‘All I want is to go back. Back to the warmth and happiness that I felt.’ The cold steel of the knife’s blade was pressed hard to the inside of her left wrist. The slightest line of crimson blood ran the length of the it. ‘Damn slayer healing!’ screamed threw her mind. Moments after the shallow cut was made, it would begin to heal. Never allowing more than a few drops of blood to escape the veins it normally traveled.

She had finally gotten a moments peace earlier...for the first time in days. No one had dared leave her unattended as if she were some small child who was going to run into the street after a stray ball if they did. The truth was they knew the truth, somewhere deep down. If given the chance, she might run or worse. They may not want to admit it to themselves or to each other but deep down they knew. Knew that there was no way she wanted to be back. Yet they all went on acting, talking, being happy. Happy she was back. Happy she was not in hell anymore. ‘If only they knew the truth.’ Heaven was so much nicer than this hell on earth that she had been brought back to.

Everyone had decided to go out for pizza for dinner. Somehow she had managed to talk them into taking Dawn and going without her. That coming back from “hell” left a person tired and begging for a good night to one’s self to rest and just be. It hadn’t been easy nearly everyone of them had offered to stay back with her. It was a finial plea that she had a headache that only sleep would cure and she wouldn’t be much company that finally got even Dawn to agree to leave her be for a bit.

She pressed the steal harder and deeper into her creamy flesh. The blood dripped faster and faster onto the cool tile floor. Pooling at her feet from the repeated cuts.

In her own introspection she totally missed the tell-tell tingle down the back of her neck and spine that always warned her without fail that a vampire was near. She missed that singular feeling of him being so near.


~* Change POV *~

He had knocked on the door, Lord knows why, but had gotten no response. The Whelp’s car was no where to be found. He saw no signs of anyone moving beyond the living or dinning room curtains. With no response upon the second knock, he tried the door. Finding it unlocked. He shook his head in wonder. The home of a slayer, two witches, and a teenager and yet no one ever locked the doors. Didn’t anyone ever tell them that demons and criminals don’t need an invitation? The over whelming sense of quiet was the first thing that struck him when he walked in. This house hadn’t been quiet since the night the Witch had brought her back. He walked in the living room looking quickly before heading down the back hall to the kitchen. No one in site. He headed for the stairs and up them. Half way up the smell of the most powerful blood ever hit him full in the demon face. The mere smell made his demon roar for a single drop. But the fact was that the smell of that blood was bad. He bound up the remaining stairs two at the time allowing his demon to guide him to the injured slayer. His slayer.

The smell drew him to the bathroom door that stood ajar. There standing in the middle of the room was Buffy, knife dug half way threw her wrist, clean to the bone it appeared. Blood standing in an ever darkening pool at her feet. Even he could tell her slayer healing wasn’t allowing her to let go. The wound was trying to heal around the blade. Blood no longer even dripped for the deep cut that held the silver chef’s knife.

He didn’t rush in for fear of startling her. But slowly eased the door open. He couldn’t tell if she even knew he was there and he certainly didn’t want to make things worse by rushing in and making her feel guilty. “Pet what ya doin’?”

“I want to go back.”

“I don’t think now is the time to do that luv, seems that good old slayer healing isn’t agreeing with you.”

“I know. I keep cutting, but they always heal before I can bleed to death. I just want to go back.”

There was a blank look in her eyes that he had seem in so many person’s over the years. All wanting death to take them for one reason or another. If Spike ever knew one thing in his entire un-life it was that a Slayer and a death wish were a bad a combination that always led to the Slayer getting just what she wanted...death. Usually in a very, very painful fashion. He should know two of them had been by his hands or fangs as it were.

Slowly he reached for the white towel that hung next to the sink and posed it to go around her wrist. He took his other hand and gently pulled the blade from its home in her arm before dropping t to the floor. Quickly he wrapped the towel around the now oozing wound. “Come on pet, best get you to bed. Let some rest help that Slayer healing.” He placed and arm around her and guided her out of the room and across the hall to the room he knew as hers.

She was asleep before he could get the bandages to wrap the now healing cut. He covered the cut and pulled the be covers over her sleeping form before leaving the room. Returning to the bathroom to clean up the evidence of her breakdown. There was no need to Bit to even know this happened. By morning the cut would be gone without so much as a faded scar he knew. This could stay just between them. He made sure there wasn’t so much as a drop of blood to be found anywhere. The knife he wrapped in the blood soaked towels that he used first to clean the wound and then the floor. He would dispose of them behind his crypt later on. He opened the door to her room one last time to make sure she was sleeping one last time before leaving the house and slipping back into the night. He wouldn’t bring this night up again and he felt certain she wouldn’t either. Tonight would be forever kept between them in silence.