Disclaimer: Deidre is mine, the rest of them aren't ::sigh::
Author's Notes: This is in response to a challenge, but I guess I got a little OT, anyway, it's first person from the POV of Deidre, Angel and Buffy's daughter, which is kinda obvious once you start reading. I kinda stole the idea of Angel using Gaelic endearments from Joanne, I hope she doesn't mind! This is set like twenty five years in the future or so, it doesn't really have an exact date. Kinda plotless too, but oh well. Feedback please!!!!

I first met my father when I was four, the day of my mother's funeral. Actually, our first encounter was that night, but my first memory of him was the next day.

I remember that week well enough. I was confused, and a little frightened. Mostly I just wanted my mother to come back. My last memory of her is waking me up in the middle of the night, crying and driving over to Aunt Willow's house, where she sang me a lullabye and told me that she loved me. When I woke up the next morning I walked into the semi-faimilar living room and Aunt Willow and Uncle Xander were there, and they were crying and Uncle Xander picked me up and held me very tightly and told me it would be all right. I didn't even know what was wrong.

I kind of figured it out over the next few days, because everyone was crying all the time and Mom still hadn't come back, and neither had Granny Joyce. Plus Grandpa Hank kept coming up and holding me relaly tightly and telling me they were in heaven now with the angels, and I wondered if that was where my Daddy was, because Mom had called him Angel. I wondered why she didn't take me too, and when I said that they all started crying more and hugged me tighter, but no one answered my questions.

The funeral is kind of a blur in my mind. I didn't understand what was going on, except that all my relatives I'd never met were there, and everyone wore black, but not pretty black like when Mom would get dressed up to go to dinner, just plain somber black. They all stopped and hugged me and told me how sorry they were and that it would be all right, until I asked Aunt Willow if we could go home and she marched me off to her house for a nap.

Aunt Willow went looking for Dad that night and left Spike to watch me (he loves this story.or at least, telling it to me with slight embellishments). She found him at the graveyard, the moonlight falling like a benediction on his face (the benediction part is Dad's, the only time I ever got him to tell me this part, but he said it was on the grave, Aunt Will added the face part).

"I'm sorry you couldn't come to the funeral," she said when she saw him. He didn't turn around, caught by the view of Mom's name on the gravestone. "I tried to convince Mr. Summers to have it at night, but he didn't understand-and everyone else thought she should be buried in the light, since she died in the darkness."

"She deserved the light," Dad whispered; his first words since he'd walked into the graveyard.

"Angel.I have to talk to you," Willow said. She had to tell him about me.

A word of explanation: Dad never knew about me at all. He and Mom couldn't sleep together (I found out when I was older) because of a curse on his soul, but Aunt Willow found a spell letting them be together for one night without repercussions. So they spent one night together, and then Dad went back to L.A. and Mom continued on with her life. Except she didn't really. She had me. She wasn't planning it, she didn't even think it was possible because vampires can't have children, but something about the spell made him more human that night, so he could. Mom didn't tell him because she didn't want him to come back because he felt it was his duty. She wanted him to come back because he wanted to. Which is understandable, but a little annoying. My parent's were way too noble for their own good; well, Mom was. Dad still is.

Anyway, Aunt Willow convinced Dad to come over to her house, and she brought him into the room where I slept, Spike watching me from a chair beside the bed. Everyone agrees he just stood there and stared at me for while. Aunt Willow says he looked heartbroken and amazed at the same time. Spike insists he had a "duh" look. At some point I cried out in my sleep and then Daddy picked me up and held me for the first time in those big strong arms. I didn't wake up, but I did speak. I said, "Daddy."

Spike still insists my words were, "Bloody poof," but Spike is one to twist the truth, and seeing as I didn't even know what the word "poof" meant at the time (I'm still a little fuzzy on that one) I kind of doubt it.

I woke up the next morning with my father beside me, for the first time, but certainly not the last. I remember this part of it very well; it marked the beginning of true love.

"Who are you?" I asked, sitting up in bed and regarding him with a curious expression.

"I'm your father Deidre," he told me calmly. I wasn't quite sure what to make of this. I'd known my entire life that my family wasn't like other families, that my daddy lived far away, even though he loved me very much (so Mom said). I wasn't expecting him to show up though, so I was a little suspicious, and he didn't look like other daddies that I had seen, who wore sweaters or suits and had big smiles. This daddy was wearing all black, and he looked sad.of course, I thought, everyone the day before had been wearing black. So maybe this was unusual.

"Are you really?" I asked. He smiled slightly, and even though it was kind of a small smile, and a little sad, I knew right away that this was a daddy. My daddy.

"Yes," he replied, "I really am."

"Okay," I said, and smiled brilliantly at him and flung my arms around his neck. At which point Spike walked into the room and rolled his eyes.

"He's my daddy!" I said proudly. The other vampire grinned.

"You could say that. I take it you two are getting on splendidly then?"

"We're all right," Angel said, "Thanks."

"Well I had to come check on the chit. God knows you're enough to depress even the most rambunctious kid," Spike replied.

"Spike..." Dad said warningly.

"I was just commenting!" he said defensively, holding up his hands.

"Daddy," I said, "I'm hungry. Will you get me something to eat? Does Mommy know you're here?" Spike and Dad felt silent immediately and turned to look at me.

"Mommy went away Y chree," Dad said, using Gaelic, though he says now he doesn't know why he did, it just came to his tongue.

"What does that mean?" I asked, looking up at him curiously.

"It means you are my heart," he replied, and I smiled and hugged him again.

"Is it French? Mommy called me French things sometimes, when she was studying for her finals."

"No sweet, it's Irish. What did she call you?"

"Funny things.she said they meant she loved me. Do you love me?" I asked boldly.

"Very, very much," he whispered, and bent down to kiss my forehead. My stomach rumbled.

"I'm hungry!" I announced, and Spike laughed at the look on Dad's face, then scooped me up and took me out, telling me in no uncertain terms that I was to call Daddy "the poof".

**

The next day Aunt Willow told me I was going to go live with Dad, because she didn't have room for me, and I should be with my father anyway. Grandpa Hank seemed upset (I found out later he didn't trust Dad, though he really had no idea), but he was my father (Mom said so in her will) and there was no contesting his legal right to me. I kept asking if Mom was going to come live with us too, and Aunt Will and Uncle Xand would get all pale again, and Cordy (whom I'd met at the funeral) would excuse herself to go off to the bathroom. Daddy just held me very closed and said, "Mommy's gone to live in Heaven now, but she'll still watch over you. She can see you all the time, and she still loves you very much."

"Will she come back and visit?" I asked quietly.

"Maybe sometimes at night, when you're sleeping," he promised me and I accepted it quietly, because I didn't really understand. I did understand that I was going to live with him and that I liked him lots and lots, and that Spike was moving to L.A. too to "keep an eye on Soul Boy" and Cordy would be there, and she gave me ribbons and things.

If you think about it, Dad really did amazingly well with the news. He must have been stunned, but he didn't really show it, except to ask, after I'd gone back to sleep, why Buffy never told him. He never thought to question if I was his; I guess it's obvious. I have his hair and his nose and the same stillness of features. Aunt Willow swears I look just like my mother, except with darker hair, but I don't know. What I remember of Mom is always so bright. She was always brilliant and shining. I'm more like Dad; I hold things in.

Mom left him a letter. He showed it to me when I was fourteen, and first thought to ask. "Willow said she wrote this the night she died," he told me. It was on her paper. I remember her paper, for some silly reason. She wrote all her letters on it. She was forever leaving me notes on it, tucked around my room, with hearts or stars because I couldn't read yet. It was pale blue, with silver stars and moons around the edges. I thought it was just like the night sky when I was little. And it always smelled just like her, this faint scent of roses. Even now when I smell roses I'm in her arms again.

The letter still smelled of her. I recognized her pretty, slanted writing from old books of hers. We still had all her diaries in the attic, though I'd never read them. Dad thought I should wait until I was older. Didn't want me to hear details about their sex life probably. What there was of it.

"Right before she woke me up," I told him and he nodded. After Grandma died Mom made up her mind. Before she was anything, even my mother, she was the Slayer. And that's how she died, as the Slayer.

"She loved you very much carraid," Dad said, tugging at a wayward piece of black hair.

"I know," I said, because every memory I have of her is full of love and sweet laughter and roses. And then I unfolded the letter and began to read.

Dear Angel,

If you're reading this, I'm dead, or at least in a coma or something. I'm sorry for everything. I'm sorry I had to do this, and I'm sorry that I never told you, that I gave you no warning. I hope it doesn't matter.

You will know by now about Deidre. About the krikov demon too, and my mother. I know you two never really got along, and god knows I couldn't stand her half the time, but she is my mother. Was. I can't believe she's gone. If it was only her, perhaps I would let this rest, but it isn't. The krikov knows about Deidre. It wants to hurt me, and it will not stop here. I cannot, I will not, let anything hurt my baby, and so I'm taking the fight to it. I hope I shall be triumphant and that you won't even have to read this. If I'm not, if something happens to me or I fail to kill the krikov, you must do it. For your daughter, you must Angel.

I wanted to tell you about her. You don't know how I longed to call you. When I found out I was pregnant, I was so happy, because I knew that meant we could be together, and the thought of a baby, of your baby, was so amazing. I wanted to call you right away.I did call actually, but you were out. I decided to call back the next today, but that night I thought about it and I realized it wouldn't be right or fair to ask you to come back. As much as I wanted Deidre to have a father, I wanted her to have a sane mother too, and I knew if I told you and you came back I would spend my life wondering whether you would ever have come back for me, whether you truly wanted to be with me, or whether you felt it was only a duty. So I never told you. I longed to, so many times. When Deidre was born, I held her in my arms and saw you in her face and wanted you with me. I was so happy to have her, but I was sad, because I wanted you to have that joy with me. I'm sorry that you couldn't see her then, that you missed her first years of life. She was the most adorable baby that ever gurgled, crawled or walked on this earth. Though I may be slightly biased.

I want you to have her. Like I said, if you're reading this, I'm not able to take care of her. She's your daughter Angel, and she belongs with you. She's like you in a lot of ways, albeit female and a lot younger. Like you would be if you were innocent and young. In having her and loving her, I've been able to love you too. Willow would take her if I asked, I know she would, but she's getting a business started and she doesn't have the time or room. I realize it's going to be hard for you, but hopefully Cordy will help, and all my friend will be there if you need them. My father too, he lives in L.A. He'll want to see her. Take the best care of her you can. Tell her how much you love her every day, every minute. Tell her how much I love her. I've never known such joy as with her. She's my entire world, as you were. She's my life. Love her as much as you loved me. Try and make her happy, but don't spoil her. I know you will try. Be firm, but just. Just love her and you'll be all right.

Once again, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that we couldn't share her, that we couldn't have the life I always wished for the three of us. I'm sorry for the shock, I wish there was another way. Tell her I love her. I love you, forever and ever,

Buffy

I cried when I read it, and tried not to get tear stains on the letter before I realized there already were some. My mother's tear stains. She'd done it for me, so I wouldn't be in danger.

I used to be angry at her for leaving me, for giving her life up for a demon. But I know now she was giving her life up for me. I don't know if that makes it better.

The tears kept coming, even though I tried to hold them back. I don't think I'd ever really cried for her before. By the time I realized what it meant that she was dead, I was used to the idea. I cried a few times in elementary school because everyone else had mothers who baked them cookies and took them out to posh restaurants for lunch. Mothers who went shopping with them and did their hair and listened to their troubles. I had none. But that was more for me, and besides, I always felt guilty afterwards, because I had Dad and I loved him more than any of those girls loved their mothers. Cordy tried too, she helped. She did those things that mothers were supposed to do, but she was always a friend. An aunt maybe. Not my mother.

That was the first time I cried for her, because she shouldn't have died, because she'd never had her dreams fulfilled.

"She wouldn't have wanted you to be sad for her Y chree," Dad said after my crying calmed down. He kissed my forehead softly.

"I know," I sniffled, "But I have to be. Don't tell me you don't spend all your time brooding over her."

He smiled at that, as I knew he would. "I don't spend all my time brooding."

"Sure Daddy. Just twenty three hours of the day. Well.is it possible to brood while you sleep? I mean, you can dream, which could be considered brooding."

"You spend too much time with Cordelia," he growled. I smiled broadly, cheered up as I always was by him.

"I know."

We spent three weeks in Sunnydale, packing up all of Mom's stuff, selling a lot of it and putting the rest into storage, except a few things, like her diaries which we brought with us. All my stuff got packed up too and Dad spent an entire night driving back and forth between Sunnydale and L.A. with his convertible piled full of boxes. Cordelia meanwhile went on a shopping spree and redecorated Dad's study into a bedroom for me. It was small, and kind of dark (no windows in Dad's apartment) but Cordelia painted the whole thing pale blue and made it as cheerful as possible without abandoning her sense of style. I remember the first night I spent there. We'd left Sunnydale at dusk, as soon as it was safe for Dad to go outside (Aunt Willow explained to me that he was allergic to sunlight, just like Spike). Spike sat next to Dad and Cordelia sat in the back, with me curled up on her lap, fast asleep. Aunt Willow bid me a tearful good bye and promised to come visit very soon.

I woke up about five times on the drive, but Cordelia would talk to me in her most soothing voice and I would go back to sleep. Once it took Dad to lull me, but I was pretty good the whole time. I woke up when Spike picked me up from the car.

"Where are we?" I asked as he carried me inside a well lit building. A strange man with glasses looked up as we came in.

"Is this Deidre?" he asked with an accent like Spike's, except more proper.

"This is the chit," Spike confirmed. I wrinkled my nose at him.

"I'm not a chit," I complained sleepily, then lay my head down on his shoulder again.

"Sure. Come on, let's get you to bed before your Dad comes in, huh?" he asked.

"Who's he?" I asked, pointing to the man with glasses.

"That's Wesley," Spike snorted. The man looked slightly offended.

"Good evening Deidre," he said stiffly. "I'm very sorry to hear of your moth-" Spike must have given him a threatening look, because he cut off in the middle of the sentence. Cordelia came in, carrying a blanket and my coat.

"She has to go to bed!" she told Spike. "Come on, Angel's coming in a minute." We went down an elevator, which I thought was the coolest thing I'd ever seen and into my new bedroom.

"Am I sleeping here tonight?" I asked as Spike laid me down on the bed.

"You're living here now," Dad said from the doorway. "Thanks Spike."

"Right then," his childe replied. "Take good care of her."

"Of course. Goodnight."

" 'Night. Be good pookah." A pookah is a mischievous Irish sprite, and Spike called me that since...probably since I was born, come to think of it.

"I'm always good," I murmured.

"I'll be upstairs Angel," Cordelia said. "Call if you need me."

"I will." Dad sat down on the side of my bed and smoothed my face.

"This is your new room m'eduail," he told me quietly. "Sleep now and I'll show you the rest of the house tomorrow."

"Will you sing me a lullaby?" I asked. "Mommy always sang me a lullaby."

"I.I don't know any lullabies," he said, his voice aching a little.

"I can't sleep without a lullaby," I whispered. "Don't you know any?" And somewhere, from some lost memories I'll never know, Dad remembered one.

"My mother used to sing me this," he said, and began to sing, softly, a Gaelic lullaby. I didn't understand, but I knew what it meant anyway. It meant that he loved me very, very much and he would keep me safe forever and ever, against anything that tried to hurt me.

I woke up later that night, from a dream I forgot a moment later. I was alone and in an unfamiliar room. There was a faint light just outside and I got up, knowing Mom would be in her room, ready to hold me when I crawled into her bed. But the room was different than I expected, and I didn't know which door would lead to her. I started to cry, wanting to know where she was, where I was.

And then Dad was there, gathering me into his arms, soothing my fears away. He carried me to his bed and I snuggled into his arms, safe again, and fell back asleep. I can't count the nights I did that. He wasn't usually asleep when I woke, but he was always happy to fall asleep with me. Whenever I was restless or scared, I would run into Dad's room and there he was, big and strong, with his half-smile and Gaelic endearments.

There's no one in the world that makes me feel as safe as my Dad. That makes me feel as loved. When my first lover broke up with me I came home at two in the morning, crying hysterically, my hair a mess, my make-up smeared and he was waiting, ready to rock me to sleep as if I was still a baby. When the kids at school demanded why my father never picked me up from school or came to my afternoon soccer games, why his assistant always took me school shopping, I ran to him in tears and he told me it didn't matter what they thought because he loved me.

Which I knew, but it was nice seeing their faces when he showed up at a basketball game with a red rose for me. They all thought he was my "older boyfriend". I admit, I wasn't really good about stomping out that rumor, even though I did make sure the guy I liked knew he was my very well aged father. I let the cheerleaders hang though.

Really, I wasn't that into sports, whatever it just sounded like. I went through phases. I did the soccer thing for a while, but I was bad at taking directions, so I gave it up and stopped hanging out with the jock crowd. In high school I played basketball for a few years before I got bored. I was strong and fast due to my unusual parentage, but I never really loved the sports. On the whole, I wasn't exactly the most outgoing person. I had a few friends that I stuck to through all my stages, but I was more like Dad-I kept things to myself. I liked to read and write poetry and sketch things-people mostly. Dad was my favorite subject. Dad was pretty much my favorite everything. Still is.

We had one real fight in my entire life, up to this point. Dad was pretty easygoing, but once, when I was seventeen, I got involved with this bad boy type, Trent. I started wearing all black and red, really slinky stuff, sexy little dresses, miniature tube tops, short skirts and tight leather pants, you know what I mean. I stayed out the entire night partying and got completely smashed. By the time I got home, I was in really bad shape. Trent...well, he didn't want to go home. I was too drunk to push him off me, and who knows what would have happened if Dad hadn't shown up. He threw Trent like across the entire street, literally, and grabbed my arm and dragged me downstairs. I've never seen him like that. He looked like he was about to rip my head off. I could tell he was trying not to go into game face, and it was getting towards a losing battle.

"You could have killed him!" I yelled when he released me. His fingers were imprinted on my arm. They left bruises for a week.

"Tell me he wouldn't deserve it," Dad snarled. I swallowed, still reeling from the alcohol but sobering up fast.

"I can take care of myself!" I yelled, and then swayed. He caught me, his hands hard and then gentle. I closed my eyes and tried to stay angry at him, but I was too close to passing out. Which I promptly did. He must have put me to bed, because I woke up there that afternoon wishing I could just die right then and there.

"Drink this," Dad said after I pulled on my black silk robe and staggered out into the living room. He handed me something that looked really nasty, but couldn't possibly be worse than the way my head felt at the moment, so I drank it and then promptly ran into the bathroom to throw up. Several times. Dad held my hair back for me and then wiped my face when I was done. He was under control again, the same calm, gentle father I had always known. There was something different though...something in his eyes. He gave me another glass of the stuff to drink and I managed to keep it down that time.

"What exactly were you trying to accomplish by staying out all night, on a school night, getting yourself completely drunk and nearly raped?" he asked calmly when I had drunk most of it.

"Could we not do this now Dad?" I asked, rubbing my head.

"When should we do it Deidre? After you get yourself killed?" He didn't say it, but it was there, like your mother.

"I am not like her!" I yelled. "And I'm not going to get myself killed! I can take care of myself!"

"Then why did I have to haul your boyfriend off you at five thirty in the morning because you were too drunk to push him off yourself?"

I wished he would yell. He just kept talking in this cold, calm, savage voice. I wondered if this was what he was like when he was Angelus.

"Maybe I didn't want to push him off," I spat back.

There was a lie. We both knew it.

"Don't lie to me."

I swallowed, scared suddenly, for the first time, of this man that had always been my protector, my saviour. My father.

"Dad, I'm not a little girl anymore. I can take care of myself. I don't need you watching over me all the time!"

"You're not an adult. You're still young. You don't know what's good for you, what you really want-"

"What? Like Mom didn't know what she wanted?!" I yelled.

That stopped him for a minute.

"This is not about your mother. This is about you," Dad replied finally. I laughed bitterly.

"Of course it's about Mom! Everything's about Mom with you! You made her life hell, you know that right? You decided she couldn't make her own decisions, she didn't know what was good for her, so you left! You left and she was too scared to call you back when she needed you! If you'd been there that night she wouldn't have died! If you hadn't made decisions for her! Just like you're always making them for me! Well, guess what Daddy, I can make my own decisions!" I screamed. At least, it was approximately that, my head hurt a lot and I wasn't really paying much attention to what I was yelling. I threw the glass in my hand and it shattered near his feet and then somehow I'd collapsed into his arms sobbing and he was crying too. It was the only time I'd ever seen Dad cry. I think because it hit too close to home. Because for the first time someone had voiced what he'd been thinking for thirteen years.

We spent the rest of the day talking and he confessed all the years of guilt he'd felt about Mom's death, how many times he'd blamed himself. And I confessed that I was acting out because I was afraid that he only loved me as an extension of Mom, not as myself, not matter how ridiculous I knew that to be, how ridiculous it was. We cried and hugged and I fell asleep in his arms again, safe for a little while longer, his baby again.

"Y chree," he whispered to me later, "Never doubt how much I love you."

I'm moving out next week. My boyfriend Justin is kinda scarily similar to Dad actually, but I love him and he loves me and I think it's finally time to move into an apartment with windows. I'm sad about leaving, but I'm not a little girl anymore and he'll always be there. That's the nice thing about having an immortal father, I never have to worry about losing him. Even though I do anyway. Not like his job is exactly safe. He promised when I was very little that he would never leave me though, and I'm holding him to it.

Someday I'm going to have my own children and they're going to beg Dad to tell them stories. They're going to insist he sing them his lullabye, and cuddle up with him in bed. They're going to steal his leather duster and trail around the office in it, pretending to be the Dark Avenger. He's going to call them carraid and m'eudail and Y chree. Maybe they'll even convince him to tell them about Mom. That's a toughie, but he'll always give in to a pout. He'll bring them roses at their graduation and all their weddings will be at night, as mine will be. He'll be there for them forever, and for their children and their grandchildren. Even when I'm gone. He'll dream about Mom for a hundred years and more, and save thousands of innocent people, from monsters and from themselves. He'll watch everyone he loves grow old while he stays young, but he won't stop loving them. I think I've taught him that at least. If he withdraws from the world, it suffers as much as he does. He'll love others, friends, grandchildren, maybe even other women, though I doubt it.

But I know I'll always be his heart.

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