"Indiana?" Angel made a face that strongly resembled a four-year-old presented with peas. "Buffy…"
She was sick and tired of his whining. She was sick and tired of his begging her to stay. She never thought she'd see the day when she was just plain sick and tired of Angel. But for once, she could see how one would want to give in to the overwhelming urge to call him a nancy-boy. Biting her tongue, she sighed. "I'm only saying this one more time. I want quiet, and I want Dawn to see snow at Christmastime. We will visit. We will write. We will call. We will be fine." The speech took on the cadence of rote memorization, as well it should. She'd only said the same damned thing a hundred times.
She had changed.
In the time between the school bus arrival of Buffy's motley crew and now, she had changed. He wished he could say when or what had changed her, but he knew the exact moment. When he'd admitted to her that they'd known next to nothing about the necklace they'd given Spike, she'd all but shut down.
She blamed him. Though she might not realize it and might not mean to, Angel knew her. He knew she was blaming him for Spike's death. He figured one more pointed finger among the thousands didn't make that much of a difference. But because it was her finger, delicate and irrationally strong, it hurt all the more.
"We could have found another way," was all she said when he tried to broach the subject again.
"We will be fine," Buffy reassured him softly, bringing him back to the moment. She stepped forward with a hand extended just as he stepped forward with his arms open. She saw the hurt flash over his face at her gesture and quickly changed her stance. When she embraced him, he was stiff with the awkwardness of it. Before he could say anything, she released him and walked outside where her friends waited.
A hug for Xander, a quick kiss on the lips. Tears glittered in his remaining eye, and Buffy started the count in her head. One, for Anya. Anya whose death made Xander gone to nearly everyone but himself. One for a death that wouldn't have happened had it not been for Buffy and her mission.
A hug for Willow and a whispered reassurance in her ear. "You know, if Kennedy doesn't work out and you can't hook up with Portia de Rossi, you can always come visit me. Check out the 'Midwest farmers' daughters.'" Two, for Tara. Tara who died from a gunshot meant for Buffy.
A hug for Giles, and the extra moment to bury her face in the softness of his shirt, inhale the smell that was Giles: the soap he used to make shaving lather and the smell of tea. She wouldn't cry, she promised herself. He smoothed her hair down with his big hands like a father, and she added another to her list. Three, for Jenny. She didn't even want to think about that one.
A handshake for Faith, her quick grin that spoke volumes, more than words between them ever could. In that fast and clever grin, Buffy saw the good times they'd had together, the hard truths they'd shared. The things about them that had been the same. Four, for Faith herself and her lost years. If you'd only stayed gone, then she wouldn't have had someone to compete with. She would have been what she was meant to be.
Waves to Wesley, Andrew, Robin, and the Slayers who were still in L.A.
Gently ushering Dawn into the taxi that idled at the curb, Buffy took one last look at the sky and buildings around her.
"Goodbye, sunny California," she said brightly, the chipper tone of her voice belying her thoughts and feelings.
In his office, Angel put his head in his hands and tried to hold himself together.
~~~
He couldn't even remember what excuses he'd made to her to leave the house. It was no matter; she would be out calling on her friends all day, anyway. Social appearances were important to his mother, and today that was a lucky convenience.
William walked the streets of London with his head down, calling up memories from more years than he'd actually lived.
Over and over again was her, glowing, gorgeous her. Effulgent, he thought ruefully, a corner of his mouth turning up.
Bloody fuckin' gorgeous, another corner of his mind spoke up. Absolutely perfect.
He couldn't agree more. He'd been awake for three hours, away from her for that same amount of time, and it was killing him. He stopped and leaned on a lamppost, pressing his forehead to the cool iron as he tried to rationalize the pain, the great gaping hole left in the middle of him.
"I have gone insane," he said to himself, taking yet another jab at the nosepiece of his glasses. Shoving a hand through his mop of curly hair, he resisted the urge to pace the sidewalk. He didn't want everyone else to know he was insane, after all.
Prove it's real, you stupid git, he told himself. Though he was frightened of the intensity of that other voice, that other him, he was fascinated by it. Fascinated by the fact that the other him was everything he wasn't.
The other him was completely crass, completely classless, and more likely than not, wouldn't take shit from anybody. Thinking this, William sighed. Just several more facts that severely weighed against the likelihood that his memories were real.
Vampires, demons, witches. And the Slayer. Most importantly of all was the Slayer. If he could prove she was real, then perhaps—
"Rupert!" William said aloud, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk and causing a young boy with newspapers to run directly into the back of him. "Sorry, lad," he said kindly, waving a hand.
"Sorry y'self, ya bloody ijit," the boy threw over his shoulder. "I don't fancy trottin' down the walk just to have me head stuck up your arse."
"Well, then you'd better bleedin' well watch where you're goin', tyke, else you'll have yer head stuck up yer own arse," he retorted quickly, the words tripping from his lips before he could even register thinking them.
The little boy's eyes narrowed at the change and he ran, his tiny feet keeping a steady beat along the cobblestones.
"Bloody hell," William said tiredly. As he walked the streets, his thoughts took up the rhythm of his steps, and his mind insisted Prove it, prove it, prove it, with each stride of his long legs.
Hearing the myriad British accents swirling around him, both familiar and far-removed at once, he thought of yet another voice.
Giles, talking about the Watchers' Council. William remembered that he—Spike—had commented once upon the unflagging Britishness of the Council, and Giles had agreed. No matter what else they were and weren't, the Council was always overwhelmingly Briton.
So how did one go about finding the men of the Council?
Get their attention. The voice was amused, even a little excited.
Why, William thought with some shock and pleasure. I know that tone. I seem to be an attention freak. He didn't immediately realize the significance of thinking of that other voice as "I."
If Buffy were real—and the memory of her warm beside him, beneath him, the memory of the heat inside her (William felt a blush creep up his cheeks at his wayward thoughts), all those things were too focused, too sharp to be fake—then Spike had to be real, as well.
"All right, then," he said, wiggling his shoulders as though preparing for a fight. Shaking his hands a little to ease the nervousness, he cast a glance around him like a rabbit exiting a den. "I'm a vampire!" he said, only slightly louder than an undertone.
No one heard. No one even looked twice at him.
Could be because it's ten in the ruddy mornin', you great bloody moron. If you were a vampire—God forbid, the state you're in—you wouldn't be out in the sun, 'less you were lookin' to become ash.
At the thought of ashes, William's fingers itched unbearably and he pursed his lips almost imperceptibly, yearning for a cigarette.
William Bryce hadn't even smoked so much as a single puff of anything in his life.
"I'm a demon," he said desperately, this time with more conviction. At the very least, this Council could tell him what on earth was happening to him. "I'm a great, horrid demon, complete with tooth and talon. You—you can't see them, but they're there. Just try and anger me. Grrr…"
Inside his head, he heard laughter.
"Oh go bugger yourself, Spike," William said crossly.