There she was. I must have been lying on the ground because I saw the frosty pink toenails first and followed up those perfect legs-- still a bit girlish-- skin golden, then hips... a subtle swell set off by a pink bikini. It tied on either side just at the hipbones. Flat belly, subtle muscle definition, that was when I was certain I recognized her. She was walking toward me, but time seemed so slow. I had so much time to relish each detail. The top, also pink tied behind her neck, under that hair-that was golden. Honey. And her face--those eyes with the conviction of a wise innocent-- they weren't like steel or like the waves behind her, they were something else completely. How were her lips the perfect pink?
"I told Xander and Wil we wouldn't be playing volleyball." She sat down lightly in my lap. I realized I was sitting up on a beach towel then, when I saw my own white legs sprawled out in front of me. Where had I gotten trunks? At least they were black. She leaned back against me and my arms closed around her. I didn't mind the extra warmth. After all it wasn't like I was catching fire in the broad daylight like I should have been. I smelled salt in her damp hair... and lemons? Instead of reacting like any normal person, I just sat there for a while and didn't say anything. Any words I thought of just then sounded stupid. Vapid. 'I like the beach.' 'This is nice.' 'I missed sun bathing.'
"How are we... here?" Is what I said instead. But she seemed not to hear me. Someone else did.
She answered, "This is where we are supposed to be Angelus." I turned behind me and saw the porcelain statue of a woman with all a woman's curves, full and promising. It was night time back there and she gleamed in the light of the full moon and smelled coolly sweet like a night blooming flower. She pushed large cat-eye sunglasses up into her hair which was a cunning mockery of blonde. So pale and lustrous. She lounged back into the wicker chaise and tipped a glass to her lips with a clear little laugh. And then that smell of blood. It had all the potency of everything I had ever wanted in one sensorial rush. It was always like that. The smell of red. Smell of sex. Smell of seasalt in blonde hair. My arm reached out for the cup before I knew it. "This is my cup Angelus," she nodded her head to indicate Buffy in my lap, "That is yours." She drained the glass and there was nothing left, not a drop. Not even a stain. Why does she keep calling me Angelus?
My attention was drawn back to the warm body reclining against me. There was a hair shining golden with a droplet of salt water glistening near her scalp. She leaned more heavily against me. She had fallen to sleep, her head tipped back leaning on my shoulder. I looked up and saw that Willow, Xander and the others had gone to the water. The waves were crashing against the shore and by the time the sound reached me it was only a whisper. The whisper took form.
Drink her. Drink her. Remember how she tastes? Drink her. Drink her. Remind yourself of the taste. Drink her. Drink her.
I turned my face from Buffy not wanting to see that carotid artery. Darla was back there when I opened my eyes, she was smiling at me, her lips moving. She was chanting in time to the waves. I felt my face change, much to her delight. I turned back to Buffy, and buried my nose and mouth in her hair. I was stalling. But while I was stalling, I acutely realized my lack of such warmth, and remembered just how it went hand in hand with the ridiculous comedy of errors that was my life. I moved Buffy so that she lay on the towel. I stood and turned to face my old lover. Though I am not sure lover is exactly the right term. I expected her to be furious, but she just smiled her little mocking smile. The one that was just for me... for Angelus, I mean.
"Still weak. That's alright, my darling boy, I am strong enough for both of us." She crushed the glass in her hand with a tinkling sound that reminded me of her laughter. When she opened her hand again a large crystal shard remained in the middle of her palm though all the other glass fell away. She offered the hand to me, and I rushed toward her, not wanting to see a single drop lost to the sand.
Before I got there, I woke up. There were noises downstairs in my hotel. Footsteps on glass. I listened by the door. It the window breaking that I had heard. When I found them, it was easy enough to chase them off-- human burglars wanting to rip off the freak who bought the Hyperion without renting out rooms. No one got hurt. I started sweeping up the glass and noticed that some of the pieces were finer than the others. I put them together, and found them to be the shape of a wineglass. I did not have all of the pieces, some of the stem and base got tossed with the window glass. It was enough. I boarded up the window and went up to my bed. Darla? Back in town? No, I killed her once, I have a soul, I am worthless to her.
I drifted back to sleep having gotten no closer to my understanding my dream or the reality immediately following it. I dreamt again though, of her running east, and laughing all the way. I guess the dream had been a parting gift. The guess was confirmed when Wes and Cordelia found three bodies beside my pool arranged just so... forming a tableau like the scene from my dream where the three of us had been at the beach. I wanted to say 'Good Riddance.' But I didn't say anything, just asked Wesley for the night off, I wanted to get drunk, maybe go beat up Spike. Something to forget that I had wanted Buffy's blood, that I would have tasted Darla's with just as much lust. The Whiskey Bar sounded perfect. Then the road to Sunnydale.