The alarm clock was ringing. It wasn’t the doorbell. He wasn’t standing there in the rain, that look on his face. The alarm clock was ringing.

Buffy moaned and turned over, shaking off the last remnants of her dream. It had been a wonderful dream. She’d been at her graduation party, and Angel had been there...and then she’d been home, and the doorbell rang, and it was him. But it wasn’t him. The doorbell wasn’t ringing. It was the damn alarm clock.

She squinted at the clock. Six o’ clock, on the dot. She hated going to work early. Why couldn’t work start at ten, like all the classes she’d scheduled herself her senior year of college. She’d gotten lazy, and now she was paying the price. And there wasn’t even anyone to encourage her to get up. Nope, Buffy was independent now. Buffy had her very own apartment.

Buffy was lonely.

No, cross that out. She was alone, but she wasn’t lonely. After all, she liked solitude.

Right?

Buffy moaned again and rolled out of bed.

I hear the clock it’s six a.m.
I feel so far from where I’ve been
Got my eggs and my pancakes too
Got my maple syrup, everything but you
Break the yolks make a smiley face
I kinda like it in my brand new place
I wipe the spots off the mirror
Don’t leave the keys in the door
Never put wet towels on the floor anymore

Having showered and gotten dressed, Buffy felt much better. She grabbed her pancake batter out of the fridge and poured a couple of medium-sized pancakes in the frying pan, applauding herself for remembering to make enough batter last Sunday to last the week. She was usually too tired from patrolling to eat when she came home at night, which meant she was ravenous in the morning. Like now. She flipped the pancakes and went back to the fridge for a couple of eggs and low fat maple syrup.

"Why low fat?" she asked herself, setting it down on the counter. "It’s not like I’m trying to stay thin to impress someone."

Now she was talking to herself. Great.

Really though, she loved her apartment. And she liked not having to put up with anyone else. She could eat what she wanted when she wanted to. She could be messy if she wanted to.

Of course, she never wanted to anymore. She sighed, flipping the pancakes expertly onto her plate. Why was that? She had plenty of freedom to be a slob, and all she could think of was how she had to keep everything neat and tidy. Why? What did it matter? No one but her would see it anyway.

But it made her feel like someone cared. Like maybe someone would be coming over. Like somebody lived there, and cared how it looked.

Angel’s house had always been neat.

"Stop," she told herself firmly, cracking the eggs into the pan, absently making them into a smiley face. "Smile," she told herself, but she didn’t really feel like it.

Dreams last so long
Even after you’re gone
I know you love me
And soon you will see
You were meant for me
And I was meant for you

It was silly, but she still hoped. Even after all these years, she still thought, maybe someday.

Yeah, maybe someday she’d get a call telling her Angel had moved to Guatemala to enjoy the sun.

She glanced at the clock, swore, shoveled the rest of the food down and frantically washed the plate, leaving it in the rack to dry and dashing into her room for her panty hose, shoes and purse. She stopped in front of the mirror, wiped off the flecks of steam and pushed a piece of hair back in place.

She stepped into her heels (it was hell being a businesswoman) slung her purse on her shoulder, grabbed her keys from her immaculate counter (yeesh, it didn’t even look like someone lived there!) and dashed out the door, locking the deadbolt behind her. She took two steps, realized she’d left her keys in the door, and went back to grab them, then ran to the car, an ache deep down in her stomach as she remembered that no one would be there when she came home. That as much as he loved her, as much as they were meant to be together, he wasn’t coming back.

Buffy shut off her heart and got in the car to go to work.

Called my momma, she was out for a walk
Consoled a cup of coffee, but it didn’t want to talk
So I picked up the paper it was more bad news
More hearts being broken or people being used
Put on my coat in the pouring rain
Saw a movie it just wasn’t the same
Cause it was happy and I was sad
It made me miss you oh so bad

Her boss gave her half of the day off. Half of a day to waste thinking about all the things she wouldn’t be doing.

Maybe she should call Willow. Her best friend had moved to Seattle, where she was busily making a whole lot of money in the computer industry. But no, she would be working now. She had better things to do. Same with Xander, as odd as that seemed. Xander busy...but there it was. He was working for some toy company in San Francisco.

Buffy finally called her mother. They hadn’t talked for a while. She got the message machine and hung up, went to get a cup of coffee.

The little café was virtually empty. Buffy got her double espresso mocha and sat in the corner, staring at her drink.

"This is fun," she muttered. "What an exciting way to spend a free day."

She missed him. She still missed him. Not all the time. There were better days of course. Sometime she could go the whole day without thinking about him once. It was one romance from five years ago, nothing really. He had walked away from her, and that was that.

But her heart didn’t see it quite like that.

Dreams last so long
Even after you’re gone
I know you love me
And soon you will see
You were meant for me
And I was meant for you

Buffy got a paper, hoping it would distract her. "Mysterious" deaths stared at her from the front page, accusing, showing her other failures. Where had she been? Moping over her lack of a life? She went to the next section, her eye falling on a court case where a woman was suing her husband for having an affair. There was an indictment against a thief who was apparently working for the mob.

"Depressing," she remarked into the air, and turned to the movie section.

Everything was about people having their hearts broken, people dying, wars and apocalypse’s. Fun. Buffy’s eyes fell on a picture of a man and woman laughing, arms around each other. There. Meant For Me. Something happy. A romantic comedy. Exactly what she needed to cheer her up. Something to take her mind off Angel, off her lonely life. It would be fun, it would be...independent.

"I’m beginning to hate that word," Buffy said softly. Why not just say alone? But she stood up anyway, abandoning the coffee and the paper, and walked outside.

It started to pour. Of course.

Buffy put on her coat, but by that time it didn’t really matter. She started walking to the movie theatre.

I go about my business, I’m doing fine Besides what would I saw if I had you on the line Same old story not much to say Hearts are broken every day

"Hey!" a voice cried. Buffy turned and smiled at someone she’d known from college. She waved and kept walking, digging her hands into her pockets.

The movie hadn’t helped. At all. In fact, it had probably been the worst possible thing she could have gone to see. Why not a nice violent movie? Why did she have to go see the sweetest, cutest movie of all time, where everything turned out perfectly? And oh yeah, the perfect date movie. Even at the matinee, the place had been littered with couples. Young, old, it didn’t matter. All kinds of couples. Buffy sat in the back and cried because she wanted what the people in the movie had. Because she’d known love like that, and she’d let it slip away from her, and now it was gone forever.

"You were meant for me Angel," she whispered to the rain. But he wouldn’t listen, even if she actually said it, to him. She could call him up right that minute, and plead, but it wouldn’t change anything. It wouldn’t make him come back. Nothing ever would.

Buffy stopped at the corner market and bought a frozen dinner and a pint of Ben and Jerry’s. She chatted with the guy that worked there, smiling brightly at him as if everything were wonderful. She took her food home, kicked off her heeled shoes and made dinner.

A much more comfortable outfit and a pint of Chocolate Fudge Brownie ice cream later, Buffy was ready to go patrolling. She opened her door and stared out at the pouring rain, wondering what would happen if she walked out into the middle of the street and shouted. What if she just told them all everything? Told the whole world? What if she walked back to that market and told the cute guy who’d flirted with her there that she was still in love with her boyfriend from five years ago, and that she still thought, deep down inside her that he would come back. That she still dreamed about him.

He wouldn’t care, she decided. It’s not like she was the only person in the world who’s heart had ever been broken.

Hers just hurt so much.

Brush my teeth and put the cap back on
I know you hate it when I leave the light on
I pick up a book. Turn the sheets down.
Take a deep breath and a good look around
Put on my pj’s and hop into bed
I’m half alive but I feel mostly dead
I try and tell myself it’ll all be all right
I just shouldn’t think anymore tonight

Buffy abandoned the idea of patrolling. No one would be out in that kind of rain, vampire or humans. She flipped through the TV channels and found nothing worth watching. Nothing depressing enough for her anyway. She turned it off and decided to go to bed. It was dark enough. She was tired.

She took her hair out of it’s ponytail, washed her face and stared at herself in the mirror for a long time, until she wasn’t even sure who she was looking at anymore. She shook the feeling off and brushed her teeth, putting the brush back in it’s holder, making sure everything was just where it should be.

When had she become such a neat freak again?

She checked the locks and turned out the living room light. One of those books she’d always said she was going to read was sitting on the hall table. She grabbed it and turned out the hall light, closing the door to her bedroom. She looked around the small, neat room, with it’s shelf of stuffed animals and trophies, her bedside table with her favorite lamp and all her favorite pictures--with her mother, with Xander and Willow, with the whole Scooby Gang before Cordelia, Oz and Angel left. With Angel.

Not letting herself dwell, Buffy pulled back the covers of her bed and tossed the book onto the table. She turned away from the whole thing, taking a deep breath and walked to her dresser. Pajamas. She pulled out a pair of silk ones and pulled them on, tossing her patrolling clothes in the laundry hamper. Not that they were really dirty. She turned back to the bed and climbed in, staring at the book on the table. It might distract her. It would be good for her to read, and Willow swore it was a wonderful book.

But she didn’t feel like reading. She didn’t feel like anything. She didn’t even feel alive.

Dreams last so long
Even after you’re gone
I know you love me
And soon you will see
You were meant for me
And I was meant for you

It would be better tomorrow, she told herself, switching off the light. She would feel better after some sleep. She was probably just getting sick. That was why she felt so yucky.

But that wasn’t why, not really.

She missed him so much.

No, her mind whispered. I’m just tired, and lonely. I just need to sleep. Tomorrow I’ll call Willow, or go out with Mark from the office. I’ve just been thinking too much. That’s it. I’ve just been thinking too much.

Buffy stopped thinking, and let herself slip into the oblivion of sleep, knowing that nothing so simple would ever fix the hole in her heart that was where Angel belonged.

You were meant for me
And I was meant for you

The End

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