Shacking Up, 17
By
EntreNous

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Part Seventeen: Pancakes and Predators

"I'll buy," Oz said. When Nathan raised his eyebrows, Oz shrugged.

He and Nathan slid into the booth that had just opened at the Donut House Diner, and Nathan pushed the top menu in Oz's direction.

"Is that how it works? I wasn't sure if I should offer to pay, considering I'm the groupie," Nathan said. They nodded at the waitress when she stopped by to drop off water and fill their mugs with coffee, and Oz flipped a half-and-half container to Nathan.

Oz smiled slowly. "Nah. I think you're supposed to try to filch the food from the backstage spread while I'm performing. At least that's how they do it in the VH1 specials."

"Too bad you don't have a backstage spread yet at your shows. A guy could starve waiting for your band to hit the big time." Nathan took a sip of coffee and studied the menu. "You usually work out who's footing the bill this early in the meal?"

"I find it clears things up," Oz said.

"What kind of things?" Nathan asked, looking intently at him.

"Well, if we haggle at the end of the meal over who picks up the check, it casts a retroactive weirdness over everything. You know, like if one person pays, hanging out meant something to them, and if the other person insists on paying instead in response, it's as though they don't want it to mean much." Oz slid the sugar packets over towards Nathan and watched him open two into his coffee. "Or worse," he continued, draining off most of his water, "you split the expense, and you figure out the other person is a cheap bastard that calculates his share of the tip down to the penny on a fifteen-percent scale. And you start asking yourself, is this guy the kind of person I want to be eating pancakes with? I offer at the beginning, it gets resolved, and none of the odd."

"Except of course that now it's odd because I'm wondering what you do or don't want eating pancakes with me to mean," Nathan observed.

"There is that," Oz agreed.

The waitress paused to grunt at them, and they placed their order: two regular stacks, home fries, a side of scrambled eggs and one large OJ.

"I have another way to take out the oddness," Nathan offered. "I can tell you what's on my mind."

"Shoot," Oz said.

"I'm interested in you."

Oz paused with his coffee cup halfway to his mouth then lowered it back to the table. "You don't really get shy about this kind of thing, do you?" Oz asked.

"Not so much," Nathan said.

"You have met my girlfriend Willow, right? Yea high, red hair?" Oz waved a little Willow-shaped gesture in the air.

"I haven't forgotten about Willow. And I wouldn't ask you to cheat on your girlfriend." Nathan paused. "I wouldn't bring it up to you if . . . look, it's not just you I'm interested in."

Oz's brow furrowed. A beat or two passed, and then Oz widened his eyes a little. Then his face cleared, and he tightened his fingers almost imperceptibly where they gripped the edge of the table. "Well," Oz remarked slowly, "that's new and different."

At that point the waitress came over and deposited their order on the table. Nathan drizzled syrup over his pancakes while Oz watched him silently. He bit into a forkful and then blinked at Oz. "Want to go to the movies sometime, all three of us?" Nathan asked casually.

Oz laughed out loud. "Movies? After what you just said . . . well, it sounds a little pedestrian. I thought you'd say you wanted us to . . . " and he trailed off, grinning crookedly.

Nathan shrugged, crinkling up his nose as he smiled. "Come with me to my boudoir of the many and varied sexual positions?"

Oz raised his eyebrows. "Something like that."

Nathan nodded. "I don't want to just fuck around with you . . . either of you."

"Okay," Oz said guardedly. "You want something more."

Nathan rolled his shoulders forward and back. "Hey, I'm not ready to give both of you engagement rings either," he said to reassure Oz, who was regarding him seriously. "I just want to go on a date with you both. See what happens."

Oz cleared his throat. "I'll have to talk to Willow."

Nathan ducked his head down and grinned. "That doesn't sound like a no."

"True," Oz said, smearing butter all over his pancakes. "But it's not exactly a yes either."

*****

"In you go," Spike said shortly, carrying Xander into the apartment and setting him down on the kitchen counter.

"You didn't have to carry me the whole way," Xander said faintly. "So the scaly thingies went right after me, ignoring everyone else in their quest to cut me into ribbons. They barely got me."

"They barely got you all over your arms and chest, right through your clothing," Spike replied in a muffled voice as he hunted under the sink for the first aid kit they had always kept there. He grunted when he found the container, and turned back to Xander, efficiently stripping him of his shirt and t-shirt.

"Fuck," he breathed when he saw the extent of the damage. It was mostly surface scratches, but the cuts needed immediate attention so that they wouldn't become infected. Spike could already tell that Xander would have some nasty bruises on his torso in the morning.

"Had to go jumping into the fray, trying to distract them," Spike said darkly. "Made yourself such an easy target that they weren't interested in taking on the rest of us."

"What can I say?" Xander asked, frowning down on the scrapes and tears on his body. "I'm a delightful treat much coveted in the demon community."

Spike snorted. "Oh, you're a treat all right. Next you'll have them banging at your door trying to get at you."

"Banging at my door? You don't think that those scaly dudes could shimmy up the fire escape and get me in here, do you?" Xander asked frantically. He scootched closer to Spike, then scootched away when he figured out that Spike had gotten a hold of the iodine.

"Hold still, won't you?" Spike said with a low growl.

"I'm trying to hold still, it's just that the shaking with fear is getting in the way," Xander said. "Also the shaking with anticipated pain from that goop you're going to dab on me."

He moved away from Spike again, but stopped when Spike took his wrist firmly. Xander looked at him with wide eyes, trying to figure out why Spike looked so pissed off.

"What do you have to be afraid of now?" Spike asked with more than a hint of anger. He pulled out cotton balls from the first aid kit and raised his voice. "How are the baddies going to hurt you? I'm here, aren't I? You think I can't protect you, or that I won't help you? You think that I won't take care of you?" he finished in a near-shout.

"Keep it down," Xander said with a nervous wave of his hand. "You'll wake up Davy."

"Oh, bloke needs his beauty sleep," Spike said with an eye roll. "Won't do to have him lazing about waiting for you to take up his standing offer if he has circles under his eyes."

"Shut up," Xander said absently, and then screeched slightly when the iodine-soaked cotton made contact with his scrapes. "There is no standing offer," he gasped out after huffing a little to ease the stinging.

"You keep telling yourself that," Spike said, glaring at Xander's wounded shoulder.

"In spite of your attempts to get me good and freaked out about him making passes at me, he hasn't done anything . . . "

"Untoward?" Spike asked with an arched brow.

"Un-to-what?" Xander asked. "I was going to say . . . I don't know, nothing sexy, or physical that's overly grope-y."

"It's just that you're waiting for him to do something 'sexy' or 'grope-y', I imagine," Spike said with a quick look back at Xander.

"Give me a break," Xander shot back. "You're the one that's acting all weird about this, giving me ideas about stuff that isn't even happening, making me feel all self-conscious when I'm with him. It's like being around you puts these thoughts into my head, and . . . just quit it."

"I'll quit it when you deal with what's going on here," Spike answered. "Unless you want to go ahead and ignore this . . . " He stopped, waiting for the reply.

"I'm not trying to ignore anything," Xander said desperately. "Things happen, and I think I know what's going on, and then I don't see you for days and I don't have a clue about what you're thinking. I have no idea how I'm supposed to react to any of this . . . or what this even is . . ."

They were both silent for a long moment, each of them thinking about the unnamed "this" in the conversation.

Spike finished applying the iodine and Xander bore it without remark.

"There," Spike said shortly. "All disinfected and ready for more cutting up on the morrow."

"Thanks a lot," Xander said in a half-joking, half-petulant voice.

Spike said nothing, instead focusing on capping the bottles and packages and shoving them back in the container with the rest of the bandages and ointments.

Xander watched his motions with wide eyes. "Okay, let me try that again. Thanks," he said in a low voice.

"Welcome," Spike returned gruffly.

"I'm sorry if . . . Spike, I'm sorry." Xander mumbled, focusing on the linoleum.

"Got nothing to be sorry for."

"No, I do . . . I . . . " Xander began earnestly, but trailed off.

Spike edged closer to him, bringing his hand up to cup Xander's cheek and to raise his face. "Forget about what I said about your stupid roommate. You think you know what he wants? Fine. But know this. I'll always keep you safe and take care of you. No matter what."

"Oh," Xander said intelligently. Spike was now stroking his cheek softly, his blue eyes locked onto Xander's face. Xander reached up, combing through Spike's hair with a light touch. "I do know that," he said seriously.

"Remember it," Spike answered, bringing Xander's face slowly and deliberately towards his own.

A small noise escaped Xander's mouth just as their lips touched. Spike's mouth brushed feather-light against his, sending a shiver up Xander's back. "Oh," Xander said again, and buried his fingers further into Spike's hair, pulling them together in a sudden motion.

Spike murmured something, but it was lost in Xander's mouth as the two of them pressed closer.

Spike slid his hands carefully over Xander's injured shoulders, bringing them down to rest on the small of Xander's back. Seemingly without conscious thought, Xander parted his legs further, allowing Spike to move into the space against the counter and letting him draw Xander's body flush to his own.

They kissed slowly, rapturously. Spike parted his lips, pushing against Xander slightly to urge the mirroring response. Then he realized that Xander was pulling backward a little, and he moved away from him. Was this too much too soon? Yet even at this moment of doubt, Spike couldn't resist caressing Xander's lips one last time with his own before pulling away completely.

"Need to breathe," Xander said wonderingly once they had parted. His hand flew up to his mouth to touch his swollen lips. "Um, Spike . . . "

"Yeah," Spike managed, his eyes drawn to the bare expanse of Xander's injured chest and back again to those full lips. "What?"

"What just happened?"

Spike opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted by a gasp. Davy stood in the hallway, taking in Xander's cuts, rising bruises, and the air of tension in the room.

"Holy shit," Davy said loudly. "What the hell happened to you, Xander?" His eyes flashed as he turned to Spike. "What the fuck did you do to him?"

"He didn't do anything to me," Xander said in surprise. He shook his head to clear it. What was Davy talking about anyway? But he didn't even get a chance to find out, because Spike had already jumped in, more than ready for a verbal brawl.

"Me?" Spike asked indignantly. "You think I did this? That's a fine thing. I'm the one who's helping him after he got himself hurt. Hell, I carried him all the way here despite his going on about how he could get home on his own. Not bloody likely with those cuts."

"Got himself hurt?" Davy asked incredulously. "You're really something, you know that?"

"Oh, you think so?" Spike said, nodding with ironic wisdom. "Should take a look at yourself if you're looking to accuse people of trying to hurt him. You think your mind games will work?"

"What the hell are you both talking about?" Xander asked impatiently. His head was beginning to hurt, and the last thing he needed was to referee a fight between Spike and Davy. He felt foggy and confused about what had just happened between him and Spike, and as much as most of him wanted to stick around to find out what would happen next, there was a small but extremely vocal part shrieking "Run away!" in the back of his head.

Spike and Davy had already escalated their taunts and reproaches when Xander interrupted them again. "Okay, so it's mostly scratches, but injured guy here! I should be going to sleep or something, not listening to you guys fight with each other over god knows what."

They both turned to look at him with some apprehension.

He hopped off the counter and glared at them as he balled up his shirts. "I don't know what's up with you two not getting along, but stop trying to pull me into the middle of it. You have problems with each other? You work them out. You have problems with me? Well, tell me about it later, because I'm going to bed."

Xander left the room quickly, leaving two startled men in his wake.

Spike opened his mouth to begin dressing-down Davy, but Davy whirled around quickly to face him and started in before Spike had a chance to begin.

"You know that you're the one fucking with Xander's head, not me," he started, and Spike's angry expression gave way to uncertainty.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Spike said.

"Oh, you don't?" Davy's eyes narrowed and he took a step closer to Spike. "You turn up here after you haven't seen Xander in days, and you bring him home all messed up like this. And you don't know what I'm talking about?"

"No," Spike answered shortly. He stepped aside so that he could follow Xander down the corridor, but Davy grabbed his arm and hauled him to a stop. Spike sneered at Davy, imagining all the lovely ways he'd have been able to maul and mutilate him before the chip had been shoved in his head. He sighed inwardly when he realized that though Davy looked intimidated by the sneer, he also looked more resolute.

"I think that you do," Davy said in a forceful, low tone. "I've seen how you ignore him for weeks sometimes. I've seen you bring him home looking like he's been worked over by a mob, and I've seen the bruises on his arms after he's spent the night 'hanging out' with you."

Davy backed away from Spike, making his way over to the phone and picking up the receiver. "I don't know why Xander keeps going back to you despite what you're doing to him. I don't know why you think you're allowed to do that to anyone, but it stops here. I want you to leave now, and I want you to stay away from Xander from now on."

Spike stood there dumbly, trying to process the charges Davy was levying at him.

"I'm not waiting for you to react, okay?" Davy said nervously, and gestured with the phone. "I don't care how mad you get, or what you try to pull -- I'll call the police, and if they find you here . . ."

"No need," Spike said. He brought his eyes to meet Davy's in a look of pure hate. "I'm not explaining any of this to you. Think what you want. Just don't try anything with Xander. He's not yours to mess with."

"And I suppose he's yours to mess with?" Davy asked in a sardonic voice.

"Not mess with, but yeah," Spike answered and paused before answering clearly. "Xander is mine."

"Get out of here," Davy hissed.

"You won't get what you want," Spike said evenly. He smiled coldly at Davy, and left the apartment.

*******