Chocolatey Goodness

Part 8: Pillow-Talking

rated NC-17

__________________________

"A mirror in your sleeping place, made from a black metal... A dark mirror...That was always the intention...But the gulf between concept and execution is wide, and many things can happen on the way."

--Morpheus (The Sandman, created by Neil Gaiman)

*******

Some games just don't get old. Not with this one around...Spike thought, a bit dazedly, a bit happily. Scrabble, two nights in a row, that would get old, but this game, for instance...Spike was quite willing to play the debauched old lecher leading the fresh-faced youngling down the path of no return. Again. Not that Spike wasn't literally pretty fresh-faced himself, but still. Nor was this exactly high-end, as debaucheries went. For somebody as goody-two-shoes as Xander, however, it would certainly do, no matter how many times he'd played it with Anya. He'd never done it with a man before last night, and never with Spike, and that had been quite enough to give Spike the tastefully twisted thrill of sharing one of his favorite kinks with a wide-eyed innocent.

Was still quite enough, with the challenge in the back of his mind that he was supposed to be acting as if this were the first time. No witty badinage. No Sunnydale history lessons. Just an agreement that this time they didn't have to argue about what somebody was being punished for. Just bloody get on with it. A bit more real and hot, traded for a bit less deliciously embarrassing. All sounded good to him. Might've sounded better from down there instead of up here, but he was being a good evil demon, and playing fair... as fair as he could bring himself to, anyway...

***

Shake...rattle...roll... Flip, and watch the bloody sands of time tick away the fact that Xander had been playing this game since first grade and Spike was drawing a blank on any four letter words besides the obvious ones.

"Dafe is not a word, Spike," Xander said finally, as the last grains of what was probably actually salt trickled through the timer, and the human leaned over to grin at Spike's scratched-up scorecard.

"I know it's not a blinkin'... oh. Thought that was a 'T'." He crunched away resentfully on a handful of chocolate-dipped pretzels, less than happy about being caught out in an allegedly intellectual game by the only non-collegiate Scooby Gang member.

"Uh-huh. Do vampires get nearsighted? Time for a pair of those reading glasses with the little chain around the back so you don't forget they're on your head? Old Man?" Xander sneered at him, flashing his winning wordlist under Spike's nose.

"Don't push your luck, boy..." Spike growled menacingly, but Xander only laughed.

"Is there a game you don't cheat at? Poker? Chess?"

"Don't need to cheat at poker, don't play chess, wasn't cheating now, and I would've wiped the floor with your arse at Trivial Pursuit," Spike replied grumpily.

"That would be why we didn't play Trivial Pursuit, O Lint-Trap for Useless Information..." Xander grinned back.

"Wasn't so useless when I told you which bit of a Mathgarau to chop off with your little axe, now, was it?"

"And whose bloodless ass did I pull out of the fire by doin' that, huh? Not mine own..."

"....Rrrrrr.....Xander, your family doesn't even speak to each other unless they're rowing. Why the hell do you have a stack of board games up to the ceiling?" When about to be shown up as an idiot, change the subject. Spike's Laws of Survival, Number Three.

"Stupid but well-meaning relatives. Every Christmas since... probably before I was born. I mean... there's an unopened Mystery Date box on the bottom of the stack, for god's sake. You blew best two out of three at Boggle-- wanna go for a really challenging game?"

Spike sighed. "No, you'd get the trust-fund guy and I'd end up with the geek with the pocket protector an' the plaid pants, and don't you dare ask how I know what's inside that game box."

" Don't think I won't be filing that away for future use, but not what I meant. I won. Again. The challenge part would be, you manage to play like last night never happened."

Spike blinked at him. "Thought we were a bit past that game, pet."

Xander tossed a pretzel at his head. "Not permanently, cheesedick. Just for tonight. Like it was the first time, with none of that shit about me havin' to come up with a reason for it. Just you yankin' me down on the bed and pulling my jeans off and walloping the hell out of me until I yell stop or your damn hand falls off. You wanna give me what for along with it, go for it, but you get to exercise your much-vaunted creativity. All I have to do is lay there and take it. You game ?"

Took Spike a minute to swallow the suddenly dry pretzel crumbs in his mouth. "Yeah, think I might be up for that." He was technically supposed to still be sulking, however, so he had to give it one last shot..

"Would've won...' he mumbled not quite under his breath.

"But..." Xander filled-in like a good little less-than-straight man.

"Gave me a right-handed pencil, didn't you?" That earned him a barrage of pretzels.

***

It assisted Spike's much-vaunted creativity immensely that the arse smiling up at him from his lap was so nicely shaped, and rippled so prettily when his hand smacked into it. There was also a bit of an oddity, a personal little hmmm... that Spike hadn't come across before last night-- the fact that it was turning a nice shade of light pink, under the naturally tan skin. A good sort of tingly strangeness, as if Xander really was corrupting him as well. A well-fed vamp might bleed a bit if you cut him, but blushing, in regard to either set of cheeks, was right out. Fun times with humans, chapter seventeen. The sight was putting him in a pleasant, warm place, so he thought he'd best return the favor.

"And while we're on the subject..." he continued the mock tirade he'd begun a few moments ago, "what the hell did you think you were doin', ironing my shirt? I like it wrinkled!" Smack. Smack.

Xander breathed in sharply, and let it out in a confused, "Huh?" before grabbing the blankets tightly.

"My shirt, whelp. The one you nicked off the chair Sunday night? Lookin' like Martha bloody Stewart's been over it with a steam iron and a lint-brush now? Ruins my image, dunnit." SMACK!

"Didn't. Just... washed it." Xander gasped.

"Eh? Oh. Shit. Guess you didn't. The witches were gonna fix you up with a spell for that, if you brought 'em extra treats on Tuesday. Must've put it on the whole place. Fine. " Smack, smack, smack. "That was for makin' me look like a right idiot."

Which made no more sense than anything else he'd said, but this wasn't really supposed to make much sense beyond the disciplinarian tones and the reactions of the suitably chastened body wriggling on his lap. Getting into the rhythm of it a bit, moving toward the requested 'walloping' as opposed to last night's gentle teasing, he found that he didn't really need to say much of anything. Xander was doing most of the work for him, squirming enticingly against him, making it exceedingly obvious by the contact between their bodies that they were both more than a little aroused by the whole affair. That the boy really was enjoying it. Little squeaking noises, every so often, just like...

Like Dru, though without her throaty laughter, and he found himself unwillingly comparing them again, for the hundredth time, and coming up with far too many similarities. Lovely and dark, far too young-- no matter their ages in years--shattered and put back together like crazy-paving. Both too attracted to things that would hurt 'em, sooner or later. Both loving pain, of one sort or another. He's not Dru. And one of the nastier voices in his head muttered But he'll leave you just like she did, won't he. And be better off for it, too.

Maybe. Probably. But while he had the chance, Spike wouldn't let anybody do to Xander what had been done to Dru. Not the driving mad, not the buggering off, not the patronizing use and abuse when he returned. Obviously Oedipal enough for you, Siggy? Always bloody came back to him, didn't it? As if he had any interest in Xander Harris. Unless he knew Spike did, and then he'd find a way to muck it up somehow, even in his goody-good souled form. And he would, sooner or later, figure it out. Because he could read Spike like a bloody dimestore novel, when he wasn't too distracted by something else blonde, with bigger tits.

But it wasn't really Angel whom Spike feared. There were a million creative ways to break somebody into jagged shards, and a million bastards out there waiting to do it. And there was somebody he had to protect, now. Wouldn't deny it made him feel a bit more like a man and less like a blinkin' eunuch. There'd been his little girl, sister, mother, wife...who didn't want him anymore. Now there was this man-child. The wise-arsed fragile little hedgehog that he was beginning to think of as his boy, despite the jeering from his own mental cheap seats. And Spike feared. Repetition. Making somebody else's mistakes. The past around every bloody corner, and who's brooding when he's supposed to be having fun now ?

Somewhere in the middle of Spike's trip to the past, Xander had kicked off his shorts and trousers, as the smacking got a little more intense. The bare legs that shifted and occasionally scissored on the bed were strong. Scattered with dark hairs. Certainly no Drusilla similarities there. So one's got a cock and one has fangs. One's mad and one's...maybe just a little bent, maybe as twisted up as I am. Tell me the difference again? One's here. No. Not fair. One's Dru, one's Xander. One's lost, one's...

He put his right hand flat on Xander's back, as he continued to smack with his left, and realized he'd definitely reached the walloping stage. The globes that had been just a bit pink before were turning a nice cherry red. But there wasn't much of a change in the way Xander was writhing atop his lap. There wasn't any blinding pain in his head. Still, probably not a lot more, now. When he eased off a bit, though, Xander actually pushed up against his hand, as if complaining. Spike chuckled under his breath. If that was the way of it...

So he got back into the swing of things. Peppered both cheeks with firm swats, drifting down to the tops of the muscular thighs every so often. Steady. Hard, but not actually harsh. Well, not too harsh. He wasn't actually punishing Xander for anything, after all. This was about... fun, he was going to say to himself, but love... slipped in there before he could finish the thought. Love, and giving him what he wants. Yeah, probably, but if you said it, there went half the depravity, didn't it. Or maybe it was even more depraved.

Maybe it was him moving his hand again, the one on Xander's back. Unconsciously rubbing a tiny circle, over and over, as if giving pain and comfort at the same time. The left hand giveth... Maybe it was a change in the pressure on Xander's skin, a change in the central air that filtered down from upstairs as the currents shifted and the basement suddenly got a whole lot warmer. A change in the moon outside the cheaply-curtained windows. Maybe it was Spike stepping up the rhythm with his left hand. Maybe it was Spike, never pausing, looking down to be sure, and asking softly, just to check he hadn't gone too far, maybe to get a little feedback for his own vanity---"How're you feelin'?"

*****

And Xander had been... in a good place. Good...kinda edgy...Thinking every so often that this was the one that would make him cry uncle, but no... 'Cause that one was just right, just the right place, just the right feeling, something to fight against, something to take, just making him hot all over. Being held down, in a safe place, and Spike's two arms, one holding him there, one dishing it out. Able to kick and growl and fight all he wanted, as long as he didn't say stop, and he wasn't, really wasn't about to say stop, stop was the farthest thing from his mind anymore.

Wasn't a hell of a lot that made sense going on in his mind at all, but whatever was happening, it was like ache and fire and somebody putting them together to make his body a damn fine place to be stuck right now... He was so glad he'd thought of asking again and so damn glad he'd won and Spike had lost if Spike really thought he'd lost, 'cause Spike seemed to be getting a kick out of it too, not that Xander was really able to concentrate on anything outside himself at the moment.

And it got warmer and things shifted and it started to build to something... reaching for it, almost stretching,

And Spike rubbing his back, just a little distraction, just something that was making him think.. don't comfort me, stupid, I don't need... and Spike leaning down a bit, closer, and he had to go and whisper... whisper... "How're you feelin'?" and dammit... don't ask me that...

And he was somewhere else, and it wasn't safe, and he wasn't being held, he was... it was hot and [how're you feelin'...] he was scared shitless, that was how, and he didn't even know this girl who left him...stuck outside... waiting, alone with, not alone but, they shouldn't be here, just him. Alone in his head with the damn ...seeing it, twisted, monsters, everything he knew, twisted up. Hearing the damn music...hated this song, had always hated the damn pulsing heat inside under the lights when it played like the song and the half-dark and the backhiss through the amps were all just made to send him into the night screaming [don't dream at all], never close his eyes again.

Hated this thing in his hand, hated the song, hated being here and when they got in and after out, how could he ever walk in this place again... And they were in and music or not...still in his head [inside my bones]

Bodies moving like they could get somewhere, in his way, only came for one damn thing, already too late [really wish...] but he had to be here. His place, his... his... let go. He'd let go, and... been ripped away, and another girl, there'd been one with...fuckin' evil little smile, and sure she was here somewhere, but that wasn't... hot, it was too... [cold day ] hot and there.

There. Here. Same.. same...face...just not the same. Just... his fault. His fuckin' fault. Not Will , not any new hot blonde... not anybody but him, letting go then and this thing in his hand now and this thing in front of him daring him to do it. [Wished I could have] And it was too damn hot or not hot enough and he hated...everything...mostly Xander, mostly him. Pussy who couldn't do it. Hated this place, hated the body that pushed the body that looked like somebody that fell on this damn thing in his damn hand [come to kill what's left] that was holding nothing-- shit-all nothing. Because everything was gone, and he was alone here. Just him. Just the one he hated most of all. [from myself...] In the hot-cold dark. Somewhere out there was...somebody... but hell if Xander could think how to get from here to there.

*****

Something changed, anyway, because where there was an enthusiastic body twisting down on Spike's lap, in an instant there was a still one. Not still with the bonelessness of sleep or relaxation, or even the sacrificial victim position that had represented the boy's fear of being taken, that first time.

A frozen sort of stillness, jumping with anticipation without twitching a muscle. As if concentrating on moving and receiving sensation at the same time was just too hard of a job. Spike stopped, his hand in mid-air.

"Hey," he said softly, again. "You okay down there?"

After a second, a low snarl. "Don't talk."

"It's just that you're turnin' sort of Willow-colored, which might be a good sign for..."

Lower still... "Don't. Be quiet."

Spike laughed. Well, tried to. "And that, my friend, is what's known as topping from the bottom. Sir, yes sir."

"Shut up."

There was no laughter in that voice. Nothing of the repartee that had gone on before this all got quite so heated. Just... a forlorn request. Not really an order. Spike resumed his smacking, a little harder. Not at all happy with the direction he sensed this was going. Feeling Xander's skin grow hot beneath his hand. A faint tremor in the back muscles. A touch of labor in the breathing. He slowed again.

"About time..."

"Does your head hurt?" Xander hissed.

"Er...no..."

"Did I say stop?"

"No."

"Then get on with it."

Spike shook his head, even though he knew Xander had no way of seeing. "I don't think that's a good idea."

"Don't..." And there was loss in that, and fear, in the sound, in the scent, the need to be forgiven for something, or not to be forgiven. This was more of an order, but a desperate one, and it was ripping at Spike, because he knew this place. He'd been there, where Xander was, or someplace like it, and he'd been here, where he was now, with Dru screaming at him to take all her badness away. It was black, and it was red, and it was full of the things that live under the beds of even the monsters that live under beds, and it was never anything so innocently soft-core as the scene in this room right now. If it hadn't been so damned...He was wrong. Nothing soft here.

"Xander..." but he quickened his pace, the memory within his body reacting to the need in that voice, in that body. "This isn't about chocolate flavored soap, now. What am I punishing you for, eh?"

"Shut up." A low litany, repeated like Dru had done the real ones, sometimes, lying in bed in the middle of the night, as if whispering the empty holy words over and over could carry her back to the novitiate, before the blood and stars and roses. "Shut up, shut up, shut up..."

"No. What the hell did you ever do? What could you 'ave possibly done?" Nothing. Nothing that ever came out of this boy could have been dark enough for this sudden hole of wanting, of desire for ... what, pain, punishment... humiliation? No, the boy got enough of that last on his own. The blackness he could see in those eyes, when he looked, at times... that came from something else. It had been...imposed.

The body rigid, twitching, the head sunk to the mattress, the fingers grasping the blankets as if they were about to tear holes three feet long... A desolate voice, lost somewhere, but filled with its own strange sense of power: "I don't have to tell you." It wasn't a question.

Spike was pretty close to shaking himself, but this wasn't the time. My turn. Mine to take care of him.

"No. You don't have to."

And he did his best. Smacked away until Xander's breathing was beyond labored, until the skin under his hand had turned a dusky rose, until Spike was just...this close. This bloody close...

"That's enough." he said suddenly, trying to be firm. Trying to control at least himself, if not the aching child in his lap.

Xander tossed his head. Kicked once at the bedclothes. "No. It's not enough... I need...to get there. Here. This..."

Oh, hell. Don't do this to me. Don't be another Dru already. Don't bloody make me too late. Don't make me hurt you, really hurt you, just to pull you back from wherever you've gone. Don't be that much like her. Don't think I can do it again. It wasn't about the chip. Not about fearing his own artificial pain. Just Xander. Just not wanting to break him, just not wanting to find out that he was already permanently broken.

"I know." And he finished what he could, in a few seconds, as much as he could. Gave what he was able to. Then he stopped. That simple. No more.

"Spike.. I need..."

"Yeah, I know. But that's enough. You don't know when to stop." Rubbing his own patterns on Xander's back, with both hands, trying to brand his fingerprints in this boy, his boy, just by touching, softly. Not going near the angry skin that lay below. Xander wriggled away, sliding off Spike's lap.

Curled up at the farthest edge of the bed, facing away, on his side. Spike shook his head again.

No. He wasn't going to lose this one. Not like this. Not to some invisible demons he couldn't even fight with fangs or an axe. He slid over to Xander's side, and placed his arm over Xander's.

"Don't touch me."

Oh, an old friend. We recognize that voice, don't we. Self-disgust in the shower, rearing its ugly mug. Well me an' the voices in my head can take you any day, tosser. I think.

"Right..." he said uncertainly, pulling his arm back. Just lying there on his own side, staring at Xander's back. Every day. Every other day. There had to be something new, to tear each other up with. Another reason to drive the other one away. Fall down in his head with a monster above, or watch Xander go somewhere away inside where he couldn't reach. Because neither of them deserved to have somebody who loved them, obviously. Well, that might be true in Spike's case, but in Xander's...Fuck that.

"Y'know...don't think I can do that, actually," he said matter-of-factly.

"Then don't let me go," Xander whispered, and rolled over into Spike's arms, face to face. He was back, from wherever it was he'd gone, but he looked like he could disappear again at any minute.

"I can do that." And he wrapped his arms tight around his boy. Making damn sure Xander knew he wasn't going anywhere. Just stared into those shuttered eyes as if he could find the answer Xander wouldn't give him. Waited, until those eyelids drooped, the breathing slowed, and Xander was sleeping in his arms. Extricated himself as softly as he could, and stalked sock-footed over to the bathroom, to get that damned bottle of moisturizer from the medicine chest. Just a few seconds gone, hoping against hope that Xander wouldn't wake up alone before he could slip back into bed.

He was safe. Xander still almost-snored as Spike climbed gingerly over him and put his arms back where they belonged.

***

So much for demon hunting this time. Unless they wanted to head out at three a.m., and Spike wasn't really in the mood. Sad sort of vamp he was, really. Xander, yawning and blinking, and wincing when he unconsciously rolled over onto his back, wasn't really in any condition, either.

Spike just watched him as he made his way back from sleep, and was finally met with a sheepish grin.

"Okay, that was... not one of my finer moments. And I've got a lot of not finer moments to not be fine with." Xander rolled over on his stomach. Not an exceptionally heartening sight, Spike decided, studying the still tortured-looking skin on the otherwise delicious arse, somewhat less than dispassionately. Still... Xander wasn't lost. He'd come back. This time.

"You gonna do that every time?" Spike asked, reaching for the bottle of skin cream.

Xander laughed. A bit shakily. "Um... I'll go with no on that one. I just kinda... went off somewhere."

Filling his palm with cool lotion, Spike began to softly rub it onto Xander's skin, watching the boy jump at the unexpected change in temperature.

"Yeah. Noticed. You gonna tell me where?"

Xander shook his head. "No. You mind?"

Spike thought about it. Hard. About the truth, and how much of it was safe to actually say. "Wish you would, but it's your head."

"I...no. Okay?"

"Yeah. Okay. So..."

"So...no. Won't happen again. If this ever...well, I guess you wouldn't want to, after that."

"That's not what I was askin', and don't make promises you can't keep, and I can still wipe the streets with you at Trivial Pursuit, so don't you bet on it. " Spike tried not to touch too hard, wincing with each twitch of Xander's back and legs when he did.

"Oh...kay. I guess. So?" Xander lay his head on his forearms, crossed on the pillow.

"So... you wanted a bloody bedtime story..."

Xander curled deeper into the mattress. "Maybe tomorrow? Y'know, when I can actually look you in the face again?"

Spike took a minute to stroke the boy's hair. Felt Xander relax under his touch.

"You can look me in the face now, idiot."

"I, ah...meant literally, actually," Xander replied with a soft huff of laughter. "Y'know, instead of lookin' at the mattress."

"Oh... I kinda like you when you're lookin' at the mattress..." Spike purred, suddenly squirting a cold line of lotion down Xander's back.

"Jerk..."

"Idiot."

"Vampire."

"Stockboy."

"Soccer fan..."

"Football, dammit."

"Can I say that mentioning Willow in connection with the color of my ass was not a particularly bright idea?"

"Heard that, did you? Human."

"Ooh... you wound me with your devastating English wit. If you really want to make me happy..."

"Yeah. What, luv?" Spike rubbed the lotion into Xander's back, feeling the muscles tense and relax, just...glad there was somebody there.

"Get me a cookie. Double-chocolate chunk."

"Oh, you're back. Fine, then. But no crumbs on the pillow. Sick of washin' 'em out of my hair."