Parts 14 - 25
While Xander
reproaches himself at work for forcing sexual contact on Spike, Spike awakens
in confusion. Spike and William struggle
internally as Spike attempts to maintain dominance. A search of the apartment yields an emotional
letter from Xander, who had left it in the event that Spike’s memory would
return. Taking the credit card Xander
has left (in the name of S Harris) Spike procures items to return his
appearance to normal. He returns to find Xander sobbing, thinking Spike has
left him. Spike comforts Xander, but
when Spike decided to go out to alleviate his frustration with the sudden
changes, the emotional signals from William overwhelm him. Finally voicing his resentment that Xander
has shown affection, love, and sexual interest to William, Spike asks Xander if
he can sleep in the same bed with him that night. In an effort to affirm their love for and
attraction to one another, Spike reopens the wound on Xander’s wrist in a
highly erotic moment.
Spike sends Xander
off to work at the site with a hickey, and Xander wonders how it is possible
that they can speak so familiarly after so long apart. Spike reluctantly asks for Xander’s
permission to go out of the apartment because William needs to hear the
approval. Patrick brings the paperwork
leasing the house to Xander and Xander tells him he doesn’t want to hide the
fact that he’s in a relationship with Spike.
Xander reassures Spike that Angel destroyed the Initiative. Together, they drive out to see the house,
and kiss for the first time in the garden.
Yet when they return to the apartment, Xander meets Spike’s advances
with trepidation. Angry that Xander had
essentially slept with William first, Spike stalks out of the apartment
threatening to find someone else to have sex with.
Just as the day
dawns, Spike returns. When Xander makes
it clear that Spike cannot order him to do anything, Spike reassures him that
he wouldn’t try to sleep with anyone else.
As their affectionate touches become more charged, Spike deliberately
embarrasses William into retreat and claims the experience with Xander for
himself. Xander keeps the pace slow
initially, but as they mark each other with the exchange of bites and blood,
they come together in a frantic rush.
Spike corrects Xander’s worry that the sex was boring, telling him that
this is the first time someone has truly made love to him. More questions about abuse at the hands of
the Initiative set off Spike’s nightmares;
Xander responds to the wail of his name to find that William has
returned to the surface.
William, using
cultured speech, informs Xander that Spike retreats as part of a bid for
self-preservation. Answers that Xander
has unsuccessfully sought from Spike come easily from William, who reveals the
methods by which the Initiative’s torture took place. The incessant cruelty at last tore the demon
and the man asunder, a circumstance similar to his condition soon after
Drusilla turned him. In both cases,
William remained to take the brunt of heinous acts (first of Angelus, later of
the Initiative’s soldiers) while the demon went into retreat. Though Xander wonders aloud how William can
cope, William protests that he loves his demon and exists with him in mutual
satisfaction. William demurs when Xander
half-jokingly asks if he can take him to bed.
William elects to sleep on the couch:
not because he doesn’t trust Xander, but because he does not trust
himself.
After Xander’s
overlong abstinence, the one he desires is finally with him, but when he begins
to seduce the vampire he realizes that William is the one in his bed. Despite heeding Spike’s jealousy and not
having full contact with William, Xander comes from the sound of William’s
purring, mannered speaking and the vampire’s light but ecstatic touches. Alone in the master bedroom after the arrival
of Spike’s car, William calls on Spike to reassert his presence. He threatens to offer himself for Xander’s
first sexual experience with a man. When
Xander later confesses his fears due to Spike’s continued withdrawal, and his
nervousness about the first night at Cedar House, William comforts him. They sleep cuddled together that first night,
uninterrupted by dreams and content with the familiarity.
The morning finds
Spike back in possession of himself. He
insists on seeing Angel immediately, disrupting Xander’s excitement about the
new house. Xander reveals how Angel
wanted to drain Spike while he was suffering and indignantly asks Spike about
the torture that Angelus inflicted upon him.
Spike, however, feels reassured that Angel still cares about him. An anecdote about buying a sweater leads to a
conversation about how much they mean to one another. On the road to Sunnydale Xander asks Spike to
follow a hands-off approach toward him while they visit their old friends. While attempting to calm Xander’s resentment
of Angel and Buffy, Spike recounts the event that broke him before the
Initiative captured him.
Xander mitigates
the awkward small-talk conversation with Angel by mentioning architecture, and
Spike shows an unexpected knowledge of the topic. Once Dawn arrives, Xander begins to tell the
details of Spike’s story; Spike distracts himself by gazing at Xander’s body
and considering the man his boyfriend has become. The two vampires speak apart from the others
about the split between William/Spike.
Spike asks Angel for help in ridding himself of William, while Angel
urges consolidation of his two personas.
The stress of the situation drives Spike to confess the details of his
torture to the entire group, including sexual abuses and mind-control games in
which his captors convinced him he had killed Xander and the others. The others insist on staying, and as the
terrible secrets are revealed witness the deep love between Xander and
Spike. When Angel attempts to push
Xander into claiming Spike by offering to do it himself, Spike retreats, and William appears once more.
William, though
happy to see Xander and old friends like
Oz and Xander
briefly and silently greet one another in the morning; after Oz’s departure,
Xander feels uneasy
about Spike’s blood and pain, but Spike reassures him that the experience was
good. In the shower, Spike goes down on
Xander and proves that he can and wants to take it roughly. Xander asks if Spike will claim him. When Spike answers that he can’t because of
the chip, Xander renews his own bite on Spike’s neck As his lover sleeps, Spike considers the ways
in which Xander has become darker and stronger, yet more fragile and
unreachable, through the years. His
memories of the forceful sex with Xander effectively calm some of the
self-doubts he experiences. Yet when
Xander sleepily asks that Spike top him in return, Spike replies reluctantly
that he can’t right now because of the situation with William. Spike falls asleep, thinking of the
differences between Angel and Xander, and purring very lightly lest Xander overhear
this peculiar quirk.
After Spike and
Xander return from a practice session with Spike’s new Jaguar, Patrick drops by
the new house. Spike responds to his
kind manner and attractive person with immediate suspicion. As Xander and Pat walk in the garden, they
discuss Spike’s process of recovery, and speak about the curiosity of their
co-workers and friends Rafe and Jake regarding Spike and Alex’s new
relationship. Pat mentions that his wife
Beth worries Xander will get hurt; Xander clarifies that he left Spike, not the
other way around. After Pat’s departure,
Spike carefully raises Xander’s defences by claiming that Pat swings and had
checked Spike out blatantly. When Xander
reacts angrily, telling Spike that he can’t play him over Pat, Spike swiftly
shifts from jealousy over Xander’s boss to fear that Xander can hurt him. Xander calms him as they both try to balance
their old habits with Spike’s new emotional fragility. When Xander explains that he needs Pat as a
father figure, Spike decides to call Angel.
Angel asks to speak to Xander, and the tensions between the two over
their relationship to Spike become marked.
The phone call ends tersely, and Xander again renews his claim-bite.
After long hours of
lovemaking, Spike urges Xander to take him again. Worried about a repeat of the rough first
time, Xander asks some questions about William that prompt Spike to display his
animosity towards his other half. Xander
asks again for Spike to penetrate him, but Spike’s fears about William
surfacing in the moment drain their encounter of passion and result in an
irritated vampire. When Xander takes
matters into his own hands by stroking his cock, Spike turns to watch and comes
from the sight of his lover taking pleasure in himself. Spike wavers between comfort and doubt as he
worries that Xander might not really need him.
In reaction to the vampire’s jittery behaviour, Xander teases Spike that
he’ll tie him down, and begins to work his lover’s cock with punishing strokes
and re-open the bite mark once more. As
Spike insists on his love for Xander and begs him never to leave, he confides
that no one has ever seen to his pleasure as much as Xander does.