Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy The Vampire Slayer! Joss does!

Setting: Btvs Post Season 7- Angel Post Season 5. Slightly AU, but I've always wondered what Dawn and Spike's relationship would be like as she got older..

"If the people we love are stolen from us, the way to have them live on is to never stop loving them. Buildings burn, people die, but real love is forever."

–Sarah, The Crow.

***************

She came back here every year; and had ever since the town had collapsed in on itself years ago. She didn't want to forget, and couldn't bring herself to remember the day in any other way, then coming back here and honoring her memory in this place, the place where she had died.

She stopped the car several feet from the edge of the crater and took a deep breath, brushing a lock of her hair away from her face. Buffy didn't know that she came here, would probably not be happy with her if she knew that she did…Buffy had tried to forget that Sunnydale had existed, and that met forgetting that their Mother had died there, so Dawn didn't tell her where she went every year on the anniversary of their Mother's death, it was less painful that way.

He watched her from several hundred yards away, well aware that the darkness hid both him, and his bike from her vision. She wasn't vampire, and she wasn't a slayer, she was just a girl, a girl that had once been the key to unlocking everything that could end the world. She was beautiful. He sighed heavily, as Dawn slowly got out of the car, and made her way to the edge of the crater. She tossed the bouquet of Lilies into it, and bowed her head for a long moment clearly lost in her own thoughts.

"Spike…I know you're there." Her voice was quiet, but she raised her head, and gazed into his eyes. "You come every year too."

"Yeah bit, I do." He said softly, joining her then. "Couldn't bring myself to ever tell you I watched you though."

"Why not?" she questioned, wrapping her arms around his waist, and burying her head in his shoulder.

It took him a moment to think clearly, Dawn had obviously grown up in the years since he'd seen her last. He wrapped an arm around her, and held her close for a long moment. "Because, it always seemed like such a private moment for you."

Dawn laughed bitterly. "Buffy wants to forget this place ever existed, that Mom existed, that you existed…I can't do that; therefore I come alone."

He nodded. "I know…I've heard." He stepped away from her, and pulled a single red rose out of his coat pocket. Then following Dawn's earlier example he threw it into the crater. He watched it fall, and then turned back to the girl behind him. "I miss her too you know. She was the only one of you lot to treat me like a man."

Dawn smiled. "She liked you, you know."

"Really"

"yea-" Dawn's answer was cut short, as Spike pressed his lips to hers. She grappled for a moment, before wrapping her arms around his neck, and deepening the kiss. After a long moment she pulled away, her breathing off. "What was that?"

"That was for being you." And then he was gone. Leaving Dawn to wonder what had just happened.