Moments
Author: Tracy
Rating: PG
Feedback: My Precious!
Spoilers: Roswell: "Graduation", Buffy "Chosen", vague
Classification: Roswell/Buffy Crossover, Buffy/Max
Disclaimer: I own neither Buffy nor Roswell. They all belong to their official owners, none of which is me. So don't sue.
Summary: Max muses on his wife.
A/N: I blame this fic completely on "The Grudge", and SMG and Jason Behr for being in it together. You expected any less?

She hardly ever slows down enough to sleep. My wife keeps busy, part out of obligation, partly out of habit. A frantic pace is all she's known for so long that slowing down just makes her grouchy and inadequate feeling. So I've learned not to nag her, and just let her go at whatever pace works for her. I take her quiet moments and cherish them. When she is calm, I can be so as well.

She looks like an angel when she sleeps.

Before I found her, I thought I'd never love again.

When Liz died, I died.

We were supposed to get the happy ending. We faced so much, even from the beginning. I broke her heart; she broke mine; we broke each other's. Liz survived a million and one crazy adventures, and just when she seemed invincible, she wasn't.

Buffy understands.

This love is a different kind of love than I had for Liz; or even what I felt for Tess. To Buffy, I'm not just some kind of hero, or idealized figure from the past. She is my equal; my partner. We are both hopelessly flawed, and we know it. We accept it, and celebrate it. It's familiarity, passion, and understanding.

I let her lead, and for once in my life, I'm content just to follow.

My life is different now. I'm done with Antar, for all that I can see. We're finally free from the FBI, with the Watcher's Council taking us under it's wing.

I work aside Buffy finding new slayers and taking them back to Cleveland for training. We travel all over the world. Kyle, who is now my brother in law, having married Buffy's sister Dawn, teases me that I'm just trying to get an extended honeymoon.

He's probably right.

Sometimes I slay, when the battles get bad. Hell, alien powers really kick ass for killing vampires.

I have a friendly wager with Kyle, to see who can zap the most vamps in a month. Buffy calls it a pissing contest. But I'm up by 23 vamps this month.

Buffy says that she fell in love with me when I said "So What?" when she told me she was a slayer. It was our first date, which our collective group of friends "bullied" us into, and she told me her calling over Chicken Cacciatore.

I'm not sure when I started to fall for her. I think it might have been when she killed a group of renegade skins, fresh from Antar, without skipping a beat. Or maybe, when I told her I was an alien, and she asked if I was from Krypton.

We each have a history, we each have our monsters and skeletons hiding in our closets. Buffy and I take each day at a time. We don't dwell on the past, it isn't ours to change. We focus on the future and think of what we're building with each other.

Neither one of us gets much sleep. The thing about this world, it seems, is that it's always threatening to end.

Today is Sunday morning, and I'm letting Buffy sleep.

I will take this moment and treasure it. Keep the good moments to get through the bad ones that may lay ahead.

She stirs, "Max?" Her hair in her face. I brush it away and kiss her lips, and snuggle down beside her.

This is my moment, and I am in love, and I am happy.