It's Always Bad News...
by Ducks

I didn't sleep, barely fed, for days. I stopped going out, stopped doing anything but wandering around in a dazed stupor. I didn't answer the phone that seemed to ring incessantly until I unplugged it. I didn't answer the door. I didn't even get out of bed, sometimes.

I cried, a lot. More than I think I ever have. Blood tears that stained tissues crimson, until my garbage was full of them. I cursed myself. I cursed Buffy. I cursed that Owen loser and I cursed Darla and every vampire before her. Curses were, after all, what I knew best...

I poured over pictures of her... letters she'd written, gifts she'd given me, little momentos -- a flower from her hair, a movie ticket...

Wasn't this exactly what I wanted for her? Isn't this why I left her, when every cell of my being begged to stay by her side?

I relived every moment we'd shared... I cherished them, I regretted them... the first time I saw her beautiful face... the first time I kissed her... the first time I told her I loved her... the night we made love... all the times we danced together... all the times I held her in my arms, wishing I could die in that moment, so happy... all the times I fought by her side...

She'd given me everything, despite all of the pain I caused her... she'd made me feel alive, worthy of life... my only friend...

'Wasn't this exactly what I wanted for her?' I kept asking myself. Wasn't it?

Honestly? Of course it wasn't. I wanted her to be with me.

I shook myself. 'Don't be an idiot.' I told myself over and over again. But it didn't help. All of a sudden all of the walls I'd managed to build around my pain came crashing down, and all of the terrible solitude, all the horrifying memories, even the joy, crushed me under an avalanche of barely remembered emotion.

When I finally left my apartment, it was only to wander the streets... and it seemed all I saw everywhere were lovers, smiling and happy, arm-in-arm. Full of delight with the thrill of love, full of happiness for the promise of tomorrow... and I, a walking corpse, a shadow of death that passed over everything, chilling it...

I couldn't let it go. I had to see...

I got in my car -- the windows custom-tinted to be illegally dark -- and I was in Sunnydale by nightfall.

I banged on the door at the house on Rubello Drive -- the scene of some of the happiest, and some of the most horrible, moments of my life.

Joyce was not happy to see me.

"Angel." She said, as if speaking to a living nightmare, come to beg on her doorstep. But she invited me in, and we talked for a while over coffee. We never broached the subject of Buffy. I didn't want Joyce to know my confusion and pain, and she didn't want me to know anything.

But it didn't matter. I could smell Buffy there, on every sufrace, every piece of furniture. her smiling face graced pictures in every corner, on every wall. This house contained so much of her... I must have stared too long at a more recent picture of her on the refrigerator, golden and beautiful in the sunlight of the park, because Joyce said:

"You shouldn't be here, Angel."

I met her serious gaze as honestly and fully as I could. Could she see the pain in my eyes? Or did she only see doom for her daughter...

"Buffy is happy." she went on, "For the first time in a long time... and it has been a long time, so long, for her to even be able to smile again..."

She looked at me for a long time. I could see the pity in her eyes, for me or for Buffy or both, I don't know. I could see she wished things could have been different, for Buffy's sake... but I could also see her resolve, that because things were not different, that her precious daughter have the best that she could have.

"I imagine you heard about Buffy and Owen..." she said. Was it that obvious? Of course. Why else would I be there after all those years?

I nodded.

"He's a nice man, Angel. A good man... a normal man... well, as normal as one of Buffy's friends gets. And he loves her. And he makes her as happy as she can be..."

I had no idea what to say. I often felt cowed by Joyce's air of authority about Buffy... not to mention the fact that she was making sense...

"Don't ruin this for her, Angel. Don't make her give this up. Don't make her have to go through all that again..."

I couldn't promise. I didn't know. I finished my coffee. I sat for a long while while she stared at me, waiting for her point to hit home. Finally, I rose to go, thanking her.

"Angel?" she called from behind me. I turned back.

"Please. Think long and hard about this. I know you love her. And I know she will never love Owen the way she does..." she hesitated, "...did you. But please, if you love her..."

I just stared at her, watching her eyes well up with the tears I felt in my heart. Then I left.

I drove around for hours, just looking at the town, remembering. I found myself in front of Giles' house. The lights were still on, so I walked to the door and raised my hand to knock.

What was I here looking for? Someone to tell me it was all right to stop her? To tell me it was okay to interrupt her life and foist this pain on her? That I should track her down, get on my knees and beg her forgiveness for my stupidity, beg her to take me back? Did I need for someone to second my raging desire to hold her again?

Because that's exactly what I wanted to do.

As soon as the realization hit me, I staid my hand, staring for a moment at the claddaugh ring on my finger. I turned and walked away from the Watcher's house, back to the car.

I wanted her. I couldn't let her promise herself to someone else when she was already promised to me. It was greedy, it was selfish, but it was what I wanted.

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