Rating: PG 16-R, angst, heartache, violence
Disclaimer: I do not own anyone from the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Distribution: any lists that I send this to, WLS, QPC, Bite Me, Cat - anyone else please ask
QPC Theme for February (from 16th to 28th): Heartache, cheating, breaking up, make-up PWP, divorce.
note: set in AU season 6. Willow and Tara never got back together after Glory, and instead Willow hooked up with Spike. Tara left Sunnydale. Willow resurrected Buffy.
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Spike had gone on patrol, his emotions a tangled mess. He knew that things were going wrong, that he'd done wrong by Willow. That he was probably going to continue to do wrong by her, like he had from the beginning. He'd still been longing for Buffy when he'd gotten involved with Willow.
He hadn't been quite certain how it had happened. Willow had been his friend, one of the few that he'd ever had. He'd been there for her when she'd lost Tara to the madness from Glory, when Tara had decided that Sunnydale was to dangerous and gone away, had left Willow. Somehow, he'd ended up sleeping with Willow. They'd become lovers, and eventually moved in together.
But he'd still had those feelings for Buffy. Not that he'd spoken of them, and a part of him knew that Willow probably thought they'd faded. He cared for Willow, and wasn't certain how he'd manage without her there, smoothing tensions, listening to him talk about anything. She accepted him, man and vampire, the dark and the light. Even if she didn't like some of the darker, more violent things he'd done, she accepted that they were a part of his past, a part of him.
He'd stood by her when Buffy had died, and watched with awe and a bit of fear when she found a spell to resurrect her friend, and actually made it work. And then he'd realized that Buffy was back, was really there again, and he still wanted her.
He'd never thought anything would come of it, after all, Buffy'd made it abundantly clear that she didn't care for him, didn't believe that he could love before she'd died. She looked at him and only saw a monster, never the man. But then he'd accidentally bumped into her about two weeks after her return... she'd been fighting a group of three minions, with an almost brutal style that had stunned him. This wasn't the same fighting style that she'd used before.
She'd followed that by grabbing him into a brutal kiss, assaulting his lips with her own. The next thing he'd known, he'd been on his back with a half naked slayer grinding down on him, her hands leaving purpling bruises on his ribcage. They hadn't made love, or even just had sex. There had been just... well, the simple fact was that she'd used him.
And he'd let her do it. And again a few days after that. A part of him was appalled that he was doing this, allowing himself to be the Slayer's sex toy, that he could betray Willow like that. So the next time, he'd tried to lash out, to push the slayer away.
That had resulted in a huge fight that had almost brought down the warehouse and raw shagging against the wall. He'd found himself believing that she finally felt something for him, finally was willing to...
And there was still the matter of Willow. Willow, the sweetest, most compassionate person he'd ever met, Willow that he lived with, that he went home to. Her lips that caressed him, that kissed him tenderly. Willow who would snuggle up to him in her sleep, sighing his name as if it was the most wonderful sound. Willow who'd offered him her heart.
Buffy knew that he and Willow were together, lived together, slept together, that Willow loved him. That he had his own feelings for Willow. But she didn't care about that. She would find him in the darkness, during a patrol, and there would often be violence, hitting, punching, kicking... followed by couplings that were almost as violent as the fighting.
He knew it was wrong, knew that he shouldn't give into the Slayer, to his own lusts for her. But she was his obsession, and she'd become his guilty addiction. A part of him was wondering how long this would continue, how long he would let himself be used... So he vowed to talk to her after the next time. It wasn't as if he'd have any other chance.
She found him in a cemetery that he knew she hadn't been supposed to patrol that night. She had to have deliberately sought him out, deliberately looked for him.
"Slayer. Fancy meeting you out here... weren't you supposed to be over on the east side?"
One fist moved with blurring speed, connecting with his jaw. "I didn't come here to be all polite. I need... things aren't right anymore. You make me feel..."
"Is it because I care..." His words were interrupted by another blow, this one forcing the air out of his body before he could finish the sentence.
Her eyes were dead, dull, emotionless orbs set in a face that showed nothing. "You don't care. You can't, you're just a demon. But you make me feel alive again."
Then she grabbed him, her fingers pulling at his hair as she pulled him to her, lips on him, nipping, biting, crushing him to her. Her other hand ripped his shirt off of him, throwing it to the ground. There was no tenderness, only raw coupling, the frantic clutching and clawing, leaving bruises and welts over their bodies, almost animal like groans and gasps. There against the mausoleum...
When she was done with him, she pushed him away, turning to leave. Something screamed inside of him, a frantic howl of protest, but he couldn't tell if it was because his addiction was leaving, or a protest to the whole encounter. "Buffy... I do..."
She turned, her eyes cold now, not quite as lifeless. "No you don't. You aren't capable of love."
He stood up, freshly bruised muscles screaming their objections. "Hey! I have feelings! And you must have something for me, or else you wouldn't keep coming back!"
Sneering at him, she laughed. "Feelings? For you? Don't be ridiculous. You mean nothing to me. This? It isn't about you, it's about me."
He reeled back, her words burning him like acid, like holy water over wounds. Such cruelty... "If it's not about me, why then? Why pick the person involved with Red?"
"Because I knew you'd come. I knew I could have you, that you could take it all." With a dismissive little wave, she left, clearly no longer concerned with him.
Bloody hell... she'd used him, and all because she knew he cared. Buffy didn't care if it would hurt Willow, didn't even seem to think it mattered. Willow... something twisted inside of him, a sickening dropping sensation. He'd betrayed Willow to... to be the Slayer's punching bag and whore. He wasn't real to her, was nothing to her.
But he was everything to Willow.
He felt as if something cold and heavy had made it's way into his veins. Something thick and heavy, slowing him, making him clumsy as he staggered and stumbled his way back to the apartment. He had a passionate woman who thought he was wonderful waiting to welcome him with open arms, and he had been shagging the slayer. He felt dirty, contaminated, and he realized that he stank of the Slayer and sex.
He got there, and the door was locked. Something wasn't right, she didn't lock him out when he patrolled. His fingers shook as he found his keys, searched for the right one, and managed to unlock the door. Inside, the living room was orderly, the pillows thrown into the chair. But it was silent.
He couldn't hear Willow's heartbeat. Dread seeped into his body, chilling his feet and rising, clenching at his chest with cold, sharp claws. He opened the door the the bedroom, and reeled as if struck. The closet was opened, and almost empty. Her dresser's drawers were slightly open, and he had the feeling that they were empty as well.
What had happened? Where was Willow, why had she left him? He moved closer, hoping to find something, a note, a letter, some sort of explanation, or sign that she was coming back, that there was just some emergency that had arisen.
She just left one little message for him - a single word written in three inch letters of dark bronze lipstick, WHY? A spell had been placed on the mirror, causing it to replay That Scene. Himself in the cemetery, with Buffy... half naked and rutting like beasts.
He felt like he'd just been gutted and left to bleed. Willow had seen him... had seen them. He could only imagine how betrayed she must have felt, how devastated. He couldn't even blame her for it, all she'd asked of him was honesty, to be truthful, and to tell her if she wasn't enough to make him happy.
She'd seen him and Buffy. He sank to the floor, vision blurring with streaks of crimson as the bloody tears fell down his cheeks, dripped onto his chest unheeded. It wouldn't have hurt her as badly if he'd left the mangled bodies of all her friends on her doorstep.
He'd lost everything. The feeble hope that there could have been something with Buffy, and the relationship he'd had with Willow. The reality of her departure was seeping in, like the gradual lightening of the horizon in the morning, and the more he understood what he had done to her, the worse he felt.
Fate or God or whatever had given him a second chance, an opportunity to be happy, to be loved and cherished, and he'd thrown it away. Thrown away Willow's trust and love. He felt sick inside, as if he was going to throw up, something that he hadn't done in well over a century. He'd screwed this up royally.
He'd lost everything that mattered, and it was his own fault.
the end