Chapter Three: Sexual Healing

Buffy stared out over the city for a moment, deep in thought, then turned to look at Angel again. "One of the things I regret the most about our relationship is the way my Mom found out. She was so disappointed in me for sleeping with a boyfriend she didn't even know I was dating-- Did I ever thank you for telling her, by the way?" She couldn't help a little sarcasm from creeping into her tone.

Angel winced. "Not one of my prouder moments. There are a lot of things about that time I wish I could relive and do differently. I had plans for the morning after that didn't include going out and feeding for the first time in decades."

Despite the blurriness of the drink, and the depressing subject matter, Buffy was ridiculously pleased to hear that. "You had plans?" she asked.

He looked sheepish. "Well, not very definite ones, but I had thought about what would happen if we made love. I wanted it to be perfect and special for you. That was new for me. Even as Liam, I never really cared about how the woman felt. But you were different. I wish there was a way to rewrite history."

Angel paused, and Buffy walked back across the room, touched at what she was hearing. It had been years since it happened, but some corner of her heart still belonged to the madly-in-love seventeen year old girl she had been.

"Actually, there is..." Angel continued, pacing past her. "It's been done for us before, but I couldn't go back that far. I wish we could have reexperienced that night with a different outcome."

The misty mood lifted a little, and Buffy frowned at him. "What history got rewritten?" she demanded. What else had he been hiding from her?

He didn't look up as he explained. "You remember when you visited me after that first Thanksgiving you cooked, three years ago?"

"Yeah..." she said, slowly, thinking back. "I was in your office for all of five minutes. You killed some demon, and I left."

"That was the second run-through," Angel said, sighing. "The first time, it got away from us, and we chased it through the sewers. By the time I thought I'd killed it, some of its blood had mixed with mine."

Buffy raised her eyebrows. What did that have to do with anything? Some aspect of the demon thingy, like what had happened to her?

He continued before she found the words to ask. "It turned out to be a regenerating demon. A self-healer. The blood turned me human. Heart-beat and everything. I got to walk out in the sunlight with you for the first time, and then we went back to my apartment and spent the rest of the day talking or in bed." He smiled a little, to himself, and Buffy had a sudden surge of angry jealousy that he had those memories and she didn't.

"So what went wrong?" she asked, sharply. "Why'd it get rewritten?"

He finally looked back at her, pain in his eyes. "The demon wasn't dead. When it came back and we had to fight it again, I was more of a hindrance than a help. And I knew it would always be that way if I didn't do something. I couldn't keep putting you in that kind of danger, and besides, I came back from Hell for a reason. It wasn't to hinder the Slayer-- I have a role to play in averting an apocalypse someday, and how could I do that as a mere mortal? So I went to the Powers-That-Be, and they rewound time 24 hours. I prevented the blood from mingling, and that was that."

There were tears shimmering in the corners of his dark eyes, but Buffy refused to let that move her from her anger. "So let me get this straight. We had a night together when you were human-- probably one of the happiest things that ever happened to me-- and you erased it? When were you going to tell me?"

"I wasn't," he said, softly. "Part of the price was that I alone would remember."

The anguish in his voice finally got to her, and she stepped close, letting him put his arms around her. She pressed her ear against his still chest, and wondered what it must have been like. "I wish I could remember it," she said wistfully. "You with a heartbeat. Out in the sunlight. Happy without losing your soul." She sighed. "But I can't."

Maybe it was the drink talking, maybe it was the subject matter, but she couldn't stop what came out of her mouth next. "Maybe we could make new memories?"

He pulled back, looking into her eyes as though to make sure she really meant it. "I do still love you," he said, his voice thick with emotion.

"And I still love you," she whispered back.

Their lips met in a kiss, first light and testing, then deep and searching. The glasses dropped to the floor, soon followed by several items of clothing as they staggered back toward the bed. Soon, all thought was lost as they made up for lost time.

Some hours later, Buffy woke again, head slightly aching from the aftermath of drink but pillowed on a very attractive, naked chest. Other things were aching, too. She lay there for a minute as memories of her "conversation" with Angel filtered back into her conscious mind, then rolled away from him instinctively and began feeling around on the floor. Somewhere down there was the Scythe-- she'd dropped it on the floor by the bed when she first came into the room.

Angel woke a few minutes later, freezing instinctively as she lightly pressed the blade end of the Scythe against his neck.

"Angel?" she asked, cautiously.

"Buffy," he said warmly, gazing up into her eyes.

That was enough for her. She dropped the Scythe on the floor again and crawled back off the bed, searching for the nearest item of clothing. "What was that?" she asked, wondering what the Hell she'd been thinking.

"Our unresolved issues airing themselves out?" he replied, tentatively.

"I'll say." Buffy snorted. She pulled Angel's shirt on over her head, as it was the first thing to hand. It covered her down to her knees.

A glance at the clock confirmed that it was only 3:30 AM, not too late for a Slayer to be up, but definitely too early to be crawling out of bed. Angel followed her gaze, then sighed and began gathering the sheet around his waist. "So what do you want to do with the rest of the night?" he asked.

"Not a repeat of what we just did," she retorted. Not that it hadn't been... her thoughts skittered away from that... but she knew it wasn't exactly healthy for either of them to keep indulging. Nor was it fair to the memory of Spike.

"No, of course not," Angel said. He climbed out of bed, dragging the sheet strategically with him until he reached his pants, which had somehow flung themselves halfway across the room. After he tugged them on, he sat down in the room's one chair and dropped the sheet.

Buffy carefully sat down on the bed again, curling her feet up her. "So," she said, trying to find something to talk about. It occurred to her belatedly that they'd never quite finished talking about the Connor question, or even the Cordy issue. Hadn't he said something about her coming back evil?

"Tell me," she asked. "Why aren't Connor and Cordy here?" She hadn't seen the ex-cheerleader in the group that greeted them when they arrived at the hotel, and there hadn't been any babies in evidence, either.

Angel frowned. "Cordelia's in a coma. I had her moved to Wolfram and Hart's medical facilities-- if anyone can figure out how to cure her, they can. After she gave birth--"

"What?" Buffy blurted, shocked. "I thought you only kissed?"

He grimaced. "It was Connor's, actually. There was this Power-That-Was--"

"Connor's?" That was even more unbelievable. "I thought he was just a baby?"

"It's a long story," he said, looking away. "Short version-- he got kidnapped into a Hell dimension where time moves differently, and came back three weeks and seventeen years later. When Cordy returned without her memory, they got... close."

Despite her confusion and irritation, Buffy's heart went out to him. "That must have hurt," she said.

He sighed. "You have no idea. A little while later, Cordy turned up pregnant. Jasmine was born full grown-- I don't know if you remember seeing her on any of the talk shows a couple of weeks ago-- and everyone that saw her or heard her voice fell in love with her. It was this whole World Peace thing, except that she ate half a dozen people every day."

"I'm guessing you killed her, since we're not living in a Utopia now." She shook her head, wondering if this Power-That-Was had had any relationship to the First. Those could have been some scary turf wars to get caught in the middle of; they'd had things bad enough as it was.

"Connor did." He sighed. "The whole thing-- he wasn't quite sane by the end of it. I had to--" He shook his head. "Part of the deal with Wolfram and Hart is that he's with a happy family now. He doesn't remember me, and nobody but me remembers him. He'll be a college student in the fall."

"Like Dawn in reverse," Buffy said, sympathizing.

Angel nodded. "That's what gave me the idea," he said. "Willow filled me in on the whole key thing when she visited and told me about your death. So when I had the chance to do something-- Connor's whole life might be fake, but it's a good life, and he's happy, and he's theirs now. I'm not cut out to be a parent-- I don't regret doing what I did." He winced. "At least, as far as Connor goes."

"What do you regret?" she asked, aware that she was opening up a can of worms with that question. But they'd got so much else out in the open already, they might as well clear the air completely. What ever else they might be to each other after this, at least it would be built on a foundation of complete honesty and understanding.

"Angelus," he said, spitting the word out as though dropping a bomb. "He had a little... reappearance. Magic-induced this time, and kind of on purpose, and he did kind of save the world, but..." He shuddered.

Buffy's jaw dropped. "That's why you need Willow, wasn't it?" She'd wondered vaguely about that at the time, but she'd been caught up by more pressing issues. "But I thought Angelus didn't care if the world ended?"

"It was sort-of, well," He wrinkled his face up. "He doesn't care if he ends the world, but when the Beast blocked out the sun... well, he was sort of an old rival of Angelus'..."

"A pissing contest?" Buffy blurted. "Angelus saved the world so he could prove he was the Bigger Bad?"

"Yeah." Angel sighed. "He killed the Beast, which brought back the sun--"

"Kind of stupid of him," Buffy smiled ruefully.

"I think 'Ah, crap,' were his exact words," Angel smiled back. "Then Faith and Willow saved me."

"Not much has changed then," she teased.

"What do you mean?" he asked, caught off guard.

"You still need the Slayer and Willow to save you," she said.

Angel shook his head. "Not necessarily, unless the Slayer is you," he said gallantly.

(end chapter three)