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Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters in this story. They belong to Joss Whedon, the WB, Fox, Mutant Enemy, etc.
Author's Note: This begins the day after 'Homecoming'. It's first person, from the point of view of whoever's name is above that section (I think it's all pretty obvious, I just wanted to point it out). I apologize for some of the writing perhaps being a bit unclear. I tried to write it more as a person would think than as someone would write a story, so they might repeat things or have them slightly out of order. Sorry. I love comments, so e-mail me at felicity_rose@hotmail.com. Enjoy . . .
Part 1
Her words plunged me back into Hell, though not in body. Seeing someone, she said. Scott. A nice, normal, teenage name. Not like Angel. He makes her happy. Like I never could. Like I never will. Maybe she loves him. She loved me after all, for much less reason. I couldn’t make her happy. She *loved* me. As in past tense.
That’s the worst of it. She doesn’t love me anymore. She can’t, not and stand there telling me in a calm voice that she needs someone that makes her happy. And she was right. Is right. She does need someone like this boy. Someone human, someone sane, that can bring her more than pain. She needs that and she deserves it. But with her words I was lost.
When I first saw Buffy-saw her to know her-it was like seeing light after a lifetime of darkness. For a minute the pain went away. I was safe. Buffy’s strength would protect me and her love would heal me. It’s the only thing that can. But it’s gone. I know that now. I lost her love and I didn’t even know it until she said those words and I went back to Hell.
Sometimes I feel as if I never left it. Especially when I sleep. My dreams take me back and I can’t wake myself up. I can only sleep when she’s there, watching over me. When I know she’ll pull me back to reality if I go too far. If I cry out, she’ll save me. I need that and now it’s gone. She said she would still help but she can’t, not really, not if she doesn’t love me.
When I was in Hell the only thing that kept me alive was the knowledge of Buffy’s love. The knowledge that she would pull me out, would love me and heal me. But she won’t heal me, no matter how hard she tries. She doesn’t love me anymore and nothing else matters.
In the last few days I have begun to think that maybe I never did leave Hell after all. Maybe that was just the prelude, the set-up for the Hell I am in now. Here I can do nothing but try and forget the pain, and that is impossible. It only makes it worse, trying to forget. I only eat when Buffy comes and I vomit up the blood as often as not . . . though never when she’s here. I cannot sleep without her, and I hear her voice in my mind, over and over saying the same words . . . Before, at least, I had hope. Now there is none. Before I had her, and now, when she is so near I can touch her, I do not. Her soul is out of my reach, and that is the only thing that could help me now.
I pace to keep the pain away, but it stays.
I cry to bring her back but she does not come.
Buffy
Sometimes I wonder how I did it. How I stood there and told him, as if it was nothing. As if it was getting a car for Christmas, or killing some vampire. It wasn’t. It was so much more. But I said it. I said it and then it didn’t even matter because I was too distracted. It didn’t matter that I hurt Angel. That I hurt myself. I did it for Scott and I was . . . too distracted. No, that’s not true. I didn’t do it for Scott. I did it for me. He’s great and I so don’t blame him for dumping me, but . . . I did it because I needed to. I needed Angel to know that I was over him. Except I’m not. There. I thought it out loud . . . or whatever. I am not over Angel.
I thought I was. I totally and completely thought I was and if he’d never come back I probably would, in time have gotten over him. But it was too soon. It’s all happened too fast. There was no time to think about it, to wonder. It just happened and I told him and realized after I said the words that I was lying. Sort of. I know I’m not making any sense. After I told Angel about Scott I realized I was wrong. Not lying, because I never actually told Angel I was over him in a romantic sense. It was just implied. Strongly implied. And that was wrong. Unfortunately, I didn’t know this until after I told him, and at that point I couldn’t exactly tell him the truth since I was (and still am) very confused about it myself. Plus I was still dating Scott at that point. He took care of that, and I am now officially single. But that doesn’t make everything good all of a sudden. Because what I said to Angel was true. The whole thing. It was just the implied stuff that wasn’t. Everything else was right on. Like me needing someone stable, someone that makes me happy.
Angel used to make me happy. I was never happier than when we were together. I hope he knows that. It’s not that he can’t make me happy. Just being around him used to give me thrills. Let’s not even go into kissing him. Or anything else. But things have changed. If it was the same situation only now it wouldn’t matter. Being a senior and working harder at school has not ruled at all possibilities of a vampire boyfriend. But now . . . well we’d never be able to have a really, really serious relationship. Well, we could, as long as it stayed serious. I’m talking no fun here. And that’s not what I want. Even though I know he can be sort-of happy, it would be really hard. All the time I’d been wondering if the next little thing would push him over the edge. Every second we were together I would worry that I would turn him bad again. I don’t know if I could take that.
Other things would be hard too . . . we couldn’t go anywhere, because I can’t tell anyone else that he’s back. He’s still really hurt from Hell and the one thing I really don’t need right now is a boyfriend that’s dependent on me for everything. I want to help Angel. I really do. And I will help. But helping a friend is a lot easier than helping someone you love. Which I might be doing right now but it’s easier when I haven’t had to admit it yet and if I told Angel the truth I would have to admit it, I would have no choice. If I do love him that is. Which I’m not admitting. I’m not admitting anything. Not until I have to.
I wish I had seen Angel’s face when I told him. Maybe I’d have a better idea of what to do then. Right now I don’t know. Does it even matter to him that I have—had—a boyfriend? Was it annoying because I wouldn’t spend as much time taking care of him? Or was it devastating? Did it hurt him? I don’t know, I can’t tell and I don’t know what to do without knowing that first.
It would be so easy to go back. So easy to tell him I love him and take shelter from the world in his arms. To kiss him and assure him that everything will be all right and I will take care of him. So easy and so very, very hard. Because once I do that I can never go back. I can never change my mind. It’s forever or bust.
All this is assuming of course that there’s not another option about how he felt about Scott. Assuming that he wasn’t happy I had a boyfriend because he never wanted me near him again after what I did.
Maybe that’s an assumption I should make. Maybe it’s not.
Angel
She’ll come soon. I know she will. It’s been a few days. The night before was the . . . the dance she mentioned, and tonight is nothing. Unless she has a date with Scott. Would she leave me for a date with him? Shouldn’t she?
Three days without sleep. She brought me enough blood last time for the whole period of her absence, but it doesn’t help. When I can eat it makes me sick, remembering what other blood I have tasted, what pain I have given. I wondered once where she got the blood from, then decided I didn’t want to know. I don’t.
She must come tonight.
I sway with weariness but push it off desperately. I must not let myself go. I must not sleep. For in sleep I have no control. In sleep I go back and I cannot get myself out. Only she can do that. I cannot sleep until she comes. And she must come or I will sleep anyway and be lost. She must come tonight.
There is a noise—a shoe scraping on the floor outside. My game face appears before I can stop it and I growl warningly. There is silence, and then a voice and I sag in relief.
“It’s me. Buffy. Don’t jump out, okay? I couldn’t handle that.” I won’t, I promise silently. I won’t jump out. I don’t think I could.
Buffy
I push aside the curtain cautiously, and take a deep breath when I see him, his game face fading, looking so weary that it almost breaks my heart. Almost.
“I brought food,” I say. He looks at the container in my hand and then nods. I’ve been getting the blood from Willy. Pig’s blood. I hope it’s all right. I set down the container on the table, nervously, though I don’t know why. He has turned half away from me, as if he doesn’t want to look at me. As if I’m repugnant to his eyes.
“Thank you,” he says finally. I nod awkwardly, and there is another silence.
“Scott broke up with me,” I say finally. He starts as if he was hit, and turns farther away.
“Oh?” he asks.
“He said I was too distracted. Before we were dating I was full of life and since . . . you know when we went on our first date? The night I left my claddagh ring here. I think it was the night you came back. I couldn’t exactly tell him that I’ve been distracted be my old boyfriend—who I just happened to send to Hell—is back and needs taking care of,” I say, a hint of bitterness creeping into my voice.
“I’m sorry,” Angel says. I start and realize what I just said.
“No! I didn’t mean that it was your fault. It isn’t. And-and I’m glad you’re back. I just thought you should know. That we’re not going out. And why.”
“Thank you for telling me then. And I’m still sorry,” he says. I wince. He can’t see me, so it doesn’t matter.
“Is-is there anything you need? I mean, I brought food. Is there anything else I can do, or do you just want to sleep?” I ask, changing the subject abruptly.
“You could—no, never mind,” he says, breaking off his thought.
“What? What can I do? I want to help Angel.”
“You can’t,” he says. “You can’t help. Thank you for wanting to.”
“I can help! Tell me what to do, Angel,” I say, suddenly desperate to know what it is. Maybe I’m trying to make up for the hurt I’ve caused him. “Love me,” he says, so softly I almost miss it. I jump, and take a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I have no right to ask that as it’s so obvious that you don’t anymore. I can’t change that. I shouldn’t. But your love the only thing that will help. It’s the only thing that can heal me.” I was frozen, mesmerized by his words and wounded by them too. How must he feel? To be so sure I don’t love him anymore, and to know that that love is the only thing that will help?
I know, in that moment that my words did hurt him deeply. And I know what I have to do.
“I do love you Angel,” I say, and watch as he straightens, his back becoming the tall, proud column I used to love rather than the hunched, scared thing it has been since he returned.
I do love him. That is the truth. And so is all the rest.
Angel
I would cry out if I could, but my voice is gone. And there is something in hers that makes me hesitate. She loves me, but there is more. She’s not done yet. And the more is what frightens me.
“I never stopped loving you. How could I? You never gave me a reason. Maybe if it had really been you . . . if Angelus was a little kinder, a little more like you I would have stopped. Maybe I would have hated you. But he was so different . . . the only similarity was his body. I knew there was nothing of you in him, and nothing of him in you. That’s not why I sent you to Hell. It was my job. I had to save the world, even if it meant sacrificing you. But I didn’t stop loving you. I went away for a summer, to try and forget. During the day maybe I did, but at night . . . never. You were always there. You walked through all of my dreams, and I could not forget, as hard as I tried.
“When I came back, everything reminded me of you. I knew—I thought—you would never, could never come back, so I tried to go on without you. And I did, in some ways. I convinced myself that it would be all right to see someone else. That it would help me move on. I left your ring here in an attempt to do just that. If I had longer, it probably would have worked too. I probably would have moved on. But I didn’t have longer. Sometimes things just work out that way. And they worked out this way for me.
“You still have my love, if that’s what you need. Even if it isn’t. But the other things I said are still true. I need someone who I can lean on sometimes, someone who will just be there. Who makes me happy. I love you Angel but I don’t know if I can be with you.”
I am frozen halfway between exultation and mourning. She loves me. But she doesn’t want to be with me. It is the right decision, of course. She shouldn’t be stuck with someone who brings her pain. But, by whatever gods there are I wish she would make the wrong decision.
“Angel?” she says hesitantly. “Look at me.” I turn, and she sees the tears running down my cheeks. Vampires do not cry. Not true vampires. Only those with souls and I am crying now. She runs to me, and looks up into my eyes. “It will be all right. I promise. I had to tell you all that so you’ll know, but it doesn’t matter right now. Right now just know that I love you. Later we’ll remember everything else. I love you.”
“I love you,” I whisper, cupping her cheek in my hand. She gets on her tiptoes and kisses my bowed forehead.
“It will be all right. Now you just need to get better. You need to heal. I will heal you Angel. I promise I will. I will heal you, because I love you.” And there are tears in her eyes as well, and they are pouring down and mixing into one river of salt. She loves me and she will heal me. For now, it is enough.