Summary: Buffy and Angel stuff. :)
Spoilers: *The fourth season of Buffy and the first season of Angel! Minor
spoilers, but spoilers nonetheless.*
Disclaimer: Joss made the characters. And thank goodness he did.
Rating: PG
Feedback: This feels nice, too.
Thanks to Joss (who will never read this, but I wanted to thank him anyway),
for the wonderful (imho) new episodes, and twice the fun.
And my eternal thanks goes to Tracy, for betas, advice, and general
greatness. :)
Author's Note: *** Depicts character changes.

It's because I love her too much that I can't be with her.

No, it really is.

I just meant to call her once, hear her voice. Maybe say hello and see how
she was doing. Assure myself that she was fine and that I was doing the
right thing and that, God willing, she hadn't been hurt. That's all I meant
to do. I only want what's best for her. And I'm not on that list, the list
of the best things for Buffy. Though she would probably disagree.

I love her so much for that.

Anyway, I just meant to call her once. Sort of soothe the burn of
separation, for myself and for her, if she needed it. I didn't mean to
become her stalker.

What she doesn't know is that I've talked to everyone besides her. I've
talked to Giles, who told me that she was fine and that she would get even
better as the time went by, who told me that it was best not to call her.

I've talked to Xander, who told me that she was great and that she was doing
better than he had ever seen her when she was with me. Idiot laughing boy.

I've talked to Oz, who didn't say much about Buffy and instead chose to tell
me about the new demons that they've been facing, and how Buffy defeated a
female vampire named Sunday, and how interesting she had been to watch while
she did it. But, being Oz, he respected Buffy's space enough to not put
himself in a place that he didn't understand, a place where he didn't belong.

And, I've talked to Willow. She's been giving me help on navigating the
Internet, which is something I've learned that I need to do while I'm in LA.
Willow tells me that Buffy is miserable and that, while she's gotten her
confidence back in the Slaying column, she's shaken up about men and misses
me terribly. Willow says that I should come back, even if it's only for a
visit, and let Buffy know how much I still love her and will always love her
because, though Buffy apparently won't admit it, Willow knows how much she's
hurting in my absence.

I'm hurting too.
* * * * * *

I know he's checking on me. Does he think that after all we've been through,
especially what happened in the days before he left, that I wouldn't feel him
wherever he is?

Okay, so sometimes I feel him in the places that he isn't.

When he called me the first time, at my mother's house, and hung up the
phone, I can honestly say that I was too stupid and preoccupied to sense him
in a small phone call. But after the second hang-up, and after the third, it
became clear what he was doing.

Making sure I was okay. Making sure I was alive. Making sure I wasn't
missing him too bad, and that I didn't hurt too much.

Except, I am hurting. I try not to let anyone see it, and try to pretend it
never happened, but acting like that is almost like saying that my love for
Angel never even existed, and that's more painful than missing him like I do.
I can't just brush off what he had. I can't just say that it never
happened, that he means nothing to me now. Because he doesn't mean nothing
to me. He'll always mean everything.

And I know he's talked to Willow. I suspect he's talked to Xander and Oz,
too. I just hope I haven't given too many of my feelings away, because I
don't want him to resent me for making him feel guilty.

Not that Angel would ever do that. He wouldn't.

But it doesn't matter what he wouldn't do.

It matters what I'm afraid he would.
* * * * * *

The thing is, as much as I told myself that I wanted to hear that she was
doing fine, I always hung up the phone feeling unsatisfied because almost
everyone told me that she was. Only when Willow told me that Buffy missed me
was I able to get my first day's good sleep. Only when I knew that I was
still in her heart was I able to find the strength to really let people in.

I haven't been at this job for a long time, at least not without her working
beside me. Doyle is more help than he thinks, at least when he isn't staring
at Cordelia from across the room or hinting that I should buy him a drink,
and Cordelia has turned out to be surprisingly efficient.

But it's not the same.

How could it be?

I'm starting to wonder if I should really go back.
* * * * * *

As much as I want him to come back, I really don't. I'm afraid of what will
happen when I see him, I'm afraid that I might fall into his arms and let the
tears I've been holding go, and that he will see me for everything I really
am.

Useless without him.

Not in the physical sense. I got my stride back in Slaying, but I'm a
complete emotional wreck. I think about him almost every minute. I think
about what he's done for my life and wonder if he's thinking about me at that
moment and ask myself what I would do if he ever found someone else?

He says he won't, but really. Angel hasn't seen himself in about a thousand
years. So how does he know?

How does he know that someone beautiful and special won't come into his life?
How does he know that it won't happen as unexpected as love usually does; as
his love for me did? How does he know anything about what's going to happen
in the future?

He doesn't.

I've taken to wearing my ring again. Oh, I never wear it when anyone could
see me, when any of the friends who knows what it stands for could question
how I'm feeling because it's on my finger.

No, I wear it when I'm alone. Only then. The quiet times of the day and
night, I'll take it out of my drawer and slip it on my finger, and remember
when he was the one putting it on my finger. I'll imagine his voice, his
velvety voice, telling me that he loves me (a phrase I could never hear
enough), and think of his eyes on that night so long ago when I was forced to
choose between my love and my duty.
* * * * * *

I know I shouldn't wear it, and I know I should just get rid of the thing,
but I can't make myself throw the ring, my matching Claddaugh ring, in the
trash. I see it as the symbol of our love: clean and pure and forever, and I
can't help but put it on my finger to see it shine at me in the moonlight.

I feel a connectedness when I wear it, connected to her and all things simple
and right, and I wish that I could have asked her to wait for me, wait
forever if need be. I say I'm doing this because I don't want to be selfish,
say that I left her because it's easier for her this way.

But I'm one of the most selfish souls on the planet. Even wishing that she
would save her love for me only, even hoping that I'll be the only man she'll
ever love is the least selfless act I can think of.

And yet, I wear the ring. I wear it and I know what it does for me and for
her, and an odd pride rises in me saying, "Love her. Never forget that you
love her. Always know that she'll always love you. Look what this ring did,
the power it brought. Cherish that."

Because whatever else the ring brought the night I gave it to her, the night
I slipped my own on my finger, it did bring power. Unbelievable, strong,
unwavering; everything every soul should have, even if they don't know it.
It was something that I had never known existed. It brought a love cleaner
than any I've ever seen, any that I've ever even read about.

Whatever else matters in this world, that has to matter the most.

I think I'm going back.
* * * * * *

I think of that night because... I don't know. I could picture the night we
made love, or the times he's said he loved me, or before we even got that
far, when everything was almost perfect. But I think of his eyes on that
night, glowing bright and warm and sweet and painful, and I'm in a place
that's as close to happy as I'm soon to get.

I think it's because, after the night he gave me the ring, after we were as
close and as intimate as two people can be, I never got to revel in that.
Not even a second. We fell asleep wrapped in each other's arms, and when I
woke up, he was gone. Just gone. Little did I know then how much he was
really gone from me.

So when he got his soul back, I somehow knew that he remembered that night
and nothing else. I knew that he was loving me in a way that he hadn't been
able to since that night, completely and totally, with all of himself. Even
as he held me, his heart lifted some and his pain lessened. Because he
didn't remember. I think that night, if I try to forget what happened at the
end of it, was the closest that he's allowed to get to being happy.

Because he loved me. And he knew, without a doubt, that I loved him.

But I don't want him to come back to me, not now. Not after so much.

It would be too hard.
* * * * * *

Angel and Buffy stared at the same moon that night, knowing what they wanted.
Each was filled with memories of a past love, a past and future love, that
were too strong and good to ignore.

Buffy knew she wanted Angel to come back. She wanted to hold him and touch
his face and hear the voice that she heard in her dreams. She wanted the
things she was never going to be allowed to have. And, for a single second,
she didn't feel guilty that she wanted him to be with her, comforting her.
She slipped her ring on and stared at the moon and thought of him and wishes
and dreams that would probably never come true.

And Angel knew that he wasn't going to go back. He knew, without a shadow of
a doubt, that he had done the right thing. And when he saw Buffy, whenever
that would be, that it would be the right time, no matter how hard it would
be to say goodbye again. He knew that they would both be ready to see each
other, and that the meeting would be all the more special and sweet because
of their loneliness for what they missed most in the world. He glanced down
at his ring and then at the moon and knew that he was right, and for a
moment, knew that things would be fine in time. Though it wasn't happiness,
the happiness of being with her, it was enough.

And as the black, hushed night went on, the lonely ones let themselves fall
in love all over again.

The End

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