Service Unit

Chapter Thirteen – Shower

They stepped into the bathroom and Buffy let go of his hand long enough to move to the large shower stall and turn on the water. She set the temperature just slightly hotter than she liked it and turned to Spike. "Spike, come here, please."

He took a hesitant step forward then looked to her for confirmation. She nodded and made a 'come here' motion with her hand. He took the six more steps needed to bring him across the room then stopped in front of her. She lifted one of his hands and slipped his fingers into the stream of water. "Is that too hot? Not hot enough?" He didn't respond except to push his hand a little further into the stream. "I'm gonna take that as okay then." She laid her hand lightly on his low back and nudged him forward. "Go ahead and get in." He stepped into the stall and looked up at the wall opposite the shower head, his brow furrowing. He stepped to that wall and raised his hands above his head, laying them flat on the wall as he spread his feet wide and bowed his back, pushing his buttocks out to expose his hole. Then he just stood there.

Buffy stared at him for a few confused seconds before comprehension dawned. He was waiting to be cleaned like he was a freaking microwave or something. She swallowed down another surge of anger and stepped into the stall, avoiding the streams of water as she moved to stand beside him. He flinched slightly and the muscles in his back and arms tensed as he braced for the pain he was apparently used to experiencing during this procedure. Buffy closed her eyes and took a deep breath then opened her eyes and laid a hand lightly on his low back. "I'm not going to hurt you, Spike. I promise. Let's get you under the water."

She reached up and lifted one of his hands off the wall then tugged and nudged until he'd turned around. She nudged him toward the water and he stepped under it and let it cascade over him. He hissed quietly at first when the hot water touched his many wounds, then he sighed in obvious pleasure at the heat of the water pouring down over him. She tugged and nudged again until he'd turned around to face her then she pointed at his head. "I'm going to wash your hair and then I'll do a quick wash of everything else."

He watched her as she picked up the shampoo bottle and poured a small dollop out into her palm, then he tensed again as she applied the shampoo to his fuzzy head. She started massaging his scalp with her fingertips and noticed his eyelids drooping even as he fought to keep them up, so she said, "You can open and close your eyes anytime you want to, Spike." He let them fall shut in contentment as she continued, and the muscles he'd been holding tense started to relax. She smiled and spoke quietly, "I only have strawberry scented shampoo, sorry, but I'll get you some manly shampoo in a few days so you won't have to smell like a girl. And when your hair grows out some more, we can bleach it if you want. Or we can leave it alone, I guess, it's up to you, although you look really different without your Billy Idol hair. Not bad different, just different. I'll have to get you some gel or something, too. I know you don't like your curls all that much, even though they make you look really cute and sexy. Well… more cute and sexy."

She took a lot longer than was needed to wash the little bit of hair he had, but he was enjoying it so much that she didn't want to stop. She wondered if anybody in the last twenty three years had shown him any kind of affection or tenderness, but with the way he was soaking up every gentle touch like a sponge soaking up water, she had to guess that nobody probably had. And, she realized with a start, she was enjoying caring for him. She'd dusted off her nurturing side and was letting it run the show for a while. No, she didn't like the reason he needed the care – and if… no, when… he got back to his normal self, he'd probably get all offended and wouldn't want to be coddled this way, but it made her feel all warm and fuzzy to be taking care of the man she loved.

She carefully rinsed the suds off his head, making sure to keep them out of his eyes, then she soaped a washcloth and started to clean him with gentle, barely there swipes of the cloth so she wouldn't aggravate his injuries. When she reached his genitals, she carefully wrapped the cloth around his penis and started to wash off the lube she'd used, blinking in surprise when he got hard from only a couple of strokes of the soapy cloth. She let him go and his cock bobbed a little as it stood out proudly from his body.

Okay… that wasn't exactly sexy touching, and it had to have hurt, considering his penis still looks like raw hamburger, so why'd he get hard? Even back when we were going at it like bunnies it would have taken a bit more than that to get Spike Junior interested again after having an orgasm less than twenty minutes ago. She glanced up at his face, but he wasn't showing any of his usual signs of arousal. She looked back down. Well, you know, aside from the obvious. So is he actually turned on? Or is it… She frowned. It's a trained response… I'd bet my Slayer Scythe on it. He gets hard from any kind of touch and I doubt he has any control over it at all. She clenched her hand tightly around the washcloth and a stream of suds poured out from between her fingers and splashed onto her shoes. Well, I'm not going to just leave him like that.

She put down the washcloth and picked up her body wash, squirting a sizeable dollop into her palm and then rubbing her hands together until they were both slick with soap suds. She started to reach for him then stopped, her fingertips only millimeters from the hard column of his flesh. Buffy, you idiot! Yeah, just grab hold and start yanking, why don't you? Don't even ask the guy who's had absolutely no say over what happens to his body if he even wants you to! He probably doesn't! He probably just wants to be left alone!

She took a deep breath then looked up at him and asked quietly, "Spike? Can you open your eyes for me, please?"

He did, blinking the shower water out of them, and she motioned toward his penis. "Uh… I know you probably don't have any control over… uh… this, but if you want me to, I'll… um…" She took another deep breath and felt her face heat as she stammered, "I'll… I'll make you come, if you want."

He just looked at her, still blinking water out of his eyes, and her face heated even more. "Do you want me to keep touching you… there?" She pointed at his penis. "Or does it hurt too much?"

He nodded tentatively and she nearly smacked herself in the forehead when she realized that she didn't know which question he was answering. "Okay… one question at a time. Right. Do you want me to… make you come?"

He looked at her for a long minute then nodded. Okay, so he does… or he's only saying yes because he doesn't think he can say no. She gently wrapped one soap slick hand around him and stroked twice then asked quietly, "Does it hurt when I do that? Please tell me the truth." He took even longer to answer this time, but he finally nodded and she immediately let go. "Okay, then I won't. Your body, your decision. I don't want to do anything that will hurt you, so I'll just rinse you off and we'll be done."

Once he was rinsed clean, she reached around him to turn off the water then stepped out of the stall and turned to face him. He followed her without any prompting, and she was just about to praise him for acting without command when he dropped to his knees outside the stall and pressed his forehead to the laces of her right sneaker, once again placing his hands at the small of his back.

Buffy nearly growled. Without the trainer there to tell her why Spike was acting this way, she wasn't sure what he was expecting to happen, but whatever it was, it probably wasn't fun. Then she remembered the plug and shuddered. He was probably waiting for it to be reinserted so he'd be ready for use. She was SO going to kick Angel right in the nuts. With each foot. More than once. And she'd be wearing boots.

She carefully wiggled her foot out from under Spike's head then moved to the towel rack and picked the fluffiest, softest towel she owned, unfurling it and draping it over his back. She clutched his shoulders through the cloth and tugged until he sat up, gasping loudly as his face came into view and she saw the tears streaking down his cheeks. "Spike? What's wrong? Oh God, I hurt you, didn't I?"

He looked up at her, blinking as he tried to control the tears, and a small, silent sob broke from his throat. She dropped to her knees beside him and wrapped her arms around him, pulling him close and using a hand on the back of his head to guide his face to rest against her neck. She murmured quietly as she stroked her fingers gently through the damp fuzz at his nape, "I'm sorry, Spike, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you, I swear. I want to help you, but I have no clue what I'm doing, and I think I'm making it worse. God, I'm sorry." Her own eyes welled up and tears spilled down her cheeks, dripping off her chin to land on the towel draped around Spike.

Spike still had his wrists pressed together at the small of his back as he sobbed against her, and they sat crying together for a long time, Buffy murmuring quiet apologies as she pressed gentle kisses to his ear and neck.

When she gently nudged him back to sit on his feet, his eyes were red-rimmed and a few errant tears were still threatening to spill, but he was calm. He dropped his gaze to his knees and Buffy reached out and used her index finger under his chin to gently lift his face. When his eyes met hers, she gave him a watery smile. "It's okay, Spike. Really. We'll figure this out. It might be rough at first, and I'm probably going to make a lot of mistakes, but we'll get through it. We're both stubborn and we're not going to let this beat us, are we?"

Spike's expression became fearful and Buffy thought over what she'd just said then she moved her hand and cupped his cheek. "Sorry. That wasn't a question you needed to answer, because I already know we won't let this beat us. We won't, Spike. I promise. Now, let's get you dried off. You've got to be freezing."

She stood and tugged him gently to his feet then started patting him dry, using one corner of the towel to dry her tears. She used a different corner to squeeze as much water as she could out of the soaked silk collar, wishing she could just take it off, but if she did, Spike would probably freak out again. She'd have to see about getting something that could stand up to being worn 24/7 and not get ruined in the shower, because Spike was a long way from being ready to own himself.

When he was as dry as he was going to get without rubbing the cloth over his damaged skin, Buffy hung the towel over the shower door and turned back to Spike. She'd moved his hands from his low back to hang at his sides and he hadn't moved them from that position since she'd placed them there.

He was watching her intently and she took a couple of steps toward the door then held her hand out to him. He looked down at her hand then back to her face. She nodded toward his left hand and said, "Give me your hand, Spike." He lifted his left hand and laid it lightly in hers. She wrapped her fingers around it and squeezed. "Good, Spike. That's good."

She led him out of the bathroom and over to the bed then nodded back toward the door to the master bath. "Okay. I'm going to go do my human stuff in the bathroom and then I'll get you some blood. I'll be right back." She nodded at the bed. "You can sit down if you want."

She squeezed his hand then let go and made for the bathroom, intending to be as quick as she could so Spike wouldn't be alone for very long. She stripped out of her wet clothes, tucking the box of pebbles into the back of her makeup drawer, then hurried through drying herself off, putting on her pajamas, using the toilet, and brushing her teeth. She went back out to the bedroom to find Spike standing in the exact same position she'd left him in, with his hand slightly outstretched as it had been when she'd let go of it.

She suppressed a tired sigh then stepped up next to him and tugged and nudged until she had him reclined on the bed, resting against a pile of pillows in front of the headboard. She pulled the sheet and comforter over him up to his waist and he looked down at the covers as she laid his hands on his thighs. His fingers twitched against the fabric ever so slightly and Buffy smiled as she leaned down to press a gentle kiss to his forehead. "I'll be right back with your blood."