Chapter 42, Part 1: The Answer
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What did she crave more than anything in this life?
The answer dawned on her the moment it threatened to slip away.
Suddenly, she felt it in his cooling skin; heard it in his shallow breath, saw it in his icy, sparkless gaze. In that suspended instant, Buffy Summers knew exactly what she craved.
It wasn't him. Not entirely. Yes, she loved him, and she'd loved him for months, long before it even made sense. But what she truly wanted, needed, had to have? Was what they could become together. She hadn't been aware of it at the time, but her every transgression with Spike was her way of coaxing that barren seedling to a vibrant, brilliant bloom.
"Come on," she urged, patting his face with a blood-soaked palm. "Stay with me. I love you!" Why wasn't his chest moving? Why was he still bleeding? Wasn't love supposed to save the fucking day? "Spike! Please! I know the answer!"
"I didn't mean for this to happen," Lindsey was muttering to himself, sitting on the floor, shell shocked. "I didn't mean to..."
What did he think would happen, bringing a gun and his batshit sister in here?
"Move," someone said behind her. Garrett. "Keep his arms down."
Buffy panicked. "Don't move him, he -- he could get hurt."
"I know what I'm doing," Garrett said, pressing hard on his chest and checking his pulse. He'd been a medic in some war, Buffy remembered Spike mentioning that now. "What happened?"
"I killed her," Lindsey said, voice hollow and haunted.
"She tried to shoot Lindsey," Buffy explained, trying desperately to keep it together. "Spike got in the way. His hand is getting cold!"
"It's okay, he's in shock. He's not dead. Hey, look at me, man," he told Spike. "We're gonna fix you up. Good as new."
Spike blinked. That was a good sign, right? She kissed his hand, squeezed it. Wiped her teardrops from his forearm.
"Put his arm down, Buffy," Garrett reminded her firmly, and she backed away, let him do what he needed to.
Her ears seemed to fill with gauze then, muffling all the sound in the room. She watched the scene unfold as if it were a movie: Garrett kept talking to Spike, kept him awake, controlled the bleeding. The medevac crew arrived, put Spike in a stretcher. All the while, she caught flashes of Lilah's lifeless stare, her crumpled doll limbs. The splatter of red on the wall.
As they wheeled him out, she tried to follow but Garrett stopped her, said there wasn't enough room on the helicopter.
"But--" she felt her throat constrict, "he... he doesn't know the answer."
"He knows, Buffy," Garrett said, leaving Spike's blood on her shoulder. "We all know."
At that, he glanced at Lindsey, who looked up at them, lost.
"Cops are coming," Garrett told her. "You help him out with that. You need anything, you call Nigel. You hear?"
Numbly, she nodded.
Left alone with a dead body and her broken husband, she leaned against the wall, and hugged herself.
He sniffled.
She peered at him. "Are you--"
"Don't talk to me," Lindsey said, so she didn't say another word.
* * *
He surrendered to the police, told them more than he should have. They were questioned for hours. When they got to the station, Spike's lawyer met them. Lindsey refused the help at first, but the power of persuasion, and his exhaustion, won out.
Nigel came with bail money and news that Spike was still in surgery, that he probably would be for several more hours.
Buffy burst into tears, and Nigel held her. He assured her that Spike had the best care possible, had his own blood stored for transfusions--
"He's alive," she said, shaking her head. "I was so afraid..." She wiped her wet face. "I want to be there when he wakes up."
"I'll see to it that you are," Nigel said, but then she caught a flicker of doubt in his eyes; one that told her he wasn't altogether convinced he would wake up.
Buffy had lost enough people in her life to take that flicker seriously. As much as she wanted to hope for the best, she had to brace herself for the worst.
She called Fred, asked if she and Charles could take the dog for a few days. She nearly broke down again when Fred asked if everything was okay.
Nothing was okay. It seemed like nothing would ever be okay again.
* * *
Lindsey wasn't freed until after dark. He didn't look at her, just pushed past her to get outside, where they were mobbed by reporters. Who shot your father? What happened in that hotel room? Is this your wife? Are you Buffy Summers? Did you have an affair with Spike Pratt?
Disoriented by the chaos and bright lights, they found each other's fingers and, hands joined, made their way to the car Nigel had arranged to wait for them.
"Where to?" the driver asked.
Where else could they go but home? As much as she wanted to be at the hospital, Nigel made her promise to wait until Spike had a room that they could sneak her into, and Lindsey... he had no one right now. Buffy gave the driver their address.
When they opened the door to the loft, the reality that it wasn't her home anymore became painfully clear. Without Huey, it was cold and unwelcoming. There was nothing left for her. Nothing but the painting.
"I'm gonna shower, if that's okay with you." She flipped on the hallway light, shrugged off her coat.
"You really met my mom?"
She turned to Lindsey. He looked even more adrift than she felt. "Yeah."
"Is she..." He put his hands in his pockets. "What's wrong with her?"
With a sigh, Buffy gauged the Scotch bottle he'd left on the hallway table. Just enough for two.
He lowered his eyes to the floor.
"Have a seat," she told him. She went to the kitchen to pour them each a glass, sat down beside him, and told him everything she knew.
* * *
Some time later, she found herself staring at Lindsey, who had fallen asleep on the couch. He looked like a kid.
She took off his shoes, covered him in a blanket, tried to smooth his furrowed brow, and said, "I have to go see your father now."
On her phone, the message read:
Condition stable. G is waiting in your parking garage.
* * *
They were flamenco dancing on a giant chessboard, to a strange, twisted version of Let's Face The Music And Dance.
He pulled her close, and they began to tango. "Gonna tell me the answer?"
She smiled. "I thought you already knew."
"Well, yeah. It's what I been trying to show you all along." They spun. "I wanna hear it from you."
He dipped her. She laughed.
"Well?"
"I forget the question."
Spike pressed his cheek to hers. "What do you crave--"
"Boss," Garrett said. "You're awake."
Buffy opened her eyes. The hospital room. Garrett, Nigel, knitting needles in hand... staring at the bed.
Spike was awake?
Spike was awake!
No excitement, the doctor had stressed, giving her an especially pointed look.
Forcing her demeanor to a quiet calm, Buffy pursed her lips and said, "Hey."
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A/N: The rest of the above scene plays out in the previous chapter, in case you forgot.
A NOTE ABOUT PLAGIARISM: Don't do it. Call me crazy, but I don't like finding my hard work pasted into other people's stories. If I find out you've plagiarized me or any other author, I will make sure everyone knows it. If you're not clear on what 'plagiarism' means, the definition is here.