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Part Four
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It scared me, the way I revelled in the feel of the knife in my hands. What was wrong with me? Normal people did *not* like this activity. They avoided it. Some managed to go their entire life without having to do it.

But I liked it.

I liked the way that the flesh tore beneath my blade, the way it sounded, the way it felt. I liked the smell that permeated the air as the first layer of skin was broken. I liked the liquid that dribbled down the knife and touched my hand.

I liked the release of finally crying afterwards.

"Have you finished chopping the onions, Buffy?" Angel asked from behind me.

I turned, flashing a grin, wiping my eyes, "Only just." I handed him the chopping board, setting to work on the tomatoes, which weren't quite so much fun.

We had been working together without crisis for half an hour now, me chopping, which was a skill of mine, and him mixing and cooking, because Angel seemed to have a Midas touch.

Angel. Touch.

A warmth spread through my fingers and into my belly as I stared at him, his back to me, now, stirring a large pot of pasta.

He was wearing an apron.

Angel in an apron.

Images of our past flashed in my mind, of him cooking for Faith and I after a long, hard evening of fighting in which Faith and I had managed to sprain an ankle each. He'd insisted on taking us home, and we'd spent most of the night at my house, watching videos together, him cooking us pasta, rolling his eyes at our viewing selection, a mixture of amusement and mild jealousy passing over his dark features when I'd put on The Big Hit and started singing Mark Wahlberg's praises.

I remember I'd forced him to sit and watch it with us, the three of us sprawled on my bed, my hand linked with his. By the end of the movie, both Faith and I were stretched across him, the three of us a big tangle of arms and legs and stomaches.

It was comfortable, and they felt familiar, and I think we all felt safe. Faith, especially, wasn't used to… to holding and snuggling without it being a prelude to sex. It just felt nice, you know...being close to people. It was like we were anchoring ourselves to each other, forming this web of safety around us...to make things easier. To forget the hurt.

Of all the nights spent with my buds, that was my favourite. I didn't think about that possibility that Faith would try to seduce Angel, and I wasn't worried about Angel and I losing control. We were just relaxing, acting like...acting like normal friends. Like Willow and Xander and I would, only...

Only Faith and Angel understood me. That's why it was so special...They understood how close the darkness was, and how afraid of it I was. They knew. Because they were as afraid of it as I was.

That night, we let ourselves be each other's light, and let each other keep the darkness at bay.

But that had been before...what?

Before Faith let go of the light, I suppose. Before Angel left me, and before...

Before he forgot. We forgot.

I wish we could go back to that time now, if only for a night. I wish I could lie in their embrace, Faith's head on my belly, her torso across Angel's, my cheek on his shoulder, one palm flat against his chest, the other playing with Faith's hair.

Only, this time...I wish I could feel his heartbeat.

I'd give anything to feel it, to hear it, just once. Anything.

But more than anything, I wish I could let them know how much I love them.

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Half an hour later, we sat down to a nice, romantic dinner. Or, at least, it would have been romantic, if Angel had let me leave him and Samantha alone.

There's nothing worse than being the 3rd wheel when you've been in love with one of the wheels for a good 10 years, and the other wheel, who is like, a mag wheel in comparison to your worn inner tube, has no idea that you're in love with her boyfriend. Fiance. Whatever.

What was worse, was that Angel and Samantha make a very lovely pair. They're the freakin' Jennifer and Brad of the tyre world.

Okay, I'll quit with the tyre thing now, I think you've got the idea.

So there we were, sitting in Angel's lovely home, with Angel's lovely fiancee, eating Angel's lovely pasta concoction, and all I can think is : Why is this not my life?

Part of me feels cheated, like something rightfully mine has been stripped away filling me with the intense desire to cry, and part of me still has the strange urge to laugh. Part of me wants to look at Samantha and grin and say 'He promised me forever,' but I do none of these things. Instead I sit quietly and eat, trying not to notice the fact that when Samantha got home she went and changed into a shirt that I distinctly remember buying for Angel when he was still mine. I can see the shoddy stitching on the third button, which I accidentally pulled off when we were training, and insisted on sewing back on, just to knock the sceptical smirk off Angel's face when I first declared that I'd mend it. I'm surprised that the button hasn't fallen off again.

This memory brings a fresh lump to my throat, and I look down and furiously blink back tears. This wasn't supposed to be so hard! Get in, get rid of Todd, get out. Wham, bam, thankyou ma'm. I wasn't supposed to have to sit through a dinner with a perfectly friendly, pleasant woman, who had everything I wanted in the world, and more.

I keep getting this thought in my head: She's what I might have become, if I hadn't become a superhero when I turned fifteen. But then I think, if I wasn't the Slayer, I wouldn't be me. And if I wasn't me, Angel wouldn't ever have loved me.

"How was your meeting?" Angel was saying to Samantha, looking at her with this little smile that made me want to drop my fork. He used to smile at me like that.

"Great," she said, smiling, and it crushed me even further that she had one of the most beautiful smiles I'd ever seen, genuine and bright, a smile that reached her eyes, which mine almost never did these days. That was a smile that I mentally compared to Will's 'geeker joy' expression, or the smile on Cordelia's face when she landed her first proper acting role. They're all so fucking beautiful when they're joyful, and I wish I could join them in their happiness, but most days I just feel...cold. I love my friends, and the only joy I have lately is watching them accomplish things, to grow and flourish. They're moving, and I'm standing still, like a parent, watching her children run through the playground, some small part of her wishing she could join them, but never really working up the energy to actually do it.

"I got the new Jonas video clip," Samantha continued, "and I got some calls from people about dresses for the Oscars," She finished happily, "I spoke to Drew Barrymore on the phone today. I love my job."

"Samantha is a designer," Angel said, with a rather obvious hint of pride in his voice, "One of the most respected in the country."

"Wait, you're Samantha as in... Samantha Minxsk?" I said, catching on suddenly, "Founder of Minx Nation?" I tried to stop my jaw from dropping, but it's a mean feat. I mean, that's pretty impressive. "Cordelia's been babbling about you for months!"

"Who's Cordelia?" Samantha said, blushing a little, which increased my respect for her. Damnit, I didn't want to like her, but I was really starting to. She had a friendly, laid back nature that I respected, and that comforted me. It was familiar, although she used much more expression than Oz, who I had a sudden longing for... my eyes even darted towards the phone, but I managed to regain my focus enough to look at Samantha.

"An old friend of ours... She and Angel used to be close, strangely, " I said with a grin.

"Cordy and I worked together," Angel said with a fond smile, "She was always so....Cordy."

I laughed, "Yeah, you'll find that people like to act like themselves."

"She's indescribable."

"Yeah," I said, unable to keep the affectionate lilt out of my voice as I thought of Cordelia, "Cordy's an actress."

"Oh," Samantha said, and then looked at Angel, with something I recognized in her eyes: irrational jealousy. "Was she your girlfriend?"

Angel almost choked on his pasta, which I found a little amusing, especially with the way his eyes flickered towards me, obviously thinking that she was talking about me. "Who?" he asked.

"Cordelia," Samantha said, gazing at him levelly.

"Hell, no," Angel said, shaking his head, "Talk about a match made in hell. Cordy's a sister to me. Incestuous, that's what it would be."

"Who did you *think* I was talking about?" Samantha asked suddenly.

Angel froze, and my mouth was suddenly moving, but I didn't know what I was going to say.

"He was just shocked at the concept of dating Cordelia," I said, and internally sighed, relieved that I had said something intelligent and plausible, rather than come out with incomprehensible babble as I had feared. I turned to Angel, smirking at the ashen colour his cheeks had become. "Cordelia's going to be beyond offended when I tell her about this, you know," I said with a grin.

His eyes were bright with gratitude as they stared into my own, and I smiled at him softly, my message clear: I'm not going to spoil this for you. I want you to be happy. I love you.

I'm dying.

I looked away quickly when I felt like I was going to shatter into a million particles of heart and soul and scatter into the wind, never to be collected again.

I pushed back a lock of my hair, and focused my attention on the monstrous heap of pasta before me. Since my calling - or more accurately, since the summer I'd sent Angel to hell- I'd become a bit of a lightweight in the eating department. I suppose I'd gotten used to skipping meals, not feeling like eating. Maybe I just didn't care. All I know is, I could never get myself to eat more than a few bites of my meal, and even that was largely just for show, to prevent those around me from looking at me with *that* expression, that look that told me they knew how unhappy I was, that expression which made me guilty that I wasn't happier, that I wasn't dealing as well as I should be.

I hate that expression.

Closing my eyes against the surge of heaviness in my gut, I shoveled another forkul of pasta into my mouth, chewing, part of me barely even tasting the food, part of me noting a little wistfully that the taste of Angel's specialty pasta hadn't changed in the years since he'd last made a meal for me.

God, I hate this. I hate sitting here with them, pretending that he means nothing more to me than a friend. I hate being his friend. It's almost worse than being his enemy. At least, being his enemy, there'd be something *intense* within him, just for me. As his friend, whatever might be in his heart for me is grey and lifeless, dull and...meaningless. Inconsequential.

Don't get me wrong, friends are special, and important, and *everything*, but that's not Angel and I. We've been lots of things over the years - lovers, enemies, side-by-side warriors - but friends was something that we never really perfected. We tried - God, we tried, I'm still exhausted from the friends-farce we pulled when he first came back from hell - but we'd never been able to do it. *I* stilll couldn't, but Angel... I was having serious doubts about him, especially from the way he's holding Sam's hand, so comfortably, so naturally....

And we're back to the whole damn perfect pair of wheels thing.

I'm sitting here with the freakin' most perfect couple in the world, and I'm desperately, mind-muddlingly, heart-wrenchingly, bone-crumblingly in love with one of them.

Excuse me while I die.