__________________________
You let me violate you
You let me desecrate you
You let me penetrate you
You let me complicate you
Help me, I broke apart my insides
Help me, I've got no soul to sell
Help me, the only thing that works for me
Help me get away from myself
-NIN, "Closer"
Dru is being dragged in towards the portal. She is clawing at the air as an invisible force pulls her in. Her desperate cries and pleas are being drowned out by the ever increasing wind. I feel frozen with fear. I break myself free and run after her.
"Close the portal!" she yells. I am about to ask how when the answer hits me. An answer that reminds me of sitting in a hotel room with the Slayer, my rusty Latin the only aid we had in decoding a spell. The blood of a mortal. The blood of the Slayer. My fists are balled so tightly that my nails are cutting into my flesh.
'No, please, God, don't make me do this!' I frantically beg. It's the first time I have ever prayed to God since I was a small boy.'Don't make me choose.'
A mortal enemy, or a lover gone cold. When boiled down to the cold hard facts, it seems easy: neither.
The Slayer, or my dark princess. When looked at like that, it seems simple: my Dru.
My friend, or the woman who chose another man over me. In that light, it too is simple: the Slayer.
But, oh God, it's not easy; it's not simple; it's not even a mild annoyance! It's fucking agony. While it's true that Dru has been less than a lover recently, how can I sacrifice her for the life of the Slayer? For my supposed mortal enemy. But on that note, it has been my mortal enemy's shoulder that has supported me when my lover was apart from me, mourning the loss of another man.
Dru is nearly at the mouth of the portal. It would be simple work to grab the Slayer, slit her throat, and throw her into the portal. I can't move. I can't choose. It's like in those stupid cartoons when one character uses Acme glue to stick the other's feet to the floor.
A noise coming from the portal turns my attention to it. It is Angel, moaning. Moaning the Slayer's name. The Slayer, who screams his name again, runs towards the portal. I had always thought that girl smart under pressure. Far too smart to do something stupid like run headfirst into a portal to Hell.
Guess I thought wrong.
Dru's pleas fall on deaf ears as I chase after Buffy, trying to close the distance in time to catch her. My hand closes on the back of her shirt and with all my strength I yank backwards. But I'm too late. She doesn't get fully into the portal, but her arms, outstretched to emabrace him, do. There's a strange sort of...fizzing? sparkling? of the portal and I pull her out, her arms safely intact, and move away.
I hold her as she struggles, kicks, pleads to be let go. There is no physical damage to her arms, but I don't know what kind of magical damage could have been done. She keeps calling his name over and over. It's mingled with another woman, crying out a name. My name.
"Dru!" I scream, turning around as realization hits me. How could I have forgotten about her? She is clinging onto a table, the wind from the portal whipping around her hair and dress. Her eyes wild, she looks at me, a frightened animal begging to be let out of its trap.
"Spike!" she cries out again. I know how frightened she must be. She gets scared sometimes if a flower is the wrong *color* for chrissakes; she's got to be bloody terrified about being sucked into Hell. If I let go of the Slayer to save her, she will no doubt run into the portal after Angel. The portal will close, and I will be left alone with Dru. A Dru who is still pining for him. And if I don't let go of her, Dru will be sucked into Hell.
I look into her face. She is looking at me with fear in her eyes. Fear and desperation. Nothing else. She no longer loves me. I know that. I have known that for a while now.But face to face, it makes a world of difference. There is no hiding from it. There is no denying.
She is no longer mine.
"I'm sorry," I say, hoping she can forgive me. Hell, I don't even know if she can hear me. I grab the Slayer tighter and walk further away from the portal. I watch Dru get pulled closer and closer, sickened; and yet I can't turn my eyes away. I can hear the voices in my head calling out...no, screaming out...asking if I am doing the right thing. I don't know. I don't think I will ever know. Is this how she felt when she had to send *him* to Hell?
"Goodbye, my princess," I whisper, and she screams in terror as the portal envelops her, her eyes still locked onto mine. There is a great flash of light, and I am forced to turn away.
Now there is nothing. No Dru. But most importantly, no Angel. The library is empty, save for me and the Slayer. Buffy turns her head, looking for him. "Where is he, Spike?" she asks me, her voice begging me to give her a positive answer.
In a desolate tone, I tell her, "Maybe he's just somewhere else. Outside the school, or something."
But we both know how ridiculous that is. Dru went through the portal. He should have come out. My mind races to figure it all out. Maybe Buffy's entering the portal threw it off. Maybe Dru didn't cast the spell right. But what plagues me most was *why* was Dru pulled through? It makes no bloody sense. And it hurts so much.
Alone, we crumple to the floor of the library. It's like neither of us have the energy to carry on. No witty banter. No insults, no fighting.
She is crying. Her shoulders heaving up and down, she leans her face into my neck. She has never been more vulnerable to me. The tough Slayer reduced to a sobbing, petite child. I could kill her right now. Third time's a charm. But I won't. She is the only friend I have left in this world. And if I admit it, the only friend I ever had.
From the corner of my eye I see the spellbook. Near it, despite all the wind, is the dried flower Dru had used to mark the page. It has seen better times, and so have I. I hold the Slayer even tighter, pressing her face more firmly to her neck to ensure that she won't see my tears.
She is still sobbing hysterically, beating her fists against my chest. "I saw him," she whispers brokenly. "For just a second...I saw him, and he had his arms out to me. He was calling my name." Her tears become even more raw and painful. I wouldn't have even thought that possible.
I stroke her hair, my tears making the top of it wet. I try to comfort her, calm her down, while inside me a selfish voice is wanting to know who will comfort *me*. I have no one now. No one but the Slayer.
And that's one relationship even I would consider dangerous.
"Dru," I whisper so low that Buffy can't hear me, and the finality of it all hits me with utter devastation. I will never see her again. Never hear her laughter, her Dru-speak, never feel her next to me.
She is gone.
And all I have left is a seventeen year old girl whose duty is to kill me.
**********
There is a knock on my motel door. I open it without looking to see who it is. If someone has come to kill me, then not opening my door sure ain't gonna stop them. I open the door and feel the warm night air come rushing through. I look at the person that stands before me.
It's the Slayer. I haven't seen her since that night.
Eight nights have already passed. Over a week. I never thought I would make it through the first night. But somehow, we both did.
With a small motion, I gesture for her to come in. She sits on the bed, taking a deep, ragged breath. "I saw them today," she begins, her voice shaky. I know perfectly well who 'they' are.
"What happened?" I ask, genuinely concerned. Gone for months, only to return more shaken and saddened than before. Her friends must have asked questions that hurt, no matter how much they deserved answers.
"I told Giles what we did. I gave him the spellbook." The difference in her is disconcerting. Sometimes I think that I must have dreamed of that cocky, smart-mouthed Slayer. Surely this quiet, resigned girl can't be the same person.
Her silence is getting to me. Her eyes are locked onto the far wall and it seems that, unprodded, she will not finish her story.
"Why?" I can't say more than that. I can't say out loud that Dru is gone. The irrational part of me is not ready to believe that yet.
"Giles said that the spell was a substitution spell, exchanging the person from Hell with the spellcaster."
This small revelation makes everything fall into place, but a lot more fall out of it. Confused, I try to figure this out. "Dru knows Latin perfectly. Why wouldn't she have realized this?" Mostly I am wondering out loud, but Buffy chooses to answer.
"Because she was a psycho," she tartly suggests.
"Don't say that," I hiss at her.
She shrugs. "It doesn't matter now, Spike, does it?"
My fist flies out, catching her squarely in the jaw. She looks at me, eyes that were once dead gray now flashing blue with anger and rage.
She jabs my stomach hard, kicking my head as I bend over double. With a thump, I land on the motel carpet, hitting my head quite bloody hard on the floor. But I manage to sweep my leg out, pulling her feet from under her. She falls heavily on me. Using her position to an advanage, she knees me again in my stomach and tries to hit my face.
"Goddamit, Buffy!" I yell, vamp face in full gear, as I manage to grab her wrists and hold her in place. I roll us over, using my weight now to pin her tiny body to the floor, her arms above her head.
"Don't you realize what I did? What I did for you? I sacrificed my Dru! I could have killed you to close the portal." My voice is thick with anger and laced with venom. How can she be so bloody ungrateful?
The bitterness in my voice gets through to her, because she screams at me with such force from those tiny lungs that it is nearly amazing. "Of course I do, goddamit!"
"Then what the hell is your problem!" I push her even harder into the floor, and try to ignore a sudden, suprising sensation in my groin. First betrayed by Dru and now betrayed by my own damn body.
But then the Slayer bursts into tears, and I scramble off her, sitting back on my haunches. Fear grips me. Did she think I was going to rape her? Hurt her?
But she eases my fears by tumbling back into my hold, wrapping her arms around my middle and burying her head on my chest.
"Angel," she whispers, and stupidly I realize that of course he would be what she was crying about. "I asked Giles if I messed up the spell by entering the portal..."
Her sentence trails off into sobs, and I feel very protective. If this Watcher was bloody cruel enough to tear her heart out by telling her yes, I'll tear his own heart out myself.
She sniffles and wipes her nose on my shirt. I try to ignore that. "He..he denied that it was my fault but I could see the truth in his eyes." Her words are punctuated by sobs and muffled by my chest. I can barely hear what she says next, but I do, and it nearly breaks my heart. "I betrayed him again."
I want to tell her that she's a bloody fool, that she couldn't have known about that, but I don't. All I can think about is the haunting parallel of what I did to Dru. I know exactly how she feels, and wish so badly that I didn't.
I can feel my own tears as they prickle in my eyes, threatening to spill over. If there's one thing that vampires aren't supposed to do it is cry in front of the Slayer.
But if there's one thing that Slayer's aren't supposed to do, it's cry on a vampire's shoulder.
We're both outcasts.
"Spike?" she whispers.
"What, Slayer?"
"I don't want to be alone."
Funny, I was thinking the same thing. "Neither do I, pet."
But then I realize the full implication of her words as kisses from her hot mouth burn me through my t-shirt.
I should stop this now. If I let it go on any longer, there's no way in hell I could turn back. She's not in her right mind. If this goes on, I'm a dead man the first moment she realizes what happened.
While my mind is protesting it though, my body is rejoicing. Buffy is beautiful, young, and hotter than hell. And, grudgingly, I'll admit that she does turn me on. Watching her fight in her little outfits had always been a thrill.
But still...
"Buffy..." I lift her head from my chest.
She looks hurt. "Buffy, I...we..." Jesus Christ, I can't even talk anymore. It doesn't matter though, because she covers my mouth with hers. Desire surges through me, heading southward, as her soft lips brush mine. She may be young, but she's damn good.
Her lips coax mine open, her tongue darting inside. She shifts above me, her hips snuggly fitting my lap. I groan as she teasingly rolls her hips. My hand in her hair, I pull her head even closer, increasing the passion of our kiss. All of a sudden, I feel so very needy.
And yet, somehow, the bloody words "Buffy, stop" slip out of my mouth.
"Why?" she murmurs. Her mouth hungrily attacks mine, and the tremors of desire that rack my body nearly knock loose my tentative hold on restraint. Her lips are open to me, and I slip my tongue inside. Her tongue fights mine just as we used to fight each other. Somewhere inside me, I'm telling myself that we are only replacements, she for Dru and I for Angel.
Somewhere inside me, I'm telling myself I don't care.
"So cold," she whispers. Her hands find their way under my shirt, leaving burning trails of fire along my chest. "Cold," she whispers again, and in an even lower voice, "like him."
I know why she is doing this. But those three words for some inexplicable reason, make me angry.
Dammit, I'm more than angry. I'm bloody pissed. Roughly, I shove her off me. She stares at me vehemently, her face flushed.
"Dru may have chosen him over me, but I don't have to put up with you pretending that I am him." There. I said it.
And I regret it. I don't know what I will do if she leaves. But instead she looks at me, long and hard. And she surprises me, yet again, when she whispers "sorry" in the most sincere voice that I have ever heard.
The small voice she says it in reminds me of Dru. Of when she was frightened, or playing sweet.
I sigh.
Dru.
Even when Dru had been mad at me, had stayed away, had sulked, I knew she was still there. That if I really, really needed to see her again, I could.
There is no chance of that anymore. She is gone forever. And even though I had been away from her before, had felt an emptiness inside of me without her there, the magnitude of this new and exceptionally final loss is almost incomprehensible.
Almost.
Because if I couldn't understand it, I wouldn't be able to feel it completely. And I do. I feel it with every single bloody part of my body. I feel like all my organs have been taken away. I am an empty husk of the man I used to be, my strength and my comfort gone beyond my reach.
I have never hurt so much before. Even with her cruelty, I have never felt so much pain. Because with her, even the pain felt sweet.
And now there is nothing. Nothing of her left. My memory is the only place she lives. And I swear that I will never forget her.
It is not possible for me to forget her.
I pull the Slayer back into my arms. Her lips on mine dull the pain, masking it with desire. Not for the Slayer, of course. Just the desire to not be alone. To share something with someone who knows what I am going through.
To be part of something, even if it is for only one night.
Even if it will most likely get me killed. Either by her, after she realizes what she's done, or by other vampires who don't like the idea of Slayers and vamps fucking.
Her tongue, wet and hot, pushes its way into my mouth and my thoughts. Her tiny body presses against mine, her breasts crushed against my chest. I trail tiny kisses from her mouth down her throat, pausing at the faint beating of her carotid artery. I fight the urge to sink my teeth in, instead placing a soft kiss on the throbbing of her life before moving lower.
Her breath escapes in small pants and whispers. It has been so long since someone has held her. My lips drop kisses along her collarbones, tasting the slight tang of salt on her skin.
She tastes so...human.
My hands cup her breasts, just the gentlest of caresses. I run the tips of my fingers over the outer swells, teasing her until she is pressing herself urgently into my hands. Kneading her soft mounds of flesh until she is nearly begging, I finally remove that god-awful shirt. Golden skin and sweet breasts nearly spilling over a simple black bra. She is different than all the other Slayers. She seems so much older at times. Almost as old as I.
She looks at me with darkened eyes, and I can see her need there. Perhaps even a small hint of doubt. It is perfectly understandable, and yet for some odd reason I am determined to make it fade away. Replace it with nothing but full-blown need.
I pull her to me, tousling her blonde hair in my fingers, tasting her again. I kiss her like she will vanish in a second, like she too will leave me.
I kiss her like its the last time. Because I know it is. This is the first and the last. We are not meant to be. We are not meant to be anything other than mortal enemies.
Except for tonight.
This is what she is telling me as her lips touch mine, as her small white teeth tug my lower lip into her mouth.
Just for tonight.
This is what I am telling her as I undo her bra clasp, letting the scrap of material fall between us. As I pull one small, pink nipple into my mouth, laving it with my tongue. As I suckle gently, I hold her bending body in my hands, running my fingers slowly up and down her back. Dipping the edges of my fingers under the waistband of her pants, I stroke her stomach.
Her hands claw at my shirt. I push them away, shifting her on my lap so that she is flush against my erection. A sharp gasp escapes her lips as I switch to the other breast, rocking my hips against hers.
Again her hands reach for my shirt, and this time I let her remove it. She presses herself against my chest, her hardened nipples rubbing against my skin. Her lips find mine again, and this time it is she who grinds herself against me.
Because we both have no one else.
This is what my sigh tells her. Her hands reach for my jeans. With a twist and a tug, they are open. One small hand ventures inside, the lack of underwear making its search easy. She runs her fingers slowly, with almost no pressure, up my length, making me come close to begging.
After a few strokes, I calm myself down. Kissing her both gently and then more forcefully, I get up and carry her to the bed, her legs wrapped tightly around my hips, her arms around my neck. I lay her down and pull off her pants, leaving her clad in nothing but a black thong. As beautiful as it looks, it has got to go.
My thumbs hook into the waistband, and slowly I pull, like a child unwrapping a present with a desire to prolong the inevitable surprise because the anticipation is so much better.
A few seconds later, the Slayer is naked and flushed before me. I take a second to marvel at this before I kiss her flat stomach, feeling the rise and fall of her breath. Her flesh is so fevered it nearly burns my lips. I slowly part her thighs with my hands, running my fingers inside the smooth, silky insides.
She is so beautiful. My mouth descends upon her, tasting her arousal. She squirms below me, crying out and gripping the bedsheets. Slowly at first, I set a pace, feeling and regestering her every reaction. Remembering for the next time.
The shock that passes through me nearly makes me stop. There will be no next time. Why the hell did I think that? But there is no time to question. Her head is thrashing now, her breathing quicker. She is close. I up the tempo and hold down her hips, feeling a tensing of her muscles. Her body tenses completely, and she screams, a cry half of ecstasy, half of something else I can't name.
Disbelief, perhaps. Maybe regret.
Or maybe I am just imagining things.
She languidly reaches down and pulls me up to lay next to her. Her hands find my jeans, and with my aid, she pulls them off. She rolls me on my back, covering me like a blanket with her body.
Some deep, insecure part of me is telling me that she is thinking of Angel. Jealousy has always been one of my strong suits. Suddenly, I want to make her feel, make her know that I am not Angel. I roughly grab her hips, trying to pull her down onto me. But instead, she manages to flip us over, her legs still around my waist as she lays on her back. In an eerie way, it's almost like fighting with her.
Only naked. My brain and a certain other part of my body remind me of that. But then, I had always enjoyed fighting her. It was exasperating at times, but it was a challenge. And it was always fun.
She reaches her hand behind my neck and pulls my head down, melding her lips to mine. I take it as the final permission. Her acquiescence to this odd and amazing event.
I position myself between her, feeling the heat she is giving off. A small thrust of her hips brings me in full contact with her, and I gently push my way in. I watch her face as I slide in, her eyes closed, her mouth partly open. The tender, rouged lips hiding perfect white teeth; tiny white pearls that nibble on her lower lip, holding back small moans.
I am in her completely to the hilt now. I close my eyes, savoring the sensation. The heat of her skin is nothing compared to this. For the first time in two hundred years, I can feel the heat of the sun. I let the fire consume me, stoking it, surrendering myself to something I know I cannot fight.
I kiss her throat again, trying to content myself with innocent little nibbles along her tender skin. Her pulse is racing, the thin sheen of sweat that covers her body utterly beautiful on her. Her hands find their way to my ass and squeeze, driving me even deeper into her.
A lock of blonde hair falls into her face, and I sweep it back, my thumb circling her cheek. Her skin is so soft, softer than the sighs that escape her perfect lips. I brush my lips against hers, so light it would be chaste if not for what our lower bodies were doing. She returns the light kiss, her hands skimming over my back, her short nails lightly raking me.
I'm so close now, but I want to see her come. I want to see her happy and satisfied, if only for a few brief and fleeting moments. I want her to forget about Angel.
Just as I want to forget about Dru. But through this pleasure-induced haze I realize that she is not on mind, that she hasn't been for a while. I haven't thought of anything but this tiny, blonde Slayer who has given herself over to a vampire. One *without* a soul.
I increase the pace, pumping into her with shorter, faster strokes. The look of rapture on her face urges me on, and a few seconds later she gives off a strangled cry, her face buried into the crook of my neck. I can feel her blunt teeth biting on my skin, feel her inner muscles contracting around me. "Spike," she whispers in a voice so low and raspy it is almost inaudible.
But I hear it, and I am gone. Two more frenzied strokes, aided on by her clenching, and I am swept up in one of the greatest orgasms of my life.
I bite my lip hard, trying to swallow back the need to call her name out. Not 'Slayer.' Buffy. To roll her name off my tongue. To try it out for the first time, so that later on in the night while she sleeps in my arms I can repeat it over and over again, trying to convince myself that this actually happened.
Nothing would be crueler right now than for me to wake up cold and lonely, the intense feelings nothing more than part of one of the greatest dreams ever, but ultimately fading as dreams always do.
Unlike Dru, she is not the wave that pulls me under. She is my anchor in reality, her weight against me letting me know that this is far beyond any dream. This is real.
***
I wake up feeling nothing, which is one of the greatest feelings in the world. Since Dru...for the past eight days, I wasn't even able to sleep. When I did, I woke up reliving those awful moments. Reliving Dru's death.
But now, I am not in a nightmare. I am in bed, and all of a sudden, I realize that I am feeling a lot more than nothing right now. Buffy's warm body is pressed against mine, her back against my chest, my arm around her waist. Her smooth skin covers me more than the blankets.
Every cell in my brain awakens at the same exact moment, sending a rush of panic through me.
I have to get out. Because...because...
I grab my clothes and put them on. I find some motel stationary and desperately rack my mind for something to write. I don't want to make her feel bad, to regret anything. I'm certain "Thanks for the lay" will not do. I finally come up with something simple, something that puts all the blame on me.
---Buffy
I should have stopped this. I'm sorry I let this happen. Hate me if you will.
It's much safer for us to be mortal enemies, anyway.---
I look over at Buffy, sleeping peacefully on the bed, the white sheet hiding just enough of her to be modest. This is probably the last time I will ever see her. She needs to stay here. She has a life to rebuild. But I have nothing...almost nothing...left for me here.
Yes. I have to leave, because...
I close and lock the door behind me. I hurry off to my car, needing to find a new place to spend the day. To spend eternity. Someplace without the haunting, bittersweet memory of Dru. Someplace without a little blonde Slayer who in sleep loses the hard look of responsibility that she carries while awake. Someplace that is not here, because...
I get in the car and start it, the engine purring. It can't wait to leave either. I roar out of the parking lot, speeding ever faster away from a small motel room in a southern California town where a Slayer and a soulless vampire gave a new meaning to the saying 'opposites attract.'
I pass the Sunnyhell city limits, breathing a sigh of relief because...
I think I'm in love with her.
Because...
I think I'm bloody screwed.
-the end-
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