Ice Cream
By She's a Star
Disclaimer: Buffy belongs to Joss Whedon.
Author's Note: This was written as a challenge for a livejournal community I belong to. It's set sometime during season six, during the whole delightful crazed-sex-buddies episode between Buffy and Spike.
*
She hates herself sometimes. Hates this. Hates that she's sunk so low. It's like an addiction, kind of, and she almost likes explaining it that way. In a way that makes it seem like it can't be helped. Because, God, otherwise, is there any way to justify her actions?
She doesn't love Spike. She doesn't even like him most of the time. But he's solid, and chilled, and lately she can only feel when she's with him. Hands tearing at each other; mouths slamming together in something too hard to be a kiss; sweat and aches and fingernail marks running down his chest. When she's with him, she screams more than she sighs.
It's fucking; that's what it is. She lies next to him afterwards, still tasting him and realizing just how screwed up her life has gotten. When he sleeps, he looks dead, and her mind is at its sharpest then. God, she's fucking a corpse, and she laughs out loud at that, just because it's so ridiculous.
Buffy. The Almighty Slayer; the five letter word that strikes fear into the unbeating hearts of vampires worldwide. Ha. She wonders if they know how weak she is. She knows. Kind of wishes she didn't.
And then she gets around to thinking about Angel. Her Prince Charming, if she wants to get poetic about it. God knows she'd rather get poetic about it than keep being little Miss Cynical, in which case he'd just be the first vampire she . . . Yeah. Not going there.
What would he think of her now? What if he walked in here and found her lying here on the cold floor - couldn't make it all the way to the bed; she'd had a hard day and this was her way of dealing with them - with Spike's arm around her waist?
It's not like it could ever happen; he's off in L.A. now, with a shiny Buffy-free new life. But still, the thought makes her sick. Physically sick - her stomach twists up and she feels bile rising in her throat.
She's had her fairytale. Her perfect love with kisses that made her knees weak; her soft sheets and one surreal, delicate night that lingered.
It doesn't feel over. Part of her, a stupid part that she finds herself wanting to kick a lot of the time, still thinks that Angel's going to come and save her from all this. He'll step out of the shadows for once - walk into the sunlight, brush her hair back with gentle hands, and kiss her. If she does sleep after she's with Spike, then it always seems like that's what she dreams about. It feels so real too - like a memory, almost. His lips; his arms around her; the sun on her back and his heart beating indistinctly against her chest. It reminds her of cookie dough fudge mint chip ice cream; she has no idea why. The interworkings of her twisted mind, she guesses.
She's dreamed it so many times that it's become real to her.
Maybe one day it will be. The same part of her - the extremely kickable one - believes it so much that it almost scares her.
But it's not now, and it seems like now is eternity. Spike next to her, not breathing; every inch of her aches. She wishes he hadn't slammed her against the wall so hard, in retrospect. When it had happened she'd just been exhilarated by how sharp it all felt. Mouth on her neck, hand creeping up her shirt. And this is what being dead has done to her.
She can blame Angel for this, if she really wants to. It all makes sense, anyway. If he'd stayed, she wouldn't be here.
Or maybe she would.
She doesn't really know anymore.
"Buffy?"
God, this is the last thing she wants.
"You crying?" Spike asks, sitting up and staring at her.
She hadn't realized, until now. She'd thought she was immune to tears; maybe that she'd cried so much that she'd simply reached her limit. Nope, no more tears for Buffy.
Not quite the case.
Well, this is just something else she can blame on Angel.
But she won't, she decides.
She wants to keep him as unblemished as she can, in her mind.
"Buffy," Spike says again.
"Shut up," she orders, and pulls him down on top of her.
The floor is dirty, hard against her back, and the bed's maybe five feet away. She can't even make it there anymore-- but it's not like there's a point to any of this. He moans her name, but she doesn't scream.
The silence is loud enough.
-
In the morning, she leaves before he wakes up and eats ice cream alone at the kitchen table.