onto the table as Sahjhan raised a piece of broken chair to Angel's
heart and was about to plunge it into him as the missing Justine ran
into the room with the special urn the little girl talked about.
Sahjhan was gone.
Buffy helped Angel up and Justine told them that she had left Wes in
the park by his house. They all agreed to go look for him together.
After they didn't find him and the sun was coming up, Buffy took
Angel back inside and let the others look around for the missing ex-
watcher.
Angel was standing in what would be his office again and looked as
Buffy walked back to him.
"Well, since Dawn is still at Lorne's, I figured we could just hang
out here and wait to see if there's anything that comes up. I
cleaned the pentagram as best I could, but I think dried blood is
starting to become a look out there."
"Thanks." Angel said quietly.
"You know me, I like to keep busy."
"All I could think about was getting my hands on Sahjhan and Fred
and Gunn tried to keep me from-"
"Going too far? I'm sorry Angel. I was so caught up in making sure
that you weren't alone in what you were feeling, I missed the whole
concept of boundaries. We both went too far. You have a reason, I
don't."
"You think Wes is�?" he didn't finish the sentence.
"I hope for the best that he's okay. But Angel, I know what you're
thinking. You don't have Connor's blood on your hands." She
reassured him.
"Don't I?"
"You think there's something more that you could have done? You did
everything you could with the knowledge that you had, just like
Wesley. Maybe the way to start forgiving ourselves is to forgive
him." She said wisely.
"Since when did you become so wise?" he looked at her and couldn't
believe that this woman was the same girl who he'd left three years
earlier. He didn't realize how much she'd grown up in that time.
"Since-" she was about to say something witty back at him when the
phone rang.
"Angel Investi- Hey Fred! They did- and? Okay, where? St.
Patricia's? Yeah, he's here. Thanks." Buffy said and Angel knew that
they found Wesley.
He grabbed Buffy's hand and they were out the door.
"It's good you came man." Gunn said as his arm wrapped around Fred's
waist.
"He ask for me?" Angel wondered aloud.
"He can't speak yet." Fred informed her friend.
"Can I see him?" Angel asked as he regrettably let go of Buffy's
hand in his.
"I think he'd like that." Buffy reassured him as she gave him her
best smile she could at the moment.
Angel entered the hospital room and could immediately hear Wesley's
struggling heart beats. He slowly approached his friend and stood
beside his bed.
Wesley looked up at Angel and wondered what was going on.
"Hey Wes� I just want you to know that I understand why you did it.
I know about the prophecy and I know how hard it must have been for
you to do� what you did. You thought I was going to turn evil and
kill my son. I didn't. This isn't Angelus talking, it's me. Angel.
You know that right?"
At Wes' struggled nod that he understood that `Angel' would never
hurt Connor.
"Good." Angel said lowly and moved toward Wes's bed, grabbing the
top pillow from behind him and smothering him with it.
"You think I forgive you! NEVER! NEVER! YOU'RE GOING TO PAY FOR WHAT
YOU DID! YOU TOOK MY SON! YOU TOOK MY SON!" he shouted as the
machines started to go crazy with beeps.
Buffy, Fred, and Gunn looked at each other and ran into Wes' room.
Fred and Gunn tried to get Angel away from Wes, but didn't work.
When he flung both of them away like flies, Buffy stepped up and
just lightly touched his shoulder. He wouldn't hurt her, she knew
that.
She moved his body to face hers as he let go of the pillow and
looked at her. He'd never felt this much pain at losing someone
since he'd left her those years ago. Just like he had done when he
saved her from Pete after he'd returned from Hell, he knelt down on
his knees, hugging her legs as he openly cried.
This time, she gripped his head and hugged him tighter.
Fred and Gunn looked at the couple in front of them and were amazed
at what just happened right before their eyes. That was love. That
was true love there.
The next day�
Angel, Fred, Gunn, Lorne, Dawn and Buffy were helping clean out the
burnt room that used to be Angel's apartment.
Angel spotted a snow globe he had bought for Connor.
"I don't even know why I bought this for him. It was a whim I guess.
Thought he might like to look at it. I never does snow in Southern
California." Angel said as Buffy walked into the room carrying a
trash bucket.
"It did once." She said quietly, remembering that night up on the
bluff looking out over Sunnydale as it suddenly started to snow on
them, thus saving our champion from being a Krispy Kreme doughnut.
Or something like that.
Angel put it down and walked downstairs to see if there were any
clients around at all, or just some work he could do to take his
mind away from his recent loss.
Cordelia walked in sporting a new hair cut, which was blonde (gag
me) and gifts with Groo on her arm with his arm around her waist.
"We're ba-" she stopped herself as she saw Angel's look on his face
and knew something was up immediately.
"What happened?" she asked as she moved toward him and approached
him with caution as Buffy came trotting down the steps to see who
was at the door.
Cordelia saw Buffy and was inwardly glad that he hadn't been alone
through whatever it was that had happened. Just a little part of her
was jealous of Buffy. Not that she was with Angel, but that she had
been present when Cordelia had been not.
Fred took Cordy aside and Buffy came down went over to Angel and put
her arms around him for support.
Fred explained what happened, about Connor being taken by Wesley and
then by Holtz into a hell dimension.
Immediately Cordy left Groo who was bringing their stuff in and
walked into Angel's office, inadvertently interrupting a private
moment between he and the Slayer.
"Cor, could you give us a few minutes?" Buffy politely asked her.
Cordelia, just nodded her head and walked back over to her man, and
took him in a hug. Groo was still new to the concept of hugs, but he
was getting the hang of them and when they were needed.
Her eyes were starting to water at the terrible things that had
happened while they were away.
"Do not cry my princess, for I am sure that things will work
themselves out." Groo wisely said as he ran his hands through
Cordy's short blonde locks. He preferred her hair dark, like his,
but if this was what made her happy, then he was happy too.
Inside the office, Angel was sitting in the chair, staring at
nothing and no one. He needed something but he didn't know what. He
just felt jumpy, that something should be done.
"What are you thinking?" Buffy asked him quietly as the answer to
his problems came to him.
"We should re-do my room. That's what we should do. Get some new
furniture and some new paint, and re-do the whole room. One where
it's Buffy-friendly." He told her surprised that the words came out
of his mouth.
"Good, because as you know, I'm probably going to be staying here
for a while. And I'm glad that you want to do this, baby, really I
am, but I just want to say�" she trailed on and looked at him more
sternly. "I hope your not thinking that by changing things that this
will somehow bring Connor back."
"I won't lie and say that it's not partially about Connor, but I
just need something to do and this is the first available thing that
popped into my head." He explained.
"Good." She half-smiled at him.
Buffy left to go call Dawn at Lorne's and ask if they could run to
the nearest Home Depot and pick up some stuff.
Cordelia took this time to go talk to her boss and her closest
friend.
"Hey." Cordelia greeted her friend as she saw him slumped in his
chair as he looked at the picture of himself, Cordelia and Wesley
from their first year together as an agency. `God,' he
thought, `times were SO different then. For bett