TITLE:
Darkest Before Dawn #14 "waiting"
AUTHOR:
Nmissi
PART: 14/?
DISCLAIMER: I own Nothing and No one. Especially not Spike. If I did,
what makes you think I'd share him with you?
DISTRIBUTION: Anybody, just credit me and let me know where it's
going.
Feedback: Please. Nmissi@aol.com
SUMMARY: The way the world would work if I wrote the Buffyverse.
The muted rose walls and comfortable furniture were a thin façade; underneath, sharp smells of disinfectant and the hum of machinery reminded everyone present that this was in fact a hospital.
Buffy and Angel stood together by the window, silently. Cordelia sat alongside Wesley with her head on his shoulder; she had long since dozed off.
Spike paced the length of the room, back and forth between the windows.
"She'll be alright, Buffy. They'll get the bullet out and she'll be just fine."
Angel gave her his warmest smile and a reassuring squeeze. Spike glared at him, angry.
How dare he put false hope in her heart? The nibblet had a bullet imbedded in her spine. Even once they got it out, there was a likelihood of complications.
He thought back to his own experience with a wheelchair.
"Please don't let it come to that," he thought.
"I'm gonna go get a smoke," he remarked to no one in particular. Digging through Buffy's purse, he retrieved his cigarettes and left.
Buffy spoke.
"Are you going to be here awhile?"
Angel's wounded expression made her feel bad for having asked.
"Of course."
She tiptoed up to kiss his cheek.
"I'll be back in a minute."
His brow creased with worry, and he tried to stop her.
"Buffy, I don't think"-
She dismissed him with forced cheeriness.
"Be right back."
And she was gone.
He saw her coming through the glass doors at the front of the building, out into the cold towards him. Fear hit him like a punch to the stomach, and he withdrew the fag from between his lips. He hadn't really hoped she'd follow him out here. Or maybe something had happened-
"What is it? The nibblet out of surgery already?"
She shook her head no, reaching for the lit fag in his hand. He passed it to her, and watched her bring it to her lips, pursing them around the filter, drawing the smoke into her mouth.
"Lucky cigarette", he thought, to be between those soft lips.
"No, nothing's changed upstairs."
She was talking about Dawn, but his gut told him there was more to it than that. Nothing had changed- Angel was up there, Angel was the one she loved, and Angel was the one she'd been clinging to every since they got here.
But then what was she doing downstairs with him?
They shared the cigarette in the cool night air, the light from the streetlamp bathing them in a blue haze.
She'd been crying when they got here, silent crying, not the kind that made her gasp and hiccough. Angel had taken her into his big arms, let her bury her face in his massive chest, and comforted her.
Spike had talked to the doctors, talked to the policemen, and filled out the forms.
"Have you called Giles yet?" he asked her between breaths of nicotine.
She shook her head.
"I'm waiting til she's out of surgery. No sense worrying Giles about it yet. He couldn't get here anyway, not til tomorrow."
She was probably right.
"Any news on the other fellow?"
"Not since you left."
They stood in silence, and he lit another fag.
Unspoken feelings hung heavy in the air between them. He was hurt and angry. She resented his pain, resented him imposing it on her at a time like this. They were both terrified for the child upstairs in the operating room.
Yet they didn't discuss any of it.
"You haven't fed yet. Do you need to get something to eat?"
He shook his head at her and Buffy grew worried. She couldn't remember the last time he'd fed.
"Are you hungry? You want to get something to eat?"
She looked back at him, contemplating his question. She'd had little or no appetite since her mother died. That fact manifested itself in her hollow cheeks and ill-fitted clothing.
"Not really."
He considered her for a minute.
"No, you need to eat. C'mon, we'll go get sandwiches and take them upstairs. Cordelia and Wussly might appreciate the thought."
He stubbed out the cigarette and she followed him back into the building.
Upstairs, Angel sat alone in a chair in the waiting room. Wesley and Cordelia slept across from him in the silence.
He thought about them, downstairs, and knew a gnawing hollow antipathy inside. Oh, he was quite sure they weren't DOING anything- not with Dawn lying on an operating table in there. But the fact that she was WITH him, that she had let him-
Angel couldn't even bring himself to think about it without feeling Angelus-like rage stir within. He'd done the right thing; he'd let her go so that she could have a "normal life", one that included marriage and kids, a life with a future.
What she'd done with that sacrifice mocked it. She'd gone into the arms of his childe, she'd bedded a soulless demon.
It made him feel less like the love of her life, and more like just one of her "Type"…How special could he be to her, if she'd gone off with another vampire? It tarnished the sanctity of their entire relationship. It made him think less of her.
And Spike. He wasn't sure how he felt about his childe, anymore, and that scared him badly. There had been a strange sense of comfort in being on the same side again, even if this time they'd both been fighting the good fight. And whatever was going on between his childe and his ex-lover, he didn't doubt Spike's affection for Buffy.
It was evident in the way he looked at her, the way he touched her. Spike was in love with the mortal Buffy Summers, and apparently doted on her mortal baby sister.
And the gentle way he'd cradled that poor child in his arms, her blood staining his clothes- For a minute Angel had loved him again, the way Angelus once loved William. There was beauty in Spike, a darkly sensual amor fati; no matter where he was, or what he was doing, his boy was triumphant. William was beautiful in his suffering, beautiful in his anger, beautiful in his passions. He'd never had that kind of vibrancy in himself, and he missed it. He had missed it for so long. It was hard to face the emotions he'd had as Angelus; they frightened, and sometimes repulsed him. But this had been a year for getting in touch with his darker self. At times, the past was so close to the surface he could almost touch it. Darla had been an unpleasant instance of that- but it was like touching a reflection on the surface of water; his hands hit it and rendered it inscrutable. It was hard for Angel to accept that Angelus had been blessed with some things he as Angel himself lacked. Among those blessings had been his childer. Angel had friends, but he had no family. Occasionally he was just plain lonely. And for a few minutes tonight, he hadn't been. It galled him.
They came back into the waiting room.
"Hello Peaches."
Spike's hands were full with sandwiches, chips. Buffy held a row of cokes along one arm.
She thrust one at him, offering. He gave her an odd look and she pulled her hand back.
"Told you 'e wouldn't eat anything." Spike said.
She ignored him and sat the food onto the table before the couch, atop some magazines.
She sat on the other couch, facing away from the window towards where Cordy and Wesley slept.
The sharp crack of a pop tab was loud in the room, as Spike sucked on a Dr. Pepper.
"Slayer, you need to eat something. You 'aven't had anything to eat since we got here."
She rolled her eyes at him.
"I told you I'm just not hungry, Spike."
He ripped open an egg Salad sandwich and sat down beside her.
"Here. Split it with me."
She sighed and took it, biting off one corner of the triangle.
"Happy? Damn thing tastes like cardboard."
"Yeah, I am. Now finish it."
He worked on his half, and then tore open some Fritos. She made a face at him, and he crunched them loudly.
Angel leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes. It was getting close to morning, and they were all still sitting around in their blood-splattered clothes. A couple nurses had offered them scrubs, but there'd been no takers.
An man in blue scrubs came out into the waiting room.
"Excuse
me…are any of you here with Mr. Gunn?"
Angel's head shot up, eyes
open.
"We are. How is he?"
Cordy and Wesley untangled themselves upon the sofa.
"Can we see him yet?" Cordelia asked.
"He's still asleep. He'll rest for some time yet- Anesthetics work that way," the doctor said, smiling.
" But he should be fine. It'll be a few days before he starts to recover his voice, but he's a very lucky man. Two bullets in the neck, and neither one damaged his spinal cord."
" A nurse was going to bring you some forms…Do any of you know the name of his primary insurer?"
Angel stood up, and stopped Cordelia from rising.
"I'll go take care of this."
He turned to the doctor.
"Can anyone go into the room with him yet?"
"I don't see why not."
"Good. Cordy, I'll take care of the insurance forms- why don't you and Wesley go sit with him until he wakes up?"
He moved close to Cordelia, and dropped his voice.
"It's getting close to sunrise, so"-
She nodded, putting her hand on his arm.
"You go. We'll handle things here. And we'll call you as soon as we know anything."
Her eyes drifted over to Buffy and Spike, eating on the other side of the room.
"Anything. Okay, Angel?"
He nodded and hugged her.
Then he went over to the others.
"The sun is coming up soon, so.."
He let the sentence hang. It was not quite an invitation, but his childe knew it for what it was.
"S'okay, "Dad". I have someplace to sleep."
His tone was suggestively lewd. Angel sucked in dead air and fought not to rise to the bait.
"You go on home, Angel. Here."
She scrounged in that monster purse for a pen and piece of paper.
"This is the number for Anya's cell phone. I've got it with me right now. I'd offer to call you when Dawn get out of surgery but you've changed your number."
He tried to ignore the pointed tone of the comment as he accepted a phone number written on a gum wrapper. Buffy stood up, and embraced him. He squeezed her middle, and kissed the top of her head.
"I love you," he said, his eyes meeting Spike's above her.
"Love you too, Angel," she said. Behind her Spike rolled his eyes and burped loudly.
He let her go, and went to deal with mundane details like primary carriers and co-payments.
Now alone in the waiting room, Spike and Buffy waited.
"Do you think"- she began.
"No." he answered, following her train of thought by the look of horror in her eyes.
"Little bit's tougher than that. She'll pull through, right as rain. Didn't you hear Cordelia? Your baby sister's a Goddess."
His tone was light and reassuring. But his words gave her an idea.
Quickly she was back in her purse, pulling out the cell phone.
He was perplexed by her actions.
"Who're you calling, Slayer?"
She ignored him, her hand over her non-phone ear. She waited to hear the machine pick up.
"Ben? Ben, You better not be working third shift at the hospital tonight... Pick up, Ben. It's Buffy. I need your help. Something…something's happened to Dawn."