A/N: Thanks to my wonderful and hard-working beta, Eowyn315!! :)



Giles and Jenny had been gone for less than ten minutes when Buffy rose from the couch and strode purposefully toward the kitchen, slamming the small, swinging door open. Spike stared at the door as it continued to sway, staring at the spot where she had disappeared, before making his way across the room to follow her.

He found her in front of one of the cupboards, rapidly drawing out various items and tossing them to the floor in her haste to find whatever it was that she sought. When she did not find it there, she slammed the cupboard shut and moved on to the next one.

“What the bloody hell are you doing?” The question was calm, merely curious.

“Giles has got to have some kind of alcohol around here somewhere,” Buffy muttered. “Gotta have something to…to take my mind off…”

“Not so sure that’s such a good idea, pet,” Spike said slowly, eyeing her with caution.

“I’m not your pet and you can’t tell me what to do,” Buffy sulked.

“Have you ever even tasted alcohol before, Slayer?” Spike’s voice was incredulous as he moved across the kitchen to stand beside her.

“There’s a first time for everything.”

Spike stared at her for a long moment, debating…before finally shrugging and opening the cupboard next to him. “Sod it. I could do with a drink myself, love.”

*************************************

“So tell me about the future.”

Spike looked up at the Slayer in surprise, from where he sat on the sofa beside her, albeit a safe distance away. For a first time drinker, the Slayer was certainly making short work of her Watcher’s rather impressive supply of alcohol -- and as a first time drinker, there was no accounting for what type of drunk she might turn out to be. After a moment Spike looked down again, drawing in a deep breath as he prepared to respond.

“There’s a lot to tell, love. And a lot of it won’t happen now, so…so maybe it’d be best not to get into it, yeah? Better not to know some things.”

*Especially when you’re pissed out of your mind and bloody unpredictable.*

“But I wanna know,” Buffy pouted, her voice slightly slurred.

It had been an hour since they had found Giles’ stash, and she had already polished off a bottle and a half of rather expensive scotch. Of course, she might have finished the second bottle already as well, had she not had to stop after every swallow to make an exaggerated face and comment on the disgusting flavor of the beverage that she couldn’t seem to put down.

“Sorry, love,” Spike insisted, leaning back on the couch and crossing his arms over his stomach. “Not gonna get into it right now. It’s not like you’d know what I was saying anyway, as thoroughly pissed as you’re getting.”

“I’m not mad,” Buffy argued, turning to face him and shaking her head emphatically. She frowned as she raised her eyebrows and declared in a voice that was a little too slow and too deliberate to be taken seriously, “But I will be if you don’t tell me.”

“Not mad, love. Drunk.”

The Slayer’s alcohol consumption did not appear to have affected her reflexes.

In the next moment, she had drawn a stake from…somewhere…and was straddling Spike’s hips, the stake poised perilously over his chest, as she leaned down close to his face to deliver a threat that was only made believable by the feeling of the wood against his chest.

“Tell me…or I’ll shtake you.”

Spike was strangely unafraid, following his instincts as he slowly, cautiously raised his hand to close around hers, the one that held the stake.

“All right,” he conceded softly. “All right, love…just…just give this to me…”

Buffy looked down at the stake with a puzzled frown, as if just seeing it for the first time, before shrugging and relinquishing her hold on it, allowing him to take it from her hand as she rolled gracelessly off him and onto her back on the couch beside him. Spike sat up, clearing his throat, adjusting his position in a futile attempt to disguise his physical reaction to her brief closeness.

Fortunately, she was too drunk to notice.

“So tell me,” Buffy demanded, though she did not appear too inclined to enforce her command, slumped bonelessly on the couch, her head falling forward and her eyes closed. “What happens in my future?”

“Might not all happen now, Buffy,” Spike reminded her. “Some things have changed already. Don’t know exactly what, though…”

“Tell me what you saw,” Buffy slurred, raising her head enough to turn bright emerald eyes, bloodshot with alcohol but still full of pain and confusion, on the apprehensive vampire. “Tell me how Angel ruins my life and kills all my friends and I become the heinous bitca from hell.”

“The heinous what?”

“Never mind.” Buffy dismissed the question with a wave of her hand, apparently lacking the energy to explain. “Just…tell me what would have happened. What I need to *keep* from happening…”

“There’s no guarantee that you can, love,” Spike warned her softly. “But…we can try…”

“Tell me.”

“All right. Well…to begin with, I wasn’t here to tell you anything about Angel…and when he showed up after the spell to restore his soul…you let him in. Willow left, and went home…and stayed there.”

“But I screwed it up,” Buffy mumbled, and her voice was thick with tears. “I screwed it up, and now she’s…she’s…” She shook her head, sighing heavily as she whispered, “Go on. What next?”

“Well…you and the poofter kept dating…and he was able to keep up the act for a long time…but he’s not the same as he was before he lost his soul, love. He’s different now…and eventually, it started to show. He…he lied to you. Was unfaithful to you…”

“Then…then it wasn’t having sex with me that made him lose his soul?” Buffy’s voice sounded oddly detached, and Spike sensed that even if he could have offered her that reassurance, it would not have meant that much to her given the circumstances.

“It was,” he confessed, his voice low and his eyes averted. “It just…wasn’t *just* the sex. It was more than that. It was…a perfect moment of happiness. That’s what breaks the gypsy curse. If Angel experiences a moment of happiness, then the soul is taken away.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense,” Buffy petulantly declared. “Shtupid.”

“Yeah,” Spike agreed with a soft, mirthless laugh. “Pretty bloody stupid. But that’s what the gypsies did. Anyway…the soul that’s in him now…his original soul…well, it’s not a part of any bloody curse…which means…”

“He can have all the bloody sex he wants,” Buffy muttered resentfully, with a little hiccup at the end of her words. “Good for him.”

“Bad for everyone else,” Spike countered darkly. “Because this version of Angel, love…this Angel doesn’t need to lose his soul to go bad…this Angel just got to where he didn’t care anymore…and he’s already gotten there this time around, love.”

“So…what happened after that?” Buffy asked, not really sounding as if she cared all that much.

“Your friends, your Watcher, saw the changes before you did. They tried to get you to break it off with him, but you wouldn’t. Angel sent Dru away right after he got his soul back…but she came back to town a couple of years later. That’s when…when Angel killed her, and…well, that’s when things really went bad. After that…” Spike shrugged.

“After that what?” Buffy pressed, beginning to sound irritable again.

“Slayer…”

Buffy sat up with an effort, glaring at him as she demanded, “Where’s my shtake?”

“Okay, okay…just wait a second,” Spike sighed. “Things went pretty much like this time around to begin with. The boy was pretty soddin’ brassed off about it…and he stopped hangin’ around as much. One night…bloody hell, Slayer, I don’t wanna tell you this!”

“Tell me,” Buffy growled without moving. “Unless you want dust. Want to get dust. Ed.”

“Right. You’re losing your power of speech, and you expect me to be scared of you.”

“I’m the Shlayer. I *am* scary,” Buffy insisted.

“Right.” Spike was quiet a moment, and the sober mood fell over them again before he continued, “It was bad. He met with a bad end. So did the teacher. She and the Watcher were married by then, and he took it hard. Went back to England. After that…well, you eventually got past your feelings for Angelus and staked the bloody pillock. It was…it was harder on you than you could take, though…you…you…”

“I what?” Buffy pressed impatiently, frowning at the emotion that was clear enough in Spike’s eyes that she could not miss it, despite her inebriated state. “What did I do, Spike?”

“You…lost your…your drive, pet. Your…heart. After you staked Angel…you…” Spike’s voice came out in a whisper as he finished with difficulty. “…you didn’t last a week.”

Buffy was silent for a long moment, taking that in, struggling to process it through her clouded mind.

Spike half-hoped that she would have forgotten it all by morning.

In her current state, it was actually highly likely.

“Where were you?”

“What?” Spike asked her to repeat the question not because he had not heard her…but because he was not prepared to answer it.

“Where were you during…all of that? What did you do, while all this was going on? Did you leave town?”

Spike shook his head.

“Why not?”

He was quiet, considering what and how much to tell her, swallowing against the thick sensation in his throat, struggling to maintain control of his emotions. He watched her out of the corner of his eyes as she took another drink from the bottle of scotch she held in her hand.

“At first…well, at first you lot wouldn’t let me,” he admitted. “Chip or no…you didn’t trust me not to…well, hire some other big nasty to take the lot of you out again…or to get it out somehow…so…you kept me here.”

Buffy frowned. “How? It’s not like we could…*babysit* you all the time, right?”

“The teacher found a spell,” Spike explained. “Like a disinvite, only…in reverse. Kept me *in*.”

Buffy stared at him, her eyes widening in surprise…and dismay. “In where?” she asked softly.

“Sunnydale,” Spike replied with a carefully casual shrug, no longer meeting her eyes. “You figured if I*did* try something…‘s long as I was in town, you’d be able to bloody well track me down.”

Buffy thought about that for a moment, her expression solemn and intent, as she appeared on the verge of some deep, profound observation. Then, she took another huge swig on the bottle in her hand, before finally speaking.

“That seems…bad. Wrong.”

Spike could not suppress a bitter laugh, and he realized with a surprised sense of alarm that it almost felt as if he had actually experienced the things he had seen so vividly in his visions.

“It was.”

“So…how did you survive? Like…get blood and stuff?” Buffy’s voice was curious, almost childlike.

“Butcher’s shop at first. Pig’s blood and that sort of swill.”

“At first? How’d you get blood…later?”

Spike winced at the question, unintentionally painful with the mental images it drew to his mind, and shook his head rapidly. There were some things that he would not tell her, not unless it came to a point when it was actually necessary -- unavoidable -- in order to protect her and the others.

*And why should you want so bad to protect her, mate? It hasn’t happened yet! You shouldn’t feel *anything* for her yet! *Ever*! She’s your bloody mortal enemy!*

“Never mind that…not important.”

To his relief, Buffy allowed that one to slip, dismissing it as not all that interesting to her after all. “What else happened? Since you couldn’t, like…feed and stuff…what did you do with yourself?”

Spike was quiet for a moment. “Helped you lot, sometimes. For cash, of course. Sometimes…for other reasons.”

“What other reasons?” Buffy persisted with a curious frown, swaying slightly where she sat, as the alcohol began to take an even greater toll on her body and mind. “Why elshe would you want to…to help us?”

Spike just shook his head, unwilling to answer.

“You better…ansher me…” Buffy slurred, impossibly drunk by this point. “Or I’ll shtake you, Shpike…I will…I mean it…I’ll shtake you again and again…”

Although there was no stake in her hand, she leaned forward as if to attack him, though it was a weak, clumsy attack at best. In the process, she nearly fell off the couch, but Spike instinctively caught her, steadying her before she could lose her balance completely. She looked vaguely startled, her wide emerald eyes locking onto his for a long moment.

As her arms under his strong hands went limp, she collapsed forward against him, her head on his shoulder. Spike’s eyes widened in surprise, but he did not push her away. He hesitated a moment, as her breathing became heavy and steady, before slowly, carefully running his fingertips through her silky blonde hair.

“Mmmm,” Buffy murmured against his shoulder. “Feels good…” She was quiet a moment -- a long moment in which Spike was almost certain she had passed out -- before she raised her head with an effort to meet his eyes again. She just stared at him, her lips parted as if to speak, though she didn’t seem able to form the words she wanted.

Finally she mumbled, “Tell me.”

Then she promptly passed out.

Spike gently lowered her body to the couch, rising so that he could stretch her out on it more comfortably. He looked around the living room until he found a blanket, and laid it gently over her with a care that he could not quite admit to himself, even as he displayed it.

Certain now that she could not hear him, lost in an alcohol-induced sleep that she had needed desperately, nonetheless, Spike finally answered her repeated question.

“Because I loved you,” he whispered with a soft smile as he brushed her hair back from her still, relaxed face. “I loved you so much.” He was silent for a long time, just staring down at her, feeling a building sensation, a tightening in his chest, which he had been trying to ignore for the past few days -- with no success.

“And I’m afraid I already do.”