It wasn't helping. She punched harder. Got angry.
Working out had always
helped. Before. She hit the bag with a jab, jab, hook combo that
made the
bag's chain rattle and the joist it hung from groan. And still
it didn't help.
She let loose with another flurry of punches, pummeling the bag with
a ferocity
she knew would scare the rest of the Scoobies, and probably draw some
worried
comment from Giles. Still, after several minutes, as she stood
winded, the
feeling returned. That twitchy, nervous, what-am-I-missing? feeling.
It was
her constant companion now, since her meeting with Angel. In
the days
immediately following her return, she had been kind of numb but that
had
changed. So much had changed. She had changed.
Not knowing what else to do, she let loose the frustration, worry, fear,
regret
and anger, jumping up and down in a tantrum that would've done any
preschooler
proud. "AAAaaaarrrrrgggghhhh!!!" She roared.
The rear door to the workout room came off its hinges with a crash.
Buffy spun
around, dropping into a crouch in anticipation of attack.
Spike followed the
door, looking wildly about room with the yellow eyes of his gameface.
The two,
seeing only the other in the room shook off their fighting stances
and, in
unison, yelled "What?!?!!"
"Spike!" "Slayer!" Again, they talked over each other. Spike held up a hand.
"Buffy- What in bloody hell was THAT about?"
"You're one to talk. Got something against that door?" Buffy retorted.
"Yeah. When said door stands between me and you and a sound like
THAT." Spike
had returned to his human guise, but his voice still held an underlying
growl.
Buffy looked down at the mat under her feet, coloring slightly.
"Oh." She
murmured "That. Well, um-yeah." She moved to the table
in the corner,
unwrapping her hands and throwing the tape down. "It doesn't
matter." Giving
herself bit of a shake, both mentally and physically, she turned to
him. "Ok,
folks. Go back about your business. Nothing to see here."
He took an unnecessary breath, letting it out in a sigh. "So,
what exactly
brought that on?" he asked. He moved nearer to her, leaning up
against the
wall, noting the sheen of sweat on her skin, the scent of exertion
rather than
fear coming off of her.
"Well?" he prodded.
"I- it's-"
"Complicated?" He supplied. She nodded. He seemed
to be doing that a lot
lately, she noted. Finishing her sentences, supplying words that
seemed to
elude her with disturbing frequency since her return.
"Do I look fragile to you?" She asked. Spike eyes followed the
sweep of her
hand as she gestured at herself. He could not help the flare
of desire and
hoped it didn't show in his eyes. Since her return, she had taken
to confiding
in him, sparring with him, maybe even trusting him. Even as it
pleased him,
that aspect of their relationship was still new and unfamiliar. He
didn't want
to risk losing her trust on account of hormones. He cocked his
head to the
side, not sure he heard her correctly.
"Come again?" he asked.
"I can't stand it, Spike," She said. "Giles, the Scoobies, Dawn. I can't
stand
the way they look at me, how they talk to me, how everyone is treating
me like
I'm this glass thing, like I have 'fragile' stamped across my forehead."
She
raked her blonde hair back from said forehead.
"Not in any language I can see." Spike quipped. He found himself
ducking his
head in a coaxing gesture, trying to elicit even a small smile.
Her lips twitched ever so slightly. Ah, sweet success, Spike thought.
She
leaned up against the wall; shoulder a hands breadth from his.
She was calmer,
he realized, but she still- buzzed for lack of a better word.
Unable to stay
still, she pushed away from the wall and began to pace in front of
him.
"Damn it, Spike. I'm not like I was, but I'm not 'Slayer, Interrupted'
either.
Even Angel-" She looked his way, grimacing, knowing there was no love
lost
between the two.
"Prick. Spike snorted. "So spill. What did the Soul-Having-One
say? Do the
Lennon-McCartney thing on you?"
"Huh?"
"You know 'I love you, blah, blah, blah'"
"No, thank God. You know how he sings." She chuckled ruefully.
Her smile
melted from her face, replaced by a look not of grief, but of resignation.
" I
guess it took me dying again to figure it out." She flopped against
the wall
next to him. "Its like this scar." She said, pulled the strap
of her sports
tank away from her collarbone, motioning to Spike it was ok for him
to look.
"Thanks for the peek, but not following, pet."
Buffy whacked him halfheartedly across the head.
"Mind the hair." was his only response.
She rubbed the spot absently, recalling the circumstances. "I
was hit by a car
when I was 14." She said "I was really lucky- the car wasn't
going all that
fast, but I had a bunch of cuts and scrapes. Not even all that
visible. But I
kept pulling at this one, looking to see if it was healed yet.
If I had just
let it alone, let it heal by itself without poking at it, I wouldn't
even have
a scar now. I finally left it alone and now you can't even see
it unless you
already know its there."
"And?" Spike prompted "The lesson from this is what? Angel is
a scar? Coulda
told you that a good bit ago."
"Geez, Spike, analogy? Embrace the concept."
"'Treat a wounded heart as you would an injured eye-'" Spike murmured,
quoting from memory.
"Ah, the Bloody Awful Poet rears his bleached blond head."
"Wasn't bleached then, ducks."
"Whatever. But you get the point, right?"
"Yeah. So you okay with it then?"
"Well, ok as a recently dead girl can be with her currently-dead ex-boyfriend."
Buffy looked out of the corner of her eye at Spike "Talking about it
with her
also-currently-dead former mortal enemy." She rolled her eyes.
"Quite the pair we make." Spike noted wryly.
"Yeah." Buffy was tapping her feet and bobbing her head.
"Still want a bit of a spar, pet? You're a little-"
"Wired? Yeah, I've got a chronic case of the heebie jeebies lately.
Fighting
kinda helps- well, at least takes my mind off of it."
"Yeah, well, yer just pathetic enough to make me risk a bleedin' migraine,
so,
lets have at it."
Buffy stuck her tongue out at him, but walked quickly over to the center
of the
mat, bouncing on the balls of her feet.
"Ok, Spike. Bring it on."
Oh, Slayer, if only I could, he thought wistfully. "Noise and funk,
coming
right up."
And so they sparred, trading punches and puns, kicks and quips.
It was
comfortable, intimate even. After a while, they took a break,
Buffy grabbing
her water bottle and flopping down onto the mat beside Spike, who had
seemingly
taken up residence on said map during their last little skirmish.
He rolled to his side, facing her, finding himself eye-level with her
ankle. A
few inches of taut, thin skin bare between sock and legging.
Propping his
head with one hand, he reached out grabbed her ankle with the other,
waggling
the whole leg.
"Spike, stop," Buffy said, rolling her eyes. Lately he was
the brother she
never wanted- tickles, noogies, getting in her space. Always
touching.
Even now he was stroking her ankle with a single finger, tracing the
lines of
the veins, the shape of the bones. One finger, with the power
to give her
goose bumps. Okay, she thought, maybe NOT my brother. She pulled
her leg away
and got to her feet.
"Okay. Slackage over, slayage to commence," she stated.
Spike quirked an eyebrow at her.
"Simulated slayage," she amended.
"Sounds kinky. Anything I should know about?"
"In your dreams, Spike."
Ah, what you don't know, Slayer, he thought. And rose to resume training.
*****
con't in part 2