Spike offers Buffy a small, ironic smile when she asks, "What's new?"
He sighs, looking around the crypt pleadingly as if it could give him the courage-- or at least the whiskey-- he needs to have this conversation. He spots a bottle of JD by the sofa chair, but remembers Xander and decides he can manage this sober.
"Right," he says, taking a deep breath and standing a little straighter. "Took a trip, tried to get the chip out."
Buffy's eyebrows shoot up and he quickly adds, "Didn't work. I decided to come back here, have a laugh. 'Cept without the laughing bit."
He watches disbelief settle on Buffy's face. That's right, he's not telling her everything, and he's not going to. The girl's got enough on her shoulders without knowing what's got Spike in such a bad mood.
Buffy crosses her arms. "You just thought you could come back here, after what you did, and you thought-- what? That would be all right with me? Everything would go back to how it was before?"
Spike drags a frazzled hand through his hair. "No, luv, I-"
"Don't call me that!" Buffy interrupts, stepping right into Spike's personal space. "You don't ever get to call me that again. Are we clear on this, William?" Her jaw is clenched and her body vibrates with barely suppressed rage. But the closeness is getting to her.
Spike watches her nostrils flair as she takes in his scent for the first time in months. She still wants him. That dark corner of her soul that he once carefully cultivated and teased to the surface-- it's still powerful and it still wants him.
"Buffy," he says slowly, taking a step back. "I know I was wrong. You have to believe me-- even then, I wasn't... I was just... Bugger. I'm sorry. Right? It was bad, what I did, and I know words won't fix it, but... that's all I got. Sorry." And that's really all the eloquence he has in him. Sorry is such a foreign word, and no amount of soul-having has made it any easier to say. He wishes he could fix her. Unmake the darkness he built in her, unmake the darkness that was already there. But there's nothing he can do now except try not to make it worse, and really, he's not even sure if that's possible.
Buffy watches Spike's eyes, sees his sincerity, and asks in a low voice, "Why?"
Spike shrugs. "Just... lost it, I guess. Wanted you, and violence was always my gig... and I, I don't know-"
Buffy interrupts again. "No. Why are you back? Why were you sitting outside a minute before sunrise? You were gonna come back and not even tell me?" She's so angry, and she really doesn't even know why, just that it's *Spike's fault*.
The vampire is confused now too. Buffy's advancing on him again, eyes alive and daring him to say anything, anything at all to send her over the edge. Spike backs up, hits the concrete wall behind him. Sucks in a nervous gulp of air as Buffy comes right up in his face, leaning into him, her arm holding her weight against the wall.
"Tell me, Spike, why you came here."
He opens his mouth to answer, but before he gets a word out, she smashes her lips over his, her hands fisting his shirt.
Spike tries to pull away, managing to say, "Buffy-" before she pulls him back to her.
Finally she releases him, tossing him to the ground a few feet away. She stalks over to where he's sprawled. She looks down on him and sneers, "Is this what you came for?" Buffy moves before Spike can form an answer, pulls her skirt up and straddles his legs, pinning his arms to the ground. "Is this what you want?" She demands.
She kisses him again, all savagery, and a part of Spike wants to grab her and hold on for dear life. Forget Xander, forget the sun just outside the door, forget his misbegotten soul, and just go with this, go with what he knows.
But Buffy's crying, sobbing into his mouth, and Spike can't take this. He knows he's destroying her, and even if he doesn't love her anymore, he doesn't want to hurt her. Doesn't want to hurt anybody, but that's all he knows how to do.
Spike tries to squirm away, shoving futilely against the slayer, but she keeps pushing, grinding her pelvis down on him. "Buffy, no. Stop," he pleads the best he can against her lips.
Buffy ignores him, ripping open his shirt and scratching her nails down his chest, creating dark red welts.
She's tried so hard to get better, wanted so badly to be who she was years ago. But there's a part of her that craves this, needs the bloodshed and bruising that Spike's devotion has always offered her. And Buffy's hated this since she first discovered it; the earliest part of her to come alive after she was pulled from the grave, the part of her that forgave Spike immediately every time he hurt her, even the last. She knows this feeling is older than her involvement with Spike-- it goes back to Faith; back to the Master's bones, waiting to be resurrected; back to Hemery High, burning slowly as the vampires who killed her first watcher screamed inside.
Spike struggles to stop Buffy's hands as they tear at the fastenings to his jeans, but she's stronger than him, and she seems totally oblivious to his growing panic.
Buffy tears her lips away from Spike's, lunging at his shoulder and biting hard, drawing blood.
His mouth free, Spike gasps, "Buffy! No. Don't. Please..."
She's got his pants open and has dragged them down just enough when she hears the 'please.' That one word breaks through the near-trance she was in, reliving the past.
Buffy freezes, looking up at Spike, seeing the panic so clearly written on his face. Shocked, she numbly lifts off of him and slides away, her bare bottom scraping on the dusty floor of the crypt.
Spike cautiously sits up, keeping an eye on Buffy as his fixes his jeans. "Buffy-"
She cuts him off. "Don't. Just... don't say anything." Her brow is furrowed in pain, but she seems oblivious to the tears still crawling down her face.
They just sit there like that, the moment stretching on as they mentally put themselves together.
After Spike starts to fidget, Buffy laughs self-deprecatingly. "I guess we're even now, huh?" She says.
Spike snorts, but a small smile finds its way onto his face.
Buffy makes a weak effort at smoothing her hair. "God, what happened to us?" She asks.
"Couldn't tell ya," Spike shrugs.
Buffy shakes her head ruefully. "Things are actually pretty good here. Dawn and I are getting really close. Willow's coming home soon, and Giles is gonna come back with her. Xander's kinda gotten into his own thing, but we're still... We're doing all right."
She flashes imploring eyes on the vampire sitting across from her. "I can't *do* this with you here. Please, you say you love me, just go away. Just..." Her faces scrunches up for a second and Spike thinks she's going to cry again, but she shakes that look of despair off, and when her eyes rise to Spike's once more, he sees the amazingly strong woman she was before she did a swan dive off a badly made pedestal for a dull goddess. "You can't stay in Sunnydale. I don't want you to kill yourself, but you just can't be here," Buffy explains.
Spike nods, admitting, "I know."
Buffy stands and he follows her. "Where are you gonna go?" She asks apologetically.
Spike shrugs. "Nowhere 'til sunset. Then... have to see."
"Still got the motorcycle?" Buffy's smiling now, her eyes red from the tears, but Spike can see she's okay. Unsettled, yes, but okay.
"Naw," he rubs his neck. "Traded it in so I could teleport over to a guy I thought would take care of the chip."
Buffy's laugh is more of a loud exhalation. She asks, "You get anything at all from this guy? I mean, even just a 'Sorry we can't remove the government chip in your head, please accept this lovely gift basket instead'?"
Can't tell her, can't tell her, can't tell her. Oh, but Spike *wants* to. Wants to confide in her so badly... But he knows that will be the final blow, the last piece. And then she might not let him leave, and he might not want to go, and her recovery might not ever be complete.
Spike scuffs his boot on the ground, his fingers fidgeting lightly with the hem of his torn shirt. "No gift basket." But I did get this lovely consolation prize... "Not a stake to the heart either, though, so that's something."
Buffy nods in sympathy. She takes a step forward, a little closer than Spike would like, but she's not angry now, so he's not too worried about what she might do. "You know, Spike," she says sincerely, "someday the chip's gonna come out. I know you; you'll find a way."
He says nothing, just watches her curiously, but his silence is an agreement.
"And when it does," Buffy raises one brow seriously, "I don't want to see you back in my town. Understand? I don't want to have to stake you, but I will."
Spike smiles gently at the girl he once loved and will always care for. "Right. No staking the vampire. I'll remember that."
Buffy grins and glances at her feet before meeting Spike's eyes. "I mean it, Spike," she says.
He doesn't respond, just lets her kiss him lightly on the cheek and walk out of the crypt.
Spike slumps against the nearest sarcophagus, more relieved than he could have imagined. This was what he was more afraid of than anything else-- seeing Buffy again. And it went well-- for one of their encounters, anyway.
Spike lies down on the cement coffin. He figures he'll sleep here until sunset, then head out of town. Maybe visit LA and see if he can get some similar closure with his sire. They're both souled poofs now, after all.
The vampire shifts uncomfortably, wondering why he can't fall asleep. Suddenly he shoots to his feet.
Xander.
He can't sleep because he went to bed early last night with Xander.
And oh hell, the note.
Spike scrambles for the door, but the sunlight has him reeling back into the darkness of the crypt.
He swears loudly at the room.
There's always the sewer tunnels, but there's no access to Xander's building. Spike's stranded.
He throws himself petulantly on the sarcophagus he was lying across a moment ago and stares sullenly at the crack of sunlight streaming in his door.
There's hours before even noon comes, and all Spike can do is wait.