A/N: Stuckey's is an actual chain in the southern states and one I remember eating at as a child when my family traveled. If we were good, my parents would let us each have a pecan log to chew on in the car.
Spike couldn't believe she'd wanted to come with him. Even as they headed down the highway, Atlanta rapidly receding in the distance, he kept stealing glances at Buffy curled up in the passenger seat. It was five hours until they hit New Orleans, just the two of them alone in the car. He thought of turning on the radio to fill the awkward silence, but their tastes in music had always been radically different and he didn't want to start an argument over some stupid pop song.
They had to say something to each other at some point; if nothing else, they were going to have to stop for gas at some point and Buffy would probably need to take care of business. The question was, could they hold the silence until then?
"How long?"
Buffy's voice was so unexpected, he almost started. "How long what, luv?"
"How long were you...gone? Before the amulet brought you back, I mean."
He had to think for a minute, tote the dates up in his head. "Almost three weeks. Amulet got mailed to Angel at his posh digs and when he opened the envelope, suddenly there I was. Didn't seem like that long to me; one moment I was in the Hellmouth and the next I was in Angel's office."
"And you were a ghost."
"Until November. Then, one day, boom; someone sent whatever mojo was needed to make me sold. Only reason they did that was to pit Angel and me against each other. There's some damn prophecy about a vampire with a soul getting a reward if they saved the world from an apocalypse -- and Angel and I both qualify."
"So you hadn't been solid very long when Andrew showed up."
She was leading somewhere, though he had no idea of the destination. "A month, maybe two."
"Did you know where I was?"
Now they were getting to it. "Angel told me you were in Europe. Andrew told me you were in Rome," he admitted. "I asked him not to tell you."
He could feel her looking at him even without turning his head. "Why?"
Spike had spent nearly two years trying to answer the same question. "Didn't want you to hear I'd come back from some babbling idiot who'd probably get half the details wrong. Wanted to tell you myself."
"But you didn't."
There was a touch of accusation in her words, but mostly it was curiosity. In some ways, that was harder to deal with than the accusation. "I wanted to, but...you were finally getting to live the type of life you used to talk about wanting. Not the white picket fence and kids and that stuff, but getting to travel and not tied to one place all the time. You were getting a chance to explore the world and find what you wanted. If I showed up, you might have felt obligated and I didn't want to do that to you."
A short pause. "Thank you," she said at last.
"For what?"
"For remembering that I wanted to see the world beyond Sunnydale and thought I'd never get the chance."
That'd been the topic of conversation several times during the course of their strange relationship. Spike vividly remembered her admitting her despair that she'd ever see anything beyond Sunnydale during one of the rare times when she hadn't actually run off immediately after they'd finished doing the deed. He'd wanted to promise her the world then but had stayed silent for once and let her speak, sensing she needed to let the words tumble out to someone. After the soul, when he'd been sane and she'd rescued him from the First, she'd asked him to tell her about some of the places he'd been, a vicarious travelogue that served as a bit of temporary shelter for the storm around them. "You're welcome," was all he could think of to say.
They drove on, the silence a little easier between them. Maybe the situation wasn't a complete disaster. Maybe they could both get through this with their sanity intact.
"I wouldn't have felt obligated."
The voice was very small, so small that Spike almost didn't hear it. "If you'd shown up in Rome, I would have been glad to see you."
"You had a new life...and my feelings haven't changed."
And they were back to awkward. "Look, you don't have to say anything," he said in a rush, desperate to cover the silence. "I'm not going to hold you to what you said down there in the heat of the moment. It was the rush of battle, everything was going to hell -- literally."
"I meant what I said."
"The roof's caving in, damn amulet's glowing, fire's coming from our hands..."
"I said, I mean what I said!" Buffy practically shouted the words. "God, Spike. Just shut up for one minute and let me talk."
Spike shut up. Even if she hadn't asked him to, he didn't think he could speak after what she'd said."
Buffy sighed, shifting in her seat. "That was so not the moment to say it to you and I can understand why you wouldn't believe me. It's just that I was afraid of admitting how I felt about you for so long and here it was and I knew that if I didn't say it then, I'd never get to tell you. And I probably ruined it because I didn't tell you sooner and you didn't believe me and that's why you didn't come to Rome."
The last words were choked with tears and she turned her head away to stare out the window. Spike tried to keep his eyes on the road, but it was hard given the sniffles he heard. "Buffy..."
"Just drive," she insisted, her voice like ice. Recognizing the tone, Spike did as he was told.
It was going to be a long drive.
***
Buffy put her head between her knees, hoping it helped stop her head from spinning. She'd made a complete ass of herself and she didn't know how she was going to find the courage to go out and face him. They'd driven in silence for over an hour before Spike had pulled into a place called Stuckey's that promised food and gasoline. She'd been out the door and fleeing to the ladies room even before the car had stopped. She didn't know if he was getting gas or if he'd decided she needed the break; whichever it was, she was going to hide here as long as she could.
Yet another glowing success in the story that was Buffy Summers' love life. Hey, whatever girl, much less slayer, could claim to have two vampire lovers return from the dead? What's more, she was keeping up her perfect record because neither reunion had gone well.
Now here she was in the ladies room of a tacky little restaurant somewhere between Atlanta and New Orleans wondering how she could catch the first plane back to Rome. Only she couldn't, because there was still a Youngar demon and a Greivas crystal to track down.
It was the memory of what she'd found in David Starkey's home in Sri Lanka that got her up and moving out of the stall. Splashing some water on her face, she glanced in the mirror over the sink and decided the redness around her eyes wasn't too bad, that she'd be able to pass muster. Not like she could hide the fact she'd been crying from Spike, anyway. Not only was there the whole vampire enhanced senses thing, there was the fact he'd had to listen to her all the way here.
She walked out of the bathroom to discover Spike standing at the cashier's desk handing over money. The faux wood paneling and harsh fluorescent lights gave his skin a sickly cast, making him look seriously dead. Of course, the woman behind the desk in the polyester uniform and hair net also looked seriously dead in this lighting and Buffy definitely wasn't getting the sense she was a vampire. She hated to think how she looked.
Spike scooped something off the counter and offered it to her. "I've ordered you up something to go, but I thought this might help in the meantime."
Buffy looked down at his outstretched hand. In it lay two wrapped pieces of candy labeled "Pecan Logs". She was about to tell him she didn't need the sugar, but then her stomach growled and she reached for one of the pieces. Spike smiled and slipped the other piece into the pocket of his duster as she pulled away the cellophane and bit down into the sugary confection. "This is good," she managed between chews.
"Figured you hadn't had a lot of pecans growing up in California and thought you might like the treat."
It was a kind gesture and she couldn't help smiling. How many times had Spike done things like this for her before? The remembrance of how many times she'd managed to throw said gestures back in his face dimmed her pleasure at this one, but a small warm glow still remained. They stood there in silence while they waited for her takeout, but this was an easy silence, the kind they didn't need to fill with words and insults.
Buffy was learning to like silence; there were places she'd go in Rome where all was quiet and peaceful and she could just be...the way Spike had let her just be immediately after Willow had brought her back from the dead. Those silences between them had seemed lost after they'd dived headfirst into murky sexual waters, only to tentatively reappear in the last days before their final battle. To find one here and now was like a gift.
Her order came up and Spike handed her the drink, taking the white Styrofoam box himself and holding the door open for her as they headed out to the car. She accepted the attentions quietly, feeling a bit strange about the easiness between them. They were always like a rollercoaster, she realized, zipping from one extreme to another, angry words or passionate declarations. Moments like this, when they were simply comfortable, had been so rare that each stood out in her mind: sitting on the back porch while she worried about Mom, him holding her when she'd been lost and needed comfort, patrolling through the cemeteries of Sunnydale in silence not because she needed to kill something but because she needed to get away from everyone who wanted something from her and he was there to watch over her.
She settled in the passenger seat again and he handed over the box before going around to the driver's side. Opening the box, she found a roast beef sandwich cut on the diagonal and French fries with small containers of coleslaw, ketchup and barbeque sauce. The bread was toasted sourdough, which she'd once told him was her favorite. It was solid protein and carbs, all the things she needed.
If he'd asked her what she wanted, she probably would have ordered a salad and picked at it.
Buffy popped open the barbeque sauce, dunked a corner of the sandwich in it and bit down. "Mmm."
"Thought you'd like it," Spike said with a grin as he pulled back onto the highway. "These places look like crap but the food's good. Discovered them when Dru and I were down here in the fifties. Wish we'd had time for a sit down because they usually do good ribs."
The image of Spike biting into a rib and coming away with barbeque sauce smeared around his mouth was enough to make Buffy laugh. Spike's grin grew a bit broader and he gunned the engine a little, picking up speed.
As she ate her sandwich and watched the landscape speed by, Buffy found herself wishing they could come up with a way to keep the easiness.
On to Part III