Title:    Endings and Beginnings
Author:   Sandy
Feedback: sp23twop@yahoo.com
Rating:   R for a couple naughty words
Spoilers: BtVS through Storyteller; AtS through Calvary
A/N:  With all the discussion lately regarding JM in any Buffy
      spinoff Joss produces, I started speculating just how Spike
      would end the season.  I am totally unspoiled for future
      episodes so this is entirely my own speculation

The house is quiet now.  Seems strange after all the racket the
Potentials have been makin' for the last few months.  Hard to believe
that the fight's over now and we won without losin' anyone, without
really fighting.  Just holdin' hands and singing Kumbaya.  Guess The
Beatles were right after all; all you need is love.

It's been over a month now.  Xander and Anya have gone back to their
own apartments.  The little boy Andrew turned himself in for his
friend's murder.  Don't know if he'll ever be prosecuted though;
can't seem to find a body or any other evidence.  Rupert's been
taking the little girls back home.  He looks wore out, poor bastard,
but it's down to just Molly and Kennedy now.  I don't think Kennedy's
goin' anywhere.  She and Red seem to be pretty tight now.  When Rupes
takes Molly home to Jolly Old England, he's staying.  He and the few
Watchers that escaped The Bringers are goin' to try and rebuild The
Watcher's Council.  Some of them have already gotten access to the
funds and have been sending support to Buffy and Faith, the second
slayer.  Good on them.  'bout time they ponied up.

I'm still here, living in Buffy's basement.  I should probably leave,
move back to my crypt, but she hasn't told me she's ready for me to
leave yet, so I stay.  Tonight I'm upstairs watchin' the telly.  It's
just an excuse really to be up here for when Buffy comes home.  She's
out again with the Principal.

At last I hear his car pull up.  I act all casual-like.  Don't want
Buffy to know I've been waitin' for her.  But when she comes in the
door, I know.  I know just the same way I knew what Xander and Anya
did in my cot that night.  The same way I knew that Willow and
Kennedy had moved on from kissing.  I look at her, and I smell her,
and I know.

I sit frozen; a corpse.  That's what I am really - a corpse.  A dead
thing that doesn't have the sense to lie down.  Buffy looks at me,
sees my face and goes still.  Finally she moves towards me.

That's right Buffy, come on.  If you're going to stake me, bloody
just do it!

She picks up the remote control and turns the television off.
Sitting on the coffee table she looks at me and goes in for the
kill.  Well she's the Slayer, ain't she?  Knows how to give the coup
de grace.  Taking a deep breath she says the words.  Says the words
I've been waitin' over two fucking years to hear.  The words that
girl Cassie told me she'd tell me one day.

"Spike, I love you."  I don't move.  I'm a corpse and corpses are
inanimate.

"I love you," she says again, "but I can't be with you.  I want
more.  I want children and a husband who can go to their Little
League games with me and on afternoon picnics.  I want a normal life."

She has tears in her eyes.  Those tears that turned me from the Big
Bad to whatever the hell I am now.

"Robin asked me to marry him tonight.  I said yes."

Well, that's that then.  I stand up.  Amazing, I'm a corpse but I can
move.  I think I tell her congratulations.  I turn and go to my
basement bedroom.  I can hear her crying.  Or maybe it's me.

I stand there for a while and then I go to the chest where I have my
things.  Not much there.  Some jeans, a few shirts, the jacket I wore
before Buffy called back Big Bad.  I take them out and looking around
I spot an old knapsack.  I take it.  Yeah, it's stealing, but
hey, 'Evil' remember?  Folding everything neatly, I pack up my
clothes.  I hear water running now, so I know Buffy's gone upstairs.
I pick up my old leather duster.  I had thought about giving it to
Wood after I found out about his mother, but it's mine now.  It's one
of the costumes I wear.

I go upstairs and open the refrigerator; take out the packets of
pig's blood in there.  Decide to drink one for the road.  I take my
mug out of the cupboard.  It's a promotional mug from a life
insurance company.  Ironic, innit?  A vampire that dealt death for
over 120 years drinking pig's blood from a mug advertising life
insurance.  After my meal, I rinse out the cup and place in on the
drain board, then think again and throw it away.  Nobody else will
want to drink from it.

I don't leave a note.  I don't say goodbye.  I open the backdoor and
leave.  I have enough money in my pocket for a tank of gas and some
oil for the motorcycle I still have stashed away.  Not sure where
I'll end up, but for now, well Angel has his soul back again so maybe
I'll head on down to LA for awhile.  Tell him Buffy's good news.  We
can get pissed together.

But I swear if he starts singing, I'll stake him.