DISCLAIMER: Joss's. Plot mine. Don't steal, not nice. Don't sue, not nice either.
TIMELINE: Season 6
SPOILERS: If you know she came back and how she came back, you're all good.
SYNOPSIS: Buffy runs to Angel after she comes back. Buffy POV. Angsty.
DISTRIBUTION: Land of Denial, obviously. If you want it, take it, just lemme know where it's going.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Major angst. Follow Buffy's thoughts, so it may not always be coherent. Tissue warning, maybe?
FEEDBACK: Send it! Send it send it send it!!
RATING: R for language.

I usually feel like I can't breathe these days. I guess a few months without air will really get you in the habit of not breathing. Angel always breathes, even though he doesn't need it. It's something his soul remembers from when he was human, so he does it without thinking. I haven't needed air in months. I don't remember why, exactly, it is that I should breathe.

Air is really useful when you've been running for a long period of time, or have just run quickly from one place to another. Judging by the 100 or so miles that stands between Los Angeles and Sunnydale, I'd go out on a limb and say I've just fufilled both requirements. My lungs should be burning, my legs should feel like jelly, my conciousness should be slipping away, but it's not. Maybe I'm still dead. Maybe air is just a weird habit now. But I hurt so much that I know that can't be true. Because when I was...

The facade of the Hyperion Hotel is enormous and intimidating and I can't help but wonder why a guy who was always so intent on blending in would buy a hotel that so obviously stands out. The fact that there aren't crowds in front of it simply astounds me; it would be appropriate, I guess. My running slows to a stop and I just stand there, panting. Suddenly my body needs air and it obviously hasn't had enough, and the entire world spins.

Someone catches me before I hit the ground.

I can hear them shouting around me as I observe my surroundings in a half-hazed daze. I'm held by a large black man, who's shouting something to.. Wesley? who is in turn yelling something to Cordelia?! who seems to be yelling into the shadows.

"It's okay, miss, just lay down here.."

I think I just murmured a reply to that black guy holding me and who the hell is he, anyway? He definitly wasn't here the last time I was here and wasn't Cordelia always saying she was going to leave? I thought this was just Angel now. Has so much changed? It's only been two years, but it feels suddenly like a lifetime.

Oh wait, it has been. Mine.

I forgot.

I'm sucking in huge gulps of air now and it's just making me even more dizzy, but I can't seem to stop. My lungs are screaming at me for release, for oxygen, for something that I just can't seem to figure out and oh god, I just need to BREATHE-

"Someone get a paper bag! She's hyperventilating!"

"Gunn, here!"

"Don't pass out on me sweetheart, c'mon just breathe into this.."

Dammit, won't they get that goddamn bag out of my face? I don't need a fucking paper bag, I need Angel, dammit!

"Gunn, who is it?"

"I don't know. Some blonde.. she was standing outside and she just dropped all of a sudden."

"Hold on, lemme see- Oh. My. God."

"What? Who is it?"

"Wesley, go get Angel!"

Wow, Cordelia's smart. Who'da thunk I'd come here to see Angel? Certainly not these two idiots. It seems Wesley hasn't changed all that much. And would they please get that bag out of my fucking face. Oh shit, the room..

"Wake up!"

A hard slap and I'm back in reality again. I'm breathing a little slower, but my chest still feels like it has a rock settled on it. Make that a boulder. Something trickles on my cheek, and when I pull my fingertips away, they're red.

"Fuck, Cordy. Retract your claws!"

"Sorry. They're- I got a manicure the other day, okay?"

"Yeah... yeah."

I try to sit up but my head doesn't really seem to agree with that, so I start to lay back down.

"Cordelia, what is it?"

His voice is thin and breathless and I freeze the second I hear it. Half-laying, half-sitting, with that guy - Gunn, I think someone called him - still trying to push a bag in my face. But I don't care anymore, and he manages to slip it over my lips as my vision tunnels to let in nothing but Angel.

"She- Gunn found her, outside. She almost passed out... Well, she did pass out, but not out there."

"Buffy."

"Who's that?"

It's a female voice from behind him and a girl follows him down the stairs. My heart stops beating, I think, when I see her and for a moment I wish I'd never come. I never thought he'd-

"Fred, that's Buffy," Wesley says gently. This chick's name is FRED?

"Oh. You mean Angel's-"

"Yes, Fred. Why don't you go upstairs?"

"But-"

"I think all of us need to go upstairs," Cordelia says carefully, glancing quickly at myself and Angel, "Will you two be okay?"

"We'll be fine, Cordelia," Angel says softly, taking a few steps towards me. I can almost feel his soul touching mine and that ever-present lump that's been in my throat for months now is getting painful.

"Alright. Call us if you need us," She says, herding everyone out of the room, and for the first time ever, I think, I shoot her a grateful smile. And, for the first time ever, I think, she returns it.

"Buffy," Angel says again and it's like music. He doesn't need to say anything else. Hell, he could grunt for all I care, "Buffy, what's wrong? Why are you here?"

"Do you know," I start softly and I think this just might kill me but I don't care, "when the last time I cried was?"

"No," he answers slowly and I can feel his gaurd being raised. I smile at him - a broken half-hearted smile that I know he doesn't believe like my friends do - and sit all the way up, resting my hands in my lap.

"The last time I cried was three years ago, when I- I-"

"Acathla."

"Yes. I cried when I kissed you, I cried when I killed you, and I cried that whole day until I threw up. And then I cried some more."

"Buffy-"

"Shh," I hold up a hand. My voice is still whisper soft, and he's beginning to look scared, so I smile again. That doesn't seem to help, "Don't feel guilty. Don't feel bad. I don't."

"You shouldn't-"

"I don't feel anymore."

That actually stunned him into silence. They're not kidding when they say the truth hurts.

"Buffy, what's the matter-"

"Can you feel it? Can you feel the air around you? Like tiny pins and needles? You can feel the tension, the pain, it drives us so far apart."

"Buffy, what is WRONG?!"

"Shh. Calm down. Sit, it's okay. I'm okay."

"What are you-"

"I wasn't in Hell, Angel."

That one seemed to catch him off gaurd as well. Wow. I'm having a good day, I guess.

"I- I hoped you weren't. I- I thought- I *think* your soul is too pure. Too good."

"I guess you're right, then."

"Buffy, why are you here? What's wrong? I can see it in your eyes?"

"See what in my eyes? I look in the mirror everyday, at my eyes. There's nothing there anymore. It's all.. gone."

"Buffy.."

"Where I was," I look him square in the eye, "Where I was it was warm. It was soft. It was gentle. It was peaceful. I was warm. I was peaceful. I knew everyone I loved, ever, was safe."

"You went to Heaven."

"If that's what you want to call it."

"And then they brought you back here."

"Where it's cold. Where it's sharp. Where it's bright. Where it hurts. Where I hurt."

"Buffy..."

"And I can't cry. I can't feel, because I feel too much. I want- I want to-"

"No! No, don't say that!"

"I want to die."

"If you die again, I won't be able to make it through."

"Do you think, if you died, your soul would come with me?"

"I- I don't know."

"Wanna find out?"

"BUFFY!" He grabs me and shakes me and it hurts so good, "Don't you *ever* talk like that."

"Why? Why not? What do I have left?" My breath catches and I'm shaking now, "My mom is dead. My dad... he thinks *I'm* dead. Dawn treats me like I'm glass. Everyone treats me like I'm glass! Giles went back to England. Riley's been gone for over a year. You're here. Dammit, all I have left is *SPIKE*!"

"You and Spike-"

"He's the only one who understands. He's the only one who knows what it feels like to be taken apart and put back together wrong."

"He doesn't-"

"He does. He has that chip in his head, that scrambled him. He can't even point a plastic gun at Xander."

"That doesn't mean-"

"Why am I here, Angel? 'Cuz I'm the Slayer? We already have an extra one of those. Why did they bring me back? So I could take care of Dawn? So I could go through the motions of everyday life? So I could sit and pretend to be happy? They don't even pay attention! Willow's too busy with magic and Tara. Xander and Anya are engaged! Dawn has school and friends... Who even needs me anymore?"

"Me! I need you!"

"To do what?? To sit at home and pine away for you?! To stare at your picture and read my old diary again and again?! To come to L.A. and fuck up your whole life again?"

"I need you to be alive!"

"Why? Why do you even care anymore?!?!"

"Because I love you!!!"

They ring in the air, those three words, and all of a sudden I'm sobbing into his arms and muttering things that I can't even make out. His arms are around me and he's crying too and maybe my heart is still there after all because it feels like it's going to break or burst, and I can't tell which. I claw at his jacket to try to get closer to his skin and somehow he slips it off without taking his arms from around my too-thin frame. I can smell him all around me and the contact of his cool skin against mine is almost too much for me to handle and I'm crying so hard now that I can't breathe anymore and I think I might be sick.

"I love you, I love you, I love you.."

He's whispering it into my hair as he pulls me closer and closer and I feel my ribs creak but I don't care. I'm trying to suck in enough air not to pass out, but it doesn't seem to be working. Funny how it all comes 'round to the same thing again, hmm? Air and my never-ending lack of it.

Then he kisses me and I realize that all the air I'll ever need is right here.

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