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Independence Day by pfeifferpack
 
Chapter 2
 
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Chapter 2
The weather was perfect, only in the high 70's and not a hint of possible rain.  Buffy and Dawn found a spot with a great view for the parade and settled in. Luckily the people around them were nice family types not like the college jocks across the street who were clearly more interested in beer and firecrackers than they were floats and high school bands.
 
"Wow, just think if you guys hadn't popped in and saved the day none of this would be here," Dawn was quite proud of her sister and the other Slayers who had arrived in that dark, rainy, alley just in time with enough firepower and magical mojo to keep LA from joining Sunnydale as yet another former California city.  "They don't even realize how much they owe you guys or you'd be the Grand Marshal."
 
"Doubt it.  No one sees what's right in front of their faces, not just me."  Buffy sat on the curb and waited for the parade to begin.
 
Dawn looked down at her somber elder sister and bit her lower lip.  She really had hoped that Buffy would have snapped back a little by now.  It had been over a month since that last battle and a year or so more since the one in Sunnydale.  She got past that one, the one that took everything they had, faster or so it had seemed.  Maybe Buffy had just been covering better then?
 
She sat down next to her, "You know you can talk to me.  I'm practically grown now and can handle whatever you toss at me without burning journals and cutting myself."
 
Buffy gave her a small grin.  "Talk won't do anything, Dawnie.  Besides I know you all hated him."
 
Dawn blinked rapidly (was that wetness in her eyes?).  Her voice held a suspicious choking sound that she gulped down before responding.  "I didn't hate him, Buffy.  I loved Spike way before any of you even tolerated him.  He was like a big brother to me.  A way-cool big brother with leather and a bike and all."  She took a deep breath.  "I was mad.  Mad at him for what he did to you, or tried to."  She put up a hand to stop Buffy from interrupting.  "I was also hurt.  We'd been so close when you ... died ... then all at once I was like nothing.  He never came around and never had time for me and then I find out he ... well ... I was mad and hurt."
 
"Dawn he didn't come around because I wouldn't let him.  I thought he would be a bad influence.  Oh who am I kidding, I knew he'd never hurt you.  I kept him away because I didn't want anyone to figure out what was going on with us."  She put a hand on Dawn's shaking knee, "I'm sorry I kept him away from you and sorry I hurt you.  I'd love to say I didn't know but really I just didn't care back then.  I couldn't seem to care about much of anything or anyone."
 
A long silence illustrated the gulf that still was to bridged over that lost year of pain and punishment.
 
"Did you love him at all?"
 
Buffy was quiet and Dawn thought at first that she was not going to answer just as always when Spike's name came up.
 
"I think I did as much as I could.  I mean I wouldn't have done all those things with him if I didn't have some feelings.  I think if I'd been in a better place I could have."  She looked Dawn full in the eye.  "We'd become friends first; really  friends.  I could talk to him.  I could just BE with him.  Then it got physical and then it got ugly and I hated me so much!  I took it all out on him and he let me."
 
"Yeah, he would."  Dawn nodded sagely.
 
"Stupid Spike," her voice broke on his name, "He was all about the giving even when it edged over into enabling.  Tore him up and broke him down.  Funny at the same time he built me back up, made me come back to life."  Buffy's eyes widened.  "Which one of us was the Vampire then?  I sucked the life from him to survive and nearly killed him in the process."
 
"I'm sure he didn't see it that way, Buffy.  Spike loved you."
 
"Yeah.  Till it killed him."  Buffy thought back to all the pain and anguish of those years, the way it could have been if only she had let it be so.  If she had only given herself permission to love back, to take a stand for what she wanted and needed for a change.
 
Dawn's voice was barely audible, "Why didn't he call?  Was it me?  I threatened to burn him you know."
 
Buffy smiled and hugged her, "No, it wasn't you.  I think ... I think he didn't know how. He was always so cock sure without the soul but after, well, he was on shifting ground and didn't know what to think or feel or do.  I can't imagine Angel gave him any encouragement.  Besides none of us were very nice to him over the years even after he'd earned it."  She bit back a sob.  "What was there for him to run to?"
 
"Us."  Dawn couldn't imagine Spike anything but sure of himself.  "He could have run to us."
 
The parade had started and they had missed the Grand Marshal and first few floats and bands.  The local Sheriff's Posse horse patrol was clomping up the street in front of them now.  Time to get into the present.
 
Nothing was going to bring Spike back for her to have a third change to get it right, not after seeing him pulled apart by those demons in the alley during Angel's Apocalypse.  He was gone.  She had searched for any sign he'd made it for days after the battle.  She'd told Giles it was because she wanted to stay for the girls who were injured until they could return to Scotland and the academy.
 
In the 45 days since she had buried their dead, consoled their injured but mostly she had looked for any sign that Spike might have miraculously survived.  She doubted he'd even seen her there in all the chaos.  45 days, she would wait 147 if she thought there was the slightest chance he was alive.  With Marina out of the hospital in the morning her legitimate reasons for staying would be at an end.  Still Buffy considered taking a leave at least until that magic number had passed and she had to haul herself out of the Nile once again.
 
She would give anything to have that third chance.  She knew now what she wanted, needed.  It was Spike.
 
"Hey, isn't that from Music Man?" Dawn yelled over the sound of the marching band.  "Mom loved that movie"
 
Buffy began to softly cry as she recognized the song.  "The day you suss out what you do want, there'll probably be a parade. Seventy-six bloody trombones."   "Damned Vampire always was right when it came to me."
 
 
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