"What are you planning on packing for the trip?" Angel asked as they stepped back out of the restaurant, his eyes glancing down at the three phone numbers he managed to get from the entire trio just as they were leaving, before pushing the napkin into his pants pocket.

Buffy made a face. "Why would I be packing anything? I can always pop back to my house to get clothes or whatever I need like I have every other time."

"Yeah," he said slowly, "but it might look a little strange to show up for a flight of this size without any baggage, not to mention you might want to bring a carry on to keep yourself occupied during the flight..." When she stopped walking and seemed to be letting that sink in, it hit him. "You've never actually been on a plane before."

"I've never needed to. If someone had a business trip or something I'd always just meet them on the other side... And nothing's ever made me feel like I need to just be part of a flight for someone, or to pop in on one..."

"Are you scared? About flying?"

"No... not scared, maybe some aspects make me a little anxious. Like, I don't want to do something wrong, pack something I shouldn't in this made up bag I apparently need to have, and get you in some sort of trouble or something like that."

"You won't," he promised, offering to print her off some flight rules and regulations if she so wanted since he knew how much she loved those, and telling her he would double check her luggage to make sure everything was good to go before they even headed off to the airport when the time came.

OoOoO

Reaching his apartment, Buffy looked up at the building and started to tell him goodnight and confirming their plans for the next morning.

"Will you please come back up with me and just hang out? We can discuss plans for me calling those girls and what I should go off and do with them even. Can we please continue to be friends... even if those lines got a little blurry?"

"I don't see how that would be a good idea, Angel."

He huffed, "Why not?"

"You know why," she turned towards him. Her tone softening a little, "Please don't be mad."

He wanted to close those precious few inches between, he wanted to grab her, to shake some sense into, kiss her until she was breathless, he wanted to show each and every reason them being together was a very good idea, and yet, he stayed still. Frozen, he didn't even trust himself to breath, her green depths locked onto his, the only sounds between them the soft breaths leaving her lips.

"I'm not mad," he finally argued, taking a step back so he could put a little more space between the two of them, a move that, judging from the strange look on her face wasn't lost on her.

"Then why are you pouting?"

"I'm not pouting okay, it's just, it's just that none of this seems fair. You can take a twenty hour plane ride with me, we can go to breakfast, brunch, you name it, but you can't come upstairs and sit on the couch while we talk about our upcoming trip, or the bimbos you're trying to hook me up with, or watch a movie, or do anything else normal people might partake in."

Shaking his head, he looked towards the ground before seeming to come to some sort of internal decision, jerking his head up, he locked onto her gaze once more. "You don't get it Buffy, you're the one in control here. You get to set the terms for this friendship, or partnership, or whichever label you have decided to give it for the day. You always know where I'm at, what am I doing, you can pop in anytime you want, anytime you have something to say or when you want to see me."

Taking a deep breath he forced himself to continue, the last thing he wanted to do was argue with her but he needed to get this off his chest. "I don't get to do that, I don't know where you go, or where you are, and when you disappeared after what happened in my room… I was so worried that I would never see you again, that some invisible force was going to snap their fingers and violate me in the worst possible way by altering my memories, by making me forget the one girl that I can't seem to get off my mind."

He knew he was digging his own grave, but the logical part of his brain was losing the battle, no matter how hard he tried to stop it his mouth just kept fucking moving. "And I'm sorry for that, not because I feel the way I do, but because I know how much my feelings terrify you. And now knowing what little bits you have told me, I have to admit that all of it scares me just as much, but you have to know that I would never do anything to hurt you or put your life in jeopardy. So if that means spending the next forty some odd weeks feigning interest in some random girl, or pretending that my dreams are not filled with images of you, or making sure that I keep my damn hands to myself, then I'll do it. But please," he begged, "Please, do not fucking shut me out, or treat me like I'm just some charge or contract or job or whatever it is that you seem to try and categorize me as."

She stood there completely dumbfounded, she was fairly certain that Angel had just said more to her standing out there on the side of the road than he had said to her in all their time together. Well maybe that wasn't exactly true, but he'd definitely just given her a glimpse of a part of him she hadn't seen before.

"Just forget it," he muttered softly, moving towards the door.

"Angel, wait," she exclaimed, grabbing onto his arm. He paused but he didn't quite turn back around to face her, he just couldn't stand to look her in the eye while she spatted off the endless list as to why how they felt was wrong.

"You're right, okay, and I know it's not fair. None of it is, you're upset because I get to see you and you can't see me, but what you don't understand is how hard that is for me to deal with. This life, this calling, it's literally the only thing I have ever known, all I know is the rules of the powers, and all I have ever been taught to do is put others' needs before my own. In this life, in my life," she stressed, "The only happiness I have ever known is a job well done, the only love I've ever experienced has been through the eyes of whoever it is that I'm helping at the time. For goodness sake, the only friends I have ever even had are part freaking demon."

She was trying her best to keep her emotions in check, she didn't want pity, not from him. Sighing, she let her fingers slip from his arm, at least he had turned back around to face her so she wasn't having to say all this to his back, "When I'm not with you, it's like my mind is consumed with you, and you may not believe me but I don't spend my free time sitting around spying on you. I get lost in my head too, wondering what you're doing, what you're thinking about, if you're having fun on the date I sent you on."

She gestured around them, "I'm here because you made a wish to find your dream girl, your very own version of happily ever after, and you get so annoyed everytime I bring it up, but what you don't seem to get is that none of this is easy for me either. I let something happen here and I risk everything, your memories are at stake yes, but as far as I know my entire life is. No one knows what happens when one of us gets too involved, I don't know if I would die, or be turned into a human, or zapped from existence, so ya I'm a little scared."

She sniffled, "I don't know why you've dreamed of me for years, I don't know how you have seemed to of created countless masterpieces all centered around me, and I don't know how the powers could possibly expect me to just sit by and send you on all these dates when they have to know that deep down I'm wishing it were me. I wish I could be your happily ever after, I wish we could go to dinner or watch a movie, or do anything without discussing the possibilities of your next date. But I don't have that luxury, we don't," she corrected.

Angrily she wiped at the tears that had started to accumulate, sometimes she really hated being a girl and the hormones that came right along with it. "I can't be your friend Angel, I don't know how to be your friend, because whenever I look at you all I can seem to think about is how badly I want you to kiss me again."

Whatever else she intended to say never came to pass as one of Angel's arms easily wrapped around her, pulling her flush against him as his lips found their way to hers, and she was pretty sure had he not been holding on to her, her knees would have buckled from under her from the contact.

Her mind seemed to go completely blank for several seconds, and then there was just him. All outside noise seemed to cease, there was no longer a line of cars passing along on the street, or people on the sidewalks, music and voices, feet stomping coming from the various other apartments. Time seemed to just come to a halt, she felt weightless, unsure if she was dreaming, if she was still in front of his apartment, in her own little dimension, if she was on the ground, floating, or anything else.

She wasn't sure how much time had in fact passed, but it felt like forever and like it all ended too quickly at the same time. When he did finally pull away, her chest was burning from being starved from the fresh air filling her lungs as needed, her entire body felt warm, her head stilling spinning. Even when he forced himself to step away, she felt like she might fall over.

"Okay, so... so let's say I promise not to do that... the rest of today anyhow..." he panted out, "Could you please, begging you here, please... just... have some normalcy with me and stop shutting me out? Just for a little bit? An hour? Thirty minutes? Fifteen?"

OoOoO

Pressing her lips together, she could just about find the taste of him still lingering, her vision still seemed a bit on the fuzzy side as she followed behind him, the alarm bells going off inside of her not helping with that one tiny bit. She knew she should leave, they'd met, even ate out together for dinner while discussing things here and there, scouting out some new faces and making tiny progress.. in a sense anyhow, she'd kept it mostly professional and stuck to a good schedule for the most part today to maintain distance and not cross some more of those lines... but that was flying right back out the damn window it seemed.

Taking a seat on the sofa, she watched as Angel went for one of the large chairs off to the side. Silence hung heavy in the air around them.

"Where is your favorite place you have been?" she finally asked.

His eyes almost sparkled at the simple gesture, "I don't really know... I mean, I haven't been many places... pretty much with art or back when I was doing my art I still stuck more or less to the West Coast, a few times I've been up North to New York, New Jersey and such... nothing really struck me as this is my favorite place ever I guess. I've only left the country once and that was just to go to Ireland and meet distant relatives, didn't even really sight see, it was more jumping from house to house in a small little countryside area. And at the time I was hardly impressed but I guess looking back it was kind of peaceful and nice."

"Maybe one of these days you should go back, really take the country in, go exploring. It is quite beautiful."

"Yeah, maybe. I keep in touch with a few great great this and that still every now and then. Maybe even before the end of this journey we could go," he dared.

Buffy looked down at the laces of her shoes and shrugged. "One trip at a time okay," she said softly.

"Alright," he agreed, matching her tone.

OoOoO

Buffy's eyes glanced to the open page of her trust notebook then back to Angel. "What should I actually pack? Like, clothes? Toiletries? What do I need to get to not seem so... out of place?" she asked as their conversation shifted back to the impending vacation he sprung on them.

"That would be a good start, yes. Just think about it as if you didn't have these magical fairy powers-"

"I'm not a fairy-"

"-And you didn't have the ability to just pop in and out of places like you do. Pretend that you're really having to pack for the whole trip and grab what you know you need to have and just whatever else you'd simply like to have with you."

"That's a very odd concept."

"And yet millions of people do it every day," he remarked back to her, earning an annoyed look in the process. "The more you think about it as a real thing the more it'd probably come together. Hell, maybe I should even challenge you to go about it like a regular ol' human... for the whole trip, no magic allowed, pack whatever you need and bring it along, anything left behind that you later decide you want to have you either have to do without or buy new, no popping off back to wherever it is you go, that you have to stay put like everyone else... things like that."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Why not? It could be fun," he teased.

"Because I will more than likely need to use some of my powers while we are there in order to help you in some way or another."

"There's ways around waving your little finger around and changing a light to red, causing someone to spill coffee, or trip over a suddenly loose tile or whatever. Not everything has to happen because of something otherwordly."

"Says the man who made a birthday wish and has a lady hanging around who he insists on referring to as his fairy godmother..."

"Fair point, I suppose, but still!"

OoOoO

Before he even realized it, hours had passed, and yet the idea of her leaving still left a sinking feeling inside of him. Even with her having loosened up some, some of her iciness from today having gave way bit by bit. Sometimes he wondered if having her close yet so far away or having her put that wall up and only deal with him as needed would be the harder one to handle long term, but whatever way that tree did fall, he couldn't help but want to have as much with her as he could manage.

He watched as she slipped her shoes back on, having discarded them some time ago to curl up at the arm of the couch more comfortably, before standing and stretching her back and arms out a bit. "Today felt impossibly long, at least for me it did. Hopefully tomorrow is a little easier... and maybe we can get you to call those girls tomorrow at some point?"

'So close,' he thought, hoping she'd forgotten completely. "Yeah, yeah."

"Don't get too excited about it or anything," she groused and all he could do was shrug back at her. "I'll see you tomorrow, Angel."

In order to keep up with his promise, he forced more pressure into keeping his feet in their place as she bid him farewell for the evening, the apartment feeling incredibly lonely the second she disappeared. He felt a bit like he'd been on some sort of emotional roller coaster these last couple of days, and honestly he still wasn't sure how he felt about it all. On one hand he was thrilled to be going on this adventure with her, but a part of him couldn't help but dwell on how different things could be if they were just able to give whatever was brewing between a chance.

At least he had gotten her to open up a little, he definitely felt a little less crazy knowing he wasn't just imagining everything between them, but he again wasn't sure if knowing she was pretty much feeling the same way was better or worse in the long run. Though she had let him kiss her without completely freaking out and disappearing, which in the grand scheme of things wasn't much, but it was something and for tonight it was enough.

OoOoO

The next few days went by in a blur, not wanting to risk pushing her further away, especially not before their trip, Angel had forced himself to behave. It was torture, but it seemed to be just what they needed. They were definitely in a better place than they were before. That icy wall she'd built between them had slowly crumbled as they quietly resumed the friendship they had been building, he had even managed to convince her to give up magic for the entirety of their trip.

He'd had to agree to take Candace, or was it Cameron, he couldn't quite remember out to dinner tonight before their big flight in the morning, but it was a small price to pay if it meant getting ten days more or less alone with her. He nodded along, pretending to keep up with what the red head was talking about, he was trying to pay attention to be invested as Buffy called it, but it was a hard thing to do when his mind was so wonderfully distracted.

No magic meant that she would be staying with him at the hotel afterall, it had taken hours of prying but he had finally succeeded in getting her to voice where she would prefer to stay. Every time he asked, she would remind him that this trip was for him, it was his vacation, that he should stay where he wanted, and so on and so on. It wasn't until he started sabotaging each and every one of her attempted set ups this morning that she'd eventually caved, but even that was only after he'd let some poor girl fall flat on her face after a pen magically appeared under one of the ridiculously tall heels she had chosen to wear.

The girl was fine, other than the bruise to her ego of course, but Buffy was mortified. She'd really torn into him for that one, which was fine by him, he was quickly learning how adorable she was when she got all worked up. So she'd fussed up, she wanted to stay somewhere authentic was the word she had used. She told him that in her opinion it was pointless to travel somewhere so exotic only to book a room at the Hilton, or whatever hotel chain may be around. She wanted to make the most of the experience, and she thought that he just might get more out of it that way too.

So instead of actually getting anything accomplished work wise, he'd spent the entire day holed up in his office searching for the perfect place. First and foremost he wanted to make sure that wherever they stayed was safe, he didn't know much about Africa, but that was all the more reason to take extra precautions. It was ridiculous, he knew that, but in all honesty he'd be lying if he didn't admit to having more than one nightmarish vision of a lion or some other wild animal creeping up on them while they slept.

He'd eventually stumbled across a resort called The Elephant's Eye, it was the ultimate blend of luxury and adventure. Each accommodation was its own separate structure, built on stilts roughly twenty feet or so from the ground, where you could literally walk outside in the morning and be greeted by a herd of elephants, drinking from one of the many watering holes within sight. It was an eco-friendly lodge, which meant that they wouldn't have access to televisions or any sort of electronics, but honestly that just made the place seem all that more appealing.

It was gated and armed guards secured the perimeter, but the gate was set up in a way that you couldn't tell. Even though the place lacked electronics, it made up for it with its amenities, there was a swimming pool of course, a full spa, and they offered a laundry list of excursions which you could book straight through them, your very own personal driver included. A visit to the falls was a must, and as much as the idea terrified him, he'd booked the trip that included a swim in one of the small pockets overlooking the falls edge. They could also take a real safari tour, visit a refuge center for injured or abandoned animals who had managed to escape poachers, there was even a restaurant they could visit high in the treetops, where giraffes were known to graze right outside, sometimes even taking a peek inside one of the windows to snag a piece of lettuce from a lucky diner.

"Huh," Angel asked for the third time, completely missing what Charlotte had asked him. "I'm sorry," he apologized, "It's just that I have a, uh, big trip coming up and I've allowed it to distract me, when my attention should have been focused on the beautiful girl in front of me." He reached across the table to grab one of her hands, while he quickly threw out one of those dazzling smiles which he'd learned at an early age could get him out of nearly anything, especially when it came to women.

OoOoO

As much as it had seemed to drag on, the date went a little better once he forced himself to stay present. She seemed like a decent girl, and he was sure that she was going to make some guy out there very happy, it just wasn't going to be him. Carlie, he'd finally managed to figure out when they bumped into one of her girlfriends as they were walking out of the restaurant, had tried her hardest to seduce him, going so far as to invite him back to her place for coffee, for split second he had considered taking her up on the offer, after all this whole forced celibate route was starting to take its toll, but as quickly as he'd entertained the idea, he'd pushed it away. He didn't want some fling, and he definitely wasn't willing to risk hurting Buffy over something meaningless, already he was feeling enough over their kiss goodnight and he hadn't even been the one to initiate it.

Walking back into his apartment, he kicked his shoes off to the side of the small foyer. He'd just begun to loosen his tie and pull it off when he noticed the small blonde curled up on the corner of his sofa. "How was your date," she asked, but he knew her better than she thought and he could hear the sadness behind her words.

"It was fine," he answered slowly, making his way closer to her.

Buffy closed the book in her hands and folded them over the cover when he sat beside her. "Just fine? You were gone longer than usual... I was hoping that was a good sign."

Angel shrugged. "Service was slow, it felt like three bus loads suddenly showed up once we got seated."

"And what about the girl? Any sparkage?" she asked and he explained that she seemed nice enough, had made him laugh a few times over the course of their time together when he'd forced himself to actually pay attention to her, that he thought she was beautiful and sweet, if a little forward... but that he didn't feel the need for any follow up dates with her, that he didn't see any real future there. "Angel... you have dated before, right?"

He felt a tug at the corners of his mouth with her tone. "I have."

"And have you always been this much of a pain in the ass with trying to see whether or not you liked someone?"

His smirk won out. "No, but it was different then. I didn't have such high end goals to worry about. It's easy to just spend an evening with someone, date with no strings attached, hell just take home for a good time but if that's all I wanted then you wouldn't be here..."

OoOoO

Sometimes Buffy wondered what was going to wreck her more, the idea of Angel actually getting over this little crush of his and realizing what he truly wanted in life was out there once they crossed paths, or if that day never came. She was ninety nine percent sure it would be the latter when push came to shove, but sometimes she sure did question it.

In her heart she knew that she wanted Angel to get everything he desired in this life, she wanted him to find love, to see him happy, to have one of those moments where they stood together and she heard him declare her services were no longer required and his wish had been fulfilled. To have a year go by and have to walk away knowing she couldn't help him get there would haunt her the rest of her days. She'd had very few instances where that had happened, usually if someone didn't get their ending it was because they made the choice to end things early, but she did not want to add him to that list.

It was going to kill her inside either way, though. There was no denying that.

Having Angel go on these dates he was absolutely uninterested in was already hard enough, sometimes she wasn't sure who she was pushing harder with them, who she was trying to convince more as she built each girl and the planned dates up. Especially this last one... the first he'd gone on since they'd kissed. Twice now.

Her heart felt like it was in her throat the entire time as she waited. And then when he mentioned that his date had tried to get more than just dinner out of her date with him, she couldn't help but feel her blood rushing faster, jealousy gripping its hold on her. Angel had even made a joke about the kiss he'd apparently shared with his latest date, it caught her off guard with exactly how awful it made her feel.

And yet she forced a smile and told him at least he was showing some progress.

OoOoO

When one of Angel's friends stopped by to surprise him with one last farewell, she easily popped out, heading home to make sure everything was in order there before morning came. While she had agreed to this little no magic allowed challenge they had agreed if an emergency came up there was always some exceptions, but she was kind of looking forward to the little game. She'd never really thought too much about not having powers or little things she found she used what she had to do little things here and there.

Walking through the house, she double checked to make sure she had everything packed away for the trip, then piled her bags together on the bed and waited for Lindsey and Angel to get done. Laying out her clothes for tomorrow, she also grabbed a pair of pajamas to change into before drawing a bath.

Lowering herself under the bubbles, she tried to just shut her mind off from worries about Angel, the trip, the Powers, and everything else.

ButImBroken:

Co-written with Scribes1015!