A/N: Penultimate Chapter! -

Willow and Jack were on their way out and Buffy stood at a distance away from the group as Kennedy kissed and hugged Willow and told her she had better come back safe. Buffy had listened to Willow's brief explanation of why the two witches's had to go away on some kind of trip. It had been something to do with finding a mystical artifact that could at some time prove useful to them. Through it all Buffy nodded along, detached to what the actual Wicca was saying but still managing to hear the gist of it.

The Slayer watched, intrigued as Angel came up to Willow and whispered in her ear, the redhead nodded and then turned to Buffy. She saw the Slayer looking and gave her a cheery smile and a wave which Buffy felt compelled to return but didn't. Willow's smile slipped from her face and she saluted Giles before walking out of the door closely followed by Jack who shook hands with Robin before leaving. The former principal shut the door after them and then Faith grabbed him by the front of his T-shirt and pulled him up the stairs, way obvious. Buffy had noticed over the past two days that Jack and Robin had become quiet good friends; in fact everyone seemed to get along with the new sorcerer including Andrew. Jack had attempted to start conversation with her several times over the past days but Buffy excused herself as quickly as possible. She was sure he was a nice enough guy but she couldn't let anyone new in and couldn't muster up enough energy to act polite.

Angel made a move to come walk over and talk to her but the Slayer turned and walked away from him and up the stairs to her room. She sighed and shut the door behind her then turned around and nearly jumped out of her skin when she saw Dawn sitting on the bed. Her sister had Spike's coat draped over her lap and was looking up at her sister with sad eyes. Since Spike had gone again Buffy had distanced herself from the entire group and in doing so had alienated Dawn. Dawn had loved Spike like a brother or an extremely good looking and cool friend, as she once put it. Buffy walked over and sat down next to her and slipped an arm around her shoulders.

"It felt so good, to see him again...you know?" Dawn looked at her, eyes watery.

"I know" Buffy nodded "I was freaked out at first but...I know"

Dawn sighed "When he came back, saw I was older he just started treating me like an adult. Like he always had. He didn't still think of me as sixteen and a kid, he got that I was a different person in some ways. I asked him about when he had gone, I asked if he went to heaven like you but he said it was different for vampires, even ones with souls. He didn't go to hell, he didn't go to heaven all he remembered was darkness but he wasn't sure if that meant anything. Just darkness, Buffy. Do you think that's where he is now?"

The Slayer took a shaky breath "Dawn, I don't know. I don't know dimensions or...other realities; I don't know what happens to vampires. Angel, when I...killed him, he went to hell and maybe the darkness...maybe that is hell. I don't have any answers to comfort you or myself, you would be better off talking to Giles or Willow when she gets back"

"Buffy," Dawn looked down at the floor "Do you remember when you came into my room and saw Spike and I talking and you got all protective and stuff?" She smiled a little.

Buffy looked at her "Yeah, well –"

"You had no reason to be jealous Buffy, or worry that Spike was gonna suddenly find me so stunningly attractive that he was gonna pounce on me. The first question he asked me when we were alone was, and I quote 'Is Buffy happy?' and I didn't know what to say. I didn't know the answer. Are you happy, Buffy?"

"No"

Dawn looked at her again "Is it because of Spike?"

"It's because of everything...Spike, Angel, demons, everything. I thought after we destroyed Sunnydale, I thought, that I would be free. I thought that I could take some time off, have a vacation and actually experience life...and to a certain degree I did that. I had a couple of weeks off, I left patrolling to the others but then we came to Cleveland and I felt like I had to carry on, I had to guide new girls" She placed her hands in her face.

"You felt like you had to look after us all. You always did" Dawn whispered.

"Kind of hard to kick an old habit," Buffy looked into the eyes of her sister "I want you to move on with your life. I do not want you to forever be the 'Slayer's sister' and neither do you. You're in college, that's a good start"

Dawn smiled "Yeah, all I need now is a husband and two kids"

The Slayer smiled a little too "Well, I don't know about the husband part but I know there's someone around here that's pretty sweet on you"

"Really? Please say that it is that Jack guy, he is hot!"

Buffy smiled "You really don't know?"

Dawn's brow furrowed "Who?"

"Never mind. You'll get it" The Slayer stood and walked over and opened the window because her room was getting stuffy "It was you who first told me about the way Spike felt about me and it freaked me out so badly. I figure this guy will get around to telling you one day"

The brunette stood "That is way unfair"

"That's life, Dawnie," Buffy turned back to her "Oh, hey, Clem's in town. He said he'd stop by tonight to see you"

Dawn smiled then it dropped "It's not Clem is it?" She looked horrified.

The Slayer laughed for the first time in a long time.

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As Buffy lay in bed the next night trying to sleep but knowing she would not be able to for a few hours yet she wondered how Willow was doing finding the artifact. The two magick practitioners had been gone almost two full days soon and the Sanctuary were expecting them back tomorrow sometime. The Slayer really wished she had listened to Willow about why this artifact was so important and she felt bad for not paying more attention. What if Willow got in trouble? Buffy should have offered to go with them for safety.

Even as she thought that Buffy rolled her eyes, Willow could most definitely take care of herself. She was the most powerful person Buffy knew or had ever known. Way more likely to stay alive in a fight then even Buffy. The witch could zap a demon at twenty paces. If Buffy could have had one person at her side in a fight it would be Willow.

There was a light rapping at her door and Buffy sat up quickly, throwing the covers off of herself and asking who it was.

"It's Angel" Came the raspy reply.

The second person Buffy would have at her side in a fight. She looked at the clock and saw it was around two in the morning and she had a feeling it was time to face Angel and have the talk that they both knew was inevitable. She told him to come in and after a seconds hesitation he did, the dark clothes he wore blended into the shadows as he closed the door behind himself and leaned against it not moving as if suddenly not wanting her to see him.

Buffy shifted on the edge of her bed and beckoned him closer, she saw his eyes flicker down to the bed and then her and the Slayer shifted again, uncomfortable. The vampire walked a couple of steps closer so that Buffy could see the pale moonlight reflected on his face and his expression was unreadable, as usual.

"Kind of a late visit" She remarked.

"Yeah, well," Angel rubbed the back of his neck "It isn't really a spare of the moment thing. I've been wanting to talk to you ever since...but you always seem to be in such a hurry"

Buffy nodded "Yeah. A hurry to avoid you"

"Figured" He stepped closer again and then after a moment sat down next to her on the bed but not too close "Tell me, Buffy"

She took a deep breath and nodded once "Okay, I can tell this is gonna be another one of our heart-wrenching moments. I don't know about you anymore Angel...I don't know what I feel. I was in love with you and, I still am, in a way but it's not...the same as it used to be. When I love you it's with my old self, it's the 'Buffy' part of me, the part in me that remembers what it's like to be a normal teenage girl, the part that remembers you as the first guy I ever fell for, ever slept with. I've always carried that part of me inside and in doing that I've always loved you. Now...now, I've changed irreparably and though I'd like to think of myself as more Buffy than Slayer I've come to realize it's the other way around. I've changed and I'll keep changing but you'll always stay the same – in appearance and in my heart. Remember back when I used the cookie dough analogy? Back when we defeated the First I figured I was cooked but I wasn't, only half-baked. So, our love is always gonna be in the past – you fell in love with someone who I am not anymore"

Angel let out a long sigh and rubbed his brow "Buffy...I'm not even gonna be able to argue with you about this am I?"

"Well, you know me. Once I've made my mind up..." Buffy smiled sadly.

His eyes shone with sadness "And Spike? He's the guy?"

"He's dead" Buffy looked down at the floor "So, it doesn't matter"

Angel clenched his fists "I think I have a right to know. If I've lost you to Spike I want to know why, I want to know what it is about him that makes you think he loves the real you when you think I don't"

Buffy closed her eyes "Angel, please –"

"You owe me that, Buffy"

She nodded "I do. There isn't an easy way to explain this, Angel, it's a long, drawn out and complicated story. What I can say for sure is that Spike knows the real me, the Buffy that I am now and he knew the Buffy that I was a few years ago when we first met and I know that if he was still here that if I changed again he would adapt and still get me. Let's be honest, Angel, Spike was always the best judge of character either of us ever knew. He understood people's motives and their desires, the reasons that they carried on living better than any of us"

"I agree, Buffy, but Spike was only good at knowing people because he liked to get inside their heads, liked to see what buttons to push" The vampire's eyes were darker then usual.

"He wasn't the only one" She looked at him pointedly.

Angel grunted "I can't believe that you think I don't know the real you. I understand you Buffy, I always have"

"You may understand me but, if we could ever be truly together could you accept the real me? Would you know what buttons to push?"

"I know everything about you"

"Favorite song? Favorite movie?" Buffy raised her eyebrows.

Angel shook his head "You can't tell me Spike knew those things"

"No," She agreed "But he knew the important stuff"

"So do I. I know you, Buffy"

Buffy cocked her head "So, tell me then. Tell me who I am, 'cos I'd like to know"

"You're Buffy and you're the Slayer"

"And what does that mean?"

"It means that a part of you wants gentle, tender love and the other part of you wants pain and violence, a kind of love that with burn you. That kind of love is why you want Spike" Angel said, glowering.

"So, does that mean that the gentle, tender side of me is why I want you?" She arched a honey blond eyebrow "Because, to me, that seems to signify that I only love you with half of myself. It's like I said, Angel, the 'Buffy' part of me loves you and that part is innocent, which, frankly I'm not in grand supply of anymore. The Slayer part of me wanted Spike, you're right, because he...did things that you or any other guy I knew wouldn't do"

"He hurt you," Angel practically growled.

"I wanted him to" Buffy said quietly "And part of me still wants that. You would never do that"

His anger was evident on his face "So you're saying that you're dumping me because I wouldn't shove you up against a wall and hurt you?"

She let out a long breath and stood turned her back on him "You don't understand, Angel. We both know there are two parts to me and you only fulfill one part of me. I love you but I can't love you, the curse changes things for us Angel. Maybe if it wasn't there then everything would be fine but because you are still cursed I had time to take a step back and look at the thing between us. Back when we first met I was ninety five percent Buffy, five percent Slayer and now it is fifty-fifty. So, I cannot settle with someone that only loves half of the person I am. You understand that I'm the Slayer because you're a vampire but you don't understand what that part of me needs and I don't just mean in terms of sex. That part of me means that one day I might walk out of you life and not come back because some demon has killed me. That part of me means that sometimes I am gonna have to put my work above everything else. And that part of me also means that I will be cold and hard and brutal to you sometimes. You understand the idea of a Slayer but you can never understand the mind of a Slayer"

"And Spike does" Angel said quietly "He's always had a thing for Slayers"

Buffy turned back to him "And that meant he fulfilled the other half of me. I sometimes thought if only I could take the two aspects from both of you and make them into one guy. Either that or date both of you...but I don't think either one of you would have gone for that"

"Damn right" He muttered.

"So, basically I was screwed. I had these two guys that both fulfilled a part of me but without the other would not. And then..." She trailed off, looked into his eyes.

Angel looked back "And then Spike got a soul"

Buffy looked at him a few moments longer and then walked around the bed to her window closed it because she suddenly felt cold. She pulled the curtains aside and looked out at the grounds of the Sanctuary.

"If only he had been human," Angel stood too "Then he would have been perfect"

Buffy felt her shoulders sag "Angel, you think this is easy for me? For the past decade of my life you have been the one person who I could always count on to be there for me, whenever I see your face it makes me instantly feel better"

"But not good enough. I've lived a long time, Buffy you know that. I may have been your one person for the past decade but you are the only girl I've ever loved in my whole two hundred and fifty two years!" Angel opened the door to her room "I'm leaving now, for L.A and...just remember something for me, Buffy. Remember that when the opportunity arises to grab with both hands. Don't hold back, don't hold anything back"

She turned back to him, silhouetted by the moonlight "What are you talking about?"

"You'll find out soon enough" His brown eyes looked into her "Goodbye, Buffy"

Angel turned and walked out of the open doorway and left it open. She heard the sounds of his footsteps recede down the hall and then there was no sound or trace of him left.

Buffy turned back around to look out of the window and hoped to see him walk down the path, one last glance of him but he never came because he was already gone.

The Slayer rested her forehead against the window and looked at the moon "Vampires, they're just so damned ambiguous"

A/N: insert plea for reviews here