Sunday Morning Coming Down

by
Crazydiamondsue

Part Thirteen

Xander pulled into the driveway and killed the engine, glancing up to look in the rearview mirror at Willow. She met his eyes with a questioning look and Xander shook his head, dropping his gaze. They all sat in the car quietly for a moment, and then Xander took the keys out of the ignition, jiggling them in his hand.

“So,” he said, turning to Dawn, “school starts tomorrow, huh?”

Dawn shrugged, her eyes on her lap. “I guess.”

“C’mon,” Xander said, reaching over and squeezing her hand. “Ninth grade! Freshman!” A look of realization crossed his face as Willow and Tara open the back doors, getting out of the car. “Ooo…you’ll have Mrs. Fashnick.” He let go of her hand and lifted his own to his mouth, crooking two fingers out and wiggling them. “She’s got fangs.”

Dawn stared at him, wide-eyed. “She’s a vampire?”

“No,” Xander said solemnly, shaking his head, “She’s got this scary-ass snaggletooth…”

Dawn giggled, elbowing him in the side, and then reached for the door handle.

Xander sat back with a slight smile. First Sunday giggle. Go Xan-man.

He watched Willow and Tara’s backs as they headed into the house, his smile fading. First grave visit since Willow offered to make it a “we’ll look back at this and laugh someday” scenario.

It had nearly killed him to watch Dawn mess with those damn flowers again while Willow looked on with a peaceful smile. It had made something he used to have to steel himself into doing into something he was embarrassed to be a part of. Almost like Buffy wasn’t still in that grave, but in some vague nowhere and they were playing some sick game.

It felt fake. It felt wrong. But nothing had changed. Buffy was still dead, Dawn was still hurt. They all were. Yet somehow his hurt and anger were shifting direction from the fates, or Glory, or their own failure, to Willow. And that felt even more wrong.

He watched as Willow opened the front door, stepping back to let Dawn and Tara into the house.

She hasn’t done anything but offer to make it right. Xander turned away from the sight of Willow smiling at Tara and looked toward the tree where Spike used to wait for…something. All Willow wanted to do was make things like they used to be.

“Xander?”

He looked up to see Tara still standing in the open doorway, looking at him expectantly. “Did you want to come in?”

He looked back for a moment, seeing her shy smile, her eyes looking back at him openly, honestly. “Yeah,” he said quietly as he shoved his keys in his pocket, opening the car door. “Yeah, I do.”

Xander stood in the living room, looking out the window as he heard Tara come down the stairs. She had changed into jeans and a sweatshirt, and was pulling her hair back into a ponytail as came into the living room.

“Willow?” she called. “Did you decide what we’re going to do for lunch? Oh, hey,” she said, seeing Xander alone in the room.

“Dawn was hungry,” Xander said, smiling. “Really hungry. Old school Dawn hungry. She and Willow ran down to the corner store because she was craving one of those greasy pizza pocket things they sell. You know, the ones in the warmer on the counter next to the porn magazines?”

Tara shook her head with a small smile and walked into the kitchen. Xander followed her, watching as she took fruit and cheese from the refrigerator. She looked up from slicing a pear, finding his eyes on her.

“Xander? Is everything okay?” she pushed the plate of fruit toward him and he shook his head.

“Listen, Tara…can I ask you something?”

Tara nodded, her eyes going back to the fruit on the counter, concentrating on sliding the knife carefully through the pale green skin and white flesh of the pear. “Sure, um, what did you want to know?”

“When Willow first told you about the spell…about bringing Buffy back, what did you think?”

Tara looked back up at him, her eyes searching his. “You mean, after ‘holy god, my girlfriend’s crazy’?” she asked with a tiny smile.

Xander laughed a little, nodding.

Tara bit her lip thoughtfully, placing the knife down on the counter and looking away from him, at the windows. “The night after we came back from the first night in the woods… the night we dug the grave,” Tara said, looking quickly at him and then away, “I woke up and Willow was gone. I walked all through the house, looking for her, and then I saw this light in the backyard. She was sitting outside, surrounded by candles, and at first I thought she was doing a spell, and it kind of s-scared me, you know, like when Dawn tried to bring Mrs. Summers back?”

She turned her head toward Xander and their eyes met and something stuttered there between them, something unsaid but silently acknowledged and then they both pushed it away.

Tara cleared her throat, continuing, “But she wasn’t. She was reading. She had her laptop and those books the Watcher’s Council gave Giles…the texts about Glory’s ritual.”

Tara sighed, the look in her eyes faraway, and Xander concentrated on the sound of her voice, realizing he’d never heard her speak this much, and for so long, and that her voice was just flowing, no stutter, no quick glances at him and then away. Words gliding out smooth as glass, as if all she had needed was to be asked and to know that she would be heard.

“Willow was just sitting there on the grass, papers all around her, and I walked up and she didn’t even hear me, didn’t see me until I touched her shoulder. And it was warm that night, summer, you know? But she was so cold, I could feel it through her t-shirt, and she was strung so tightly she almost…I don’t know, vibrated. Then she looked up at me, and she was crying and I don’t think she even knew it, because she was laughing, too. She just looked into my eyes and said, ‘I found it.’”

Tara was quiet then, and Xander looked at her, feeling like he’d seen something too personal, and he knew that they were both blushing, but he couldn’t help it, he felt like he’d walked in on them, naked, and not in a good, ‘Come play with us, Xander,’ naughty thoughts kind of way.

Xander swallowed, his mouth dry. “She found what?”

“Where Buffy c-could have gone. The portal. Dimensions. Hell,” she said softly. “She knew then that if she…we could find the right spell, follow the right steps, we could do it. Bring her back. Raise the dead.”

“Yeah, okay, and that’s the part where my brain kind of shuts off. Raising the dead, Tara. We’re talking about forces here that we’ve never dealt with before, and there are reasons we haven’t.” He shook his head, his hands gripping the edge of the counter. “This is everything we were ever told was wrong…”

“It is wrong,” Tara said, and Xander’s neck jerked as he looked up at her. “It's against all the laws of nature, and practically impossible to do, but it's what we agreed to.”

She tilted her head, looking at him. “Willow’s a very talented witch, Xander.” She nodded then, almost unconsciously, her eyes meeting his firmly, and he wondered how much that moment of self-assurance had cost her as she continued, “What we’ve seen her do…that’s barely been a glimpse of the power she has. I have to believe that she can do this, and even if she can’t, I believe that it’s something she has to do. To try.”

“Would you do it, if you could?” he asked, feeling kind of low for pointing out her own limited power and for putting her on the spot like that.

Tara shook her head, her ponytail brushing her cheek. “Oh…I c-couldn’t, I mean I’ve never had that kind of…and, you know how much I liked Buffy, but it’s not really m-my p-place to…”

Xander felt like kicking himself as he heard Tara’s stutter worsen and felt her pulling away from him, becoming aware of things she’d told him here in the quiet kitchen, lulled by the intimacy of shared grief, of Sunday ritual.

“It’s okay,” he said, putting his hand up and giving her a lopsided grin. “Just, I don’t know. Spike said something the other day that got me to thinking. We were, ah, talking about Buffy, kind of hard to believe, I know, and he said, ‘we’ll leave her to heaven,’ and you know, I know he doesn’t know anything ‘cause Willow’s been all about the down low, but he said it with such…conviction…”

“Leave her to heaven and to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, to prick and sting her,” Tara said softly and then smiled, a real Tara smile, at the confused, slightly fearful look on his face. “Hamlet,” she said, reaching for a slice of pear, “he was quoting something Hamlet says about Ophelia.”

Xander shook his head. “Am I the only one who fell asleep during that movie?” He smiled at Tara’s quiet giggle and then said, “But here’s what really gets me…if Willow’s found it, if she knows that Buffy’s in hell, why didn’t she tell Giles? I mean, he would have stayed then, right? If he’d known there was even a chance of bringing Buffy back? I totally get not wanting to tell Dawn, ‘cause there’s no point in getting her hopes up, and this is all kinda…freaky, but why not Giles?”

Tara frowned, blinking at him, and started to speak, but Xander shook his head, continuing, “And that thing she said about how it would be like re-ensouling Angel? You weren’t here then, Tara, but Angel wasn’t dead, well, not undead, anyway. He was still walking around, living large, and Willow put something back that had just whooshed out in the first place. But that’s not what we’re talking about now, is it? We’re talking about bringing back someone who’s dead. Been dead.” He cleared his throat, his voice choking on the words, “buried in the ground.”

He looked up at Tara. “And you’re really one hundred percent behind that? ‘Cause that night at the Bronze when Willow told me about this, that’s not the feeling I got from you.”

“Xander,” Tara said, her hand trembling slightly as she went to put the plate in the sink, “Willow’s a really talented witch…”

“Yeah, you said that,” Xander interrupted and then winced as her eyes widened, filled with hurt at his tone.

Tara took a shaky breath and continued, moving away from him again. “And Willow would never do anything to hurt anyone…”

“Well, duh,” Dawn said from the doorway, walking toward them to drop a grease-spotted bag on the counter. She grinned up at Xander. “What’d you do, eat the last of the ice cream and now you’re trembling before the wrath of Willow?”

“I, uh, I’m gonna go see what Willow got at the store,” Tara said, ducking her head as she passed Xander on the way out of the kitchen.

“What’s up with that?” Dawn asked, reaching for a slice of pear.

Xander shook his head, not looking at her. “Don't know. Guess she missed Will.” He flashed her a shaky grin. “You know how those two get when they’re not within hand holding distance.” He shoved his hands in his back pockets, turning away. “I better go. Gotta check in with Spike about patrol tonight.”

He gave her one last smile and then headed for the door, barely acknowledging Willow’s startled goodbye as he brushed past her on his way out.

“What’s up with that?” Willow asked.

Dawn shrugged, taking another bite of the pear, her eyes thoughtful as she watched Xander all but run from the house.

Xander opened the door to his apartment, finding it cool, dark and quiet. For someone who had loved to keep the blinds open, sunlight streaming into the rooms after the dark and dankness of the basement, he’d adjusted to the return to dimness quickly.

Spike was curled into the couch, his face pressed into the back cushions, Xander’s jacket from the night before still draped over his bare feet.

Last night had been bad. Patrol had begun as usual, quick sweep outside the Bronze, dispatching a couple of oblivious fledges, their limited powers of concentration too focused on listening for, “I am so fucking wasted!” to hear the whistle of descending stakes behind them.

They’d hit four cemeteries, Xander walking ahead of Spike and turning around, walking backwards occasionally, so that he could see the look in the vampire’s eyes when he said something particularly snarky.

Then they’d come across a pair of what Spike called Tethra demons, who’d been taking out their frustration at not finding anything living to kill, by hacking with axes stained black with blood at a marble angel.

Xander could understand their frustration. What he didn’t understand was what drew demons to the cemeteries in the first place. Vampires – no choice there, they popped up where they were planted. Ditto zombies. But you’d think demons, be they green and spiny or red and horny, would realize that the only people likely to wander through a cemetery on a Saturday night were people looking to find demons. And not as some demon outreach, “Meals on Sneakers” program.

Spike had grinned, his face morphing even as his lips spread open, the human faced smile of glee somehow more frightening than the fangs and forehead that replaced it. And then he had howled, launching himself toward the marauding pair who had looked up with goggling looks of shocked horror on their faces. Then they had grinned with evil delight as they gave answering growls and ripped their axes free of stone wings, meeting the downward stroke of Spike’s blade with a clang that had shaken Xander to the soles of his feet.

He and Spike had tried fighting back to back, but that just caused the vampire to keep turning around, checking Xander’s position and counting his appendages, before whirling back to narrowly duck axes and claws. And then he whirled when he should have ducked and claws had lashed and axes bitten…

Xander closed his eyes, remembering the feeling of his own hands ripping the axe from Spike’s leg and watching as the blade buried itself between the neck and shoulder of one demon even as he heard preternaturally strong hands rip the head from the other. He hadn’t bothered to point out the futility of Spike’s threat to “shit down its neck.”

They’d limped home, eyeing each other silently as they realized they were going to get themselves killed, trying to protect each other. Both of them trying desperately to hold on to something they hadn’t defined or acknowledged.

Xander opened his eyes and reached down, trailing his hand over a pale arm that was marred by scratches that had faded to pink from vivid red and blood dripping.

Spike stirred under his grasp, turning slightly. A slow smile spread over his face and he leaned into the light touch. Blue eyes opened, sleep dazed and innocent, as he looked up at Xander. “Oh. It’s you,” he said, closing his eyes and snuggling back into the couch cushions.

“Ha ha,” Xander answered, his fingers running over Spike’s skin one last time before he pulled his hand away, turning toward to the bedroom.

“Mmm,” Spike said, scooting over a scant inch on the couch. Xander smiled down at him and then kicked off his shoes, sliding in behind Spike. He slipped one hand beneath blond hair that curled slightly beneath his fingers. His other hand fell naturally to the vampire’s side, rubbing absently at the soft t-shirt that covered Spike’s ribs.

The past few weeks had seen several moments like this. Xander knew that they both needed this kind of closeness, this kind of touch. Even though it usually wigged him out beyond the enjoying of it – waiting for Spike to remember that vampires didn’t cuddle and shove him away. Or examining his own need for it, because he couldn’t remember needing to touch Anya this much, other than to arouse or to comfort.

Yet they’d end up curled together, either on the couch or in bed, and Xander would relax into it for a few minutes and then he’d realize it was Spike’s hand pulling his head down to rest against a hard shoulder. Or that the chest beneath his own hand didn’t rise or fall and that it wasn’t soft with curves of flesh but taut with muscle. And then he’d really start to think about it and wonder if Spike thought of him as “the girl”, or if Spike was pretending that he was someone else and that every time Spike’s eyes closed he was just surrendering to the fantasy. Or worse, that this was some kind of conditioned behavior ingrained in Spike after Drusilla, and all of this was just comfort, because he saw Xander that way, like something…broken.

He’d get so tense then that he wasn’t leaning into Spike anymore, but more just propped against him, stiff and anxious and grinning unnaturally and saying, “This is nice,” loudly and often. Spike would mutter a curse then and bury his lips against Xander’s throat, chest or thigh, wherever he’d thought it would most distract. And that was okay, because that kind of touching just made everything quiet again.

But when it was like this, when one or both of them were still mostly lost to sleep, it was easy. He’d slept here, like this, after they’d come in last night. Spike had stumbled to the couch and torn off his boots before falling back with a groan. Xander had cleaned the scratches on Spike’s arm, ripped the tear in his jeans open wider, swallowing hard when he’d seen the place on the pale leg where a demon axe had glanced off of bone and started to bandage it, but Spike had waved him off, mumbling, “Be healed by morning.” Xander had moved to put away the first aid kit and head to his empty bed, but Spike had whispered, “Stay.”

And so he’d woken up this morning, fully dressed, clothes stiff and crackling with demon blood, and Spike’s head on his chest, cool lips pressed against his throat. Xander had looked down at the body in his arms, stronger than his, and in his opinion, a whole lot prettier, and just held on.

And it wasn’t as if they never talked. Or snarked, fought, teased or just listened. While they patrolled, while Xander experimented with new things to do to hamburger, after they had sex. Spike pushed for answers on Xander’s feelings about the fractured state of the Scoobies, made him talk about Anya, about Giles, about what he thought Anya might be doing with Giles. Xander would refuse to respond, and Spike would just answer for him, answers so close to the bone that Xander would just end up letting it all spill out and then shutting down when he heard all of his own fear and anger and confusion just…out there and Spike would shrug and say, “Still here, aren’t you? Means something, that.”

Spike would answer anything just about anything Xander asked. What the chip felt like when it fired, if patrolling really appeased his blood lust, where he’d learned to do those things with his tongue. The only questions he wouldn’t answer were about his past; the turning, Drusilla and Angelus and if the things the Watchers Diaries had written about them were true. Spike would just curl his tongue over his teeth and say, “Tell you when the now gets boring, pet.”

But they never talked about what this was, so it just was. Spike had only gone back to his crypt once since what Xander had come to think of as “the night of the naked fight,” and he guessed that meant they were living together, although there was nothing that domestic to it. Spike didn’t push him to out them to the Scoobies and treated him pretty much the same as he always had around them, although he had called Xander “mate” once, causing Dawn’s eyebrows to shoot up and Spike to say, “What?” before continuing with his tale of patrol, or as he liked to call it, “How I saved Harris’ ass last night.”

And even though they never put words to it or acknowledged anything, whatever this was came the closest to anything Xander had ever had of something real. More two-sided than the tussles with Cordy and Faith and somehow less confusing and guilt ridden than two years with Anya. The very fact that neither of them had to call it anything just made it seem more…honest.

Xander burrowed his face closer to the back of Spike’s neck, closing his eyes. Yeah, honest.

It wasn’t like Spike didn’t lie to him, but the lies he told weren’t meant for Xander to believe. Just more of the old posturing, and they both knew it. Spike lied to him to cover his own reasons for being there. Xander lied to them both about why he was afraid that someday Spike wouldn’t be.

“Xander,” Spike mumbled, “calm down or start something. Your heart’s pounding me through the bloody sofa.”

Xander took a deep breath and held it, and then realized that just made his heart beat faster, so he exhaled, watching his breath stir the soft hairs at the base of Spike’s neck.

Spike reached back, groping at Xander through his jeans with a hand that moved with the ease of familiarity.

“Uh-uh,” Xander said, reaching for Spike’s hand then resting their joined fingers against his thigh. “Don’t want you when you’re half-dead.”

“Out of luck then, mate,” Spike sighed, growing still against Xander and not complaining about the mental wrestling and restless fidgeting that was disturbing his sleep, since it came with body heat and warm breath that bathed his cheek.

“Go to sleep,” Xander said, resting his chin on Spike’s shoulder. “Gotta be all healed up and dangerous, ready to save my ass again tonight.”

Spike grunted, his eyes still closed as he nipped at Xander’s shoulder. “Some danger I am…don’t even scare you anymore.”

Xander tightened his arm around Spike and concentrated on just breathing and believing that that was true.

Part Fourteen

“Why do you always wear this?” Xander breathed into Spike’s ear, his hands running down the leather sleeves of Spike’s duster.

Spike tilted his head to give Xander better access to his neck and continued walking, a slow process with Xander pressed against his back, hands exploring beneath his coat and an insistent hardness grinding against his ass every time he slowed to untangle his feet from Xander’s.

“It’s a part of me,” he answered, hearing his voice hitching and taking a deep breath, trying to hide how much this was getting to him. “Feel naked without it.”

“Don’t like it,” Xander said, tugging lightly at the leather collar with his teeth. “Not that it’s not sexy as hell,” he said quickly when Spike stiffened against him and then started walking faster. “It’s just that it’s thick and heavy and…” his hands slid beneath the lapels of the jacket, running down Spike’s chest and stomach to the waist of his jeans, “makes it hard to get to the good stuff.”

“Hmm,” Spike said as they finally made it to the door of the apartment, Xander still pressed hard against his back, warm mouth on his neck and warmer hands making their way beneath his shirt. “Have to take it off then.” Spike leaned back against Xander, bracing one hand on the doorframe. “Hold on – better idea. How ‘bout I take off everything but the coat?”

He grinned as he felt Xander jerk behind him, hands clenching tightly on Spike’s waist, digging in and hurting almost enough.

“Oh, God,” Xander groaned, his hands sliding from Spike’s stomach to his hips and yanking him back hard, the thickness of the duster insignificant between Spike and several inches of excited Xander.

Spike chuckled, reaching back and slipping a hand up Xander’s thigh, over his hip, searching.

“Yeah,” Xander said his hips swiveling into Spike’s fingers even as his hands dropped to Spike’s belt, unbuckling it. “Nothing but the jacket.” He paused with two buttons to go on Spike’s fly. “And the boots.”

“Xander,” Spike said, his voice cautioning despite the laughter that filled it, “you do realize we’re still in an extremely well-lit hallway?” His fingers tightened around what he sought in Xander’s jeans and he pulled the key ring out of the pocket with a tug. “And while I don’t give a flying fuck who’s leering at us out their peepholes, I don’t want to listen to it from you after the blood flows back to your brain.”

Xander spun Spike around, shoving him against the door. “Let ‘em watch.” He bent his head to Spike’s lips, but Spike held him off, yanking Xander’s shirt out of his jeans and pushing it up, his lips lowering to Xander’s chest instead.

His tongue traced a path down Xander’s breastbone, feeling the grip on his arms tighten as he made slow circles around each nipple. Xander hitched against him, his hands sliding down Spike’s arms to clench on his wrists.

Spike felt the tension building in Xander and knew he needed more…they both needed more. Everything so far had been slow and careful, Spike leashing himself in acknowledgement of Xander’s inexperience, trying to avoid both an emotional jolt from the boy and a literal one from the chip.

But as warm fingers dug so deeply into his wrists that bones ground together and Xander's leg pressed so hard between his legs that Spike was almost lifted off the floor, he decided they both wanted something darker...something more. His lips parted around Xander’s nipple, blunt teeth breaking the skin and his tongue catching the few drops of red that welled up.

Spike felt the pain burst in his skull and closed his eyes against it. They flew open again when he realized that the chip was silent and the pain was from Xander’s fingers clenched in his hair, tugging his head up to meet eyes wide and startled, and lips wet and parted, hot gasps of air bursting against Spike’s cheek.

“You’re not supposed to be able to bite me,” Xander said, the words thick with shock and need.

“You’re not supposed to want me to,” Spike answered, his voice low and knowing.

They stared at each other for a long moment, Spike’s fingers cool and soothing on the bite mark, Xander’s hand trembling in Spike’s hair.

Spike started to pull away, his fingers sliding regretfully from the warm wetness on Xander’s chest and then felt the shudder beneath his hand as Xander spoke.

“Open the fucking door. Now.”

Spike jabbed the key into the lock just as Xander attacked his mouth. Then the door was opening and Spike was turning to press against Xander as they stumbled through the doorway, Spike’s hand still on the key and Xander’s fisted in the leather collar.

Xander dragged his lips from Spike’s mouth, across his jaw and then down his neck, biting teasingly even as his hand found its way beneath the jacket again, smoothing over Spike’s hip to curve around his ass, pulling him closer.

Xander grinned as he heard the breathless, high-pitched gasp, lifting his head to ask who the girl was now, and then everything just kind of stopped. In the empty quiet he could hear the pounding of his own heart, even hear the sound of air being drawn through Spike’s open lips and hear it find its way back out, unneeded. He could feel his hand, still clutched tight around hard flesh beneath the soft denim of Spike’s jeans, feel each individual fiber rasp against the calluses on his palm.

He felt a coldness creep up his legs and fill his gut, spreading through his chest and arms, leaving him numb. But it stopped there, not reaching his face, which seemed to be burning and expanding and spreading way too wide. He tried to shake his head, tried to turn away, but the heat just burned hotter and the silence grew louder and there was nowhere he could look where he couldn’t see her.

And her eyes stared back at him, as wide as his felt, her face bright with the heat that was filling the room around them and her mouth trembling with the same unspoken words he couldn’t say.

Then his chest hitched, rising and falling and breaking the silence as the word fell from his lips, sounding broken and harsh, “Willow?”

She didn’t answer and when she rose from the couch it was like something from above had yanked her up by strings. Her legs wobbled as she stood, her hands grasping uselessly around her, like she was searching for something she’d brought with her and not finding it. And then somehow she was across the room, brushing past him as he stood there, his body still pressed against Spike’s, cold and lifeless where they had been hot and urgent just moments before.

Willow’s shoulder scraped his as she rushed by, her hair almost touching his cheek, the smell of her shampoo and the soft thud of her purse against her thigh making her real.

Still Xander stood there, his fingers tightening and loosening damply against the leather collar of the duster, his other hand numb and bloodless over the pocket of Spike’s jeans. And it was almost funny. Like he could call her back, laughing, begging for some witchy assistance, because it obvious that he and Spike were just stuck together with some kind of freaky mojo, ‘cause otherwise he could let go, right?

He felt a tightness in his chest and looked down, wondering if this is what a heart attack felt like. He stared for a moment at the hands pressed flat against his shirt front, feeling the twisting and the wrenching and then it was gone as Spike shoved him away.

Xander watched his hand as it fell to his side, away from Spike, the fingers still curved in the shape of Spike’s body but grasping and empty now. He looked up at Spike, saw the hand that relented, reaching for him and jerked away from it.

Looking at Spike, the duster crumpled, hanging off his shoulders. Saw the t-shirt shoved up, bunched around pale ribs, baring a hard stomach mottled with bright pink finger marks above unbuttoned jeans. Saw the open belt, the buckle swaying slightly, bumping against a black clad hip with an unfulfilled promise. Saw everything Willow had seen.

And Spike looking back at him, his eyes acknowledging what Xander was seeing, but his face blank, waiting. No anger, no leering, no apology. Not even posturing embarrassment at having been caught getting bent by the Slayer’s boy, neck arched in submission, moaning Xander’s name between curses and kisses. Just blank, now, as if his face were clay and Spike would mold it into whatever emotion Xander felt this moment required.

Xander shook his head. They could figure out what this feeling was later, after he’d made up something to call it to explain it to Willow. Maybe whatever he came up with would sound good enough that they could believe it, too.

“I can’t now,” he said, trying to answer the silence and blankness of Spike. “She doesn’t…I’ve got to…”

He watched Spike turn away from him, looking toward the window where a flash of red hair caught the streetlight. “Hurry,” was all Spike said, and then Xander was out the door.

Xander caught up with Willow at the corner, her arms crossed, her head down as she walked determinedly, as if the only thought in her mind was, “away from here.”

“Willow,” he gasped, his lungs burning from the dash down the stairs, the sprint across the street. He expected her to ignore him, keep walking, and he geared himself up to jog alongside, but she stopped and turned, almost as if she had been expecting him.

“So this is what it was?”

“W-what?” he asked, his tongue tripping over itself, his brain rushing to catch up as his half-prepared speech was preempted by an unexpected Q&A.

“This is why you’ve been fighting me so hard about patrol, about Buffy, about…everything?” Her eyes didn’t quite meet his as she asked, and for some reason that pissed Xander off, because it wasn’t like he and Spike had been naked and it wasn’t as if she had been expected…

“Fighting you…I haven’t been fighting you on anything, Will,” he said, bending and leaning in a bit, trying to force her to look at him.

“Avoiding me, then,” Willow said, as she hugged her arms against her body, her eyes on the ground and then she whipped her head up to face him. “Telling me you ‘don’t know,’ or changing the subject, or saying that you have to go to work, or you have to patrol with Spike.”

Xander winced at the inflection in her tone and shook his head. “Willow, there are things you don’t know…”

“Well, duh, Xander,” she cut in, flinging her arms out, her purse just missing him. “The only thing I do know is that you’ve been walking around like a zombie for weeks. And at first I thought, well, yeah, after everything with Anya…but this, I just…you and Spike?” Her eyes widened then in realization and met his fully for the first time.

“What?” Xander asked, his discomfort growing ever more discomforting, and he looked around them uneasily, trying to see what Willow was seeing that had her advancing on him, eyes locked on his.

“I think I get it now,” she said, nodding slowly. “Cordelia. Faith. Spike. Xander…you’re attracted to mean. You know, I wasn’t serious with that whole ‘demon magnet’ thing, kinda thought it was just hormones and dicey decision making skills, but you’ve really got a thing for mean!”

Xander backed away from her, shaking his head. “What? That’s not tr...” he bit the inside of his lip, changing tactics. “Anyway, Spike’s not mean, he’s evil. Well, Reform Evil.” He hesitated, and then went for it, a nervous smile tugging at his lips, “’Cause all that pig’s blood? So not kosher.”

There was a moment of uneasy silence, and then Willow did the very last thing he expected her to. She giggled. A sort of nervous tension, giggle-choke combination, but still a giggle.

They stared at each other, Willow giggling behind her hands, her eyes still comically round and wide, brimming with tears and Xander just looking back at her, dumbfounded.

“God,” Willow said softly, her giggles fading away as she sighed, “I always seem to be walking in on you kissing the last person on earth I’d want to walk in on you kissing and then storming off in a snit, don’t I?”

Xander wiped damp palms against his thighs and swallowed. “Look, Willow, I know you’re incredibly freaked and probably really mad at me right now, but…”

“I’m not mad, Xander,” she answered; reaching a hand out to him and then letting it fall. “There’s the overwhelming sense of fear, and if you’re getting a vibe of ‘seriously wigged,’ you’re not wrong, but I think I was more…shocked than anything. Well, other than embarrassed, ‘cause um, yeah, there was a lot of that. I mean, seeing you kissing Spike was one thing, and I think I’m entitled to a little shock, here, but it wasn’t just kissing, was it?” she asked, her face trying for stern but flaring pink again.

Xander flashed back to the image of Spike with his belt torn open, shirt hiked up around his nipples, and closed his eyes, groaning. Definitely not just kissing.

He opened his eyes to see Willow looking back at him, her face flushed and concerned, filled with the same uncertainty he felt. They were too old for jokes about second base or third, but separated by too much left too long unspoken for unflinching honesty.

Xander cleared his throat. “A ‘gay now’ joke would probably be a bad choice at this point, huh?”

Willow shrugged, “Actually, kind of explains a lot…” she trailed off as Xander blanched, his eyes widening, “and um, I’m really not making this better, am I? Look, Xander, the whole guy thing, okay, something new and sort of unexpected, yeah, but Spike…” she chewed her lip for a minute, looking at him. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but aren’t you worried that he could be just…using you? You know, messing with you, somehow, to…”

“To what, Willow?” Xander answered as he geared up for Willow’s ‘point A to point B’ thought process to start clicking through the same mental checklist of wrongness he’d been tabulating for the past weeks. “There’s no Slayer to get revenge on, and I don’t think any demons with world domination plans are going to start chatting him up to foil the crack team of Harris and Rosenberg.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Willow said, frowning at him. “It’s just that…we saw the way he was that day…at the tower. That was real, Xander, whatever he felt for her. And now he’s all into you and that doesn’t freak you out just a little?”

Only every other nightmare, Xander thought.

Willow’s hands tightened around her purse straps, worrying them. “I know there are things you haven’t told me, and I get that, I do. I mean, I wasn’t exactly sharey about Tara and me, either, and she wasn’t even a…”

Her eyes were no longer avoiding his, but searching and seeking and Xander found himself wishing she’d get a little less comfortable and snit off again as she steadied herself and continued, “Hey, this is me, remember? And I know how this goes for you; it’s never just kissing…or more, to you. You just kind of…fixate, and the less appropriate the person is…” She gave a short laugh, rolling her eyes, “I mean, it took you ten years and me finally getting a boyfriend for you to want to us to get smoochy…”

Xander’s eyes narrowed and he shook his head, ready to refute that, so Willow cast around quickly for someone else, “And, uh, Faith! You thought you had a connection with Faith, you were ready to marry Anya, and that whole thing with Cordelia…”

Willow tilted her head considering, “Although somehow, Spike? Slightly less horrifying than Cordelia.” A grin wobbled out from the concern etched in her face. “I mean, it’s not like we ever elected officers for the I Hate Spike Club.”

Xander snorted. “How could we? Buffy had already declared a dictatorship.”

And the elephant in the room stood up, bowed and did a pirouette.

Xander watched as thoughts flitted across her face, realization and remembrance that there was more at stake here than what Spike might be doing to him or what he and Spike might be doing with each other.

Xander’s throat tightened, the words rising and choking. “I haven’t told him,” he said finally, his voice hoarse, unsteady. Willow didn’t answer, just stood there watching him silently, carefully. “But I’ve wanted to,” he said thickly.

“You can’t, Xander,” Willow said, her face earnest, voice even, steady. “Spike is too…well, we don’t know what he’d do. Try to stop us…not understand,” she shook her head. “We have to believe in this, to make it work. You, me, Tara – there’s power there, Xander, because you both believe in me, and we trust each other. Even if Spike wanted to help, it wouldn’t work. We can only tell the people we can trust…”

“That’s just it, Willow,” Xander said softly. “I trust him.”

He watched Willow’s face as those words sank in, and he could tell that she realized that he had just figured that out for himself, as well.

“Xander, he’s a vampire.” She raised her hand as he stared to speak. “I know, I know, a vampire who’s patrolled with us all summer and baby-sits Dawn and sometimes, kind of sort of hangs out with us, but he’s a still vampire. And one without a soul.”

“Oh, come on, Will,” Xander angrily. “How much of Angel’s fighting along side us had to do that soul you crammed back into him and how much was getting an ‘in’ with Buffy?”

“And how much of Spike’s was?” Willow snapped.

“But he’s still here, and she isn’t,” Xander said.

“And she won’t be, ever, unless you stop fighting me on this, and you are Xander, and I get now that there have been…things that you’ve been dealing with, but we have to stop everything now. Our lives, the pain of her being gone…none of that matters when we have this chance to get her back. For us…for everything she fought and died for. Stop. Think,” she said, her eyes pleading with his. “Think of how much better this, all of this, would be if we could have her back.”

Xander rubbed his hand across his mouth, shaking his head. “It’s just that…Willow, this all seems like something we should just let be…and I…I don’t know…”

“You don’t know,” Willow repeated, and then stopped, taking a deep breath and shaking her head. “Even if we fail, and I promise you, I will do everything in my power to make sure we don’t, it won’t be any worse than it already is. Xander,” she said softly, “sometimes it’s like you don’t even want her back. Can’t you see what her death is doing to me, to all of us? How much Giles and Dawn and, God, even Spike would want her…”

Willow stopped, her mouth falling open, her eyes widening in accusation as Xander’s breath caught in his throat. “Xander, you don’t want her back…because of Spike?”

“Willow…no, that’s,” Xander shook his head, backing away from her, because, oh, God there wasn’t truth there, not a truth he could face, and certainly not in front of her and it was just because Buffy was dead and they had buried her and bringing her back wouldn’t make everything all right, because it hadn’t been all right before she was gone and oh, God, what if it was true?

“I understand that your loyalties are little…divided right now,” Willow said tightly, glancing past him to the darkened window of his apartment and Xander wondered if there was a tiny red glow on the balcony and if she saw and if she knew. “But what I’m asking from you is bigger than us, what we want doesn’t matter, the only thing that does is what’s right.”

“I’m not divided, Willow,” he said, his lips stiff, tight with anger and fear and the words forced out anyway, no real thought, just feeling and God, please let these be the right words, “what I don’t know is which right is the right. How do we know that this is right, and not something we want?”

“Because it’s hard,” Willow said, walking over to take his hand. “Because it hurts and it’s scary and it feels wrong. That’s how it is for us, remember? When we’re terrified, we know we’re doing the right thing.”

Xander squeezed her hand, looking past her as his jaw worked, bargaining with himself. “All right,” he said finally, nodding. “Whatever you need, whatever it takes…I’m there.” He swallowed hard. “It’s Buffy.”

Willow let her fingers brush soothingly against his as she pulled her hand away. “Thank you, Xander…really. I need you, and Tara, to be with me on this. I need your strength.” She looked up at him and they stood there for a moment as Xander tried to find that strength for her and Willow searched for answers in his eyes. “Because it’s soon, Xan. Saturday night, at midnight, we’re doing it. We’re going to bring Buffy back.”

Xander took a deep breath, the air hitching in his chest and then nodded again, jerkily. He turned slightly, waving a hand in the direction of his apartment, the darkened balcony, Spike. “Are you…gonna be okay with this?” he asked.

Willow smiled at him sadly. “Are you?”

Spike heard Xander enter the apartment behind him and pitched his cigarette through the open balcony doors, turning around slowly. “So. What's got Red bunched up more? That I'm a man...or that I'm not?”

Xander didn’t answer, just looked back at him with an expression that was drawn, tired and closed off.

Spike sighed, drawing his duster tighter around himself, his hands gripping his shoulders and then he let his hands drop, reaching for the bag of cigarettes, blood and t-shirts next to him.

“Right,” he said quietly, hauling the bag up to his shoulder and starting toward the door, toward Xander. “I guess you can send Dawn ‘round if anything too nasty for Willow to control pops up, otherwise…you know where you can send the rest of my stuff. Or burn it. Whatever gets you through the night.”

Xander moved then, coming toward him with a brow furrowed in confusion and lips that moved wordlessly until he was close enough to touch Spike, reaching out for him and then drawing back and shoving his hands into his pockets. “Okay, why do I feel like I missed a few episodes?” He nodded to the bag in Spike’s hand. “Where are you going? And what’s with the running away from home act?”

“Going home. My home,” Spike said slowly, deliberately, his hand tightening around the neck of the bag as he stared at Xander. “Crypt. Graveyard. Sodding off…getting out of your life…breaking it off. However she put it.”

Xander seemed to relax a little, edging closer to him. “Spike…Willow didn’t say you should…” he jerked his hands out of his pockets, raking them through his hair. “God, when will everyone stop thinking Willow runs my life?”

Spike shrugged. “When you do, I ‘spose.”

Xander appeared about to argue and then shook his head. “No. Not anymore. And even if she did, she didn’t say you should leave, Spike. Or that I should ask you to.”

Spike’s hand dropped from his shoulder, the bag swinging between them. “So, what’d you call this, then? Temporary insanity? Put the blame on me? What did you tell her this was, Xander?”

Xander shrugged, smiling slightly. “How could I tell her when we don’t even know?” He sighed, turning away from Spike. “I don’t think Willow would see the ‘why’ in fighting and fucking.”

“S’not just fighting and fucking,” Spike said, grabbing Xander’s arm and turning him back to face him. “It’s…a thing.”

“A thing?” Xander asked, his voice rising and cracking. He laughed, a little bitterly. “I just faced down my very confused and not a little horrified best friend over a thing? Well, thanks, Spike; that clears up everything. All right, then, I’m not going through some freaky sort of post-traumatic stress sex therapy. I’m not attracted to mean. No demon magnet, here. Nope. It’s a thing.”

“God!” Spike groaned, closing his eyes and pushing Xander away as he tossed the bag aside.

He stood silent for a minute, his fists clenched, his body taut and trembling with frustration before he turned to Xander again. “Why does everything have to sodding be spelled out for you? I know I’ve given you hell in the past, but I never really thought you were slow. Isn’t it enough? You’ve got Red’s blessing, or lacking that, her indifference. Stop trying to define everything and…for fuck’s sake, Xander, I’ve already lived twice as long as you ever will, and at some point you have to realize sometimes there isn’t a why.” He stared into Xander’s eyes, finding the same tired, defeated look he felt in himself. “Why can’t something just be?” He moved forward slowly, raising a hand to brush against Xander’s lips, cupping his cheek. “Can’t it just be?” he whispered roughly.

Spike felt Xander’s throat working beneath his hand, and then a warm mouth was on his, the lips driving and reckless. Memory slammed into Spike, a hard, hungry kiss in a graveyard, a boy desperately trying to prove he was a man. He moved his hands to Xander’s arms, rubbing lightly, soothing, but he felt Xander surge against him harder, not wanting to be soothed.

Xander’s hands were in his hair, running down his back and then back up to grab the collar of the duster, jerking Spike closer. His lips crushed Spike’s, driving them into teeth, drawing blood and then flicking it away with his tongue.

Xander’s tongue plunged deep, coaxing Spike’s out to play as his hands twisted loose from the collar, raking down Spike’s chest to clench on his sides, hard, rough thumbs scraping his nipples through the thin t-shirt.

And for the first time, Spike was the one to break the kiss, gasping as he pulled away from Xander, his lips swollen, wet and hurting in the very way he needed. “Christ, Xander, what is it about a showdown with Red that gets you so hot and needy?” He quirked a brow, wincing a little as his lips pulled into a grin. “Something you need to tell me?”

Xander shook his head, his eyes on Spike’s mouth. “No. Done that. Didn’t work out – kiss called on account of impalement.” Xander reached for Spike again, drawing him back with fistfuls of t-shirt.

Spike’s head fell back as Xander’s tongue swept down his neck, tracing tiny blue veins. Xander’s hands were down his ribs, under his shirt, shoving it up; nails scraping the muscles of his stomach as they followed their path back down. Then they were tearing at his belt, the buckle banging against Spike’s hip as Xander got it open.

Xander eased back slightly, his eyes hot as they ran over Spike. “That whole time, out there with Willow, this was all I could see. All I wanted to get back to.”

Spike swallowed, running his hands over Xander’s chest. “Didn’t think you’d come back,” he said, shrugging lightly and then looked up at Xander, his lashes lowered, eyes knowing. “Waited…in case you did.”

Spike’s duster fell to the floor as Xander shoved off of his shoulders and then their lips were pressed together again, kisses hot and hungry between tearing at clothes, rough touches that sought skin and found it.

Xander’s hands slid down Spike’s thighs, shoving jeans in their wake and then tugging impatiently at laces. Spike stepped back, kicking boots and trousers aside and then grinning down at Xander, who slid his hands around Spike’s hips, pulling him closer.

Spike shook his head, easing Xander to the floor and following. “Don’t need it, love,” he said, his lips brushing Xander’s as he ground their bodies together, earning him a harsh groan. “Wanna be inside you.”

Xander nodded, his head falling back as his hand closed around Spike’s cock, guiding it to him. Spike chuckled, brushing Xander’s hand away and then leaning back to dig through his bag, finding the small tube beneath the cigarettes and blood and drawing it out.

Xander raised his head, staring at Spike as he popped the cap. “You were stealing the lube?”

“Souvenir,” Spike said, slipping a slick hand around Xander’s erection and then sliding it teasingly below. “Didn’t want this to be for anyone but me.”

“Well, technically,” Xander gasped, his body tensing as Spike’s fingers slid into him, “there was a whole lot of this before you,” he said, curling his fingers into a loose fist and shaking it.

“You’re ruining the moment, Xander,” Spike sing-songed as he twisted his fingers inside the warm body beneath him, making Xander shudder, clenching around him until the only sounds he heard were low moans and wordless pleas.

“Shh,” Spike murmured, his lips brushing Xander’s and then he rose up on his knees, cock jutting forward, glistening and eager, as he wrapped his hands around Xander’s thighs, lifting him. He felt Xander tense and tighten around him in a way now so familiar as he eased inside.

He moved them slowly, carefully, allowing Xander’s body to adjust to the burn, finding the rhythm, but Xander hands closed over his, forcing them together harder, faster, “More, Spike, please,” gritting out between clenched teeth.

Spike eased Xander’s grip on his hands, pulling him up so that he could lean down for a kiss, but Xander turned his head, his mouth opening against Spike’s throat, biting sharply and forcing a groan from Spike, his thrusts deepening, matching the pull of Xander’s mouth on his skin.

“Harder,” Xander groaned, his breath hot, his mouth careless, his teeth sharp on Spike’s neck. Spike answered him by sliding his hands up Xander’s hips, his body bowed and trembling as he pulled Xander closer, rhythm breaking and bending into a fierce desperate lunging of bodies that made them both cry out.

Xander’s fingers closed over Spike’s hand again, dragging it to his cock. Their slick hands slid together over it until Spike squeezed firmly from base to tip with an almost vicious twist. The force of Xander’s orgasm wrenched them apart, and he fell back to the floor, his hands closing around Spike’s hips in a bruising grip, thumbs digging into hipbones as ground the two of them together until Spike tensed above him, pressing deep as he came with a choked cry.

They lay there for a moment, Xander’s breath bathing Spike’s neck and their bodies trembling against each other, warm and weak.

“Fuck,” Spike groaned, as he rolled off of Xander and rubbed a hand over the finger shaped bruises that were rising on his hips and thighs. “What the hell got into you, pet?”

Xander grinned up at him blearily. “I might be loopy with the afterglow, but I’m pretty sure it was you…”

Spike looked down at him and then chuckled. “You know, I thought we were, I dunno, drawn to each other ‘cause we were both blokes with great cocks who got off on a spot of monster fighting, but that’s not it, is it? It’s the bad sexual puns.”

Xander shrugged, pulling Spike back against him. “Maybe that’s our ‘why,’” he said, grinning, as he fitted them together and smoothed his hand over the marks he’d made on Spike’s skin.

Spike watched as Xander got quiet again. He wasn’t blind, he’d seen how the boy got this sort of…desperate calm about him when they were shagging, face blissed-out, as if he were using Spike’s hands, his body, to help him to forget. And then afterward came the quiet, when it all came back around them, could see it roaring in Xander’s head behind eyes that turned away, closing, shutting him out.

Spike sighed as Xander relaxed against him in sleep, hoping that this…thing, whatever it was, whatever they made it, was stronger than their past.

Part Fifteen

Xander opened the door to the apartment quietly, glancing toward the place on the sofa where he found Spike most afternoons. Reading. Watching TV. Or sprawled out, wearing only his, “why, yes, a shag would be lovely, thanks for showing up,” grin. But the sofa was empty, and Xander exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding as he closed the door behind him and went to place his hardhat on the table.

As he set the hat down, he rubbed his hand distractedly over its hard plastic shell. He’d told Spike he was going in today, some Saturday grunt work for the extra money. He wasn’t sure when lying had started coming so naturally to him. Possibly when waking up wrapped around a naked vampire had become the norm, but he knew it was probably earlier than that. Saying the lies out loud was the recent thing.

And if the Saturday grunt work had been dropping Dawn off at Janice’s and slipping her $50 to forestall any questions before heading back to the Summers’ house to sit on the sofa with Tara and watch Willow fact-check and re-fact check, that wasn’t so much lying as implying, right?

Xander looked up as the bedroom door opened and Spike walked into the room, fully dressed in jeans and t-shirt. Spike paused, his hand on the doorknob, and then he narrowed his eyes, frowning.

Xander felt guilt twist in his gut and his fingers clenched around the hardhat, his nails scraping the plastic. He knows! He knows!

When Spike said nothing and just headed for the kitchen, Xander relaxed a bit, rolling his eyes at himself. He was so tired of feeling that white hot flash of fear every time Spike frowned or grimaced or looked like his jeans might be too tight. Sometimes it was all he could do not to blurt out, Look we’re bringing Buffy back, so you just go ahead and steal some flowers and brush your blood breath, or whatever you’re gonna do, and I’ll go hold the urn for Willow and we’ll get our Slayer back, okay? By the way, she’s never going to want you back in a million years, and I’ll be damned if I’ll stand around and watch you chase after her while I… But then Spike would grin or the jeans would come off and Xander would forget he’d ever thought Spike was thinking of anyone but him in the first place.

Xander rapped his knuckles thoughtfully against the hardhat as he listen to Spike bang around in the kitchen. Okay, if Spike still didn’t know and – yeah, hello, paranoia, my old friend – what’s with all the silent?

“Got something in the post, pet,” Spike said, his voice silky soft, and then a postcard was flipping from his careless fingers toward Xander’s head.

Xander ducked, his hand coming up quickly and catching the card as it fluttered to the table. He looked down at the card, puzzled at the image of a white horse carved into a hillside, the printed script beneath it reading Westbury White Horse.

Xander frowned, flipping the card over. He drew in a breath as he looked at the postmark and the neatly written signature, and looked back up at Spike.

“Did you read it?” he asked, rubbing a thumb over the glossy front of the card.

Spike shrugged as he opened the microwave, turned the mug, and set the timer again.

Xander turned the card over, looking again at the shape of the horse, stark white and filling an entire hillside. “Does this mean something?” he mumbled.

“Could mean she still thinks you’re her white knight,” Spike answered, his back to Xander, his arms braced on the countertop, the muscles in his back and arms rigid. “Could be that, since that horse was carved to signify a battle victory, she feels she’s the winner now. Or it could just mean that she’s in sodding Westbury. Read the card, you git.”

Xander slowly turned the card back over, staring at the neat, evenly spaced printing until the marks formed actual words.

Xander,

Giles said I should write and let you know that I am well. I am well. I had hoped when Giles told me that you thought that he and I had…Xander, how could you? I’d hoped that you’d figured out what you want, but it obviously isn’t me, as the lack of phone calls and incredibly illogical cards like this one suggests. Despite everything, I hope you’re happy, Xander. You can be a good man, you just have to stop being so afraid, and yes, I mean afraid, and I’m not talking about slaying. I’m still more angry than sad. I thought you’d like to know.

Anya

Xander let the card drop to the table and looked up at Spike, who still stood with his back to him, the mug lifted to his lips.

“You read it.”

Spike turned around, his eyes on the mug in his hands. “Did not.”

“Yes, you did,” Xander said, irrational anger filling him as he rounded the table, stopping a few inches from Spike. “You read that, when you knew it was from her, that it was personal.”

Spike lifted a brow and shrugged lightly. “Thought we didn’t have any secrets, anymore, love,” he said, his voice bitter, deepening as he lifted the mug to his lips again.

Xander’s throat tightened and he shook his head, turning away.

“Despite everything, I hope you’re happy, Xander,” Spike said, his voice lilting, sing-song as he approximated Anya’s voice.

“Shut up,” Xander muttered, his back to Spike, muscles tense, hands shaking with anger. Fear. Guilt.

“Sweet girl,” Spike murmured, his voice close as he neared, easing behind Xander, his hands lifting and then gliding over Xander’s shoulders, down his arms. “Just wants to make sure you’re happy.” His head tilted thoughtfully as his fingers measured the tension in Xander’s body. “Noticed she pointed out that she’s not getting up to anything dark and damp with old Rupert,” he glanced down at the card on the table, “Printed her address all nice and legible like, too. Lettin’ you know where she is, where she’ll be waiting when you stop,” his voice lowered, the words just breaths against the back of Xander’s neck, “getting,” his mouth opened, his teeth just grazing skin, “scared.”

Xander spun around, his eyes wide. “You’re jealous.”

“Am not,” Spike countered, his eyes cutting away.

Xander stopped, frozen by a flash of something he couldn’t identify, something that straightened his spine and made him feel… it was satisfaction. Spike was jealous and Xander could see it in his posture, in his face, in the way slim, pale fingers were clenching at his sides. Xander paused, and thought about what he was going to say. Time was short, and events were going to start accelerating soon, like a snowball at the top of the hill, gathering momentum. This could be the last…something.

He reached up and caught Spike’s chin, feeling the ivory curve of bone under the skin against his fingers. “Not scared right now, Spike,” he said. It was a lie – he was scared. Scared of being found out, scared of what was going to happen when Spike saw Buffy, scared that whatever was between them was going to melt away in the heat between Slayer and vampire and normal humans were going to get left on the fringes again. He was scared of words he couldn’t and wouldn’t say, feelings he couldn’t express, loss he couldn’t imagine. But if Spike saw the lie, he gracefully ignored it and neatly changed the subject with a searing kiss.

Xander parted his lips, letting all of the fear and anger, regret and doubt, be swallowed in the kiss. His eyes slid closed as he reached for that warm, safe place where there was no pride, no uncertainty, just this white hot feeling. But everything was still so real, the blood tang of Spike’s tongue, the rasp of their cheeks against one another, the light filtering through blinds and his own closed eyes.

Desperate, his fingers tightened on Spike’s jaw, sealing their mouths together and then running his hand down Spike’s back in a rough, restless rhythm, nails scratching one moment, fingers stroking the next.

And Spike arched to meet the surge of Xander’s body, hardness meeting hardness in a way that was everything it should be, and in a way that was no different than any time before. But behind Xander’s closed eyes, beneath lips that hid their tremble in the unforgiving way they ground into Spike’s, there was no rest in mindless want, no escape from the words he tried to sear into Spike’s flesh with every brush of his hands. I’m sorry.

Spike's hands rose up to grip Xander's shoulders, and the restrained strength there just made Xander shake harder. It made Xander feel like a puppy confronting a German Shepherd - he wanted to lower his head and roll over and show his belly, wanted to submit to Spike's strength. He wondered if Spike felt it, if his instincts were screaming at him to take as loudly as Xander's were telling him to give. And he wondered if Spike could read his mind when he unsealed their mouths and dropped his face down to Xander's neck and closed his teeth against the warm, sweaty skin there.

Xander’s head fell back, his eyes still closed, hands easing slowly up Spike’s back to his neck, closing around smooth skin, pressing Spike’s lips deeper into his flesh. He swallowed, feeling Spike’s mouth open around his skin, feeling the way they just sort of…danced around each other, hesitant, both asking, neither answering.

Everything in Xander felt rattled, unable to find that peaceful, easy feeling, but still reaching for it, and Spike’s mouth on his skin was so real, and he knew what it meant. What he was asking for, what Spike was offering. What it meant each time he tried to hide inside the very thing he was trying to run from. That being with Spike was feeling safe and hidden, but still stripping him down to the bone.

It was an insane sort of logic, but a reassuringly familiar one. The same sort of logic that lead to Slayer suicide; leaps away from emotional pain and into the comfort of physical ones.

He arched his neck slightly, encouraging the bite, encouraging Spike. Fangs descended and skin parted and then there was the rush of heat, of liquid, that hummed straight to his cock and muddled his head. But even that wasn’t enough, and he was still standing in his living room, a vampire in his arms, fangs in his throat, a hand roughly palming his erection as another stroked his cheek softly.

His lashes fluttered as Spike’s head lifted, a brief glimpse of blood flecked lips before Spike’s tongue flicked out, licking it away. Xander closed his eyes, pressing his forehead against Spike’s, breath shuddering in his chest.

“Xander?” Spike asked warily, starting to pull away.

Xander tightened his arms, holding them together. The biting was something new, and they didn’t do it often, and it was always over as soon as it began. Beyond their first realization that Spike could actually do it, if Xander offered, they’d never discussed it. The fact that it was never discussed was never mentioned. Why would it be? It was just the latest in a long line.

Spike was lax in his arms, which should have been distracting in itself, because holding Spike usually meant trying to hold Spike while he twisted and slithered beneath Xander, hands and mouth everywhere at once. Xander lifted his head, looking at Spike who stood still against him, eyes closed and jaw tight. Waiting.

Waiting for Xander to lose himself and give in, so that Spike could take control, knowing that he was wanted, that he wouldn’t be pushed away. Sometimes men just fuck, Xander thought, but never us. Too much between them to let it just be release, and too much unsaid to let it be anything else.

He felt Spike shift slightly in his arms, lips brushing against his jaw as Spike pulled back slightly, looking at him, face guarded but eyes questioning. Xander answered by dropping to his knees, and tugging Spike down to join him. He lifted a hand that was shaking only slightly to the middle of Spike’s chest and pushed, following him back until Spike lay on the floor with Xander above him.

Xander braced himself over Spike, looking down at him, eyes darting from Spike’s eyes to his lips and watched as those lips parted and Spike grinned lazily. “Wanted to top, love, all you had to do was say…”

Xander ducked his head, his mouth covering Spike’s. He kissed with eyes open as long as he could, and then when Spike groaned into his mouth, Xander let his eyes slide shut. He focused on the slide of Spike’s tongue against his, the hand that fisted in his hair, and then let himself give over to the kiss, holding nothing back. No thoughts of forgiveness or forgetting as he memorized each curve of lips, tongue and teeth. No thoughts of hiding as he gave in and let himself feel everything, the fear, the anger, and the pain, and then gave it over to Spike, who arched into it, accepting it as need, relishing it as want.

Xander lifted his head, looking down into eyes that met his fearlessly, and then he covered Spike’s body with his own, hands reaching to tear impatiently at clothes that were suddenly too concealing, too separating. Spike reached above his head, his hands impatient as they fumbled in pockets, and then they were joining Xander’s and rubbing slickly.

Xander leaned down and kissed Spike again, softly, without need or want, and then he eased back, joining their bodies as their eyes met again.

And he realized this was the one time he didn’t want to get lost.

“You know, this whole ‘babysitting’ thing is starting to get kind of old,” Dawn called from the kitchen. “Willow and Tara said they’d only be at the library for a couple of hours, and it usually doesn’t take Xander that long to mow.” Her voice got louder as she neared. “So you totally don’t have to stay. If you’re bored.”

Spike settled back into the sofa, looking up and forcing a smile as Dawn walked back into the room. “I’m not, and I do.” He cleared his throat, fingers drumming as she stared down at him. “So, what do you fancy, Bit? Game of Rummy?”

Dawn made a face. “Not unless you promise no cheating.”

Spike’s eyes widened, the picture of innocence. “Taught you everything I know about cheating. You should be able to suss out when I’m…”

Dawn rolled her eyes, dropping down on the sofa next to him. “Holding cards, yeah. Using vampire senses to hear my heartbeat speed up when I have a good hand? Unfair.”

Spike smirked, reaching for the deck of cards. “You’re the sneaky one. ‘M sure you’ll figure out a way to get a better poker face.”

Dawn stared at him. “It’s Rummy.”

Spike shrugged. “Rummy face, then.”

Dawn shook her head. “Nope. Not tonight. Tonight, I have,” she leaned forward, gesturing to the coffee table in front of them, “pizza you won’t eat, soda you won’t drink, and,” she said, lifting a tape box and waving it, “a movie you won’t watch.”

Spike grabbed at the box she was waving in his face and turned it over, looking at the title and smiling slightly. “That’s where you’re wrong, love. Rebel Without a Cause.” He looked up at Dawn, “I think somebody planned this.”

Dawn shrugged lightly, grinning.

Spike looked back down at the movie. “James Dean,” he murmured, rubbing a thumb over shiny plastic of the case. “Live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse. Not the most original idea, you know, but he was on to something, there.”

“Willow and Tara said he’s like, some kind of gay icon.”

Spike dropped the movie onto the seat between them, looking away from her. “Yeah?” he mumbled indifferently as he reached for his cigarettes.

“Wouldn’t know it to look at him,” Dawn said, not taking her eyes off of Spike. “He’s all tough with his…jacket and his cool hair and his cigarettes…”

Spike dropped his lighter onto the table, turning to look back at Dawn. “Something you want to tell me, Niblet?”

“Something you want to tell me?” she answered, blinking at him.

Spike reached for the movie cassette, smiling tightly. “Not a bleeding thing I can think of,” he said, standing and walking over to the television. He bent over, muscles tense as he punched the buttons on the VCR and watched the lights blink as it came on. He ripped open the case and slid the tape into place, hitting play and then standing there, staring as the title screen came up.

“Wow,” Dawn said, “look at you, working the technology.”

“Yeah,” he said, turning to grin at her, “Xander’s got…” he stopped abruptly, jaw tightening as she grinned at him.

“Xander’s got what?” Dawn asked, her grin widening. “Big, poofy lips?” she asked, puffing her own lips out. “Long, swoopy eyelashes? Totally squeezable a -…”

“Dawn!”

“Abs?” she giggled, giving him a leer with a lifted brow that was just missing a scar.

“Think I liked you better when you were all weepy and mopey,” Spike muttered. Dawn’s face immediately darkened, her eyes falling to her lap. Spike closed his eyes, sighing. “Didn’t mean that, love. I just…” he walked back over to her, perching on the edge of the sofa. He reached out for her, and then drew his hand back, shaking his head and looking away. “Just can’t believe they told you, is all.”

Dawn snorted, lifting her head. “Oh, yeah, that happened. Willow and Tara so sat me down and gave me the ‘sometimes two guys like each other in a special way’ talk. Right.”

Spike looked back at her, frowning.

She shrugged, leaning back and crossing her arms. “I might have been outside their room the other day, looking…”

“Lurking,” Spike interrupted pointedly.

“Looking,” she said with a quick glare, “for my shoes, when Willow was telling Tara that she saw you and Xander. Kissing. Each other.” She stopped, looking at Spike uncertainly.

“Yeah?” he said, slowly.

“Kissing,” she repeated firmly. “Each other.”

“Huh,” Spike said, reaching for the remote and turning up the volume. He leaned back against the cushions, staring at the television.

“Well?” Dawn demanded, grabbing the remote from his hand and hitting mute.

“Well, what?” Spike sighed, looking at her. “Sounds like you already got the story. I’m sure Red painted all the strokes broad enough,” he said bitterly.

Dawn didn’t answer for a moment, her fingers fiddling with the hem of her skirt. “So why didn’t you tell me?” she asked finally, her eyes on the movie playing silently in front of them.

“Not the sort of thing we talk about is it, pet?” he said, giving her a wry smile. “And not something we’re gonna start,” he added, turning his attention back to the television. He could watch it silently if she could.

“Do you…love Xander now?” Dawn asked carefully, all traces of teasing and teen curiosity over vampire/Scooby kisses gone from her voice.

Spike’s head jerked, and he closed his eyes, his fingers tensing on his knees, digging deep and grinding bones together. “Dawn,” he sighed finally, “sometimes it’s not about love.”

She paused, tilting her head to look at him closely. “It usually is for you.”

Spike stilled, looking at her, and knowing that anything he said would let her into places she didn’t need to be, and places he didn’t need to revisit. The memory of Xander’s lips still burned on his, and it was a feeling he didn’t want to lose by sharing it. Even with himself. He shook his head slowly; then turned away from her.

“So you don’t love Buffy anymore?” she asked, her voice cracking on the last, and Spike stiffened at the pain in her voice. He swallowed, knowing that he had to answer that, and finding the words for her when he wasn’t sure of the answers himself was just the first in the long line of wrong with this conversation. Cursing the fact that he couldn’t hit her or kiss her to make her shut up, he turned and looked into her eyes, his voice quiet.

“Nothing will ever change how I felt about Buffy, Niblet. But you know how that was, what that was. Nothing in it for her, nothing real, anyway.” He winced at the dull tinge of pain that always accompanied that admission, whether spoken or not, but the edges were blurred, somehow, and its acknowledgement somewhat easier to swallow.

“But you and Xander, that’s real?” her voice still quivered, but her eyes were dry, as if she had determined to be the grown up in this situation, and see it through until her questions were answered.

“It’s…complicated, Bit,” Spike said, reaching for his cigarettes again and suddenly wishing that Willow kept something stronger in the house than herbal teas.

“Complicated,” Dawn laughed shortly, nodding. “Yeah, I guess I wouldn’t get complicated, since the rest of my life has been so easy. I just dream every night about memories that never really happened and get pissed off at a dad I’ve never really met and spend the day with a robot that looks just like the sister who died… for me. For me: the key that doesn’t fit anything. Yeah, you’re right, Spike – complicated. Not something I’d ever understand.”

Spike stared at her, mouth working silently. Well, that was…eloquent, he thought, if sarcastic and cruelly honest and vaguely reminiscent of…hmm, seems someone’s copying more than the brow lift.

Dawn shrugged, falling back against the couch and lifting the remote, clicking the sound back on. “Whatever. If you’re not gonna tell me about illicit Xander smooches, we can just watch the movie.” Neither of them turned to look at the television, though, and then Dawn drew a deep breath. “Or you could always tell me what else is going on.”

Spike blinked, frowned, and then blinked again, looking at her. Dawn’s teenage rapid-fire mood swings were second only to Dru’s, and he was a few years out of practice following those. “You’re losing me, Bit,” he said, shaking his head. “Could have been the use of ‘smooches,’ but, again, we’re not goin’ down that road. There’s an ‘else’?”

Dawn rolled her eyes, and Spike watched, confused, as her entire body seemed to vibrate with an unspoken, duh. “You know, the conversations that stop the minute I walk into the room? Those looks that Tara and Willow give each other that aren’t anything like the ones they give each other before they sneak upstairs and turn the stereo up really loud. The way Xander looks at Willow sometimes and then sees me watching him and says, ‘gotta go’ immediately and walks out without saying goodbye? The way all of you…”

“Careful with who you include, Dawn,” Spike interrupted, his voice low. “Kinda persona non grata myself around here, you know?”

“But I know there’s something,” she continued, waving that aside, “I might have been born almost yesterday, but I’m not blind. Or deaf. I’ve lived in Slayer central long enough to know ‘planning’ when I see it. The secret meetings, spell and research books everywhere, doors that close suddenly whenever I walk down the hall. And all of you…” her eyes widened. “No, not you.” She stared at Spike. “Not me, not you. Just them.”

Spike looked back at her, memories clicking. Xander’s silences, the strange looks that he’d just chalked up to the boy working his way through the new living arrangement. But he’d blather on about their ‘arrangement’ whenever Spike got him worked up into it. Then patrolling with Willow and waiting for her to threaten, to at least question, for fuck’s sake, but nothing. Like it didn’t matter. Like he and Xander weren’t worth her attention because there was something more.

The way Xander had been today, greedy and grasping, and not with guilt over demon girl like he’d thought. And that last kiss, wasn’t just giving in, or acceptance. It had felt…final.

He focused on Dawn, on those too old eyes in that too young face. He leaned forward, arms resting on thighs as his hands clenched together. Fear and anger warred, and his throat worked as he forced the words out, trying to let her know the anger wasn’t directed at her. “What else do you know, love?”

Xander walked in a slow circle in front of the grave, his hands pushed into his pockets, his eyes on the ground. He heard a rustle in the darkness and looked up, expecting Willow and Tara and fearing Spike, but there was nothing, only wind and expectation.

He lifted his hand, peering at his watch. 11:45. Fifteen minutes ‘til midnight, ‘til another day began. Another Sunday here in this place with its scents of grass and earth and week-old flowers that wilted and faded against the stone but never had a chance to die before they were replaced, whole and new.

He turned and looked down at the headstone, his breath tightening. “This is it, Buff,” he whispered. “No turning back now. Even if we wanted to,” he finished, his voice trailing off. He reached down, rubbing his hand over the top of the stone, his fingers curling around it tight. “Willow says all I have to do is show up and believe. Funny thing is,” he said, his voice husky, “I think this would be the one time I’d listen if you showed up and told me to leave before I got hurt.”

“Xander?”

He jerked, turning around, heart in his throat and strangling the breath that tried to force its way out.

Willow and Tara stood in the clearing, their hands full of candles and jars and other things that said that this was no dress rehearsal, no game of ‘what-if,’ but the real deal, and things were about to play out whether he was ready or not.

Xander ducked his head, brushing the grit from the headstone off of his hands. He looked back at Willow, started to speak, and then really looked at Willow and let the words bubble forth, taking comfort in the lack of thought that it took to produce them.

“Wow, Will, workin’ your spellin’ clothes,” he said, nodding to her black and grey off-the-shoulder dress. He glanced over at Tara’s jacket and pink jeans, and then at his own button-down and jeans. “You didn’t say there was a dress code, but then, what is the dress code for a resurrection? I think the last recorded one had this whole robes and sandals motif, and I’m not really a sandal sort of guy. You know – hairy toes…”

His voice died away as Tara stared back him with a look of amused confusion and Willow’s face just reflected…hurt. Right, solemn is the tone we’re going for. You’d think he’d have figured out by now when the inappropriate funny was actually going to have the desired relieved laughter effect and when it was just going to make him feel even more useless.

“Sorry,” he muttered, walking over to take the candle Tara held out to him. He risked another glance at Willow’s face, and it was still closed tight, tension radiating from her, but directed away from him now. Believe, he thought, believe that Willow can bring her back, and that there’s nothing of the wrong in that. Dawn will be okay again, and Giles will come back, and everything will go back to the way it was, and I can go back to hiding in the mix again, hidden and unthinking and unthought of.

His hand trembled as he took the lighter Tara handed to him, lighting his candle and watching the flame sputter. He gripped the candle tighter, feeling like he was in a grade school Christmas chorus, in a time before candles had come to mean spells and vampires who couldn’t have light any other way and the way the light glowed against pale skin…

“Xander, do you have it?” Willow’s voice cut into his thoughts.

“Yeah,” he said, swallowing, his mouth dry as he handed the lighter back to Tara and watched her light her own candle.

“What time is it?” Tara asked suddenly.

Xander loosened his death grip on the candle and checked his watch. “A minute ‘til midnight,” he said, his eyes going to Willow’s.

“Okay,” Willow said, kneeling, her fingers laced tightly around the urn she held in her hands. “Start the circle.”

Xander knelt at her side and started to point out that they were really in more of a triangle than a circle, but he’d gotten a D in geometry and figured that silence was probably his best option now. Believe.

“Osiris, keeper of the gate, master of all fate, hear us,” Willow began, her eyes on the headstone. Xander’s eyes widened as he realized they were starting. Starting starting, and shouldn’t Willow go through some sort of checklist and give Tara and him instructions? Was he really supposed to sit here and just believe? He squeezed his eyes shut, and then opened them again. He really needed something to do, something that would shut his brain up and distract him from…

He watched as Willow dipped her finger into the urn, lifting it to her forehead, her cheeks, painting bright stripes there. You didn’t fight with a Slayer and sleep with a vampire without recognizing the bright red that shimmered against Willow’s skin in the candlelight, dripped down her cheeks. Blood. Whose? And from where? And why did…oh, right, it always had to be blood. Fucked up Hellmouth logic? Check.

Willow kept speaking and his candle and Tara’s quivered along in time to her words. She poured the contents - blood - of the jar on the ground, her voice firm, commanding in the way it had echoed in his head, whispered in his dreams, all summer long.

“Accept our offering, know our prayer,” she said, voice gasping a bit on the last, and then her arms went rigid, her breath labored. Unseen blades cut into her arms, the flesh falling open, blood welling beneath.

“Willow!” Xander cried out, reaching for her.

“No!” Tara said, stopping him. “She knew she would be tested. This is what’s supposed to happen.”

Xander fell back, watching as Willow centered herself, her voice calm again, calling on Osiris, demanding that Buffy be allowed to cross over. And then her back jerked, her jaw lifting as these…things…began to rise up in her arms, under her skin, rising across her chest, her throat.

Oh, God, Xander thought. Willow…what have you done? How many lines did you have to cross, what kind of lies did you tell yourself to get…and the blood, the blood.

“She needs help,” he said, forcefully, looking at Tara.

Tara shook her head, her eyes wide. “She said not to stop, that once…”

“Tara – it’s killing her!” he said, the candle in his hands shaking, hot wax splattering across his fingers, unnoticed.

Willow’s body shuddered, and she fell forward, gasping, her fingers clutching at grass that was longer, unruly, this week, because there was no need for him to mow, to tend, anymore. Her fingers gripped harder, blades of green breaking off and clinging to her hands as her body lurched, shaking as she moaned.

And then her mouth was opening, opening wide, and in the darkness, something slithered out. Past her lips and winding its way over her tongue, falling to the ground as she gasped and choked.

Xander’s throat felt squeezed shut, and he silently thanked God for it, because it sealed the way against the bile that rose up in it. That was in Willow’s mouth, he thought, and choked again, looking down at the snake that blinked and then slithered away from them, unconcerned with the horror it left in its wake.

Willow suddenly lurched upright, her back bowing as she was bent almost in half, and then snapping forward again, a red glow, like fire, like blood, encircling her, surrounding her, separating her from them.

Xander stared at her, at the blood on her arms, her face, the light that glared from her, highlighting her closed eyes, her clenched jaw. He glanced over at Tara and saw the shock on her face, the tears on her cheeks as she mumbled to him, to herself, “Just a test, just a test,” over and over. She hadn’t known. All of this – and for what? And then something just…snapped.

Bringing Buffy back wouldn’t change anything or make everything all right again. His mind flashed to Buffy’s body on the ground, dead and broken, and to the look in Spike’s eyes as he had stared at her – dead and broken. Buffy wouldn’t have wanted this – any of this. If she had, if this was right, Giles would be standing with them, reassuring them, explaining why Willow had to go this way, take this path. And Spike would be next to him, his hand in Xander’s, at least for a while, both of them finding the courage in each to face Buffy’s return, no matter what it meant. United as before, like they had been, before Buffy had shattered them apart when her body shattered onto the ground.

Instead, this secret, this plan had torn them apart farther than before, forcing its way between him and Willow, crawling into the spaces between him and Spike, causing Tara to turn a blind a eye to magic she couldn’t believe in and making the mission - if they even still believed in it - meaningless.

Without Buffy, they fought by rote, with trained responses, feet moving toward cemeteries and dark alleys because it was what they did, no thought to what any of it meant. There was no higher purpose, no greater good, nothing in their destinies that commanded them to do it. And bringing Buffy back changed that…how? Following a leader? Willow had lead a tighter team than Buffy had ever imagined, more equal, more even. If bringing her back meant restoring a friend, easing the pain…what right did they have to do that? How were they any different, any more special than others who had lost, others who had died? If it meant the return of the Slayer…what did it accomplish but counting the minutes until she died yet again, the victim of a violent life, a causality of her own destiny? And then…what? They brought her back again? Cycling over and over until one day, maybe, none of them cared anymore?

“Willow, stop.” And that was his voice, weary and resigned, and so quiet that she actually heard it over the roar of the light and her own groaning.

“Xander?” Tara’s voiced quivered.

“Stop, Willow. Now,” he commanded, tossing away the candle and standing, facing her as she shook and shuddered beneath the onslaught of magic so dark, so powerful it was ripping her apart.

“Xander,” she gritted out from clenched teeth, forcing herself to speak, “don’t. Need you,” she grunted, her body snapping again. “You have to believe…”

“I believe, Willow,” Xander said, swallowing, his eyes dark holes in his face, his hands damp and trembling as they reached out to her, “I believe you think you’re doing what’s right by doing something very, very wrong. You believe you’re not going to have to feel the pain if you can do this, if you can make yourself believe we didn’t fail that day. That you didn’t fail. But Buffy chose this, and you’re lying to yourself, to all of us, if you think that she didn’t.”

“Xander!” Willow cried, pulling back from his hands as they reached for her. “More important things now,” she gasped, jerking as the magic lashed around her. “Buffy. It’s Buffy…more important than…Spike. More real. Being…selfish,” she yelled through the pain.

“Selfish?” Xander said, staring, his heart seizing in his chest as he considered that, and then shook his head. “No. This isn’t about me, and whether you believe it or not, Willow, it’s not about you. Selfish was lying to Spike, to Dawn, to Giles about this. Why aren’t they here, Willow? Why can’t they take part in this beautiful,” he looked her up and down, the blood, the fire, “celebration of love?”

“Xander, stop,” Tara whispered behind him.

“No,” he said, shaking his head, not looking at her, his eyes on Willow. “Will, you know me, you know it’s killing me to see what you’re doing, and it’s killing me to say this. You’re calling me selfish, when you don’t know…” he broke off, shaking his head. “When I don’t know what I mean, what he means, what I feel. But this,” he said, waving his hand. “This isn’t love, this is control. And I didn’t saying anything, until it was too late, but I saw it, I heard it in everything, in all of us. This isn’t about Buffy and wanting her, or needing her, or missing her. This is you, trying to prove to yourself, to us, that no matter how much you say we need Buffy back to feel strong, to feel right, that, in the end, you can do the one thing Buffy couldn’t.” He stared down at her, his hand opening, grasping and then squeezing tight. “And I can’t believe in that.”

The urn was slippery in his fingers, blood and sweat mixing, and then it was grasped firmly and he watched it gleam in the bright light that surrounded Willow as he smashed it into the ground. Jagged edges burst away, cutting into his palm, the sound as it broke lashing into him. And then the light bled away, Willow slumped forward with a cry and he stared at the broken bits that clung to his fingers, the blood on his hand dull in the single light of Tara’s candle.

He looked up into Willow’s shocked eyes, and then back to the blood in his fist, the shattered urn at his feet, and heard the silence of the grave around them. “Oh, God.”

And then he ran.

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