Wilderness 4
 

So Harris had lapsed back into silence.

No more self-pitying outbursts.

And when Spike'd told him what a bloody idiot he'd been to make a wish like that to a demon in the desert, all Harris'd said was: 'Yeah. Kinda figured that out on my own,' which took all the fun out of it if you asked him.

So there was an endless parade of hot wings and pizza. Lo mein and wonton soup. Fish and chips but Spike drew the line at ketchup. If Harris was in Rome, he'd do as the bloody Romans and that was that.

There was no more curry.

But Spike was tired of curry anyway. Sodding Remi always complaining about the tip.

The pizza boy - Jacob or Jamie or Johnny or whoever - could barely add or walk a straight line, much less calculate fifteen percent.

Every now and again, the knock on the door was Rupert, looking in on the patient and Spike denied any superstitious motivation if he told Rupert, every time, Harris was asleep. Sick. In the bath. On the loo. Hiding under the mattress from things that went bump in the daylight.

If Spike didn't want Harris' friends to see him, it was because he didn't care to have his home invaded by former Scoobies he couldn't toss out on their ears.

Harris could go visiting when he was well enough to do it on his own overlarge feet.

Spike tossed the leftover lo mein and wonton soup into the refrigerator and threw himself onto the couch next to Harris. Plucked the packet of cigarettes from the table and patted himself down for the lighter.

Lighter clicking on in front of his face.

"Ta, mate."

Once Spike was smoking away, Harris tossed the lighter onto the table and they lapsed into companionable silence. Oh all right. Harris lapsed into his usual silence, if you could call it a lapse when he hadn't said a word out loud during it, and Spike had lapsed into watching Harris through curls and plumes of smoke.

It was a hobby.

He'd learned Harris had a preference for Marlboro reds but would smoke anything put in front of him. Even the Silk Cut Ultras though Harris had given him a dirty look and smoked through that pack and Spike's Marlboros in a vengeful pall. Plague of smoking locusts. Tobacco burning locomotive engine.

They'd gone smokeless the rest of that afternoon until the sun went down.

And Spike resolved not to let Harris watch commercials anymore. They were dangerous for impressionable minds - and all right, Harris was about as impressionable as a rock but chip away long enough at a rock and you got -

Well, you got a pile of rock flakes is what you got but you also made an impression.

Spike continued to chip. "Took a call from Red while you were asleep."

Flinch.

Flake.

"She and the Niblet were going to hurry home to their long lost brother in arms."

Harris' breath sped up and his cigarette took an undignified tumble into his lap.

"Don't burn the couch!" Hands collided grabbing for it and foul looks were exchanged.

Harris lit another.

Spike sank, out of sorts, into the cushions and ran a hand over one. Not a protective hand. Not possessive or acquisitive. It was a battered leather couch. Black and deep.

He liked his couch.

Harris' hands were shaking.

Course, chip hard enough at a rock, and it cracked. Then all you had was a pile of useless fragments. "Told them not to bother, pet. They'll come home on schedule and not a day before."

Spike watched the slow unkinking of Harris' spine, the steadier trip of cigarette to lips and the growing column of ash at the end of Harris' fag. He coughed, ashed and picked up his beer. "Why are you doing this, Spike?"

"Don't know what you're talking about." Not strictly true but Spike had learned years ago the value of letting the other bloke define the specifics. Never volunteer information in the face of vague pronouns.

"Keeping my friends away."

"Why would I do that?"

"Because it's putting off my death."

Harris wasn't looking at him but that was all right. Spike was doing enough thoughtful staring for two. "Why would I do that?"

Harris saw his thoughtful stare and raised him an eyebrow. "You know, that remains one of the mysteries of life."

"You that keen on dying, then?" Spike raised him a straight question.

Fold. And Harris went back to watching the telly.

"I'll pencil it in Thursday."

Poker was no fun with two when one folded every hand.

Spike stared at the telly where the BBC continued to 'celebrate the weird science of Doctor Who'.

Again.

"Didn't you watch this earlier?"

Five words got him a shrug. Stingy git.

"Right. Forgot who I was talking to, didn't I? Bloke who wore a hole through his geek TV box sets."

And twenty words got him a quick smile.

Best twenty words he'd spent in days. Wouldn't mind seeing that smile again.

"Maybe I don't want to see your mates. Ever think of that? Loud and suspicious. Always calling to check I've fed and watered you and haven't stuck any hot pokers in tender places. Bloody hell - I took care of Drusilla for a hundred years. Talk to Red, and you'd think I killed the bloody goldfish in a weekend."

More words, more smile.

"What's so funny?"

"You're babbling."

Spike stared at him. "One of us has got to fill the silence before we both go raving bonkers."

"Thanks," Harris said, laying a warm hand on Spike's knee that surprised Spike out of anything to say for the remainder of the program.

Because Harris left his hand there. Big, silent and warm with scars over the knobbly knuckles that made Spike wonder whether they'd been there in Sunnydale or if he'd picked them up in Africa.

So they sat there together, warmth from Harris' hand seeping through Spike's jeans and into his muscles, into his bones until he wasn't sure if Harris was aware his hand was still there.

Spike found himself uncomfortably reluctant to say anything that might remind Harris and cost himself the warmth.

Dr. Who wasn't all bad.

But he drew the line at situation comedies after and clicked off the telly.

Harris' hand left as predicted, rising above his head in a stomach-hollowing stretch. Then dropped and scratched at his stomach. He finished off his cigarette and stubbed it out in the ash tray.

Then, he sat - eye fixed straight ahead.

Experimentally, Spike turned the television back on. It looked like Harris was watching it.

He turned the telly off.

Now it looked like Harris was staring into space, lost somewhere behind the eye.

Bloody disturbing.

Spike turned the television back on and wandered to the bath, turning taps and filling the room with steam.

Then, he turned and nearly threw himself backward into the tub because the pillock was standing right behind him, naked because Spike hadn't been arsed to buy pajamas and just - looking at him with his one eye and obscene tan lines, lax right arm and the left around Spike's waist holding him up. Oh. Spike squirmed out of the supporting arm. "Never sneak up on a vampire, mate." No reaction to that. Harris didn't step away.

Instead, he lifted a hand and ran his fingertips over the bumps and ridges of Spike's forehead, traced the demon's features.

Oh.

"What's it like?"

"Being a vampire?" Spike shrugged but didn't dislodge the light human touch. The tub would overflow soon. He kept an eye on it - put him on even footing with Harris. "What's it like being a human?"

Harris shook his head, dropped his hand and turned off the water. "This is gonna overflow."

They stared at the water together until the ripples smoothed.

Spike shook himself, shed his jeans and climbed in - half a minute later, Harris climbed in too.

When Spike pulled him around and propped Harris' spine against his chest, Harris didn't fight it. Good enough. And while Spike's soapy hands explored in the name of cleanliness and public health, Harris got around to elaboration. "What's it like living forever?"

Spike considered it. Considered the frothy water and the lump of lemon and cloves soap clutched in his hand and leaving slick trails over Harris' abdomen to the steady thumpthump of his heartbeat. "Dunno," he said. "Haven't done it yet."

"You know what I mean." Harris traced the inner curve of Spike's thigh.

"Bloody right I do," Spike said through gritted teeth. Vampires did not have ticklish inner thighs. "Better than you do."

A tidal wave of indignant suds sloshed over the rim and Harris fixed Spike with an impressive one-eyed glare. "Because you were there when I made my deal with the demon."

Spike's chest was cold so he slouched down in the water and if it trapped Harris between his knees, so be it. His voice echoed with water in his ears. He wiggled his toes around the hot tap and gave it a twist. "We all live until we die, mate. Trick is figuring out what to do 'till then."

"What will you do?"

"First?" Spike grabbed the soap, working up a scented lather between his hands that reminded him of hot Christmas drinks. He looked Harris over, from dripping, curling hair to bony knees sticking up out of the water and blew a handful of bubbles into the air. "Reckon I'll finish my bath."

Harris hadn't volunteered more after that - well, more than a hand to scrub Spike's back and that had been nice. He'd have to get the shower head fixed, one of these days but he couldn't be arsed. Nothing wrong with a long hot soak in the tub and Harris wasn't bad company.

Didn't take up much room.

Dropped his towels on the floor but Spike figured that was only fair.

Spike dropped his towel on top of Harris' and padded into the larger room, looking down at him seeping water into the spare pillow, covers pulled up to his chin and tucked close. "What about you?"

Look of sleepy confusion.

"What're you going to do until you die?" Spike asked, unprepared for that question to wind the clockwork spring in his chest.

Harris frowned and rolled onto his back. "Wait, I guess."

"Here?"

"Here or a box in the subway. Tube? Do you have homeless guys living in boxes in tube stations?"

Spike ignored it. "Not gonna leave?" The clockwork in Spike's chest began to tick. Rusty with disuse.

"No."

"Sure?" Spike sat on the bed. This close, he could see water beaded on the eyelashes of Harris' missing eye, pooling in the hollow.

"Where would I go Spike? Not like I have time to see the wide world. I've seen enough of it, thanks." Harris thumbed the moisture away and tucked his hand under his pillow like a boy.

"So you're staying."

"Do vampires lose hearing after the first hundred years?" They stared at each other. "Yes."

"Git. Budge over. You're hogging the bloody mattress." Spike tugged Xander back, the way he had in the bath, chest to spine, buttocks to groin, legs and legs and legs. "Fine. Go to sleep."