A/N: So this is an idea I had awhile ago whilst I was listening to Pink's Long Way to Happy and then I realised that Buffy and Faith's relationship could be found in quite a few of her songs and so this fic was born. It's mostly AU but some things will stay the same I'm hoping the chapters will sort of explain it all. These will be little ficlets but they will sort of join together.

************************************************************************************************

She's back on drugs again
Even though she knows it ain't right
She can't even call up her friends
And say "help me save my life"
She's so ashamed of herself that she's
Come full circle
Nobody understands what it's like to
Be this girl

"Save my Life" – Pink

BUFFY POV:

I'm an enabler, I know it, she knows it.

I know how she feels about me and yet I can't admit to myself, to her how I feel and yet I can't stop myself from meeting her here, can't stop myself from giving in to the passionate kisses we share late at night. No one knows of course, my friends, Angel, Giles, my Mom, they wouldn't understand and I'm not even sure even I do.

I tell myself it's a Slayer thing, that I don't really feel anything for her but each time I pull away, when I leave her alone in the graveyard that desolate and lost feeling I see in her eyes leaves this unsettling feeling in my stomach and pains my heart.

I know where she goes on her bad days, how she deals. It's hard not to notice when she turns up to the library the next day with shaky hands and bloodshot eyes. On her really bad days, when our late night meetings become too much or our verbal sparring gets too fierce she doesn't even make it to the library. I always go to her motel to make sure she's there, to make sure she's still breathing because, I know it's my fault, I know that everything she puts into her body is because of me.

They see the way she sits with her head in her hands, they see the way loud noise makes her flinch but they shake it off, she likes to party, it's never been a secret. But, it's not their house she stumbles to in the middle of the night; it's not their tree she climbs crying for them to let her in, it's not their mother who finds her on the doorstep and holds her hair back while she empties the contents of her stomach. I kind of resent her for being as reckless as she is, I have never felt as free as she does. Or at least as free as she presents to the outside world, her eyes betray the despair kept hidden deep down which is getting harder and harder to mask.

It's why she turned to drugs. It's why she's out on the dancefloor now with another random guy, tendrils of sweat soaked hair stuck to her face as she grinds her body on his. I've never confronted her about it, about what it is she takes but sometimes if it's a particularly large dose I can feel it, not enough for it to affect me but enough for me to know that it's been a bad day. Her eyes are glassy and her smile is a little big off letting me know that it's more than just the bar she's been hitting tonight.

My friends are talking happily amongst themselves, there's nothing out of the ordinary about seeing her let out steam on the dance floor. My eyes are trained on her and I know in her current state the buzzing of our connection is completely overshadowed by whatever it is that's running through her veins and she has no idea I'm here.

I have no idea why I'm here. I'm not her friend; she tells me everything whilst telling me nothing. Whatever it was that we have, whatever it is that we share it's addictive and I can almost understand why she can't stop polluting herself with those substances. I can't stop going back to her and yet can't trust my feelings enough to admit myself that what we have is more than just after Slaying lust. She's told me how she feels, never when she's sober but she's whispered it those few times I've let her in after she sat swaying dangerously on the branch outside my window.

I'm sure Angel knows, I'm not sure he knows exactly what's been going on but he knows things aren't exactly white picket fencey with us right now. He cares about her, not in the same way he cares about me but in the way that they share the whole dark, brooding and gorgeous thing. She would never let him in, she lets no one in at least not when she's completely aware of her actions, which she isn't right now. Whatever it is she took is starting to control the way she moves, her arms are sluggish raised in the air and her head is resting back against the guy whose body is pressed against hers.

Everything in me is screaming at me to go over there and rip his hands from her waist. To yell at her for hours on end about how stupid she is for making herself this vulnerable, but that would mean admitting to them, to myself that I cared and I'm not ready for that. So I force myself to turn myself away to concentrate on my redheaded friend who is talking animatedly about the new spell she's learnt. I force myself to smile and kiss his cheek taking ahold of his larger hand in my own. I force myself to stay in my seat when she leads him out stumbling past our table. Force myself to close my eyes, to block out the tortured brown that stare into my own screaming at me to save her, screaming at me everything that she's afraid to say.

Her life isn't like mine. She never had the family or the stable home thing. I know she's ashamed of her past like how I know she's ashamed that I caught sight of the track marks on her arm when she came into the library the next morning. Her hands shook as she hastily threw on her jacket her eyes never meeting mine. I watch as her hands grab her stomach and her eyes close briefly as she sits in one of the chairs. Giles, for someone who supposedly had a rebellious past is completely oblivious to how close she is to self destructing. My hands clench at my side as she reaches a shaky hand to brush her hair away from her face. Why should it be me? What makes her my responsibility? Why do I keep going back to her?

I get my answers in one look. Tortured eyes that show hate, love, lust, despair and hope.

It will be me.

I will save her life.

TBC

A/N: Please review. This has been in my head for so long I don't even know if it can go anywhere, I'm hoping it can so feed the starving author with your thoughts.