Moonlight Sonata
by Jenn

The legendary "Garden on Wheels!" had come to Sunnydale, and with it the air of a carnival. Two days had been required to set it up in the large field over by Sunnydale High School, but now the exhibit was finally open to the public. The biggest feature of the exhibit was the hedge maze, the 5th largest hedge maze in the world.

Spike wandered through the maze. He couldn't even begin to imagine what in the faerieing forest he was doing there. But it was nice, he supposed. Eight-foot high hedges surrounded him for as far as he cared to sense. They were lush and green, so thick they were like walls of solid shrubbery. Tiny vines of jasmine snaked in and out of the neatly trimmed bushes. The delicate white flowers glittered in the pale light of the moon.

He smiled sadly as the sweet scent of the flowers sent him back to a time he regarded now as some lucid dream. He'd always associated the fragrance of jasmine with his Dark Queen. It was her favorite scent, and he recalled many nights spent watching her spin around in the moonlight, dancing in the jasmine. The years he spent with Drusilla hardly seemed real now. He had taken a long time to move on, and the scent of jasmine always offered a sad reminder. Sighing heavily, he continued along the maze in silence, drinking in the fragrance of jasmine and sailing to times long passed with a heavy heart.

He turned a corner of the maze and entered the moonlit center clearing. The large rectangular expanse of grass and rock gardens could easily have accommodated ten elephants side by side. He strode into the box from the left entrance, the full moon hanging in the velvet black sky like a lazy orb, making the flowers shimmer.

Jasmine bombarded his senses once more as he took a seat on one of the cold stone benches in the middle of the clearing. He stared up at the sky, aching for release of his pain and the sickly sweet scent that surrounded him. The moon above shone so bright he could barely see the stars. But a few of the brightest sparkled like diamonds on the canvas of night. Behind him, a hedge shuddered, permeating the air with the fragrance of jasmine and pine. He glanced back from the sky to the right entrance.

Moonlight bathed the emerging beauty in pale blue light, shadowing the delicate planes of her face and illuminating her tears like liquid silver. She hugged her leather jacket closer to herself and, oblivious to the blond vampire on the bench, stared up at the moon, the angles of her face thrown into sharper contrast.

Jasmine always reminded her of Angel, and their final fight in the mansion. The flowers had been growing in abundance in the garden and as Acathla consumed him whole, the smell had wafted into the vast room from the adjacent corridor. She'd left the house, broken and alone, and the odor had followed her to the last.

He'd returned though, and in her joy the mansion and its garden almost ceased to be haunting. She spent many hours there with him, talking and thinking and lingering in comfortable silence in the same vast room in which she lost him in the first place. But things had changed. And she thought of the sweet scent of jasmine once more as she watched him board the train to Los Angeles.

And she cried, falling, sobbing to her knees by the right entrance of the clearing. Why did it have to be jasmine? In an instant, strong leather-clad arms encircled her shoulders. Not caring to whom the arms belonged, she buried her face into his chest and sobbed.

Spike trailed his fingers through her wind-blown hair. The petite Slayer only pulled herself further into his embrace. He knew he shouldn't be hugging her, or consoling her like this. She'd probably stake him the minute she came to her senses and realized exactly who was holding her. But he knew what she'd experienced, and how she felt. And he knew they both needed the same thing.

A lone tear slid down his cheek and together they cried. Slayer and vampire. Alive and undead.

She raised her head from Spike's black T-shirt and peered up into the fathomless blue eyes that reflected her pain. Recognition skittered across her face, and she regarded him owlishly, tilting her head to the side. He froze, rising abruptly and glancing away. Despite the risk, he helped her to her feet.

A soft hand slid across his cheek. He caught sight of her penetrating hazel eyes once more and witnessed the tiniest smile flit across Buffy's face. He smiled back. And vampire and Slayer joined in a kiss.

Suddenly, the sad smell of jasmine was a million miles away, and only the two of them were in a world beyond this world. She drank in the heady smell of tobacco and mint and leather. And he tried and failed to detect anything but the light scent of vanilla and a pure feminine strength.

The kiss was short and chaste. Sad eyes met sad eyes, tiny smiles met tiny smiles, and Buffy and Spike joined hands to find their way out of the maze of jasmine together.