starlit_desires | FIC: Back From the Dead 11/11 (Reply)

well this is it.... tell me what you think. I decided against a confrontation between Willow & Angel for specific reasons, which I hope will become apparent when I write the sequel to this.

Title: Back From the Dead 11/11

Author: Sweetness (aaronlisa@gmail.com)

Rating: PG-15

Pairing: Angel/Willow

Disclaimer: It all belongs to Joss Whedon and company.

Notes: this started out life as a drabble for velvetwhip. Set during BTVS Season Three.

            He had made sure that Buffy was okay before he had left town. Part of him had wanted to make sure that Willow was okay but he knew that she would have hated him even more for that. Well perhaps hate was too strong of a word to use. But he knew that she wouldn’t have appreciated him making sure that she was okay. Things between them had been strained, and had been ever since he had made his way to the bedroom where she was crying. He had understood her anger and her frustration but he had been unable to do anything to relieve them. His mind wandered to the moment when he knew that things between them would never be repaired. She had asked him why he had not told Buffy that Willow was safe with him. When he had shrugged in answer, she had asked him if it was because he was ashamed. When he told her that he had nothing to be ashamed of, her tears had stopped and she had looked at him in disgust. And he knew then that he should have been honest with her, that he should have told her that he was confused. He should have said anything, instead of just letting her go out into the night. He had tried every night since that night to make it up to her. He had left gifts of books and flowers and any thing that he thought would make her smile in front of her French doors. And in return most of those items had found their way back to the mansion or in the trash. The only thing that she had kept was an old spell book left behind by Drusilla and Spike. And even that she had turned over to Giles.
            The only time she had let him close to her was the night when her vampire double had arrived in Sunnydale. She had let him hold her as she told him of her guilt for sending her double back to wherever she had come from. He had comforted her as best he could but he had no words to say to mend the rift between them. And soon she had shrugged off his arms and went back into her room. The click of the doors closing behind her had been the most painful sound he had ever heard. And she never let him comfort her again, not even after Faith had tried to kill her. Instead she had turned to Oz for comfort and support. And she had slowly ignored him more and more. In public, her behavior towards him never changed, but when it was just the two of them, she turned cold and indifferent. She was always polite to him, but she always acted as if there were a million other places that she would rather be. Whenever he had tried to apologize, her look of disgust would always make the words stick in his throat. So he had decided to leave. He couldn’t stand being so close to her every day and have nothing but her cold anger.
            So he lied to Buffy and told her that he had to leave Sunnydale because of their relationship, which would surely self-destruct. He even lied to himself and told himself that he was leaving because he couldn’t be close to Buffy. He had refused to admit that he couldn’t stand being so close to Willow and not being able possess her. He knew that he had claimed her that night when he had woken up to find her being attacked by a demon. And every night since he had been in a Hell of his own making.

**END**