Title: Soul Searching
Author: Aislin
Season: Takes place after "Grave"
Characters: Mostly Willow and Spike. There may also be some W/S shippage, I'll just have to wait and see how the story plays out
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters; I just amuse myself by playing with them when I'm bored. They belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, and whoever else owns them. Please don't sue me, I have no money.
Feedback: I would love that, thank you. This is my first attempt at a Buffy fic, so please tell me how I do. No major flammage, please. I don't know that I could handle it.
Rating: I'm gonna call it R cuz it deals with some heavy issues and there will be some adult situations.
Authors Note: Ugh, Sorry it took so freaking long for me to get this chapter up. School and homework and stuff kinda took off on me. But, on the plus side, I finally know how this story is going to end, so it won't be too much longer. Next chapter, maybe. In the meantime, read this chapter!
Story Note: Spike is a vampire and can only wander around after sunset. The store where Willow works stays open into the evening. Spike only drops by after the sun has already gone down. Sorry, I don't really put the time of day in my stories too much. But, in case anyone was wondering, Spike is never out during the day in my story.
Willow's feet pounded the sidewalk. All she could think was that she had to get away, far away, from Spike. She had spent the night at Spike's place, in Spike's bed! At least she had woken up fully clothed. But now she needed to get home, and home was on the other side of town. At least this was a small town.
She checked behind her, yet again, to make sure Spike wasn't following her home. She had already checked three times. This time she looked into the sun and couldn't see behind her. The sun! Spike couldn't be following her. Good, she still didn't want him to know where she lived.
She felt so guilty about spending the night at his house. Wait a second, guilty? What was there for her to feel guilty about? They hadn't done anything; at least it hadn't looked like they had done anything. She searched her mind trying to remember exactly what had happened the night before. She remembered crying, there were lots of tears. She had cried until she had fallen asleep exhausted. And she had been in Spike's arms while the tears flowed. She had run to him, not knowing what to do. How had she known where to find him? Oh that's right, he had been outside the restaurant where her and Greg...
Greg! Oh dear Goddess, how was she going to explain running out on him? Why hadn't he come to look for her? Or had he? Had Spike taken her somewhere so Greg wouldn't find them and she hadn't noticed because she had been crying so hard?
Willow ran a hand through her hair in exasperation. She could see her apartment building in the distance. Good, she needed a shower and a change of clothes before she went to work. She was going to be late for work, but she didn't care. There was too much else going on in her life. When had everything gotten so complicated?
Things had been fairly simple back in Sunnydale. See a demon, research demon, kill demon, party. Even after Warren had- Things had been simple. Seek vengeance. Kill Warren. Then that powerful magic that Giles had infected her with. Stop suffering, destroy the world. But when Xander had shown up. When she actually had to think about the recent events in her life. She had run away from the complication and her life had become even more complicated. Had this happened to Buffy? Is that why Buffy had come back? Willow willed herself to stop thinking about this. She would shower and go to work. She would concentrate on work and she would tackle one problem at a time.
Willow breathed in relief. Thinking things through logically always made it easier for her to deal. She could organize her thoughts and only worry about the immediate problems. She pushed Spike as far into the back of her mind as possible and entered her apartment.
~~~~~~~~~~*
She had left. She had just up and left. Two soaps and a talk show since she had left and he could still feel the imprint of her hand on his shoulder. He cursed the sun for not allowing him to follow her. She had been polite enough when she had left, but it had been a somewhat urgent departure. A morning after departure, where the girl isn't quite sure whether she regrets the night before or not.
Willow had nothing to regret. Nothing had happened. She had slept soundly in Spike's bed with him watching her all night. But in the morning she had just left. No one ever walked out on Spike! Well, plenty of girls had walked out on him, but they had never lived for very long. And their deaths had been slow and painful.
That was before Angel left. Before Drusilla was his and his alone. It had been a hundred years since a woman had left Spike's bed and not returned. He was sure Willow would never return to his bed. He couldn't stand the thought of not seeing her anymore.
Spike made up his mind to find her that night. They would go to that coffee shop, the Beanium, and talk. He would make sure she didn't feel guilty. She had nothing to feel guilty about. Spike smacked his head. Now he was feeling guilty for someone else's guilt. Why had he ever gotten his soul back? Oh yeah…
~~~~~~~~~~*
"Buffy, I realize that this is hard on you. Do you think it was any less hard on us when you skipped town?" Xander sat on Buffy's sofa while she paced the room.
"I just want her back. I never should have said those things. I pushed her away Xander, what if she never comes back?"
"She'll come back. You came back." Xander reassured her.
"Yeah, I went to Hell and then came back. I don't want her to have to go to Hell."
"I imagine she's already there." Giles said.
"She's in Hell? We need to get her out!" Buffy exclaimed.
"Not in the literal sense. Emotionally, she's probably going through hell right now, as you would put it. I don't think there's anything we can do to help her at the moment. She just needs time."
"You're probably right, you always are. I just want her back. I hate knowing that she's probably pissed at me."
~~~~~~~~~~*
"So, how'd the date go last night?" Beth asked Willow once the store was free of customers.
"It, uh, well…" Willow kept her eyes directed to the floor.
"Isn't he such a great listener?"
"I told him more than I think I want him to know." Willow admitted.
Beth cornered Willow against some shelves near the back of the store. "What do you mean?"
"There's just too much to deal with right now and I told him almost everything but now I don't feel comfortable. I barely know him and he knows so much about my past."
"Get to know him. I'm sure he's eager for another date."
"I walked out on him." Willow said really fast, still looking at the floor. She tried to push past Beth but the older woman caught her arm and Willow was too drained to put up much of a fight.
"What?" she looked astonished.
"I have to get back to work." Willow said. "Let me get back to work. You're not paying me so you can hear about my life."
"You work hard enough. What happened that made you walk out on Greg?"
Before Willow could respond, the bell above the door rang, signaling someone's entrance. "Look, customer. I have a job to do." Willow walked around the shelves, saw who had just entered the store and immediately turned and walked to the back of the store.
Beth smirked slightly and made her way to the front of the store. "Greg, hi!" Beth stopped short when she saw the blond man. "Sorry, I thought you were someone else." Beth paused to take in the young man in front of her. He wasn't bad looking: lean but muscular, great ass, high cheekbones, scar on one eyebrow. If I were thirty years younger, she thought to herself. "Can I help you?"
"Yeah, I'm looking for Willow."
"And who are you?" Beth asked, wanting to protect the girl, even if she had walked out on one of her dearest friends the previous night.
"The name's Spike."
"What sort of a name is that?" Beth began to interrogate him.
Spike smirked, "A nickname."
"How'd you get it?"
"I used to kill people with railroad spikes." Spike said, partly because he saw no reason in lying to this woman and partly because he wanted to see her reaction.
Beth rolled her eyes. "Funny. How do you know Willow?"
"Oh, we go way back. I've known her since her junior year of high school." Spike smiled.
"How did you meet?" Beth pushed.
"Bloody hell, woman. You want my entire life story or something? You're not gonna get it. Willow was upset last night, real upset. I came by to see how she's doing. Please, tell her I'm here."
"She knows you're here. I'm not sure she wants to see you." Beth began to stand.
"Please. I'm begging you. I need to make sure she's all right."
"I'm fine Spike." Willow appeared from behind a bookshelf where she had listened to most of the conversation once her curiosity pulled her out of the back room. "Please, go away. I don't want to deal with this right now."
Spike stood and walked over to Willow. He placed a hand on her cheek. "You may not want to, but you have to. Just like I have to deal with my soul. If I don't, I'll go insane. Angel never told you, but he was in a worse state than Dru for the first couple decades after he got his soul back."
"It only took him a couple of weeks the second time around." Willow snapped. She didn't want to admit that Spike was right. Spike was right?
"Plus the few hundred years he spent in hell. Willow, you're the only thing keeping me sane right now. You're the only thing I can hold onto in this world. You're the only thing that's real to me anymore. Without even realizing it, you're helping me so much. I want to help you, too. I want to help you anyway I can. Please, let me help you."
Willow took a deep breath to try to control the tears that were threatening to spill over. "Meet me in two hours. Remember that coffee shop you took me to the first time I saw you? Meet me there." Spike said before turning and leaving. Through the din in her head Willow held onto the one thought that she could actually put into words. That move worked so much better with the duster.
From behind the counter, Beth stared at the two of them. Had she just heard that conversation correctly? No wonder Willow had run out, if she had told Greg half of what Beth had just learned. None of it made sense, unless… Beth shook her head. Vampires didn't exist. And that one individual she had heard about in the chat room, Angelus? Bullshit. Nope, vampires, and especially vampires with souls, were just fairytales made up to entertain the masses. Still…
~~~~~~~~~~*
Spike glanced up at the clock. She was supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago. What if she stood him up? No, she was still Willow. Beneath all the hurt and betrayal, she was still Willow and would never stand anyone up. Spike settled back in his chair. She would be there, even if she was a little late.
Willow stood outside the Beanium. What was she doing? She had dallied at the store until Beth had started questioning her about Spike. Not answering a single question, Willow reminded Beth that she had to meet Spike and was already late. Then she had taken the longest route she knew of to get to the small coffee shop. Why was she avoiding Spike? She had nothing to be guilty about. Nothing had happened. With that thought in her mind, Willow entered the Beanium and walked over to the table Spike was sitting at.
"You made it." Spikee smiled.
"Of course I did. What do you want?" Willow asked.
"I already told you. I want to help you."
"There isn't much you can do." Willow said.
"You'd be surprised how much talking can help sometimes."
"Fine, what do you want to talk about?"
"You, of course." Spike responded. "I want to talk about Willow."
"Are you a psychiatrist now?" Willow asked him.
"No. But I play one on TV." Spike smiled.
Willow couldn't hold back the laughter that statement brought forth, but she managed to stop it quickly enough.
"So, you didn't change your name. Buffy changed her name when she went to LA."
"How did you know that? Did Buffy tell you?"
"It was in her diary." Spike replied.
Willow raised an eyebrow. "Honesty? From William the Bloody? Why?"
"If I'm honest, I can expect you to be honest, too. So, why didn't you change your name?"
"Willow is who I am. It's all I've got left of before." Willow replied.
"Before?"
"Before Tara. Before magic. Before Buffy. Back when life was relatively simple and my only worry was whether Xander would ever see me as anything more than a friend." Willow said matter-of-factly.
"You had a crush on Chubs?" Spike's eyes lit up.
"What, you haven't read my diary, too?"
"I respect you too much to ignore your privacy."
"But you don't respect Buffy?" Willow asked.
"That's different. I wanted Buffy and it was the only way I could find out anything about her. No, I guess I didn't really respect her. But she never respected me, either."
"Sure she did." Willow reassured him. "She thought you were a great fighter."
"Yeah. She respected me as a fighter, as an enemy. She didn't respect me when she started to see me as a man. She couldn't, it's against the nature of the slayer."
"Yeah, you're right. But, she should now. I mean, you went and got a soul for her."
"Why are we talking about me? We're supposed to be talking about you. Helping you heal." Spike quickly changed the subject.
Willow sighed. "Okay. Ask me a question. I'll answer it."
"Why didn't you let yourself grieve for her?" Spike jumped right in.
Willow's eyes went wide. "You don't beat around the bush, do you? Okay, honesty, right? Tara was, she was my everything. I didn't think I'd ever be able to stop if I started grieving."
"You'll never reach the end of your grief unless you start, though. It'll just stay there forever."
"Yeah, but it's easier to deal with when it's in the background. Dealing with it face on. Goddess, last night Spike. I honestly didn't think I'd ever stop crying. That's why I didn't start."
"But now you have started." Spike said. "You have to continue if you want it to stop."
"No, I don't. Grieving Oz didn't work. My friends got sick of me. If I grieve Tara, the few friends I have here will get sick of me."
"I won't." Spike looked straight into her eyes.
"You're my friend now?" Willow snapped. Spike looked down. "Oh Spike, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that."
"Yes, you did."
"No, Spike. I'm just mad because you're pushing me to deal with things I'd rather not deal with. And you're right. I hate you being right. And, I don't want to continue this conversation in public. Can we go somewhere else?"
"What?"
"If we keep talking about this, I'm going to start crying again. I hate crying in public. Can we go back to your place or mine?"
Spike smiled at her and stood. "Sure, pet. We can go to your place.
Willow rolled her eyes. Why had she said that? Oh well, too late now. She took Spike's arm and led the way back to her apartment.
A/N: Okay, the next chapter will be the last and I promise to have it up soon. Please go review this one, now!