Paranormal Table 2
It was well after midnight by the time Xander returned to the school. The doctor had cleared him for release the following morning, but Xander offered a quick "no thanks," before hastily packing his belongings. The young medium had practically run from the hospital, eye glued to his feet. In the space of two days, Xander had become surprisingly introverted. Normally, he would nod and smile at everyone he met. But after an embarrassing trip down the hospital hallway that nearly landed him in the hospital's psychward that had quickly changed. Fearful of accidentally talking to a ghost and appearing insane, he'd become hyper-aware of his surroundings, tense, and was bordering on paranoid. Facing the kitchen entrance, Xander cursed as he tried to insert the key again. A combination of nerves and tension caused his hands to shake so violently that the key danced around the lock.
"Stupid - fucking - key!" he growled. With a frustrated moan, he clenched his fist, willing the shaking to stop. His was so fearful that nearly every muscle in his body was clenched and shaking with tension. His head jerked up as he heard the familiar "snick" of the first lock being undone. Several seconds later, the door opened to reveal Spike. The blonde vampire merely raised an eyebrow before walking back inside the kitchen, silent.
"Thanks," Xander muttered as he shut the door. Spike leaned indolently against the counter, sipping from a black mug.
"Sorry about the, uh, thinking you were dead thing." The vampire didn't answer, choosing to instead continue drinking. Observing his former nemesis, Xander mentally cursed the blonde. Barring First-induced incidents of insanity, Spike always managed to have that cool, unruffled look. Stupid, well-muscled, undead-vampire guy, being all cool and mysterious he thought. Uncomfortable, he cast his eye about the kitchen, pretending to contemplate carpentry repairs.
"So ya see the dead, then?" Xander twitched, surprised at Spike’s sudden interruption of the silence. Xander nodded, gnawing on his lower lip.
"Yep. Kinda freaky." They stood in silence, eyes darting across the kitchen before finally settling on each other.
"Would be." Silence descended again. Spike's eyes traveled down Xander's body slowly, taking in each changed detail of the Scooby. Xander was leaner and more confident than he had been not even two years ago. And if forced, Spike would admit the boy was also more attractive. He'd grown up, become a man. A very attractive man. He watched as Xander sighed and nodded. Clearing his throat, Xander spoke.
"So, kill anything creepy lately?"
"Nah. We were too busy runnin'. Ran across some hunters who didn't want to wait for an explanation before they started shooting."
"Oh, wow. That sucks. You should have Giles yell them. Or you know, write a terse letter." Spike snorted and rolled his eyes.
"Ponce wants to give them jobs."
"Ah." Spike raised his mug and drained his mug. Xander scratched the back of his neck. The animosity and testosterone that had always surged between them had disappeared over the years of separation. All the differences and sins of the past seemed unimportant in the face of training new Slayers, watching hellmouths and facing various apocalypses. But now there was a new tension, filled with something Xander couldn't quite identify, partly because he didn’t want to.
"Good Lord, that vampire is looking at you like a fraternity boy at a Tijuana strip club." Xander shrieked, jumping and turning midair toward the small table in the corner. There sat Grandmother LaVelle, calm and entirely unimpressed with Spike. Without the confusion of the previous day, he could see her clearly. She seemed smaller than she had twenty years ago, but where he’d once seen a cold statue, he now saw a composed woman with steel in her spine. She reminded him of a slayer.
"Would you stop doing that? Can't you warn me before you sneak up on me?" he yelled, clutching his hand to his heart.
"Sorry, Grandson. I keep forgetting you're untrained. After you've trained for a while, you'll be able to sense the presence of a spirit."
"Who's this?" Xander started and spun back towards the counter. He'd momentarily forgotten about Spike's presence.
"What?"
"Who are you talking to? Red told me that you've been seeing ghosts, so apparently you're not crazy. Or at least not that crazy."
"Yes, Grandson, please introduce me to this creature that keeps leering at you like a dog outside a butcher shop." Xander groaned, his skin darkening with a blush.
Spike smirked and raided an eyebrow. He didn't know what was being said, but whatever it was, it was bringing a delightful color to the boy's face. And the scent wasn’t bad either.
"Would you stop it with the creepy similes! God! Grandmother, this is Spike," Xander sighed, gesturing to the vampire. "Spike, this patch of invisible is my Grandmother, Grandmother Annamarie LaVelle."
"Pleasure to meet a member of Xan's family that isn't attached to a bottle of booze," he said, offering a quick bow.
Xander cringed; if there was one thing he remembered from his visits with Grandmother LaVelle, it was that you NEVER pissed her off. Aw, crap. This won't be good. Waiting for the inevitable screech of indignation, he was surprised when is he instead heard a warm laugh.
Xander’s indigent sputter caused a smile to curl Spike's lips. He didn't know what the ghost said, but was obviously not what the boy had expected. With a groan, Xander threw his hands up in surrender. "That’s it! I have had enough of this crap! For two days I have been walking around and talking to people! People that aren't really there! And I don't figure it out until I see that there isn't a shadow but by that time I've been having this whole conversation with an invisible ghost so everyone thinks I'm NUTS! I am tired, paranoid and pissed off! I am going to bed!"
Grandmother LaVelle disappeared as Xander turned and stomped up the stairs, muttering angrily. With an appreciative glance and smirk, Spike watched him leave.
* * * * * * * *
Xander slammed the door behind him, wincing as he realized that he might have woken the mini-Slayers. He dropped his bag to ground before he fell onto his bed with a groan. As he started to relax, he heard someone clear their throat.
"Go away, Grandma. I'm tired and cranky," he said, the words muffled by the bedding.
"It's probably because you haven't been getting enough orgasms."
Xander jumped, trying to sit on the bed to look up. Instead he ended up falling to the floor in a tangle. Standing quickly, he saw Anya sitting against the headboard, dressed in a red gown. A burst of joy tinged with sadness flooded him.
"Ahn-,” he started, walking towards her.
"Don't try to hug me!" She warned him. Xander frowned, dropping heavily to the bed.
"Why, you don't want me to?" Anya rolled her eyes and shook her head.
"It's not that. It's just that you can't touch me, and I didn't want you to try and then get all sad when you couldn't."
"Oh." Xander scooted up to the head of the bed and rested against the headboard.
"So, are you in heaven?"
"Yes. I even met your friend Jesse. He's quite attractive. If he'd lived, I would have wanted us to have sex with him." Xander blushed slightly and chuckled, Anya's blunt manner's distracting him from his confusion and fear.
"Can he come back and see me now?"
Anya shook her head. "Sorry. Only highly aware spirits can get back to earth."
"Then how can you visit me?"
"Well, it has to do with being able to work at a higher level, spiritually speaking. To get back to this plane, it’s like going through a huge labrynith. Sometimes a couple spirits stumble their way through. But usually, only people who are used to using their brains on a higher levels, like witches, mediums, and seers, have the ability to find their way back to this plane. Those spirits can… feel, I guess, the way to get back. And even then they can only be seen by mediums. Because I was so old, along with my involvement in magic and former demon status, I can fine my way back here to visit you."
"Huh. That’s interesting. Wait, if you're a ghost, why can't you touch me? Because some ghosts can touch stuff, right?"
Anya sighed. "I didn't want to give you the whole lecture, but I guess I might as well. I mean, you Grandmother doesn't seem to be good at explaining it, anyways. I guess because she doesn't know you like I did. Or, well, do. There are two general kinds of spirits: higher spirits, like me and your Grandmother who are in heaven, and then bound spirits, which usually get called ghosts. Bound spirits are the spirits that are stuck on Earth and can't move on for whatever reason. Because they're stuck here, over time the bound spirits can get strong enough to manipulate their surroundings, and if they feed off of emotions, the can eventually be seen."
"I will?"
"Yes. It's a side effect of being a medium. Do you know what a medium is Xander?"
"Uh, I’m guessing a person that sees ghosts would be my first guess."
"Oh, don’t be such a brat, Xander. Ghosts exist only as a sort of energy. A medium is a person whose senses are on a different wave length and can see that energy. Eventually, you'll be kinda like Buffy is with vampires. You'll be able to sense spirits and you'll know that they're here as soon as you see them. Usually we can only be seen by normal people if the Powers help us or someone uses magic. But once you get trained well, you'll also be able to sense demons that feed off of emotions or manipulate minds."
"Huh." Xander nodded, absorbing the information. When he spoke his word were colored not by anger or frustration, but defeat. "Fuck. This sucks, Anya. I don't want this. People always look at me like I'm crazy because I'm talking to people that they can't see. It's driving me crazy, I feel like Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost, except I can see them too, oh no, it wasn’t enough for me to hear them. So I just get to keep walking around, talking to AIR and just generally look like a jackass.” Suddenly, Xander paled. “Oh god, last night I said some stupid stuff to Spike. I think I may have even told him he was not. Shit. Now I just get to wait for the mental torture and emotional blackmail to begin."
"Possibly. But on the plus side, he'll probably blackmail you for sex."
"What? No, no Anya, that's just so... I mean, no!" Xander pulled his pillow over his head and started whimpering into the bedding. Eventually, the room fell silent and Xander started to relax.
"So, are you and Spike going to have orgasms together? Because if so, I'd like to know so Cordelia and I can come and watch."
Part 3 Here