Unexpected Blessings

Title: Unexpected Blessings
Author: Pattyanne
snapkik@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: Not mine
Rating: Varies from chapter to chapter
Feedback: Tons of it, please.
Summary: Buffy and Spike have a
baby. This is a prequel to "Daddy's
Girl"



~~~~~~~~~

The Eighth Month

~~~~~


Spike could hear the sound of the kitchen
cupboards being yanked open and banged shut
as alkealked downstairs.

Folding his arms across his chest, he leaned against
the doorjamb and watched Buffy ransack the
pantry, muttering under her breath.

Grinning, he said, "If you'll tell me what you're
looking for, maybe I can help you find it."

"That's just it," she replied, blowing her bangs
out of her eyes as she reached into the back of
a cupboard. "You can't help me find it...cause
it's not here."

"What's not here?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said, pulling her hand back.

Spike joined her in front of the opentryntry
door. "Well...if you don't know, then how do you
know it's not here?"

"Because if it was here," she explained patiently,
"then I would see it."

"See what?"

"See what I'm looking for."

Leaning over, he peered into the cupboard with
her. "But if you don't know what it is, how do you
know it's not right here in front of you?"

Buffy sighed. "Because..if it was right in front of
me..I would see it, because it would be here."

"What would be here?" He was about to start laughing,
he just knew it.

"The thing that I want."

He decided to try another approach. "Well, if it WAS
here...what would it look like?"

"Like the thing I want."

"Which is what?"

"I already told you...I don't know."

She turned on him, hands on her hips, fully
expecting him to understand and endorse her
convoluted logic.

So, he tried. "Okay...you want something, but you're
not sure what it is. You'd know it if you saw it, but
since you don't see it, then you don't know exactly
what it IS that you don't see...even though it's what
you want."

Buffy stared up at him. "I have NO idea what you
just said."

He chuckled. "Neither do I, honey."

"Arrgghh" she growled, closing the pantry door. "There's
nothing to eat in this house."

"What are you talking about?" he asked in disbelief. "Dawn
was at the market for over an hour this morning. This
place is packed with food."

"I know," she said agreeably. "But there's nothing that
I want."

"Well, what do you...oh, no you don't" He backed away. "No
fair dragging me into THAT again!"

"Dragging you into WHAT again?"

"That game of verbal volleyball that you enjoy torturing
me with."

Buffy just smiled. "Be nice to me."

"I'm ALWAYS nice to you," Spike protested. "You're
the one who's mean to me!"

Dragging out a chair from the dinette, she flopped
down onto it and stared at the table. "I know...I'm sorry."

He looked at her suspiciously. "You're not gonna cry,
are you?"

"No."

"Pout?"

"Nope."

She looked so sincerely miserable that he couldn't
bear it. With a sigh, he picked her up from the chair
and sat back down with her in his lap.

"Oh, don't," she complained. "I weigh a ton."

"You do not," he denied, nuzzling her hair. "What's the
matter, baby?"

Buffy looked at him and made a face. "I want chocolate!"

Spike was surprised. "Dawn didn't get anything chocolate?"

She shook her head.

Now, he was really shocked. The two women he shared
this house with had an absolute passion for chocolate. It
was as essential to them as blood was to him.

"Why would Dawn do all that shopping and not buy..."

She interrupted him. "I..sort of told her not to."

"YOU...told her not to?" Would wonders never cease?

"Wellll," she whined. "I thought I was eating too much
of it."

"Baby," he said, stroking her hair. "The doc said your
weight was fine. He told you to go ahead and give
in to your cravings."

"I know...but...he didn't really know how much of it
I was eating." Sitting up straight in his lap, she gazed
into his eyes to make sure he understood. "Spike...I
was eating chocolate breakfast cereal."

"Well, that's not so...."

"With chocolate milk poured on it!"

"Oh...."

Buffy hid her face against his shoulder. "I'm a chocolate
junkie," she moaned.

His arms tightened around her. "No, you're not," he said
soothingly.

"Yes, I am!" she insisted. "You don't know how badly I
want it. It's like...like heroin!"

Spike laughed. "I don't think it'll have exactly the same
effect, honey." He kissed the top of her head. "Listen..it's
hard to stop doing something, or eating something that you
love. Just quitting flat out and all."

"YOU did it!"

"But I had some negative reinforcement, if you remember
correctly. It really won't be good for you to have a blinding
migraine every time you eat a piece of candy."

She wrapped her arms around his neck. "But you
quit smoking too."

He nodded. "Yeah, but I did that for you and the baby. It
can't hurt me, but I'm not taking any chances with the
two of you."

Buffy leaned her head on his shoulder. "You're so
sweet to me," she murmured.

"Because I love you."

"A lot?"

"Mm-hmm...more than anything."

"Enough to do something for me?" She placed a
line of kisses down the side of his face.



"Sure. What do you want me to do?" he asked.

"Well," she said, playing with his shirt buttons. "The
sun's down."

"So?"

"I thought...maybe you would...go to the store for me?"

Spike pulled back a little and looked at her. "For
what?"

Buffy sighed in exasperation. "For what do you think?"

Wrapping his arms loosely around her waist, he
kissed her and said, "I thought you wanted to cut down
on chocolate."

She shrugged. "I changed my mind."

Spike hid his grin against the side of her neck. "Honey,"
he said sincerely, "I wouldn't feel right about it if I didn't
try to help you overcome this prob...OW!"

He rubbed his ear as she waved her small fist
under his nose. "Next time you're really gonna
yell," she warned him pleasantly.

"You know, that's not a nice way to treat someone
when you want them to do something for you."

"Nice?" she squealed. "Is it nice to treat ME this
way? Nice to tease your sweet little bride, who YOU
knocked up higher than a box kite?"
"Swe"Sweet?" he muttered under his breath as he
dislodged her from his lap and stood up. "She calls it
sweet! I haven't seen anything sweet since before..."

"What was that?" she demanded.

"Nothing, baby...nothing important," he said as he
walked out of the kitchen.

"Where are you going?" she asked, trotting after
him.

"To get the keys and..." He sighed and rolled his
eyes. "...go to the bloody store."

She graced him with a huge smile. "Thank you, honey."

"You're.." He frowned as she thrust a piece of paper
under his nose. "..welcome. What's that?"

"A list" she said brightly, nudging him towards the
stairs.

When he came back down, she was waiting for
him by the door, holding his jacket.

He leaned over to kiss her, and she returned the
kiss, but placed her hands on his waist and began
walking him backwards out the front door."

"Bye, sweetie," she said cheerfully. "Drive carefully...but
hurry home, okay?"

"Yeah," he said. "I'll just..." She closed the door. "..do that."

**********

The market was almost empty, making his chore a
lot easier.

As the cashier ran the items over the scanner, she
shook her head in amazement. "Boy...someone has a
serious love affair going with chocolate."

Spike shrugged. "My wife is..."

"Pregnant?"

"Yeah."

The woman laughed. "I know how she feels. With me..it
was meat. Rare meat..bloody. By the time I delivered, I
was almost eating it raw."

Spike was intrigued. This was a craving he could get
behind! "That's entirely understandable."

She shook her head. "My husband didn't think so," she
said. "I drove him nuts serving undercooked meat. He was
afraid we were both going to die of botulism or something."

"That's an old wives tale," Spike scoffed. "Little blood
never hurt anybody."

The cashier handed him his change and the grocery
bags. "Good luck!"

"Thanks, pet."

Halfway home, he decided to make a quick stop at
Willy's.

The place was fairly crowded, forcing him to roughly
nudge a few demons out of his way.

"What'll it be?" the bartender growled.

Spike glanced around. "You new here?"

"Yeah. What do wan want?"

Turning his head briefly, Spike let his demon loose
and looked back at the man. "Take a wild guess."

Without a word, the bartender reached under the
bar and brought out a tall glass, filling it from a
blood bag. Pushing the glass across the bar, he
asked, "You want it straight..or should I make it
interesting?"

Spike briefly considered the offer, then decided
against it. It woldn't be a good idea to show up at
home smelling of alcohol. Buffy was a fairly patient
girl these days, but he didn't want to give her a
reason to yell at him.

He saw a gold glitter out of the corner of his
eye and looked down to watch the light reflect
off his wedding ring. Tilting his hand, he watched
the sparkle come and go.

Spike smiled, remembering every moment of
the day she had given him this ring. She had
looked so pretty, she had absolutely knocked
him out.

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////


Buffy and Dawn had spent a lot of time planning
the "perfect wedding," even after he had told her
that no wedding could possibly be perfect, and
she shouldn't expect it to be.

It hadn't worked. She had been up at sunrise, drag-
ging Dawn out of bed and down to the back yard
to start decorating.

He had spent most of the previous night stringing
tiny, clear Christmas tree lights through all of the
trees and bushes, so Buffy had given him the day
off, assuring him that all he needed to do was shower,
dress, and present himself at the proper time and
place.

Waking at about four o'clock in the afternoon, he had
glanced out the window wat watched with a grin as
Buffy bossed everyone around with the authority of
a traffic cop.

"Don't worry about where the chairs will go...We'll
decide when they get here...Did you find the table-
cloths?...Look in the bottom drawer of the china cab-
inet...Where's Willow?...Go find her...XANDER!...Don't
put the arch there!...Of course I didn't tell you I wanted
it there!...I want it in front of the rose bushes...Then
PUT it there...please!...What time is it?...Are you
kidding??"

The doorbell had rung, and he had gone downstairs
to answer it. He directed the delivery men to the
back yard, instructing them to speak to the bride about
where she wanted the chairs, explaining that they
would have no trouble identifying her...just look for the
small, pretty blond behaving like a cross between Hitler
and a professional football coach.

Back upstairs, he'd returned to his vantage point by
the window to watch the show.

"Xander...move the arch over there...Because I've
changed my mind...Never mind why...Willow?...The
flowers are here...You have to see these, they're
my favorite...HEY!...Come back here...These roses
are red!...Well, I ordered white roses...Yes, I'm
sure!...If I'd ordered red roses, then I wouldn't be
complaining about GETTING red roses, would I?...Yes,
that's exactly what I want you to do...And move
fast...Run red lights...Shoo!...What do you want now,
Xander?...I am perfectly calm!"

Spike had chuckled softly, shaking his head as he
went to shower and change. After the sun went down,
he presented himself for inspection.

After checking him over from top to bottom, Buffy
had smiled and kissed him, whispering in his ear
that he looked delicious in the black silk shirt and
suede pants she'd bought, and that she couldn't wait
for their wedding "night."

Rewarding him with another kiss, she had called
her posse into the house with her to help her
dress.

An hour later, everything was in place, and the
ceremony began.

One of his clearest and best memories was the
moment he had turned to see his bride.

How she could be more beautiful than she already
was, he couldn't fathom.

She wore a cream colored dress, with a velvet bodice
and a satin skirt that fell to the floor from beneath a
high waistline designed to accomodate her pregnancy.

The sleeves of the gown were velvet as well, snug
all the way to her wrists, then ending in a froth of
creamy lace that cascaded over her hands.

A circlet of white rosebuds nestled in her honey
colored curls.

When she'd reached his side, he'd stared at her,
almost hypnotized by her beauty. He had taken
her hand and turned it over, then lifted it to his
lips and pressed a lingering kiss into her palm,
never breaking eye contact with her.

"You look like an absolute angel," he'd murmured.
"Will you marry me?"

She had smiled. "Yes, I'll marry you."

They had exchanged their vows in front of a
Wiccan priestess that Willow knew, although
Buffy had requested a more traditional love,
honor, and cherish form of the ceremony.

The actual wedding hadn't taken long, but the
party afterwards had gone on for almost six
hours. The night air had been warm, and the
entire yard glittered and sparkled with lights and
laughter and music.

The last ones to leave had been Willow and
Tara. Taking Dawn home with them for the night,
they had promised to return the next day and
clean up the party mess, then disappear for the
rest of the weekend.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



TBC...(in chapter 8, part 2)