Lonely No More

"I can't believe I'm going on vacation," Buffy stated for the tenth time in an hour. She looked over at Spike's amused and yet somewhat uncomfortable face. "With you," she finished.

"Oi! Not very nice, kitten. You're going to have a fantastic time with me.
Much needed rest and . . . all that stuff."

"Where are we going?" Buffy asked, as she pulled out a sheet of paper and
wrote: ‘Things to Pack' at the top.

Spike fidgeted. Good Goddess, why did he never think things out? Let's go
on vacation Buffy. Uncle, make her say yes...Where the bleeding hell were
they going to go? He understood now what his mother meant when she
called him impulsive. Impetuous. It was the whole reason why, his mother
claimed, he'd rammed straight into Mt. Olympus' pillars when he was
learning how to fly still. Apparently, he'd wanted to show he didn't need any
help and that he could do it all on his own. He took off in the middle of his
mother's explanation about flight control and wham! His left wing had been
sore for a week. He rubbed his left arm as Buffy looked up at him
expectantly.

"Uh, it's a surprise," he finally answered.

"You mean you don't know," she said, placing her pen down.

"I mean it's surprise," he said huffily. "Can you just trust me?"

She started to laugh. That didn't bode well. He glared at her and she
stopped. Then started again. "In case you hadn't noticed, I don't trust
easily. At least not anymore."

Spike cocked his head to the side. "What happened?"

She shrugged, "Life. So, if this is a sur—"

"Like what happened?" Spike asked and sat down across from her.

She blinked at him. "Huh?"

"What happened to make you not trust," he urged.

"Just let it go Spike."

"You'll go on vacation with but won't tell me why you don't trust anyone?"
Even if it wasn't you that actually agreed, he thought. So much guilt for
that.

"It's not that I won't trust anyone, I just have a hard time doing so."

"Tell me why."

"I've known a lot of liars, okay?"

"Were these liars ex boyfriends?"

She sighed heavily, leveled him with her eyes. "Yes."

"Did you love them?

"What a ridiculous question," she waved her hand at him, as if dismissing
him.

"Not really. You could have been in lust with them. You could have just
cared for them. You didn't have to be in love with them."

She studied him for a long time. "Well, I was," she said finally, quietly.


"What did they lie about?"

"One lied about being married. Another about getting a job. One told me he
never loved me at all."

"Do you believe he did?"

"Sometimes I thought he did."

"Only sometimes?"

"You can feel it ya know? You can tell when someone is really with you and
only half with you."

"Why was he with you if he--? I'm sorry Buffy." "What are you sorry for?
You asked." The hardness in her tone made him wince.

He reached across the desk and took her hands in his. She looked up at him
surprised. "Because I hate to think of you in pain," he told her. "And I don't
understand how someone, anyone, could not love you."

Her eyes widened at that and he swore he saw tears before she yanked her
hands away and stood.

"Don't," she said coldly, pointing at him.

"Don't what?"

"Lie to me."

Now his eyes grew large and he stood to face her. "I would never lie to you
Buffy. I told you I never would and I never have." Except that I'm
immortal and my Uncle is Eros, the God of Love, and I have wings and I
had my uncle work magick on you so you'd go away with me. Other than
that, I wouldn't lie to you, Spike thought sarcastically in his mind, wanting
to kick himself for his duplicity.

"You just don't want me to leave here," she told him and stalked off.

He went after her, grabbing her arm and making her face him. He was
pissed. Pissed at himself for the deceptions that kept growing, pissed for
feeling guilty even though he knew she would never have agreed to go
away without some outside assistance, pissed that he cared more than he
should have, pissed that she invoked feelings in him that he knew he wasn't
supposed to be feeling for any mortal and least of all the one he'd been sent
on a mission to help. He was also pissed that he'd been denied his hug that
morning!

"Now you listen to me Buffy Summers," he demanded, his voice shaking with anger. "I do not lie to you. I never have and I never will. I care about you dammit. I care about you and this place most of all. I'd rather see you happy and see this place burn if that's what it took to put a smile back on your beautiful face. I'm tired of you running away from me and thinking I have some other motive under my sleeve. I don't. It's for YOU that I put up with your attitude; it's for YOU that I care. I want to help YOU. I'm not like them Buffy so don't lump me in there with them. Maybe they had motives and ulterior motives, but I don't. When I say I want to take care of you, I mean it. When I say that. . . " he softened and wrapped his arms around her, "that my new favorite thing is to hold you, I mean it. I do. I really, really do." He brushed his fingers through her hair and froze when he felt her body rock with a sob. No, this was a good thing. It needed to be done and she needed to know that she could let that side of her show with him and he'd accept it, he'd take all of her just as she was. No brave fronts were needed.

It only made him care for her more.

"You need to be held like this," he whispered soothingly. "You need to know that you're not alone. At least not while I'm here." And please, don't take me from her now or . . . possibly ever. "Let me take care of you Buffy. Let me show you that I want to be here because of you and no other reason. Let me hold you and cook for you and make you laugh. Will you let me do that?"

"I'm scared," she whimpered through her tears against his chest.

"So am I, my lioness."

"Of what? You're never afraid.""I'm afraid you won't let me in. I'm afraid you'll give up on everything. There is so much life in you, Buffy. You just don't see it. I want you to see it."

She didn't answer and instead buried herself deeper in his embrace and he nestled his head against hers, whispering nonsensical words of comfort.
It was funny how all felt right with the world just by holding Buffy Summers in his arms.