pleasant journey. One wrong step and BAM! mental agony and choking emotions flood through me for the rest of the day, week...month. Depends on the memory touched.

This is different though. I realized pretty quickly that the whole subject of everyone I know thinking that Spike and I are a couple was more confusing than anything else. Confusing in that I had no idea what to think or how to feel about it.

I was a little scared, a little upset, a little nervous, a little startled...and most disconcerting of all, a little intrigued.

*That's* what convinced me that I needed to do the whole soul-searching thing...despite the mental landmines buried in my psyche. That tiny tendril of curiousity. Like a sliver of want that I didn't even know was inside me suddenly uncurled deep in my mind.

So... soul-searching.

It's weird, ya know. Now that I've actually laid down across my bed at night and contemplated Spike while watching the shadows drift across my bedroom ceiling, I can honestly say that our 'relationship' has changed *dramatically* from...Before. Not just in the way that we relate to each other, but also in the way that I see him.

Before...I don't think I really saw him at all. He was just this guy. This annoying, dangerous and unrepentantly evil guy...who I had no choice but to put up with on occasion. And I didn't even bother to get to know him. Honestly, I didn't want to. I had no desire or interest to know anything about him on a personal level.

Then...After...well, he was one of the few people I could stand to even be around. He didn't push about my feelings or thoughts or anything personal...so he was 'safe' in a way. And yet, he was someone who *knew* what had happened, so in that, I *wasn't* alone...physically *or* emotionally. Because neither of us talked about IT didn't mean IT didn't effect us or hurt us.

So...we became each other's distraction. Mutually acceptable. The fact that the girls approved...for a variety of reasons, made it convenient.

There were lots of nights spent hunting down demons and ripping them to pieces...and little by little our mutual and individual anger began to dim. Then, at the insistence of the girls, we became roomies. And somewhere along the line, Spike went from being someone that I could stand to spend time with to someone I *wanted* to spend time with. I had come to *enjoy* his company.

His biting humor, which can easily turn morbid and black, tends to suit my frame of mind. Often I'm the only one who can even *get* his jokes...let alone find them funny.

I also appreciate his stark realism, the brutal honesty with which he views the world around him. I'm *far* too jaded and cynical anymore to have anything but disdain for people who refuse to open up their eyes and see what's out there in the dark waiting to bite you on the ass...no matter *how* scary that thing in the dark is. It's better to know what's going to kill you and to go down fighting and spitting and cursing up a storm than to sit back with your eyes closed and humming top forty tunes. Spike couldn't close his eyes to the world even if he wanted to...fighting back is too deeply ingrained in his very being to walk away from danger. I like that.

The irony of that, is that despite the harsh and often painful truth that he inflicts upon himself, he's a champion liar. Shameless too. There have been many times when I've nearly bitten through my tongue to keep from bursting out in ribald laughter after he's let loose with one of his ingenious fabrications.

I know...lying is of the bad and I shouldn't consider that one of Spike's positive points, but it *is* funny to watch people get sucked up into his stories. He winds them up...and then sits back to watch them spin. It really is amusing...especially since he *can't* do it to me. You see, I *know* when he's lying. His left eyebrow lifts just slightly and he gets the tiniest indication of dimples in his cheeks...most likely from suppressing a grin.

It *really* sets him off when he tries to spin me a yarn and I catch him at it red-handed. Maybe someday I'll tell him how I can always tell when he's lying. Naw...

The most recent addition to my mental collection of reasons to like Spike is his quiet and understated vulnerability. That might sound kinda dumb, but it's true. He *is* vulnerable in ways that are staggering to even contemplate. Let's face it, he can rip a ten foot tall Kelnor Demon into itty bitty slimy slivers, but put him in a dark alley with a handful...or even *one* drunken human with a bad attitude and he's the vampire equivalent of toast.

If I didn't buy him bagged blood he would starve. Because he *can't* hunt down food.

If *that's* not vulnerable, I don't know what is. I try to imagine what it must be like. The closest I can come to is that everytime I try to enter the supermarket or a restaurant that I am practically knocked unconscious from an instant killer migraine...so I'm left outside staring through the huge floor to ceiling windows to gaze longingly at the rows upon rows of food. Drooling and starving.

I don't think I could live like that and stay sane.

But I won't let him starve. Ever. I try to make sure there is always blood in the apartment. I get the pig and cows blood from the butcher's shop on a fairly regular basis. And whenever I have a bit of spare cash I try and get human blood from Willie's, but that's too expensive to do often.

But if I could afford it, I'd do it all the time. Because after all that's said and done, Spike *is* my best friend and I don't want to see him suffering. And somewhere in all this soul-searching that I've been doing I realized that yes, he is not just my best friend...because I *do* love him. And I can admit that...even if it's only to myself.

I, Alexander Harris, love Spike, aka William the Bloody.

The only thing I hadn't figured out was if I could love him *physically*. I mean, there *is* a big difference from loving someone as a best friend or even a pseudo-brother...or even a hunting partner who casually and continuously places his safety and life in the other's hands, than there is from having an intimate sexual and romantic relationship with that same someone.

So, that was the big question of the day. Could I have sex with Spike?

I honestly didn't know, and I figured that it would ruin everything we *already* have if I were to walk up to him, say 'Let's go bump uglies' and then find out that it gives me the wiggin's and nothing happens except mutual embarrassment. You know what I mean? I decided that I had to have this figured out before...IF, I mean *if*, it ever came down to that.

What did I do to help figure it out? Easy. I took a long hot shower and tried to jerk off to mental images of Spike. Nothing *too* intense. Just...how it would feel to have *his* hands running over my wet skin, how it would feel to have his lips nibbling on my throat, my chest...my nipples. How he would look, all wet and soapy as he slid to his knees in front of me and how he would nuzzle against my hip before running his pink tongue along my erection. How it would feel to have him take me into that cool mouth of his, swallowing me down...

Great, I have another hard-on now.

Anyway Diary, the experiment was a great success. It has been *so* long since I've been that turned on. I came so hard that it was all I could do to keep from falling in the shower and most likely splitting my head open. And I know for a fact that my orgasm made me see spots behind my eyes. If he's even half as good as my imagination than he's hell on wheels between the sheets. If he's even half as good at sex is he is at fighting than I think that he's probably the best lover on the planet.

And these thoughts are soooo not helping my erection go away.

Of course, now the big question is how do I let him know that I'm suddenly attracted to him and would like to change the basis of our relationship. It's not like I can just walk up to him, strip off my clothes and casually announce that we have to 'interlock parts' now.

oh my god...

*What* am I doing! What kind of heartless beast *am* I? How could I be contemplating having a *relationship* with *anyone* when my poor sweet Anya is lying in a cold grave?

I am scum.

Alexander L. Harris

END