Aftermath

Summary: My ideas of how things could have ogne after the Buffy finale. This was started before Spike came on Angel, hence the reason it's completely off canon.

Disclaimer: None of the Buffy/Angel characters belong to me. I'm just playing with them.

Pairing: Spuffy all the way. Maybe some others tossed in eventually, but mostly just Spuffy.

Rating: PGish for now until they're reunited. Then lots of NC-17 Spuffy lovin!!

Contact Info: Please read and review, just don't flame me! Feel free to e mail me at chocoholicgirl03@aol.com. Promise I'll respond. I'd appreciate any comments or suggestions you have to make my story better.

Distribution: If you'd like to put this story someplace else, just let me know

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Buffy sighed softly, rubbing her throbbing head and swallowing two more pain killers. She’d had headaches ever since the battle had ended. Oddly, life was sort of normal again. The SIT’s were all packed up and back home, training other girls and keeping in touch for advice through e mail, IMs, and phone calls. Faith and Wood had SERIOUSLY hooked up and were busy with the Hellmouth in Cleveland. Andrew had actually met a nice guy and had moved to Denver. Willow and Kennedy had split up but were still friends. Willow had come to realize that she was still not over Tara and it wasn’t fair to Kennedy to make her play second choice. Buffy had a sneaking suspicion she was gonna try to bring Tara back the right way. Tara was exactly what Willow needed, especially now. And this was different; Tarabablbably wanted to come back from Heaven to be with her Willow. And oddly enough or maybe not so, there was a hint of something between Dawn and Xander. Not that it was a bad thing in her book, in spite of the age difference. She had NO room to say anything on that topic considering Angel and Spike. She was happy for them. Giles had gotten them a very nice renovated Victorian house in the Bay area and was the librarian at a private school nearby. That was enoto gto get a weak laugh from her. She stared down into the darkness of the battered and chipped yellow Kiss the Librarian mug that Giles had happily surrendered to Spike. Stirring her tea slowly she bit her lower lip somehow she’d ended up with it in spite of everything.

Just thinking about Spike hurt. Knowing he was gone left her feeling empty and less than whoNot Not to mention the look on his face that still haunted her every time she closed her eyes. It took her several years to FINALLY tell him she loved him and mean it and he stood there and told her she didn’t. What the hell was THAT about?! Growling softly she sipped the steaming tea. God she could almost smell him. The rich combined scents of old leather, clove cigarettes, whiskey, and just HIM. It was so hard to pretend she was ok, that she was dealing with her new life but she really wasn’t. She’d come to depend on Spike’s strength, support, and yes his love so much and to suddenly have it torn away was almost more than she could handle. Tiredly she shut off the lights, heading up to her room. Crawling into bed she fondly hugged Mr. Gordo, another little thing from her life before the final battle that had shown up mysteriously. She’d come up to bed one night to find him sitting in the middle of the bed. Smiling she hugged the pig, staring out the windows. “At least I’ll always be able to depend on ONE man in my life huh.” Laughing bitterly she hugged the pig, falling asleep slowly.

The sound of her own sobs woke her and she shivered slightly. It was the same dream again. Spike, telling her he knew she didn’t love him and then the cavern caving in around him. Shivering she crawled to the edge of the bed, grabbing a stack of CD’s and her Discman, maybe listening to some music would help. Again, another odd coincidence. Most of them were CD’s Spike had listened to. They definitely weren’t the sort of thing any of the rest of them would listen to. Maybe Dawn had kept them somehow and they’d gotten mixed in with all the other CD’s. That HAD to be it. Picking one she remembered him often listening to, she put thadphadphones on and turned up the volume. Ok, so his taste in music wasn’t as bad as she’d thought. Even though the words of the song stung a bit she still liked it. It was the Highlander theme by Queen. To almost anyone else it would have been a major pump up the heart rate for a good workout type song but it made her relax. She wouldn’t doubt for a second the somewhere in the branches of Spike’s family tree there’d been royalty. The more she thought about it the more she cosee see it in his attitude and that swagger. As far as rivals went, he didn’t have any serious ones. Not even Angel. Spike could kick Angel’s ass any day. He had years of rage on his side to fuel him in a real fight. And he could keep a clear enough head to banter with Angelus and still win the physical part of the fight. And no, no man could ever be his equal but they had both been more than surprised to learn they were each other’s equal.

Halfway through the CD she was just laying in bed staring out the windows. She squinted through the darkness at the windows. When had she opened them? She couldn’t quite remember. Didn’t matter, the breeze was nice. Sorta salty tonight, coming from the direction of the ocean she could glimpse in the distance. She smiled, closing her eyes briefly with a sigh, another song cutting through to her. This time it was Who Wants to Live Forever. Made her wonder if despite of what he said it bothered him some to know he had a pretty good chance of living forever. They’d gotten WAY beyond trashed one night and had ended up having a very deep discussion on if he had the chance to change everything if he would. Not surprisingly he didn’t want to change anything, except he admitted he d had have stopped the whole I’m going to kill you and I hate you Slayer game a lot sooner so they could have had a real shot at being a couple, and a few other things he didn’t want to go into detail about but mostly he was happy with how things had turnet. At. And when he’d asked her, she’d said much the same. Make a few changes, mostly less of Angel, Parker, and Riley more of him. But the living for so long, well she had to admit to him she’d sort of like to do it. Being the Slayer really cut into havingh ofh of a life. Living for a good long time sorta sounded appealing.

The soft cool breeze made her remember Spike’s touch and oddly the memory didn’t hurt. If she concentrated hard enough, she could ALMOST make herself believe it WAS his touch. Usually it didn’t feel QUITE this real. Maybe she was just missing him more tonight. Wincing she rubbed her right knee. It had gotten pretty messed up in the battle and even with Slayer healing it hadn’t healed quite right. She probably was getting arthritis or something. Perfect, arthritis in her twenties. Just what she needed, frosting on the cookie that was her life. NOT. Sighing she wished Spike was there to tease her about moping over arthritis and throw being over a hundred and not having a thing wrong with him in her face like he usually did when she complained. She continued rubbing her knee, her skin cooled by the breeze. Some nights like this she would have given into the need that the coolness helped to dull and let herself imagine it was Spike touching her, pleasing hbut but not tonight. She was too tired and her knee was really starting to hurt and that was a real mood killer. Thinking back on it she’d been having a little trouble with that same knee for a while now. Not this bad but still enough to make her annoyed now and then. Trying to remember just when he knee had started bothering her gave her something to do. She grinned slowly. That had to be it. It had started bothering her sometimes just after she and Spike had brought down that abandoned house. Mmmm that had been good, so good. God she missed him so much.

All right Buffy, enough of that, time for a hot bath. For more than just her knee, the scalding water made it impossible to think of the glorious coolness of Spike’s body against hers. She sighed deeply, blinking back tears. Why wasn’t he here? Why did she have to go on without him just when she’d figured it all out? It just wasn’t fair! She missed him so much needed him so much. He had been right, he was in her now, heart, soul, mind, body, blood all screamed for him. Clutching Mr. Gordo she cried herself to sleep. Softly the shadows moved closer to her, tenderly brushing her cheek and murmuring soothing words of comfort as they tucked the blankets in around her. She calmed in her sleep, smiling faintly and murmuring Spike’s name. Sighing softly her muscles unwound as she felt herself held in strong arms.

There had been a time years ago when she would have given anything to have gone to Angel and let him hold her. But not now. There was too much history there, too much pain for both of them. She loved him, always would. But Spike, Spike would always be the great love of her life and nothing would be the same without him. It hurt losing him a whole hell of a lot more than when she’d thought Angel was gone. This was a different pain. More intense. But somehow, that pain was less when she was held like this even if it was just another dream. And now, she could almost smell him again, feel the soft supple leather of his coat against her as he held her. And more than that she could practically feel his soft kisses and nuzzles on her cheek kissing her tears away, hear his rich voice purring in her ear. ‘Hush pet, I’m here. ‘S all right now. I got you. Make it stop hurting.’ She really had to stop this, it wasn’t good to keep giving into these little fantasies letting herself pretend they were real, that he was actually there holding her. It wasn’t good. Too tempting to just stay there with her memories and not go back to the pain and emptiness. At the moment though she didn’t care didn’t want to think about it. For the time being there was peace and comfort and even a faint sense of hope she hadn’t felt before. The thought that maybe, just maybe, things would be better. Maybe not as soon as she would like, but still they would be better.

Reluctantly she got up the next morning, looking at the now closed windows. Had she gotten up sometime during the night and closed them. Maybe Giles had come in to check on her and closed them. She wouldn’t be surprised if he had. Sighing softly she closed her eyes, swearing she caught Spike’s familiar scent Ok, enough of that. It was day now and there were things to do. Giles would be at the school and Xander had gotten a really nice job as foreman of a construction crew. Willow was probably with some members of her new coven, probably talking about the RIGHT way to bring Tara back. They seemed really supportive of the idea and wanted to help. Something about it not being Tara’s time yet and second chances. Dawn would probably be at one of the little galleries that dotted the nearby neighborhoods. She’d picked up on their Mom’s love of art and had actually learned a lot from hanging around the Sunnydale gallery and listening to Mom talk about art for hours on end. Usually she’d just tune out but apparently Dawn had actually listened and picked up on a few things. And with her charming personality she could get the most reluctant of customers and the no thanks I’m just looking crowd to buy expensive stuff.

She’d considered going back to college but her heart just wasn’t in it. She didn’t really want to stick with Psychology it was just way too technical. And besides there was who whole lingering Riley, Dr. Walsh, Initiative, Adam, chip in Spike’s head thing. Funny, everyone else had picked up and moved on so easily. Everyone but her. Now she understood how the rest of them had felt when she was off doing the Slayer thing and they just had to sit back and watch. Now they all had lives and she just puttered around the house. Sighing she pulled her hair up into a tucked in ponytail and moved to make the bed. She froze. Normally she just used one pillow and the other just sat there. But this morning it had obviously been moved and used and the side of the bed she didn’t sleep on was sort of rumpled. She vaguely remembered having a nightmare. That had to be why the bed was all messed up. Sighing she straightened the other pillow, blinking as the sunlight caught a few platinum strands on the pillow. She shook her head backing away. No, this couldn’t be real, it just couldn’t! Giles, she needed to call Giles and have him come over. Trembling she picked up the phone, dialing his office in the school library. “G, Giles, can, can you come home? PLEASE?!” He was immediately concerned by her tone. “Buffy, is everything all right? What’s wrong?” She shook her head. “No, Giles, everything is NOT all right. I don’t know what’s wrong!! Just, just can you come hopleaplease!!” He sighed softly. “Of course. I’ll be there shortly.” She nodded. “Thanks Giles.”

Still shaking she went downstairs, curling up on the couch and just staring at the wall. She looked up briefly when Giles came in, getting up to pace. “Just sit, I just need to talk.” She began to pace, acutely aware of his eyes on her. “O.k. MAJOR weird stuff has been going on since we moved in here. Spike type stuff. Like, like I keep SMELLING him. You know because he had this smell that was just HIM. And, and then there’s Mr. Gordo. MY Mr. Gordo not some Mr. Gordo look alike! I mean only MY Mr. Gordo has the tip of his left ear missing and the tip of his tail isn’t fluffy anymore because Spike was a big stupid head jerk and decided he was gonna curl his tail the other way, and, and, and then last night, the windows, I didn’t open the windows and next thing I know they’re closed again. And the CD’s, they don’t belong to any of us. None of us adore the Sex Pistols and Queen but the CD’s show up in my room, andbed bed it was all messed up. I sleep on one side. I don’t use both pillows and I don’t mess up the other side of the bed and it was this morning and I had this dream that Spike was back and he was holding me so I could sleep because sometimes he used to do that because I had nightmares and they went away if he held me and then I was making the bed this morning and there’s these blond blond hairs on the pillow I don’t sleep on and they’re WAY shorter and lighter than mine and am I losing my mind?!” She sniffled softly, shaking slightly. “This, this can’t be happening. I mean Spike’s gone, big glowy light. Light, vampire, NOT a good mix There’s, there’s just no way he could have survived and I have to be going crazy, because that is the only explanation that makes ANY sense but I don’t want to be going crazy Giles. I want Spike back. I need him back. And I know all the reasons I shouldn’t and that none of you would approve even if he was somehow miraculously still alive and this sounds like just back from the dead Spike makes me feel Buffy but I don’t care. I need him.” She sniffled softly, finally coming to a stop with her back to Giles. Taking a shaky breath she lowered her head, wrapping her arms around herself tightly.

Quietly Giles put his arms around her, letting her cling to him and cry. Gently he smoothed her hair and rubbed her back, not sure exactly what to say. Finally he gently tipped her chin up. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say, how to help you.” Buffy shrugged faintly. “Just be here.” He nodded. “Of course. I’ll call the school and take the rest of the day off. I’m sure someone can take over for me. Will you be all right while I call?” Nodding slightly Buffy pulled away. “Yeah. Think I’ll just go lay down, try to rest.” “I’ll come and look in on you in a bit, bring you some tea.” She smiled. “Thanks Giles. That’d be nice.” God old Giles bring Buffy a cup of tea and everything would be ok. Carefully she made her way back upstairs, closing the blinds and darkening her room, curling up on the bed with Mr. Gordo in her arms.

Willow let herself into the house, catching the worry in Giles tone as he called the school. Setting her bag down she leaned against the back of a chair. “Ok, what is it? Just don’t tell me it’s another Apocalypse because we’re not due for another one for a couple of years I think.” Giles managed a weak smiled, ng hng his glasses off and pinching the bridge of his nose between his eyes. “Thankfully, no. But I am rather worried about Buffy…… She seems to be under the impression that perhaps Spike somehow possibly survived and has been leaving her things. And was in her room last night.” Willow bit her lip. “Oh. Maybe I should go talk to her.” She stopped him with a raised hand. “Giles, I know you’ve lost people you’ve loved too, but it’s different ok. It just is. I’m Buffy’s best friend. Let me try and help. Like it or not Spike was her soul mate, like Tara was mine. I know what that pain feels like. I still deal with it every day. It’s why I couldn’t stay with Kennedy anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not telling you to butt out, just be there for her. Don’t try to rationalize with her right now, just be there for her. I’m going to go talk to her. Make us some tea and give me a few, then come join us.” Giles nodded, a bit surprised at Willow taking charge of the situation so thoroughly. “Yes, all right Willow.” Smiling she patted his shoulder gently. “Giles, we don’t say it enough, but thanks for everything.”

She headed upstairs, knocking on Buffy’s door lightly. “Buffy, it’s me, can I come in?” Buffy sighed, sniffling. “Yeah Will, it’s open.” Willow slipped in, sitting next to her. “Giles told me. You ok?” Buffy shook her head, not trusting her voice. Willow blinked, hating to see her best friend in so much pain. “Oh, Buffy, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know how much it hurts!” Willow hugged her gently. Buffy simply leaned into her, crying. “I’m losing it Willow, I really am! It scares me. If I let myself, I could just let go and be with him in my head.”