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CHAPTER 5: The show's been canceled

It had been a week. A week of watching Buffy crying, but not going to Spike. A week of watching Spike drinking himself unconscious. Buffy hadn’t been at the crypt all week. Well, that was not completely true. She had been there, but only when she knew Spike wasn’t. She’d move around the crypt like a ghost, picking up things randomly, touching his clothes, laying in his bed, then leaving before he’d come back. But every time, Spike knew she had been there and as the days passed, his state degraded considerably.

Xander felt powerless in the face of his friends’ pain and it was killing him. Guilt was also consuming him. Most of the pain Buffy was in right now was caused by him and the girls doing that spell on her. He couldn’t help but think that there must have been a way they could have found out if she was at peace or not before deciding to do the spell. Psychics contact dead people all the time, don’t they? If Willow was powerful enough to raise the dead, couldn’t she try to contact her first to ask if she wanted to be brought back to life? Couldn‘t he have thought of it?

Thoughts were bouncing around out of control in Xander’s head. He wanted to talk to Buffy, help her. But It’s not like he could walk up to her and say: “Yeah, I know about you and Spike because I’ve been watching you screwing and fighting for the past two months. Wanna talk about it?”

He did try to get her to open up to him, but it didn‘t go very far. All he got out of her was an: “I‘m fine.” Not a great base for conversation. He still wished he could do something for them though. At first, he thought it wouldn‘t take too long before Spike would come running back to her, but he started to have doubts. And all he could do was sit back, and watch as the relationship between the two blondes seemed on the verge of imploding.

It was late. Anya was gone on a week-end of shopping in L.A. with Halfrek. She said she needed some girl time before the wedding. Xander couldn’t sleep. He was too used of having Anya’s warm body wrapped around him. Now, the bed felt cold, empty, and just plain uninviting. So he sat in the dark, the room only lit by the computer screen. Addiction ran in his family. Thoughts of his mother and father’s destructive addiction to alcohol flashed briefly through his mind. At least, his little addiction wasn’t really hurting anybody. It’s not like he was neglecting Anya in favor of watching Buffy’s love disaster unfold on the screen. Anya was still his priority. But she wasn’t there now, so it really wasn’t cutting into his quality time with her.

Xander looked at the clock on the bottom of the screen. 11pm.

**Another hour, then I’ll hit the pillows** He thought, opening another video.

He opened an old video and watched Buffy and Spike having sex under the oriental carpet. He rolled his eyes and chuckled when Spike dangled a pair of handcuffs in front of the girl. Xander yawned. He decided it was enough, but wanted to check if there were any new developments before going to bed.

He opened the camera to Spike’s crypt. Things looked normal, though much darker than usual. The candles were all out, so the only source of light came from the moon outside. The vampire was pacing aimlessly around the crypt. Xander jumped in his chair when Spike stopped and unexpectedly punched the stone wall with all his strength. No sound of pain came out of him even though his fist was smashed to a bloody pulp. Even in the relative darkness, Xander could tell how bad it was. He winced in sympathy, remembering when he had put his own fist through a wall after Joyce had died. Not a pleasant thing to do. And that was only plaster. Vampire or not, this was stone. For a second, the thought of blowing his cover and going to talk to Spike crossed Xander’s mind. But he quickly dismissed it.

That’s when everything went to Hell.

“Bloody fucking bitch!”

Xander just stared in shock as Spike started half destroying, half packing, everything he had in his crypt. This was the implosion he had been waiting for. It was happening. Needing to do something, Xander checked Buffy’s room to see if she was home. If she was, she wasn’t in her room. He realized, at the speed Spike was packing, that he didn’t have enough time to go get Buffy, explain her how he knew Spike was leaving, and get her to stop him. Getting up, he decided that it was time for him to do something good for Buffy. Even if it meant that the truth would come out and they’d all look down on him. He owed her that much.

Picking up the phone, he called her place while trying to put on his jeans at the same time. There was no answer. He remembered Willow was supposed to chaperon Dawn and her friends at the Bronze tonight. Buffy must have been on patrol, or maybe she went with them.


“Hi, you’ve reached Buffy, Dawn, and Willow. We’re probably out battling the evil forces of darkness right now, so leave us a message, and we’ll call you back if we survived.”


“Buffy? It’s Xander. Are you home? Please pick up the phone, it’s important… Ok, I guess you’re not there. I need to see you, it‘s urgent. Call me back.”

Xander grabbed his car keys and left.

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The car stopped right in front of the cemetery’s gate closest to Spike’s crypt. Xander hurriedly locked the car door and made his way as fast as he could to where Spike lived. Or, if he was too late, used to live.

He arrived just as the vampire was struggling to tie his duffle bag to the back seat of his bike.

Xander slowed down and shoved his hands down his jeans pockets. He suddenly felt awkward, not really knowing what to tell Spike to stop him from leaving. He didn’t want to screw this one up.

“Hey bleached wonder, what you doing?”

Spike looked up, his face a mess of raw emotions. He made an obvious effort to look detached nonetheless.

“What does it look like, Harris? Making your wildest bloody dream come true. I’m leaving town. What are you doing here by yourself in the middle of the night anyway, whelp? ”

“Couldn’t sleep so I decided to take a stroll. What? You think I need my girly bodyguards to protect me?” Xander asked.

“Unless you have a death wish, I’d say yes.”

“Hey!” the brunette exclaimed offended. “I’m a big man, I don’t need girls to protect me from the baddies. Lots of years of fighting experience under this construction worker’s belt. I was born in Sunnydale you know.”

Spike sighed. “Look, I’m not in the mood, Harris. So be a good whelp and bugger off.”

“Don’t leave.”

Spike looked up, surprised at the unexpected request. “Excuse me?”

“Don’t leave. Buffy needs you.”

Spike barked out an hysterical laughter bordering on scary. He finally managed to calm down enough to talk.

“Bloody hell, that’s rich. Never thought I’d hear something this funny coming out of your mouth.”

“Well I’m glad you find it amusing, but I wasn’t kidding. She needs you here. She’s at the lowest she’s ever been in her life right now, and you’re the only one who can help her.”

Spike resumed his task of tying his bag to his ride. “I should be honored that you think so highly of me that you think I can do something for her, but you’re wrong. She’s beyond helping. And don’t think I haven’t tried.”

“I know you did. Look,” Xander started, suddenly looking uncomfortable. “I know you guys have been… together.”

Spike looked up in surprise and opened his mouth to speak, but Xander cut him off before a word could come out.

“Don’t ask me how I know, I just know. And I also know that something happened between you two about a week ago, because Buffy’s been an even bigger mess ever since. But, no matter how bad things turned out to be… don’t give up on her now.”

“I'm shocked. You know you’re the one person I thought would go completely stalkers if you’d ever find out about me and her? What’s with the change of attitude mate?”

“I’d love to enlighten you, but this is not about me.”

“What is it about then?” Spike asked, standing up. He lit up a cigarette, and despite his bravado, his hand was shaking slightly.

“I know you love her. Took me long enough to accept it, but I see it now. And I also know for a fact that she loves you. She turns to you, when she can’t turn to her friends. She lets you see behind the façade she puts up for everybody else. I know it’s not pretty. I’ve had a few glimpses here and there and it scared the shit out of me…”

“Sorry, Harris. Under any other circumstances, I’d be real happy that you’re all in favor of the Spike and Buffy loving. But you’re just a little too late. There’s nothing left I can do for her.”

“You’re wrong. You’re just doing what she wants you to do. By leaving, you’re proving her right. You‘re proving her that men always leave her, that life‘s not worth living, that happiness doesn‘t exist. She doesn‘t want to find a reason to enjoy life again so she‘s pushing you away to show herself that she‘s right. Don‘t give her the satisfaction.“

Spike went to sit on the steps leading up to the crypt’s door. He lowered his head and ran his fingers through his messy hair.

“You don’t know Harris. You haven’t seen what I’ve been putting up with. The things she’s done to me. I thought I could take everything she’d throw at me and always be there for her no matter how much it bloody hurts. But I’m not as strong as I thought I was. It hurts too much.”

Xander went to sit next to him. “She doesn’t mean it you know. She’s broken inside, Spike.”

“You think I don’t know that?” The vampire let out a derisive snort and shook his head. “I know it’s nothing to you, but… She’s the love of my life. She’s hurting and there’s nothing I can do--nothing she’ll LET me do--to help her. And I just end up hurting her more.” Spike took a deep steadying breath and closed his eyes. “God, Harris. I told her… I told her I hate her. I’m not the rock she needs, I’m just sinking down with her.”

“Look, man, I know things look bad right now, and maybe they are. Try to look at it this way. Maybe that ‘I hate you’ thing was the slap in the face she needed to realize how far she pushed you and how close she is to losing you. I know it’s not something you feel good about saying, but maybe that’s what she needed--for you to shake her a little instead of just lay there and let her do as she please.”

“I don’t know. But I think it hurt us both as much when I said it.”

“She knows you didn’t mean it. But at least, now she knows to what extreme she’s pushed you. She’ll come around. I’ll talk to her. Even if I have to tie her up to make her listen. I’m done doing nothing.”

Spike gave Xander a small grin. “I wouldn’t try that if I were you. Been there, done that. Tying her up doesn’t make her listen, it just makes her real scary.”

Xander gave him a confused look, but Spike didn’t explain.

“I can’t stay here, Xander.” he said in a pained voice.

“Yeah, but you can’t leave either. Why don’t you just go somewhere and take a few days to calm down and think about it instead of making a rash decision?”

“What are you suggesting?”

Xander pulled out his wallet and handed Spike one of his credit cards. “There’s a motel just outside of Sunnydale, on the highway to L.A. Why don’t you pay yourself a couple of nights. You’ll be away from Buffy and you can think about what you want to do. Decide if you really want to leave, or if you‘re gonna stay.”

“I don’t know…”

“Just think about it, ok? Don’t do anything you’ll regret. We both know you can’t stay away from her anyway. So what? You’ll leave, then a few months down the road, you’ll realize you made a mistake and come back? I don’t know if she’ll be able to forgive you. Too many people have done it to her, even Giles. Everything will be ruined if you leave. Tell me you’ll think about it.”

“I will.”

“And no matter what you decide, keep the card.”

Spike smirked. “Are you sure about that, whelp?”

Xander rolled his eyes and got up. “Yeah, go crazy. There’s a five hundred bucks limit on it. Use it for gas, blood and Ho-Hos, or something.”

“Thanks mate.”

Spike got on his bike. “Don’t miss me too much.”

“Oh I won’t. You won’t be gone long enough for me to miss you.”

Xander watched as Spike’s tail light disappeared into the night, hoping that he was right and the vampire wouldn‘t leave for good. Once he was gone, he pulled out his cell phone and called Buffy’s home. This time, there was an answer.

“Hello?”

“Will? It’s Xander. Is Buffy home yet?”

“Huh.. No. She went to your place. Didn’t you see her?”

“…”

“Xander?”

Xander finally found his voice back. “How--how long ago did she leave?”

“I don’t know. About 45 minutes, an hour maybe. Why? What‘s going on?”

Xander broke into a cold sweat. He hadn’t locked the door. He wasn’t even sure if he’d closed it.

“Xander? Are you all right? Xander?..”

**Not all right. Not all right at all.**

“Can’t talk right now, Will. Bye.” He hung up.

**And even less all right once I’ll get home** He thought grimly.

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