DISCLAIMER: Whedon's characters, any recognizable dialogue, and the canon events of their storyline are not mine.
A/N:
Use of quotes: You will quickly discover that (at least for purposes of this story) I have decided that some conversations seem destined to happen. Maybe not at the same point in the timeline. Maybe not in precisely the same way, or with the same outcome. But you will recognize some dialogue – some pulled from later points in the original timeline, sometimes edited down … usually to better fit the new circumstance, sometimes just for brevity's sake.
This chapter will cover from the day after Buffy's death through episodes #6.1 and #6.2 "Bargaining Part 1 & 2."
CHAPTER 9
funeral, 147, & Paradise Lost
May 2001 ... through summer to fall ...
It was apparent to everyone that Xander was not happy to see Spike.
"Dawn left me a note. Said I should come over. I'm not here to cause trouble."
Xander started in, "Why are you here? You could leave town, you know, now that you don't have Buffy to moon over."
"Not that I wouldn't like to get away from your incessant badgering, but I made a promise to Buffy to protect Dawn."
Xander's face clearly expressed his disbelief. "When exactly? I never—"
Spike responded in a measured tone. "Last night. When she and I came back here to get weapons. Said she was counting on me. Because of my strength. Anyway, I made a promise, owe a debt. And more than that – I may be evil, but I'm loyal. Fought alongside her – foxhole buddies. At the very least, allies. Buffy may be gone, but the Bit's still here. Way I see it, I've still got a mission. Last orders given and all that."
Giles began to speak, "That's actually quite noble of you."
Xander interrupted, "But the fact of the matter is that Buffy is not here and she was the one that wanted you around. We didn't."
Spike attempted to take the high road. "This is no time to be selfish and petty. You're gonna need help patrolling. Remember what I said about using the Buffy-bot, not just for additional help in a fight, but to convince the demon population that she's still alive?
"Yes, of course. And with that help, we won't need you."
Now, Spike was becoming aggravated, but was trying to maintain calm, at least the outward appearance of calm. "Well, we both know that's not true. Even with Buffy here, you needed me. And the Bot's not quite as good as the real thing. She's not actually the Slayer." He glanced down at the floor, regrouping. "But that's not where I was headed with all this."
"Well, spit it out and be gone already."
Spike directed his words primarily at Giles. "Look, you've probably already finished the funeral plans – and I know I have no say in any of that. It's just … well … there's one thing I want to make sure you think about, cuz once you do it, you can't take it back. And it could affect more than just the people in this room."
Giles responded, "I'm listening."
"The gravestone. If you put her name on it, sooner or later … word will get around. If you're giving any consideration to the plan of trying to convince the seedier side of Sunnydale that the Slayer is still alive ... then you shouldn't put her name on it."
"I didn't think I'd be saying this again so soon, but Spike has a point."
Dawn was looking at a sketch she had made of the headstone with the following words to be engraved:
BUFFY ANNE SUMMERS
1981-2001
BELOVED SISTER
BELOVED FRIEND
SHE SAVED THE WORLD
A LOT
Then she looked up at the others and said, "But we have to put something. I don't want to leave it completely blank."
Spike walked over to see the drawing. He put a piece of paper over the last lines and covered up the first and last names with each of his hands. "What if you just put her middle name, the years, maybe the sister and friend bits, and leave room for the other to be added later?"
Dawn nodded her approval. "I like that idea. What does everyone else think?"
Tara smiled warmly at Dawn and Spike. Willow and Xander exchanged looks and said that they felt that was a good compromise – honoring Buffy while keeping the information secret.
Giles took the helm as usual. "Good. We're agreed. That brings up another matter: do we need to rethink the funeral itself? We can't very well put it in the newspaper. And then there's the when and how to have it – to draw the least amount of attention."
Turning to Spike, Willow asked, "What time of day is best – you know, when are the evil types least likely to be out and about, possibly seeing the funeral?"
"Well, daytime will cut the vampires from the guest list. Since many other demons like to stay out late and raise hell – so to speak – they usually sleep in. So, I'd say early to mid-morning is your best bet."
"That's what I would have figured. But thanks for confirmation."
Then, Dawn's unhappy voice piped up. "That means that you can't be there."
"That's alright, Bit. I can pay my respects later that night. Or maybe I can find a shady spot and watch from a distance." He paused to clear his throat. "And … uh … not that he's my favorite person in the world – but did anyone call Angel yet? Captain Forehead does have a right to know."
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On the day of the funeral, Spike made his way to the cemetery just before sunrise. He had found a place not too far from the grave where he could remain in the shade and at least watch. Might even be able to hear bits and pieces.
There was a priest in town who Giles had met through mutual acquaintances – the priest was known to do exorcisms, which could come in handy in Sunnydale. Giles asked him to perform the funeral, but made it clear he was to tell no one. Spike could hear the reverend reading the commonly known passage Psalm 23: "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want … Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil … Surely goodness and mercy will follow me…"
Spike watched as each of them laid a white rose on the casket. He watched as the box that contained the woman he loved was lowered into the ground. He struggled to remain composed while his grief rolled over him like a wave, overwhelming him. The pain and loss were palpable – more so than he had thought possible.
At the end of the intimate graveside service, Dawn had come over to him in the shadows to give him a hug, which she needed as much as he did. They spoke briefly and she handed him a small packet of tissues. He thanked her and kissed her forehead.
Ducking from shadow to shadow, using a blanket for cover when necessary, he made his way back to his crypt. After he had paced for half an hour, he finally had a drink. And then another. After six shots, he gave into his grief and listened to the cassette. He needed to hear her voice again. At this moment, most of the words were not important at all. He tuned out the information and just listened to it like music. It soothed the pain momentarily, but as soon as it was finished, the waves of grief slammed into him again. He could not imagine how excruciating the pain would have been without the knowledge that she would be back in a few months. He could not imagine how he – in the other timeline – had gotten through that.
He slept for a few hours. By the time he awoke, he felt no lingering effect from the alcohol, but the same could not be said of his grief. When it was nearly sunset, he put the Walkman away and prepared for his private goodbye. The walk to the grave seemed to be in slow motion.
For a long while, he just stood there, holding the flowers he had brought. Finally, he placed them on the gravestone: first, Lily of the Valley; next, a red tulip; and last, blue and white violets.
Speaking to Buffy, as if she could hear him, "Well, the vicar got the reading right – you certainly did walk through the valley of the shadow of death. And no matter how many apocalypses came your way, you did not fear evil." He shifted his weight side to side nervously. "I thought I might sing a song for you. Hymns aren't really my thing, so I chose an old folksong. Just gonna sing the last stanza." He shoved his hands into his pockets and began to sing:
"Love, to thee my thoughts are turning
All through the night
All for thee my heart is yearning,
All through the night.
Though sad fate our lives may sever
Parting will not last forever,
There's a hope that leaves me never,
All through the night."
Then, he took a folded paper from his pocket, not that he needed it. He had memorized it long ago.
"Also, picked out a poem to read. Not one of my own, mind you. This one was written by Robert Browning:
You'll love me yet!—and I can tarry
Your love's protracted growing:
June reared that bunch of flowers you carry
From seeds of April's sowing.
I plant a heartful now: some seed
At least is sure to strike,
And yield—what you'll not pluck indeed,
Not love, but, may be, like!
You'll look at least on love's remains,
A grave's one violet:
Your look?—that pays a thousand pains.
What's death?—You'll love me yet!"
Earlier, Dawn had invited him to come over to the house that evening. At the time, he said he wasn't sure. But after spending about an hour alone at Buffy's graveside, he decided that he not only wanted to be at the Summers' home, but he knew it was a way to continue building trust with the Scoobies.
Again, he chose to knock on the door. He had done it the other night to be polite, but realized now that they didn't know that Buffy had invited him in the night they came to get weapons. It would probably would be good for them to know that.
Dawn answered, saying, "You know you don't need to do that, right? I invited you in the other day."
Speaking loudly enough for everyone to hear, "Well actually, you didn't. And truth be told, I could have walked in that night or when we dragged ourselves back here after the battle. Didn't walk in, though. Chose to knock, to be polite."
His brows knitted together, Giles was deep in thought. "Now that you mention it, I held the door for you the other night, but no one – myself included – invited you into the house."
Xander's eyes widened. "Will? I thought you did the whole dis-invite thing."
"I did." Turning her attention to Spike, Willow said, "You better 'xplain, mister."
"When Buffy and I left the lot of you at the Magic Box and came to the house to get weapons, I suggested that she could just hand them over the threshold, but she invited me in."
Giles was piecing together recent events and realizing how much trust Buffy had placed in Spike during her last days. Remembering also that he had taken quite a beating and yet did not tell Glory what she wanted to know about the key. "That's when she asked you to protect Dawn?"
"Yes." The others seemed to want more of an explanation, so Spike went on. "My reply was 'to the end of the world, even if that happens to be tonight.' And since the world did not end, my vow is still in effect."
Though they did not press it much further, he figured it would come up again at some point.
This unit had become like family and as such, they spent the evening having dinner and talking. Once they were assured that Dawn had finished her homework, someone suggested playing a game. As Dawn made her way to the living room, she called to the rest of them, "I pick Clue. Nothing's quite as fun as solving a mystery – particularly if the dead body is fictitious. Ew! I really don't like dead bodies. On second thought, maybe we should play a different game."
Xander, Willow, Tara, and Anya exchanged glances and eye rolls as they followed Dawn into the next room.
Giles began taking dishes to kitchen. Spike grabbed a few and followed.
Spike knew he needed to become more comfortable asserting his opinion in conversations with them, rather than just making annoying quips that were of no real value. Yet, when it came to the things that future-Buffy had talked about, he felt a certain amount of pressure to make things better, or at least, not make them worse. "I feel like a broken record … I don't mean to stick my nose in where it doesn't belong, but who is going to look after the finances and the house? I mean, I can protect Dawn, but I can't – and wouldn't – presume to play the role of her guardian. And I guess, if you're trying to convince folks she's still alive, the guardian thing would be more 'under the table' than legal."
"Spike, what are you getting at?"
"Just that after all her Mum's hospital bills and with no income coming in, someone should be keeping an eye on cash flow in order for Dawn to be able to stay in this house."
Giles turned to face him, mildly exacerbated, "Are you suggesting that you—?"
Cutting him off, Spike continued, "No, of course not. Just saying that someone should. You're the more mature adult of this crowd. Figured it would be best to bring it up with you and you could sort it out. I wouldn't want to see Dawn lose her Mum, her big sis, and her home in quick succession, when a little financial wisdom could avoid a potential problem down the road."
Shaking his head while an amused smile spread across his face, Giles said, "You know, you're not as much of a self-centered prat as you appear. Guess that could explain why Buffy chose to keep you around."
"Here I thought it was my dazzling wit and charm."
"While I can't speak for the others, I'll go on record as saying that we could use your help and that I'll feel better knowing you're on our side. Although, I'm still not quite sure I'd trust you without that chip in your head." He paused, listened to the voices in the living room. "I don't think you'll have much trouble winning over Willow. You've already got Dawn and probably Tara. However ..."
"Yeah. Xander is another story."
"To be expected, after all. He just lost one of his best friends. And when he's upset, biting sarcasm and scathing derision are his weapons of choice. You should be fine … if you don't take the bait."
Spike nodded his understanding. "I think I'll take off while tension is relatively low. Probably do a sweep of the high traffic cemeteries on my way home."
Giles turned back to the dishes, which he preferred to board games. Spike walked into the living room and started putting on his coat.
Dawn's frown was apparent in her tone as she said, "You can't leave. Not so soon." She wrapped her arms tightly around his torso.
Embracing her and kissing top of her head, he replied, "Not leaving town or anything. Just heading home for the night. Figured it would be good for someone to do a quick patrol tonight.
She looked up at his face with a sad puppy expression. He tapped her nose with his index finger.
The others looked on as Spike and Dawn said their goodbyes. He nodded and gave a brief wave at the door. Everyone except Xander bade him a good night.
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And so began Spike's ritual for the five months without Buffy: patrolling (with or without the Scooby gang) and going home for time alone with future-Buffy's recorded voice and his annotated outline of the next three years.
When he returned to his crypt, he poured some bourbon into a glass. As he took a sip, he knew he had been right the other day about needing to limit his drinking, lest he slip up and reveal things he had promised to keep private. He determined that he would limit himself to the one drink when he returned from patrol – to take the edge off before enduring the joy-filled ache of listening to the cassette of their conversation on the stairs.
As the months went on, he could nearly play the conversation in his head from memory without pushing the button on the Walkman. Hearing the sound of her voice as he drifted off to sleep soothed some of the pain. However, his dreams were filled with a mixture of the wonderful moments they had shared plus his fantasy version of ones they had yet to create.
He began to realize that he needed to make sure that the timeline was as complete as possible, because once she returned, he would not be able to listen to the recording any more. It would be too difficult and confusing to interact with Buffy and then later, listen to her voice saying such intimate things, causing him to have a visceral reaction to the memory of those hours they had shared. At that point, he would need to focus on the task before him – one thing at a time, one day at a time, wooing the Buffy who would be with him in this timeline … not the one who had visited him from the future.
He had gotten a calendar and was counting the days. She had said it would be roughly 5 months. He decided he would number the days 1 through 150 on the calendar and then put an X through each day as it passed. He figured he should stop listening to the tape a couple weeks before Day 150, to be sure that he stopped before her return.
Day 130 was the last time he played through the conversation. He placed all the cassettes and a copy of the timeline in a fireproof/waterproof box and hid it in the tunnels. He kept one copy of the timeline tucked away in his crypt for regular reference and another sewn into the lining of his leather duster, in case of emergency.
The next series of days seemed to drag on – when you're only having one drink per day and no longer have 90 minutes of audio entertainment, there's not much to look forward to. There was no real change in the daily life of the Scooby gang until Giles decided he should make a trip to England in order to meet with the Watcher's Council. He was more than a little concerned about the Hellmouth being left unattended – well, Slayer-less anyway. Things were a little different while he was away, but in general, the daily routine revolved around caring for Dawn during the day and patrolling at night.
Day 146 came and went. He dusted a few vampires when the gang patrolled, but nothing exciting or out the ordinary. Spike went home, marked another X on the calendar, and began to wonder if she would actually be coming back. Had he done something wrong? Had she altered things by time traveling? Was her estimate of five months inaccurate? Worrisome questions swirled in his head.
After a fitful night of sleep, he made his way over to the house in the afternoon of Day 147 to see if there was anything he could help with – dishes, laundry, whatever.
Willow said that they needed him to stay with Dawn tonight. When he asked, all she would say was that they had something to do.
He and Dawn decided on food and entertainment for the evening. Pizza delivery was becoming all too frequent, but Spike ordered different toppings than the others – so Dawn did not mind that much. At least it wasn't boring old pepperoni and cheese. Usually, spicy BBQ chicken and banana peppers. Dawn said she would play any games except Life and Monopoly, because those were the only games Anya would play when she was on baby-sitting duty – and Dawn was sick to death of those.
They started with Rummy, but then Dawn convinced him that he should teach her Blackjack and Poker. In place of chips, they used pennies from the jar. At the beginning, Spike coached her and even let her win a few hands. However, she caught on quicker than he expected and he had to swiftly switch gears before she had a chance to take him off his coin.
Later that evening – Willow had to do some minor repair work on the Bot. Spike was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the presence of something that looked like Buffy, but was not truly Buffy. Every once in a while, the Bot would say something left over from the old programming. Tonight was one of those nights – and he snapped at Willow to figure out how to remove the remaining traces of the machine that was originally intended to replicate a Buffy that could love him.
Although Spike would likely never admit it to anyone, he cried himself to sleep that night – having given up hope that he would ever see her face again, except the facsimile on the Buffy-bot.
[
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On Day 148, Spike dropped by the Magic Box to find the group huddled around the phone. Giles had called to say that although he had intended to be coming home that day, he would need to stay a bit longer. Apparently, they were in the midst of some research for which the Council needed his help and it would benefit their efforts on the Hellmouth.
Spike had gone into the back room to go a few rounds with the punching bag. Willow came back to fill him in on the phone conversation and to ask if he could be at the house to meet Dawn when she got home from school and stay with her this evening. Without even replying, he turned to go back through the store to get his coat.
As they rejoined the group around the table in the store, Willow added, "We need to do some work from here that … could speed up things for Giles' return and … well, Tara and I might get home late."
"Sure. 'S better than spending hours with my nose in these dusty old books," he said gesturing at the volumes that were open on the table.
Xander bristled. "What? No crack about being surrounded by the lot of us?"
Slapping Xander on the back, Spike said evenly, "Haven't you noticed that I've stopped insulting you every chance I get? Maybe just every third chance or so. Seriously, you're all not really so bad – an acquired taste, mind you, but not altogether awful. Kinda getting used to it. Even you, Xander." He paused, looking at the time. "Well, I've got a few errands to run and I'll need to stop by my crypt. Should be leaving if I'm going to get that all in before she gets home."
[
It had gotten dark hours ago. Dawn had fallen asleep on the couch in the living room after dinner and the first movie. Spike was now watching another – some old black and white film. He had seen it before and it was not one of his favorites. He finally decided to pick up the living room and take care of the dishes and garbage.
While he was in the kitchen, the Buffy-bot came in the back door. From past experience, he anticipated that the Bot would be rambling about either needing service or possibly spouting a programmed line that Willow had failed to erase.
However, these are the words that came spilling from the Bot's mouth: "Where did I go? Where did I go? I was there. Then, I ran away. I thought I would come here."
"What are you on about? You're right here."
"No, not me. The other Buffy. Yes, the other Buffy. I don't know where she ran off to ..." The Bot's battery had apparently run down or something was very wrong with the circuitry, because it stopped working midsentence.
Somewhere amid the swirling thoughts in his brain, some things were beginning to click into place. There was another Buffy. Here in Sunnydale. It was Day 148.
He wanted to believe it was true, but was afraid of how much pain that kind of disappointment could bring with it. That night on the stairs, she had come to give him hope. Now, he would have to dare to hope. He had dared many things during his existence. Surely, he could put his faith in the veracity of future-Buffy's words.
He did not realize that Dawn had woken until he heard her footsteps.
"Dawn, what is it? Did you hear something?" Spike inquired as he headed for the living room.
She did not respond to his question, but after he heard the door open, he heard Dawn speaking. It sounded as though she was choking back tears, as she said, "You're really here. You're alive. And you're home."
A/N:
Thanks for again for reading. Sorry for the long wait on this one, but the good news is that I've gotten a head start on the next installment. So I'm hopeful that you will see that in about a week or so.
Tune in next time … for my version of #6.3 "After Life" and #6.4 "Flooded."
~Jen
18 Oct 2015