Fic: The Everyday Life of Monsters, Buffy/Spike, PG
The Everyday Life of Monsters
by Barb C
Words: ~600
Characters: Buffy/Spike
Rating: PG
Setting: Barbverse (Post-Gift AU)
Notes: Spike and Buffy vs. the Recession, Part 2. Takes place in the Barbverse, circa 2014 or so. For the prompt: Domesticity -
A sort of neutral domestic moment, neither happy nor sad.
Couch springs whumfed as Spike collapsed beside her, and for a moment they sprawled there, side by side, too tired even to flick on the TV.
He roused first. "Your day?"
Buffy rubbed her eyes. "There's a new suck club downtown - Bite Club. We'd better keep an eye on it. And I found a lead on those Keller demons. Oh! I ran into Mrs. Erskine at the grocery store and gave her the earnest speech about athletics enriching a young girl's life and voila, another three months of lessons." She rummaged through her purse, produced a check, and waved it triumphantly. "Let's hope it's not boingy. You?"
Spike grunted. "Tracked down that git who owes us for the Ergax scales - Elhorn the Magniloquent or whatever he's calling himself. Bleeder tried to pay me off in fairy gold, but he had a nice long chat with my knuckles and saw the error of his ways." He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a tattered roll of bills originating in at least eight different countries, three of which didn't exist any longer.
Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing - sometimes they were worth more to a collector than the face value. Buffy plucked the limpest and most dog-earred of the lot from the fan of currency and held it up to the light. "Yay us. We can stop taking the kids to lunch at the sample trays at Costco for a few weeks. What are we gonna do about the washing machine?"
Spike yawned. "I keep telling you, the security camera on the ATM down on the corner's been out of commission for months."
She was ninety percent certain he was joking, but she gave him a half-hearted punch anyway. Sometimes she suspected that he said stuff like that on purpose, to invite punching. "The non-evil version."
The corners of his eyes crinkled in amusement. "Oh, right. I'll think on it. Might be a few more deadbeat wizards in the files."
"I hope so. Did I mention that Bill needs a filling and Connie needs braces?" At Spike's look, "Hey, it could be worse. It could have been the other way around." What kind of specialist it would have taken to fit braces that morphed between human teeth and fangs, she really didn't want to contemplate.
"Sodding braces." Spike went a little fangy himself for a moment, perhaps indulging in a fantasy of a drained and cowering orthodontist. "If anyone'd told me, back in the day, that William the Bloody would come to this..." He waved a hand at the living room, currently in dire need of vacuuming. "This is exactly the sort of mind-numbing, soul-sucking, bourgeois existence I became a vampire to get away from, you know."
Buffy snorted, stifling a smile. "And how's that working out for you?"
He pursed his lips and feigned consideration. "Seeing as I haven't a soul to suck, pretty well."
"Some ex-mortal enemies would not leave the obvious comeback lying there..."
Spike swung an arm around her shoulders and tucked her against his side with a grin. "But you're made of finer stuff." He thumbed the remote, and the room filled with the soothing, mindless flicker of three AM I Love Lucy reruns.
This was what she'd miss most, Buffy reflected as she snuggled up against his chest, should she ever lose it. It wasn't that there hadn't been big moments in their lives. All in all, they'd probably had more big moments than most couples.
There were just so many more small ones.
END
by Barb C
Words: ~600
Characters: Buffy/Spike
Rating: PG
Setting: Barbverse (Post-Gift AU)
Notes: Spike and Buffy vs. the Recession, Part 2. Takes place in the Barbverse, circa 2014 or so. For the prompt: Domesticity -
A sort of neutral domestic moment, neither happy nor sad.
Couch springs whumfed as Spike collapsed beside her, and for a moment they sprawled there, side by side, too tired even to flick on the TV.
He roused first. "Your day?"
Buffy rubbed her eyes. "There's a new suck club downtown - Bite Club. We'd better keep an eye on it. And I found a lead on those Keller demons. Oh! I ran into Mrs. Erskine at the grocery store and gave her the earnest speech about athletics enriching a young girl's life and voila, another three months of lessons." She rummaged through her purse, produced a check, and waved it triumphantly. "Let's hope it's not boingy. You?"
Spike grunted. "Tracked down that git who owes us for the Ergax scales - Elhorn the Magniloquent or whatever he's calling himself. Bleeder tried to pay me off in fairy gold, but he had a nice long chat with my knuckles and saw the error of his ways." He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a tattered roll of bills originating in at least eight different countries, three of which didn't exist any longer.
Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing - sometimes they were worth more to a collector than the face value. Buffy plucked the limpest and most dog-earred of the lot from the fan of currency and held it up to the light. "Yay us. We can stop taking the kids to lunch at the sample trays at Costco for a few weeks. What are we gonna do about the washing machine?"
Spike yawned. "I keep telling you, the security camera on the ATM down on the corner's been out of commission for months."
She was ninety percent certain he was joking, but she gave him a half-hearted punch anyway. Sometimes she suspected that he said stuff like that on purpose, to invite punching. "The non-evil version."
The corners of his eyes crinkled in amusement. "Oh, right. I'll think on it. Might be a few more deadbeat wizards in the files."
"I hope so. Did I mention that Bill needs a filling and Connie needs braces?" At Spike's look, "Hey, it could be worse. It could have been the other way around." What kind of specialist it would have taken to fit braces that morphed between human teeth and fangs, she really didn't want to contemplate.
"Sodding braces." Spike went a little fangy himself for a moment, perhaps indulging in a fantasy of a drained and cowering orthodontist. "If anyone'd told me, back in the day, that William the Bloody would come to this..." He waved a hand at the living room, currently in dire need of vacuuming. "This is exactly the sort of mind-numbing, soul-sucking, bourgeois existence I became a vampire to get away from, you know."
Buffy snorted, stifling a smile. "And how's that working out for you?"
He pursed his lips and feigned consideration. "Seeing as I haven't a soul to suck, pretty well."
"Some ex-mortal enemies would not leave the obvious comeback lying there..."
Spike swung an arm around her shoulders and tucked her against his side with a grin. "But you're made of finer stuff." He thumbed the remote, and the room filled with the soothing, mindless flicker of three AM I Love Lucy reruns.
This was what she'd miss most, Buffy reflected as she snuggled up against his chest, should she ever lose it. It wasn't that there hadn't been big moments in their lives. All in all, they'd probably had more big moments than most couples.
There were just so many more small ones.
END