Part V - Open Wounds

They walked silently all the way to the Doublemeat Palace. Spike hadn’t uttered a word since their previous fight and Buffy felt a little bit uneasy about it. In all their argueing and bickering it had never come to this uncomfortable stillness. Every time something was wrong they would just throw a few nasty remarks about each other and move on as if nothing had happen. She didn’t know why, but this time it was different.

“Could you hurry up, please? I don’t wanna be late for work.” Buffy asked nonchalantly.

The only evidence she got that he had heard her was the quickening of his pace, nothing else. His eyes where still looking straight forward and his hands firmly placed inside his coat’s pockets.

As they reached their destination Buffy turned to him and explained:

”I don’t want people to think I’m bringing someone to work so I’ll go in through the employees entrance and you can just go through the main door as if you were a costumer, ok?”

He nodded and headed towards the fast-food restaurant.

***********************

Hours had past. It was almost time to close up. Spike had spent the entire evening sitting at a table at the far end of the DP just looking at people passing by without even glancing in Buffy’s general direction.

She sighed and took off the ridiculous hat as finished cleaning the grease off the counter.

“Well, time to go!” she announced.

Automatically, Spike stood up and walked towards the door, which Buffy held open for him. Once more in silence, they headed towards the cemetery for one quick patrol before finally going home.

**********************************

As she finished dusting a newborn vampire, Buffy looked in Spike’s direction to see how he was doing. To her surprise he was still fighting the same vampire he had been when she’d staked her first of the evening and that had been four vampires ago.

She leaned on a near tombstone as she watched Spike literally get his ass kicked by a very inexperienced vampire. As the fight evolved Spike seemed to finally get the upper hand and she sighed in relief. The newborn lay on the ground as Spike hovered over him, stake in hand. The older vampire was about to dust the younger one when he felt the sharp end of a broken tree branch go though his chest.

“SPIKE!” Buffy screamed running towards him. In seconds the newborn vampire was dust and the Slayer turned her attention to Spike who laid motionless on the ground next to her. “Oh my God are you ok?” she asked frantically running her hands across his face, shoulder, arms and then back to his face again. “Spike talk to me damn it!” she yelled, slapping him across the check.

“I think… I’d… talk better if you…” he struggled to speak through the excruciating pain in his chest. “… took this… thing… out.” He finally managed to say.

“Oh! Yes, of course.”

Carefully avoiding his heart, she removed the wooden twig. She didn’t know what was more disturbing: the sight of the big whole in Spike’s chest or the agonizing and sharp howl he let out when she pressed over the wound with her hands.

“Bloody hell woman! Are you trying to kill me?” he yelled in pain.

“Well, you’re supposed to apply pressure over it or you’ll-“

“Or I’ll wha? Bleed to death? I’m a bloody vampire, Slayer!” he shouted as he tried to sit leaning on a tree.

“Oh! Right, you can’t bleed to death.” She reminded herself.

Spike hissed as he moved to a more comfortable position.

“Are you ok?” she asked. Concern was evident in her tone.

“I’m just right as rain!” he mocked sarcastically “I blood well am NOT alright.” He shouted in anger.

“Hey, no need to yell at me. It was you’re fault.” She pointed out.

Spike just sighed, he was too tired, too wounded, too everything to argue with her. Slowly he drifted to slumber.

When he opened his eyes he was exactly in the same position and the same place he had been when he passed out. It was still dark but his vampire senses told him that daylight was close at hand. He had to get out of there immediately and sunlight wasn’t his only problem. He knew of plenty demons who would love to get their claws on the vampire who helps the Slayer. And speaking of the Slayer… she was nowhere in sight.

“Figures. Not the first time she’s done it, not the last.” Spike thought to himself as he remembered the night she had beaten him up and left him to rot in an abandoned alley.

As he dwelled on his insane relationship with his former mortal enemy, he heard footsteps coming from behind and to his left. He tried to force himself up, but he was still very weak and couldn’t move and inch. All he could do was sit there and pray it wasn’t a demon.

“There he is.” The sound of the Slayer’s voice was like a wave of relief washing over him, but he decided to play it cool.

“Spike, old pal.”

“Clem, wha are you doing here?” Spike asked surprised. He looked at the friendly demon and noticed he was carrying a strecher behind him.

“Came to help. The Slayer here came by the bar asking for it. Man, you look like crap.” Clem noted.

As Spike absorbed the information he had just received, he felt the urge to smile at his saviour, but instead he looked at her and snarled sarcastically:

“Slayer! Fancy seeing you here! Thought you’re MO was beat’em up, leave’em to rot.” He gave her an evil grin and continued: “Oh! I forgot. You didn’t do the beating up part. Guess that means you don’t get to leave.”

Buffy tried to ignore the stinging in her chest caused by his venomous words as she took the stretcher from Clem’s hands.

The moment he saw Buffy’s reaction to his words he regretted ever saying them. “Bollocks, why do I always have to have my foot in my bloody mouth?” he thought as Buffy and Clem helped him onto the stretcher.

****************************

“Oh my God, Buffy! What happen?” Dawn asked a little panicky as she saw an unconscious Spike laying on the living room couch.

“He got staked.” Buffy explained as she came back from the kitchen with a wet towel.

She knelt down next to the semiconscious vampire and tried to carefully wash the wound.

“Hey! Watch it, Slayer!” Spike hissed as he felt a throat clenching pain run through his entire body.

“Sorry…” she apologized giving him a painful look as she continued cleaning the deep gash in his chest. “This might take a while to heal.” She noted.

“How did it happen?” Dawn inquired kneeling down next to her sister.

“Spike here decided to be an idiot for a night and get staked.” Buffy explained with an annoyed face.

“I was just…” Spike started but was cut off by a suddenly very pissed Slayer.

“What the Hell were you thinking?” she yelled, accidentally applying a little too much pressure as she got rapped up in her rambling. Spike cried out in pain but she didn’t even hear him. “Playing with a vampire like that? He might have been a new one but he could have – What could have possibly possessed you to do something so stupid? I’ve seen you do a lot of really dumb stuff, but this…” she stood up and started walking around the couch. Spike silently thanked the gods that she was at a safe distance from his aching chest. “…this-this just won a place in the Guinness Book of Records. You-you just stood there. You just—You could have—“ she stopped mid-sentence not wanting to admit her worries about his well being.

She looked around the now empty room, somehow in the middle of her rambling Dawn had left the room and she was now alone with him. She squeezed her eyes shut as she remembered the tenth of a second when she thought he was gone for good. Suddenly her legs faltered and a tight knot formed at the base of her throat. She couldn’t breathe.

“You ok, Slayer?” he asked concerned.

“I’m fine.” She answered opening her eyes to look at him. “Don’t. Ever. Do. That. Again.” And with that she left the room, behind her was a seriously confused vampire.