Spike

Standing on Union Street in the chill darkness of a December's eve in London, he was only a few blocks from where the home he and his mother had shared had been. On the third day, he'd gone to look, finding that the buildings weren't quite what he remembered. In place of their brownstone was a candlemaker's shoppe, and he'd gone inside, coming out with nothing to show for the trip but a beeswax pillar that he'd left burning in the window of his flat that night.

Funny thing, he'd been certain these were issues he'd worked through. He'd been so sure. But a century of loss, of separation, had not faded the memory of his mother's face from his mind, and now, faced with this city, he saw her on every street corner. Felt her in every inch of his flat. Heard her voice in every howl of the wind. In every alleyway, he saw Dru, dark hair and yellow eyes, and he felt a longing he'd been so sure he'd shaken years ago.

But it was mother that the city reminded him of most.

Luckily, he was still himself. The city had not brought the return of William, though the clothes might have suggested otherwise. Collar turned up against the cold, hat tipped low over hair that had grown out to it's natural honey blonde, he hurried toward the pub down the street, hoping for a bit of warmth and a pint.

That's when he heard it.

It was nothing but a tinkling at first, barely a tune, but it grew stronger as he walked. It had no pull on him, no power the way it had back in Sunnydale when the First had been rooting around in his skull, but it was so familiar... so full of memory and pain, he felt the breath taken from him, his heart seizing in his chest.

Sitting on the stoop of a darkened office building, was a tiny music box. It stood open, that familiar tune clanking from within. With a growl, he stalked towards it, slamming the lid shut and lifting the mahogany box in his hands. His father had given it to her for an anniversary, when William was still small. Before Father had passed. Back when mother was still young and healthy and beautiful. He knew without looking that inside would be her jewelry. Not the most valuable or flashy, but the pieces which held the most sentiment. Her favorite pieces.

With a sigh, Spike sat on that darkened stoop, the box resting on his knee, and thought of his mother. But in his memories, she was not young or beautiful or smiling. In his memories, just then, she was sneering, yellow-eyed and hungry.

He might have claimed that he'd come to terms with what he'd done, that he'd come to terms with all those awful things she'd said, but that hadn't erased the memory from his mind. A thousand years wouldn't be enough for that.

[[Find him on the west side of the river, sitting on any stoop you'd like. He probably won't be receptive to strangers, but now is a perfect time for friends. Also note, as the post said, his hair is honey blonde instead of platinum, but cut short in his usual style. ST/LT always welcome.]]

It was a peculiar place, this Tabula Rasa.

Mother had always stressed a thorough education, including all the classics, all of which they'd read together, in the parlor, in the dim light of the fire and gas-fueled table lamps. He had a rudimentary knowledge of Greek and Latin, as every proper, well-bred young man should, and he found it charming that they'd given the island -- a place the likes of which he'd never seen -- such a clever name.

He missed Mother terribly, however, but he took comfort in the knowledge that, according to the lovely island natives he'd been fortunate enough to converse with, Mother's arrival could come at any moment. He could only hope and pray his wait would not be too unbearably long.

Just then, he found himself in a kind of common room, sparsely furnished and not at all like the richly decorated, warm parlors he was used to. He sat rather primly in a vacant armchair, a pair of wire-rimmed glasses perched on his nose, which he'd found while searching for proper attire in that curious little hamper they called the clothes box.

In his hand was a leather bound volume of Shakespeare's collected works, something that had always given him great comfort, a flood of memories assaulting his mind, his heart, of hours spent listening to mother recite those familiar lines, her sweet William knelt at her feet with his head come to rest on her lap.

He did so wish that she could be there with him, in that very moment, in such an alarming and exotic place.

[[He looks almost exactly as he does in the icon, dressed appropriately for a gentleman of modest means, in the late 1870s. He is wearing glasses, and his hair is longer, curlier, and honey-blonde.]]