He was avoiding her.
She knew he was avoiding her.
Usually, that is, usually...he kept his distance, kept himself in the corner of the room but had always been ready and willing to meet her eyes when needed.
And that's just it, isn't it? That was the exact exactly.
She was finding out that she needed the warm luster of his eyes all the time now; she needed him, her haven on this Hellmouth in this, the time before the end and hello brick wall and cartoon splat but not funny, no, not coyote funny.
And ever since...ever since her journey to meet the three Shaman...ever since the vision and coming back and yes, maybe she had held herself away from them all for a while as she took it all in, but now she was back and ready and needing his eyes.
The warm contact of complete fealty and he wouldn't raise his head and when she turned to look at him he always, almost always would be looking away.
He was getting ready to leave.
She knew it.
He was getting ready to leave and he was making the 'better get used to it' noises. He was beginning separation with her in degrees. Trying it out in the economy pack of minus me before buckling down to the jumbo jump across the Grand Canyon.
They hadn't talked since the dressing down she had given him that night, the calling out and it was too. Calling on the demon to come on out and break the bluster of this woeful soul filled Spike and she refused to consider irony, there was only the iron and flattening out the wrinkles in the works--there was just what she needed and what she needed now and then doing becoming DONE.
And he hadn't talked to her since.
Could barely look at her.
She wasn't going to apologize, she simply was not.
He...he had gotten the demon and it was a big one and strong too and it had been a ten man job and Spike had done the thing...well one of the things he did best and she would not blush about (the other) so he was a one man army and the demon had been Godzilla Part VII and Sunnydale would have been a greasy spot, a squished belch if not for Spike, and Willow had told her this on the side, confirmed all this because, Spike; well, this Spike wasn't one for bragging. So he had stepped up to break a bone but now he wasn't talking to her...and...and her hands...wouldn't stop shaking.
And so she wound her fingers round each other in a pretend thinkers pose as she laid out the strategy for the week to the girls.
It was only three days after THE night and she was thinking hard now...trying to work out what to do with this new information crammed inside her overwhelmed noggin and when she looked to Spike standing in the dark, far and away and in the corner of the dining room by the kitchen...just there...on the fringe ready to disappear...she had looked at him, right into where his eyes would be as he stood there in the dark, almost eaten by shadow and for once, he was looking at her--but she couldn't see his eyes and her hands had started to tremble and she interlaced her fingers and continued speaking, voice smooth and strong to the girls about plans for training, plans for the field... voice calm, face calmer, crossing her arms in front of her now to hide her hands...because they were still shaking.
Meeting over, girls dismissed for the evening, for sleep and she looked back toward where Spike had been standing...but he was gone...
Her stomach clenched and she felt a tearing at the back of her throat.
She would not apologize she simply would not.
And...and she would tell him so in spades.
Without thinking she felt herself pulled to where he had been standing and then out through the kitchen...
She would not apologize....she...she...
She pushed open the back screen door to find him there, leaning on the rail as if he was waiting for her...and that scared her too.
She could face a Hell God and any demon delighted to eviscerate; but Spike hiding his eyes, made her tremble.
He looked her in the eye now, though, straight in the eye and she was shocked for a moment by how steady he looked. How...present...how solid...she hadn't seen him look like this since....no, no she had never seen him look like this, so maybe the talk she had given him had helped. She sure hoped so because she wasn't going to apologize...
"Buffy..."
His voice was low and musical and a caress. A cool breeze skim tripping to her on a hot night with the scent of fresh cut grass attached.
She inhaled him and looked into eyes that were steady. so steady on a blue sea, see-saw blown away and now his eyes were steady but sad and resigned. He had come to a decision...
"Luv.."
"--I'm sorry..."
She apologized.
She said it. It just slipped right out, surprising her, shocking him but still it was true.
"I'm sorry..."
"No lass, no...no need, there isn't, truly. You do what you need to...I know that."
"I could have found another way to say it--"
Spike raised his hand and whispered to stop her.
"Shh, shh now..."
Amazed, she quieted and looked into his large eyes and then he said:
"It's over for me the night, luv, it 'tis."
She felt her throat tightening and her teeth clench down and the bottom falling, falling, falling out...
"It's over for me, luv..it's gone...I know what you...need from me, I do...I understand what's needed...and it's gone from me luv...it is and no mistake. See..."
And here he hung his head and wagged it in a slow arc and the light cast from the kitchen shone out on the silver white of his hair and she had a childlike desire to reach out and stroke it...just touch the gossamer feather light like...
He was talking again.
"See...it, doesn't just hurt me to...hurt people...things...any thing...it kills me to kill, Buffy...it, cuts into me like a mortal wound to my heart...my soul...I 'spect...and I would do it...I would...if it meant I could help you...but here's the thing..."
"Spike, stop...stop please..." she whispered..
And he heard the tear in her voice and more importantly...he felt it...he could feel his words hurting her but still he had to say it.
"Irony, luv and a joke too 'cept the timing is pure shite and no mistake...times were I wouldn't feel a thing, wouldn't hear a thing 'ecpt the crunch of bones like my favorite chocolate crisp...but now Buffy...now I feel it all...I feel it if a hiccup hurts somebody coming up wrong."
And here he looked up into her eyes and she saw that his were moist. He could feel pain leaking from something inside her tearing, but there was nothing for it.
Where was the good in goodbye? Stupid, stupid word.
He whispered
"I feel it all my lamb, you plus me plus the birds in the trees...I feel it all and..."
And here he did choke out a laugh.
"And now I can't hurt a living thing...and not have it come back in spats and spades...I'm no good to you like this, pet...none. Worse...I'd upset the cart. I could crack up on the field at the worst moment...or spend all my time bottled up on Jackie D to numb it all like, and which of these two roads is gonna help get you to where you need to be? You know it...you sensed it when you called me out...”
"I'm sorry..."
"Shh...luv, you aren't listening...I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying you're right, for you, for now...but I'm out of it...I'm done with the fight. That ways at least...:”
She was crying now and not trying to hide it...just quiet tears rolling down from her eyes and snot coming loose at her nose and her brain scramble grabbing for anything...anything...she grabbed a raggedy rag of a breath to croak softly:
"You...killed the demon, he was big, Willow said so...he--"
"Magics."
His answer was soft and succinct and when he spoke his voice trembled, stumbled somewhat but he went on. His mind was made up.
"Magics...still have a trick or two up my sleeve...mind, not something I could rely on often...but I had a bit in the bank for a rainy day and this was it...fortune spent now and digging deeper into more of that account would put me deep into red and then I'd be a danger of a different kind..."
She was just shaking her head now...no words would come out.
"I'm going the night luv, best make a clean break...ah...luv...stop, stop, please stop..."
Her body was trembling now she was trying to hold it in, hold it all in...but the effort just made her tremble more.
He stepped forward and took her by the elbows.
"Buffy, listen to me...You think The First is through with me?" He snorted. "Right. Exactly and I can't pull my weight and you know it and now so do I. I'm leaving luv, and I'm going the night, I am and..."
He couldn't say it...couldn't say the terrible two syllables sounding out the stupid word.
Instead he turned and walked away..
He was at the fringe of the bushes when she managed to push this through her throat and out up past her lips.
"...please..."
It was soft but spoke so true she felt him slow down.
She coughed to clear her throat and whispered.
"Dammit Spike, don't make me chase you..."
She left the porch and moved across the stretch of back yard--soft grass. soft grass, soft grass and then again:
"Please.."
He turned slightly and she could see he was crying or just barley holding it all back, holding it all in and she knew a moment of hope when she heard him croak out:
"Turn loose of my coat, woman...bloody hell, Buffy, don't make this harder--"
"--Shut up. I mean it, shut up. And I'm sorry if that hurts all your new found feelings...well, no I'm not sorry. You go. If you wanna go..if you wanna leave, then go--but just don't leave if you think you're doing it for my good...cuz...not feeling too good right now...so if you're leaving for my good...it's already a bust..."
He turned to look at her, amazed, perplexed, and crazy sharp hope cutting while--
"You're ruining my exit luv..."
"Good."
They looked at each other for a moment.
"I could be the means to bring it all down on our heads, Buffy and how can I be the one to make you suffer?"
"Simple. Don't." and then softer. "Don't leave, Spike. I need you."
He looked down and then over her shoulder and then said very softly, simply, ingeniously:
"How?"
She looked at him and then the thing happened that happens sometimes just before irrevocable separation, just before gone for good, just before the deathbed and now the clock was ticking down, pressing out the truth.
Buffy stepped in closer because suddenly he was too far away, even three feet was too far away and as she did she felt her body soften and yield and her heart grow warm and the size of Siberia too but not the sub-zero temp no, not cold, not cold at all and she watched his eyes soften as he felt her reach out...
"Spike...I heard you, I did...so you can't fight, O.K. so you can feel all this pain from people and stuff...but if..."
And here she stepped up close and barely breathed.
"--If you can feel my pain...then you can feel..."
And absolutely without preamble she stepped in close and pressed her breasts, her heart up against his and wrapped her arms up around his neck and pulled him in close and breathed him in until she felt the thin veneer of his control, of her control crack and break and fall about with tears into water overflowing singing sweet so sweet my love...
No doubt, no doubt.
She buried her face in the crook of his neck and then her hands burrowed deep into his hair in a death grip and she pulled his head down to her, until his cheek pressed aganist hers, like he didn't have a thing to say about it and then after a moment and he was still there and she hadn't had to wrestle him to the ground...they both leaned back and looked into each others eyes and...soft, soft, soft.
And then the thought of leaving was impossibly hard, because it should be impassibly hard and situations could change and battles could change and what was called for could alter dramatically within seconds and life can change your circumstance and she could gain seventy pounds and he could change jobs midstream from CEO to Trash Collector but when love was alive and acting like life’s best glue...you stuck together...regardless.
Regardless.
*
