Luster

Author: Leena
Email: ryme34123@yahoo.com
Rating: PG-13, light R
Pairing: B/A
Disclaimer: Story’s mine, characters aren’t. Simple as that.
Synopsis: Angel is feeling down, goes to Buffy in desperation and stuff ensues *G*
AN: This is for Vatrixta because well…she wanted it! =]
AN2: The beginning quote is from a poem by Kim Addonizio called “Stolen Moments”. Very beautiful poem.

”Love's
merciless, the way it travels in
and keeps emitting light.”

Her heartbeat is the primal drum rhythm beneath her skin, to the tune of her eyelashes fluttering in sleep. It’s beautiful, in some kind of deep way that I don’t think I’ll ever understand completely. She used to tell me that she had these certain songs that she’d listen to, and it was like her heart stopped and she wanted to cry, because it was so beautiful. She affects me like that. She’s the one song that I could listen to forever and never tire of. Just looking at her does things to me that I can’t comprehend, something like sparks traveling up and down wires on my skin. Like flint striking together in my dead heart, creating some kind of light down there that I haven’t seen since I was human. And even then, the spark was weak. She is my Song.

I lie there for a little while, noticing the blue light slithering across the white of her carpet, staring at the stucco points that adorn her ceiling. Her breathing nearly lulls me back to sleep before I’m reminded of the violence that we created. I can almost believe that I’m forgiven when I look at her like this. She looks…satisfied. Maybe she always looks like this now, I’m not sure. But I haven’t seen happiness on her face like this in awhile, maybe not since the night of her seventeenth birthday. And we all know that didn’t end well.

The match that has been struck inside me is quickly doused when I think about how I got her here, how my jealousy spread through me like a stain. How I came here, just intending to talk, to tell her about Spike’s life and his rebirth, but instead something took me over. I could blame it on the demon, but I think it was male pride, desperation. I knew that I was losing an inevitable battle to Spike, and she was the prize. So instead of talking, like a calm adult, I grew angry and said a few choice things that pissed her off. I’ve seen the look before that appeared in her eyes. It was like jade; it was cold, hard rock. She snapped her mouth open to retort something nasty, but instead I pressed my lips against hers and backed her up against a wall, my hands roaming her thighs.

I don’t want to say that I fucked her, because that sounds so dirty. I love her. I don’t think I could ever just fuck her and leave it at that. But my anger fueled me and it was rough, even if she did want it. Even if she did dig her nails into my back and let out those little screams. They only drove me on harder.

But now that I think about it, I would have preferred talking to the orgasmic and sated calm that has now washed through me. At least I would have been enlightened. As of now, my life is a mess, ripped apart by a Shanshu that I didn’t get. That I obviously didn’t deserve. And I have the girl now, but I really don’t. Is the curse gone? Does it matter?

It’s so strange to me that I can still feel this way after so long, but I do. And I say ‘so long’ like it’s been a thousand years, when really it’s only been seven or eight. For a vampire, it’s like the shot of a bullet. But I’ve gone through so much, seen so much. Yet I still see her, smell her, and it incites this thing inside me, a living thing that pushes inside of me and keeps me going. It makes me love her, and that’s intensely scary. How can I feel this way about someone who is so wrong for me for so long? One person. Once, long ago, a then-vampiric Spike said, “love isn’t brains, children, it’s blood”. And the bastard was right.

Sometimes I kissed other girls throughout the duration of my “redemption” (if you can even call it that) and I felt something. I thought it was pure and clean, and finally true. I thought I was freeing myself from the chains of the past, I thought I was finally shedding my skin. I was about to become someone intensely different, and show the world what a change that I could make. Then I would see a little blonde, or I would see a picture of her, or maybe even see her again and I would don on the old “skin” just like it never went away. And I don’t think it ever did. As cheesy as these metaphors sound, it’s true. I can change everything about myself. I can dress differently, I can even choose to kill everyone in my path, but one thing is unavoidable: I will always, always love Buffy Summers. Those are some chains that I wouldn’t mind being free of, finally. I’ve always tried to deny it so much, and now that I want it again, it’s slipped from my fingers.

Everything that has really mattered to me, everything that has created perfect harmony in me is sitting next to me right now. And I messed with her mind, I growled at her and rutted with her like an animal. Why can’t I ever just ask her, calmly, like an adult? I’m scared. I’m scared that she’ll pick Spike, that she’ll throw me out or stake me or call me a useless, worthless loser. And although those insecurities may be naïve, especially for someone of my age, they still exist. She makes me feel young again, no matter what amount of time has passed. I degraded her; I made her feel less than what she is. I just wish…I could convey the depth of what I feel for her.

I turn on my side, and trace her cheek gently, not wanting to wake her. I want to do something, anything, but I’m so filled with uncertainty and guilt that I can’t move from my spot. For a while I’m content to try to forget what happened and relax in her warmth, but it doesn’t work. Reality starts ramming into me. Should I tell her the truth? Should I just leave her here, under the covers and warm, to forget me? Maybe I should lie to her, pretend to be Angelus. Anything to get this acid out of my heart. How can I still be this in love? How can that be possible? I touch her once more before pulling on my pants. I need to get out of here. Enough of this. I can’t complicate things further. I can’t set myself up for a letdown.

I escape just as the pink dawn is creeping into the shadows. I stare at the orange sky and wince, knowing that I would have been dust had it been a few more minutes. I slink into my hotel room and settle down there, feeling my bones sink into the bed. I feel satisfied but empty. I just left her. That won’t solve anything. It’s all I ever seem to do; I’m weak. Why would she want raw beef when she can have prime rib? Spike will go to her now, and maybe that’s why I went to her first. It was good but it wasn’t great. It won’t be great until she’s gasping her love for me, telling me that she hasn’t forgotten. That she wants me.

In the afternoon an insistent cell phone rouses me. It’s loud and shrill to my sensitive ears, and I let out a little growl. I want to smash it with my fist, but knowing that I have nothing left, I need to answer the phone. I’ve destroyed too many cell phones before, only to regret it later. Even if I’m not the Champion of light and goodness and all that other utter bullshit, I still need to believe that I have a purpose for existing. Then I remember that I do: she lives a few blocks away.

“What?” I snap into the phone, sitting up in my bed and wincing. Every night starts like this. No matter how much sleep that I get, I still feel drained, and I ache.

“Angel?” It’s that sweet voice, like whipped cream, even though I can’t taste. I can’t remember what food tastes like, but I can taste my name on her, and it’s almost like I’m revived. I need to snap out of this. She doesn’t sound angry, as I thought that she would, she sounds…hurt, unsure. She’s not screaming, her voice is like fingers on velvet.

“Buffy?” It always happens. Our names. I remember vaguely Xander once making fun of us, but we can’t seem to have it any other way. I guess she means too much to me to say something as trivial as ‘hey’ or ‘what’s up’?

“I was here…and you weren’t. I just wanted – well, I wanted to see if you were you and if you were okay.”

“You’re not angry?” It’s like a slippery eel, out of my mouth before I can even grasp what I’m saying.

“Actually, I’m very angry,” she admits quietly, with no venom in her voice. “Those things you said to me…” I make a little noise in my throat, kind of a dying noise. I want to say I’m sorry, but it seems so inadequate now. My ‘reasons’ seem so distant, on the horizon of a parallel universe. I was angry, how is that a justification of taking her like an animal? How can that be a “reason” for saying ugly things to her?

“I-Buffy…I-” I can’t say anything suddenly because my throat is collapsing, and I don’t know why I feel so bad, so unbearably bad for treating her this way. God, I’m turning into Spike. And he’s already ten times the me because he got the fucking Shanshu. Something I’ve been working on for so long. She’ll care, and she’ll be even angrier when I tell her.

“Angel, what’s wrong?” Hurt and worry are catapulted into her words, and sometimes I don’t even think I understand the violence with which I love her. And maybe that sounds bad, but it’s not gory violence, it’s just this depth of feeling. It’s like the bottom of the ocean, but ten times as far, because I’ve already been to the bottom of the ocean. She’s not even a real Slayer anymore, and she still cradles this compassion, this selflessness inside of her that’s been ingrained in her. Only one of the things that I love about her. How can you be so perfectly made for someone but so fucked up? I just don’t understand it. Fate is pretty twisted.

“I-I don’t know,” I stumble over the words and curse myself. I was never good at hiding things. Well, I used to be, when I could keep my mouth shut. I should have just hung up at the first syllable of my name. But who am I to deny the candy-sweetness of my name? Who knew it could be so beautiful? God she’s just-

“Angel,” she says plainly. I know that she’s trying to coax me, and her voice is calm. It belies the storm beneath, something rippling in her tone like stars orbiting. She always sounds like that when she’s hiding her anger, when she’s barely tethering her emotion. Isn’t it amazing that I can still read that? Sometimes I can’t even believe it myself. I can still feel the texture of her shiny lacquered fingernails, the gloss on her lips, that light pink color that I always associate with her. Her skin, like that yellow-gold-rose color that comes up in the morning with the sun. She’s so much older now, and I’m so much worse…and she’s built a new life around her. And we’re still so not right for each other that it’s sick. But I still love her. How can I explain it? It just exists; it’s like a deep pull inside of me. Like a black hole with unbearable light inside of it.

“I just wanted to apologize,” I say lamely, knowing that it could never compensate. God, I could never compensate. “Last night was…empty. I just left you there afterwards. I’m sorry.”

There’s just breathing on the other end before I hear a little grunt. Then she speaks. “I heard about Spike,” she says, choosing to ignore my apology. I’m hoping that she’s just stowing it away for later, in usual Buffy-fashion. If she couldn’t accept it, I’m not sure what I’d do. I kind of feel like I’m underwater, like this all isn’t real. Like there’s gauze coiled inside of my head, veiling me from the truth. Did last night really happen?

“I know that he’s alive.” She seems so much gentler now. Or maybe she’s not, maybe she’s just gentle because my face isn’t there to punch. “He’s really…alive. I couldn’t believe it.”

“Yes,” I say. I don’t know how else to answer that. How do you respond to your life disintegrating like something frail in your fingertips? I question now if I even really had a life in the first place.

“Maybe that’s why I’m not as angry, Angel.” Again, it’s like melted chocolate. And fuck, I can’t even taste chocolate. “I understand – that you’re angry. I would be too,” she ends this little section with a bitter laugh, and I can feel the rope starting to knot itself between us again, slowly trying to fuse together. I wonder if she feels the same, or if it’s only my illusions. “I’m sorry. I know that I don’t understand the full story, but I’m sorry. You deserved it. You really did.” She sounds sincere. She could have been so fake. Told me an empty apology and hung up the phone. But she stays on, and through the receiver I can hear breath and the strong heartbeat the lulled me to sleep last night.

“I guess not enough to earn it, huh?” I say. I don’t mean to sound like such an asshole, but that seems to be all I can manage lately. It’s only been a few months, it would be expected that I’d still be sour. But a Champion wouldn’t be sour, now would he? No, he would be lounging poolside with some fucking fruity drink and tons of women. And he is.

“There must have been some kind of screw up, I mean honestly-”

“No, he saved us all.” I sigh, not wanting to release any more information than I already have. “I’m just sorry that you got caught in the crossfire, Buffy. I just wanted to see you again…I just wanted to see you one last time, to tell you about Spike and I-”

“You what?” She says with little tremors in her voice. I can tell that she’s afraid of my next words, but I need to get them out regardless. There’s never been much real, solid communication between us, despite our deep connection.

“I never want you to think that I used you. I was just desperate for you. I couldn’t get you out of my head.”

“You sure that’s it?” She’s always been a smart one. But I didn’t go to her out of pure jealousy of Spike. If that were it, I’d just put Spike’s head on a stick. No, I wanted her. I had some kind of feeling stringing me along towards her that I couldn’t ignore, and then there I was in front of her door, pounding frantically on it. My libido was out of control at her scent, and I was nearly clawing at the damn door. Then I was inside, saying my heart, my jealousy, and I was kissing her.

“I know that…” I take a deep breath, “I know that I’m not good enough for you, that I’ll never be, but I just had to see you again. I mean, it’s been so long.”

There’s an awkward silence for a little while, and my inadequate reasons slither over the phone cords. Finally she replies. “If you’re think that I’m going to pick Spike over you, or some other silly thought like that, you can forget it,” she says firmly. “What I don’t understand is why you couldn’t have just come right out and said that you think that Spike is going to get everything he ever wanted, including me.” It’s good to see she hasn’t lost her intelligence. “If you hadn’t fucked me on my bed like some whore, we could be sitting together on my couch right now, and I could be asking you out for coffee.”

“Buffy, it’s not going to work, it’s never going to work-”

“Angel, shut up,” she says softly. “I’m different now. It’s been two years since we’ve last seen each other. We’ll find a way. Isn’t that what we always do?”

“I don’t know,” I answer honestly into the phone.

“Well, we usually find a way, unless you’re running away from me.” I smile at the wry tone her voice has taken. Maybe she has changed, but there are still traces of Buffy inside of her. There’s young Buffy and old Buffy and new and wise and naïve and everything that I still love. It’s crazy to have this feeling inside of you and just know, like instinct, what it is. There’s no ‘maybe’ or uncertainty about it, it just happens. And it’s still there, coursing through my veins. I don’t think I could love another so much. I don’t think I could love anyone besides her. And it’s bizarre, because I’m still trying to figure out what love is.

I went to a poetry reading once and there was a poet who said that everyone is in love with their poems when they first create them. They’re shiny and new, and perfect and delicate and everything that you want them to be. This poet compared them to a lover. You love them for who you make them out to be, who you worship them for in your mind. Then you get to know them and your love crumbles, like stale cake. Same with your poetry, the more you look at it, the more you nitpick, and the more you hate it. Somehow, somehow, I’ve managed to skip the whole ‘falling out of’. Buffy is more than what I’ve created in my mind. The figurehead that I’ve made her out to be, the paragon that I’ve created in my own imagination, is ten times less than what a woman she is. I can feel the life pulsing from her in rivulets, and I don’t think that I’ll ever understand just what that means. Maybe that’s why I can’t fall out of love. There is no false reflection here, it’s just purity, running through my chest, whenever I see her smile. The way her eyes light up like jade lanterns.

I’m the poison in that purity, the one that ruins it. I shatter the image, the rock to her mirror. I come in and fuck her, defile her, out of rage and sadness and depression. Sometimes I just repress myself so much that there’s no getting around the bursts of emotion that come out of me, and I aim them at whoever is closest to my heart. I suppose that’s why she’s been hurt so many times before. I’m not good with sharing; I don’t think I’ve ever been. I hurt her, and that reflects off of her and comes directly back to wound me.

---

Her eyes glow in the blue darkness of the setting sun. They have sheen to them like emeralds, but there’s a certain opalescence that they have that even emeralds don’t possess. I’m standing outside her door, feeling suddenly big and small at the same time. I can’t believe that I just tainted something so beautiful, letting my emotions override every part of me.

“Are you okay?” I ask tentatively, and she nods and steps backwards, in a silent invitation.

“I’m fine. Slayer strength, remember? ‘Sides, it doesn’t take that much to get over great sex.”

There’s a creeping smile on my face. “Great, huh?” She just smiles at me, and for a moment I’m lost. I’d forgotten that look, so sweetly girlish, but at the same possessing the knowledge of a thousand warriors. “I just didn’t – I didn’t want it to be like that. It was kind of dirty.”

“I’ve had worse,” she says nonchalantly, as she sits on her couch and turns on a small light. A blue shine from outside casts on her face as rain starts falling. Gentle rolls of thunder sound when I seat myself. “So, talk.” Always the blunt one.

“I don’t know what to say,” I admit after a second. It’s awkward, but she’s trying to make it not be. “You have everything you want,” I start.

“No, I don’t,” she smiles. “I don’t know if I’ll ever have everything that I want.”

“Maybe not,” I concede. “It’s just well…now Spike’s human. I guess I just wanted to make sure you were real. That what we had was real.” Her only response is her smile departing, like a halogen lamp fading off.

“Why do you keep thinking I’m going to choose Spike?” Her voice bounces off the walls like a wild thing, and I suddenly wonder why I’m even here. Why do I even bother? We haven’t seen each other for years.

“He’s human. He knows you better than me. I’m still not enough.”

“Is that the reason that you came all the way here? Because you have inferiority issues?”

“No,” I answer firmly. “I’ve been thinking about you a lot lately,” I admit, finally. “Not just because of Spike…but ever since that day in the cemetery. I’ve just been…thinking.”

“Yeah?” She reclines a little, and her face scrunches up in a yawn. Outside it gets darker, and the rain falls harder.

There’s this thing inside of me that thinks that she’s kind of like wine. When she ages, when she changes, it’s like filaments of light showing her true beauty. And maybe that sounds corny – but it’s true. My love for her is like knowing that the sun will rise every day and set every night. It’s as primal as knowing that you’re hungry, or as common and certain as knowing that two plus two equals four. There’s no way that any of those things will change, there’s no way that I can unlearn them.

This shocks me a little. Because I know that there will be no one else like her, and sometimes I let these feelings get the best of me, I let my obsession with her override me. It’s not unhealthy, though, because it’s kind of cleansing to think about her. It’s like being run through cheesecloth, being drained, being revived. This still happens to me, with an intensity more than the sun. But I know, somehow, that she won’t feel the same. I know that it’s been too long. To me, it’s been only one sixtieth of my life, something akin to one millisecond.

I’ve spent a long time being lonely. I’ve spent a lot of time around friends, amongst family. I’ve spent way too much time without her. I need to at least say it. Before I give up, truly give up, I need to let out communication in bursts of color. Communication that we’ve never achieved, things that have made us deteriorate. I need to make her sure; I need to make myself sure. “I’m sorry for…doing that to you,” I say, feeling ashamed that I can’t even talk openly about it. I know that I left her in the first place, and that might make me seem like I didn’t love her, but I had to find myself, as selfish as it sounds. And I had to let her go. I had to not love her because I loved her, if that makes any sense. When I left, I pushed my love so deep inside myself that sometimes I could even forget it, but it always resurfaced haunted me. It always chased, nipped at my heels. It’s back again, fuller and brighter than I ever thought, like a lustrous flower in bloom. It’s the sun, back glowing on me, bright, nearly searing me to ash.

“Fucking me?” She says candidly, and I nearly recoil. “I heard a poem once,” she says, suddenly, brightly, staring me down with her brilliant green. “It said that fuck is the mean-all word. It can mean happiness, pleasure, hurt, hate, exclamation. At the end of the poem, the woman talked about how when she said ‘fuck me’ to her husband, it wasn’t just some nasty, dirty thing. It was a clean, pure thing of making love tangible. Because it wasn’t what she said, it was who she said it to, and what they were doing. The word has so many aspects, and you can make it into whatever you want. Not just something nasty and kinky, but something light and playful, or loving and deep.” She ends the spiel here, and sometimes I think she’s too wise for her own good.

“Still,” I struggle, “I shouldn’t have just left you. It was wrong.”

“I’d have to agree with you there. You can’t maul a girl and then just leave. It’s not right, especially considering the first time,” she says. There’s still a light in her eyes. I can tell that she’s sad underneath though, that that point and time still carves a little part out of her heart. I can still see the colors shifting in her eyes, the way her brow slackens slightly.

“Buffy…”

“No, it’s cool,” she quips, leaning backwards. “Hey, do you want some wine or something?” Changing the subject, in typical Buffy-way. I know that this is going to be awkward; I know that it’s going to be painful, but I don’t care anymore. What else is there to try? As a last effort, if not for me than for her, I want to get this out. She has to know, she has to know what I feel.

“Buffy, it’s not cool. It was never ‘cool’. We never talked about this, and we need to.”

“Why? Why drag up old dust, Angel? What’s that gonna solve, huh?” A shaky smile ensues, and I know that she’s not as detached as she thinks.

“Just please, let me. I-I need this.” I can’t believe how scared I am, how incredibly scared I am just to tell her how I feel, what I need, to tell her the truth. How can someone who has faced the unthinkable, who has killed his own son, be scared of telling the truth? It’s true; facing Buffy with communication has always scared me. Maybe just because it all makes it so much more real.

I take a deep breath and start again. “I never told you…I never told you that it wasn’t your fault. Sending me to hell, I mean. I know that for a long time you thought it was, and maybe it’s a little late. But I just wanted to let you know that I was happy. Truly happy, and I wouldn’t take the night back for anything. The only thing that makes it horrible is your pain.”

She nods, but doesn’t respond. Where I’m expecting some acid-tongued quip, some kind of lash to me, I get a docile face that looks like china in the cobalt light from the window. “And I know that we haven’t been that open about sex. I just wanted to apologize for that. I mean,” I give a little nervous laugh, “I probably ruined you for life in that aspect. Or at least, hurt you a lot. I should have been more mature, more responsible. I should have taken the initiative. I should have talked to you about sending me to hell, about how much I loved you…all of it. I just want you to forgive me for that.”

“There’s nothing to forgive you for,” she says, and her mouth is shaped perfectly. I want to kiss it, but it’s been so long. How can you start something up as intense as I’m feeling two years after you’ve even see the object of your desire? “Don’t feel guilty, Angel. We were young then. Both of us. Despite what you may think, even you’ve grown since then.” She still has the strength to let happiness glitter inside of her, and it ricochets into her face.

“Now you have to let me say my piece,” she says. In fact, she even marks then end by getting off her couch and coming to sit next to me. “You made me happy. You did, and Angelus wasn’t you. The way I look at it is like this: we all have anger inside of us. The anger is part of us, but for most of us it doesn’t consume us. We are not our anger; our anger is just a side of us that comes through, that’s integrated into our personality. I think that’s what Angelus is. He’s a part of you, but there are so many more sides to you that your soul adds. It’s incredible.” I can’t help it, and I can’t even say that I regret it, but I kiss her. I take that slender jaw in my fingers and I pull her forward, and she lets me. I think it’s because she wants it too. Just like last night. She wanted it then too, because she clung to me. And maybe fucking was beautiful, because it was just us. Just our bodies. Maybe she was right.

It’s soft and sweet, and it’s like we’re being washed clean, it’s like we’re starting over. It’s like a first kiss, the first of both of our lives. Almost like nothing has existed before this. When I kiss her I can almost forget that my life is fragmented, that my purpose has dissolved. And so many things have come before, so many sweet connections that burn beneath our skin, and we can remember those. But with this kiss it’s like absolution, washing away all the bad and slipping into a new skin. For both of us. We can still know what happened, and acknowledge it, but we’re purging.

When I break it, it’s not awkward, but we just stare at each other through drugged eyes. It’s unbelievable that I can still get this way, even from a simple close-mouthed kiss. Her eyes are narrowed, her mouth slightly open, and the green has dimmed down to a lethargic color. She snaps out of it after a little bit, but I’m still in a stormy haze.

“Wow…”

“Uh, sorry,” I mumble, but it really comes out more like a slur, because I’m so put out of it. Just by the simple touch of her. I want to lean into her, tell her all my fears, tell her every insecurity that I’ve ever possessed and let her take it away, but I can’t put that on her. I can’t make her take that. I can’t lay that on her.

It’s now completely dark, except for the side table lamp, and I wonder where everyone else is. Dawn? I can smell other, unfamiliar scents that waft around the house, so I know that she lives with others. Also, it’s a big house.

She shifts so that we’re closer and I can feel her breath on my face. “Can we go somewhere, please?” She asks me, and I wonder if she thinks I would ever turn her down. For anything. She could have told me to rip my arm off in that innocent, pleading way, and I would have gladly done it.

“Yeah, let’s do that,” I say, and I grab her hand to pull her up. She goes up easily and I rub the back of her knuckle before letting go of her fingers.

“Dinner?” I look down for a second. “I know you can’t eat, but at least you can drink,” she says and touches me lightly on the arm. She can feel my sadness, just like I can taste hers.

---

“I’ll help you through this,” she says sweetly, showing her teeth in a smile. It’s stunning, and wine is on her lips, making her more open. I wish we could always be this open, this close. I wish we could stay together.

“Will you?” I say quietly, and she nods while she chomps on another bite of her food. When she eats, especially good food, her scent changes because she fills with the happiness of eating. It’s innocent, and completely primitive, but her scent changes in a base way that I can’t explain. It’s like endorphins being released into my system. It’s almost like her happiness is spreading into me, like food coloring into water. I study her face while she chews. She has the most beautiful nose in the world.

“Angel, I know that you feel depressed, I’ve been in the depression before. Of course, not the real one because y’know. I mean, you’ve been in the real one…Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that you’ll get through this. We’ll get through this.”

“We will?” I repeat, feeling little flashes inside of me. She’s so willing, so pliable, so reasonable. I know that I can’t love her anymore than this, but I also know that I’ll prove myself wrong in a year, two years.

“I’ll be there for you. You deserve somebody. You deserve a lot of somebodies, but it looks like you’re stuck with me.” I try to give her my most adoring smile, but I’m not sure if I could ever let that volume of love out of me. It’s just not possible.

“Okay,” I reply, and I take a sip of my wine.

---

When we get back to her house, there are a few lights on, but all is quiet on the Western Front. I don’t get drunk very often, but when I do I act wacky. Not that I’m drunk now, I’m just a little buzzed, and she’s a little tipsy. I should think that she would be ten times angrier with me, not consoling and soft. We just fucked like rabbits a day before, you wouldn’t think we’d be sharing our feelings and having dinner now. Time was, I’d take off and she’d let me. But she’s grown more aggressive since then; she’s dug her talons into me. It’s exactly where I want her. I wonder why she’s not pushing me off a ledge, whipping a stake out on me. It’s what I deserve.

“So what did Spike say when he came over?” I ask with what I can feel is a goofy smile on my face.

“He told me that he loved me, said some other bullshit, then he left,” she giggles. “But I can’t love him, I can’t! I mean, not the way that he wants.” She’s leaning heavily against the porch now, wobbling a little in her drunkenness. How can she possess such poise even when she’s downed a bottle of wine? And she’s small, it affects her a lot. “I did love him, Angel, I did a lot. I do. But I couldn’t even return that kind of love. You know? Maybe you don’t. You had Cordelia, right?”

“Buffy…maybe we shouldn’t-”

“No, I want to hear this!” She laughs. She doesn’t know about Cordelia yet. I’ve gotten over the death, as much as I can just ‘get over’ it. But it still aches a little when I hear her name. We were best friends. We weren’t in love (well, I wasn’t), that much I’ll admit, but we were close. Her death affected me, it hurt me a lot.

“I heard,” she slips a little, but catches herself before I can, “I heard that you had a ‘love of destiny’, you know? I mean, at first it pissed me off, but then I kind of laughed about it. I thought ‘Cordelia? What the fuck?’” Another thing about Buffy: she swears a lot, very casually, when she’s drunk. I’ve been around her a few times when she’s drunk, including this time, and I’ve noticed this. It doesn’t really bother me; I suppose it’s just silly. She’s loose, she’s comfortable, of course she would swear.

“She was different…I was different.”

“So it was true?” She asks. For a second she seems dumbfounded, then hurt, and I wonder how she could get jealous over another woman. How could I find her then just fall in love three years later, not to mention such a short time after her resurrection? How could she even think that?

“No, not exactly. She had changed. It’s true that our relationship had changed, but I don’t think we were in love, no.”

Her face goes slack a little and she looks relieved, and that feeling makes me light up inside, like the sunrise. She’s happy that I wasn’t in love with someone else. “Then what was all that prophecy stuff, or whatever?”

“I think it was just my friends trying to help me get over you. I was trying to help myself get over you, because I couldn’t allow myself to think about your death and your resurrection. I would really slip if that happened, Buffy, and I couldn’t allow that to happen.”

“Oh, I get it. So did you?”

“Did I what?”

“Did you get over me?”

“Ah…” I don’t really have to answer this because she’s twirling around the post on the front porch and she slips. I catch her by the waist and instinctually pull her towards me. It’s funny how things work out sometimes. She looks up at me and kisses me right on my nose, a big wet and sloppy drunk kiss. Then she laughs and I laugh a little too.

“Let’s go inside. Post drunk party,” she whispers to me, and I hoist her upright and she leans on me, and we go inside. “Except you’re not drunk. How long does it take for you to get drunk, anyway?”

“What about your roommates?” I ask, purposely avoiding her question. We step over the threshold and I close the door behind me. Her eyes go cloudy for a second before she smiles. Her smile is soft, like blurred lines. A drunk’s smile. Does she get drunk often? I hope not, but this is Italy.

“Four of them. All out partying. I’d rather be here with you,” she pushes one of her fingers right into the middle of my chest, right about where her nose comes up to. She slips off her sandals and saunters over to the couch and flops on it, obviously feeling sleepy.

“And Dawn?” I still stand by the door, unsure. I don’t want to feel unwelcome. It’s happened too many times before.

“Living on her own,” she yawns, “school and stuff. She’s going to some Italian University. So we’re alone, there’s nothing to fear, Batman.” Now she’s just not making sense. But I like her logic; it reminds me of her. Something so unique that she couldn’t ever just be another blonde girl. Her hair is shiny and the color of wheat in the low light. “You have to stay with me tonight, okay? No leaving. I don’t want you taking off again, because we need to talk about the Sanshu. The Sunshine Sun-Soo thingy. Yeah.” I let out a low laugh at her mispronunciation. She’s really that drunk. I must love her, to find even something like this endearing.

I sit down across from her, studying the way she’s spread out on the couch. She looks right about at the passing-out stage, and I suppose that I’ll fulfill her wishes and stay here. Maybe I’ll sleep in someone else’s room and put her to bed if she passes out here right on the couch. I get up before she can get to the stage where her eyes roll back in her head and pick her up, sliding one hand under her knees and one under her back. She looks up at me with bleary eyes.

"Angel,” she says, and it’s all melted and gooey coming off her tongue, in her drunkenness.

“Mmm?” I reply, steadily carrying her up the stairs.

“I’m so sick of the men here,” she wraps her arms around my neck. “You gotta stay. My bedroom is the last one on the left. You have to stay, just stay so I have something to hold onto. Don’t leave, okay? Promise.”

“I promise, Buffy,” I say.

“And you have to stay in my bed,” she says. “But no fucking, because that would only complicate things.” She laughs at this, and my lips curve a little too. She’s cute, she really is. I nudge the door open into darkness, and navigate easily. Her bed is the same as I remember, big and white and blue. Like an Italian summer. Although, I didn’t spend much time focusing on it before, I only focused on her, and her incredible mouth, and her heartbeat, her strength and her body.

“Just stay,” that’s the last thing she says before she fades out. I put her on the bed and scoot her over to the far side. Then I pull off my shoes and join her, pulling the covers over both of us. But no fucking this time, because it would only complicate things.

In the morning Buffy tries to make muffins and fails miserably. I suppose I can’t be that disappointed because I can’t eat them anyway. She makes them watery, she forgets to spray the muffin tin, so they come out burnt and stuck on. She finally gives up and breaks the thing in half after trying to scrub the black crust off for twenty minutes. She also has a hangover.

“Shitty muffins,” she growls, as she stoops over her coffee and rubs her head. “I threw up twice this morning, Angel,” she almost whines, and I try to keep a solemn face.

“It’ll be okay, Buffy,” I say, touching her back lightly.

“No it won’t! I feel like there are elephants having a party inside of my stomach and my head is being chipped away with those ice-pick thingies that you use to break ice apart. It hurts.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t have drunk so much wine.”

“Yeah, maybe,” she mutters. “Then I mess up the muffins! I’ll never be a Martha Stewart. Which is…actually kind of good, once you think about it. I mean, she’s in jail now for a long time, and she did all this intrading or whatever. Then on top of that I heard she’s this arrogant bitch. So I guess in a way-”

“Buffy, you need to lie down.” I look at the sunlight patches on the floor before I look back up at her face.

“Actually, I so need to be at work in about a half an hour. And I still look like shit, and my hair’s a mess.”

“No, come upstairs with me. You can skip work for a day.” Through the haze of pain she still manages a smile towards me and slips her hand into mine.

We move through the darkened hallway and see a sleepy slip of a girl moving through. She looks up at me then looks at Buffy. “Where did you pick up him?” She says in a thick accent. Then she gives me an appraising smile to which Buffy only groans.

“Not now, Rosa, I need sleep. And stop looking him over,” she growls, tugging me towards her room.

“That one of your roommates?” I ask her as she flops on her bed and holds her arms out to me.

“Yeah,” she looks so small on her bed, so tired. And she still manages to give me a tiny smile. “She likes looking over men. Especially of the lickable kind. Which would include you.”

Her arms automatically slip tightly around me, almost too tightly for a second, before I return the gesture. We lay on our sides, her arms ensuring that I won’t get away from her. They’re slipped around my waist tight, and I can feel them interlaced behind my back. Her nose (the beautiful one) is crushed up against my chest and she’s inhaling me like oxygen. Her heartbeat is going a million miles against my stomach, fluttering like a crazy insect. I slip my hands around her back and place my mouth against her hair.

“My head hurts,” she moans. Her voice is muffled against me.

“Want some Advil?” I say quietly.

“No, I already had some. And I know that the girls are gonna come in here and start bugging me about who you are and why you’re here and why I have a hangover and I just can’t deal with that.”

“Let me deal with it,” I try to say as gently as I can. She just pushes herself further into me.

“You make it better,” she says, before going to sleep.

Unfortunately, she wasn’t lying when she said that they would bother us. All I want to do is cradle her warmth and sleep during the day, with my arms around her. I want to think about all the hangover and bad muffins and swearing that I could encounter in the future, if only she’d let me. If only we could pretend that I wouldn’t be around forever, that I couldn’t give her babies or steal her life away. I wince at this thought, and I’m brought back to the poignancy of why I feel so damned sad these days. She takes it away though; she makes all of it worth it.

I awake to the slow pounding of her heart against me, and she’s breathing heavily into my neck, snoring a little. Then I hear creeping footsteps and feminine giggles, and I glance groggily around. It’s nearly sunset, probably an hour till. What the hell…?

“Buffy,” one of the girls says, in a loud whisper. She doesn’t want to knock, I can tell, she’d rather just peek through the door and watch us sleep. See if we’re going to do anything or not.

“What is it, ladies?” I ask, and my voice is husky from sleep. Buffy doesn’t rouse, but only continues to snore while the girls jump in surprise.

“There’s someone to see her,” the one named Rosa says and they all dissolve into laughter and saunter back down the hallway. Should I let her see them or see them myself? I should probably wake her up, don’t want to be rude.

I know how it feels to have a hangover, I made my life a string of them when I was human, and I know that I don’t want to wake her rudely. I can’t just shake her awake and shout at her. Normal speech sounds like shouting when you have a hangover. I decide to try as best I can to wake her, simply but stoking her shoulder and whispering to her. Kissing her temple, her hair occasionally. Eventually the snoring comes to a halt.

“What?” She asks, and there’s still a resonance of a headache, I can feel her tension thickly in the air.

“Someone here to see you,” I say in a light whisper, and she opens one eye.

“Tell that someone I don’t want to see them,” she groans before turning her head the other way.

I get up quickly without even thinking twice. I crawl out of bed and open the door slightly, slipping through it. The girls have vanished, probably downstairs or off to their own devices. I’m glad.

Downstairs, carefully dodging sunlight, I see a bleached blonde head looking appreciatively at the sunlit girls walking around outside the window. He has a nice tan now, but hasn’t lost that radioactive head of his. I know why he’s here. And honestly, I’m glad that Buffy didn’t want to come down and see him. At least the sun is going down quickly, and my sleepiness is evaporating.

I know that I could easily kick his ass out of here if I wanted to, but Buffy wouldn’t be happy about that. She would probably call me childish and throw me in a patch of sunlight.

“Angel,” he says, his eyes thinning. Already, his accent is a little less. It’s blending with an American and Italian accent, creating a totally different hybrid. If it weren’t for the beacon of his hair, I probably wouldn’t have even recognized him. “What are you doing here, mate?”

“I came to see Buffy.”

“And now you’re her answering boy too?”

“No.” I restrain myself from saying something else, knowing that it will only come to bite me in the ass later.

“Well, I need to talk to her, so if you could go hide in a patch of shadows, that’d be great. It’s really more of an A-B conversation. You know, excluding the ‘C’.”

“I know Spike,” I say through a clenched jaw, precariously holding the reins on the slew of insults that I have in my head. “And she doesn’t feel well. She doesn’t want to see anybody right now. So you can just leave a message or come back later.”

“Uh-huh. Sure that you aren’t just hoarding her up there, not telling her that I’m here?”

“I’m sure,” I say. Well, it’s the partial truth.

He lifts his nose, looking at me through his newly human eyes before letting loose a half grin. He already knows that he won, regardless of the little battles that I may win along the way. He already got what he wanted; he already proved that he’s better than I am. He doesn’t say anything to my remark but turns and walks exaggeratedly out into the fading sunshine, where he knows that I can’t go.

---

Back up in the darkened room, darkened by her blinds, I can sense that she’s awake. Her eyes are open and following me around, but she’s still sprawled out over the bed.

“Who was it?” She whispers, moving only minimally.

“It was ah…salesman,” I don’t know if I’m prepared to broach the subject of Spike. I’m reminded of why I came here in the first place, only to apologize for using her. Well, not using her, just taking her so brutally. I abused her, just because I was selfish and desperate. I shouldn’t be here, I shouldn’t have listened to her pleas and stayed. It would have been better had I left. She holds her arms out to me, signifying what she wants. I have a weakness for her, I’ll admit.

I slide into the bed, under the sheets warmed by her skin and her arms slide around my waist. They clasp behind me, and I know that I’m trapped. I lift my hand and stroke the hair off of her face. She smiles at me, and it’s nice being so close. Not only to another person, but also to her.

“It’s been a long time having someone in my bed, someone who held me.”

“How long?” I say, and I can’t help it. She looks up at me and smiles a sweet, knowing smile.

“A long time,” is all she offers. “And it’s never felt so good.” We lay there for a little while, with me just stroking her face and she laying there and pressing her body against mine. My hand comes up to cup her face, my thumb passing over her brow every few seconds.

“I need to go,” I whisper to her, my face only a couple inches from her own. Her arms are still wrapped warmly, comfortably, around my waist. I feel large, imposing, on this bed. I feel like I can’t give her anything, and it’s true: I can’t. I had forgotten that within just ten minutes of her presence. Now it’s nearly been two days and I’m still lazing around here, watching her get drunk and burn muffins. It’s not what she needs, and it doesn’t matter what I need anymore. I’m a moot point on this earth.

“Why do you need to go?” She says, and I can see this light coming up in her eyes, like the light of a train fast approaching. It’s full of sadness and regret, and insecurity. And I don’t want her to have that. “Don’t go. Didn’t you hear me? I said I like having you here.” She smiles, unsure of what my reaction will be. I continue stroking her face, and she closes her eyes.

“I kind of ambushed you, Buffy. Just coming here…taking out my anger on you. I was jealous.”

“Of Spike?”

“Yeah,” I chuckle a little, but it leaves a sour taste in my mouth, “I guess.”

“Don’t be. He’s nothing.”

I wince at these words. Nothing has changed. Well, maybe except the curse, but does that matter? “We still have problems, Buffy.”

“That’s okay with me,” she says in a chipper tone, one that warns me that there’s trouble brewing underneath. She’s always been stubborn. She’ll always be. “People have problems. People together have problems. It happens.” She tries to roll it off her back, but I know that she too knows that nothing has changed.

“I don’t want to suck away your li-” She lets out a groan before cutting off my prepared speech by her lips creeping onto mine. It’s not a spontaneous, harsh thing. It’s almost like she did it in slow motion, like she’d been planning it for the last ten minutes. She kisses me lightly, little surface kisses, not really putting any work into it, and my hand slides around to her neck. It tastes better than anything I can imagine that I want. Hell, this is what I want. She just dashed my reason into a million little pieces of confetti, spraying them away into nothing.

When she pulls away, she opens her eyes gradually and they’re a bright and shiny, like something polished. “I know what I want, and I want you here, Angel. Don’t give me your bullshit reasons and leave, okay?”

I don’t say anything, but lay my head on top of hers. She lets out a large sigh and her body expands against mine for a second, filling with sweet breath that she exhales out. I slip into another nap for a while.

I wake to warm kisses along my neck, and the first thing that I think is how nice it is, and the second I think is how horrible it is. This will only make it harder. She lays her head on top of mine again and sighs again, a big gasping thing. I can feel her heartbeat hammering against my shoulder.

“I need to leave,” I say in a loud whisper, and she starts the fluttering kisses along my neck again. I try to resist, but it’s hard.

“Don’t leave,” she finally says. “I want you to stay here.” Her breath is hot on my ear, and it’s really hard to negate that question when she’s so close to me. “The curse is gone right?” She asks, and I can’t think of an answer. Actually, I can’t really think of anything except her body against mine, her voice in my ear. She laughs lightly and bites down on my earlobe.

“Buffy,” I rasp, and after a second when she’s doesn’t stop, I say it again. “Buffy.” She pulls away a little and I roll over to face her. Again her arms are around me and I wonder why she always has to hold me. It makes it so much harder, dammit.

I sigh a little before starting the millionth revision of the speech that I had prepared in my head. “We can’t do this. I can’t suck away a brand new life that you have.”

“Who’s sucking? I’m not sucking. I mean…you’re sucking blood but well, that’s a different story.”

“You know what I mean,” I say with a stern face. “You’re not a Slayer anymore. You’re trying to escape all the demons that were in your life, all the vampires and staking. I would only drag you into my world, or worse, you would drag me into yours.” “Maybe I want somebody in my life,” she says, pulling me into her.

“I’ll age when you won’t. I can’t give you anything, Buffy. No sunlight, kids, no nothing. Nothing has changed.”

“I think we can make it,” she says confidently, as though nothing I’ve just said has extinguished her hopes at all. “I think that we can do it. And…” she starts kissing my neck again, almost hiding her face in the skin there, “the curse is gone, right? No more bad happy?” I can’t reply to this, so instead I just make a little growling sound. “Was Spike at the door?” She says, loudly, as if just catching on. Which is probably the truth. I lean my head back with my eyes closed, wishing nothing more than that her lips were back on my neck.

“Mmmm…” I reply, not really prepared to say ‘yes’ quite yet.

“Did you turn him away because I told you to, or because you were jealous?” I open my eyes and stare her head on. “Is that why you want to leave now? Because he was here?”

“That’s not all of it, Buffy,” I say, rubbing my eyes. “There’s so much more – I didn’t mean to lead you on like this. I just meant to come apologize when you invited me and suddenly we were going out to dinner and…I just don’t want to ruin your life. I don’t want you to be sad, to get tired of me.”

“I don’t foresee that in the near future,” she says, and her mouth moves against my cheek. I can feel it, a centimeter away from my skin. I know that she’s teasing me. And I also know that we have so much more to talk about. “Buffy, we have to be serious. We can’t dive headfirst into this without at least looking at it realistically. Please, just talk with me.”

“Okay,” she says, conceding far too quickly. I know that something is up immediately.

“Buffy, sex wasn’t the only problem. There was a lot more to our relationship than that. I didn’t get the Shanshu, okay? I’m not human. I have nothing to offer you or anyone else.”

She stares me in the eyes and asks me the boldest question that’s ever come out of her mouth. “Do you love me?” It’s not demanding, it’s simple, like saying ‘hello’. She’s not trying to make me say it, she’s just curious.

“I don’t think it’s possible for me to love anything else,” I hear myself say. “So…” she says slowly, pointedly, “you still love me?” Sometimes Buffy may seem like a ditz, but she’s incredibly smart. She has reflexes like a cat, and she’s intelligent and beautiful and witty. She also likes to make points.

“You know I do, Buffy,” I tell her. “That won’t ever stop.”

“Then what else do I need?”

“Humanity?” I offer, and it’s out before I can stop it.

“No,” she says, laying her hand on top of mine. “No, stop it. I didn’t love you because you’re a vampire. I won’t not love you because you’re a vampire. No one can emotionally stop themselves from loving. I don’t care about logistics. Can’t we make it work? Aren’t we allowed just a little time to relearn each other?” It’s hard to believe that she’s so positive. Time as a non-slayer must have done some good for her optimism. Last I saw, she seemed pretty down in the dumps.

I don’t say anything to her words. “I think that one day, we’ll get it. You’ll get it, even if I have to kick the Powers’ ass. They’re just testing you, making you wait a little longer, Angel. Don’t lose your focus. Even if you lose everything else.”

I pull her close. I can’t help it. I have the overwhelming urge to make myself sure that she’s real, that I’m here and she’s actually comforting me. “Will I always have you?” I ask. For the first time in as long as I can remember, I feel insecure. I don’t want that. But she’s Buffy, and she wouldn’t let me fall because she loves me. She loves me, despite the fact that I fucked her not two days ago, left her three times, broke her heart, drank her blood, sent her away for another girl, and tried to love someone else. She’s done everything for me, and she is so fucking beautiful.

“Jeez!” She hits me, and I flinch unexpectedly. It’s a light hit (at least but her standards) but it still shocks me a little. “Of course you will, Angel! Or don’t you get the point?”

“Point?” My brow furrows a little.

“The whole point, you dummy.” We’re quiet for a little while, watching the shadows change while the sun says its goodbyes. Hopefully we’ll never have to do the same.

“I love you,” she whispers to me, right as the pink is fading into a dark indigo, and the stars are birthing themselves in the sky.

“You shouldn’t expect any less from me,” I tell her, staring her straight on.

---

We wake up in the middle of the night, or rather I wake up to her, burying herself into me after getting up for a drink. I can smell the water on her tongue. Her soft hands are gliding over my skin, through my shirt. I was always a hedonist, having a fetish for silk shirts, velvet. She feels like that all over, except she’s warm, and she moves. I want to touch her, but I need to hold back. We can’t just start having sex, then start a relationship, that’s not how it works. I won’t become another Spike.

She’s still awake. “Did you really love her?” She asks, and for a second I’m disoriented.

“Who?” I ask.

“Cordelia. I know that it’s selfish of me but – well, I’ve become a little selfish in the past few years.”

“Buffy, it doesn’t matter now, she’s dead.”

“No, I need to know,” she grinds out, almost forcefully. “It matters, it matters to me. I never loved anyone but you. I mean, I loved people. I loved Riley and Spike, but not like you. I was in love with you.”

She’s softly clinging to me, but I’m still unable to meet her eyes. I can feel them, they’re trained on my face. “Buffy, I already told you no.”

“Are you sure?” Her eyes are like cats’ eyes. They’re large and luminous, all-knowing. I sigh and push her on her back, resting my head on her chest without her permission. She seems to be okay with it, though, because her hands immediately start sifting through my hair. She’s so small, but her heartbeat is like a thousand drums all pounding together at once. I don’t know how such a tiny person can have such a strong, loud heartbeat.

“I’m sure, Buffy. I won’t be in love with anyone else for as long as I live. I can’t.”

“Even when I’m old and dying?” I lift my head off of her chest, and look at her through the growing darkness.

“Don’t say that,” I whisper. I don’t want to think about that.

“Well, you’ll be old and you’ll die with me, Angel,” I can see her smile, like a beacon.

“Yeah maybe, or maybe it’ll be Spike.”

“No,” she says, and her expression goes icy. “No. It will be you. You will die with me, and we’ll be married and have great grand kids and all that other crap. It will be you. I don’t care where you go or what you do, just don’t be without me, because I’m gonna be waiting for that Shanshu.” I’m content with these words, content enough to just lay my head back on her chest and close my eyes. She starts humming a tune that I can’t name, but her heartbeat twines with it.

Fin

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