FIC: I in Love Based on I in Team (3/4) W/B PG

Disclaimers in Part One

Part Three

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I stand on the steps to Tara's dorm and watch as Buffy disappears down the

path. I keep running the conversation that we just had through my mind,

sure that I missed something. Well, I missed something besides being a

complete and utter coward. The person that I wanted to tell I loved was

Buffy, not Tara. But, my nerve ran out and so, here I stand. I knew that

Buffy was straight as an arrow, I mean Riley? Good All-American Riley,

and Angel? Hello, I may be Gay now, but there is no possible way that

Buffy would ever be . . . . So why I have spent the last five minutes

standing on Tara's steps instead of . . .

I hear clapping off to the right and instinctively I reach into my pocket. My hand

curls around the water pistol I'm carrying there. The water pistol that's filled

with Holy Water.

"Now that was a bit of right good entertainment if I'ver saw it." Spike.

Why does it have to be Spike? Isn't my life complicated enough without him

showing up tonight. "I see how you're on the bird's doorstep and haven't

stepped, so to speak," he continues and his words are finally breaking

through my thoughts.

"Huh?" He just smiles at me. He leans against one of the columns that

supports the building and lights up a cigarette, which is totally gross!

How can anyone think that ashtray mouth is sexy? He takes a puff and blows

the smoke my way. Why am I still standing here . . . Oh, because I don't

want to go in and tell Tara I want to date her when I love Buffy.

"You are an idiot," he says the words slowly and I almost pull out the Holy

Water anyway. "You finally realize that you like birds and then you let the

one huge love of your life walk away from you!" He smirks, then throws the

nasty cancer stick away and takes a threatening step towards me. "You

bloody humans are so tragic!" He screams in my face. I have no clue what

he's talking about so I back away.

Spike takes an unneeded calming breath and, yep, he still smells like smoke.

"You love the Slayer, the Slayer loves you, so why are you here standing on

another bird's doorstep?" he asks calmly.

And do my best impression of a fish as I open my mouth to answer, then close

it and then open it again. I'm stunned that he knows my secret. I am so

shocked that the truth comes out. "'Cause Buffy doesn't love me, she likes

men."

"Ha, bloody ha!" he tells me and then turns away. He goes back to lean

against the column again but thankfully does not fire up. "I'll let you in on

a little secret, the Slayer has it for you, she loves you so much that she's

scared down to her tight little ass that something will happen to you."

I feel sick, why do I feel sick when Spike just told me Buffy loves me? Oh,

maybe because it's Spike? Or it could be that I want to believe him

so badly . . . "That's not true, it can't be true, Buffy likes men. Yes,

she loves me, she just doesn't love me, love me."

Spike looks confused for a moment as he runs my words through his dead

brain. Then he reaches for his cancer sticks again. And I'm sick of his

rudeness. How dare he continue to smoke around me when I have repeatedly

asked him not too! So I grab my water pistol and soak the cigarettes along with

his hand. He drops the pack and shakes his hand, trying to get it to stop smoking.

"Aye! Wha' ya do 'at fore?" he spits out, grabbing a hankie from his coat

pocket and wrapping it around his still smoking hand.

"You deserved it for lying to me and for smoking around me. You might have

dead lungs but I don't!" I shout and then notice that lights are going on in

the dorm behind me so I start down the stairs. "I'm going home." He's right about

one thing . . . I do love Buffy, not Tara. I

took the first step tonight by telling her I was Gay. When she gets home I'm

going to go all out and tell her I love her.

******

I drag my tired, aching body up the stairs to the dorm around eight hoping

that Willow has already left for class. I can't believe I was so depressed

that I lost control after the fight with that poky demon. God, if I hadn't

been turned on already there would have been no way Riley could have

satisfied me. And why do I feel like an enormous slut, on top of feeling like

I cheated on Willow?

Willow probably spent the night with that Tara person; spent the night with

someone who won't bring her continuos gut wrenching pain and misery. I'm

happy for her, I really am, but . . . I hurt. I feel like I can barely

breathe just thinking about my Willow in another woman's arms.

It was hard enough to see her with Oz day after day, night after night. . .

Sometimes I would let the Slayer loose on some helpless demon in sheer

frustration.

I hate myself for feeling this way, I know that jealously is one of the

deadly sins . . . I stop in the middle of the hallway, vaguely thinking

about going back to Riley to see if he's recovered. The Slayer is on edge.

Upset that I would let Willow go and not fight for her. But the Slayer is all want,

take, have, and damn the consequences. I saw what that did to Faith, what

that nearly did to me when I listened to Faith.

Why can't I just stop loving her? What is it about me that makes love so

hard? I see people falling in and out of love all around me . . . why can't

I fall out of love, when I know it's for the best?

Shaun passes by me and gives me a questioning look. I can I tell that

he smells the sex on me--so Riley's out--if nice and polite Shaun smirks

because I smell like sex then what would Riley's immature soldier boys say

or do.

I reach the door; I don't want to open it. I don't want to see Willow's bed

unmade, unslept in. And if she's there I don't want to hear how wonderful

Tara is or was, I hate that falling in love glowing newness she has. I hate

that I'm going to have to pretend to be little Miss Straight as an arrow

Buffy--yeah, like she couldn't see what Faith and I were doing.

Damn it, and I hate that now I'm getting angry at her when she hasn't done

anything except to be happy. My emotions are so out of control that I fling

the door open and it crashes into the wall--which causes a sleeping Willow

to jump out of bed with a stake in one hand and a water pistol in the other.

The sight of her wild red hair and startled green eyes instantly arouses me.

It's all I can do not to growl at her.

"Buffy?" she says blinking the sleep from her eyes. Then she cutely peers

at the alarm clock. We all know that she needs glasses, she just refuses to

go to the eye doctor. "It's morning?" she looks around confused and I use

that confusion to grab my shower basket and robe.

"You need to get going Will, you're going to miss class," I tell her as I

breeze out the door, hoping against hope that she'll be so distracted by

being late for class that she doesn't notice the smell.

"Huh, wait Buffy," she shouts as I escape out the door. I nearly run down

the hall to the bathroom, I don't want her to follow me. Willow has been

known to do strange things when she thinks that one of her friends could be

hurting. My little Wiccan has a sixth sense about things like that.

I turn on the cold water before stripping off my clothes. The stalls have a

privacy area away from the spray of the water and it's there that I realize

something. Something that steals my breath away and makes me double over in

pain, in the space of less than twelve hours my simple crush on Willow has

changed. It's changed and because of it I must leave her, today. Ever

since I found out that she could possibly like women instead of men, ever

since she told me about Tara--my love has become an obsession--an unhealthy

obsession.

Normal people do not go and screw their boyfriend because . . . and then the

similarities between Faith in high school strike. I can't let it go that

far, I can't let the Slayer drive me into the sexual frenzy that it would

drive Faith to . . .

As if on automatic pilot I get up off the bench and stand under the shower.

I must leave her, today. I have to end the friendship. I let the tears come

then, I can move back home, mom will be thrilled to have me.

I just stand under the shower and let the water wash the pain through me. I

have to leave Willow, I can't have the comfort of her friendship, the Slayer

won't let me.

TBC in Part 4