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| Sooner or Later, Part 4 of a series, cont'd |
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| He tried to recall if he and Xander had ever managed to bond over anything, if even for a moment. If there was an instance, maybe while they'd shared his parents' basement, he could not now dredge it up. On the other hand, there was Willow. She was as protective of Buffy's well-being as anyone, but she managed not to be so sanctimonious about it as all the rest of them. And she made a terrific chocolate chip cookie. But, as with Lady Macbeth, for whom "all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand," Willow knew there were no true amends for what she had done. That, at the very least, was their bond. Even before that, though, there was something special about Red. Maybe it had been the effect of the booze, but he remembered her being sympathetic when Dru left him and he undertook the first of his many returns to Sunnydale. He always seemed to be pulled back here, one way or another. Damnedest thing...'m a soddin' boomerang...'r a bad penny. He'd noted that the "Welcome" sign on the main road had either been consumed by the crater, or stolen in the year since. Had it been in place, he might have been tempted to go back and drive over it, for old time's sake. Just keep comin' back.... In another moment or two, these recollections and musings began to take their own directions, and as Spike slid into sleep, provided the fodder for his dreams. His Morphean exploits had progressed from playing guitar onstage at The Bronze, to reeling flowered leis in through Joyce's bedroom window on a fishing line, to repainting the interior of the elevator at Wolfram & Hart, to building a model of the house in which he'd grown up in the Sunnydale High School basement. He opened his eyes to realize that the sound of the hammer tapping the nails into the wood was, in fact, someone knocking on the car window right by his head. Not just someone. He stared at her, still disoriented from the dream, unable to shut his mouth, or check his chin to see that he hadn't drooled in his sleep. She chuckled as she watched realization dawn on him, and then gestured to the passenger side of the car. Spike finally reacted by hitting the automatic lock to open the door for her, while wondering if it was possible to dream you were dreaming -- maybe he'd only awakened from the inner dream, but not the meta-dream? The fresh spring breeze that entered the cabin as Buffy slid into the passenger seat seemed to belie the idea that he was still asleep. It was too multi-layered and tangible, with the unmistakable scent of this woman overriding all else. He could have sworn his heart leapt into his throat. He seized upon the trivial observation of the sense memory his body displayed in such moments, as if his heart hadn't been inert for over a century. "Aren't you even going to say 'hello'? I'd think I was the one with the right to be shocked." He recovered himself a bit then, dragging his eyes from the oh-so-welcome sight of her, dropping them to ruefully observe the gearshift, but starved of her for so long, they wandered back almost immediately. "Yeh...guess I could at least do that." His fingers twitched as he reigned in the desire to reach out and touch her. "Hello." "So, I don't really have to wonder why you're here...well," she paused for emphasis, "why you're here here, anyway." He nodded. "Had to see what it looked like. Maybe say good-bye." "Yep...makin' with the closure." The words were of the old, school-girlish phraseology, but the tone was new. More mature, I s'pose. She was turned towards him in the passenger seat, one leg tucked up under her, and her head tilted sideways so that her temple lay on the headrest. And she just looked at him. He had expected a barrage of questions, perhaps even anger that he hadn't come to her to at least let her know...now he wondered if the absence of these things meant that she didn't care one way or another. But everything in her body language told him otherwise. She just seemed to be... "Waitin' for me to explain, are you?" "Mmm-hmmm." "Never known yeh to be so patient when you wanted to know somethin'." "Slamming doors and punching people is so last year." She smiled at him...a small, wry smile, but one that reached her eyes. Those green eyes -- they were... Don' go gettin' distracted, or goin' all soppy on 'er.... "Well, there I was in the Hellmouth, disintegratin' an' all...then, well...felt like I popped back up 'lmost right away, but 't turned out t'was some weeks later. Shocked hell outta me! 'N' even better, shocked hell outta Pea---." He broke off, not knowing exactly how to explain the convoluted business of this last year, especially as it involved the competition/friendship/rivalry between himself and Angel. "Yeah, Angel, I know." Right, then. His eyes narrowed as he realized what had struck him wrong since he woke up. "You already know all this." "Yeah." "Bugger Andrew -- I told 'im, I'd find my own way in my own time--" "It wasn't Andrew. Well, not at first." She drew in a breath to continue, but sat as if waiting for her mouth to form the right word to get her underway. When it didn't choose to, the air she'd gathered dissipated, and she laughed the rest of it away softly, shaking her head. Whatever profound thing had been trying to be said was unreachable. Instead, she asked gently, much more gently than had ever been her wont, "Spike, do you really think I could be in the same room with either of you, never mind both of you, and not know it? The nightclub? My apartment? That's when I asked Andrew straight up, and he explained it all, at least, explained it as it made sense to him....There were movie references. It was almost cute, really." |
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