RATING: PG
COUPLES: B/A, B/S, B/R (but the last 2 only in references)
SPOILERS: Up through "Normal Again" on Buffy and "Sleep Tight" on Angel.
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, never will be. But a girl can dream, can't she?
DISTRIBUTION: My site, Land of Denial, anyone else who asks for it.

The doctor flashed the light into the young girl's eyes, sighing with despair. 'Six years. And now she's gone to us. We were so close!' He turned to her parents. "There's no reaction. We lost her."

The older woman - the girl's mother - burst out into tearful sobs. "No. My baby can't be gone. No!"

Her husband embraced her from behind, trying his best to be calm for his wife. "Joyce, calm down. The doctor will find a way to bring her back to us. Right?" he asked the dark-skinned doctor.

But he just frowned, putting the light back in his pocket. "I'm sorry, Mr. Summers. Your daughter is in a state of catatonia right now. There's nothing I can do for her. Buffy's regressed back into her schizophrenic world."

"You have to do something!" Mrs. Summers shouted. "She was so close to breaking through, we almost had her back."

He nodded. "I know how horrible this is for you. Losing your daughter to delusions…words can't begin to describe how unfair it is. All we can really do now is wait for her to come back to reality. If she ever does."

Mrs. Summers wrenched herself from her husband's grasp and crawled to her twenty-one year old daughter, who sat in the corner of the room staring at nothing. "Buffy, I know you can hear me. Fight them, I know you can do it. Remember a few minutes ago when I told you how strong your heart is? Well, you have to use it now. These people - Willow, Xander and Dawn - they're not real. We are. Do it for your father and me, sweetie. Then you can come home." She took hold of her daughter's hand and brought it to her lips, kissing it gently.

Mr. Summers could only shake his head. "I don't understand this, Dr. Torres. Buffy was coming out of it, she was making serious progress. How could this have happened?"

"I truly wish I had an answer, but unfortunately I don't. Truth is, I can only speculate as to what caused it. Perhaps she wasn't ready for the real world; she didn't want to come back. My best guess would be that she simply couldn't leave them. They had become so central to her reality that coming back here to a world without them would have been like killing them."

"Do we even exist to her anymore?" he wanted to know.

"It's hard to tell. From what I've gathered over the past six years, in Buffy's reality you do exist. You and your wife divorced, she died a year ago and you haven't been seen or heard from. But she knows who you are."

Mr. Summers closed his eyes in pain. "Is there anything we can do to help her?" He would do anything to have his daughter back. They had already lost out on six years of her life, neither he nor his wife were willing to lose six more.

"Nothing, I'm afraid. Buffy needs to come out of this on her own. She could wake up from her catatonic state tomorrow, weeks or months from now. Or possibly never."

"I refuse to accept that," Mrs. Summers stated, still holding her daughter's hand. "Buffy will be herself again, I just know she will."

***

Weeks passed by and nothing happened. Buffy remained in her state of catatonia, laying on her bed and staring at the ceiling. It was a daily struggle to get her to eat, she wouldn't respond to anyone, not even her parents. Mr. and Mrs. Summers were there every day after work, begging and pleading with her to come back to them. But their pleas fell on deaf ears. Buffy didn't so much as blink at the sound of their voices.

A month after she lost touch with reality, a new doctor walked into the room. Buffy's mother sat in the chair next to the bed. She hardly noticed when he came in, thinking it was Dr. Torres checking her chart as he did every-so-often.

"How is she doing today?" the new doctor asked, looking over Buffy's chart.

"No change," Mrs. Summers muttered. She glanced up when she didn't recognize the doctor's voice. "I'm sorry, I thought you were Dr. Torres."

He smiled at her. 'She looks like she hasn't slept in weeks.' "Her vital signs are good. Buffy is strong, I can see that from reading her chart. By the way, I'm Dr. Donnelly, Dr. Torres is on vacation this week and I've taken over some of his patients. Are you Buffy's mother?"

"Yes."

"Have you noticed anything out of the ordinary today?"

She shook her head sadly. "No. She's been like this for a month now. All she does is stare at the ceiling, not talking or blinking or making any sound whatsoever. I don't know how much more of this I can stand. I want my little girl back the way she was."

"I know you do. It'll take some time, but nature has a way of fixing its mistakes." He moved to the left side of the bed to shine the light into the young girl's eyes. He got no reaction her the patient. "She has the most beautiful green eyes I've ever seen."

"That she does."

Dr. Donnelly placed his fingers over Buffy's wrist to feel her pulse. It jumped when his skin touched hers. He found it strange, but didn't think anything of it. "Well, everything seems fine. Don't give up hope, Mrs. Summers."

"Please, call me Joyce." She took an instant liking to the handsome young doctor. He didn't look much older than thirty, good-looking with dark hair and friendly brown eyes. 'He seems like a nice guy. The kind of man Buffy should be with if she weren't in this hospital.'

"Very well. I'll be in to check on Buffy again in a few hours or so. Let me know if anything changes."

"I will."

As Dr. Donnelly was walking out the door, Buffy squeezed her mother's hand. "Angel," she whispered. "You're here with me. I can hear your voice. Angel, please don't leave me again."

***

2

They'd been there with her, she could hear their voices. Her mother and father came by to visit every day, always begging her to come home to them; to leave her friends behind and be with them. And when they weren't there, it was the doctors and nurses saying the same things. But Buffy didn't want to leave. There was no way she could kill her friends and younger sister, even if it meant being with her parents again.

Sunnydale, California was her home now. It offered her security, friendship, family, responsibility and love. In Los Angeles - where her parents were - everyone believed she was crazy, but in Sunnydale, she was just Buffy. She wasn't crazy, she was extraordinary. People looked up to her, people depended on her. The world depended on her. Why would she want to trade all of that just to be Normal Buffy? Crazy Buffy?

Then she heard *his* voice. It had been months since they'd spoken, not long after she'd returned from the dead. They met halfway between L.A. and Sunnydale and talked for hours about death and life, and how both of them had been given second chances. But when Buffy told him she still loved him and wanted to live her second chance with him, he said it couldn't be; they needed to move on. His words left her devastated - she felt like she'd lost the only man she ever loved. And in a way, she had.

She and Spike were arguing in the cemetery over when she would tell her friends about them when she heard the voice. Angel's voice. She looked around for him but he was nowhere in sight.

"Angel," she whispered, ignoring Spike's expression of anger at the sound of his grandsire's name.

"He's not here, love," Spike informed her with a roll of his eyes. 'Will he ever leave her thoughts? Bleedin' Christ, it's been years since the big poof left her.' "He's in Los Angeles with those freaks who work for him."

Buffy shook her head. "I hear his voice. Angel's nearby, I have to find him."

"Whatever. But you've got until tomorrow to tell your friends about us or I will." He walked away, leaving her standing there alone.

"Where are you? I hear you, Angel!" she shouted. "You know I don't like playing games, and I hate it when you hide in the shadows."

She could feel him, she could always feel him when he was nearby. Their connection, despite living hundreds of miles away from one another, was still as strong as ever.

"She has the most beautiful green eyes I've ever seen," she heard Angel say.

Buffy turned in a circle, but saw nobody. "Who does? Stop playing games, this isn't funny anymore."

It was then that she felt him touch her right wrist, pressing against her pulse. But nobody stood to her right, she was still alone in the exact same spot Spike had left her standing in. Her pulse quickened when she felt his skin against hers, but it didn't surprise her. It always happened when Angel touched her. No man - dead or alive - could effect her the way he did.

As suddenly as it arrived, the feeling was disappearing. She could feel Angel leaving. 'How can he come and go without even telling me why he's here? Don't I deserve that much?' "Angel, don't go."

Her thoughts flashed to the day that changed her perfect life and turned it upside down. The day the love of her life broke her heart into a million pieces.

//"You deserve more. You deserve something outside of demons and darkness. I mean, you should be with someone who can take you into the light. Someone who can make love to you," Angel said, his face filled with sadness.

"I don't care about that," Buffy told him.

"You will. A-And children."

She stared at him, her mouth agape. "Children? Can you say jumping the gun? I killed my goldfish."

"Today. But you have no idea how fast it goes, Buffy. Before you know it, you'll want it all. A normal life."

Buffy shook her head. "I'll never have a normal life."

"Right. You'll always be a Slayer. But that's all the more reason why you should have a normal relationship instead of this…this freakshow." He paused, seeing the look of devastation written all over Buffy's face. "I didn't mean that."

"I'm gonna go." She started to leave, not wanting to hear any more.

Angel reached out to her, grabbing her shoulder. "I'm sorry. You know how much I love you; it kills me to say this."

"Then don't. Who are you to tell me what's right for me? You think I haven't thought about this?" she asked him.

"Have you? Rationally?"

Buffy did her best to fight back the tears. 'I can't let him see me cry.' "No. No, of course not. I'm just some swooning little schoolgirl, right?"

"I'm trying to do what's right here, okay? I'm trying to think with my head instead of my heart," Angel reasoned.

"Heart? You have a heart? It's not even beating!" she shot angrily.

"Don't," he begged.

Buffy swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. "Don't what? Don't love you? I'm sorry, you know what? I didn't know I got a choice in that. I'm never going to change; I can't change. I want my life to be with you." 'Listen to reason, Angel. Please.'

He looked down, unable to say this while looking into her sad green eyes. "I don't."

"You don't wanna be with me?" It finally sunk in. "I can't believe you're breaking up with me."

"It doesn't mean that I don't-"

The rest of his sentence was cut off by the lifting of Buffy's hand. "How am I supposed to stay away from you?"

Angel sighed. "I'm leaving. After the Ascension. After it's finished with the Mayor and Faith. If we survive, I'll go."

"Where?" she wanted to know.

"I don't know."

"Is this really happening?" she asked.\\

"Angel. You're here with me. I can hear your voice. Angel, please don't leave me again," she said.

***

Mrs. Summers jumped up from her chair when she heard her daughter speak for the first time in a month. "Dr. Donnelly, she's talking. Buffy just said something. She's coming out of it."

Dr. Donnelly had already turned around and was on his way to the girl's side. He'd heard the words, knowing it was a good sign. He flashed the light back in her eyes, noticing a significant improvement from only a minute before. Buffy's eyes were following the light. "It looks like you may be right, Joyce. It's amazing."

"She did it," Mrs. Summers rejoiced. "She killed them."

"Them?" he questioned.

She nodded. "The people that were keeping her there. We told her she had to get rid of them before she could come back to us and she finally did." She kissed her daughter's cheek. "Welcome back, Buffy. Your dad will be so excited when I tell him."

Buffy took several deep breaths, realizing she was no longer alone in the middle of the cemetery. Glancing around, she found herself in a small room with only a bed in the middle of it. To her left stood her mother, wearing a bright smile on her face. And to her right, she saw her love, dressed in dark pants, a white dress shirt and a white medical coat. "Angel," she whispered, focusing her eyes on the doctor.

He gave her a half-smile, the one that made her knees weak and her heart race. "It's been a long time since anybody's called me by that name," Dr. Donnelly told her. "Actually, I think my sister was the last person, and that was over ten years ago."

"You came back for me. I knew you couldn't leave. You still love me, don't you, Angel?" Buffy asked in a soft voice.

"I don't want you to get all worked up, Buffy Just lay down and rest. I have to talk to your mom."

She tensed. 'He's gonna leave me again.' "Don't leave. Please, don't leave. I'll be good, I promise. I told you I'd do anything to keep you from leaving me again. Just tell me what to do."

Dr. Donnelly placed his hand over hers. "It's okay. I'll be right outside with you mom. I'll stand in front of the window so you can see me. Okay?"

"Okay," she agreed reluctantly.

He nodded to Mrs. Summers, following her into the empty hallway. "Is she going to be okay, Doctor?"

"I don't know. She seems to think I'm someone else. Do you recall her mentioning this Angel person?"

"Yes. He was a man she loved in her other world. I don't know all the details of it, but from what I heard, he left her," she informed him.

"I see. When I was leaving, she must have thought he was here and getting ready to leave her again, and it brought her back to the real world."

"And if Buffy thinks you are him, you can bring her back to us completely. You brought her back to us; you got her out of her catatonia. I'll never be able to thank you enough," Mrs. Summers said.

"Don't thank me. I'm going to need to look more in-depth at your daughter's case. Find out what it was about him that brought her back, and why I triggered it. And what happened to the people she was with," he advised the older woman.

She smiled. "Okay. What if she asks for you? I mean, for him."

"Tell her I'll be back in a little while. But don't say anything about this Angel guy. If she does ask, make sure you refer to me as Dr. Donnelly, or even Liam. The last thing Buffy needs is to be thinking she's still there. Just talk to her as if nothing changed since you brought her here. But whatever you do, don't mention Angel. Not until I find out more about their relationship."

***

3

Mrs. Summers went back inside her daughter's room, finding her in the same position they had left her in - laying on her back, staring at the ceiling. "I'm back, Buffy. Say something. Say anything."

"Angel," she moaned softly. "I can't feel him. He's not here with me anymore. I wanna go back."

"No! Listen to me, your dad and I need you, so don't even think about going back there. And Liam hasn't left you, he just had some other patients he needed to take care of. He told me to tell you he'll be back before you know it," Mrs. Summers told Buffy.

The patient closed her eyes and smiled. "Liam. That was Angel's name before he was turned. He really is here with me."

Mrs. Summers sat down on the bed next to her, holding one of her hands. "Do you know who I am?"

Buffy looked closely at the woman seated next to her. The voice was familiar, but what she saw could not be true. "Mom. You can't be here, you're dead. I found your body on the living room couch almost a year ago! It's all their fault, they're playing tricks on me. They are making me see things I want to see."

"Nobody's playing tricks on you, sweetie. I'm right here, I am alive and well." She took Buffy's hand and laid it flat against her cheek. "See? Warm."

She shook her head violently. "No. No, it can't be true. They're trying to make me believe you're real, but you're not."

"Who's doing this to you back there?"

"Jonathon and his dorky friends. First, one of them built a robot for Spike who looked exactly like me, then they made me invisible and now this. I have to stop them before they find another way to hurt me," Buffy told her mother. "I need to get back to Sunnydale."

'Buffy knows she's not in Sunnydale. Which means she's here with us; mind, body and spirit. It's a miracle!' "Do you know where you are right now, Buffy?"

She nodded sadly. "The clinic in L.A.. But I have to get home."

"L.A. is your home. Don't you want to be with your mom and dad anymore? Everyone who loves you is in L.A.."

"Angel's in L.A.. I love him and I need to be with him."

"Isn't that enough reason to stay? To be with the man you love?" 'Maybe saying that will convince her that she belongs here and not in that Sunnydale place.'

Tears filled her large green eyes. "He left me. If I stay in L.A., will he leave me again?"

'He must have hurt her so badly when he left her other world.' "You can ask Liam when he gets back. But, somehow, I don't think he's going anywhere."

***

"Still here, Dr. Donnelly?" Nurse Annabelle Michaels asked, popping her head through his open office door. "I assumed with your doubled patient load this week, you'd be dead tired by now."

Shaking his head, Dr. Liam Donnelly smiled at the friendly nurse. "I thrive on stress, you know that."

"Yeah, I know. There's a rumor going around that Buffy Summers had a major breakthrough when you examined her this evening. Is there any truth to it?"

"Yes. She came out of her catatonia a few hours ago. That's actually why I'm still here; I want to read over her file so I can find out exactly what happened to her. Buffy kept calling out for someone and I want to find out more about him," he told the nurse.

"Well, happy hunting. See you tomorrow afternoon."

"Bye, Annabelle."

Once she closed the door, he opened Buffy Summers' file. He'd already read some of Dr. Torres' entries, learning that she had been brought to the clinic when she was fifteen for claiming her sole purpose for being on this earth was to stop vampires. She called herself a Slayer, the Chosen One for her generation, the only girl powerful enough to stop the vampires from taking over. And that was the beginning of her descent into madness.

Dr. Donnelly couldn't stop reading, silently praising Dr. Torres' affinity for details. Not long after being brought to the clinic, Buffy's schizophrenic delusions only increased. In her mind, her parents divorced, she got kicked out of high school, and she and Mrs. Summers moved to a small town called Sunnydale, a town described as being two hours away from the nearest Neiman Marcus.

He read about her friends - Willow Rosenberg, the redheaded computer geek; Xander Harris, the dark-haired goofball Willow had been best friends with her entire life; Rupert Giles, the British librarian who revealed himself to Buffy as her new Watcher; and Cordelia Chase, a no-nonsense girl Buffy described as being rich and self-centered. Then there was the infamous Angel.

They met the first week she moved to Sunnydale. Buffy was instantly attracted to the cryptic mystery man, saying later that the name Angel fit him perfectly. Their early relationship was antagonistic, he followed her around, giving her cryptic warnings about upcoming dangers before finally revealing his true identity a few months later.

But it was too late by that time. Buffy had already fallen head over heels in love with Angel when she found out who he really was. He was a vampire, known as Angelus, the Scourge of Europe prior to being cursed with a soul by Romany Gypsies in 1898. The two fell in love, unable to stop themselves even though they knew how wrong their love was. Things heated up, until the night of Buffy's seventeenth birthday when they made love for the first - and only - time.

Dr. Donnelly felt himself begin to tear up when he read about the events of the next few months. Angel lost his soul after their lovemaking, terrorized her and killed her Watcher's girlfriend, tried to suck the world into a hell dimension, only to have his soul restored in time for Buffy to kill him. It was around that time that she fell into one of her catatonic states, until he returned from hell in October. Then she started coming around again.

After he'd read of Buffy and Angel's breakup senior year of high school, and his subsequent exit from Sunnydale, Dr. Donnelly had to stop reading. He was so emotional over reading the tragic love story between the two that he couldn't continue. To him, it was like reading Romeo and Juliet all over again. One thing that struck him was Buffy's description of Angel: tall, dark and handsome, with caring, loving brown eyes and spikey brown hair. Looking at himself in the mirror hanging on his wall, Liam Donnelly sighed. 'No wonder she thought I was him. From her description, I *am* him.'

***

"I thought you were supposed to be home at eight o'clock," his girlfriend Emma Novick complained when Liam Donnelly finally walked into his apartment. "Your rounds were over then and it's after ten. Where have you been, Liam?"

He sat down on the couch, slumping his shoulders in exhaustion. "Sorry. Long day today. One of Miguel's patients had a major breakthrough and I had to do some research."

"You could have called. It was very inconsiderate of you, we had plans for the night."

"Emma, don't start. You know I'm a doctor, which means my job is never over. I had a patient who needed me, and I wasn't about to ignore her needs so I could return here and play house with you," Liam exploded.

Emma placed her hands on her hips. "Don't get angry with me. I am your girlfriend and you never pay any attention to me. All you care about is your patients. What's the big deal about this one? It's not even *your* patient. Let someone else deal with her problems."

He put his hands over his eyes, not wanting to deal with an argument with his possessive girlfriend. "You have no compassion whatsoever, do you? People depend on me. If you don't like it, you can leave. The door is right over there."

"Fine, I will. But if I walk out that door, I won't come back. I hope you know that."

"I know. Goodbye, Emma."

As she walked out the door with a huff, Liam stretched out and thought about Buffy Summers, and how it was he existed in her other world.

***

4

The next day, Liam began his rounds at noon like he always did. It had been a long time since he'd looked forward to them; he preferred the one-on-one sessions he shared with his patients to the quick, impersonal five minute visits at the beginning of his shift. And if there was one patient Liam looked forward to seeing that day, it was Buffy Summers. Ever since he'd read her case file the night before, he couldn't get her out of his mind. He wanted to find out everything, but he wanted to hear it in her own words.

When he entered her room at one-fifteen, Buffy was sitting on her bed, hugging her knees to her chest and rocking back and forth. Her blonde hair fell over her face and she was muttering something incoherent to him. "Buffy?" Liam asked. "Is something wrong?"

"Not enough time. I'll never forget, I'll never forget, I'll never forget," she repeated over and over again.

Gingerly, he sat down on the bed next to her. "Never forget what, Buffy?"

She lifted her head when his voice entered her subconscious mind. "Angel. You're still here. You said the Powers That Be were turning back time and I would forget everything. But I remember, and you didn't go away. I thought I was going to lose you forever." Tears streamed down her pale cheeks.

'She still thinks I'm Angel,' Liam told himself. "Tell me about the day. Why were the Powers going to turn back time?" He didn't recall reading about that particular incident in Dr. Torres' file.

His question triggered something inside Buffy. 'Why would Angel have to ask me that? He remembers that day as well as I do.' When she gazed into the concerned eyes of the handsome doctor sitting next to her, it hit her. "Who are you?" she asked softly. "You look and sound like Angel, but you're not him. What are you doing here?" Frightened, Buffy slid further away from the doctor.

"It's okay, Buffy. I'm not going to hurt you," Liam reassured her.

"Then who are you?!" After a momentary pause, she jumped off the bed and ran to the far corner of the room. "You're evil again. Go away, Angelus! Stop torturing me!"

Not wanting to scare her further, or send her into another catatonic episode, he remained on the bed. "Nobody's trying to torture you, and I assure you, I'm not Angelus."

"You are playing mind games with me, but it won't work this time. Because I'm not falling for it. You can't hurt me anymore, Angelus. All of my family…all of my friends are dead."

"Dead?" Liam questioned. "How did it happen?"

"Don't play dumb, it doesn't become you. Mom died a year ago, you know that. You came…no, wait, it was Angel. *My* Angel."

"What about the rest of them?"

Slowly, she walked over to the bed once again. Whoever this man sitting there was, he certainly wasn't Angelus. The evil vampire never would have cared enough to ask what happened to her friends; he would have gloated over their deaths. "They're dead. I watched while a demon killed them. I heard Angel's voice in the cemetery, so I went back home and found an ugly, scaly demon in the house with them. I wanted to be with Angel so badly that I didn't try to save them. I killed my friends." Buffy sniffled. "All to be with Angel. I thought you were him, but you're not Angel."

"No, I'm not. But I'm not Angelus, either. Believe me, Buffy, I didn't come here to hurt you. I want to help you."

"Why? Why would you want to help me?"

Liam watched as she sat back down next to him. She looked so lost and lonely, and in desperate need of a friend. "I'm a doctor at Meadow Woods Clinic. My name is William Donnelly, but you can call me Liam if you'd like."

"I like the name Liam. That was Angel's name. Did you know that?" she wanted to know.

He nodded his head. "Yeah, I think I read it in the notes Dr. Torres wrote."

"Dr. Torres? I think I know him."

"Sure you do, he's your doctor. He has been since you first got here. Do you know how long you've been here?"

"At the hospital? A long time, I guess," she answered. For some reason, Buffy trusted Liam. Not because he could be Angel's identical twin, but because there was something about him that made her feel completely at ease. And with him there, she didn't want to return to Sunnydale. She could feel safe again.

He flashed her a smile, and she returned the favor. The sight of Buffy's smile tugged at his heartstrings. "Yes, a long time. Six years, actually. Can you tell me why you were brought here?"

"Because Mom and Dad thought I was crazy."

"Do you think you're crazy?"

She shook her head at the question. "No. I swear to god, Liam, they were there. The vampires. Why doesn't anyone believe me?"

"I don't know. Maybe because it's a little far-fetched. Don't you think so?" he asked her.

"It's true, though."

"Okay, I have an idea. How about you and I go out tonight and…what do you call it? Patrol? See if we can come across any."

"No!" she exclaimed. "It's too dangerous. I don't want you to get hurt. Not like Angel did when he was human that day."

He placed his hand on her shoulder. "Buffy, I want you to be truthful with me, and don't get angry when I ask you this. Do you want to go back to Sunnydale or stay here?"

"I want to stay here with you."

"Then you have to say something, and you have to believe it with your whole heart. You need to tell me, tell everyone that vampires don't exist. Would you say it for me?"

"I-I don't know. I don't think I can."

"If you want to get better, you have to. Don't you want to get better? Get healthy again and go home with your parents? Start living a normal life again?" Liam probed. He was going to do everything in his power to make this girl well again.

"Yes, I do. I wanna be healthy again. I wanna go home."

"Then please, say it. For me."

Buffy took a deep breath. She knew her words would seal her fate. But she trusted Liam, and if he said she would get better if she said it, it had to be true. "They're not real," she whispered. "Vampires aren't real. It was all in my head." Pausing, she let out a sob. "I want to be healthy again. Help me get healthy again, Liam. Please."

She collapsed against him, and Liam held her to him while she cried into his coat. "I will help you. I'll be here every step of the way, Buffy. You have my word."

***

5

"So, Doc, what do you want to talk about today?" Buffy asked with a bright smile when she sat down on the plush couch in Liam's office.

Nearly a month had passed by since her decision to get healthy again. They'd been meeting for an hour every weekday, Buffy talking to him about anything that happened to be on her mind. Although, most days it ended up being an hour-long discussion of Angel. Liam was the only person she felt comfortable opening up to; when Dr. Torres returned from his vacation shortly after her awakening, Buffy vehemently refused to work with him. Due to her protests, her case was handed over to Liam on a full-time basis.

"I thought we'd talk about something different today," he suggested. Even though he enjoyed hearing about Buffy and Angel's maudlin love affair, Liam wanted to learn about the other men in her life. "Tell me about some of the other relationships you've had. The ones after Angel left."

She nodded. "Okay, I can do that. The summer after he left Sunnydale was pretty boring, even by Sunnydale standards. I danced with a couple of guys at the Bronze, but I wasn't attracted to any of them. I don't know if it was the way they spoke to me or the way they touched me or what, but none of them felt right to me. Maybe because I always found myself comparing them to Angel, and they never measured up.

"Then school started. I felt lonely, every one of my friends had someone to love except me." Buffy choked back the tears burning in the back of her throat. "Well, a few weeks later, my roommate was really starting to get on my nerves. To get away from her, I cut in front of this guy in the food line. He was…so perfect. I thought I'd finally met the guy who would make me forget all about Angel. His name was Parker Abrams, and he was everything I'd been looking for - good-looking, funny, smart and…and human. And then I made one of the biggest mistakes of my life. I-I slept with him.

"But he didn't love me; he didn't even care about me. I ended up being another one of his conquests. I made love to him, I gave myself to him completely and you know what he called it? Fun. He hurt me so much, even more than Angel did when he left me. Because Angel left me because he loved me, Parker didn't even care about me enough to call the next day."

Liam grabbed a tissue off his desk, walked over to Buffy and handed it to her. "Here, you look like you could use this," he offered.

"Thank you." She dabbed her eyes with it. "It just hurts to talk about it sometimes. Even though I know now it wasn't real, I still lived it in my mind."

"I understand. Maybe talking about this wasn't such a good idea. You might need a little more time."

Buffy shook her head. "I'm okay. If talking about this helps me get better, then I want to do it." She laughed softly. "You know what? I'm glad it wasn't real. I don't have to live with the guilt anymore."

"What guilt?" he wanted to know.

"The guilt of knowing I was taken in by seductive words and a pretty face. He used me. Here, I would never have let any man do that. And I never will."

He sat down on the other side of the couch, facing her. "Not all men are like that, Buffy. I know I'd never do that to you."

She gazed at him with curious eyes. "You wouldn't have?"

He turned away, embarrassed by what he'd just said to his patient. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that, I'm your doctor."

"Liam, it's okay."

"No, it's not okay." Desperate to change the subject from his comment, Liam cleared his throat. "What about after Parker? You were seeing a graduate student named Riley Finn, right? What happened between the two of you?"

"Riley was a great guy, but things were complicated between us from the start. See, he was part of a demon-hunting organization called The Initiative. I really don't want to go into all the details of it, but suffice it to say, the group wasn't exactly what it claimed to be. Anyway, Riley and I started seeing each other a little before my nineteenth birthday. I was determined not to have another office romance, considering how it turned out for me and Angel.

"But I couldn't help myself. Riley was everything I thought Parker was, only this time it turned out to be true. He really *was* nice and funny and smart. And he was strong, he could fight demons and take on a vamp without a problem. We started out slow, but we really couldn't stop ourselves, and we started sleeping together after about a month. It was like we couldn't get enough of each other."

He looked at his patient closely. "A very intense relationship. Sounds like everything was perfect. But I feel a 'but' coming on."

Buffy nodded. "Yeah, there is. Riley always seemed so confident, so sure of himself. He wasn't, though. Xander…well, I had to tell Riley about Angel, but I couldn't tell him everything; I left out the curse and its trigger. So when I had to leave town for a little while to help Angel with Faith, by the time I got back, Xander had already told Riley everything. I mean *everything.* And to say he wasn't happy would be the understatement of the century. He and Angel got into an out-and-out brawl a few days later, and I had to choose between these two wonderful men. In the end, I chose Riley.

"However, he couldn't stand the love I still felt for Angel. He began showing this inferiority complex because he knew a part of me would always love Angel. Riley could never touch that part of me and it drove him crazy. So he started turning to…other forms of pleasure because I just wasn't doing it for him anymore. A vampire whorehouse; he got off on having vampires bite him. And he blamed it on me. He wanted to know what was so exhilarating about it that I didn't stop Angel or Dracula when they fed off me."

Liam could see Buffy start to shake. Obviously, telling the story was taking its toll on her. "Buffy, you don't have to go on. If it makes you feel better, we don't have to talk about it."

She took several deep breaths in order to compose herself. "I have to talk about this, it'll help me get better, right? And I want to get better."

"Are you sure you can handle it?"

"Yep. Anyway, Riley really hurt me when he left town. I spent weeks wondering what was wrong with me and why all the men I loved had to leave me. *Really* leave me. I loved Riley, and I gave him my heart, body and soul."

"Were you *in* love with him?" Liam questioned.

Shrugging, Buffy bit her lip. "I loved who he was and what he stood for. But I was never in love with him. I'd spent so long being in love with Angel, I don't think I know how to be in love with somebody else."

"I see. Angel was the only one for you."

"Exactly."

"And Spike?"

Buffy laughed. "That one's easy. We used each other. He was in love with me and wanted to get in my pants, and I needed to feel alive. Having sex with him made me feel whole again. When I ended it, Spike started threatening to tell everyone about our sex-capades." She closed her eyes and sighed. "Does that make me a slut? I mean, I know it wasn't real and everything, but if it were, would I be?"

"No, not at all. Giving yourself to four different men doesn't qualify you for the Slut Hall of Fame. Trust me, it doesn't."

"You don't think any less of me?"

Liam inched closer to her. "No, I don't think any less of you. You're an amazing young woman, Buffy. Those things only happened in your mind, but that person in your mind isn't you. Just remember that."

"I'm just Buffy Summers, Normal Girl. Right?"

"Right."

"I like being normal again. And I like having you here to talk to."

He gave her a half-smile. "Well, I like talking to you, too."

Buffy lifted her hand, bringing it to Liam's face. "It's amazing how much you look like him. You have the same face, the same eyes…I always loved his eyes. I could lose myself in them. Why do you look like him, Liam?"

"I wish I knew."

"Do you…" She didn't finish the sentence. Instead, she brought her lips to his in a slow, soft kiss that took both of their breaths away.

***

6

Her kiss was the last thing Liam expected. Even as her hands found the sensitive spot on the back of his neck, his mind screamed at him to pull away. It was unethical for him to be kissing a patient. At the same time, his heart told him to keep going, that the kiss was meant to be and he shouldn't fight it. And the doctor felt himself torn between listening to his heart and his head. one. It was something she'd wanted to do since they'd begun having their sessions. She felt herself being drawn to him, and his resemblance to her true love couldn't have been a coincidence. In her heart and in her mind, she knew she was meant to be with him. was the chance to feel normal again; she craved the feeling she got form being in Liam's embrace - a feeling of being alive and safe and free, all at the same time. For Liam, it was a connection to a woman that ventured beyond the physical and beyond the intellectual. In his thirty-two years, he'd never felt an emotional connection to anyone. He couldn't explain why Buffy triggered it.

But when her tongue began to probe his mouth, Liam knew he had to pull away before things went too far. Using all his willpower, he pried his lips from hers. "We can't be doing this, Buffy," he stated breathlessly.

"Why?" Buffy licked her lips, still able to taste him.

"Because it's wrong. It's unethical for a doctor to have feel-" He stopped himself from completing the sentence. "I can't be kissing you."

She shook her head in disagreement. "That isn't what you were going to say, Liam."

Liam stood up; he needed to put some distance between himself and his attractive patient. "You're right, it wasn't. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what I feel. I have a job to do."

"It should matter," she reasoned. "You can't help what you feel. It's only human nature."

He smiled in spite of himself. "How did you get to be so wise?"

"Experience. What happened in Sunnydale might not have been real, but I remember every lesson I learned along the way."

"Look, maybe we should call it a day," Liam suggested. "I think it's been quite an eventful session as it is."

Buffy could sense he wanted to be alone. "Okay," she said softly, afraid she'd ruined things between them. "Are you angry at me for kissing you like that?"

"No, I'm not." 'I am angry at myself for letting my feelings get in the way.'

***

"Honey, you look great," Mrs. Summers commented that night when she stopped by the hospital to visit her daughter. "You have some color back in your cheeks."

"Thank you, Mom. I feel great."

The older woman sighed with happiness. "You have no idea how wonderful it is to have you back. Pretty soon, if all goes well, you can come home again."

"Really?" She had been so preoccupied with her therapy - and her growing feelings for Liam Donnelly - that the idea of returning home didn't cross her mind.

"Of course. Your room is just the way you left it; we didn't change a thing." Mrs. Summers paused. "Unless it would make you feel better if we did change it."

Buffy shook her head. "No, it's fine. I guess I haven't given much thought to going home. When will I?"

"Well, according to Dr. Donnelly, if your treatment continues as it has in recent weeks, you should be released in a couple more weeks. He's amazed by all the progress you've made in the past month. If he wasn't confident in your state of mental health, I'm sure he wouldn't let you go yet."

"Mom, if I ask you a question, will you be honest with me?" Buffy asked.

"Sure. What's the question?"

She took a deep breath. "What do you think of Liam? Not as a doctor, but as a person. You know, as a man."

"I don't know. He seems very nice. I've liked him from the very beginning. There must be something remarkable about him if he brought you back to us."

"He is remarkable," Buffy agreed.

Noticing her daughter's far-off gaze, Mrs. Summers realized what was happening. "Buffy, something's going on between the two of you, isn't there?"

"What would you say if I told you I want to spend the rest of my life with him?" she wanted to know.

'I'd say you were crazy,' she thought to herself, but couldn't very well say that to her recovering daughter. "You are just starting to get well again, and it was Liam Donnelly who helped you find the road to getting better. I can see why you'd think you love him but, Buffy, it's hero worship. Granted, he's a good-looking man…"

"He is."

"I just don't want you to get attached. And if seeing him every day is causing you to have feelings for him, maybe you'd be better off with another doctor."

"No. Liam is the reason I'm better. You can't make me see another doctor," Buffy told her mother. "He's the only one who can help me."

"Okay. But I don't want you doing anything that will put your health in jeopardy. I'm sure these feelings you have for him stem from his close resemblance to that Angel guy. You miss being in love. Honey, when you get out of here, you are going to meet a lot of young men. And you'll fall in love and get married and give me and your father grandchildren. And you will forget about all this nonsense with Liam Donnelly."

She just nodded in agreement, not wanting to get into an argument with her mother. 'It's not nonsense. I love him. And I will be with him, I don't care what anybody says.'

***

7

At the kitchen table inside Liam's modest-sized home, he sat with piles of papers scattered in front of him. Buffy Summers had become his obsession, and he wanted desperately to find a connection between himself and the Angel who existed in Sunnydale. He knew there had to be a reason for the similarities between them. And Liam refused to rest until he found an answer.

'March 10, 1997,' he said to himself. 'That's the first time she encountered Angel in the alley.' Grabbing his personal journal, he searched for the entry he made on that particular date. Ever since he started working at Meadow Woods, he'd kept a log of the goings on for his own personal reference. Carefully, he read over his notes.

3/10/97 - My first day at the clinic and I think I'm going to like it here. For the first year or so, I'll be following Dr. Miguel Torres on his rounds. I'll get to meet his patients and learn from someone who is more knowledgeable than any professor I'd had at UCLA. Maybe it's only wishful thinking on my part, but I think I connected with one of patients today. She suffers from schizophrenia, and Dr. Torres told me she doesn't do much of anything except stare at the ceiling. But when I spoke to her today, the girl looked right at me and smiled. It made me feel that I might actually make a difference in someone's life. I wish I could remember her name; all I remember is her blonde hair and lovely green eyes. She couldn't have been more than sixteen.

Liam removed his reading glasses. "Oh my god," he stated. "Buffy met Angel the day I first encountered her. I can't believe it. I *am* Angel to her."

After more digging, he discovered more patterns developing. On June 2, 1997, she tried to kill herself by stabbing a fork into her neck, and Liam was the one who found her and stopped the bleeding. According to the file, a vampire killed her and Angel was the one who found her. And most strikingly, on May 22, 1999, Angel left Sunnydale - and Buffy - forever. It was the last day Liam worked alongside Dr. Torres before transferring to another wing of the clinic. Also on that day, there had been a fire in Buffy's wing, coinciding with the explosion that demolished Sunnydale High.

"She knew what was going on around her the whole time," Liam remarked. "Buffy inserted everything into her life in Sunnydale."

***

"You get to go home tomorrow, Buffy," Liam told his favorite patient on May third. "Aren't you excited about that?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "It's great, I guess. I've been in here for long enough." The lack of enthusiasm was apparent in her voice.

"You're not happy, I can tell. You've come a long way since we started working together. That's something you should be proud of. What's really going on? Why don't you want to go home with your parents?" he wanted to know. He could sense something wasn't right with her.

"Because it means I won't be able to see you anymore," Buffy admitted. "I don't understand why I have to start seeing another doctor. It doesn't make sense; you're my doctor."

"I wish I could keep seeing you, too. But hospital rules state that once a patient leaves the clinic, he or she begins the transition into the outside world with a new doctor." Liam hated having to lie to her, but it was a necessary lie. Working as her doctor had become a conflict of interest for him. Even though he could see outside patients, it would be unethical to treat Buffy when he was falling more in love with her with each passing day.

"It's still not fair," she complained.

"I know it isn't. You know what? Let's do something different for our last session; it's a beautiful, sunny day outside. Why don't we go for a walk?"

Her face broke out in a huge smile. "I would really like that. Can we go to the pond over there? I've wanted to go there since I first saw it." Buffy pointed out Liam's office window to the small pond to the left of the clinic.

"Anything you want. and we'll make it very informal today. No tape recorders, and you get to pick the subject of discussion. Anything under the sun."

"Anything, huh?" she pondered aloud as they walked down the hall toward the front entrance. Liam signed her out for an hour and held the door open for her.

"It's beautiful today, isn't it?" he asked her. The sun shone brightly from the sky and the air was warm and dry.

Buffy nodded. "Yeah. I haven't been outside in so long. It feels wonderful to breathe fresh air again. I feel alive."

They reached the pond a few minutes later. He watched as Buffy ran her fingers over the still surface, causing the water to ripple across the pond. Two ducks floated along the water, keeping their distance from the doctor and his patient. Liam could not keep himself from smiling at the simplicity of her action.

"Did you come up with any ideas yet?" he wanted to know. "What are we going to talk about today?"

"Uh-huh. I don't want to talk about me anymore. I think my brain's been dissected enough," Buffy stated. "So, I want to talk about you."

"Me?"

Buffy grinned at his shocked reaction. "Sure. I get to pick the topic, right? And I want to know all about you. So spill it, Doc."

They settled under the shade a nearby tree. "I'm very boring. Unfortunately, there's not much to tell."

"I don't care. I think you're pretty interesting. Please?"

The pleading in her voice practically broke his heart. "All right, but don't say I didn't warn you. I'm thirty-two, my birthday's on Christmas. Which means as a child, I got totally screwed for presents. Having a birthday on Christmas isn't something I'd wish on any child. Anyway, I have a younger sister named Kathleen, but I call her Kathy just to tease her. She hates it, but teasing her has always been a form of enjoyment for me. She's twelve years younger than I am."

"She's almost my age," Buffy commented.

"Yes, she'll be twenty-one later this year. She attends Columbia University and she's studying political science. My parents live in Santa Barbara, where my dad's a successful pediatrician and my mom's a retired teacher."

"Is that why you became a doctor? So you could follow in your father's footsteps?" Buffy asked him.

Liam thought for a moment. "I never thought about it like that, but yeah, you're right. I guess I wanted to be like my dad. Although by the time he was my age, he had a wife and a seven year old son. He's certainly got me beat in the family department."

Buffy secretly crossed her fingers before asking her next question. "No wife or girlfriend for the handsome Dr. Donnelly?"

He shook his head. "Nope. The last serious girlfriend I had broke up with me several months ago. Emma didn't like the amount of time I spent here."

"She was the jealous type, huh?" she deduced.

"You could say that."

Silence filled the air around them. Neither knew what to say after that. It was almost a full minute before Buffy spoke again. "I don't want to go back out there again, Liam. I'm scared."

He gazed at her, hypnotized by her piercing green eyes. "Why? You have absolutely no reason to be afraid. The real world hasn't changed that much since you came here."

"But I've changed. What if I don't fit in anymore? What if people still think I'm crazy? Or, what if it's so hard that I try to go back to Sunnydale? What if this isn't real?" Her lower lip trembled as tears burned her eyes.

He cupped her chin in his hand. "You have too many 'what ifs' there, Buffy. You have made remarkable progress, and I know for a fact you're going to be fine. I know you're unsure right now, but I promise everything is going to work out for the best," Liam reassured her. "I would sign your release papers if I didn't think you were ready."

Buffy inched her face closer to his. "Promise?"

"Promise."

The word barely escaped his mouth before Buffy's lips descended upon his. Her palms were pressed flat against his chest before they slipped between the buttons of his shirt and caressed his bare skin underneath. Liam ran his fingers through her shoulder-length blonde hair while his right hand massaged her back. She pressed herself up against him; he could feel her heart beating through her shirt and feel the heat radiating from her body.

When the kiss ended a short while later, they didn't quite know what to say. Both had agreed not to let it happen after the last time. "I'm sorry," Buffy apologized. "I don't want you to get in trouble."

"I know you don't," he replied.

"No, wait. I'm not sorry. Dammit, Liam, can't you see what's going on here? Don't you feel it? I love you."

He looked at the ducks floating along the pond, purposely keeping his eyes off her. "No, Buffy. You can't."

"I do. That's why I don't want to leave here. Because if I leave, that means I'll never see you again."

"Maybe that would be better for you. I'm here for you, Buffy. I'll always be here for you. But not like that. I can't be." 'Which is exactly why I can't be your doctor anymore.'

She stood up, her eyes glassy from her unshed tears. "I thought you felt the same thing I felt. Tell me I'm wrong and I'll leave you alone. Tell me, Liam."

He never responded.

Go to Part 8