fic: And Indeed There Will Be Time
Title: And Indeed There Will Be Time
Characters: Spike, Buffy Summers
Relationship: Spike/Buffy
Rating: PG-13
Words: 941
Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this unofficial fanwork, nor do I claim to or profit in any way.
Summary: Spike hadn't wanted Buffy to know that he was alive, but she found out anyways. Set in S5, after Spike's corporialization.
A/N: Written for Spring 2013's seasonal_spuffy. Enjoy! Also, the title comes from a line in T.S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock."
This wasn’t what he wanted, not at all, walking through a door (not literally this time, which was a marvel in the fact that it was a marvel) to find Buffy sitting on the edge of his desk, arms crossed beneath her breasts and one foot swinging like a hangman’s noose.
“Buffy?” Spike gasped, more taken aback than he would have expected. She was lovelier than all his memories of her, here before him in glorious three dimensional Technicolor, so lovely it was almost painful, his unneeded breath catching in his throat and sticking. He still wasn’t sure if he had come back with a soul (haunted in equal measure by the sins of his past and the temptations of more), but the sight of her brought back feeling that he hadn’t had since his soul burned inside his chest and set the rest of him on fire with him. Buffy had never loved him, that much he was sure, but that didn’t stop Spike from falling in love with her once more as if from the beginning all over again.
“So, you’re not dead,” Buffy said blandly, face still and expressionless.
“Well, technically, love, I am dead,” Spike smirked, “But I suppose you’re wondering how I’m not more dead than I am now. Which I still am, just so we’re clear.”
“You burned to ashes and took the Hellmouth with you, remember?” she continued. “So do you mind telling me how you’re standing here avoiding my questions instead of being buried in a crater?”
“Well, love, do you remember that fancy necklace you got me?”
“The one that Angel got in the mail back in August? That amulet, Spike?” Buffy asked calmly. She didn’t sound upset but she was; Spike could hear her pulse pounding and heart pumping, smell rage on her as if it were just strong perfume. She hid it well, her face a mask of calm disinterest, so well that Spike could almost believe that she didn’t really care that he was back, that she was inquiring out of more care for the status quo than for him.
“Er, that’s the one. Yeah.”
“You’ve been back for months, Spike,” Buffy snapped and her tight control finally broke like a rubber band, making it impossible to believe that this was about anything other than him. “And it’s been weeks since you were all ghost-Spike, so why the hell did I hear about this for the first time on Tuesday?”
“Buffy, love…”
“And why the hell did I hear this from somebody else?”
Spike didn’t have an answer to that, at least not one he could give. ‘I was scared of seeing you again,’ was a weak answer (though completely understandable in the face of her current rage, he thought) and ‘I didn’t think you would want to see me,’ self-pitying, ‘You were too busy for this,’ was as naïve as ‘I didn’t care enough to tell you’ was cruel, and not a one of those answers was really true.
“I don’t know, Buffy. I don’t know what to tell you.”
He’d died a perfect death and it had seemed a waste to follow it up with such a flawed existence. He had wanted to see how it ended and he had, but then he’d seen it all begin again, start over from where his world has burned down. Spike couldn’t change the universe so that he was never resurrected, couldn’t fix the glaring injustice that was his continued existence, but he could preserve the idea of his perfect death. He could let Buffy remember him as a hero, so even when he couldn’t remember that he’d sacrificed himself and became a Champion, somebody would.
“I just wanted you to remember me like that, when I died. Not like this,” Spike sighed, halfheartedly waving a hand across the office spread behind him.
“Then I’m sorry,” Buffy spat, eyes blazing like bonfires. She was still beautiful when she was angry, Spike reflected, dangerous and dazzling as the sun. “Because this is how I’ll remember you, Spike. Hiding behind your big lawyer desk and making up excuses to save your own ass.”
Buffy stood up, pushing away from his desk and sweeping across the room to his gaping doorway. Spike jumped back out of her path, watching her go.
“Buffy, wait! Can’t we talk about this?”
“What’s there to talk about?” Buffy asked softly, turning to face him once more with heartbreak in her eyes.
“You should have stayed dead.”
She left without another word, closing the door behind her with a decisive click, the sound louder than it had ever seemed before. She would be back the next day, Spike predicted; Buffy had never been one to leave things unfinished. She would be furious and heartbroken and overjoyed and enraged, and she would be messy and complicated and she would feel all of those things at once, but that would be later. He had betrayed her trust like this, by letting her believe that he had stayed dead, and that would take time for her to forgive. She would forgive him, to kind to let him suffer forever, to smart to lose a proven ally, too attached to leave him behind forever; but not tonight. Tonight, she would just be gone, her presence hanging in his borrowed office like a second shadow, clinging closely to him wherever he stepped.
And Spike wished he could forget about her until the next time she came through that door, but he couldn’t, not with her last words echoing through his head like church bells.
You should’ve stayed dead.
They had never agreed more.
fin.
Characters: Spike, Buffy Summers
Relationship: Spike/Buffy
Rating: PG-13
Words: 941
Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this unofficial fanwork, nor do I claim to or profit in any way.
Summary: Spike hadn't wanted Buffy to know that he was alive, but she found out anyways. Set in S5, after Spike's corporialization.
A/N: Written for Spring 2013's seasonal_spuffy. Enjoy! Also, the title comes from a line in T.S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock."
This wasn’t what he wanted, not at all, walking through a door (not literally this time, which was a marvel in the fact that it was a marvel) to find Buffy sitting on the edge of his desk, arms crossed beneath her breasts and one foot swinging like a hangman’s noose.
“Buffy?” Spike gasped, more taken aback than he would have expected. She was lovelier than all his memories of her, here before him in glorious three dimensional Technicolor, so lovely it was almost painful, his unneeded breath catching in his throat and sticking. He still wasn’t sure if he had come back with a soul (haunted in equal measure by the sins of his past and the temptations of more), but the sight of her brought back feeling that he hadn’t had since his soul burned inside his chest and set the rest of him on fire with him. Buffy had never loved him, that much he was sure, but that didn’t stop Spike from falling in love with her once more as if from the beginning all over again.
“So, you’re not dead,” Buffy said blandly, face still and expressionless.
“Well, technically, love, I am dead,” Spike smirked, “But I suppose you’re wondering how I’m not more dead than I am now. Which I still am, just so we’re clear.”
“You burned to ashes and took the Hellmouth with you, remember?” she continued. “So do you mind telling me how you’re standing here avoiding my questions instead of being buried in a crater?”
“Well, love, do you remember that fancy necklace you got me?”
“The one that Angel got in the mail back in August? That amulet, Spike?” Buffy asked calmly. She didn’t sound upset but she was; Spike could hear her pulse pounding and heart pumping, smell rage on her as if it were just strong perfume. She hid it well, her face a mask of calm disinterest, so well that Spike could almost believe that she didn’t really care that he was back, that she was inquiring out of more care for the status quo than for him.
“Er, that’s the one. Yeah.”
“You’ve been back for months, Spike,” Buffy snapped and her tight control finally broke like a rubber band, making it impossible to believe that this was about anything other than him. “And it’s been weeks since you were all ghost-Spike, so why the hell did I hear about this for the first time on Tuesday?”
“Buffy, love…”
“And why the hell did I hear this from somebody else?”
Spike didn’t have an answer to that, at least not one he could give. ‘I was scared of seeing you again,’ was a weak answer (though completely understandable in the face of her current rage, he thought) and ‘I didn’t think you would want to see me,’ self-pitying, ‘You were too busy for this,’ was as naïve as ‘I didn’t care enough to tell you’ was cruel, and not a one of those answers was really true.
“I don’t know, Buffy. I don’t know what to tell you.”
He’d died a perfect death and it had seemed a waste to follow it up with such a flawed existence. He had wanted to see how it ended and he had, but then he’d seen it all begin again, start over from where his world has burned down. Spike couldn’t change the universe so that he was never resurrected, couldn’t fix the glaring injustice that was his continued existence, but he could preserve the idea of his perfect death. He could let Buffy remember him as a hero, so even when he couldn’t remember that he’d sacrificed himself and became a Champion, somebody would.
“I just wanted you to remember me like that, when I died. Not like this,” Spike sighed, halfheartedly waving a hand across the office spread behind him.
“Then I’m sorry,” Buffy spat, eyes blazing like bonfires. She was still beautiful when she was angry, Spike reflected, dangerous and dazzling as the sun. “Because this is how I’ll remember you, Spike. Hiding behind your big lawyer desk and making up excuses to save your own ass.”
Buffy stood up, pushing away from his desk and sweeping across the room to his gaping doorway. Spike jumped back out of her path, watching her go.
“Buffy, wait! Can’t we talk about this?”
“What’s there to talk about?” Buffy asked softly, turning to face him once more with heartbreak in her eyes.
“You should have stayed dead.”
She left without another word, closing the door behind her with a decisive click, the sound louder than it had ever seemed before. She would be back the next day, Spike predicted; Buffy had never been one to leave things unfinished. She would be furious and heartbroken and overjoyed and enraged, and she would be messy and complicated and she would feel all of those things at once, but that would be later. He had betrayed her trust like this, by letting her believe that he had stayed dead, and that would take time for her to forgive. She would forgive him, to kind to let him suffer forever, to smart to lose a proven ally, too attached to leave him behind forever; but not tonight. Tonight, she would just be gone, her presence hanging in his borrowed office like a second shadow, clinging closely to him wherever he stepped.
And Spike wished he could forget about her until the next time she came through that door, but he couldn’t, not with her last words echoing through his head like church bells.
You should’ve stayed dead.
They had never agreed more.
fin.