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ramblingmoon · 23 days

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https://archiveofourown.org/works/54857788/chapters/139054702

Coffee Shop AU for Daan and Elise so that they can find some peace outside of the canon. Work.

For my fandom spouse.

Please enjoy this fanfic with a hot beverage of your choice. I'm personally drinking Spring Blossom from Republic of Tea.

Highly recommend the “Hopeless Romantic” playlist on Spotify. It has Fur Elise – reimagined by Alexander Joseph and it’s just chief kiss

No trigger warns, just fluff and hints of angst. I mean if you’re a Mormon you might get triggered by the coffee but if you're a Mormon I don't know why you're reading a Fear and Hunger fan fiction

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The coffee shop stood at the corner of Miro Ave and Orange Street. The warm lights glowing against the night’s own darkness. Welcoming to those souls that must be up with the moon and sleep against the sun. A proper coffee shop for those nocturnal beings with every caffeinated beverage one could dream of.

Windows surrounded the two front corners giving the occupants plenty of places to daydream their novel idea. There was of course the stander couches for gossiping and tables for working. A long bar, like in a diner, for customers to wait at to watch their drinks being prepared.

Behind the long bar stood a dapper man polishing a lavender color coffee mug. The dish washer in the back had left water stains on them. As the good employee was he was, Daan was taking a rag to each of the cuts and buffy the spots out. After the cups met his standers he would place them on the glass shelves behind him.

It was one of the many ways he would prep for the morning rush. Next he would get make sure the coffee, creamer, and such where stocked. Daan had already cleaned the bathrooms and honestly they wouldn't need it until someone other than him would use it.

Most of his shift was just doing small tasks as not to fall asleep. Not that he didn't have any customers at night. This was a college town after all. There was always some rich kid that could afford over the top lattes at midnight to help fuel their mad rush to finish the midterm paper. Basically their parents where paying even if they didn't know.

They where spoiled but still better than the last job. He preferred them sober and not drunk. Even when they came in drunk on the weekends nights still better than the bar. Anything was better than that job.

He glared at the carafe that had an hour old coffee in it. His eye twitched at the memory. The damn cop with his man titties out had come in ordered a small black coffee. This normally wouldn't be a problem but there was no fresh coffee. Most night shift works would just sign and order a something with a expresso. It has less caffeine but it beats waiting when needed that rush. Not this asshole, he demanded a whole new pot be made. The guy didn't even pay like most police officers do. Daan did get some satisfaction because he made the coffee decaffeinated.

He was ranting in his head all over again and he didn't want to spend his night this way. Daan had to do a job and not oppressed minorities like some other people he could name. Besides its not like he would see the cop ever again as they didn't have donuts. Pigs love their donuts.

Daan knew that there was no one else coming in tonight for decaf coffee. Might as well dump it down the sink. There was no point in having it out. Afterwards he could have a smoke break outside. But he never had the chance.

The bell at the front door went off, a customer. Well shit the cigarette would have too wait.

“Welcome in…” He had to stop. She made him lose the ability to speak. He was shot by cupid's arrow.

She stood there in the doorway, a haunting beauty to her. Long black hair cascaded down to her waist in waves. Maroon lips gave the impression that she was a vampire out of a gothic romance novel. The slit in her black dress revealed legs that seemed to go on forever. Daan could have mistaken her for a personification of the night with the ethereal vibes from her.

When she spoke it was husky. Regardless of the space between them it felt like her lips were right next to Daan's own ears. “Do you have time for some company?”

Daan dropped the rag in his hand. He did notice that he dropped it but didn't want to look even more foolish before this goddess by picking it up. So he just kicked it away from him.

“Of course, how could anyone not make time for you?” He hoped it was a seductive voice but somehow he doubted it. She was making him nervous in the best way possible.

She laughed and took a seat at the bar. Her elbows on the pale cold counter. Resting her head on her hand she gazed up at him under thick curled lashes. A smile playing on her lips.

“Oh my, what excellent customer serves.” The looks she had was that of amusement.

“I try.” Daan loosen the ribbon around his neck. When had it become so hot in here? It was cold autumn night and he was boiling.

“You are perfect at it.” They held each other’s looks for so long they could have been sculptures of people falling in love.

Daan was loosing himself in her brown eyes. He studied every line in them. The darker circle. How they started to get lighter towards the center before turning black. He could have stand here forever, lost in the most wonderful way.

“Aren't you suppose to you ask what I would like?” The trance was broken, for now.

“Oh right!” Daan snapped back to reality. He felt a little blush on his cheek.

Going for the glass mugs, he thought he'd show off a little. Taking one of the mugs he flipped it up into the air. It take gave a couple of extra flips into the air before coming back down into the palm of his hand.

“What can I get for you?” He spun the handle around his finger.

The mysterious woman gave a round of applause as Daan gave a little bow.

“Tricks from a barista? I've only seen that from bartenders.”

“Use to be one before I found this gig.”

“What made you quit?” How delightful, she wanted to know more about him.

“This is a college town, too many damn kids trying to buy alcohol with fake ideas on busy nights. Also, got tired up clean up puke from kids that can't handle their liquor yet. The lack of me having to clean human body fluids here is a massive plus.”

She had to hold to her chest as she gave out a hearty laugh as she was about to fall out of the barstool. “Yes, college kids can be quite something. I can see why you prefer this job.”

Daan's heart gave little flutters at each of her laughs. The laughs where like a warm summer eves wrapping him in warmth. Gods, how can anyone be so enchanting. He falling hard, blindly for her.

“Other than my tricks, else can I get for you? I've been told that I make fantastic coffee art, so good that they had to put me on the nightshift.” He even gave a wink or at least tried with missing one eye.

“Is that suppose to be a self depreciation or self praise?”

“I'll let you be the judge of that, darling.”

“Well if I'm going to be the judge,” she said, leading in. Daan could smell her perfume, he just wanted to burry his face in her neck and just died there. “I'll let you do you best work.”

“I'll be sure to wow you then.” Daan set himself to work.

As he said this the stress of trying to impress the woman came crashing down on him. Shit, what was he going to make for her? A heart seemed too forward and leaves felt to basic. Pulling out the milk he heated it making sure to swirling it with one hand. With the other he prepared the expresso.

He about to just start the have the dark caffeine pour into the cup without sweetener but he glance over to her. She seemed like the type to put sugar in her coffee. He grabbed the sugar and pour some in hopping that the heat from the expresso would melt it in time by the time it reached her lips. The beautiful lips painted red, they must taste wonderful.

The machine squirted out the hot bean juice and Daan went back to his focus . Pinhead bubbles formed in the milk and it was time to create.

Just try and impress her, this mystery from the night. That’s all he needed to do

He was about to start pouring but noticed out of the corner of his eye that she was leaning over. She strained her neck to look at what he was making. He turned his back to her, hiding the art from her.

“No sneak peaks.”

“But I want to see you work.” She sounded disappointed but she was still smiling making Daan's heart rush.

“It has to be a surprise, it will be better if you don't know.”

“Fine I'll close my eyes.” She covered her eyes.

Satisfied that she wouldn't look it all came down to Daan trying to figure how what was he going to make. No hearts , no leaves, he wanted to impress her as much as she impressed him. He poured the espresso into the wide mouth. Faraway he started to pour the steam milk, ever second passing his mind raced tried to think of something. Something beautiful like her and a deep sadness to it, just like her.

Inspiration came to him in a moment as he moved the steam milk closer and formed it into swirls. He smiled at his creation thought it would please this stranger in the night.

But it needed something to go with the drink. Taking the tongs he reached for the last good biscotti. It would be a few more hours till they got the new shipment from the bakery.

A cup of latte art and biscotti to go with it, a perfect set. He could serve this to her. Turning around he almost dropped the cup. She was sitting right there with her eyes closed. He traced with his eyes the sharpness of her eyeliner and those leashes brushing against her cheek. She was a master of makeup.

“You'll tell me when its ready? You wouldn't let me stay this way?”

“Never,” He place the cup before her. “You can open your eyes now, enjoy.”

He watch in slow motion as she open her eyes. Beautiful brown likes that match the coffee. So dark and he'd spend a life time trying to figure out what is behind them.

“A swan" Her eyes light up as she surveyed intricate swills of white on the canvas of coffee that formed into a delicate bird. He even added little white spots hopping that it would look like starts.

“She's beautiful, very talented. I honestly thought you would do a simple design.” She lifted the cup to her lips. The dark liquid passing through her lips. When she put the cup back down Daan noticed the red lip stain on the cup.

“I would never skip out on trying to impress someone as beautiful as you.”

“Its perfect.”

“I aim to please.” He gave half bow. “Have I fulfilled your curiosity?”

“I think this rises more questions then anything.” She took another sip. “Why would they ever put you on nights when you are this talented?”

“I'll answer your question but only if you answer one of mine.”

“A question for a question I see, but you must know a lady must keep some secrets.”

“No, nothing too personal I think.” Daan waved his hand dismissing the very idea of asking a lady he just met something too intimate.

“Alright, go ahead with your questions.”

“Why,” Daan lean against the counter elbows resting on the surface. “is a young woman, such as yourself, wondering around in the middle of the night. Shouldn't you be safe at home, asleep.”

She turned to the big windows facing out into the cold streets. Her expression went hard, unreadable to Daan. He had feared that he had pushed too hard and at the first question at that.

She did answer back but every moment she waited kept Daan pulsing with fear.

“I don't sleep much at night anymore. If I can I sleep its during the day. I find that I feel the safest at night. Everyone is asleep so no one bothers me, no one can see me. I can walk outside with peace as when the world is asleep.”

The next part, Daan could barely hear her say like it was a dream.

“I'm like a phantom in the night.”

Daan watched as a single tear formed in her eyes. It was like a diamond but it struck a dagger into his heart.

He reached over reached to wipe the tear away from her. To cradle her in his hands just so she would have a moment of knowing someone was caring for her. He needed her to know he was there.

But she wiped her hand over her eyes before he could reach her. His hand left there and awkwardly fell away. His chance gone.

Before she turned back to face him, Daan quickly moved his hand still hanging there back to where it was.

“But now is time for you to answer my question.” She said trying to sound happy but it was hard to believe.

“Hu?” Daan raised an eyebrow having totally forgotten what she had asked him.

“Did you forget already?” She laughed sounding better but there still was that lingering sadness to her.

“Come now, I can’t be the only one answering questions here. Unless you have a policy to interrogate every customer that comes in here.” She was smiling and all the old sorrows melted away.

She laughed as she watch a blush form on his face. He looked away from her and tugged at the string on his eyepatch. Whenever did it get so hot in here?

“Sorry I didn't mean to pry.” Daan did take the courage to look back at her. She was still smiling. Those deep brown eyes gazing into him making him forget everything that wasn't her.

“Well?”

“You have beautiful eyes.” Was the only thing he could think of. She didn't seem to mind as she laughed again. Daan couldn't help but noticed that her cheeks where turning red too.

“Are you going to answer my question?”

“Hum…”

“Hum?”

“… What was your question again?” Daan could feel any cool points that he might have had with her dwindling away. Well there goes his main appeal, he’s got to win her back.

“Oh Daan, boy.” She reached over and flicked his name tag. “ I was asking how such a talented artisan such as yourself is doing working the nightshift all by his lonesome self. Surely, your employer would rather you be on mornings instead?”

The way she said “artisan" and referring to him made his knees week. She really could just send him. He could just melt into her.

“Its nothing really interesting. I'm afraid to tell you.” He gave a shrug. “It’s a remnant from a past schedule and it never got changed. No special reason, just never got around to changing it.”

“I prefer nights.”

It was a half truth. The whole truth would take to long and far too sad.

“Oh, you stayed doing midnight shift because of a habit?” She tilted her head. She studied his face.

“Something like that.”

“Somehow that doesn't feel like all of it and you are keeping secrets.”

“It matches your own answer.” Daan shrugged.

“I suppose it does.” She smiled into her cup, the swan starting to face into the expresso.

“I suppose we should start another round?” Daan started thinking of what to ask her but she stopped him.

“Yes, but this time I’m going first.” She said.

“That isn't far, you can't have a round twice in a row.” Daan crossed his arms and leaned against the counter behind.

“But you went first last time.” She pouted. “Besides, aren't ladies suppose to go first?”

He let out a chuckle, “I can't argue with that. Shot.”

“What's your full name?”

He thought for a moment, thinking what is the best way to phrase it. It was unusual situation.

“Its anyone's guess to be honest with you. My mother called me Daan while my dad called me Daniel. So take your favorite and I'll be that for you.”

“No last name? I did say your full name.” She raised her eyebrow. Now it was his turn to become uncomfortable with the questions. Last names meant family and his was better left in the dust.

He let out a sigh, “Well, not really. It wasn't something that was important for them to teach me or even leave on my birth certificate. I was given the last name Winters.”

“I see, why Winters?”

“The orphanage lady was really into Dark Shadows.”

“Oh,” She glanced down at her cup, it was already more than half way gone. Some of her hair falling, hiding half of her face.

“Sorry, I shouldn't have pushed it…”

“No, you couldn't have known, besides I pushed you too.” He waved it off. It was all in the past and they where here now. How could he be focused on the past when there was such a beautiful woman before him?

“Same to you.” He asked.

“What?” She was about to finish her coffee but put it back down.

“Its my turn and the same question to you. I want to know your name.”

“Elise, please to meet you Daan or Daniel.” She reached a hand out for him to shake. Daan held her hand, is was soft like holding silk. The idea of kissing her hand was tempting but that might come off creepy.

“And?” He couldn't help himself but should have.

“And?” She couldn't quite look into his eyes.

“What’s your last name? You asked for my full name and its only fair that you share yours with me.”

She was silent and Daan had feared that he had offended her somehow. His hands went cold with the fear that maybe he went too far. But he had to know.

Starting out into the window she seemed lost in her own world. A pit formed in his gut thinking she wouldn't talk to him. That this was the end.

“… Its Elise von Dutch.”

“Von? Was your family noble or are you from Dutch?”

Elise smiled still looking out the window.

“Couldn't tell you. It was a long time ago.”

“Well it’s a lot better than Winter.”

“What makes you say that?” Her head snapped back towards him and he jumped a little at her sudden sharp movement.

“It just seems like there was a family behind it. When I get married I'll take my spouses’ last name. I hate the last name Winters. Seems too fake, something that doesn't sound like a last name that should have a family with it..”

“Oh,” Her face soften. “I thought Winters fit your mysterious aura but I suppose when you put it that way it I can see why you hate it.”

“Now that you've complemented it, I’m starting to like it.” They laughed a little. Something so painful below the surface but yet a rose was blooming on that ground. Maybe, just maybe.

They where lost in that moment. Silent and staring at each other. She finished the last of her coffee and Daan prayed that he could figure out a way to make her stay longer.

“Here,” She handed him a $20. “This should cover the bill and tip.”

She got up and made her way to the door. The autumn's cold wind picking up shaking the whole store with its tenacity. A harsh wind shuttered against the building and even Daan shivered. He couldn't let her leave out into the cold night.

In a mad rush, he pour the rest for the coffee left in the carafe into a to-go cup with cream and sugar. He spilled most of the coffee on the floor. It stung his skin, still hot.

“Wait!” Daan yelled, he jumped the counter. She turned to face him, surprised.

He grabbed onto her arm in one hand and in his other hand was a to-go coffee. What a scene. The man with the crush chasing after the girl. His heart beat against his chest threatening to burst out.

“For the tip home, its too cold outside to bare it alone.” He handed her the to-go. “I put cream and sugar in it. That's how you like it? Its on the house.”

Daan wanted to add, let me come with you to keep you warm but thought that might be too much. He still had some sense to him after all.

Elise’s mouth hung open for only a moment and then shut. A smile like dawn breaking after the longest darkest night came from her. A smile that melted Daan, he was about to melt to the floor at her smile.

“You are too sweet on me.” Her hand grazed his. That warmth and smooth touch pausing throughout Daan heart making him light head. Entranced about everything when it came to her.

He watched at she placed the lid to her lips, leaving red stained lips again. He watch at her throat as she swallowed his coffee. Even the light in her eyes as she enjoyed it warmed his soul.

“Its perfect.”

Daan's whole face went numb with joy. His hand slipped away as she left. The cold wind making her hair flow into the night. She must be cold at there but she had his coffee. Turning around she did give him a wave goodbye before slipping back into the shadows.

Daan stood there for far too long just waving at her as she left. A little bit love dump by cupid's arrow. But he just could move but he wanted to radiate in this happiness. Until something brought him back to reality.

“Oh shit, I need to clean up that coffee up.” Luckily the rag he had dropped earlier was already helping him.

#fear and hunger termina #fear and hunger #daan von dutch #daan fear and hunger #elise von dutch #daan winters #daanelise #Daan/Elise

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prose-for-hire · 2 years

Text

She hates me

This was my fic for @idabbleincrazy‘s 1k I can’t believe it’s classic rock challenge !!

(I’m sorry it’s so ridiculously late, but I still wanted to post it !!)

Pairing: Spike x fem!reader

(or I guess it can be read as Spike x Buffy maaaybe if she was a little ooc and you just squint a little)

Desc: I chose the song She hates me by Puddle of mudd and the phrase ‘Oh fuck off’ !! I decided to actually... challenge myself for this challenge and write something with a bit more angst. Rather than ‘you’ I use ‘she’ pronouns throughout.

Warning: unresolved angst, swearing, arguing, alcohol consumption.

The room was dark by design, the lights dimmed as much as they could be. The clientele of the place weren’t the kind to appreciate any kind of harsh lighting. Not just because it may harm the several pairs of eyes on some demons faces, but because it made it easier to navigate without the stares the less humanoid in feature were accustomed to.

He had braved the bar despite almost every demon in there having him at the top of their hit list. He needed this, needed to be away from the crypt. Everywhere he looked it reminded him of her. Of moments of fervent intimacy. Of stolen moments where she appeared to be right there with him.

Now he couldn’t stop second-guessing it. Everything. Finally seeing through what had been so obvious, if he hadn’t been distracted by how deeply he felt for her.

He sat at the bar. Hunched over his drink. He was several rounds in and not even likely to be halfway through his alcohol intake for the night. Regulars would recognise his face and mutter in disdain, but he didn’t care. His mind was on her. It was always on her.

Here he was again, a place he had found himself in much more frequently. Since her. He always found himself, alone, sitting at the bar and knocking back as much liquor as he could take. He had become a regular, giving the phrase ‘drowning your sorrows’ a new meaning.

There had been a silence for a moment, only interrupted occasionally by growls and whispers about him by demons from the corners of the room. Someone had hit the faulty jukebox on their way past to the bar and jolted it back into action. It was magically programmed to have any song on there that one could imagine and yet this one starts up. He scoffed, downing the rest of his drink.

Met a girl, thought she was grand. Fell in love, found out first hand…

The voice reverberated around his head, making him feel like the room was spinning. Or, perhaps that was the alcohol. His jaw tensed at the words, managing to hear through the fog of his mind and fully experience the meaning.

Because, well, the words spoke to him. He felt them. He was thinking them before the lyrics had put it painfully back into the forefront of his mind.

Went well for a week or two. Then it all came unglued

He growled at this, an involuntary response. His anger began to seep from every pore. About the situation. About her. He turned swiftly and threw an empty glass bottle at the speakers.

The bartender tries to intervene and ask him to leave but before he opened his mouth, he saw Spike’s demeanour. This man was in pain and he had a soft spot for the lonely, heartbroken demons of Sunnydale.

“Let me get you a drink” He offered as Spike patted his pockets down for any cash.

“Hey, this one’s on me. You wanna talk about it?” The bartender asked, scanning the blonde vampire as he spoke.

“Don’t swing that way, mate” He said flatly. Although he cast an eye over the man before he said so. No, he was too concerned with her. As he always was. He could only ever go her way and that was what made this worse. He wanted to fuck away the image of her in his mind. Drink it away. Do anything that could possibly burn her image from where it was stuck fast in his brain.

“Uh, no. I’m offering my ear pal. Most say I’m good to vent to” He shrugged, a third arm slid from under the bar to pass him a drink.

In a trap, trip I can't grip. Never thought I'd be the one who'd slip

“She’s bloody left again… left me hollow – a space she could only fill” he groaned, knowing how pathetic he sounded.

Spike had been trapped. In the web of the words she would spin for him. Such beautiful words that had spoken to his romantic heart. To the idea that had always lived in his mind that he would find the one. One that would last an eternity. That he could love with both heart and mind.

He thought back to how it had been. He began to recount it to the guy behind the bar. Visions of the good that clouded his mind, made him near ready to get up of his seat and walk straight to her. Sink to his knees before her, promise her that his heart would never stray. No matter what she thought. What she said. He hated that he was this way, hated that he would lose the last thread of his pride so that he could tie it into a bow and gift it to her.

She had walked out on him three times, including the latest incident. This one had been the worst, there was something so final about it. That look on her face. As if she wouldn’t care if he had been dusted before her eyes.

When it was good though, it was really good. Devastatingly good. Addictive, even. They spent hours in bed, skin touching skin. There were rough, passionate encounters that led to both parties panting and glowing with pleasure. Other times could be surprisingly tender, holding hands and whispers that led to feelings spilling out. Mostly from Spike, but she had let on that she felt something during the throws of passion.

When they were alone this way, he felt as if he were on top of the world.

Then I started to realize. I was living one big lie…

He had known from the beginning that their relationship, or whatever it was, would have to be a secret. It had been fun at first, sneaking around under everyone’s noses. That was until the guilt settled in. He noticed that she started to pull away. Refused to even discuss telling anyone or calling their relationship what it was. She couldn’t let anybody know about them.

Spike sighed, nursing his drink as he explained how it had been getting harder to get time alone with her. How she didn’t even acknowledge his existence around other people. Especially not her precious Scoobies.

“Didn’t speak to me, would barely look my way. Pretended like the night before hadn’t happened” He said, his voice cracked at the memory. At how she could walk through her life as if it meant nothing. That he meant nothing to her.

He wanted to hold her, to have some sort of intimacy that wasn’t just a quickie whenever she could find the time to slip into the crypt unannounced. But after a while, she always insisted she was busy. Found excuses for why she couldn’t stay very long after they finished up. It hurt him. Wounded him in such a way that his insecurity became too much.

He had started to follow her, to see if there was another guy. One that she left his bed to see. He never caught her with anyone but she did catch him following her one night. He had thought he was at a safe distance but somehow she had spotted him. Might have been something to do with the cloud of smoke that signalled his presence.

She had screamed at him and, although he knew he was in the wrong, he shouted back. That had been the beginning of the end, he realised. She didn’t trust him as much, wouldn’t come round as often. Not even to allow him to explain.

He sighed, trying to explain himself to the demon behind the bar, “She just-”

She fucking hates me. Trust, she fucking hates me

The music kicked back in and finished his sentence for him as he lit up a cigarette and recalled the events of earlier that evening. They had been arguing. Again. He saw her pulling away further and had confronted her about it. Seeking solace, some kind of reassurance that she would stay. Instead, he was met with her blank expression as she waited for him to finish his usual accusatory speech.

Instantly, he felt her disinterest and interpreted it in his own mind. People didn’t love as deeply or as earnestly as he seemed to, or at least wouldn’t admit to it. Especially not her and so he decided that she must truly hate him. There was no other possible explanation.

She snapped. She was sick of having to stroke his ego every time she saw him. And she told him this. The conversation turned ugly. Eventually, he asked her to leave, to never come back and hoping that she would plead with him to let her stay. The way he knew that he would had it been the other way round. He just needed her to show some kind of emotion, give him some kind of reaction. Something, anything that would give him hope.

He could remember it now, as if it was… well around three hours ago. He could see it playing out on a loop in his mind’s eye. Just how much she appeared to loathe him and clearly herself just for being with him. It hurt, a deep and devastating ache that ate him from the inside out.

“Oh fuck off!” he had shouted, kicking the nearest piece of furniture to him and splintering it in his frustration. He scanned her face, it was unmoving and set.

“Happily,” She said, shrugging and storming away. The crypt began to shake at the force she slammed the door shut behind her.

“Bloody women!” He shouted, kicking the cupboard again for good measure.

I tried too hard and she tore my feelings like I had none. And ripped them away

It gets worse. He couldn’t leave it, despite shouting at her to leave him to rest in peace. He followed her out as she weaved between the gravestones. Trying to get her to come back to the crypt. Hopefully apologise in bed, the best way he knew how. But she was over it. She had gone colder, her eyes would have betrayed her though if he could bare to look in them.

“I thought you wanted me to fuck-off-and leave-you-alone-for-the-rest-of eternity or else?”

“Look, just stop, would you? I was angry, ‘cause you’re, well, you’re you and I’m… me”

“I’m not in the mood for riddles, Spike” She warned, as he sighed. He would have to do this. And now. He adored her. Needed her more than he had ever needed anything in his un-life.

“I love you, pet, always have” He insisted, taking her hand in his. She watched him for a minute, as if to discern if it was some kind of joke.

“You don’t love me, you… you don’t even know how. I think you’re right, we should keep a distance from each other. I can’t do this anymore. It’s shit.” She stated clearly. No emotion in her voice and Spike interpreted it in the most disastrous way possible. She didn’t care about him.

“Love-” He grabbed her arm desperately. Trying to pull her into him but she shrugged him off, looking ahead of her rather than at him.

“Bye Spike” she said, steely tone made him choke back a sob. As all of the past rejections he had faced mingled with the freshest one, which had become the deepest and most painful.

She was queen for about an hour. After that, shit got sour

All the good memories swam to the surface after she walked away, drowning all of the bad. Just to make the loss sting even more.

All the lazy mornings/evenings that they spent in bed together. Kissing and talking when she had time. The times they spent patrolling, laughing and working together to slay the demons. He loved the way she looked when she laughed, it made her face look so much brighter.

There were times where he had convinced her to stay at the Bronze when he arrived. They had danced, bodies pressed together in a way that felt natural. As if they were a proper couple. It had been fun, she had relaxed around him. Pressing a kiss against his lips on the busy dancefloor even though people she knew might have been there. They even played a few drinking games, leaving together to go to the crypt later to continue the fun.

But the good times never lasted. Some of the worse memories came back to the surface. They were very different people in some ways, they found themselves arguing fiercely, over anything. Just because one was in a bad mood and had taken it out on the other. They struggled to find anything to agree on during a bad day.

The way she would leave as soon as they finished up in bed always left him feeling like shit. Sometimes without a second glance at him as she got dressed and hurried out of the crypt. The look of shame that clouded her face when they were together, the way she blamed him for how she felt. She felt gross inside, lying to people and sleeping with someone that had tried to kill her more than once. She took all the love and care he had offered her and left him, lonely, in his crypt without a shred of reciprocation.

She took all I ever had. No sign of guilt

Not feeling bad, no

“She- she just treats me as if I’m nothing, barely looks at me on a good day” He sighed continuing his explanation of the recent events to the demon behind the bar, “Sees me as a monster, I can see it you know… the kind from her personal nightmares”

“Why don’t you move on, pal, huh? She’s not worth it” He offered as he cleaned down the counter.

“You don’t understand, she’s the love of my un-life”

“But you’re obviously not hers” He shrugged and realised he wasn’t helping when Spike stood up as if to fight the bar tender, who quickly surrendered and turned away to look busy.

He sat back down and nursed his drink, shaking his head and downing the rest before demanding another. He thought about it, he swore she felt the same sometimes. It wasn’t often she left her guard down but it was there. She enjoyed the sex, he knew that much. But he had hoped there was a deeper reason why she kept coming back for more.

They had laughed together at the beginning, shared things. Nothing too deep but you pick things up about another when you spend as much time as they did. Enough to love someone. Enough to make them your every thought.

But the way she reacted when he professed his love was nothing that he could have ever expected. She barely even blinked. She had taken his heart in her hands and crushed it into a fine powder. The kind that could never be pieced back together. The kind that couldn’t be retrieved or replicated by anyone else. He had a hole where his heart should be. His heart now lost somewhere with his soul, in the ether.

In a trap, trip I can't grip. Never thought I'd be the one who'd slip

By the time he left the bar in the early hours of the morning, he had convinced himself he didn’t care about her. Didn’t need her. She was cruel and cold and… the only person that had ever owned his heart in this way. The one person that made him feel alive again. Made him quiver with want.

God, he couldn’t get over this in a night. He didn’t think he would ever get over it. He had fallen for her deep and he wished he hadn’t. He always did this, became love’s bitch. The fool that fell so deep without thought or reason. But never had he fallen as deep as this. He ached for her. Longed for her, in both sleep and wake.

It was meant to be a bit of fun. Shagging and sneaking around. Until, of course the inevitable happened. He should have known this would happen. Especially when he had suddenly been inspired to write poetry for the first time in several decades. But he had been oblivious, these feelings growing fast and strong.

He now felt as though he was caught up in a maze with no end in sight. A predicament he wasn’t always sure he wanted to escape. Stuck, loving her for eternity when she probably hadn’t thought twice about him since she walked away. Yet, he was all in. Even now, after everything. The constant arguments. Her lack of emotion. Her coldness.

Then I started to realize. I was livin' one big lie

As he staggered through the dark streets, he knew deep within that if she even gave him a moment of attention again, changed her mind and offered to come back to his crypt even now that he would say yes. He wouldn’t even stop to think.

Through the entire night, as he tried to convince himself and the bartender that he was over her, he was thinking about how he would give anything to be in bed with her again. To slog through the pain, the disgust or worse, that blank expressionless look that may flash across her face just for that sweet moment they may share briefly.

He knew she was annoyed. Mad. Tired of the constant arguments. The sneaking around. The lying she was doing to her friends. And she blamed him. For being this monster, just as he blamed himself. She made him wish his un-life away.

But the truth was, he would go through all of that again, just to be close to her. He would allow her to set him on fire. Stake him through the heart. He would bathe with her in holy water, just for a single moment by her side.

Trust, she fucking hates me…

#Spike btvs #Spike x reader #Spike x you #Spike imagine #Spike btvs x reader #btvs #btvs x you #btvs imagine #Buffy The Vampire Slayer #buffy the vampire slayer imagines #buffy summers #spike #buffy x spike #spuffy #if you squint?#female reader #Song Fic

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cangelgifs · 1 year

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Saw some really bad anti-Cordelia/anti-Cangel opinions but I’m being so brave about it. In all seriousness though, what do you say to people who think Season 3 regresses on cordelia’s development for the sake of the romance plot? I think it’s an unbelievably wrong take that clearly has no appreciation for her character whatsoever but I’d like to hear your takes.

So, I do think we lose some of Cordy’s POV in the second half of S3 once she becomes a ‘romance interest’ but I don’t see this as a flaw on Cangel’s part. Moreover, I see it as a flaw of the show itself AKA having too many male writers in the writers room.

However, I don’t think her character is regressed at all. S3 has some of the most amazing growth for her character in the show. "So - demonize me already” is one of the best Cordelia moments across both series.

I'm going to quote Nika_83 here because she said it better than I could:

"I say they also don't know the meaning of the word regression. Which is to go backwards. At no point in season 3 does cordy slide back in to season 1 btvs behavior. So that's pattently wrong. Rather she is way more selfless and giving. This all makes sense given what she has seen and experienced. She literally feels the pain of the visions. She wants to help those people. And selfishly she wants to be important to angel and the cause. And she still maintains that "materialism' she always had with loving nice things, being bought out by clothes, loving being pylea princess, etc. Which is a part of her as a character and can be a flaw but that doesn't override her need to save others, or herself."

I don’t know the posts your referring to specifically but common arguments I see for S3 are:

She’s become a Mary-Sue/Saint Cordy.

Angel on Top has a good response to that: “She's in this relationship with Groo that we already discussed as being, like, flawed in various ways and has a certain amount of denial baked into it. Like that is imperfect. And she also tries to read what is going on with Gunn and is completely wrong as well. Like, she’s also, like, there’s human error happening still with her. Like I don’t think she is—god forbid I use the Mary Sue word–she’s like not doing that kind of stuff. I do think Cordelia would be inherently less interesting if she was suddenly perfect and never did anything wrong ever in her life. But, you know, she’s still Cordelia. She’s still, like, making some mistakes and being a little too abrasive every once in a while. Like, I don’t subscribe to that.”

“Angel's feelings are the only ones I care about” - The Price; ‘she’s become too focused on Angel’

I think saying ‘oh, all she cares about is Angel’ is oversimplifying it greatly and missing the point. Yes, she cares about Angel and always has (see 1x22 when she buys him art supplies to make him feel better and “Well, he's gonna have to start wanting things from life, whether he wants to or not!”). This is nothing new. I think in the overall context of what’s going on in S3 at that time, it makes sense. I think she is prioritizing Angel and focusing on Angel’s grief over losing Connor to protect herself from her own grief. If she keeps busy taking care of Angel, she won’t have to feel the pain/loss herself. Also we know Cordy is guilty of downplaying her own pain to her own detriment (her hiding that the visions were literally killing her!) so sadly this is in character for her.

Thanks for the ask!

--whatisyourchildhoodtrauma

I also wanna hop in here and say that I completely agree with everything that has been said and I also wanna add that even if you completely strip away the romantic subtext of s3, Cordelia would be the same person that she was in that season because two things are very true. One, that her life would still be very much intertwined with Angel's because that's the nature of him being the protagonist--similar to how Cordy's life was very much intertwined with Buffy's on BTVS--and two, her growth over the last seasons (and arguably since BTVS) would still lead her to the place that she wound up. She didn't grow to the kind hearted, loving person who cares more about the mission than money that we see in s3 because of Angel or for Angel. She grew because she was presented time and time again with a worldview and a mission that was bigger and more important than herself and it shaped her and facilitated her growth into the person she became.

I also gotta point out that the argument in itself feels kind of sexist as if a woman can’t have positive growth unless it’s attributed to shipping her with a man. Not to mention that the "Saint Cordy" moniker also feels sexist because it both diminishes her growth and patronizes her. Essentially it paints her as this super perfect saint of a person instead of talking about how much she's grown or the sacrifices that she's had to make in order to get where she is in canon or even talking about the mistakes she does make/flaws she does have in the back half of s3. Not to mention it also is used to not talk about the real issues of the back part of s3 and how that twisted into the narrative of s4 (which is a very sexist narrative with many flaws). It's just is like "oh she's saint cordelia now" and doesn't leave much, if any, room for deeper discussions. Not to mention it also paints this narrative of "a woman has to be suffering constantly or tormented in order to be viewed as a flawed, complex person" which is both gross and incorrect.

Again, super agree with everything that has been said and this was a very good question, thank you for the ask!

-- someonefantastic

#ask

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wikiangela · 1 year

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so, I really liked season 6 - here's some general thoughts and opinions

I mean, I hated what happened to Tara and I don't think I'll ever get over it, she was my fave - I literally took like a month break from watching after 6x19 because I wasn't ready to say goodbye to Tara

but it was a really good season (not close to how amazing s5 was but still great l)

I loved Buffy dealing with being back, though her relationship with Spike was getting annoying tbh 😂 at first I felt bad for Spike with how Buffy was playing with him all the time, up until that bathroom scene tbh

also, tbh in 6x22 I couldn't care less about Spike's side of the episode but omg he got his soul back?? I'm really curious about what's gonna happen now ngl 👀

Willow and Tara were my fave part of this season, loved how they portrayed Willow struggling with her addiction to magic etc - and, again, how could they take Tara away from us 😭💔

I was so here for Dark Willow, I was 💯 rooting for her (tho I probably was supposed to be against her but fuck it, I wanted revenge too) 😂😂 the show could've ended here with Willow actually destroying the world and I'd still be with her, what even is the point without Tara 😭

I think I'm starting to like Anya a bit more (she's still annoying tho) and I like that she's a vengeance demon again

and I definitely dislike Xander now, for many reasons that I ready expressed in other posts I think 😂 he's just so infuriating, and at this point I'm pretty sure part of my dislike must be the actor, because I saw him in criminal minds too and I'm annoyed every second he's on screen (it's never for long but I hope he stops showing up altogether soon lol - I'm on s7 there too 😂) I genuinely wish Willow eneded up killing Xander at the end there lol

and omg I was SO sick of Anya and Xander's relationship and of hearing about the wedding and don't get me started on how Xander just left her at the altar, and how he handled all that (I have a whole other post about it, not gonna get into it again)

I love that Giles didn't die, I genuinely got worried there for a second, but I'm so happy he didn't 😂 missed him when he wasn't there tbh (tho that laughing scene with Buffy was a bit weird and went on for way too long 😂)

the trio weren't the best villains but also not the worst, they were more competent than I initially gave them credit for and Warren was seriously gross and evil and got what he deserved haha

also, I saw that so many people love the musical episode and it's the top rated eps on imdb, but I lowkey hated it - not the worst episode of the series but definitely far from fave 😂 the worst episode of the season was definitely 6x15 - as you were - with fucking Riley back 🤢 god I hated that one so much, almost as much as beer bad (the actual worst episode of the series so far imo) 😂😂

the finale was insane and I loved it - tho that scene with Willow and Xander was kinda meh and lowkey anticlimactic? idk I was underwhelmed 😂😂 him just repeating 'I love you' was too cheesy even for me tbh, and because I don't like Xander, I probably liked it less than I normally would've anyway 😂 (so it might be just my bias, I admit haha)

tho tbh I also wish we got more of Dark Willow than just, what was it, three episodes? would've been even better haha

but overall, it was a good season, tho I'm never gonna forgive them for killing off Tara - despite that, I did enjoy it a lot and can't wait to start s7 soon 😁

#Buffy season 6 #buffy the vampire slayer #Buffy s6 #btvs s6 #btvs #buffyverse #watching buffy #general thoughts #just my opinion #my personal opinion #Buffy s6 finale

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walkawayinsin · 2 years

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Opinion: Why Season 5 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer was much darker than you thought.

*BIG SPOILERS* (also tw; depression, mental health struggles)

There are people who recall season 6 as being the darkest season of the whole TV-series. And in context to the development; it confuses me why some fan thinks that the series should've ended with Season 5's final episode "The Gift". It even triggers me in a way which I will talk about later. While season 6 stands for the darkest character arcs for like EVERYONE, season 5 is foreshadowing a lot of the upcoming, personal struggles within the Scooby gang. It also made me understand why Buffy struggled the way she did in season 6.

Buffy Summers, the main character of the series, has always gone through more or less struggles through the whole series. It's not surprising since the series does revolve around her double-life as a youth with normal struggles and as a slayer. But not even the dark half of season 2 and whole season 3 can reach up to the level of struggling she goes through in season 5. In season 5 she isn't just dealing with one or a few hardships; she's dealing with a shit tons of them. To explain this further I will, down below, list every main struggle Buffy has been facing through season 5 and analyze them deeper.

*****

Role as the slayer As I've previously stated; the role as slayer has always been a main struggle in Buffy's life. What separates if from the other earlier seasons begins with as early as in the first episode when Buffy faces Dracula. And this is mainly because it looked like she had it all figured out in season 4 regarding her role as the slayer (except for the foreshadowing dream in the finale episode which told her otherwise). It also makes her realize that she still needs Rupert Giles in her life as her Watcher. Just like previous times, it affects her confidence and her questioning her role. But on top of that she's now facing the wrath of an enemy by the name Glorificus (also known as "Glory"). Since you've probably watched Buffy you know who I am talking about. It's Buffy's toughest enemy - even tougher than the mayor. Glory is an almost unbeatable Hell Goddess who stops at nothing to be able to go back to her dimension. And Buffy doesn't just take one beating from Glory; she takes several of them and even have to face the fact that she has to run away from this enemy. This affects her confidence even further. Glory is after Buffy's little sister who, until season 5, never existed which leads us to Buffy's next main struggle

The arrival of Dawn Summers Buffy's struggles with her little sister Dawn Summers (and other family problems) are another theme for season 5. And if you have siblings; you already know it isn't all sunshine and rainbows. On top of that Joyce Summers, Buffy's mother, is also a single parent and has her own issues which leads to Buffy taking the role of a caretaker. In episode 2 we already see how Buffy's life becomes even more complicated with her having a little sister around her. As if that wasn't hard enough; Buffy faces the harsh truth when she realizes, in episode 5, that hers, and everyone else's, past memories of Dawn are made up by a couple of monks. Dawn is in fact an energy source called "The Key" which, the previously mentioned, Glory is after. And the girl has no idea about her previous identity and has no powers other than the ability to open dimensions with her blood. And it's a task Buffy has been given without consent. It's also a task she can't escape and not least because she still feels like the bond to her little sister is very real. She feels protective over Dawn and it grows even more after finding out about Dawn's role. This isn't even half of the trouble. Buffy now has to deal with the truth regarding her sister. Like I've previously mentioned the one being after Dawn is a powerful Hell Goddess. This leads to Buffy having to struggle with keeping Dawn a secret for everyone, except Giles, to stop Glory from figuring out who the Key is. So while everybody else behaves as if nothing has changed; Buffy (and Giles) has to go on pretending that everything is normal. Not the least do they also have to hide it from Dawn because that girl is a fragile hormone monster. Episode 13 proves my point further and who can blame the poor girl? Finding out that everyone's memories of you were altered and that you were nothing but a destructive energy source before isn't something a struggling teenager wants to hear. Dawn doesn't the least affects the relationship between Buffy and Riley which will be the next main struggle I want to talk about.

Buffy's love life struggles Buffy's love life being a messy roller coaster isn't anything new. Her first boyfriend Angel was a vampire. Sure he was a vampire with a soul but it had it's catch; he would loose his soul if he experienced a moment of happiness. So that was doomed from the start. Then Riley arrived and Buffy faced a new form of struggle: while Riley was otherwise normal he was being involved in a military project called The Initiative. This project was a big part of Riley's life but it was toxic and his involvement with Buffy lead to the project's downfall and him living a normal life. It seemed as if their struggles were done by the end of season 4 ... but it's Buffy we're talking about. So already by the first episode, in season 5, the seeds for Buffy and Riley's relationship struggles are planted when Riley is facing doubts about his importance to Buffy. When Buffy gets bitten by Dracula (which she also fangirled about early in the episode) it affects Riley's insecurities regarding Buffy's ex-boyfriend Angel. And it's only episode 1. Following each episode leading to their breakup, with Riley leaving in episode 10, there are subtle hints that Buffy and Riley has some serious issues and power struggles within their relationship. Not the least is their relationship affected by Buffy's family issues and her new struggles with her slayer identity. It's becomes even more heartbreaking when Buffy finally catches a break from her family issues but then suddenly have to face her love life being more rocky than she previously thought. On top of that she hasn't even any time to process it before he leaves her without saying goodbye. But Riley isn't the only one she faces struggles with. Spike has been Buffy's enemy since season two and since season 4 he became a reluctant ally of The Scoobies because he has a chip in head which makes him harmless to humans. Kicking demons helps him deals with his new life as a "neutered vampire" as Buffy calls him in season 6. But in season 5 Spike has realized that he has developed a crush on Buffy. And as much as I love Spike and Spuffy; it was just creepy by this stage - not the least the whole thing with the Buffy Bot in episode 18. Spike also triggers the breakup between Buffy and Riley. He also helped Dawn find out about her identity in episode 13. Buffy doesn't just have to deal with someone having an unrequited love almost directly after her breakup with Riley. She has to deal with it coming from a soulless vampire who wanted to previously kill her and her friends and with Buffy's past experience she won't even consider Spike at this point. By the end of season 5 Buffy has developed a bond with Spike based on him helping her protecting Dawn from Glory. This after he protected Dawn's secret identity even if it almost cost him his life back in episode 18. Not only has Buffy another powerful ally but she can also feel some kind of kinship with Spike, who understands her struggles far better than anyone in the Scooby gang. This was hinted already back in episode 7 when Spike chooses to comfort Buffy when she finds out about her mother. This leads us to Buffy's fourth struggle.

The death of Joyce While I could've talked about Buffy's family issues in one category I felt it was worth separating her struggles with Dawn from her struggles with her mother. Buffy has already had problems with her mother in previous seasons - not the least when her mom finds out about her identity by the end of season 2. While the season begins with Buffy bickering with her mother about sister responsibilities, it takes a 180 degree turn when Buffy's mother becomes sick in episode 5 and later discovers she has a tumor in episode 7. Now Buffy has to face the fact that her mother might die since the operation she faces isn't without any risks. Buffy, who has overcome death before and seen how life continues after death, struggles with the fact that nothing supernatural is the cause for her mother's illness. And while Joyce's operation succeeds in episode 10 Buffy can't enjoy this moment for a very long time because, as previously told, she faces a sudden breakup in the same episode. And Joyce's recovery is short-lived when episode 15 ends with Buffy, who finally seems to have recovered from Riley, finds her mother dead on the sofa. The next episode "The Body" is about Buffy having to deal with her mother's death and it is an amazing episode which has been well-deserved for all the praising it got. This is the darkest moment in the whole Buffy series - yes even darker than the Dark Willow arc. Because it's not caused by anything supernatural - it's a "natural cause" of death. Something had gone wrong with the operation and therefore Buffy couldn't save her mother this time. Also when Buffy is facing this, as you can see from what I've mentioned earlier, Buffy has already gone through shit tons of hardships without catching a break from it. Instead she's faced with one of the worst moments of her life. And no breaks are taken after that either. Because she's now has a single responsibility for Dawn while only being 20 years old. Episode 17 shows how Buffy finally has enough and breaks down in front of her sister while bursting out "Who's going to take care of us?!". No matter what role Buffy was given she's still a young human who faces the beginning of adulthood. The death of Joyce marks Buffy's down spiral towards depression and emotional/mental exhaustion from the intense struggling she has been facing the whole season.

Her loved ones being in lethal danger Joyce and Dawn was not the only of Buffy's loved ones facing lethal danger in season 5. Like many other struggles; Buffy's friends and family facing danger isn't new but it's on a new level. When the Watcher's Council returns in episode 12, they threatens to take away Giles if Buffy fails their trials. Tara, girlfriend to Buffy's best friend Willow, is tortured by Glory who breaks her hand and then takes away her sanity in the search for The Key. And as Buffy's sister is revealed as the Key by the end of episode 19 Buffy can't protect her loved ones in any other way than to run away with all of them. But their runaway trip is followed by being hunted down by knights who also wants to kill Buffy's sister to protect the world from her. This leads to Giles getting lethally wounded and in need for medical care. In the end the running away was for nothing since Glory ends up kidnapping Dawn anyway in episode 20. This leads to Buffy's final breakdown over all of her struggles which leaves her completely blank. She is trapped in her guilt and the fact that she may loose the only family member present in her life. While she is brought back to sanity by Willow she must almost immediately face that she may have to kill Dawn if the portal opens. Which of course it does. *******

As a final discussion, after this long analyze, I want to bring back my statement about how season 5 made me understand why Buffy struggled as much as she did in season 6. Because by the end of season 5 she was already depressed. By the end of season 5 Buffy solely lived to protect the world and her loved ones. Otherwise her love life was in shackles, her mother was dead, she dropped out of college and she'd come to realize that the struggles with being The Slayer would never end. She wasn't just facing troubles with the supernatural but also with the real life. I don't think she would've mildly accept her fate as she did in the final episode if she hadn't gone through all those hardships and trials in season 5. So ending her life to protect the others wasn't as hard as it was for her in season 1. When she realized she could've taken her sister's place, in closing the portal, she also found her own release. And O'boy do I know that feeling. As someone who is struggling with periods of depression: facing a lot of struggles at once is what triggers me to question if life is worth living. I felt Buffy's relief as she saw the sun rise and Heaven waiting for her self-sacrifice. And this is why I needed season 6. Because in that season Buffy came to realize she couldn't escape her life struggles. And also the Scooby gang realized the cost of not accepting someone being dead. Spike singing "Life's not a song; Life isn't bliss. Life is just this. It's living" is one of the most encouraging lines I've listened to. It also summarizes Buffy's struggle to live with her hardships and eventually succeed in dealing with it. It's encouraging to us who deals with life struggles just as season 5 reminds us that even the supernatural hero can experience extreme life struggles that leads to them questioning the point of living.

#tw; depression #tw; death mention #buffy the vampire slayer #btvs #btvs season 5 #btvs season 6 #mental heath awareness #buffy summers #character analysis #tv-show #depression #life struggles #dealing with life #buffy spoilers #buffy #tv-show essay

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leguin · 1 year

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I posted 4,345 times in 2022

1,643 posts created (38%)

2,702 posts reblogged (62%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@leguin

@slaygentford

@canticleoftheturning

@zombiesun

@betelgeusing

I tagged 3,779 of my posts in 2022

Only 13% of my posts had no tags

#q - 861 posts

#art - 299 posts

#iwtv - 256 posts

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#words - 75 posts

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#disco elysium - 45 posts

#asks - 41 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#i do like that the daughter is apparently a failed lesbian comedienne...finally some representation to balance out all those successful ones

My Top Posts in 2022:

We now have all the exposure of life pre-Roe but none of the paternalistic protections: Women are now seen as fully autonomous moral agents, which means that they will be legally on the hook for endangering the babies they carry, but they will also be punishable as autonomous adults. Women thus remain children for purposes of pregnancy and giving birth, but have become adults for purposes of criminal liability.

It’s easy to lull yourself into the false belief that a reversion to life pre-Roe would simply mean that the reproductive freedom movement needs to redouble efforts to fund and transport persons needing abortions to more hospitable states. That would be awful, we think, but maybe not that catastrophically bad. But as Goldberg warned in 2019, “the past can prove inadequate to understanding the depredations of the present.” We are not in fact moving “backward” to life before Roe. We are more likely moving sideways into a fundamentalist religious regime in which life pre-Roe will come to look like a vastly less terrifying option than a world in which women are subject to revanchist religious claims—claims with no support whatsoever in the Constitution—about the lives they may carry, the unknown crimes they may commit, and the choices they are no longer permitted to make.

1,292 notes - Posted June 24, 2022

also. and yes i did just rewatch the finale. when louis admits (in his own head) what actually happened over lestat’s body, and it becomes clear that actually he’s just inventing things wholecloth. he’s just putting words in claudia’s mouth, which means she could’ve said anything. lestat could’ve done anything. louis could’ve done anything, and we barely know what he did do because he’s a lying liar who lies! maybe there were only 10 true seconds in the whole interview! maybe not even that! it’s insane and the flip happens in about .2 seconds, which is even more insane. just like that.

1,515 notes - Posted November 9, 2022

There are few things on film as vulnerable as Lee Pace drinking and weeping as he confesses his guilt, his hurt, and his grief to tiny, crying Catinca Untaru, who believed during filming, that Pace, like his character, could not walk. It’s not important to the climax of the film, but it underscores the relationship they have on film: naive, plain, exploratory. Singh asked Untaru to help shape the stories, and the fantastical sequences sometimes have a child’s endearing disregard for logic. But the end, when Roy comes undone, realizing what he’s implicated this little girl in, and realizing that he feels worse about that than he thought he could feel—this is the story of someone who understands guilt and pain and the bad choices we make while in their thrall, and the way we need to be forgiven, or accepted. The way we need enough space and enough love to let us fuck up and keep going. All of this, and I’ve said so little about Singh’s imagery: blood-red, sky-blue, saturated and full of butterflies and growling soldiers and places that seem solid enough in the real world until you line them up one after another, at which point they become a dream, a single land of everything beautiful. Everything still hurts in that beautiful land; everyone is betrayed, left alone, haunted, shouting his (alas, all his) pain into the sky. Everyone dies because Roy wants to die; Roy lives because Alexandria insists that his story is not the only story.

Ten Years Later, There’s Still Nothing Like Tarsem Singh’s The Fall by Molly Templeton

2,177 notes - Posted September 4, 2022

The United States reported more deaths from COVID-19 last Friday than deaths from Hurricane Katrina, more on any two recent weekdays than deaths during the 9/11 terrorist attacks, more last month than deaths from flu in a bad season, and more in two years than deaths from HIV during the four decades of the AIDS epidemic. At least 953,000 Americans have died from COVID, and the true toll is likely even higher because many deaths went uncounted. COVID is now the third leading cause of death in the U.S., after only heart disease and cancer, which are both catchall terms for many distinct diseases. The sheer scale of the tragedy strains the moral imagination. On May 24, 2020, as the United States passed 100,000 recorded deaths, The New York Times filled its front page with the names of the dead, describing their loss as “incalculable.” Now the nation hurtles toward a milestone of 1 million. What is 10 times incalculable?

2,612 notes - Posted March 8, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

can't stop thinking abt this tweet

5,301 notes - Posted June 16, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#year in review #oh i see you can just post it

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spnae · 1 year

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Chapter 32 Coming Clean?

When Buffy and Willow returned to the castle they promptly deposited their shopping bags upstairs. Then they made their way back down to the living room to check on Ruby. Spike, per usual, was lounging on the couch watching TV.

“Hey, there’s my favorite dead guy,” Buffy, went over to him. Spike sat up a little to make room for her and she snuggled in next to him.

Spike looked up at her, “Hey you, how was your day?” he asked.

Buffy huffed, “Oh you know. Probably said way too much to Callum‘s mom.” Spike raised an eyebrow at her, urging Buffy to continue, “Yeah I kind of told her that I was a Slayer too—“

“And now you’re regretting it?”

Buffy shrugged.

“Not like you told her anything about the school or the girls right?”

“Nah, I just gave her some quip about the life saving properties of CPR.”

“Right. Still think Angel was a bloody git. Xander told me about that whole thing. He had to do CPR on you because Angel has ‘no breath’? Oh yeah and those squeezy breathing bag things EMTs carry around don’t work either. Right. I bet the idiot just doesn’t know CPR. Git.”

Buffy looked at him blinking, “What?”

“Don’t NEED to breathe, Pet, doesn’t mean we can’t inflate our lungs. Cigarettes wouldn’t have much of an appeal if that were the case.”

“Huhh. I— huh. Ok, sure, so do you know CPR?”

“Course I do. Dawn had to learn it in Health class while you were a less-solid heavenly-body and after that gem of a story I had Xander and Dawn teach me.” He shrugged. “Anya suggested using me as a practice dummy but that was a hard pass for me.”

“Good to know. So how’s it been here?”

Spike sat up a little straighter, turning to see Willow a little better, “Yeah, could’ve used you, Red, a little bit ago. She had another one of those blasted panic attacks. She seems a bit calmer when you’re around. I finally got her calmed down but that took some doing. She keeps going on about ‘Lauren’, but won’t say anything else.”

Willow sat down in a chair looking troubled, “Yeah she brought her up a couple of times already. I’m really wondering if we should be looking for a body.”

Spike rubbed the back of his neck, “Probably a good bet. What do you birds have going tonight?”

Willow perked up, “I was going to ask Buffy if she would help me collect the stones I need for the protection spell around the property while it’s still light out and then I thought we could get Xan to help us engrave them with runes tomorrow night. Maybe we could watch a movie!”

“I’m a fan of this idea. Big old fashioned Scooby-gang fun. Stones instead of stakes.”

“That’s what I thought! I have two dremel tools for you guys to use. I figure I’ll draw out the runes, you two carve them and then pass them back to me to charm them.”

“Bloody hell, don’t hold back on the excitement,” Spike groused. “That covers tomorrow, what about tonight?”

“Girls are on patrol, I’m taking a night off with my favorite people.”

“Sounds exciting.”

“Oh and you have big plans?”

“I’m still one of your favorite people aint I? I got some plans for tomorrow after we get Rubes settled in at the house and figured I’d go run some errands and get the bike after. Reckon it’s been sitting at Steve’s since we came back from Edinburgh, ‘bout time I got it back.”

“Oh yeah like that’s super exciting.”

“Smart ass,” he pulled her closer as he tickled her mercilessly, “Bit more adventurous than carving rocks!” He growled out playfully. Buffy laughed and squirmed as he continued to tickle her. He didn’t stop until she was laying on top of him panting for breath. He gazed into her sparkling eyes and dug one hand into her hair. He swallowed her final laugh when he cut her off with a long lingering kiss.

Willow cleared her throat, “You two do have a room last I checked.”

Spike hummed in mild protest as Buffy broke the kiss, then sighed, “Red’s right, Pet. I’d originally thought about going on patrol or playing cards or something tonight but I could do with a night in. Especially if you lot are doing the arts and crafts part of witchcraft tomorrow.”

“I have all four Level 4 girls out on patrol tonight, it would be a serious waste of your time.”

“Home it is then,” he grinned up at her wickedly, “might not be such a dull night after all.”

“You’re bad,” Buffy giggled.

“Don’t you forget it, Love.” He pulled her in for another kiss.

“Seriously, you guys literally have a room here. Upstairs, in fact.”

“That we do, you don’t have to collect your rocks right this minute do you?” He asked as he trailed a finger from behind Buffy’s ear and down to her cleavage letting his searing blue gaze linger.

Buffy stood up pulling Spike with her, “Humm, Willow—“

“I’ll keep tabs on Ruby. Just don’t be too long, I really do need to get those stones gathered, the carving might take a while.”

“You heard the little witch, time is of the essence,” Spike backed away out of the room grinning at Buffy as he did.

Buffy couldn’t help the smile on her face, “He’s— eh— I’m just going to—“

“Go on, get out of here.”

Spike was waiting for her by the elevator when she caught up to him. He gave her a hard, dangerous look and grabbed her roughly by the shoulders to kiss her. Buffy’s mind snapped to attention and she shoved him into the elevator, pinning him against the wall. Spike let out a low growl at the impact and moved a splayed hand across the small of her back, holding her to him.

“You gonna give it to me rough then?” He grinned, “Might not get you back to your mates in a timely manner if we take that route.”

“We can do quick and rough.”

“Deal,” he murmured as he nipped hard at her neck with blunt teeth and shoved her against the wall of the elevator fumbling for the controls.

Spike managed to get the elevator moving and a moment later they had reached their floor. They paused long enough to exit the small space and then they were once again locked together kissing, groping, and shoving each other roughly against the walls in the hallway like a sexually fuelled pinball game.

Buffy pinned Spike against their bedroom door until she found the doorknob. The door gave way suddenly and the two of them fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs. They rolled together and Buffy positioned herself to shut the door with a kick. Spike gripped her skirt while Buffy yanked at his belt buckle.

“Oh God Buffy, I love you,” Spike groaned into the junction of her neck.

“You’re mine, all mine,” Buffy murmured possessively in his ear. Spike was usually the one to play that card. For some reason, she suddenly felt the need to say it. To claim him roughly. “Mine,” she bit his neck with her blunt teeth, eliciting a gasp from him.

“Always,” he growled, pulling her into a rough kiss. Her words and the bite had kindled a fire in him; he ran a hand roughly up her skirt. Buffy fumbled with his pants a little before she was able to release his smooth hard length from them. She stroked him from base to tip running her thumb over the tip feeling the delicious moisture there.

He moaned into her mouth as she stroked him greedily, “Slow down, Pet. Said quick, not instant. Want to get to the main event.” He twitched his fingers gripping her inner thigh. He pulled at the little panties, ripping them off of her and rubbed a thumb over her wet heat. Buffy gasped as he stroked her.

She was already wet and she let out a little growl of her own at the unnecessary foreplay, “Now. I want you now.” She repositioned herself forcefully, gliding down over him. She clamped around him as he rolled his hips driving himself into her. She gasped again as he pushed in fully and she met his thrusts with equally rough enthusiasm. Spike gasped.

Buffy grinned, gripping her fingers into his now semi-freed curls and pulled roughly. She brought him to her for a deep bruising kiss. Tongues pushing for dominance. Spike bit her lip making her shudder and she yanked his head back forcefully.

Spike grinned at the pain, “Getting close are you?”

Buffy increased her pace and he pushed into her harder with a grunt. Her inner walls crushed against him as the pressure built up. With the hand still tangled in his hair she cradled him to her shoulder, “Bite me,” she gasped. The fingers of her other hand reached under his shirt clawing at his back leaving deep scratches in his pale flesh.

Spike didn’t hesitate. Pulling at her shirt roughly, he bit with blunt teeth into the space between her shoulder and neck.

“Spike! Harder!’

He vamped, sinking his fangs in slightly. He wasn't feeding and it wasn’t a deep bite. Buffy gasped and felt herself nearing release. She wrapped her leg around him pulling him into her with almost bone crushing force. He increased the pressure of the bite very slightly and retracted his fangs. Then ran his tongue along the bite shuddering pleasurably at the taste of her. The effect of her blood was instant. He felt his body respond as he continued drilling into her hard, making her scream, “Gahhh! William!”

Buffy’s head swam as she lost herself in the myriad of sensations coursing through her.

He pushed into her pounding hard and fast, the pressure building. He held on until he felt her start to quiver. She gave his hair a yank as they came together hard in a quivering mass of tangled limbs. Pleasure and pain. Fast and rough and worth every second. Buffy kissed him as she continued to grind her hips against him.

After a moment, Spike placed a firm hand on her lower back holding her in place against him, as she caught her breath.

“Think we made good time?”, he teased.

Buffy laughed into the crook of his neck, “No idea. It was definitely fun though.”

“Been a little while since we got a bit rough.”

“Still fun.”

“Girl’s got a vamp kink.”

“Matches your Slayer kink.”

“Bloody well right, could go for a bit more of that if you’re willing,” he said, pulling her into another hard kiss.

“Not now. You’re being punished.”

“What for? Not the bite, surely. I barely had a taste and you literally asked for it.”

“Did you really have to rip my undies? I liked those ones.”

Spike rolled his eyes and flopped over onto his back, “Bloody hell, I’ll get you a sodding new pair, Slayer.”

Buffy grinned widely, she really loved to mess with him.

***********

By the time Buffy and Spike went back downstairs, Willow had already found a couple of buckets they could use to carry stones in. She held them up to her gleefully as Buffy and Spike came back into the living room “Ready? I found one for each of us, we can pretend it’s an Easter Egg Hunt!”

Buffy couldn’t help but laugh, “Oh Will, I missed you. Yes, rock my world with your witchy egg hunt.”

Spike turned to her quizzically, “Buffy, sweetheart, I think your pun mixer is broken.”

“Nah, that was solid.”

“You’re better than this.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure I can dig up some rockin' puns before we finish this project.”

“Oh god, here we go.”

“You love my puns.”

“Just so long as you're not putting marzipan in my pie plate we’re good.”

“To that I say a big ‘Huhh?’”

Willow rolled her eyes, “Don’t worry about it, Buff, it was a Buffy-Bot thing that you totally missed with the whole being dead.”

“Oh come on, the rock thing wasn’t bad, in fact, I think I rock the rock puns.”

“I’ll let you rock me with any rock pun you want to throw at me.”

“Didn’t we just do that, my hot lava?”

Spike grinned, “Oh yeah, got our rocks off, real good.”

“You know I’m going to win a pun-off right?”

He chuckled, “We keep it up and we’re going to end up back upstairs.”

Buffy placed her hands on his hips, pulling him closer, “Are you still taking requests?”

“I’ll be your short-order cook, hot and ready or cool and slow, whatever tickles your fancy, Pet.”

Buffy felt herself melting into him for a kiss before she could stop herself.

“Okay! As fun as this is, I think maybe Buffy and I should get a move on. These stones won’t collect themselves.” Willow said as she wiggled the buckets at them.

Spike rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah right, I’m gonna yeah— check in on Ruby. She’s still in rough shape. Sort of glad they don’t have things ready for her over there, kinda want to keep an eye on her.”

“That won’t take long though, what are you going to do until tonight?”

“Might poke around the library a bit.”

“I’m surprised you haven't read every poetry book in there yet.”

“Yeah well, it’s been nice having a proper in-house library. I never realized how much I missed it until we got here.”

“You know, you can start collecting books and build your own library in our new place. The attic already has a ton of shelves, it’s probably what they used it for anyway or maybe you could have it in your Spike-space.”

“Could work, we’ll talk later. Mustn't dottle, Pet,” he kissed her once more before heading towards the utility room.

************************

The two friends had been collecting smaller stones from along the border of the property and the low stone wall surrounding it for over thirty minutes. They had been chatting idoly when Willow suddenly cleared her throat uncomfortably.

“Buffy I have a confession to make.”

Buffy felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle, she had expected something was still off between them. She turned towards her friend, “I’m listening.”

Willow straightened up after picking up another stone, “I’ve been going through those files Wes sent.”

“Yeah the stuff on Angel right?”

“Well, yeah. There’s a bunch of that but that’s not what I’ve been working on.”

“It’s not?”

“Wes also sent me what looks like pretty much everything W&H had on Slayers… there’s a lot and it’s not all translated so it’s been really slow. I’ve had Andrew and Dawn working on pieces but neither of them have a full picture of any of it.”

“Does Giles know?”

“He knows Wes sent some stuff but I didn’t tell him exactly how much. A lot of it is stuff Giles already has, but there’s some new stuff too. I found a couple things that are a little— disturbing,” Willow said as she picked up a few more stones along the way.

“Disturbing? Like how disturbing? What do you know, Will?”

“Well that is sort of the problem. I haven’t been able to get through all of it and then Xander just brought back a bunch of books and scrolls and a stone tablet he found in Africa so now there’s that much more to go through. He was supposed to be showing those to Giles today. A few of them are referenced in the files from W&H. It might still take a while to figure out. I’m hoping I can start playing connect the dots soon.”

“Okay— I’m hearing a lot of words but I’m not hearing why all the squirrely. What dots are you connecting?”

“Remember a while back when we were talking about the fact that there hasn’t been a record of any Slayer making it past the age of 25; like there’s some crazy expiration date?”

Yeah, Niki Wood is the oldest I ever heard about and she didn’t reach her 26th birthday.”

“Yeah well I started translating some of the new stuff, I brought it with me to have Giles take a look at it too— If I found what I think I found— This one part I was reading has been seriously bugging me. It mentions the Slayer receiving her gift by the end of her 25th year. I took another look at it after talking to Spike and it looks like another part translates to ‘Death Wish’.”

“You told Spike?”

“Oh goddess no! It was just something he said; it sparked an idea in my head and I went to check on it this morning. That's when I put together the Death-wish thing.”

“Death is my gift right? But I already sort of returned that gift… or well—“

“I returned it for you— yeah…” Willow sighed and leaned against the stone wall. “That’s the thing I’m so worried about... I haven’t finished the translation but, I think I might have accidentally— made you sort of immortal—ish— maybe.”

“Huhh?”

“The stone tablet Xan brought back, it’s one that W&H didn’t have, anyway it seems to contain part of the original working from creating the first slayer. It’s written more like a story so it’s difficult to figure out but... I don’t know. I don’t have anything solid on it yet but I just— I had to come clean and let you know. I don’t know if what I did made things better or worse for you and I won’t know until I finish going through all this stuff. It’s been kind of an obsession.”

“Is this why things are strained between you and Kennedy?”

“The obsession part maybe. I haven’t told her any of the rest of it. I’ve been too afraid too say anything, and… we really haven’t been talking much for a while now. It’s part of the reason why I’m hoping Kennedy is gone before I get back.” Willow hesitated and Buffy was sure there was something else she wasn’t saying.

“I just need to be able to focus on this because this could really be big and I just I can’t right now, Buffy! I can’t deal with Kennedy. I can’t deal with thinking about you dying again or maybe not being able to die at all because I brought you back from the dead and maybe that whole thing doesn’t apply to you anymore and maybe it doesn’t apply to any Slayer anymore because I used you as the basis of the sharing spell instead of Faith. I have no idea, I just don’t know—“ she sniffed.

Buffy’s mind was reeling. She blinked several times as she stared at her, anger suddenly flared, “Willow! I just sent a girl home to her mother in a box! She definitely wasn’t immortal!”

“She was also 15, not 25, or more specifically 26. I have to do more research and make sure the math is right but I’m pretty sure that if you make it to 26 you probably aren’t going to age anymore— maybe none of you will IF they can stay alive that long. You might still be able to die but it would have to be something seriously extreme.”

“Like a beheading? So what, I’m like the freaking Highlander now? Buffy McLeod?”

“Probably, or something similar, I think— I don’t know yet I really have to do more research.”

Buffy looked at her friend aghast, blinking several times, “Why are you telling me now, if you’re not sure?”

“Because it’s ripping me up inside. The not telling. I feel like I’m lying to my best friend about something I did. A big something that could affect your entire- possibly very, very long life,” she was almost in tears. Willow took a deep breath.

“But we don’t know for sure,” Buffy paused for a moment, “and I can think of one plus.”

Willow looked at her knowingly, “Yeah I guess it would be sort of perfect for you and Spike.”

It was a lot to take in, “But why 25?”

“As far as I can tell, I think it has something to do with ‘the end of maidenhood’,” Willow scoffed as she rolled her eyes dramatically.

“Sick bastards. Like it’s not enough to take a girl and turn her into the Slayer but then they have to shorten her already short life with a death wish AND an expiration date?”

“I’m not really sure yet but that’s exactly what it looks like. It seems like it was worked right into the original spell. Probably for that reason.”

Buffy nodded, “Sure, young and pretty girls are better bait for the trap,” she snorted derisively, “Well, we still have some time before I get there and if you’re right I could still die before that. Yay me!”

“That’s just it— the other girls can, that's for sure— but I think you might be different.”

“Because you brought me back.”

She nodded, “That wound you got in the Hellmouth should have been fatal, but you got back up and not only continued to fight, but you also made a pretty daring escape, Buff.”

“But recently I had some broken ribs and I swear it took a couple of days longer to heal than usual.”

Willow chewed on her lip, “I’ve suspected since the Hellmouth that your pain tolerance has also elevated. It was always pretty high but now— I don’t know if you are really feeling the extent of your injuries. You might have had more damage than you thought, maybe even a punctured lung and you might not have noticed. Without X-rays I doubt we’ll ever know to be sure.”

Buffy thought about that as they kept walking along. It made a kind of sense really. “You know, I kinda think Spike probably would have been able to tell me if my lung was punctured… he’s no doctor but he knows anatomy pretty well and he has pretty good hearing. Might have just been broken worse than we thought. The bruising was pretty ugly, I don’t normally bruise like that. That vamp pretty much crushed my rib cage on one side.” She paused thinking about the head injury she got at the hospital and suddenly wondered just how hard she had hit her head.

“Good point.”

They had nearly finished their circuit around the property before Willow spoke up again, “So when were you going to tell me about you and Spike’s new place and when are you guys planning on moving?”

“I, oh yeah— it won’t be for a while, it needs some work and we wanted to talk to Dawn about it first. I can show you after we’re done here, it’s on the other side of the castle where we’re going to be keeping Ruby.”

“Yeah, we’re almost done here anyway. If you’re going to bring it up to Dawn, you should probably do it now. I don’t know if she’s gonna be able to transfer to Edinburgh for the fall semester.”

“Oh it’s not going to be ready that fast. Maybe by the spring semester if we’re lucky but that sort of brings me to my next point. I hoped you might want to take the other half of the duplex.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. This was all stuff that I wanted to talk to you guys in person about…”

“I— yeah that’s sort of why I put off telling you about this stuff too.”

“Seems like we’re both guilty of that then.”

“Ehh yeah, seems like. Are you going to tell Spike about this?”

Buffy had to think about that, “Of course. Eventually. I don’t want to get his hopes up too much… Just in case.”

Willow chewed on her lip, “I’ll keep at the books and go over the spells, do some calculations and see what I turn up.”

“Thanks Wil.”

“What’s your personal Witch on retainer for anyway?”

***********

The next night after the sun had gone down Willow helped Buffy and Spike gather up the blankets and pillows Ruby had been using and helped them get Ruby settled into the basement of the duplex. Buffy was a little surprised by how different the basement room looked now. She had just expected Xander and Callum to set up a cot and a mini fridge in a corner and call it done.

The guys, and Buffy suspected Faith too, had gone above and beyond. In addition to the cot and a mini fridge, they had also found some secondhand furniture for the space. A little bedside table, two comfortable but shabby reclining chairs and a small dresser, as well as a couple of mismatched end tables, an old television set and a couple of mismatched lamps. On the nightstand was a hot pink lava lamp and a large stack of old magazines. A small crate of dog eared paperbacks sat next to the bed. The overall effect was one of dank comfort.

“Not bad,” Spike smiled, “nice homey spot down here.”

“I sort of asked Xan to make it as cozy as possible but I didn’t think they would do all this.”

Willow deposited Ruby onto the cot. Ruby looked around the space with wide eyes. Then watched as Willow went over to the little bathroom, “Looks like someone cleaned this up too. There’s even a few towels and shampoo and stuff in here. A nice shower might be a good idea. Maybe you’ll feel a little better.”

Ruby scoffed, “Right, because a shower is going to wash away my sins. Soapy bubbles gonna clean up what I did?”

“Ain’t nothing going to do that. You can apologize to your family, there might still be hope there. Donning a white hat can soften the edges a bit but you’re gonna carry that weight a long time, Rubes. In the meantime, some scrubbing bubbles’ll do you wonders. Looks like you even got laundry capabilities set up.”

Willow quietly moved over to the washer and dryer in the laundry room to investigate the set-up.

“But you’re not alone, you have us now,” Buffy interjected as she wrapped an arm around Spike, “and you have a place to stay. You can fix it up however you want.” She left Spike’s side and opened the dresser drawers, there was a couple of old t-shirts and a few pairs of sleep pants but that was it. She pulled out a set, they were clean and would be comfortable to sleep in but not much else. “You’ll need some clothes—“

Willow stuck her head out of the laundry room, “Looks like the handy-guys were busy in here too. The washer has an out of order sign taped to it but there’s a sink and some laundry soap in here. There is a note on the dryer, looks like it’s from Xander— use at your own risk— Humm ok, so at least there’s a sink and some laundry detergent,” she crumpled up the note from Xander.

“We can always go over to your dorm or your parents house and get some stuff for you or I can go,” Buffy added.

Ruby swallowed and nodded once, “What would you tell them?”

“What do you want me to tell them? I can tell them anything you want as long as it’s at least close to the truth but I really think they would rather see you.”

“You do?”

Spike narrowed his eyes at Ruby, “Course they would. Although I don’t recommend going here right off, it might do you some good to see them. We will go with you, explain the soul thing and all,” Spike added.

“We don’t have to do it tonight do we?”

Willow spoke up, “Not tonight. We’ll call your parents first. You have time, we’ll do it when you’re ready.”

“How are they?”

Buffy answered, “They’ve been better. They have one daughter in a coma because their other, undead-daughter put her there, so yeah, they’ve been better,” Buffy watched her. To the best of her knowledge, this was the first time Ruby had asked about her parents at all since she had been with them. “We can even go see Sheena if you want.”

She nodded, “I think I’d like that.”

“Maybe tomorrow night then. I’ll see what I can do about clothes. You get settled in.”

“Ta,” she cleared her throat, “Ahh, thanks for everything. I think a shower sounds pretty amazing right now.”

“There should be blood in the fridge there,” Spike went over to double check, opening the little fridge door and glancing up at Ruby, “Looks like they got you a nice little variety and a little microwave. That’s right nice of them. Looks like you’ve got just about everything you need here.”

Buffy nodded in agreement, “Why don’t you do your thing, take a shower put on some comfy clothes, settle in with some reading material or watch some TV or something just try to wrap your head around stuff.”

Ruby nodded again, still looking a bit blank but maybe a little bit more hopeful then she had a few minutes ago, “No you’re right, moping isn’t really doing me much good now is it?”

“We’ll check in on you later.”

And with that the three of them went back upstairs into the kitchen. “I’m feeling oddly good about this,” Buffy smiled.

“She’s not out of the woods yet but it’s a start,” Spike said a little distractedly as he watched Willow. She was wandering around the kitchen checking the cabinets and the countertops. “Alright there, Red?”

“I was just thinking about how I want to refinish the kitchen. I have a decent amount saved up, I was thinking about getting a house eventually, but I think this would be even better.”

Buffy squealed and pulled Willow into a hug, “Do you really mean it? You said you’d think about it but—“

“Rome is nice but I really like the idea of living close to the action. I sort of already have a job here. I won’t have to do the long distance teaching thing anymore and I’ll also be closer to the Devon Coven which is definitely a plus.”

“Yay-ness!”

Willow grinned, “Xander needs a place too, I bet he’d take the second room.”

“We’ll ask him tonight,” Buffy smiled brightly. For over a year the Scoobies had been spread across multiple countries and now it seemed like things were finally starting to come together. A little hole in Buffy’s chest that she hadn’t really noticed before suddenly closed up a little.

Her smile lit up the room. Spike couldn’t help but smile back. He loved seeing her smile. He cleared his throat, rubbing the back of his neck and fiddling with his overgrown hair, “Good to know your neighbors I guess. Anyway, I’d better be off, Pet.”

“Us too.”

They made their way out into the entryway, Spike gave Buffy a chased kiss, opened the door to the other side of the duplex and stopped. “Humm, Buffy? Sweetheart?”

She turned back to him, “Yeah?”

He pressed his hand against the invisible barrier now blocking him, “Looks like our little experiment finally paid off. Think I’m going to need an invite into our place, Pet.”

Buffy bound over to the door going inside, “Welcome home! Come on in!” She grinned.

Spike hesitated, “You know what this means right? You’re ready for this?”

“Get your ass in here, William!”

He crossed into the threshold and let Buffy pull him into a long kiss, “Hoped you’d say that,” he grinned.

#fanfic #buffy the vampire slayer #buffy fanfic #buffy x spike #spuffy #bound #spike x buffy

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actuallylorelaigilmore · 2 years

Text

one girl in all the world: chapter 1

Willow x Angel, BTVS. Also on AO3. Prologue here. Bonus graphic here.

A reimagining of Buffy the Vampire Slayer from the very beginning, in which Angel was sent to Sunnydale to help the wrong girl, and fell in love with the right girl anyway. Very belatedly for @actuallylukedanes in honor of their birthday. 💗

“Sorry I mistook you for my mom,” Willow added as an afterthought. “It wasn’t because you’re…like my mom. I was just confused.”

He grinned. “I figured.”

“My mom and I aren’t all that close,” she babbled before she could stop herself. “But when I was little, she was the one who would come in and hug me really tight when I woke up from a nightmare, and it always felt…safe.”

Willow shook her head. “I know how that probably sounds. Like I said, with the gas and everything, I got confused. But when I woke up, I knew I was safe, somehow."

She looked over at the table where Buffy was laughing at something Xander said. “I don’t know why you’re helping Buffy–why you’re helping us, even, because of Buffy. But without you, we’d probably all be dead by now.”

Some things were simply facts; elements of reality that Willow accepted the way she accepted gravity and oxygen. She didn’t have to enjoy them to live with them–but like basic physics, she knew there was no point in trying to fight them, either.

That was her life before the day that Buffy Summers came to town and changed everything: good friends in Xander and Jesse, good GPA in high school…and a place at the very bottom of the social hierarchy.

She had her theories about why Cordelia felt the need to pick on her so much. Basic psychology– in her head, that sounded a lot like her mother giving a lecture –would blame deep-rooted insecurity that the Queen Bee covered up by constantly putting everyone else down. And as someone who kept to herself, Willow was an easy target.

She knew she was smarter than the popular girls, and probably better adjusted. She didn’t feel the need to bully people, or try to be somebody she wasn’t. She was happy enough in her life. So Willow tried not to let it get to her.

But shrugging it off didn’t change the reality of being a teenager at Sunnydale High, one who had stumbled onto Cordelia Chase’s hate list long ago, and lived there now. Nothing changed that, any more than she could decide to resist gravity.

It made Buffy’s arrival a truly unprecedented event. She not only brought fresh life to their little town, breaking Willow’s understanding of what reality even meant; she also chose Willow and Xander to be her friends, in open defiance of the way things were supposed to be.

Suddenly, life was different. Willow had more to worry about than people staring at her in her nightmares. She had to reconsider every scary story and fairy tale she’d read, every monster movie she’d seen. And she had to decide what it meant, to live in a world that was more dangerous than she’d known.

But at the top of the list of what had changed, there was also just Buffy. Her first friend who was a girl, who she could talk to about crushes and parents in a way that Xander would never understand. Willow was maturing, as her parents liked to say with coded glances and distant tones. It was a lonely place to be sometimes.

Living in the after of Buffy’s arrival, it was a little less lonely. Willow figured that was a decent trade for the upgrade in her nightmares.

Especially since, if she had never learned that Sunnydale had extra layers to its reality, a different kind of physics, those things would still be real. She’d just be blind to them. Less safe from the monsters.

Willow might not be able to do much to fight the evil of mean girls in her everyday life, but Buffy had shown her that some dangers could be defeated. She planned to make use of that lesson.

****

Willow couldn’t have explained to anyone why she felt drawn to the books on magick that she found in the library. At first, she wondered what they were even doing there, old intimidating volumes in a high school library. And then when she started reading them, she found them really interesting.

It didn’t seem unusual to her, or like something she should worry about. She found a lot of things interesting. She enjoyed learning.

But she was still grateful that no one caught her slip when she was teasing Xander about them. Nobody asked how she knew the books had semi-nude engravings, how she knew anything about them at all. The group was too busy, or distracted.

And of course, she was lucky her name wasn’t listed right above Xander’s. She hadn’t felt the need to be sneaky, exactly…but she had a habit of browsing in the library in her free time. She’d never considered checking out the magick books and taking them home, because she hadn’t been studying them any more seriously than the books about French history she read, or photography.

But before she was knocked unconscious, it occurred to Willow how silly she felt, tossing questions at Amy’s mom to get her attention. She didn’t know much about the woman’s black arts, not nearly enough to successfully distract her. She did have questions, though--less silly ones, unrelated to broomsticks or black cats.

Willow wanted to know what it was like when people used witchcraft for good. What did that kind of magick look like? And could it protect them from people like Catherine? Or worse?

There was no harm in doing some more research, she decided. Research only helped. Giles had lots of books she hadn’t even opened yet. And living on a Hellmouth, clearly they needed as much help as they could get.

****

There was something about him, Willow thought, the first time she saw Angel in the Bronze. He wasn’t funny like Xander, didn’t carry that warm familiarity that made Xander feel like home.

Even from across the room she could tell that Angel was nothing like that; even if Buffy had never described him to her she would have known he was the enigmatic guy who had caught her friend’s attention.

There was a coolness about him, a stillness. A calm. As if the world moved around him and he stayed a little bit apart from it.

It reminded her of that thing people said, about having an old soul. He looked so serious, even more than the age difference would explain.

Buffy had talked about how cryptic she found him, how impossible he was to pin down, but that made sense once Willow could actually see him: he was right there among the rest of the crowd and still, somehow, he didn’t fit.

So she knew Angel was Buffy’s new crush the moment she saw him. She also knew he was even cuter than Buffy had said, like some romantic hero from literature brought to modern life. To Willow’s life, to her sleepy little town that used to be so boring.

Vampires and all, she wouldn’t want to go back to the way things used to be. But Willow couldn’t separate the two things–Buffy was why she knew about the vampires. And Buffy was the only reason she knew Angel.

So it didn’t matter if she found Angel cute, in a brooding sort of way. Her friend was into him. That was all that mattered.

****

Willow could tell that Giles wasn’t used to his supernatural knowledge, his ties to the Slayer, being known to outsiders. When she asked him where the term Watcher came from, since he behaved more like a coach or a guide, he sputtered.

It happened when she asked him other questions too, about witchcraft or the origins of evil or why Sunnydale sat on a Hellmouth but the next town over didn’t.

He was much less hesitant when they were facing a battle–when it was Buffy he was delivering information to, or they were all working together to fight her battles. That led Willow to guess that it was about Buffy’s unconventional allies. He clearly wasn’t prepared for this…for them. For a Slayer who simply wanted to be a girl.

But since Willow wasn’t prepared for nightmares to come true and for monster-fighting to become her new extracurricular activity, she didn’t feel too badly for him. She just wondered why he was called a Watcher if that was not really what he did.

She could argue, Willow thought, that she was much more of a watcher than Giles. In the truest sense.

She’d always lived her life on the outside, observing, taking things in. As great as it was to have Xander in her life, that didn’t give her a warm and involved family. It didn’t make her part of the social scene in Sunnydale, one of the popular girls. She was still invisible in a lot of ways.

And being invisible wasn’t always bad. She would rather be ignored by jerks like Cordelia than picked on. It gave her a different perspective–the freedom to see more and understand more than she could if she were noticed.

Like the way Angel and Buffy circled each other; she watched that and saw what was coming. Maybe even before they did. Definitely despite Buffy’s words to the contrary.

Her friend was head over heels and she barely knew the guy. Angel was much harder to read, but he never seemed to be anywhere except where the Slayer was.

Willow thought it was romantic, swoony like a classic film you’d see in black and white. She worried a little bit too–but she couldn’t tell anyone about that part because she couldn’t explain it. All she wanted was for Buffy to be happy, and if Angel was the guy, who was she to argue with that?

Who was she to be judging anybody’s relationships, Willow added to her self-directed scolding. The only person she’d ever wanted to date was Xander and even he was mooning over Buffy now.

Instead, she kept watching. She kept her worries to herself. And by the time things started to get complicated, it was too late for her to do anything about it.

****

When Willow and Xander arrived to interrupt Buffy’s date with Owen–which was already being interrupted by Angel–they were in too much of a hurry for introductions. And Buffy didn’t bother, probably because she was trying to get them to go away and leave her and Owen alone.

Which meant that technically, Willow and Angel were never really introduced. After that night, they would acknowledge each other in a work-acquaintance sort of way whenever the chaos of the Hellmouth brought Angel to them…but Willow found it kind of funny that they’d skipped past ever saying hello.

She assumed it just hadn’t occurred to Buffy, given who Angel was. He was this dashing, mysterious figure in the Slayer’s new life–almost like some kind of superhero–who appeared whenever he might be needed, then faded into the shadows. As if he only existed because of Buffy.

So of course she didn’t think to introduce them all. It wasn’t like Angel was a part of the group.

Willow didn’t know him well enough to know if Angel minded that, but she had to wonder if the distance came from him or from Buffy’s efforts to have a normal life. Owen was a prime example of that: cute boy, their age, not a mystery to be solved.

It was clear that Angel wasn’t thrilled to see Buffy dating, but that didn’t change the way he hovered and held back. He didn’t make small talk, he didn’t try to bond with Buffy’s people. He didn’t do the things a person was supposed to do when they liked somebody.

Angel left Willow wondering. Because she might not understand Buffy’s mystery guy, but she knew one thing for certain: staying on the outside, being so disconnected…it had to be terribly lonely. Why would anybody choose that if they didn’t have to?

****

It shouldn’t have taken hyena possession, Willow thought, but she knew now that she had to let go of her crush on Xander.

Not having her feelings returned she could live with. She didn’t need Xander to be in love with her.

And even the bullying, the way he behaved as part of a cruel pack, she could forgive. She knew who Xander was, how his father treated him and what he tried to rise above. The potential for mean was there, and the possession tapped into it.

But what he did to Buffy…what he tried to do…Willow felt guilty about that. Because part of her was relieved it hadn’t happened to her, which was too much like being glad it happened to Buffy. And she wasn’t! She was horrified.

She would have sworn to anybody who asked, before the hyena possession, that Xander would never do anything like that. That he wasn’t even capable of it. Under any circumstances.

Knowing what was lurking inside him, somewhere deep down–what had to be inside him to make that possible–changed how Willow saw her oldest friend. And it made her a little scared of what he could’ve been like if she was the object of his obsession, rather than Buffy.

Spending this year together as a new friend group, Willow had been quietly jealous of Buffy. A little bit.

Buffy was strong and could defeat the evil that lurked in their little town. She was pretty and knew how to flirt and get boys’ attention. She had not only Angel but also Xander pining after her, while Willow was off to the side, watching it all happen.

She’d longed for Xander to see her the way he saw Buffy, to want her even a fraction of how much she wanted him.

And now, Willow had seen where that kind of longing could lead. She never wanted Xander to think of her that way, after all.

She wished she had the ability to go back in time and keep Buffy safe from his attention, too.

****

After the truth came out, Willow wasn’t sure what to make of Buffy’s crush on a vampire. Of course, if anyone could handle herself in that kind of situation, it would be Willow’s new Slayer BFF. She’d never met anyone like Buffy–not that she’d met many people so far.

But, still. Willow remembered the boy she’d tried flirting with at the Bronze, who turned out not to be a boy at all but a vampire who wanted to sacrifice her to the Master. She’d been so pleased with herself, so caught up in how well her efforts had worked out, she hadn’t been even a little bit aware of the threat.

The irony that she was following Buffy’s advice that night had not been lost on Willow, but she also knew–even more after she almost got eaten–that she and Buffy were very different people, when it came to boys and dating.

For example, Buffy had definitely dated boys already. Whereas Willow had not. Other than her childhood relationship with Xander, anyway, and she knew that didn’t really count.

But knowing that Buffy probably had a lot of dating experience didn’t make it any less strange to see her mooning over a vampire. A dark and dreamy vampire who didn’t seem like he wanted to eat Buffy, Willow reminded herself. Angel was different.

She hoped that Angel was different. For Buffy’s sake.

Because if the Slayer fell for a vampire, and he just wanted to eat her, that would make her, like, the worst Slayer ever, wouldn’t it? And Willow believed in Buffy. She had skills. She was a badass. She could flirt and cheerlead and kill monsters, without missing a beat.

Since surviving her near-death and her very first rescue from Buffy, though, Willow couldn’t help wondering how Buffy–who had fought and killed so many vampires, who had seen so many vampires attack and kill other people–could still be interested in Angel. Knowing what he was, didn’t that change things?

Willow had always been a curious person. It made school easy for her. And when she found a new interest, like computers, she could master it quickly.

While Buffy wrestled with her feelings, Willow wondered what made Angel different…unique among demons, but also something more than that. Appealing. Almost human.

What did it mean, that Angel’s existence broke the supernatural rules Willow was still getting used to?

She couldn’t discuss her thoughts with Xander; he was too jealous of Angel to be helpful. She wouldn’t pose her questions to Giles, who seemed uncomfortable around Angel even before he discovered the history. And she definitely wasn’t going to ask Buffy anything she selfishly wanted to know.

Luckily, Willow always had the option of trying to learn more on her own. She could try to satisfy her curiosity towards the vampire that her best friend was falling for–even if her curiosity had to stay a secret.

****

While he sought to avoid Buffy, Angel admitted to Giles that being around Buffy was too hard for him. The Watcher misunderstood his fear of losing control for a kind of romance.

“A vampire in love with a Slayer,” Giles commented, continuing on for a moment, before switching subjects. Angel didn’t respond to the commentary on his feelings, largely because he didn’t know what to say.

Is that what this is? He wondered. This feeling of being pulled despite reason, toward someone you should know better than to want?

He was soulless during his life with Darla, so he couldn’t say he had loved her. He had tried to make her happy even after regaining his soul, but Angel blamed that on not knowing much else after more than a hundred years together. He'd wanted their old life back, to escape the pain.

And before Darla, he was soulless in another way–he bedded many women, but certainly never loved them.

So maybe that explained why being around Buffy was so hard. He didn’t know how to handle being in love, because he wasn’t used to it.

But at the same time, Angel couldn’t say for sure that his feelings for Buffy were the same as what she felt for him…what her Watcher assumed he was feeling.

How would he know the difference?

Really, after spending so long living for his passions–selfish, cruel, and solitary in turn–what did he know about love at all?

****

There was something about her, Angel thought, after he half-dragged, half-carried Willow out of the gas-filled room. He knew Giles had grabbed Xander and was right behind them, but to be honest it hadn’t occurred to him to worry about Xander’s safety–he’d gone straight for Willow, whose lack of consciousness he sensed before he even entered the room.

She smelled sweet, like fruit, not as though she were wearing perfume but simply as a result of being human. A young woman, he reminded himself. Practically still a girl. Innocent.

Buffy was the same age, but already draped in the weight of her duty, her fate. And at the same time, there was a lightness to her that came of confidence–it was not a surprise to him that she’d led a life of cheerleading and dances at her old school.

Willow, though, she made herself small. He didn’t like thinking that part of the attraction there was a predator scenting prey, his natural instinct to seek out weakness, vulnerability. Especially since it had become clear to him quickly that Willow was anything but weak.

But the vulnerability that radiated out of her…it tugged at him. It reminded him of things he’d rather forget.

When Willow woke up from the gas fumes, she stayed pressed against him, leaving only when Xander did, and even then her hand lingered on his arm as she pulled away.

Angel could feel her heart, the way it was racing, but he couldn’t know if that was in response to him or the constant life-threatening events she was encountering in Sunnydale.

He wondered, though. A bit.

****

She’d expected Angel to be…well, cold, Willow thought, after he saved her in the high school. Vampires were dead, after all. Shouldn’t that mean they were lifeless, no blood flowing…chilly to the touch?

He wasn’t, though. He wasn’t warm, the way a living person would be, she knew now–but he wasn’t a corpse either. He was sort of room temperature.

She wondered if that had something to do with the blood he drank. Did he warm it up, and did that warm him? The science nerd in her had so many questions.

Questions he would probably find rude, she guessed. Not that she would have an opportunity to ask them. She and Angel didn’t exactly hang out. He just sort of appeared, and then vanished again whenever he was done helping them or seeing Buffy.

That made it nearly impossible for her to do what she needed to, but after several days of watching and waiting, Willow spotted Angel at the Bronze after school while Buffy and Xander were chatting next to her.

“Bathroom,” Willow said, a little too brightly. She left before either of them could ask any follow up questions–she didn’t expect them to notice her absence, but she knew it was more likely if they thought she was acting weird.

Willow was careful not to look at him as she skirted the edges of the dance floor, making her way to where Angel was standing in the shadow of a staircase. She had a hunch that if he knew she was coming to find him, he might leave before she managed it.

“Hi,” Willow said when she reached him.

Her smile was soft, like the rest of her, Angel thought. There was a seriousness to Willow that he appreciated, but it was her open sincerity that made him feel unusually protective.

It surprised him that Buffy–who was so vibrant, even prickly sometimes–had grown close to this wide-eyed girl despite their differences.

“Hello.” Angel shifted where he stood, and Willow wondered if his discomfort came from being spoken to in general, or if he was concerned that Buffy might notice them together.

“She thinks I’m in the bathroom,” she offered helpfully.

“Oh. Okay.”

“I needed to talk to you, and I didn’t know how to find you,” Willow explained. “So I’m glad you’re here. I…wouldn’t know where to look.”

“I wouldn’t want to be looked for,” Angel replied. The lines in his forehead made him the picture of a worrier. Willow wondered if he was; they would have that in common.

“Well. I wanted to say thank you.”

His brow stayed furrowed, and he stayed silent. Willow frowned. “For saving my life, in the high school? With Giles and Xander?”

“Right.” He continued to watch her, his gaze flicking back to Buffy for a second before refocusing.

“It was, um, really scary, and we wouldn’t have made it out of there, if you hadn’t found us. I don’t think. So thanks.”

“Don’t worry about it.” His words should have been casual, but he said everything with such a grave tone. Could vampires have depression? She wondered. Because if any of them were a candidate for that, Angel should be at the top of the list. He always seemed so somber.

Maybe that was just what happened when you lived for hundreds of years.

“What?” He asked her, and Willow realized she had been staring at him without speaking, the whole time she’d thought those things. She blushed and looked down at her shoes.

It could be worse, she reminded herself. She could have been thinking aloud.

“It’s the centuries,” Angel said, and she looked up, meeting his eyes.

Maybe she had been thinking aloud, she realized. Shoot.

“Makes me forget how to act around people,” Angel explained, and Willow relaxed. He hadn’t been reading her mind. He was apologizing.

“Oh, you’re okay,” she assured him. “You’re-you’re very person-seeming.”

One corner of his mouth lifted. “Thanks.”

“Well, I should probably get back,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Before anyone notices.”

“Sure.” There was amusement in his eyes now, she noticed, though you wouldn’t know it from the rest of his face.

“Sorry I mistook you for my mom,” Willow added as an afterthought. “It wasn’t because you’re…like my mom. I was just confused.”

He grinned. “I figured.”

Willow shook her head. “I know how that probably sounds. Like I said, with the gas and everything, I got confused. But when I woke up, I knew I was safe, somehow."

Willow looked back at him with no hint of a smile. Not even her usual sweetness. There was a strength instead, that he was surprised to see shine from underneath her words.

“Everything that’s happened since I met Buffy, the really scary stuff and the really nice stuff, I wouldn’t give it up to be safe and in the dark again. I’d rather know about the monsters. But if high school has taught me anything, it’s that sometimes the worst monsters are the ones who seem safe.”

She frowned again, looking up at him. “You feel safe. I trust that. But I’m not sure I should.”

Angel nodded. “I’m not sure you should either. But that’s good to know.”

She nodded back and turned away, disappearing into the crowded dance floor.

Angel watched until she reappeared at the table where Buffy was waiting, now alone. He followed Buffy’s pointing finger to where Xander was dancing by himself.

He didn’t know what either of them saw in that one; he suspected Xander was the most likely among them to end up dead before graduation. But he could see the fondness in Buffy’s smile from where he stood, and Willow watched the boy’s movements like a flower staring at the sun.

Angel couldn't decide what to make of Willow’s rambling speech, or her gratitude. He certainly didn’t deserve anyone’s thanks. Or their trust–most definitely not their trust.

Well, she was young, he reminded himself. Even before he was turned, he was much more worldly at Willow’s age. Spoiled, and an awful person, but experienced.

Thinking about who he used to be put him in a terrible mood. Scowling, Angel left the Bronze, letting the dark night envelope him and make him a shadow among shadows. He wasn’t sure what he’d been thinking, lurking in the Bronze, anyway.

****

Angel entered the Bronze the week after Prom, in what was becoming a habit. Willow saw him more often now around the edges of the club, not even meeting Buffy–just watching. She couldn’t tell if it was meant to be protective or romantic. Or if those were the same thing.

That night, though, he came to where Willow was sitting. She was alone, holding the table until Buffy and Xander took a break from the dance floor. Which would hopefully be soon, she thought, watching them laugh from a distance. She was thirsty and they’d promised to grab her a soda.

“Hey, Angel.” She smiled at him, then went back to watching her friends.

“Hey.”

He seemed relaxed, but it was unusual for him to join her without Buffy around. “Is there danger? Should we go get Buffy?”

“No. I mean, not that I know of.”

“Oh. Okay.”

She listened to the music for another minute, then turned to him. “They should be back soon.”

“I’m not in a hurry.”

“I guess you wouldn’t be, huh? Being immortal and all.”

“That, and I’m here to ask Buffy about her plans. Not exactly time-sensitive.”

“Like for a date!” Willow nodded encouragingly. Buffy had seemed a little off ever since she…well, died. It would be nice if she and Angel went back to normal–or as close to normal as possible for the Slayer and her vampire boyfriend.

“Actually, for patrolling. I want to get an idea of which cemeteries she’ll be slaying in, make sure I’m close by.”

“Oh.” That wouldn’t help Buffy’s mood at all, Willow thought. Didn’t guys understand that girls wanted to be wanted for more than their saving-the-world skills? Buffy in particular was wishing for non-Slayer fun lately.

Like dancing with Xander, who seemed to have bounced back from Buffy’s rejection sooner than Willow would’ve expected. Being the one who saved her life had probably helped, she decided as the music sped up and her friends stayed on the dance floor.

“I guess they might be a little longer,” she told Angel. “You could sit.”

He hesitated, but settled across from her. “Thanks.”

“Buffy’s not going to be patrolling,” Willow remembered suddenly. She didn’t look forward to being the bearer of bad news, but it was strange that he didn't already know.

“What do you mean?”

“She’s leaving tomorrow. Spending the summer with her dad. She didn’t tell you?”

He turned his gaze to Buffy, expressionless as he watched her dance. “No.”

“I’m sure she was going to,” Willow rushed to assure him.

“Yeah.” He added, after a moment, “I live near here. In case, while Buffy’s away, something happens and you need…help.”

“Okay. Thanks.” Near here was more than a little vague, Willow thought, but it was nice of him.

“I’ll write down my address and get it to you. When I can.”

“Cool.”

He was still watching Buffy, and his stare was starting to look a bit like a glower. “So you’ve seen, like, so many things,” Willow said in an overly-chipper attempt to change the subject.

She cringed a little when Angel looked her way. “I mean…I read about history, but you’ve lived it. You must have really good stories.”

Now Angel was the one who looked uncomfortable. “I guess that’s one way you could put it.”

“How would you put it?”

He was silent for so long that Willow worried he might decide to leave, rather than answer. “You don’t like to talk about yourself, huh.”

“Not much, no.”

“Why?”

“You ask a lot of questions,” he replied, without rancor.

Then he did answer, carefully. “Let’s just say that a person can make a lot of mistakes in 200 years. And I’m barely a person.”

“That must be hard. All those memories.”

He wasn’t expecting that level of understanding from someone her age, and it showed. “There are no words that can truly describe it.”

“I can still remember every one of the worst moments I’ve lived through,” Willow confessed. “Like I’m living them all over again. The fights I’ve had with Xander, the bullies that never seem satisfied. The Audio-Visual room full of dead kids that I knew, where I went all the time.”

She was the one who paused now, considering him carefully as that memory washed over her. Willow was struggling lately to make sense of a world that contained both that kind of vampire bloodbath, and Angel, who was so different.

“I know it’s not the same…but I understand feeling haunted,” she tried to explain. “Ashamed. And like something must be wrong with you, even if you don’t know why.”

He was watching her with that intense stare she still wasn’t used to. He didn’t speak.

Instead, the flash of knowing and being known passed between them silently when he nodded his agreement. It was crazy, with him being a vampire and all, but it felt like a meeting of souls.

And then Buffy came back with a soda in hand, Xander behind her, and the moment passed.

****

Angel heard her before she knocked, and opened the door carefully to gesture her in. Willow had arrived close to sunset, but not quite close enough. He had to stay behind the door while she entered.

“I need your help.”

Willow hadn’t come to his apartment before, though he’d seen her at the Bronze several times since he’d given her his address. She’d seemed touched by the gesture. He knew his motives were more selfish than kind.

If something happened to Buffy, he didn’t trust Xander to keep him informed–but Willow was much more sensible than the boy. And less territorial.

“Is something wrong?” Angel was already setting his book aside and standing, ready to follow her. “Is Buffy alright?”

Willow shook her head, holding both hands out to calm him quickly. “She’s fine. I heard from her yesterday. It’s not an emergency.”

“Okay…” Angel relaxed, but was now watching her with a bemused expression. It wasn’t an emergency and she had…showed up at his home?

“You’ve been around a long time.” Willow looked around his place while she spoke, rather than at him. He couldn’t tell if she was nervous or curious. “You’ve had centuries to learn about, well, anything you wanted.”

“I suppose.”

“I want to learn about magick.”

“You want to be a witch?” He didn’t look confused anymore–now Angel looked stricken. If it was possible, he became even paler than usual.

“No, I just want to learn about witchcraft. Like, as a hobby. A practical skill.”

Willow sighed. “You know what it’s like here. Better than I do. But ever since meeting Buffy–and you–I know that danger is everywhere. And magick can give a person power. I need to be able to protect myself better. Maybe even protect us all.”

Angel shook his head, avoiding eye contact while he spoke. “You shouldn't get involved with power like that. You don’t know what you would be getting into. It backfires. It hurts people. It does what it wants.”

“So you do know about magick then.” Willow’s chin jutted out stubbornly. “You can explain things to me.”

“I might be able to,” Angel admitted, “but I won’t.”

“Why not?”

“It’s not a hobby,” he said simply. “You can’t dabble in it. You can’t pick and choose parts of it to use as weapons. It will corrupt you, if you do. Using magick for good requires you to treat it like a practice. A calling, even. To wield that kind of power…”

He trailed off, and Willow could see something deep in his eyes, something dark and far away. It sent a shiver through her.

“It will change you forever,” Angel explained. “In ways you can’t know. I don’t want to be any part of that.”

He sat back down, gesturing for her to sit next to him.

“What brought you here, anyhow? Tonight, I mean. To me.”

“Well, I’ve been interested in witchcraft for a while. There are books in the library. Old books. Like nothing I’ve read before. And I went back to them to try and learn more, after Buffy had to fight this witch at school. I wanted to know what good witches were like, compared to Amy’s mom.”

Angel continued listening patiently as though he knew who Amy or her mom were.

“Giles realized I was consulting his books, and he-he kinda freaked out. I’ve never seen him so upset. I tried to explain, like this–I pointed out that Ms. Calendar uses magick for good. I promised I would use it to help Buffy. But he totally brushed me off, wouldn’t even listen.”

Willow’s voice was more formal when she continued. Angel recognized her tone as a Giles impression, even without the British accent.

“Ms. Calendar isn’t a witch. She simply incorporates some Pagan elements into her use of computers, and even that is risky–and not a path I would ever condone for someone your age. What you are talking about, Willow, is much more perilous, as well as wholly unnecessary. These forces are not to be trifled with.”

She sighed, slumping against his chair. “He locked all the books up after that. Not just the ones with spells in them, but even the history and theory books, the ones that explain different kinds of Paganism. And he’s been watching me ever since, with this weird look on his face, like…”

“Like you’re about to start levitating?”

“Exactly like that. He’s being ridiculous. I’m not Xander,” Willow protested, exasperation lacing her voice. “I’m not some irresponsible kid who doesn’t know what she’s dealing with. I saw how terrible it was, what Amy’s mom could do. I understand the seriousness of it. That’s why I need to learn–so I’ll be able to fight back.”

He seemed unmoved, but Willow pressed onward.

“Buffy can fight. She’s got superpowers, basically. And Xander is, well, Xander, but he and Giles are both bigger than me and stronger. I can’t predict what kind of monsters will come for us next, but I do know they’re coming. They keep coming. And I need my own way to be strong. This could be my way.”

Angel wanted to tell her that her words were truer than she realized, but he knew it would make everything worse–more complicated, not less. It wouldn’t stop her. It might ruin her.

So he asked her a question instead.

“If Giles banned you from his library, you could have gone to the public library, shops in town. Or researched online. You still haven’t explained. Why did you come to me?”

“You’re right, I could go online. Or those other places. But the ‘Net is full of unreliable sources, and given the risks I don’t think Ms. Calendar will encourage my independent studies any more than Giles. I don’t want to go to strangers.”

She bit her lip. “It’s probably dumb, but I thought…we’re on the same team. Team Buffy. I know you’ve had centuries to learn stuff, and I need to learn too. I hoped maybe you would give me a chance, if I could fight for good like you do.”

He could see it in her posture, the determination she had brought to his door. The certainty within her that his efforts so far hadn’t managed to shake.

It wasn’t going to be that easy, he realized. He should have known.

Witches and magick couldn’t be easily kept apart. Even when those witches didn’t know they were witches yet.

He could see it within her so clearly, the need to prove herself. The yearning to matter. He recognized it, a mirror of what brought him to Sunnydale in the first place. Angel had wanted to become someone worthy of Buffy’s light, as though good deeds would wash away his past.

Now, with Willow waiting for his response, he was forced to admit–if only to himself–that his efforts with Buffy were selfish. He was following his passions, just as he always had.

Attraction and need were pulling him toward Buffy even as it hurt them both, even as it defied the laws of nature, of good and evil. He knew better and yet he kept letting himself get closer to her. He let himself want her.

Willow was human, and her needs were as selfish, as deeply rooted. Authority figures couldn’t steer her away from power any more than burning flesh could sway Angel from the Slayer.

Willow might not realize it yet, he thought, but the magick was drawn to her the same way she was seeking it out.

Nothing would keep the two apart forever.

You could almost call it destiny.

Angel leaned back, sighed quietly. Then he nodded.

“I’ll help you.”

“Really?”

After her impassioned speeches, that made him laugh. “Yes, really. Better than you getting your information from a more dangerous source. And you have a point. You should know how to look after yourself. Buffy can’t always be around.”

She smiled, gratitude changing the way the light hit her face. For a moment, she looked older, less girlish. Angel could see the woman she would be, centered in her power, confident. He blinked and let that go.

“Neither can I,” he added, his tone serious again. “So you’ll learn. But it takes dedication. It’s not something you can try on and then leave behind. If you’re going to do this…really do this…you need to be ready. For whatever comes.”

“I understand.” Willow smiled again, this time softly. “I trust you.”

He didn’t like the way those words made him feel, coming from Buffy’s friend. If he let himself, he could sense her heartbeat from across the room. It was a small space, and he could smell perfume that she was wearing today, a light fragrance that reminded him of the Roseraie in Paris.

The vein in her neck that was jumping didn’t show a hint of panic. It proved her words true, though he had no other reason to doubt them. Willow was so sincere, it made him ache. Had he ever been that guileless? How long would she remain that way?

He couldn’t think about the blood running through her, the way she smelled even more intoxicating than Buffy and had brought herself unbidden to his home, with no one else aware.

He was lucky he’d spent a long time building up his willpower, and that he was living his life now for a reason–aiming for a higher purpose. Otherwise, it would have been far too easy to enjoy Willow’s company in a way that was not safe for either of them.

****

After several weekends of study at the Bronze, with Angel bringing her books and some practical supplies, he rang the doorbell of Willow's home.

Knowing he wasn't shielded much from the view of passersby, he waited close to her house's front windows. Beyond her footsteps, there was silence as she approached.

Lack of additional heartbeats made him bolder. If she hadn’t been alone, he would have dropped off the bag without waiting.

Willow opened the door and stared blankly at him. Recovering her manners hastily after that, she took a step back. “Angel! Hi.”

“Hi.”

“You’re at my house.”

“Yeah, I wanted to bring these by.” He lifted up the bag of books in his hand. “I know we said we’d meet Saturday at the Bronze, but I found these early. Figured you could use the extra time with them.”

“Oh, well, thanks. And, um, my parents are traveling, so I can bring those into the living room for now.” She turned to head that way, leaving him standing on the porch.

Angel cleared his throat. “Kind of need an invitation.”

“Right! Sorry. You’ve never been here before.”

“If you’re not comfortable,” he said, “I would understand. You can take the books yourself. I don’t have to come in.”

She huffed out a breath, and he got the distinct feeling that she might’ve rolled her eyes if he weren’t watching her so closely.

“Angel. Come in.”

She closed the door behind him after he entered and locked it. “It was really great of you to bring those by. I can’t wait to read the collection of beginner incantations you told me about.”

He smiled. “What are friends for?”

“Friends? Is-is that what we are?”

“I think so.” The guarded distance that Angel carried with him, that he’d begun relaxing around her, returned. “Is there something wrong with that?””

Willow shook her head “I don’t think so. But I don’t exactly have a lot of vampire friends. Or, well, any. So I wouldn’t really know.”

“And I don’t make a habit of befriending humans,” Angel pointed out. “Or anybody, much. So I’m probably the wrong vampire to ask.”

She took the books from him and sat on the couch, gesturing to the other end. “Well, then, friends it is.”

Willow reached for a text on magick theory, and she was hit with a sharp flash of deja vu.

It reminded her of the book that had unleashed Malcolm–Moloch, she corrected herself–on their world.

Clearly, Willow had decided after Malcolm, she wasn’t meant to have a boyfriend. Spending most of her life pining for her best friend–who didn’t see her that way–should have been a clue, even before the hyena possession.

But Malcolm had seemed so nice, and smart. As if he understood her. And then he wasn’t even human!

Plus there was that vampire, she reminded herself, right after Buffy arrived in Sunnydale. Willow was pretty sure nobody had a more pathetic dating record, especially considering she had never been asked out on a date.

Xander had been moping over Buffy during their summer hangouts, and that kept reminding her of her own un-luck in love. Kind of funny, though, that Xander complained way more about Buffy’s absence than her actual boyfriend did while in Willow's company.

She couldn’t help wondering why Moloch had decided to prey on her. Why he chose to fixate on her, of all people.

Something must be wrong with her.

She would have spent much longer in wallowing self-pity mode if not for Angel. “The opposite,” he said, in his matter-of-fact way. “You’re thinking about that all wrong.”

“Huh?”

She hadn’t been talking to him, exactly–more like worrying out loud.

“The demon didn’t choose you because there’s something wrong with you,” he explained, a little more gently. “I know I wasn’t there, but Buffy told me about it.”

“Okay.”

“Well, Moloch needed your help to be free, but he needed to be freed by magick.” Angel watched her, waiting for the click, for it to sink in.

“Wait, are you saying…” She blinked at him. “What exactly are you saying?”

“He needed to be free from the magick binding him. You were there, able to free him.”

Angel shifted a little where he sat, feeling trapped. He hadn’t wanted to be the one to introduce this idea to her world, but maybe it had been inevitable all along.

“He could sense the magickal potential in you.”

“He–” Willow gulped, audibly.

He held back the urge to chuckle.

“Is that a thing his type of demon can…do? That’s kind of intrusive.”

Angel waited a moment before admitting, “It’s not specific to him. All demons can sense magick. It’s not useful to all of us, but it’s there. You carry it in your blood.”

“Oh. So because you can sense my blood…”

“Yes. I felt it the first time I met you.”

“Why didn’t you say something? To me, if not to Buffy?”

“It would’ve been rude. And of no use to you–you weren’t a witch then.”

She pressed her lips together hard, thinking about it. She saw his point, and yet… “I still would have liked to know.”

He didn’t reply.

“Angel, promise me something?”

“What?”

“That if you know things about me, you won’t keep them from me, ever again. Secrets can ruin things.”

“That was the only thing I knew,” he countered, but she shook her head.

“I mean it. Friends should tell each other the truth. You can’t have trust without it.”

“You know, you shouldn’t trust a vampire,” Angel pointed out for the first time, his mouth quirked.

Willow grinned back. “Little late for that.” Then her face grew solemn again.

“Promise me.”

Angel considered it for a long time, while she watched him and waited. He knew the weight of making vows; he didn’t take them lightly. Especially now that his life was eternal.

She probably couldn’t understand what she was asking, to expect him to keep his word. To demand that he prove himself trustworthy rather than trusting him as easily as she had so far. But he understood.

To befriend a human was no small choice. Not without risks. He had done so with this one, and didn’t regret it; Willow was unique among them.

To promise her anything was another choice, and Angel knew he might regret it. But he wanted to be who she saw, in the asking. He wanted to prove he was trustworthy, in some real way, if only to himself.

When he nodded, matching her serious face with his own, he could feel something shift between them. Like a crack in a wall.

“I promise,” Angel told her.

And Willow smiled, dipping her chin to return to the books. Her long hair veiled her face a little, her eyes roaming quickly across the current page.

“I should go,” Angel said. “Enjoy the reading.”

“Oh.” She looked up. “You don’t have to.”

“Well, you can keep the books as long as you want. I’ll get them back when you’re done.”

“Thanks.”

Before he stood to leave, Willow asked, “What if I have questions for you?”

“You mean, about the magick?”

“Yeah. Isn’t it just, like, practical if you stay–in case I need your help?” She blushed a little. “I mean, if you don’t have somewhere else to be. I wouldn’t want to–”

“I don’t have anywhere to be.”

Charmed by her welcome, Angel settled into his seat.

The silence between them was easy as Willow read, and he looked around her living room and kept his thoughts to himself.

She didn’t end up asking him any questions, but when he left an hour later, neither of them mentioned it. Angel walked home feeling lighter somehow, and Willow dreamed of candle flames and cemeteries when she slept that night.

#willow x angel #willow x angel fic #angel x willow #angel #willow rosenberg #btvs fic #my fic #ogiatw fic

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sircarolyn · 3 years

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juliet landau's british accent never not hilarious

#lucy listens to bf #it's way way less over the top than in buffy but still the way she says certain words is just 😘#and romana talking to herself pretending she's talking to k9 ❤#'i'm not at all delicious and very friendly' i love you

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opheliawillowbrook · 3 years

Text

How the Cookie Crumbles

To say his brothers fought would be an understatement: They warred. That. That was the better word. However, it was Dick who was the peacemaker among them. The mediator extraordinaire, translating all his brothers’ woes and misunderstandings into less doom-pending transgressions. But to say this unofficial, yet very necessary part he played was tasking was yet another understatement of unspeakable proportions. It was a FUCKING LOT.

“I swear to God, Drake. You and Brown are a special kind of stupid.”

“Shut up, Damian! It’s a good idea!” Tim grumbled in reply.

“Yeah! You’re just mad you didn’t think of it first!”

Dick’s face fell upon hearing the argument and considered turning the other way, but he’d learned the hard way that his lack of interference could result in bloodshed. Damian did have a history of stabbing Tim, and Robin had an impressive body count, according to Jason. I’d better make sure he doesn’t add two more.

“Well, fuck me and my entire life,” Dick droned in frustration. “What are you three bitching about now?”

“Damian keeps saying our idea is stupid,” Stephanie tattled.

“Yeah!” Tim added with crossed arms. “He says we lack the fortitude for good ideas!”

“You do!” the current robin exclaimed.

“Damian?”

The youngest batboy rolled his eyes and reasoned, “Listen, I know these two brain donors barely have two brain cells to rub between them—”

“That’s not the only thing they rub!” Jason called from the other room.

Damian again rolled his eyes in contempt and continued, “And I’ve accepted, as a member of this family, that everyone gets to act a little stupid from time to time. However, as much as I would like to respect their commitment to their shared stupidity, I feel as if they are abusing the privilege and it needs to stop before one of them gets hurt.”

“Wow, he actually cares,” Jason added from still in another room.

“Have you been sitting there listening the whole time?” Dick asked, near facepalm.

“Affirmative,” Jason confirmed, entering from the hall.

“And you did nothing to stop them fighting?”

“It’s funnier this way.”

“Do I always have to be the responsible one?”

“Affirmative,” all four said with little thought.

“Okay then,” Dick sighed with reluctance. “Damian, I know you find it hard to accept the choices of others, but you need to understand that free choice and expression is about accepting that others may not make the same choices as you, and that’s okay. It’s the same as you choosing not to take my dating advice and ask Raven out because you’re afraid of rejection—”

“Shut up, Grayson! This isn’t about me!!!” Damian spat.

“Damian has the hots for Raven?” Jason teased. “You have good taste, Mighty Mouse. She got a great—”

“Don’t even finish that sentence, Todd!” Dick and Damian ordered in unison.

“I was gonna say personality,” Jason droned. “Get your minds out of the gutter. I mean for fuck’ sake.”

“Sure you were,” Tim replied with a glower.

“Yeah Tim, cause you never stare at her tits while you talk to her,” Jason added, throwing him doubly under the bus.

“Dude, are you trying to get me killed?” Tim said, shooting an elbow into his brother’s ribs as Damian and Stephanie both glared. Spurring Dick into a further mood for murder.

“My point being is, just because you don’t like other peoples’ ideas, doesn’t mean they’re stupid.”

“Tell them the idea, guys!” Jason urged, stirring the pot.

Stephanie and Tim looked at each other and nodded, as though they’d discovered the holy grail itself. “We’re gonna write a series of YA novels and sell them on the web!” Steph sang optimistically.

“Yeah, it’s a huge and diverse market,” Tim added.

“And with established characters, we’ll make a killing.”

Dick’s brow furrowed. “That sounds like fanfiction?”

“It sounds like utter bullshit,” Damian sneered, not single fuck given.

“It’s not bullshit,” Tim snapped. “YA novels make up a huge portion of the market. People love those things.”

“Then name one YA novel that has sold more than a manga in the last 10 years?”

Tim shrugged. “I can’t think of one at the top of my head, but there they definitely exist and sell.”

“Yeah, so does my fanfiction based on this family,” Jason added under his breath.

“What?” Everyone asked.

“Nothing. Continue.”

“So anyway, I told Damian it’s a foolproof plan.”

Dick rolled his eyes with a bit of doubt, but who was he to judge or discourage their creativity. I mean, he dropped out of college after all? “I’m not saying I believe it’s bulletproof, because frankly, nothing is. But I’m curious why you would consider telling Damian? I mean, he hates most things.”

“And Drake. I hate Drake.”

“We’re all very aware, Dami,” Dick drawled in annoyance. “But yeah, why would you tell him anything important to you? Especially that?”

“Well, we kinda needed a loan. I knew Bruce would undoubtedly say no and, well, Damian has money.”

“Because I make good business decisions.”

“I don’t know why I thought of asking you?”

“You didn’t, Jason told you to,” Stephanie confessed, recalling an earlier conversation.

“Jason, really?” Dick tsked.

“Hey, Damian does make good business decisions. Who do you think cleans and invests money? It’s certainly not Alfred.”

“Because Alfred would have nothing to do with your blood money, Jason. And Damian, I’m very disappointed in you!”

“Grayson, I don’t know what high horse you are riding on today, but you better come off it. Father told me if I wanted money, that I needed to earn it and that I should get a job. So I got one.”

“Laundering money for Red Hood’s criminal Enterprise is not a job!”

“Actually it is. Mighty Mouse made us an LLC and everything. I own several Wash & Folds, all legitimate! Thanks to Hell Spawn here! I’m actually considering making him a partner.”

“So will your LLC fund our YA Novels?”

“Oh fuck no!”

“Come on, Jay! We have a solid business plan,” Stephanie pleased.

“You’re business plan is a bunch of meaningless numbers written on the back of a napkin and poorly illustrated versions of us,” Damian said, holding up the napkin in question.

“Okay, so it’s not the final draft, but we’re working on it!” Tim said pointedly.

“Yeah, as tempting as this all sounds, I didn’t make my money making half baked business decisions,” Jason reasoned

“No, you made it by taking over Gotham’s drug trade,” Dick clarified with disapproval.

“Which was a solid business decision.”

“Why do I even talk to you?”

“I don’t know why I talk to any of you,” Damian scowled, arms crossed, grateful there was no shared genetics between him and his adoptive kin. “I don’t understand what father saw in any of you.

“I can’t answer that,” Jason replied. “However, I can tell you, from personal experience, what he saw in your mom.”

“Do you wanna die, Todd?”

“Do you wanna not have a job?” Jason wanted. “Also, been there done that. But hey, if I died twice then I’d have buffy status so don’t threaten me with a good time, kid.”

“On that note, I’m leaving,” Damian grimaced. “I have to meet Raven, anyway.”

“Oh,” Dick sang. “You have a date!”

“It’s not a date.”

“Bet you wish it was a date,” Stephanie teased. “Y’know, if you just stopped acting like a dick all the time, I bet she’d go out with you.”

“Shut up, Brown.”

“Oh no,” Dick smiled. “I know it’s hard to believe, but he’s nice to Raven.”

“Hey keep that shit up,” Jason added. “If you’re nice to her, she’d be nice to you!”

“I hate all of you,” Damian proclaimed and stormed away.

“Fuck you too! See you at work Monday! Jason called, earning a tiger middle finger.

“He might be an asshole, but he’s a good kid,” Jason nodded with a sense of pride, causing to Dick to silently scoff. “Still needs to get laid though.”

“Bruce is gonna be so pissed when he finds out you pulled Dami into your bullshit.”

“You’re using Raven’s pet name for him now?” Jason mocked. “And fucker’s gonna have to prove it first; there’s a reason I hired ‘Dami’ for that job.”

“Dude, fuck you; dig your grave,” Dick lamented. “And don’t come at me with one of your tired ass death jokes, they’re getting old.”

“Suit yourself,” the Outlaw glowered as silence set in.

“So Dick,” Tim dared sheepishly. “You, um, wanna invest in--”

“Absolutely not,” the elder hero replied.

Leaving Jason to chuckle. “And that’s the way the cookie crumbled.”

If you enjoyed that feel free to leave me kudos 👉 here on Ao3 lol. If you have any remdom prompts send them my way; maybe I’ll feel inspired 😘

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locke-writes · 3 years

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Racing Hearts

Author: locke writes

Title: Racing Hearts

Song: Bad Habits - Ed Sheeran, Spike For: Anon

Rating: T

Word Count: 1,528

Tag List: @multifandomfix / ask to be added

You had no one to blame but yourself. If you actually thought hard enough about the situation that you were currently in then it was very clear that you had no one to blame but yourself. Yet still part of you wanted to blame others, part of you wanted to blame Buffy. She had been the one who introduced you to him after all. Sure at the time of the introduction she had introduced the two of you with caution knowing that Spike was recently new to not killing and you had known of his victims.

Yes you really had no one to blame for yourself for the predicament that you were in. You had no one to blame for the fact that you had fallen in love with Spike.

Spike had of course come on the Sunnydale scene like many other vampires in the area, hunting for the next feed. Entirely uneventful you had thought, easy to ignore as everyone had come to believe. Yet he kept popping up, kept coming around, kept running into Buffy. He kept on becoming some sort of annoyance for all of you and you hadn't expected him to be anything else to you at all. He was, to you, a vampire, only and always just a vampire and nothing more.

Buffy bringing him into the Scooby gang wasn't a betrayal, it was just odd. He was the enemy, he had on numerous occasions tried to kill her or anyone close to her, no matter what he hadn't seemed like the greatest ally that anyone should have. She explained that there was no way for him to kill anymore, something about a chip that prevented him from killing anyone at all although that seemed suspicious to you, some lie he might have created in an effort to infiltrate the group of the Slayer.

There was a sense of mistrust that filled you, maybe it would always fill you when you were around him. There wasn't anything that could ever calm you as you stood near him, as you worked with him. He was an enemy in your eyes, there wasn't anything that you supposed he could do to change your mind. A vampire and a human could be nothing more than enemies, it was something you had believed since the day you learned they were not more than fiction.

Each and every time you were asked to do surveillance, research, or pretty much anything at all to help Buffy in fighting some sort of the supernatural, you were paired with Spike. There was never a comment as to why you were paired up together, you had your thoughts (mainly that Xander and Willow were as suspicious as you) but you never said a thing about it. Never said a single word against working with him although you knew deep down what you felt about him had never changed.

Conversations were non-existent between you and he. The two of you would simply sit at the same table together pouring over books in an effort to find the correct creature. Silence fell over the two of you when out on patrol, the air still and the only noise the chirping of birds and the occasional car alarm. You kept your distance from him, you kept cautious of him although he had since proved that he truly could not kill. There was the thought that he might turn against you even without killing you.

You had thought you might go one continuing with your distrust of Spike, you thought perhaps that you would merely see him as an acquaintance if ever the two of you were to become more than patrol partners. You had thought a lot of things up until the night when Spike saved your life.

Some demons were stronger than others, some demons more brutal than others, these were things you knew, had been aware of, and yet still became ill prepared for. Granted when a hoard of demons appeared in Sunnydale under the disguise of a tour group you knew that anyone was ill prepared. The most demons that Buffy had taken on at once had been a small group, nothing in the twenties and thirties as had been estimated by Giles.

Buffy was the slayer but she was unable to go in alone for this one, everyone needed to be taught how to kill demons. Spike didn't need to be trained for anything, these were demons he was going up against. In an all out brawl with too many demons you were still shocked to find that you had managed to kill three before being gripped by the throat. Pressure was applied, everything going dark as you began passing out. As quickly as the moment began, it ended, the demon being pulled from you, its head being ripped from its body by Spike.

Certainly not the most romantic of moments, yet you knew something had changed between the two of you as soon as Spike began questioning you about you're well-being once the demons were all killed. He hated admitting it to himself yet it was easy for the two of youth see, he cared about you and you knew that you cared about him. Whatever animosity you'd had towards him before that moment had gone in an instant, replaced with a multitude of understanding and respect.

Caring, that's what began everything, caring. You attempted now to get to know one another, speaking about everything and nothing during research sessions. Spike began to get you into terrible British soap operas, you began asking him questions about the times and placed during which he'd lived. Told jokes, shared stories, grew with one another, that was what happened. Day after day the two of you grew into a friendship, one that often led to you visiting him on the nights when you couldn't sleep or even the nights where you had no patrolling to do.

Spike was the first one to change the nature of your relationship with him. You'd thought of him as a friend, only as a friend. Yet even though you kept telling yourself that the nature of your relationship was strictly platonic there was a part of you that wanted to be with him, that wanted to love him, that perhaps even did love him. Something you felt when around him had shifted from being pleased to have time with him to wanting to be near him and being pained when you weren't.

The two of you were watching the latest episode of a sitcom you'd managed to find that actually interested Spike when you felt his hand move on top of your own. You wanted to hold his hand, knew that was what he was asking in this silent manner but even still there was this fear that he had done it on accident, that he'd done it without thinking and he might regret the accident. You turned to face him, turned to face the downfall of a friendship but instead he pulled you to him and kissed you. When the two of you broke away you put your head against his shoulder, smiling against him.

It was easy to fall in love with Spike and even easier to know that you shouldn't. The chip was something that was to be taken away, he'd be able to harm people soon enough, be able to harm you. And even if he refused to harm you, you knew that he was a vampire, he killed to feed more often than just feeding and leaving the victim alone. Dangerous to love him, dangerous to be with him, yet you couldn't keep away from him.

No one knew you were sneaking out in the middle of the night to see Spike. Even if they did they never said a word. Night after night you'd go to visit him, there were a limited amount of things you could do that wouldn't lead to the two of you being caught together however night still led to some sort of date nights. He wanted to give you as normal a relationship as he could which was easiest when the two of you were on patrol together as there was less sneaking around and more just trying not make it obvious that you had feelings for one another.

Buffy, Giles, Xander, Willow, all of your friends perhaps suspected that you were in a relationship. Behavior changes often occurred when someone was happy in the way that you were. However even then you feared telling them, what would they think, what would they tell you? Perhaps it would end in a conversation about breaking up with him, theories about using you to get back at someone, there could be many valid reasons regarding why you should never date Spike. Still whatever they said you knew you would go against it.

It was a pattern you wanted to break although you knew that you couldn't. Try as you might you'd still come back to him. You loved him, there was never going to be any parting from him. A habit you knew you would never break.

#locke writes #buffy the vampire slayer #spike #buffy the vampire slayer fic #spike fic #buffy the vampire slayer fanfic #spike fanfic #buffy the vampire slayer oneshot #spike oneshot #buffy the vampire slayer imagine #spike imagine

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disquietiswhatitis · 3 years

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You’re my favorite reason to lose sleep (Sam/Andrea)

Of all the many things Sam has experienced that she did not expect since her relationship with Andrea began, the most surprising by far might be this:

Andrea Rojas snores.

Not always, but she does. It’s a quiet snore, nothing compared to the logs Sam’s father would saw when he fell asleep in front of the tv. Sam’s been with Andrea long enough to know that her lover only starts snoring if either she consistently hasn’t been getting enough sleep or if she’s gotten extremely drunk because she refuses to accept that Sam can outdrink her when it comes to tequila. As fun as drunk Andy can be, they’ve been good about their wine intake and they haven’t had any tequila in the apartment for a little over a month, so Sam figures it must be the lack of sleep. Reaching out, Sam takes a strand of her sleeping fiance’s hair, tucks it behind her ear, whispers “why haven’t you been sleeping baby?” and places a quick, tender kiss to Andrea’s shoulder. It’s a rhetorical question. Andrea snores again. Now, Sam loves Andrea. Truly, passionately loves her as does Andrea with Sam. While past heartbreaks have taught her to tread more cautiously, Sam still loves so easily and has so much to give. Andrea, conversely, hadn’t felt worthy of love in so long, she built walls that made it hard for her to receive or convey it. Somehow, much to the surprise of them both, Sam shattered those walls. They’ve been through their fair share in the time they’ve been together. While communication hasn’t always been their strongest suit, they’ve put in the time and effort to get better at it because they both enthusiastically agree that the other is so worth it. Knowing this, Sam is aware that she could ask Andrea what’s wrong, that Andrea would tell her and that they could go from there. However, Andrea is also asleep at the moment and Sam can’t think of anything else. She can’t put on her airpods and distract herself with her audiobook. The sultry voice of the narrator combined with the scene she was last narrating, well, it would make her want to wake Andrea up and... do things. Sam doesn’t know what she’d watch on any of the way-too-many-streaming-services-they-rarely-use without Andrea cuddled up with her on the couch. She’s not particularly hungry and she already went to the gym this morning. Reaching over to her nightstand, Sam puts on her reading glasses, grabs her phone and starts scrolling through social media she doesn’t really use. She likes a few photos of Alex and Kelly with their daughter. She glances through some articles about current events. After about five minutes, Sam sets her glasses and phone down and lets out a small huff. She can’t help but still think about it. Why hasn’t Andrea been sleeping? Sam gets up and walks to her dresser. She pulls out a pair of underwear and a slightly too large tee shirt, puts them on and goes to the kitchen to grab a glass of water. Grabbing a mug out of the cabinet that had a picture of two avocados on the top row, three on the middle row and four on the bottom that said “avocados, avocatres, avoquatro,” Sam ponders her lover’s possible sleep-depriving woes. “It’s not Obsidian, right?” Sam thinks as she pours water from their filter into a mug, a gift she had gotten Andrea during their vacation to Miami. Sam knows how much it hurt Andrea when her company fell, but Sam stood by her side through it all and figured Andrea’s sleepless nights over that were over. “Could it be CatCo?” the brunette contemplates as she finishes her water and goes to refill it. Maybe. The print media conglomerate’s business model transition in an increasingly print-less world had been a bit of mixed bag even before Lena purchased it all those years ago. She knows Andrea likes the work she does at CatCo well enough, but she’d definitely noticed that her mood get a little more sour for a bit when it was the only thing she had left after Obsidian. Not that CatCo was a consolation prize but Andrea loved being on the cutting edge of the tech world and short of some major restructuring, CatCo just wouldn’t provide the same opportunity. Still, the business wasn’t struggling. They had a few layoffs some months ago, which led to some incredibly passive aggressive back and forth jabs between Kara and Andrea at game night shortly thereafter, but otherwise everything was fine. “Ok, lightning round” Sam states to herself, setting down her mug so she can count off with her fingers all the possibilities it could be. It’s definitely not the bills and nothing broke or needed repair around their home. Sam’s truck is functioning like a dream. They bought their outfits for the Lena Luthor Foundation gala two days ago. Andrea bought a dashing suit and Sam an incredibly curve-hugging dress, respectively; Sam thought it was a refreshing change of pace but she was more looking forward to the suit and tie look she had planned when she married Andrea...

Marry Andrea. The wedding. Sam forgot to mail out the invitations. Shit. Sam runs over to the table by the door and sure enough, there they were. A whole stack of save the dates that Sam had set down on Sunday evening, promising to mail them out first thing on Monday. It was Friday night. Fuck.

Quickly but quietly running to their home office, Sam pulls out a sticky note and a sharpie out of the desk drawer and in all caps writes “DO NOT FORGET.” Careful to put the sticky note and pen away quietly, Sam returns to the table by the entrance. She grabs the invitations, goes back to the kitchen and places them on the counter with the note and her purse next to them. There was no reason to try to hide her snafu from Andrea. They have a good relationship and Sam is confident Andrea will forgive her so long as she’s honest and apologizes (and credit to her Catholic boarding school education, Andrea sometimes really enjoys making Sam beg for forgiveness.) Refilling her water, Sam heads back to their bedroom, discarding her clothes and thinking of how she’s going to make it up to Andrea tomorrow. As soon as she climbs into bed, her partner, still in her sleeping position, states “you’re thinking too loud” in a voice that lets Sam know she’s awake but not fully conscious. Sam still smiles at the sound of her voice and happily says “Hey, you’re up.” Andrea turns, changes from laying on her left side to her right in order to face her significant other. “I am. What were you thinking about?” Sam just smiles “You. Always.” Andrea smiles back. “Oh? Do tell.” Sam tells her “You were snoring.” Andrea deflates. “You sure know how to woo a woman, Sammy.” Sam picks up Andrea’s left hand and points to the rock on Andrea’s ring finger “Damn straight. Exhibit A.” Andrea smiles again “You’ve got me there.” “So why the snoring? Is everything okay?” Sam asks.

“Yeah, everything’s fine honey. I just stayed up way too late...reading.” The way Andrea says “reading” catches Sam’s attention. Whatever Andrea was reading, Sam can tell she’s not not embarrassed by it and it almost certainly wasn’t a sales report. “Oh. What were you reading?” Sam teases playfully. Andrea couldn’t refuse the dimples facing her even if she wanted to. She just hopes the teasing won’t be too severe. “Buffy and Faith fanfic” Andrea states rather bluntly. Sam laughs. Andrea loves that laugh; it’s one of the many ways Sam broke down her barriers and made Andrea fall in love. “That’s great babe. Did you enjoy it?” Sam asks, no longer laughing but still smiling and still completely sincere. Sam is not mocking in any way, just delighted at the fact a successful CEO of a multimillion dollar company stayed up too late reading about a twenty year old ship. Andrea knows this and while she knows it’s not an interest Sam shares, Sam actively listens and encourages Andrea when she talks about it because Sam knows it matters to her. Andrea loves Sam so freaking much. Andrea delicately runs her hand up Sam’s arm and says “I enjoy us” in an overtly suggestive tone. Sam doesn’t need to be told twice. She goes for Andrea’s neck first; slow, steady kisses, savoring every pulse beat she can feel as Andrea’s breathing starts to shallow. She works her way up to Andrea’s earlobe and bites it just enough to get a moan out of Andrea without leaving (much of) a mark as her lover’s hands grasp at Sam’s shoulders. Sam kisses her way across Andrea’s wonderful jawline, pulling back just before Andrea’s luscious lips can connect with hers. Andrea’s lips instinctively chase after Sam’s but Sam pulls her head back just a bit farther to stay out of reach and tease the shorter woman, if only for a moment. She goes back in and Eskimo kisses her nose with Andrea’s. The buildup is excruciating for Andrea but damn if not’s always worth it. A breath away from Andrea’s lips, Sam looks into her eyes and asks “Yeah?” Andrea rolls onto her back. Sam follows, her arms on either side of Andrea’s head, to stay positioned above her lover. Andrea tosses aside the blanket and with it, the sight of her exquisite body is completely bare for Sam to drink in. Sam’s eye dilate and the only way Andrea can describe her look is carnal. Taking in the site of the sculpted woman above her, she knows she can reciprocate that desire. Andrea huskily replies “Yeah” and as she hungrily grabs Sam’s face to bring her in for a searing kiss, their bodies suddenly writhing against one another, Sam figured it’d probably be okay to wait to tell her about the invitations.

Author’s note: I actually felt inspired to write a short Reignjas ficlet yesterday and I went with it. As the idea kept expanding, it wound up heading in a direction I’ve never tried to write before. I ended up putting more thought and hours into it than I had expected, staying up to the point where I maybe had to call out of work this morning (my life’s a mess but that’s not important right now.) Anyway, this isn’t that final ficlet. I’ll probably be working on that (more responsibly) for a little bit but I felt confident enough that I wanted to post this (mostly) smut free version. Hope y’all enjoy it.

#reignjas #rojarias #sam arias #andrea rojas #writing #ficlet #fanfic #supergirl #sam x andrea

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hamliet · 3 years

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The Girl Who Gets to Have It All: Buffy Summers

So with @linkspooky‘s encouragement, I have binged Buffy the Vampire Slayer and relived my childhood culture. And, it's a 10/10 for me. Not that it doesn't have flaws, but it's genuinely one of the best stories I've seen, with consistent character arcs, powerful themes, and a beautiful message. It's also like... purportedly about vampires and demons and superpowered chosen ones, but it's actually all about humanity.

Buffy was able to be a teenage girl, allowed to like the things teen girls are scorned for (boys, shopping, etc), to be insecure about the thing teenage girls are insecure about (future careers, dating, school, parents), and to be a superhero with its good and its bad aspects. The story wasn’t afraid to call Buffy on her flaws (sometimes she got in a very ‘I am the righteous chosen one’ mode) and to respect and honor each of her desires (to be a good person, to be loved, and more). The story listened to what she wanted and respected her desires, giving her the challenges needed to overcome her flaws while also never teaching her a lesson about wanting bad boys or romance is silly or any manner of dark warnings stories like to throw at teenage girls.

It respected teenage girls--nerdy girls like Willow, jocks like Buffy, lonely wallflowers with trauma like Dawn, and popular/snobby ones like Cordelia, girls gone wild like Faith. It never once reduced them to the stereotypes that were lurking right there: each character was fully rounded, human, flawed and yet with respected interests and goals. This is so rare for a story that I’m still in awe.

The story as a whole follows Buffy from 15 to 21, of her as she grows from teenager to adult. She acts like a teenager and grows to act like a young adult, wrestling with loneliness and duty. The adults, like Giles, Joyce, and Jenny, are not perfect either, but neither are they “bad parents” or “bad mentors” necessarily. Joyce in particular says something terrible to Buffy, but she tries to do better, and it’s rare to see a parent in YA stories shown with such nuance. Basically, it wrote the long-lasting adult characters as human beings, too.

Speaking of growing up, I appreciated how Buffy’s love interests mirrored this. Angel was someone Buffy loved and admired, wanted to be like, but who was always either extreme good or extreme bad, and combined with Buffy’s own tendencies towards black-white thinking, made for a beautiful relationship to help her grow, but didn’t necessarily form a foundation for a long-term partner. Spike, on the other hand... they both saw each other at their worst and were drawn to each other even then, and were inspired to become better because they couldn’t bear to be a person who treated the other person so wrongly. They pushed each other to become the best them they could be, and believed in each other. Also, Spuffy is an enemies to lovers ship for the ages.

(Also, most of the other ships were well-done or at least can be understood. Riley was very obviously wrong for Buffy which paralleled Harmony and Spike in being 100% wrong for each other. Cordelia and Xander were a fun ship even if we all knew it would never last, and Willow and Oz were beautiful and cute. But Xander and Anya and Willow and Tara? OTPs. As were Giles and Jenny, the librarian and the computer teacher.)

That said, it’s not a perfect series. No story is. All of the characters and ships had problematic aspects to them worthy of critique, and the writing is very 90s in a lot of ways. It’s a product of its time, and in many ways it’s good society has progressed beyond some of the tropes/metaphors used in the show. In other way, though, the show was ahead of its time, and in a good way it wasn’t bound by the fear of purity policing with its takes on redemption (many characters would never fly today).

So, in order of seasons ranked from my very favorite to my “still enjoyed it very much” (no season was actually bad, imo), here’s my review. I’ll also review my top 10 villains in the show, because Buffy does villains very well in terms of the redeemable and irredeemable.

Season 7: Yep, the final season was my favorite.

Overall Opinion: Buffy's finale is literally "f*ck them men, our power is ours" and while it seems cheesy it actually works (also, f*ck in both a literal and figurative sense). The series strongly hit all the themes: love as strength, and redemption. Buffy consistently shows love as her strength--*all* kinds of love. Friendship w Willow/Xander, familial with Joyce/Dawn, romantic with Spike/Angel. These types of love are also never pitted against each other as is so often the case in current-day media. It's beautiful. Also, Spike’s confrontation with Wood was so powerful in terms of exploring forgiveness, redemption, and reconciliation: where they overlap and where they don't, and what it means to move forward.

Unpopular Opinion: I have seen a lot didn’t like the inclusion of Potential Slayers, and while I agree they could have been better incorporated/characterized, it was a great way to show Buffy’s final stage of growing up to be ending her chosen one status and projecting/multiplying her powers over the world.

Biggest Critique: Kennedy was female Riley--the anti-Tara to Riley’s anti-Angel (by ‘anti’ I mean opposite in every way). Kennedy was annoying and immature. Her role, like Riley’s, was less about exploring her as a character and more about her just being stamped as “love interest: lesbian.”

Favorite Episodes: Beneath You, Lies My Parents Told Me, Touched, Chosen

Season 6:

Overall Opinion: I said this on Twitter, but I felt like this was Buffy’s The Last Jedi or Empire Strikes Back moment. It is polarizing and dark, deconstructing the tropes it stands on--but by digging to the core of these tropes, it actually makes what’s good about them shine brighter. Everyone’s enemy was the worst versions of themselves. Giles left Buffy, Willow's struggle to relate to the world led to her trying to destroy it, Buffy hurt everyone through her anger, Xander abandoned Anya at the altar, Spike... yeah. It ages well as an integral part of the story, and the Trio were eerily prophetic.

Unpopular Opinion: Dawn is a great character with a good arc. A traumatized teen acting out and struggling to come to terms with loss and identity? She wasn’t whiny; she was realistic.

Biggest Critique: Willow’s addiction coding (I’ll discuss this below) and Seeing Red as an episode. I see the argument for both of its controversial scenes from a narrative perspective: Willow starts the season not grieving Buffy but instead being determined to fix it with magic and needs to learn to grieve, but. Still. Bury your gays is not a good look. For the Spike scene... he conflates sex/passion and violence (”love is blood, children” is something he said way back in season 3), but like Tara’s death, it had more to do with Spike (as Tara’s death did for Willow) than with Buffy’s arc, and as for the actual execution... they really botched that. Did it like... have to go on that long or go that far? No. Also, the framing was good, but inconsistent with the rest of the series (Xander to Buffy in the hyena episode, Faith to Xander and to Riley, etc.)

Favorite Episodes: Once More With Feeling, Smashed, Grave

Season 3 (tied with Season 5):

Overall Opinion: The opening continuity of Buffy meeting Lily/Anne after saving her life in Season 2 was sweet. The Witchhunt episode had really powerful subtext: stories of deaths that aren’t even true are actually demons that possess the town and convince them to turn against their children in the name of protecting the children. It’s a good commentary on, oh, everything in society. Faith’s character arc was fantastic, and her chemistry with Buffy was off the charts (look, I may be Spuffy all the way, but Fuffy has rights). The finale was satisfying in so many ways, seeing the entire graduating class unite to destroy the Mayor and the school with it, symbolizing Buffy et al’s readiness to move on to college. Oz's relationship with Willow was very sweet and meaningful for a first romance for Willow.

Unpopular Opinion: I actually don’t really have one. Maybe that the miracle in Amends was earned? I think you can make a decent case that Season 3 is the best written of the seasons, but can only truly be thematically appreciated to its full potential in the light of subsequent seasons (which finish Faith’s arc and deconstruct Buffy’s).

Biggest Critique: It forgot Buffy killed the hyena guy in Season 1, making her continual insistence that she can’t kill people very ?????

Favorite Episodes: Lovers Walk, Amends, Graduation Day Part 2

Season 5, which ties with Season 3:

Overall Opinion: The entire season is about family and what it means, from Tara’s to Buffy’s to the Scoobies. I loved Glory aka Enoshima Junko as the Big Bad, I loved Dawn’s interesting meta commentary on retconning (like, the fact that she’s retconned in matters), and most of my ships are still alive. Joyce’s relationship with Spike is one of the most heartwarming aspects, and Spike’s arc’s desire is clearly highlighted: he wants to be seen as a person. The episodes after Joyce’s death are the most honest portrayals of grief I’ve ever seen, and absolutely brutal to watch.

Unpopular Opinion: Buffy’s choice at the end seems a deliberate inversion of her choice at the end of Season 2 (sacrifice a loved one to save the world), but it actually isn’t: much like at the end of Season 2 where Buffy skips town because she’s devastated after killing Angel and doesn’t want to sort out being expelled, her mom knowing she’s the slayer, and her own trauma, Buffy’s sacrifice here was as much about her wanting the easy way out of relationships, family, college, etc. as it was about saving Dawn. Buffy’s death is coded as a suicide, which Season 6 emphasizes as well.

Biggest Critique: Like Season 3, I don’t have a lot to critique here. I wish the suicidal coding had been a little more obvious in Season 5 itself, but also I’m not sure it could have been more obvious; it’s pretty apparent if you pay attention. Maybe also that Buffy and Riley’s relationship failing should have been more squarely blamed on Riley, you know, being insecure and cheating.

Favorite Episodes: Family, Fool for Love, Intervention.

Season 2:

Overall Opinion: Heartbreakingly tragic but exciting and revealing at the same time. It asked the viewer interesting questions about redemption and forgiveness and atonement through Angel being honest about his past, and then decided to show us his past now reenacted, challenging us. And still, we saw them save him in a parallel to saving Willow in Season 6 (but Season 2 was tragic because it wasn’t enough, while Season 6 was not). Jenny’s death was agonizing, and the scene were Angel watches Buffy, Willow, and Joyce get the news through the window was powerful. We didn’t have to hear them to get the grief.

Unpopular Opinion: Jenny’s death isn’t a fridging; it works for her arc too when you consider her history. She worked to save the person whose life she was tasked to ruin, and it cost her her own--yet she still succeeded, because Jenny brought joy and wisdom to the show. Kendra’s death, on the other hand... was because they needed the stakes to be high--but we already knew that before she died. So, her death was useless.

Biggest Critique: The subtext was Not It. It was essentially “do not have sex. Your older boyfriend will lose his soul, kill your friends, you’ll lose your family, your school, your home, and have to kill your true love or else hell will literally swallow earth.”

Favorite Episodes: School Hard, Passion, Becoming Part 2.

Season 1:

Overall Opinion: I really liked it; it’s just lower on this list because the others are just better. It’s a great introduction to the series and to its characters, from Giles to Buffy to Willow to Jenny to Cordelia. It has great subtext a lot of the time (for example, Natalie French as She-Mantis is a literal predatory bug who engages in predatory behavior with students). Additionally, it subverts the typical YA trope of two guys and a girl, in which the girl is usually the least interesting character. Buffy and Willow were both fully fledged characters from the beginning with distinct strengths (even before Willow became a witch, as she wasn’t one in season 1 yet), while Xander was the more ordinary of the group.

Unpopular Opinion/Biggest Critique: Xander’s arc showed its first flaws that unfortunately continued throughout the series: his writing was either very good or very indulgent in ways it never was for other characters. (cough, the hyena episode, cough, in which he gets to skirt responsibility--and acknowledges that he is skirting it--for something the show will later hold others to account for). Xander’s just kind of inconsistent, which weakened his character over all. (Which is why both his love interests--Cordelia and then ultimately Anya--were good for him: they did not indulge him.)

Favorite Episode: Witch, Nightmares.

Season 4:

Overall Opinion: it’s still a good season. It’s a good portrayal of college and the growing pains of branching out, the strains of college growth on relationships (romantic and platonic). It shows us the first hints of Spuffy, giving us some serious Jungian symbolism between Spike and Buffy early on, and does well in establishing Xander/Anya and Willow/Tara as beautiful OTPs. Faith and Buffy’s foiling is fantastic. The Halloween episode was very fun as well. However, it suffers because its Big Bad, Adam, is not all that compelling thematically--yet, he could have been. See, the final battle pulls off the Power of Friendship in a really strong way but notably the season does not end there. Instead, it ends on dreams of each character’s worst fears, continuing what we saw in Nightmares in Season 1. Why? Because it shows us that the characters’ wars aren’t against monsters, but monsters of their own making: their flaws. Adam, as a literal Frankenstein, exemplifies this, but it wasn’t capitalized on as well as it could have been.

Unpopular Opinion: Beer Bad isn’t a bad episode, at the very least because Buffy gets to punch Parker. It’s not one of the series’ best, obviously, but it does give Buffy an arc in that she gets her daydream of Parker begging her to come back, but she has overcome that desire and her desire for revenge. If we wanna talk about bad subtext in Season 4, Season 2′s Not It sex subtext continues in the Where the Wild Things Are episode in this season; it’s a powerful callout of abusive purity-culture churches, until the fact that the shame creates a literal curse undermines the progressive message it’s supposed to send. Also, the Thanksgiving episode (Pangs) is a nightmare of white guilt and Oh God Shut Up White People.

Biggest Critique: Riley is awful. Like Kennedy, he had “love interest:normal” stamped on him and that was it. The thing is, he could have worked as an Angel foil, representative of the normal-life aspect of Buffy to Angel’s vampire/supernatural aspect, but the writers never explore this and seemed to even try to back away from that later on. They threw all the romantic cliches at the wall to see what sticks, from klutzy “I dropped my schoolbooks, that’s how we met” to cliché lines that had me rolling my eyes. Do you know how bad a romance has to be to make me dislike romantic tropes?

Favorite Episodes: Fear Itself, Hush, Restless

Villain rankings:

Dark Willow, the only villain to be truly sympathetic. While the addiction coding was insensitive and, while unsurprising for its time, aged extremely poorly. That said, Willow’s turn to the dark side after Tara’s death worked well for her character and the story: it was believable and paid off what had been building since Season 1's “Nightmares” episode (Willow’s inferiority complex).

Glory managed to be genuinely terrifying, and humorous/enjoyable too. Her minions and their numerous nicknames for Glorificus were hilarious, as was her intense vanity. Her merging with Ben--a human being who genuinely wanted to be kind and good--added complexity and tragedy to her role.

The First. A really good take on Satan. The seventh season as well as the First’s first appearance in season 3′s “Amends” had kind of blatant Christian symbolism, and so the First being essentially Satan works. Their disguising themselves as dead loved ones and the subtle manipulation they used to alienate people was really disturbing and well done.

The Mayor, who was a terrible person but a truly good father. He provided an interesting contrast to the normal ‘bad dad’ bad guy character, in that he provided Faith exactly what the other characters refused to: he saw the best in her and offered her parental support, while the heroes didn’t and wound up pushing her away.

The Trio, who were villains ahead of their time: whiny fanboy reddit dudebros, basically. The stakes seemed so much lower than fighting Glory, a literal god, the previous season. But that’s why they worked so well for Season 6′s human themes, and were especially disturbing because we all know people like them. I also appreciated the surprisingly sensitive takes on Jonathan and Andrew, who got to redeem themselves, but Warren did not, and I don’t think he should have either.

Angelus + Drusilla. I’m ranking them below the Trio because Angelus was just sooooo different from Angel that it was difficult for me to feel the same way for him. He was still Angel, so it wasn’t possible to enjoy his villainy, but he also wasn’t nearly as sympathetic as Dark Willow, had no redeeming qualities like the Mayor, and wasn’t as disturbingly realistic as the Trio. However, the emotional stakes were excellently executed with him as the Big Bad, in that you were never quite sure how to feel and it just plain hurt. Also, Drusilla was a favorite recurring character. She was sympathetic and yet batsh*t enough to be enjoyable as a villain at the same time.

The Master, who was just completely camp and really worked as an introductory villain. He was scary enough to believe he was a threat, and was funny enough to introduce the series’ humor as well. He was, like Glory, an enjoyable Big Bad.

The Gentlemen, the one-off villains of Season 4′s Hush who were genuinely terrifying. It’s not as if they got a lot of explanation or any backstory, but they didn’t need it.

Caleb, the misogynist priest. Fitting with the First’s Christian symbolism, Caleb serving as a spokesperson of all bad religious beliefs felt appropriate. He was also a good foil to Warren--being actually supernaturally powered instead of a wannabe--and to Tara’s family in being full-out evil. I despised him.

Snyder. Okay Snyder is not a Big Bad like Adam is, but let’s face it: Adam is lame compared to the other villains. But Snyder as a principal? He was so irritating and yet really well used in the series to critique overly strict, hypocritical teachers. Like, we all know teachers like him. I loved to hate him, and his ending was so satisfying.

#buffy the vampire slayer #btvs #spuffy #buffy summers #dawn summers #spike #angel #cordelia chase #btvs giles #willow rosenberg #tillow #tara maclay #anya jenkins #xanya #xander harris #jenny calendar #kendra young #faith lehane #hamliet reviews

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prose-for-hire · 3 years

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UC Sunnyhell: Part six

Highway from Hell!

Previous Part // Next part

Pairing: Spike x reader

Request: College AU. Set sort of more modern. Part six of eight. You go on a trip with your friends and find yourself realising just how you feel for Spike.

Warning: Alcohol consumption, swearing, sex reference

Original request by: @sunflower-stan

Other tags: @fictionalhoomanfromnowhere @harpersmariano @artsymaddie @shy-ginger-in-the-graveyard @cameo-greaves @llott1e

You and Spike were getting on so much better again. You were enjoying your friendship with him, you almost didn’t want to leave him. You knew you would really miss him.

You were packing for your trip. You and your friend group were going to the coast for a weekend trip with your friends. It also happened to coincide with spring break.

You were really excited, you had never done anything like this before and you were practically gushing. And packing way more than you needed for a long weekend. Spike was lying back on your bed, some of your discarded clothes surrounding him as you gushed about the trip.

He hadn’t been welcome to join your friends (which upset you a little) and he had insisted he wouldn’t be seen dead going on spring break. He maintained that it was expensive and stupid so he never went. He teased you about it, but you knew now that it was his way of showing his affection. A kind of endearment that only worked now you knew him.

You shrugged and continued packing. He eyed some of your swimwear and raised an eyebrow and you took it back from him with a warning look that he found sweet. He chuckled slightly, mock-surrendering. He wished he could see you with so little on. Wished you wanted him to. Wished to drink in your form.

You turned away and shook your head. He couldn’t help scanning his eyes along your body when you turned away though, imagining you wearing that. Wearing it because you knew he liked it. Wearing it because you enjoyed his eyes on you.

God, he had it so bad. He loved your mind. The way you smiled at him, the way it lit up your features. He wanted to kiss your lips. Hear your voice. That tone of yours, it comforted him to no end to hear it. He loved the way you smelled, that natural scent. Just sitting in your room even, becoming enveloped by it. By you.

“You gonna go wild then - on this trip?” He asked lazily, using his hand to gesture with his words.

“Wild? Do you think I’ve ever gone wild before Spike?” You couldn’t help scoff at his words. He frowned, he wasn’t so sure. You weren’t as innocent and boring as he thought upon his first impression. You would tease him, especially more so recently. You weren’t afraid of sex or intimacy. But he still continued his line of thought anyway.

“Spring break, ain’t it? Gets everyone all worked up right?” he said this, a hint of anxiety in his voice. He still didn’t enjoy the potential for people that weren’t him catching your eyes. Sharing your body. Bed.

In fact, it made him angry. Pulsating with jealousy. Throbbing with a fury he could barely keep at bay. Never at you, he wasn’t mad at you. Could never be. Not anymore.

He looked up at you, daring to see your reaction. In case he had shown his hand. In case you had caught the anxiety on his face. That he would lose your time. Your sweet mind. Words.

Couldn’t bare it if anything changed.

But you were still smiling. You always did when it was you and him. Rather than fuel his words, you instead tried to close your suitcase, but it wouldn’t shut properly.

He had been frowning slightly as you spoke about the trip. He was really going to miss having you around the house. Sharing your spare time together. Those nights in. He was fast becoming consumed by you and the thought of spending even this little time apart was starting to make him a little lacking. He liked to be by your side. In your company.

The amount of times he had chosen to stay in rather than leave the house was now becoming more apparent to you. You had noticed but never mentioned it. You just guessed he had been leaving so often before just so he didn’t have to spend time with you when you didn’t like each other.

He got up from his spot on the bed. Launching himself off the side as he usually would before he moved to you. Reaching for the case to help you close it. You smiled him and he almost leaned into you and expressed the raw emotions he had to push down when you were around.

Instead, he just looked down. At the case. You closed it together, pressing the case down and eventually managing to zip it up.

His hand brushed against yours and you shivered. Glancing at him sideways as he moved his hand away slightly too quickly. How he wished he could have kept his hands there. His skin against yours. That thought sounded so good to him.

You had figured it out. Finally. That you had feelings for him. That all that time you spent with him would never be enough. You had looked over from your side of the sofa one evening and caught him in a certain light. The glow from the tv managed to accentuate those beautiful features of his and suddenly you felt it. How deeply you cared for him. How easily you could see yourself in his arms, or better wrapped around each other in bed.

You had been thinking about these feelings, that moment you had realised, rather than focusing on what you had been doing. You were staring at him. Again.

You were snapped out of these thoughts though. He smiled, about to say something but you became distracted. His face dropped as he heard it too.

You heard a noise getting closer, loud music vibrating against the house from outside. Oz had pulled up in the van outside your shared house and you called your goodbye to Spike before running to join your friends.

You were squished into the window side of the van with Cordy and Xander making full use of the backseat despite you and Buffy sharing it with them. Willow was in the passenger seat sorting through Oz’s extensive cassettes trying to find something else to put on. They were good friends again despite their past.

It truly felt as if you were driving away from hell itself. You all felt lighter the further down the highway you went. The further towards your destination. It meant a break, it meant carefree fun with your friends. You were already having fun, giggling and joking together.

A classic rock song began to play. Loud and it instantly lit everyone’s faces up. Everyone began to sing along at the top of their lungs, including yourself. No matter how in tune any of you were, it was freeing to be able to scream along in this way. Even Cordy and Xander had come up for air. It was as if you were in a coming-of-age movie, the weekend was full of possibilities and you were ready to just relax and perhaps sift through the way you truly felt… if you had time between the parties Cordelia had told you that you were going to. She had planned out a way for you to hit all of the coolest parties with almost military precision.

You stopped off a few times, grabbing more snacks and trying to figure out the right direction. Xander challenged everyone to a game of how many snacks you could throw up and catch in your mouth which just made a mess of the back of Oz’s van. Buffy explained that Angel was already at a party and waiting for everyone to arrive. This then launched into a conversation about the battle plan you had all decided upon to finally get Buffy and Angel together.

You began to stare out of the van’s window after a while, no matter how happy you were your mind wasn’t far from him. Wondering what he might be doing. Who he might be with. God, sometimes it made you ache to think he’d rather have strangers in his bed than you.

You became lost in thought as you ate some of the last remaining snacks. You couldn’t help but think just how much you longed to be with him. How much you wished he would choose you over the rest of those vying for his attention. Your soul ached for him, you could feel it. You wished he had thought you were being serious when you invited him to come. But he had just scoffed at you in that way he does.

You had it bad. You even adored the way he scoffed at you. The way he teased. You loved the ugly parts of him just as much as the good. Wait… you loved him? Of course you loved him. It’s Spike.

This revelation, of how deeply you had fallen for him was spinning around your mind for the rest of the journey. A tornado, ripping everything you thought you knew apart. You wished he was here, beside you. You wished that he felt the same as you.

It was dusk by the time you got to the motel you were staying at. once you arrived you found out you had to wait for your room to be cleaned up before you could settle your stuff in. They let you leave your belongings behind reception for safety and you all went to hit the beach party that was already in full swing.

It was so alive, the party had a mind of it’s own. An entity of itself. Wild and unstoppable. You were marginally more comfortable here than at a frat party. You knew less people and you could just focus on having fun with your friends. However, you still felt as if there was something missing.

Something. Or perhaps, someone…

Just as your mind cast towards him, you thought you saw a glimpse of a familiar face.

Bleach blonde hair. Leather.

You moved through the sea of people looking for a better view. Spilling beer over people as you went in your haste. You so hoped your eyes hadn’t deceived you. But, when you got to the spot, there was nobody you recognised around. He couldn’t have moved that fast. You shrugged, walking back to your friends.

A smile on your face as you saw Buffy walk up to Angel and whisper something in his ear. She lead him away from the crowd and you laughed at Xander’s stupid comments about him.

You pulled your friends back over to dance. You began to really enjoy the evening, this band was playing just before Dingoes had managed to score their set.

You kept seeing flashes of his face no matter where you looked or how energetically you danced to try and shake the imprint of him that appeared to be stamped into your vision. As if you at stared at light too long and he would slowly fade at some point. Although, you so hoped he wouldn’t disappear from view. Even like this.

It made you miss him though. More than you even thought possible. You saw things you wish you could tell him about. In your head, you heard his voice commenting something snide that would make you laugh. He was in everything. He was everywhere you turned.

And it just made the fact he wasn’t really there with you more apparent. Not to mention, you didn’t think he could possibly feel as deeply as you did. Everything was bubbling to the surface, all these feelings you hadn’t acknowledged were all descending on you now.

He always made you feel more comfortable. More at ease. He made you want to share yourself in a way you never had before. It made you feel things you had only ever dreamed about. Written feverishly about without truly getting it until this very moment.

You wondered if Spike had ever felt this way. Love.

You looked up from the red cup you were drinking from and directly into his eyes. Everything was still happening around you, the party was still raging on. But it felt as if time had stopped, only briefly but you were sure of it. And unbeknownst to you, he felt it too. It was only the two of you.

You stepped towards him, this time you had no doubts. It truly was him. The face you thought you had been imagining. Because you couldn’t stop thinking about him so much. Spike. He was there. He was really there.

“Spike!” You exclaimed, the smile on your face widening which he couldn’t help but match at your reception, “What are you doing here?!”

You grinned about to launch yourself at him in a hug that he would have adored. But you hesitated and held yourself back, worrying he may figure out how you felt. You felt self conscious of your movements now you acknowledged your feelings. But even such innocent contact would have made him dizzy. God, he was a fool for love. For you.

“Thought I’d drop in. Prove myself right” He shrugged, swigging from a bottle of beer.

“Well… it’s really great you’re here! Why don’t you come and join us?” You smiled, your cheeks aching from how wide it was. You gestured towards your friends and his face dropped slightly.

“Not on your bloody life” he looked over to where Angel and Buffy were dancing together and to where some of your other friends were drinking and laughing. That wasn’t his life. He didn’t fit in with any of them. They didn’t trust him. Didn’t like him. Because he didn’t have the same interests as them. Same morals.

They thought they were so much better than him, which is why it always confused him so much how easily you got on with them. To him, you were more similar to him. A soul that spoke to his own. You belonged with him. By his side. Not theirs.

“Well, then... just one dance? Please? Nobody will know, everyone’s probably drunk already” You whispered, your hand reaching for his.

Your confidence had decidedly sprung from nowhere but if you hadn’t taken this chance, you would have regretted it. His eyes widened in panic as he watched your hand reach for him. But he didn’t move. His hand was hard, stuck in place as you took it. It almost made you let go again, until he relaxed slightly. You were so sweet to him - he just couldn’t resist you.

Couldn’t resist the idea that you wanted to dance with him. Only him. He had been watching you from afar, you hadn’t asked anyone else to dance with you. Just him. This filled him with a kind of pride, that you liked him in this way. That perhaps there was hope.

You took the hand that you had kept in his and pulled him into the crowd, away from your friends so you could have a sense of privacy amongst the writhing bodies of strangers.

You began to get a little bolder, pressing your body a bit closer which made him smirk. He opened his mouth, as if to say something. He closed his eyes slowly at the proximity, he swallowed thickly. He felt lucky to even be in your presence in this moment.

You pulled away a little, still dancing. Your hand never far from his. You wanted to weave your fingers between his but decided that gesture would be more intimate than you wished to reveal. The alcohol and the way he softened around you had made you a little braver, but not by all that much.

He whispered something jokingly in your ear that left you laughing, his face turned up into a smile. The widest you had ever seen from him. Especially in public. God, he wanted so badly so lean in and kiss you but he was concerned how you would react. Couldn’t lose you. Or this. It was starting to mean too much and it scared him.

Being this close and not being able to do anything about it was almost painful. He wanted you in every way. He ached for you, longed for you in every sense imaginable. He dipped and moved against you again, his own hands becoming bolder as he held you against him.

You were about to muster up the courage to say something to him. Hint at how much this meant. How this moment made you so happy you felt as if you could happily die by his side. Your last moments would have been the greatest. Because you had all of his attention. His touch. Even the whisper of more, if you ignored the doubts that usually plagued you.

However, you were quickly pulled apart from each other. You were about to shout at the offending party, never mind spike, but when you looked your eyes bulged. It was Cordelia. Seeking to protect you from Spike.

She took a deep breath as if she were about to launch into some kind of argument, but instead she stared him down, said “ew” in his face and then pulled you away. Spike opened his mouth to say something back but you got swallowed by the crowd. You had slipped through his fingers again.

You wished you had leaned in when you had the chance. You just didn’t know how he would react. You believed that he was so painfully honest and so real to himself that if he had an interest he would say something.

You wanted to kiss him. To let him in, completely. Which was dangerous. You knew about everything the others said. About everything he himself had said. But you couldn’t help it. Nobody knew him like you did, you were so sure of it. You were fast beginning to fall for him and you weren’t able to do anything to stop it.

You felt like an idiot. Of course he was too cool for you. He was the kind that broke hearts and smoked and kept a string of one-night stands. You were better off as friends… right?

You kept looking for him through the rest of the night but managed to just miss him each time. He saw you but didn’t guess for a second that you could be looking for him. Buffy had probably lost an earring and told you all to look for it, he presumed. She did seem to be bossy in that way, to him anyway.

You began to drink less, instead scouting the crowd between trying to keep up with your friends. You barely cracked a smile when you saw that Angel and Buffy were finally talking after dragging their feet for as long as possible. Eventually, knowing how invested you had been in getting them together, Willow noticed and pulled you aside. She worried when you had that look on your face. Sometimes you appeared lost - just staring into space. She didn’t realise you were usually trying to understand your feelings. Well, not until you blurted it out to her anyway.

“Will, I like Spike” You shouted into her ear, over the thumping of the music. It was so freeing to say it out loud and you continued, “I think I really like him!” You shouted louder and she almost stepped back at the force of your feelings. As if she could physically feel the shocking words. They slapped her in the face and she stayed silent for a moment. She was concerned.

“You should be careful, he looks at you as if he wants to eat you or something” Willow furrowed her brow. You held back the suggestive look you could have given her that could only have transferred to you since you had been spending so much time with the man himself.

She was staring beside you, to a spot on the periphery of the beach. She snapped her eyes away but not before you turned to look. There he was shrugging someone off him. You couldn’t tell if they were coming onto him or trying to start a fight with him and really it could have been either. His eyes instead boring into yours. Transfixed on you. You snapped away, feeling your cheeks heating up and you couldn’t blame it on the alcohol anymore.

You looked back to Willow who didn’t seem to want to let you go over there. It was as if she could read your mind, it was almost spooky. You had spotted him, much to your friend’s apparent distaste. You slowly walked over to him, leaving Willow watching you in concern.

“I found you again” You said quietly. You were sure he probably couldn’t hear you over the music but he had. And he had savoured every last syllable. The way you looked this evening, it knocked him breathless. The way you appeared under the moonlight. Your attention all his even if it was just for this brief moment.

“Just looking for one of those abandoned beach houses”

“Why?”

“Man’s gotta sleep some time.” he shrugged.

Spike didn’t have anywhere to crash. At the furrow in your brow, he mentioned something vague about finding a sofa or something instead as if he knew anybody in town. He hadn’t actually expected you to offer him somewhere to stay. Figured you had probably had enough of him seeing as you lived together all of the time.

But of course you offered for him to come back to your motel. You would have room, you were pretty sure that they gave you two single beds like the one you saw in Buffy and Willow’s room.

You were the only one with a motel room to yourself. Buffy and Willow were sharing – Tara hadn’t been able to come on the trip but insisted that Willow still should. Willow had been on her phone checking in with Tara the entire time. Oz was sleeping in his van and insisted he was fine there when you asked if he needed somewhere to stay. Cordy and Xander were sharing because it was more comfortable than the back of a car and Angel was staying with one of his frat buddies.

He lit up at your offer. Eyes dropping to the floor before looking back to your face. Head tilting slightly, scanning your face and finding only sincerity. Concern. How much you cared. He was really pleased you would offer. Want him to have somewhere to stay despite him dropping by unannounced and completely out of character.

You both decided to leave after a while, it wasn’t really Spike’s scene anyway and you were happy to spend more time with him. You walked back the way you kind of remembered and grabbed your stuff, ignoring the disapproving look you got from the woman behind the counter for bringing someone back with you. Spike muttered a few choice words about her that made you feel less embarrassed and he took your bag off you and carried it to the room.

You were both laughing as you stepped inside. It only subsided a little when you saw it. Spike’s face went white. Your laugh turned a little nervous. You would have never guessed it could be this. It was something that you had only ever heard about. Something you couldn’t have even fathomed would have happened to you.

There… there was only one bed.

You looked at each other for a moment. Both of you would have jumped at the chance of sharing in an ideal world. Where feelings didn’t choke you on every other word and the idea of having even such innocent intimacy made you dizzy.

“I-I can take the floor” You offered quickly. Which was the opposite of what you wanted to say. You wanted to slip into bed beside him. Press your body against his.

“Now, don’t start with that rot – I’ll take the floor. Slept on worse believe me” He insisted, already snatching up a pillow and arranging a thin sheet on the floor. It looked anything but comfortable but he wouldn’t hear your insistence.

You both got ready for bed in silence. You had only a little more to do than Spike, who’s nightly routine consisted of taking his t-shirt off and slinging it to the other side of the room. He would usually sleep naked but learned that would be inappropriate based on how your eyes had bulged upon your first meeting.

You didn’t really speak as easily as you had earlier, everything felt a little stilted. Awkward at even the whisper of the idea that you could have been sharing a bed. With you, that idea was a sacred one and so he didn’t lay on his usual charm to get himself to slide in beside you. He was uncharacteristically bashful about the arrangement but didn’t let it show.

You both instead opted to go straight to bed, turning the lights out and hoping that sleep would be quick. But, of course, that would never happen.

It had been a few hours now and you were both yet to fall asleep. Both of your courage had been growing as the night wore on. You felt bad being in the bed. You were moving around a lot, unable to relax in one position. You could also hear him shifting uncomfortably every so often. His back wasn’t taking to the floor.

“Spike… are you awake?” You asked through the darkness.

“No”

“Spike…”

“Can’t hear myself think with all that tossin’ and bloody turning you’ve been doing” He muttered. His voice was gruff but you could tell he was letting you off lightly.

“I was thinking… it’s not right you being on the floor-”

“Told you, I’ve had worse-”

“I was wondering if you wanted to, uh, share… the bed I mean” You said this so slowly. Barely above a whisper. You were scared he was going to tease you. Say the last thing he would ever want to do was be near you.

However, he was so surprised at your offer he forgot to make a suggestive comment. You weren’t offering anything, he knew that. But his heart began to soar.

He lifted himself up to look at you, squinting through the darkness - ensuring you were being sincere. This was all he had ever wanted recently. To be in bed beside you. To be that close, for you to want him there.

It filled him full of hope. Hope that he tried desperately to push down. He was used to disappointment. He so wished to wrap his arms around you and have you wish to embrace him in return. He didn’t want his face to betray him, show you just how much this meant to him. Not yet at least.

He was satisfied you meant it and slowly, as if moving too fast would make you change your mind, took his pillow and walked towards the bed. You hitched over to one side, bringing your pillow. Giving him space to settle. You couldn’t help but smile a little as he slid beside you. Although he kept a lot further away from you than you found yourself hoping he would.

There was a clear boundary line. One you were both nervous to cross. You both stayed on your respective sides of the bed as you lay awake dreaming for more. He wanted to reach for you, to whisper things that only this time of night emboldened him to. But he didn’t.

He stayed awake purposely now. He cursed himself for being such a lovesick fool but he wanted to savour every moment of laying here beside you. He heard you begin to breath deeper. Slipping into a contented sleep.

Knowing he was beside you, you felt almost protected. Safer. It allowed you to sleep peacefully, maybe deeper than you had in a while. You couldn’t describe it - you had never consciously noticed you had slept all that badly. But with how noticeably easier it was to have a restful sleep, it was now clear. It was as if you were… at peace.

As the morning sun began to wake and stretch its golden rays, you woke up. It was a pleasant feeling. A soft one. Especially when you shifted slightly and realised that you were being cradled by strong arms. You smiled, half asleep nestling further into their grip. The smell, it was familiar. It made you feel safe. Content. You moved back slightly. Pressing yourself flush to the body lying against you.

Your bodies had found each other in the night. Subconsciously moved towards each other. As if your sleepy states could share something that you hadn’t been able to when awake.

As you began to wake up properly, you tensed. Realising who had their arms around you. This sudden movement jolted you awake. You pulled you in tighter on instinct before completely pulling away and almost rolling from the bed in his shock at how you had spent the night.

He had sprung from you and so you mirrored his action. Your faces in shock. You were both, for once, speechless. Unsure what this meant. If the other was silent because they were horrified or possibly… pleased that this had happened?

God, you could only hope. Neither of you knew what to do or say. You just stared at the other from across the bed. The bed you had shared such soft intimacy.

You instead grabbed your stuff and went into the adjoining bathroom to get ready for the day. When you were finished, he had left. Your heart sunk. You didn’t know what to think.

You were scared he would go back to how he had been when you first met. Not wanting to even know you. Or tease you because of how you had shifted against him. Because he hated that he shared vulnerability with you. So he would distance himself again. You really couldn’t bear it if he did any of that. You wanted him close again. Your skin felt cold without his touch.

Since that evening neither of you could stop thinking about the other. More so than you ever had been. You were both consumed. Wholly.

Your mind was distracted, although you were having fun with your friends. You went to the beach a lot and plenty of parties but your mind couldn’t help moving to him every so often. The thought of sharing a bed with him. Having him by your side. It made you giddy.

You wanted him against you. His skin pressed against yours. His lips grazing yours. Hushed tones promising affection. Promising the world. You craved it. Craved him.

Both of you thought of the other. Longed for more through your respective days. Wished against everything that you could return to the other’s arms. But for Spike to let you in any further, he had to be sure. He so wanted to let you in but he didn’t want to get burned in the way that he was used to.

You crossed paths but managed to miss each other. Whether it was intentional or not on the other’s part you weren’t sure. But you sorely missed the other. It had only been a day or two and yet the space that the other held in your heart and mind was growing by the second.

He finally returned to the motel the night before you were set to return back to Sunnydale. You were worried he wouldn’t come back. You couldn’t help but smile when you saw him enter. He looked a little awkwardly around to begin with. You couldn’t look each other in the eyes straight away. You hadn’t spoken since you had been that close. It ached even now, to have him stood there and not be able to reach for him less he breaks your heart.

Spike had done some depraved things with a random swathe of the general public. He had tried it all but had never been rendered this speechless to face someone after spending the night in their bed. All you had done was cuddle up together and he could feel himself almost blushing at the idea of facing you.

You smiled slightly when you saw it was him. He had even knocked before he entered. You held yourself back from launching yourself at him and pulling him under your bedclothes. You instead spoke to fill the space. You asked if he wanted to travel back in Oz’s van with you and your friends but he muttered something about sticking something large and wooden through his chest instead.

You had been reading when he walked in, so instead he changed the subject. Not wanting you to hear his nasty comments – rather he wanted you to think of him and remember good things. He began to discuss the you the book with you. He had read it himself and was now managing to find his voice at last. You spoke animatedly and he smiled softly. Admired the way you had such enthusiasm.

He was watching your lips as you spoke. Even in the dim light of the room, to him you looked ethereal. As if you were glowing. He almost succumbed to his thoughts and spilled this aloud but something stopped him. An insecurity he had repressed perhaps.

Eventually you put your book away and began to move as if to turn off the lights. He took a pillow from the bed and began to move to a spot on the floor. You frowned and you spoke before you had a chance to stop yourself.

“Are you not taking the bed tonight?” You asked lightly, turning over to face away from him as you said it. Your heart was beating dangerously out of your chest. You didn’t realise but his would be too. Completely in time with yours.

You had hitched over to the same side as last time when you rolled over. Leaving him space to slide in beside you. You weren’t sure if he would take you up on your offer. Waiting was agony. He hadn’t replied and the silence was deafening. You started to become embarrassed at your offer. At the way he hadn’t replied.

Until you felt it. The bed dipped in beside you. He had slid into bed again. He lay facing you but left a notable space between you. You hadn’t realised but you had been holding your breath until he settled beside you. This meant so much.

After a moment, you turned to face him cautiously, gauging his expression. It was guarded but his arms began to move, snaking around you and when you smiled his actions became less tentative. It was a small smile that you shared but it meant so much. You pressed yourself closer, cradling him against you further.

It wasn’t an accident that night. It was confirmed to you. You cuddled on purpose. Shared something precious. Warmth and intimacy and hushed whispers filled your hearts. Neither of you wanted to succumb to sleep in case this wasn’t real in the morning.

You eventually fell asleep in the early hours, as the threat of light had began to intrude through the window. Wrapped around each other. It was the purest bliss. You never wanted to leave this moment. You just wanted to stay, arms draped around the other. As if you could take on the world. Protect each other. As if it was only the two of you that mattered in that moment.

You jumped awake, however, still tangled against him. You had overslept. You were late for the trip back. You were going to take the long way and stop off somewhere Cordy knew that was apparently insta-worthy. You rushed about to pack up and decided to leave him the key for when he woke up with a little note.

You turned to look at him, still sleeping before you left. But his eyes were open. That look in his eye, one you wouldn’t forget. He appeared almost forlorn that you were going to leave him that way. But you smiled, it was a warm smile. One that told him you didn’t regret a thing. That you had been right there with him.

He held onto that smile, the corners of his own mouth tugging slightly. He nodded his head and you turned and left. Hurrying to the others before they left without you.

You were doing dangerous things to him. Giving him hope. Hope that you could be more than friends…

#uc sunnyhell #spike x reader #spike imagine #spike x you #btvs #Buffy The Vampire Slayer #buffy the vampire slayer imagines #btvs imagine #btvs x reader #btvs x you #spike fic #gn reader #gender neutral

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beauenfer · 3 years

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True Happiness

ﾟ: *✧𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫: @beauenfer ﾟ: *✧𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4,651

ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ:⠀ *⋆.*: .: ⋆*･ﾟ: ﾟ .: ⋆*･ﾟ: .⋆

•‎𐩐 ༘ ✦* FANDOM: Buffy the Vampire Slayer

•‎𐩐 ༘ ✦* PAIRING: Angel x fem!Reader

•‎𐩐 ༘ ✦* WARNING: 18+, not very explicit but there’s sexual content, some language

•‎𐩐 ༘ ✦* SUMMARY: After an argument with Angel, reader doesn’t think he loves her. He shows up to her room that night to prove her wrong. But all actions have consequences, as the old saying goes

ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ:⠀ *⋆.*: .: ⋆*･ﾟ: ﾟ .: ⋆*･ﾟ: .⋆

“YOU THINK I WANTED THIS?” You cried, whipping around to look at the man you loved. But he was no more of a man than you were. He was a vampire, a killer. He’s hurt innocent people to fulfill his own boredom and pleasure, he had two hundred years on you, and he was considered a monster, yet you couldn’t help but fall in love. You must’ve looked crazy, at least to him. With your frizzy hair, red cheeks, quivering chin, and swollen, bloodshot eyes. You’d been fighting for over an hour, at least, over something you regret even admitting.

Angel looked at you with a simple frown, wearing the white tank top he always wore when it was just the two of you. He clenched his jaw, looking at the floor. And for some reason, that made you angrier. It made you think he couldn’t even look at you.

You quickly walked up to him, and shoved his chest in a fury you’ve never felt before. You felt like your skin was burning, a kind of rage that had you thinking dangerously. You couldn’t see due to your tears blurring your vision. They were relentless, falling down your cheeks, to your neck, down to your shirt in wet patches around the collar.

“What? You can’t even look at me?! Am I that repulsing to you?!” You exclaimed, wiping your tears with your palms to give yourself some dignity.

Suddenly, Angel’s face had morphed into his vampire one with a growl. He reached you in one big step and grabbed your wrists, forcing you to look at him. You sobbed as he jerked your arms, hovering over you as your legs seemed to have gotten weak.

“Do you love this, huh? You may think you love me but do you love this? The monster? Don’t stand there and tell me you love me when you don’t! I’ve killed people far more innocent than you and liked it! I loved to hear them scream, make them beg for mercy!” He hissed, his fangs poking out from behind his lips as he spoke with fervor. He was trying to give you all the reasons you shouldn’t love someone like him, trying to convince you he wasn’t worth loving. But you knew better than that.

“That wasn’t you! That wasn’t you!” You could barely breathe, closing your eyes because you couldn’t look at him. You were just rambling and sobbing all at once. Your chest felt like it was going to explode and your heart was hurting. You told him you loved him, you told him you didn’t care that he was a vampire, you put your heart of glass out in the open and it felt like he had crushed it. You didn’t think you’d be able to handle this rejection.

“It was me! I’m a killer! I’m a monster! Monster’s don’t love!” He growled, jerking you in his arms one last time before you fell to the ground, sobbing on the floor. Angel just turned around, clenching his fists.

You looked at the tattoo on the back of his shoulder, feeling something spark inside you that had your shaky legs standing you up. You closed your eyes for a few moments to calm your tears, a sudden realization that all this yelling was getting you nowhere.

You inhaled shakily, giving Angel your final words.

“I know what you are, perfectly well. You were a killer, you were a monster. But you’re not anymore. So stop trying to make me hate you.” You paused to see if he would react, he stayed turned away. Another tear fell down at the silence, but you continued.

“I love you, Angel. And I am so sorry for that. I didn’t mean to, it just happened. Shit happens. But it’s your decision whether or not you want to do anything about it.” You spoke through your teeth, wiping your nose with the sleeve of your flannel. When you still didn’t get a response, you scoffed to make one last jab at him.

You were hurt, taking his silence as your answer. You nodded your head wordlessly, snatching your bag off the couch and turning around to leave. In your departure, the flames from the fireplace roared, spitting out flames like it knew the pain you felt.

“Guess that’s it then.” You grimaced, walking towards the door.

Angel waited a few moments until he turned around, about to speak. He sighed when he saw an empty room staring back at him, mocking.

You were already gone.

ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ:⠀ *⋆.*: .: ⋆*･ﾟ: ﾟ .: ⋆*･ﾟ: .⋆

“Wait, you told him you loved him and he didn’t say it back?” Willow asked in astonishment, and you could just imagine her expression. Sitting on the edge of the bed just like you, a toothbrush in her mouth with her blue pajamas. Her nightly ritual before she went to bed.

You clenched the phone in your hand, looking down at your lap as you remembered. Your jaw hurt from yelling, your eyes hurt from crying, and you still couldn’t control your sniffling. It may have happened a fews hours prior, but it still felt like you were there, standing in front of the emotionless man you thought would love you, you thought you would be with forever.

Looks like you were wrong.

“Basically, yeah. I’m sorry, Willow, I don’t want to talk about it right now. It’s still just so... fresh, you know? And I just really feel like going to sleep to see if today was just a dream… I’ll tell you tomorrow. Me, you, the gang. Buffy’s house, right?” You forced a smile, but quickly went back to frowning. If you were being honest with yourself, you knew you didn’t feel up to hanging out with the gang tomorrow. You wanted to sit in bed and relish in your last day of isolation before your parents came back, a bowl of your favorite icecream as you had a romance movie marathon for the rest of the night. But you owed it to them, having spent the last few weekends with Angel, talking about his past, snuggling on the couch, and just enjoying each other’s company before you had to leave that morning. And who knows, maybe the get together with the gang would be the best thing for you. You really did miss them.

You heard Willow let out a sigh, feeling your sadness through the phone.

“Hey, if you’re not feeling up for it, we don’t have to. We can just do it next weekend!” Willow suggested, understanding how badly it can feel when you thought someone didn’t reciprocate your feelings. She always did have a thing for Xander, after all.

You let out a pathetic laugh, rubbing your nose with the tissue in your hand. You sniffled, shaking your head.

“Oh Willow, I can’t do that. I’ve missed out on so many nights as it is... Trust me, I’ll be all bright and bushy-tailed in the morning. Promise.” You smiled, hoping you could believe your own lies.

“Okay. Are you sure you’re gonna be okay by yourself tonight? I can come over, cheer you up with some sugary goodies!” Willow exclaimed, concerned for your well-being. She knew you were feeling fragile right now, and maybe a friend is what you really needed.

“Willow!” You giggled, admitting that this conversation has made you feel a little better. And had your voice always been that scratchy?

“Alright, fine. Remember, there’s plenty of guys who want to go out with you! Like, um, you know, Lucas. Or-or Thomas. Angel’s an ass.” Willow stated, making you let out a genuine laugh. You loved Willow’s loyalty, and the fact she was already trying to hook you up with someone else.

“Thanks, Willow, but I haven’t even stopped crying much less thought about moving on. I’m going to go to sleep now, okay? I love you.” You brought the tissue up to your nose, tears glazing over your eyes. You hated the fact that you couldn’t stop crying.

Willow nodded her head, slumped over.

“Love you, too. Be careful and dream good things. Like puppies.” Willow barely smiled, hearing your goodbye on the other end before hanging up the phone.

You did the same, sniffling some more. The house felt deafening, big and empty. There hasn’t been noise for the last week, ever since your parents went to LA for some convention. They were both doctors, which meant they were away a lot. You were always scared of being home alone, the knowledge of what ghastly things that could break in had you make Angel stay the night with you so you felt safe. But not tonight. Angel wasn’t going to protect from the silence, much less anything ever again.

You got off your bed to put your phone back in its socket, the sound of your own footsteps obvious in the quietness of the house. You wanted to cry, cry and cry and cry until you couldn’t possibly cry anymore. You wanted to scream and throw things in some way to relieve the pressure on your chest. But at the same time you were just exhausted, void of anything. Is this what it felt like to break up with someone? You didn’t know. Angel was the first boyfriend you ever had, and you thought he would be the last. But maybe, just maybe, Angel was right. Maybe monster’s couldn’t love.

You shuffled over to your nightstand, lighting up the candles there. They smelt like cherry blossom and rosewood, two sweet scents that gave life to your now dull senses. But as you lit the last candle, you felt that familiar gust of wind on your back, gently blowing your hair against your neck.

You heard the cars in the street below, the ruffling of the trees, and the buzzing of the wildlife outside your window. Your hand paused above the candles, hovering over the flame so that you could feel the heat on your palms.

“Can we talk?” His voice was also so quiet, so calm. It would have spooked you, the suddenness of it all, but you had gotten used to Angel showing up so unexpectedly.

You swallowed, closing your eyes so you didn’t cry. He didn’t deserve that satisfaction.

“I’ve already said what I wanted to say. You can leave.” You mumbled, ignoring him as you stayed turned around, trying to distract yourself with ruffling your pillows.

You didn’t hear him come closer, but you felt it.

“Please.” He sounded so pathetic, like you were the one who broke his heart. How dare he sound like you were the one to blame for the current situation. Even if he was trying to act like he gave a damn about your feelings, he was still acting like the gentlemen you knew him to be. With his please, his thank you’s, and his your welcome’s.

You felt uncomfortable; you really didn’t feel like having an even more heartbreaking discussion and having to act like it didn’t affect you. You didn’t have the strength not to cry.

Despite your bitterness, you couldn’t help but turn around at the sound of his voice, so sad. You had to breathe when you looked at him, the heavy atmosphere in your room making it seem stuffy. You had to breathe or else you’d choke on it. The candles flickered noisily behind you, and you could barely see Angel's face if it wasn’t for the moonlight.

He had on that same white tank top from earlier, his leather coat slung over it. He stood by the end of your bed instead of by the window, his fingers nervously fidgeting together. When you finally looked at his face, you didn’t have the strength to look him in the eye. Going by his features alone he looked broken. And you knew if you looked him in his maple-colored eyes you would see his sadness, and a million other sad things swirling in its depths. To be truthful, you knew if you looked into his eyes you wouldn’t have the strength to look away, and you would end up feeling that familiar flutter in your stomach only love could give someone. You knew you wouldn’t have the strength to say you hate him. Because in all reality you didn’t. You still loved him, and you always will.

You were a stubborn person though, known to hold grudges. So you crossed your arms and cocked out a hip, supporting your weight on one foot.

You cleared your throat, trying to give him the meanest look you could.

“Fine. Let’s start with why you’re here. Interrupting my alone time.” You gave him a sarcastic smile, not wanting him to think you were as affected by earlier as you actually were. You had suddenly gotten loud, the whispers voiced before forgotten. In your opinion, whispering would make it too intimate. And with your nerves, you just wanted to cover up the wobbliness in your voice.

Angel didn’t stop looking at you, perfectly statuesque.

“Like I said, we need to talk. And besides, I wanted to make sure you were okay. I know you don’t like being alone.” He still murmured, but that was usually how loud his voice got. One of the reasons you loved him. He was always your peace when you caused storms, the beast to your beauty and the cold to your hot. That was one thing Buffy always said. You two were just harmonious. You clicked.

You swallowed, but your throat was dry.

You felt a pull in your chest when he sounded like he cared, remembering your fear of your empty house. He wanted to make sure you were okay? You forced yourself not to focus on that.

“Well, I’m a big girl, Angel. I can handle myself against the big bad house.” You snipped, throwing your hands up impatiently. Truth was you wanted him to stay, stay and say he loved you. Stay and protect you like he’d been doing ever since you met him. But that inconsolable part of you wanted him to leave so he didn’t see you cry into your pillow.

He sighed.

“Listen, I think we both said things we shouldn’t have. I didn’t mean to get... physical with you. I never wanted you to see that part of me.” Angel looked down at the ground, ashamed. You just shook your head at the statement.

“What do you mean that part of you? Angel, you are aware that I knew you were a vampire, right? I looked past that because it doesn't define who you are.” You gave yourself the opportunity to drop the facade, but regretted it as soon as he looked up at you with those sad brown eyes.

You continued when all he did was look at you.

You took a step forward, everything you wanted to say earlier suddenly being poured out when you were supposed to be hating him. But now here you were about to expose your soul even more than you did before. See? You couldn’t be mean to Angel even if you tried.

“Angel, do you really think you being a vampire had anything to do with us? I knew you were a vampire long before I even met you. I didn’t care then and certainly didn’t care when we started dating. I didn’t fall in love with you because I wanted some fling with a guy who occasionally drunk blood so I can go around school and brag about how cool I am. I fell in love with you because... “ You couldn’t finish, getting distracted by the way he was looking at you. He looked at you like he’s always known you, like you were the only he would die for. He looked so intense, and your breathing had gotten a little heavier. You willed yourself to look into his eyes, stepping up to him.

“Because what?” Angel murmured, his breath fanning over your lips. You stood just below his chin, looking up at him with an undying devotion his eyes reflected.

You continued, your voice just as soft as his.

“I fell in love with you because you were always there when I didn’t even ask you to be, waiting to see who you’d had to kill whenever you’d see me cry. You’d always be the one asking if I’m okay, and you’d always make me feel like the most beautiful girl in the world. I fell in love with the way you’d hold me when you’d sleep and make me feel safe. I love how you were always so supportive, honest, and caring. You always made me feel special. I fell in love with the man... “ You tentatively reached up and touched his face with your palms, slowly rubbing your thumb on his cheek as a fond smile cracked through your frown.

“...not the monster.” You whispered, glancing down at his lips when he leaned closer and his fingers hesitantly traced along your hips. The space around you seemed electric, and your body buzzed to be touched by him. You leaned towards him pathetically, forgetting about how you were supposed to be crying your night away at the thought of what you and Angel could’ve been.

Angel kept glancing between your eyes and lips, more confident as his hands gripped your hips and he pressed his forehead against yours.

You closed your eyes and swallowed, struggling to catch a breath in the heat you were feeling. You both knew what you wanted, but you needed to hear him say it.

“(y/n)...” You hummed, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I love you, too. I love you more than life itself. I’m sorry I didn’t say it before I just didn’t know how.” Angel had his eyes closed, whispering his confession that had your heart swelling and smile growing. You felt something wet on your lips, a tear you didn’t realize had fallen. At this moment, nothing in this world mattered except you and Angel. Your love, your one and only. You were excited, excited for the future you were going to share with Angel. But you could barely focus on anything right now.

All you could focus on was how close Angel’s lips were to yours, how his hands gripped your hips like he couldn’t believe you were real, standing in front of him in your pink pajamas and fuzzy socks, the most beautiful he’d ever seen you. All that registered in your mind was how hot you were, the dim-lighting of your room and the crackling of the candles behind you, the smell of cherry blossom and rosewood getting you more worked up than you were.

Everything about this moment was perfect. The darkness, the moonlight, the candles.

But above all, the romance between two passionate lovers added to the ambiance.

You really couldn’t believe that Angel loved you.

“Angel.” You murmured, your nose bumping his.

“What?” He responded, his fingers digging into your skin.

“Kiss me already.” You breathed, already reaching up towards his lips.

It was with your permission did he finally do it, his arms quickly going around your waist and pushing you into his chest, kissing you with an intensity that made your heart swell. It was full of passion, and said the feelings the both of you were feeling but couldn’t put into words.

Your hands were in his hair, on his arms, anything you could grab as he bent down and picked you up. You jumped, seperating from him to wrap your legs around his waist, boosting you up to his height.

You couldn’t keep up with your own breaths, knowing your lips must’ve been puffy and pink just as his were. There was a moment where you both paused, equally as emotional and aroused as the other. You stared into each other's eyes, knowing what was about to happen but unsure how to go about it. You had never felt so vulnerable with another person and more loved than you did in that moment. Every word said earlier that day and every tear fallen was forgotten now, because all you could feel was happiness and love and every other emotion swelling in your chest.

“I love you.” It felt unfamiliar on your tongue to say, but that was the only thing you could say. You gripped his face and kissed him once again. He only took one step forward as you started shoving his jacket off his shoulders, his hands gripping your thighs as you landed on the bed, one of his hands going up towards your shoulder to support his weight on top of you. He fell between your thighs, his mouth going down towards your neck as he took his jacket off the rest of the way, throwing it to the floor behind him blindly. You let out a moan, opening your neck as your hands pulled at his hair.

You felt like crying, but not for the reasons you did earlier. You felt so loved, so cared for, so safe. Angel was the only one who made you feel like that, the only one that made you mad enough to care, the only one that could get you so emotional. You bit your lip when he nipped at your jaw, a smile breaking onto your face as your back arched into him.

In all the haze you were feeling, you didn’t acknowledge his hands languidly unbuttoning your pajama top. All you could feel was the coldness of his body and the coldness of his fingertips, but also the hotness of his mouth on your base of your neck.

You were letting out all kinds of desperate noises you never imagined you could make, leaning up and taking off your top Angel had unbuttoned. While you did that, your lustful gaze couldn’t leave Angel when he picked himself up on his hind legs and took off his tank top, just throwing to the side like he did with his jacket.

He stopped there, the candles illuminating both your faces in a flickering orange glow. He stared at you, at your white bra your heaving breasts were about to spill out of, the way you leaned back with heavy eyelids looking at him like you wanted to be devoured. He thought you looked so angelic, your hair laid out on the bed like a halo, but you were biting your lip and looking at him like you were nothing but sinful.

He felt the same way you did, pure love and devotion to you. It was then he realized, with you lying down beneath him and his fingers itching to touch you, that he would do anything for you. If you told him to leave, told him you never loved him in the first place, he would never feel the same. He loved you in a way that seemed to take control of his life. All he could think about was you, all he could see was you, and now all he wanted to do was feel you. Make you feel as good as you made him.

You grabbed the gold chain around his neck, pulling him down to your lips. As you moaned into his mouth, his hands were reaching up to grab at your breasts from above the material of your bra. You reached down and yanked your shorts off, but as quick a pace as it felt like, you were both going at a sweet pace, nothing but your breathy gasps and small moans filling the silence. He didn’t want to rush this. He wanted to touch you, feel you, be the only one to make you feel like this for the rest of your lives.

A few moments later, of confident strokes on your soft skin and you grabbing at everything you can, you both ended up fully exposed to the other, your clothes thrown all about the room as the soft fabric of the duvet helped you relax against the bed.

You grabbed at his shoulders as he thrust into you slowly, making sure you felt him inside you. Surely enough it made something pull in your stomach as you threw your head back against the mattress, your mouth wide open as you breathed a moan into Angel’s ear.

He had his head buried into your neck, letting out a few groans of his own when you would clench around him. Your nails dug into the griffin tattoo on his shoulder, beads of blood poking through but immediately being healed as quickly as they came.

You couldn’t stop from moaning directly into his ear, one of your hands holding the back of his head into your neck as he thrust into you some more. You felt so full and good, feeling every time he would slide out and back in because it would send another pleasurable pulse up into your core.

Your heart was beating wildly in your chest, Angel could feel it against his own from the way he held you to him so tightly. You felt another tear fall from your eyes as he continued on, making you feel things you knew no one else could ever make you feel. You felt like sobbing he felt so good, but that was not only from the tightness in your stomach and the hot pleasure in your core, but also because you loved this man with your whole being, and just thinking about the intimacy the two of you were sharing made you emotional.

Angel was holding you so tightly and driving into you so passionately it wasn’t long before you had reached your peak, crying his name out into your room as he growled in your ear, finishing the same time as you in one more thrust that you curling your toes and grabbing the blanket between your fingers.

When you were both done, he held you underneath the covers, you curled against his chest and sleeping soundly, a tingling still in between your legs.

He told you he loved you one last time before he went to sleep himself, a tender kiss on your forehead the last thing he did before closing his eyes.

ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ:⠀ *⋆.*: .: ⋆*･ﾟ: ﾟ .: ⋆*･ﾟ: .⋆

Angel snapped his eyes open at the crack of thunder, a pain in his chest that had him gasping for air as he collapsed out of the bed, the heavy pounding of rain blocking out his cries as he crawled to the window.

You were still blissfully asleep, an absent smile on your face as you clutched the blanket up to your chin on the other side of the bed, the rain lulling you into a deeper sleep.

Angel looked up at the sky as he gripped at his chest, groaning in pain on your bedroom floor as the moonlight shone down onto his nude form, curled into himself at the agony. As his soul died inside of him, all he could think about was you. His love, his salvation, his true happiness.

You see, you loved Angel with all your heart, you would do anything for him, die for him, love him in a way he’d never been loved before. Angel was your calm in the storm, the only sane thing in your crazy, crazy world, you would be aimless if you didn’t have him by your side. You planned on waking up snuggled into the love of your life, a smile on your face and a new glow to your skin.

But Angel was no longer the man you loved. He had become the monster because you were his weakness, the only thing in this cruel world he truly cared about. It was because he loved you that he could no longer.

It was because you were his true happiness, did his curse get revoked, because the man you loved had turned into the monster he always was.

Angelus.

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