You like to have a little piece of everyone, don’t you? Now it’s pictures…but I remember even before, you had trinkets from your victims. Unnecessary locks of hair, shreds of velvet, and limbs of dolls. I don’t know where you kept them all. I don’t know what exactly they meant to you. What I do know is that the reason behind it must’ve been significant, because you’re still doing it; only your methods have changed.
You like the girl. It doesn’t surprise me. She’s everything Buffy wasn’t, soft, with dark skin and dark eyes. She’s outspoken, defensive, and just as stubborn as you are. I’m glad you have more than competition now. You’ve got an equal. I bet she smells good too, not like death, blood, or privilege. She smells human, doesn’t she? I’ve forgotten. I don’t even remember her past her name…but I think she helps you forget. Maybe she makes you feel like you’re in heaven, or at least out-running hell. And that’s a good thing. I know because I’m in love with hell, and she only helps me remember how ugly immortality can become with time. I know what I am. But she knows how to remind me until I’m completely lost in it. Then all I see is the plague of black hearts infesting our world. I think you’d be disappointed, Angel. Light seems to have been rationed since we were last in it.
And then there’s the two you were talking about, Fred and Gunn. Look at them in this picture, so distinct, lionhearted, and unafraid to befriend you. I was afraid. But I suppose in all truth, they’re nothing like me. You need them, Angel, because they don’t disappoint you like I used to. They’d do anything for you, never mind leave you…
But Wesley doesn’t have a picture here, or if he did you’ve fed it to the flames. I can feel the contempt he’s caused you just by the abrasiveness of your tongue whenever you forget he’s not around anymore to supply you with a Post-It when you need one. I don’t know what came between you, but it’s probably that idiotic kind of piffle that would make me shake a finger at you, if I had mind enough to do it. He knows more about you than any of the others, and in essence, could cheat you out of everything you know. Souls don’t conserve enough brutality to withstand manipulation. Trust me like you used to. Deep down, you’re the only real thing he’s ever had.
However, within this circle of pictures, this circle of salvation you’ve exhausted, the boy has become the center of it beyond a shadow of a doubt. I can’t imagine how much you love him because I’ve never had the love inside of me that you’ve had. I’ve had love that sparked, worshipped, sacrificed, and then dropped dead under ill-fated circumstances. I’d die for love. You’d live for it. That’s what makes you so different from the rest of us. You love like humans do. Maybe that’s why I’m exalted by the desire to earn your adoration the same way these people have.
You’ve never had the innocence and the frailty the child in this picture has unbalanced your life with. You’ve never known anything that depended on you like this before. All you’ve ever known about blood came from your vampire family. And what have we taught you? Pain? Surely not killing. Every vampire knows how to kill the moment they’re reborn. Maybe that’s why I don’t feel like you’re real family. True family involves blood ties. We involve corrupt attraction, attraction so thick and consuming it will kill you with one kiss.
There were moments when we exchanged those kisses and the cells of our blood mated, became indistinguishable and kindred, locked in a vital current of essential need. I swore in those moments when we evolved to be equals that our love was immeasurable, and that was how it would always be, as long as eternity wasn’t short-circuited. You wouldn’t let it change, and I would fight it if it did. That’s how we worked, you and I. That’s how we promised ourselves to one another.
I’m not so sure now.
The main door opened.
“Spike?” came Angel’s distant voice.
“Over here,” Spike answered from within Angel’s room.
There was the sound of stairs being walked on, then the scent of ginger and rosemary; blood…Angel’s blood. The kind of blood that stung your eyes, dried your mouth out, and made every hair on your body stand on end like static electricity.
Spike looked at him and watched his expression shade to bewilderment. “You’re hurt,” he guessed.
“What are you doing in my room?” Angel asked coolly, ignoring him.
“Nothing,” Spike lied. He put down the picture frame that had become rooted to his clammy palm.
“Nothing usually means something,” Angel suspected.
“Fine. Something. Was there something particular you were hoping I was doing?”
“No,” Angel supposed.
“Okay, then. I was doing nothing in your room.”
“Stop being difficult,” Angel ordered.
“I wasn’t,” Spike alleged. “You were.”
“I was not!”
“Now you’re in denial.”
“No. I’m not,” Angel articulated.
“Now you’re in denial that you’re in denial.”
Angel’s frown broadened. “Shut up, Spike. I can kick you out at any time.”
“Can you?” Spike played.
“Yes. I can and I will.”
“It’s not like you actually care if I’m here or not.” Spike softened, allowing the poison to seep from his voice. “It’s a pity you’re so ashamed of your own kin.”
Angel suddenly looked perturbed. “Excuse me?”
Spike cracked a turbulent laugh and then wiped a finger to his sinful lips. “Oh, come on, Angel. Don’t you remember when you used to take Dru? She’d be spinning…moonstruck and spinning,” he quieted, “and you’d catch her dress.” Spike’s eyes rose, bizarrely cerebral. “And you’d take her in front of me, make me watch your shadows on the wall; make me watch my own disgrace.” His smile remained. “But did you ever love me?”
There was nothing but silence.
“This is crazy,” Angel protested, walking deeper into his room and tugging Spike at the arm. “Come on. Lets go downstairs.”
“You can’t say it, can you?” Spike prevailed. “It’s a simple question.” He shrugged off Angel’s grip. “Hell, can you say that you’ve ever loved any of us? Darla, Dru--”
Angel’s hand came across Spike’s face, hard and sharp. His eyes gleamed, emitting nothing but primitive anger. “Enough. I won’t listen to this anymore,” he attacked in a cutthroat whisper, putting himself face-to-face with Spike. “I won’t listen to you rip me apart because you can’t deal with your soul.”
“It’s not about my soul,” Spike said vehemently.
“Then what is it about?”
“It’s about why my soul is the only thing anyone’s ever loved about me,” he sputtered, tears of rage boiling in his eyes.
“Maybe because it’s the only good thing you’ve had to show for,” Angel answered with overwhelming supremacy.
That was all it took for Spike to wake like a boar, grabbing Angel’s brawny shoulders and throwing him backwards into the bedpost.
Angel winced convincingly when he made contact with the solid oak, correcting his balance before coming at Spike with equal muscle, braiding their limbs together while they shifted their weight in a test of endurance.
“You’re making a mistake, Spike. It doesn’t have to be this way. You’re only hurting yourself,” Angel counseled as he braced against the other’s force.
“You’re the one making this hard,” Spike challenged, struggling out of Angel’s grip and sending his legs out from beneath him with a swift under kick.
Angel rose awkwardly, reacting quickly to an attempted punch from Spike by gripping his throat and forcing him up against the nearest wall. “I’m not fighting you,” he spat, looking up into the menacing eyes of the other vampire.
Spike chuckled with the influence of insanity. “Do me in, Angel. Make the world a better place. Isn’t that your job?”
In the midst of their fray, an arrow came from the direction of the door and caught Angel in the ribcage. He fell back, holding his side with a distressed sigh, while Spike crumbled unexpectedly to the ground aside him with a heavy cough.
Spike’s gaze darted to the doorway where a boy stood, bold, the impression of scars vivid on his young flesh. Angel just rolled like a fish out of water, sucking in his lungs and sealing his lids shut.
“You truly are a monster,” the boy admonished.
Angel’s unconcerned eyes rose perpendicular to his collapsed body. “Connor…you really have the worst possible timing,” Angel mumbled, tearing the arrow from his side with a sizzle of saliva and a choking breath.
Spike took this chance to speak, standing and rubbing the redness of his neck. “Okay, usually little boys appearing out of the blue isn’t any sodding business of mine, that is unless they give off the Robin Hood vibe and willingly send arrows into free flight. So then I ask; who the hell are you?”
The boy’s nervy glare was aimed in Spike’s general direction. “I’m not small.”
“I said little,” Spike shot back.
“It’s the same thing,” the boy insisted.
“He’s my son,” Angel volunteered gruffly, interrupting the verbal rivalry.
Spike looked down at Angel with wide eyes. “Wow. Baby got big.”
“I’m not a baby,” Connor chimed in defensively, readjusting his bow and keeping it traced on Angel’s unmoving form.
Spike glowered. “Oh, shut your gob, kid. I called you a big baby. That in itself is a compliment.”
The boy looked at Spike from the corner of his eye, and suddenly Spike estimated that the arrowhead now pointed at him would hurt just a tad if fired.
Nope. Kid was definitely not the right word to use.