Part II: Angel
Buffy got out of the taxi and stood looking up at the huge edifice with the tasteful “Wolfram and Hart” sign in front. She felt a frisson of fear as icy fingers clawed their way up her spine. This place had been a repository for evil for so long it was like a miasma surrounded the building. How could Team Angel stand to work here? How could they force themselves to enter this building day after day if the Immortal had been telling her the truth and they really hadn’t been corrupted? Well, that was a part of why she was here—to see for herself.
Squaring her shoulders, she entered the lobby and paused in the shade of a potted plant. Well dressed employees purposefully went about their business. It all looked so normal. Bright, sunny, it looked like any other thriving, big-city office building. The “ding” of the elevator drew her attention, and as the doors opened, she saw a couple embracing for one last kiss before parting.
Buffy smiled. Good to know romance was still alive, even in an evil law firm! The tall, dark man in the designer business suit brushed the hair back from the face of the attractive blonde with such tenderness it gave her a good feeling. With a radiant smile, the blonde gave him one final, quick kiss and then grabbed for the elevator door before it could close. She slipped out as he held the door for her and turned to watch her go.
Angel? The Italian couture suited “lawyer” tenderly kissing the blonde goodbye was Angel? Buffy’s mouth dropped open as she turned to stare at the blonde pushing open the outer door and walking rapidly down the sidewalk. Her movement caught Angel’s eye and she turned back to find him staring at her in shock.
“Buffy?”
She gave a little wave and crossed the lobby to the elevator.
“Hey, Angel.” She pasted what she sincerely hoped looked like a friendly smile and not the grimace it felt like, on her face.
The doors again began to close, and he impatiently slammed them open.
“Buffy. What are you doing here?”
“Nice to see you, too, Angel.”
Suddenly becoming aware that he was gaping like a landed fish, he closed his mouth with an audible snap.
“Can we talk?” she asked. “I mean, I know you’re all busy with the firm and . . . everything, but . . .”
He gestured her into the elevator and keyed in the penthouse floor. Buffy studied him while he silently looked straight ahead as the elevator ascended. The doors opened on his private suite and he led her into the living area. Sun streamed through the wall of picture windows.
“How come you’re—”
“Not on fire?” Angel smiled briefly. “Necro-tempered glass. The whole building has it, as well as my cars and plane. Makes getting around so easy, people sometimes forget I’m a vampire.”
“But you never do.”
“No. I never do. Why are you here, Buffy?”
She sat on the couch and was a little bit disappointed when he chose the chair opposite her instead of sitting beside her. Oh, well, maybe it was better this way.
“I guess I owe you an apology,” she began.
He continued to look at her steadily and waited for her to go on.
“We . . . Giles and Willow and I, we maybe jumped to some conclusions about you and what you were trying to do here . . .”
“You could have asked,” he suggested quietly.
“Yeah. And we probably should have, but it just seemed so clear. I mean, you took over Evil, Inc., what were we supposed to think?”
“If you didn’t trust me, why didn’t you contact Wesley, or Fred, or. . .”
“I don’t know, Angel! I did call, to tell you about closing the Hellmouth, and about Spike dying and that we were going to be based in Europe trying to sort out the whole thing with the Slayers, but then, you weren’t exactly forthcoming with us, either! You never told us why you took over W&H or what you were trying to do here . . .”
“Let’s face it, Buffy, we haven’t really been a part of the day-to-day experiences of each others’ lives for years, now. I had my reasons for working from inside W&H and you weren’t a part of them. It was nothing to do with you. I had decisions to make, goals and purposes that were not about you, or us, or your mission. I have my own mission. I had at least thought we were on the same side until Giles and Andrew both told us you didn’t trust us anymore.”
“I should have called. I know that. I was just afraid . . .” Buffy looked away and twisted her fingers together.
“Afraid you’d call and Angelus would answer?”
“Yeah. I think . . . I think it was better not knowing for sure. Willow and Faith said . . . that Willow had to re-ensoul you again, last year and . . .”
“That was a deliberate decision, to bring back Angelus. Maybe not a good one, but it was deliberate. Wesley hired a Shaman to remove my soul because he thought Angelus had information that I didn’t. Information we badly needed. I . . . I don’t think you’ve ever understood what it means to me to be trapped inside with Angelus ascendant. It damn near destroyed me, Buffy. And I saw how you reacted when I was just pretending to be him when we set the trap for Faith. He’s always there, just beneath the surface, trying to get free and you’ll never be able to deal with that. Hell, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to deal with that! I’ve seen it in your eyes. You may think you love me, or . . . at least loved me, but I’m never alone in this body, Buffy. He’s always here, too, and you’ll never be able to totally trust me again.
“I’d like to. I want to . . .”
A brief, sad smile crossed his face for an instant and then was gone.
“I know.”
“Do you . . . do you still love me?” she asked haltingly.
Buffy saw the pain in his deep brown eyes as he tried to answer as honestly as he could.
“I’ve never been much good at talking about my—” his fingers made *air quotes* “’feelings’, but I’ll give it my best shot. I owe you that.”
Angel leaned forward in his chair and took both her small hands in his large, strong ones. She felt the familiar lurch in her gut that happened whenever they touched.
“You were the first person I ever loved, Buffy. Ever. In 277 years, I have never loved anyone the way I loved you. You made me feel warm . . . included . . . worthwhile. You made me feel like a person. I thought I could go back. Start over. Just be a guy in love with his girl. You gave me that.” A smile touched his lips. “You even got the Scourge of Europe to attend a High School Prom, which, in retrospect, is probably one of the most bizarre moments in my very long, unconventional life.
“I believed I had changed. I believed I was different . . . I could make a difference because of you. And then he came back and it was worse than ever. For a hundred years, I believed he was gone. I was no longer Angelus, but I didn’t know who Angel was. Then Whistler came to me. He showed me a path. He showed me you. And I thought I had discovered who Angel was.
“Then, after the best night of my life, I was sucked down into hell and Angelus took over my body and I was helpless. I can’t describe to you how that felt. Willow might understand some of it, but you never will. You can’t. It isn’t in you.
“Then, I was brought back, and I still loved you, but it was different. It would never be that all-encompassing, passionate, loss of ego again, because I now know what it means to lose myself. I knew we couldn’t be together the way we had been, and so we had to part. And as time went on, we grew apart. We had different experiences, developed relationships that the other couldn’t share.
“Then I learned about a prophecy and thought there might someday be a chance for us. It was always in the back of my mind. Eventually, I started developing real friendships. I’d never had that before, either. The Scoobies were never really my friends, and you and I weren’t either. Spike was right about that. We could be lovers or enemies, but we could never be friends. I didn’t know how to be a friend. Doyle and Wesley and Cordelia taught me.
“Cordelia became an amazing woman, Buffy. We had something special. She became my best friend and then, almost without my noticing how it happened, I realized I was in love with her.
“I still loved you, I’ll always love you. You were my first love, but our lives were so different, and the love I felt for Cordelia had a solid foundation. If we’d have had time to grow . . . develop . . . who knows? But we didn’t get that time. Things happened and I lost Cordy. She’s dead now and we’ll never know what might have been.
“But you . . . my first love . . . I still had hope that maybe someday we could try again.”
“You said ‘had’,” Buffy spoke at last. “You said ‘had hope’. . . not ‘have’?”
Angel shook his head.
“Our time is past, Buffy. We both know it. What we both sometimes long for is what might have been, not what might be. I do love you. You’ll always be important to me, but I’m not in love with you, and you’re not with me, either.”
She nodded. “You’re right. But it’s hard to give up . . . hope. the idea that somehow, someday, things will finally work out and be the way they used to.”
“They’ll never be the way they used to be.”
“No. I feel sort of . . . cheated. Like I’ve spent the past five years being in love with the idea of being in love with you instead of actually being in love with you, you know?”
Angel smiled.
“Yeah. I know.”
“But I still love you, Angel. I still want what we had!”
Suddenly, he was sitting beside her, and she was in his arms. Buffy traced the line of his eyebrow and then trailed her hand down the side of his face. Her eyes were luminous with unshed tears. He buried his face in her neck and breathed in the scent of her.
“As long as we both live, we’ll have it . . . in our memories.”
A single tear streaked down her cheek.
“And that’s where it belongs, doesn’t it? In our memories. Our shiny, perfect first love.”
“And now, we have to go on . . . and find new loves, different loves. And by doing that, we honor what we had, because you’re the one who taught me how to love, Buffy, and for that, you’ll always have a place in my heart.”
Buffy smiled through her tears.
“That girl I saw you with . . .”
“Nina? She’s special, Buffy. She’s an art student, lives with her sister and niece. It’s all pretty new. I don’t know what may develop there, but I think I’d like to find out.”
“Wow. You with a normal girl! Having a hard time picturing that!”
“She’s a werewolf.”
“Oh. Good. Makes me feel better, somehow.”
Angel laughed.
“And you with the Immortal . . .”
“Oh, that. That was just a . . . thing. Angel, what I really need to do is to see Spike. Do you have a problem with that?”
Tamping down the atavistic flare of jealousy that always occurred at the mention of Spike’s name, Angel thought about it. Really thought about it.
“No. I don’t. It’s sort of weird, cause I feel like I should have a problem thinking about you and Spike. But over the past year, I’ve spent a lot of time with him. I’ve seen his soul, and I think I’m big enough to be able to see his good points. I still don’t like him. But I understand him, and he’s a good man, Buffy.”
Taking his face in both her hands, she gently kissed him.
“I love you, Angel.”
“I love you, too.”
******************************************************
|
|
|
|
Rave
Barbie Girl (Becca)
biscuit07
Filmtheory (Jim)
Malice (Jess)
MebbtheScribe (MichaelB)
Reset (Allie)
Shay (Marrisa)
somnambulist29 (Shea)
Stephanie Loss
Wendyness (Wendy)
Questions?Contact Us
|
|
All stories on this site have been archived with the authors' consent. Do not copy these stories for your own uses without the express consent of the author themselves. Buffy the Vampire Slayer TM and Angel TM are © UPN, WB, Fox and its related entities. All photos on the site are © UPN, Fox, Warner Bros, and/or their respective owners. No profits are being made by use of these images.
Powered with the assitance of eFiction.
|
|
|
