Past Perfect
by SpikesKat
England
The heat was intense, but she refused to let go of his
hand. She had to hold on.
There were so many things she had to say… tell him.
Sure, he was her champion.
But not like this.
She hadn’t wanted this.
He looked down at her with those solemn blue eyes of
his and calmly told her it was time for her to go. She’d done enough, and it was left for him to do the
cleanup.
Buffy woke with a start, her mouth frozen open on a silent
scream.
No, you don't. But
thanks for saying it.
Wearily, she ran her hands down her face, pausing to take a
deep, calming breath as the recurring dream settled back into her subconscious. Her
tired eyes took in the ancient alarm clock on the bedside table.
Noted with a groan the hour – three o’clock in the morning.
Another sigh, and she swung her legs over the side of the mattress and
stood up. No point in trying to go back
to sleep.
Octobers in London were cold. And the lack of carpet beneath her feet seemed to make it even more so.
Not that it stopped her from padding barefoot across the wooden floor, out of her room and down the hall towards the kitchen.
No, she took odd comfort in how the cold seeped into her bones,
chilling her to the core. It grounded
her, kept her mind in the here and now rather than focusing on other things.
Darker things.
~*~*~*~*~
“Can’t sleep?”
Buffy swung around from her customary spot in front of the
stove to see Giles, looking similarly tired and unkempt, standing in the doorway
to the kitchen.
“Giles!” she gasped.
“You scared me! Wha--what are you
doing up?”
“Same as you, I suspect,” he sighed wearily.
The Slayer stiffened; she didn’t want to have this
discussion with him. With any
of them. Her last moments with
Spike were all she had left of him, and she hoarded the memories to herself –
even if they were harsh.
Seeing the understanding in her watcher’s eyes made it that much worse. It was like he knew.
“Tea?” she asked, changing the subject.
Giles played along and nodded, stepping into the room and taking a seat at the small round table in the corner.
The kettle was just shy of sounding its warning shrill when
Buffy snagged it from the burner. She
turned off the eye and filled two cups full of the boiling water, teabags already
waiting in the bottom. Buffy felt Giles’ eyes practically boring into her back
as she
She had to hand it to him, he recovered well; his frown quickly disappeared and he gifted her with an overly bright smile.
‘Tea snob,’ she thought silently as she laid the
spoon aside and joined him at the table.
Giles watched Buffy as she proceeded to massacre her tea,
wincing as the third spoonful of sugar disappeared from her spoon. When she
started for a fourth, he was compelled to comment, “Why do you even bother
drinking tea?”
“Huh?” Buffy looked up at her Watcher, confused and a bit
distracted, the hand gripping her spoon pausing in midair.
“Your tea. It’s a
wonder you can taste it for all the bloody milk and sugar you’ve added to it,”
Giles griped.
“Oh… uh…” She stared down at the liquid that had
gone from a dark shade to an almost cream colored one.
“Habit, I guess…”
Giles rolled his eyes and made a production of adding only
a dollop of milk to his own cup, and Buffy couldn
“I think that’s the first time I’ve seen you smile
since…” His voice trailed off,
and the Slayer’s eyes became haunted, her mirth squelched in an instant
at the reminder of Spike. Giles was
half tempted to kick his own arse at his faux pas.
“I’m sorry… It’s just… Buffy, you’re hardly sleeping.
And when you do, it’s never more than a few hours at a time.
I know the destruction of… of Sunnydale came as a sharp blow—”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she announced
abruptly, jumping to her feet. “I
just…” Instead of finishing what she was
about to say, she turned on her heel and, with tea in hand, left the room.
~*~*~*~*~
“Here,” he murmured as he held out a small pouch to the
Slayer.
Buffy looked away from the fire blazing in the hearth to
glance first at the leather sack lying on the palm of Giles’ hand then to his
face; confusion marred her features.
“Take it,” he urged.
“What is it?” she asked, making no move to grab his
offering.
“A sleeping potion… and don’t look at me like
that. Strictly white magicks, all
natural ingredients, and completely non-habit forming.
Trust me.”
Buffy eyed the pouch dubiously, but took it out of his
hand nonetheless, and Giles released the breath he’d not realized he’d been
holding – his slayer could be so contrary sometimes.
Her next words just confirmed his opinion.
“If I take this, will you quit harping on me?”
“Uh… yes… really, Buffy… I’m just trying to look out for
you.”
Buffy sighed.
“I know, Giles. Really… I
do. It’s just… it’s something I have to
work out on my own. But…” she added when he looked to interrupt. “…I’ll take
this like the good slayer I am.”
She opened the pouch and tilted her head back to pour the
contents into her mouth, snagging her tea from the coffee table in front of her
to wash the powder down. A tingling
sensation started where the sleep agent hit her tongue, spreading out from her
core to race along her limbs. Her eyelids
grew heavy, and Buffy stretched out on the couch as sleep quickly overcame her.
Giles closed his mouth, biting back the retort for her to
wait to take the potion until she was in bed; there was no harm in the Slayer
sleeping on the couch. The only other
people that shared the flat with him were Willow and Dawn, and the two girls had
gone off on a Wiccan retreat a few days ago.
He pulled the afghan from the back of the couch and settled
it over her slight frame in a show of fatherly affection.
As she was fast on her way to REM sleep, he could clearly see the fatigue that lined
the girl’s face – fatigue that no amount of cosmetics could hide.
He knew she was harboring some painful demons, just as he himself was.
While slowly rebuilding the Watcher’s Council from, quite literally, the
ground up, he’d spent an equal amount of time pondering – and writing down – the
actions of the blond-headed pest that had loved his Slayer.
And who apparently loved him.
Although, to call him a pest….
No, Spike hadn
Only, she hardly seemed to be doing that now. Buffy was just a shadow of her former self, even worse than when she’d been ripped out of heaven and thrust into the mess that had accumulated in the months since her death.
Part of him was ashamed at his duplicity, but Giles felt he’d proved often enough that there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for his slayer. If, by manipulating her dreams he was betraying her trust…
Well, that was something he could live with.
He’d been accused of and done far worse in his time.
~*~*~*~*~
Buffy watched at the scene from the Magic Box, when
everyone had lost their memories, thanks to another spell gone wrong, courtesy
of her friend Willow, played out
before her eyes. A nostalgic smile tugged at her lips as she watched her “other” self.
Even as “Joan,” she’d seemed to know that she was a leader; and her actions, even without the knowledge of who exactly she was
seemed to prove it. Her eyes ate up the
scene, and everyone.
Everyone, but him.
Him she saved for last, her gaze finally drinking him in just as he got to his rant about his name. A full-blown grin engulfed her face at his righteous indignation.
“…Randy Giles? Why not just call me ‘Horny Giles,’ or ‘Desperate for a Shag Giles’? I knew there was a reason I hated you!” Spike complained.
“You don’t have to be desperate. I’ll shag you anytime,” she murmured aloud.
Spike’s head swiveled away from his
Then Spike was speaking, and she swallowed hard at feeling a rush of moisture between her legs.
“That a fact, pet?”
‘He’d heard her?’ she thought, followed quickly by a, ‘And how did he do it?’
Even with amnesia, and garbed in those outlandish clothes, Spike still managed to exude that Bad Boy sexuality inherent in his nature.
She nodded helplessly.
Hey, it was her fantasy after all, right?
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