it's like a buddy movie (only without the buddy part)
Chapter Six: In Search of a Proper Ale
Spike cocked his head to the left. “Car’s down off the next street here.” He strode ahead, not even looking over his shoulder to make sure Xander was following.
“So, where’d you get that thing, anyway?” Xander asked.
“Pardon?”
“The DeSoto,” Xander explained. “I mean, I’m sure it’s not like you just walked into a classic car dealership at high noon and said, ‘I’ll take that one.’”
Spike chuckled. Things were all manner of mucked up, but it might be fun to mess with the boy a trifle.
“Actually, it was exactly like that,” he said, grinning to himself.
“Huh?”
“Well, ‘cept it wasn’t at noon, you git, and I didn’t so much drop cash on the counter as hold the head salesman at gunpoint ‘til he let me off the lot with the thing.”
He heard Xander stop behind him, and Spike turned around slowly.
“Somehow I sort of doubt that,” Xander said, clearly not buying the yarn.
Spike shrugged. “Suit yourself, then. ‘S how it happened.” He continued down the sidewalk until they reached the car.
“I’m thinking more along the lines of grand theft auto.”
“That so?” Spike plucked a set of keys from his duster pocket and dangled them in front of Xander’s face. “Then how’d I get these?” He unlocked the passenger door and walked around to the other side.
“You ate the real owner,” Xander theorized, climbing inside.
Spike slid behind the wheel and fired up the engine. Immediately, the stereo began blaring, Johnny Rotten’s angry nasal voice filling the small space. Xander reached over the stick shift and snapped the music off defiantly.
“I don’t solve every quandary by eating someone, you know,” Spike told him, turning the stereo back on but keeping the volume lower. “Some things are even best done in a completely straightforward manner, ways even your little gang of good would approve of.”
Xander raised an eyebrow. “So you got this thing totally on the up and up?”
Spike pulled away from the curb. “Didn’t say that. You’re right. I stalked some bloke few years back whose ride I fancied, did him in, and nicked the car.”
“Well, then, what are these illustrious things you get via perfectly legal means?”
Spike tossed an empty pack of Marlboros onto the dashboard. “Always pay for my smokes, I do.”
“You’re truly a prince among men.”
“And don’t you forget it.” Spike pulled into a gas station a block away from the Magic Box. “Be half a mo’,” he said. “You want some of those ghastly Twinkies of which you’re so bloody fond?”
Xander looked down guiltily. “Maybe,” he mumbled.
“Fine. Fill me up with a bit of unleaded.” He opened his door, but stopped as Xander got out to begin pumping the gas.
There was something lying on the passenger seat.
Spike took a nervous glance outside.
Brilliant, he hasn’t noticed yet, Spike realized.
As quickly as possible, he grabbed the object and made a mad dash for the convenience store.
Inside, Spike snatched up several packages of Twinkies and Red Vines from the shelves, and then paused to survey the beverage options.
Nearly all the cases and bottles of beer featured shabbily-illustrated depictions of mountains and rolling hills. Spike shook his head sadly. They were out of Heineken, even, which usually did in a pinch. Yanks, he thought bitterly. God, when would they learn to produce a proper ale that wasn’t flat as hell and tasted of goat piss?
He finally settled for a six-pack of MGD, but halfway to the register, he doubled back, adding two tall cans of Guinness for good measure. Not as good as it was fresh from the tap, but sufficient. Satisfied, he spread the bounty on the counter, cutting in line ahead of an elderly woman purchasing entirely too many Slim Jims, requested a carton of cigarettes, and slapped a credit card down on the counter.
The clerk squinted from the card to Spike. “Okay, Mr. Harris,” he finally said, his tone bored and apathetic. “Anything else?”
Spike pointed outside. “Right, yeah. Pump four, just add whatever my mate’s filled the car with, eh?” He ran a shaky hand through his hair as the clerk finished the transaction, wondering how long it would take Xander to realize his wallet had gone missing.
Sod it, he thought as he returned to the car. Lad’s gotta realize someday how the world works.
With a grand flourish, he tossed the wallet in a high arc to Xander just as the boy was coming back around to the passenger door.
Xander caught it, then looked confusedly at his wallet. “What the… Wait. What’d you just do?!”
Spike unlocked the trunk and stashed the grocery sack inside. “Told you I always pay for my smokes,” he said simply.
“But this is MY --”
“I didn’t say I used my own money. ‘Sides, thought you were pickin’ up the tab tonight, eh?”
Xander shot Spike a death glare, but remained silent on the short drive to the shop.
When they pulled up to the curb, Xander held up Anya’s keys pointedly. “Okay, see, this is how NORMAL people do things. Need to get into retail area in the middle of the night? You get the keys. You don’t break in. You want food? You ASK the person with the money if he’ll pay. You don’t swipe his wallet.”
“Way I figure it,” Spike sneered, pulling the bag from the trunk and slamming it much louder than necessary, “you said you’d pay, and you did. I also think screwing the shopgirl’s a brilliant way of gettin’ into said shop.”
Xander’s nostrils flared.
“It’s all in the details,” Spike said.
“I hate you,” Xander said, unlocking the front door.
“You say that so often. Ought to get you a thesaurus for Christmas. I’m sure you could come up with somethin’ better’n that.”
The door banged against the inside wall as Xander swung it open.
“Oh, THAT’s right. You’re the one what didn’t go to university. So I shouldn’t expect much clever to come out of your gob.”
Xander spun around quickly. “I have had JUST about as much from you as I can take tonight. Got it? We’re stuck hitting the books together, but cut the commentary.” He let out a bitter laugh. “God, when I think of how you actually thought you stood a chance with her. Lemme tell you something about… about how stuff worked between us.” He took a step closer to Spike. “She was loyal to her friends, and anybody who talked crap about them was liable to find themselves deader than usual.”
There was a long, heavy silence as the two men stared at each other, both seething with mutual loathing… and both heavily enmeshed in the most profound grief either of them had ever felt.
Spike ground his teeth together so hard his jaw began to ache dully. He was the first to break eye contact, but no longer cared if this put him in the position of defeat. “Truce,” he said softly. “Just for tonight, then, ‘s all right by me if it’s all right by you.”
“Yeah, right,” Xander scoffed. “As if we could ever get along. Never work in a million years.”
Spike reached into the grocery bag, pulled out a beer, and handed it to Xander. “Might not, but this’ll sure as hell make it more interesting to try.”