He arrived an hour later than he told her, and he used the back entrance, but that was on purpose. Didn't want to look like he actually wanted to be there. He grabbed a full plastic cup of Budweiser off the counter and tried not to gag as he swallowed it down. College students had no scruples when it came to cheap alcohol.
It didn't take long to find her. She was hunkered down in a chair near the corner of the main room, obscured by thick clouds of cigarette smoke and dim lighting. He slunk back in the recesses of the room to watch her as she alternated between staring at the almost full drink in her hand and keeping watch on the front door. A frat boy standing nearby was attempting to make conversation with her, but wasn't faring terribly well. Occasionally she'd give him a few syllables or a tight smile, but made no other attempts at appeasing him.
Spike downed the dregs of his beer, tossed the cup into a terracotta planter, and made his way towards her. When she looked up and noticed him, she sat up a little straighter and the mask of distaste she'd been wearing seemed to slip off, revealing… what was that? Fondness? Relief? A little foreign curl of warmth wound its way into his stomach, and he wasn't completely sure what to make of it. So maybe it was a little strange, but this girl seemed to have no one. No friends, no family. Perhaps that made him the closest person she had in her life, and the thought made him feel a little protective of her.
In any case, the bloke disturbing Charlie needed to go find a hobby. Or a chair, Spike noted as he saw the boy wobble on his feet and take another sip of his drink. "Chattin' up my girl, are you lad?" he asked as he approached the pair, speaking with a touch more hostility than was necessary.
"Spike…?" Charlie gave him a puzzled look as she spoke his name.
The boy hiccuped and laughed, "Your girl, huh? Didn't see a "belongs to" label on her shirt, buddy."
"Yea, well you wankers don't seem to take a hint very-"
"Spike, it's-" Charlie began to interrupt.
"Hang on luv, Big Bad'll teach him what's what."
"Spike!" she hissed, and he stopped to scowl down at her, "he wasn't hitting on me."
"Load of bollocks, he was talkin' and givin' you a good look-over while you were makin' doe eyes at the nearest exit."
"He was asking about my boots. And my jacket. And his boyfriend is over there."
Spike looked back at the boy, and noticed that he now had his hands clasped together with another male partygoer who'd been standing nearby. "Oh, well good for you!" he called out sincerely, as the two backed away quickly.
"So. Been here long?" Spike asked, turning back to Charlie.
She shook her head, flabbergasted at his quick change of topic, "What the hell was that?"
"What was what?"
"I don't know, how about that weird possessive-friend slash fake-boyfriend thing you just pulled? He was super drunk, not super sexually harassing me."
"You looked like misery incarnate, pet. Just tryin' to help you out."
"Ooohhh, you're one of those guys," she said, with a look of semi-amusement, "Well, newsflash, I'm not some damsel in distress looking for savior."
"See that now. Too busy fendin' off the chatty types. Know what your problem is, pet?"
She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow at him. "Does it start with the letter S and end in p-i-k-e?"
He ignored her jibe. "You can't stand it. Bein' in a room with all these people and nothin' to do. No bar to separate you from them, no drinks to make, no cute banter to make in passin'. It's just you and them, nothin' to do but talk and you don't want to talk, do you? Cause you're so used to deflectin' and closing people off that havin' a real conversation scares you brainless."
"Stop doing that," she said quietly, her voice so chock-full of repressed emotion that Spike knew he'd hit the nail right on the head.
Before he could respond, Willow was by his side and giving him a playful punch on the arm. "Spike? I thought that was you, you old vampire… pal. Um, who's your friend?"
"Oh, hey, Red," he said, patting the witch uncomfortably on the shoulder, "This is Char- er, Allie."
Charlie shot Spike a look that could have curdled milk.
"Charerallie?" Willow asked, a little louder than was natural. Clearly all of her talent was syphoned into magic making, not lying. "That's um, a really unusual name. Is it like a family name or something?"
"Just call me Charlie. But quietly. I'm kinda keeping a low profile around these parts."
"Ha, I completely understand! Sunnydale is like a magnet for all the badness, and if I worked at Willy's I'd want to keep a low profile too," Willow laughed nervously and then cleared her throat when she realized that she wasn't supposed to know anything about Charlie. "I mean, I thought I heard you say you worked at Willy's, or maybe it was just word on the street…" she looked to Spike as he shut his eyes and clenched his jaw in exasperation.
"Mighta mentioned you to Red here," Spike explained to Charlie, who was also staring at him, though slightly less amiably. "Just that you were attendin' an it might be good for you to meet a few of the locals of the pulse-havin' variety." At least it was partially true.
"Nice to meet you… Red," Charlie said, extending her hand in greeting.
"Oh, it's actually Willow. Spike just calls me Red 'cause he's all about the nicknames. And this is Tara!" Willow said, shaking Charlie's hand and then grabbing the elbow of her pretty girlfriend and dragging her over. Tara smiled and waved shyly.
"So… you guys go to these parties often?," Charlie asked, cringing as the words exited her mouth. "Ugh, just ignore that question… I take my social cues from cheesy soap operas and MTV so my talent for small talk at social gatherings is pretty much non-existent…"
Tara smiled at her reassuringly, "Don't worry. It can be kind of hard being in a g-group of people you don't know. Been there."
"We all come to these things occasionally, but I don't know too many people here either. Just our usual partners in crime," Willow's eyes widened, "Not actual crime, though. Unless hanging out is a crime nowadays!"
"We all?" Charlie asked.
Willow looked around the room, "See the blonde girl over there, dancing with the guy in khakis? That's Buffy and Riley, and the couple over by the drinks is Xander and Anya. We're kinda like the Breakfast Club, but without the detention. We did do the library thing for a long time though, but now we hang out at the Magic Box."
"That's the magic store, right?"
"Yeah! It's a little magic shop that Giles, Buffy's… er… friend opened up downtown. We just started carrying these really cool blessed candles that were made by the monks of Morriganash Valley, and they've got little pieces of bluebells and amber in them!" She waved her hand dismissively, "Ah, sorry! I get really excited about stuff like this, but non-magicy people don't usually know what I'm blabbering about."
Charlie shook her head, "No, that's actually really clever! I never thought to combine bluebells and amber into the wax! Must make your locating spells really easy."
Willow and Tara grinned at eachother.
"And we- we've got the biggest collection of dried herbs in the county," Tara said proudly.
"Yeah? I'm assuming you have sage, it's pretty basic... I've been meaning to do a ritual smudging in the apartment I just moved into. You know, clear away all the bad energy."
Spike choked on a laugh, "Better off just lightin' the whole apartment on fire, pet. Burnin' a couple of namby-pamby herbs'll only make the place smell less like rubbish heap."
Charlie nailed him with a dark look, and turned her smile back at the girls, "How are your stocks of crosses and holy water? My apartment also has a really bad pest problem at the moment..."
"Real funny, Charlie Girl. Gettin' a drink. You girls want-" Spike stopped himself. Since when was he the attentive friend to humans, serving them drinks and taking care of their needs? "Gettin' a drink," he muttered bruskly, and sauntered back to where he's seen a keg when he'd arrived.
He got his drink, but didn't return to where the girls were talking. Instead, he perched himself towards the top of a staircase that overlooked most of the bottom floor, stealing the occasional sip from his beer and playing with his lighter, all the while keeping an eye on everything that was going on at the party. Buffy and her stupid boy-toy were still dancing in the throng of party-goers. The Slayer always had moves, but the commando danced like an inebriated dad at a high school prom.
The Harris boy and his ex-demon girlfriend eventually joined Willow and Tara, and all four were animatedly talking as Charlie looked on, occasionally answering a question or two with a smile that didn't look completely happy. Spike felt strangely put-out. He'd done what was asked of him, getting Charlie to the party so the team could inspect her themselves and try to figure out whatever it was that was going on with her. Didn't mean he liked it. He liked having things just to himself, and now he had to share with the Scoobies. Sharing was for toddlers and socialists, not evil vampires.
After a while, Buffy and Riley mingled in with the group of friends, and Spike strained to hear the conversation. Couldn't hear a blasted thing with the music blaring. He leaned his head against the wooden bannister and watched the brief exchange, glaring at a couple that stumbled up the stairs past him, interrupting his attention. Whatever interrogation had taken place was finished by the time he looked back to the group, and Charlie was back to sitting alone in the corner chair again.
He stood up, massaging a crick out of his neck, and went back down the stairs to join her.
"Magic-aholics Anonymous meetin' over already? Usually takes an hour, then they finish up with donuts, coffee, and a hand-holdin' round of serenity prayers," he said from behind her chair.
She leaned her head back and looked at him upside-down, shrugging as she twirled the ice around in her drink. "Must've been the abbreviated version. They were nice though. I'll probably see them at the magic shop this week."
"Right. And until then, you'll jus' sit here like the life of the party, sippin' at your jack-n-coke, lookin' like someone just cancelled Christmas."
"I'm not-" she began, then stopped. "What's your excuse? Maybe I'm not the most open, sociable person around, but you're the one that invited me here and all you've done is sat at the top of the stairs like a creepy gargoyle."
An unexpected wave of satisfaction rushed over him, at the realization that she'd been keeping an eye on his whereabouts during her chat with the Scoobies. "Vampire, luv. That's my excuse. You're supposed to be the livin' one. Think I'm doin' a better job of it. Least I'm enjoyin' myself."
"Whatever," she muttered, then settled on a look of decidedly female stubborn determination that Spike had grown all too familiar with in the last hundred years of his existance. "No, you know what? I can enjoy myself. I happen to be really good at enjoying myself!" She shrugged off her jacket and tossed it over the chair back. Then she grabbed three shots of clear alcohol off a tray some poor frat pledge in a speedo was carrying around and drank them in rapid succession, coughing a little at the burn when she'd finished the third one.
"Wasn't sayin' you should drink yourself into a stupor, but it's not a bad-"
She was walking away from him before he finished his sentence.
"- plan."
She maneuvered her way into the mob of gyrating bodies just as some sultry number that was heavy on the bass radiated through the stereo. Intrigued, Spike followed, circling the crowd in a predatory fashion to find a better angle to watch her.
A tall, burly man stepped on his foot before he'd made it even half way around. "Hey watch it!" the man barked, eyes listing thoughtfully over the bleach-blond vampire. "Oh, you look familiar. Do I know you from somewhere?"
Spike took in the man's solid olive-green attire, compact muscles, and ugly crew cut. Initiative commando for sure. Maybe coming to the college party hadn't been such a good idea after all. He made an attempt to speak with a more American accent, "Uh, think we're in the same class, the early one on Tuesdays. Introduction to… Combat Formation." That sounded like a class a commando would take, right?
The man narrowed his eyes and leaned in close enough to Spike that he wondered if drunkenness was possible from inhaling alcohol fumes. "Haven't made a morning class since the beginning of the semester… did we have any homework?"
Spike grinned in relief. Leave it to the Initiative to spend all their money on equipment and their high tech facility, and have none left over to hire personnel that had any brain activity. Though it was never the wisest course of action, Spike was itching to mess with the guy.
"No, but next class is one of those away classes," he said, giving in to temptation.
"Field trip?" the man asked.
"Yeah, field trip. To… that awful place… the one that's really far from here."
"Oh, tell me it's not the Plagiarus nest in Sacramento… "
"That's it, the nest. Next class. Attendance counts for the whole grade."
The commando nodded and clapped him on the arm, "Thanks man, I owe you one."
"Don't mention it," Spike purred, and continued moving around the impromptu dance floor until he could see the top of Charlie's head in the crowd.
It had started innocently enough, the girl's arms in the air, and her hips swaying back and forth. She was graceful and lithe, and he enjoyed watching her move. His enjoyment only lasted a few minutes however, as she started grinding up against the first poncey college boy that began to dance with her, running her hands down his arms in a way that raised Spike's hackles. He decided to vacate to the next room when he accidently crushed the glass he'd been holding.
The living room wasn't much of an improvement.
"What's wrong Spike, girlfriend doesn't wanna do the Dance of the Dead?" Xander laughed, pulling a soda out of a cooler, and popping the tab in the most annoying way possible.
"Sod off, Harris," he growled, "or I'll tell everyone that your mum still calls you Pumpkin Doodle."
"Hey! You promised you wouldn't say anything!"
"Evil, remember?" Spike muttered irritably, lighting up a cigarette and shoving his way through the masses of people onto the empty porch where he could smoke in peace. He leaned against the railing and watched the tendrils of smoke curl out of his cigarette, and wondered why he was even at the party to begin with. Was it because he was actually trying to help Buffy and the Scoobies or because he wanted to get Charlie out of the melancholy lifestyle she seemed to have acquired? Either way, he wasn't pleased with the implications.
His quiet reflection only lasted a few minutes before Charlie located him.
"Who'sa party life now, vamp?" she said with a grin. Her cheeks were flushed and she was clutching a fresh cup of beer. "Now you look like cancelled Chris. Christmas," she said, holding on to the railing to steady herself.
"Think you've had enough, pet," he said, crushing the butt of his spent cigarette against the porch post. "Why don't you pass the drink over, and we'll see about gettin' you home."
"No! This is what youdo at parties. Drank. Drink, get trashed man," she giggled, "And that Trevor, Hank… Jerry? He said I waspretty."
"Sure he did, Charlie Girl," Spike murmured darkly, "Any bloke with eyes could see that."
She stopped giggling, and tilted her head at him, a tiny crease forming between her brows, "You don't-"
BANG!
The entire porch seemed to explode into a tornado of wood chips and beams, and both Spike and Charlie went catapulting into the side of the house, landing none so gracefully in a heap by the door. Three large scaly-faced demons launched themselves past the steps and landed near Spike's feet, their red eyes glowing with malice.
Spike extricated himself from underneath Charlie's legs, relieved to see that her eyes were fluttering open, and there didn't seem to be any blood. Spike turned his attention back to the demons, "Not that I don't 'preciate a good entrance mates, but you won't get invited back if you take the whole house down before you've even rung the bell."
"WE WILL KILL YOU AND MAKE A NECKLACE OF YOUR FINGER BONES!" one of them roared.
The door swung open by Spike's head and Buffy stepped outside, "Guys, did you even read the last issue of Cosmo? Bone jewelry is sooo last year," she chided, "and I don't think it would look good with your complexion anyway."
All three demons bellowed at the same time and Buffy wasted no time diving fluidly into an attack, with Riley right behind her. Spike helped Charlie stand and handed her off to Tara and Willow, who were standing by the door watching the mayhem. He could hear Anya and Xander through the hysteria that was emanating from the house, yelling to get everyone out and away from the battle. He tested his limbs. No cuts or breaks, just some bruises. Nothing a little brawl couldn't fix.
He shifted into vamp mode, his face changing from its human mask to its demonic visage. And then he grinned and jumped in beside the Slayer and commando, punching, tearing, kicking every scaly limb he came into contact with. Buffy and Riley made quick work of one of them, impaling it with a broken beam from the house.
Spike felt two rock-solid arms slip around his neck as he kept half an eye on the death throes of the skewered demon. Looked like a bloody shishkabob. As he tried to loosen the tightening vise around his neck, he mentally chastised himself for being so unfocused.
He headbutted it, and it released him, clutching at its head and letting out a ear-piercing howl of pain. Taking the opportunity, Spike spun around ducking into a seamless roll and landing on his feet behind the creature. It elbowed him powerfully in the stomach, and Spike felt the sharp pain radiate up his side. Definitely broke a rib or two.
Pissed off and more than ready to kill something, Spike grabbed its head and twisted it with a sickening crunch. The beast dropped into a weighty heap in front of him, and he launched a massive kick into its belly, just to make sure it was really down. It didn't move.
Buffy was still fighting the last demon, and it wasn't tiring out quickly. It swept a massive arm through the air, narrowly missing Buffy's face. She went flying to the ground, throwing herself back into a defensive crouch position at the last second and whaling on its midsection. The demon tried to grab her, but she was too fast, kicking its leg out from underneath it and bringing it to its knees.
Riley moved to help, but she shot him a warning glance, then punched the demon right through the throat. Her arm went right through to the other side, blue slime trickling down her arm as the demon collapsed.
"And to that I say ewwwww," she whined as tried to wipe the viscous fluid off on the grass. She stood up and surveyed the corpses lying in the yard, "I don't know what these were or if there's more of them coming, but I don't want the rest of the group here if they do."
"I'll radio my boys in, but maybe you should stick around until they get here," Riley said, pulling out some strange electronic contraption and moving it over the surface of the demon bodies. The device made a series of beeps and clicks, and Riley's mouth drew into a tight line.
"Yeah, sounds like a plan," Buffy said, directing a questioning gaze at Spike.
"Don't look at me, I'm not stickin' around for Captain Cardboard's Merry Men to show up," he said, changing back into his human form and dusting a bit of grime off his coat as he walked away, "Gotta say it though, my kinda party, Slayer."
The inside of the house was deserted, except for Willow and Tara, who had managed to get Charlie seated in a kitchen chair. Tara was holding a bag of ice to the back of her shoulder, and Willow was on the phone, talking in hushed tones, presumably to Giles.
Spike entered the kitchen and squatted down next to Charlie, "Party's over pet, time to fly."
"My head hurts. And my shoulder hurts."
"No surprise there. Let's get you home," he said, and helped her stand. She wobbled on her feet and clutched at his arm, the heat from her fingers burning into his skin as she tightened her grip.
"I ah- I think-" she mumbled, then sat back down in the chair.
"Spike, we'll take her home," Willow said, putting down the phone receiver, "You should probably go take care of the-" she pointed to his head, and Spike realized he was bleeding from a cut on his forehead.
He wiped at it with his palm and shook his head, "Buffy wants you both gone now, and kitten here hasn't been out of the cups long enough to make it past the coat closet. So unless you and Glinda feel like waitin' it out to see if Finger Bones has any more kin stoppin' by, I suggest I be takin' her."
"It'sokay. He won't bite. Me. He just eats all the crackers," Charlie reassured the girls.
"'Nuff talkin' pet," Spike said, as he lifted her into his arms and began to carry her out. Her hands shifted around his neck and her face nestled into his chest. His ribs didn't even protest.
She was so warm that he felt he was holding the blazing sun itself to his body, and he wondered if she might burn right through him if he held her for too long. She was quiet for a few minutes as he began walking away from the campus, and he thought she might have fallen asleep until she began to mumble into his shirt.
"You smell like you."
He snorted, "That a nicety or an insult? Sounded about the same."
"Nice. Like smoke. Smokier. Smokey-ish. And your coat." She unclasped her arm from around his neck and he startled when he felt her fingertips graze his cheekbone. "Beautiful," she whispered as she looked up at him, and he almost dropped her.
"Bloody hell, you don't hold your liquor well, do you pet? Gonna stake me in the mornin' if you remember this."
He tried to maneuver her arm back to where it was, but she yelped in pain and a reverberating shock of electricity spasmed in his brain, almost bringing him to his knees. He yelled out a colorful string of agony-induced expletives.
"New plan, Charlie Girl," he said breathlessly, despite oxygen being nonessential to him. "Detour to Spike's crypt. Gonna tie that bloody arm to your side and it's not gonna move until you're back in your bed with your blankets tucked under your chin."