Vampires

I pity the vampire that runs into us tonight. Buffy is barely hanging in there emotionally, I can almost taste the tension rolling off of her and Spike and I are both in overprotective mode, ready to take out anything that causes her to even break a nail. She may need to do this but I don't have to be happy about it. Simply put I'm not sure she's ready but I can't hold her back. The good news is that I doubt anything but the youngest of fledges is going to be stupid enough to confront us and we are most definitely not going to go looking for trouble. There will be a quick sweep across a couple of cemeteries and then we are taking her home, whether she likes it or not. This is her first night out here in a very long time and we are playing it safe. This is about seeing how she handles herself, not about saving the world and both Spike and I know it.

Over the past few months I've grudgingly developed a new respect for the vampire. He's been here and he's been helpful... he's also been the only one I could turn to for the most part and he never let me down. I have to admit that at first I had my doubts about him. I had a hard time seeing him as anything but a demon but that has changed and I'm not sure that's a good thing. Yes, he's a demon but as I got to know him I also got to see glimpses of the man he once was and I'm not sure that seeing vampires as anything but demons is a good thing in this line of work. For the time being I've settled for telling myself that Spike is different in that regard --and there was ample evidence to support that theory even before he got his chip-- but the truth is that I don't know whether or not that's really true.

We've worked together to help Buffy heal and more than once he's kept me from despairing. Whenever I feared that Buffy might be slipping, or simply when I felt she wasn't getting better fast enough he reminded me of just how far she had come. He took over patrolling when I asked him to and he took over Dawn's care without even being asked... or rather he never relinquished that role, he had been taking care of her while Buffy was dead too. I hate to say it but I think his experience in caring for Drucilla has come in handy. Come to think of it that seems to be the common theme throughout Spike's unlife... caring. I would have expected it to be blood and mayhem but it isn't, not really. Sure, he was part of the Scourge of Europe but in spite of his viciousness he was just the tag along, caring for Dru, doing her bidding.

I think Dru was the one thing from his background I had always failed to consider. For over a century he cared for her and even though Buffy miraculously managed to hold on to this side of sanity through out her ordeal, Spike's experience in dealing with his insane Sire has been invaluable. He provided me with a familiar reference, something I could compare Buffy's progress to. Angel's experiences in Hell may have provided us with some valuable insight as to how Hell operated but I now realize it didn't tell us much about how to help her. I think it took me this long to recognize just how valuable Spike's input really was because it was always mixed with Angel's. Spike was our mediator as I stayed close to Buffy and Angel couldn't come near her, but Spike also managed to add his own advice without me noticing it.

I hate to think that I've been behaving like Xander but in a sense I have. A few days ago Xander insisted on going to the Bronze because Spike said he didn't think it was a good idea and the results were disastrous. I may be able to take comfort in the knowledge that I never did anything as stupid as that --that I never dismissed the advice because of the messenger-- but I have to admit that I've been less than willing to listen to what those around me had to say. Spike has been helping as much as he could without me knowing about it and in their own way Willow and Tara have been doing the same thing all along. I took over Buffy's care in part because she is my slayer and I love her, in part because it felt natural, and maybe even part of it was because of the way she clung to me for reassurance. Even though I've known better almost from the start, in my mind her clinging to me remained a reassuring sign of her trust in me rather than the sign of terror it truly was... at least in the beginning. I believe that by now she's finally growing to trust me again.

The thing is that in taking over Buffy's care I denied what others had to contribute... and that includes the contribution of the 'Slayer of Slayers' who now walks the streets of Sunnydale, willingly watching a slayer's back. We both know that tonight is going to be hard on Buffy but we also know we need to see how she handles herself, so we watch and we wait while we both do our best to keep her safe.