Sober/Drugs/Addict

by - Alicelostwonder or AngelSummersForever

Author's Note: What can I say? I love me my Buffy & Angel and I like them dark. Apparently, however, this one about as dark as Ms. Kitty Fantastico but I don't know, you read and decide. Writer's Strike Unite!!!! Wait, NOOOOOO!!!! COME BACK!

Disclaimer: Not mine, characters, I mean...the story is

His fingers were stiff against the steering wheel. The "place" was closer to L.A. but he knew waiting at the hotel was not an option. His eyes twitched about, his body rigid in anticipation; waiting for the feeling. It was a pull, starting in his stomach and working its way until he couldn't quite see straight from the high. She was his drug. And he had been detoxing for 3 years. He'd slipped up a few times, ("How's forever? Does forever work for you?")when the call was too strong but always stumbled away ("Its Buffy."), never quite quitting and always craving more. Shutting out the memoriestoucheskissesscentsheartbeats of her to stay clean for awhile; until she wasn't beatingbreathingliving anymore ("Dawnie, listen to me.") and he was suddenly in the worst kind of rehab, rehab that he would never ask for simply for reasons every drug addict understands. He would never want that kind of pain set upon his still heart.

She died, he died. That was the way it worked. Or how it was supposed to anyway. He put his fake smile on and assured the masses he would live ("And now she's gone forever."). That's funny coming from a vampire. He hadn't lived for over 200 years. He hadn't been living for 3 years. He hadn't been living for 4 months. Then her siren song filled his ears, his cravings returned ("And from the depths of the forest, the call still sounded"). He met her in their pre-arranged spot, an address scribbled hastily for her on his way out of town. The rules were simple. The place was simply a precautionary to fall back on. Nothing more. There was no beach or cabins or happy beginningsendings, simply a sleazy motel a quarter of the way to Sunnydale.

The room smelled of stale air and bleach. He sat hesitantly on the floral covered bed, unneedingly exhaling slowly. A painting of a meadow stared back at his empty gaze. Outside of the window, the sky began to lighten as the new day began. She still wasn't there.

He had not allowed himself to hope. There would be no loss if this was another hoax. If it wasn't her, then he would deal with whatever repercussions that caused. If she simply didn't show, then he would leave quietly and plaster his fake smile on and go back to his fake life without her. He could not think of the other possibilities. That would lead to hope.

So Angel waited. He knew how to do that. You didn't mossy around for a hundred years being impatient. It was all about establishing a sense of calm. Relaxbreatheconcentrate. ("You think they make a patch for this?") He shut his eyes, thinking of serenity, of cemeteries and kisses, of her smile. Had she had that same smile when she died? Had she felt that same peace when she was dying? Did she have that peace now?

Angel's eyes snapped open. His mind had wondered to its usual place of late. He thought a lot about those last moments of her's. He thought even more about where she went after that. He knew that there was no where else Buffy deserved to be then in heaven. He had idle thoughts of the possibility of her soul spending its eternity in hell but that was just not an option, no matter what her friends had claimed to think. Her body had not gone with her. She was not in that hell god's dimension. Angel's years, months, of his own experience gave him at least that much knowledge. There were dimensions were simply souls rested but Glory's had not been one of them.

But if she was truly in heaven, how could she be here?

("Some great evil takes credit for bringing you back, and you buy it?")

Yet more evidence stacking up against Angel's stretched heart, evidence that merely helped to support his no hoping rule.

A sigh heaved his frame forward. He felt broken and tired. When was the last time he had truly slept? Months, most likely. His hands twitched slightly, partly at the thought of sneaking out to kill the demon he had smelled pulling in but mostly out of anxiousness. He refrained from leaving to track the demon down, however. He wouldn't miss her arrival. The drug addict inside would simply not allow it.

He eyed the room wearily for few minutes more. Moving around nervously in the motel room's few choices of sitting, a chair or the queen. As he finally laid his head back against the mattress, his feet planted on the ground, he felt a rush of pain just above his pelvic bone. He breathed in sharply, eyes fixed on the door. Finally. ("I just know that when you're around, whether I can see you or not, I feel you. Inside. And it throws me.")

His stomach was all over the place. Slowly clenching tighter and tighter until he had to stop taking his false breaths. His body started to feel like it was being tugged forward, like his entire being needed her there, right then. His eyes fluttered closed, taking in the quick whirl of painpleasure he was experiencing. When they opened again, they were a deep shade of amber, to dark to possibly call them amber, yet golden nonetheless.

His head felt clear and strung out at the same time. He had the sensation of being on top of the world and falling endlessly to the dirt. But most of all he felt relief.

He stood and grasped the door, unconcerned with any thought that it might be too late out; that if he opened the door, he would surely burn. His head was just too high, to care if he would die. He saw the lightest shade of blue in the horizon. He had a few minutes. He looked past walkway's gate and onto the early morning traffic of the highway and the surrounding trees. He closed his eyes once more and used his senses. She was almost there. Up the stairs, 20 feet and she would be in his arms ( "Just kiss me." ). He breathed once more and opened his eyes. She stood before him. Not saying a word. But he didn't care. He was rushinggushingswimmingswirlingliving in the sight of her. He closed his arms around her. One arm clutching her forever closer and the other running his hands through her hair, relishing in a feeling he never could perfectly remember. One that hit him every time he was touching her. He pulled away, met her eyes.

And then his high was broken. He hit the earth harder then he ever had before and stepped away. She walked silently to the bed. Sitting so her hands rested underneath her thighs and her legs dangled slightly above the ground. He closed the door, stood before her. Waited. She didn't say a word. So he did.

"Buffy…"

She looked up sharply. Looking back at him. Meeting his piercing gaze with her much emptier one. There was no torment. No guilt or melancholy. Just endless, swirling emptiness.

He didn't know what to say or ask or do. He was unprepared for this sober meeting. He was not use to this harsh, clear reality. He had only known the high.

Hours passed. Angel itching for his true fix. But he got none. He had forced her to lie down. So she did. He had asked her if she wanted food. She said no. He asked her to talk. She said nothing. He held her. She simply laid there. The tears never came. The smile never appeared. There were no arguments or confessions. Just silence and emptiness.

The time came for Angel to leave and then it passed. He stayed with her all morning and slept with her through the night.

Dawn approached for the next day. Angel had to leave. Vacant highs and missing feelings were getting him agitated. There was nothing he could if she would not accept his cure. She was nothing more then a broken girl that would not let him put her back together again.

"I have to go." ("I'm leaving…If we survive, I'll go.")

He waited for her reply and there came none. He sighed, started to sit up and then a hand grabbed the inside of his elbow. He looked down, puzzled. And then the heat started to spread up his arm. It spread quicker and quicker until he was on fire from her touch. It hit his brain in seconds and he was instantly floating 10 feet off the ground. Shapes began to swirl around him, mixing into the blackness surrounding everything that wasn't her. She was the most beautiful of colors. Colors no man could imagine, colors impossible to see through sober eyes. His eyes weren't clear, not at all. They were soaring. He was soaring.

She pulled him down. Brought him closer. Rested her head on his chest and breathed deeply. She didn't cry or start to spill her unlife story. She simply held him back. It was always the unspoken that said the most between them.

She looked up at him then. Something sparked faintly in her otherwise empty eyes and he knew everything she wasn't nearly ready to say. She leaned foreword ever so slightly, her eyes fluttering closed. He leaned the rest of the distance and lighter then even he felt, brushed his lips with hers.

Sensation raced through his unbeating blood and made his whole body rocket with tingles. He was racing past a thousand moons and circling around a million earths. He could swear he was so hot he had a fever. Even if his skin was cold to the touch. He was burning up inside, set afire permanently. She was a drug that never ceased to make him just as high as that first touchkisscaress ("I'm just trying not to think about how badly I want to kiss you.").

She pulled away, her hands dropping to the bed. She turned away on to her back. Her eyes refusing to meet his, instead they met the ceiling. He reached over her and pressed his palm to her face. She did not react, as he had suspected. So he touched his lips to her forehead, his signature goodbye, besides for a billowing jacket and foggy smoke escape. He grabbed his coat. Headed for the door and touched his hand to the knob.

"I missed you." ("I missed you.") Her soft voice was almost inaudible to his hazy senses. He looked back at her but she was still staring blankly at the ceiling, a single tear rolling down her cheek.

He turned quickly to the door and shut it behind him. He took the stairs two at a time and nearly sprinted to his car. It was now or never. He knew that. That's the way it always was between them. He got in his car and pressed his head to his steering wheel. His high was clearing, his feet gracefully touching earth. He switched on the car and drove out of the parking lot, headed home towards L.A. Away from the only arms that he had ever truly called home. Away from his love, his lust, his life, his drug.

Fini.