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Chapter 10 - All's Well. (a. Talking to Tinkerbell)
Saturday, May 4th, 2002
Spike slumped, dropping his head into his hands and running his fingers through his hair, loosening the hold of his hair-gel
and allowing a few stray curls to find their way loose. He straightened
up with a visible effort. "'Bit, d'you think you could get Glinda to come out here
and have a chat? I think I've really cocked things up this time... I'm
goin' to be eatin' a whole lot of humble pie and I'd rather not have Red
puttin' in her twopenny worth. It's goin' to be bad enough, anyway, not
that she's got any room to talk."
"So you know what's happening, then?" Dawn inquired.
"Haven't exactly thought
it all through, 'Bit," Spike replied, "but it looks like it's something to do with a spell
I tried earlier. Should be able to figure out what went wrong between
me and Glinda and come up with a way to fix it." '...or at least put
Buffy back together again. Nothing's goin' t'put things right between
me and her now. Should just have wished I didn't love her. That would
have been easier. Saved yourself a boatload of hurt that way... but, then
you'd end up dancin' the old dance with her and maybe without feelin's
gettin' in the way you'd end it. Would that-"
"Spike?" Tara intruded on the vampire's reverie. "What's happened? Dawnie said you wanted to talk
to me. Do you know what's wrong with Buffy?" Her voice was gentle and
soothing as she prodded for the information she needed.
"Yeah, me. I'm what's wrong with her. Doesn't matter
what I do, I just end up hurtin' her one way or another." Spike sighed, and Tara couldn't help but think that the
only time that she had seen him look so broken was the night that Buffy
died. "I haven't worked out exactly what I did but I cast a
spell and I reckon that's when 'she' went walkies, so I guess it is all
my fault."
"It'll be okay," Tara tried to ressure him. "I'm sure we can fix this, Spike. Just tell
me exactly what the spell was and what happened when you cast it."
"Well, would be before your time, but you must have heard
about the spell that Red did where the Watcher went blind, and me and
Buffy got engaged..." Spike's mind drifted off into wistful memories of
that day. He should have known then he was on his way to falling in love
with her. The sexual tension between the pair of them when she was feeding
him had had the Watcher running for cover before the spell had even hit
and when the enchantment ended he had felt as if someone had stolen his life
and given him some sort of inferior replacement.
"Spike? You mean you did a spell to have your will done?
Is that right?" Solemn grey-blue eyes looked into Spike's as if they could see all the way down to the soul he didn't have.
"Yeah, but I didn't mean to hurt her. I don't..." The vampire gave an exasperated shrug. "Something's
wrong. I mean, I knew what happened with Red, and I thought I worked out
all the stuff I wished real careful and then I thought I'd ended it so
that I couldn't accidentally do anything like she did, but maybe it didn't
end or ...I don't know."
"It's okay," Tara repeated. "We'll work it out. Let's start with the wishes
you made deliberately. Just tell me what they were and then, if we eliminate
those, we can look at the possibility that the spell's still active."
Spike looked at Tara out of the corner of his eye as if he couldn't bring himself to look straight at her.
"You're going to hate me when I tell you. It's just I got to the end of
my rope. I got to where I just couldn't bear for things to be like they
are, but I guess what I did wasn't too far removed from what Red did to
you. I just wasn't thinking straight enough to see it like that."
Ever gentle, Tara prompted the vampire once more. "Spike,
right here at this minute no-one is bothered about laying blame. All that's
important right now is getting Buffy back. I know you love her. I saw
what it did to you when she died. Just tell me so we can work out what
to do to put it right. What was your first wish?"
"I wished that an empty bourbon bottle would fill up
again, but that was sort of a practice run and I didn't really think it
would work, 'cause I reckoned the way the spell was worded that there had
to be some sort of passion involved. That you had to be angry or... well...
you know... for anything to happen."
"So that didn't work?"
Spike shook his head. "Next thing I wished was that Buffy
would make up her mind exactly what it was that she really wanted."
"Well, sweetie, I can't see any harm that that could
do," Tara opined. "I don't think that caused the problem. What else did you wish?"
"I wished that she would be honest about her feelings...
I could read her like a book when it was her an' Angel, but when it comes
to her and me, either I've lost the knack completely or she's lying to
me or she's lying to herself... So, I wished that she'd be honest about
her feelings, to herself as well as to others." Spike looked across at Tara, expecting to see disapproval
but, instead, all he saw was compassion. "I know... If she wants to lie to
me I should just let her. I'm interfering with her brain, but, the stuff
she's been saying lately, well, it hurts... and if I thought she really
meant it, then I'd leave." '...or dust m'self, one of the two.' he
added silently. "But that's what every guy in her life from her father
on down's done, so I need to be sure that she really wants me gone, because
if she's puttin' up some sort of front... If she's tryin' to push me away,
because she thinks I'll eventually leave her so she'd rather make the
break now and I take her at her word and go..."
His eyes glimmered as he continued despite the relative darkness. "Honestly, I was hoping... Well, you can probably guess
what I was hoping, but trying to second guess everything she says, it's
killing me and I just wanted to know where I stand."
"Spike, honey," Tara replied, reaching out to stroke his back. "I don't know what exactly the situation
is between you and Buffy at the moment and I know since Buffy came back
we haven't seen each other very often but if things have been that bad
you know I'd be there if you needed someone to talk to. You know I'd miss
you if you left and Dawn probably wouldn't take it too well either."
"S'nice of you to say that, but, well, it's not like I
really get to see 'Bit any more. Buffy doesn't approve of the two of us
together. The last time I can think of seein' you was the birthday party
that wouldn't end and I had to get an invite from Red for that. Buffy
didn't even ask. Red's already shown tonight what she thinks I'm capable
of and what's worse it looks like she's right. And, since it looks like
Demon Girl's back with Droopy, I doubt I'll be visiting her again any time soon.
Never been invited to his place in all the time he's had it, so I don't
see why that would change now. There's Clem, but everybody likes Clem.
He doesn't need me. Leave him the video and the telly... He'll be fine.
It all comes down to her in the end," he proclaimed with an air of finality.
'Stay or go. Live or die. Can't be a vampire, can't
be a man. Only place I fit in this world is by her side. Together everything's
in perfect balance. Without her... away from the Hellmouth... without the
purpose that helping her gives... Leave the Hellmouth and you'll be hard
pushed to find a spot of non-human violence before bedtime. What reason's
left to go on?
And maybe I would have talked to you before, pet,
but vampires aren't allowed to spill their guts when things get to them.
They're just meant to sit in their crypt like an anatomically correct
Action Man in a toy box and wait till the slayer wants to play with them
again.'
The guilty feeling that Buffy had felt when she saw the downstairs
room in his crypt was back and a hundred times worse.
"If that's really how you feel, then couldn't you talk
things through without all the magic," Tara suggested.
Spike gave a tired sigh. "You think I haven't tried? For one thing, she only ever hears what
she wants to. For another, she refuses to accept that I've changed. She
accused me of a whole list of things the other day and, unless you include
killing demons or cheatin' at kitten poker which isn't really cheatin'
'cause it's part of the game, then the only one out of the lot of them I
can remember doin' in the last year is nickin' a bit of burba weed and
maybe a blood-bag or two from the hospital. Oops, nearly forgot, of course
the nasty vampire nicked the bloody camper. And technically, I suppose
the bike, but I prefer to call it the spoils of war.
Any time you try to get her to talk about her feelings
she's off quicker than Concorde. Any time you try to tell her about your
own feelings she either does something to stop you or she runs or she
calls you a liar, and believe me, you don't ever want to ask her to explain
something to you."
Suddenly realising that he had said too much, Spike fumbled for a new cigarette to escape the compulsion to meet the witch's gaze. "...Anyway, I don't see that any of this is solving the
zombie problem. The last thing I wished was that she would understand
how I feel about her. She keeps saying that I don't have a soul so I don't
have real feelings or they're real for me whatever the hell that means,
so, I wished that she would really understand."
"And that was the last wish you made?" Tara asked, with the slightest hint of excitement.
"Yeah, after that, did a little rhyme, invoked the elements,
basically saying 'That's all, folks! I've got what I want, so ignore everything
else I say from now on.'"
"And after that there's nothing you can think of that
might have set anything off, if ending the spell didn't work," Tara questioned.
"Well, no... From what I understand you have to say the
thing out loud. Didn't speak to anyone from then till Clem rang, except
for a few off the cuff remarks to the odd demon on patrol, but that was
after dark, so..."
"So, it looks like the spell decided the only way she'd
really understand how you feel was if she was in there with you," Tara reassured.
"In there with me? ...you mean, she's here?" Spike held
his hand up to his head, using the butt of his cigarette to point at his
temple.
'Hey, look Slayer, what I was thinking before, well,
that's just big thoughts. Might leave, if that's what you want, but, well,
I thought about the other when Dru left and I'm still here, right, so
don't you go feelin' sorry for the Big Bad. Don't want your pity. It hurts,
but I'll get over it.' Spike frantically tried to cover his undead
ass.
"In there and in there." Tara touched her fingertips
to his forehead and then to his heart. "And possibly even checking you
out for muscle cramps."
'Good job I wasn't exactly in the mood for my normal
just-woke-up wank when I got up tonight then... Bugger. Why do I keep thinking
of all the stuff I don't want her to know about?' Spike started counting
from one thousand down to zero in his head in an effort to prevent any
more secrets coming out.
'Because that's the way it goes as soon as you know
Buffy's in here. At least I'm not going to find out you slept with Giles
on the hood of a police car, or I hope not. You haven't, right?' Buffy
cringed mentally at the image she had conjured up.
Spike maintained his mental countdown as he spoke to the witch.
"So what do we do to reverse it? Ehm... I was... ehm, well, preoccupied with
other things when Willow did it." His mind filled with the memory of tender,
passionate kisses and Buffy's body on top of his.
"I think she just did the same sort of thing you did,
but she reversed it at the same time as she ended it."
"So if I make up some bit of doggerel then that'll put
her back in her body."
"It's worth giving it a try, don't you think?" Tara gave
him an encouraging smile.
"Right then. Here goes, pet.
The time for wishes now has passed
Undo the spell which I have cast."
Spike raised an eyebrow and tilted his head as if listening for the sound of a slayer searching for her favourite stake, but there was nothing. "So mote it be?" he added, giving Tara a rueful smile.
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