not_that_spike | (no subject)

(no subject)

Beth's reading.

She's just sitting on the edge of the bed over there, reading, and I can't remember ever just watching someone read before like this. From a position of decadent comfort.

I like how she puts her fingertip to her lips before she turns the page. Not every page, but once in a while. It's an absent-minded sweet move and she's not paying attention to me. She's reading what I wrote, about traveling to Venus, and it's sweet.

That's a phrase she uses on me sometimes. Spike, you're sweet. I'm not, really. I don't know if I've been sweet a day in my adult life. But if she thinks I am, I can be. I like it. I like being sweet for Beth. I have something I want to do for her, for a surprise. But it will have to wait just a little while longer.

Learning how to work around being Bound here has been a good exercise. I always liked a challenge. I always manage to work things out, one way or another.

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"That would be the eighth deadly sin, right? Being charming?"

Well, shit. There's nothing else to do, nothing else at all, other than to take his hands and put them on either side of her smile and kiss her and then wrap his arms around her and hold her tight. For a moment he rocks her back and forth, back and forth.

"I have a confession to make." He doesn't let go of her at all, and it's not an ominous statement, just something he's thinking. "I didn't know that love made people this happy. I thought it only brought its own kind of desperation. This is so different."

And I love you.

All she can do is smile contentedly while wrapped in the comfort of his arms.

"Love is funny like that," she agrees, speaking quietly against his shoulder. "Terrible and wonderful, desperate and happy."

She falls silent for a moment.

"I'm glad that you're happy."

"Are you?"

He thinks it's a fair enough question.

She kisses his shoulder and wonders if he can't tell.

"Very."

If there were music he probably wouldn't dance; he's not that type of guy. But he likes the feel of Beth in his arms. He likes it very much.

"So." He speaks quietly. "Once there was a girl named Elizabeth, Beth for short, and she was the most beautiful girl on the whole asteroid. And I know that for sure because there was a contest and everyone voted her most beautiful. Only she didn't know about it, because she was too busy being nice to everyone and taking pictures of honeysuckle flowers in the greenhouse. And there was this one guy who was only there because he had no place else to be, 'cause he'd finished what he needed to do on Mars. And the most beautiful girl on the asteroid came over to him and took him away with her, and the guy knew he couldn't have been luckier if he'd tried."

His voice, low and steady, continues. He's still holding Beth close. "And even though the guy never expected it, Beth picked him, of all people, to share herself with. And so the lucky guy decided no matter what, he wasn't going to fuck things up. He was going to make it work."

Spike kisses Beth on the forehead and looks into her eyes. "And the only other part of the story anyone knows is that they both looked really, really happy. Neither of them were perfect people, but they were perfect for each other."

Beth starts biting her lower lip very close to the beginning of the story, trying to restrain a grin. She makes a good audience, quiet and attentive and watching his face with interest.

She stops biting her lip at the end. "Have I told you how much I like your stories?"

She's pretty sure she has.

He smiles.

Have I told you how much I like being with you? holding you close? falling asleep next to you? waking up and seeing you first thing, before anything else? the way your body feels next to mine? Have I told you those things enough? I've sure as hell thought them.

"I think you have. But I always like hearing it."

He can feel the beating of her heart.

She goes ahead and tells him again then.

"I like your stories. I like the ones about the people you've known, the ones about the places you've been, and the ones you just make up on the spur of the moment." Just like that last one.

She looks at his eyes, those mismatched eyes, and smiles at him. It's not a huge smile and she doesn't show teeth, but it's immensely satisfied.

"You're joy and sunshine, and I love you."

And he kisses just below her jaw, off to one side, and presses his body against hers, and has no need at the moment for more words.

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