Title: A New Life pt. 2
Author: Faith, Faith_Dru@lcos.com
Disclaimer: The characters of BtVS and AtS belong to Joss Whedon and company. I'm merely playing with them.
Season/Spoilers: Totally AU, although the idea was brought up because of "Welcome to the Hellmouth"
Distribution: If you like, tell me and you can have it
Pairing: It looks like a definite friendship between William/Faith, Angelus/Willow and Oz/Dawn are couples.
Rating: Looks like nothing more than a PG to a PG-13
Feedback: Please! Keeps me writing. Plus it keeps me sane (where ever that is).
Author's Notes: Again this is totally AU and has nothing to do with the season. Just read and you'll understand (hopefully). Oh and everyone's human. And Sunnydale's not the hellmouth.


{The Final Bell}

Thank goodness today is over. I thought Mrs. Nice was going to talk forever. Although don't be fooled by the name, or so I'm told. Walking out of class to see a pair of amused eyes staring at her she had to ask, "What are you guys staring at?"

Angelus was the first to chuckle and reply, "I thought you were going to go nuts in there." He started laughing only to be hit on the arm by the shorter brunette women in front of him.

"Sorry, luv. But I'm going to have to agree with Angelus here. You're face was funny." William said only to have the action taken out on Angelus focused onto him.

"I didn't realize that I'd be so amusing on my first day of school. Ready to..." She started but was pushed out of the way, again. Three times in one day. What's she doing here again?

"Hello, Angelus." The blond women from before purred.

"Good bye." Angelus said walking away only to have the blond grab him by the arm. "What do you want Buffy?"

"To talk about...." She started only to be interrupted by Faith.

"He's taken, now run along to your little group." Faith said walking towards Angelus. She saw his thankful look and continued. "Besides didn't we already cover this? Move on." She finished shortly before William placed his arm around her.

"Yeah, ducks. Move along." William said walking between her and Angelus only taking his arm away from Faith long enough to do that simple act.

"Fine. I'll talk to you later, and don't for once think this is over Angelus." She called to the three peoples forms retreating.

Once they were around the corner Angelus spoke, "I don't have to tell William this but I do have to thank you." He stopped them and looked into her eyes.

"It's no problem. I'm glad to help, although very surprised that I found my voice." She said chuckling to herself. "I helped William out earlier, so I thought why stop there." Seeing his look of curiosity she looked at William and said, "you didn't tell him did you."

"No, luv. I didn't really get the chance to talk to him before we saw you." William said.

"No need to explain I know the drill. My ex-flame is trying to get me back to burn me again. Not a new issue." Angelus said with soft bitterness.

"Not to over step my place in the group, but who was she?" Faith asked.

"Her name is Buffy Summers, best friend of the 'may queen' of Sunnydale High Cordelia Chase." Angelus said bitterly.

"Was she the one that ran into me earlier?" Faith asked walking towards her new group of friends.

"The one and only." William said. "Such a same though, her boyfriend Alexander used to be kind of cool. Remember the times, Angelus?" He said getting the far off look that matched Angelus'.

"That I do. See before high school, he and Willow were really good friends. That is until he met Cordelia. Nearly broke Willow's heart, luckily William and I were also her friends." Angelus spoke as if it had happened yesterday.

"Well what's his loss is our gain. I'm just glad that you're over Slutty." William said coming out of his memory. He hated to see Willow hurt and when Xander chose Cordelia over her she was crushed. But if he hadn't chosen Cordelia they would never have been such good friends.

Faith laughed at William's comment of Buffy, though she tended to see what he meant.

"Angelus!" Willow cried.

Angelus turned around just in time to see his girlfriend running up to him with tears running down her face. "Willow, what happened?" He asked when she caught up to him and ran straight into his arms.

"BBBuuufffyyy." Willow tried to get out but the tears over whelmed her.

But that's all that William and Faith needed to hear. They both looked at each other and walked together the way she'd come running out from. When they finally found her, took all of about five minutes, she was laughing and joking about Willow to the 'Cordetts'.

Buffy turned around when someone was tapping her shoulder. She looked at a very angry William and the new girl. "What?" She asked hazel eyes challenging William's blue and Faith's hazel eyes.

"What did you say to Willow?" Faith asked getting a hold of her anger.

"What do you mean?" Buffy asked innocently.

"Come on Slutty. We know that you said something to Willow, now what the bloody 'ell was it?" William said barely holding on to his anger.

"I just said that Angelus still loves me and that he'll tire of her and come back to me." Buffy snapped at them. "And you know it's true so don't deny it."

"You can't honestly believe that Angelus would leave someone like Willow for you? I've known both of them for about a day and even I can see that they belong together. The only thing he feels for you is hatred." Faith said seeing anger flair up in the blond in front of her.

William just looked at Faith, he was shocked that she responded this way but was happy that she was here because his anger towards the girl that hurt his best friends would have gotten the best of him.

"Whatever. You don't know what we had together, besides who are you anyways? Thinking that you can talk to me that way." Buffy said looking towards Cordelia for help but noticed that she was paying all her attention towards Alexander.

"The names Faith, although I don't know what business it is of yours anyway. I may not know what happened in the past but that's all it is, the past. Stop living there and stay away from Angelus and Willow or this will get ugly." With that said she turned on her heal only to feel a hand, that didn't belong to William, grab onto her arm. "Let go."

The arm turned her around so that Faith was once more looking at the blond women. "What are you going to do?" She sneered at her.

Seeing that Faith was going to do something that he'd wanted to do all along, he couldn't let it happen here. He retched forward and released Faith's arm from Buffy's hand and said, "Come on, pet. It isn't worth it."

Faith looked at William and knew that he didn't want her to get in to trouble. She nodded and together they walked away from a very shocked Cordett.

Once outside, they immediately looked for any signs of Willow and Angelus. Not seeing either person, William was the first to speak. "Ready to see if you can hang out with us tonight?"

"Sure." Was all she said.

He wished that he knew what she was thinking. "What's wrong, pet?" He asked stopping to look at her.

She thought for a moment before speaking. "I don't know what's wrong. When I was in Boston I was the protector of all my friends, then I move here and I'm beginning it with people I don't know all that well. She's right, I don't know the situation but from what you and Angelus have told me and from the looks between him and Willow I just know that they're happy." She said looking up into his eyes. She took a deep breath before continuing, "I hate seeing people like this. I know what it's like to date someone that wants another person that everything they say isn't towards you it's towards the other person. Lets just say a memory that I don't want to happen to Angelus or Willow." She looked up and saw understanding in the blue depths.

"I know." He said bringing her into his arms. "I understand. My ex-girl Drusilla and I were dating for 2 years. We were happy until her ex moved into town last year. She called it off after she found out that he was in town. Then she dropped out of school and moved in with him and he's currently stationed in Virginia."

Faith pulled away just enough to look up at him to say, "I'm sorry."

"It's okay, luv. I was lucky I had friends like Angelus, Willow, Oz and Dawn." He said softly. Not wanting to let go he just held her until she giggled. "What?" He asked pulling away to look at her.

"Nothing, let's head towards my house. You can meet my grandma and if you're lucky my mom." She said moving slightly so that she could still have one of his arms around her.

"If I'm lucky?" He asked glad that she still wanted his arm around her.

"Yep, only on rare occasions do I get to see my mom. I think she's going through denial or something. It never happened until after my dad died." She said looking up at him noticing that he wasn't that much taller than her.

"What does she do to 'get' away from it all?" He asked.

"She berries herself at work. After we moved here, she went out and got two jobs just so that she wouldn't have to be reminded of my dad or me. I think she sees a lot of him in me."

"I know how that goes. I live with my uncle, because my parents weren't married and they didn't want me. They let my uncle adopt me and up until I was ten, my uncle let me believe that I was his son. After a while he just came out and told me, but after he did he never treated me any differently so I knew that he cared about me just like I was his son." He said happy to have his uncle always there for him.

"So how long have you lived here in the States?" She asked not knowing what else to say to that story.

"I've lived here since I was 11. I still miss England, but I'm happy here. I don't have anything there, except for my biological parents." He finished as his cell phone started to ring. "'Ello?" He said into the phone. He paused while the other person was talking and then said, "Sure, I'm heading over to Faith's flat but after that I can." Another pause before he moaned, "Bloody 'ell, uncle." Finally he spoke again, "fine, whatever. I'll do it. Goin' to be another long night huh?" He took the phone away from his ear and Mr. Giles yelled into it. "Calm down uncle, I'll even make dinner for you. Can I go out with the gang?" William looked at Faith and saw amusement in her eyes and stuck his tongue out at her. She started laughing and almost missed his next comment to his uncle. "Thanks, uncle. Yes I'll be 'ome at 11. 'Kay bye, Uncle." With that he hung up the phone and turned his attention back to the beautiful brunette at his side.

Looking up at the man next to her, she saw the mischievous look she had to wonder what he was thinking about when all of a suddenly it hit. He started tickling her, she couldn't contain the laughter. She started tickling him back but was failing because she was laughing so hard.

"Say uncle." William said enjoying her laughter.

"Never!" She said between giggles. After 10 minutes of the tickling her stomach was hurting and she yelled, "Uncle!"

William heard the word spoken and slowly stopped his fingers from tickling her. After he stopped Faith wiped the tears off of her face and asked, "What was that for?"

"Don't know. 'Cause I felt like it." Just then Faith began her assault of tickling. During his assault of tickling they made it down to the grass as to not get hurt, so after he stopped she sat up and then began tickling him.

He couldn't stop laughing, somehow she'd found all of his tickle spots. After a while she stopped and just looked down into his eyes, she slowly drew herself in as if his eyes had a hold of her. She stopped inches above his lips, only hesitating that once she moved the extra inches and met his lips. She almost pulled away, until she had felt one of his hands in her hair and the other on the small of her back.

Just as quickly as it happened it ended. Faith wide eyed and blushing like a fool jumped off of William and reached her backpack just as William stood up and walked up to her. "Pet?" He asked.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me." She said not turning around to face him.

Instead of saying something he reached out not very surprised when she jumped away from him. She turned around and spoke softly, "Thanks for a nice day, but I'd better go home. I'm sorry." She turned around and ran off towards her house.

Stunned by her retreating form, he cursed softly picked up his bag and ran after her.

TBC