Counting Dawn
Fandom: Buffy/Angel
Rating: G
Summary: Buffy fell in love with numbers. And Angel... well Angel was too busy watching something else.
Author's Note: I was inspired by biggrstaffbunch. This is fairly rough so I may revise it at some point. It's just a drabble really. Marking Notches is the mirror piece to this.
Buffy didn't remember when it happened but she fell in love with numbers. Fantastical ones, like the two billion third dead by Angel's hand demon which became his redemption. Real ones, like the twenty third morning that Angel woke her right before dawn with excitement glinting in his brown eyes and carried her outside to the porch swing to watch the sun burn up the sky into four shades of red and three shades of orange.
Yes, she loved numbers. She drew her robe closer as she curled up against Angel, her eyelids languidly sliding down to shield her from the early brightness of the new-minted morning. His arm, slung casually around her shoulders, tugged her closer as he twitched a little, still expecting to burst into flames.
Her favorite numbers started with two, she noticed. Like her twenty-ninth birthday present in the form of an offer to live in sin from her newly human soulmate. And the little 201 Ridge Street house that Buffy privately thought Angel settled on because of its huge windows and massive porch swing.
Angel kissed the top of her head casually. Twice, she noted. Oh really more than twice, but she liked symmetry in her counting. She grinned, letting her hair fall forward to cover the overjoyed expression.
I love you.
They didn't talk much. The chatterbox Buffy felt no need to chatter around Angel and he was much too awed at watching shadows fall across the asphalt to waste time with words. She rubbed her cheek against his shoulder and watched him watching the dawn break.
I love you two...too...
She was almost getting to like dawn too. Almost.
