ATTENTION: This story is going to be rather taboo, and I am not trying to glorify stalking or call it romantic. I was merely inspired to write something where Spike's "lurking" habits are highly present in an AU fic. This is all human, will probably include violence at some point which is why I included it in the warnings, but it won't be between Buffy and Spike. If you are easily squicked out by the whole stalker thing/someone watching someone else without their knowledge, this may not be the fic for you. Spike is absolutely harmless here and is not the traditional definition of a stalker, but I am fully aware that his character in this is going to be behaving super inappropriately. If you don't like character ambiguity, then you probably shouldn't read this. I'm not trying to sound mean or put anyone off, I simply don't want anyone to say that I didn't warn them. For people who give this fic a shot, I hope you enjoy it. Also, I am writing as I go.

Side notes: There is some heavy talk of Buffy/Angel love at the beginning, but that's all it is, talk. There will NOT be any sex between them in this fic, and Angel will probably not show up twice. As for the crossover category label, it is there because I'm going to add in a VERY tiny bit of action between a couple of side characters who are my OTP in another TV show, but I don't know how I'm going to do it yet and I don't want to give them away. They really won't have a too involved story though, so you don't need to worry. This is a Spuffy fic all the way.

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Buffy remembered that night, it was crystal clear in her mind's eye. She remembered the wind, cooling tears on her cheeks, words she said while he stood silent. She could still hear that angry beat of a broken heart, like wild horses in her chest. An unmitigated sense of fractured reality, the "This can't be happening" rockslide and every bruise on the way down. She remembered it all so well, and looking into Angel's eyes now, she might even be able to imagine they were ten years younger standing beside his idling car. One more time, another chance to relive a bitter memory.

That car was gone, though, and in place of a beaten up black Toyota was a shiny black coupe, new and gassed with as much money as stellar importance. It looked so out of place alongside her little red mailbox and lily dotted pond.

Angel was the ex love of Buffy's life, wearing a suit and for once, his heart on his brand name sleeve. It appeared the venture to New York had paid off. He was offering himself on a silver, security laden platter. A ring and a wedding gown might be waiting for her outside a condo hundreds of miles away.

His aged heart was part of the bargain.

Buffy could feel an unsteady pounding in her head, like the blood flow ceased, prohibiting actual thought while her chest fought to catapult her heart into another lifetime. There were warm, tingly sensations crawling along her skin. But it wasn't the same. Nothing was the way she had pictured it.

It was as if Angel dropped the mask, or bent to pick up his fallen disguise. A peeling back of layers; a realization. Old hurts were suddenly so filled up, stuffed to the brim with scars long since healed. She almost wanted to cry.

"Buffy," he said, big hands lying open from his wrists. He would like it if she reached out to hold them. "You're... We've always had each other. Always. We're forever, remember?"

"I remember," because what else could she say? They had promised each other exactly that so many times in unvoiced heart whispers, and sorrowful proclamations.

He wanted to step closer but didn't. "We can have that. Nothing is keeping us from being together," he said. "We're able to do anything we want. I control my life now... We can be happy."

Wind blew passed and she rubbed her arms. An old wool sweater was suddenly more comfort than Angel being here, hanging around, coming back, had ever been. "I don't think..." She inhaled deeply. "It's too late, Angel."

"Exactly!" he sounded thrilled, happiness pulling at whispered words like bubble gum. "It isn't too late. We can have everything we couldn't before. I'm settled in now. It's safe. I can be what you need." He finally moved closer, but she stepped away.

Meeting those questioning brown eyes, Buffy let her hands fist. "No. I meant, it's too late."

He was instantly confused. "What- Buffy-" A frown and shake of the head. "I thought this is what you wanted. I thought you wanted... us."

So had she. Once, she had known. She used to want him with every hurdle and every fall, but now... the road was gone, washed away by time. Buffy was without a map showing her how to get back, and if there were one, she didn't think she could open it. "I wanted you and me- us -a long time ago."

The words seemed to permeate the stillness. He fiddled with a gold cufflink, not meeting her eyes as hurt burrowed into lines edging his face. Angel was still handsome, always had been, whether sad or discouraged, it didn't matter. "But things change," he supplied morosely in her stead.

Buffy swallowed. "Things change." So many things. Things neither of them could control; but leaving, that he could have controlled.

Two teenagers, so in love they swore it was star born, slipping away to make out in cars and graveyards afterhours. A relationship supported on nothing but feelings and desperation neither could understand. A love that died when one half left the other behind.

Angel had left her. He had good reasons, of course, but they never took the hurt away, or explained why they were good enough to just... give up.

Funny how those two words didn't hurt as much as they once had.

Angel frowned and looked up, sadness swallowing her in a glance. "I want what we never had, Buffy. I wanted..." He smiled warmly, recollection brimming his teeth. "Always my girl, remember?"

She looked at the dirt beneath her boots and sidestepped, an old flame finally burnt out. "Yeah. I remember." Time to meet those eyes she used to swear housed the world; in this minute, they only held rusty mirrors that were new ten years ago. "We don't belong to each other anymore, Angel. We... I'm not her," she spoke softly, "and you're not the same guy who left after graduation."

He looked miserable, but nodded in reply. Not his girl. It was a daunting realization. A pothole caving in. He finally took a step back, narrowly avoiding a hopping toad as he hedged towards his parked car. "I'll always love you, Buffy."

"I know." She swallowed thickly again. "But not like that."

He didn't say anything, and perhaps Angel was still in love, maybe he just wanted her to want him forever and a day. Buffy couldn't be sure. She couldn't play a guessing game either. Smiling a fond, nostalgic curve, Angel backed sadly away with his hands in his pockets. She returned the expression, but there were no promises in it. She let him go, and then turned towards the house.

For once, and for the last time, he watched Buffy leave him. Not the other way around.

***

Stepping through the front door, Buffy removed her shoes before checking the mail at the kitchen table. Bills, an ad for the new pizza place in town, and a letter from England- that would be Giles, sending his love.

Paper stuffed hands made for useless fingers, so she managed to nudge the refrigerator open with her toes. Buffy finally tossed the mail on the counter after choosing to reach for a yogurt.

She hadn't eaten yet, and so dove into the vanilla treat with gusto. Angel's appearance on her front porch hadn't allowed for casual niceties, let alone a shared breakfast.

She paused, taking only three bites before setting the plastic container down. Nothing simple ever happened between her and Angel. Nothing everyday or ordinary. At one time, Buffy had been very willing to throw simplicity away for passion, and she probably still was, but not entirely.

Angel was her first love, her only love if she were to measure the other few against that measuring stick. He was sweeter than any dream she could come up with, and always more devastating.

When they were together, Buffy truly believed their love would last forever; when he left, she was forced to see the errors in that sentiment. After high school graduation the sweetheart fantasy fell apart. Angel told her things needed to end before he headed off to school in California.

He was going to make it big, he said, and long distance just wouldn't work. Because it wasn't fair, because she deserved more than that, because he couldn't string her along while he searched for a career in books and a big city. Those arguments felt stale now. At the time, Buffy had understood, for the most part, despite bitterness and a breaking heart.

Not long after, Angel was gone. He'd gotten as far away from her as possible. *For my own good,* she thought palely. He never said goodbye. Part of Buffy believed he couldn't, due to pain and a mutual disbelief that they were really through; the other part thought he simply didn't want to say it, make it permanent. Neither had she, but he left and people were supposed to move on after breakups.

Fat chance in this scenario. Their remained an unspoken bond between them. They shared letters on occasion, and when her mother died he flew in from Los Angeles to attend the funeral. He always seemed to show up when Buffy needed him, or could use a little help, but he never stayed. She stopped asking him to after a while.

She had been tethered, like a boat to a dock. Images and daydreams filtered into Buffy's day to day life, thoughts of Angel returning, falling to his knees, fighting for everything she used to wish he would. Apologies, vows against giving up. But he just stayed away, because he was needed in L.A., choosing his future over one they could have shared every day.

Buffy never perceived herself as demanding, or unfairly bitter even, until realizing the concept of Angel moving on brought out the shrew in her. They had relationships with other people, but the first ones to follow were the hardest, the eye openers.

She had loved him more than she would ever love anything in this life. Buffy knew it, but she hadn't realized the truth so many years ago, when other men tried their best.

Others that never quite made the cut, never quite broke through her hardened chest with enough gall, tenderness, brash intensity, or devotion. None of them filled the space. She should have let them, but there were too many variables.

Now, as Buffy sat in her drafty kitchen, alone and surprisingly unmoved but for sad realization, she could hear old dreams falling away in the silence. Like baby teeth or a smoky cloud, they lost their shine, and dropped sincerity.

A welcome distraction walked up and rubbed against her ankle. Buffy looked down, moist eyes catching on the sight of her little tabby, purring and nuzzling her leg. She smiled and scooped the cat into her arms, while a strange lineup of thoughts continued in her mind.

It couldn't be more surreal, considering everything in this foreign light; or perhaps it was merely brighter. Angel's love had always been a shadow, a constant memory that never fully shifted from present to past. Like a water spot, something that evaporates but still leaves a mark. She never could quite scrub herself clean, and chuck the possibility of being with her soul mate away.

Today, in a moment she'd dreamt up at least a thousand times before, Buffy discovered the past had stayed where it belonged. She just told the man she once believed would always hold her heart, that it was too late, because he wasn't what she needed anymore. The first time he really wanted to stay, could actually make good on promises the both of them had silently sworn to keep, and she pushed him out the door. Without hope or vows. Without possibility. Without an unwritten future to share one day, like they used to share secrets. Angel was gone in ways he had never been until today.

Buffy breathed heavily as tears leaked from her eyes. Tabitha- Original, right? -left a couple licks on her chin, shaking her furry head when she tasted saltwater before climbing onto Buffy's shoulder. She let the feline remain perched there, as something heavy floated off. Light finally brightened, filling her in ways it hadn't since before she fell in love at the age of seventeen. Old scars were faded, and barely discernible across tougher skin, stronger muscle.

Her hand stroked Tabitha's back. Questions followed liberation, peace drenched quickly in the emptiness all around. Buffy felt alive, on the inside; every breath was hers to take for herself alone. Except amongst the freedom came an awareness, several things standing out like black streaks across a white wall. The lack of footsteps, creaks under their weight, a stillness to the air, and quiet inside her home. Dead quiet, but for the gentle purring beside her left ear.

A deep frown settled on her face, marring the pale skin along her forehead. Despair was gone, waving itself away with every inhale, yet she breathed in cold solitude. Loneliness like she had never felt before, an invisible road sign with her name printed in faded block letters. A path that she could no longer take, and a broken compass.

A close call at a dead end.

Buffy gulped down fresh tears and pulled Tabitha closer.

One thing she knew for certain, and that was cats made excellent companions.

***

A cigarette fell outside the cabin, meeting with wet leaves and a black boot. Spike, William Pratt to his dead mother and a nutty ex girlfriend, was standing in one of his three favored positions. Today he was beneath the large maple tree, leaning into its trunk as if a stiff wind had bent him that way. Eyes bluer than the sky overhead and lined charcoal on the bottom, resolutely fixed as Spike tucked another cigarette between his lips.

He didn't have a lot in his life. A job on the graveyard watch, another at the local high school as janitor, a beautiful house on the edge of town, beaten up DeSoto, Zippo lighter, and her.

He had her from a distance, anyhow. In his mind, in his heart she resided quite well. That was the only way.

Buffy Summers. The woman who occupied his nearly every waking thought. Spike only realized she existed two years ago, and it was never his intention to end up following her. Stalking her, honestly, but here he was for possibly the thousandth time, staring at a familiar cabin like a bat does a lake at twilight.

There was never hope in resisting, though he surely tried. Of course it wasn't right to stand outside, to watch her like some crazed lunatic day in and day out. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough to make him stop; he was thoroughly besotted. A man obsessed. Walking slave sewn to her shadow. Hours spent accompanied by mindless television or nameless women in motel rooms, only distracted for so long.

For every bottle Spike drowned his consciousness in, there was a bleary evening of drawings made with unsteady fingers, poems that should never grace paper, and equally dour hangovers to follow. Drunken art lined up beside sober sketches, a painting or two, and real photographs taken from a distance, all of her. Spike knew he would never get the girl, never feel the grace of her hand touching his, so he took what he could get and let his imagination do the rest.

In reality, this bordering on sick obsession- All right, maybe we were passed bordering -had taken months to cement. Things started off slow, all beginning with spotting her outside a gas station once or twice, noticing Buffy's smile and her walk, a fluff of gorgeous blonde hair. Before he knew it, he was dreaming about her. Then, subconscious hopes bled into the daylight hours, and his fantasies ran away like a flying kite. Spike found himself beside windows, searching for Buffy at the gas station across the street every day.

He soon figured ways to run into her, without actually running into her. She never noticed him, but he treasured every glimpse he could steal of those smiles. He loved the sound of her laughter, but heard it rarely. He saw the kind of comfort she brought to the teenagers in town, those who sought it anyway. They came into her store just to talk, as if they could confide in Buffy like a mother. She seemed to enjoy the trust they exhibited. Fortunately for Spike, her little shop had large windows and the library across the way did not.

His watchful habits did nothing to affect her, and harm was the last thing Spike would ever bring. More often than not, he was the one getting hurt, but he couldn't give her up. Watching her, like a man does that which is most important to him, but similarly out of reach; it was all he had.

Spike threw the second half burnt cigarette to the ground and snuffed it, exhaling a stream of smoke. All he could have. All he would ever get, and still not because any of this was freely given. None of the facts meant it wasn't hard watching her talk to an ex, of course.

That's what he surmised the overgrown Neanderthal had been to her; a boyfriend. A lover, and judging by the emotion in her eyes when they talked, a serious pursuit. One who probably used to be Buffy's everything, if she didn't still feel that way about the git.

Spike remained on his feet, still tense as an ironing board, not crashing to the ground in sickening pain only because she had told the tosser to hit the road. He saw it all, and thankfully, neither girl nor Captain Forehead saw him. Sadness glistened in Buffy's eyes and Spike felt that familiar, overwhelming urge to comfort, to make it stop, along with the desire to hurt the man who'd encouraged those tears.

Instead, he remained far away. Far from even developing a right to help. He refused to scare her, to hurt Buffy in any way, let alone get close.

Spike sighed, gritting his teeth. Bloody stupid heart. Could never focus on something attainable, could it? Always had to fall for the magical ones, the soft and sweet. Yet as unreachable as Buffy was, it had absolutely nothing to do with his feelings, this blood fueled, bone deep sensation that filled him to the brim. A desire to see her happy and joyful, alive with it, covered in it. To watch her and the things she did, the way she treated people, friends and young kids that sought her advice, watch her eyes brighten. Even if Spike could make his own dreams come true, even if it were doable, nothing would change.

He would still love her, a woman he barely knew but for the curve of her smile.
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END NOTES: Please let me know what you thought! Thanks for reading. :)