SPOILERS: None. Nada. Zip. I think. Possible slight spoiler for "Flooded".
SUMMARY: Sequel to "Those Graces," a short-fic dealing with a bit of aftermath after "Afterlife" (try saying that five times fast...I triple-dog-dare 'ya...) -- but this can be read as a stand-alone. Post-Flooded. Spike helps Buffy get a grip after The Meeting with Angel. B/S in spirit.
FEEDBACK: Does Giles need to come home (and stay home)? Urm, duh...and yes. In other words: please?
DISCLAIMER: Count von Whedon owns it all. I'm just a poor serf with too many thoughts in her head.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: I have come to the conclusion that I listen to far too much Tori Amos and Radiohead. Everything's all bittersweet and...splotchy. Inspiration came from the sad parts of the movie "Casper" -- mock me if you must, karma's a bitch. Lompoc is in SoCal (urm, duh); I guesstimated it from mapquest.com to be about an hour's drive north of LA. I'm not too familiar with SoCal, 'cause I live in Sacramento, so uh...yeah. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.


PRETTY HATE MACHINE


This is how things are now.

He nods his head and pretends to listen. Sometimes he
really does, for hours on end -- or maybe it's just minutes
that seem like hours (he doesn't know.) Other times he
can't make himself try.

It's not that he doesn't care. Because that's what got him
in this mess in the first place, for christsakes. He
thinks the problem might be that he cares too much. No,
scratch that -- that doesn't make any sense. He has a
short attention span, no patience, too much of that
mid-twenties masculine adrenaline that came packaged
alongside eternity. Gift with purchase.

Yes, that's the problem. Because she doesn't like to do
much these days, but sit and contemplate...or, rather,
brood. And he *hates* brooding.

And it got so much worse after her road trip to Lompoc.
Her and the other met halfway; she took the bus.

She came back the next day saddened and confused and she
was saying selfish things and he wonders how someone like
that can break so easily after all they've been through.

He has a question to ask: 'Did the poofter cry?' But
that'd just upset her, because there is no way that he
could ask that and *not* ask out of contempt. And it's a
stupid question.

*He* cried. Manly tears. Of the evil sort.

And he is definately *not* jealous. Of Angel.

So it goes:
Angel broke. Angel put himself back together. Angel is
rock-solid, now. Angel broods less these days.

That pissed her off.

The first thing she said was, "He was so...cool...and like,
collected. Unphased by the Dead-Ex Lazer Beam. How rude
is *that*?"

Spike just laughed. She glared at him. He stopped
laughing. It wasn't even that funny.

He knows she wanted to see Angel shattered. Like everyone
else was. Bits and shards of who they once were and could
perhaps someday be again, scattered across the tiled floor
and weedy grass, waiting for their savior and she was their
savior. She returned to make them feel whole again, make
them feel again. And there He was, two hours away, a
million miles away. And he was okay.

Yeah, that really pissed her off.

"Why didn't the world end?"

"Wasn't that, uh, kinda why you jumped?"

And he wants to tell her, explain to her, *prove* to her,
that the world *did* end when she died. It stopped and
spun and spun in the wrong direction and stopped again,
leaving those that remembered dizzy and defeated. It
crumbled to dust and *he* crumbled to dust and jesus
*fucking* christ why can't that be enough?

"I feel recycled. Like a soda bottle. When I'm done, just
place me in the proper trash can and in five to seven weeks
I'm back again. But instead they'll make me like a...a
milk jug or something, and I get so lost..." She stops,
realizing how ridiculous she sounds. Then: "He didn't need
me."

"Are you *daft*?" She furrows her brow at him. "Who cares
if Angelus got over it? He's a selfish git." Not the
point. "Do you think the A-Team played Moral Badmitton
with the hocus-pocus just so you could help them with the
heavy books? People lived because of what you did...but,
some people...I mean, other people *died* because of what
you did. They didn't know how to live without you." It's
the truth, and he wonders, sometimes, if maybe they weren't
*just* being bad by bringing her back...they were
just...really really lost and they're really young, and he
doesn't think he can blame them, anymore.

"And what about you?" she asks. He suddenly has a newfound
appreciation for his boots. She's standing a little closer,
now. He's a little concerned. "The spell wasn't your
idea. You...were living without me."

"Nuh-uh," he remarks in a tiny voice. Then he looks her in
the eye. "Big difference between living and existing."

They're standing in her front yard. She sits down on the
cold lawn. He takes a moment, then sits next to her.
Sixteen heartbeats later she lays back, getting
comfortable, and he waits for her to start mumbling some
cliché about the stars being so beautiful at night and how
they remind her of the heavens. But there's nothing.
She's just...quiet. He lays down next to her and doesn't
say a thing. His fingers lace together, cradling the back
of his head from the barely-wet grass, and he's pretty damn
sure he could just fall asleep, right there in front of her
house, and she's so friggin' close he can taste her though
he can't touch her.

And as his eyelids close by their own accord, he feels her
tiny fingertips and her tiny nails tangle in his hair,
playing with it, rubbing the hair gel out of the thick,
curled clumps. Occasionally her warm hand bumps one of his
wrists. He opens his eyes, because things like this happen
in his dreams and he doesn't want this to be a dream.
She's voluntarily touching him. Then suddenly she stops her
actions and rests her hand against his forearm -- still
touching, because she knows he misses warm skin.

"I think I get that now."