AN: Thank you once again to everyone leaving reviews! You're comments are greatly appreciated!


Part 6
Yawning, Buffy stumbled down the hallway and towards the kitchen. Coffee. All she wanted was some coffee. Or a soda. Or chocolate. Anything with caffeine in it. She definitely needed some kind of jump-start this morning. With Angel just a room away, she hadn't been able to sleep a wink the whole night. Well, she'd dozed now and then, but actual sleep had been impossible.

How in the world had she ended up in this mess? Oh right, she was being stalked by some psycho who apparently wanted her dead. And because of that, she was now tangled up with Angel again. Not that that was entirely a bad thing, she mused. It was just unexpected. Maybe if one good thing could come out of all this, she and Angel could put the past behind them and get some closure to the relationship they'd had four years earlier.

The thought of getting closure with Angel didn't bring the relief Buffy would have thought. She'd never forgotten Angel, not even after he'd moved away from Sunnydale without a word to her. He'd been one of the few good things in her life, and she'd chased him away by being a total and complete idiot. She'd messed things up royally. He'd had every reason to leave her and to hate her.

Ever since she'd managed to get her life on the right track, Buffy had wanted to talk to Angel. She wanted to explain to him why she'd been such a jerk. But mostly, she just wanted to apologize. He deserved that much. Even though she'd wanted a chance to make things right with him, she'd never thought she would have the opportunity. After all, she'd had no idea where Angel was.

Then, wham, there he was at her doorstep. Buffy wasn't sure she'd yet recovered from that shock. And now he was staying in her apartment, or at least he had spent the previous night in Dawn's room. It was no wonder she hadn't been able to sleep. Aside from the anxiety over what was going on with the stalker - and that was enough to keep anyone awake - her mind kept focusing on the fact that Angel was so close by. She hadn't been able to stop all the memories that had assailed her from their time together in Sunnydale. As nice as it was to be around Angel again, when his eyes weren't pinning her to the wall for her past transgressions, Buffy knew she'd sleep much better with him elsewhere.

Just before reaching the kitchen, Buffy heard Angel's voice. She grimaced. She'd been hoping he was still asleep or that he'd left for work already. No such luck. If she didn't need coffee so desperately, she'd be tempted to go back to her room and hideout until he was gone. But she needed caffeine. Now.

Angel was shutting off his cell phone as Buffy entered. She gave him a small smile and made a bee-line for the coffee that Angel had already apparently brewed. When she was more awake, she'd have to remember to say thank you.

Pouring herself a cup, she took a huge gulp, swallowed, then mumbled, "I thought you'd be at work already."

The temptation to smile hit Angel hard. Buffy was not a morning person. She hadn't stayed through the night many times back in Sunnydale, but when she had, she'd always needed to ply herself with coffee in the morning. It looked like that hadn't changed a bit if the way she was sucking down her first cup was any indication. He pushed away the urge to smile, though. This wasn't Sunnydale, and they weren't together anymore.

"Looks like I'm going to be sticking around for a while," he told her, still trying to decide for himself if the phone call he'd just gotten was good or bad.

The mug stilled halfway to Buffy's mouth as she stared at Angel. Sticking around? Huh? "What do you mean?"

"That was my boss on the phone," he nodded to the cell phone he'd set on the counter. "With this latest attack, he's agreed that you need twenty-four hour protection until this guy is caught. So I'm going to be hanging around."

"What?" Buffy squeaked. He couldn't possibly mean...

"I'm your bodyguard," he clarified simply. And wasn't that a kicker, Angel thought. Ironic, really, that he'd end up in this position given their past. It was the last thing he needed. But Buffy's safety was priority. And if he was honest with himself, the prospect of being around her twenty-four hours a day didn't seem as awful as it might have a few days earlier. He just didn't want to think about why that was.

"But...I mean...this isn't...," she sputtered incomprehensibly. This was awful. Just awful. Angel was going to be here. All the time. There was no way she'd ever sleep again. "UGH!"

"Yeah," Angel agreed with a shrug. This definitely wasn't the best of situations. He set down his own mug of coffee and stepped closer. "It's necessary, Buffy. This freak isn't playing around."

"I know," she said, her shoulders slumping. "This is just..."

"Awkward," he finished for her.

"Yeah."

"We'll-" Angel started to say, but a knock at the door interrupted. He looked quickly at Buffy before pulling his gun out from the back of his jeans where he'd stuck it this morning instead of putting on his shoulder holster. "Wait here."

The sight of the gun stunned Buffy for a moment. She knew that her stalker wanted to hurt her, but seeing the gun in Angel's hand made the situation seem all the more serious. A shudder worked down her spine, but she recovered enough to nod to Angel. He tried to give her a reassuring smile before slipping out of the kitchen toward the door. Only a moment later, she heard him call out to her.

"It's okay, Buffy. It's just Faith." Not the psycho, was all Buffy could think for a moment. By the time she made it to the living room, Faith had already entered and was talking with Angel.

"G'morning, Faith," she greeted her friend, her voice distorted by a yawn that slipped out.

"Yeah, yeah. I don't see what's so great about it," Faith grumbled.

Angel laughed at the two of them. "I can see why you two get along. Neither of you are morning people."

"Laugh it up, jerk face. I've had two hours of sleep and I've got a gun. You don't want to piss me off," she warned. Tossing a bag to Angel, she started stalking to the kitchen. "There are your clothes. I'm goin' to get some coffee."

Angel accepted the bag chucked at his head with an oomph. He glared at Faith's retreating back for a few seconds before setting the bag down next to the couch. Turning to Buffy, he said, "While Faith is here, we should sit down and try to brainstorm some more about who might be after you. I'm positive that it's got to be someone you're acquainted with somehow."

"I'm with Angel," Faith agreed as she reentered the living room. "Everything about this is personal. Whoever it is has something against you."

"I have no idea who, though!" Buffy replied, exasperated. She couldn't think of a single person who would do this to her. Well, after what she'd done to Angel, she couldn't blame him if he had it in for her. But she knew it wasn't him. He hadn't even known she was in LA until after her apartment had been trashed. Besides, he wouldn't do something like this in the first place. He just wasn't like that.

Angel glanced at Faith. "I still think-"

"Don't even say it!" Faith ordered. "Spike didn't do this. And I was with him last night anyway."

"Spike?" Angel asked.

"That's his nickname," Faith answered with a growl. She was sick of Angel trying to pin this on Spike. Just because he'd made some mistakes in the past he was automatically a suspect. Whatever happened to second chances?

"I just think-"

"No, Faith's right," Buffy cut in. This was going to get ugly soon if she didn't put a stop to it. She knew herself that Spike wouldn't be out to hurt her, even if Faith hadn't been with him last night. But Angel was intent on putting the spotlight on Spike. Well, she was pretty sure she could end that line of thinking. "I think it was a female."

"Huh?" Faith grunted over a mouthful of coffee.

"A female? You didn't say anything about that before," Angel accused suspiciously. Or wait...had she started to say something like that after the previous night's fiasco? He wasn't sure.

"I didn't know until last night!" Buffy snapped at him, annoyed at his attitude. "That was the first time I'd heard their voice, and I'm positive it was a female. I meant to say something, but after what happened, I wasn't thinking clearly."

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have been so harsh," Angel apologized, feeling guilty. He really shouldn't have been so rude, but this whole situation was playing havoc with his head. Not only did he have to worry about Buffy's life being in danger, but he had to deal with being around her after what had happened between them. It definitely wasn't his idea of fun.

"Okay, so we now know this person is a chick," Faith jumped back into the conversation. They really needed to deal with what was important and try to ignore the ridiculously obvious tension that existed between her partner and her best friend. "Can you think of any females who would have it in for you?"

"No!" Buffy practically shouted. "I don't know anyone who would do this to me!"


An hour and a half later, after having spent some more time talking with Faith and Buffy, then having showered and changed into clean clothes, Angel wandered around Buffy's apartment, taking in details he hadn't noticed before. Not that there was much to see. Most of her possessions had been destroyed during the break-in. Buffy had managed to replace quite a bit of the necessary stuff, but the more personal items were still missing. He wondered what it had looked like before all the trouble had started.

The new furniture she'd bought for the living room was a muted blue-green color with white threading running intermittently through it. The style and color were very understated. He wouldn't have pictured the Lizzie he knew with furniture like this. His guess would have been red leather. The walls would have likely been painted black or some other freaky color. But everything about this apartment and about the woman he knew as Buffy was completely different from the Lizzie he'd known in Sunnydale. Buffy was...softer.

Angel winced at that thought. He was letting her get to him. He couldn't let himself forget that she was a habitual liar who had nearly destroyed his life. But she'd apologized for that, an inner voice in his head reminded him. Of course, she could just be playing him again, trying to reel him in just as she had last time. Because the truth of the matter was that he didn't know Buffy.

At the window, Angel stopped and stared out onto the mildly busy street. No, he didn't know Buffy. And in all honestly, he hadn't known a damn thing about Lizzie, either. A large part of that had been her fault. She'd done a hell of a lot of lying to him. At the same time, they'd never really just gotten to know each other.

That night when he'd met her at that club, they'd leaped right into a physical relationship and gone from there. Everything about them had been about the heat and passion that flared whenever they were within sight of each other. He hadn't spent much time learning about what was below the surface. Sure, they'd gotten along great, spent time together that didn't involve sex, but everything had been superficial. He hadn't asked her about her personal life, and he hadn't offered anything about his. The first he'd ever learned anything about her childhood had been when she'd barged into his apartment yesterday – had it been just yesterday? - and told him about her parents divorce.

So who was Buffy? And who had Lizzie been? Angel found himself suddenly wanting to know what lay behind the facade she always seemed to put up. He wanted to know who the real Elizabeth Summers was. And he needed to hear the rest of whatever she'd been about to explain to him before they'd been interrupted yesterday. Maybe if he knew, he could put all this behind him.

With nothing else to do, Angel set out to find Buffy. It was time they talked. Really talked. He hadn't exactly been open before, for good reason. His anger over the past had clouded him, made him reluctant to hear what she had to say. But now he wanted to know.

After checking for her in the kitchen, her bedroom, and the bathroom, Angel grew worried. She wasn't anywhere that he could see. It wasn't like the apartment was that big. What if she had left without telling him? What if something had happened?

Dammit, Angel cursed aloud. He was supposed to be watching her, keeping her safe. And what happens? His first morning on the job, and he'd already lost her. Well, he'd just have to find her. He'd call Faith to see if she knew of any places Buffy was likely to go.

As Angel reached for his cell phone, he thought he heard a noise. Turning his head, he saw the stairs leading up to the medium sized loft. Of course! he exclaimed in his head. That area was her studio. Why hadn't he thought to look up there before? Probably, he told himself, because he was still having a little trouble acclimating to the fact that Buffy was an artist. Supposedly a good one.

Ascending the stairs quietly, he saw that Buffy was indeed in her studio. She was seated on a stool in front of a set of shelves, and looked to be arranging tubes of paint, brushes, knives, and other artist's tools. From the small pile of plastic wrap on the floor, he gathered that she was unpacking new supplies. Thinking back on the night of the break-in, Angel remembered that everything in this room appeared to have been destroyed.

For a moment, he contemplated going back downstairs and leaving her to her work, but before he could, Buffy swiveled on her stool and looked at him. They stared at each other as Angel climbed the last two stairs and came further into the room. He had no idea what to say. He was suddenly feeling ridiculously uncomfortable around her.

"Hey," Buffy said when Angel remained silent.

"I'm not bothering you, am I?" he questioned, feeling completely out of place in a part of Buffy's world that he knew absolutely nothing about.

"No," she answered, shrugging. "The new stuff I ordered came in yesterday so I'm just getting it set up."

"Was everything you had destroyed?"

"Pretty much." Buffy looked over the room that seemed empty compared to what it had been. She'd had to throw away all her blank canvases, paints, and well, everything. In essence, she was starting from scratch. "At least almost all of my paintings were over at the gallery."

"Gallery?" he repeated.

"I've got a show coming up in a few days, so all of my current work is over there. And most of my other stuff is down in Sunnydale since I don't have a lot of storage room here," she explained while arranging the tubes of oil paints.

"In Sunnydale?" Angel wondered aloud. This was a good opening to all the things they needed to talk about. "So you still go back there?"

"Yeah, every couple months or so," she said, almost evasively.

Angel walked across the room and sat down on the floor near the stool Buffy was seated on. He leaned back against the wall and looked up at her, trying to put as friendly an expression on his face as he could. He wanted Buffy to know that he was open to listening to her. "You never got a chance to finish telling me about your life. What happened after your Mom died?"

The question left Buffy temporarily speechless. Angel was asking about her life? She was shocked that he seemed genuinely interested. All of the anger that had been there before was gone, or almost so. Did he really want to listen? Even if he did, she found she couldn't get her mouth to work to answer.

Sensing her surprise, Angel gave Buffy a sympathetic smile. "I know I didn't want to listen before, but I'm ready now. I think we need to talk about everything. Maybe it'll help us put the past behind us so we can move on with our lives."

Buffy turned back to her shelves of supplies and tried to process what was going on. Angel was giving her a chance to explain everything. She felt tears prickle the backs of her eyes. Ever since she'd managed to get her life on track, she'd wanted a chance to talk to him, though she knew she never would. And now she really was. She would finally be able to try to set something right that she'd messed up years ago. Well, maybe not make it right, but make it better.

She tried to think of what to say to him, where to start. What had she told him about yesterday? She thought back on the conversation. Before they'd been interrupted, she'd told him about her parents' sudden divorce, and her ensuing problems, along with being kicked out of school and the move to Sunnydale. The phone call had come just after she'd mentioned her mother's death. Buffy was pretty sure that was where she'd left off.

"Dawn and I went into foster care after Mom died."

"Foster care?" The very idea that Buffy and her sister had had to live with strangers was baffling to Angel.

"Yeah," Buffy laughed, but it was a humorless sound. "When someone finally managed to track down our Dad, he signed off on responsibility for us and we went into the system."

"He just...abandoned you?" How could a father do that, Angel wondered? Didn't the man have any sense of family and love? "What about other family members?"

"The only other person that we knew of was my Mom's sister. She lived out in Illinois. She didn't want to take in two half grown kids, and there was no one else," she explained, attempting to ignore the pain she still felt over her father's heartless actions.

"That must have been horrible for you and your sister. I'm sorry you had to go through that," he said sincerely.

Buffy ignored the sentiment and focused on her paints as she told him more. "We went through seven foster homes in, I guess, three and a half years. Some of them were temporary to begin with, and some just couldn't put up with me. I wasn't exactly the model kid. I found trouble wherever I could. And once I got booted out of a home, Dawn would start acting up until she was moved to the family I'd been placed with."

Standing, Buffy walked over to the large bank of windows on the opposite side of the room. She crossed her arms over her chest, warding off the chill that came from thinking about her past. "I was a mess, Angel. I'd had problems in LA, and right after we moved to Sunnydale, but when Mom died, I just got worse. Drinking, partying, drugs, hanging out with the wrong people. You name it, I probably did it."

She turned to face Angel, who was silently listening to her whole wretched life story, and sat on the window sill. "That was when I started calling myself Lizzie. I don't really know why. I guess I just didn't want to be Buffy. Lizzie was someone else entirely, someone I created and made myself be. It was a street name, if you want to call it that. Not gangs or anything, but what I went by with the crowd I'd become part of. At school and with the foster families I was still Buffy, but when I was out on my own, I was Lizzie, the total badass."

"Looking back," she went on, "Lizzie was my escape. She wasn't an orphan, she wasn't unwanted. Lizzie was in control and could do whatever she wanted, when she wanted. She had friends, even if they weren't good ones, and she went out and had fun. She was just whoever I wanted her to be."

"And that's who I meant that night," Angel chipped in.

Buffy instantly felt guilty at the reminder of everything she'd put Angel through. "It was never my intention to trick you, Angel. Lizzie was just part of who I was at the time. I never expected what happened between us. And even if I did, I don't know that I would have told the truth. My head just wasn't screwed on right then."

"So you were just expecting a one-night stand?" Angel asked, not sure if he should be offended or not.

"No. Yes." She shook her head. This was so hard to explain. Buffy wasn't sure if even she understood everything that had been in her head back then. "I know you probably think I was some big slut, but I wasn't. I won't lie and say I was an innocent virgin. I'd had sex before, but I didn't jump from guy to guy. That was probably the one thing I never got involved in. But I watched you come into The Bronze that night, and I just...wanted you. I figured we'd have a night of fun and that would be it. I never thought I'd end up liking you, and that you'd be interested as well in something other than sex."

"You could have told me at any time," he pointed out. It was the only logical thing Angel could think to say as he tried to process all of the information. Buffy's life had been absolute hell. Everything she'd told him made her actions make sense for the first time since he'd known her. For so long he'd thought she was just playing some big game with all her lies. But now he realized that she'd just been coping with a horrendous situation. But what did all that mean? To him.

"I know I could have. And should have. It just wasn't that simple, Angel. With the way things were in my life, part of me just didn't care," she said, being completely honest. "When I was with you, I was part of a different world. I wasn't Buffy with the dead mother, the father who didn't care, and I didn't live in foster homes with my sister. I was Lizzie with the really great boyfriend. I didn't want to lose that. When I was with you, I was almost happy."

Buffy turned her head away so that Angel wouldn't see the tears that were threatening to fall. "And then I lost it all. You had every right to hate me and to leave."

"I won't lie and say I wasn't angry as hell," Angel admitted. "I was pissed off and hurt. And I could have gotten into a lot of trouble because I was a cop."

"I know. I don't think I really understood all of that until a while after you left and I got myself away from all the bad influences," she pressed her lips together hard, desperately trying to hold back her tears. "I really am sorry, Angel, for everything I put you through."

"I think I'm beginning to understand that," Angel said, truly accepting her apology for the first time. "I just wish you had told me all of this before. Maybe I would have been able to help in some way."

"I was too selfish back then, and I didn't want to deal with my life. All I wanted was to forget about all the bad stuff," she told him. "But in the process I lost one of the only good things I ever had."

Angel could think of nothing to say in response to that. He could hear the regret and sincerity in Buffy's voice. She'd really cared about him. She hadn't just used him and played with him. Still, that didn't change the past or erase all the hurt. So what was he supposed to say to that? For now, nothing. It was something to think about for later.

"What happened after I left?" he asked instead. "How did all this," he gestured around the room, "come about?"

"Right before I met you, Dawn and I had been placed in a new foster home. One of my teachers at school, Jenny Calender, had offered to take us both in. God knows why. She knew exactly what I was like," Buffy laughed sadly. "She did it anyway, though, and she stuck it out. She seemed to really care about us, unlike some of the other families we'd been with. Dawn really like her and responded to her, but I could have cared less. I was too lost in myself by then, but she never shipped me off to someone else. She just did the best she could."

"She sounds like a great woman." Angel was grateful that someone had finally stood up for them and cared when no one else had. He couldn't imagine not having anyone in his life who truly cared.

"Yeah, she is," she smiled fully, showing her true feelings toward the woman who'd taken them in and not given up when things were rough. "I still talk to her often."

"So you and your sister stayed there?" Angel asked, drawing his knees up to rest his arms on them.

"Sort of," Buffy answered, making herself more comfortable as Angel had. This was going much better than she'd expected. Angel was really listening, and he seemed to be understanding. At best, she'd thought he would hear her out, say okay, and walk away. At worst, he would have laughed in her face and said whatever. Instead, he was really listening and responding. It was a relief to her to finally get this out in the open between them.

"A few months after you left," she began. "A guy showed up at Jenny's house. He said his name was Rupert Giles and that he was our uncle."

"Uncle? I thought you didn't have any other relatives," he interrupted.

"Back then, I hadn't remembered him. I'd only met him once, when I was maybe five or six. He's my Dad's half brother and he'd lived his whole life in England. He and my Dad weren't close at all, so I just never thought of him after Mom died," she relayed as she pulled her legs up to sit Indian-style on the window seat. "Then he just suddenly showed up one day over four years later. Apparently, he'd run into my father at some party in England. In the course of their catching up, I guess Hank, my father, told him that he and my mom had divorced and that my mom had died only a year later. When Giles, that's what we call him, found out Hank had just dumped us off on the system, he left everything in England and came to Sunnydale."

"Did he take custody of you and Dawn?" he asked.

"It wasn't that simple. I was eighteen by then so technically I was an adult, but Jenny let me stay with her even though I went off on my own and got in trouble most of the time. Dawn was only thirteen, and still a ward of the state. But Giles had a life and a job in England, and he wasn't sure what to do," she continued to explain. "He stayed in Sunnydale, though, and got to know both of us. Well, mostly Dawn. I still pretty much didn't care about anything."

"Eventually," she went on, "he decided to move permanently to Sunnydale. He and Jenny kind of, uh, hit it off and started dating. So he applied for guardianship of Dawn. When his request was granted, he told me that I was welcome to live with both of them, but that he wouldn't tolerate the things I'd been doing. He didn't want drugs or alcohol in the house or any of the other crap I'd gotten messed up in."

"So what did you do?"

"Part of me didn't give a damn. But there was another part that was, I don't know, starting to thaw," Buffy answered, scrunching her nose at how stupid she sounded. "Giles and Jenny really seemed to care. They were always right there in my face, and I hadn't had that in so long. I still didn't quite care, though. In the end, I went. I didn't want to be left alone again."

"Of course," she shook her head at her past mistakes, "it wasn't long 'til I messed it all up. I knew Giles was serious about not putting up with my crap, so I tried to sneak around instead of just doing everything out in the open. I went out one night, I'd just turned nineteen, and I got drunk as hell. When I came back to Giles' house, I tried to sneak in by climbing up the tree outside my window. Alcohol and tree-climbing don't mix, in case you didn't know. I fell and ended up in the hospital with a fractured collarbone, a sprained ankle, and a severe concussion."

"Damn," Angel mumbled, thinking of Buffy falling out of tree.

"Yeah. It was pretty stupid on my part," Buffy snorted. "When I came to in the hospital the next morning, Giles was there. He looked so disappointed in me. I think that was the first time I really realized that he loved me, and it made me feel awful. He gave me an ultimatum, straighten up, or I was on my own. He didn't want me being any more of a bad influence on Dawn"

"So just like that, you changed?"

"Hardly," Buffy shifted and sighed. "He had a friend running this program in LA. It wasn't a rehab exactly, but more of a support home for young people like me. He told me I could go there if I really wanted to try to make something of my life."

Buffy was quiet for a minute, and Angel gave her the time she needed to put together her thoughts. He knew this had to be hard for her to talk about. Years of being a cop had given him some insight into the world of troubled youth. Most of them never pulled themselves out. Once you got lost in that world, it tended to suck you in forever. But somehow, she'd made the decision to change. Before he'd run into Buffy again, he wouldn't have thought it possible. He was just realizing, though, that he'd never really known a thing about her.

Finally, Buffy stood and walked over to where Angel was sitting. She slid down the wall next to him, seeming to need the closer contact. Resting her head back against the wall, she told the rest of her sordid life story.

"I had a lot of time to think in that hospital bed. About all I'd lost, about the things I'd done, and why. And I thought about you, and how I'd lost you. That was when I really realized what I'd done to you and what could have happened because you were a cop," she explained, clutching her hands together across her knees. "All of a sudden, everything in my life just slammed me in the chest. And there was the fact that I was in the hospital in the first place because I'd been blitzed out of my mind and fell out of a tree. It hit me how freakin' stupid that was. Giles and Jenny talked to me a lot, too. He spent time telling me what my life could be. But it was Dawn who really made me open my eyes. She cried and told me she didn't want to lose me, too. So when they released me from the hospital, I came here to the place in LA Giles knew of."

"Seems like everything worked out," Angel said and reached out to take one of Buffy's hands before he could stop himself.

"It wasn't easy," Buffy answered, deciding not to comment on the fact that Angel now held her hand. She didn't want to break the companionship they seemed to be having, even if it was only temporary. "I'd spent six years getting myself into trouble and doing whatever I wanted. It was tough to leave all that behind. But the place I went to was great. I stayed there for six months, did a lot of talking, a lot of crying, and came out of it a better person in the end."

"Is that when you started painting?" he wondered, still curious about that aspect of Buffy's life. In the time he'd known her in Sunnydale, there'd never been a hint that she was artistic.

"I'd always loved to draw. My Mom owned an art gallery and being involved with art came kinda naturally," she shrugged. "But when things got bad, I just pushed it away. The place I came to here had one of those 'art as therapy' things, and I started painting again. They saw my talent and told me to use it. My family really encouraged it too, so when I left the support group, I went back to Sunnydale for a few months, but then I decided to move to LA. There were more opportunities for artists here."

"And that's the story of Buffy the screw-up's life," she ended by saying.

"You're not a screw-up, Buffy. You had a lot to deal with, and look where you are now." The words tumbled out of Angel's mouth unconsciously. He was shocked by them, at first. For so long he'd held so much anger inside at Buffy – Lizzie – over what had happened between them. Now it all seemed to be fading away. Replacing it, was an odd feeling of pride over what she had managed to accomplish in the face of adversity. It left him feeling a bit confused.

"I wouldn't have been able to do it without Giles, Jenny and Dawn, or Hyp-," she abruptly stopped.

Shit! Buffy thought. Tonight was Thursday.

"What's the matter?"

"I, uh, just remembered I have something to do tonight," she said, evading the full answer.

"No problem. Wherever you go, I go. I wouldn't mind getting out for a while." And that was the truth. He was feeling a bit crowded at the moment, by Buffy, by everything he'd learned.

Unfortunately for Buffy, it was a big, big problem. Or rather, not one for her, but for her friend. She darted up and grabbed her cell phone off the shelf. She needed to talk to Faith. Now.


TBC!