Chapter Sixteen: Don't ever leave me

            As it happened, several neighbours saw the fire and called 911 at the same time.  Dawn arrived home from school just in time to see Glory's remains being zipped into a bag and loaded into the coroner's van.  Her home was a shell.

            She dropped her bag on the lawn and ran.  "What the hell happened?"  She grabbed the nearest fireman and spun him round.  "What happened?  Was there-"

            "Don't know how it started yet," he said.  "You live here?"

            Dawn nodded, shocked tears coming to her eyes.  "Was there - was there anyone in there?"  She flicked a glance at the coroner's van.  Oh God, not another death.  She truly couldn't bear it.

            "Yes," he said, "they've gone to the hospital."

            "Are they - is anyone-" she couldn't say it.  Tears overwhelmed her and she sat down hard on the dirty ground.

            She wasn't sure who called Xander - someone took her cell phone from her, maybe a policeman - but he turned up, held her in his arms like the darling big brother he practically was, and got her into his car.  He didn't say anything on the way to the hospital, except to tell her that he'd called the gallery and Anya's shop and they were all closing down and coming to the hospital.

            "Anya's closing down?" Dawn sniffed in disbelief.

            "Some things are more important than business."

            "Even to Anya?" Dawn asked, making Xander smile.

            They rushed in and were made to wait.  No one could tell them anything.  Anya arrived, then Willow and Tara, and they all hugged Dawn but no one could think of anything to say.  Xander and Anya had done this all before, with Joyce, and it was too awful to bear.

            Eventually an ER doctor came out and asked, "You family?"

            "Of a sort," Xander said.

            "I'm her sister," Dawn gulped.  "Is she-"

            "A little worse for wear, but she'll be fine."

            "And William?  The baby?"

            "Well, there's nothing wrong with his lungs, that's for sure. We had to sedate him just to quieten him down.  He's fine too."

            Dawn slumped with relief.  "Can I see?"

            They were allowed in to see William who was fast asleep, but he wasn't covered in wires and tubes and bandages, so Dawn figured that he must be pretty much okay.

            "Can I see Buffy?"

            The doctor nodded.  "But don't wake her up."

            Dawn stepped into her sister's room, and saw her hooked up to several machines, drips, swarming with tubes like snakes, covered in bandages.  Tears spilled out over Dawn's face.  She curled up on a chair, and waited for her sister to wake up.

            Buffy's eyes felt like they were full of grit.  Her skin burned and her lungs chafed.  She dragged in a breath, and it hurt.

            She forced her eyes open, and everything was a bit bleary.  She was getting a bit tired of waking up in unfamiliar beds with injuries she didn't remember getting.

            "Buffy?" Dawn said.  "You're awake!"

            "Apparently."  She blinked a few times.  "Hospital?"

            Dawn nodded.  "I'm just gonna fetch the doctor," she said, and was gone before Buffy could ask her anything else.  Spike, she thought.  William she was pretty sure would be okay - if they'd found her and got her to the hospital, they'd have found him too, and he'd have been fine that far away from the blaze.  It was Spike she was most worried about.

            But everyone ignored her, the doctors and nurses who swarmed around calling confusing medical things to each other, telling her to flex this, move that, breathe like this, cough like that.  Buffy learnt that she had a dislocated shoulder - vaguely, she remembered something hurting when she'd landed in the back garden - lacerations on her other arm from the bathroom window, her lungs were full of smoke and she had first degree burns on most parts of her body, and a few second degree ones on her shoulder and arm.

            "Could I get some more morphine?" she asked, and that was the only request they listened to.  Eventually, they all swarmed out, just as they'd swarmed in, and Buffy waved frantically at Dawn to stop someone.  "Hey!  Can you even hear me?"

            The last nurse got caught by Dawn, and Buffy said, slowly and clearly, "What about William and Spike?"

            "William - your son?"

            Buffy nodded.

            "He's just fine.  Would you like me to get him?"

            Buffy nodded a little too eagerly, because the woman vanished in a second, before she could ask about her husband.

            "Dawn," she said instead, "do you know what happened to Spike?"

            "Spike?  I haven't seen him.  I called the hotel but they said he hadn't been there since yesterday-"

            "Wait, it's tomorrow?"

            "Interesting philosophical question," said a wonderfully familiar voice, and she looked up to see Xander lurking in the doorway, hands in pockets.  "How ya doing?"

            Buffy shrugged.  "The drugs are good," she said.

            "As I dimly recall."

            She raised her eyebrows.

            "Hospitalisation last year, broken jaw, anyone remember?"

            "Actually, it was the year before," Dawn told him.

            "I stand corrected."  Xander looked Buffy over slightly shyly.  "Sorry I haven't been around much."

            "Sorry I've been a Buffy-shaped shell."

            They gave each other small smiles, and then the nurse came back in, carrying William, who looked cross.  Buffy reached out with her less-restricted arm and awkwardly held him against her, and he looked up and smiled.  Buffy's heart turned over.

            "Be careful, now," the nurse said.

            "I thought you said he was fine?"

            "Oh, he is.  But you're not."

            Buffy made a face.  "I feel fine."

            "Again, drugs," Xander said.

            "And again," Buffy looked up at them all.  "What.  About.  Spike?"

            "I said I'd tried to call him," Dawn said.  "His cell was off-"

            "He was there," Buffy said, starting to panic.  "In the house.  He was there in the house.  You did get him out, right?"  Her voice rose, her words got quicker.  "You got me out, what about Spike?  He was right there, down the hall-"

            The nurse hurried out to see what she could find out, and Dawn went with her.  Buffy clutched at Xander's hand.  "He was right there," she repeated.  "He was trapped, I couldn't get to him.  I tried to get there but I couldn't and then something hit me and I-" she dissolved into tears.  "Xander, where is he?"

            He put his arms around her.  "He'll turn up," he said.  "Probably outside having a smoke."

            "Smoke bad!"

            "Bad choice of words.  I'm sure he's not gone far."

            Buffy looked up at him.  "No, you're not.  You hate Spike, remember?"

            "But I don't think you do."  He wiped her tears away.  "Dawn told me.  I know things have been a little weird lately.  Seems like he was the only one trying to help you.  Can't hate him for that."

            No, Buffy thought, I can't either.

            Dawn came back in.  "She's checking records.  They found someone else in the house."

            Buffy didn't want to ask.  "Alive?"

            "Well, she's not checking morgue records so - oh," she suddenly remembered.  "But there was, er, I had to ask them about it and they, uh... You remember Glory?"

            Buffy narrowed her eyes.  "Been trying to forget."

            "She was there."

            "In my house?"

            "Hey, our house," Dawn corrected sharply.  "Well, our ashy shell, but anyway.  They found her body.  Bits of it.  Had to identify her by her signet ring..."  She gulped, not sure how Buffy would take the news.

            Xander held Buffy's hand.  They waited.

            "Glory's dead?"

            Dawn nodded.

            "In my house?"

            She nodded again.

            "Bits of her?"

            "Like she exploded or something... They're still not sure."

            Buffy looked pale.  "Do they have drugs for queasiness?"

            The nurse came back in.  "What was the name of the man you're looking for?"

            "Spike.  William - uh, Lord Dashwood - no, Lord Spellingdon-"

            "See, she can't remember either, and she's married to him," Dawn said.

            "He's my husband," Buffy said, ignoring her sister.

            "William Dashwood?  We have him."

            "Is he - is he okay?" Buffy asked, frightened to hear the answer.

            The nurse paused.  "He's in Intensive Care.  He was quite badly hurt."

            Buffy clutched at Xander's hand and held Will close.  The tears had come back, but she'd hardly noticed.  "Will he be okay?"

            "He's still unconscious.  We'll know more when he wakes up."

            "When will that be?"

            The nurse's shoulders lifted, then fell gently.  "We can't say.  The sooner the better."

            Buffy whined and bullied and eventually resorted to tears in order to get them to take her to see Spike.  She wasn't allowed in because there was a doctor in with him, but they put her in a wheelchair and took her up to the window on his room.  He looked terrible: burnt and scorched, his hair singed, covered with more tubes than Buffy herself, attached to a respirator.

            "Wait, he can't breathe?"

            "He inhaled a lot of smoke.  It's just to keep his lungs working, get some oxygen pumping round his blood."

            Buffy closed her eyes and tried hard not to cry.  She failed.

            They let her in to see him eventually, told her to talk to him because it might help.  She kept Will with her as much as she was allowed, read to him from baby books, got the newspapers and told Spike what was going on in the world.  She tried not to cry.  She didn't want him to wake up and see her bawling.

            And sometimes, when Will was asleep on her lap, curled up with his (newly washed) teddy bear, looking angelic, she just sat and talked to Spike.  Told him everything about Will: about the birth, about bringing him over to America, taking him to see his grandmother in the cemetery.  About his first steps and baby noises.  About the time he'd eaten a handful of grass and got sick and she'd been terrified it was a dreadful fever, only to be told he'd be fine in a few hours.  About how much he loved his daddy and how alike they were.

            She told him how she'd coped before he came back, how she'd cried, how she'd wished for him and wanted him.  How incredibly grateful she was to him for everything he'd done: the money and the gallery and talking to Dawn and bonding with Will.

            And sometimes she just sobbed, especially when it got late, and the nurse's words rang in her ears.  The sooner the better.

            "Wake up," she half shouted.  "For God's sake.  I just got you back.  You just made me feel okay, you saved me from myself - you keep doing this, Spike, you keep coming back and making me feel like everything's going to be fine, and then you just go away and leave and you're not going to this time!  I won't let you.  It's not fair!"

            He lay there, still.  He was off the respirator now - and that was progress.  He could breathe for himself, which had to be a good thing.

            "Spike, please don't go," Buffy whispered, reaching out and touching his cool hand.  "I need you to be here and love me and love Will.  I love how you love him.  I love you."

            He didn't move.

            "I love you so much," Buffy sniffed, and closed her eyes in an effort to keep the tears in.

            "Can I have that in writing, love?" came a voice, a fabulously familiar, wonderfully warm, delightfully dry voice, and Buffy's eyes flew open.

            "You're awake?"

            His eyebrows flickered.  "Apparently."

            Buffy laughed hoarsely.  "That's just what I said."

            He turned his head a little.  "You're crying."

            "You've been unconscious for a week."

            He looked shocked.  "Bloody hell.  The - there was a fire...?"

            She nodded.  "I tried to get back in but something knocked me out."

            "Are you okay?"  He looked at her arm in its sling.  "What happened?"

            "Had to jump out of the bathroom to get Will out."

            His eyes darted down to the sleeping baby.  "He's all right?"

            "Better than you or me."

            Spike paused.  "Question still stands."

            She laughed again.  "He's fine."

            Spike sighed.  "Bloody hell," he looked down at himself, at the burns and scars and tubes.  "I look like a pile-up on Spaghetti Junction."

            "You look better than you did."

            "I do?  You know, Summers, I'm gonna have to stop telling you I love you.  I always seem to end up in hospital."  A thought occurred to him.  "Is Glory dead?"

            "Dead dead.  They said her gun exploded her."

            "Ha!  Stupid bint."  Another thought.  "Did she shoot me?"

            He looked so outraged that Buffy laughed again.  "Yes.  But they got it out."  She started to wake the sleeping William.  "I should probably go and get a doctor or something."

            "Wait-" Spike held out a hand with a needle inserted in it.  "Buffy.  You aren't still going to divorce me, are you?"

            She nodded.

            He stared.

            Buffy took off her wedding and engagement rings, and handed the latter to Spike.  "You're going to need that," she folded his fingers around it, "for when you get the use of your legs back."

            "You're div - what, what's that about my legs?"

            "Well, one of them.  Third degree burns.  I wouldn't move it too much if I was you."

            She seemed so horribly calm.  Slightly happy, even.  "Is this a joke to you?"

            "No," she said, "no joke.  This marriage never went right from the start.  I want a divorce."

            Speechless, horrified, Spike stared at her some more.

            "And then I want a proposal."

            He blinked.

            "A what?"

            "A proper, down-on-one-knee - but maybe we can waive that clause for now - I-love-you, romantic proposal.  And an engagement party.  And a ceremony with just the people we actually like.  And no title.  I won't be a viscountess even if you pay me."  She gave him a stubborn, so-there look, and Spike suddenly burst out laughing.

            "Summers," he said, "you are going to be the death of me."

Epilogue

            "I can do this," Spike said.  "I've been doing it for bloody years.  I can do it now.  No problem."

            "You want a hand?" Buffy offered.

            "No!  I can manage."

            "Okey dokey."  She watched him.  "You sure?"

            He gave her a murderous look.

            "Fine, whatever."  Trying not to laugh, she stood back and watched her husband very carefully stand up.  And walk.  And stand and grin.

            "See?  I sodding did it!"

            "Well done!  Will only beat you by nine months-" she darted out of the way as he swatted her.

            William came rushing across the lawn and this time it was Spike's turn to flinch out of the way as his son came barrelling towards his still rather painful leg.

            "Watch the leg, kid, watch the-!"

            Buffy grabbed the little boy and hefted him up into her arms.  "Oof, you're heavy.  What did we agree about Daddy's legs?"

            "Ow?" Will suggested.

            "Yep.  'Ow'.  See, do we have a smart kid, or what?"

            "Genius."  Spike looked around the small garden, the trees, the flowers, the back of the house he and Buffy had bought together.  Dawn was living on campus and Willow and Tara's apartment wasn't far away.  They'd decided to sell what was left of the old house and start again - if it worked for marriage, they reasoned, it could work for bricks and mortar.

            Spike's eyes settled on his wheelchair.  He gave it a swift kick with his good leg.  "Poxy sodding thing."

            Buffy let Will down and he ran to his sandbox.  Maybe it was an age thing, but the kid never walked.  He always ran.  "What did it do now?"

            "Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to be stuck in one of those things and never be able to move at all by yourself?"

            Buffy widened her eyes and shook her head.  "Gosh, why, no idea at all.  Must be dreadful to never be able to walk anywhere-"

            "Hey, that was for your own good," he caught her to him, "and besides, you could walk if you wanted to."

            "You never let me!"

            "Can you blame me for being protective?"

            She stuck her chin in the air.  "Yes."

            "Oh, you know you love it," he teased, and Buffy rolled her eyes.  Damn him, he was right.  Again.  "And you know it's gonna get a whole lot worse."

            She groaned.  "We can't have the both of us in wheelchairs.  That would be ridiculous."

            "Hey, I'm never getting back in that thing."

            "Well, you have your crutch-"

            Spike shuddered.  "Ugh."

            Buffy laughed.  "If you fall over and it really hurts, I'm not gonna come a-runnin'."

            Spike pouted.

            "All right, maybe I will."

            "And this time if any of my relatives come round and start arguing-"

            "I can take Darla or Harmony," Buffy protested.  After Glory's rather unglorious death, her mother had left Ethan, and he had died alone in a hospital in England.  They hadn't gone to his funeral, and neither had anyone else.  Spike was officially the earl, but he was considering selling the title.  After all, Buffy and Will were expensive.

            "You are not going to 'take' anyone," he nuzzled her neck.  "Except for me."

            "Just no wrapping me up in cotton wool this time, okay?"

            "Oh go on," he said.  "Please."

            Buffy groaned again as he started kissing her neck.  "I can't believe I let you get me pregnant again!"

                Spike grinned devilishly.  "It's a dirty job," he slid down her shoulder strap, "but someone has to do it..."

A.N.  Oh lala, another fic finished!  Hope y'all enjoyed it.  I know I had fun writing it.  Will there be another sequel? …Well, only time will tell!

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