A/N: Chapter 2! Thanks for all your feedback. I'm toying with several ideas right now, but I do know this: you readers are in for a long ride :O)



Anya woke up the next morning surprisingly sans the pounding headache that usually accompanied her morning-after low. She actually felt kind of refreshed; and it was nice to wake up somewhere other than the Motel 6 she'd stayed in before returing to Sunnydale.

She guessed by the dim light being filtered through the crypt windows that it was near eight o'clock and time for her to get up and get going. The Magic Box needed to be opened and then it would be business as usual.

Sort of.

Anya sat up and stretched, letting the warm blankets fall away from her body. She'd slept in one of Spike's token black t-shirts, having nothing else to wear and realizing that she'd be forced to wear the same outfit until she could get to the apartment to pick up her suitcase. Always the professional business woman, she didn't want to make her appearance anymore beat up than she knew it already would be.

'And I still smell like alcohol,' she thought disgustedly, sliding off the bier. 'I am in desperate need of a shower.'

She stood for a second, contemplating her options, before tiptoeing over to Spike, who was still sprawled out over the chair and ottoman. He was dead asleep and wearing nothing but his pair of black jeans, which rode low and exposed his sexily chisled torso. 'God,' she thought. 'I should have taken off his shirt last night when... no. No, no off-topic thoughts. Think shower. Shower.'

"Spike?" she whispered, tapping him on the shoulder.
He stirred a little, arching his back like a cat and letting out a soft groan.
Anya supressed a smile at his show of masculine grace. "Spike," she whispered again, this time shaking him.
His eyes fluttered open at her persistance. "Morning, Demon Girl," he said sleepily, giving her a teasing grin.
"Morning, Fang Boy," she shot back, returning his gentle smirk. "I have a question."
"What's that, pet?" he asked, sitting up and stretching out his arms.
"Do you have a shower? I have to be to the Magic Box in a little while and I still smell like JD and sweat."
He thought a moment. "Yeah, actually I do. Hasn't been used in a while though, so I'm not sure if the it'll still work. And it's nothing fancy, just a pipe in the wall and a hole in the ground. It's in the lower part. Want me to show you?"
She nodded. "Yes, please."
"All right." Spike stood up and stretched again, then turned to Anya and motioned for her to follow him.

"So, how'd you sleep then, luv?" he asked as he helped her down the ladder to the lowest level of his crypt.
"Very well," she replied. "And for some reason I'm not all sick from the drinking we did last night. How about you? Hung over much?"
Spike shook his head. "Actually no, not at all. That's an advantage of being dead-- much easier to sleep off the effects of drunkeness."
"That's lucky," she said. "I guess that's what-- oh my God!" Anya interrupted herself as she the state of ruin the bottom floor was in registered with her. "What happened here?"
Spike shook his head. "Don't really feel like getting into it right now," he told her. "But let's just say it involved Captain Cardboard finding Buffy and I together, some demon eggs, and a hand grenade."
Anya raised an eyebrow, surveying the extensive damage. "How the hell did the shower survive?"
Spike let out a laugh, shrugging. "I guess it was just lucky." He jerked his head toward the back of the crypt. "Come on, it's over there."

They walked to the farthest corner of the crypt, picking their way through the debris, and stopped at a mildew-encrusted sheet that hung stiffly on several rusty hooks. Spike pulled it aside to reveal a spigot and showerhead mounted about six feet up, and a bar of deteriorating soap with hair growing out of it on a stone ledge jutting out from the corner. The entire wall was covered in a slimy green fungus which smelled oddly like rotting watermelons and chlorine.

"This smells like rotting watermelons and chlorine," Anya said, wrinkling her nose.
Spike looked at his shower in amused disgust. "Yeah, guess I let my home maintenance skills slip a little, huh?"
"A *little*?" she retorted sarcastically. "I'm getting ringworm just *looking* at it."
He laughed, shaking his head. "Sorry, sweetheart. Looks like you'll have to go elsewhere if you want to freshen up."
Anya sighed. "And it looks like *you'll* have to think about fixing the shower if I'm going to be staying with you."
He gave her a grin. "Guess so..."


TBC...

Sorry to cut it off in such an awkward place :O/ . I'll update as soon as I can, I originally planned for this chapter to be longer but I wanted to get something up before people lost interest. You know how that goes. :O)