Chapter 1 – Changes

 

 

 

 

I still don't know what I was waiting for

And my time was running wild

A million dead-end streets

Every time I thought I'd got it made

It seemed the taste was not so sweet

So I turned myself to face me

But I've never caught a glimpse

Of how the others must see the faker

I'm much too fast to take that test

               David Bowie

 

Buffy was late.

 

It always worried Spike when she was out of sight for too long. And although she’d call to say that she had an errand to run after Journey’s play group it made him wonder where she was. A slim pale finger tapped the side of the aluminum ellipse clock engraved with their anniversary date and calculated how long it should have taken her. It was after twelve and their daughter was used to her lunch promptly at noon. A small luxury they could afford since neither of them worked full time and was available to cater to their children’s every need. They always tried to keep their now three-year-old daughter on a schedule. The child care books said it gave children security to be able to count on things and making their baby feel safe was important to both her parents.

 

Spike picked up phone with every intention of checking up on his wife but after a second of debate returned it to the cradle. She’s safe, the baby is safe, he told himself and leaned back in his chair. The paperwork that Angel had couriered from Los Angeles for him to sign was forgotten on his desk while he tried to rationalize his fears. Ever since Buffy’s pregnancy Spike had felt a need to always know the whereabouts of his wife and children. The fight with the First a year ago had only deepened that fear. He knew that his obsession was sometimes a suffocating hold on his family but they tolerated it with as much good humor as they could. After all, they knew it was out of love and not in an insane need to control them.

 

The sound of tires crunching along the graveled driveway made Spike pull the blinds up to see who was pulling in. Even before he saw the vehicle he knew it was Buffy. The sound of the Navigator barreling over the bricked edge of the garden was a dead giveaway. His truck was really too big for Buffy to handle but she liked the power and security it gave so Spike indulged her. He swore though that one day she was going to take the corner off the house.

 

Spike hurried out to greet them with relief flooding his heart. He jogged down the back stairs, taking in the brunette undoing the child seat. After Buffy’s return from the Brandon Clinic her hair had never returned to blonde. It had been almost every other shade and style but she had never been his Goldilocks again. He didn’t mind though; after all, she was still with him.

 

“Hey,” Buffy said over her shoulder. “I’m sorry. The mall was really crowded for some reason. Must have been a run on vampire detectors or something.”

 

“I was getting worried.”

 

Everything crashed back into place when she turned around holding their child in her arms. A love that was purer than sunlight radiated through his being and banished any remaining doubts that he may have had. Spike leaned over to enjoy the familiar taste of her lips as he kissed her. At thirty the tiny Slayer was even more beautiful than when he’d first met her. Her body was as tone and taut as it had been at sixteen thanks to an intense training and exercise routine. A few lines had settled next to her eyes but she said that they were her happiness quotients. Her hair dyed to such a dark brown, that it was almost black, hung to her waist in a riot of wild curls. But it was her eyes that had changed the most. World weary, they had the wisdom of several lifetimes radiating from the hazel orbs. And her hands still gave a love that knew no end to her husband. She had become the rock to which his happiness and heart was secured to.

 

“Look, Joy, Daddy was waiting for us,” Buffy cooed, kissing the child’s cheek. “I bet he even has lunch waiting for us. No more of those nasty crackers Mummy was trying to feed you.”

 

Spike glanced behind them into the truck and saw crumbs all over his leather upholstery. He smiled and shook his head at the mess, but there was no anger for his child. Journey hated crackers and usually just crumbled them up in her surety of not eating them. He held his arms out for the child that was a crazy mixture of both Buffy and him. Her hair was his, dark and curly, her nose was definitely her mother’s and her eyes, well they were his too, but magnified in their intensity.

 

“Daddy, Daddy, Mummy shopping,” Journey informed her father as she was transferred to his arms. She wrapped herself around him as he hugged her tight.

 

“What did Mummy buy?” Spike asked. He watched as Buffy grabbed a shopping bag from the backseat.

 

“Secret,” Journey crowed, clapping her hands. She glanced proudly at her mother and Spike knew she’d been coaxed not to say anything to him. Her small hands cupped his face to turn him toward her. “Kiss me, Daddy.”

 

A smile lit up his face as he turned back to his daughter. He kissed her as requested. She was the personification of everything good in him and every moment with Journey only made his life only more valuable. He carried her back into their home while Buffy followed. He headed for the bathroom and listened to Buffy using the kitchen sink while they washed up. Journey kept up a list of everything she’d done so far that morning but he still listened to the sound of his wife putting their lunch together.

 

Curiosity made him glance into the bag as he passed it on the way to the table. Inside was two wrapped presents and he looked to Buffy in confusion. “Did I miss someone’s birthday or something?”

 

“Nope, it’s for you,” Buffy said, putting plates out for them. “Later though when little miss is napping.”

 

It took only a couple of minutes for Journey to be put into her booster seat and for sandwiches to be passed out. It was halfway through their meal that Spike took notice of the curl of fear in his belly. There was something distant in his wife’s attitude and he just knew that whatever was in those packages wasn’t going to make him happy.

 

 

~~~~~~~~

 

 

Their quiet conversation and hushed laughter floated through the house. Buffy smiled as she listened to Spike putting their baby down for a nap. They always called this their private time. Although Sean now lived away from home at college, the house was still full with their other three children, Del, the dog and various other family members still coming to stay with them. During the afternoon when the children were at school, Del was running errands and Journey was sleeping, they were left with a small window of intimacy they had come to count on.

 

Buffy stretched out on the bed and waited to hear his footsteps padding up the stairs. Today they came at an almost frantic pace. Her heart caught at his urgency, knowing that the shopping bag was the reason. Everything in their lives and relationship would change once he opened them. Buffy considered getting rid of them quickly as she watched her husband walk to her. It needed to be done though and she loved him enough to see it through. He crawled onto the bed and she opened her arms so he could settle on top of her.

 

“I love you, Spike,” Buffy whispered, her hands floating over his back. He was so solid; her anchor in a life that constantly changed. She wrapped her legs around his hips as if they were one being “You make me so happy.”

 

“I love you, too, Buffy,” Spike whispered.

 

His kiss was so full of need that it made her heart ache knowing that yet again she would be the one to hurt him. The packages they both dreaded were forgotten as they let their bodies lead the way. His hands touched her with gentleness as they floated over her flesh. He unbuttoned her shirt and pushed it aside so he could suckle at her breast. Her fingers clenched in his hair, forcing him against her flesh that ached for his touch. It was a familiar haze covering them. The days of discovery were over but yet each time was a new voyage they had come to yearn for.

 

Spike kissed his way toward her neck while his fingers stroked her over her shorts. They caressed her soft flesh until she could feel her body flooding in preparation for her husband’s claim. She was always aroused so easily by the merest touch of him. A growl of possession vibrated the softness of her throat as he sucked upon the curve between shoulder and neck. Buffy let her head fall back, hoping he would bite her and give a stronger edge to their bonding.

 

“Buffy, let’s have another baby,” Spike said, pulling back. His hand cradled her cheek as stared down at her. “Journey’s three and I don’t want to wait too long.”

 

It was time. He knew that something was happening he just wasn’t sure what and was trying to find another reason to tie him to them. It was always a new excuse to hide behind. Buffy couldn’t let him do it anymore. He needed to leave them while he still loved them. The job offer from Jake of Matrix Returns was the perfect excuse to go. It would give Spike the freedom he needed while doing the one thing he was good at; fighting evil.

 

Buffy sighed and sat up. She grabbed the bag, putting it between them, knowing that the innocent lies they lived under would forever be shattered. It was the old adage of being cruel to be kind. Spike had denied himself for so long that he’d forgotten how to ask for what he needed. When she had returned from the clinic he’d told her that she’d had time to deal with what had happened, he hadn’t. And to this day he still hadn’t. Their lives had become lost in the daily living of making a family and starting a new business. Spike had never grieved, had never raged, had never let go of what happened during her pregnancy with Journey. It was building inside of him and one day it would explode.

 

The prophecy dreams she’d had as a teenager had returned with a vengeance after her merging with Drusilla. The vampire’s second sight and her Slayer instincts made for an almost dead on accuracy at the future. A nightmarish future haunted her night after night telling her that she faced a life without her mate beside her. It was never clear but she suspected it was linked back to that terrible time in their lives and the consequences that were never dealt with. Buffy was determined to beat fate at her own game by letting Spike go before he was taken from her.  The distance between them would give him a chance to find the man that he wanted to be for him and hopefully for her. And maybe after he’d faced what was hiding inside of him the threads of time would have been changed and he could return to her.

 

“Open it,” Buffy said, pushing the bag closer to him. Her eyes filled with tears as her rejection brought a mixture of pain and fear to her husband’s face. She didn’t reach out to him even though it was killing her.

 

Buffy watched as Spike’s trembling fingers slide the wrapping paper off the smallest present. It was a journal. She’d gotten it for him to take and record what he saw and did. Hopefully, it would bring the writer out in him again. Let him find the poet that still hid inside of him somewhere. He laid it on the bed without question to open the second offering. It was a backpack for him to carry on his journeys. His hands caressed the soft leather as he examined the many pockets it offered. Finally he gave up pretending to like it. A single teardrop fell onto the gift from her husband’s heartbroken eyes.

 

“What are these for?” Spike asked. His voice was soft around the choked sound of his pain.

 

“I want you to take the job with Jake.”

 

“You want me to leave?”

 

The single question tore Buffy’s heart from her chest. It was the one thing he’d come to fear the most. That the day would come when they’d lose the precious binds between them for good. They’d been shredded before and it had been a horrendous fight to keep their marriage together. The years had brought them closer together than ever before but there was still something between them. Damaged and forgotten. It had been shoved to a distant corner of their lives and never acknowledged. It was the knowledge that there’d been a time when Spike hadn’t loved her. It was something that could tear them asunder because it had been the one constant in their lives for almost fourteen years.

 

“No,” Buffy said. “I don’t want you to leave but I think it’s time that you took time for you.”

 

“I don’t need time for me,” Spike said, standing. He gathered the ripped wrapping paper up to throw it away. “My life is here with you and the kids. Besides the business…”

 

“Will be just fine without you and the kids and me will still be your life no matter where you are.”

 

“Well, thanks for the presents but I’m not going anywhere.”

 

Buffy watched as he threw the paper away, gathered the presents up and put them away in the closet. The door was closed with a decisive click indicating as far as Spike was concerned the discussion was finished. It wasn’t.

 

“Look, Spike, Jake has given you leeway to call the shots anyway you want to. Tell me that the idea of being out there in the middle of the fight doesn’t appeal to you.”

 

“I’m a family man now and don’t need to be getting myself in the middle of these battles.” Spike sighed and turned toward the stairs. “I’m going to go and clean up the kitchen.”

 

“Oh, no, this discussion is not over, Buster,” Buffy said, scrambling up to follow him down the stairs. She grabbed the nursery monitor before running down the stairs. “It’s not just the fighting. What about everything else?”

 

“Like what?”

 

Spike ran down the main stairs and into the hallway. His stride picked up as he headed for the kitchen.

 

“Like the fact that you’ve never grieved or dealt with what happened.”

 

“Dealing and dwelling on it is for Nancy boys like your ex.” Spike said. Apparently he decided that the kitchen was too confining and hurried out the back door. “It’s over. What else is there to say or do?”

 

“A lot,” Buffy said, jogging to keep up with him. “Can we at least talk about this?”

 

“No,” Spike said, turning to glance at her over his shoulder as he rounded the corner of the house. “There’s nothing to talk about. I’m needed here and just because you want to get rid of me for some reason…”

 

“Yeah, I want you to leave so I can have a wild on the table affair with the mailman, so would you mind going away,” Buffy said, bounding around the cars in the driveway to follow him through the front yard. “Or, hey, we could compromise and you could just disappear every day between 11 and 1 so we can do it.”

 

“Piss off, Buffy,” Spike bit out as climbed the front steps. “You’re starting a fight that I don’t want to have. Drop the subject.”

 

Spike hesitated briefly in the hallway as if he was trying to decide whether to go upstairs or head through the kitchen again. His slumped shoulders held the weight of the world on them. It had to be settled now before Buffy lost her nerve. If they didn’t finish this discussion she knew she’d never have the strength to do this again. With a sigh she took advantage of his distraction and tackled him. They landed in a heap on their imported Italian rug.

 

“Get the fuck off me, Slayer,” Spike snarled, rising to his hands and knees.

 

“Ride ‘em cowboy,” Buffy said, wrapping her arms and legs around him. She kissed the back of his neck and when he lay back down she knew he was giving in. “Hear me out Spike. That’s all I’m asking for. If you don’t want to go then don’t go. I’m just offering you choices.”

 

Buffy crawled off of him and knelt beside him. Spike refused to look at her as he rolled over and backed up to the wall. She mirrored his pose on the opposite wall.

 

“Say everything that you want to say so we can finish this,” Spike said, pinning her with a deadly glare.

 

“I know you,” Buffy said, refusing to back down. “Something died inside of you during…that time and you’ve never been able to revive it.”

 

“Am I not being good enough of a husband or father for you? Am I not providing enough or working hard enough? Am I not satisfying you?”

 

“This has nothing to do with the way you handle the business or parenthood, or being my husband,” Buffy paused, searching for the words to make him understand. “There’s a part of you…that is only yours. The poet, the dreamer, he’s gone and it’s like your soul is only going through the motions.”

 

“Who else thinks I’m not good enough?”

 

“No one has said anything,” Buffy said. She crawled over and straddled his lap. Her arms looped around his neck. “You’re everything you should be but there’s sadness inside of you that I can’t reach. It’s killing me to see you like this. It’s not weak of you to need time for you.” Her hands cupped his face, turning him to look at her. “You have the right to grieve for her, Spike. It’s not going to hurt me. You loved Drusilla for a hundred years and you’ve never shed a tear for her. You’ve never cried for what we lost and you’ve never released the anger over what happened to me. Or really screamed at me for what I did.” Her hand drifted to cover his chest over his heart. “It’s still there and it’s eating you up inside. You’ve lost the ability to dream or really relax. I love you. I always will and I’m just letting you know that if want to take some time for you that’s its all right. Just think about it, okay?”

 

Spike nodded and pulled her closer to him. “I’m still not going to go.”

 

“Fine, don’t go,” Buffy said. “Stay here and end up hating me.” She shrugged. “But we both know you want it and need it.”

 

“How come you’re so sure I want to go?”

 

“Because not once have you said I want to stay,” Buffy said, quietly. “It’s I shouldn’t go, I’m not going, but never once have you said, there’s no where else I want to be than where I am right now.”

 

His eyes closed in resignation as his body went lax beneath her. The world was out there waiting for him and it was only a matter of time before her husband left her. Love would be the only thing that would hold them together in the time to come. Fate had never wanted them together and always fought against them. Buffy pulled Spike to her and prayed that they were stronger than existence itself.

 

 

to be continued…

Chapter 2
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