When do you think she started to fall for him? The moment. I think she started to grow feelings for him in the beginning of season six, the way he was with her. She trusted him the most to tell him she was in heaven. What do you think?

It depends on what season I'm writing. LOL

Seriously? I think one of the things that makes their relationship so believable is the fact that it evolved over time from adversarial, through reluctant allies, back to adversarial, reluctant allies again, growing trust and friendship (which Spike set back months with his chaining her up to confess his love idea. lol), and then the sexual realtionship which, in spite of Buffy's determination, led to affection.  When you start having sex with someone that you have come to like and depend on, and you continue to have sex with them because it's good and because they love you, then you are developing feelings - whether you choose to admit it or not. So, I would say she began to develop feelings pretty early-on, but didn't allow herself to admit it until she broke up with him.  I don't think that you can pin-point a particular moment when she began to fall in love with him because it was so gradual and had so many setbacks.  The beginning of  season VI is as good as anything else, I guess.  Certainly, that's when she began depending on him for more than extra muscle.

I think she started to see him in a different light after Glory tortured him. At the end of season five she's counting on Spike, not her friends, to protect Dawn.

Honestly?  I'd have to say in "Something Blue," was when her attraction to him became obvious- they both had that "tease your crush," kids on the playground kind of thing going on.  Feeding him, teasing him about her neck, him with the idle threats, that's not how you treat someone who you loathe, but more along the lines of immature and treating someone you like in such a way.  Before that faux marriage incident, Buffy had not been into Riley that much.  But "lips of Spike" shook her up so much, that she jumped head first into the most vanilla and lack luster relationship she could find with the dullest, boring man she could find.  She didn't treat him as she would treat a regular villain.  Had that been Angelus who was chipped, the reactions wouldn't have even been close.

And then there's Spike- if he really wanted to help Adam isolate the Slayer and piss her off at the same time, making her come to him, well, not just tell the patchwork demon when to approach her friends, one by one when Buffy wasn't around them, and pull one of his "experiments" on them, leaving them gutted and strung up for her to find?  She'd know it was Adam, and she would've really been alone then.  No- Spike's solution is to "start an argument."

Buffy softens up towards him when he comforts her when she first finds out about her mom.  She saw him with the shot gun, and it was clear what he wanted to do, but once he saw that she was hurting, and she saw that he actually cared about that, I think there was a change there too. 

Buffy finally leaves her land of denial about Spike after hearing his sincere confession to "The Bot" at the end of "Intervention," with the soft kiss.  Had Spike not pulled back, I honestly wonder how far she would've let that go.

As for season six, Spike was the only one who asked her if she needed help, or if she was in any pain- he didn't think that all was good and well in Buffyland, and she appreciated the fact that he could see that, and just let her be.

I think she wanted him from the beginning, she just fought it.  "Love" I don't know when that happened.  I'm not sure if she ever really "loved" him like she should have.

I agree with Lady Yashka, I think the first time Buffy saw a good side in Spike was in the end of Intervention, before she probably thought he was just a stalker with an unhealthy obsession. At that moment she realized that his feelings might be real. After that she started to trust him more with her family and friends. But I truly believe she started to have feelings for him later in the beginning of season six, she found a good listener in Spike, unlike her friends who were pushing too much. The best thing about Spuffy is how gradual things develop, especially Buffy's feelings for Spike. I think she reached the place where she was in love with him in season seven where he seemed to matter more than even Dawn to her.

I kinda agree with Scarlet--around the time of Something Blue. Willow didn't say anything about them falling in love...she just said that they should get married and they went on and on about love and gushiness and such so I think fond feelings where there at that point and gradually it turned to more even though they had the whole tolerant/irritating pattern going strong by that time.

And I think that all these different (and all very believable) possible beginnings are what make it so easy for us to write Spuffy in just about any season that we choose... LOL

SpikeHot, I started a thread on the forum awhile back called "Methinks the Lady Doth Protest Too Much."  You can read that one,too, if you want any other ideas of when Buffy fell for Spike :-)

 Thank you Immortal Beloved I'll check it out. :-)

Well, I think she had a certain physical attraction for him all along. I think her emotional connection didn't start until "Intervention" in season five. That was the episode where she was finally able to admit that he *could* be good and do good things. Was it love? Probably not. But it was the beginnings of trust and friendship.

I saw a lot of the same trust in season six's "Afterlife" but for some reason after this episode she started to pull away from him. Even when they were sleeping together it seemed they had no emotional connection whatsover. Spike even comments on it when he says: "Do you even like me?" To which she replies coolly: "Sometimes." I think in her heart she did have an affection for him  in season six, but it couldn't possibly have been love. She could not have treated him as badly as she did, had she been truly in love with him.

I think the real love started when she found out he had gotten his soul back for her. Unfortunately for him, (and us) she was too much of a coward to admit this until it was already to late.

Unbridled Brunette, I believe it was "I... feel for him."  Bah.  Gosh, how can you not be ashamed to say you're in loved with Riley, and then feel all guilty about passionate, sexy Spike?  Jeebus...

I agree with Zoe.  They both were hot for each other from the get go.  In Becoming, she invites Spike into her house and doesn't uninvite him for years.  She only gets around to uninviting him when he takes her to chase down some vampires in a dump building and tells her that he loves her.  And Spike does some pretty bad things before she locks the door: (not necessarily in exact order)

Leaves her to fight Angelus alone.  Kidnaps Willow and Xander, kills the woman at the Magic Shop, gets Buffy and Angel involved in a fight with the Mayor's minions, pokes her in her wounded belly with a cue stick, threatens to kill her as soon as he gets his chip out, sicks Harmony on her, causes half of Sunnydale to collapse, tries to kill her when he has the ring, taunts her about Parker (jealous much?), kidnaps and tortures Angel, sneaks in her house and steals her underwear, busts up her relationship with Riley, has Warren build a Buffy Bot for Spike to have sex with and leaves cigarette butts all over the lawn. 

Buffy must love him to put up with all that. 

Wait a sec- to be fair, he took Dru and saved Giles, as was their deal,  he poked her with his hand, Harmony was after her anyway, and Riley never told Buffy bout the whole sniffing her clothes bit, and I don't think she was aware of the clothing theft until after she saw the lower part of the crypt, and Riley messed up the relationship with Buffy- no one told him to get suck jobs from vamp ho bags. 

She uninvited him when she realized he was no longer a threat... Way weird.  He comes back to town again, trying to kill her, she's not sure if he left or not (before she got the ring from him), and doesn't bother to warn her mom or tell Willow to disinvite him then.  Buffy's a weirdo.

Okay, he did a couple of things, but only so he could get Drusilla back.  It's true that Riley didn't tell her about the underwear, but she caught him in the basement (stealing her pictures) when the Quellar demon came to get Joyce.

Spike and Harmony also showed up at the party where Buffy was being jerked over by Parker, dragging a dead body.  When Parker asked, Buffy said Spike was her friend and laughed somewhat hysterically when he suggested she was a lot more than a friend. 

"....left cigarette butts all over the lawn."

Oh, the trials and tribulations of being a Slayer!

I agree with ... multiple people here. around the time of Something Blue, there really was an attraction based there.

And all Spuffy fans rejoice!

Damn my forget-to-loginness!

I think there seems to have been attraction there from the very start...the way she related to Spike was never the way she related to her other opponents...I agree with those who've said it seemed more like the immature way some people behave with a crush...

As for actual love, I think the beginnings happened around the time of Intervention, when she began to see that he was capable of caring for her and Dawn without a soul, whether she wanted to admit it or not. And right after Intervention, the actions really started picking up and there was no time to really develop anything between them. That look she gave him in "The Gift", when he gave his speech about her treating him like a man (ironic in hindsight :( ...) speaks to me of her seeing him in kind of a different light than she did before Intervention.

If Buffy hadn't died on the tower, things might have gone very differently between them from that point on.

I think she fell really in love with him gradually over the course of seasons 6 and 7, though in 7 she finally learned to really let herself love him -- but too late.

Okay, I know I just posted on this forum...but I just watched the last 6 episodes of season 7...and my opinion has totally changed...

I think I now see Spike's response in the Hellmouth -- "No you don't, but thanks for saying it" -- in a completely different light.

I think Buffy had feelings for Spike from much earlier on then we might have thought...she was attracted as early as season 4, with that attraction deepening and taking on a more emotional level around "Intervention"...but...and hate me for this if you like, but this is how I now see it...

I don't think she ever *really* loved him, not the way she should have.

I think that in season 7, she was struggling with that -- her feelings for him, and the fact that even as they were increased from season 6, they still weren't what he wanted and deserved...

The way she acted after that sweet scene between them in Touched, "does it have to mean anything?" and his response got me thinking...it was like something changed in his expression in that moment, and I think it was in that moment that he accepted that she would never really love him like he wanted her to.

Her kiss with Angel when he showed up, and her non-committal answer to his questions about Spike's relationship with her, kind of sealed the deal in my mind too...

Now, don't get me wrong...I think that if Spike had survived the Hellmouth and they'd stayed together, him not in LA, she *would* have gotten there...she was on her way...but she never quite got there...

She said it, because she knew he deserved it, and she *wanted* to feel it...but what she felt for him wasn't love...because real love is unselfish and focused on the needs and feelings of its object...and even when it all came down to it, spike's feelings were not her focus at all...

Sorry if this seems a bit melancholy, but it's the result of my musings following watching these episodes...what do you all think?

Wow... I totally agree with you- had that been s3 Buffy and Angel in Spike's place the Liz Taylor thingy, she would've ripped it off of him and dragged his ass up the stairs.  She let Spike die.  She did, because she didn't love him that much.

That "Does it have to mean something?" line pissed me off to know end-  "Gee Spike, I was there with you, but damn, it didn't mean much- just a bit of cold comfort before I leave you all alone in the morning- the usual, you know?"

 I mean, here's the only guy who stood by her, after her long time bff's and her own damn sister kick her out of *her* house, and he's the one who gave her the courage to get the axe, among ten thousand other things he's done.  I said it before- I didn't believe SMG's "I love you" to him, but maybe, Joss told her to say it that way.  Maybe Buffy didn't love him, at least, like the way we (and Spike) wanted her to.

unfortunately, I think that was probably the case...it does go along with the whole "cookie dough" speech she gave angel...buffy as a character had just been through too much romantically speaking, and was not really ready to truly love anyone at that point...

the expression on spike's face when he delivered that line "No you don't but thanks for saying it" spoke volumes. As always, he knew her so well, and she couldn't B.S. her way past him, even then at the end. He knew her better than anyone, and therefore he knew that no, she didn't love him, but she *did* have good reasons for saying it...she *wanted* to love him, wanted him to feel loved, and thus his heartfelt "thanks for saying it"

okay...i'm gonna end up in tears again like i was when i was watching it.. :P *sigh*

So here goes... soap box spiel from a newbie...

I kind of agree with the general interpretation that whereas Buffy was certainly attracted to Spike as early as Season 4 and had fond feelings for him probably from Intervention, if not that early then early season 6… but I'm not sure if she was ever truly was in love with Spike – at least not truly and completely like she is in our world. But I guess my question is – why is this a melancholy thing? Why look at this negatively? I know I'm a newbie but hear me out…

I'm not a fan of the cookie dough analogy but the meaning behind it I very much so support Buffy's logic. Buffy wasn't ready. She's what, 22 years old? Speaking from my general experience of being 21 and being surrounded by people within this age bracket - few young adults would proclaim to have without a doubt been 'in love' and even fewer would say that they are ready to settle down into some epic fairytale romance situation like we envisage for Spuffy. Sure it happens, people find their true loves early on and its all hugs and puppies. But lets go with the general population for arguments sake.

Then throw this in – Buffy has been through a hell of a lot, despite all the criticisms of her, you can't deny that she's been through a lot. Absent father, mother dying, annoying brat sister, friends with addictions and being shot and killed and lets not forget the dying and being dragged away from heaven.

Given all of this context – is it reasonable to think that Buffy is ready to be in love with someone? To give herself fully and wholly? Your average 22 year old who has only really been in one somewhat healthy relationship (in Buffy's case being *ew* with Riley) is possibly not in the place in their life to give themselves so completely. Then throw in the aforementioned context leading to a plethora of emotional and trust and intimacy issues…

As for the "I love you" in Chosen… I think its probably a matter of there being a fine line being 'loving' someone and being 'in love' with them. Buffy came to realise what the potential Spike had, she came to see the Champion within him and I would even argue that she did love him. But was she 'in love' with him… and perhaps that's what Spike meant by "No you don't"

I guess what my somewhat incoherent rambling is saying is – within the context of the strict canon, Buffy was never given the opportunity to allow herself the time to develop such deep feelings to be 'in love' with Spike. And that's okay. All of those variables created a situation where Buffy was cookie dough, she wasn't ready – and that's perfectly normal for her to not be ready. As was said much earlier in this thread – the relationship went up and down and up and down with the variables and setbacks which made the show exciting and dramatic preventing the feelings from developing healthily.

IMO, this is what most Spuffy fan fiction (well, fan fiction with a strong plot anyway...) is about – it's about changing those variables and allowing that opportunity to arise.  It wasn't that Buffy wasn't capable of loving, or that her and Spike were never compatible. It was that circumstances prevented this love from thriving.

Anyway... I'll step down before my rant goes on for another eighteen paragraphs...

~Brokenwings147

Very good points, Brokenwings.  However, Buffy wasn't the average 22 year old- in fact, she was old, considering that she was a Slayer.  She's already died two or three times- and the next time might be her last.  So really, she should go for something that seems like the real thing.

On top of that, she has Daddy *and* abandonment issues, and I understand that she would be afraid.  However, what boggles my mind in all this is the fact that she was dead for five months roughly, and Spike was still there- not Angel, or Riley, or even Giles (yes, Xander was there, but he's like her brother and doesn't count) her father figure, adding to more "daddy issues," which usually leads the female with that type of problem to go for an older guy... and Spike takes care of the things that she would need at that point- he's older, got the demon thing going to appease her Slayer side and not be insecure about her being stronger, and the most important part- love.  But perhaps, maybe she really was in love with pain.  In s7, Spike told her she likes men who hurt her- and basically in s6, she boxed Spike into a corner, forcing him to become one of those guys. 

Okay, I need to go to sleep now...

I don't think she would have said it if she didn't feel that she loved Spike - Buffy has such a problem expressing her feelings, that there's no way she'd say it out loud without meaning the words. However, there are so many meanings of love - the English language doesn't come close to accurately describing it. (I know of 4 different words in Greek for different types of love off the top of my head.) I believe she loved him as a friend by that point - her best friend. She also cared for him beyond that.

Buffy was so bad with words.....she needed Spike emotionally, as she expressed with "I'm not ready for you to not be here." As for the "Does it have to mean anything?" line - I think it was typical foot-in-mouth-Buffy-speak, but also, that she was really trying to say "I've got so much on my plate right now - please don't pressure me to define us until I get the spare time." But being Buffy, it comes out in the most callous way possible. And yeah, SMG dropped the ball on that one, as what should have been in her eyes, wasn't.

For cookie dough - hmm....so many ways to go with that analogy. Again, it removes the now pressure from Angel to, again, define a relationship. It also expresses what I believe she was feeling, too - that she wasn't ready for "dating". An incredibly tired 22-year-old facing almost certain death - yeah, she just can't make that kind of decision with anyone. Buffy isn't a "carpe diem" girl, because she believes she has to be self-sacrificing at all times, or she's letting everyone down.......so, she won't seize that chance for love, for soooooo many reasons.

That "I love you", with the wobble in her voice, and the tears in her eyes, was actually one of the few moments I really did believe SMG in her scenes with James. (And not to dog her, but she's not in his league. The guy just emotes.)  So, I believed Buffy......and even, maybe in that moment, she finally got that he was what she wanted.......but she also saw the determination in his eyes, the acceptance of dying as a hero, and wouldn't take that from him. She, of all people, knows what that's like. And Spike had firmly made his peace with meeting his Maker.

So, what really makes the whole ending ambiguous to interpretation, is that we didn't have an inside view to what Buffy did after leaving Sunnydale. That was May, and we don't know anything for sure about her activities until the following May. And a year is certainly long enough for a person to at least start going through the motions of moving on, if not actually doing it. She could have spent months crying herself to sleep in her bedroom at night - we just don't know. It's the beauty of fanfic......

Unfortunately, Joss isn't picking up immediately after Sunnydale with those comics, so we don't get to see them deal with grief. A problem I definitely have with the series........so what if it would have made at least the first issue somber and gritty? That's life. Anyway......there's my two cents.....or more like five. :P

Caro Mio

I can see how someone would think that Buffy didn't love Spike when she told him at the end of "Chosen," especially if looking at it mostly from Spike's point of view.  However, I believe that Buffy meant it when she told Spike that she loved him (and that isn't even based on Whedon's commentary on the DVD where he says that he told Sarah to "love him when you say you love him..").

Buffy knows that she's a person of action, and she's not so much with the words.  She has a hard time telling her sister or Giles that she loves them.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall Buffy ever telling her own mother that she loved her.  She never tells Riley that she loves him ('Cause she didn't.)  Buffy did tell Angel that she loved him, but he abandoned her anyway.  And she seems to develop her "I love you" phobia around that time.  Buffy thinks that she's been hardened by being the slayer, and she begins to wonder if she's loosing her ability to love.  It's very hard for Buffy to tell the people that she loves that she loves them.

Then Buffy is faced with Spike, the poster child for unconditional, unrequited love.  She tells him numerous times that she doesn't love him, that she couldn't love him.  She shows him that she doesn't love him, couldn't love him with her fists.  In fact, as difficult as it is for Buffy to say, "I love you," to everybody else, it's extremely easy for her to tell Spike, "I don't love you."  Spike tells Buffy that he loves her many times, giving Buffy plenty of opportunities to mutter a "Me, too," or a "Ditto."  Why would Buffy tell Spike that she loves him if she didn't?  You could argue that she was giving a dying man his last wish, but I'd have to ask you, "Since when has Buffy ever done ANYTHING because Spike wished it?"  It's not in Buffy's nature to say, "I love you," when she does mean it.  It would be completely uncharacteristic of her to say the three magic words if she didn't mean them.  

The cookie-dough-Buffy-was-too-young-to-be-in-love debate:  I met my husband when I was 22 years old, and I had ended a previous relationship a few weeks earlier.  I was in love with my husband within one month and picking out wedding rings within two.  If anyone had asked me if I was ready to get married or even just looking to bake my cookie dough even the day before I met him, I would have answered with a resounding NO!  I think that I would never have been ready to get married until I met someone whom I wanted to marry.  I suppose my point is that it's completely possible for Buffy to have been discussing unbaked goods with Angel one night, and wind up well done and crispy with Spike the next.  Love's funny that way.  Sometimes you plan it.  Sometimes it jumps out of the bushes and scares the crap out of you.  Sometimes it drops on your head like pigeon droppings.  Maybe for Buffy it just hit her at the most inopportune moment, like when the guy's burning up and saving the world :P

Ditto! :D

CM

When she told him she loved him, to me, she might as well have been saying "Gosh, you're awesome!"  Personally, Andrew had more emotion on his face when Xander gave his lil speech about Buffy before the horrendous vineyard incident.

Just to clarify that my point was more about Buffy's life experiences and issues and complexes than about her age...

Immortal Beloved, I do like your way of looking at the 'I love you.' All the different opinions - they possiblly stem from that it was very purposefully left open to the viewers interpretation for the purpose of keeping fans of all the ships content. A lot of probably comes down to each opinion of the sincerity of SMG's delivery :P I always find it interesting when I listen to the audio commentary and Joss speaks of how he was disappointed with the scene. I'm still not clear as to what it was he wanted from them...

~Brokenwings147

Wait- when did Joss say that he was disappointed?  I heard him say on the DVD that he couldn't have been prouder or something (not that I agree).  And I just wanted to say, that it didn't leave me discontent in the slightest.  It was Joss's show, and he should've picked someone instead of jerking us around, and not cutting, well, not completely writing pivotal scenes (the basement scene that never was)... As the creator, he should've taken the reins and made a definitive choice, IMO.

Well disappointed wasn't the word... anywho here is my rough transcript...

"This was an interesting scene because both James and Sarah came to it from, the wrong place really. They were playing things falling apart and the terror of it and I said that what I wanted was for them to completely distance themselves from it, I explained how all the sound was going to drift out.... What I basically told them was play the romance, be proud of him, love him when you say you love him, love her when you say she doesn't love you, forget about the crumbling world, for that period of time it doesn't exist... I was surprised that they hadn't come there because usually the three of us come to a scene in exactly the same place..... This time it really was sort of... sort of different. Eventually Sarah said 'if you have what you think you need I think we should move on because I'm not sure I understand how this works'. But I look at the two of them together and their work is tremendous... "

He kinda contradicts himself really... he says they came from it from the wrong place and then says their work is tremendous... hmm. Almost as though he's saying, it wasn't what I wanted but it was great anyway.

Oh, I see.  Sounds like he's saying that SMG got tired of trying, and he just said the hell with it...  Then tried to backtrack real quick with his "tremendous."

That paragraph basically covers from the beginning of trying to film that scene, to the last take, though. That they came into it from the script with the wrong mindset, and then Joss started correcting them after he watched them do it the first time. And...there are only so many times you can go over the same scene before nothing new pops out of you, as an actor. And then, Joss looked at the final product and thought their work was great. So, even if Sarah wasn't sure she got it right (cuz you're not doing the scene in front of a mirror), Joss saw what he needed for it.

I know when I've been performing a song in front of my voice teacher, that I thought I was giving it my best, but there was more of a specific this or that, that she wanted from me....and you have to trust her and get beyond how you're feeling, because the final product she'd get out of you really would be better.

CM