Buffy curled up on her bed and let her tears loss in the pillows, letting the hurt echo through her hollow body.  Not hollow.  If she was hollow, she wouldn't hurt this much.  She heard a soft tap on the window and froze.  When it shyly persisted, she turned around.

Angel.

Angel?  It didn't look like Angelus.  Look like Angel and she so badly needed it to be Angel.

"Hi," he said softly.  "Is it OK if I come in?  Why are you crying Buffy?" He noticed the tears and became worried.  He climbed through the window, not waiting for the 'ok' and went over to her on the bed.  Her eyes were streaked and puffy.  He sat on the bed and Buffy turned fully to him.

"Angel?"

"Yes," he confirmed, nodding his head.  "Why are you crying?"  He reached and brushed away her tears.  Buffy gasped at his touch.  Warm and caring.  Warm.  Not cool or cold.  As warm as she was.  He stretched his palm over her cheek and carressed it.

"Buffy, please tell me," he pleaded.  "Let me do something.."

"Hold me," she said through more tears, so confused.  He nodded and took her into his embrace.  Buffy threw her arms around his waist and clung with the strength of forever.  Never to let him out her reach again.  As he head was settled against his chest, she heard something.  Something she was used to hearing as a child as she went to sleep on top of her mom.  Something Angel never got to have but now did.

A heartbeat.

"Angel," she gasped, looking up at him.  "You're alive."

"You know that.  But it's not important.  What's important is why you're hurting."

He held her hands in his and felt something in one of them.  He eased them open and found their claddagh ring.

"What are you doing with this off?" He teased, slipping it on again, causing another burst of tears from Buffy.

"Angel.. How did you get to be here?  Have I been dreaming?  Is Angelus..."

"That was months ago Buffy.  Remember, I was made human when I was given back my Soul.  I never thought that you would have worked yourself up over it again.  I'm so sorry.." He whispered and kissed her forehead.

"Months ago?  What month is it?"

"April.  I got my Soul back soon after I was turned back," he prodded her memory.

"By by.. Us," she stated simply.

"Yes.  But it's OK now. Something must have jolted your memory back to those few days.  I can't tell you how much I--"

"Don't..  It's OK.  I don't know what's wrong," Buffy admitted, holding Angel closer.  "You're here.  And everything's fine.  Have we... Since?"

Angel shook his head.  "Buffy I don't want to rush back into that."

"I do," Buffy said, sitting up and holding his face in her hands.  She knelt up and kissed him

"Buffy," he murmured.  "If you've just had a memory thing.. Maybe we shouldn't.."

Buffy resisted a deja vu of last time.  Had several months passed and Angelus was gone forever?  And Angel was human?  And they'd be together properly?  Had this Hell become paradise?

"Where's my mom?" Buffy asked softly, kissing him gently and lingeringly.

"Art conference Buffy.  Coming back in a few days."

"We'll have to make those few days count then," Buffy murmured into his lips.  Angel gave up trying to stop and kissed her passionately.  Buffy slipped into his lap and straddled him sitting up.  She shrugged off his duster jacket and went to work on the buttons.  Angel helped her jacket and top off, kissing her neck.

Angel laid her back and their flesh touched fully, scalding each other.  He smiled almost sadly and kissed her again.

"You don't have anything to prove.  I know you love me," Angel smiled.

"I know you know that.  I just want you Angel," Buffy told him, pulling him in for another kiss, closing her eyes.

But felt nothing.  She opened them and Angel wasn't on her bed.  She sat up quickly and saw that the window was shut and his jacket wasn't on the floor.

He was gone.  He was never really here.  She grabbed her black top and pulled it on.  All a hallucination?  Of course.  It was too easy to skip to the happy ending.

She looked at her hand, her claddagh ring on where he had placed it.

Confused, exhausted and hurting all over again, Buffy's body racked with sobs, collapsed on top of her bed and she began to mourn into her pillows all over again.

She closed her eyes and cried herself to her dreams where she knew he would be waiting for her.
 
 

From the window he watched.  Not saying anything, not delighted in the sight of her pain or confusion and his part in it.

For a single second he regretted the charade.  From the look of the Slayer, it was beyond torture.  Wasn't that what he had been aiming for?  But he wasn't going to say anything or admit that it wasn't all her imagination's doing.

He just watched.