Though Buffy was sitting at the Espresso Pump with Willow, her mind was far away. Somewhere on the road between L.A. and Sunnydale, actually. Sipping her mocha and chatting with Willow, her mind was with Angel. It was a good place to be.
“Buffy,” Willow broke into her reverie, “Earth to Buffy.”
Buffy just grinned to let Willow know she’d heard.
“I’m trying to decide,” Willow said, “whether you’re still dazed from your dive into the Hellmouth, or Angel’s coming any minute.”
Buffy blushed.
“Option number two confirmed!” Willow said triumphantly. At Buffy’s odd expression, she smiled. “Really, I’m happy for you. Both of you. I like having a happy roommate. You weren’t… before. Happy, that is. And Angel…happy bad.”
Laughing slightly, Buffy replied, “Think you can say ‘happy’ a few more times?” She smiled. “Thank you. I wish you were…happier too.”
“I’m not really a nerd, am I?” Willow asked suddenly.
“Of course not,” Buffy agreed. She wasn’t concentrating on Willow again, though, as she felt a familiar presence behind her; a welcome, waited for presence.
Willow caught the look on Buffy’s face. “I wonder who that could be?” she teased. She raised one hand to wave to whomever had just walked in. “I just lost your attention for the rest of the weekend,” she said to Buffy, “didn’t I?”
Buffy smiled but said nothing, waiting for Angel to weave through the tables and approach. In only moments a gentle hand was placed on her shoulder. Angel leaned down to kiss her cheek in greeting, but Buffy turned her head quickly to catch his lips with her own. He chuckled very softly and met her brief kiss.
When they broke apart, Buffy was grinning wildly. “Hi,” she said softly.
“Hi, yourself,” Angel replied, taking a seat next to her. “Hey Willow,” he said, acknowledging the third person at the table.
Willow smiled back. She seemed amused, but said nothing.
“What?” Buffy and Angel asked simultaneously, then looked at each other and laughed slightly.
“I’m just not used to seeing Angel in the daytime,” Willow mused. Neither of them acknowledged the comment and Willow stood. “And since the hopes of holding a conversation with you two right now is rather futile, I’m just going to go.” She gathered her things quickly.
“No, Will, you don’t have to go,” Buffy protested.
Willow shook her head. “I need to study anyway. It was good to see you, Angel.”
“Likewise,” Angel replied, and Willow left the pair of them alone.
For a long while neither of them said anything. Buffy gazed at Angel and the rest of the world seemed to disappear. It had been nearly two months since Angel’s return to humanity. The change had left its mark on him in that time. The sunlight had lightened his hair so that it was clearly brown instead of the near black it appeared without that light. His unnatural pallor had lessened to something that, while not exactly tan, was a look only the living and sun-touched can have.
Angel returned her silent gaze. His eyes no longer seemed to hold the pain that was so much a part of his undeath. She could only guess that the guilt that had plagued him felt more removed now. It was still there, but less. His eyes shown with love and happiness instead. The love that they had long been afraid to share. The happiness that had long been forbidden them both.
Angel took her hand in his. It was warm, and Buffy grinned ever wider. The little things made all the difference.
They might have stayed and stared at each other indefinitely, but someone cleared their throat loudly next to them. Buffy jumped and looked at the person in surprise. “Riley!”
“Buffy.” He wasn’t looking at Buffy, though. He was looking at Angel.
Oh, this is not going to be good. “Riley, this is Angel. Angel, Riley.”
Both men regarded each other in silence for a moment.
“Uh, Buffy’s told me a lot about you,” Riley said. The phrase was civil, but the tone wasn’t.
No, I didn’t, Buffy thought.
“Really. Buffy didn’t say anything about you,” Angel replied a touch darkly, and Riley flinched.
“And this is us leaving!” Buffy said
suddenly, loudly, pulling out of his chair and dragging him out of the
coffee shop. She caught one final glance of Riley standing there still,
gaping like a fish. Keep that up, she thought in amusement, and you’ll
live up to the nickname ‘fish boy.’
Willow was disturbed from her studying
by a knock on the door. Even though it was daytime, her experience with
almost getting attacked by Spike led to one thing: she didn’t ever say
‘come in’ anymore. Instead she took the time to stand up from her desk
and open the door.
“Riley!” she said in surprise. “Uh, Buffy’s not here.”
“Actually,” Riley said, stepping through the doorway, “I was hoping to talk to you.”
“Me?” Willow squeaked. “Um, okay.”
Riley sat down on Willow’s bed looking uncomfortable. Willow sat in her chair, turning away from the desk and waiting for him to speak. After a couple of uncomfortable moments, he did. “Buffy’s with…Angel right now, right?” he asked.
“Um, yeah,” Willow replied uncertainly. “Is there something you needed her for? ‘Cause if it’s important, I…”
Riley held up a hand to halt her babbling. “No, no,” he said. “I…well, the truth is, I’m confused. And since you’re Buffy’s roommate, and her friend, and…not confused, I thought maybe I could ask you something.”
“Sure,” Willow said with a smile.
“Who’s Angel?”
Willow looked at him oddly. “Uh, he’s…Angel.”
Riley shook his head. “No, I mean…I don’t know what I mean. It’s just, I like Buffy, and then Angel came out of nowhere and suddenly Buffy stopped even looking at me and…I’m confused.”
Willow was suddenly reminded of a conversation with Angel over two years earlier when Buffy had briefly turned her attention to an old friend named Ford. Why did all of Buffy’s boyfriends turn to Willow for information on the competition? “You’re jealous.”
“No!” Riley said too quickly. “I’m just…concerned.”
“Uh huh…” Willow said with a grin. “Do you want my advice?”
Riley nodded eagerly.
“Don’t.”
Riley looked confused.
“Don’t try and get in the middle, don’t
think Buffy’s going to ‘realize her mistake’ and come back to you or something.
Nothing is going to break those two up. Even when they had the ultimate
forbidden love thing going on, even when we all thought Angel…dead for
months, still they always got back together. Something tells me this time
they’re together for good, so my advice is this: find yourself a new girlfriend,
Riley, because Buffy won’t look twice at you while Angel is around."
Buffy and Angel sat together in the
shady grass of Weatherly Park. They had yet to spend a cloudy day together,
so perhaps the Fates were truly smiling at them for once. They sat in silence.
There was no need for words. Angel had his head tilted towards the sunlight,
his eyes closed, a peaceful, contented expression on his face. The day
was perfectly beautiful, and made all the more perfect by the company.
Leaning against Angel’s chest, Buffy broke the silence. “Willow was right,” she said.
Angel opened his eyes and looked at Buffy. “About?”
“That it’s still weird seeing you in the sunlight,” Buffy explained. “I used to dream about you that way. Two months, and seeing it is still surreal.”
“It feels strange to me too,” Angel replied.
“Does it?” Buffy asked out of nowhere.
Angel looked at Buffy oddly. “Of course. Why do you think it wouldn’t be?”
“I don’t,” Buffy replied. “Intellectually, I know it has to be weird for you. You just never talk about it. I know there’s all sorts of things about being human that are new to you and that’ll take a lot of adjusting, and I want to help. But I can’t if you never talk about it.”
Angel held Buffy a little tighter. “As long as I’m with you, it’ll all work out.”
Buffy began to smile, then stopped herself. “That’s sweet, but you’re avoiding the subject.”
Angel sighed. “What’s the subject?”
“That you never talk to me.”
“Yes I do!” he defended himself.
“Really,” Buffy said. “Then what’s bothering you?”
Angel looked confused at that. “How do you know something’s bothering me?”
Buffy turned to look him in the eye. “Because you’ve got some of that guilty look in your eye again that I was getting used to not seeing.”
Angel looked down and shrugged slightly. “There was a vampire killing in LA that managed to gain the attention of the police and the newspapers. A vampire that I made.”
“Ah,” Buffy said, nodding very slightly in understanding. “But Angel, you didn’t make him.”
Angel sighed. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “Could we not talk about this?”
Buffy made a sound of exasperation. “See! This is exactly what I mean. Every time we get on an uncomfortable subject, one of us avoids it.”
“Buffy…”
“No,” she interrupted him, sounding angry now. “You told me once that if I ever wanted to know what you were thinking, I should just ask. Well, I’m asking. How come we’ve never spoken about when you lost your soul, or Hell…”
Angel looked stricken, and Buffy instantly regretted what she’d said. She didn’t know where this had come from, but she knew that they’d have to talk about these things someday. Perhaps today just wasn’t that day. “I’m sorry,” Buffy said suddenly.
Angel shook his head and pulled away. “I know,” he said softly. “I just can’t talk about…those things right now.” He stood up suddenly, and before Buffy could stop him he did something she’d never seen him do before, neither when faced with vampire nor hell-beast.
Angel ran away.
At the moment they were walking the corridors of the Initiative’s underground headquarters. Conscious hostiles in their cells watched the two of them warily as they passed. One of them growled. Still, Riley rambled on.
“So, there’s Buffy,” he said, “sitting in the coffee shop with this guy who’s much too old for her. They’re just sitting there, staring at each other. They didn’t even notice me.”
“You just wish she was making googly eyes at you,” Forest replied, trying to halt his rant.
“No,” Riley replied half-heartedly. “I just was hoping for an introduction, you know?”
Forest sighed and decided to go along with the conversation. “So what’s the guy’s name?” he asked.
“Angel,” Riley responded with a sound of disgust. “I mean, what kind of name is that for a guy?”
Forest just made some general sound of agreement and ignored him.
“And who is this guy anyway?” Riley demanded. “He just comes out of nowhere and it’s ‘sorry Riley, I made up with my old boyfriend. Bye.’”
Riley might have continued on that vein for some time had one of the hostiles not drawn his attention. The vampire had listed to much of this exchange and started chuckling. “You want to know who Angelus is?” he asked.
Riley took a step towards the cage, but Forest put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. “Don’t. He’s just trying to get to you.”
Riley ignored him and turned to the vampire. “I don’t know anyone called…what was that name again?”
The vampire grinned. “Angelus, and I heard you talking about him. Angel.” The name came out mocking. “Tall, dark hair, hangs out with the Slayer?”
Forest rolled his eyes. This old game again. Then he remembered that the Slayer myth was another of Riley’s latest obsessions. “Just ignore him and come on.”
The vampire wasn’t the one ignored. “How do you know him?”
The vampire grinned. “He made me.”
Riley stepped back quickly and turned down the hall at a brisk walk. His babbling was finally silenced. Forest knew that had to be a bad sign. “He was just making trouble, Riley.”
Riley shook his head. “Either that, or Buffy’s dating a vampire. She wouldn’t…I have to know.”
Forest sighed. “What are you going to do? Find him and say, ‘Hi, are you a vampire?’”
Looking over the weapons and various methods for capturing vampires, Riley shook his head. “I wasn’t planning on asking.”
“Riley!” Forest demanded, getting a bad feeling about the whole situation, “Don’t do anything stupid!”
But once again, Riley just ignored him.