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Chapter 8—Tongue-Tied and Twisted

Willow stared at her best friend in shock.

Buffy’s eyes glittered with anger.

“Buffy?”

His voice behind her. He was here, oh, God, he was here. She turned, and saw his face before her, and fairly flew to his side. “Spike.”

She turned wondrous eyes to him, much to the surprise of her friends. Her anger melted as she looked on the face she had missed so badly, the reason she was eager to return here to begin with.

She raised her hand to touch his cheek, and his hand came up to touch hers. Xander stepped forward, his mouth open to speak, and she put her other hand up to stop him. “Don’t. Don’t say a word to him, Alexander Harris. Or to me. He’s the reason that I came back.”

Willow sank to her knees, and began rocking. “I don’t feel so good.”

Xander changed direction, and went to help Willow to her feet. “We need to get you home. That spell took a lot out of you, Will.”

She touched her nose, and found it bleeding. She felt warmth on her neck that indicated blood trickling from her ears as well. “Tara, take me home.”

Tara took her arm, extending a tendril of awareness, and gasped when she felt nothing from Willow. Her power, what she had tapped into, was completely gone.

Willow turned her head to look Tara in the eye. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything, Will. You did. The spell. Remember?”

Willow shook her head, negating her girlfriend’s insistence. “No, you did something. I know you did. I can’t feel the magic anymore.”

“Come on, honey, let me get you home. It’s probably just the after effects of the spell. You’ll feel better tomorrow.”

Mollified, Willow let Tara lead her down to the gravel road to their car. Xander and Anya stood there, still reeling, until Buffy noticed them. “Go on home. This took a lot out of you guys. Spike will take care of me.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Xander mumbled, and Buffy flared.

“If you want to see me, or continue to be friends with me, you’ll get over that right now. I’ve had a lot of time to think and a lot of things to think about and this is one of them. If I choose to be with Spike, Xander, you need to accept it and get over it. It isn’t your choice, its mine.”

Xander shuffled his feet, but refrained from replying. “Come on, Ahn,” he said, and they moved off in the direction of their car.

She stood there next to Spike, conscious of his eyes on her. Turning, she said, “Where’s Dawn?”

“Well, since I didn’t think you would appreciate her being at the resurrection party, I sent her to Janice’s for the night.”

“Good. We need to talk anyway. Just us.”

He let her lead him home to the house on Revello. She started up the sidewalk and bounced off the barrier.

He muttered the incantation, and the barrier lowered long enough for them to step through. “’S a protection barrier. Keeps everything out of the yard.”

“Good. I guess it wasn’t tied to Willow’s magic, then, was it?”

He looked at her closely. She seemed different from the old Buffy. “No,” he said. “Tara erected it for us. What about Red? What do you know, Buffy.”

She turned, and tossed him a look over her shoulder. “Magic has consequences, remember?” she said slyly, tossing his own words in his face.

He paled, then moved into the front room to sit heavily on the coffee table. He looked at her, wonder written clearly on his face, the worry lines disappearing and making him look younger. She sat across from him on the couch, and his heart leaped in his chest. The dream. It’s the sodding dream. She reached for him, and he took her hand, the knuckles bloodied from the initial powerful punch it took to ram her fist through the wooden casket.

“How long was it?” Her voice was soft in the silent house.

“One hundred forty-seven days. One hundred forty-eight today, but today doesn’t count, does it?”

“I watched you.”

He was silent. He had no answer to that.

She rubbed her thumb against the knuckles of his hands. “Actually, I watched everyone, but I watched you and Dawnie the most. Does that surprise you?”

He looked up at her and nodded.

“And I was telling the truth. I came back for you.”

She leaned forward, and kissed him softly on the mouth.

He scooted away from her. His mouth opened, but no sound emerged. He tried to think of something to say and nothing at all came to mind.

She laughed softly. “I don’t believe it. Spike speechless.”

He stared at her. She leaned back, into the couch cushions, and crossed her legs, stroking his knee with her bare foot. She sighed. “I watched you a lot. Saw you patrolling, drinking, trying to grieve when nobody would let you. Saw you and Giles together. Saw you and Xander a couple of times. Watched you with Dawnie, after Willow finally gave up. Watched it all like some kind of daily soap or something.”

“You—you were in heaven.”

She coughed at his bald statement. “Do you think the Chosen one would go to hell? Not possible. Yeah, I was there. All I could think about was being here. Wishing I was home with you two. Wanting to be back in this body on this earth so badly, I created a rift in heaven with my mind. And everything bad that I forced myself to feel made it closer and closer, until I finally sped on through the breach. And do you know what thought I used? What memory was strong enough to take me to the waiting-place?” At his blank, confused look, she grinned. “It was you, Spike. It was remembering you, and how much I love you and wanted you. It’s always been you.”

He stood, paced around the floor for a moment, then stopped in front of her. “I have to…hell, I gave up the crypt, Clem lives there now. But I can’t…Buffy, I…bloody buggering hell…” he finished, unable to speak.

“Again with the lack of speech. I’ll have to write this on the calendar. What’s the what? Why can’t you stay here?”

He sat back down on the coffee table, and took her hands in his. “I’ve been having dreams, Slayer. About this. You and I, sitting like this, talking. Sometimes you kiss me. Sometimes you stake me. I don’t know what to expect from you right now. And I don’t really know what you expect from me.”

She tipped her head to the side, and considered him for a moment. It was a gesture that was so much his own that he nearly gasped aloud. “Spike, I expect you to love me, just like you always did. I don’t expect any more right now. You don’t have to leave. You’ve been living here for, like, forever, and you don’t have to give your home up for me.”

He couldn’t look at her for a moment, then turned the full force of his bright blue eyes her way. Her breath caught in her throat, and she melted. “Buffy, I love you, and I never stopped. But when you….”

“Died,” she supplied helpfully.

“Left,” he said, glaring at her, “I resigned myself to…being without you. I can’t switch on and off like this, Slayer. I have to get used to the fact that you’re back here now.”

“I understand, Spike. I do. Do you think that you could co-exist in the same house with me? At least for a while, until we both get our legs under us again?”

He stared at her. “Live here together? You and me? I…I suppose we could. Dawn would be here too, to chaperone.”

She rolled her eyes. “Please. Dawn would probably shove you in my bed faster than we could say, hey, I’m back. Don’t need a chaperone. We are just fine the way we are.”

He ducked his head, and she found his unease endearing. “I won’t push you, Spike. I won’t chase you.” She stood, and started toward the stairs. “I’m going to take a shower. I need to get this grave dirt off of me. God, what did you guys bury me in? Like I ever wore this dress in real life. What happened to my leather pants and jacket?”

He listened to her snark all the way up the stairs, then turned to the phone and tried to call Giles. All he got was a busy signal.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Spike got a busy tone because Willow was already on the phone with him.

“…and then, she climbed out of the grave, helped me stand up, and hit me. She slapped me, Giles, for saving her from hell!”

She could hear him moving around his flat while he talked. “I daresay that’s the least you deserve, Willow. That was a very dangerous stunt you pulled. You could have done yourself and Buffy permanent damage.”

“But I didn’t! Giles, I got her out of hell!”

“You can say for certain that she was in hell.”

“Well…no. But she had to be there, Giles. Glory opened up portals to hell dimensions….”

“Willow, did you consider that she might have just been in heaven?”

She was trying to formulate a response and coming up with nothing when Tara took the phone. “Giles, I think that you need to come back here, right away. She isn’t herself.”

More fumbling came over the line, and Giles cleared his throat. “All right. I’ll be on the next plane. Please, try to avoid doing any magic for now.”

“I don’t think that Willow will have a problem with that.” Tara said her good-byes and replaced the receiver.

Willow wanted a confrontation, and she wanted it now. “What did you do to me tonight, Tara?”

Tara stared back at her, masking her emotions and concealing her aura. She knew Will couldn’t sense auras, but preparedness never hurt. “I didn’t do anything to you, Will. If anything, I helped you.”

Willow snorted. “Right. You helped me. Well, sorry if I don’t believe you, sweetheart. I don’t think you helped me at all, I think that you did something to me. I will find out, you know I will.”

Tara put her arms around her girlfriend, and found herself shoved roughly aside. “Get your hands off me and get out of this house. Never try to see me again.”

Tara turned away, saddened by the rejection, but also strangely relieved. Willow’s aura was still the same dark, muddy color it had been, but now it was painted with ruddy streaks that radiated from her head and heart. There would be no reconciliation here.

She turned, and left the apartment for the last time.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Xander was puzzled.

Anya was sitting on the other end of the couch. She had showered as soon as they reached the apartment, and was wearing her ‘don’t touch me’ nightgown. He almost didn’t recognize it, it was such a rare thing.

She was flipping through a bride’s magazine, something she did a lot around him. Mention marriage, and women lose their minds, he thought. First, it started with the magazines, then segued quickly to the large, overstuffed invitation catalogues. Currently she was dress browsing.

He thought that maybe he ought to try to do something, so he sat down next to her and stretched his arm out on the couch. “Ahn….”

“Don’t say it, Xander. Don’t say anything.”

“Ahn, I don’t know what’s wrong. Could you at least tell me what’s wrong?”

She stood, her body vibrating with her rage. “I don’t know, Xander. We raised someone from the dead. She went home with a vampire. Willow’s gone and done something horribly wrong. Tara doesn’t smell right. The only thing that went right this whole night was Spike showing up. He’s the only thing that salvaged this whole operation.”

“Spike!” Xander’s lip curled in disgust. “Spike shouldn’t have been there. He wasn’t Buffy’s friend.”

She glared at him. “No, he wasn’t her friend. Neither was I. The only reason that I was there was because of you. Spike loved her. Loves her still. He had more right to be there than I did.”

Xander started to pace, his face twisted in a grimace. “How can you talk like that, Ahn? Spike is a soulless twisted monster….”

Anya rolled her eyes, and groaned. “By D’Hoffryn balls, Xander, that does not make a person. Do you really think that I have a soul, just because I’m human now?”

That stopped him. “Don’t you?”

She flopped her hands at her side. “How am I supposed to know? The fact is I don’t care. Soul or no soul, I am still the same person. I have killed thousands of men without a single shred of remorse. It was my job, and I loved it. But I can’t do it anymore, and so I adapt. No big deal.”

He stood there, horrified by her admission. She turned, and went into his room for a moment, and then came back out quickly, fully dressed. “I think it would be better for both of us if I went home tonight, Xander. We need to be apart from one another, and not using satisfying mutual orgasms to hide our problems. You need to change the way you think about demons and vampires and ex-demons before I can ever think about marrying you.”

She moved quickly to the door, threw her coat on, and left.


A/N: I know that I said I wasn't posting until Monday, but I get overexcited. Not only that, but missing your feedback too...feed me please! Thanks for all the comments--they are appreciated....