Finally, an update. Oh and just to let you know - this fic will be wrapping up in a couple of chapters.


“Oh my god! Buffy!”

The Slayer shoved Spike off of her and jumped up in possibly the fastest manoeuvre of her entire life. A hot flush felt like it was burning her face, her shoulders, and setting a path of fire down her back. It caused her to actually wince and shift from foot to foot. Her mind was racing a mile a minute; she had no idea what to say. A brief thought – ‘how could you be so moronic?’ flittered to the surface of her consciousness before it too was lost in the melee.

Spike jumped to his feet, giving her mother an unobstructed view of his complete and utter nudity. Joyce screeched and covered her eyes as she clawed blindly around Buffy’s dresser for something. Spike hurried into his jeans just managed to zip himself up when Joyce whirled around with a cross in her hand pointed directly at him.

He flinched and took a step back, knocking into the bed. “Oh, come on now! There’s no need for that! It’s me – Spike.”

“Get out of this house!” Joyce cried, arm still covering her eyes.

“Look, Joyce, I know this has been a shock but –”

Buffy shoved him towards the window. “Just go!”

“Yeah, but –” Spike started.

“Go!” She ordered sharply.

Spike frowned at her, a flash of something that looked like hurt in his eyes, before he sighed and climbed out of the window, clothes in hand. Buffy stood at the window watching his descent just so she didn’t have to look at her mother. She could feel her hands sweating as she balled them into fists and thought she might be having a panic attack.

She’d been found out. This was it. There was no way she could fix this.

“Buffy, what the hell is going on?”

The Slayer took a deep breath and turned towards her mother. The look on Joyce’s face was one of absolute shock and confusion. Buffy could only guess she mirrored the same expression on her own face, albeit for different reasons.

“I don’t know,” she responded, shakily. “I just…it’s complicated, mom.”

Her mother’s face darkened. “No, Buffy, it isn’t. You’re having a relationship with a vampire. Again. Haven’t you learnt anything?”

She shook her head vehemently. “It’s not like that! It’s not a relationship!”

“Oh, well. That’s much better,” Joyce replied, expression turning weary. “Buffy, did I raise you this way? It’s bad enough you’re using him for sex –”

“Mom!” Buffy whimpered, embarrassed to hear her mother even use that word, despite the seriousness of the situation.

“No, don’t ‘Mom!’ me! He is a vampire, Buffy. He’s a demon, he’s not human. It was bad enough with Angel but Spike doesn’t even have a soul, am I correct? Did he get a soul, Buffy?”

She looked down at the floor. “No. It’s not the same, mom. He’s not Angel. And I don’t want him to be.”

“Neither do I. I don’t want him to be anything to you.”

Buffy did look up then. “You liked Spike. You made him cocoa for god’s sake!”

“That was before I found out he was corrupting my daughter,” her mother folded her arms, eyes searching her daughter’s face. “He’ll drag you down to his level, Buffy. He lives in the dark. That’s where you’ll end up too. And your friends won’t understand this. Just like I don’t.”

“You don’t have to tell them.”

“Yes, I do,” she replied. “I’m going to call Willow, have her come around and do one of those spells she does…uninvite or…whatever…” Joyce murmured mostly to herself as she walked toward the door.

Buffy caught her hand. “Mom, please don’t.”

She looked down at their hands for a long moment then back up to her daughter’s pleading eyes. “I have to do what’s best for you. Even if you hate me for it,” she pulled away and left.

Buffy sat down on the side of her bed, a numbness enveloping her. It was time. The confrontation was finally here. She knew how they would all look at her; disgust, confusion, maybe even hatred. She knew that but she had to be strong. A part of her wanted to do the easy thing; run away, hide. Maybe it would be better if she did but she wouldn’t. This was her town and her life and she had to stand firm in her decisions.

Buffy stood and walked over to her wardrobe, pulling a light yellow sundress out and examining it. Though it was the middle of the night she changed into the dress and then sat down at her vanity table and brushed through her hair carefully. It didn’t seem right that she be dressed in pyjamas when her friends came calling. She had to meet them on even ground.

As she worked a tangle out of her hair, Buffy looked at herself in the mirror. Her face was devoid of make-up and pale, her eyes seemed darker than they once had. The dress had thin spaghetti straps and she was sure part of her scars were visible in places. For once, it didn’t matter. There were more important things to worry about, or not worry exactly, but to consider. Like how she would get them to understand and if they couldn’t then where she would go from there.

Buffy mused on all of this as she drew in a deep breath and made herself presentable.

+ + +

Xander was the worst, she knew he would be. They all arrived together; Xander, Willow and Giles. Piling through the door and asking a hundred and one questions of her mother before they spotted Buffy standing in the centre of the living room. The sundress threw Xander for a split second before he started in on his barrage. A lot of it wasn’t even coherent, just a bunch of swear words and flailing arms. Buffy stood still, her face portraying a sereneness she didn’t really feel, and waited for him to calm down enough to make some actual sense.
Willow stood behind him looking upset and betrayed. Buffy didn’t know what that look meant but it hurt to see it on her friend’s face, maybe even worse than the raving anger Xander was portraying. Giles, for his part, stood in the doorway eyes turned towards the floor – a quiet disappointment about him. Buffy knew that was usually the calm before the storm.

After about two whole minutes of getting abuse shouted at her from a boy she had thought respected her enough to let her make her own mistakes and decisions, Buffy had had enough. She raised a hand in a gesture to make it clear she wanted him to stop. When he didn’t, she spoke up.

“Xander,” Buffy said with a level voice. “Enough. If you have something to ask, then ask it. If not then shut the hell up.”

His lips formed a tight line. “Yeah, I’ve got something to ask, Buffy. When exactly was it that you became a vampire groupie, huh? Are you completely insane? You do realise he’s just using you; you’re just a joke to him, right? And another thing; Spike? What the hell!”

She blinked. “You want me to answer all that chronologically?”

He gritted his jaw. “Do you have any idea what you’re doing?”

“Yes,” she answered simply.

“Really? Well, then maybe you’d care to let us, your friends, in on it?” Xander motioned with his arms to them all.

Buffy looked at them each in turn. “I needed something to…to make me feel alive again.”

“Something. You got that right, at least. He’s a thing, Buffy!” Xander spat. “And he’s dead! How can a dead thing make you feel alive?”

She shrugged with one shoulder. “Because he treated me like me. Like I was still Buffy Summers. He didn’t tiptoe around me, too afraid to say what he really thought. He didn’t pity me and he didn’t put up with my crap. He was just Spike and I was just…me.”

Her only reaction from him was a shake of the head and a grimace. He didn’t understand and by the looks everyone else was giving her neither did they. Buffy sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose gently. Joyce, who had been standing by Giles, turned and left. Moments later sounds of tea being made and dishes being washed could be heard.

Her Watcher took a step forward, eyes level with her. “Your unpleasant association with him aside, Spike is a killer. He is a murderer and you didn’t see fit to inform us that he was back in town. Instead you carry on with him behind our backs. You are the Slayer. It is your duty to kill vampires, nothing more.”

“He isn’t killing anymore,” Buffy asserted quietly.

It was at that point that the whole room exploded into a cacophony of noise – shouts and swearing and disbelief. The Slayer scrunched up her eyes against it all for a moment before opening them again. The only thing she really wanted to do right now was get out of there. She didn’t need to hear their protestations and insinuations.

Willow shook her head, face pinched. “Buffy, come on. He’s Spike. He wouldn’t give up killing for anything.”

“He said –”

“Oh, so he said? Well I guess it must be true then!” Xander yelled, hand waving about as though it had a life of its own. “He’s evil! Lying is pretty much a part of that! I can’t believe you’d be stupid enough to fall for that.”

“I believe him.” Buffy said firmly, her voice carrying across the room and bringing with it a heavy silence.

It was Giles who spoke next. His voice low and strong. “I don’t think of you as a foolish person, Buffy, but I do think your judgement has been impaired. Clearly, we need to re-evaluate some things…but when it comes down to it, you’re either with us or you’re with him. There can be no middle ground in this.”

A low ache started in Buffy’s stomach. She turned her back on them so they wouldn’t see how this was affecting her. When the room went deathly silent, she realised that her scars obviously did show. Her friends had never really seen the damage the flames had done to her skin, it wasn’t as though she was about to go around showing them. For a moment she wished for her longer hair to hide them away but that moment passed and instead she squared her shoulders and clenched her jaw.

Buffy turned back to them, noting Willow’s shock and Xander swallowing solemnly but her eyes were for Giles.

“If you make me choose between you or Spike, I’m going to choose neither. I choose me,” she said defiantly, chin raised. “And if I choose to continue seeing him, then that’s my decision. You’re all my friends and I respect your opinions but I have to have conviction in myself.”

“Well, yourself is obviously wacko!” Xander threw his arms up in the air. “I can’t listen to this anymore. I can’t do this.”

He turned on his heel and stormed out of the door, after a moment’s hesitation Willow ran after him. Maybe to comfort him, maybe to get out of there, or maybe both. That left Buffy facing Giles in the centre of her living room. Neither wavered from their intense eye contact.

Giles spoke first. “I’ve always encouraged you to believe in yourself, Buffy; but I can’t condone this. I won’t. And you won’t change your mind?”

“I won’t.”

“Well, then,” he stepped back and shrugged slowly. “I suppose there’s nothing more to say. Goodbye, Buffy.” Giles turned to leave.

She called after him. “Goodnight Giles.”

He paused for a moment; back to her, then shook his head and left closing the door quietly behind him. The Slayer stood rooted to the spot in the middle of the room feeling suddenly hollow. It could have been hunger but it was a deeper kind of hollow. One she doubted she would be able to fill up. Blinking, she finally took a step forward and then another one and without really knowing why she found herself walking out of the house, barefoot and distracted.