"This is OK with you right?" Richie's voice was unsure and nervous. Dawn enjoyed the way he could go from looking like a mature older guy to the nervous nineteen year old that he outwardly appeared to be at the blink of an eye. She liked knowing that she had that power over him, that she could make him nervous enough to revert to that level.

She looked around the Vatican museum in awe, then gave Richie a reassuring smile.

"I love this stuff Richie." She assured him. Until everything had gotten so crazy the year she found out she was the key she had indeed loved school especially history. Buffy had always hated it, but Dawn had found great solace in the stories and people from the distant past. It fascinated her. She was glad that Richie had thought to take them here.

"Mac is always saying I should be more cultured." Richie was saying ruefully. "He's always at me to go to the museums and stuff in Paris, but I just never got around to it. I guess I figured that I had all the time in the world to see that stuff so I never bothered."

"I've never even been out of California and now I've seen Paris AND Rome!" Dawn couldn't keep the excitement out of her voice. "Sometimes it seems like a dream, you know? Like this is happening to someone else and not to me. I mean, I'm upset that Sunnydale is gone and that Spike and Anya didn't make it, but part of me is so grateful to be here that…does that make me a horrible person? The fact that I don't feel worse I mean?"

"No, it makes you healthy." Richie replied. "Believe me Dawn, if you spent all your time mourning what you lost you'd be…"

"Xander." She interrupted with a sad sigh. "It's like he's not even here."

"Exactly." Richie said. "I hate to point him out as a symbol of unhealthiness, but…"

"I know." Dawn told him with a small smile. "Buffy says there's nothing more we can do."

"She's right." Richie said simply.

"I used to have the biggest crush on him you know." Dawn admitted with a wistful smile. It had all seemed so easy then. A crush was a very simple thing. She'd watch Buffy laugh and joke with Xander and picture him looking at her the way he looked at Buffy. She'd write Dawn+Xanderlove, or Dawn & Xander 4Ever on her notebooks and in her diary and plan her wedding, complete with the song they would both have for their first dance. She'd imagine what it would be like to have her dad give her away to Xander. He was her first real crush.

But then it all went wrong. Her dad stopped calling them, and eventually ran off to Spain with his secretary in what Buffy called a spectacular mid-life crisis. Angel left, causing Dawn to wonder if true love was really all it was cracked up to be if it couldn't even keep the two of them together. Her mom got sick and Dawn found out she wasn't the normal human she had always thought herself to be, but a magical key whose power seemed to lie only in destruction. It had all fallen apart and the simple thought of a crush and a wedding became something that only little girls were allowed to dream of.

Dawn had already seen too much to ever think that way again. Xander became more of an older brother and the dream wedding became a very distant illusion. If she wasn't even human, how could she get married? Her dad was gone, unable to be located when they needed him most. And then her mom died, ripping away the last vestige of a normal family life she ever had. All she had of a family was Buffy, but then she was gone too.

After she came back things weren't the same. Dawn learned to rely on herself, to get up in the morning and face the day knowing that she couldn't afford to think about such trivial things as boys, a dream wedding or what song she would have for the first dance. It was always one thing after another. Buffy coming back from the dead, Willow going evil, Xander leaving Anya, the world almost ending. It never seemed to stop. And in the midst of it all, Buffy's friends ceased to be just Buffy's friends. They became Dawn's new family.

She could never look at Xander and see a guy again. Now, whenever she looked at him she saw an older brother. To think of him that way was even more painful as she watched him self destruct.

She looked back at Richie who was contemplating her statement silently.

"Why?" He finally said. She realized he was asking why she had a crush on Xander. She thought about it for a moment before answering.

"I have a thing for older guys." She joked. Adding a note of seriousness, she continued, "because he was something special. An ordinary guy, but one who fought demons right alongside Buffy, even without any powers or abilities. I guess I thought that was pretty romantic. I don't know if that makes any sense."

"It makes perfect sense," Richie assured her. "When I first met Duncan and Tessa, I had a little crush on her as well. I mean I idolized Duncan, thought he was just the greatest human being I had ever met. He fought with a sword and seemed cooler than cool y'know? I wanted to be just like him. And here was this beautiful woman, who was strong and loyal, and fierce as hell if you knew her and I wanted that. I wanted to know that someday I would find a woman who would stay by me no matter what trouble I was in. Until I met the two of them, I had never had that."

"Duncan's your hero." Dawn said softly.

"More like a mentor." Richie corrected. "I mean, before I was immortal, I woulda said yea, but now…well I've seen too much of what it is to be immortal to call what we do heroic. Mac is a good guy, with strong morals, but he's not perfect. Nobody is. Not even her. I miss Tessa so much sometimes….but every time I do, I think of how much Mac loved her and realize that he misses her ten times more."

"Buffy said she died." Dawn spoke quietly, unsure of whether Richie wanted to talk about it any further. The Vatican was beautiful to behold, but Dawn was suddenly too caught up in the conversation she was having with Richie to really pay significant attention.

"Yea, she did." Riche told her sadly. "Pretty damn senselessly too. You never know how fragile life is till something like that happens. I mean, I may be immortal, but all it will take is someone better than me and I'm a goner too y'know? I'm supposed to live forever, but who knows if I'll even make it to a hundred?"

"You will." Dawn said, ignoring the knot that tightened in her stomach at the thought of something happening to Richie. "Buffy says Mac is one of the best teacher's out there."

"Yea, he is." Richie replied. "But a good teacher can only go so far. I still don't know if I'm a good enough student."

He shook his head as if to clear the thought process from his mind. "But enough of that. I grew out of my crush on Tessa, and I learned that senseless killings can happen to anyone. I think that's called growing up. What about you? What happened to end your crush on Xander?"

"I never really thought about it." Dawn admitted. "I guess when Buffy died, Xander, Anya, Willow and Tara became sort of like my parents…they all took care of me. It's hard to see somebody that way after something like that."

"Well that's a shame." Richie said with mock seriousness. "A girl your age should have a guy in her life that she likes as more than a friend."

"What makes you think I don't?" Dawn teased back, enjoying the game they seemed to be playing with one another. His eyebrow went up in surprise.

"Oh? So you do have a crush on someone?"

"Maybe," she said coyly.

"What does he look like? I'll have to check him out to make sure he's good enough for you." He took a step closer to her, their faces only inches apart and felt his heart speed up at their closeness.

"Well," there was a slight catch in her breath as her eyes met his. "He's tall, and a few years older than me. He has reddish blonde hair, an amazing smile and I think he'd probably look really good without a shirt on." She blushed at the last statement, but continued. "He's smart, and really funny and brave. He's a good friend and a really good guy."

"Damn," Richie said huskily. "He's gonna be hard to compete with."

"Maybe you should find someone then." Dawn countered.

"I have." He said simply. He smiled. "She's a good friend of mine's younger sister. She's exciting, smart, brave, and incredibly fun to be around. Oh and did I mention gorgeous? There's this one outfit she has-a pink dress that literally made me speechless when I saw her wear it. She makes me want to…you make me want to…"

"What?" Dawn asked, abandoning the charade entirely and feeling her heart rate increase tenfold. They were so close, all he had to do was move forward just a little bit and…

"Are you going to kiss me at some point Richie?" She finally whispered. "Or are we just going to stand here in the middle of the Vatican museum looking like idiots?"

He answered her question by closing the gap between them in a soft, tentative kiss that made all of Dawn's nerve endings come alive with sensation. She gasped softly as he deepened the kiss, wrapping his arms around her waste and pulling her against his chest. His lips were incredibly gentle. Dawn felt as if she could kiss them forever, so wonderful was the feeling of them against hers.

She reached up and ran her hands through his close cropped hair, trailing her fingers lightly down the back of his neck and loving the feeling that accompanied it. He shivered slightly at her touch and the kiss became even deeper, his tongue touching hers and exploring her mouth with a languid curiousness that excited her greatly. She had never felt like this before, so anxious and yet so completely content. She wanted to pull him closer, to deepen his kiss to the point of no return and yet she was perfectly happy not to, to just allow him to do what he was doing and forget the rest of the world existed.

Eventually, reluctantly, he pulled away from her, his face flushed with emotion.

"I uh…don't think this place is the best place to do this." He finally said, his breathing ragged. Dawn instantly went red with embarrassment when she realized where they were.

"I didn't think…I mean, I knew you liked me enough to ask me out, I just didn't think it was that much to…I just didn't expect anything like that." She sounded like an idiot and looked away, sure that Richie would realize how woefully inexperienced she was in this sort of thing and call it all off. Instead, he touched her chin gently and turned her back to meet his gaze.

"I didn't plan to kiss you here Dawn." He said honestly. "But don't for one second think I never wanted to kiss you. It's all I've been thinking about since I met you."

"Really?" She fought the urge to ask why. "I didn't realize…"

"I hope it wasn't a disappointment." He continued. "I mean, I hope you wanted to kiss me back."

"Are you kidding?" She giggled nervously and then stepped back. "I mean, yea. I wanted to. A lot."

"You do look beautiful tonight, you know that right?"

"Buffy picked the dress out." She told him, feeling it was her duty to warn him that her fashion sense was not as good as he might think. Best to warn him now.

"You want to get out of here? We could spend the rest of the night walking around and talking….or kissing. There could be more kissing."

"I would love that." She replied, then blushing added, "the talking I mean. And the kissing. Both. Err, yea, let's get out of here."

"I knew a night of culture was the way to go." He joked as they headed for the exit.