First thing Xander heard was a well modulated and soft spoken "Oh dear. That wasn't supposed to happen," before all hell broke loose.

"Bloody fucking hell!"

And English cursing guy sounded really different when he was English cursing gal but Xander was too busy finding himself two (big big) boobies richer and missing a dick to listen to the rest of whatever Spike had to say. "What the fuck?"

"I asked first!"

And that girly Willow shriek sounded really manly.

"Get him - her! She's getting away!"

That's all the Xand-ma - oh whatever - needed to spring into action - or spring into Spike, colliding in a collision of hard bits with soft bits and "Ow" one struggling female Ethan Rayne on the bottom.

Xander waited for the moaning to stop and the groaning - and the faint wet slippery sounds that he hoped to all kinds of gods he was only imagining because Spike was really getting into it for a while there.

Then, he averted his eyes and hurried down the hall straight into the bedroom with no more than a glimpse of long, pale leg hanging over the edge of Spike's bed and the curve of a nice nice breast with -

*Not looking!*

Enlightenment wasn't walking a mile in someone else's shoes.

Enlightenment was walking a mile in his own shoes which had never seemed so big when he had guy feet.

Big guy feet.

Though he still had guy-sized hips, only really not.

Whatever. At least his jeans weren't falling down.

Xander flip-stomped his way to The Magic Box thanks to the gods of Ace Bandage and Hanes Extra Thick Workman's Socks. "Okay. Research guy reporting for work."

Four pairs of eyes slid down Xander's body.

"What?"

"Guy?" Willow asked.

"If you can still do little girl voice with a pair of testicles, I can still use masculine pronouns with boobies." Xander threw himself into a chair. "Bring on das books!" He banged the table for emphasis - because let's face it, beating his chest was currently out of the question.

"I'm afraid it won't be quite that easy, Xander."

Xander looked at Giles. Giles and his classic jeans and a sweater - that fit. Really fit. Christ, it almost flattered and that was wrong. Also unfair. Giles looked as comfortable in his clothes as he had before it all went balls up - to borrow Spike's very very ironic turn of phrase. Either there was more to Watcher training than met the eye, what they said about English guys and cross dressing was true (and he'd ask Spike but Spike wasn't doing much dressing at all these days) or you could accomplish anything with a credit card and a red BMW convertible. And maybe a Wonderbra but that was territory Xander really didn't want to venture through.

And Giles was still talking.

Whoops.

"Huh?"

"There are no books on this subject."

Xander processed that quickly - too quickly - raced through all of the possibilities until he reached the solid wall of oh shit at the end of the tunnel. "That's what I heard you say - but what you meant is that there are no books on this subject in your collection and one is being FedExed from LA as we speak. Right?"

"What I meant is that Ethan created a unique spell for our benefit and does not know how to reverse it."

"Have you tried thumb screws?" Xander asked weakly. "I hear thumb screws are really popular for making people talk."

The shop door slammed on a cloud of smoke and Spike casually dropped his blanket into a display of fetishes. He strolled the length of the shop and hopped up onto the counter, crossing his legs. "Thumb screws are overrated, pet. Now, bamboo under the fingernails, that's a classic for a reason."

They all stared.

Tight black jeans looked a lot different on girls.

And that tight black camisole looked a lot different on Spike.

"I'm confused," Willow whispered to Tara, so quietly Xander almost didn't hear it - and then wished he hadn't. "I think I have an erection - does that mean I'm still gay or does it mean I'm straight now?"

"It means you're horny, sweetie." Tara petted her hair, the gesture no less natural to big man hands than it had been to slender girl hands.

Xander dropped his head onto the table and covered it with his own (please god, temporarily) girl arms.

Spike lit a cigarette. "His bird left a box of clothes in the closet."

Xander closed his mouth - quickly - before he could say anything that might imply Spike filled out Anya's clothes a whole lot better than Anya did - or that Spike was clearly a little bigger than Anya the way the clothes stretched. Either way, it was not something that should come out of Xander's mouth if he wanted to see another morning. "Those clothes were for charity," he said instead.

Spike shrugged. "I'm charity, luv. Think of the poor naked vampire with no clothes to call his own."

Xander tried to think of anything but the poor naked vampire.

The poor naked vampire with busy hands and no earthly inhibitions.

He heard Willow whisper about wishing she'd worn looser pants.

Xander moved very very far away from Willow and leaned against a book shelf in what he hoped was a casual pose. "So!" He said loudly before any more very disturbing whispers could reach his ears. "What are we going to do about this? This is where we break out the Scooby power, right?"

"This is where we wait." Giles took a seat on one of the benches and removed his glasses, tapping the stem against his teeth. "Ethan insists the spell is designed to wear off if we wait. I don't feel particularly inclined to trust him but it may very well be our best course of action until we learn differently."

"And when you say wear off - you mean when? Exactly."

"We don't know."

"And you are going to learn differently - right?"

"If there is a different option." Giles did not sound hopeful for the possibility.

Xander stood - a man with a plan - boobies too, but most importantly: a plan. "Who's up for drinks at the Bronze?"

It was a really popular plan.

"I'll - er - break out the books then."

"That was bloody satisfying, it was."

"Spike - "

"Seeing her high and mightiness brought low by a pack of angered Neanderthals defending my dainty virtue. For shame, Slayer."

"Spike - "

"A true gentleman never hits a lady."

That stopped Xander. "Okay, there is so much wrong with that. First? You're not a lady, Spike. You are a man under a spell that gave you girl parts." Spike waved him off dismissively but Xander was not to be silenced. "And second, you hit girls all the time. Including Buffy. Especially Buffy."

"Never said I was a gentleman, did I? She's a white hat." Spike was inspecting a breast down the front of his camisole. "Reckon these would look good with rings through 'em?"

Xander's brain whirled through the subject change and threw a cog when it got there. He stumbled over his boots.

"Don't seem to be any more sensitive but I've always fancied bints with metal through the tits." He gave a nipple an experimental pinch but Xander was too busy denying the hot and wet throb of interest in his loins to answer - or tell him to shut up. In hindsight, this was a mistake. A big one. "Think I'm gonna do that. You toddle on home, mate. I'll be in by dawn."

And Xander found himself standing on the street in Sunnydale so far after dark the nightlife was having its lunch break.

As a recently smaller and more tender than usual member of the species most likely to be lunch, Xander decided cowardice was the better part of valor and hailed the first empty cab that came by.

Because the sooner Xander got home unmolest - uneat- alive, the sooner he could drink himself into that happy place where he couldn't feel anything from the neck down.

Or the neck up.

There would be no feeling - up or down.

Damn it.

He stomped up the stairs to his apartment. Stomping felt good. Stomping was manly.

Stomping distracted him from the tingle that wouldn't go away every time he thought Spike, boobies, needles - three unmixy things that were currently doing a lot for him.

He unlocked his door, kicked it shut and headed straight for the fridge and cool, foamy oblivion.

Beer.

Beer was manly too.

Beer good as a wiser woman once said before hauling off and kicking ass.

Why couldn't he be an ass kicking guy with boobies?

Xander's brain tapped him on the shoulder, rewound the conversation and pointed out the many levels of wrong in that thought.

Xander squinted at the label on his beer. Either they were makin' the Bud stronger these days or the lack of oxygen to his brain was starting to get to him.

He tested the ace bandages.

Okay. Time to feed the Xand-man's brain and if Spike walked in on him, Xander would strangle him with the bandages.

It was a plan.

Death by brassiere.

He slugged down the beer, steeled himself, shucked his shirt and began to unwind the bandages.

Carefully.

Because holy pantheons his nipples hurt.

Cradling his nonmanly parts with a protective arm and grabbing his beer with the other, he shuffled his way across the room and collapsed on the couch.

He looked down at boobie A, nestled against his palm, feeling way too good there for a boobie where it wasn't supposed to be. It was in restricted territory without a pass. "This is your fault," he told it. "And don't think you're innocent either, buddy," he told the other before gingerly letting go and lifting his beer to his lips.

They throbbed back at him vindictively.

Now he knew why girls didn't do the ace bandages thing.

He was glad he hadn't gone to plan B: duct tape.

Xander lay in bed with his eyes closed and an arm thrown against them - and quietly waited to freak out.

The problem was how many things he had to freak out over.

A guy could stay up all night listing them all - or keep himself up all week trying to decide what to freak out over first.

Or fall asleep counting reasons to freak out like they were sheep.



And wake up to something that felt suspiciously like a blow job only...not.

Xander stiffened everywhere but the usual and dug his fingers into the blankets. "Spike?"

"Mmm?" The consonants vibrated between his legs with a buzz that went straight to his brain and Xander's throat clicked when he swallowed.

Reason eight to freak out was coming back to haunt him: Spike had access to his apartment.

Bedroom.

Bed.

Xander yelped, scuttling back into the pillows when Spike's access got a whole lot more personal and they reached an impasse.

One where Xander clutched a pillow to his chest with his knees pulled up, thoughts pinging off each other like over-excited atoms, and really naughty tingles banging through his nerves to the rhythm of his pulse - and Spike sat back on his heels, naked, and looking offended.

"What? You can't say you weren't enjoying that." Spike stuck a glossy finger into his mouth, frowning around it.

And it was wrong - wrong wrong wrong - to have naked Spike in his bed with boobies and curving places and parts it was too early in the morning for Xander's brain to put into context and his fingers in his mouth - his very up close and personal fingers - and a pout - and -

Then context happened.

Spike helped it along.

The number one reason to freak out:

"Enjoyed it enough last night."

Xander was never - ever - going to drink again.

Until he got his own body back.

And then he was going to get very very drunk.

And if he was a good boy, maybe that time he wouldn't wake up in bed with Spike looking like a wet dream -

Which he so totally did not just think.

While Xander made a run for Denial, Spike was sniffing the air, smiling, looking pleased and prowly and wrapping cool hands around his ankles and tugging and Xander told himself he was no match for vampire strength.

No match at all.

And really, there was no point in fighting because it would only give Spike a headache and it was only natural to - to -

"Nothing I haven't felt, pet. Nothing I haven't done." Spike's words buzzed and hummed up the nerves of Xander's inner thigh that he's pretty sure he didn't have a week ago and Xander's spine tried to bend like Mr. Santiago's cat's. "Nothing I haven't seen. Nothing I haven't got, come to think of it."

Xander lifted his head. It took effort but he fought the gravity of the mattress and his traitorous parts that were saying yes, yes, yes! and singing hallelujah when Spike's thumbs skimmed way too sensitive, way too swollen flesh. "Huh?"

Apparently, his brain hadn't been able to fight the gravity as well as his head and was lodged down between his thighs, lost in unfamiliar territory without a road map.

And Xander was clearly a passenger for this ride.

"Haven't you always wanted to know what it feels like?"

Then, while Xander was still trying to form a reply that wasn't god, please yes! and wasn't quite enough no to put Spike off - he found out exactly what it felt like and wondered if it was too late to call Giles and tell him to hold off on looking for a cure - yet.



And he would have - if his brain hadn't dissolved like a cheap lollipop under every lick.

So he'd come to some time in the afternoon. After the orgasms - after the - okay, he had no metaphors but his legs were numb and the phantom lashings of Spike's tongue really weren't helping Xander through metaphor man territory.

"That's right," he told the bricks, taking a sharp right into the alley behind The Magic Box to gird his metaphorical loins, "man."

Even if he had given up on the Ace bandages thing. And if he had been whistled at by a couple of guys he was pretty sure he worked with on site during the summer.

But damn it! He was a man! He was confident! He was a man while Spike ate him out and he was confident that he would still be a man while jiggling and being whistled at in public places.

And - and - his manliness was in no way threatened by Spike getting him off with womanly parts because he was man. Orgasms good.

Okay, orgasms great because that over a hundred years' experience promise? Spike so delivered and - well, it hadn't been bad. It'd been so far from bad, it'd have to call bad long-distance.

And his friends would in no way be able to read evidence of happy naked time with Spike on his face the moment he walked into the 'Box.

Xander let himself in through the back door of The Magic Box and everyone stared.

Of course, by 'everyone' he meant big manly Buffy and Ethan and Giles - who was actually pretty hot in an 'oh my god, I did not just say that out loud, did I?' way.

"Er. Yes. Thank you, Xander."

Damn it.

But there was no yelling and no recriminations. So score one nonchalance point to the Xand-man.

Xander helped himself to a chair and sat down while he could still feel his knees.

"Did you - um - go shopping?" Buffy's fingers wiggled in Xander's direction and he looked down. Into cleavage.

And a shirt that said Angel on the front in sparkling blue.

"It was in Anya's charity box."

"What happened to Xand the Man with the Plan and an Ace bandage?"

Xander resisted the urge to rub his sore nipples.

"His new plan is lettin' it all hang out. And Spike took her Devil shirt."

"Oh dear god."

"Hey, I'm a believer in listing the contents on the package. Ever since that Tijuana chocolate bar incident - ." Xander was being stared at in ew-face, horror and vague interest respectively. "Which you don't want to hear about."

Boy was the packaging accurate on Spike.

In the shirt or out of it and curled up in the middle of Xander's bed with tousled hair and soft skin and - Xander took the kind of deep breath that'd gotten him through Sophomore year with a minimum of humiliation. "So when do we make with the presto changeo backo mojo?"

Giles kept polishing.

And kept polishing.

"Giles?"

"I'm - afraid it could be some time."

Another of Anya's shirts said Trouble.

Yeah, truth in advertising.

And that shirt was tighter and hello, nipples! thin.

He loved that shirt.

And Xander was going straight to hell.

He accepted that.

"Spike?" Xander asked. "Spike." He put a spin on it for emphasis. "Hands!" This time he jumped away from the vampire with busy hands, hastily tugging his shirt down and holding a warning finger between them. "What did we say about the hands in private places outside of the apartment?"

Spike snorted and lit a cigarette, squinting at Xander through the smoke. "We didn't say anything about it, mate. You said no hands in private places outside the apartment and I said - "

He squinted and Xander tried really hard not to think about how good Spike looked squinting and how obscene that thing Spike did to the filter of his cigarette with his tongue really was.

"Don't remember what I said, actually," Spike said with the air of a man who didn't know what he'd said but knew he wouldn't agree to something silly like that.

Unfortunately, he was right.

"Point is, you like it."

And right again.

Really raking in the right points for Team Vampire.

Xander smoothed his shirt and tried to look like a guy who hasn't been enjoying a vampire with benefits in the comfort of his own home all weekend. "Yeah, well not when your hands are cold, buddy. Cold hands, no nookie."

Spike twitched an eyebrow upward, did that thing with his tongue and Xander sent up the danger flares. "Didn't mean no nookie last night, mate."

"New rule."

The eyebrow mocked him.

"Very new."

"Whatever you say, pet."

And the eyebrows stood down and Xander lowered the threat level and they started walking again, taking a turn into the alley behind The Magic Box.

Together.

But not together.

Okay, not together in any way that'd lead to uncomfortable discussions.

Because at some time in the last week, Xander had caved and naked fun with boobies!Spike had become less about plausible deniability and more about Spike's really really rational suggestion. How had it gone?

'Listen, mate. I've got great tits. You like tits.'

It was something Xander hadn't been able to argue with - it was something Xander hadn't wanted to argue with. It'd opened the floodgates of possibility and the wiggy naked fun had kept on being naked fun and got less wiggy and lots more participatory and exploratory and other tories that were of the good.

And there was something endearing about the way Spike grabbed his hair and squirmed when he came against Xander's tongue but never crushed Xander's head like a grape with his thighs. Restraint. Xander appreciated that.

And showed his appreciation with repeat performances.

And Spike seemed pretty appreciative of Xander's appreciation.

It was a whole big appreciation-fueled orgy.

Which had absolutely nothing to do with -

"The point," Xander said because when you said 'the point' there had to be a point and people were supposed to pay attention to that and not to the way you were staring at their nipples through their really skimpy tops, "is that we're standing behind The Magic Box - where we are expected, okay ten minutes ago - and any one of the people in there could come out here any second now and I do not want them to come out to find your hands - " Xander held up the magical hold on there, buddy finger again, "or any other part under my shirt."

Spike tilted his head the other way and folded his arms the way that made his breasts swell up and spill over the top line of his shirt. "Why?"

"I'm a coward," Xander said and beat a heroic retreat into The Magic Box - or as he affectionately liked to think of it: the place where reading was not optional. He got ten feet before Giles passed by and handed him a book. He tucked it under his arm unchecked. Because the day Giles handed him the important book was the day Giles was a lot more desperate than this. "So what's the what, my gender-challenged friends?"

"The what is Giles and Ethan are hot on the trail of our solution." Buffy stood up and stretched, cracked her neck from one side to the other. "And I have a date."

"A what now?"

"What? I'm not good looking enough to date?"

"As a card carrying - if not hormone-carrying - member of Club Guy, I reserve my right not to answer that." Xander sat with his book and checked out the cover. Magical Practical Jokes And You.

"Come on, mate. Slayer's a good enough looking bloke. Bit on the puny side but there's some who like that kind of thing."

"You'd know."

"I'm dainty, pet," Spike said and leaned forward and showed off his dainty wrists and fingers and Xander thought it'd be impolitic to mention any of the really really not dainty things Spike got up to behind closed doors.

"Oh, good lord."

And Xander had seldom been so glad for Giles' exclamation before he could say something out loud he really shouldn't.

"Is this good lord of the good or is it kinda more like get used to lifting the toilet seat, Buffy?" Buffy winced. "Um, not that that's been an issue - or anything - in the middle of the night. More than a couple of times."

"I believe you won't find that news shocking to anyone in present company, Buffy." Giles slipped off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "It appears there is a reversal spell."

"Where's the bad?"

"The bad is, well see for yourselves." Giles offered Willow the book.

"Oh. Ooh, this is bad."

And bad was a really good way to get Xander's attention. "What's bad?"

"Well, the reversal's really easy." Willow turned the book so Xander could see. "Or it would be if Riley hadn't shipped out a few nights ago. Because everyone who was there for the spell's gotta be there for the reversal or - poof - no presto change-o."



Which is how Xander found himself in Giles' hot new car with Spike and a CD player blaring The Cramps.

Spike thought that was funny.

Xander didn't. "And if you say one word, one word of Thelma and Louise, this trip is over."

"Where's your sense of adventure, mate?"

"In my dick."

Spike tutted - tutted - and in Xander's stunned posttut silence, he went on. "Look, we've got a mid life crisis car, two credit cards and the open road. What's not to love, mate?"

It was a good question. It was a great question.

It was a question Xander had a perfectly good answer for and he'd sooner dance naked across the 'last rest stop for fifty miles' than hand it over.

Because he couldn't think of a way to put it that didn't sound like he kinda wanted to keep the tits.

Which he totally didn't.

Strictly a loan. Borrowed goods. Happy, horny multiorgasmic experience never to be spoken of again once his dick was reclaimed.

But there was no way to ask 'will you still want me when I've got a dick' that didn't sound girly.