Fallen Angels

By Kristi

The Road Less Traveled.

-Angel-

I’m sitting out on the balcony in our room waiting for the sun to rise. It will be my first sunrise in over 250 years. The French doors behind me open and Buffy is there, balancing a tray full of more food then both of us could eat. I am still in wonder that I am here, that she is here and that I am human.

She sets the tray down and sits in my lap. “I didn’t know what you wanted, so I grabbed a little of everything.”

My eyes alight on chocolate bars. I remember chocolate from our Day that Wasn’t. I hastily unwrap one and stick a square of the dark creamy chocolate in my mouth. I laugh. I can’t help it. It bubbles up inside of me and comes spilling out like champagne.

“I love chocolate,” I say with my mouth full of it.

Buffy giggles at me. “I remember. I brought peanut butter too, crunchy.”

I bite into an apple next and sigh in bliss. I used to love apples.

“Mmm, I love food.” I say.

Buffy smiles at me. “You came on the best day then. Willow has been cooking for two days. Normally we’d have OJ and some sort of sugary cereal Dawn likes, probably a carton of bad milk. Will has really gone crazy with the food thing though.”

I look at her slightly confused but every thought is forgotten because the sun crests the horizon a brilliant red pink. I took so much for granted when I was human before. I don’t think that I ever saw the sun rise then. It’s beautiful and wonderful. I watch speechless until the colors have faded and it’s just the beginning of a beautiful sunny day.

“I had forgotten how beautiful a sunrise is.”

Buffy brushes her fingers against my cheek. “Yeah, we have another one of those scheduled tomorr-“She stops and covers her mouth with her hands. Tears instantly flood her eyes.

“Buffy, what’s wrong?”

“Oh, God, Angel, I used to dream about seeing you like this. You are so beautiful in the sunlight.”

She reaches out to touch me with trembling fingers, afraid I’ll turn into dust. I lean into her touch. Being touched by Buffy has always been a religious experience for me, and I’m not talking about the sex, although we tried that earlier and, Wow. Even the way she touches my face, or my shoulder, or my hand. Being touched by Buffy, when I’m human, nothing compares to that.

She leans in and kisses me, hesitantly at first and then deepens the kiss. For the first time in our relationship, I’m the one who has to come up for air. I take a deep breath and laugh. I love being alive.

I pick my beautiful golden girl up in my arms and carry her back into the room. I want to stay out the sun, but I want Buffy more.

@--Buffy--@

I wake up slowly, by inches. I reach across the bed and purr when my fingers run into Angel. He doesn’t feel like my Angel. His skin is warm and not cool. He’s snoring very softly, a side effect of the whole breathing thing. I open my eyes and roll on my stomach to watch him. The rise and fall of his chest brings tears to my eyes. How long have I wanted this? It feels like since the day I was born.

I can hear Willow and Dawn downstairs. I know they will be floored by the news. I want to keep him just mine for a little while longer though, selfish I know, but I think I’ve earned it. I look at him now, the sunlight washing his pale skin. I wonder if I had known in the beginning it would turn out like this, would that have made a difference? Maybe there wouldn’t have been as much heartbreak or pain, maybe there wouldn’t have been as many tears, maybe I wouldn’t have gotten lost for those two hellish years, maybe all that makes this that much sweeter.

There is knock on the door. I am pulled out of my reverie and Angel wakes up with a start. I lay my hand on his chest. The thump thump against my palm makes me giddy and the knock on the door is forgotten as the world fades away. Angel closes his eyes, basking in my touch, in the feel of his own heartbeat and I am overcome. I lean forward and capture his lips, warm lips, with my own. I run a hand through his hair and down his neck. He smiles into the kiss and I feel the little puff of warm breath against my lips as he exhales.

“Omigod omigod omigod, I’m scarred, I’m scarred.” Dawn’s voice pulls the world back into sharp focus. “Buffy! Who the hell is naked in your bed?” She yells, clearly irate and over the scarred for life issue.

I bite my lip and lean back to reveal Angel. Her face goes pale and her eyes tear up. She jumps in the middle of the bed with a squeal and tackles Angel with a hug. She saying something, but it’s completely incomprehensible. She’s crying though.

“Dawnie? What’s the matter?” Willow yells up the stairs. The redheaded witch appears in the doorway only a second later. She stares with her mouth agape and then she joins Dawn on the bed with the hugging and the crying.

At some point, we all realize that I only have a nightgown on and Angel is naked with only a sheet pulled up to his waist. Dawn and Willow both turn crimson and stumble their way out of the bedroom.

I look at Angel in complete awe. He’s blushing. I’ve never seen him blush before.

*

Fred was downstairs in the kitchen cooking. Angel wanted to go in and see her himself. I don’t know what was said but I did hear lots of Fred squealing and then some crying. She and Angel came out of the kitchen together. Fred had tear tracks down her cheeks and a smile as wide as I’ve ever seen.

“Oh Gosh, this gives me so many new theories on dimension and portals and the effects on people who go through them and in them and out of them.” She was still chattering about theories and timelines and dimensional portals when she wandered into her office to start her research on it.

Wes cried in that very British I’m-not-crying way where his eyes tear up and he pinches the bridge of his nose and says “yes, well” a lot.

“You were right, Wes, about the shanshu, all along.” Angel says.

“Perhaps, I had no idea shanshu would involve you spending time in a hell dimension. It would have been rather convenient and made things easier for you had we known ahead of time.” Wes commented.

“It doesn’t matter now.” He says wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling me closer. “It was worth it, all of it.”

He is right. The road here was a bumpy one and we even lost it a time or two, but we found our back and it’s worth it. I’d do every single step all over again just to get here.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

-Robert Frost

~Fin~