Chapter Twelve: With All My Soul. Ghosts of two dead lovers haunt the halls of Sunnydale High School, while Spike and Xander battle it out over the lack of Spike's soul.

Notes: This turned out to center much, much more on the Buffy-Xander friendship than I'd meant for it to. But I enjoyed writing it, so I don't care. And there's plenty of Spander stuff later.

Notes the Second: Obviously, this isn't on hiatus anymore, but I will be posting the final eight chapters very, very slowly, as I have about a million other projects I'm working on. But this chapter, which, except for one and a half pages, was written all in one sitting, is for everyone who reviewed and told me that they wanted more. Smooches to all of you.

It was just another night at the Shady Rest Cemetery in Sunnydale, California. It was dark, and peaceful, and the quiet was broken only by the sound of two teenage voices.

"So your mom still isn't dealing well with the whole Slayer thing?"

"It's been two weeks! She finally accepted that I am the Slayer, and that I can't get away from that, but she gives me this look every time I leave the house at night. I tried going out the window like I used to, but she came up to my room when I was out and freaked out about that when I got home. She tries to be with me every moment of the day, and looks horribly hurt when I'm not interested in mom-time. I love her, but she's smothering me!"

"Is she still drinking?"

"No. Thankfully, she stopped that, at least. But Xander, what am I supposed to do about her? I don't want to hurt her or anything, but lately it seems like I'm doing anything but."

"It seems to me like it's just one of those things that will only resolve itself with time," Xander said. "Besides, why are you coming to me for advice about your mom? I don't even talk to mine."

"Well, I would talk to Willow, but she's still pissed at you, and so is determinedly spending all her time with Oz. Giles said the same thing you did. And Angel, well, he's not exactly a go-to guy for problems right now."

"You took him off of suicide watch, though, didn't you? He told me that you finally let him leave the house and go back to his apartment."

"Yeah, I trust him not to kill himself now. Mind you, he's not always happy and healthy, but he won't walk into the sunlight or something."

"And if he tries, Spike can always kick his ass. He'll even enjoy it."

"Spike?"

Xander glanced over at her. "You hadn't heard? Angel went back to his apartment, freaked out, and decided that he couldn't live there anymore. He's moving into that old abandoned mansion on Crawford Street that Spike claimed for his own. Spike threw a hissy fit about it, but he gave in and Angel's moving in tonight."

"I was wondering why your lesser half wasn't here tonight. Usually he's here to make sure that I, the evil Slayer, don't get you killed even though you can handle yourself perfectly well." Pause. "Hissy fit? Spike throws hissy fits?"

"In his own Spikey way, yeah. There was lots of cursing, plenty of drinking, and eventually sex." Xander grinned. "I like it when Spike throws a hissy fit."

She snorted. "Oh please. Like you don't get laid more than is at all fair." Another pause. "I don't suppose you'll tell me any of the really good details, will you?"

"Buffy!"

"Well, it's not like I'm getting any," she said with a pout. "Not only is Angel seriously avoiding me when I let him- which is never, in case you're wondering- but I can't sleep with him or he turns evil. Wreaks hell on a girl's love life, you know?"

"I'm not telling you any juicy details," he said firmly. Then, after a moment, he grinned wickedly and said, "You can imagine perfectly well for yourself, I bet."

She stuck her tongue out at him, and they walked for a while in silence. Finally Buffy said, "How are things between you and Spike, anyway?"

He sighed. "I don't know. I'm starting to miss the halcyon days when we were just fucking."

"Oh, come on. It can't be that bad. You love him. You told me you do."

"Oh, I know I love him. That part is... well, not easy, but easier. It's the rest of it that's complicated."

"The part where he's an evil, bloodsucking fiend?"

"Yeah. That part. He's promised not to kill anymore, and so far he's kept his word, but how can I trust him? He doesn't have a conscience. All he has is an idea of what I don't like. And while I know he meant it when he promised, I can't be sure that he won't slip sometime in the heat of the moment and be apologetic afterwards. If he doesn't just hide the body and lie."

Buffy arched an eyebrow as she looked over at him. "And I thought my love life was complicated."

"Yeah, but at least I get to have sex," he retorted, and in retaliation she smacked him on the shoulder, hard enough to make him stagger.

"Jesus! Watch the Slayer strength, will you?"

"You're all super-Xander, you can take it."

"Yeah, but it hurts," he complained, cupping one hand protectively over his shoulder where she hit him. "You really pack a punch there, Buff."

She shrugged and tried to look guilty. "You'll survive."

He was about to say something- or possibly hit her on the shoulder to see how she liked it- but just then he saw a shadowy figure pop out from behind a tree and approach them, grinning through his fangs. Xander tapped Buffy's shoulder to get her attention and pointed. "Hey Buff- vamp alert."

"Damn, and here I thought I'd actually be able to go home without dusting one tonight," she said with a sigh. Xander leaned against a nearby headstone, arms crossed over his chest, and watched critically as she ducked the vampire's first clumsy swing, then pummeled him for a couple of minutes before finally staking him.

Buffy came back over to him, not even out of breath, already tucking her stake back into the back pocket of her jeans. "I think I'm done for the night," she told him. "You wanna head home?"

"Sure," he said easily. "See you tomorrow?"

"You know it," she said, and slapped him on the shoulder again, more gently this time, before wandering off towards the South entrance. Xander made his way towards the North entrance and his house, whistling tunelessly to himself, thinking about Buffy's mom and if there was anything that he could do to ease the situation.

In the shadows, just far enough that Xander couldn't sense his presence, Spike watched him walk away and growled a little to himself. Xander shouldn't be going to that... place, with those people. Those vicious fucks that he called parents. He should be coming home with Spike.

But he wasn't, and nothing Spike could say would change his mind. He'd moved into the mansion a couple days after making his promise to Xander, and had spent the last week and a half trying to convince his lover to move in with him, with absolutely no luck. Xander refused to budge, and wouldn't even tell him why.

Tonight he'd gotten here just in time to know that his boy had been talking to the Slayer about him, but not in time to hear what was said. So, unless he wanted to swallow his pride and go to the Slayer for help- and Hell would freeze over first- he'd just have to figure it out on his own.

Feeling better now that he'd decided on a plan of action, he started walking out of the cemetery. Maybe he could go up into Angel's rooms and bother his Sire- the sod had moved into his home, which, in Spike's eyes, gave him the right to annoy Angel every chance he got. Not that he didn't do that anyway.

Whistling much as Xander had, he headed for home.

It was an average morning in Sunnydale- bright and sunny, with birds singing, and students shouting cheerfully as they poured out of buses and cars and into the school. Xander lurked in the shadows near the front doors, waiting for Buffy to show up and feeling very glad that he'd finally surrendered to his abused eyes and bought a pair of sunglasses. Xander was very much a nocturnal person these days, and his eyes had adjusted accordingly.

It was just a minute or so later when he saw Buffy walking up the steps- accompanied by Willow. They were talking- or rather Willow was talking, very fast and intense, and Buffy was listening, her face set in an unreadable expression. Xander got ready to duck away and leave them to it, but then he saw Willow glance up, see him there- and very deliberately turn away, saying something that was probably a goodbye to Buffy and walking away, angling off across the grass so she wouldn't have to pass anywhere near him to enter the school.

Buffy sighed, heavily enough that Xander could see it from twenty feet away, and closed the distance between them. "I'm guessing you didn't miss that little byplay."

"Nope," he said. "She still hates me, I take it?"

"Not so much hate as..." Buffy trailed off, searching for a different word.

"Hate," Xander supplied. "Not that I blame her. I did lie to her."

"I know, but you'd think she'd get over it," Buffy said. "If I can deal, she can deal. Spike was my mortal enemy, after all."

"She's afraid," Xander said. Buffy looked at him sharply. "I'm not the same person I was, and now she knows it. Before, she could look at me going toe-to-toe with you or Angel and pretend that I'm just stronger, but still the same Xander. Now she knows that I'm not the same person at all, and she's afraid of who I am now. In addition, she trusts Spike about as far as she can throw him, and she'll always be afraid of him, and his hold on me."

Buffy was silent for a minute before saying, "That's amazingly insightful for someone who hasn't even spoken to her since the last apocalypse."

He shrugged. "I know Willow," he said. "We've been friends since birth, practically. I don't have to talk to her to know what she's thinking."

Buff y sighed and leaned against the wall next to her. "Nothing's ever simple, is it?"

"Oh hell no. Think how boring life would be if it was."

"I think I can live with a little boring," she said with a smile. "In fact, I could live with a whole hell of a lot of normal."

"Yeah, you got a point there." Xander tilted his head towards the door. "We should probably head in."

Buffy nodded an agreement, so they both grabbed their bags and went inside. Xander folded up his shades and tucked them away as soon as they were out of the bright California sunshine, and Buffy smirked at him.

"You're such a hottie with those shades on, you know. Lounging there against the wall, dressed all in black, looking like every girl's wet dream..."

Xander rolled his eyes. "Why do I talk to you?" he asked rhetorically. Buffy ignored him.

"I mean, if it weren't for the fact that the whole school knows that you're gay, you'd have girls swarming all over you." She paused, considered. "Actually, now that I think about it, why don't you have boys swarming all over you?"

"They know I'm taken," Xander said. "The swarming happened last week- you know, when you were out for a couple days for mom-time? I was joking about it to Spike, and the very next day he came to school through the sewers, and by the end of the day the whole school knew that I had a boyfriend." Xander shrugged. "So now I am swarm-free."

"You sound less than sorry," Buffy said. "I take it you didn't like the attention?"

"I wasn't interested in any of them, because c'mon, how could they measure up to Spike? So after a little bit it was annoying. It's nice to have some quiet for a change."

"Look at Xander, jaded from all the attention from cute boys," Buffy teased. "It's really funny sometimes, you know?"

"Yeah, I know." He sent her a wry glance. "Trust me, I surprise myself every time I look in the mirror. Even now. It takes getting used to, when your life is suddenly different."

"Now that is a topic I know really well," she said. "Getting your life turned upside down? I'm practically an expert on it."

"Well, I'm catching up with you there." He paused in front of the door to the library. "Hey, I'm gonna go in and check up with Giles. See you in English?"

"You know it," she said, and waved to him and she sauntered off down the hall.

Xander pushed the door open to the library, only to see Mrs. Calendar pulling away from a blushing Giles. Xander ducked his chin to hide his smirk, and pointedly looked at the ceiling while Giles stuttered out a goodbye, and Mrs. Calendar left the library.

"So," Xander said as soon as he knew she was out of earshot. "You two made up, I take it?"

"Yes," Giles muttered, still embarrassed. "We settled our differences."

"I could see that," Xander teased, but he was smiling. "Over the whole thing with Angel's soul and her not telling anyone till she had to?"

"Yes, that," Giles said with some asperity, and Xander sighed, because Giles was back to normal. "We argued, and then we-"

"Were kissing madly? There's a lot of that going around," Xander said. "Don't worry. You're in good company."

Giles sent him an odd sideways glance. "I assume you're referring to your- vampire."

Xander didn't miss the disapproval in Giles' tone, but he did ignore it. "Spike, yeah. Whoever knew that arguing could be foreplay?" Giles winced as expected at the thought of sex and Spike combined, and Xander laughed, his goal accomplished. "Sorry. I'm done, I promise. I actually came in here to see if anything-"

A teacher, dressed in long skirts and a neat blouse, hair done up in- what was the style? Something fifties, sixties? A student, wearing khakis and a letterman jacket. Talking to each other, nose-to-nose, intense. A kiss. A hungry embrace-

"-weird was going on. Holy shit, did you see that?"

"See what, exactly?" Giles was giving him that look, the one he gave you when you did something incomprehensible to him, and he wasn't sure if you were in your right mind or not.

"The scene changed. Just switched, right while I was talking, and there were two people here- a student and a teacher. By the clothes and the hair, I'm guessing fifties. They were talking, and then they were kissing, and then it was back in this time and place and I was finishing my sentence. So, weird?"

"Definitely odd, yes," Giles said, and he already sounded distracted, like he was going through a mental filing index as he spoke. "It sounds like a type of ghostly manifestation. Perhaps it's- Good Lord!"

"It's Good Lord? Not quite what I was expecting."

Giles gave him an impatient glance. "Last night I was working late, and interrupted a passionate argument between a teacher and a janitor. They seemed to be having a lover's quarrel of some sort, and just as I arrived on the scene the janitor pulled out a gun and aimed it at the teacher. I knocked it out of his hand, of course, but the odd thing is that as soon as it left his hand, it disappeared. In addition to that, when I turned and asked him what in God's name he was thinking, he didn't remember a moment of it, and when I told him what he'd said and almost done, both he and the teacher vehemently denied any sort of romantic liaison. Do you think that perhaps-"

"They could be the couple I saw in my vision, or whatever it was? Yeah, it feels right. The question now is, who are they, and what do they want?"

Hours later, Buffy poked her head into the library, looking for Xander. "Xan, you missed English, so I was wondering what-" She stopped when she spotted Xander sitting at the table, surrounded by heaps of Gilesian tomes, newspapers yellowed with age, and what looked like yearbooks. "Hell. Is it something I need to slay?"

"Ghosts, Buff," Xander said absently, turning the pages of one of the tomes. "We figured out the who, and possibly the why, but we're having issues with the how."

Buffy sighed and slumped down into the seat across the table from him, letting her bag slide to the floor. "You're going to have to explain it a little better than that for the Slayer who's been out of the loop."

Xander looked up from the book. "Two ghosts are manifesting, and not in a harmless way, either. A teacher was almost killed last night."

"And still that tells me next to nothing useful."

"I'm getting there. We figured out that they're the ghosts of two lovers- a teacher and her student from the fifties. I found here-" he lifted up one of the newspapers, "-that the student, James, got into a fight with his lover when she tried to leave him, and shot her. Then, in remorse, he went into the music room and shot himself. Big scandal, big tragedy."

"Yikes," she said. "So which one is it? Or is it both of them?"

"It's James, as far as we can tell. He's trying to right the wrongs he did forty years ago. Or maybe just be forgiven. Who knows? Either way, it's not exactly working out, and people are going to get killed if we don't stop him. I'm currently looking for exorcisms, but there's surprisingly few that deal with a ghost with this sort of power. Most are for routine hauntings. It might be easier said than done to get rid of a ghost of this caliber."

"Not good," Buffy said. "So what do you want me to do?"

"Can you use the computer? It's usually Willow's job, but-"

"But she's not exactly in the Scooby mode," Buffy finished. "Yeah, sure. Anything's gotta be better than books." She went over to the computer and sat down.

"Just don't go googling for hot boys," Xander called over to her, and she flipped him off cheerfully before settling down to work.

Xander trudged home, exhaustion in every line of his body. They'd finally found a spell that Giles thought would work, and the three of them, along with Mrs. Calendar for her mad techno pagan skills and Cordelia because she was there, had tried to perform the exorcism at midnight. Only the ghost hadn't exactly appreciated it, and had lashed out badly enough that they were now completely blocked out of the school by a massive swarm of buzzing bees. So by Xander's count, they had not only failed, they'd crashed and burned. Ghost: 1, Scoobies: 0.

He caught a brief flash of white hair in the shadows to his left and came to a halt, sighing to himself. He didn't have the energy for this tonight. He guessed that Spike wanted to have a talk instead of sex- Spike had become less and less subtle over the past couple of weeks about trying to get Xander to move in with him, and Xander had so far refused. He'd also refused to explain why, and he suspected that Spike had finally run through his limited supply of patience and was about to demand that Xander tell him what was going on.

"Xan? I need to talk to you."

Could he call it or what?

"Yeah, I figured." He left the road and crossed the grassy lawn till he joined Spike under the tree near the gate to the cemetery. "Shoot."

"Why won't you move? In with me, I mean. You keep saying no and you won't even tell me why so we can't even argue about it."

There was a pout in Spike's voice, and as always Xander felt himself wanting to melt a little inside. He resisted, though.

"Do we have to do this tonight? It's been a long day."

"Yes, we fucking well do," Spike said with a burst of anger. "I think I deserve the soddin' truth, Xan. You owe me that much, if nothing else."

Oh, lovely. A guilt trip. Who knew that vampires without souls knew how to do them?

"You want the truth? Fine, I'll tell you why. It's because I can't trust you."

Silence stretched taut between them, broken by Spike's deadly soft whisper. "What was that?"

"You heard me. I said it's because I can't trust you." Xander knew it was useless to get mad. But he couldn't seem to help it.

"You can't trust me? Fuck you, Xan. I gave up killing for you, and this is what you hit me with? You can't trust me? I thought you loved me."

"I do. The two emotions don't necessarily go hand in hand." Pause. "And you promised to give up killing, yeah. How do I know you'll keep your word? You don't have anything to hold you to it."

"I have you, you fucking git! As if I'd ever do anything to hurt you!" Spike paused, as if realizing something. "Oh, I know what you're talking about now. I don't have a soul. That's what it all boils down to, isn't it? I'm not good enough because I don't have a soul. Like I can't love you without one."

"You've never gone out of your way to actually, you know, tell me that you love me," Xander snapped. "How the hell am I supposed to know? I don't fucking well read minds! And yeah, while we're at it, it's because you don't have a soul. You don't have a conscience. You don't understand the difference between right and wrong. You might intend to keep your word, and you might be sorry afterwards if you slip up, but that won't make the people any less dead. The very fact that you can't even understand why I feel this way just proves my point!"

"It doesn't prove a fucking thing! You've just got this wild hair up your ass, and now you're acting like some hysterical chit!"

"Fuck you, Spike! And the horse you rode in on!"

"That'd be you, pet, or had you forgotten already?"

Xander let out a wordless noise of frustration that Spike would later liken to the sound of a teakettle with steam escaping, and clenched his fists. "I don't know why I fucking bothered," he said venomously. "The first time we have any sort of problem, you turn right back into Spike, the Big Bad, destroyer of mankind and kicker of puppies. Fuck, if you understood me half as well as you think you do, you'd know why I'm upset. But you don't. And that's why I can't trust you. So you know what, Spike? Fuck off. I don't need this tonight."

"Maybe I don't need you," Spike shot at him. "Hell, I'm not sure I even want you. Fuck you, I'm outta here. Don't know why I bothered with you in the first place."

And while Xander stood there, staring in shock, Spike whirled on his heels and stormed out off into the night.

"Can you believe him?" Xander demanded to Buffy. "He just walked off. Didn't stay and fight it out, just... walked off. Can you believe that bastard?"

"Not really," Buffy said frankly. "It's kind of hard to take Spike seriously, truth be told. C'mon, Xander, he was just being an asshole. You know he's gonna track you down tomorrow to finish duking it out and then you'll have wild monkey sex. Isn't that what you two do?"

"Yeah, but he was being... I dunno. It was different tonight, Buff. I can tell the difference between arguing for the sake of argument and arguing because you mean it. We meant it. He meant it." Xander slumped dejectedly back on the couch.

He'd gone straight to Buffy's after his little scene with Spike, and found her there alone with her mom. More mom-time, he presumed, but knowing the way Buffy felt about it, he felt little guilt for barging in to rant about Spike. From the relieved look on Buffy's face, he guessed that she felt much the same.

The phone started ringing, but Buffy made no move to answer it. "C'mon, Xan, you know it'll work out. He really cares about you. Hell, even Angel says so."

"Really?" Xander said, perking up a little bit.

"Really," she said, then cursed when the phone kept ringing. "Hold on, let me get that." She went off to the kitchen, muttering, "Guess mom doesn't think answering the phone is a big deal anymore."

Xander slumped back into the couch cushions again, and tried to empty his brain. It didn't work. He couldn't stop thinking about Spike.

And then there was a voice calling him, and the only thing he could think to do was follow.

Buffy came back into the living room a few minutes later, saying, "That was Giles. He thinks he found something about-"

But Xander was gone.

"Can you believe him?" Spike demanded to Angel. "I gave up everything for him, and now he's rabbitting on about me not having a soul so he can't trust me or some shit."

Angel, who was sitting on the couch in the living room, patiently listening as Spike paced back and forth furiously and ranted, personally thought that Xander had a point, but knew better than to actually say so when Spike was in this sort of mood.

Spike stopped and threw his hands up in frustration. "He's just so- fucking- something, I don't know. I love the little bastard and he throws shit like that in my face. Not like it's my damn fault that I don't have a soul."

Angel, since he liked his hide intact, remained silent.

Spike resumed pacing again. "I want to be with him. But if he's going to be acting like this then-"

He paused, and the pause stretched on long enough that Angel felt it safe to say, "Then?"

Spike's face looked like he'd found religion. "Then nothing," Spike said wonderingly. "I want to be with him anyway. Despite this shit. Despite everything." His expression was one that Angel had honestly never seen before- a slow, sweet smile that was more innocent than any vampire had the right to be. "In fact, I think I'll go tell him that."

Angel opened his mouth to say something- agree, disagree, anything- but Spike was already gone.

He'd walked into the school, and the wasps had parted before him like Moses and the Red Sea. The buzzing mass closed up again behind him, but what did he care of such things, when someone was calling him, someone he had to go to.

James' voice whispered loud in his ears, in his mind, and without thought he made his way through the halls his feet had trod a thousand times before until he was there. There, the place where it had happened, and all he needed, all that James needed, was his love. Miss Newman.

The woman that he killed.

It was an easy matter to track Xander. He'd started from the Summers house, and just followed his nose right up to the high school.

It was equally easy to get inside. Wasps didn't like the undead, and parted for him as easily as they must have parted for Xander. And then it was just a few more halls, a few more moments until he turned a corner and saw Xander, standing with his back to Spike, absolutely still.

"If you thought wasps were gonna keep me away from you, you've got another think comin'," Spike growled. "I found you, now let's finish our fight."

"You're the only one," Xander murmured. "The only person I can talk to."

Spike cocked his head, confused. "Not exactly the response I was expecting, but okay."

Xander whirled around, and there was something slightly hysterical in his face, in his eyes. "You can't make me disappear just because you say it's over!"

"What? Never wanted you to fucking disappear, Xan. And you should've known I didn't mean it back there. I'm here, aren't I?" He took several steps closer, till they were just inches apart. And then it changed.

"I just want you to be able to have some kind of a normal life," said Spike/Miss Newman. "We can never have that, don't you see?"

"I don't give a damn about a normal life! I'm goin' crazy not seein you. I think about you every minute."

Spike reached out, cupped one hand over James'/Xander's jaw. "I know," he whispered. Xander's hand came up to cover his, and then he was sliding his hand away, and walking away. "But it's over. It has to be."

Xander raced after him, grabbed his arms and turned him around. "Come back here! We're not finished." Xander shook him, once, hard. "You don't care anymore, is that it?"

"It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter what I feel," Spike choked out.

Another hard shake. "Then tell me you don't love me!" And another. "Say it!"

"Is that what you need to hear?" Spike asked softly, between sobbing breaths. "Would that help?" He shook his head helplessly. "I don't. Now let me go."

"No." Xander's voice was choked, and his eyes were fever-bright with tears and rage and grief. "A person doesn't just wake up and stop loving somebody!" He reached behind him and pulled out a gun, childishly gleeful at the shock in Spike's eyes when he leveled it at Spike's forehead with a shaking hand.

"Love," he said, "is forever."

The moment was frozen, and Spike took a cautious half step back, and the gun shook a little more as Xander said, "I'm not afraid to use it, I swear! If I can't be with you-"

"Oh my god," Spike said, and turned and ran, short, hitching steps that were nothing like his usual loping gait.

"Don't walk away from me, bitch!" Xander screamed, but Spike kept running, down the hall and out the door as Xander chased after him, yelling, "Stop it!" and again, "Stop it, don't make me!" as Spike came to a halt at the balcony, Xander behind him with the gun still pointed, waveringly, at his back.

Spike turned, slowly, hands held up in defense and supplication. "Alright," he said. "Just- you know you don't want to do this. Let's both just- calm down. Now give me the gun."

"Don't," Xander snarled, gesturing with the barrel of the gun for emphasis. "Don't. Don't do that, damn it! Don't talk to me like I'm some stupid k-"

And the gun went off.

Spike looked down at his chest, and one hand came up to press against the bleeding hole. He looked up at Xander, who had slowly lowered the gun, and stared at him with wide, shocked eyes. "James," he whispered, and then fell.

The next few moments were a blur to Xander. He walked back into the school, and then into the music room. An old record player was there, with a record already on, and with careful, shaking hands he turned it on and lifted the needle into the first groove.

"My love must be a kind of blindness," drifted out of the speakers, and Xander stared into the mirror, seeing James' wide, wet eyes and tear-streaked cheeks instead of his own. "I can't see anyone but you."

Slowly, he lifted the gun towards his temple.

And then there was a hand on his own, stopping his movement, and he whirled around to see Spike standing there, his hair and skin so brilliantly pale in the soft moonlight coming in from the windows. "Grace?" he whispered, and Spike gripped his hand tighter.

"Don't do this," Spike whispered, and Xander let his breath out on a sob.

"But I killed you."

"It was an accident," Spike said. "It wasn't your fault."

Xander looked up into Spike's eyes and said, breathlessly, sobbing, "It is my fault, how could I-"

Spike's fingers on his lips silenced him. "Shh," Spike said. "I'm the one who should be sorry, James. You thought I stopped loving you, but I never did. I loved you with my last breath." Another sob exploded from Xander's lungs, and Spike lifted a gentle hand to cup his wet cheek. "Shh," he said again. "No more tears."

And then they were kissing.

It was so good, just as it always was. This was one thing they had never had problems with, and it was a kiss filled with the passion of two lovers denied each other for four decades.

Unnoticed by either of them, light began to gather around them, streaming upwards. The light swirled together into a burst of light, and then was gone.

Both of them were slow to pull away, and when they did they just leaned into each other for a moment, resting their foreheads together. "Spike?" Xander whispered finally. "Are you-"

"I came here for you, pet," Spike said, equally softly. "Ranted a bit to Angel, and realized that there wasn't anyone I wanted more than you. Anything I wouldn't do to keep you. I love you, Xander Lavelle Harris, and if a soul is what it takes to get you to trust me, then a soul I'll get."

Xander pulled away completely at that. He stared at Spike, a sort of shocked wonder in his eyes. "Love me?" he said faintly. "You do?"

"Yeah, pet," Spike said, and pulled him back, not liking any sort of distance between then just then. "I love you." Pause. "And did you miss the bit about the soul?"

Xander grinned at him and kissed him on the forehead. "Oh hell no," he said. "But- are you sure? I mean, I wouldn't want you to-"

"I'm sure," Spike said, before he could finish the sentence. "I'm very damned sure. More sure than sure can be, even. Can you do it?"

Xander thought about it for a minute. "We'd have to find another Orb of Thessula," he said, considering. "And we'd have to get Willow to do the spell itself." A little smirking grin appeared at the corners of his mouth. "Save her right for being such a bitch about you."

"Always knew I liked you, pet," Spike said, and pulled him close. Spike buried his face in Xander's neck, inhaling the warm, spicy Xander-smell that was so familiar and dear to him, and Xander laid his cheek against stiffly gelled hair and just... breathed.

They were gonna be okay.

Buffy leaned against Angel's side and watched as Xander paced nervously back and forth across the living room floor of Spike's place. "He looks like an expectant father in the waiting room," she whispered, and felt Angel's body shake with silent laughter.

They could all see through the open door to Spike's room, where Spike was on the bed, lying with his arms tucked behind his head and looking supremely bored as Cordelia and Oz waved herbs, Willow chanted, and Giles hovered in the background. Buffy found herself wanting to laugh, too- the whole scene was just so... so Spike.

The Orb began to glow, then, and suddenly any urge to laugh left her. She tensed up, felt Angel do the same, and saw Xander do the same, only to a much greater degree.

Willow's chant built up to a shouted finish, and the Orb disappeared in a flash of light that was echoed in Spike's eyes. He arched up off the bed, and Xander was in there in a flash, sitting by his side on the bed and pressing his body flat with one hand.

Spike went suddenly boneless, and everyone held their breath. Slowly, Spike opened his eyes.

"Spike?" Xander said in a low voice, the tension in his body palpable. "Spike, are you okay?"

"Yeah," Spike said, and suddenly grinned. "You gonna move in with me now?"

Xander shouted with laughter and flung himself onto the vampire. Buffy saw Giles and Willow (mostly Willow, who had agreed to ensoul Spike because she couldn't figure out a reason why she shouldn't, but still hated the thought of him with Xander) grimace with distaste, but Buffy, who had seen far more graphic displays over patrol the past two weeks, just smiled and settled closer to Angel's side.

"Love you," Angel said, too low for anyone to hear but her, and she basked in the glow of that as Xander finally peeled himself away from Spike to say, "Yes. I will definitely move in with you."

Buffy grinned to herself. So what if Giles was hesitant and Willow hated it? Her best friend had finally found love, and, she reminded herself as she rested her cheek against Angel's chest, so had she.

They were all gonna be alright.