Summary: Buffy's pov in the climatic scene from Amends
Spoilers: Ummmmm.... Let's see.... hehe
Disclaimer: These characters aren't mine, no matter how much I wish they
were. <sigh> They belong to Joss Whedon and the WB. I have to
live with borrowing them for my stories.
Rating: PG, maybe. You watch the show, this is fine.
by: Amy
********
I was frantic. After I had talked to Jenny, or the thing pretending to be her, I knew what Angel intended to do. I felt like my heart was being pulled apart again. I didn't know if I would be able to live with another heartbreak. It flashed through my mind where he would go.
Once, last year when Angel and I thought nothing would ever get in the way of our love, he had taken me to a little knoll at the top of a hill. It was beautiful. You could see all of the lights from the town, and I swore I could even smell the ocean, though it wasn't that high up. He was there, I felt it.
I got there quickly, as it wasn't far from the mansion, the first place I tried. I burst through the bushes to see him standing there, so quiet and calm. He looked out over the tow, and I could tell by the way his shoulders straightened that he knew I was there. I stared at his back for a moment, willing the tears to go away before I approached.
"Angel." Saying his name aloud to him hurt me, but like every other hurt I'd been dealt, I would get through it. I had to. He didn't turn but just continued to stare out over the town.
"I bet half the kids down there are already awake. Lying in there beds, sneaking downstairs." His voice sounded hollow. "Waiting for day."
I went to his side and he finally turned to see me. "Angel, please. I need you to get inside. There's only a few minutes left," I pleaded.
"I know. I can smell the sun long before it comes." He was scaring me-- More than he had in the dream, more than he had in my room. He sounded hopeless. I had never really heard that in him. His soul was so beautiful... I couldn't imagine him not having hope in it.
"I don't have time to explain this, you just have to trust me... That thing that was haunting you--" He broke in.
"It wasn't haunting me, it was showing me." Still he sounded calm and dead inside. I didn't need to wonder at his pain, because I felt all of it.
"Showing you?" I didn't get it. I didn't understand... This was hurting too much.
"What I am." Tears filled my eyes and I protested firmly.
"Were." He spun to look at me, and I saw the wetness in his own eyes.
"And ever shall be."
I wanted to die. I had told him once that when he kissed me I wanted to die, but the truth was, that whenever I was with him.... Whenever I wasn't with him, and whenever I knew I couldn't ever be with him, I wanted to die. I never knew that love would be this strong, this painful. Love was not the fluffy lightness I had always imagined, it was dark and scary and made no sense and made a heart bleed. There was the part the was different, of course. The part that made you want to scream and cry and laugh at once. I was feeling everything.
"Look," he continued. "I wanted to know why I was back. Now I do." I almost felt angry. I felt like he was letting me down, that he didn't love me back enough to want to try to live.
"You don't know!" I cried. "Some great evil takes credit for bringing you back, and you buy it?! You just give up?" I demanded. The tears finally started to fall, streaking my face.
"I can't do it, Buffy. I can't become a killer again." I knew what he was saying, but I also knew there was more. There was more than he was giving himself credit for. Much more in his heart that hadn't been realized yet.
"Then fight it."
"I can't." He, too, let go of his tears, and I saw one slip down his cheek. I resisted the urge to wipe it away. I wondered if it would always hurt like this.
"Angel, please. You *have* to get inside." The sky was dark, but it was getting colder, and I knew that those cold seconds were the moments right before the rise of the sun.
"They told me to kill you," he said. "You were in the dream, you know. They told me to lose my soul in you and become a monster again." I flinched, the memory of that dream so real and clear in my head. He had touched me, caressed me in ways that he hadn't the first time. Maybe he was touching my heart more than then, because somewhere deep down I knew it had to be a dream. I knew that we wouldn't be allowed anything else.
"I know what they told you." I was trying to be calm, but my heart was breaking. "What does it matter??" I demanded.
"Because I wanted to!" he burst out. I blanched, and felt my face drain of color. He continued, damning himself for every word he spoke, every confession he had to make. "Because I want you so badly... I want to take comfort in you, and I know it'll cost me my soul, and a part of me doesn't care." I stared at him as he turned back to look out over the town again. Didn't he know that there was a part of me that wanted him to do that? That wanted--craved-- his touches and kisses and the fire that he brought to my heart. I hated feeling half alive, and I knew that that's all I would ever be without him. Of course he wanted that. I wanted that too. There was no way around it. "Look, I'm weak. I've never been anything else. It's not the demon that needs killing in me, it's the man," he finished. He sounded resigned, angry and tortured.
"You're weak. Everybody is. Maybe this evil did bring you back. But if it did, then it's because it needs you. Which means you can hurt it. Angel, you have the power to do real good." His head turned slightly towards me, but he didn't meet my eyes. "To make amends. But if you die now, then all you ever were was a monster." I half yelled to make him see and understand what he was doing. I knew that amends was what he wanted more than anything. We both knew that there was no real way to get it. But if he could do good, then maybe it was a start. "Angel, please! The sun is coming up--"
"Just go." He was done with me, he was saying. He was letting me go, and trying to cleanse his heart of me. It wouldn't work, I told myself stubbornly. I wouldn't let him.
"I won't!" He turned again at my words, taking in my tearstained face sadly. I wondered how many tears I would cry if he succeeded in what he came there to do.
'What, do you think this is simple? You think there's an easy answer? You can never understand what I've done!" His voice held so much pain. How could two hearts hold so much hurt?
"You aren't staying here, I won't let you!" I started tugging feebly on his arm. I knew it was useless, but I needed to try. I wanted to save him. He flung my hand off his arm.
"So leave!" He yelled. I looked at his face, so blind and unseeing to the things that needed to be seen. I drew back my arm and struck him across the face. He looked at me a second before grabbing me and throwing me harshly to the ground. I skinned my palms and cried for him in the dirt. There was no way that I could convince myself that he had not done that to me.
He strode over and flipped me over to face him, half straddling me. All I felt was love and fear, and I realized that the two would always coincide with each other. I stared into his face, wanting him to let me go. I wanted him to hold me forever. "No! No..." I sobbed. He took my arms and held me roughly in place.
"Am I a thing worth saving, huh?" He demanded. "Am I a righteous man? The world wants me gone." He stopped and I looked at him, my tears falling silent between us. Pain crossed his face as I stared up into those lovely eyes, full of sadness. He was begging me to leave, I saw. He was begging me to stay.
My voice came out small and helpless. I didn't want to say the words, but I needed to, I needed him to finally know everything I felt. "What about me? I love you so much. And I tried to make you go away... I killed you and that didn't help." It was just hurt. There was this huge hurt that would never go away in me. I threw him off my my body as he looked at me, stunned by the truth and unfairness in my words.
"And I hate it!" I continued, sobbing. "I hate that it's so hard.... And that you can hurt me... *so much.* I know everything that you did, because you did it to me." His eyes were agonized and I wished I could stop. But my heart wouldn't let me. "God, I wish that I wished you dead. I don't. I *can't.*" I fell to silence as we both got to our feet, grieving that loss of something so glorious and powerful.
His eyes leveled mine, but I couldn't look away. "Buffy, please. Just this once, let me be strong."
"Strong is fighting. It's hard, and it's painful, and it's everyday. It's what we have to do. And we can do it together." I knew those words would only cause me pain if he should accept them, but I didn't care. I needed him alive, or too big a part of me would die with him. "But if you're too much of a coward for that, then burn." Shock passed over his face... Shock and love and self contempt. "If I can't convince you that you belong in this world, then I don't know what can But *do not* expect me to watch. And don't expect me to mourn for you, because--" I broke off to stare at something falling on his coat. White and small and utterly breathtaking. It was snow.
We looked up at once. Snow was falling all around us, gaining weight and speed. The ground was already being covered by a soft, white blanket. It was still dark, and I looked towards the town, watching the snow fall. I spun around, my eyes meeting Angel's and locking. He had a flicker of a smile and a spark of life in his eyes. This was my Christmas miracle.
We stared at each other for a long time. Walking forward slowly, our hands met, just like they had in the dream. We both knew that this didn't mean that everything was changed, but our hearts didn't care for the moment. Palm to palm, we looked at each other, our eyes sharing everything that we had said, and everything that we could never say. His fingers laced through mine.
Angel drew me to him and stroked my hair softly as I buried my face in his chest, breathing in his scent. "You're my Angel, " I whispered. Love filled me. It filled the despair and covered up the ugly hurt that had tried to distort my heart. Only love was left, and I was grateful.
"You're mine." he whispered back, and I let my tears seep into his shirt. I pulled back slowly and looked up into his eyes. He leaned down and my mouth met his is a fiercely bittersweet kiss. I stored the feeling of it in my heart, for when I got weak and had nothing to fight for.
Holding hands, we separated from each other and silently started down the hill. I wasn't even cold. We didn't speak the entire walk down. The snow glistened on everything, making the world seem pure and sweet and asleep.
As we made our way into the town square, I looked at him. He was looking at me with a small smile on his face that made me forget everything that had happened. We broke our gazes once more to stare at the snow. He was my life miracle.
We walked on and on, into the night of day.
The End