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| In Omne Tempus - Goodbye's Such A Hard Thing To Say by Holly (4 Reviews) | | - abc + + |  | | | Chapter Three
Goodbye’s Such A Hard Thing To Say
“This is the one you want?”
Buffy nodded brightly, smiling into the face of a stuffed pig. The sun had been down for about an hour; the minute it disappeared beneath the horizon, Spike had taken his small mate, gathered what few belongings he carried with him, and left the only family he had known for a century. What little remorse he felt was quickly dwarfed by the promise of the future, however long he had to wait. It was as though he had experienced life without sight, and was suddenly bombarded by a rainbow of color.
He hadn’t said goodbye to Drusilla, and it bothered him that it didn’t bother him.
Being in the presence of his mate was all-consuming. Making her smile filled his small, dreary existence with sunlight. He’d never been around children; not unless he was tickling one of Dru’s fetishes. Had he known the simple pleasure of being the source of a child’s delight, he might not have wasted so much time with the Order. Not for the want of what he could not have—more for the promise of the world that was willing to love him the way he loved. The way he experienced love with the entirety of his being.
The way Drusilla never had, or could.
He had feared sleeping past sunset, and his worry transformed into an inability to rest throughout an hour without jarring awake in a panic. Buffy, it appeared, slept soundly, and had mumbled her complaint when he gently brought her out of slumber.
“Time to go, ducks,” he had whispered. “Time to go back home to your mum.”
It was easier said than done. The minute he stepped into the fresh night, his reluctance to let go of his mate intensified. And suddenly, he wanted nothing more than to prolong his time with her.
After all, it would be the last for more than a decade.
Now they were in a toy store near the same one that Buffy had indicated Drusilla had snatched her from, talking to each other over the head of a small stuffed pig.
“This is the one you want?” Spike said again, brows arching playfully. “Ugly li’l bugger, isn’t he?”
An insolent pout crossed the girl’s face. “Mr. Gordo is not ugly.”
“Mr. Gordo, is it?”
“Uh huh.”
He grinned. She was adorable. “Tell me he din’t tell you his name,” he said. “’ve had enough of birds who talk to dolls.”
“You know birds that talk to dolls?”
“One or two.” Spike placed the pig back on the shelf and sighed. “Right then, Miss Buff. I’ll have to remember that for the big day.”
“Oh, you don’t have to wait if you don’t want to.”
“Is that right?”
She nodded innocently, clutching her bear tighter. The employees of the toy store seemed to think nothing of it, especially since the stuffed animal looked more than a little worn.
Still, it had to be more than a little suspicious. A little girl in pigtails and PJs in a neighboring toy store the night after she vanished? Somehow, the vampire didn’t suspect her mother took her disappearance with a wink and a nod. There had to have been more than just a scene. And he didn’t particularly fancy getting arrested for kidnapping. The human police force was just tedious, and he doubted any cop would be sympathetic to his aversion of southern exposure when it came time to select a holding cell.
“Why’d you come birthday shoppin’ if you were ready for beddy-by?”
“We were on our way back from Nana and Papa’s house, and I saw the store and Mommy said we could go in if we made it quick. My jammies have footsies. See?”
She held up her foot; or tried to, and tripped. He caught her with a laugh, completely enthralled with her girlish charm. “Yeh,” he said, grinning. “You got yourself some footsies there. Your mum really thought of everythin’, din’t she?”
Buffy nodded brightly before the mention of her mother brought her back to reality, and a desolate look befell her face. “I bet she’s real scared, huh?”
“I’d imagine so, poodle.”
“I don’t want her to be worried.”
“We’ll get you home right quick, okay?”
That thought didn’t seem to rest well with her, either. “I’m not gonna see you again, am I?”
A small, sad smile crossed his lips. “Not for a while, no.”
“Why not?”
He paused. “’S a grown-up thing.”
“I hate it when people tell me that.” Her pout deepened. “I wanna be a grown-up so I know what that means.”
“I want you to be a grown-up, too.” For entirely different reasons. “You’ll know some day, sweets. I’ll be back for you then.”
“Back for me?”
Better bloody believe it.
“Yeh,” he said softly. “I’ll be back for you.”
“Back from where?”
Closer than you think.
“I’ll tell you when I’m back, yeh?”
The child’s eyes averted coyly to the abandoned pig. “What about Mr. Gordo?” she asked. “Will you be back for him?”
Spike grinned and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Well now,” he said. “Can’t leave Mr. Gordo behind, now could we?”
“I think he’d get lonely.”
“Yeh, I’d wager so.” He paused, then released a deep breath and lifted her into his arms. “Tell you what,” he said. “Let’s leave him for now. See if he finds…Miss Piggy…or somethin’…to keep him company.”
“Miss Piggy is married to Kermit.”
“Well, that doesn’ make sense, does it? Kermit’s a bloody frog. Interspecies relations are jus’ wrong.”
“What’s inter…speci…what you said?”
Spike groaned and rolled his eyes. “Another grown-up thing,” he replied. “Come on, poodle. Let’s get you home to your mum so she’s not worried anymore, right?”
“Okay.”
It wasn’t until they were outside that Buffy spoke again.
“I don’t want you to go away,” she said.
“I don’ wanna go away either,” he replied honestly.
“Then why do you gotta?”
Because I don’ want you to think of me as your bloody father or favorite uncle.
“’Cause we don’ always get what we want.” A note fell within him at that, and a deep breath rumbled through his lips. “One thing I’ll promise you, pet…you’ll see me again.”
“Really?”
“Oh, yeah.”
An’ then you’ll never get rid of me.
“When?”
“When you’re older.”
Buffy lived not too far from the toy store, making their final minutes together regrettably brief. The neighborhood wasn’t everything he’d hoped for his little mate, but far from some of Los Angeles’s more noted slums. It didn’t much help that he had to duck behind a tree to avoid being spotted by a police car. Not that he was surprised; had the coppers not been patrolling the area, he’d be suffering even more reservations about leaving his little mate with her family.
As it was, he stopped outside the house a few minutes later, his heart heavy, the pangs of separation already beginning to set in.
There wasn’t anything to the girl aside the fact that she was the one destined to share his eternity. He found her unspeakably adorable, though he knew somewhere that it wasn’t the demon—rather the man he had once been. The demon wanted her blood. Wanted the words. Wanted everything that would betray the one he was never supposed to hurt.
It wasn’t just Buffy that wasn’t ready; he wasn’t anywhere near prepared. Not like he thought he would be. It was one thing to wish and hope—the game changed entirely when fate handed him what he’d been searching for. Especially like this.
“Here we are.”
“How’d you know where my house is?”
He smiled. “Your scent.”
“You can smell me?”
“Oh yeh.”
“Do I stink?”
His grin broadened and he shook his head. “Hardly. Now listen, poodle, never, ever let anyone as cold as me,” he pressed a hand to her brow, “into your house, ‘kay?”
“Okay.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise.” Tears were welling in her eyes, and she wrapped her small arms around him. “I don’t want you to go away. Please stay. Mommy will say it’s fine. She will, I know it.”
Spike paused. “’S for the best.”
“No.”
“Buffy—”
“That’s just a thing grown-ups say when they don’t have a real reason.”
He chuckled and shook his head. “Well, that’s part of it. It’s somethin’ we say when we know we can’t explain it very well.”
Amazing. His most adult conversation was being held with a four-year old. Dru never let him talk to her like this. Dru wanted to be a little girl, pampered by everyone around her. And while Buffy was like that to a degree, she similarly seemed to genuinely crave the wisdom that only age could bring.
He wished he could make it easy for her—easy for both of them.
“You promise me I’ll see you again?” she whimpered. “Y-you’re not just saying that?”
“I promise.”
“Are you gonna go back to see the mean lady?”
A bitter chord struck within him, and his soothing smile turned pained. “No,” he said. “’m not goin’ back to the mean lady.”
“Do you wanna?”
Bugger all, what a question.
“Not really.”
“She wanted me dead.”
“’S a good reason not to go back, then. Don’ want the mean lady after my best girl.” He forced a look of comfort and nodded. “Right then. Better toddle on home.”
“You’re not coming?”
“Buffy, I told you—”
“Not even to meet Mommy?”
Spike expelled a deep breath and raised his eyes to the house. It wasn’t a good idea, he knew. Knowing his luck, Buffy’s mum would be the sort that never forgot a face, which would make her severely distrustful when he reappeared in fourteen years to claim what was his.
And yet, the old fashioned sod in him that his little mate had resurrected couldn’t help but concede.
“Okay. Let’s go meet your mum.”
Since he had awakened a vampire, the thought of warming someone’s life with happiness had been a strong source of repugnance. His demon relished tears and not tears of joy. The moment the door opened, Buffy bounded from Spike’s side and propelled her small body into her distraught mother’s arms. The woman nearly fell to her knees, color flooding her pale cheeks as she sobbed her relief into her daughter’s hair.
“Oh, Buffy!”
“I’m okay, Mommy. Really, I am.”
It took a good ten minutes of Spike’s awkward tacit supervision to convince her mother that she was, indeed, okay. He didn’t think the woman even noticed him until Buffy tugged at her and pointed upward.
“Mommy, this is Spike.” She beamed. “He saved me from the mean lady!”
He suddenly found himself under uncomfortable scrutiny. The glare of the porch light made him look even deader than usual.
“Saved?”
“The mean lady was gonna kill me,” Buffy went on. “Spike made her go away. He saved me, Mommy!”
The woman’s eyes widened. “Really…Spike?”
He cleared his throat. “William,” he said instinctively, then growled at himself.
Meet your mate, an’ all goes to hell.
The name he had promised to bury was suddenly the forefront façade he was allowing everyone to see. He needed to get away from them and drain some co-ed just to feel like himself.
“William?”
“Willyum?” Buffy frowned. “No. I like Spike better.”
A grin tickled his lips. That’s my girl.
“She’s exaggeratin’ ‘bout the other,” he said. “It was no big deal.”
“No big deal!” the woman exclaimed. “You saved my little girl. Oh, what am I doing? Come in, please! Have some coffee, or…oh hell, have the whole house. I—”
Spike grinned. Jackpot.
An invitation. That was all he needed. Not that he needed the temptation to encourage further contact between them for the next several years, but he wanted the comfort of knowing he could get to Buffy if need be.
“No, thank you,” he replied politely, his accent dragging back to the days of bloody awful poetry recitals. He needed to get away and fast.
Buffy’s lip began to quiver again, and the demon once again found itself shoved to the back. “Please don’t leave, Spike.”
He gave her a stern look. “We talked about this, remember?”
“I don’t want you to leave.”
“Buffy,” her mother berated, shooting him an apologetic look. “You heard Mr.…William. He probably has work to do…or something.”
That didn’t stop the girl’s tears from becoming heavier. “But—”
“No ‘buts.’”
“’S all right.” Spike flashed a disarming smile. “Come here, poodle. Give us a hug.”
It hadn’t truly registered how hard this was going to be until he felt her small arms encircle his neck for the last time, her stuffed bear bouncing softly against his back; until the scent of her tears was right under his nose, her sweet skin touching his, the hum of her blood against his mouth. Never before had he heard of a vampire that couldn’t claim his mate the minute he saw her eyes flash for him. Never before had a vampire’s mate been trapped in the body of a child. Never before had any vampire had to say goodbye to the one that eternity had given him.
None that he knew of.
It wasn’t fair.
“Goodbye, Buffy.”
“No…”
“’S time to put this fairytale on hold,” he told her, low enough so that her mother wouldn’t hear. “’S not forever. I promise.”
She pulled back at that, hiccupping and wiping at her eyes.
Her mother looked as though she might cry as well. “You obviously made an impact on her,” she said. “Buffy never lets anyone touch her. Not even her father.”
Spike suspected that notion was well founded, but held his tongue. Instead, he smiled once more, and shrugged. “Guess she jus’…I dunno. She doesn’ strike me as the shy type.”
“Well, I…oh! I’m gonna go get my card. Just in case you, you know, ever need anything and can’t find someone to—”
He held up a hand. “No, that’s—”
“I insist. Please, it’s the least I can do.”
She wasn’t going to be satisfied until he said yes to one of her offers. And the longer he stood before the tearful girl, the more he wanted to grab her and run. Sod his plans. He’d watch over her and claim her when she was old enough. He’d do anything to stop her crying.
The connection between mates, even without the words and the blood exchange, was potent enough that he reckoned he would feel her pain for days before the sensation finally knew rest. They’d been together now for nearly fourteen hours. What she felt, he felt. It was a part of nature. A part of what made her his.
A part of his reasoning for turning away.
“Right,” he said, nodding. “Your card. Thanks.”
The woman disappeared down the hall at his acceptance, and he was alone with Buffy again.
“Here,” his small mate said, thrusting her teddy bear into his arms. “So you won’t forget.”
“I won’ forget you, ducks.”
“Mr. Jenkins won’t let you forget me.”
“Take Mr. Jenkins? Won’t he miss you?”
“No. He wants to go with you.”
“Does he, now?” Spike’s eyes rose once more as Buffy’s mother reappeared. “Your daughter is tryin’ to pawn off her stuffed animals on me.”
“She’s giving you Mr. Jenkins?”
“I want Spike to have Mr. Jenkins!” Buffy said stoutly. “Mr. Jenkins wants to go with him.”
The woman smiled awkwardly. “Well,” she said, “there is no swaying her when she sets her mind on something.”
“I don’ feel comfortable—”
“I don’t really, either. She loves Mr. Jenkins…she’s had him since she was born.”
“Well, then—”
“But if you don’t take him, I won’t hear the end of it for days. I guess you’re adopting a bear.” She handed him the aforementioned card. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call me.”
His eyes fell to the name.
Joyce Summers.
“I won’.” I will. “Thank you.” He pocketed the card and turned his gaze back to the child. “You’re sure about this bear thing?”
“Take him. He doesn’t like it here anymore.”
“’m sure that’s not—”
Joyce raised her hand. “Trust me, if you start down this road, you’ll never leave the house. She won’t change her mind. You don’t know Buffy.”
I will, though. Better than anyone.
“Well…” He looked back to his mate. “’F you’re sure.”
Buffy nodded.
“Okay.” Mr. Jenkins found a temporary home under his arm, and he nodded with finality. “Thanks.”
“No,” Joyce objected. “Thank you for bringing my baby back.”
“Was nothin’.”
It was everything.
“’Bye, Buffy,” he said softly, eyes leaving her face for the last time as he turned and began his way down the walkway, forbidding himself from stopping when she called after him. From even glancing back to what he was leaving behind.
There would be a day. He knew there would be a day.
“Well,” he said, shifting the bear before him. “Look like it’s jus’ you an’ me, Jenks.”
A piece of her to remember her by.
He found it rather comforting. Not her offer; rather the idea that she wanted him to remember her. That she was so terrified he would forget.
Perhaps she would remember him, then, when the time came.
Perhaps.
*~*~*
Three weeks later, he sat outside her bedroom window, listening as an ecstatic shriek pierced through the air.
“Mommy!” he heard her cry. “He got me Mr. Gordo! Spike got me Mr. Gordo!”
Satisfied, he stuck a cigarette between his lips and turned to get on with his life.
No regrets, now. He forbade it.
His family was leaving the city today. He felt it. And if they were looking for him, they would be unsuccessful.
He didn’t care to see any of them again. His life was in LA.
No matter how long it took.
To be continued in Chapter Four: Where The Road Goes…
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