I take the time to send whatever spirit is guarding me today a quick prayer of thanks that Anya didn't wake me when I fell asleep on the pile of new invisibility cloaks I was meant to be cataloguing, because that is the only reason I’m still awake, before I say, "Thank you, William."

He has been watching me all along, tensing his muscles so as to remain still, and now he widens those expressive eyes in surprise, asking for more details.

"Thank you for being here," I continue. "Thank you for dressing up for me, for supper, for not trying to make me talk when I was eating, for cleaning the apartment. Thank you for setting up this evening for me."

He smiles, but doesn’t say anything, apparently deciding that it’s now my turn to do the work. Which is fine by me—I've got plenty to say.

"I’ve really enjoyed it, but there is something missing."

• * *

Something missing, he says. Yeah. I’m not human, and he doesn’t love me. I don’t trust myself to speak without letting him see my tears, so I just concentrate on staying where I am, not snatching my hand away and running off to stake myself. Any time with him is better than no time.

"… what we’re missing is honesty. We’ve been a couple, living and sleeping together, working together, for nearly six months, but neither of us has ever really begun to talk about how we feel."

Ah, so this is where he asks me how I feel, and I…I should have written and rehearsed that declaration of love after all. Here it comes, the dreaded- no, it doesn’t sound like a question.

"I really don’t know how you’re going to react to this, but I’ve got to say it."

• * *

He continues to look at me, carefully hiding whatever he is feeling behind ‘the mask of Spike’, the picture of I’m-a-bad-vampire-with-no-feelings-and-I-don’t-care-about-yours. It must have been cultivated over many years to transform him into what he believed Drusilla wanted him to be, but now he uses it to hide when his emotions are in turmoil. When he’s wearing jeans and boots, it suits him very well, and must have protected him from much heartache over the years- if not the pain of feeling, then the pain of his feelings being known. On the other hand, it doesn’t quite go with what I can now see are patent leather shoes.

Stop thinking, Rupert, look down at his hand in yours and say what you have to say. He can’t- won’t- wouldn’t- bite you.

"William, I…I love you."

• * *

What! That’s supposed to be my line, and he’s supposed to reject me! Does that mean I should—no, William, you want this, react the way he does when you fantasize the ideal way of telling him about your feelings. Let a little smile out past the mask, turn around a touch, and lean forward into his embrace.

• * *

He frees his hand from mine, as I’d feared he might, but it is only to run it up my arm, and my fears are calmed as he leans forward into my embrace. It makes me supremely happy, even though the position is more than a bit awkward, because as he nestles up to me, I hear him whisper, "Love you too, Rupert."

I clasp him tight at that, and know that this will rapidly turn into something else. I know because he has begun to pepper light kisses up and down my neck and over my ear, all the bits of exposed skin he can reach. This evening will go down in my private diary as one of the best of my life.

Am, I'm loving this. But there's one bit that threw me enough to where I honestly didn't know who was speaking:

"True—but that could be a good thing. If you let me put these down inside, I’ll go and fetch the rest—Xander gave me a lift, but he couldn’t stay to help carry."

For the second time that day he stood back to allow me to enter. This time, I went back past him almost at once, saying, "I can help for maybe two hours, then I must be off again."

"Fetch" and "must be off" - you'd say it, I'd say "off again" as a half-half Anglo-American, but Willow? She's a nice Jewish girl from southern California. I can't imagine her using either of those terms. they're purely UK.

The rest? I am sooooo loving this.

Drat. USians don't use 'fetch'?

(Stoopid Canadian parents.)

Drat. USians don't use 'fetch'?

Rarely. Very, very rarely. And then they're usually heavy-duty readers of Britlit.

I still have some leftovers from being dragged all over the place as a kid - I'll use "right, I'm off" and I have never got out of the habit of saying "mind that idiot on the bicycle!" instead of "look out for" or whatever. But honestly - try imagining Willow using clasic Britspeak in her own accent.

I'm from a family of fetchers.

Some things (marks, writing exams, to(u)ques, university, pissed for drunk, chesterfield, washroom) are obvious. Fetch, NSM.

(Adds new one to list.)

(My vocabulary, spoken, has altered a great deal since I started watching TV like an obsessive, but I am beginning to understand why I was frequently mistaken for an exchange student.)

(I'm slow.)

Hee! I still say university as well, and it takes me a moment when people say they're going to college.

Oh, and there's another one: "as well." I use "too" only in very specific circs: "Hey! Me too!"

Thanks for the pointer, deb. The classic Britspeak in my own accent, and that I'm writing in Giles and Spike, affects the Americans at times.

Is

"True—but that could be a good thing. If you let me put these down inside, I’ll go and get the rest—Xander gave me a lift, but he couldn’t stay to help carry."

For the second time that day he stood back to allow me to enter. This time, I went back past him almost at once, saying, "I can help for maybe two hours, then I have to get to class."

Am, yup, definitely. I'd be tempted to add something like "...carry stuff" at the end of the first one, just because I can hear Willow saying it.

It's a huge balancing act, isn't it? I'm Britlingual but I'm sadly lacking in the current slang - even "pants!" was new to me as of a year ago. So mine is the phrasing and slang I used as a child, and I'd bet a lot of it is obsolete.

It's difficult. But I think you're right about "carry stuff"-- very Willow.

Do you ever find yourself wanting to write something with phrases like "going down the pub" or "going out to the shops", and then remember, it's an American speaking, and really, they wouldn't?

I've programmed myself to double-check in my head for that. Because I do it all. the. time.