o_cm_draw_o

Dude. Dude. Dude. What is spike in after life. Man has never been so pookie. Comes home looking for Dawn. Worried sick about her. Sees Buffy. Looks at her with pure wonder. Oh so gently takes her hands in his. Tells her she's not alone, he clawed his way out of his coffin too. He knows exactly many days its been since she died. He's quiet and gentle and when the scoobies come he clears out. Xander and Anya see him outside. He's crying. He wipes away the tears quickly. He knows they didn't tell him because even if she came back wrong he'd never let anything happen to her again. He has a motorcycle now. Then we see him at home. He punches the wall, now his knuckles are bloody too. They match hers. Buffy comes to see him. She's still off, still quiet. He tells her he tried. He blames himself. He thinks about all the things he could've done different every day all the time. He'd rather it was him who died. He's protected Dawn every day since. Buffy sees him an its daylight, hunkered in the shade. He was giving her space to be with her friends. She came out here to be alone, but she can be alone with him here. He calls her Slayer again. He hasn't done that in so long. He tells her if there's anything she needs, he's there. She confesses to him she was happy when she was dead. He listens. She tells him she was so content and peaceful and whole. She hasn't told anyone else that. That her friends tore her away from paradise. She trusts him with that secret. No one can ever know, but she tells him. I want what they have.