The Thoughts & Truths Series: Part One - Eternity
by Ophelia
I do not own the characters in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Joss Whedon and co. do.

Each part of this series is from the perspective of a different character.

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Angel

If I was being honest, many surprising things have happened to me in the past year or so. For a start, I finally met her. Buffy. The girl I’d been watching ever since she first learned she was the Slayer. I’d waited... I’d like to say I did it patiently, but I was anything but patient. From the minute Whistler showed her to me, I wanted to meet her. To tell her who I was, tell her she wasn’t alone. To tell her I was there for her... with her. To let her know I’d always be there.

Well, that was a joke. For the last few months, I’ve been anything but there for her. I’ve been... gone. Nowhere and everywhere all at once. I’ve been a demon, and I hurt her so badly.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. I should really start at the beginning, but that is impossible. I don’t know where the beginning is. When I first met her? More likely, when I first saw her, back in LA. It could have started when Whistler came to me and gave me a chance.

I wouldn’t call it a second chance; I’d screwed up too many before it for it to be only the second. I thought then it was my last chance. When I saw her, I began to think, maybe I wasn’t that near to the end of my chances, but now I’m not so sure. Now, I don’t think I have another chance. I think I screwed up the most important chance I’ll ever have... Her. Buffy.

She... she’s everything to me now, and I did everything I could to ruin her. I think I may have succeeded.

There are so many beginnings, real and imagined. The beginning of my obsession with her, and then our relationship... barely even there, at first, but it grew. It grew from mysterious helper and Slayer to two people who loved each other more than anything, and let that get in the way of their better judgment. I’m not blaming Buffy, she was young, and so innocent. She truly thought she could be happy... could make me happy. I wish she was wrong. My happiness only led to her pain.

We were happy... for a time. I spent my nights watching her back, and feeling quietly jealous that she had a life besides the one she spent with me, in the darkness. I spent my days alternating between dreaming of her, wishing I could leave her alone, and praying she would never leave me alone. Sometimes, more often than not, I’d think of the ones I’d killed, and pray she could be spared from ever encountering true evil as I had been.

The monsters and demons she dealt with were... pathetic. Spike and Dru barely caused a murmur until they kidnapped me, and pissed her off. Everything else, well, I don’t think she was ever really afraid. I don’t think anything truly terrified her, except the Master, and that wasn’t so much a fear of him as a fear of death. She got over it though. She fought him and died, and then she fought him again, and killed him.

I think that was the first time I faced the possibility of losing her, and then I knew what hold she had over me. That she could die at any time, and I knew I could never live without her. I needed her so much then, and the longer I put off ceding to my better judgment and leaving Sunnydale, the harder it became. If I’d left earlier... she would have gotten over me. Moved on, fell in love. But I stayed, and she fell in love with me.

I felt so much guilt, so much pain. All those lives I ended, the souls I’d taken. But every night I spent with her, trading barbed insults, warning her, watching her, and finally helping her, every day I spent thinking of her... well, the less guilt I felt. With each touch of her small hand, each brush of her soft lips, so warm and tender, each shared look, conveying so much in so little, the sorrow I felt lessened. I truly believed she could redeem me with her angelic smiles and loving caresses. How naive I was.

I didn’t sense that as my guilt lessened and my love grew, so did the power of my demon. It knew what was coming, and maybe I did too. “This could get out of control.” But I let her talk me around. I let the sunshine she brought into my life drive away the shadows, but I forgot that when the sunshine goes away... the shadows come back. I forgot that, ultimately, just as light expels darkness, so darkness kills the light. And finally, the darkness within me leapt up and I was powerless to stop it. It was free, and it wanted her.

Demon or soul, she was the only thing I craved. My demon thought it wanted to extinguish her, but really, it needed her as much as I did. Poor Buffy, I don’t think she ever truly understood how much Angelus loved her.

I guess the best way to describe the return of my soul for the second time would be to say it was as if I never left. It didn’t feel like I’d lost any time at all, as if the night we’d spent in each others arms was not yet over. I truly had no idea that anything had come between, much less several months. But I knew something was wrong. I think I asked her where we were, or what was happening... something. And from the look in her eyes, I knew. I knew how much she hated me, and how much I’d hurt her.

I wanted to tell her I was sorry, but I didn’t even know what I was sorry for. I couldn’t understand why I felt such sorrow, but I had to let her know it was okay. I wanted to tell her to do what she had to; I knew something had to happen. But all I could say was the stupid phrase that got me into so much trouble in the first place. “I love you.” As if I really thought that would help. I closed my eyes when she asked, and I felt the touch of her lips on mine. And then I knew I’d never feel that touch again. I may have cried; I think it was starting to come back to me. I wanted her to know how much I loved her; I didn’t think I’d let her know properly, but something in me acknowledged that it was too late. And then I felt unbelievable pain.

My last thought on earth was of her... she looked like an angel in my mind’s eye, but not a soft, gentle loving angel. She looked like the angels I’ve always believed in, tall and so bright they hurt your eyes, but at the same time you can see them so clearly. No fuzzy edges and cherub cheeks, but sharp and bright and beautiful and terrible all at the same time. An angel that knows the truth about life, and sorrow, and pain, and is torn between grief and fury. An angel that isn’t supposed to comfort you, it’s really supposed to let you know how much you’ve screwed up, yet, despite that, still love you. It’s what they do... They accept the mistakes their children make, and don't punish them for those mistakes, but they can’t save you either. They just love, and know.

She was so perfect... She never deserved any of the pain I caused her.

Chilling, isn’t it? She sent me to Hell, the little bitch ran me through with a sword, and sent me to my eternal punishment, and I still can’t do anything but love her, and admit that it was all my fault. It wasn’t, it was her too. She should have held back, should have used her stupid Slayer sense to realise what a mistake she was making. Just once, she should have listened.

But even now, I can’t blame her, not in my heart. I want to, believe me, but I can’t. I never could. Even when I came back, and saw her with him, and knew she’d barely waited a month after losing me to move on... well, even then I still loved her, and forgave her, and couldn’t hate her. I make myself sick, the way I saw her in his arms, and realised it wasn’t the first time, and I just turned and walked away.

You see, the thing is, I think I know what she wants. She doesn’t want to lose me, or push me away. And she wasn’t doing it because she felt lonely. She has so much strength, she could wait for me forever. But she knew, before I did, that she would have to wait forever. So intuitive; she guessed even before I came back that I wouldn’t ask her to take me back. She knew I’d stay away, and avoid her, and do everything in my power to keep us apart.

So she did the only thing she could think of; she took him as a lover, believing it would make me remember how much I wanted her, and fire me up into fighting for her. We know each other so well, but she figured wrong. No matter how much I die inside every time I see them together, I can’t fight for her. I can’t do what she needs me to do.

She can’t take the first step, and come to me, so she went to him instead, and he willingly welcomed into her embrace, not realising she was hoping all the time it would become my arms holding her, and my lips caressing hers. She didn’t do it to hurt him, though. She’d never hurt anyone willingly, but she needs me, and it was the only way she could think of.

But I can’t take the step she wants me to. I’d die for her, but I can't fight for her. I love her beyond everything, but I cannot do this, and it’s killing me.

I watch her watching me as he holds her, and we look into each others eyes, and so much passes between us. She knows, now, that I can’t do it, that I’m not strong enough, and I accept that she isn’t either.

It seems we’ve reached a stalemate, but I know how to end it. This love isn’t meant to be, and I can’t hold it within anymore. As a demon, the natural expression of my love for her will be as destruction. Our love is too powerful for this world, and we both know it. I just hope there’s some place we can be together eventually. Eternity is a big place; I’d hate to think I’ll have to face it alone.

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