"Bills, Laundry, and Discussion."
Part twenty-seven of the
"What Am I?" series.
Rating: R. for the entire
series.
Spoilers: I don't have the
time or the energy to go through and state exactly what spoilers are contained
in my fics just assume that anything that has aired in the US is fair game.
Disclaimers: Joss owns everything
fun. I only borrow it for a while.
Feedback: Let me know what
you think. (ladyduvessa19@icqmail.com)
Entire Series can be found
at: http://www.geocities.com/ladyduvessa19/
He and Buffy had sat at her dining room table for hours trying to figure out her bills. There was the mortgage, the phone bill (which had several call to England that cost a fortune), the electric bill, the gas bill, the bill for her mothers car, which he really didn't know why she was still paying considering she couldn't drive, and then there was the credit card bill. It was amazing how women could charge a whole wardrobe on a credit card knowing full well that they wouldn't be able to pay it off. The hospital bills had already been paid. Buffy had said that's where all the money went. They would have been fine if it weren't for the doctors. He knew that it must have been hard. To pay people who had failed. To have to give money to the hospital when they hadn't saved her mother.
When the bills were all paid Buffy promised Spike that she would pay him back. He tried to explain to her that it wasn't necessary. The money had always just been sitting there. What little money he did spend he won playing pool with the blokes at the Bronze. Or he got it from people like Giles who needed to pay him for information. He regretted that now. Taking money from Giles. He could just see Buffy throwing that in his face later. Her yelling at him for having money and still charging for information. Not that he had charged any of them for information in a long time, but he knew that she didn't forget things easily.
When Buffy finished putting the stamps on the envelopes that had her newly paid bills inside Spike offered to take them to the post office. "I have to go out anyways." He said.
"But it's the middle of the day." She pointed out.
"Yeah well I don't think that people are going to rent an apartment to someone who will only show up in the middle of the night." He said and she gave him a worried look. "I can get there threw the sewers. Won't even have to step outside."
"Going up threw the sewers is a real good way to make a good impression on the apartment renters." She said with a little bit of a laugh.
"You got a better idea?" he questioned.
"Yeah I do." She said smiling. "I'll go for you."
"You'll what?" he asked shocked. First she had bought him blood and now she was going to go and get him a place to live.
"I'll go. I'll put on a sophisticated outfit and get you the apartment."
"What, now you're saying I'm not sophisticated enough to get this apartment." He said putting his arm around her waist.
"I'm saying that people live in that apartment building to get away from people like you." She said running her fingers through his hair.
"Is that so?" he asked moving closer to her.
"Yep." She said and he captured her mouth in a kiss. The kiss wasn't passionate. It wasn't full of heat and desire. It was more of a thank you. It was never spoken. Neither one of them said that words, but their gratitude was there in that kiss.
"Well then I suggest you get going. You are the one who wants me to get a bloody apartment. I'd be happy getting another crypt. My last one was quite posh." He said knowing full well that she didn't want him living in a graveyard anymore.
"I'm going. I'm going." She said walking away from him towards the door. "No boyfriend of mine is going to live in some dirty rat infested whole in the ground."
"Hey it was not rat infested!" he said defending his poor lost home.
She didn't answer him. She just gave him a look that said 'yeah right' and opened the door.
He couldn't follow her because of the sunlight so he just yelled. "Well it wasn't."
"It doesn't matter whether there were rats or not, it was still dirty. And I refuse to roll around in the dirt." She said and then added "Again."
"There was a bed you know." He said and she gave him one last look and slammed the door.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It was painfully quiet after Buffy left. Of course his crypt had been quiet most of the time, but this was different. This was the Summer's household and he had never been inside it without the chatter of females bouncing off the walls. Well except for when he had snuck in to steal things of Buffy's just so he could have something of hers. Weather it had been pictures or articles of clothing. Still that had been different. Back then he had been inside without permission. Now she had left him alone in her house. She had gone out for the day and left him alone. Without any warnings. No 'don't steal anything'. No 'I swear to god if you break anything'. She just left him.
He looked at the clock, saw there was still 45 minutes 'till Passions came on, and decided that maybe he should do laundry. He only had the outfit he had on, black jeans and a black t-shirt. And he had been wearing it for about a day and a half already. It wouldn't be smelling that great in a couple of hours and he wanted to be clean when she came home. He took of his shirt and threw it to the floor. Scratching his head he pondered what he was going to wear while his clothes were being washed. He knew that they wouldn't have any clothes that would fit him so he decided to just forgo the clothes while he washed his. It wasn't like anyone was going to be coming home any time soon. Dawn would be at school until sometime after 3:00 and if Willow happened to get out of classes early it didn't matter, it's not as if he was shy about his body. He shed the rest of his clothing and headed downstairs to where the washer and dryer were.
The last time he had done laundry it hadn't turned out that well, but he thought that this time he could handle it. It helped that Joyce had the washing machine carefully marked with the settings to put it on. He figured she had been trying to get Dawn to help clean clothes. There was even a note. 'Don't put bleach in with the colors. Don't but colors in with the whites. And make sure you read the labels on the detergent before you put it in. Turn the knob to the smiley face sticker and pull it out. –Mom-' He missed her. She was a good woman. He put his clothes in the washing machine and did exactly what was written on the note.
As he headed up the stairs he heard voices. "She said she was going to be here."
"Buffy." Another yelled.
*This is going to be great.* he thought as he continued up the stairs. As he started to turn the corner from the kitchen he tried to think of something clever to say, but decided that a simple hello would be just as good as anything so he turned the corner and said "Hello boys."
Xander and Angel both turned to face him. The second Angel laid eyes on him he turned away and simply greeted him "Spike."
Xander just stood there staring in a state of shock. It was just the reaction Spike had been hoping for. "I must admit, Harris, Anya was a good cover. I didn't think you were this much of a poof." He said moving a little to the right.
"What? No. I wasn't… It's just that…" Xander said turning red and looking away.
"It's ok to look. I'm not ashamed of what I am. I know I'm attractive." Spike said with a grin.
"Put some clothes on." Angel demanded still looking away.
"Well see that's a little hard considering my clothes are a little water logged at the moment."
"Water logged. How did they get that?" Xander asked.
"Wouldn't you like to know." Spike replied leading them to believe that they were something other than in the washing machine. "So what is the nature of this pleasant little visit?"
"We're here to see Buffy." Angel said.
"She's a little bit busy at the moment." Spike said and he could tell that Xander was going threw in his mind what exactly he had been doing before they had shown up. And from the disgusted look on Xander's face he could tell that his thoughts were about he and Buffy in a naked water fight.
"Well we need to talk to her." Xander said.
Spike kept moving. Never standing still. It was so much fun to watch Xander and Angel move their gazes to different directions so as to not see him in his naked glory. "Yeah well I already told you she's busy. How did you get here anyways. Sun's up." He said.
"I have my ways." Angel said and then looked to Xander. "I'll go find her."
"I told you she's busy." Spike said and stepped in front of Angel blocking his way to the stairs.
The door had opened and Buffy stood there asking "Who's busy?"
"He made us think that you were here. Wet and naked doing god knows what." Xander said.
"I did nothing of the sort." Spike said innocently.
"Oh god. Put some clothes on." Buffy said noticing Spike's state of undress.
"Oh come on slayer. It's not like you haven't seen it all before." He said disgusted.
She grabbed his arm and pulled him into the kitchen. "Look my best friend still needs to get used to the fact that we're together. Can you please just, I don't know, try not to make this hard on him."
"I thought red was your best friend?" Spike said.
"Spike." She half whined.
"Oh alright. But my clothes are in the washer."
"Well I'll get you something. There might be something of dad's somewhere." She said.
"Well I suppose that nothing could be as bad as having to wear Xander's clothes." He said remembering the time when he had been forced to do such a thing.
"Just stay here." She said leaving to find him something.
He could hear Xander asking her questions as she tried to get upstairs. "What's he doing here Buffy? He didn't stay here did he??"
"Xander, just wait a minute. I'm gonna try to find some clothes for Spike." She said trying to avoid his question.
She returned to the kitchen with a pair of blue jeans and a t-shirt. "Here." She said handing him the clothes.
He put on the jeans, but they were too big for him. He looked at her and was about to say something when she handed him a belt. He put the belt on and tightened it enough so that the pants would stay up. He unfolded the shirt and read what was on it. 'Red Cross Volunteer.' It said and he threw it to the floor saying "Bugger this."
She looked at him disappointedly, but didn't say anything. She just headed back to where Angel and Xander were and he followed.
"So what is it that you want?" She asked. "Cause I really don't want to hear how you think this is bad for me." She said gesturing between her and Spike.
"We won't tell you how wrong we think it is because we know you already know we don't approve." Angel said.
"Yeah Buff. We just wanted you to know that we didn't do it." Xander said.
"Didn't do what?" She asked.
"We didn't start the fire." Angel said.
"How'd you know about that? You did do it didn't you. Just wanted to come here and make sure Buffy believed that you didn't. Mighty noble of you." Spike said knowing full well that it hadn't been them.
"It was on the news. Fire in the graveyard. They pulled a refrigerator out of the crypt. Police are looking for leads as to who was living there." Xander said very defensively.
"We don't think that it was you." Buffy said. "It was Aurora and Drusilla."
"What?" Angel said.
"Spike had them tied up in his crypt. They probably got loose and started it." Buffy said.
"Have you ever had a normal girlfriend?" Xander asked.
And Buffy reacted with a "Hey!"
"Sorry." Xander said still weirded out by them as a couple.
"Well are you trying to find them?" Angel asked.
"Don't really care to see them again. Especially if they were the ones who burned all my stuff." Spike said.
"Buffy?" Angel asked.
"What you think I want to find them?" she said.
"You can't just leave them alone!" Angel said.
"Why not?" Buffy asked.
"Because Dru is a little south of sanity and Aurora is like a super vampire. And they're after you Buffy." Angel said.
"They're not after me! They're after the slayers in waiting. Aurora wants to put a stop to the slayer because what the council is doing is wrong. They make us demon and they don't even ask! And I'm with her." Buffy yelled.
"Yeah and they're going to stop at the slayers in waiting. And since when are you the type of person who lets other people get killed." Angel yelled back.
"Excuse me. I died to save the world."
"Yeah so did I!" Angel yelled.
"Because I killed you!" She yelled back.
"People. People." Xander said. "We can have a battle of the exes later. Right now we need to be focusing on trying to stop Aurora and Drusilla."
"We're meeting at the Magic Box tonight." Buffy said clearly still mad at Angel.
"Ok, but maybe we should look stuff up before then. You know have a mini research team right here." Xander suggested.
"I've got stuff I need to do." Buffy said leading Angel and Xander to the door.
"But Buffy, we need to figure out exactly what they're doing." Angel said.
"And we will. Tonight." She said opening the door.
Xander walked out the door and Angel stood still. "Sun's up."
Buffy got a blanket and shoved it at him. "Have a nice day." She said pushing him out the door and closing it behind him.
"Well you sure were in a hurry to get rid of them. Did you get my apartment by the way? You sure weren't gone long." He said and she pulled keys out of her pocket.
"You can move in first thing tomorrow." She said.
"Great. So do you think…" He started to say, but she jumped on him kissing him passionately.
"No more talking." She said undoing her fathers borrowed belt buckle.
They fell to the floor and
made love. Screaming each others names.
Part 26 || Part 28