Nights were probably the worst.

During the day he had Dawn and the House to concentrate on. When he wasn't doing that he searched for a job. Which was stupid because he had a job. One that didn't pay and he couldn't leave. He had to find a way to afford the roof over their head after all. The Scoobies would come over occasionally but unlike last summer Spike had lots of gown-up things to do. Willow and Tara were doing summer classes to make up for what they had missed at college during the whole brain-sucked mess.

At night, after Dawn went to bed, he was alone. He left to patrol but since it was summer, it was dead and not in the way he liked. A lot of the demonic community had booked out of town in the run up to Glory's big world-ending show. It would take a month or two for things to get back to normal.

Not to mention that everywhere he went reminded him of her. They'd fought each other in that street and together in the next. He'd remember her smirking at him after saying something that would make him seethe. He'd remember some pearl of wisdom she had imparted on him, some ridiculous pun or snarky comment made with a flick of her hair.

He patrolled her graveyard every night. He remembered her saying Restfield was a devil's playground after all.

"It's why I like it." And she'd smiled and raised her eyebrows at him.

He'd look at the grave stone he got her. Sometimes from afar, when he wasn't strong enough to get any closer. Sometimes he'd kneel down beside her plot and tell her what was happening. How sorry he was.

When the sun began to rise he would head home.

Then Spike would lay down and wait for the nightmares to come.

Some nights he was quicker, smarter. He would make it up there before Dawn got cut. Other times it was him that jumped in her place. Every night he saved her. And Dawn's words would echo in his head. He could imagine the words in her voice so clear he almost believed he'd heard them.

"I gotta Dawn! If I don't your brother will. You need him more than me. The world needs him. Do something for me? Tell him... Tell him I love him. Will you do that for me, Bit?"

"You live. For me."

And he'd wake up with tears streaming down his face.

Spike wondered where she was. He hoped against hope that she wasn't in hell somewhere, not after what she did. Mostly he didn't let himself think about it because then he could see her screaming out in pain. Calling for him.

Sixty-four days she had been gone.

Sixty-four days of guilt and grief. Because something had changed between them before she died. She had changed. She had fought by his side to protect Dawn.

And it hurt more than sending Dru to hell. It shouldn't be possible but it was.

Maybe because even though it had hurt, it had been the right thing to send Dru to hell? This didn't feel right. It didn't feel just.

Her things were in his basement. They'd boxed up her clothes and books, thrown out the blood, ignoring the human packet hidden at the back and put it all in his mum's SUV, something he'd sold soon after. Dawn had taken her diaries up to her room. Everything else had stayed in the boxes.

He'd been surprised to find a selection of poetry books. It seemed to be another passion they'd shared. It was strange how much he was learning about her now she was gone. Dawn was learning about her aswell, reading her diaries. Spike had yet to open one.

He was hesitant. She had told Dawn she loved him. But what if she didn't know until the very end? What if the pages were filled with hate for him? He knew those last couple days wouldn't be in there. She hadn't been to her crypt since he'd asked her to help him get out of town. Did it make him a coward?

Spike hadn't seen the gang in a few weeks but Xander had called to invite him and Dawn round his house on Saturday. He wasn't sure he was in the right mood but agreed because of the slight begging tone in his best friend's voice. Dawn seemed excited, at least. Which was good because Dawn was grieving her loss as much as he was.

When they arrived with a bottle of coke and three big bags of Cheetos, the door was answered by an ecstatic looking Anya. She motioned them over the threshold like any clever Sunnydale resident.

"It's so good to see you!" She greeted with a huge smile, then over her shoulder. "Everyone's here! Can we tell them?"

Dawn rushed over to Willow and Tara and gave them a big hug. Giles sat on the sofa. Xander was laughing and Anya snuggled herself under his arm.

"Go on." He smiled at her indulgently.

"We're engaged!" Anya showed everyone the ring.

The girls clamoured round to see the ring and Giles got up to give Xander a hand shake.

"Congratulations." He had told Xander giving him a smack on the arm.

"Thanks." He grinned.

It was a nice night all in all. There were no demon party crashers, mystical artefacts or rouge spells. He had to guess that this was because it was Xander and Anya's party and not his own. It was probably the most normal party the Scoobies had ever had. But there was also no snarky vampire in the corner. Her absence was sometimes as loud as her presence had ever been.

God he missed her.

He left Restfield for last that night and after a sweep he walked up to her grave.

"Me again." He told the grey cold rock. "Xander and Anya got engaged. There'll be wedding bells before you know it."

Spike sank to his knees and swept his fingers through the grass. It was hard, trying to find the right words to say. What could he say to the cold lifeless stone that represented her so poorly. She had been passionate and fierce and...loyal. Because she had, even soulless, she had been loyal. First to Angelus before he threw her aside and then to Dawn, and slowly, he thought, him. She had died so that they might live. An act that could not be framed as anything but selfless.

"Really missed you today. Felt like you were missing again. Like you might burst through a door any second... The party went well. No arm in a box or sexually repressed ghosts... You were at that party, weren't you? If only it had been me and you and not Sam. Maybe that would have given us the kick in the head we needed...Or it probably would have made everything awkward and left us avoiding each other, huh? Either way, you were right about her from the beginning. Soldier girl was no good for me."

He couldn't get over the thought that he'd wasted so much time. He thought he'd learnt that it could all be over any minute when he died but it seemed like he'd forgotten that somewhere along the way.

"I think about how I treated you a lot; how much time I wasted. You'd think I'd have realised by now. I'm on borrowed time as it is." Spike sighed, running a hand over the letters of her name.

Spike let the tears fall but never let his guard down. He was all too aware he was outside, that he came here regularly. That this place would be excellent for an ambush.

"Miss you, luv." He pushed himself up, otherwise he's still be here at sunrise, again.

He walked home with heavy feet and a heavy heart. It was still dark when he reached his house. He fished his keys out of his pocket and let himself in. As he put a foot on the bottom stair, something about how the house was lit reminded him of their last night. The way she'd followed him. Her words when he'd made her promise to look after Dawn. That look on her face. That undecipherable look. Almost like he'd given her something precious. And then it had been gone and all his thoughts had shrank down to Dawn and nothing else.

He shook his head and went round checking everything was locked up. Only then did he let his body relax and he hung his duster up. Spike sunk into the sofa and rested his head on the back of the chair. It had been a long day. A long day that followed lots of long days. He felt...worn.

He woke up screaming.

"Buffy!" he sat up looking around wildly, convinced in that instant that he might actually find her there, somewhere.

Adrenaline rushed through his system and his heart thumped double time in his chest. His breathing was ragged. Sunlight trickled through the curtains. In the dawn light he saw his sister watching him worriedly.

"Dawn." He rasped, trying the get his breathing to slow. When she didn't answer he tried to reassure her. "I'm fine. Go back to bed."

"No you're not." She hugged herself. "It should have been me."

And she burst into tears. Spike leant forwards, pulling her arm until he had her against him, his arms wrapped around her body.

"No. She did it, so we wouldn't have to." It was what he'd been telling himself.

"But it's my fault. No one would have had to jump if not for me."

He shushed her. "No. Glory and the monks and the hell gods that put Glory here. It's their fault. You didn't ask for any of this."

After a while she quieted down. They sat on the sofa with his arms wrapped around her, occasionally stroking her hair like their mother used to do, until the sun was up proper. There was no point going back to bed- well, for Dawn to go back to bed. Spike hadn't made it and now it didn't look like he would. It didn't matter.

He got up and made Dawn and himself breakfast before sending her upstairs to get ready for summer school. He made her a lunch to take with her and said goodbye. Then he sat back on the sofa. He had six hours till Dawn got back.

His mind wandered to the diaries again. They had been haunting him for days. This was it. He was going to do it.

Going into Dawn's room he found them on her bookshelf. She'd put them in order and the one she was reading was sitting on her bedside cabinet.

Did he start from the beginning? Did he want to read about her killing the other Slayers? Or other things she'd done that he didn't want to imagine. Spike couldn't find it in himself to deny Dawn but he didn't know if he wanted to remember her like that. He'd known what she was but it would be different, wouldn't it, to read her words as she revelled in killing?

He could just read the last one, couldn't he? Dawn had mentioned that it started when Angelus and her reached Prague. That wasn't long before she arrived. But that would likely have him in it and her desire to kill him. Would that be better or worse than her killing people long dead, who he'd never set eyes on?

Eventually he picked up the first one. He took it back down stairs and sat on the sofa. The cover was slightly battered and the pages had gone wavy with age. Dawn had mentioned that the first four diaries had been re-written. He supposed they started to fall apart. He supposed Dawn had got her avid diary keeping from her, since he'd never had an interest.

Spike opened the book and took in her handwriting. It wasn't something he thought he had ever seen before. Her handwriting was neat and loopy. He tried to imagine the lessons she must have been taught growing up so long ago. Had she suffered the under the cane until her handwriting was perfect?

He'd never know. There were only a few traces of her human life. There was the locket from the jewellery box and the pictures held inside. A kind looking woman with curly blonde hair and a stern man with a waxed moustache. He could see Buffy in them, even with the fading. A jewellery box that Spike had wondered at maybe being a family heirloom. It was too old to have been new even in her day. Did American Heiresses have family heirlooms? There was no diaries from before her turning.

Spike took a breath and turned the page.

It didn't feel long before he closed the book again. But it had taken four hours for him to consume three years of her life. He learnt she'd always hated America and had found men's clothing freeing. He learnt of the many awful things his once beloved Drusilla had done to her and how it had only strengthened her. He read about her devotion to her Sire.

She wrote very little of killing humans. The battles she wrote about were against demons. It seemed they were a worthy enemy, a challenge. The first mention of The Slayer had made his stomach cramp. After that she was clearly tracking them. Sometimes there were short entries, containing only a rumour about the Slayer and nothing else.

Spike couldn't help but feel as though she had seemed more herself than he was expecting. Fledges were often reckless and lacked control. But not her. He thought maybe they had all put a little too much credit in the chip. Maybe alot of the 'behaviour modification' had just been her. How well had he known her before that anyway?

He returned the diary to it's rightful place on Dawn's shelf. Spike hesitated in picking up the next one. Should he leave it for tomorrow? He didn't want to be a blubbering mess when Dawn got home. He knew his eyes were already red but he'd managed not to cry just yet. Not properly at least.

It was then that the door downstairs opened and Xander called through the house.

"Hey, it's me. Anyone here?"

Spike sighed and left Dawn's room. He checked his face in her mirror and wiped his face on his sleeve before heading downstairs. He hadn't seen Xander since his engagement party but he was a welcome distraction.

"Hey." He mustered up what he hoped was believable smile.

Xander's worried frown told him it wasn't.

"You alright? Nothing I need to slay, I hope." Spike turned away and headed for the kitchen.

"No, nothing like that. I just thought I'd come see how you're doing." Xander let out a weak laugh.

"I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?" He answered as he stuck his head in the fridge.

Xander had probably hated her most of all. She'd always antagonise him and he'd do the same back. He couldn't get over the way they had all just stood there to watch her burn. Even though they were his friends and she had already been gone, he couldn't forgive them. As much as he couldn't forgive himself.

"Spike," Xander continued. "We all know you took Buffy's death pretty hard..."

Spike tried hard not to wince at her name but he didn't think he succeeded. He closed the fridge and turned to his friend. Xander was looking at him as though he didn't understand. And maybe he didn't. Maybe he couldn't. Not after everything they went through because of Dru.

"I'm fine, Xan." Spike paused to wonder the truth of that statement. "Coping anyway."

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Willow waited at the coffee shop. She'd mentioned to Tara that she was meeting Xander after class but she hadn't voiced her worries to her girlfriend. Tara was only really getting back on her feet and with summer classes, Willow didn't want to add to her stress.

And Willow was stressed. Well, worried. Spike had been so closed off since the last apocalypse. They hadn't had a Scooby get-together in weeks and almost every time they had invited him out with them Spike had refused. He'd been so quiet at the engagement party, hardly saying two words to anyone.

After the party Tara had said that now he had time to breath, he was finally grieving. Not only Buffy but his mother aswell.

Willow wasn't really sure what happened between the two of them at the end there. The way he'd run, leaving Dawn behind, to pull her body out of the sunlight. The tears he'd shed at the funeral he held for her.

Willow thought it had all started with the torture Buffy had gone through for Dawn. The vampire had been beaten up worse than Willow had ever seen her. All without saying a word about who the key really was. Xander had been in practical hysterics saying how he knew Buffy had given them up. But she hadn't and the truth spell proved it. It still smarted slightly that she hadn't been involved in that. Why they didn't ask her to do it instead of Giles she'd never know.

Willow sipped her latte scanning the crowd for Xander's familiar face. Eventually he bobbed into view and she waved him over.

"How was he?" She asked immediately.

Between them they'd decided that Xander would go see him alone so Spike didn't feel like they were checking up on him.

"I don't know Wills. He's so..." Xander grasped at the air for the word. "I think he'd been crying when I got there."

At first Willow hadn't questioned that Spike would snap out of it and everything would go back to normal. He'd stop crying and start going out with them again and they'd forget all about Buffy. But the more time passed the more obvious it was getting that Spike had really felt for her at the end. That he had actually cared for the vampire.

Dawn was only slightly better as far as Willow could tell. Dawn had told Tara about finding Buffy's diaries. Tara had told Willow how excited the girl had been to find something in common with her... Her original source. Willow couldn't bring herself to think of Buffy as a mother to Dawn. She just wasn't. Anne was Spike and Dawn's mother. And she wasn't sure how she felt letting Dawnie read those diaries. Spike and Tara might not have had a problem but they didn't know what that vampire had written about.

Willow watched Xander's face flicker between conflicting emotions. He'd hated Buffy more than she ever had. Something had to be done. They needed their Spike back.

"I just don't know what to do for him, Will."

Willow didn't know either. She'd tried looking for spell to make someone feel better when Oz had left. That's how she'd stumbled upon the will-be-done spell. But she couldn't risk doing that again.

"Almost wish we could bring her back. As much as I hate to say it, that'd probably put a smile on his face." Xander chuckled.

Willow couldn't help but think, why couldn't she?