I'll Fly Away

3/25/02

Part 3: Happy When We Meet

He heard the swearing first, then the sobbing.

Spike hovered on the Summers porch and considered high-tailing it back to the safety of his crypt. The vibes coming from the house were of anger and sullen defiance, not the panic and hysteria that resulted when, say, a sword-happy, chicken-headed demon popped out of the wall. Or a slimy monster attacked your terminally ill mother.

"Of all the selfish, pig-headed, head-up-his-ass things to pull…"

He had his hand raised his to knock when a shiny, red head poked itself around the corner of the house. Two bright, liquid eyes shimmered in the pale light of the street lamps.

"Psssst….Spike!"

Spike meandered over and knelt down. Through the living room window, he could see Buffy pacing to and fro, gesturing, mouth opening and closing like a scandalized silent movie heroine.

"What are you doin' hiding out here, Red?"

She smiled a little nervously. "Waiting for Hurricane Buffy to get down-graded to a tropical storm. You might not want to go in there just yet."

Willow was wearing pajamas made of some soft, floaty material that reminded Spike of China, of his first Slayer, of rice paddies and temples so ancient that Jesus Christ was said to have visited them in his youth. Her hair was damp but drying quickly in the heady, summer air. This was Willow as he first knew her--before magicks and motherwort and many, many losses--wholesome, fresh, beautiful in a salt-of-the-earth way. But, looking closely, he could see the irrevocable differences wrought by time. There were crows feet around the witches' eyes, and her hands trembled.

He followed her around to the back of the house, past the remains of Joyce's long-neglected flower beds.

Pity, that.

Joyce had the touch, that uncanny talent for healing everyone and everything around her, be it the lonely heart of a Watcher, a daughter's broken dreams or the flagging hopes of a lovelorn vampire. Not bad for a life's work. Maybe the Powers picked the mother of a Slayer as carefully as they chose the warrior.

Willow plunked herself down on the double swing that Spike had put up for Dawn the year she was sixteen. He'd had to climb the tree to test the ropes, and the Niblet had rolled on the grass, laughing like a loon. Buffy, hidden in the house, had peered suspiciously out the kitchen window, as if she expected to catch him, red-handed, putting down roots.

Spike gestured to the other half of the swing, and sat down when Willow nodded ascent.

"Spike, can I ask you something?"

He shrugged. "Go for it, Pet."

"Can I have a cigarette?"

The years have taken their toll, and he'd always liked Willow. What she did for Buffy, she did out of love, wrong as it was. After he lit her fag, and his own, the hysteria in the living room ceased for a moment. They both looked hopefully toward the house, only to hear it begin again.

"That's all right," Willow sighed. "We'll try again, later."

She puffed on her cigarette, then erupted in a fit of coughing. Spike thumped her on the back until she could speak again.

"Buffy's Dad has some month long business trip that came up suddenly. Poor Dawnie. Buffy said she wishes we hadn't lost Olaf's hammer--so she could pound Mr. Summers into Cream-of-Wheat with it."

Spike wasn't surprised. The man's picture was probably listed under 'git' in Collier's.

"I'd like to feed him to Dru." Willow laughed, but the sound was rusty with ill-use.

They were silent for a few minutes, listening to the crickets.

"How's Glinda, Red?"

Willow sighed. "I miss her. She never moved back in after…everything. We're still together, but nothing's the same, y'know?"

Spike nodded. Willow went on. "If I use magic, I lose Tara. They're both so hard to live without." She looked at him. "Do you understand?"

Spike understood. He was a vampire in love with the Slayer. His lust for blood was equaled only by his passion for her.

Just then, Buffy's shadow fell across the back porch. Spike helped Willow frantically wave away the smoke around her head. He plucked the butt from her fingers and tossed into the neighbor's hedge.

"What are you doing?" Buffy stood with her arms crossed, the fearless leader scowling down on her wayward subjects. Spike rolled his eyes.

"Playing Parcheesi. What does it look like, Slayer? We're havin' a conversation."

Buffy's jaw tightened as she took in their position on the swing, Willow's state of undress, and the way Spike's hand gripped the rope behind Willow's head. Wisps of vermilion hair caught the breeze and floated over his knuckles.

Buffy sniffed, did a patented California girl head-toss. "Well, don't let me intrude. Converse away."

"Okay, then," He muttered

"Okay." She shot back.

"Fine."

"Fine."

"I said 'fine' first."

"Oh…whoop-de-do. I'm impressed."

Willow's eyes darted back and forth between them. When the two began to take menacing steps toward one another, she popped up like a cork.

"I'm gonna go check on Dawnie then I'll…" she floundered, "… go check on Dawnie." Willow fled in a swirl of gauzy material.

The scent of dead roses was strong in the June heat, reminding Spike of a summer spent with his Dark Queen in the remains of an old plantation house. That was 1922, the age of ballyhoo, and they were the scourge of New Orleans. They drank blood and bathtub gin. He wore a bowler hat and Dru danced the Blackbottom.

Nothing in Spike's rich and complicated history wiould ever allow him to step back from the fierce girl that now faced him across a few feet of grass and a chasm of shared experience. He'd known her seven years, probably loved her almost as long. Even in the beginning, there was a crackle in the air, and a familiarity to their bobbing, weaving, circling dance. One meeting and they knew the steps.

Her voice sliced through the night. "Willow likes girls."

Who did she think he was--the village idiot? "Willow wants love. Some people don't put the terms and conditions on it that you do, Slayer."

She flushed and looked away. He took an experimental step closer. To his surprise, she did not retreat. He could smell her now. Vanilla and bitterness and, oh, life.

Suddenly, as if she'd made a choice, Buffy took a minuscule step forward. Once again, Spike's world cracked open. The last remnants of his olde life were crumbling to ruin like that decaying mansion, with its verandahs and its columns that were supposed to endure forever. It was the end of everything and the start of something new, something good, something better…

Something effulgent.

Effulgent!

Spike crossed the distance between them so quickly that his duster flapped in the breeze he'd created. He was glad that he didn’t need to breathe, since the air was heavy and sweet with the promise of a thunderstorm. There was no room in his body for anything except overwhelming love for her. It sang through the borrowed blood in his veins, zipped along his nerve endings and beat at the barriers of his long dead heart. He felt stormed, like the Bastille. Absently, he remembered that Darla claimed to have been in Paris that year, among the cheering crowds at the foot of Madame La Guillotine.

He knew it might be a mistake, even as he reached for her. Losing her again would destroy him. But more alien to his nature than losing was not trying at all. So be it. He would go to his fate complete, and die with her name on his lips.

There was nothing elegant about that kiss, the first in two years. He wrapped his arms around her waist, and the much-missed feel of her skin--warm, soft, vibrant--went to his head like honey wine. His eyes zeroed in on her lips, imagined them opening like a flower under his. Absently, he noted the black pupils of her eyes expanding until only a thin edge of green remained. She drew in a startled breath. Spike had never had much sense anyway, so he forged ahead.

She met him halfway, and Spike decided there was a God, even for creatures like him.

She did taste like flowers, just like he remembered. Her mouth was soft and velvety and made him dizzy. He slanted his head and increased the pressure.

He wanted to taste her soul.

Buffy climbed him like a tree, wrapping her arms and legs around his shoulders and waist. If Willow had looked out the window just then, she would have seen two bodies welded together like one of the sculptures in Joyce's old gallery. Spike could hear the blood thundering in her veins--sweet, hot, flavored with regret--and a growl erupted from the basement of his untamed nature. He hiked her closer, drawing her cradling hips inward so that his erection was nestled in the notch of her legs.

She was making flustered, incoherent sounds that made every muscle in his body seize with want. She tipped her head back like a daisy on a broken stem. He nipped at the curve of her jaw, and she mewled helplessly.

"I've got you, Kitten," Spike murmured against her throat. "I won't let you fall this time."

The scent of crushed grass was all around them as he drove her backward against the clapboards of the house. They were in the shadows, but the warm light that spilled from the kitchen cast enough illumination to make their corner a borderland between his world and hers. She was like live fire in his arms, sliding her hands through the pale moonlight of his hair and underneath his shirt, over the muscles of his back.

Spike slipped his hand under her thin T-shirt and over the lace of her bra, closing his palm over her breast. He muffled her scream with a kiss of such primal intensity that her breath hissed between his teeth. He wanted to mark her, kiss his way down her body, and reacquaint himself with her----

The screech of the screen door penetrated the sensual haze that surrounded them.

Dawn Summers, two days ago a bright, self-assured young woman had been reduced by disappointment to a sniffling child. She stood on the back porch, bleary-eyed and red-faced, hugging herself.

"Buffy? Spike?"

They remained frozen against the house, her head still resting on his shoulder. Finally, Dawn shrugged and went back in. Spike slowly let Buffy slide back to the ground. They stood staring at each other for a moment. They weren't like other people, For them, absence from one another was like wind to fire. The slightest spark set everything ablaze.

"We should go in. Talk to Dawn." Buffy looked thoroughly kissed, which pleased him to no end.

"Right, then." He waved his hand toward the house, indicating that she could go first.

He paused for a moment after she disappeared inside, the screen door slamming in her wake. The scent of arousal hung heavy in the air.

Spike lit a cigarette and thought about choices.

TBC