Angel let out a deep breath as Cordelia's little introduction about her history and then talking a little about him ended and he started to make his way up the three small stairs at the back of the stage and he walked out toward her. She gave him an encouraging smile and put her hand on his forearm for just a moment before she was walking off in the other direction and it was just him.

The lights dimmed as he stood there, trying to gather his thoughts. He swallowed and nervously touched at the little microphone ear piece thing they'd given him earlier. He rubbed his hands together and and finally spoke. "Hello," he greeted the room, thankful for the room darkening a little, thankful that he wasn't full on bouncing off the walls as he spoke. "My name is Angel Chase, Cordelia there is my younger, pain in the ass sister. And she invited me rather out of the blue to come here today. And I didn't even know why she did until yesterday."

Angel let his hands fall to his sides and he began to walk slowly around the small wooden stage. "If you knew my sister when she was younger you might be surprised by some of the things she's accomplished in her life. Young Cordelia Chase is not someone you'd automatically think of as someone who wanted to help others. That may sound harsh, but it's true," he said with a nervous laugh at the end. "But near the end of her high school career some of her world shifted... which she spoke about earlier. A boyfriend she had started changing his own self, slowly got more possessive, made her feel bad about herself. Eventually she ended it and he had a hard time accepting that. She was scared, especially after that night she described to you all and she really closed herself up for awhile after that. Until she finally began opening up to someone, and they directed her toward the idea of wanting to help others, other men and women, children, who may be in situations like this."

Angel stopped once he reached the end of the length of the stage for a moment. "My sister volunteered anywhere where someone would have her pretty much. She set up a program at the high school, reached out to other schools in neighboring towns to do the same, she wound up working with two of these organizations since high school. This one who helped set all of this up today was actually the first one she was with, then she came back after about a year. And she loves it. She doesn't love that these types of places have to exist. I can't even begin to count the times she's called me hysterically crying over things she's seen or stories she listened to that day, crying over the evils of this world, wishing she could do so much more... but she loves that every day she tries, she's there, she gives hope to people."

Angel rubbed his hands again as he started walking the other way down the stage. "I've offered to help many, many times, my sister has asked me to in a wide variety of ways. I have donated money, I have used contacts that I have in my own line of work to help get people to these events or to donate something towards helping the cause, I have been a temporary guardian of a child for her once, I have driven hundreds of miles to collect women who have called my sister for help, I've set up stages, booths, handed out papers, taken names and information, and that list goes on and on. My sister calls and almost always I'm like, okay, what do you need? And... Cordy has asked me to to speak to people before, she's gotten me up on stages... but it's always been I was a game show host for a silly thing she was doing, or I was at the end of the conversation begging people to reach out for help if they needed it, or I had a speech that she had me memorize. That was it. She's never once asked me to talk about something personal or something that happened in my own life."

Angel's eyes scanned the crowd without really looking at any of them. "Cordelia called me up the other day and she told me and that something had happened in a little town and she was taking a small team and she just kind of rambled on. She asked if I could come and I actually told her I couldn't, I said I could in other ways if she needed me to but I was supposed to be leaving that next day for a week long business trip. Cordelia got real quiet, then she hung up on me. And it was weird. She called me back maybe fifteen minutes later and she was real quiet still, and she asked me to come again, and she said that she wanted me to talk about what happened. How she said that phrase made me understand without question what she was referring to. And then it was my turn to get quiet because not once has she ever asked me to. Not like this on some stage in front of strangers, not in more private settings with people to try and get them to open up, hell I think she and I have talked about these events maybe once or twice and otherwise we skirt the hell around it."

Angel walked back to the center of the stage and sat down on the edge, his legs hanging off the front. "I wound up coming out here, and I spent yesterday helping set up and doing random things for people, but I was still confused as to why she thought I wanted to this right here. And I made it clear I didn't want to and she still wouldn't answer me about why she had even asked me. Then, late yesterday evening I saw it on the news. I saw what brought my sister here, what tragedy happened in your little town. I saw the face of the young blonde woman who was attacked... and I began searching online for more information about what happened to her... and... I understood."

Angel let silence fall over the room for a moment. "Two years ago, I was in another part of this state. I went with my sister and her boyfriend at the time to this girls' house, I'd never met her, it was her birthday and there was some big party being set up for her at a club in town that somehow I wound up being invited to. They were stopping in to drag out some time while final decorations or whatever were being handled and then they were going to suggest she go to the club pretty much. We were there maybe five minutes when the young man my sister was dating got a phone call, and it was another few minutes before my sister was whispering harshly at me that she needed to go take care of a cake situation and I needed to stay here and distract this lady I didn't know."

Angel sighed. "This young woman reminds me a lot of the one your community lost. She was young and full of life, she was happy, she was blonde even, similar body types, big innocent eyes, the whole deal. I was left there alone with her at her house, it was awkward, I told her Happy Birthday and just tried to make small talk. I remember her saying she was going to the kitchen to grab something but for the life of me I don't remember what or why. I don't remember what I said that made her laugh. I remember smiling at the sound, I remember looking around to the other side of her house. I remember what that laughter sounded like as it died in her throat and the one that took it over. I remember the sound of her being punched - twice - and it was the two loudest hits I'd ever heard in my life. I ran as fast as my legs would carry me and I jumped on him. I had never seen this man in my life, all I knew was that he was here to hurt this girl. I grabbed the hand that held a gun with one of my hands and the other kept hitting him as I yelled at the young blonde to get out, to run, to go get help. With that small distraction a shot was fired, recklessly. It barely grazed me. He tried again before I could get control and it went even more wildly, the bullet hit the wall behind me. I got the gun away from him for awhile and we fought hard... he wound up with the gun once more."

Angel's hand moved to his abdomen on instinct. "We were both standing, I was trying to quickly come up with my next move, and while looking right at me another shot was fired, his final bullet he had on him at that, before I could do make my brain or my body do anything. I was hit mid abdomen, just below my sternum. Time seemed to slow down around me, I knew that I was going die in my head. He stared at me for a long moment before he took off running. I managed to get my shirt off and I tried to cover the wound as I laid myself down, trying to mentally prepare for death to overtake me. I wondered why this all even happened. I thought of my family, tried to make amends mentally for all the wrongs I know I had done in my life. It felt like an eternity but in reality I think it was close to ten minutes before the police arrived. I was in and out of it but I remember when I saw those flashing lights, how I tried to scream out for help but I couldn't because I was drowning in the blood filling my lungs. I barely made out the first officer coming inside... and it's still like random flashes of memories when I looked back. Words said, I remember him rushing toward me, I was asked how many times I had been shot and my hands shook as I held up two fingers. They told me they had someone in custody and asked if I knew the person who shot me. I tried shaking my head that I didn't, I'm not sure how well that came out. An ambulance came, oxygen was put on me. I was on a stretcher. I was taken to an airport and we waited for my transport. I don't remember when it arrived or the next many days of my life."

Angel pulled his feet up into a criss cross seating position and sighed once more. "I came out of the coma seven days later. The seventh day was still pretty much a blur, I could see shadows and hear muffled voices but I couldn't make anyone out really. That, at times, made me want to panic so I just tried to sleep and escape. The next day, the eighth day of being in the hospital, I woke up again and I could open my eyes more and I could see clearer. And the first thing that I saw... was that girl."

Fighting off the urge to shake, Angel moved his hands a little and tried to push down the anxiety building up right now. "That young woman was standing beside my bed.. and nearly her entire face was covered in bandages. Bloody bandages at that. And in that moment I realized that I hadn't even saved her, that she had not been able to get away from whoever in the hell that man was unhurt. And I never felt worse in my life. Later, I would learn more details about what happened. I would learn that the man who attacked us was an ex-boyfriend of hers who had been stalking her and threatening her for some time by that point. I would learn he had a history of violence, a history of drug use. I would learn that she tried three different houses before someone answered and she begged for help, and yet he tracked her down, dragged her out of the house. She would get away again and go into hiding, she was found yet again, that she fought with all she had and he still overpowered her. I would learn that he bashed her face in with the stock of the gun he shot me with, that he'd came there to kill her with. He hit her so hard the left side of her face had shattered bones, her teeth broke, the stock of the gun itself broke from the force he was attacking her with. Bits of the gun had to be removed from her. He attempted to use a large piece of the broken weapon to carve into her face. The police, when they found him, said he was laughing hysterically. He claimed he was going to carve his initials into her face so she knew who she belonged to, so everyone would always know. He laughed at her as he hit her telling her no one would ever care about her now. At the time I first saw her again, I didn't know any of this and I was in tears, I began to hyperventilate as she thanked me. She thanked me for saving her life, for being her hero. And I hated it. I was so glad she was alive, but I felt like I failed her. And it wasn't some make it all about me situation I promise, it was literally just me hating that someone had done this. Hating that I or someone else couldn't have stopped such a senseless act. I didn't feel like a hero, I wasn't trying to be a hero, I still hate that whole thing. I wasn't a hero. I'm not one. I had a fight or flight moment and I didn't want a young woman to die. I didn't want her to get hurt."

Continuing, "I was on life support for two more weeks. And it was frustrating. It was hard. I couldn't speak, I couldn't communicate really with anyone around me. The ventilator was a nightmare all in itself. I couldn't answer questions or ask them, I couldn't tell that girl I was sorry, I couldn't tell people that I would sometimes begin to drift off and be overtaken with nightmares of a large figure standing over my bed to finish the job of killing me, or, hell, I couldn't tell someone that my foot itched. I couldn't ask how bad I really was, what the extent of damage I had from that night. It wasn't until I could remain awake and coherent for a handful of hours at a time that people really began telling me anything. They told me bits at a time about all that had happened, about the guy, what happened to that girl, how bad off I was. I had one of my kidneys removed, my spleen, my gallbladder, and also a small section of my liver were all removed. My stomach had to have several surgeries done to attempt to repair it, same with my intestines and pancreas. I had forty six units of blood transferred to me, twenty six of plasma, and a long list of other fluids that made me swell up for about a week. Then, another week and a half later I lost that extra weight but also I lost another thirty pounds because of... well... being in bed, not being able to even roll over, not being able to eat besides my feeding tube which couldn't even give me a full meal at this point either, stress, the surgery... I looked kind of scary. It was weeks before someone wanted me to try and walk. And I couldn't. I was in pain, my muscles weren't working like they were supposed to now. They wanted me to use a walker and I refused, in my head I thought that is ridiculous, I'm a strong guy, I don't need a walker. And I collapsed on my first step."

Hearing Cordelia cough, his head turned to find her way off the side, off the stage, back where he was standing before he came out here. She looked like she was trying not to cry already. "I pretty much had to learn basic things all over again. I had to learn how to walk again, how to feed myself, how to sit up for long periods of time... just... so much. I spent a very long time in the hospital unit, I had to go through endless months of physical therapy, I had in home nursing set up to deal with the wound I was left with. I had to fight every day, I had to regain all my strength, I had to get my head right, too. I wasn't myself for awhile. It took seven months to be considered healed, recovered... but the head's a funny thing. There had been a fundraising page and dozens of events for that young lady and for me as well, she didn't have insurance so people gathered to try and help. I didn't take any of it. I saw her a handful of times while I was still in the hospital, she had many surgeries of her own she had to go through. I found myself distancing myself from her which I hope she didn't take in the wrong way. I was later told that she healed up nicely as well, she has scars just like me, she had teeth replaced, she had tried just... doing like me I guess and just taking life day to day. I think about her a lot. I think about how scared she must have been, I fear for what all would have happened if I hadn't been there by chance, I worry she's carrying it around and is afraid. I think about the idea of going to her sometimes, apologizing for... all of it. Telling her how sorry I am I couldn't keep her safe like I thought I had or how I tried to, that I am sorry she ever had to deal with something like that. Try and find someway to help I guess."

"It was six months and twenty days before he was officially sentenced. He plead guilty to attempted capital murder charges. He was sentenced to two thirty-five year terms, one for me, one for her. That was a huge relief to me, it made a lot of what happened kind of feel like it came to a close, like it was a good moment to start moving on toward the future. But I'm alive. That young woman is alive. Your community was sadly not spared this loss, the one of that young woman and of her friend... and my heart goes out to her wherever she landed after this life. My heart goes out to her family, to the family of her friend who lost his life as well to this unspeakable act. My heart goes out to friends, to... to everyone. Even if you didn't know this woman... you heard it maybe, you felt some connection some how or another... my thoughts are with you. I've heard the stories on the news, read comments online, so many people looking back and ignoring signs, keeping a distance, how she reached out for help and didn't seem to get any. A big part of me wants to be angry about that, but I'm not here for that, and it doesn't help for me to be up here preaching any of that. I just wanted to tell my story. I just wanted to be able to connect to you all maybe. And to reach out and say that there are men and women being killed and, or hurt daily because of situations like this. Because of domestic violence, abuse. If you are going through something like this and you need someone to talk to, please do. There are so many resources. If you are worried about someone, reach out the best you can, help them if you can. Keep yourself safe, please, but take care of one another. Do not become a statistic, do not let someone you love and care about become another one. You're more important than you realize. You are stronger than you realize. That young woman shouldn't have lost her life. The one from my story shouldn't have come so close to losing hers. Be the change, help change, something..."

Angel recited some organizations, phone numbers and websites, gave advice on how to reach out locally and nationwide, and decided he had enough of the spotlight so thanked everyone for their time.

OoOoO

It was much later in the evening when Buffy Summers found herself standing in front a large hotel room door. She thought about knocking, she thought about running back down the hall... but she looked down at the envelopes in her hands one more time. She swallowed, smoothed out the bright green post it note that was stuck to the top one before kneeling down lower to the floor.

Swallowing hard, she slipped the first envelope with the note attached through the small crack between the floor and the heavy door. One at a time, she eventually got all three enveloped to the other side before standing. She wiped at her pants, accepted those letters she'd been carrying around in her car were out of her hands now, waited another few seconds to see if anything happened... then turned to walk back down the large hallway.

Buffy found herself thankful for the downpour as once she returned back to her car she had a hard time keeping it together. Today had been long, the past several days had been long...

Her hand flew to her chest, toying with the necklace as she opened her glove box and for the first time in years found it without those letters she'd left for him, for Angel Chase. Part of her found it freeing, part of her wanted to panic.

Buffy could still feel the pen in her hand, shaking, hurting, bloody as she'd written that first letter. She had been told she could home and recovery didn't require her to be at the hospital any longer. And she had cried hysterically in that hospital bed trying to write words, to express how she felt, how sorry she was, how thankful she was to the stranger who'd saved her life. She had meant to give it to him before she left, but it hadn't felt right... he wasn't okay, he wasn't going home and wouldn't for weeks after she had, and he always seemed worse when she was even around. She didn't even know if he would want to hear anything from her.

So, she'd taken it home. She'd set it aside until he got released. She put it in an envelope, put it in her car and waited to be brave enough to send it. And then a year passed, and she found herself writing a second one and hiding it away in her car with the other. Then a second year passed... and another letter drove around with her. She'd managed into a post office with them this year, but she'd chickened out right before dropping them in.

She wasn't sure why she was so scared to send them, why it was making her want to panic right now, but it was there.

Buffy sat in the car until it passed and she managed to drive a few streets back over to the hotel she had been staying in the past several days. She too had found herself coming to this small Northern town after hearing the news one late evening. She had dropped a bowl of cereal walking from the kitchen to the living room as it played on the screen, striking her harder than a single other story she'd heard that resembled her own in any way.

Much like Angel had talked about in the speech he'd given while she hid in the very back row... she wasn't lost on the similarities, how close in age and looks they were, how she had an ex-fiance who couldn't just accept that she had enough of him and his behavior and wanted to move on with her life. It wasn't the first time she'd played the "what if" game... wondering what exactly would have happened if she'd made any other choice that day, if she hadn't been home, if she had been there alone... she'd wondered many times about what if what happened to this other girl would have been how her own story played out. What if Angel hadn't been able to fight him off, if he had been blindsided like the young man who lost his life had, if he hadn't been stronger... She'd had more than one nightmare since coming here of Angel and her in the place of those two, lying dead, gone...

Most people around her own small town of Sunnydale knew what happened to her, she'd talked about it, answered questions, hell people spread the truth and made up their own version enough times as well. She found she didn't really like talking about it with strangers, like too many people already knew so much of this event it felt nice to not always have everyone know. She still reached out to people in need in other ways, she just didn't like the spotlight.

She'd come here though and she'd talked with some of the family after privately reaching out. She'd tried to help out with the small community who were in a state of shock. And then... she heard about Cordelia being here, and not long after that he was here, too. It was like another one of those random works of fate that you either chalked up to nothing or you figured it had to mean something, somehow... and probably never understand why.

Her throat wanted to close up even seeing Cordelia, then when he came out it was like the room started to spin. Her lips curled into a smile at all the right times, her heart ached right along with him as together in their own way they relieved that night, she fought the urge to flee the room to make it stop.

OoOoO

Buffy was just about to fall asleep when her phone rang. Her head lifted up off the pillow and her arm shot out to the bright light filling the space around the bedside table and she quickly answered the call from the unfamiliar number. When no one answered she repeated her "hello?"

"Um... hi. Buffy. It's-"

"I know," she cut him off. Even if she hadn't sat in the back corner today she was sure she'd know his voice anywhere, it was forever etched into her memory.

"Right," he answered. "I know it's late and I'm sorry for that..."

"It's okay. I was awake." She was trying to drift off to sleep but it was true, she was awake. Still thinking about the past, of today, of the long gone letters, wondering if he would take up on her offer to call or come see her with the information she'd left on the neon sticky note. Not to mention she had trouble actually falling asleep no matter how tired she was most nights anyhow.

"It's late," he repeated and nervously asked if she might want to see him tomorrow for coffee or lunch or something.

Buffy glanced at the clock also on the little nightstand and knew with the adrenaline coursing through her now with even talking to him over a phone she wasn't going to be back down anytime soon. "Are you busy right now? I mean, if you're tired I understand... I just... I thought maybe we could talk now if you're up for it?"

He was silent and she started to feel nervous. She was about to say something when his voice came back on, nearly making her jump.