Tara’s declaration after over an hour of silence brought her Buffy and Spike’s attention – and twin looks of panic in their eyes. “What?!” they exclaimed in unison.
“I can’t break the spell. That doesn’t mean it can’t be done,” Tara clarified. “Buffy’s going to have to do it.”
Spike’s gaze shifted warily between Tara and Buffy. “But you’ll supervise, right, Glinda?”
“There’s not really anything to supervise.” Tara cleared her throat, looking down slightly, away from the intense stares of the vampire and the slayer. “See, um, when Buffy said she did the spell to herself and not you, Spike, she was technically right. She’d didn’t cast a spell on your…um…on you. She put a spell around herself to protect her from what she’s afraid of.”
Spike cut his eyes over towards Buffy. “You’re afraid of my penis?”
“No!” Buffy replied quickly.
“You took that a little too literally, Spike,” Tara said. “She’s not afraid of your, um, penis. She’s afraid of what it represents.”
“So we’re getting Freudian now, are we? Bloody lovely.”
Tara blushed. “I don’t really know how to even say this, and since I obviously can’t get inside Buffy’s head, this is all speculation, but going on this spell and, um, recent events, what I would say is that Buffy’s probably afraid she can’t resist the temptation of a physical relationship with you. So she, um, protected herself by removing that temptation.”
Spike glared at Buffy. “You better be bloody glad it didn’t remove the temptation completely. You’d be a footnote in history, Slayer,” he growled.
“I’m sorry,” Buffy muttered, though she knew the words didn’t really mean anything to either of them at this point.
“Well, stop being sorry and fix it,” Spike snapped.
“How do I do that?” Buffy asked, turning her attention back to Tara. “Are there like, magic words I’m supposed to say?”
“It’s not quite that easy. In order for the spell to break, it needs to no longer have a purpose.”
Spike looked panicked at that. “No longer have a purpose? What do you mean?”
“Don’t worry, Spike. She doesn’t have to do anything to you,” Tara assured him. “She just has to…stop being afraid.”
“Of my penis. Or what it represents. Or whatever.”
“Yeah.”
Spike turned towards Buffy again. “So?” He gestured towards his crotch. “Fix it.”
Buffy stood there for a moment, staring at Spike, before she declared, “I can’t!”
“What do you bloody mean you can’t?” Spike demanded. “You did this to me, Slayer. You can sodding undo it. Now.”
“I can’t!” Buffy said again. “There’s…” She glanced between Spike and Tara. “There’s too much pressure!”
Spike threw his arms up in the air. “You have got to be bloody kidding me.” He got up and grabbed his charred blanket off the floor. “I’m out of here. Thanks for your help, Glinda.”
“You can’t just leave!” Buffy argued.
“Why the hell not?” Spike yelled. “You’re not making things any better, and I need a sodding drink.”
“Spike, wait!” Buffy said, trying to grab his arm as he stormed past her. He shook her off and left the room, slamming the door behind him.
Buffy sank down in the chair Spike had just vacated. “I so hate myself right now.”
“I’m sorry there’s not an easier fix,” Tara said. “Although I could keep looking for something.”
“I’d appreciate it if you would. And I’m sure Spike would, too.”
“I don’t doubt that. But in the meantime, maybe you could work on trying to, um, not be afraid?”
“I’m not afraid,” Buffy insisted as she crossed her arms defensively over her chest. “This is just…not a road I can go down with Spike.”
Tara didn’t point out that it seemed like it was a road she was already on. “Well, you don’t have to keep…sleeping with him. You know, if that’s really something you don’t think you should be doing. But maybe you could, I don’t know…figure something out where you’re not as worried about being tempted?”
“God, I wish that wasn’t even an issue. I can’t believe I’m even attracted to Spike, never mind apparently helpless against his charms, or whatever.” Buffy dropped her head into her hands. “What’s wrong with me?”
Tara got up from the bed and knelt beside Buffy, her hand on her shoulder. “Buffy, nothing’s wrong with you. You’ve…well, you’ve really been through something. And maybe being with Spike has made you feel a little better.”
Buffy looked at Tara. “Why aren’t you judging me? Why aren’t you telling me I’m wrong?”
“Why would I do that?” Tara asked, her brow furrowing.
“Because I am.”
“No. Buffy, no. I mean, yeah, Spike’s a vampire, but as far as vampires go, he’s not so bad. He…he’s always been nice to me. Relatively speaking at least. And he’s done a lot of good recently. It wouldn’t make you wrong to have feelings for him.”
“No, I am,” Buffy insisted, shaking her head. “I…I came back wrong.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Spike…he…he can hurt me. Ever since I came back, he can hurt me and the chip doesn’t fire. And he says it’s still working otherwise.”
“That doesn’t mean you came back wrong,” Tara said, knowing Buffy needed her support more than anything else right now. If Buffy was scared enough to do something like that spell, then she needed more help than just undoing her mistake. “You probably just came back different. The spell scrambled up how the chip reads you or something. But you’re still the same Buffy.”
“How can you be so sure of that?”
“Do you remember when you switched bodies with Faith?”
“Kinda hard to forget something like that.”
“Well, then you also remember how I knew it wasn’t you. But now, you’re you, Buffy. I’d be able to see it if you weren’t the same, and you are.”
“Then why can’t I keep from wanting Spike?”
Tara shrugged. “’Cause he’s hot?” Buffy looked at Tara, wide-eyed in surprise, and Tara couldn’t help but giggle. “Hey, just because I’m a lesbian doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate something pretty.”
Buffy giggled back in response. “Yeah, I guess he is rather pretty. Though he’d be soo pissed off to hear us say that.”
“Oh yeah. He’d be all growly with the ‘grr, I’m the Big Bad,’” Tara replied, scrunching up her face and doing her hands like claws.
Buffy laughed, feeling a little better. She realized she’d never really spent any one-on-one time with Tara, and was wondering now why she hadn’t. She felt better after talking to her about this, and somehow, she thought that probably wouldn’t be the case, had she been having the same conversation with Willow or Xander.
After a moment, however, she sobered again. “I need to end things with him, though, don’t I?”
“I can’t answer that for you, Buffy,” Tara replied. “No one can speak for what’s in your heart but you.”
“But everyone else will. If I actually got together with Spike, they’d all hate me.”
“Is that what you’re worried about, Buffy? What your friends will think of you if you’re with him?”
“Not only that,” Buffy replied. “He’s…he’s evil. I mean, even with the chip, he’s evil.”
Tara took her hand off Buffy’s shoulder and looked down. “He helped out a lot this summer, Buffy. He…he didn’t know you were coming back and he still helped out. He helped us fight, and he took care of Dawn.”
“Are you saying I should be with him?” Buffy asked.
“I can’t tell you either way,” Tara answered. “But obviously, it’s something you’re not really sure of. If you didn’t have any feelings for him at all, this wouldn’t be an issue.”
“You’re right,” Buffy admitted, her voice barely above a whisper.
“Maybe the best way to deal with this is to try to figure out what you’re really feeling for him and what you truly want. Then you might not have to worry about whether or not you can fight the temptation anymore.”
“What if I don’t like what I find?”
“You’ll never know until you look.”
Buffy swallowed. Tara was right, and with the current situation, she couldn’t just go around ignoring it. That wasn’t fair to Spike, and she knew that was something she needed to be concerned about, even if it would be easier to bury her head in the sand.
She’d broken him; she had to fix him.
“I should go find Spike,” Buffy said as she got to her feet.
“I’ll keep looking for another solution to the problem,” Tara said as she stood as well. “I’ll call you if I find anything.”
“Thanks, Tara. I really appreciate this.”
Tara nodded. “And I won’t say anything to anyone else either. This will stay between you and me.”
“Thank you.” Buffy gave Tara a small smile before leaving the dorm in search of her vampire.
It wasn’t hard to find Spike. Buffy knew him well enough to head straight for Willy’s, and sure enough, he was there at the bar, bottle in front of him.
“Bloody hell, Slayer, can’t you just leave a man to suffer in peace?” Spike grumbled as Buffy took a seat on the stool beside him.
“I wanted to talk to you. Tara said we couldn’t fix your little, um, problem until I dealt with my issues or whatever.”
Spike looked over at her harshly and said in a snarled whisper. “Don’t talk about that in here.”
Buffy looked around at the handful of other male demon patrons and decided she wouldn’t add insult to injury. “Sorry.”
“Just go away, Buffy. Leave me to suffer in peace.”
“But I want to help.”
“Well, it’s not all about what you want.”
“Spike…”
Spike turned on her, his nostrils flaring. “No, Slayer. I’m bloody tired of being your sodding puppet. You’ve been knocking me back and forth like a rubber ball ever since you came back. You come to me for a bit of cold comfort, then you decide I’m not good enough for you, so you smack me back down. And now, you’ve done the stupidest thing you could possibly do just so you wouldn’t have to make the effort to control your own bloody hormones. I’m not going to sit here and listen to you pretend like you give a rat’s arse about me just so you can go to sleep tonight with a clean conscience.” He stood up and plucked the bottle from the bar. “I told you the other morning I was done being your whipping boy, and I meant it. I’m through here.”
He stormed out towards the sewer exit in the back, coat swirling behind him, and Buffy felt a lump rising in her throat. Since when did Spike walk away from her? She scrambled down from the barstool and ran after him.
As soon as he heard her footsteps following him into the otherwise deserted back room, Spike wheeled around, struggling to keep his anger in check now that he knew he could hurt her. “That was me leaving you behind, Slayer. Can’t you take a fucking hint?”
“But…but you can’t just go,” Buffy argued.
“Why? Because it doesn’t fit in with what you want? Ask me if I care.”
Buffy blinked. Spike was never like this with her, not since he’d decided he was in love with her. Not even when they were fighting. He seemed so…cold. “Spike, please. I just want to talk to you.”
“There’s nothing for us to talk about! What you did…” He shook his head. “You used magic to manipulate me, Slayer. You knew how I feel about magic. You knew, and you still went right on and did this. And I don’t care how your dress it up or try to rationalize it, you did this to me. Even if all the spell did was make you not want me anymore, your aim was to hurt me in favor of sparing yourself.”
Buffy shook her head. “Spike, no. That wasn’t it. I…I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
“Yes you were!” Spike bellowed, making Buffy shake from the strength of it. “I love you, and you pissed on that! You don’t care one bit about my feelings. It’s all about you.” He shook his head. “You know, Slayer, if you didn’t want me, then you shouldn’t have started things in the house that night.”
“Things got out of hand then,” Buffy said. “I…you could hurt me, and…”
“Save it. I honestly don’t care one way or another why you did it anymore. You and I both know what there really is between us, and we also both know that you’re never going to do anything but deny it.” He stepped closer to her, their bodies almost touching, and Spike could hear Buffy’s heart pounding in her chest. “You spend so much time focusing on titles. Slayer, vampire – like that’s all we are. But I’m a man, too, Buffy, same as you’re a woman. Only you’ll never see that. You’ll never let yourself see it.”
“Spike…”
“Sod off, bitch,” he snarled before storming out, slamming the door hard enough to shake the room.
Buffy stared at the closed door, dumbfounded.
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