A/N : Big thanx as always to my fantastic reviewers; spuffymonica, Ember, Spuffy2008, Ape18, KelleyTheSelfToastablePopTart, Brunettepet, Baby Girl Geller-Green, Spikez-babe91, Freezyboncoolipants, wicked-angel413, Daniel Wesley Rydell, spiked-gurl, Princess-of-Magic 3, souled-angel, Moluvsnumber17, and spuffygrl.
As far as the mysterious phone calls are concerned, some of your guesses were right and some were wrong. An explanation will come, as will some major Spuffy, but you might have to wait a while for both those things - sorry! This contents of this chapter and what will be the next one was all supposed to be one chapter by my imagination went wild and everyting kinda grew. I'll try to get the second half of this double chapter posted for you as soon as possible!
(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)
Chapter 15 - The Passion (Part I)
"Where too next then, luv?" Spike asked as he and Buffy sat by the lake in St James Park with an ice-cream cone each.
"Uh, how about nowhere?" she said slipping off one sandal and inspecting her aching feet for blisters, "My God I don't think I ever walked so much in my life"
"London's bigger than you thought, I s'pose" Spike smirked as the blonde leaned back on the bench and shielded her eyes from the bright sun that bounced off the water.
"Bigger" she nodded, "Better too, kinda pretty. Sitting here with the sun and the water, it's almost like back home"
"You miss it?" Spike asked with interest as he watched her looking at the view.
"A little" Buffy shrugged, "I dunno I thought I'd miss it way more than I do. Being here with you is kind of distracting me" she smiled, as she turned to look at him and found he was much closer than she'd expected.
"That a good thing?" he asked more quietly than he meant to and Buffy found it disturbing but almost in a nice way that she couldn't tear her eyes away from his.
"I don't know" she said eventually, "I think..." she wasn't sure where the sentence was going now she'd begun. It ended up getting no longer as the ice cream from her cone dripped onto her hand, the coldness of it making her jump.
"Oh, damn!" she said, standing up and holding her arm out away from her as melting ice-cream dripped down her hand and wrist.
Spike tried desperately not to laugh but she looked so ridiculous, holding the cone at arms length as if it were a bomb or something.
"It's not funny!" Buffy protested, though she too had to bite her lip to keep from laughing about it. She walked away a few steps and put the rest of the cone in the trash can. When she turned back she was cursing and studying her top.
"I got it on my clothes too" she complained, and Spike was a little put off by having his attention drawn to her chest, "This is probably ruined"
"Sorry, pet" her friend sighed, throwing away his own half-melted snack too, "'S my fault for suggesting ice-cream when it was this warm, and then being a distraction" he smirked, "Tell you what though, now we have you back on your feet, what say we grab a taxi, I'll take you somewhere I know you'll love" he said as they started walking again.
"Okay" she nodded uncertainly as they made their way out of the park.
"Here we are, pet" Spike announced as he and Buffy got out of the cab together, "This is Oxford Street"
"Wow" the blonde said, looking all around, "That's a lot of big stores, for England anyway"
"And when confronted with such an amount of 'large stores'" he quoted, "I'm sure you can find use for a fair amount of cash" he said as he dug in his pocket and produced a wallet.
"What are you doing?" Buffy asked, the smile falling from her face as she realised what he was doing, "I don't want your money"
Spike stopped abruptly as he realised he'd offended her, though that hadn't been his intention at all.
"Buffy, I wasn't... I wanted to get you a gift of some kind" he explained, sounding so very much like William and not a bit like Spike right now, "I don't have any idea where to begin in choosing something so I thought you could get something yourself and I could pay for it"
Buffy took a long look at the man before her as they stood their in the middle of the busy street.
"Why?" she asked eventually, "What did I do to earn a gift?"
Spike shook his head, not really understanding her attitude.
"You didn't 'earn' a gift, Buffy" he told her, "I just, I want you to know that I appreciate your, well, friendship I suppose, and... I feel as if you've given me so much just by being here, I wanted to give you something...besides it was my fault your top got ruined" he reminded her, not looking at the item he spoke of.
Buffy smiled at that, and at his childish sort of innocence as his eyes went to the ground. He was clearly embarrassed now and she didn't like to think she had a part in that. He was a really sweet guy and he'd done nothing but be her friend, just like he'd said. Besides she was sure she could find a couple of things down this street he could buy her if he really wanted to. What kind of girl would she be if she turned down free clothes?
"I'm sorry" she said eventually, finding it felt a little strange, those words were so foreign to her, "I didn't mean to be ungrateful or whatever" she explained, "If you're all set on getting me a gift then thankyou" she said, leaning in close to him and placing a kiss on his cheek. Though she pulled away again a moment later, she didn't move enough to put any real distance between them. Inside she was screaming for him to kiss her now, properly and with all the passion he possessed, but that was the whole point about William, he'd never do that, it wasn't the proper thing to do.
"Er, let's go shopping then" he said with an awkward smile, backing off fast.
"Yeah" Buffy sighed, forcing a happy look onto her own face too, to cover the disappointment she hated herself for feeling, "Let's go"
Buffy stood in front of the mirror at the hotel feeling strangely uncomfortable. The top and shoes she wore had been bought for her, gifts from a friend which should be simple enough. Except nobody really ever bought gifts for Buffy, not counting the junk her Aunt and Uncle got her for Christmas and her Birthday, and a few things Faith had admitted to stealing on her behalf. Anything Buffy owned she'd pretty much bought herself and she rarely had enough spare cash to be getting anything fancy.
Despite a small argument she'd allowed Spike to get her a stylish pair of black high-heeled shoes and a fire-engine red top that given the very small amount of material it was made of should not have cost half so much as it did.
Buffy adjusted her short skirt and smirked at her reflection in the glass. She looked good, and she knew it, but a tiny voice in the back of her mind was saying she looked awful. She didn't know why, at least on the surface she didn't. Deep down she knew that voice was a mixture of her own opinion and Spike's influence. It was the way he looked at her when she'd originally picked out this top and said it was the one she wanted if he didn't mind. He was so used to her wearing revealing clothing, the stunned look in his eyes was barely noticeable and the embarrassment almost invisible. Instead she saw vague disappointment and a little dislike. He didn't approve of her exhibitionist behaviour, she was sure, and whilst he had agreed to go a little wild, changing his own looks and attitude, she was still too much for him. He wasn't comfortable when she was over the top in any way and Buffy wondered why it bothered her.
Her behaviour was deliberate to catch attention if she was honest, to show she didn't care, to hell with the world and everyone in it. Still, that little voice in the back of her mind was telling her to tone down her make-up and put on a different top that covered more skin and she couldn't help considering it for a moment.
A knock on her door made her mind up for her and she stayed as she was, answering the door and finding Spike waiting on the other side, in that first outfit she'd picked out for him. They matched, both in black and red, almost as if they'd been designed as a pair to be always together. That thought made a strange look appear on Buffy's face and Spike asked her what was wrong.
"Er, nothing" she smiled, shaking her head, "Just thinkin' something weird, it's not important" she laughed it off as stupidity as they set off for the club. Imagining her and Spike being together, like some kind of fairytale was insane. She knew he'd never want her enough to really be with her. Like all guys, her physical appearance made her attractive to him, and despite the fact he was too spineless to try anything, she knew sex appeal was all that made him want to spend time with her, it had to be. What else was there about her to attract anybody's attention?
Spike was frowning as he and Buffy hailed a cab and were driven to the other side of town, where night-clubs full of flashing lights and booming music beckoned. There was something off about her tonight, she'd hardened against him again. Sometimes when she smiled at him or their eyes inadvertently met across the table, it was as if he could see right into her soul, a beautiful woman inside and out. Other times, like now, she looked right through him as if he wasn't there, and snapped at the slightest thing, just as hard and sharp as she had been the first day they'd met. He didn't like her so much this way, not now he knew she could be different. Of all the insane things he knew he was falling for her, despite the fact her moods blew with the wind and she was so incredibly out of his league.
Spike resolved to put all such thoughts to the back of his mind for a while. They were having a night out, it was supposed to be fun apparently. Pushing all his deep notions away, he paid the cab driver what they owed and got out of the car with Buffy. She was through the door of the club before he could blink and seemed desperate to get some alcohol inside her. Spike was less keen but got himself a bourbon and made it last a little longer than those he'd downed so quickly last night. Drunkenness had it's upsides, but hangovers were just all kinds of bad that he'd rather not experience again any time soon.
Buffy wasn't paying much attention to what Spike was drinking or anything he was doing in fact. Today she'd come so close to being close to him, actually wishing he would want to be close to her. Sometimes he seemed to like her, sometimes she wondered if he was just hanging around with her because it was better then being alone. Whatever his reasons for spending time with her, they were not the reasons Buffy wished they were. Deep down she was still the little girl that believed in happy ever after endings, but for the most part she was too tough, too experienced and knowing of the world to believe in such things.
Still, hanging around with Spike and getting nowhere was making her feel things she couldn't handle alone. She needed a man, she needed the kind of physical release she could only get by being with someone in a way she knew she never could be with Spike. The club she sat in now was crawling with guys she'd happily take for a spin and from the way several of them were looking at her, it seemed they wouldn't decline if she offered.
"I'm gonna dance" she said vaguely to Spike as she hopped down from the bar stool and disappeared amongst the writhing bodies on the dancefloor. As Spike watched her go he didn't notice immediately that another young woman had taken her place at his side.
"Hey there, sexy" her voice brought him out of his Buffy-induced daze and Spike blinked at the woman before him. She was good looking, he realised, but really nothing special, looking just like all the other sheep that surrounded them both in the club. Spike smirked to himself as he realised that all this exhibitionist behaviour that Buffy and these other people were so fond of seemed to have nothing to do with standing out at all, but more about following a crowd. They were sheep and as much as he appreciated their love of freedom from constraint, he pitied them for their foolishness in really believing they were being themselves. He was fairly certain that many a man and woman that surrounded him were as fake a 'wild person' as he himself was.
"You want a drink, pet?" Spike asked the girl beside him, thinking she at least seemed sober enough he shouldn't get accused to taking advantage of her should she get touchy feely with him.
"That all depends" she told him with a sly smile, "My mother always taught me not to accept things from strangers. I should at least know your name before I accept a drink" she smirked.
"Name's Spike" he told her with a similar smile, "And you?"
"Charlie" she told him, pushing her curly blonde hair over her shoulder, "Mum's got a thing for old authors and stuff, named my sister Emily after the one that wrote Wuthering Heights, and I copped Charlotte bein' the sister, but it's too posh, don't suit me" she said, picking up the bottle of beer she'd ordered and taking a large swig, "Guessin' your Mum didn't christen you Spike either?"
"Your guess'd be right, luv" he agreed, half paying attention to Charlie, half watching Buffy as she gyrated along with two muscley blokes in the middle of the floor, "...know what I mean?" Charlie said as he tuned back into her voice and Spike quickly tried to answer to make it look as of he had been listening, which of course he hadn't.
"What's her name?" she asked, realising his problem, "Don't give me that look" she smiled when he looked like he might deny it, "There's a woman in your head that you'd rather be with right now than me, yeah?" she checked and Spike sighed.
"Sorry, pet, you're not wrong" he admitted, downing the rest of his bourbon and ordering another. As Buffy took hold of one of her dancing partners hands and led him across the club floor to the fire exit, Spike suddenly felt like getting very drunk, very fast.
"Bad break up?" Charlie asked, "Cos y'know I don't mind being rebound girl, if it'd help" she winked. Spike wasn't sure whether the little laugh she gave meant that was a joke or not but he took it as such so as not to let himself blush.
"Not a break up" he sighed a moment later, "She's not even mine, I just..."
"Wish she was?" Charlie guessed, "Must be bloody stupid if she's turned you down. She's not got a dog and a white stick has she?" she smirked, taking another drink.
"She doesn't see me for what I am..." Spike explained, "It's all about appearances with her, attitudes and image... Sometimes I feel like she's really talking to me, trusts me and everything, then she puts the barriers back up and everything's a fight and... Sorry, luv" he apologised yet again to the blonde beside him, "Don't s'pose you expected all this when you sat yourself down there, did you?"
"Maybe not" Charlie agreed, "But that doesn't mean it's a nasty surprise to find a nice looking fella that's also got feelings and a brain" she told him, "Somethin' tells me you're here cos she dragged you, or cos you think she'll like you better all dressed up in your leather and drinkin' this crap" she said, fingering his glass on the bar, "Maybe she's not worth the effort"
Spike thought about that and laughed out loud. He barely knew Buffy, in real terms, they'd known each other such a short time, and yet he'd told her things he'd never discussed with anyone else, and he knew for a fact a few things she'd shared had been truths that no-one else had ever heard from her.
"Despite all the things I know about her that I don't like" he sighed "they're out-weighed a hundred fold by the things I love about her" he stopped speaking abruptly when he realised the word he'd used there - love.
"You feel that way about her, she must be worth somethin'" Charlie said with a shake of her head, "Makes me wonder though, if she deserves you"
Spike didn't answer her then, and she followed his eyes across the room as a dishevelled blonde girl and a butch-looking brunette man came from the back alley. There was no mistaking what they'd just done and the pain Charlie saw in Spike's eyes when she glanced back at him left no doubt in her mind that this girl was the one he wanted.
As she watched, she caught the mystery blonde looking over at Spike. Something wasn't right about the way she stared at first him and then herself, a sort of surprised shock that he was sitting with another girl perhaps.
"Spike?" Charlie said, eyes still fixed on Buffy. Without waiting for an answer, and certain Buffy was watching, Charlie swung around and put her lips to Spike's, arms winding round his neck to hold him close as she kissed him with a fiery passion for several moments. When she pulled away and he looked at her with shock, Charlie just glanced over at Buffy and watched the colour drain from her face. She leaned in close to Spike's ear with a smile on her face.
"Don't give up on her" she whispered as she got up from her stool and walked away, without glancing back.
Spike watched her go, still trying to process what had happened. The look on Buffy's face told him she was stunned and not necessarily in a good way by what she'd just seen. Spike wondered vaguely if Charlie could have meant what it seemed like she did, that perhaps she thought Buffy did want him, and she was jealous of the two of them kissing. Spike shook his head as he went back to his drink, tearing his eyes away from the hazel pair that still watched him from the edge of the danceloor. As if Buffy would ever want him like that.
Across the floor, Buffy stood rooted to the spot, stunned to the core by what she had seen. The sight of Spike in a passionate lip lock with some unknown blonde was burned onto her retinas and she was shocked by how much it hurt. There was a nauseous kind of feeling in the pit of her stomach that had started to build when she was up against the back wall of the building with a guy she knew only as Tommy. Now it felt like her insides were being screwed into a ball, as her heart thumped slow and heavy as lead in her chest. Knowing the pain she felt was all down to a man as insignificant as William Rayne should be, made Buffy angry. Angry at him for making her feel this way, and angry at herself for caring.
In a fury she threw herself into the heaving crowd of dancers, hell bent on having a good time on her own, or with any man that caught her eye between now and the early hours.
To Be Continued...
A/N2 : Charlie is a character I invented. I maybe could've used a Buffy or Angel character but Icouldn't think of anyone to fit the role that I hadn't already used, there aren't that many English girls in theJossverse