He never looked at her, never said anything. Kept his eyes downcast and his head bowed. She saw that his roots were growing in and his real hair was something like a strawberry blonde...he was thin, gaunt even...and she would have steered him in the direction of the number 4 or 5 on the menu--to the pancakes and steak, but what would beefing up on carbohydrates and protein do for a vampire?
The first time he had been there, she had recognized him before he had recognized her...if indeed he ever had...or did. She didn’t call him by name...and had simply asked him want he had wanted to order. He said nothing, just kept his head bowed and she had said softly...’you have to order something, they won’t let you just sit here’ and when he had said nothing, she had asked: ‘can you pay for coffee? And here she thought...what had blood in it? Gravy?
He had raised his head a bit and then it drooped back down...so maybe that was ‘yes.’ She took a gamble on a yea vote.
Sausage and biscuits. She had brought him coffee and sausage and biscuits.
He hadn’t touched the food...but he had drunk the coffee and then he sat there smoking cigarettes and staring out the window. He sat there so long she was surprised to look up and find him gone. She had felt a pang of sadness. Loss of something familiar in this strange huge city but then it was: ‘damnit!’ Had he skipped out on the bill? But no. There had been a twenty dollar bill there. Almost three times the cost of the meal.
And now she had a moment of temptation of: ‘what to do’? With this extra, with this tip...she could get those pre natal vitamins she should be taking and what was this? Some kind of test?
She gave it to the bus boy. It made Mickey happy and bussing her stations like nobody’s business.
So maybe it was o.k. to give it to someone else...someone who didn’t know. But information was everything and when you know it’s blood money...well, she may not be the Slayer anymore, and fallen from grace as she was...but she still understood what was right and what was wrong...and once you had that understanding...you couldn’t pretend not to.
Three nights later he was back. She hadn’t seen him come in. He was just there in her station already smoking a cigarette that nobody had dared to ask him to put out. Well she would. It was a no smoking section this time...and the law was the law.
He didn’t put it out right away....but when she came back with the menu she noted with satisfaction that it was out. Ground out on the table top. But hey! Not like she had been specific about where to put it out. She almost smiled...but did not.
It felt...good to see him again. She had saved blood from the chicken livers...she had gone into the cooler and had drained blood from the livers into a Tupperware container...in case...in case he came back. He had looked so skinny, almost emaciated...and had he been feeding? Was it possible that he had done as she asked...or was it grief...or a combo plate of the two?
And still he said nothing. So she ordered a chicken liver omelet for him plus blood treat in a coffee cup. He didn’t acknowledge her but when she checked back she saw the cup had been drained.
Well that was it...any vamp that would drink that...was desperate. He wasn’t feeding off humans...and she felt something...close to affection for him...and maybe pride.
He left her a fifty this time and she had another moment of temptation. Maybe he was feeding...maybe he wasn’t...but sure as shootin’ lab rats in a cage--he didn’t get that from an eight hour stint of work somewhere. She cashed it out at the register and spread it between...the bus boys...and Abigail. A high end sixties something fellow waitress who had a hard time walking after two hours on her feet, and could barely make it to her tables to service them...hence low tips for her. It would help her.
Buffy needed it too...badly...but it felt like the right thing to do.
*
“Hey Anne...” Abigail called to her one night as she came out of the storage room that doubled as a break room.
“Hey Anne...your boyfriend’s here..” And Buffy’s heart did a double thump at the thought of Angel. Angel...had forgiven her...he had come to find her...but no...that thought only lasted for the length of one half breath. No.
That look in his eye...the almost feral glow that turned...on her...like he wanted to hurt her...to kill her even...that is, after she had told him...after it had sunk in. Once she had made him understand that Spike hadn’t attacked her...and it had been tempting to let him think that he had...it had been tempting...but no...Buffy was honest...always honest...it had been...an accident...an accident like falling down...falling and gravity and the earth and life and death...and...
Then the look. That look had come into his eyes. Like he might hurt her.
And she had been afraid--not so much of him, as of the broken edge now between them. An edge so sharp she feared for a few days that she might cut her own wrist on it.
They had decided on an abortion. Giles and Angel and Mom...and, and Willow couldn’t look her in the eye when she talked to her...and Xander...Xander would walk the other way if he saw her coming.
So yes an abortion would work, just wipe it away, but then she had had a dream and woke the next morning--didn’t even remember the details of it...some image of Spike maybe but older and wiser and a still quiet voice that said something like: 'go, go, go think about this...let it be what you want to do...one way or the other...but let it come from inside you, not from out there with pressure from them...just go think.’
And she had packed a bag, wrote a note, and left.
And then when time slipped by...that itself became her decision by default.
So no. She didn’t think this would be her boyfriend.
It was Spike.
“Oh...” she said casually to Abigail. “He’s not my boyfriend...”
"Well he’s not moving. Made a point of sitting in your section...and...well...nobody wants him anyway--you can handle him, can’t you?”
Buffy nodded. If Spike knew all of it...what would he do? She wasn’t showing, much...but she was skinny and so it would show up soon.
Plus there was the other thing...power diminished...Slayer power was fading in proportion to the baby puffing up...and was this a sign she had fallen from grace?
Shamed her Mom, friends, her Watcher and boyfriend...runaway from an abortion to find her Slayer power fading too. Spike could snap her like a twig.
O.k. that was a cliché...but so was ‘girl in trouble.’ Would Spike sense it?
But she didn’t feel fear when around him and that was very important, her intution had never failed her there and besides...he seemed too broken himself. He didn’t seem strong enough to defend himself let alone attack her and then she remembered the ash. Dru’s ash smeared on his face...and wondered...just how broken...was he?
“How come you didn’t keep it?”
She had been so used to the silence between them--even liked it, that she was stunned for a moment at the sound of his voice. She had just placed a plate of food before him. (She had chosen a ham omelet to go with the beef blood this time. It looked so good to her, her mouth watered.)
“How come?”
No use pretending not to understand. She simply told him.
“I may not be the Slayer anymore--” oh god, it had slipped out, would he notice? She went on quickly.
“But I can’t take that money, Spike...not when I know how you got it.”
He still didn’t look at her, but lowered his eyes and that seemed to suggest he had heard her...and understood.
He was gone for four days and she felt that sadness again. Having him around had felt like home--the comfort of familiar faces, she reasoned with herself, even if it was your mortal enemy could be reassuring in a strange environment. It had felt good seeing him...and now...
He came back Saturday night.
And she smiled when she saw him walk in, just smiled. She watched him move right to her section and sit at an open table. She tried to think: (what seemed different?) and then she realized...ah...no coat. He was wearing a dark blue t shirt with the sleeves ripped off hanging loose over torn blue jeans.
No coat.
She had never seen him without that coat. Even...then...when they had fallen together...and then at the thought of it--there was a sense memory tingle and she shut it down. Don’t go there for god’s sake.
She brought him his coffee and a clean ashtray...(smoking section tonight...that should make him happy)...if he could register pleasure. As she placed the ashtray on the table, he took an envelope out of his jeans pocket and slid it into her apron pocket.
“Spike I...”
“Don’t fret...I pawned my coat and...and some gold...”
And here he looked out the window to hide his face from her close perusal.
She thought about pointing out...’well...where had he gotten the coat and things and it was still blood money’...but stopped when she noticed he kept his face down and away from her. As if he averted his face so she couldn’t see him cry...and she thought...'well...maybe, maybe if there was love attached to those things, then maybe the sacrifice of them evened it up.' O.K.
“O.K. O.K. Spike...thanks. Mondo beef sound O.K.?”
He nodded.
“Slayer...”
She stopped with her back to him, and when he spoke, his voice was low and had a vacant sound but...but she believed him for the feeling in it. A broken violin trying to play a steady olde time tune.
“I’m not going anywhere...” he said and then because he couldn’t think how to make it plainer, he said it again.
"I’m not going anywhere.”
She didn’t say anything but had to almost run to the kitchen to call his order in--before her voice broke apart in a different way.
When the order was up, she asked Serina if it was o.k. to take her lunch break now...and--‘seeing the place was so empty...was it o.k. if she sat out front?’
“You wanna eat with your boyfriend”?
“He’s not...oh whatever...is that o.k?”
It was. Serina knew Anne was pregnant and hoped things would be alright for the young girl. The world could be so hard and she had a very tough road ahead.
“Yeah, go on.”
Buffy brought Spike his food plus a cup of coffee for herself and if he was surprised when she sat down across from him--it certainly didn’t register.
She had already eaten her lunch but she wanted to talk to him and now found she had nothing to say. Or had plenty...but couldn’t imagine how to begin.
After only a few minutes of silence he moved his cup of coffee to the side, and pushed his plate of food partway across the table to her.
Part way. The universal restaurant body language...for sharing...for ‘help yourself’.
If he had pushed it all the way across...it would have been too much...too much like an order, an 'eat this edict'...or maybe it would have hurt her feelings--like she needed charity or something.
But this. This plate of food...'nudged.' Just nudged like it was no big deal, in her direction...undid her.
Her whole world torn apart, fallen from grace, love lost, loss of self respect, Mommy gone, a Mommy to be, pregnant and alone and still she had been able to hold it all together until a broken vamp offers to share his plate of food.
Undone by American fries.
She started to cry. Spike looked at her...directly...for the first time really, and cocked his head like a puzzled pup. Puzzlement and concern now clouding his sad eyes.
What was wrong?
Abigail chose this moment to come run interference on a maybe 'new baby spat' the young people might be having.
“You alright Anne?” And then she cast a sharp look at Spike...the MALE, the bearer of all things emotionally untidy.
Spike’s face went blank.
“No...no...it’s all right...it’s...” and here Buffy’s mind scrambled and seized on the first thing that popped into her head.
“It’s Princess Di...it’s, you know...”
Abigail was instantly sympathetic, shaking her head--showing off the bad vegetable dye in two tones on the different sides of her head. It accentuated Abby’s age, her cluelessnes, her vulnerability, so old and hurting too and still she would come to defend a girl against the big bad. So kind, so brave...and that just made Buffy cry more.
“Oh I know...” Abby clicked her tongue; “Isn’t it awful? terrible thing, killed like that and in a helicopter crash of all things. Terrible accident...yeah the Princess is gone, the Princess is gone...O.K....honey it’ll be O.K.”
And then she turned to Spike and mouthed: “Hormones.”
And his brows pulled together as he nodded, it was a little stilted...but...a kind of communication. And then he said quite simply as if this added to the conversation.
“Heartbeat.”
Abigail nodded approvingly...good, he was going with Anne to the Doctors...good...and with that she limped away...her feet already in crisis.
Buffy was still caught on his single word. Heartbeat? He could hear the baby’s heartbeat? Oh thank god...oh god...and this relief made her cry too. She had been afraid to go to a doctor for fear of what they might find. The baby had a heartbeat. She looked down wiping tears from her face.
Spike looked at Buffy and then did the only thing that made sense to him in the midst of this emotional display.
He nudged the plate a little closer and then muttered
“Bloody Royals...”
Not sure if he was cursing Princess Di or the Royal family or maybe it was just some general all purpose way to take her side against the Monarchy that made her cry.
She blew her nose on a napkin from the holder and then reached in and picked up a chunk of potato and tried to swallow it past the lump in her throat. It was good. It was fresh and there was black pepper on it and why did she have a craving for steak sauce?
Satisfied to see her eat something, Spike drank a bit of his blood...and then ate a bite of almost raw burger. Mondo Meat.
And there they sat. In quiet. In good company. A master Vampire that wasn’t working quite right and a dethroned Slayer sharing a plate of food.
*
the end
love,
Lizerrrbeathan
c
P.S.--Markus O’ Really finished that book with no title and it was published as this:
‘The End; Not.’
Feedback to lizerrr: sekarsn@aol.com
