"I love you." A surprised Angel looked up at Illyria who was pacing in front of his desk, completely ignoring him. He studied her as she paced some more and then gave up and bent his head back over the paperwork., trying to fill out the forms that Gunn had insisted they incorporate into the system to organize themselves better. It was probably something included in the brain upgrade from the W&H offices.
"I luh-ove you." Illyria said again, as if taking her mouth on a test drive. This time Angel only glanced up at her before back down at his work.
"I love yuh-ou." Illyria said again, trying to put emphasis on another section of the sentence and this time Angel put the pen down and gave his full attention to Illyria who continued to pace and put emphasis on different parts of the sentence. Eventually he got to the maximum of his capacity of hearing 'I love you' a certain amount of times.
"Illyria," Angel said, stopping her in mid pace, "What are you doing?" He asked and she looked at him, frozen, before deciding to answer him.
"I was practicing saying 'I love you'." Illyria said in a self explanatory tone of voice and Angel refrained from rolling his eyes and saying 'duh'.
"I know, but why?" He kept prodding and she started pacing in front of him again, as if searching for an explanation.
"Why is love treated so highly?" She asked and Angel sighed heavily. It was, once again, time to explain to Illyria a concept that wasn't something you couldn't explain.
"Love is everything for some people." He said, knowing what would come next.
"But not for all. Still it is revered as the most important emotion of the human emotions." Illyria pressed him and he sighed heavily again. Having learnt the occasional polite tips here and there from Gunn and Connor (not really the experts on politeness) she decided to specify her topic, "What did love mean to you? Who did you love?" Unknowingly she'd made it worse for Angel but he didn't say anything, just tried to organize his thoughts so that he could present them to the ever curious Illyria.
He leaned back in the cheap factory chair and cracked his knuckles, as if he was getting ready for an up hill battle. Which this was going to be. Big time.
"Love was the thing that brought me out of the gutters, if it wasn't for love I'd still be feeding on rats in New York. Love isn't something that is defined so easily. Love is what can be the only thing that some people hold on for at time, and what can cause them to let go. You're always worried that they're going to be stolen away from you or that you're going to lose them so much that it hurts you beyond words."
"Then why do people just not fall in love if it is so painful?"
"Because, when you meet someone you love you have so many feelings, you soar every time you see them and they look at you. Any time that they say something to you, you feel that your heart is going to burst and your vocal chords are going to seize up because you can't believe that this person is talking to you."
"I still don't see the up side of love." Illyria said stubbornly and Angel was just about to bring out the big guns. Then she continued, "Who did you love?" Then that was it, the big guns were drawn and ready for firing.
"Buffy Summers. The vampire slayer. So unattainable to everyone else except for her closest friends and… me." Angel began and Illyria was about to interrupt when she saw the look on his face. Love. Remembrance. And so he continued, "Everyone from the outside looking in everything was fine. But I knew this girl since her she first found her destiny. And I knew what was hidden behind those eyes."
"What was it?" Illyria asked, completely enraptured by the vampire with a soul.
"Pain. Detachment. The realisation that she was different."