ANGEL: I bet half the kids down there are already awake. Lying in their beds... sneaking downstairs... waiting for day.

BUFFY: Angel, please. I need for you to get inside. Th- there's only a few minutes left.

ANGEL: I know. I can smell the sunrise long before it comes.

BUFFY: I don't have time to explain this. You just have to trust me. That thing that was haunting you...

ANGEL: It wasn't haunting me. It was showing me.

BUFFY: Showing you?

ANGEL: What I am.

BUFFY: Were.

ANGEL: And ever shall be. I wanted to know why I was back. Now I do.

BUFFY: You *don't* know. Some great evil takes credit for bringing you back and you buy it? You just give up?

ANGEL: I can't do it again, Buffy. I can't become a killer.

BUFFY: Then fight it.

ANGEL: It's too hard.

BUFFY: Angel, please, you *have* to get inside.

ANGEL: It told me to kill you. You were in the dream. You know. It told me to lose my soul in you and become a monster again.

BUFFY: I know what it told you. What does it matter?

ANGEL: Because I wanted to! 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. Look, I'm weak. I've never been anything else. It's not the demon in me that needs killing, Buffy. It's the man.

BUFFY: You're weak. Everybody is. Everybody fails. Maybe this evil did bring you back, but if it did, it's because it needs you. And that means that you can hurt it. Angel, you have the power to do real good, to make amends. But if you die now, then all that you ever were was a monster. Angel, please, the sun is coming up!

ANGEL: Just go.

BUFFY: I won't!

ANGEL: What, do you think this is simple? You think there's an easy answer? You can never understand what I've done! Now go!

BUFFY: You are not staying here. I won't let you!

ANGEL: I said LEAVE!

He jerks his arm free of her grasp. In her anger and desperation Buffy punches him. He reacts by shoving her away from him roughly, making her fall face forward, hard to the ground.

ANGEL: (quietly to himself) Oh, my God...

BUFFY: No! No!

ANGEL: Am I a thing worth saving, huh? Am I a righteous man? The world wants me gone!

BUFFY: (tearfully) What about me? I love you so much... And I tried to make you go away... I killed you and it didn't help. (crying) And I hate it! 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. Oh, God! I wish that I wished you dead. I don't. (whispers) I can't.

ANGEL: Buffy, please. Just this once... let me be strong.

BUFFY: Strong is fighting! It's hard, and it's painful, and it's every day. It's what we have to do. And we can do it together. But if you're too much of a coward for that, then burn. 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...

(snow falls...)

• Angsty Traumatic Confrontations
• Buffy & Angel
• philosphies on monsters, animals, killers, etc

written by: Joss Whedon; Transcribed by: AleXander Thompson. Full transcript at:
http://www.studiesinwords.de/44amends.html