Work Text:
…Forty-six… forty-seven…. Pause to look into the baby carrier beside him, then continue, ignoring the line of pain sizzling from his pelvis to just under his ribs. …Forty-eight… forty-nine… fifty.
Spike let himself rest for a moment after the last situp, then checked the baby carrier again. Thursday was still there, sleeping peacefully. She’d probably need a feed soon, but he’d be able to squeeze in a few more exercises before she woke. Maybe a set of thirty pushups, one-armed to keep the focus mostly on his abs. He shifted positions, gritting his teeth through the pain in his middle. Animal instinct pushed at him to curl around the pain, or to at least press his hand against it in an attempt to soothe it away. Revulsion kept him from doing either.
It’s fine, he told himself, starting the pushups. As long as he didn’t feel anything tearing in there, he was fine. One… A warning flare as he switched arms between one pushup and the next. Not yet. He could do this. He didn’t have to stop yet. Two… thr-
Searing, tearing pain as the barely knit together muscles betrayed him. He hit the floor with a thud that woke the baby, his body curling in on itself against his will. His arms crossed over his distressingly soft belly, his knees drawn up protectively. Over the sound of the baby’s cries, he heard the thump of someone running up the stairs, heading towards Buffy’s old room before correcting and coming towards the room Joyce had traded them.
By the time the door was flung open, he’d just managed to uncurl himself and start to whisper ragged reassurances to his little girl.
“I’ve got this,” Buffy said, scooping Thursday up into her arms before he could get to her.
She’d learned, over the past month, to never take the baby directly from him. He’d been trying to fight through it, but even Thursday’s mum taking her from him threw him back into that night. When Dru had sliced him open and stolen his daughter from his body, where she should have been safest.
“I’ve got this,” Buffy repeated, gently patting the baby’s back to calm her. “Go downstairs and wait for me on the couch. I’ll change her diaper and bring her down.”
“Bu-”
“Now!” she snapped, her eyes flashing with barely suppressed anger. If he didn’t go down the stairs himself, he had a feeling she’d seriously consider kicking him down them, injured or not.
He went, too weighed down with failure and self-disgust to argue. Couldn’t even manage a simple workout routine, and had upset both Buffy and their daughter in the process. God, he was pathetic.
He flopped down on the couch with the complete lack of grace that had become typical over the last month. Granted, he’d been mostly waddling about before that, but he’d been pregnant at the time. Sort of went with the territory. Now, though, there was no excuse for it, or the general state he was in. He stared down his body, at the baggy charcoal gray t-shirt and black sweatpants. His old clothes still didn’t fit, even after a month.
He took a deep breath, slowly letting it out before he pulled up the shirt and stared at himself. The skin had completely sealed a couple of weeks ago, leaving a fading – but still nasty – scar. Proof of his failure to keep Thursday safe. And beneath that….
A random stranger on the street probably wouldn’t call him fat, though there was a a layer of that – meant to protect the baby somewhat – between his skin and what could laughingly be called muscle. No matter what he’d tried, he hadn’t been able to get rid of that layer, not even by going back to starvation rations of pig instead of the mix of horse and human they had delivered from an ethical source. And nothing had helped in getting back the muscle definition he used to have.
She’s not going to throw you away, he told himself. It didn’t help. How many times had he been rejected, both in life and after? He knew what he had to offer, and without his looks and overall physicality, it wasn’t enough. Dru had started pulling away when he’d become paralyzed. And now that he was… like this, Buffy was….
He yanked his shirt down, not able to look at himself anymore. Her voice had had a certain tone when she’d told him to wait on the couch. She wanted to have a talk. And after that talk…. He knew she wouldn’t kick him out, but that didn’t mean they would still be together.
He squeezed his eyes shut and tried not to think about what he’d do once Buffy told him she didn’t want him anymore.
...
Taking care of a baby was a lot of work, but in some ways it was easy. Check and change the wet diaper, then pop a boob out and cuddle the baby while she ate. Food, diaper changes, and cuddles. Figuring out what a baby needed was easy. Especially when compared to Spike. She didn’t know what the hell he needed, or how to give it to him.
She’d tried, exactly once, threatening to take Thursday out on daylong visits with her friends if he didn’t cut down on the workouts. She still felt almost sick with guilt over the panic attack that had caused. Which left her without much she could do to get that idiot-
“He’s not an idiot,” Tara’s remembered words whispered through her head. “He’s been through hell. Even if we don’t agree with his feelings, he’s not stupid for having them.”
Buffy knew Tara was right, but it didn’t keep her from wanting to smack some sense into him. She had one more idea, but if it didn’t work…. She sighed and shifted the baby to her other boob. Right now, all she could do was take care of their child, then go downstairs and try to take care of Spike.
She finished nursing the baby, then put her back in the carrier to take her downstairs. Spike was slouched on the couch, one hand using the remote to flip through channels while the other was braced between the armrest and his head, buried in his tousled curls. She loved free range Spike curls, but it was more proof that he wasn’t taking very good care of himself.
She set the carrier on the floor near his feet so he could easily look in on her without moving too much, then sat beside him. He didn’t stink, exactly, but this close, she could tell that he’d need to shower soon. It was better than scrubbing himself raw and bloody like the first few weeks after the rape, but the decrease in showering was just as much of an indicator of something wrong. Her vampire liked long showers and reading while he soaked in a bubble bath. A five-minute wash every few days was just… wrong.
“Hey,” she said quietly, not sure how to start the conversation they needed to have.
He grunted a vague greeting, refusing to look at her as he continued flipping through the channels. He was trying to look unconcerned, but she knew him well enough to know he was tense. He didn’t want to talk. Fine. She’d manage most of the talking, if that was how he wanted it.
“We’re having a Whale Night,” she announced, taking the remote and switching the TV to the local station that always seemed to be showing dubbed kung fu movies. That got his attention. He stared at her in disbelief. “But first, there are some things I need to tell you.”
No response, other than a sudden wariness in his eyes. Damn it. She sucked at words, but she was going to have to find the right ones.
She took a deep breath before starting the next part. “Other than chaining you up again – which I’m not going to do – there’s nothing I can actually do to stop what you’ve been doing to yourself. If you feel like you have to keep hurting yourself and keeping yourself from fully healing, then okay. You do that. But there are going to be some rules. Dawn is spending the night at Janice’s and Mom is staying with Giles. Tonight, we’re going to just sit around and watch TV together while we eat junk food. Starting tomorrow…. I’ve already talked to Dawn, Mom, and Xander. Any day that you choose to workout, you can’t come on patrol with me, and no one will babysit if you try to follow along anyway. Until you’ve healed, you can either workout or patrol. Not both on the same day.”
“That’s not–”
She held up a hand to stop him. He was talking, which was a relief, but as much as she wanted to sit back and let him carry the conversation, that wouldn’t accomplish anything right now. “You won’t talk to me, and you haven’t been listening. This is the result. Workouts or patrol, it’s up to you which you want to do more.”
“You just want me out of the way when you patrol,” he said bitterly. “You don’t want some flabby git in sweats and a baggy shirt hanging about, trying to fight.”
“Why are you being so stupid?” she yelled. Sorry, Tara. “You’re still a badass fighter, and I don’t care how you look. I love you because you’re you! You’ve got Dad bod a month after having a baby. So the fuck what?” She shoved her hand under his shirt and pressed against his belly, leaning in when he tried to pull away. She was probably hurting him, but she didn’t care. Not at the moment. “You earned this.” She pressed a little harder. “You grew a whole person inside your body, and you need to give it a break. I love you, you moron, and I’m going to keep loving you, no matter how long it takes for you to get back into shape. So chill. The. Fuck. Out.”
He looked away from her, and she could feel him trembling. “If that’s true….” His voice was rough, like he was forcing the words out. “If that’s true, why haven’t you touched me like this since Thursday was born?”
“Huh?” Her jaw dropped in confusion.
His hand slipped under the shirt to rest on hers. “Like this. You used…. Every night, you’d curl up against me and do this with your hand. And then you just… stopped.”
She blinked, mouth opening and closing a few times as she tried to figure out what to say. This is what had been bothering him? That was… That was just…. Sorry, Tara, she thought again.
“You… are… such an idiot. Drusilla cut you open. When I got to you, your innards were trying to become your outtards through the half-assed stitching she’d done. Even after Ben fixed things up, you were still in bad shape. I haven’t been rubbing my ‘grubby little slayer paws’ all over you lately because I didn’t want to hurt you.”
The shocked look on his face made her want to punch him, but she kept more of Tara’s words firmly in mind. He didn’t think she was an asshole who didn’t care about causing him pain. He just wasn’t used to people thinking it mattered.
She moved her hand out from under his before yanking him close and wrapping her arms around him. “You’re an idiot,” she whispered. “But you’re my idiot.”
“So, not done with me, then?”
“Nope. You’re mine. You’re not getting rid of me unless you use a crowbar. And probably not even then.” That got a laugh out of him. “Now, come on. We’ve got movies to watch and snacks that aren’t going to eat themselves.”
He wasn’t okay. Not yet. She was going to have to put her foot down at least a few more times, and he wasn’t going to suddenly be taking a bubble bath tomorrow, but he’d get there.