Title: Irish Dreams
Author: Foxhunt2blue
Summary: On St. Patrick’s day Angel muses about Ireland 
and his past.
Rated: R (Adult Situations)
Pairing: Angel/Spike 
Disclaimer: I’d not be owning them. That rapscallion Joss 
does! If I’d be owning them I wouldn’t be needin’ to write 
would I? I’d be spending me time...well you know! Snicker
Feedback: Ye can or ye can’t now, but I’d be watching out 
for those leprechauns if I were ye! They might just be 
stealin’ yer lucky charms and I’m not talkin’ about the 
cereal if ye’d be getting my drift. 
E-Mail: foxhunter2blue@peoplepc.com
 
***
 
He always hated this day.
 
No matter how many years passed, he hated it with a 
passion. Not because he was vampire and thought 
humans were stupid or because he was, as Spike put it, a 
broody ponce. It was more than that.
 
It reminded him of home.
 
It also reminded him that people really had no idea what it 
meant to be Irish. After all on St. Patrick's Day apparently 
every human on earth was suddenly Irish no matter his or 
her lineage.
 
Angel let out a faint sigh as he sat at the bar surrounded 
by wanna-be Irish men and women staring at that vacant 
spot in the mirror where his reflection should be. He 
stared and his mind drifted back, back almost three 
hundred years to a small coastal village in Galway County. 
It was there that he'd grown to manhood or to a 
worthless layabout to have his father tell it.
 
***
 
A cold blue-grey sea, rocky coastline, then further back 
hills of the richest green.
 
The scent of peat, flaring in a stone fireplace, on the 
coldest winter night.
 
Mists curling in from the sea to dance through the 
cobblestone streets on a chill night.
 
The taste of rich, dark ale on his tongue, bitter and sweet 
all in one swallow.
 
Fiddlers playing in the eerie dance of firelight, a glow like 
the fires of hell licking at Lucifer's feet.
 
Then there were the lasses---buxom and hardy. Full ripe 
hips, plump breasts, curls of auburn or black, and eyes of 
blue or green. He remembered nights in front of the 
roaring fire at the local pub, his lap full of one giggling 
barmaid or another. It was on such a night that he had 
met his fate in a mist-shrouded alley.
Drunken not because he could, as always, but because 
he'd done the unthinkable.
 
Padric O'Connor.
 
His best friend since he could walk. 
 
He'd been hell raising as usual with Padric when he'd 
suddenly looked at his friend and realized something that 
both frightened and exhilarated him. He was in love with 
Padric. There was no woman could make him feel like this 
and suddenly it was crystal clear to him that he wanted 
Padric in a way no good Catholic boy would. That's when 
he'd made the mistake of grabbing his friend, without 
pause or thought, and kissed him.
 
Padric had been horrified, not to mention furious.
 
As Padric had stormed off cursing him for a sick bastard 
his fear had taken over. He knew without a doubt come 
morning the entire village would know Liam Conaway for 
what he truly was---a disgusting sodomite. Trying to 
drown his fear in ale had done nothing, but meeting Darla 
had. He would never know the shame of being driven 
from his village for his sick ways for he died that night.
Padric though had never been far from his thoughts.
 
The demon he'd become had taken great pleasure in 
torturing the young man until he'd died begging for 
mercy from a non-existent god. Even then, Padric was 
never far from his thoughts.
 
Imagine his surprise when almost a hundred years later his 
childe Drusilla had introduced him to her new childe. 
 
A young man named William.
 
William possessed the looks of a fallen angel. 
 
He also reminded Angelus of the man who had denied him 
in his human life.
 
Soon he'd taken what Dru had made. Taken the boy and 
formed him into a lost dream or perhaps a nightmare.
 
***
 
The bartender drew Angel from his dreams of Ireland and 
the past sitting a glass of dark, bitter Guinness in front of 
him.
 
"I didn't..." he began.
 
"Guy at the end of the bar. Said to tell ya Happy St. 
Paddy's Day."
 
Before he could ask anything else, the bartender 
disappeared into a sea of green. For a moment he just 
stared at the creamy foam then, he lifted his eyes to 
focus on the figure at the end of the bar.
 
Spike glanced up over the burning ember of his cigarette, 
tilting his head in acknowledgment. Without another 
glance he turned back to his glass and tossed back the ale 
in two quick gulps as Angel watched. He then turned back 
to Angel and smiled taking a deep drag, releasing a swirl 
of grey-blue smoke into the already smoky air. As he 
watched Spike stood dropped two twenties on the bar, 
then in a swirl of black leather and smoke disappeared 
towards the door.
 
Smiling to himself, Angel picked up the glass and slowly 
savored the rich bitter taste.
 
No need to hurry, he thought, there would be time.
 
His smile broadened as he thought of pale smooth skin, 
platinum curls loose and damp from the bath, and cobalt 
eyes filled with lust and need. Every year this had been a 
ritual until he'd been cursed. Now he remembered how 
much he'd missed those nights. It wasn't the demon who'd 
made him lust for this man. It had been the man he'd 
been; the memory of that man and a human love never 
fulfilled.
 
Dropping the glass on the bar Angel stood, gliding 
through the crowd, and out into the warm Los Angeles 
night.
 
"Catch me if you can, luv."
 
No human would have heard those words whispered so 
softly from the darkness, the words of a challenge that 
had been forsaken for far too long.
 
"I'll do better than catch you, boy." Angel growled as he 
leapt onto the nearest fire escape climbing into the 
darkness.
 
"Doubt that." 
 
A deep chuckle rose in Angel's throat as he caught a 
glimpse of platinum hair in the shadows. "An Irishman can 
always dream---now can't he?"
 
~Finis~