Banzai and Salut

Buffy and Angel stood at the foot of his bed facing each other. She smiled sheepishly. She positively sparkled in the dim light, and had rarely, if ever, looked more beautiful.

"Are you ready?" Angel asked, touching her shoulder tenderly.

Her sheepish grin turned to one of seduction. "Don't I look ready?"

"You look amazing," he told her, moving closer and touching his lips to hers.

Their kiss was electric, the first since her arrival in town that morning. After the revelation about the curse, Buffy had decided to go shopping. Angel had found this odd, but he didn't try to argue. Cordelia had tried to explain to him that a woman's relationship with shopping was something not to be trifled with, something unbreakable and inexplicable.

So interefere he did not. He just figured that Buffy needed to time to process the information, to think about what it meant for their odd vampire/Slayer dynamic, and shopping was just an excuse to get away for a few hours. Though when she returned, she was carrying a shiny black bag from a place called Yukiko's. He asked her what they sold there, and she said, "Japanese stuff." Then she and the bag disappeared downstairs so she could change clothes.

The kiss left them both breathless. They pulled away from each other reluctantly, and in a way that made Angel want to beg Buffy to bag the idea of dinner and a movie. He wanted to take advantage of his clause-free curse right now. He wanted to take advantage like bunnies, and preferably with the lights on. Possibly on the kitchen floor.

But she had used the phrase "real date" about five hundred times that afternoon and he had to keep reminding himself that in spite of her strength and smarts and all the junk she'd been through, she was still only nineteen. He knew that she wanted the long, romantic, pressure-free evening that they had never had together. He had suggested "dinner and a movie" himself, that being the only "real date" fodder he had in his repertoire, and she had agreed. While she was out shopping, he'd made plans: a reasonably expensive meal with proper romantic lighting and music, the lame chick-flick of her choice, a long walk home, followed by some earth-shattering, but non-apocalyptic, sex that would keep both of them indoors for most of the following day's sunlit hours.

. As a matter of practicality, since looking in the mirror did him no good, he had meant to ask her how he looked. Cordelia had recently goaded him into buying a black Armani suit expressly for meeting with well-to-do potential clients, and he had never worn it before now. He felt spiffy in it, coupled with a crisp white dress shirt and silk tie, but he simply didn't know, and didn't own a Polaroid. But when he took a step back and regarded Buffy, all coherent thought left his mind. He looked at her from head to toe. She was wearing a fitted emerald green satin dress with spaghetti straps, and Japanese kanji lettering patterning the fabric in black. Her black lacquered zori platform sandals accentuated her long, lean ankles. Her hair was piled in a bun in the back of her head, held in place by two black chopsticks with charms on the ends.

Her radiant, California good-looks coupled with the dramatic Japanese overtones turned more than a few heads throughout the restaurant that Angel had chosen, as they were escorted to their table. The venue was Ryukona Luxe, a trendy, elegant Japanese-French fusion restaurant which was exceedingly difficult to get into.

"I decided to take the Japanese theme and run with it," he whispered to her as they settled in their seats.

She smiled. "Very appropriate, and thoughtful. And the French is appropriate too," she said cheerfully, lifting the menu over her face to hide the giddiness in her expression.

"How?"

"Good e-vu-ning," the waiter said to them, in his Japanese-tinged English. Then, he switched to Japanese-tinged French. "Bienvenue à Ryukona Luxe. I am Toshio, your waiter. May I bring you a Sake with Chambord, or a Genmai-cha with Grey Goose and fresh blueberries, perhaps?

"Just some champagne," Angel said.

"Very good," Toshio said, scurrying away.

"Angel," Buffy asked. "This place is a dream. How did you manage to get in on such short notice?"

"I saved the owner from a Tanafirroh demon about a month ago," he answered. "He's been putting off paying the bill."

When the champagne arrived, they toasted their good fortune. They made a pact to buy something nice for Willow before Buffy returned to Sunnydale, and Angel asked Buffy which movie she'd like to see.

"I don't know if there's anything out right now that I'm interested in," she said. "I think a little blast from the past might be in order."

"You mean you want to rent something? That's cool. We can stop on the way back if you want to."

"I'm not sure that I'm in the mood for anything they have at the video stores either," she replied, evasively sipping champagne. She avoided Angel's quizzical gaze in an exaggerated roll of the eyes toward the ceiling.

Angel was vexed, but he wasn't going to push. He had no idea at this point what she wanted or what she was getting at, let alone why she was being so cryptic about it, but this was not the time. Everything would happen in its way.

Buffy's dinner consisted of tuna sashimi with a Morel mushroom and Wasabi cream sauce, alongside haricots verts sautéed in honey-dijon miso sauce and served over white rice. It was possibly the strangest meal she had ever eaten, and she basically couldn't identify anything that she was putting in her mouth, but it was tasty. Even better was the company. Even though Angel ordered only a gratuitous green salad with their special Camembert-daikkon dressing, she was having the time of her life. Just to be here, in a swanky restaurant enjoying rich food and desirous gazes with the love of her very short life, knowing that later the desirous gazes could (and would) turn to desirous kisses and eventually desirous sweaty nakedness... it was nothing short of magic.

Toshio refilled their champagne glasses as he took their plates away. A few moments later, he slyly left a dessert menu on their table, without saying a word. Buffy snatched it up and began to study it. When the waiter returned, she ordered a chocolate mousse with miniature Manju balls, as well as Fuji apples baked in Chardonnay and ginger root. To go.

"To go?" Toshio asked, as he committed her order to memory.

"Yes, please. I'd like to take them with us, if that's all right."

After a pause, Toshio glanced at Angel. Both men shrugged and the waiter assented. Fifteen minutes later, Angel and Buffy left the restaurant happy, each with a dessert in-hand.

"Snacks for the movie?" Angel asked.

"Something like that," Buffy answered.

Hope you enjoyed this completely silly chapter - I promise, it will start getting juicy soon.

Also, I hate to use one story as a forum to whore another, but check out "Daughters: A Tale of Conventional Wisdom" and see what you think. I've got almost no reviews for it!