Spuffy2008 – I'm anticipating about 20 chapters.
All – I'm sorry this has been progressing so slowly. Believe it or not, when I get into the writing mood, I can crank out a chapter pretty fast. It just takes about two months to find the motivation to write for the two hours it takes to procure an update. Anyway, I'm hoping the updating will speed up, because after almost a year of writing chapter-by-chapter, I've figured out how I want to end this, and a rough outline for the few remaining chapters. I like my ending, and will consider it a happy ending, even if some people don't. But my point is, thank you for reading even when I fail to make the updates snappy, thank you for reviewing, and expect more from me quicker this time around.
The bus rolled along, making good time in the California night. Buffy stared out the window; Spike glared at the 'No Smoking' sign. They were going to LA, because that was the first destination offered to them. Buffy hadn't spoken since their talk on the sidewalk. Spike didn't know how to explain things to her.
"Spike," she contradicted his last thought, "my mom's going to kill me."
"You can call her when we get there."
"She'll make me come home."
"Buffy, NO. You don't seem to get it. You go past the 'Welcome to Sunnydale!' sign, your head is no longer attached to your neck. Be as stubborn as you want, I'm not letting you take that step."
"I can't run away to LA, you're the one who doesn't get it." Spike sighed.
"Buffy, I just lost a hell of a lot. Because of you. So if you think I'm going to let them take you too, you're stupid. I'm keeping you safe, no matter what it is you think you want."
"I want to go HOME." She crossed her arms, grumpy.
"They'll probably kill your mum too, if you go back." Silence. Then,
"This is your fault. Everyone around me is in danger, because of you." He growled.
"One could argue that it is, in fact, Buffy's fault."
"Hello, I can't see my mom, or my friends, or my stuff for God knows how long."
"Try never."
"No way. I refuse to leave Sunnydale forever. I'm letting you take me away until things blow over, but then I'm back. And I'm done with you. No more scary death stuff."
"I don't like the situation either, bint. Neither can I go home. So shut up and be glad you have me to keep you alive." She turned away from him, to cry facing the window. He didn't let himself try to comfort her this time.
They rolled into an LA bus station. Spike took her hand automatically, not willing to let her out of his reach again after the incident at the club. She pulled it back to her own body. In the next second, he yanked her against him.
"You really have a thing for bein' kidnapped, don't you?"
"Seeing how you were one of my first kidnappers, I don't see why you're reminding me of this fact." He pushed her away and threw his hands up.
"Fine. I'm just tryin' to save your neck. You want to chance it, be my bloody guest." They walked out of the station and onto the street a few feet apart, keeping the other in their line of side vision at all times.
"Giles will love this," she said suddenly. He turned to her with exhausted eyes. "Me running off with William the Bloody. Something tells me they won't let me be a Protector when this gets around the demon-slaying circles."
"I'm getting tired of you acting like I'm dragging you away from your whole life because I feel like it. There's some damn good motivation here, missy. Involving preserving your life, in fact." She turned up her nose. They walked farther in silence.
"What are we doing here, anyway? LA? Where are we going to stay? What are we going to eat? Do you have any money? Because I sure don't."
"I have some."
"Well, what's the plan, Spike? You got me out of Sunnydale, good job! Did you stop to think about what we'd do after we got out?" He set his jaw. Buffy was about to get socked if she didn't cut it out, and he wanted her to know it.
"I'm looking for a cheap, but clean, hotel. I need to sleep, as day is approaching, and you'd do well to calm down too. We'll decide more when we wake up."
"I'm not sharing a hotel room with you."
"Buff, I wouldn't be wasting time and money on a hotel if I didn't have a little chick with me. Now SHUT THE HELL UP before I lose my temper with you."
"Do not call me Buff." He grabbed her arm and twisted it behind her back before she could react. "Spike! Ow! You're hurting me!"
"I fell, Buffy. I had minions, I had food, I had a reputation. I lost all that tonight. I can't go back on my turf. And know why? Because I didn't want anything to happen to you."
"Real sweet stuff coming from the guy who's about to break my arm. Let go!" He released her. Picking up the pace so he was several steps in front of her, she jogged to keep up. When he reached a place that he deemed acceptable for his young companion, he shot through the door, her still in fast pursuit.
"'Ello!" he called into the empty lobby. An old-fashioned 'Ring me for service' bell sat on a robin's egg blue counter. He pushed the girl who had just entered forward. "Go ring the bloody bell."
"Too cool?" she asked with a smirk, still panting as she walked to the counter and tapped the noise mechanism. She turned and leaned against the counter as Spike heard her heart rate begin to slow, glaring.
"If there's only one bed, Spikey sleeps on the floor," she sneered as a petite man with coke-bottle glasses limped into the lobby.
"Oh happy day, customers," he drawled in a tone that suggested he would be having more fun slitting his wrists than assisting them.
"Spikey's payin', bint. Shut your pretty little mouth." She crossed her arms as he requested a room for the both of them.
"One double bed or two singles?"
"Two," Buffy piped in from where Spike had come to stand next to her. She still glared up at him, but he was lustily eyeing the man's neck instead of paying attention to her.
"Here's your change, kind sir, here's your key. I hope you enjoy your stay here at the Periwinkle Motel. Checkout is at noon." Buffy snatched the key from across the counter, noted the number 5 on it, and stormed down the hall labeled "Rooms 1-6" to her left.
The hallway was dank and unlit. The green carpet had mysterious white stains; the blue walls had gross orange spatters. Buffy unlocked their door and was forced to slam her miniscule weight into it to cause it to unstick. She clawed around in the dark for the light switch, finally finding it feet away from where it logically should have been, and wrinkled her nose at the room. She fought the urge to turn the single light bulb back off – it was almost better that way. Said light bulb hung exposed from a cobwebby chain, illuminating the floor and walls that matched those in the hallway in color and disgustingness. A single window, covered by a heavy, gray curtain was opposite the door, and the same scratchy-looking material covering the window formed the sheets on both low, rickety beds. A sheenless mirror over an ancient sink were visible through a doorframe, and on closer inspection, a yellowing toilet and cabinet-sized shower stall also existed in the 'bathroom.' There was a tattered armchair in one corner of the room, and a TV tray covered in a dusty doily with an alarm clock, bible, and phone book sat between the beds.
"Okay, this is SO not clean," she said aloud, even though she was not aware of Spike's having entered the room yet. She fumed when she realized he had probably picked this dive just to irritate her. Realizing she could conversely blame herself for annoying him during his hotel search, she instead chose to huff, shut the door, and peel back the covers on the bed nearest the bathroom. The sheets, a color that suggested having been blue at one time, seemed clean enough, so she cautiously slipped between them, suddenly exhausted. She drifted off for a few minutes, but her mind would not fully go into rest-mode until the light was turned off, poor quality though it was. Spike had still not come in when she got up, so she yanked the door open to go and fetch him from the lobby, where he probably still was. If she had to sleep in this dump, he was so going through the same icky torture.
"Are you out here, buttface?" she called into the lobby. No one was visible. A twinge of fear shot through her for the first time since they'd come to LA. Sure, it was a big, scary, different city, but she had a Vampire Master with her for the sake of cheese and rice. He was bigger and scarier than all the mangy crooks that littered the city, so she'd simply been angry and frustrated with him instead of worrying about their location. But now, she couldn't find him. Had he ditched her? Something inside of her knew that Spike wouldn't just leave her alone in Los Angeles, but skipping out on her for a few hours, just to piss her off and get her all jittery was not something he would refrain from doing, especially in his bugged state.
She stopped her hesitant walking forward as she passed the counter, hearing a faint sound. It sounded like...she tried to place it. It sounded like...
Slurping.
She threw herself against the counter and looked over before thinking. Face bloody, face in game mode, Spike looked up at her from his midnight snack, the poor, depressed motel clerk.
"He hated life anyway," he muttered, trying to shrug from his position on the floor. A fresh wave of anger hit him as he realized he was automatically trying to justify himself to Buffy. He shouldn't have to do that. She knew he was a Vamp; Vamps hadda eat. Simple.
"Does that give you any right to take it away?" she asked, eyes wide in horror. His eyes glowed a goldish-green color, illuminating the wet blood smeared on his mouth like Xander with chocolate.
"I am eating, Buffy. You know this is how I take my nourishment."
"It's beastly."
"It's not a surprise to you."
"I didn't want to see you do it, though." He groaned and stood up, dropping the nearly-drained corpse.
"Bitch, you came out here, not the other way around. If you had just gotten settl'd in, 'stead of sniffin' around, you wouldn't have witnessed this pleasant scene."
"I didn't know where you were, and I got nervous," she said flatly, snobbishly, sliding backwards off the counter. Some of the fear dissipated, as he'd gone back to human form upon standing.
"It's probably best that you stay in the room, anyway. I don't smell any other blood-suckers in the place, but be careful. I won't always be around to protect you."
"I'm not moving until you come back with me." She was getting angry again, and still frightened by the blood on his face. How dare he...he was right, this was nothing new, but she'd never...SEEN him snacking before...
It's not fair, she thought. Spike was wonderful, when he wanted to be. Despite being jaw-set over having to flee Sunnydale, his words 'Because I didn't want anything to happen to you...' floated back to her. There was a genuine gentleman in there, buried underneath the fangs. She liked that side of him. But whenever she got too close to it, such as she had at the club tonight, the monster tore out of him.
"Go back to the room, Buffy. If I have to carry you there, it won't be pretty."
"Why can't you come now?"
"If we're going to stay here for more than a night, which I haven't decided on yet, I need to clear the body." Disgust, again. Still fear. Still anger. Pity, for his situation, which she had played a part in. Giddiness, that he cared. She knew he cared. Shame for herself, for being such a hypocrite, still. Maybe more so. Her emotions were running on overload, had been since getting on the bus. There was only one thing that could calm her down. As low as she felt for wanting it at a time like this, it would work. She just knew that it would.
"Fine. Hurry up. Hide the body and come to bed." The sentence rang weirdly in her ears. A few months ago, the words wouldn't even have made sense in combination. Now she was uttering them, and walking away.
A little dazed with her surrender, Spike heaved the man onto his shoulders, and carried him outback to a dumpster, where two teenage girls were toking guiltily. He ignored them as they gasped, and skittered away. He had his own teenage girl to think about.
It wasn't fair. He should not have fallen from power, he shouldn't have had to leave his hometown. Word would get around in the Vampire world, and he'd be screwed running in to any of his old buddies. Which there were quite a lot of, being the age that he was. Buffy was a stupid girl, not worth that kind of loss. He pictured the alternative; throwing her to his minions, and pretending to laugh as they tore her to pieces, so as not to cast suspicion on himself.
He closed his eyes, knowing that he could snap the necks of newborns, rape little girls with fat cheeks until their sides split, suck the last drops of life-prolonging crimson fluid from the necks of screaming mothers, but he could not in a thousand years have let Buffy fall prey to anyone he had the power to stop. Even if he couldn't stop them, they'd have to go through him before even nibbling on her pale, slender throat.
"Oh, Sire," he muttered, feeling like he was swimming as he tried to walk back inside. The air itself formed a resistance against him, and he felt choked for the first time since losing the necessity of breathing. Buffy was...Buffy is...Buffy would be... in him. It was startling to realize, but he had the familiar sensation upon thinking the words that it had been true for a long time. He could not deny her, he could not sacrifice her, because she had become a part of him. More so than Drusilla, more so than his former position as Sunnydale Vampire overlord, more so than Passions, he loved her. He felt inquisitive as to how such a royal mistake of fate had happened, but did not feel the need to ask questions of anybody. It was. It had been. It would be. He was sure.
Feeling sick to his stomach for just minutes before being so annoyed with her so as to bring her to such a dingy building, and for the look he'd put on her face when she witnessed him feeding, he shuffled to the door behind which he could smell her. Spike never shuffled. He wasn't a shuffling kind of guy. But with his recent realization came a humbling that still tugged him down like overintensified gravity.
He knocked on the door behind which the woman he loved pouted and quivered. "'S'me" he called inside, not caring if it woke up the other residents. He'd probably eat them soon anyway...while making sure Buffy was nowhere near. He would not disgrace her again by letting her view him in his most primal state. She had come to expect more from him –Hell knew why- and he felt the solid need to live up to whatever she envisioned him as. Buffy came to the door and opened it, facing him in the unlit room with a gulp. She was anxious over what she was about to do, but knew she had no other choice. It would calm them both down, and both were running themselves to the ground with emotions at the moment.
"Hey," she said, voice wavering a little as he shut the door behind him. She had seen the bloody chin in the hall light while it existed.
"Are we still pissy," she heard him ask grumpily.
"Wipe your mouth off, please." She heard him oblige with his duster as he muttered, "Don't boss me, bitch."
"Get to sleep, Buffy. We have decisions to make tomorrow, and you're at the end of your rope as stands. Maybe you'll be happier with me tomorrow, though I still don't see what the big deal is. Eating is a regular occurrence for me, as is for most, including you-"
His excellent night-vision enabled him to see her as she jumped, and he barely caught her in time. Holding her to him by her legs, she crashed their mouths together with such voracity that he slid to the floor, despite his buckled knees.
"I bloody love you," he said with a grin evident in his voice a few minutes later as he somehow got them to their feet, and allowed her to pull him towards the bed nearest the door. She paused, but then kept going, shedding their clothing, ferociously kissing him.
Did he just say...?
The first time Riley had mentioned the L-word, and yes, he had been the first to bring it up, he had cooked dinner for her, cleared his dorm of any roommates, given her flowers, played her favorite slow music, and whispered it in her ear as they were dancing. She had echoed, and they'd ended up in bed for the first time together soon after. Buffy felt the contrast of her relationships with both men as different as Riley's cool cotton sheets had been to this rough, worn, stretched mystery material she was suddenly lying against. No candles, no flowers, no music. He still tasted like blood. They were nowhere near anything comfortable and normal. What was about to follow would not be slow and beautiful and exciting, but violent and deep and for the simple reason that everything was falling apart, and they needed to bring it back together with this act of tough love. Love. Still love, though harsh.
When she woke up that evening, twined in his tight embrace, his fierce blue eyes on her as they had been for several hours, she could not remember if she had echoed his statement.
"I love you too," she said with a yawn, making statement comical. He grinned at her.
"I'll see if I can't get us a double bed. As much as a bloke likes to lie next to you, it's very crowded in here." Somehow, his acknowledgement without dutifully repeating the phrase, so as to not wear it out, rang true to the nature of their relationship. She snuggled against him, not wanting to think about what had transpired in Sunnydale, on the streets, in the lobby. She just wanted to think about the solid, chilly being lying with her.
