Chapter 17:

Spike came into the diner the day of her birthday, grinning at her. She was working behind the counter instead of waitressing; she loved him to death, but her dad couldn’t understand the concept of taking a break from the diner if his life depended on it.

Hank was bussing tables; when he saw his daughter’s best friend he smiled and said, “Ah, Spike. Nice to see you. Have you eaten yet?”

Spike shook his head and came over to the counter, sitting on one of the bar tables. “You know me, I save all m’ hunger for when I come here.”

Ever the businessman, Hank whipped out his paper pad. “What’ll it be, then?”

He glanced lazily over at Buffy, his fingers playing with a cigarette. “I think the birthday girl knows what I’d like to eat.”

Generally speaking, Buffy didn’t believe in eyes gleaming—because seriously, unless a person was crying, eyes did not gleam. But just then, Spike’s eyes were glinting, and she would’ve sworn it was a wicked-evil glint.

She ducked her head to hide her blush. “Um…pastry?”

“Thanks,” he said, taking it, his fingers brushing against hers. As Hank walked away, he added, “I love this things…so soft, warm, an’ sweet…”

“You’re a pig,” she informed him matter-of-factly, smiling as she handed another customer his coffee. “A big, fat, ugly—“

“Sexy—“

“Cute pig,” she finished with a grin.

He looked offended, just as she’d known he would. “I am bloody well not cute!”

“Right.” Buffy rolled her eyes. “So, want anything other than your…pastry?”

He shook his head. “Nah. ‘m not that hungry. Could go for somethin’ sweet from my girl, though.” That last was accompanied by a very Spike-like leer.

“You are so juvenile.” She smacked him with a rag lying on the counter.

“That’s why we’re perfect together,” Spike replied, before sliding off the stool. “I gotta run—promised that demonic boss of mine I’d get there early. See you later, yeah?”

She nodded, wishing more than she’d wished anything before in her short life that she could just kiss him. It would be so easy, so sweet…

He was thinking the same thing; she could read it in him like most people would read a book. “We’ll get to that later.”

“I know.” She moved forward and kissed him on the cheek, just as she had before this whole thing had started—but this time her lips molded themselves into her skin, turning the peck into something sensual and promising.

She smiled when he looked at her with burning eyes. “See you tonight.”

~*~

The plan was for him to come around five in the evening, well after Hank and Joyce were to have left for the long, much-anticipated art showing, and well before they would come home. Spike had thought the movie plan was a good idea, and had promised to swing by the video store before he came to her house.

That left Buffy standing in the middle of her living room, wearing jeans and a tank top and feeling very, very nervous.

What if he showed up in a suit? Not that she’d really mind, because there was absolutely nothing bad about Spike in a suit, but…what if? She’d be way underdressed. And that was bad. Even if they were in her house, and they were going out, it was still bad. Plus, what if he brought a really icky movie, like War of the Worlds or something? She was so not in the mood to watch stuff blow up…

After about ten minutes she was forced to face the fact that she was kidding herself. She wasn’t nervous about her clothes or the movie. To be honest, she wasn’t really nervous about anything.

She just felt sad because it was her birthday, and none of her friends had so much as bothered to call.

It was ridiculous, really. She knew that Willow, Faith, Oz and the gang were all busy. Given that their group of friends was tiny to the point of being ridiculous, she really shouldn’t have been complaining about the lack of birthday wishes.

Except…this was the first year no one had even acknowledged it.

At four-thirty, a knock sounded on the door. She opened it, grinning to find Spike standing on the doorstep, looking sheepish.

“Would it be completely idiotic to admit that I left work early for this?”

She laughed; he had taken off his suit jacket, but he still wore the pants, shirt, and tie. “That eager to get me alone, huh?” she asked smugly.

He moved into the house and shut the door, pushing her against it in the same way he had less than a month ago, that night of their first kiss. “This answer your question?” he murmured, caressing her through her clothes.

“Mmm,” she moaned, leaning up to kiss him. “This definitely makes up for the suckiness that was my day.”

“What?” He pulled away at that, concern in her eyes. “’s your birthday, kitten. What happened?”

“Nothing, really,” she demurred, eager to turn the attention back to their movie night goodness. “It’s just…no one called or anything, that’s all. Stupid teenager stuff.”

He snorted. “You think adults grow outta that? I’d be downright hurt ‘f Xander didn’t treat me to his entire bar on my birthday.”

That made her roll her eyes. “You know you have issues, right?”

“You’d better believe it,” he said, wriggling his eyes mischievously.

She pushed him away half-heartedly, smiling almost in spite of herself. “You’re a dork.”

“And you’re adorable,” he purred, kissing her neck. “Don’t worry ‘bout your mates, yeah? Bet they’ve got a surprise planned for tomorrow, or somethin’ like that.”

“Maybe,” Buffy said doubtfully. They broke apart and moved towards the living room, his hand staying on her arm in a comforting gesture. “So, what movie did you bring?”

“I brought a few, actually.” He held up the bag he’d been carrying; in it were three or four DVDs. “All of them soppy teen flicks, so no worries on that score.”

She laughed. “I bet you loved explaining that one to the store-person.”

“Oh, of course.” Spike plopped down on the couch and grabbed an M&M from the bowl on the coffee table. “We’ve got a right nice setup here.”

Buffy grabbed The Perfect Score, which looked the least “soppy” to her, and glanced at the table. She’d laid out candy, soda, chips…anything and everything in the world that was fattening currently resided on that table. “What can I say?” she said lightly, putting the DVD in. “I like food.”

He laughed and they curled up on the couch, both staring over-intently at the opening credits. Buffy frantically tried to ignore the fact that as soon as she’d opened the door, she’d learned that coat-less suit-wearing Spike was even hotter than just plain old suit-wearing Spike…and that now that they were curled up on the couch, she really wanted to show him just how much she appreciated his hurrying.

She was also coming to realize that she probably shouldn’t have worn a tank top. It was red, and she thought it was cute, but it showed a lot of skin—skin that Spike was glancing at every other second.

It was ridiculous. They’d been together, in a secretive sort of way, for almost two weeks now. They’d done enough heavy petting and naughty talking to be completely comfortable with each other, but at the same time, they both still went nuts when a situation was even the tiniest bit sexy.

Like right now.

Almost in spite of herself, Buffy deliberately scooted closer. Her hand came to rest on his thigh.

“I could easily get used to this,” she remarked, moving her hand in circles.

He went rigid, and she’d known he would. A small, smug smile was about to make its way to her lips when she felt his fingers caressing her bare shoulder, dipping near her collarbone but never quite touching her breasts. “Likewise, Blondie,” he said lightly, keeping his eyes on the movie.

Fine, then. Two could play that game. “I mean,” she continued, “It’s just so comfortable, you know? Me, you, a movie…yummy stuff to eat…” She moved to his inner thigh, now, her fingers almost trembling as she touched him.

They’d never done this before, and it was starting to almost scare her. Not because she didn’t want to, but because once they started, she knew it would be almost impossible to stop.

In retrospect, they really should have locked the door.

Because just as his hand reached her shirt and began to slide the fabric upwards, exposing her stomach to the room, the front door flew open and the bulk of her friends and family rushed inside, screaming, “Surprise!”

Buffy and Spike both froze as everyone in the room grew silent—before Cordelia, who’d apparently been dragged there by Doyle, voiced what they were all thinking:

“Oh my God!”

~*~
 

Chapter 18:

Looking back, it probably wasn’t all that good an idea—but Buffy blurted out the first thing that came to her mind.

“It’s not illegal!”

“Well, actually—ow!” Willow made a face at Faith, who’d elbowed her in the stomach.

Never moving her gaze from the couple, Cordy backed out of the room and onto the porch. A few silence-filled minutes later, they heard a car start and leave the driveway, tires squealing.

Finally, Oz took Willow’s hand and said, “We should go.”

He, Faith, Willow, Doyle, and Jonathon all left.

Now it was just Buffy, her parents, and Spike—who was still on top of her. Buffy frantically shoved him off, straightening her shirt and standing up. He, too, stood, clearing his throat and running a hand through his hair. “Uh, I s’pose it’d be useless to say that wasn’t what it looked like…”

“Yes, it would.” Hank’s voice was cold.

“Dad—“

“No, Buffy. I trust you with him and he takes advantage of you, violating you!”

“Hank!”

The other three in the room stared at Joyce. She’d been silent the entire time, looking at the scene with a bit of a smile on her face; but that smile was gone, replaced by a look of utter fury that she directed entirely at her husband.

Still staring at him, Joyce said, “Why don’t you kids go outside. I’ll talk to your father, Buffy.”

Spike took Buffy’s hand and pulled the teen out into the kitchen and then outside. They both stayed silent; dazedly, Buffy wondered if there was anything either of them could say to make this a little less disastrous.

They were on the back porch when Spike put his mouth to Buffy’s ear. Even then, when her stomach was roiling in near-panic, the action made her shiver.

“’round front?” he asked in a low, rumbling voice.

Buffy nodded; together, they circled the house and settled outside the still-ajar front door.

“Hank, we knew this was going to happen,” Joyce reminded him. “We’d have had to be blind, deaf, and dumb not to know it.”

“But Joyce—she’s just a baby, and he’s a grown man!” Hank still sounded furious, though a note of almost-petulance had entered his voice.

“She’s seventeen now, and a whole lot more mature than most girls her age,” Joyce said firmly. “She’s old enough to make her own decisions.”

“Then why don’t we just toss her into the street?” Hank said harshly. “If she’s such an adult that she doesn’t need her parents, she ought to get the hell out of here.”

Buffy gasped—she’d known her father would have a harsh reaction, but this…this was bad.

Her companion’s hand found its way to her back and rubbed in soothing circles. Buffy leaned into him, clutching him for dear life.

“We could do that,” Joyce said sarcastically, “but then Spike would just let her live with him. Is that what you want?”

“Dammit! Joyce, you know good and fucking well that’s not what I want. Our baby girl is being violated by that sick, twisted pedophile!”

“Violated? Hank, I may be over forty, but I can tell when someone’s being violated,” Joyce said scornfully. “Your daughter was enjoying that every bit as much as Spike was.”

“Joyce—“

“Hank.” Now her mother’s voice was pure steel. Joyce had dug in her heels about this. “There is absolutely nothing harmful in their relationship, and despite what we may think will happen, we have no right to interfere. Now, you are going to go out front, tell Buffy and Spike that they can stop eavesdropping—“ the two both started guiltily—“and then we are all going to come inside and have a nice, quiet family dinner.”

Silence. Then: “Fine. But when she’s reduced to a scarred, crying mess for the rest of her life, don’t blame me.”

“And when they get married and live in bliss, you won’t get any credit for bringing them together,” Joyce said lightly. “Come on in, you two. I can see your shadows in the doorway.”

Both of them wore sheepish grins as they came inside; Buffy’s was tinted by a blush. She knew that the whole her and Spike thing had to come out sooner or later, but hearing her parents speculate about it was definitely on her list of things she did not want to hear.

Hank nodded at Spike when the younger man came inside. “Sorry about that,” he said gruffly. “But I want you to know, if you hurt her in any way…”

Spike held his gaze, and in that moment, Buffy had never felt more proud of him. Having been in his life for four years now, she knew that he wasn’t the most courageous when it came to dealing with “meet-the-parents” moments, but he looked straight at her father and didn’t flinch.

She moved closer to him. “If he hurts me in any way,” she told her father sweetly, “You’ll have trouble getting to him, on account of him being dead already.”

Both males laughed at that. “You always were violent,” Hank said, a bit of grudging affection re-entering his voice.

“Of course,” Buffy said. “Now, come on—I wanna eat. This birthday’s been enough of a suck-fest, ok?”

Now it was her father’s turn to look sheepish. “Sorry,” he muttered. “It’s just that I—“

“Food,” Buffy interrupted firmly. She pushed her father into the dining room; Spike followed behind her.

Joyce had quickly set the table for four; judging by the plastic plates and forks lying on a side table, the original intention had been more of the cake-and-music persuasion. Luckily, though, she’d also made her daughter’s favorite food.

“Wow,” Buffy remarked as she sat down, “It’s déjà vu all over again. Didn’t we do this just a few nights ago?”

Joyce threw her daughter a quelling look. “Well, we could have had a party if you hadn’t scared off all the guests,” she said, the smile on her face making the comment sting less.

Buffy pouted. “It’s not my fault. How’d I know you guys were going to make with the surprise-ey-ness right when me and my boyfriend were getting it on?”

Despite how light her tone was, her eyes darted to her father. She knew that she was baiting him by talking about her and Spike together, but she really couldn’t help herself. Sooner or later, it was going to come up, and she’d really rather deal with the ugly now than later.

To his credit, Hank just scowled blackly and took a rather overlarge bite of food.

“So, pet…when does school start again?” Spike asked in an effort to get all their minds off the display they’d just witnessed.

Buffy grimaced. It was almost time to go back to the world of bad grades and getting grounded. “Like, a week,” she said, half-pouting. “It sucks so much.”

“Well, think ‘f it this way,” he said, grinning. “The more you go to school, the less you have to go in the future.”

Buffy looked at her parents. “Okay, did that comment make sense to either of you guys?”

“Can’t say it did,” Hank said, raising an eyebrow at Spike.

“I’ll have to side with them on this one,” Joyce said, almost apologetically, to the bleached blonde.

“’s because the lot of you are rotten Yanks,” Spike teased, tickling Buffy and causing her to drop her spoon as tingles—and not just the tickle-kind—ran through her. “If you were self-respecting Brits, like m’self, then you’d see the logic.”

Just to get back at him, Buffy rubbed her foot against his leg, smiling at him. “And if you were an American,” she said, “Then maybe you wouldn’t still be wearing your hair like you think it’s 1985.”

“Low blow, pet,” he said, affecting a wounded look. “’sides—“ he captured her foot with his legs—“the way I dress is a hell of a lot better than those wankers you go to school.”

Buffy opened her mouth to refute the statement—when she realized, much to her dismay, that he was right. “Damn,” she mumbled.

“Buffy! Language!” her mother scolded her.

“What?” Buffy said, widening her eyes innocently and gesturing to her boyfriend. “Come on, mom. How can you look at him and not say a dirty word.”

As though to reinforce her words, Spike waggled his brows at her.

That made her parents laugh. “You know,” Joyce said, nudging her husband, “I’m starting to think that they deserve each other.”

“Oh, shut up,” Buffy grumbled, but inwardly she was grinning and doing cartwheels.

They were all the in the same room, with the whole huge secret out in the open, and no one’s innards were on the ground. That was definitely a good thing.

The worst was over. As she devoured the chocolate cake her mother brought out and smiled at Spike, who was watching her fondly, she tried to convince herself. The worst is over.

Then why did she still feel like she was waiting for everything to fall apart?

~*~
 

Chapter 19:

Buffy had expected for the next day at the diner to be worse than the day after Angel had opened his mouth about her and Spike, given that Cordy had seen their little display last night. That day, she’d arrived at the diner on her guard, ready for the onslaught of teenage pettiness that characterized Cordy and her friends.

It never came.

She was on edge when Spike came in around five in the evening. She was wiping tables down then, her apprehension lending her a violence she didn’t normally use on the poor wooden surfaces.

“Bloody hell,” he said when he saw her. “Rough day, sweets?”

“No!” She almost kicked the table she was currently cleaning in frustration. “In fact, my day was just about perfect. Everyone was nice, and courteous, and no one called me a slut!”

“That’s a problem?” Spike asked. She could hear that he was being careful…and for some reason, it enraged her.

“Yes!” she all but screamed, whirling to face him. “Spike, Cordelia was there last night! Faith was, too! Faith my friend so she might not babble, even if she does have a really big mouth, but we’re talking about Cordelia, Spike. The Prom Queen herself. She’s totally going to blackmail me if she hasn’t talked by now!”

Spike cocked his head at her, and Buffy resisted the urge to whack him—could he not see how urgent this was? Okay, it was kind of teen-movie-of-the-week-ish of her, but still…Cordelia with blackmail material was like Norah Jones with a microphone. Only scary, scary things could result.

“You sure ‘bout this, luv? Maybe she knows it won’t do her any good.”

“Who’s the teenager here, me or you?” Buffy demanded good-naturedly. “The Prom Queen is the biggest bitch in Sunnydale, Spike. There is no chance of her keeping this to herself.”

“Bit cynical, don’t you think?”

“Not about Cordy,” Buffy said firmly. “She’s evil, Spike.”

Her boyfriend just laughed. “Whatever you say, pet. After you’re done cleanin’ we’re going to the movies, right?”

Buffy froze. They’d made this date almost a week ago, but…”Sorry, I can’t,” she admitted, ducking her head.

Spike frowned. “What d’you mean, you can’t?”

“I kinda promised Willow that I’d go with her and Oz to the movies…she’s wicked scared of going alone,” Buffy admitted. It hadn’t been something she’d wanted to do, but her friend had been so incredibly nervous that Buffy had agreed almost before thinking twice.

“And I can’t tag along, eh?” Spike voice was dry; he knew what her answer would be.

She thought she knew what her answer was going to be, too, until it popped out of her mouth. “Sure.”

Spike blinked. “What?”

“Um…well, I think I said it was ok.” Buffy bit her lip. I guess I could tell Willow we’re gonna double-date…but it’s Spike! My ten-years-older-than-me boyfriend!

So? Another part of her shot back. He’s your boyfriend, which means that unless you decide to boink him in the middle of the theater, it’s totally okay for you to take him.

“Buffy, pet?”

“Sorry,” she apologized, coming out of her reverie to smile at him. “I was having a devil on the shoulder moment.”

“Oh, really?” He moved closer, until he was almost pressed up against her. Buffy gulped and fought hard—no, not hard!—to remember that they were in the middle of her dad’s diner. “An’ what was this devil ‘f yours sayin’?”

“He was telling me to take you to the movies, just as long as I didn’t kiss you or anything,” Buffy said perkily.

Spike’s face fell. “You coulda played along at least a little…”

“Hey, just be glad I didn’t tell you what the angel was saying. She didn’t want you to go at all,” Buffy teased, pressing up against him ever so slightly.

Spike shuddered. “Point taken. So, the movies is a date?”

“A double date,” she corrected primly. “Willow and Oz will be there.”

“Right, then,” he said, releasing her reluctantly. “Meet you there in an hour?”

She grinned at him. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

~*~

Deciding what to wear? Really not easy.

She’d been friend with Spike long enough that he’d probably seen every single article in her wardrobe before…but this whole date thing was putting new pressure on the all-too-familiar quandary of what she should wear.

Finally, she just grabbed a jean skirt and a purple top, and to hell with consequences. This whole date was so generic and—tame was the only word that came to mind—that Spike ought to be glad she was even dressing up at all.

Besides, knowing him, he’d just sit there and talk about how much he wanted to get her out of the clothes.

Lecherous old man.

But even as she thought it, Buffy was grinning. He might be a lecherous old man, but she loved him for it, just like she knew he loved her for being a pervy teenager. With them, that was just the way things worked.

Now, if she could just convince everyone else of that, life would be peachy with a side of keen.

“Buffy!” her mom yelled suddenly.

Buffy finished applying her lipgloss. “Whatever it is, I didn’t do it!” she yelled down the stairs, grinning.

“I know,” her mom replied. “Spike’s here to pick you up!”

“Crap,” Buffy muttered. She’d told him not to come get her, but had he listened? No, because his stupid, bleached, British ass never listened to anything she said.

“Butthead,” she muttered, before grabbing her purse and running down the stairs…

Into a scene straight from last night’s rerun of Cops.

“If I catch you with so much as a hand on her, they’ll be finding your body for weeks,” Hank promised.

Buffy saw Spike’s eyebrow twitch, and no wonder: Hank had picked that statement up from Buffy, who’d gotten it from Spike himself.

To Spike’s credit though, he didn’t so much as smile. “’f course, sir,” he said, sounding almost as formal as the first time he’d met her parents, back when Buffy was almost thirteen. “I’ll have her back safely.”

“Oh, come on, Dad!” Buffy cut in, whining. “It’s Spike, for God’s sake. He’s the one who taught me all that stuff to do to guys who can’t take ‘no’ for an answer, remember?”

Hank relaxed slightly at that. “I’m just nervous, is all,” he grumbled. “My baby girl, going out on a date with a guy who isn’t Angel.”

“Which, given that Angel was a cheating rat bastard, is probably a good thing,” Buffy quipped. “Come on, Dad. Spike and I are going to be late!”

Hank’s scowl didn’t lessen, but he did nod and say, “You kids have fun, then.”

Joyce smiled at them both almost benevolently. “Have a nice night, Buffy.”

“I will. We both will. Nice, innocent night—bye guys!”

When they finally left the house, Spike rubbed his arm, wincing. “Think you just yanked my arm out ‘f it’s socket,” he complained.

“Yeah, well, small price to pay if it got us out of the house,” Buffy shot back.

He got into the driver’s seat. “So you say. It’s not your arm. ‘sides, if I get injured, who’s gonna drive?”

Buffy just grinned at him.

He affected a horrified face. “Oh, no. There is no sodding way ‘m gonna let you drive. You’re a bloody menace!”

“Oh, please.” She pouted. “You didn’t think I was a menace yesterday, when we—“

“That had nothing to do with driving.”

“So did!” Buffy protested. “What was that you said about steering around all the corners? And—“

“You have a nasty, dirty mind.” One of his hands came off the wheel to whack her on the head; but as soon as it connected with her hair he settled for stroking it and then rubbing her mostly bare shoulders.

“Said the guy who’s just itching to feel me up,” Buffy shot back.

“Bitch.”

“Pinhead.”

“Slut.”

“Pig.”

“And the award for originality goes to…”

“The girl who will totally not let you make out with her in the dark back of the movie theater if you don’t shut up,” Buffy said with a tiny smirk of her own.

Spike groaned but was silent; settling back in the seat, Buffy smiled, proud to have won another argument.

They arrived at the movie theater to find Willow and Oz already waiting for them. Buffy sent Willow an apologetic look. “Parents,” she said by way of explanation. Willow nodded and whispered a question; Buffy giggled and whispered back.

Oz had spent the few minutes since the couples had met sizing Spike up. Now he nodded at the older man and said, “Hey.”

Spike had been versed in Oz-speak by Buffy, so he just nodded back. “’lo.”

“Guess we’d better get into the movie.” Oz tapped his girlfriend on the shoulder. “Willow.”

“Time to go in?” Willow elbowed Buffy with a conspiratorial smile. “They want to get us seats in the back, where we can make out, and laugh at all the little preteens.”

Buffy smiled back, then turned her eyes to Spike…who, for reasons he preferred not to examine, given that he liked his delusions of masculine superiority, gulped. “See, even Willow’s getting into the naughty feelings,” she teased. “What about you?”

“If you’d come a little closer,” he all but growled back, “’d show you just how naughty I was feelin’.”

“But it’s not dark enough,” she pouted. “I can’t let everyone see you corrupt me, Mr. Kingston!”

He all but laughed at the absurdity of that statement. “Kitten, you were born with all sort of dirty thoughts in that head of yours,” he teased as they began to head towards the theater where their movie would be shown.

“Yep—and gimme a few minutes, and I’ll put my head to use.”

That last comment had Spike all but chasing after her.

~*~
 

Chapter 20:

Willow and Oz chose seats on the left back side, so Buffy and Spike chose seats on the right. When they were going to be making with the naughty, they didn’t really want to be close to each other.

As soon as the previews began, though, Spike felt Buffy yank on his hand. He glanced over at her—she grinned widely and nodded towards the aisle.

He shook his head, not understanding, as she began to tug him into the aisle. Crazy bint must’ve never made out in a movie theater before, he thought. He probably should’ve been annoyed at her antics, but all he felt was satisfied that she’d never done the nasty in the theater with that ponce Angel.

But now she was pulling on him hard, and he really was starting to feel less than happy with her. Finally he got up and allowed her to lead him up the aisle and to the theater doors. Like most theaters, a short hallway led from the door to the lit-up aisles; she pulled him till they were just a few feet from the door, and thus in heavy darkness.

“Buffy,” he whispered, his voice a hiss in the smothering blackness, “What the hell are you doing? I thought you wanted to—“

“I got horny,” she informed him in a breathless little voice that had his already hardening length swelling against his zipper. “And then I thought, what are the chances of us ever being able to do anything other than kissing in the seats without getting caught?”

She had a good point, but…”Buffy, this is a foolish—“

He was cut off by her lips attacking his.

And it was definitely attacking. She was ten years younger than he and didn’t have near the experience he did, but God, that girl could kiss. She’d pushed him against the wall, her hands firm on his chest, her lips firm against his and her tongue demanding entrance.

He granted it and reciprocated, his tongue dancing with hers, pulling her inside his mouth and stroking her tongue with his own. Buffy moaned quietly, and when he turned them so that she was pressed against the wall, she didn’t object.

It was insane on more levels than Spike could count, but he savored every second they stood there, mouths locked together, risking discovery every second they remained. He’d thrown in the figurative towel the second they’d been caught a week ago, but he rather suspected that whispered rumors were a world apart from full-blown evidence that he and Buffy were together and getting physical on a regular basis. Keeping that in mind, Spike prepared himself to pull back from her soft warmth.

Then she did the bit where she wriggled her hips and moaned into his mouth, and he was lost in her again.

He was hard and ready to go, and even though he knew that there would be no going of that sort, he couldn’t help but slip a hand beneath that tiny purple top and feel the smooth skin beneath it.

Even her stomach was perfect—curved every so slightly, smooth, and soft as silk. It shuddered under his touch, making him smile into her lips as he thrust his hips towards hers, pinning her more firmly against the wall.

“You like that, kitten?” he asked, stroking her stomach in tandem with the strokes of his tongue. “My hands…all over you…” he slipped a hand behind her, squeezing her bottom; she gasped and, to his delight, thrust back at him.

“Please…” she whispered, the pleading sound lost almost as soon as it left her lips.

Spike allowed his hand to travel upward, nearly trembling with the desire to just cup her, knead her, until she was gasping and putty in his hands—but he curbed his desire, sliding around the underside of her breasts, up to her collarbone—pausing for a moment where he could feel her heart beat—and then going down again, until his fingers rested, ever so lightly, on her right breast.

In the theater, the yuks had started. The audience was laughing at the actors’ innocent, PG-13 rated antics. Somehow, knowing that innocent fun was being had just feet from them made the whole adventure that much better.

She shoved herself into him. “Touch me, Spike,” she ordered, her breathy voice strangely commanding. “I need you now.”

He kissed her again, his lips teasing. “Are you sure about that?” he asked with mock innocence, catching her already hard nipple in between two long fingers. “It’s dirty, you know…lettin’ me take advantage ‘f you in the movie theater…”

She growled. He almost laughed with delight when he heard it—and then shuddered in desire. Her hot little mouth with its straight white teeth and lush lips, going down on him…sliding over his dick, swallowing around him—

Shit.

He palmed her roughly now, rolling her nipple and grinding into her with a rhythm that had them both gasping.

“Dirty girl, aren’t you?” he gasped, still in a whisper. Her face was illuminated now, very softly, by the flickering light coming from the huge movie screen. She was smirking at him.

“I am dirty,” she told him, reaching down and brushing her fingers against his painful erection. Lightning shot through him—he moaned and closed his eyes, almost overcome by sensation.

“I’m very dirty,” she continued. Her other hand left his neck, where it had been tangled in the soft hair there, and traveled downward to his hand on her breast. Spike watched incredulously as she began to move her own fingers around his, tweaking her nipple, licking her finger and tracing it around the edge…

Christ. ‘f his dick jumped any more, they were going to have a problem.

She smiled at him kittenishly. “Look, Spike,” she said, her voice deceptively innocent, as she cupped her breast. “It’s all wet.”

Her nipple glimmered in the light. Jesus. Fuck. “Buffy, ‘f you wanna get screwed right up ‘gainst this wall, then keep going.”

Her eyes glimmered at him. “But you know what’s wetter than my nipple?” she asked, her voice at the barest whisper. “My cunt. It’s dripping, Spike.” Abruptly she removed her hand from his dick. He almost whimpered at the loss…until she slid a hand into her jeans.

He watched them move as she clearly inserted her fingers inside herself, then moved his gaze to her face. God, she was beautiful. Even in the midst of fooling around that was beyond illegal—and not just because it was in a public place—she was an angel, pure and clean.

When she removed her finger, however, it was not. It shone blue and sticky in the light from the screen.

“Wanna taste?” she asking girlishly, batting her eyelashes.

“God yes,” he growled, and grabbed the digit, sucking it into his mouth.

Ahh…his eyes rolled up. They’d done stuff like this in the past week, but nothing quite this intense. Tasting her was heaven. “Fuck, luv,” he whispered, the obscenity an endearment as it rolled off his tongue. “You’re so damn—“

“I’m sorry, am I interrupting something?”

A few seconds later, if you’d asked Spike, he would have said that the whole levitation bit was a bunch of bullshit…right before he ripped your head off for interrupting the two of them. But when he heard Robin Wood, Principal of Sunnydale Elementary, speak behind him, he jumped about two feet in the air.

He hastily shoved Buffy’s shirt down and jumped away from her. Too late he realized that he had her juices still on his lips; he hurriedly wiped them away before opening his mouth to tell the principal to sod off and go teach some impressionable little kiddies.

“Uh—uh—y’see, mate—um….”

Sodding, buggering--! He was turning into William!

He’d pretty much given the whole thing up for lost and resigned himself to life in jail when he heard Buffy speak behind him. “Principal Wood! Hi! Are you looking for Faith?”

Wood’s eyes left Buffy’s top, which only covered about half her stomach and was just about as helter-skelter as it could be and still count as a shirt, and met her eyes. “Well, actually, I was just—“

“Faith told me all about you guys.” Spike watched in wonder as his girl linked her arm through his and batted her eyes at the suddenly nervous-looking principal. “You guys are really close, aren’t you?”

“Um…” He was black and the room was dark, but Spike could’ve sworn he actually saw Wood blushing.

The blonde smirked. “Best get a move on then, mate.”

“Right. I’ll just be—going now.” Wood turned around and hastily exited.

Spike and Buffy both let out breaths they hadn’t known they’d been holding. They’d survived getting caught a second time in a much less innocent position. Spike, for one, was ready to die from relief.

He couldn’t love his girl from prison, not properly.

Then their eyes met—and the tension in the mini-hall evaporated as they both burst into laughter, leaning against each other for support as tears ran down their eyes.

“Did you see the look on his face?” Buffy gasped, giggles bursting through her.

“An’ how he started blushin’ when you mentioned Faith?” Spike chuckled. “Pet, that was downright amazin’.”

A sly smile came over Buffy’s lips, and she stood on tiptoe to kiss him deeply.

“You are, too.”

~*~
 

Chapter 21:

~*~

School. Worse, high school. Hell on earth didn’t even begin to describe the place…

And now it was time to go back.

Granted, she was a junior this year, so she was all with the upperclassmen power. But still—if she was looking forward to it any less, she might start to consider running away and getting a job in Los Angeles, or something equally dumb.

Despite his teasing her about it, Spike had offered to drive her the first day. She couldn’t refuse, even though walking would be just as easy. She’d begged him to drive her on her first day of high school two years ago, and somehow, it had become a tradition.

When he looked at her, his grey-blue eyes wide and hopeful, she didn’t think there was anything she could refuse him.

“Is it immature to admit that I’m scared?” Buffy asked, staring out of the Desoto at the all-too-familiar high school in front of her.

“Nah. You had a big summer.” Spike grinned at her slyly. “Hookin’ up with sexy older men and all that.”

“Careful, you’re venturing into poofter territory,” she joked, grinning at him when she used his phrase. “Sexy older men? What, do you have a crush on that Aragorn guy now?”

Spike arched an eyebrow at her. “Very funny. Be out here at three sharp, yeah?”

“Controlling.”

“Brat.”

Buffy smiled at him brilliantly. “Bye!” she said, and flounced off.

Spike watched her leave, torn between eyeing her ass and laughing at her antics. When she disappeared inside the building, he drove off.

~*~

Buffy was looking around intently for Willow and Faith. Since she’d tolerated Spike taking her to school, she was a good ten minutes early—plenty of time to talk about schedules and groan over the awfulness that was Sunnydale High School.

So she was very surprised when she didn’t find either of them. Usually they all met right at the entrance—it was a tradition they’d started in ninth grade and had kept every since, but this time, her friends were conspicuously absent.

“Crap,” she muttered. Ten minutes was not long enough to hunt through the school for the two girls.

“Damn, B, who died?”

Buffy whirled around, relief flooding her. “Oh, thank God.”

“Um…why are we thanking him?” Willow asked, looking confused.

“You guys weren’t here,” Buffy explained. I thought maybe something had happened, or…” She trailed off at the incredulous look both her friends gave her. “Sorry. I guess the whole Spike thing’s made me a little paranoid.”

Faith nodded. “Dating old guys can do that to ya,” she said with authority. “By the way, what the hell did you do to Robin? He’s been limp as a noodle since that day he saw you guys at the theater.”

“TMI, Faith!” Willow exclaimed, wrinkling her nose with distaste.

Buffy laughed. “Aren’t we just so mature? We’re juniors and we’re acting about as mature as a bunch of kindergarteners.”

“So? We’re upperclassmen, we can do shit like that.” Faith grinned. “Hey, I got an idea. Let’s go terrorize the freshman down in the caf.”

“Faith!”

But their friend was already heading towards the cafeteria where all the school’s freshmen traditionally congregated. Laughing, Buffy and Willow hurried to catch up.

~*~

“She’s just…fresh, y’know? Like springtime.”

Anya gave him a level look. “That is the sappiest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

Spike grinned. He knew he probably looked like an utter ponce—hell, he definitely sounded like one—but he couldn’t help himself. “’s wonderful, isn’t it?”

“It’s disgusting,” Anya said flatly. “How are you supposed to make me money when you’re completely lovesick?”

“Said the woman who spent all ‘f yesterday giving the whelp a good sending off,” Spike shot back.

“Xander’s going to Cancun, Spike. It’s my duty as his girlfriend to make him so lust-addled that he won’t want to have orgasms with anyone else.”

“That’s sodding disgusting, d’you know?”

“Shut up and work on the Nike ad,” Anya ordered, but she was smiling. “I have to go have phone sex with Xander.”

Spike winced as his friend-slash-boss-slash-Woman Who Lived To Bugger Him Up walked away. The bird had some definite issues as far as givin’ out too much information went. Hearing her talk, you’d think she was the slutty, minimum wage type, but the truth was that Anya’s Ads earned millions of dollars a year and employed what sometimes seemed like half of Sunnydale, himself included.

Although, he thought smugly, he was a bit more special than the other employees. Being a childhood friend had its perks.

He knew she was tired of his constant prattling about Buffy, but how could he help himself? She was his, and he could finally tell people. That alone was enough to make him addled. Add that to the fact that their dates were becoming increasingly amorous and, well…

Spike Jr. was enjoying this relationship, too, and he wanted to tell the world.

Right now, though, he had work. Slip up on the job and Anya’ll fire me straight off…money-hungry bint. He opened the Nike portfolio and started inspecting the ideas his team had laid out for him at their meeting yesterday.

One of them wanted to advertise the bathing suits in a rather unorthodox way. Instead of having the girl swimming, she’d be standing under a waterfall, her hair wet and droplets clinging to her skin from the mist.

He looked at the photo and thought of Buffy.

Grimacing, he wrote on the paper, “Every guy’s wet dream, but have you forgotten that Nike wanted something empowering?”

His morning wore on slowly as he decided on projects, delegated tasks, and shuffled the papers at his desk. He almost wished that he was still low enough on the totem pole to be able to do the actual advertisement…but then, the low men didn’t get paid half as much as he did.

If he was gonna pull off what he had planned for his girl’s eighteenth birthday, he was going to need some cash.

Granted, that was a year away. Spike briefly allowed himself to think that far ahead—to dream of the day when they’d finally be able to cement their relationship, to imagine that she wouldn’t have tired of him by then.

He loved her and she knew it, but was that enough to keep her?

Buffy loved freedom. God knows he’d heard enough ‘bout her rows with her mum to know that. How would she feel about being tied down to a man she couldn’t even hold hands with in public?

Fucking rules. If he was a woman—well, for one, Buffy would be a lesbian, and wasn’t that a pretty thought? But Anya was living proof that if their genders would be reversed, then everything would be right as bleeding rain. A seventeen-year-old boy dating a woman ten years older than he would just get called lucky, and no way in hell would the woman be called a pedophile…unlike Spike, who’d had that word written on a sheet of paper tucked into his windshield. He’d found it a few days ago when he was out with Buffy, but luckily he’d managed to tuck it away before she found it.

She was under the impression that no one but her family and that Cordelia bird knew about them. Who was he to shatter that idea?

“Spike!” Anya called from her office. “Putting your head in your hands isn’t going to make me any money! Well, unless you’re naked,” she added as an afterthought. “Then I guess I could take pictures and sell them. If the angle was right I could even make it look like you were sucking yours—“

“I get the point, Ayn!” Spike cut in quickly. “How ‘bout I go talk to Arty, yeah?”

He made his escape before Anya could decide he needed more money-making motivation. Woman’s a menace. A bug-shagging crazy menace.

But at least, he thought as he went to find something to get Anya off his case, she made things interesting. He liked that in a woman.

Damn, Buffy, I wish you were here.

~*~

Buffy scowled at the boy in front of her. Damn, Spike, I wish you were here. “If you ever touch my ass again, you’ll draw back a bloody stump. Are we clear?” she snapped waspishly.

“Jesus! I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t know you were such a frigid bitch.”

Buffy heard gasps around her, and to her disgust, she actually heard someone say, “Oh no he did not!” Why did she bother to go to high school, again?

But the guy wasn’t done. “I guess I’d have to be a fucking old dude to get a piece of your ass,” he sneered, leering at her.

The world spun, then froze. Buffy found herself staring at Percy, completely at a loss for words. “How—how did you—“

A delicately manicured hand suddenly appeared on Percy’s shoulder. But hands don’t just appear, Buffy thought, her brain still numb with shock.

The hand lead to an arm, which led to a shoulder, then a neck, and then a face.

“Well, well, well,” Harmony Kendall said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “If it isn’t our resident hooker!”

Out of the corner of her eye, Buffy saw Faith approach. The brunette looked mad as hell.

An image of the Principal’s office suddenly flashed before Buffy’s eyes. Oh, shit, she had time to think—

And then Faith arrived and dealt Harmony a blow square to her nose.

~*~
 

Chapter 22:

~*~

High school fights were one of the strangest phenomena the world had to offer. High schoolers were never all that civilized, but when a fight broke out—especially if it was a fight between a bunch of girls—everyone in the school would trample each other to get to the scene on time. It was, Buffy thought, ridiculous. Generally she tried to be as far away as possible.

But that was kind of hard to do when you were right in the middle of it.

Percy had slapped Faith for hitting Harmony, and Buffy’s friend was currently doing her best to unman the burly football player. Harmony herself had chosen to attack Buffy…although to be honest, it was less of an attack and more of the kind of clawing Buffy would have expected from a particularly bitter cat.

“Can we stop?” Buffy asked conversationally. “Because seriously, I’d like to not get expelled because you were having a bitch attack.”

“You should’ve thought of that before you, like, broke my poor little Angel-poo’s heart!”

“Yeah, about that,” Buffy said sarcastically. “Tell your precious Angel-poo that he deserves you. Actually—“ she batted Harmony’s hand away—“I’ll tell him myself. Where is he?”

Harmony smirked. It was an unsettling expression, because it meant she’d been thinking—not such a good thing, when it was Harmony.

“Angel’s off making sure your boyfriend can, like, never make it across town again,” she said smugly.

“Huh?” Wonderful. Now I sound like a dunce in front of Harmony. What’s next, pigs growing wings?

“Fliers, Buffy. He’s putting up fliers.”

For a second, Buffy was torn between hysterical laughter—because honestly, fliers?—and pure, unadulterated fury. Unfortunately for Harmony, the fury won out. “You stupid, conceited, jealous little bitch!” And with that invective, Buffy launched herself at Harmony.

It wasn’t much of a fight, really. Spike had long since taught her how to defend herself, and as the local waitress/Girl Who Gets Made Fun Of, she’d been in quite a few scuffles. Harmony, on the other hand, apparently thought that defending herself amounted to squealing and holding her hands up to her face. It was less than a minute before Harmony was sobbing and holding one hand to her black eye, and Buffy was above her, gasping with anger, a few scratch marks the only evidence that Harmony had even tried to fight back.

“Apologize,” she gritted, grabbing Harmony’s wrists in a cruel grip and wrenching them away from the girl’s face.

“I—I’m sorry!” she squeaked. Looking down at the frightened girl, Buffy sighed; this whole intimidation thing was really no fun when the person she was intimidating was such a wimp.

“Fine,” Buffy said, sitting back on her heels and letting Harmony up. “But if you ever pull this kind of crap again, I’ll—“

She never had time to finish her sentence, because Harmony jumped at her, face twisted into a rather crazy-looking snarl.

Buffy rolled her eyes, grabbed the girl’s shirt, cocked her fist, and dealt her a carefully placed blow to the temple. Harmony crumpled, falling to the ground like an extremely ungraceful sack of flour.

Now that the Bimbo Baddie had been taken care of, Buffy’s attention expanded to the action occurring around her, including Faith and Percy. The four of them—Faith, Percy, Harmony, and Buffy—were surrounded by students, most of whom had their attention firmly fixed on the brunette and her opponent.

“Fight! Fight!” they cheered. Luckily, Buffy didn’t recognize anyone she knew—although the idea of Oz screaming Fight! was enough to bring a smile to her face.

“Gonna help me out, B?” Faith asked, jerking back to stop Percy from hitting her. “Apparently skanky’s boy hasn’t heard about not hitting girls.”

Buffy grinned. She wasn’t as openly violent as Faith, but fights were fun, and she was still plenty mad enough. “Of course,” she replied, and jumped into the fray.

She and Faith came at Percy at the same time, but from different directions. Buffy kicked the back of his knees and Faith kneed him in the balls. He doubled over in pain from both sides, and with identical grins, the two girl’s fists met his face. When he didn’t go down, they hit again. Buffy’s fist found his nose, and she heard the satisfying crunch of bone.

“Woo-hoo!” Faith yelled—and that was when they realized that the crowd had gone silent.

“Miss Lehane,” said a cold voice, “and Miss Summers. Why am I not surprised?”

Buffy’s head snapped up, her eyes confirming what her sinking heart had already concluded: Principal Snyder had arrived.

“And beating up on one of our school’s prized students, as though your ordinary activities weren’t enough of a blight upon Sunnydale High School,” Snyder continued. “Well, well. I smell some discipline in the air!”

“Ooh, kinky,” Faith muttered under her breath. Buffy glared at the other girl.

Snyder moved his glare to Faith. “I assure you, Miss Lehane, that two months of detention starting today is not kinky. If I find you two miscreants fighting again, I’ll take great pleasure in expelling you. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Buffy said quickly, smiling at Snyder and willing Faith to keep her mouth shut.

Snyder glared at her. “Stop smiling,” he ordered. “And what are you little deviants staring at?” he demanded, his eyes sweeping the crowd of students. “Get to class!”

Everyone hurried off, averting their eyes from Snyder and chattering in excited but low voices. Snyder coldly directed them to help the two fallen students to the nurses office. He sent them off with a cold threat to behave “or believe me, I’ll make juvie look like a walk in the park for you two.”

They walked off silently, not even daring to look at each other while they knew Snyder was watching. As soon as they were sure he was out of earshot, they glanced at one another…and burst into laughter.

“Did you see his face?” Buffy gasped. “Priceless!”

“Can’t believe that fucktard didn’t suspend us,” Faith agreed, laughing. “We totally kicked his star player’s ass, and he didn’t do a thing. Well, except for detention, and that ain’t shit.”

Buffy blinked at her, all traces of laughter suddenly gone. A sense of foreboding suddenly came over her. “That’s right,” she said slowly, “he didn’t do anything.”

“What, is that bad? We got away with it, B!”

“He gave Willow detention. For sneezing!”

“So? We got detention,” Faith said, still stubbornly refusing to see the point.

Buffy barely refrained from rolling her eyes. This was the part of being friends with Faith that drove her up the wall; the girl just plain couldn’t see the obvious. “Faith, he should’ve tried to expel us. He’s tried it before!”

Now it was Faith’s turn to look unsettled. “So, why didn’t he? Think he’s got somethin’ else planned?”

Grimly, Buffy replied, “We’ll have to wait and see.”

Faith snorted. “Yeah, and then die from the cliché.”

“Ha ha. You know, this might be serious.”

“Yeah, I know. But laughing’s fun.”

“True.”

“Damn straight it’s true.”

And then, still wary underneath the jokes, they went to class.

~*~

At quarter till noon, Spike said hell with the papers and poked his head into Anya’s office to let her know he was going to lunch. He grabbed his briefcase and left the building as usual.

Sunnydale was a strange town, full of more labyrinthine alleys than most cities twice its size. Spike generally used those to get around—it was a habit he’d had as a kid that he’d never really shaken. He was less than a block away from the diner when he reached one of the main roads.

The second he turned the corner, he halted in shock. There, on hundreds of sheets of fluorescent pink and yellow paper, was a picture of him and Buffy, snogging on the beach. The papers were attached to buildings, electrical posts, even the odd car window. And on every single one, accusing black letters said: William Kingston: child molester.

The funny part was, Spike thought dimly as he stared at the fliers, his mind still utterly stunned, that had this happened to any one else, he would’ve been laughing his arse off right about now. It was the most juvenile, stupid joke he’d ever seen—but somehow, faced with the reality of it, it didn’t seem stupid.

It seemed damned clever and, to Spike, deadly.

God, he was fucked. Well and truly fucked. By now all the kids at Buffy’s school would know—chances were he’d get shit from everyone at the diner—and oh God, her parents. What if they took legal action? What if they felt like they had to take legal action?

It was with a heavy heart and a sick stomach that Spike turned towards the diner, walking like a man in a dream.

 

Chapter 23:

~*~

Heads turned and low, disapproving murmurs sounded as Spike slipped into the diner. Careful to keep his eyes away from anyone specific, Spike walked to the counter where Hank stood, drying dishes.

“Hello, Spike,” Hank said genially. “How are you doing today?”

Spike stared at the man in disbelief. Surely no one was that thick? “Well, with the exception of the borderline pornographic pictures outside, it’s all sunshine an’ lollies with me,” he said sarcastically. “Why the buggering hell aren’t you knocking the stuffin’ out of me, Summers?”

Hank gave him a measured look, one that unaccountably made Spike want to squirm. It reminded him that Hank was a good two decades older than Spike himself. “Believe me,” he said, “I would be, if it weren’t for my wife. Joyce pointed out that we knew you kids were getting up to that sort of thing. Having it posted all across town is stretching my restraint, though.”

“’s not doin’ wonders for mine, either,” Spike admitted. “Fucking juvenile prank.”

“Well, that’s another reason I’m not hitting you,” Hank said, a grin starting to form on his face. “I don’t want to give those kids the satisfaction.”

It wasn’t a particularly funny joke, but Spike, having finally caught on to Hank’s game, laughed anyway. “Damn immature, innit?”

“Definitely.” Hank handed him a soda and pastry. “Bet you’re missing my daughter’s idle banter.”

“Not as much as I thought I would be,” Spike said thoughtfully. “S’pose you’ll make a bearable father-in-law.”

The glass Hank had been holding fell to the counter. “What?” he hissed.

He didn’t smirk. Took quite a bit of control, but he didn’t. “Honestly, Mr. Summers, did you think I’d fool about with your daughter ‘f I didn’t plan on spending the rest of my life with her?”

Hank was now blinking rapidly. “I—uh—“

“You did.” Spike shook his head. “What did I ever do to make you think I was like that?”

“Sleep with half of Sunnydale?”

He was blushing. Dammit. “Well, yeah, I did that…”

“Exactly. Joyce may be trusting enough to believe in your good intentions, but I most certainly am not.” Hank gave him a stern look. “I’m not even sure you’re telling me the truth now.”

“Mr. Summers.” Spike leaned forward, still smiling slightly for their audience’s benefit but looking Buffy’s father straight in the eye. “I know Buffy’s underage,” he said bluntly, “An’ I know she’s still very young, in every sense of the word. But I love her, have for awhile now. ‘m not gonna leave her alone—ever. We clear?”

The older man gave him a look that was filled with something suspiciously like respect. “You know,” he said slowly, “I think we are.”

“Right, then.” Spike nodded his head as though he’d been expecting that answer all along, though the truth was that he felt like sagging to the floor in relief. “I’d better be gettin’ back to the office.”

“Probably.” Hank accepted his empty plate and glass. Spike was about to slip off his stool and leave when he said, hesitantly, “Good luck. I know—well, it can’t be easy for you right now. And Buffy cares about you, so I don’t want to see you suffer.”

He smiled. “Thanks, mate.”

The occupants of the diner watched in amazement as the current leper of Sunnydale left the diner whistling.

Of course, the whistling didn’t last long. He missed his girl, for one; the fact that she was stuck in that hellhole of a school didn’t help much, since every time he thought of it he was reminded that she was far too young to be mixed up with him. The fliers that he ripped down as he walked just made the whole thing worse.

Funny how you could have perfection and all it took to fuck it up was a pushy bunch of gits who wouldn’t know love if it ripped their collective heart out and ate it for breakfast.

Spike smiled faintly. Now there was a nice visual.

He knew his girl was young; he knew she had to attend school, and that when their relationship got out things would be difficult for her, and there was nothing he could do about it. He’d accepted shit like that a long time ago. But what he hadn’t counted on was pure adolescent spite.

The only teen he’d been around since he was her age was her, and Buffy would never stoop to something so immature as this.

Parental disapproval he could understand—he’d even expected it. Hell, he’d think there was something wrong with Hank if the man hadn’t given him the third degree. But those sodding teens, doing nothing but try to ruin a relationship, pissed him off beyond measure.

When he got back to his office he headed straight for the elevator, deliberately avoiding departments that he knew would be crowded. Generally he was friendly with his coworkers, but right now he wanted to be left alone.

Unfortunately, when the elevator opened to his floor he was greeted with the extremely unwelcome sight of a half-naked Anya about to go down on Xander.

“Holy fuck!” He looked away quickly. “Anyone ever tell you ‘f you’re gonna do it in the workplace, you oughta at least take advantage of your private office?”

“We did,” Anya said cheerfully. “But then we decided to let it air out for awhile, so we came here.”

Spike stared at them incredulously. “You are abso-fucking-lutely insane, did you know?”

“Of course,” Anya said cheerily. “Now, Johnson & Johnson called while you were out. They want you to plan the advertisement for their newest baby lotion. Have fun!”

Spike watched incredulously as Anya abruptly ignored him, focusing instead on the way Xander was nuzzling her neck.

He went into his office and shut the door, burying his head in his hands, unable to feel anything but a kind of weary amusement.

He’d never be able to do that with Buffy—never be able to take risks. Even after she turned eighteen, the May-December stigma would still be hanging over them. It saddened him, made him angry. Fucking stereotypes.

But the thing that upset him the most was how Buffy would react to them. If he, a full-grown man and more than capable of ignoring juvenile pranks, was having trouble dealing with the idiots of Sunnydale…how much she be feeling?

~*~

Anya cocked her head as she watched her friend enter his office. “You know,” she said thoughtfully, “I almost feel sorry for him.”

“Why?” Xander asked curiously, running his hands down her back.

She pulled away from him a bit. “Well, look at us. You’re eight years younger than I am—we kept our relationship a secret for months because of that.”

“Maybe they shouldn’t have let it get out,” Xander said. “I’m not saying I support what people are saying, Ayn, but they haven’t exactly been careful about things.”

Anya glared at him. “Xander Harris, we’re in the middle of the largest room on this floor, and we were about to have sex that would make a porn star blush! You’re really one to talk.”

“But it’s different for us!” Xander argued. “We’re—I dunno—less reactionary, I guess. Less likely to have people freaking out over us.”

“No,” Anya said sadly, “We’re exactly the same.

“You and I are in love to the point of being crazy…and so are they.”

~*~
 

Chapter 24:

~*~

It shouldn’t have been so hard to bear. Logically, Buffy knew that. She’d spent two years in high school being mocked and ridiculed on a pretty regular basis because she was a waitress at the town’s most popular diner, so she really shouldn’t have been bothered by a few more taunts. But these were different somehow.

When she mentioned this to Faith, the brunette just rolled her eyes and said, “Duh, B. They’re hittin’ you where it hurts.”

“But they’re just stupid stuff,” Buffy argued. “I mean, I’ve been called slut something like 20 times today, so it shouldn’t hurt me—“

“Cumulative.”

Buffy blinked at Oz. “Huh?”

“Cumulative,” he repeated. “They keeps saying it, so the hurt builds up.”

“I—I’m not sure it works that way,” Tara said slowly, twirling the spaghetti in her lunch tray with her fork. “If Buffy can just ignore them—“

“But who could?” Faith asked. “Those motherfuckers just don’t shut up.”

“Faith!”

“What?” Faith asked, unfazed by Willow’s admonishment. “C’mon, you know those skanky hos are just tryin’ to get under B’s skin, and it’s working.”

“Faith, were you hanging out with the white trash again?” Buffy asked dryly.

Faith was unrepentant. “I might’ve been,” she said, “But that’s not the point. The bitches are gonna keep annoying Buffy ‘till she breaks down.”

“So what are we going to do?” Oz asked. “We can’t let Harmony keep it up. She’ll drive us all crazy.”

Everyone blinked at him—even Willow, who’d heard him say a sentence longer than that once. His participation in conversations was generally limited to monosyllabic contributions.

“Um, Oz? Are you feeling okay?” Buffy asked, grinning.

Oz just gave her an expressionless look that on anyone else probably would have been sarcastic. “I’ve had to listen to Harmony beg me for details on you and Spike’s sexual relationship,” he said. “Trust me, I’ll give a speech if it will make her stop.”

“Okay, then.” Buffy nodded resolutely. “What we need is a plan. Of the evil variety.”

“Um. Okay.” Willow nodded, an action that unfortunately made her resemble a bobble-head doll. “We can do evil…can’t we?”

“Well, Faith can,” Buffy said, grinning. “Honestly though, don’t you think this whole thing is a little—“

“Stupid?” Tara suggested, smiling slightly.

“Yep.”

“Could be fun,” Oz said neutrally. “Old school.”

“Startin’ a war over Buffy’s boyfriend is old school?” Faith laughed. “Damn, what school is that?”

“The school of hard knocks,” Buffy said, suddenly grim. Well, an image of Harmony trying to claw Spike’s eyes out could do that to a person. “So, what are we going to do?”

“We could turn her hair green,” Willow suggested.

Everyone else looked at her, confused. The redhead’s face turned the same color as her hair. “I saw it on an after school special,” she mumbled.

“It’s actually not a bad idea,” Buffy said thoughtfully. “I mean, if we could get dye, or something. You know Harmony’s neurotic about her crinkly bad bleach job.”

“Unlike your boyfriend, right?”

Buffy rolled her eyes at Faith. “Okay, let’s see: who’s hotter, Harmony or Spike?”

“Point,” Oz said. “Now, back to the diabolical planning.”

“Right.” Willow nodded resolutely. “Diabolical planning. Because…we’re evil now.”

“I thought we were fighting evil,” Buffy said, confused.

“Well, you know what they say,” Tara said. “F-fight fire with fire.”

“So we’re gonna have to be evil,” Buffy said thoughtfully. “Okay. Aside from dying her hair, what else can we do?”

“We could feed Percy steroids, make his Willy shrink,” Faith said.

“That’s just gross,” was Oz’s assessment.

“Yeah, but just think of how pissed Harm would be once she found out her boyfriend’s dick was too tiny to—“

“Visual!” Willow squeaked, clapping her hands over her ears. “I don’t wanna think about that, Faith!”

Buffy laughed, and the rest of the table joined in. They were still debating diabolical strategies when the bell rang and the group separated to go to their classes.

Willow gave Buffy a small, sympathetic look; they both had English right after lunch. “So…the world’s gone insane,” Willow said cheerfully.

“Looks like,” Buffy said dryly, flipping off a girl who’d just slunk by her and hissed, slut. “Of course, I figured it had gone nuts when I got into a fight this morning. I just don’t do that.”

The look Willow gave her was the same she would have worn if Buffy had informed her that the earth was made of cheese. “Because you’ve never had Snyder yell at you for fighting before…”

“Maybe once or twice…or every other week,” Buffy admitted.

“Exactly.” Willow nodded. “But we’ve never done the whole clichéd large-scale revenge thing.”

“There’s a first time for everything, though.” They entered the classroom and sat down. “And anyway,” Buffy continued, crumpling up the flier lying on her desk and throwing it in the trash, “I am getting pretty monumentally sick of this hellish town’s obsession with my love life.”

A paper airplane hit her in the back of her head. Grabbing the paper, Buffy unfolded it to a lurid drawing of herself and a man that she assumed was Spike, participating in an activity that she was sure had never occurred. God knows she would’ve remembered if it had.

She crumpled up the paper and threw it in the classroom, weariness suddenly overcoming her. Plots and immature pranks aside, this was shaping up to be a truly suck-ass school year.

I hate my life, she grumbled mentally, and fought to focus on the now-lecturing teacher.

~*~

“So? How was your day?”

“How was yours?” Buffy asked, fighting to remain neutral.

“Tolerable. C’mon, pet, I go to work every day. You only get a first day of school every…er…”

“Three hundred sixty five days.”

“Right. Once a year. So you should tell me about your day first.”

Buffy collapsed onto Spike’s couch. “I got teased,” she pouted. “Not just about the diner, either—they called me a slut and you a pedophile.”

“So far ‘m not seein’ anything that’s all that different from last year,” Spike mused, sitting down on the opposite end of the couch and pulling her feet into his lap.

“They had pictures,” she said, snuggling deeper into the couch and wriggling her toes as he began to massage the soles of her feet. “And this time, it wasn’t all made up.”

A slight smile graced his lips. “Odd to think that last year, none ‘f this had happened yet.”

“Yeah, I lived in bliss back then,” Buffy said dryly.

She noticed two things immediately. Firstly, he stopped rubbing her feet; and secondly, his entire body stiffened beneath hers. “So, you’d rather this hadn’t happened, then?”

His voice sounded hollow. Not even angry, just…empty.

She sat up, not an easy feat when you considered that he was clutching her feet. Feet. Feat. Ha.

I’m going insane.

“Hey,” she said, wriggling her toes again—except this time, it was more of an urgent wriggling. If there was such a thing.

He looked up, his face blank. Buffy wasn’t fooled, though. She’d been friends with him for four years—even when he fought to hide behind a mask of invulnerability, she could read him like a book. An easy book.

Looking him straight in the eye, Buffy said quietly, “You were the first person I met who…who took me at face value. Who didn’t try to make me into something I wasn’t. And I loved you first. I loved you more than An—more than anybody. And that hasn’t changed. It will never change. Okay?”

Pathetic excuse for a speech that it was, it somehow managed to cheer Spike up. Ladies and gentlemen, the seventh—or is that eighth?—wonder of the world, Buffy thought dryly. Buffy Summers can cheerfully speechify.

“’course you love me,” Spike replied lightly, jarring Buffy out of her thoughts. “’m just so damn adorable.” And then, with all the abruptness that she’d come to expect from him: “Wanna go shopping?”

Buffy laughed and the tension was broken. “Sure, Bleach-Boy. Let’s go.”

~*~
 

Chapter 25:

~*~

“You know, when you said shopping, this really wasn’t what I had in mind.”

“Oh, sod off. You’re just itching to do this.”

“Um, actually, no. I’ve never itched to explore the nether regions of the world’s furniture industry.”

“But you’ve always wanted to explore my nether regions,” Spike said in a perfectly innocent tone. “And if I get new furniture, then we can do just that.”

Buffy scowled at him. “Perv.”

“Don’t you know it, baby.” Silence. Then: “So, picking out furniture with me is really that dastardly a task?”

“Did you just say dastardly?” Buffy paused beside a couch. Large, plushy, comfy-looking—would’ve been perfect if it wasn’t cream colored. Spike shuddered theatrically.

“Spike! Answer the question.”

“What? Oh. Yeah, I did. What’s it to you?” He tweaked her nose. “Avoidin’ the subject, Blondie.”

“Am not!”

“Are so. You still won’t answer what you think of going shopping with me for furniture.” He grinned at her to hide some very real trepidation. “C’mon, admit it. You want me.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want the responsibility of redecorating your heinously appointed apartment—until,” she added hastily, “I’ve had the chance to make plans. I mean—honestly, Spike, it’s terrible. And you dragged me out here with absolutely no warning!”

He looked at her suspiciously. His girl’s eyes were shining, her face the absolute picture of innocence—hell, even her hair exuded apple-pie American trustworthiness.

‘Course, he’d never trusted the Yanks. Bloody unreliable lot, they were.

“Right, then,” he said with mock-weariness, already knowing where the conversation was headed. “Exactly what kind of shopping do you propose we do?”

That glint in her eyes, he decided, wasn’t innocence. It was pure, demonic intent.

“I have an idea,” she said, and dragged him out of the furniture store.

Two hours later, Spike was convinced he’d gone to hell. “Pet, this is the fifth clothing store we’ve been in!”

An abject observer would have said he was whining—but Spike never whined. It was as simple as that. He was merely complaining…in a slightly less than dignified, but still very menacing, manner.

“And I’ve only bought two pairs of jeans, three tops, and a bra,” Buffy replied. “Come on, Spike, you’re the one who’s gonna be looking at me!”

The bint did have a point…Spike smiled widely, his prospects suddenly much improved. “Right, then. Carry on.”

“You are such a pig,” she said affectionately. “Okay, what about this top?”

It was red. It was strappy. On her, it would be almost illegally skimpy. Spike gulped. “Looks wonderful.”

She grinned and draped it over her arm. “I love the clearance rack. What about this one?”

Yep, he was in hell. And he was, by the looks of things, going to languish there.

Luckily for him, when she finished with the hellish mall sojourn, Buffy was more than willing to go to the ice cream shop and down an enormous cone of double fudge ice cream.

“Now this,” she said, licking the cone as they walked through the park, the bags forgotten in the Desoto, “Is something I could get used to.”

“Licking phallus-shaped objects?”

“Ew. No.” She waved her gone and winced when chocolate drops spattered the sidewalk. “Being served,” she explained. “Telling the pimply-faced teenager to get me food, instead of the other way around.”

Spike couldn’t help himself—he laughed out loud. “You’ve really got a complex about that.”

“What? I do not!”

“Do so,” he teased. “Every time someone serves you, it’s practically an orgasmic experience for you—ow!” His girl had hauled off and punched him in the arm. “That bloody well hurt. Abusive bint.” He pouted.

“Oh, please. You’re a baby,” she informed him, grinning.

There was a little bit of chocolate on his lips, which Spike took as a sign from God or whoever the hell was in charge that he was supposed to grab her shoulders and kiss her.

“Come over Friday night?” he asked, nipping lightly at her lip and then soothing the spot with his tongue.

“Hunh?” Buffy pulled away, looking up at him with unfocused eyes. “Oh. Um…I guess, sure.” He heard the unspoken message: and this is different from every other day, how?

He smiled. “For dinner, pet. ‘m gonna cook for you.”

“You can cook?”

Well, he’d be able to by Friday. “You doubt my abilities?” he asked, mock-offended.

“When it comes to cooking? Um, yes.”

“Silence, blasphemer!” He smothered her half-amused, half-bewildered laugh with his lips, kissing her a bit harder this time—deliberately showing the feelings that they were both too damn clumsy to voice.

When they moved apart again, she looked even more befuddled than before. “What about blue?”

He blinked at this apparent non sequitor. “What?”

“Blue. For your apartment.” His expression must have been utterly dumbfounded, because she elaborated, “You know, roses are red, violets are blue, dogs are colorblind, and apparently so are you…?”

Blue? He’d never considered it before. There was white…there was black…and there was red. But blue?

When he voiced this opinion to Buffy, she rolled her eyes. “You are such a boob,” she said. “There’s a whole color spectrum, did you know? There’s even green. You know, the color of the trees and the grass…and ooh, there’s yellow, too!”

He winced. “Hadn’t considered that you were gonna girlify my apartment,” he complained.

“Oh, please, are you five? Blue is totally a boy’s color. It’s the boy’s color.”

“But ‘s not my color,” he protested, knowing how very weak his argument sounded and yet somehow feeling compelled to keep it up anyway.

“Which is sad, really,” she said, cocking her head and looking at him. “You’d look good in it.”

He smirked at her, unable to resist the opening. “’course I would, but would it look good around me? Blue’s not very badass, and you know ‘m just about as bad as they—‘ey!”

His girl had dissolved into giggles. The ice cream cone was inches away from staining his leather coat as she leaned against his arm, laughing for all she was worth. “I am bad,” he muttered defensively.

“The baddest,” she said, snickering. “Of course, there was that time you were two hours late to work so that you could save that kid’s hamster—“

“Damn creature was up in a tree! Could’ve been eaten!”

“—or that time I caught you crying because of a Dawson’s Creek rerun,” she continued blithely. “And there’s also the whole baby thing.”

His cheeks reddened at that. “I do not, he said indignantly, have a ‘baby thing’.”

“You totally do,” she said with the cheeky impudence of a youth who knew she’d cornered the adult before her. “Come on, any time there’s a baby around, you can’t help but cuddle it. You even coo at it. It’s not wonder you’re such a wimp.”

By the end of her speech, Spike was spluttering. She’d emasculated him as only she could—stripped down all his defenses and yanked out his vulnerability as proof that he was what she claimed.

Still, he was never one for giving up easily, so he just grinned at her. “Well, who’s to say ‘m not just practicing?”

It was her turn to look gobsmacked. “Pr—practicing? For what?”

“For havin’ little brats ‘f my own.” He damn near laughed at the expression on her face. She’d hardly have been more shocked than if he had announced plans to join the circus.

“You don’t think—I mean, we—“

“Maybe someday, kitten.” He felt uncertain suddenly—not the same inexperienced and gawky uncertainty that plagued youths, but a deeper sort of feeling. The full and cognizant knowledge that he was taking a risk. “You don’t want to, then?”

For a second she studied him, her green eyes wide and serious. Then she smiled. “Like you said, maybe someday.”

He couldn’t stop himself from asking. “So you think this is—you think we’re gonna stick around, then.”

“Of course.” She replied like it was a foregone conclusion, something that made him feel quite nicely reassured. “I mean—didn’t you?”

“Hell yeah,” he said vehemently. “Just wasn’t sure—you’re a teenager, luv, try though we both might to forget it. Thought you might be havin’ second thoughts.”

She dropped her chocolatey cone into a nearby trash can and placed her hands on his shoulders, a quiet, serious expression on her face. Going on tiptoes, she pressed her lips to his. It wasn’t a kiss of anger, or of passion. It was instead filled with love—with promise.

“Never.”

~*~