Author: Kay Tee
Website: Head Rush http://www.oocities.org/maybeshedoes//front.html
Feedback: No thanks, it just clutters up my inbox. Yeah right. I almost typed that with a straight face. I love a good mess; send all clutter to maybeshedoes@yahoo.com
Rating: NC-17 for two not totally pleasant sex scenes.
Spoilers: Entropy, Seeing Red, Grave. Basically, everything through season six of Buffy.
Pairing: Spike/Xander, with a side of Spike/Buffy
Summary: Everybody wants a happy ending...
Distribution: Take it, but tell me where so I can visit.
Disclaimer: In my dreams I'm Joss, but during the day I have to face the cold hard truth-- I'm a hack who steals characters. But I'm not giving them back! Or I am, just don't sue me, all I have are speeding tickets and student loans.
Author's Note: Posted in parts originally. But that was a bad idea, one that I hope I'll remember not to repeat. This version is actually betaed. Go me.
Part 1
Xander picks up the pace, runs a little faster. Dodges through someone's yard and those motion sensor lights come on, but Xander doesn't care. Jumps over a low fence, and hell, it's so light out now, sunrise could be any second and Xander is *late*.
Finally hits the cemetery, makes a mad dash for the usual spot. Shouts, "SPIKE!" And the white-blond head turns slowly to see him.
But the sun's just cracking the horizon now, and Xander sees Spike flinch. The dark haired man dives, feels like he's moving in slow motion but can't speed up because he's flying through the air. Impact, and Xander topples Spike to the ground. They both roll into the underbrush, safe.
Xander's sprawled on top of Spike, but he's not moving until he catches his breath. When he does, he just wraps his arms around the vampire and squeezes before pulling back to look him in the eye.
Xander was probably going to scold Spike, but the look on his face stops Xander. The vampire hasn't looked this bad since the beginning-- eyes red-rimmed from crying, lower lip still trembling... And Xander had let himself think that they'd made so much progress. Dumb dumb dumb.
Xander trails one hand softly down the side of Spike's face, asking, "What happened?"
Spike swallows, shaking a little, and says quietly, "I thought you weren't going to come."
And Xander has to bury his face against Spike's neck, has to hide what he's feeling because. Oh. Shit.
The look of sorrow and desperation and apathy in Spike's eyes this morning was for *Xander*, not any of those other things. Xander made the vampire feel that.
"I'm sorry," he mumbles into Spike's skin. "Can we go inside now?" Small voice, pathetic, but he needs reassurance as well, and when they finally make it inside the apartment, Xander just folds his vampire onto the couch and holds him.
It wasn't always like this.
In the beginning, Xander hadn't really cared about Spike, he'd just been trying to do a good deed. Or a decent deed, at least.
He was patrolling the cemetery just before dawn-- the perfect time to catch those tired little vampires as they returned home for the day-- and he saw Spike. At first he was furious that the vampire dared return to Sunnydale after what he did to Buffy. Xander hit Spike, knocking him off the tombstone where he sat, facing east and apparently lost in his thoughts. The vampire hadn't fought back, hadn't even tried to block Xander's blows, and the dark-haired man may have killed Spike if he hadn't realized that the sunrise had begun.
Xander was hit by a horrible wave of guilt. He had kept the vampire outside so long that Spike was probably gonna be blasted by the sunlight. Apparently he'd broken Spike too, because the vampire lay limp on the ground, eyes open and blank.
Xander struggled to remove Spike's duster and wrap it around the vampire. At this point Spike protested a little, but Xander just scooped the smaller man up in his arms and carried him back to the apartment because his crypt was in another cemetery on the other side of town. That was the first thing that had tipped Xander off, and he quickly figured it out.
Xander spent the next day watching over the vampire, though really, Xander knew he should just let Spike commit suicide if that's what he was so inclined to do.
The vampire snuck out sometime that night after Xander fell asleep, and the dark-haired man had to rescue Spike again that morning.
This went on for weeks before Spike finally spoke to Xander-- other than the ever-present curses as Xander dragged the vampire home. Once he started talking, Spike spilled the whole story about teleporting to Africa and getting a soul instead of freedom and then returning to Sunnydale to die.
And Xander thought, 'Christ, not another vampire with a soul. Buffy will be so pleased.'
But Spike wouldn't see Buffy, wasn't even spying on her the way he used to. Xander asked the vampire about it, but Spike didn't want to talk about her.
Xander figured that was why Spike wouldn't return to his crypt-- Buffy often went there when she needed to be alone to think. Sure, Clem had been living there, but he left when Buffy promised to housesit. Not a lot of demons are going to try to move into a crypt that reeks of Slayer.
Eventually, Xander got into the habit of swinging by the cemetery on his dawn patrols-- the only ones Buffy allowed him to do alone-- and Spike would just be sitting on the usual tombstone, waiting for him. They would walk back to Xander's apartment in companionable silence, and Spike would curl up to sleep in Xander's bed while he changed for work.
Xander got off at four-thirty, and would return home to keep Spike company. They would chat or argue or just watch tv until sunset, when they would part until the next morning.
Having company was good. Anya was really gone, having taken off to do vengeance full-time. Willow was in England, 'recovering' with Giles's help. Buffy and Dawn spent most of their time together training and being uber-sisterly. And Xander... was lonely.
So Spike and Xander had grown close, which was fine, normal even, in a very strange way. After all, if Xander could make up with Larry, why not Spike?
Funny thing about that-- both had eventually kissed him, though with wildly different results.