Tara walks until she's just out of the shadow of the crypt, the heavy iron door cutting off the gang's whispers as she leaves. Debating who's going to go after her in hushed tones. It's a double-edged sword; the longer it takes them to make a decision the more humiliating it is, and yet the more time she'll have by herself.

It feels better to be alone.

It always has, but it feels even more right at the moment. If Willow is torturing herself, and she's alone because of her, it feels natural that the scales are balanced.

They aren't truly balanced though. Tara's here, with Willow's friends, in her place, in their old bed (or she was… or is; what with the apparition?...too hard to figure out now) and part of her can't help feeling she deserves this somehow. That this is punishment for trying to slot into a place she doesn't belong. Isn't truly welcome.

And now Buffy's house is filled with duplicates of her like a real-time home movie of her and Willow's relationship with each moment of intimacy now walked in on. So many memories of happiness disturbed by other people's observations.

God, the dorm rooms…

She buries her head in her hands, envisaging and reliving all that went on in those rooms. Are people watching her now? Are whole groups of college kids sitting around for a ghost viewing and getting a show of some of her most private moments?

What would Willow focus on?

The time with the rose? Are people watching her mess up a spell? Laughing and pointing at the idiot diving out of the way of an invisible missile?

Or the time when Willow came to her dorm room holding a candle?

God, please not that, not our first time together, please no—

It hurts endlessly, but maybe what hurts the most is that Willow's falling into a deep dark hole and Tara can't even try and pull her out. She sent her halfway across the globe, and she's falling apart.

She pulled me out first. Dragged me from Glory's jaws… Why couldn't I have done the same? Why didn't I manage to?!

I pushed her away. This is my fault.

Dad was right, it's always my fault—

The crypt door squeaks as it opens and she wipes her eyes on her sleeve bracing herself to find out who's been sent to get her. Probably Buffy. Maybe Dawnie; in a way she's just as much an outsider as Tara. As long as it isn't suspiciously-awkward-around-lesbians-Xander. She couldn't bear his uncomfortable babbling right now.

If it's Anya she'll just run.

She turns and is more than a little surprised to see Spike standing at the edge of the shadows.

She sniffs, feeling relieved and guilty at the same time. One wrong foot and he could go up in smoke and yet he's out here fetching her back because she's acting like a little kid threatening to run away from home.

Stupid.

"Did you draw the short straw?" she asks, pulling her sleeves down over her hands and crossing her arms over her stomach.

A look of sad concern flashes through his eyes almost too fast to notice before he shrugs easily.

"Rigged the election," he answers, smiling pleasantly.

"Right," Tara nods, taking a couple of steps back towards him so he doesn't have to raise his voice to talk to her.

"You alright?" he asks and genuinely seems to want to hear the answer.

She starts to nod on instinct. She's alright, she's fine, she's not a burden, she's not a burden, she's not—

Her face crumples, and she can't stop it from doing so. "No," she gasps as fat tears roll down her cheeks.

She covers her face with her hands, but the teardrops are thick and unstoppable and they soak her sleeves.

I should go. I should leave. Find another college and find a way to pay for it that isn't credit cards. Find another town and this time make sure Dad doesn't get the address…

Except you're feeble and you're weak, Tara. You'd never make it on your own.

She jolts when Spike reaches for her, placing a careful hand on her forearm. His fingers smolder as sunlight touches his skin and he pulls them back hurriedly, shaking the blisters off with a muttered curse. He settles for kicking her gently on the calf with the side of his boot.

"Come on, big witches don't cry," he mutters uncomfortably, shifting from foot to foot.

She chokes off a sickened gulp, unable to stop the flood now it's started.

"I just feel like… like she's r-released our sex tape," she says with a sob that's half a smirk at how stupid she's being, filling in the bullying role her brother would have played. "Like she's letting everyone look at my li-life like they've got tickets to a show." She heaves in a shivering sob, crying properly now, trying to wipe her eyes but the tears continue to slip silently down her cheeks. "And it's because she's thinking about me. She's thinking about me so hard that it's killing her but I'm thinking about her all the time too so I can't even… it's not even her fault... I don't know what to do."

Spike nods, gritting his jaw in the way she's come to realize is his can't-stand-watching-girls-cry face as he stuffs his fists in his coat pockets.

"You're allowed to be brassed off about it," he says and Tara swallows down the wet gulp strangling her throat.

"But I-I-'m not. I'm n-not that's the w-worst thing. Everyone th-think-thinks I should be angry but I'm just sad. I just miss- I miss h-her so much and I feel like I'm not allowed to—"

"Hey, take a breath," he says sternly as hyperventilating stutters her words worse than usual. He pulls her into the shadows a bit more so he can squeeze her shoulder without burning his fingers. "You're the one that decides your limit, Glinda. Even if she buggers up the whole stinking town, you're the one that decides when you're done. And if you're not done that's no-" he cuts himself and sighs hard through his nose. "If you're not done then you're not done. Fuck everyone else."

Tara pulls at her neck, looking up into the blue sky to try and get the tears to sink down again as she lets what he said sink in.

I'm not done.

She closes her eyes to really feel the weight of those words.

I decide when I'm done.

"Okay," she says after a moment, and for a brief moment feels a weightless sense of relief that she doesn't have to call it quits just because that's the logical thing to do. Tears still slip down her face but they don't sting like they did, just a soft, exhausted purging.

"You saw the-," she starts before swallowing down rising revulsion as her eyes pinch shut tighter. She can't bear that she has to ask this question but it's going to haunt her not knowing. "You saw the me on the bed?"

Spike clears his throat, obviously embarrassed, and for a second her heart plummets into her stomach. "I just caught the overture," he mutters, wincing apologetically. "The fully clothed part," he adds with an awkward wave of his hand, and Tara lets out a relieved huff of air. "If it makes you feel any better, Old Rupes thinks it's gonna start being all of us soon. You're just the first act."

Tara worries at her lip, staring up at the blue sky. She needs to look at something that isn't a concerned look on someone's face as she loses control of herself. She's always hated that look.

Sometimes when things go wrong like they always do she likes to just look up and pretend she's actually looking down. She's a tiny little thing on a tiny little speck of a ball looking down into a blue abyss. And then gravity will release her and she'll fall. Straight down into that endless blue. To be swallowed up by such a forgiving color…

A plane flies overhead and she airily wonders if it's England-bound. Wishes briefly that she was on it. "I don't know if that makes me feel better," she sighs, rubbing her eyes with the heel of her hand to try and massage away the ache that crying has caused. "I don't know where to go," she mumbles.

Spike cocks an eyebrow at her.

"Dawn's staying at Xander's tonight… Buffy I guess here? I've got nowhere… I could go back home to my dad's I guess," her face drops again at the thought.

Spike snorts. "Bloody hell, if you're going to stay with a monster you might as well kip here."

Her head snaps to him then, unsure if he's joking, but he doesn't look like he is. He shrugs, gesturing back into the crypt. "I gotta bed and everything downstairs now. It's right posh if you like furniture from the dump," he smiles with ironic smugness. "Plus I pilfered an entire rug shipment from the docks," he adds proudly. "Proper cozy like. You and the Slayer are more than welcome to the bed. I can sleep anywhere."

Tara's mouth opens and closes wordlessly for a moment as she attempts to get her head around the offer, evaluating the lack of concern inside herself. Vampire lairs should be a big red no. Obviously. And both Xander and Willow seem to hold endless reservoirs of contempt for Spike no matter what he does or how he acts.

She'd heard the stories of what he was like before the chip, all told with such vitriol… And she'd helped with the banishing that first time when his feelings for Buffy came to the surface. She'd felt overjoyed at being useful to the gang even as a shard of pity for him had soured the experience.

She thought their venom towards him might dwindle a little after Xander and Giles dumped his bloody and beaten body back in his crypt, having hauled him there from out of the foyer of Glory's apartment complex. But it seemed like that sacrifice hadn't changed anything at all. The fact that it hadn't made her feel…. Conflicted. Sad. It was so hard to watch someone trying their best to change only to be dismissed. Trying to build a bridge over a rushing river of their past mistakes.

She could relate to that more than somewhat.

You don't have to hate him just because Xander and Willow do, she reminds herself, a sentiment she's no stranger to. It's so hard to remember she can have opinions of her own when everyone else talks over her all the time.

She stiffens her spine, deciding to stop being dragged along by the undertow of everyone else's disdain.

Because he's sort of nice.

Sort of.

And, Buffy loves him. She's pretty sure that's what that sparkle in her eyes is. Buffy should have at least one ally for those feelings if that's the case.

And he did punch you in the face that one time…

"That's–," she sniffs wetly, wiping her eyes on her sleeve tucked over her fingers. "That's kind of y—"

"Oi, watch it," he growls playfully, cutting her off as he ushers her back inside with a hand on her arm. "That's bloody slander, that is."