Title: Family Part 2

Email: tirel@pcnuthut.com

Author: Velvet Crypt

Disclaimer: Joss is God. I own nothing.

Spoilers: Umm…total non canon.

Summary: Spike completes the circle.

_________________________

Xander burst into the Magick Shop in full fury. He carried Ellie, who'd wrapped herself around him like a kitten. Nate and Lys followed along behind, holding hands and looking terrified. Well, Lys looked terrified, Nate looked like he was trying not to be terrified.

The girls looked up from their books and Giles came out from around the counter. Spike reached for Ellie and the little girl was transferred from Xander to Spike without comment. She curled up around Spike just as she had around Xander, actions that didn’t go unnoticed by the others.

Spike reached a hand out to Lys and she hurried forward to bury her head into his shoulder. His eyes met Nate's and issued a welcome to him as well. Nate looked away quickly, uninterestedly. But he sidled over to Spike's other side and nonchalantly took a seat next to the blonde.

"What’s wrong, Xander?" Willow asked.

"My parents." Xander spat. He took a deep breath and rubbed his face. "My parents." He began more calmly. "I went to the lawyer to see if he could help me figure out how to take care of the four of us on my salary. He could have knocked me on my a-butt, with a feather when he told me that Aly had trust funds in place for each of the kids. There is one for each of them when they turn 21 and one for each of them to be turned over to their guardian in the event of Aly and Brent's death."

He began pacing. "Let's just say...it's a lot. No, it's really...a lot. Anyway. Apparently, he had the not so good sense to inform my parents. I went back today to talk to the man and I found his office had been robbed. The whole place was trashed. Fortunately, he'd taken the files on the kids home to work on."

"Xander, how do you know that the robbers were looking for the children's files?" Giles asked, watching the man walk in circles around the table.

"Because, today, I got a call from the kids. Someone was trying to break down the door to the apartment."

His statement was met with gasps. Lys pulled her head off of Spike's shoulder.

"There were three of them. They were really big." She whispered. "They kept beating on the door. I called Uncle Xander at work and hid with Ellie. Nate stayed in the living room to find out what they wanted."

Spike shot a disapproving glance at Nate, who turned red.

"Well, I wanted to know!" He defended himself. "And they told me. Grandma and Grandpa Harris want us back. Now that they know we have money, we apparently aren't such a burden. They hired the three men to break in and take us to them."

Xander flopped in a chair, finally. "By the time I got there, they were gone. Nate told them he called the police and they ran before they could get caught."

"Xander, that's horrible. Kids, I'm so sorry." Buffy said. "What are you going to do?" she asked Xander.

He shrugged. "I'm moving. I'd planned on it anyway. We need more room. I'll look for a house to rent and hope that they can't find me." He looked at Spike. "I also need to ask Spike a favor."

The blonde vampire looked up from the precious bundle in his arms. "Whatcha need, mate?" He rubbed his cheek on Ellie's head.

"I can't live on the kids' money." Xander said. "That's not right. I need to keep my job and only use their money when we are absolutely strapped. That means I have to be gone during the day. I can't leave them alone. What if Mom and Dad send someone else after them? They have to be watched at least until the guardianship paperwork goes through."

He took a breath. "Will you move in with us? Watch the kids when I'm not there?"

Spike smiled wryly. "Everyone else has a life, eh?"

Xander shook his head. "I trust you, Spike. I know, considering your past, that's probably damn stupid of me. But I trust you to do it for their sake." He nodded at the picture the four people he loved most in life made: Ellie held like precious china against an evil vampire's chest, Lys snuggling in the crook of a protective arm, even Nate, who'd inched sideways until he was pressed against the comforting hardness of Spike's side. "I think they do too."

"Yeah," Spike whispered, looking at the kids. "I'll take care of them." Damn Harris Clan.

_________________________

They fell into a routine quickly. Spike became a househusband and Xander was amazed to see that he was damn good at it. He seemed to know just what needed to be done hours before Xander could think to ask him. He had no problem into assigning chores to each of the kids, but he made time during the day for quality time with each child and arranged family activities for the evening so that Xander wouldn’t feel left out of the family loop.

He prepared meals, having breakfast ready when they all rolled out of bed like puppies and having dinner on the table when Xander walked through the door. He had the twins taking turns doing dishes and had taught Ellie how to sort and fold clothes. Xander didn’t know how he’d gotten around the never going out in the day issue, but none of the kids seemed to notice.

During quality time, he drew pictures with Ellie. Xander had taken to making the refrigerator door his first stop after getting home. Spike spent ‘girl time’ with Lys, talking about everything she was afraid to talk to Nate about. He learned what Brent had been like and mourned with Lys for the loss of her mother. He shared his stories of losing Angelus and Dru, abbreviated, of course. They talked about what made relationships and what made family.

He found out that she was far too intuitive for her own good, especially when it came to reading though his commentary of Xander. She didn’t come out and ask ‘are you gay and do you want to shag my uncle’ but Spike didn’t mistake her thinly veiled hints that she wouldn’t be adverse to the situation if it were true.

For Nate’s time, Spike came out of the closet on his past education. He’d only shown the Cockney, street rat image for so long that Xander was astonished to see William sneak through in his conversations with the boy. Nate was proficient in Spanish, French, and some German and expressed a desire to learn more. Spike spoke Spanish, French, German, Italian, a dozen demonic languages, and Latin. He offered to teach the boy Latin and had a plan to teach him some demonic languages under the guise of tribal languages.

Xander couldn’t remember every seeing Spike smile so much. He was elated to see that Spike was helping them work through the loss of their parents; not letting them forget and move on, but rather recall fondly the memories. The kids didn’t seem to even think about their grandparents or the thought that Xander didn’t have the guardianship papers yet. They just trusted that they were safe and Uncle Xander and Uncle Wil would make it all work.

The scoobies came over every few days to see if they could help. Xander felt a surge of pride when Giles complemented him and Spike on their parental skills and another when he caught Buffy and Willow whispering in the kitchen about how much Spike had changed for the good since being around the kids. When they all sat down to watch movies for their dinner-and-movies-weekend, Xander had a realization.

He watched as his friends took over the chairs and the end of the couch. Willow sat on one end, Tara at her feet. Buffy sat in the puffy armchair with Dawn leaning her head on her sister’s knee. Giles sat in the other chair, the father figure personified. Xander took the other end of the couch, Spike sitting in between Xander and Willow. Ellie curled up in Spike’s lap and Nate and Lys leaned against the couch between their uncle’s legs.

He was happier than he’d ever been in his life. He was in his own home. He didn’t have to answer to his parents anymore. He had a job he loved. He was surrounded by friends who loved him and accepted him. He had his family. He had Lys, the incarnation of Aly, but a spirited beauty in her own right. He had Nate, a bright, sensitive cross of himself and Spike. He had Ellie, a joy he’d never expected. And he had Spike. His love, his friend, his partner. Granted, he doubted that the vamp thought the same of him, but he could tell that Spike felt something.

That realization sparked a flurry of change for him. He went out apartment hunting after work each day, looking for something that would hold them all comfortably. After two weeks, he had found the perfect place. It wasn’t an apartment. It was a two-story house not too far from Buffy’s. It had four bedrooms, two baths, a big fenced in yard and a huge kitchen.

He had a moral dilemma about using the kids’ money to stock the house. He asked Giles for advice and was treated to a 15 minute lecture on how if he was feeling guilty enough to ask if he were doing the right thing, then he was obviously doing the right thing; and was not that what the guardian’s trust fund was for? Making the children comfortable and wanting for nothing?

So, he put the down and the deposit on the house and went shopping. He bought bedroom sets for each child, another double bed for Spike that he planned on putting in his own room, and a new dining room set, big enough to fit eight comfortably. He bought a cd player each for Nate and Lys along with a cd stand in which he placed a $100 gift certificate each from Goody. He bought a computer plus computer desk for each of their rooms and another one for the living room.

He purchased games for Ellie and another couple of gift certificates for Nate and Lys. He bought a Playstation 2 for the living room and a couch and love seat combination so that no one would have to sit on the floor. He’d thought about chairs. They were so much more space smart, but he loved sitting next to his family. You couldn’t do that in chairs. So, they would just have to make do with less room.

He bought a swingset for the back yard, a mailbox for the front yard, an alarm system for the whole house and heavy curtains for every window in every room.

A week later, he told them where he’d been after work every day. Then he took them home. Nate just walked through the house touching things. He never stopped at anything in particular, and lingered in every room for an equal amount of time. The wonder on his face was amazing; and then, he reached his room. He went in, sat on the bed and just stared.

Lys cried. She cried when she saw her room. She cried when she saw the gift certificates. She cried when she saw Ellie’s room, and that it wasn’t in with her. She cried when she saw the huge dining room table and she cried when she saw Nate’s face. She went to sit by him. He stared, she cried.

Ellie hopped around the house like a bunny. She hopped into her room and bounced on her bed, and then her attention was taken up by the swingset in the back yard and she hopped outside to swing.

Xander followed Spike through the house, anxiously waiting for his opinion. Spike poked through the kitchen cabinets, looked at the appliances and ran his hand over the dining room table. He smiled at Xander.

“Plenty of room for everyone to sit and talk about their day.” He said quietly. Xander looked away. How the hell does he do that? Does he read my mind, or does he just know me that well?

Spike walked through the living room, looked at the computer, the game system, the couches. Another smile. “No chairs, I see.”

He glanced in Ellie and Lys’s rooms, smiled at each, and then moved on to Xander’s room. Then he stopped. He looked at the beds, then at Xander.

“There are only four bedrooms.” Xander explained, feeling the heat steal up his neck. “I thought it would be nice to let each of the kids have their own room. Neither one of us spends much time in the bedroom.” He could feel the full on blush. “So I thought that you wouldn’t mind having to share the room.”

Spike stepped forward and looked straight into Xander’s eyes. He seemed to be searching for something. Xander stopped breathing. Finally, Spike seemed to find what he was looking for, because he turned away and stepped back into the hallway.

“Sure, mate. Don’t mind sharing a room.”

Xander let out the breath he’d been holding and followed Spike into Nate’s room. He was a bit concerned when he saw Nate staring vaguely into space and Lys crying, but when he and Spike stepped into the room they launched themselves off of the bed. Lys threw herself into Xander’s arms, still crying, but saying over and over again, “Thank you, Uncle Xander. I love you.”

Nate slammed into Spike’s chest. He didn’t cry. He didn’t say anything. He just clutched desperately at the older man and trembled. Spike wrapped his arms around the boy and met Xander’s eyes over his head. A look of contentment passed between them, and they both hung on to their kids and just loved them.

_________________________

Two days later, Xander had another surprise. Aly’s lawyer finally came through with the paperwork giving guardianship to Xander. He presented the news to them as they sat around their new dinner table and talked about their day. The kids were ecstatic. Spike smiled and congratulated them but remained subdued for the rest of the evening.

Later, in their room, Xander finally braved his question. “Spike?”

Spike rolled over and looked at him across the intervening expanse between their beds.

“What’s wrong? Aren’t happy that the kids are finally ours?”

Spike briefly closed his eyes. When he opened them, he had a look of pain of the like Xander had never seen on his face before.

“They aren’t ours, Xander. They’re yours.” He whispered.

Xander sat up. “Of course they’re ours. Just because the paperwork has my name on it means-“

“Everything.” Spike interrupted. “It means everything, Xander. You are their guardian. You have the right to…to love them, to take care of them.”

Xander couldn’t stand the pain in Spike’s voice. He got out of bed and moved to sit next to Spike.

“You don’t need papers to love them, Spike.” He lay a hand on the blonde’s chest. “You don’t have to have a right to love someone. It just happens.” Isn’t that the truth? “I think loving them when you don’t have to says a lot about you. And a lot about them. They deserve your love. Your love is pure, untainted with anything but to love them for who they are.”

He cupped Spike’s cheek. “I think they are very lucky to have their Uncle Wil. I think they love their Uncle Wil very much. I also think Uncle Wil is as much their guardian as the idiot on the paperwork. And I think the idiot is very lucky to have him as a partner.” Spike smiled a tiny smile.

“You aren’t an idiot, Xan.”

“Don’t let it get around. I have a reputation to protect.” He grinned, and then knelt down by the bedside, taking Spike’s hand into his.

“Would you, William the Bloody…Spike, do me the great honor of becoming my co-guardian? To love and cherish those three kids, in sickness and in health, for better or for worse, til they grow up, move out and only want to see us for their college allowance and to get you to do their laundry?”

Spike burst into laughter and spontaneously hugged Xander. “I was wrong. You are an idiot.” He grinned. “Go to sleep, whelp.”