Mixed Signals
By: PhoenixJustice
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer is property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, etc. I only own this story and make no profit from this.
Warning: Rated M for future graphic sexual content, language, etc.
Pairing: Spike/Buffy Summers (main), Willow/Tara, etc.
Setting: Bargaining pt 2/Afterlife, with spoilers up to Season 11 of Buffy, Season 11 of Angel and anything inbetween.
Summary: Two people who were never supposed to meet. She had seen everything, up to the Dragon that destroyed everything she loved. He had only the lasting memory of her words of love before he burned to cinders. Could they bridge the gap between them?
A/N: Flashbacks in italics.
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Chapter Three - Bed, but no Breakfast
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He's quick of foot to get back into the house. By now the witches and the Bit have gone into their rooms (though he knows from the small sounds than none are yet asleep.) He's quick to get inside, quick up the stairs even, until he reaches the final one. He pauses, emotion clogging his throat, threatening to overwhelm him. How should he, how could he, approach this?
He knew Buffy well. Better than she knew, but all the same, this Buffy had been through death two times over now, had been through trauma and strife and very little rest. What would be good for her? But she had cried. She wanted to see him. That, more than anything, is what pushes him to put his feet on the landing upstairs, to walk past the witches' room, past Dawn's room, to get to hers.
He stops when he sees the door open. Just a crack, but enough to surprise him.
"Spike?" She whispers.
He takes that as permission enough and pokes his head in.
"Slayer?" He asks.
She looks up at him from her place on her bed, where she sat. She looked nervous and tired. He could still see the trails of tears that were drying on her face, could smell the salt in the air.
"Come in."
He closes the door behind him and walks up to her, hands in his pocket, unsure of himself, unsure of where he stood in her eyes right now. Her hands start to move forward, before stopping, putting her hands in her lap. She looks away, but she doesn't seem distant in the ways he could remember.
"I didn't forget, y'know." "Forget what?" "I-"
He winces a bit, his head still feeling tender. Well he had just got thrown from Sunnydale's Hellmouth back right into the fight, so it was no wonder. He also wasn't getting any obvious 'Leave me alone!' signals from her, consciously or unconsciously, so he gingerly moves over to sit next to her.
"I-" Buffy starts, then stops. She looks down at her hands.
"You don't have to say anything if you don't want to, luv." Spike reassures her.
"It's hard." She finally whispers. "I don't know what to do. Everything is-" He braces himself, steels himself for those nearly same or possibly even the same words of before, when she tells him that her friends, her family had unknowingly pulled her out of Heaven. She glances at him for a brief moment, almost shyly. "I-don't know where I stand with you."
He stares at her. "Buffy?" He asks confusedly.
"Can we-" She shrugs helplessly. "Can we forget about any possible confusion or-or anything else for now and you can just hold me?"
She looked so earnest, sad and-desperate almost. The look on her face melts his heart. God, he never stood a chance at not loving her, did he? If he hadn't fallen in love with her the moment he first laid eyes on her, then it had to have been soon after.
"Anything you want, pet." He says hoarsely.
He stands briefly to take off his coat, folding it and setting it down before moving back to the bed. She looks at him for a moment before scooting back onto the bed. She still wore the clothes she had on when he sees her again and something jumps out at him, making him curse loudly, startling her.
"Did I-"
"Your hands, luv."
She stops whatever she was going to say, looking down at her hands. They were still red and raw from where she had clawed her way out of her own coffin (he remember that feeling all too well, the smell of dirt and blood and grime, and then that break of air, feeling it all around you (even if you, like him, didn't need it anymore) and how everything felt different (sometimes not for the best reasons, but different nevertheless.)
"Oh." She says, surprised. "I-forgot about them."
He laughs, surprising both her and himself. The situation she had gotten them in wasn't funny by any means, but the tone in her voice had been so earnest and-herself that he couldn't help but laugh.
"Had a bit of a long day, I expect." He says, amused.
She glances up at him then and their eyes connect. In one brief instant, everything disappears-everything-and it's just him and her. And for that one brief moment, everything comes to him again and he remembers. He remembers the pain and the scorching sounds-
And just like that the moment passes and he remembers none of it after.
He looks over at the nightstand and sees bandages and ointments sat on it (Dawn. It had to have been her.) He grabs the lot and sits next to Buffy again, this time with more of a clear purpose, something he could focus on easier. He takes her hands without thinking but her hands only briefly tense in his before they relax and takes to cleaning them carefully, pausing only when she lets out a hissed breath.
"Too rough?" He rumbles softly. "M' sorry, pet."
"It's okay." The humor from a few moments ago had evaporated, leaving a quiet between them that he wasn't sure how to mend. They were talking, but not talking. He could all but hear the tears in her voice, even if he somehow couldn't smell the beginnings of her tears, and he knew as well as her that it wasn't from her hands getting fixed up.
"It's not." He says, looking at her before looking back down at her hands. Small and dainty they were, wringing Death through gentle hands. "But it's okay. Take...as much time as you need, Buffy. Alright? No matter what pressures you might feel now or feel later. Don't let your friends push you, or your Watcher, or your sister even. Take all the time you need to-"
What? Feel well again? Certainly wasn't as easy as it sounded; he had been through that himself, often enough. And she? Well, she had been through enough trauma, his poor girl, for ten people.
"-rest up." He finishes.
It's quiet again (and by now, he can-if he listens closely-the slowing heartbeats of Red, Glinda, and the Bit, letting him know they had finally fallen asleep) and it isn't until he finally bandages her up that she speaks again.
"And you?" She asks quietly.
"Me?" He asks, confused. He pats her hands gently. "There, all done. What was it you said, pet? What about me?"
"You said...my friends, and Giles, and Dawn. But not you."
Oh. What he had just said? She had been listening closely then (honestly he wasn't sure at that point if she had been listening or stuck in her own painful memories.)
"I wouldn't ever push you, Buffy." He winces as memories instantly come to him. Ones he wished he could forget..no, that he could undo. He had been the cause of some of her own trauma (though this Buffy hadn't experienced it, thank christ, and certainly wouldn't ever now) and he couldn't ever undo it. "Not if I could ever help it."
He could only show her, every day, that he loved her and that he wouldn't ever let her faith she had placed in him (she had placed her faith in him. A man would have to be robbed of all senses not to realize the magnitude of that) go astray. Even if this Buffy couldn't ever come to love him, he would always be there for her, for this family that she had inadvertently created when she came to Sunnydale.
She moves to lay on the bed now and turns to look at him, silent, invitation and hesitation in her eyes. He holds back a swallow and dumps his boots onto the floor. They tumble, dirty, on the floor but she seems to take no notice of them, her eyes on him as he climbs onto the bed. She instantly turns in his direction when he starts to get settled on the bed.
All the times that he had spent with Buffy in his arms, those few glorious times, it had never been in her bed. That had been one of the things he had been kept at bay from, one of the many things (for a time.) She had let him inside of her body, but her heart and her trust had been things much harder gained.
He gathers her up in his arms and he isn't sure which of them is trembling most.
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The smell of burning flesh is strong and the pain is pure agony upon her skin. But she cannot falter now. She has to remember what this is all for. She cannot fail. She can't. She-
She awakens with a small gasp, looking around wildly for a moment, heart thudding in her chest. It's only when sleep fades away just enough and she recognizes Spike is still in bed with her, holding her close, his boyish face relaxed in sleep that she starts to relax again.
Not...hers. But also absolutely hers. She knew that was something she'd have to work out soon enough, but for now...despite whatever signals might be crossed between them, it was just the two of them, Buffy and Spike. And that could let her rest.
She sleeps.
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"Should we bother her?" Willow asks in a quiet voice, mostly to herself, biting on her lip.
"I know you're worried, sweetie." Tara says, looking at her girlfriend as they walk out of their room, on the way to Buffy's. "But I'm sure she could use some breakfast."
They had talked over things a bit, before managing to fall asleep (the nights events plus all the energy taken out of them from the spell itself had exhausted them all greatly) but there still were things left up in the air. For Tara, she definitely didn't want to step on any toes here, especially Buffy's, but her own nurturing instinct was kicking in, making her want to help in any way she could.
It was a feeling she hadn't been able to foster or think about when she had been with her family-well, the blood related people she had been around. It was these people, these witches and ex-demons, and humans and vampires and Slayers that had proven themselves her true family and she could never repay them enough for that. She wanted to do her part to protect this small little family of theirs, a family she never could have imagined ever having.
"Buffy?" Willow asks, voice still quiet as she starts to slowly open up Buffy's door (after a knock gets no answer.) "We thought you might like break...fast."
They both stop short in the doorway, looking at the strange tableau of Buffy laying in bed with Spike, entwined with Spike. Both of them looked at peace. She finds herself smiling softly; surprised, to be sure, but how could she try and pull them apart? Buffy definitely deserved to find some semblance of peace, after all she had been through, but so did Spike.
Tara had seen the devastation that Buffy's death had caused him, from the beginning when they first see her body after her jump and the days after. She knew he had only managed to go on, tough but gentle (she hesitated to say soul as, being a vampire, he didn't have one, but Spike was unlike almost any vampire she had ever encountered) spirit.
"Let them sleep in a bit, sweetie." Tara tells Willow, gently grasping her elbow, leading her away from the door, closing it softly behind her.
"Was that-" Willow seemed much more baffled than Tara did, which Tara wasn't all too surprised at; Willow had known Buffy-and Spike-for much longer than she had, after all.
"It was." Tara says plainly. Willow turns to look at her, shocked, as if not expecting the agreement from Tara. She smiles at Willow, stroking her hair a bit. "How did it look, Willow?"
"Huh?"
"How did they look?"
Willow stops, glancing at the door then back at her girlfriend.
"Happy." Willow says, surprise coloring her voice.
"The first thing Buffy could use is happiness, don't you think?" Tara asks her.
"Of course!" Willow is vehement in that. "But...it's..." Spike. Willow doesn't say it, but Tara knows it's on the tip of her tongue. "What if he's taking advantage of her?"
Even if she was going by their body language in bed alone, Tara knew that wasn't the case. Besides that, she could see both of their auras as she looked at them. They glowed brightly, as if being near one another made them both glow more beautifully.
"You know that's not true." Tara admonishes her. "You saw how he was when she died, Willow." Willow winces at that, not at the thought of Spike, but obviously at the thought of Buffy's death. "He was as broken about it as the rest of it. More...even, in some ways."
Willow bites on her lip. "He loves her." She says, almost resignedly.
Tara's eyebrow raises. It was the first time she had heard one of the Scoobies talk about it like that. Sure, Spike's feelings for Buffy had been talked about in the group before, but the others (not Tara, never her. She could never dissuage someone's feelings of obvious love for someone) had always talked about it scoffingly, like he was delusional about it, in a context where they obviously believed that vampires couldn't truly feel, truly love.
Tara knew that was a load of bull; the moment she saw Spike talk about Buffy she saw him brighten from within, with an intensity that almost hurt to look at. It often made her wonder what 'souls' (at least in the case of vampires) actually did. He could obviously, love, and love well. And now...well, he, like Buffy, glowed.
She glances back at the direction of Buffy's room and can only hope that the two of them could find some sort of common middle, common ground. And from the looks of them in her bedroom, it looked like they had-tentatively? strongly?-started to.
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She feels something pull away from her and moans, trying to grasp at it. She opens her eyes and sees Spike looking at her, shock on his face. Instantly she feels her insides grow cold. Did he...was he angry somehow? Or disgusted? He didn't want to be around her anymore?
"Spike-"
"Thought you'd have thrown me out on my arse by now." Spike says, almost sheepishly.
She stops and shakes her head. "No, of course I wouldn't." He raises a brow at her and she flushes, insides now squirming with a beginning heat. "I mean, why would I? Unless uh, you copped a feel or something while I was asleep?"
He shakes his head, head on his elbow now while he looks at her.
"No. Damn," He says, but not in anger (she can see the amusement in his eyes.) "Probably should have...taken the chance while I could?"
She can see the hesitance in him saying that, but tries to reassure him with a smile (some confusion or not she did not want Spike thinking she hated him or disliked him. That much was not true and wouldn't ever be true. The rest had to be figured out, but her feelings for him were not in question.)
"Probably should have." She says lightly, amusement in her tone, poking at his arm lightly. "I mean now I'm going to have to stay up next time to make sure you fall asleep first!"
He stares at her and it takes her a moment to realize why.
"I-" She stammers. "I mean, if you-"
"Buffy! Spike!" Dawn's voice calls from far off. "Come on! Breakfast is getting cold!"
She glances at Spike and has a simple thing to say:
"Oh boy."
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I hope you enjoyed this!
Let me know what you thought!
-PhoenixJustice