Chapter Seven

"What was that noise?" Joyce asked.

"Nothing. I… hit my leg. Ow!" Buffy lied. She put Spike's right arm around her neck and dragged his unconscious body out the door. "I really should've thought about this before I knocked you out. But you were being your typical stubborn self and it was the first thing I thought of, so technically this is all your fault," she informed Spike, who didn't respond.

Buffy looked next door at the house she used to know so well. She used to be able to navigate that house blindfolded. She tried it once when she was eleven and the only snag was when she ran into a lamp but Spike caught it before it hit the ground. They watched movies together and made s'mores using candles because their moms didn't want them near the stove. And as far as they knew the two ate only popcorn within the confines of the dark green walls. They used to have so much fun together. They were all each other needed, and now they were all each other hated.

Buffy quietly made her way to the back door and turned the knob. She slumped Spike's body over the counter so she could push up on the door and shut it because if you didn't, it would make a loud, rusty squeaking noise. Once it was shut she commenced with the movement of the body and dragged it upstairs to his bedroom. When she opened the door she found that there were bookshelves where his dresser used to be and a desk where his bed was. Buffy accidentally let go of his arm in shock and his body fell to the floor. "Oh sh-" Her head spun to her right when she heard a door open. "Crap." She pulled Spike behind the desk and curled up into a ball.

The light from the hall streamed across the floor and a silhouette formed. "Hello?" a woman said, afraid of hearing an answer. "Is someone there?" Buffy remained still until the door shut. She lay on her stomach in order to see when the light from the hall was turned off. "Come on. Come on." Suddenly, the carpet from the hallway went black. "Yes!" she whispered.

Buffy grabbed Spike and continued dragging him. "What room did you move to?" His head hung from his neck and his lips remained closed. "And why do I keep talking to you like you're going to answer me? Ya know, I blame you for this. If you would've just stayed home, this wouldn't have happened. If you would've said hello to me four years ago, this wouldn't have happened. But no you have to be a stubborn ass who can't give a kind nod to his best friend." Buffy opened the next couple of doors finding no results of Spike's furniture. "Did you finally move to the basement?" Again, no answer.

Buffy made a noise of frustration as she walked back down the stairs. And keeping someone unconscious isn't as easy as it looks. His feet kept hitting each step and with every noise Buffy would turn to see if the light relit. Luckily she made downstairs and then down into the basement. "Oh thank goodness." She lugged him over to his bed and plopped him onto the light blue sheets.

"Spike? Is that you honey?" Buffy's eyes widened as she started fumbling towards places to hide. Finally she decided to slip under the bed, it was her easiest option. However she forgot that he was Spike and therefore piled everything under his bed. She cringed as she pushed her body against the random objects. His mother came down the stairs and looked at him. Buffy heard the ruffling of the sheets and the sound of a kiss. With that the woman went up the stairs and shut the door.

Buffy quickly rolled out from under the bed and started cringing. "That was disgusting. Oh gross." She picked a sock off of her shoulder and brushed it off. "And my hand is moist," she wined. She went to smell it but then put it back down at her side. "No, I don't want to know." She quietly went up step by step and opened the door. The coast was clear for her escape. She reached for the back door handle and-

"Buffy?"

Oh no. She slowly turned around with a smile on her face. "Hi Anne."

"I haven't seen you in ages. What are you doing here?"

"I, uh, gave Spike a lift home. From… Bob's. Bob's house."

"I see. Well how have you been? How's Joyce?" Anne asked as she took a seat on a barstool.

"She's good, I'm good, we're all kinds of good. But I gotta get going so-"

"How long has it been since you've come over here? I asked my son why you were never over but he always refused to answer me."

"It's complicated."

Spike's mom took Buffy's hand in hers and placed her other hand on top. "How are you? Are you all right?"

Buffy pursed her lips before answering. "Yea, I'm fine. It's just… Nothing."

"What?"

She looked into the eyes of the woman who was her second mother for over ten years. She kissed her scrapes and supplied vital snackage. She talked to them about sex when they were eight because she caught them kissing. They just wanted to know what the big deal was. "I miss you. And your bran muffins. My mom still can't make them like you." They both smiled.

"You should come over more often. I've really missed you."

Buffy smirked at Anne. She had gotten older over the last four years, with a couple stray gray hairs and early impressions of crow's feet by her eyes, but she was still one of the nicest people she had ever met. "I will. Thanks Anne, but I better get home." Buffy slipped her hand out of the woman's reach and left. She took a deep breath to try and hold back the tears as she made her way down the sidewalk. "Well that didn't go as planned."

In the cemetery Buffy heard some familiar voices screaming "hold him" and "stake it." She ran towards the noise and saw Willow and Xander getting their butts kicked by a suited vampire. It had Xander by the throat and spun him around so he knocked over Willow. Buffy skipped the welcoming comment and kicked him in the face. After a roundhouse punch he fell to the ground. Buffy tried to stake him but he blocked it with his arm. With a swipe to her legs Buffy landed with a thud. He jumped on top of her and smiled. "Guess we're not so lucky tonight are we?" He leaned in for s bite, not realizing the stake held against her side that dug into his heart.

"Guess not," Buffy said before he turned to dust.

Xander helped Willow up who still had her stake clenched tightly in her hand. "Well sure, just come in and open the jar once it's been loosened up." He held his hand out for Buffy to grab, which she gladly accepted.

"I must've confused your lying on the ground as a sign for help."

"We were just lulling him into a false sense of security before we nailed him," Willow said. "In a non-sexual way."

"Very non-sexual," Xander defended.

"Got it. No sexualness." Buffy started walking straight and her friends followed at her side. "What are you guys doing here?"

"We figured we could help you with your lines between stakings. And when we were doing it-," Xander quickly added after realizing what he said, "reading lines, it wasn't working out well. I think I just can't speak Shakespearese."

"Shakespearese?" Buffy and Willow questioned.

"The language of Shakespeare. Whenever it's a language it ends with ese. Like Japanese. Chinese. German…ese."

The two nodded in recognition of their friend's funny, but false factual statement. "That's really cool of you guys but I think I should go alone."

"Well, speaking as the only male in this group who had recently switched parts in the play and is freaking out because he found there is only two months until showtime, I would have to disagree."

"I'm with Xander on this one."

"Why do you want to run lines Will, you're not even in the play?"

"Which I'm very happy about but I think you could use the practice. You've already got a packed schedule as it is so why not fit this in where there's space to be filled?" Willow and Xander looked at Buffy with cheesy come-on-say-yes smiles.

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Okay," she said with a smirk. Willow handed her a script so they could start reading lines. "Where should we start?"

"How about at the scene in the orchard between Romeo and Juliet?" Willow suggested.

"We don't have Romeo?" Buffy reminded her red headed friend.

"We have Xander."

"Who is Paris," he replied.

"Oh come on Xander, you can play Romeo for a few minutes so Buffy can learn her mass amount of lines."

"But what if I remember his lines and tie them in with my own?" They both gave him an emotionless look. "Okay, good point. All right. Buffy start."

Buffy flipped through the pages and start to read. "O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name;
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,
And I'll no longer be a Capulet."

"Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?" Xander said, holding his arms out

wide.

"What are you doing?" Willow asked.

"I'm acting."

"Yes, but this is aside, not with gestures of grandeur."

"Sorry Miss Assistant Director."

"'Tis but thy name that is my enemy;
Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
What's Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O, be some other name!
What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call'd,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name,
And for that name which is no part of thee
Take all myself."

"I take thee-" Xander stopped when he heard another voice saying the same line

he was.

"-at thy word," Spike said.

"Spike?" Willow said with a hint of question.

"Spike." Xander sneered in his direction.

"Spike!" Buffy was frustrated that after all the work she did he wasn't even

knocked out for a couple more hours. His head slammed into the floor for crying out loud. "What are you doing here?"

"Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized;
Henceforth I never will be Romeo."

Buffy walked up to Spike. "No. No Shakespeare. What are you doing here?"

"I told you ya couldn't stop me from followin' ya."

"I knocked you unconscious and dragged your puny little body throughout your

house because someone decided to grow a pair and move to the basement."

"I was ten years old when my mum brought up the idea of livin' in the basement. Basements scare little kids. You remember that loud grinding noise?" Spike defended.

"A. It was the rusty pipes. B. I thought I told you that we aren't friends. I said it with a stern face. Kinda like the one I'm wearing now. Yet you come over to my house and plan slaying dates with me."

"Just 'cause you don't like me, that doesn't change the fact that we got a play to do in two months."

"I don't want to see you any more then I already have to. Now leave," Buffy ordered.

"Why can't you just cooperate for two seconds? You always do this. You always avoid talking about things by bashing me. You've been doing this since you were five. Just like when I took your Barbie and all you did was call me a meanie because I wanted you to play with me."

"Stop talking about what we used to do. What we did is done and who you were then certainly isn't who you are now. And we aren't talking about things. You're trying to make me read lines with you."

"Then what do you want Buffy? Do want me to leave? Is that all? You want me to walk away from you and never talk to you or say hello to you ever? You want me to only speak to you at rehearsal and even then, not get too close?" Spike questioned. He wasn't even sure if he wanted to hear her answer.

"That's exactly what I want."

"Why?"

"Because you're a jerk."

"And you're a brat."

"How am I a brat?" Buffy said in disbelief.

"You're acting like an immature child who can't get their dolly from Toys R Us."

"Oh yea, you're one to call me immature. You snubbed me."

"I told you, I wasn't thinking straight that night." Spike remained strong in the idea of not telling her the truth. It's not like she wants to hear it anyway.

"Or maybe you were just showing who you really were."

"No I wasn't."

"Where are those pesky vampires when you need'em?" Xander asked no one in particular.

"Then what was it Spike? You said you were just trying to be cool but all this defiance of the rules that we lived by for the past four years is suddenly no longer in play. Instead of avoiding each other you come looking for me. Instead of sitting apart from each other you switch seats with the kid behind me."

"I can't tell you," he said with a mixture of frustration and sadness.

"You can't tell me? You're telling me we need to talk and then you're the first one to back out of the conversation."

"Fine, I'm goin' home." He turned to leave.

Buffy quickly walked in front of him and ceased him from taking any further steps. "Oh no, you're not getting off that easy."

"I thought it was what you wanted."

"Yea but now you're only leaving to avoid this conversation. Just tell me why you snubbed me and I'll let you leave."

"I can't."

"Then you can't leave." Buffy stood with her feet apart and crossed her arms.

"I can't tell you, so stop," he pleaded.

"Why do you get to tell me what I should and shouldn't do but once I take the wheel you run in the other direction?"

"Because you're a horrible driver."

"Oh shut up. I am… I am but at elast I can admit it. And stop changing the subject."

Spike inhaled deeply and in anger, frustration and basic emotion overload, he blurted it out. "I ignored you because I saw you drooling over Angel in the hall."

"What do you care if I talk to Angel?"

"It wasn't just talking. It was flirting. You were doing that hair twirling thing you do when you're nervous and you were showing him your mysterious smile that you somehow know to do."

"So?" Buffy asked, still not getting what he was trying to say.

"I want that from you." Buffy's face became one of confusion at what Spike finally decided to confess. "I love you Buffy. I've loved you ever since my thirteenth birthday and I got sick from the measles. Your mom told you not to come over, and my mom barred you from the house but you climbed up the drainpipe and crawled through my window with two cupcakes and party hats. Then you came and visited me everyday and would cheer me up by making puppet shows with my socks and doing impressions of Mr. Killigan." She remembered. Both their mothers were adamant about keeping them apart but she wouldn't let them no matter what. Buffy's bottom jaw began to quiver. "You happy now? That's why we're not friends any more. And that's why you're letting me walk away right now." Spike strode past Buffy who just stood with her mouth open in shock at what she just heard.

"Vampire," Xander informed.