She'd barely eaten anything in she couldn't remember how long. Hunger crashed in on her now, a rude and offensive guest in the house of her fluttering, hovering, delicate desire. In the kitchen she made a thorough inspection, found more coffee though no milk to put it in it, and in the freezer, toaster waffles and sausages. A bottle of maple syrup, caked and stuck to the shelf it rested on, turned up inside the fridge door. A veritable microwave feast. While she assembled things, Spike again attacked a blood bag with one sheepish fang. She took it from him, and removing the frozen sausages from the turntable, put it in to heat. "Nicer this way."


"Ah?" He smiled. When she poured the heated blood into a mug and gave it to him, he looked so pleased, as if she'd just prepared a ten course meal that had taken all day.


It occurred to her suddenly to wonder if William was any more accustomed than was Spike to a routine receipt of routine kindness.


She ate, thinking, no one ever has to know I sat on Spike's lap while I ate breakfast, and then he kissed the sweet maple flavor from her lips until it was all gone, and then just a little longer to make sure.

She expected, from prior experience, that he'd press her for sex. He'd agreed to wait, but she could imagine him thinking, well, that was HOURS ago. He'd been constantly seductive in those months when she'd succumbed to him and could not stop; every time he saw her, he tried for whatever he could get.


"I just want you to understand ... it's not going to be today."


If his surprise was feigned, it was an awfully convincing job.


"Never thought it would be."


"I'd like you to sleep with me though, but only if you want to."


"If I want to!"


"Okay, good. I just ... just wanted to get that straight."


She wanted to think her reluctance had to do with keeping a decorous pace to this strange impulsive affair, not rushing interactions that contained a delicacy she wasn't used to in her experience. But she knew it was much more about raw fear. The less she permitted herself, the less Spike would have to rage against when his memories reappeared. She thought of him like a valley in deep fog. River, trees, roads, settlements, everything still there, intact beneath the encompassing mist. That mist could burn off at any time, and there he'd be, with her right up in his face. You're sick, .


"You don't trust me to keep a promise?"


She didn't want to say I know what you're like.


"It's good, havin' you in my arms, making me all warm, an' breathing you in." He gathered her closer, buried his face for a moment in her hair. "Eases me. Think about what's to come, how I'll possess you an' make you mine, but you already are, aren't you?"


"As much as I can be anybody's."


"Still parsing it fine."


"Spi—Will. You know I can't help it."


"Gettin' that, yeah."


She kissed him again, to show that she meant no distancing. He tasted her lips each time as if they were new to him.


"What still beats me a bit ... what's a fine strong warm woman want with a creature like me? Perverse, rather, vampire slayer fallin' for a vampire."


"Lots of people meet their dates in the workplace." The joke sounded flat as soon as it left her lips. It came to her then, that Spike had once said something like that to her, on one of the numerous occasions he'd tried to refute her essential disgust at him, to assert that they were meant for each other. "My first lover was a vampire. It never really occurred to me to be put off by him. He was very attractive to me, his temperature and his ... presence ... just seemed like part of him. Not something lacking. It's like that now." She curled her fingers around his hand. "And you must know you're very handsome."


"Am I?"


"Don't fish."


"Can see I've got a tight enough body, but dunno what I look like. Could have a mug like a monkey."


"Well, you don't." She gave him a teasing prod in the ribs. "You have a fair sharp face, a full mouth, and the bluest eyes of any I've ever seen. C'mon, you've got to sense this—the way people look at you."


"Way you look at me."


"How do I look at you?" she asked, a curl of tension flexing in her belly.


"Most of the time? Like I'm a nuisance an' a worry. But some times? Like you'd like to to eat me up bite by slow bite."


"Well there you go. You know perfectly well you're not ugly."


He was quiet for so long then she began to grow antsy. Time to get moving again. Except that his arms were folded around her hips, and she didn't want to be the first to pull away.


"Who was this other vampire? Your first lover?"


"It was a long time ago, he's gone."


"You slay him?"


"No." She didn't want to explain. Already sorry she'd brought Angel up. That was the trouble with this ... every question he might ask her brought up things too difficult to confront while she was trying to enjoy this amnesiac idyll. It was sick, carrying on a kind of shadow-play of a love affair with a man who'd been nine-tenths erased. What did it say about her, that she could unleash love only for someone whose personality was so abraded? Always in secret?


Another memory popped into her mind, sudden and grievous.


Buffybot.


How disgusting that had been.


Wasn't this nearly the same? She'd been given a life-size, functioning replica of Spike, like him in all the ways that would be pleasing to her while conveniently sans all incriminating backstory and acid opinion. A veritable living doll, programmed for affection, gratitude, and pleasure free of all complications. To be enjoyed until she got caught, which would have to be very soon now.


And to think she'd exerted so much energy into letting Spike know they had nothing in common.


His lips tracing through her hair, to nibble on her ear. "Sorry I asked."


She slipped off his lap. "I really need to go out and buy provisions. Can you do without me for a little while? Before I go—how are your wounds? Healing up? Let me see."


He pulled off his teeshirt.


"Good, they're almost gone."


"Don't suppose they'll scar," he said. "How's the back?" He leaned forward for her inspection.


She laid a hand lightly on his protruding spine, brushing fingers across the black scabs. Then couldn't resist leaning in to inhale the nape of his neck, where the hair feathered away into smooth skin the color of paper. When had she ever had time to cherish anyone like this? It embarrassed her, the number of whims that skirted through her mind concerning him, some of them more suited to a little girl adoring a wonderful new doll than to a mature slayer in love with a broken vampire. She let her cheek rest against his nape, knowing that its warmth would give him pleasure, as would the tickle of her hair against his bare back.


"I think if not for you, that guy would've shot up the place. If you'd been facing the other way, and hadn't seen him ...."


"Did see him. Saw him in plenty of time."


"I wonder why you were the only one they found."


"Eh?"


The blurted question discomposed them both.


"After the battle. Angel was gone, and the others ... did you survive because you fought best? Because you were facing the right way?"


Beneath her touch, Spike shuddered.


"Maybe I was the one coward. Maybe when they ran ahead, I ran back."


"No, not you. Never."


"No?"


"I'm sure. You wouldn't have done that."


She could feel him straining to think, probing his own blankness. "Would hate to think so," he said. "But what do I know?"


His uncertainty chilled her—he'd been putting up a very brave face, but the amnesia was a burden on him. How would it be, to try to manage without any real grasp on your sense of self?


"You'll just have to take my word for it." Another kiss. "Now I really should go shopping. I need nonfat yogurt, you need blood. I'll just be a couple hours, tops. Wait up for me, okay?"


"Always, pet."