Title: Waiting for the End of the World
Author: Annalore
E-mail: lseghatoleslami@rocketmail.com
Summary: Companion to "What I Once Loved." Read that one first. Spike reflects on his new life.
Spoilers: Nothing specific.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Needless to say, the characters in this story do not belong to me. They are the property of Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy and 20th Century Fox, and I'm sure UPN has some sort of rights to them...
Feedback: Oh, pretty please, would you? And read and review anything else I’ve ever written, too?
Distribution: Not My Boyfriend, http://www.midnightmist.net/fiction, and all mailing lists this is being sent to. All others — ask, and you shall (probably) receive.
Pairing: Buffy/Spike
Notes: This, as indicated, is a companion piece to my story "What I Once Loved." That story can be found at

We live together now. But not in the house she used to keep like it was a hotel. She got rid of that place after… well, after. Neither of us like thinking about it. Neither of us can stand to remember how it used to be. If she hadn’t asked me to move into her new apartment, I would’ve found a new crypt pretty soon.

It was the night it happened that she first came to me. I didn’t even know yet. She fed me some story about helping her in an icy calm tone, then took me to a cheap motel on the edge of town where she’d got a room for the night. I made love to her in that dingy room on the lumpy mattress, and she cried in my arms, so hard I thought she’d never stop.

She cries a lot. She misses her home, regrets giving it up. But she didn’t have the money to keep it, and without little sis brightening the place, there was no use in it either way. She sold everything — the furniture, the knickknacks, the appliances — and bought new things. A little over the top if you ask me, but it was what she needed to help herself feel normal.

She asked me to help with the shopping. I wasn’t sure she’d even talk to me, after we’d slept together, but miraculously enough, she did. She wanted my opinion on the curtains, told me to pick out the bed sheets I liked best. She said she’d be too lonely living by herself. I couldn’t speak for loving her so much at that moment.

We’ve got a nice little place. Cozy. Buffy’s got a knack for decorating, I’ve discovered. She’s done it in natural colors, pine and oak for the furniture to match the hardwood floors, deep beige sofas with maroon trimming and throws, lacy curtains that blow in the breeze. Cream color sheets that she ended up picking after all.

It doesn’t give her a lot of pleasure, but it does give her some, knowing that she’s got her own place, and that it’s beautiful. At first, when she used to come home from the Doublemeat Palace dead tired, she’d collapse onto the couch, and I’d sit at her feet, rubbing her ankles. I could see how much it relaxed her, being home at long last.

She’s got a better job now. One where she doesn’t have to stand all day long and put up with the indignities of catering to overweight slobs who care not a lick about her life. She’s taking a class at the University too. She’s trying to be happy. But every time a smile starts to appear on her face, she remembers that she had a sister, an almost-daughter.

And she cries. She cries long and bitterly, seeking refuge in my arms. I cry along with her, and we fall into bed, stripping each other desperately, both remembering the girl we swore to protect. I’m not sure if the tears streaming down her cheeks are hers or mine as I enter her. I can’t tell if it’s me that cries out, or her, as she quivers beneath me. It doesn’t matter. We both failed.

End.

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