"How did it go?"
Willow stared at Tara's reflection. The other witch was standing behind her and gently brushing Willow's red strands into neatness.
"I need my roots doing," she remarked absently. Tara's eyes met her in the mirror and she smiled kindly. Willow sighed.
"There was a lot of pain involved. Angel was crying, even. I mean, not totally him, but still..."
"Not the type to cry?" Tara hazarded. She'd met the vampire only briefly, but she'd seen a lot when they'd performed the lifeline spell - more than she thought Willow had - and though she felt an instinctive touch of fear at the unleashed demon she felt in him, she appreciated the strength it must take to control it, responded to the unconscious protective vibes he emitted.
She thought he'd probably had a little sister, once.
"Not at all," Willow agreed. "He seems too... big, or something."
"Not a big emoter," Tara said.
"No," Willow replied. "He doesn't let people in. That was probably the most vulnerable he's been in years."
Tara put the brush down and sat next to Willow on the bed.
"Even with Buffy?"
"Even with Buffy," Willow said. "She always made the distinction between Angel and Angelus - most of us did - but I think there were parts of Angel we never knew either. When all this started, I thought it'd be a good thing, but..."
She trailed off, shrugging her shoulders helplessly.
"There's a lot of pain in their history," Tara said, "and some to come yet."
"How do you know?" Willow said, surprised, leaning her head on Tara's shoulder. She knew her lover was empathic, but she'd never suspected any kind of clairvoyant abilities.
"Don't you?" Tara said, surprised herself. "It can't end painlessly. Not for everyone."
"Oh," Willow said. "No. No, I guess not." She stared at the wall, at the picture of she and Tara that hung there. "Everything's changing."
* * * * *
"Riley," Buffy said, leaning on the doorframe of his bedroom. The door was open. All the doors were open, which was how she'd got in; one of Riley's first priorities upon getting the apartment had been to get her a key, but she'd forgotten it that morning.
"Buffy." His tone was cordial, polite. Foreign.
She stepped into the room without being asked - she wondered why she felt she had to be asked, after all the times he'd welcomed her eagerly - and watched what he was doing with dismay, regret, and no surprise.
"Aren't you going to even try and work this out?" she asked, trying and failing to put some life into her tone.
"Do you even want to?" he countered calmly.
Buffy thought about it. About picnics in the sunlight versus kisses in a moonlit cemetery; about hours of good, fun sex versus one night of tender lovemaking; about warm, safe, reliable human arms versus a fleeting, cool touch on her cheek while she slept.
She thought about it all - thought about them - and didn't answer. Riley was going on regardless.
"I don't think you do. I don't think you know what you want, but... I saw you with him. Something happened, didn't it? With the shared lives?"
Buffy fought down a protective instinct about her 'new' old lives, and simply nodded. To all of his points, though she knew that wouldn't be apparent; she wasn't sure what she wanted. Angel wasn't offering her anything; just a heart and a connection re-broken when he left her again to go to a home that she no longer signified. On the other hand, Riley was only just now withdrawing the offer of - everything, she supposed, and if she said the right words he wouldn't go, wouldn't remove that... that safety net, she admitted to herself.
Riley was her safety net, giving her all the things she wanted from Angel but would accept from someone else. And that wasn't fair to Riley, or to herself.
Riley nodded after her, his gesture half firm and half broken.
"I can't fight that much history. Not without even being important in your life now."
"How can you say -" Buffy said, having made her decision but too shocked he thought that to either comment or take issue with his telling her what *she* thought.
"I'm not, not really," he said, cutting her own. "You don't need me. You don't -" his voice hitched, and he cursed himself for it, going on quietly, "you don't love me."
She was silent, and it was all the answer he needed. Riley turned away from her, resuming packing his suitcase with military neatness.
"You're going to live in what you can fit in one suitcase?" she asked, knowing she hadn't given him much - certainly not what he'd wanted, herself - and trying to at least make the appearance now. She would be sorry to lose him.
But if you don't love something, set it free; and she'd recover from *this* leave-taking.
"No," he answered. "I'm going to live in what I can fit in one suitcase, and in my uniform."
"You're going back to the army?" she exclaimed, honestly distressed. "After everything..."
"The army, Buffy," he cut her off. "Not the Initiative. The regular army scouted me this summer. Told me they could still use me, and if I changed my mind, to come back."
"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked, getting a little mad. Mad was good. Some righteous anger helped detract from the still-present guilt; that she should have known, should have asked, shouldn't have snuggled with Angel while she was still with Riley...
"I didn't think I'd be taking them up on their offer," he said simply, and she wished there was accusation in his voice.
She moved closer, fidgeting with a shirt she had distractedly taken from his pile.
"I already wrecked your military career once," she said. He turned to look at her and she looked into his eyes, hoping he would pick up on the honest sorrow in hers. "I won't stand in your way. If... if that's what you want."
He took the shirt away from her, fitting it into his case and zipping it shut firmly. He conjured a weak, bitter smile, glad at least they hadn't brought the vampire into this; it let him pretend that their relationship hadn't always, in some part, been about him and his - residue in Buffy. It let him pretend he had a little dignity, that he'd maybe been in charge of the ending of the relationship the way he hadn't been for the rest of it.
He lifted his case and walked to the door, pausing only to turn around and tell Buffy, "It's not."
He'd wanted a big wedding with all their assorted family present. He'd wanted a house in the suburbs and a big car and 2.4 children. He'd wanted to look after her, and have her look after him.
He'd wanted her to *fight* for him, for them.
And she hadn't.
So he walked on.
* * * * *
"Hello?"
"Buffy?" Angel was hesitant, a little subdued; for all he knew, Buffy was taking the call in the middle of conciliatory sexcapades.
"Angel," she said, and his vampiric hearing picked up a slight, muted sniffle, even over the phone.
"You're crying," he said.
"No," she denied immediately. "Well. Maybe a little."
Things hadn't gone well with the boy, then. Angel felt a tiny burst of joy, of smug, proprietary satisfaction; and then chastised himself for it in the moment before the familiar self-loathing surfaced at the unfair reaction. Angel didn't like the ex-soldier - had he been given reason to feel differently? a small voice said in his head. Yes, he had, he answered himself.
Buffy was with Riley. She'd claimed to love him. He obviously adored her. She had a chance of happiness with him, of everything Angel couldn't offer her (yet, remarked the voice). Their argument, split (he firmly quashed that resurgence of joy), whatever, was hurting her.
For all he'd often made Buffy cry, he hated to see her do it.
"Are you still at Giles' place?" she asked.
"Yeah," he said.
"Alone?" she said.
"Uh... yeah," he said, taken by surprise.
"I just have something to do... I'll be there in half an hour."
"Right," Angel said to the dial tone.
Half an hour seemed to drag on for a long time (especially for someone who was immortal).
* * * * *
Giles walked slowly into the magic shop and went straight over to his private bookshelf. On the way over, he'd had a notion about a possible connection between the Desuin and the Faadal, a serpentine demon variant which also killed its prey with some sort of... tongue-like... appendage. He suppressed an instinctive shudder at the thought of the pain what Angel had described must cause, and unsure as he was about the new tensions that came from Angel's presence, he was glad they'd had to bring him into it because of Buffy's lack of memory of the event. His Slayer had often been unusually squeamish, for a Slayer, and recalling in detail such a gruesome death - particularly visited on a woman who was to all intents and purposes *her* and intended again for Buffy herself - would serve only to harm her mental, and possibly physical, health.
"You're back," Anya said in an unfriendly tone entirely at odds with the sunny smile she bestowed on a departing customer, "finally."
"This is rather important, Anya," Giles said, not bothering to look at his difficult employee. She was an excellent shopkeeper - keeping his profits high(er) and costs low(er) than they might have otherwise been (he admitted he'd jumped into the business rather rapidly, with considerably less caution than such a decision would usually warrant) - but still working on excellence as a person.
Unless, of course, it was to someone giving her money. Or Xander.
"How important?" another equally demanding voice enquired. "Did it work? Is Angel okay? Still... y'know... Angel?"
"Cordelia," Giles said, barely looking away from the shelf as he pulled a book off and perused it, meaning to dismiss the girl until he had more time to chat.
Until he glanced up and registered the concern in her eyes for her friend. Older eyes, he thought; surrounded by as beautiful and youthful a face as ever, but showing a deeper understanding and empathy than he'd noticed there before. He thought of the brief picture Wesley had sketched out for him of their operations in LA, and his short description of the painful visions that drove it.
Giles had known seers before, of both the drug-addled, demon-enhanced visions he and his friends had produced twenty years ago and the legitimate, Power-driven flashes Cordelia experienced. They were difficult for the seer, who felt as much as saw the obscure images, and it was to this he attributed Cordelia's newfound attitude. God knew the girl had never lacked confidence; but that which the woman now possessed came from a surety of purpose, the vocation of protecting people from a threat they couldn't imagine. And, naturally, from the entirely common prospect of being set adrift to survive in an adult city, an adult world; one Xander and Willow and even Buffy, for all of their maturity, had not yet experienced.
Not so different from the situation he had once been in himself, and so Giles closed his book and led Cordelia into the back room.
"Angel is... alright," Giles said, choosing his words carefully so as not to alarm her while still conveying that Angel, who had after all been crying in Buffy's arms last time he'd seen him, was not exactly fine.
"What do you mean, he's alright?" Cordelia said impatiently. "He's physically alright but in an unbreakable hypnotic trance, it didn't work so he's completely alright, or he's remembered something horrible and is currently brooding his depressed ass off?"
Giles suppressed a smile. It was comforting to know that *some* things - particularly her tendency to blunt tactlessness - had survived her change.
"More of the latter, I'm afraid," he said, sighing. It had occurred to him that the hypnosis might be distressing to Angel, but he had gone ahead... not regardless, precisely. Simply, on balance, he had decided that the risk was worth it. It *hadn't* occurred to him that Angel's emotions might still affect Buffy's so strongly.
"What did he remember?" she said anxiously. "Did he get what you needed so we can go home?"
"He did, actually," Giles said, rather affronted. "Angel's alter-ego, David, recalled the circumstances of Sarah's death intimately, which is what proved difficult for Angel. And Buffy."
"Buffy," Cordelia muttered under her breath.
"It might be nice if you co-operated with us all, Cordelia," Giles said stiffly, beginning to feel annoyed about her apparent ability to grasp the import of the situation. "Your eagerness to leave and unwillingness to have come, besides being rather unflattering, won't help Angel at all-"
"How do you know?" she snapped, standing up and beginning to pace the floor with dramatic restlessness. "You don't even like Angel."
"Cordelia!" Giles began, then pondered his answer. He didn't like Angelus, naturally. And the two of them were intertwined, and crucially, shared the same face. Buffy may have been able to kiss the lips that had drunk of human blood; he had found it almost impossible to shake the hand that had snapped Jenny's neck. Even now, it could be hard, if he didn't remind himself this was *Angel*, and therefore not responsible. No-one had answered for Jenny's death and occasionally - when he was loneliest - Angel was the only candidate who could, simply by virtue of the body-sharing, of the taints the human personality left in the vampire.
And yet... before Angel'd turned, he'd liked the other man (thought of him as another man). He had always appreciated how much Angel loved Buffy, as the Slayer's Watcher and as Buffy's surrogate father. He had been impressed when Angel left her, and he had been saddened; not only for her loss, but for his loss as well - Angel, in his way, had been as expert as Giles himself and certainly the one to come closest to his age, metaphorically. Giles respected his skill as a Warrior, his devotion to duty... and if the personality was flawed, most peoples' were and he appreciated Angel's efforts in trying to redeem himself.
"That is not true," he said simply to Cordelia, without explanation or embellishment. She obviously heard and understood the note of sincerity in his tone, because she gave him a piercing look and then, slowly, resumed her seat.
"You don't have to see how he gets when he's seen her," she said, almost despairingly. "He's doing... we're doing pretty well. And then its like he *regresses* or something. Gets Buffy Face and mopes around and he's killing things either maniacally or mechanically and either way..." her gaze met his, and Giles was sorry to see her expression was miserable, "I'm worried it'll get him *killed*."
"Perhaps-" Giles tried to cut in, but she was in full, ranting flow, and she ignored his interruption.
"And the time it lasts is practically proportional to the time he's seen her for on some ridiculous scale like a day of brooding for every hour of her 'glorious' presence..."
"Slight jealousy?" Giles hazarded, sure she wouldn't even hear him. Unfortunately, she did, and reacted, eyes flashing as she glared.
"*Excuse* me? Jealous of *her*?"
"Not *her* exactly," Giles stumbled to qualify, "just her place in Angel's heart. In his life."
"Eeuw," Cordelia exclaimed with all the eloquence of the days of research he remembered. "That is so not... he's like my *brother* or something!"
"Yes, quite so," Giles agreed - demon fighting did seem to promote familial bonds somewhat - "but you are used to being the most important, if not the only, female in his life and it might seem that Buffy's... usurping that place... could conceivably upset you."
To his surprise, once past her initial reaction, she listened to him, appeared to consider his theory.
"Maybe it's a little that," she conceded grudgingly. "But mostly... I don't *like* to see him like that. And not only because it dampens my day. Because it makes me *hurt* for him, you know?"
Giles nodded, but again, she was continuing without waiting for his reactions.
"You know after the whole Faith thing?" Here she glanced at Giles, who nodded again to affirm that he knew about the 'whole Faith thing'. Few details, to be sure; Angel had called, he had passed on the information they had on Faith, Buffy had gone to LA and returned with only the short, terse, notice that Faith was in jail and Angel had been pivotal in getting her there. He suspected something had transpired between Buffy and Angel, and that it had been negative, but had no real knowledge.
"Well, he did a good thing with Faith. Not just the getting her locked away part, because I do still kind of think she's dangerous and dare I say semi-psychotic, but with getting her to get *herself* locked away... anyway, he gets this major victory... and all he does for the next week is mope around and brood and read old books and be practically silent, all because Buffy marched in wearing her holier-than-thou bitch boots." Cordelia looked almost distraught at the memory.
Giles winced, remembering his own experience with - those, late last year. He'd felt quite like moping around and reading old books himself, in actual fact.
"And so," Cordelia concluded, regaining some of the fire she had lost to emotion in her last speech, "I don't see how this is going to work out great for anyone."
Giles thought again of Angel and Buffy, sobbing together on his couch; of Riley, who had been conspicuously absent during the LA group's arrival; of Cordelia and Wesley, following Angel to a place where they thought he would get hurt simply so they could pick him up, take him back home, and help him recover; of a Desuin demon he didn't know how to stop, perhaps this moment tracking the Slayer it was hungry for.
"Yes," he replied softly. "I understand that very much."
He pressed Cordelia's hand gently where it lay limp on the table; when he then replaced it with the book he held, open to the significant chapter, she dutifully began reading the pages while Giles went to get another.
* * * * *
Buffy stared at the door for a moment, and then knocked gingerly before pushing it open.
"Angel?" she called, looking around; the interior was dim and she flicked the light on.
"Yeah," he said, getting up from the couch where he'd lapsed into automatic brood since her call. He scrutinised her unobtrusively in the muted light; she looked poised and together, no obvious signs of her tears. She'd changed into red leather pants and a tighter t-shirt, presumably for patrol purposes later rather than for his benefit, but he'd always (especially) appreciated her in smooth leather. His senses, always particularly sharp in Slayer presence, screamed to be nearer, to feel the leather and then her skin against his and... but it wasn't that dim, and if he kept on with *that* unattainable train of thought - well, anyway. He thought of Riley, and though the demon snarled in possessive anger within him, he calmed.
"Did you and Riley..." Angel said, unsure of his right to probe, leaving the question hanging.
"He's gone," she said simply, dropping her bag by the door and walking over to join him by the couch.
"Gone as in..."
"As in 'I'll forward your mail'," Buffy said matter-of-factly.
"Oh," Angel said, unbalanced by her straight-forwardness when he'd been prepared to tread gently around the subject. "And we're feeling...?"
"Will you say a complete sentence?" she said in exasperation. "And I don't know how 'we're' feeling because I wasn't aware there was a 'we' to be feeling anything. *I'm* feeling pretty crappy about having led on a decent guy for the past year and you're feeling... I don't know how you're feeling."
"Sorry," he said softly, turning his body more towards hers. "He seemed to be... a good guy to you."
"He was," she said. "I just wasn't such a good girl to him."
"Don't blame yourself -" Angel began, but she waved a hand, cutting him off.
"Who else? I wasn't in it the way he was, and I should have realised that a long time ago. In fact, I shouldn't have started it when I was..."
"When you were what?"
"When I wasn't over you," she said, looking up into his dark eyes. "I think I figured..." she looked down, fidgeting, hoping she wasn't going to lay all her cards - screw metaphors - lay her heart down for him to trample on. Of course, Angel being Angel he'd do it gently, even lovingly... remind her again how it was for her own good and fill the air with unspoken thoughts of his unworthiness... but those were still big, trample-ready feet he had. Still a big grip on her heart. "I stopped thinking about you because I never really thought I'd get over you," she said, "so I gave Riley what I could... and it wasn't enough."
"I'm sorry," he said. "I never should have -"
"Don't," she said. "Whatever you're going to say, you should have. A lot of people don't ever get to love like that and... I'm grateful I have. Do."
She felt his arm creep around her shoulders and leant into him, pillowing her head on his chest, which was harder muscled than she remembered. For a moment she yearned to sit up, slowly unbutton his shirt and test the change with her eyes and hands and mouth... but it was Angel, and the biggest unfairness in her life - which even in her non-self-pitying moments she knew was filled with unfairness - was that while there was one thing she could give only with him, her love, she couldn't give him the expression of it that was possible with anyone else.
"I'm grateful I do as well," he murmured, very close to her ear, then tested the lobe gently with blunt teeth.
"And - have, as well," she went on, with some awkwardness, "I mean, with all this past life stuff..."
He didn't make any reply, concentrating instead on nibbling tiny areas of her neck, sending delightful sensations rocketing up and down her body from the slight touches of his lips and teeth - and the low growl he sounded when he encountered the slightly raised scar, his mark at the base of her neck.
"It's made me think about," she breathed in sharply as he licked the scar, one hand tangling in her hair to gently urge her head to the side, allowing him better access, "destiny..."
"So?" he said, his other hand tracing small, cool circles on the skin of her taut belly.
"And about you leaving," she said, whining instinctively when he immediately detached from her, sitting straight up. His grip on her loosened as he tried to judge her mood.
"And?" he said cautiously. He was completely ready to defend his decision to leave for it having done good for both of them... but particularly for what it had given him. A purpose of his own. Friends - a family - he loved and trusted a way he had only her, before. Respect, and the responsibility of a city and people, people's *souls*. Something he could be proud of... besides her.
A vintage car and a very expensive - but very effective - long duster.
And so he was prepared to defend that choice, but he would prefer not to have to; he'd hoped Buffy would have realised he'd made it in good faith, and the opportunities it had afforded him. If her opportunities hadn't quite worked out... it did upset him, as anything that upset her did, but it wasn't his fault. He considered it quite an achievement for his self-esteem that he saw that.
"And I'm sorry I resented it for so long," she said, burrowing into him slightly more strongly, hoping to induce him to tighten his arms again, which he did. "You're not my shadow. You shouldn't be *in* my shadow. You're doing... so much... and I should have seen that you needed that."
"I'm glad you approve," he said jokingly, contented and a little amazed at her maturity. He bent to kiss her properly, partly in thanks and partly because sitting here with her in his arms and not tasting the skin and heartbeat and *life* he could sense beneath him was driving him crazy.
"Like the Faith thing," she said tentatively, and he went rigid again. She quickly laid a reassuring hand on his thigh, knowing that he was remembering his fist against her face as vividly as she was; she felt no rancour - now - but she figured it was probably something he guilt-tripped over.
"I was wrong," she said. "I was wrong to judge you instead of support you, I was wrong to say what I did to you, I was wrong not to stick around to apologise... and when *you* came to *me* to apologise, I was wrong not to say it then."
"You did -" he started.
As she'd thought. Guilt.
"I didn't," she said firmly. "I hummed and hawed and said maybe you hadn't been entirely wrong... when you'd been right. I'm sorry."
"Thank you," he said gravely.
"And... I admire you for it," she said. "I'm so proud of you, Angel. You've come really far."
Unseen by her, he grinned. Buffy was his reason for fighting, had always been; he'd found other reasons - the people he helped, the people he could help, the simple fact that it was the right thing to do - but still, Buffy remained at the core. The Slayer. Giving her life to the fight because someone had to. He was long past needing her validation in what he did, but he delighted in her backing.
"I could never go so far that I'd be out of your reach," he vowed softly.
Buffy smiled and curved her arm up and around his neck; their gazes met.
"I love you too," she said. "I know it can't... go anywhere... now."
He thought briefly about his shanshu, but before he could properly contemplate telling her (now she'd made her feelings about moving on from him clear) she was carrying on.
"But Willow's spell showed me... this is only one of a lot of times we've been together." Her fingertips softly stroked the hair on the nape of his neck. "We're meant for each other. So, I can wait."
He smiled back down at her and leaned down to *finally* capture her lips in a kiss.
Just before their mouths met, he heard her whisper mischievously, "It can't exactly get any worse..."
* * * * *
"Are you sure you have to go *right now*?" Angel said, nuzzling Buffy's neck. "About quarter of an hour, the sun will have gone down, I'll come with you."
She laughed and pushed the length of his body off hers. Only vampiric grace and reflexes stopped him crashing straight to the floor. She offered him a hand, pulling him up and back into her arms.
"You hunt enough in LA," she said mock sternly. "This is my patch."
"I don't mind," he said, sliding his hands down to the small of her back and pulling her against him even tighter.
"I know you don't," she said, laying her head on his chest. "But there's no need, really. Routine sweep."
"Unless you happen to run into the Desuin," he said, all joking gone. He felt her stiffen infinitesimally against him.
"And then running will indeed be the word," she said dryly, and started to back them towards the door.
Once there, she pulled away from him, keeping hold of his hand. She opened the door, and then suddenly turned back into Angel's embrace, kissing him hard. Surprised but not unwilling, he wrapped his arms around her again and responded.
Buffy pulled back, resting her forehead against his. "I love you," she whispered.
"I love you," he said, and then she was out of his arms and the door.
He stared after her for a moment, and then spared a thought for when Giles and the rest of the gang would be back. Walking over to the phone, intending to call Cordelia and find out where she was before the sun went down and he could follow Buffy out on patrol, he caught sight of Buffy's bag, still where she had dropped it when she came in.
He picked it up, and two letters fell out.
Puzzled, he turned them over. They were addressed simply to 'Mom' and 'Willow'.
Frowning, instinctive dread and fear for his impulsive mate growing in his centre, he reached into her bag, pulling out several more letters. He found the one bearing his name and ripped the envelope open hurriedly, almost tearing the letter inside in his haste.
It was written on plain white notepaper in her usual loopy scrawl. He unfolded it.
'Dear Angel (he read)
Hopefully this won't be necessary, not only because the Desuin won't actually make its quota, but because we'll have had the conversation I'd like to have and you'll already know that I love you, and never stopped loving you.'
He only got that far before the fear running through dead veins exploded into terror.
The letter dropped heedlessly onto the carpet.
"Oh God, Buffy..." he breathed.
* * * * *
Willow stared at Tara's reflection. The other witch was standing behind her and gently brushing Willow's red strands into neatness.
"I need my roots doing," she remarked absently. Tara's eyes met her in the mirror and she smiled kindly. Willow sighed.
"There was a lot of pain involved. Angel was crying, even. I mean, not totally him, but still..."
"Not the type to cry?" Tara hazarded. She'd met the vampire only briefly, but she'd seen a lot when they'd performed the lifeline spell - more than she thought Willow had - and though she felt an instinctive touch of fear at the unleashed demon she felt in him, she appreciated the strength it must take to control it, responded to the unconscious protective vibes he emitted.
She thought he'd probably had a little sister, once.
"Not at all," Willow agreed. "He seems too... big, or something."
"Not a big emoter," Tara said.
"No," Willow replied. "He doesn't let people in. That was probably the most vulnerable he's been in years."
Tara put the brush down and sat next to Willow on the bed.
"Even with Buffy?"
"Even with Buffy," Willow said. "She always made the distinction between Angel and Angelus - most of us did - but I think there were parts of Angel we never knew either. When all this started, I thought it'd be a good thing, but..."
She trailed off, shrugging her shoulders helplessly.
"There's a lot of pain in their history," Tara said, "and some to come yet."
"How do you know?" Willow said, surprised, leaning her head on Tara's shoulder. She knew her lover was empathic, but she'd never suspected any kind of clairvoyant abilities.
"Don't you?" Tara said, surprised herself. "It can't end painlessly. Not for everyone."
"Oh," Willow said. "No. No, I guess not." She stared at the wall, at the picture of she and Tara that hung there. "Everything's changing."
* * * * *
"Riley," Buffy said, leaning on the doorframe of his bedroom. The door was open. All the doors were open, which was how she'd got in; one of Riley's first priorities upon getting the apartment had been to get her a key, but she'd forgotten it that morning.
"Buffy." His tone was cordial, polite. Foreign.
She stepped into the room without being asked - she wondered why she felt she had to be asked, after all the times he'd welcomed her eagerly - and watched what he was doing with dismay, regret, and no surprise.
"Aren't you going to even try and work this out?" she asked, trying and failing to put some life into her tone.
"Do you even want to?" he countered calmly.
Buffy thought about it. About picnics in the sunlight versus kisses in a moonlit cemetery; about hours of good, fun sex versus one night of tender lovemaking; about warm, safe, reliable human arms versus a fleeting, cool touch on her cheek while she slept.
She thought about it all - thought about them - and didn't answer. Riley was going on regardless.
"I don't think you do. I don't think you know what you want, but... I saw you with him. Something happened, didn't it? With the shared lives?"
Buffy fought down a protective instinct about her 'new' old lives, and simply nodded. To all of his points, though she knew that wouldn't be apparent; she wasn't sure what she wanted. Angel wasn't offering her anything; just a heart and a connection re-broken when he left her again to go to a home that she no longer signified. On the other hand, Riley was only just now withdrawing the offer of - everything, she supposed, and if she said the right words he wouldn't go, wouldn't remove that... that safety net, she admitted to herself.
Riley was her safety net, giving her all the things she wanted from Angel but would accept from someone else. And that wasn't fair to Riley, or to herself.
Riley nodded after her, his gesture half firm and half broken.
"I can't fight that much history. Not without even being important in your life now."
"How can you say -" Buffy said, having made her decision but too shocked he thought that to either comment or take issue with his telling her what *she* thought.
"I'm not, not really," he said, cutting her own. "You don't need me. You don't -" his voice hitched, and he cursed himself for it, going on quietly, "you don't love me."
She was silent, and it was all the answer he needed. Riley turned away from her, resuming packing his suitcase with military neatness.
"You're going to live in what you can fit in one suitcase?" she asked, knowing she hadn't given him much - certainly not what he'd wanted, herself - and trying to at least make the appearance now. She would be sorry to lose him.
But if you don't love something, set it free; and she'd recover from *this* leave-taking.
"No," he answered. "I'm going to live in what I can fit in one suitcase, and in my uniform."
"You're going back to the army?" she exclaimed, honestly distressed. "After everything..."
"The army, Buffy," he cut her off. "Not the Initiative. The regular army scouted me this summer. Told me they could still use me, and if I changed my mind, to come back."
"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked, getting a little mad. Mad was good. Some righteous anger helped detract from the still-present guilt; that she should have known, should have asked, shouldn't have snuggled with Angel while she was still with Riley...
"I didn't think I'd be taking them up on their offer," he said simply, and she wished there was accusation in his voice.
She moved closer, fidgeting with a shirt she had distractedly taken from his pile.
"I already wrecked your military career once," she said. He turned to look at her and she looked into his eyes, hoping he would pick up on the honest sorrow in hers. "I won't stand in your way. If... if that's what you want."
He took the shirt away from her, fitting it into his case and zipping it shut firmly. He conjured a weak, bitter smile, glad at least they hadn't brought the vampire into this; it let him pretend that their relationship hadn't always, in some part, been about him and his - residue in Buffy. It let him pretend he had a little dignity, that he'd maybe been in charge of the ending of the relationship the way he hadn't been for the rest of it.
He lifted his case and walked to the door, pausing only to turn around and tell Buffy, "It's not."
He'd wanted a big wedding with all their assorted family present. He'd wanted a house in the suburbs and a big car and 2.4 children. He'd wanted to look after her, and have her look after him.
He'd wanted her to *fight* for him, for them.
And she hadn't.
So he walked on.
* * * * *
"Hello?"
"Buffy?" Angel was hesitant, a little subdued; for all he knew, Buffy was taking the call in the middle of conciliatory sexcapades.
"Angel," she said, and his vampiric hearing picked up a slight, muted sniffle, even over the phone.
"You're crying," he said.
"No," she denied immediately. "Well. Maybe a little."
Things hadn't gone well with the boy, then. Angel felt a tiny burst of joy, of smug, proprietary satisfaction; and then chastised himself for it in the moment before the familiar self-loathing surfaced at the unfair reaction. Angel didn't like the ex-soldier - had he been given reason to feel differently? a small voice said in his head. Yes, he had, he answered himself.
Buffy was with Riley. She'd claimed to love him. He obviously adored her. She had a chance of happiness with him, of everything Angel couldn't offer her (yet, remarked the voice). Their argument, split (he firmly quashed that resurgence of joy), whatever, was hurting her.
For all he'd often made Buffy cry, he hated to see her do it.
"Are you still at Giles' place?" she asked.
"Yeah," he said.
"Alone?" she said.
"Uh... yeah," he said, taken by surprise.
"I just have something to do... I'll be there in half an hour."
"Right," Angel said to the dial tone.
Half an hour seemed to drag on for a long time (especially for someone who was immortal).
* * * * *
Giles walked slowly into the magic shop and went straight over to his private bookshelf. On the way over, he'd had a notion about a possible connection between the Desuin and the Faadal, a serpentine demon variant which also killed its prey with some sort of... tongue-like... appendage. He suppressed an instinctive shudder at the thought of the pain what Angel had described must cause, and unsure as he was about the new tensions that came from Angel's presence, he was glad they'd had to bring him into it because of Buffy's lack of memory of the event. His Slayer had often been unusually squeamish, for a Slayer, and recalling in detail such a gruesome death - particularly visited on a woman who was to all intents and purposes *her* and intended again for Buffy herself - would serve only to harm her mental, and possibly physical, health.
"You're back," Anya said in an unfriendly tone entirely at odds with the sunny smile she bestowed on a departing customer, "finally."
"This is rather important, Anya," Giles said, not bothering to look at his difficult employee. She was an excellent shopkeeper - keeping his profits high(er) and costs low(er) than they might have otherwise been (he admitted he'd jumped into the business rather rapidly, with considerably less caution than such a decision would usually warrant) - but still working on excellence as a person.
Unless, of course, it was to someone giving her money. Or Xander.
"How important?" another equally demanding voice enquired. "Did it work? Is Angel okay? Still... y'know... Angel?"
"Cordelia," Giles said, barely looking away from the shelf as he pulled a book off and perused it, meaning to dismiss the girl until he had more time to chat.
Until he glanced up and registered the concern in her eyes for her friend. Older eyes, he thought; surrounded by as beautiful and youthful a face as ever, but showing a deeper understanding and empathy than he'd noticed there before. He thought of the brief picture Wesley had sketched out for him of their operations in LA, and his short description of the painful visions that drove it.
Giles had known seers before, of both the drug-addled, demon-enhanced visions he and his friends had produced twenty years ago and the legitimate, Power-driven flashes Cordelia experienced. They were difficult for the seer, who felt as much as saw the obscure images, and it was to this he attributed Cordelia's newfound attitude. God knew the girl had never lacked confidence; but that which the woman now possessed came from a surety of purpose, the vocation of protecting people from a threat they couldn't imagine. And, naturally, from the entirely common prospect of being set adrift to survive in an adult city, an adult world; one Xander and Willow and even Buffy, for all of their maturity, had not yet experienced.
Not so different from the situation he had once been in himself, and so Giles closed his book and led Cordelia into the back room.
"Angel is... alright," Giles said, choosing his words carefully so as not to alarm her while still conveying that Angel, who had after all been crying in Buffy's arms last time he'd seen him, was not exactly fine.
"What do you mean, he's alright?" Cordelia said impatiently. "He's physically alright but in an unbreakable hypnotic trance, it didn't work so he's completely alright, or he's remembered something horrible and is currently brooding his depressed ass off?"
Giles suppressed a smile. It was comforting to know that *some* things - particularly her tendency to blunt tactlessness - had survived her change.
"More of the latter, I'm afraid," he said, sighing. It had occurred to him that the hypnosis might be distressing to Angel, but he had gone ahead... not regardless, precisely. Simply, on balance, he had decided that the risk was worth it. It *hadn't* occurred to him that Angel's emotions might still affect Buffy's so strongly.
"What did he remember?" she said anxiously. "Did he get what you needed so we can go home?"
"He did, actually," Giles said, rather affronted. "Angel's alter-ego, David, recalled the circumstances of Sarah's death intimately, which is what proved difficult for Angel. And Buffy."
"Buffy," Cordelia muttered under her breath.
"It might be nice if you co-operated with us all, Cordelia," Giles said stiffly, beginning to feel annoyed about her apparent ability to grasp the import of the situation. "Your eagerness to leave and unwillingness to have come, besides being rather unflattering, won't help Angel at all-"
"How do you know?" she snapped, standing up and beginning to pace the floor with dramatic restlessness. "You don't even like Angel."
"Cordelia!" Giles began, then pondered his answer. He didn't like Angelus, naturally. And the two of them were intertwined, and crucially, shared the same face. Buffy may have been able to kiss the lips that had drunk of human blood; he had found it almost impossible to shake the hand that had snapped Jenny's neck. Even now, it could be hard, if he didn't remind himself this was *Angel*, and therefore not responsible. No-one had answered for Jenny's death and occasionally - when he was loneliest - Angel was the only candidate who could, simply by virtue of the body-sharing, of the taints the human personality left in the vampire.
And yet... before Angel'd turned, he'd liked the other man (thought of him as another man). He had always appreciated how much Angel loved Buffy, as the Slayer's Watcher and as Buffy's surrogate father. He had been impressed when Angel left her, and he had been saddened; not only for her loss, but for his loss as well - Angel, in his way, had been as expert as Giles himself and certainly the one to come closest to his age, metaphorically. Giles respected his skill as a Warrior, his devotion to duty... and if the personality was flawed, most peoples' were and he appreciated Angel's efforts in trying to redeem himself.
"That is not true," he said simply to Cordelia, without explanation or embellishment. She obviously heard and understood the note of sincerity in his tone, because she gave him a piercing look and then, slowly, resumed her seat.
"You don't have to see how he gets when he's seen her," she said, almost despairingly. "He's doing... we're doing pretty well. And then its like he *regresses* or something. Gets Buffy Face and mopes around and he's killing things either maniacally or mechanically and either way..." her gaze met his, and Giles was sorry to see her expression was miserable, "I'm worried it'll get him *killed*."
"Perhaps-" Giles tried to cut in, but she was in full, ranting flow, and she ignored his interruption.
"And the time it lasts is practically proportional to the time he's seen her for on some ridiculous scale like a day of brooding for every hour of her 'glorious' presence..."
"Slight jealousy?" Giles hazarded, sure she wouldn't even hear him. Unfortunately, she did, and reacted, eyes flashing as she glared.
"*Excuse* me? Jealous of *her*?"
"Not *her* exactly," Giles stumbled to qualify, "just her place in Angel's heart. In his life."
"Eeuw," Cordelia exclaimed with all the eloquence of the days of research he remembered. "That is so not... he's like my *brother* or something!"
"Yes, quite so," Giles agreed - demon fighting did seem to promote familial bonds somewhat - "but you are used to being the most important, if not the only, female in his life and it might seem that Buffy's... usurping that place... could conceivably upset you."
To his surprise, once past her initial reaction, she listened to him, appeared to consider his theory.
"Maybe it's a little that," she conceded grudgingly. "But mostly... I don't *like* to see him like that. And not only because it dampens my day. Because it makes me *hurt* for him, you know?"
Giles nodded, but again, she was continuing without waiting for his reactions.
"You know after the whole Faith thing?" Here she glanced at Giles, who nodded again to affirm that he knew about the 'whole Faith thing'. Few details, to be sure; Angel had called, he had passed on the information they had on Faith, Buffy had gone to LA and returned with only the short, terse, notice that Faith was in jail and Angel had been pivotal in getting her there. He suspected something had transpired between Buffy and Angel, and that it had been negative, but had no real knowledge.
"Well, he did a good thing with Faith. Not just the getting her locked away part, because I do still kind of think she's dangerous and dare I say semi-psychotic, but with getting her to get *herself* locked away... anyway, he gets this major victory... and all he does for the next week is mope around and brood and read old books and be practically silent, all because Buffy marched in wearing her holier-than-thou bitch boots." Cordelia looked almost distraught at the memory.
Giles winced, remembering his own experience with - those, late last year. He'd felt quite like moping around and reading old books himself, in actual fact.
"And so," Cordelia concluded, regaining some of the fire she had lost to emotion in her last speech, "I don't see how this is going to work out great for anyone."
Giles thought again of Angel and Buffy, sobbing together on his couch; of Riley, who had been conspicuously absent during the LA group's arrival; of Cordelia and Wesley, following Angel to a place where they thought he would get hurt simply so they could pick him up, take him back home, and help him recover; of a Desuin demon he didn't know how to stop, perhaps this moment tracking the Slayer it was hungry for.
"Yes," he replied softly. "I understand that very much."
He pressed Cordelia's hand gently where it lay limp on the table; when he then replaced it with the book he held, open to the significant chapter, she dutifully began reading the pages while Giles went to get another.
* * * * *
Buffy stared at the door for a moment, and then knocked gingerly before pushing it open.
"Angel?" she called, looking around; the interior was dim and she flicked the light on.
"Yeah," he said, getting up from the couch where he'd lapsed into automatic brood since her call. He scrutinised her unobtrusively in the muted light; she looked poised and together, no obvious signs of her tears. She'd changed into red leather pants and a tighter t-shirt, presumably for patrol purposes later rather than for his benefit, but he'd always (especially) appreciated her in smooth leather. His senses, always particularly sharp in Slayer presence, screamed to be nearer, to feel the leather and then her skin against his and... but it wasn't that dim, and if he kept on with *that* unattainable train of thought - well, anyway. He thought of Riley, and though the demon snarled in possessive anger within him, he calmed.
"Did you and Riley..." Angel said, unsure of his right to probe, leaving the question hanging.
"He's gone," she said simply, dropping her bag by the door and walking over to join him by the couch.
"Gone as in..."
"As in 'I'll forward your mail'," Buffy said matter-of-factly.
"Oh," Angel said, unbalanced by her straight-forwardness when he'd been prepared to tread gently around the subject. "And we're feeling...?"
"Will you say a complete sentence?" she said in exasperation. "And I don't know how 'we're' feeling because I wasn't aware there was a 'we' to be feeling anything. *I'm* feeling pretty crappy about having led on a decent guy for the past year and you're feeling... I don't know how you're feeling."
"Sorry," he said softly, turning his body more towards hers. "He seemed to be... a good guy to you."
"He was," she said. "I just wasn't such a good girl to him."
"Don't blame yourself -" Angel began, but she waved a hand, cutting him off.
"Who else? I wasn't in it the way he was, and I should have realised that a long time ago. In fact, I shouldn't have started it when I was..."
"When you were what?"
"When I wasn't over you," she said, looking up into his dark eyes. "I think I figured..." she looked down, fidgeting, hoping she wasn't going to lay all her cards - screw metaphors - lay her heart down for him to trample on. Of course, Angel being Angel he'd do it gently, even lovingly... remind her again how it was for her own good and fill the air with unspoken thoughts of his unworthiness... but those were still big, trample-ready feet he had. Still a big grip on her heart. "I stopped thinking about you because I never really thought I'd get over you," she said, "so I gave Riley what I could... and it wasn't enough."
"I'm sorry," he said. "I never should have -"
"Don't," she said. "Whatever you're going to say, you should have. A lot of people don't ever get to love like that and... I'm grateful I have. Do."
She felt his arm creep around her shoulders and leant into him, pillowing her head on his chest, which was harder muscled than she remembered. For a moment she yearned to sit up, slowly unbutton his shirt and test the change with her eyes and hands and mouth... but it was Angel, and the biggest unfairness in her life - which even in her non-self-pitying moments she knew was filled with unfairness - was that while there was one thing she could give only with him, her love, she couldn't give him the expression of it that was possible with anyone else.
"I'm grateful I do as well," he murmured, very close to her ear, then tested the lobe gently with blunt teeth.
"And - have, as well," she went on, with some awkwardness, "I mean, with all this past life stuff..."
He didn't make any reply, concentrating instead on nibbling tiny areas of her neck, sending delightful sensations rocketing up and down her body from the slight touches of his lips and teeth - and the low growl he sounded when he encountered the slightly raised scar, his mark at the base of her neck.
"It's made me think about," she breathed in sharply as he licked the scar, one hand tangling in her hair to gently urge her head to the side, allowing him better access, "destiny..."
"So?" he said, his other hand tracing small, cool circles on the skin of her taut belly.
"And about you leaving," she said, whining instinctively when he immediately detached from her, sitting straight up. His grip on her loosened as he tried to judge her mood.
"And?" he said cautiously. He was completely ready to defend his decision to leave for it having done good for both of them... but particularly for what it had given him. A purpose of his own. Friends - a family - he loved and trusted a way he had only her, before. Respect, and the responsibility of a city and people, people's *souls*. Something he could be proud of... besides her.
A vintage car and a very expensive - but very effective - long duster.
And so he was prepared to defend that choice, but he would prefer not to have to; he'd hoped Buffy would have realised he'd made it in good faith, and the opportunities it had afforded him. If her opportunities hadn't quite worked out... it did upset him, as anything that upset her did, but it wasn't his fault. He considered it quite an achievement for his self-esteem that he saw that.
"And I'm sorry I resented it for so long," she said, burrowing into him slightly more strongly, hoping to induce him to tighten his arms again, which he did. "You're not my shadow. You shouldn't be *in* my shadow. You're doing... so much... and I should have seen that you needed that."
"I'm glad you approve," he said jokingly, contented and a little amazed at her maturity. He bent to kiss her properly, partly in thanks and partly because sitting here with her in his arms and not tasting the skin and heartbeat and *life* he could sense beneath him was driving him crazy.
"Like the Faith thing," she said tentatively, and he went rigid again. She quickly laid a reassuring hand on his thigh, knowing that he was remembering his fist against her face as vividly as she was; she felt no rancour - now - but she figured it was probably something he guilt-tripped over.
"I was wrong," she said. "I was wrong to judge you instead of support you, I was wrong to say what I did to you, I was wrong not to stick around to apologise... and when *you* came to *me* to apologise, I was wrong not to say it then."
"You did -" he started.
As she'd thought. Guilt.
"I didn't," she said firmly. "I hummed and hawed and said maybe you hadn't been entirely wrong... when you'd been right. I'm sorry."
"Thank you," he said gravely.
"And... I admire you for it," she said. "I'm so proud of you, Angel. You've come really far."
Unseen by her, he grinned. Buffy was his reason for fighting, had always been; he'd found other reasons - the people he helped, the people he could help, the simple fact that it was the right thing to do - but still, Buffy remained at the core. The Slayer. Giving her life to the fight because someone had to. He was long past needing her validation in what he did, but he delighted in her backing.
"I could never go so far that I'd be out of your reach," he vowed softly.
Buffy smiled and curved her arm up and around his neck; their gazes met.
"I love you too," she said. "I know it can't... go anywhere... now."
He thought briefly about his shanshu, but before he could properly contemplate telling her (now she'd made her feelings about moving on from him clear) she was carrying on.
"But Willow's spell showed me... this is only one of a lot of times we've been together." Her fingertips softly stroked the hair on the nape of his neck. "We're meant for each other. So, I can wait."
He smiled back down at her and leaned down to *finally* capture her lips in a kiss.
Just before their mouths met, he heard her whisper mischievously, "It can't exactly get any worse..."
* * * * *
"Are you sure you have to go *right now*?" Angel said, nuzzling Buffy's neck. "About quarter of an hour, the sun will have gone down, I'll come with you."
She laughed and pushed the length of his body off hers. Only vampiric grace and reflexes stopped him crashing straight to the floor. She offered him a hand, pulling him up and back into her arms.
"You hunt enough in LA," she said mock sternly. "This is my patch."
"I don't mind," he said, sliding his hands down to the small of her back and pulling her against him even tighter.
"I know you don't," she said, laying her head on his chest. "But there's no need, really. Routine sweep."
"Unless you happen to run into the Desuin," he said, all joking gone. He felt her stiffen infinitesimally against him.
"And then running will indeed be the word," she said dryly, and started to back them towards the door.
Once there, she pulled away from him, keeping hold of his hand. She opened the door, and then suddenly turned back into Angel's embrace, kissing him hard. Surprised but not unwilling, he wrapped his arms around her again and responded.
Buffy pulled back, resting her forehead against his. "I love you," she whispered.
"I love you," he said, and then she was out of his arms and the door.
He stared after her for a moment, and then spared a thought for when Giles and the rest of the gang would be back. Walking over to the phone, intending to call Cordelia and find out where she was before the sun went down and he could follow Buffy out on patrol, he caught sight of Buffy's bag, still where she had dropped it when she came in.
He picked it up, and two letters fell out.
Puzzled, he turned them over. They were addressed simply to 'Mom' and 'Willow'.
Frowning, instinctive dread and fear for his impulsive mate growing in his centre, he reached into her bag, pulling out several more letters. He found the one bearing his name and ripped the envelope open hurriedly, almost tearing the letter inside in his haste.
It was written on plain white notepaper in her usual loopy scrawl. He unfolded it.
'Dear Angel (he read)
Hopefully this won't be necessary, not only because the Desuin won't actually make its quota, but because we'll have had the conversation I'd like to have and you'll already know that I love you, and never stopped loving you.'
He only got that far before the fear running through dead veins exploded into terror.
The letter dropped heedlessly onto the carpet.
"Oh God, Buffy..." he breathed.
* * * * *