TITLE: Redemption

PAIRING: Buffy and Spike

RATING: R (Light smut and shameless product placement)

SPOILERS: Hopefully season six spoilers

DISCLAIMER: Joss is the hottie. I am the ‘shipper.

SUMMARY: This is a sort of follow up to Fever, for those of you who have read it. In this setting, Spike is living with Buffy and Dawn in a low-income apartment building in Sunnydale, Buffy works as a waitress at the Bronze, Dawn is in high school and about to go on her first date, and Spike…well, he really, really loves the Slayer.

My boyfriend is dead and has been for over 120 years. He has killed many people…thousands upon thousands, maybe even a million. I couldn’t tell you. My boyfriend has not drawn a single, life giving breath for over a century. My boyfriend has not felt the sunlight on his face since the late 1800’s, except for a brief time when a magical ring allowed him to be impervious to the sun, impervious to my stake, impervious to even a splash of holy water. My boyfriend likes TV. Specifically, he likes old shows on TV land, reality shows, and soap operas. My boyfriend makes frequent trips to the fridge, looking to see if I’ve bought anything from the butcher’s shop for him lately. There’s always a carton in there for him. My boyfriend is very low-maintenance; just give him some blood and he’s happy. My boyfriend has about ten black tee shirts and ten pairs of black jeans, all that I launder for him, once a week. My boyfriend keeps a school picture of my sister, shoved deep into his back pocket, which I must search for it every time I do the laundry. On the back of the photo, in my sister’s out of control teenage scrawl, is the message, “I hate this picture. It makes my teeth look bad. Love, Sweet Bit.” My boyfriend has only one black coat though that he won’t even allow out of his sight. My boyfriend growls occasionally in his sleep and talks about things that I’d rather not know about. “Gonna kill…Mmm…gonna kill…no…” My boyfriend says I say similar things in my sleep. My boyfriend has never really taken me out on a date. My boyfriend has never been introduced to anyone outside my circle of friends, or to my father. My boyfriend smokes…he smokes all the time, but never in the house. My boyfriend cannot see himself in the mirror. My boyfriend does not have a beating heart. My boyfriend has a hard time dealing with right and wrong. My boyfriend lies next to me, cold.

Her boyfriend adjusts his position next to her until his head is lying on her chest. She has been watching his eyelids droop for over an hour and has wondered when he might tell her what he says to her now.

“I’m going for a nap, Slayer,” he says in a near whisper. “Wake me when Hogan’s Heroes is on.”

“I will,” Buffy says.

Before completely settling, he lifts his head and kisses her. “I love you,” he says.

“I love you too,” she answers.

He moves one more time, clears his throat a couple times, and then relaxes his torso on top of hers. She clasps a hand around the back of his head, holding her to him, taking a few moments to comb her hands through the mass of unruly curls he has allowed to sprout out since they have been together. She bends to kiss him and watches as the touch of her lips sparks a smile on his face that remains even as he heads towards sleep.

Yeah, my boyfriend may be dead, but he’s completely adorable.

Buffy is the last to pad out of bed this particular morning. And even when she does, morning doesn’t seem like such a good idea. Was there a night at all? When she set the alarm for 7:00 did it become 7:00 right then and there?

She walks into the kitchen and finds her sister already at the table, being entertained by the blond, wiggly haired man who has shared her bed the last night and every night for a while. He has just made himself at home, it seems. Pouring coffee, getting into the frozen waffles he knows---HE KNOWS!---are for Saturdays only, and dipping his Wheatabix into the carton he holds in his hand as he laughs at something Dawn has said.

“Oh, God, Peter is such a jerk,” Dawn says as Buffy is just about to walk into the kitchen. “Like, he totally told Mr. Lumford that he didn’t do his homework because he’s got lime disease or something.”

“Well, does he?” Spike asks.

“No! If anything, he’s just got, ‘Must be an asshole in class disorder.’”

“Well, from what I hear about the current Sunnydale High, that disorder is growing to epic proportions.”

“No, shi----Mmm, Buffy!” Dawn is suddenly arrested by the sight of her older sister leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed, eyebrows raised. The “y” sound at the end of Buffy’s name comes out in a dog yelp almost.

“Good morning,” Buffy says, averting Spike’s eyes as she looks at her sister intently.

“Good morning, Buffy,” Dawn says, her eyes moving widely about the space around her. She seems to want to spring up from her seat, but then she remains, her posterior settling uncomfortably on her chair as she looks at her corn flakes.

“Sweetheart!” Spike exclaims, sliding off the counter top and bounding over to her. Before she can even register a complaint, he takes her into his arms. He gives her one of those exaggerated, Hollywood kisses if only for the reason that he doesn’t want to allow her time to accuse him of being a bad influence again.

“Nice language you’re teaching her,” she whispers sharply into his ear.

“Would you rather I teach her how to rip a man’s heart out of his chest and show it to him while he’s still breathing?”

“No, of course not!”

He kisses her softly. “Then be happy with what you’ve got, Slayer.”

For a minute it’s like they are the only two people on earth. It’s easy to think this sometimes because they have to do it so often. They know no one can stomach the idea of the two of them being together. When they’re alone they can turn off all the monitors on their personal life and just be who they are…two people in love. But in the sight of others, more specifically, her friends, they have to be different people, evaluating their existence, looking at each other as outsiders would view them. There are no such problems here this morning, though. They have someone who condones their relationship in their midst and for a moment they have acceptance. They kiss, not knowing how much time has elapsed until Dawn voices her annoyance. There is a limit after all.

“Um, guys! Me---eating---here! Not liking the saliva swapping right now,” Dawn says, making a point to turn her head away in a dramatic flourish.

Buffy slowly breaks away from Spike’s kiss. “MMM…sorry, Dawn. Guess I must have gotten carried away for a minute.” There is still the phantom promise of another kiss on his lips and she looks into his eyes. Wait…just wait…she tries to say.

“Well, I gotta go anyway,” Dawn says, rising from her chair and wiping her mouth. “I’ll give you guys an early start.”

“Early start?” Buffy asks.

Dawn rolls her eyes. “Oh, come on. Like I don’t know what you guys do when I go off to school.”

Buffy and Spike feign innocence…terribly. To the point that Dawn has more to say immediately.

“OK, if I’m wrong then the flour bin is where you have suddenly decided to store your nightgown, Buffy.”

Buffy remembers the other day. Dawn was out of the apartment. Someone was running a hair dryer in the next room over. The calendar announced some insignificant holiday in another country. And Spike was inside of her, pounding away, right there on the kitchen table. The same kitchen table where she is expected to eat this sweet concoction of flour, butter, eggs, and syrup, all with a smile, all while remembering the first time she saw her boyfriend. And God, that was horrible. She can still remember when her very life was an envisioned feast for him. But somehow it occludes the fact that now her very life would be a famine without him. She touches his face…

“I’m off,” Dawn says, slinging her backpack over her shoulder. “Oh, and just remember. School lets out early on Friday. So if you guys are still going at it at 1:00 you might have an audience. She takes another swig of her orange juice before departing the room, leaving them alone---alone---for the first time in sixteen hours.

Buffy stares at Spike, watching him hike his countenance into a broad, sexy grin as the front door closes. His hands are traveling down her backside, down the length of her brief nightshirt. In seconds, his cold, bare hands are touching her flesh, drawing her closer.

They have imposed a no-sex-while-Dawn-is-around order that they have followed to the letter. They sleep together each night. They hold each other, knowing that the morning will be coming soon. It’s hard, but that manage. And sometimes Dawn does spend the night elsewhere and they have that time in the darkness together. But in the clutch of morning, their passion is more real, more fought for. It’s as though mentally they’re figuring out how long it will take Dawn to get from the threshold of the apartment to the elevator to the parking lot.

“She’s got some imagination,” Buffy says as Spike’s nostrils drizzle cool drafts on her neck as he bends to kiss her there.

“Those energy blob types always do,” he says, kissing her firmly under her chin.

“Like all we ever do is have sex while she’s away,” Buffy says, closing her eyes as Spike’s hands make their way to the front of her nightshirt and his fingers begin tugging at her nipples.

“Like that’s all we ever do,” Spike says, his mouth coming down on hers.

Buffy moans. “Can that be all we do for a while?”

Spike chortles. “Mmm…absolutely.”

Spike is resting on the sofa when he hears someone inserting a key into the door.

That'll be Little Bit, he thinks to himself as he looks at the clock. It's a few minutes after three. Poor kid. If it weren’t for me she’d be one of those latch key kids who always end up being profiled on Rescue 911 for accidentally setting themselves on fire or falling through plate glass windows.

Once the door is opened, he swings his legs over onto the floor, rising to greet her. It's been a long, lonely afternoon and he smiles when he sees her.

"Hey, Nibblet. How was school?"

She doesn't answer right away. She sets her book bag down very carefully on the chair by the door and begins to look around, cautiously. "Is Buffy here?" she asks.

"No, she went to go train about an hour ago. Said she'd be back by five."

Dawn exhales a long-held breath and presses a hand to her chest.

"What kind of mood is she in today?" Dawn asks.

Spike smiles. "She was in a good mood when she left." Because we spent the morning in bed and she was awfully good to the little sizzler, so she got much in return, he continues in his head. "Why?"

"Let me get something to drink first and then I'll tell you," Dawn says, motioning for him to join her in the kitchen.

She reaches into the fridge and extracts a cold Capri Sun for herself and the carton of butcher's blood for Spike. As she's ramming the straw into the bag, she sighs and says, "I need you to help me with something."

"Anything, love. You know that."

She smiles and leans her backside against the counter. "Yeah, I know. But this is going to take, like, all your powers of persuasion and then some."

"Oh? Consider my curiosity piqued, love. What is it?"

She sips a little at her drink before she continues. "Well, you know how Buffy is dead set against me dating before I'm sixteen, right?"

"Right," he says, taking a sip of his own drink.

"Well…" her teeth graze lightly over her bottom lip. "There's this guy at school and he's really cute. I mean, like, way, way cute. Like…like…"

"Like the entire pantheon of TRL hotties combined cute?" he offers.

"Yes, exactly! That cute."

Spike is beginning to piece this together. Little Bit has a crush, he thinks to himself. And it might not be an unrequited one…

"So, there's this bloke and he's quite the spunk and …" he says.

"Well, I've had a thing for him for a while. I mean, everyone does. But I thought that he didn't even know who I was. But today, when I was at my locker, he, like, came up and starting talking to me. Just like that. He asked me if I were in any classes with him and I said no, but I had seen him around. And we just starting going on about school and stuff and what we did in our free time, which led to talking about movies we had seen and movies we would like to see and before I knew it…" She takes a breath. "He was asking me to the movies on Friday night."

Spike's mouth flies open, though he did see this one coming. "No!"

"Yeah!" she is blushing and seems to find it hard to look at him right in the face. "I couldn't believe it either."

"So what did you tell him?"

"Well, I didn't want to sound like a total dork and say, 'I've got to ask my sister first,' so I just told him that I had to check my calendar."

"Good one. Makes you sound in demand. That he might not be the only bantam in the barnyard. Men thrive on that. It's the competitive nature of the beast."

"So anyway. I need you to help me with the convincing Buffy thing, because you're good at that."

"Well, that shouldn't be too difficult. It's only taken me, what, a year to convince her that I was the right man for her."

"Yeah, but she listens to you now. Like the other night when you just had that feeling that she might need help on patrol and at first she was all, 'I'm the Slayer. I can handle things by myself.' And you said, 'You're also my girlfriend and if something happened to you, I couldn't bear it.' And she said, 'This is my job. And every time you help me with the slayings, the vamps in this town get all grumbly and put out hits on you.' And then you said, 'I can handle the vamps in this town. It's life without you I couldn't handle, love.' And she started to protest again and you started kissing her and you, almost made out in front of me until she stopped you. And then you went out and did the slaying together, which was good because you said there were demons and vamps out for blood that night."

He remembers this night well. She had gotten him so hot that when they got to the cemetery, they made love on top of a marble sarcophagus, the vampire slayer equivalent of shoving everything off an office desk and doing it with a co-worker.

"So you think all she needs is some kissing to convince her, eh?" Spike says, still immersed in the memory of the moonlight on Buffy's face as he rocked against her slowly in the aftermath of her climax.

"Maybe a little more than that," Dawn says. "You should definitely do that thing that makes her go 'eee eee eee.'"

"Dawn!" He remembers that old saying about little pitchers having big ears.

She smiles knowingly. "Anyway, I'll go to the library tonight and give you guys a chance to, uh, talk. OK?"

"Never fear, Little Bit. Consider it done.” He cocks his head. “What's his name, anyway?"

"Travis," she says in the obvious delight of just saying his name.

Spike winces. "Travis? His name is Travis?"

"Yeah. Travis Singleton."

"There are actually people out there who would name a kid Travis? I'd do nothing of the sort and yet I'm chased with wooden stakes. What horrible injustices there are in the world."

"What's wrong with the name Travis? I think it's a cool name."

"It's a nancy boy name."

"Nancy boy? How do you get that?"

"It just is."

"Like Spike is all that great a name."

"Spike is a great name. And besides, my real name is William and there are kings and conquerors named William. Travis is the name of flaming’ country western singers and Scottish bands that aren’t nearly as good as Radiohead."

"I'm not dating him for his name, Spike!"

"Let's hope not, Nibblet. Else I'd be a might scared for you."

"So you think you can do it? The convincing and all?"

"I'll give it a try. That's all I can do. But if she says no, that's the law. And if she says yes…Well, Buffy and I would have to meet him first."

It is over now.

Buffy knows this because she has seen his face convulse into that near-demon visage several times. He continues to rock against her. This is his way. His presence still looms large inside of her, even as the muscle diminishes in size, trembling out its last gasps of life between her shuddering walls. He is trembling as well. Sometimes when it is over, she has to hold him until he stops shaking. She doesn’t know why. There is some doubt in him mind that this is not real. Even as he feels his own skin on hers, even as he tastes himself on her lips, somehow the validity of what they’re doing eludes him. He wants to believe. He wants to believe very badly. And when he looks into her eyes when they have finished, there’s always the lingering question: “Are you really here with me?” She can stare back into those blue black eyes and assure him all she can, but she can’t eradicate the question, or provide an adequate answer, it seems.

“Hey, you,” she says softly, threading her hand through his hair. “You back?”

“Yeah,” he chokes out, his mouth curling into a satisfied smile as he makes the return to earth.

He pulls himself away at length and falls at her side, staring at the ceiling. All the covers are on the floor. Buffy imagines that if they were in a movie or in a TV show they’d be making an effort to cover themselves. They remain bare, she, covered in a fine film of sweat, he in that veneer of incredulity he wears like a shroud.

But when he looks over at her, she is smiling, quietly, to herself. He has done something right. She is drumming her forefinger and index fingers against her chest and humming something he can’t discern. At last, she grabs herself from her reverie and flings herself against his chest, latching onto one flat nipple with her swollen, ardent mouth before revisiting his lips. She nestles her head on his shoulder, stroking her small hand across his chest, still humming that song.

“You know what?,” she asks, her hand moving down the rack of taut abs leading down to the nether regions she’s seen and felt so much of this evening.

“What?” he asks, watching her hand’s singular path. Her finger is tracing the row of rough hairs under his navel.

“I think we should have started doing this sooner. Because the way I see it, we spent four years fighting and we’ve just a couple of months fucking. And the fucking is definitely better than the fighting.”

He laughs slightly, feeling new life course into his exhausted member as her fingers tease around his tousled, wiry hairs. “Consider those four years foreplay,” he says, suddenly remembering why he treated Buffy to pages 55-95 of the Kama Sutra in one single session. Not that it was an imposition or anything. “This may be an awkward time to bring this up, but there’s something you should know about Dawn.”

She lifts her head curiously. “What about her?” her eyes widen. “Is she in trouble again? In school? She had another fight and she’s been suspended and she was only pretending to go to school today. That’s it, isn’t it?”

“No, no. Nothing’s wrong at school, so calm yourself. It’s not bad news at all. It’s very good news, actually. For her. You may not think so right away, though.”

“What the hell is it?”

He regards her sympathetically. There’s so much turmoil in her eyes as she’s thinking about the million and one things that Dawn could possibly have gotten herself into or will be getting herself into. He reaches for her hair, smoothing back a stray hair that has stuck to the side of her perspiring face.

“Has she talked to you about the boys at school?”

“Yeah, I guess…” A look of fear flickers across her face. “Oh, she’s fighting with boys?”

“Not fighting with them, Slayer. Wanting to date them.”

“Well, I know she wants to date, but she knows she can’t before she’s sixteen. And that’s not a Buffy rule. That was a Mom rule.”

“She knows that. But she’s hoping that big sis might cut her a sliver of slack on this. You see, this bloke is pretty special to her. And don’t worry. From what she’s told me, he’s no baddie. He’s perfectly boringly suburban. Wears Abercrombie and Fitch, has clean, white, non-pointy teeth, wears his hair in his eyes, which, when uncovered, are a soft hazel. He moved to Sunnydale from Seattle last year after his father’s company relocated him. He plays lacrosse, is active on the debate team as well as something called Model UN, and he’s planning on going to MIT when he graduates high school.” He finishes his description with a tight clench of his jaw. “Guess the apple sometimes does have quite a ways to go when it falls from the tree.”

“She told you all that about him?”

“Well, yeah. I asked and she told.”

“Funny she hasn’t said much to me about him.”

“Aw, sweetheart, she probably thought you’d get all suspicious if she started talking too much about him.” he says, kissing the top of her head. “But there’s something else you should know about him.”

“Oh, God, what?”

Spike sighs drearily. “His name is,” and he swallows hard before speaking. “Ter-A-vis!”

“So?”

“So? So! Hmmph! Perhaps I was wrong about that apple. You both chose poof-sounding wankers to be your first loves.”

She exhales a deep breath as she places her worried head on his chest. “I am so not ready for this.”

“Point is, Slayer, Dawn is ready,” he says, stroking the back of her neck. He sees Buffy extend her lip in a quasi pout and he can’t love her more. “Buffy, you know how on the soaps, sometimes the ankle biters out-stay their cuteness and are sent away to boarding school and come back fully grown and ready to either take over their fathers’ companies or learn about their true paternity?”

“Yeah,” she says dully.

He kisses her on the top of her head. “Dawn’s back from boarding school. And she’s not a baby anymore.”

“She’s my baby sister, though,” she whines in protest.

“Chin up, Slayer. You know, you weren’t that much older than Dawn when you picked Angel Poof to be your cherry poppin’ daddy.”

Her eyes fly open as she lifts her head. Spike imagines that if she were a cat, every hair on her back would be raised.

“I am SOOOOOOO not ready for this!”

It is nearly eight o’clock when Dawn returns to the apartment. All of her friends were there and they had gotten to talking about how impossible Mr. Lumford’s class was, what happened on Dawson’s Creek the night before, and who they were thinking about taking to the homecoming dance in two weeks. Dawn knew exactly who she wanted to go with and none of the girls were surprised by her response. It would be their first high school dance. This was a big deal. Dawn wanted to buy a grown-up dress and not borrow one of Buffy’s like she usually did for her junior high dances. Besides, she was a lot taller than Buffy now, a fact that caused her ego-minded, slaying sister a lot of grief.

She sighs as she approaches the door. “I’ll always be little sis to her.”

Buffy and Spike are in the kitchenette when Dawn arrives. Spike has a cup towel draped over his shoulder and Buffy is sudsing up the dinner dishes. She is swirling a brush around a black iron skillet when Dawn enters. The lingering odor of fried potatoes and onions hangs in the air, something that would normally spur Dawn’s appetite. But she is not hungry tonight. Her mind is too full of wonder and worry.

“Hey, Nibblet,” Spike says, catching her out of the corner of his eye as he swabs a glass.

“Hey,” she returns warily, noticing that the pair are unnervingly quiet.

Buffy empties the black iron skillet and fills it with clean water, still scrubbing. Her lips are pursed and she is fully engaged in getting the burnt on, stuck on mess off the bottom of the skillet.

Finally, she says, “You’re late.”

“I know. And I’m sorry. I had a lot of studying to do, I guess.”

Buffy says nothing. The skillet is finally divested of its clinging mess and she hands it over to Spike.

“There’s a plate on the stove for you,” Spike says.

Dawn goes over to the stove and lifts the foil from the plate. Hamburger, home fries, and a thick slice of tomato. She quickly replaces the foil and goes over to the fridge for a Capri Sun.

Once the last dish is dry, Spike wipes his hands. “I’m going out for a smoke, love.”

Buffy nods acknowledgement, moving a sponge around the sink.

Before departing, Dawn tries to engage his eyes. She wants to know…But Spike has nothing to offer her except for a slow, sympathetic smile. He turns and heads for the door, grabbing his duster before leaving the apartment.

Now the sisters are alone. Dawn continues to watch her sister ignore her. Now she’s mad at me. I might as well tell Travis tomorrow that I can’t go. I’ll have to be cool about it though. I’ll have to say, something like, what Marcia Brady told Doug Simpson. Something suddenly came up…

Dawn sits uneasily at the kitchen table, crushing the cool Capri Sun nervously, sending too much drink through the straw. She swallows slowly in two audible gulps, nearly choking on the last one.

Buffy switches off the light over the sink. She is drying her hands on the same cup towel Spike used minutes ago. She notices the plate is still on the stove.

“That’s going to get cold, you know.”

“I’m not in a hamburger mood tonight.”

“Suit yourself. But there’s no money for Domino’s in the budget, so that’s all there is.”

Dawn nods. “I’m not hungry anyway.”

Buffy clicks her tongue and walks towards the door. Before she leaves, she hangs back slightly, holding onto the frame. She turns her head, not enough to look at Dawn, but to make herself heard.

“You have any plans after school tomorrow?” she asks.

Aside from trying to salvage what’s left of my social life after I tell Travis I can’t go to the movie with him on Friday? “Not really,” she says. “Why?”

“I thought we’d go to the mall. Do a little shopping.” Buffy finally swivels around to look at her sister. A smile spreads over her face, a pleasing one. An I’m-not-mad-at-you,-Dawn-type smile. “If you’re going on a date on Friday, you’ll probably want something new to wear.”

Dawn springs immediately from her chair, squeezing the Capri Sun until the juice spurts from the straw. “Oh, my God…you mean, I can go?”

“Yeah, you can go,” she says, her eyes shining in the dim.

“Oh, Buffy!”

The boisterous teenager’s hug of gratitude nearly knocks Buffy over. “Hey! Watch the slaying arm! My non-paying night job may not put food on the table, but it keeps the people of Sunnydale from becoming food on a vampire’s table.”

“You mean, I can really go?”

“Yes, Dawn. I just told you you could. But it can’t be a car date.”

Dawn rolls her eyes. “D’uh! He’s fifteen. So unless he’s going to drive up in a bumper car, I think it’ll be more of a walking thing.”

“Dawn, you know I don’t like you walking after dark. Spike can drive you to the theater.”

“Cool! The DeSoto!”

Buffy can tell that in her mind she’s already on that date, so she feels a need to add a disqualifier. “But Dawn. Before you go out with this guy, Spike and I would like to meet him first.”

Dawn smiles at the familiarity of Buffy’s words. Damn. I have the coolest “parents”.

When Spike returns from his smoke break, Dawn draws him aside and out of earshot of Buffy. Conspiratorially, they hover by the door.

“Eee…eee…eee?” she asks with a broad grin on her face.

Spike knows immediately what she is talking about. He is suddenly glad that he has lost the ability to blush. “I should really look into getting a patent for that.”

The whole apartment reeks of femininity.

It’s 6:30 on Friday and Buffy and Dawn have been behind closed doors preparing for her date for nearly an hour. Spike has been excluded from this right of passage, gladly, alternately flipping through the channels and sipping at a warm mug of butcher’s blood. He hears the girls tittering in twin Geisha girl conspiracy as perfumes are sampled and dismissed, choice of wardrobe is discussed and criticized and shoes are tried on for comfort, style and clunkiness. He still isn’t too clear about what all the fuss is about. All this for some young buck named Travis who momentarily will walk through the door and whisk Dawn off for her first non-chaperoned night with a member of the opposite sex.

The doorbell rings. He hears Dawn’s squeal, “He’s here! Oh, God, he’s here! And I can’t stop running my tights!”

Buffy’s head emerges from the bedroom door. “Spike, could you stall him? We’re having tights issues in here.”

“Will do, love. I was in the mood for an after dinner aperitif,” he says lazily, gathering himself off the sofa.

His remark is met with a warning glare.

“Kidding! Teenagers give me horrible indigestion. It’s all the sports drinks and garlicky pizza they eat. And besides, his neck is for the Nibblet to nibble on, not the bloody chaperone.”

Buffy slams the door. He hears Dawn query, “You don’t think he’d really…?”

“He’s just messing with us like he always does, Dawnie. Don’t pay any attention to him. It’ll only encourage him.”

Spike smiles as he swaggers over to the door. The doorbell rings once more before he can answer. “Eager little bugger, idn’t he?” Spike mutters.

And when he opens the door, suddenly he understands why this is a big deal.

There he stands, a hair short of being six feet, embracing his budding masculinity with a splash of Polo and a rash of red bumps running down his long, thin neck, signaling that some kind of shaving had been attempted that evening. His hair, just as Dawn said, tickles his incongruously long lashes. His shirt fits across his chest very well and Spike can define his muscular, sporty build and envy gouges Spike’s thoughts. His belted khakis hang right at his waist and almost appear to have been tailored. On his feet are a pair of sensible loafers that look new. He stands quite still in his awkwardness and when he finally speaks, his voice is strongly, decidedly male with just a hint of a boyish squeak.

“I’m sorry, I think I have the wrong apartment. I’m looking for Dawn Summers.”

Spike continues to stare. He has been staring for a while. When he tries to speak, there is a boyish squeak in his voice. “Yeah. You’ve got the right place.”

“Good. For a minute there I was worried.” He extends his hand. “I’m Travis Singleton.”

Spike takes his hand and gives it one good pump before releasing it, continuing to stare.

“And…you are?” the boy asks.

“Oh. Sorry. I’m Spike.”

“Oh, I’ve heard Dawn talk about you. You’re Buffy’s boyfriend, right?”

“Right,” he says.

Travis rocks on his heels. “Can I come in?”

“Oh, yeah. Come in. The girls are just finishing up their preening. They’ll be out in a bit.”

The young man enters the apartment, looking around shyly, secretly gathering opinions about the decorations. His eyes scale the walls, momentarily snared by the Aztec sun that beams over the mantle. He then looks at the arrangement of photographs on the in table by the sofa. Buffy’s mother smiles brightly over vacation snaps of her two daughters. Buffy and Dawn at Fisherman’s Warf, Buffy and Dawn in Death Valley, Buffy and Dawn at Sea World. And then one not of the two girls, but of just the older one, being held close by the strangely silent, pale man in black who continues to bore holes into him as he walks about.

“You, uh, you live here?” Travis asks.

“Yeah.”

“I’ve never been to these apartments before. They’re kind of…small,” he says, bordering on being smug.

“Room enough for the Little Bi—I mean, Dawn, Buffy and myself.”

Travis nods. “My parents bought this huge house over on Summit. It’s a fixer upper and they’ve been tearing it up since we moved it. I was still living out of boxes up until, like, two months ago.”

Spike has nothing to say to this. He supposes he could say something like, “Well, two months ago I was living in a rather stylish crypt in the cemetery and I slept on a concrete slab. But the Slayer took me away from all that.”

“It’s really cool, though. Really old. Really…old and big,” Travis continues.

Spike nods. “You may as well have a seat. The girls may be a while.”

Travis sits on the sofa, exhaling a frustrated breath and picking off lint from his pressed chinos. Spike sits opposite him, slinging his leg over his knee, fixing the young suitor with a probing gaze. Travis smiles nervously, averting his eyes, sweeping the hair out of his face, only to have it fall back to where it was before.

“That’s a nice rug,” Travis says.

Spike thinks at first the young man is making a crack about his hair, but then he sees that he’s pointing at the floor. “Used to be at Buffy’s old house.”

“Dawn told me she used to live on Revello Drive. My parents almost bought a house there. We could have been neighbors.”

“How sweet,” Spike demurs.

“My parents say the Real Estate values in this town are off the hook. They couldn’t believe they were able to close on a house that big for less than 1 mil.”

“I’m sure I wouldn’t know.” The rent at the crypt was free. You live cheap when your roommate is a decomposed corpse.

Finally the door at the end of the hall opens. Buffy struts out first, almost tiptoeing, popping her curiosity-laden face into the room.

Travis raises himself quickly, looking relieved that someone else has joined the room.

“Hi. Travis? I’m Buffy,” she says with a smile lighting her face as she takes his hand.

“Nice to meet you. Dawn’s told me a lot about you.”

“Oh, so you already know I’m a controlling wench who can’t cook and hates housekeeping.”

“Nah. Nothing like that.”

“Ah. I see Dawn’s hair isn’t the only brown thing about her,” Buffy says gleefully as she plops herself on the arm of Spike’s chair. “So, have you guys been getting to know each other?” she says, wrapping her arms around Spike and pulling him close, noting that he seems unusually stiff.

“Yeah,” Travis says, swallowing hard.

He’s an all right kid, Buffy. Did you know he lives in a really big house? Spike wants to say.

The door at the end of the hall opens again. All eyes turn as Dawn makes her way slowly into the room, wearing a pair of dark denim hipsters, a pink, navel-baring tee-shirt with rhinestone studs spelling out “Cutie.” Her glossy hair shines in the light. Her face is aglow as well, sparkling with a dash of glittery make-up. Her lips are painted pink. It’s the first time Spike has seen her wear lip-gloss.

The reviews are in. Dawn’s suitor is pleased. His face breaks out into an idiotic smile. “Wow. You look great.”

“Thanks,” she says, in a voice that sounds different from her usual girlish gab.

She takes her place on the love seat and Travis sits down beside her as well, still staring her up and down with that awe-struck look on his partially fringe-hidden face.

“So, Travis. Dawn’s been kind of sketchy about you. She told me you just moved her a little while ago.”

“Yeah, my Dad got transferred. He’s a chemist for Roache Industries.”

“Cool!” Buffy enthuses.

“Right now he’s working on a new drug that’s supposed to combat white blood cell destruction in cancer patients. If the FDA approves it, it could save a lot of lives.”

“That is so neat! Wow, to be in on something like that. That is really amazing.”

Spike has completely withdrawn from the conversation. He sits, still staring ahead, his jaw set, his hand perched on his knee. Buffy is sitting upright now on the arm of the chair, bubbling over with enthusiasm for new cancer drugs, new Sunnydalites, new presence of manhood in the apartment. Spike can’t take his eyes off the pair on the sofa.

Tonight this young man is going to whisk Dawn off into the night and take her to a darkened cinema. Well, he really won’t be whisking her off. I’ll be their chauffeur. But when I drop them off, they’ll go, hand-in-sweaty-palmed-hand, off into the night. They’ll wait for their tickets, go inside, walk through the maze of different screening rooms until they find the one showing the latest teen hormone fest. They’ll sit down, maybe have a bucket of popcorn between them that they’ll nibble at while shyly passing glances at each other in the dark. The conversation will be light, giggly…all about school and Friends and…bleedin’ Carson Daly. The house lights will go down. The screen will brighten with the light of the rear projector. The opening credits will roll. “Freddie Prinze, Jr. and Jennifer Love Hewitt in… Hooter Summer. They’ll laugh together at the insipid breast jokes. The Nibblet will swoon every time Freddie tells Jennifer that she has beautiful eyes. Things will get a tad awkward when Freddie goes to second base with Jennifer in the front seat of his Daddy’s Buick Century. The Nibblet will find her gentleman caller’s arm wrapped tight round her shoulder. She’ll act as though she doesn’t notice, but before long she can’t help but notice because he’ll be groping her with that eager, adolescent hand that acts on hormone responses only. He’ll have his hand on that tight, pink tee shirt, fingering the rhinestones, tracing the line of her bra, trying to find her precious pink little nipple…

Spike hears an unmistakable growl. It’s coming from…him!

Panic ensues when he realizes his tongue is presently being impaled by a rapidly growing incisor.

Oh, God…I’m vamping out! Quick! Gotta stop it…somehow…think! Think of…Buffy. Buffy’s arm, Buffy’s hair, Buffy’s sweet smile, Buffy’s nose, Buffy’s ears, Buffy’s mouth, Buffy’s tongue, Buffy’s tongue as it dives into my mouth one more time. Buffy’s legs…Buffy’s legs as the drape over my shoulders while I’m poundin’ into her on the kitchen table. Buffy’s hot, wet, center that burns around me as I continue to thrust. Buffy’s breasts bouncing up and down in front of me…Oh, God. Now I’m not only vamping out, I’m horny as hell.

Buffy is laughing at something as she lightly touches Spike on the shoulder. All at once, at the feel of her hand, the incisor turns blunt and the emergency is over.

“The same thing happened to us not too long ago. Remember, Spike?” Buffy asks a clueless Spike.

“What, now?” he asks.

“At the Bronze, remember? That thing with the thing? And the girl?”

“Come again?”

Buffy eyes him curiously and leans into him. In a whisper she says, “Are you OK?”

“No. Just keep touching me and I’ll be all right, I think.”

Buffy draws her head back as though trying to observe him from a distance to see what is really going on.

“Keep touching me! Keep touching me!” he urges through gritted teeth.

Buffy obliges, alternately stroking his shoulder and patting his back.

Travis looks at his watch. “We’d better get going if we’re going to catch the movie.”

“Yeah, we should,” Dawn concurs.

“All right, well I think Spike’s car is just out front,” Buffy says. “Spike will drop you off—

“You’re coming too, aren’t you?” Spike says, grabbing her hand.

The desperation in Spike’s grasp takes Buffy completely off guard. “Yeah. If you want.”

“I want. Believe me. And so do you.”

Buffy raises an eyebrow, now truly perplexed at her boyfriend’s skittish behavior. But she says nothing.

“You’re going to love the DeSoto. It’s way old and so cool,” Dawn enthuses to her date.

“You drive a DeSoto?” Travis asks Spike.

Spike, afraid to open his mouth in fear that another growl will escape, nods his head rapidly.

“Cool! Do you collect old cars or something?”

Spike shakes his head and holds up his index finger to indicate “one.”

“Ooookay,” Travis says warily.

After the young couple leaves the apartment, Buffy draws Spike aside.

“What’s going on?”

“I’ll tell you later,” she says, making sure that his hand is secure in hers.

The rumbling DeSoto pulls up to the curb of the cinema just as a rather serpentine line is forming outside the box office.

“Looks like we got here just in time,” Dawn says.

“Yeah, you guys better claim your place in line,” Buffy says.

“Bye, Buffy,” Dawn says, leaning over the front seat to whisper in her sister’s ear, “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

“I know,” Buffy says. “What time should we be back? About ten-ish?”

Dawn and Travis mentally quiz each other before both agreeing on 10:15.

As soon as the eager pair leaves the car, Buffy turns to Spike. “Now would you mind telling me what’s going on?”

He exhales a long-held burst of unneeded breath. “I wish I knew. I was sitting there in our apartment and all the sudden I thought I was going to show everyone what makes Spike just a tad different from all the other blokes about town.”

“You were going to vamp?”

“I thought I was. I don’t know why. I just started thinking of Dawn being alone with this…living statue to maturing male sexuality and I…I don’t know…”

“Aw, honey. It’s that protective instinct of yours. You can turn it off tonight. Travis is a gentleman. I can tell.”

“Begging your pardon, Slayer, but historically, you haven’t had the keenest sense when it comes to sorting out the gits from the gents.”

“OK, what is it about him that you don’t like?”

“He’s arrogant, for one. Materialistic. A bit too muscular. And you can tell he spends far too much time on his hair.”

Buffy breaks into a raucous laugh. “You could be describing yourself there, bleach boy,” she says, driving her finger into his rock-hard stomach. “Maybe that’s why she likes him. Could be he reminds her a little of you.”

“Gaaaaa! Buffy! Had I still a gag reflex, I’d be steam cleanin’ blood out of the upholstery in here for weeks.”

Spike shifts gears and pulls the car away from the curb. As the car merges into traffic, he turns his head to peer out Buffy’s open window to see Dawn and Travis standing in line, chatting it up, laughing excitedly. Once he can’t see them anymore, he stares straight ahead, pensively. He reaches into his pockets, fumbling for his cigarettes. They are not in the front pockets, or in the interior ones either.

“You left them at the apartment,” Buffy says.

“Oh, bugger all!” he mutters.

He begins rubbing the nail of his thumb with the tip of his index finger. He clears his throat a few times and runs his hands through his hair, fidgeting like a two year old in a stroller. As he continues to drive, barely a word is said between them until they are just about to begin their approach to Sunnydale Heights.

“I’m more OK with this than I thought I would be,” Buffy says finally.

“I’m not,” Spike says darkly.

That’s all too obvious.

“If anything, I’m a little jealous.”

“Hmmph! “So jailbait-in-loafers lights your fire as well, eh?”

“No! What I meant was, Dawn’s doing something I rarely do these days. We’ve been together now for almost three months and you’ve never taken me out on an anything that even resembles a date.”

“I tried to take you out on a date once, but you didn’t like the little Vamp and Jiffy-pop show goin’ on at the warehouses.”

“That wasn’t a date! That was you being desperate. I’m talking about a real date where the two of us actually pick an evening, go have a nice dinner, maybe do a little dancing, go see a movie or something. Something romantic that doesn’t have Jackie Chan or Jim Carrey in it.” She moves a little closer to him. “And then, on the way home, you could take a different route. Maybe to the outskirts of town. You can stop the car someplace secluded, maybe a cliff overlooking the city or something.” She traces the outside of his ear with her finger, initiating a little chill down his spine which she can see. “And then, you’ll turn to me and slyly say, ‘We’re out of petrol.’ And I’ll know you’re lying the Big Bad dog you are, but I’ll take it all in stride.” She latches onto his earlobe briefly with just the slightest touch of her lips. “And then we’ll find ourselves alone in the backseat, covered in the moonlight from the open windows. But that’ll be the only thing covering us.”

Spike pulls the car over to the side of the road, easing into a parking space between a large pickup truck and a Volkswagen Beetle. He lets the engine idle for a few minutes before shutting it off. In the quiet of the night, a dog barks somewhere, a clutch of throaty crickets sing a chorus of mordant tunes, and a police car sounds its high, piercing wail off in the distance. Spike continues to stare ahead, drumming his hands on the steering wheel as though waiting for an imaginary green light to come on overhead.

“What are you thinking?” she asks, huskily.

He twitches his mouth to one side. “I’m thinking that we’ve got about an hour and a half, maybe two hours until the picture lets out. So the dinner and dancing bit is probably out of the question tonight. We could turn ‘round and go see a picture ourselves, but that would make us late meeting the Nibblet and the Travesty. So, it looks like that last bit you talked about is the only thing that fits in our schedule.” He turns to her and smiles.

“So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying we’re out of petrol, pet. Better make the best of it.”

The Desoto is once again tearing down Sunnydale’s main drag, heading for the cinema. Buffy is breathlessly rearranging her clothes and checking her face in the rearview mirror, hoping the darkness will obscure the flush on her cheeks.

“Oh, God, my hair’s a mess and my panties are soaking wet,” she says disdainfully.

“Uh huh,” Spike says, his hand creeping over to her thighs.

She slaps his hand away. “Keep your hands on the wheel, Spike.”

“Sorry. Can’t get enough of that Niagara Falls that is you in full arousal, Slayer.”

“Uh, Spike?”

“Yes, love?”

“Was I wearing a bra?”

“Yeah. Maddeningly so.”

“Well, I’m not now.” She looks around in the front seat, feeling around on the floor. Finally, she flips down the sun visor. “What did you do with it?”

“I can’t remember. It took me so long to unsnap it. I don’t like those Angel bras from Victoria’s secret. And not for reasons obvious to both of us.”

She turns and flings her body over the back of the seat, peering around in the darkness for any evidence of white lace. Finding her rump so close to his head, Spike can’t resist giving it a little pat.

“Spike, this is serious! What did you do with it?”

“I told you I can’t remember! Maybe I threw it out the bloody window.”

Buffy settles back into her seat, trying to calm down. “OK. It’s all right. It’s probably on Elm Street, lying in a puddle of water or something.”

“Mmm…puddle,” he says, reaching between her thighs again.

“You’re hopeless,” she says with a smile, taking his hand in hers.

“Always.”

She leans close to him, snagging him between her arms, drawing him to her as he continues to drive. “And amazing.” She kisses the side of his face so that he can keep his eyes on the road. “Promise me something?”

“Anything.”

“Promise me that it’ll always be this good. Even when I’m eighty-five and you’re pushing 250.”

“Ooh, what a sexy granny you’ll be, pet. You’ll be my little gray panther,” he says, putting his arm around her as she snuggles against him.

The cinema is now in sight. As the Desoto pulls up to the curb, Dawn and Travis are waiting. Dawn points to her wrist with a peeved look on her face.

“God, Buffy. We’ve been waiting here for, like, ten hours.”

“Sorry, Dawnie. Spike and I were, um, were um…”

“Watching a documentary about unique American attractions in the West. Giant balls of string, the world’s oldest general store, those big replicas of Pecos Bill and his blue ball—er, bull.” Buffy pinches the underside of his arm. “Bull. I said bull, dammit!”

“Uh huh,” Dawn says knowingly, crossing her arms. She whispers something inaudible to the passengers in the front seat and she giggles with Travis in short tweets.

They know, Buffy thinks wearily.

She decides to change the subject. “So, em, how was the movie? Two thumbs up?”

“Sucked,” Dawn says. “So we just kept a count of the number of times Keanu Reeves said, ‘whoa’ and that made it kinda bearable.”

“The soundtrack was good, though. Lots of Tool and Limp Bizkit,” Travis says.

He even listens to wanker music, Spike glowers as he stares ahead.

The DeSoto makes its way to the west side of town where the houses suddenly become large, lurching and gated. Travis indicates that his house is the third one on the left. He was not lying. His house is huge. Lights beam from every window. In the front room a halogen lamp glows against a stark white wall and a woman in a kerchief studies a wallpaper sample.

“Well, here it is,” Travis says. “Home sweet home.”

“Beautiful place, Travis,” Buffy says admiringly.

“It will be. Needs a coat of paint and some furniture, but it’s nice.”

“And big,” Spike says softly, smiling in self-satisfaction.

“Well, good night, Dawn,” he says, touching her hand. “I had a nice time.”

“I did too, Travis. See you at the library on Sunday night?”

“Yeah. Mid-terms are coming.”

“Whether we’re ready or not,” Dawn says, beaming.

“Nice meeting you. Buffy. Spike,” he nods to the pair in the front seat.

“Oh, nice meeting you too, Travis. You take care.”

Dawn watches her date amble up the sidewalk to his house. All of a sudden she squeals, “Oh, my God! Travis must have stepped on a piece of toilet paper or something. He’s dragging something white on his foot!”

A sudden fear grips Buffy. And she knows instantly what it is. She slowly turns to see Travis making his way to his house with one of her unmentionables attached to the cuff of his chinos. Right as she’s about to say something, the bra disentangles itself and is left on the sidewalk to be found by the sanitation department in the morning.

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