Starting Over, Part 2
By Tango

***

The following Monday, after Willow had run off to class and Angel had jogged back home, Buffy spent the day relaxing, moving around the house, reading, lazing in the sunshine. She started drinking a lot of herbal teas. She told herself they were for the healing effects, both mental and physical, many of them had, but honestly, she just wanted to try them because Angel seemed to like them so much. He drank coffee in the mornings, but he wasn’t a hardcore coffee drinker like Buffy. He was more into soothing through the day, picking up the rhythm of things. Buffy found herself relaxing more in his presence, even if her hormones were buzzing at a high, forbidden pitch.

She tried not to think too much that Angel was forbidden fruit. She tried not to think about the fact that she was going to have to do something with her life – or what was left of it. When her mother died, she had gotten some money in a trust. It wasn’t a huge amount but it was enough to put her through college and take a few years off after that.

She was fine with spending days relaxing and trying to find some semblance of happiness but she was going to have to get a hobby. The idea of a job where she would be under a microscope, where they could somehow find out about her sickness and judge her for it, made her skin go cold.

She was just smiling to herself, thinking maybe Angel would teach her to paint, when a light knock on the screen door sounded. She glanced over in that direction to find him standing there looking sexy as hell in jeans and a t-shirt. The man made Levi Strauss feel lucky to cover his ass.

“Wanna take a walk with me?” he asked, after he stepped inside and leaned casually against the doorjamb. She felt her pulse quicken. Nodding, she retrieved her tennis shoes.

Some people only walked when they actually had some place to go or there was a final destination in mind. Angel didn’t really work that way. He strolled around the town heading nowhere, for no purpose. He pointed out things when they walked, telling her about the buildings and the history of the place.

“Have you lived here all of your life?” Buffy asked, as they passed an old building that had a sort of architectural structure Angel found interesting for some reason.

“No,” Angel said, shaking his head. “I grew up all over. My parents liked to move around. We traveled a lot. We went all over Europe, a bit in Asia too.”

“When did you move here?” she asked. They had gotten to the quad and he spread out on the grass and closed his eyes, soaking in the sun like a great big cat. She stretched out next to him and did the same. Students straggled by here and there but they ignored them, not thinking it odd to see a couple lying full out on the bare, soft grass.

“When I was 26,” he said quietly and offered no more. A few minutes of blissful silence continued and he turned over on his side, propping up on his elbow. “Do you think about going back to school?”

“I don’t know,” she answered, just as quietly as he had. They both had secrets they weren’t ready to share. She blinked open her eyes and looked back at him. “Maybe. Someday. I’m not sure.”

“Your eyes change colors,” he said with a soft smile. “Did you know that?”

“No,” she said, giving him a confused smile. “They do?”

“Yeah,” he said, lying back down in the grass next to her, so close but not quite touching. “Yeah, they do.”

***

That evening Willow was bubbling over with excitement over her new Wicca group. She joined them a few months ago when all they could talk about was the new bake sale “blessed be” and dancing in naked under the full moon. Willow, along with her new friend, Tara, had been encouraging the girls to take baby steps toward trying spells.

Buffy sniffed a baggy of herbs that were sitting on the kitchen table and wrinkled her nose. “Stinky.”

“Yeah,” Willow agreed, not at all deflated. “There are better smelling things though. The incense is nice and so are the candles. I like the spells with lavender. And look, witch books!”

Buffy tried not to laugh at her overachieving friend. She couldn’t even go into her hobbies leisurely. The books stacked up on the table, all shiny and new, were hard to miss. She sat down and leafed through one of them.

“Protection spell,” Buffy read, “Money, prosperity…Will, do you think any of this stuff will actually work?”

“Healing,” Willow said, flipping Buffy towards another page. “It’s just like anything else. Mind over matter. It’s about colors, soothing energies, controlling the mind and the emotions. The body will follow suit. Oooh, and look, I got you a book on meditation.”

“Will, I beg you not to help me,” Buffy said, groaning. She loved Willow. She did. Bunches. But her friend had the tendency to come up with the strangest ideas. She called one day while Buffy was still in LA spouting about the energies and the body’s reaction to certain colors. She then suggested very strongly Buffy start wearing as much blue as possible.

Buffy groaned at her then too. “I have a terminal illness, Willow. I don’t think blue jeans are going to cure that,” she had said at the time.

She could almost hear her best friend rolling her eyes through the phone before she launched into a twenty minute tirade on the hidden mysteries of the psyche and the ever challenging unused portions of the brain. It shouldn’t have surprised Buffy that her room was all blue when she arrived at the house, but of course, she was shocked. The walls were blue, the curtains were blue, the sheets and the comforter were blue. Everything was in varying shades of blue. Buffy was pretty sure she hated the color now.

Buffy smiled at her determined friend over the pile of books. If Willow got credit for nothing else, she should get a prize for her sheer faith in Buffy’s ability get well. It was simply unacceptable to her that her best friend in the world should be allowed to die. She was not going to just lie down and let fate steamroll her like it had with Oz. No, that would not be allowed. Not again.

So sighing, Buffy paged through her brand spanking new meditation book.

“Angel says that meditation is the best way to connect the mind and body,” Willow said, casually, flipping through one of her texts. She smiled inwardly when Buffy started paging through with more interest, but said nothing.

“Anyway, I have the Wicca group over on Wednesday night, if that’s okay,” Willow said. “There’s about fifteen of them. You can hide in your room if you want…or hey, maybe you can have dinner with Angel or something.”

“Will, what did I tell you about matchmaking?”

“I’m not,” Willow pouted and stared into her book. “I’m just suggesting a non-Wicca evening, that’s all.”

“Uh huh.”

***

Wednesday afternoon Buffy was smiling despite her failure to avoid having dinner with Angel that evening while the Wicca group was in session. It wasn’t her fault really. Willow had mentioned it yesterday morning over coffee and when Buffy looked in Angel’s direction he was smiling at her, nodding as if he thought it was a great idea. Spying those smooth sensual lips curved in pleasure was about all she could take. Before she could stop her self, she was agreeing wholeheartedly to the plan.

She stopped by the grocery store and attempted to pick out a good wine. As she stared at the selection, she realized that maybe it was a bad idea to bring wine. Angel probably knew a lot about it than her with his wealthy, traveling-abroad family. In the end, she picked out a Merlot with a pretty label and not too steep of a price tag.

Next on the agenda was the pharmacy to pick up her prescriptions. She had to call her doctor in Los Angeles and swear to get a new physician before he would call in her meds to the small town drug store in Sunnydale.

When she walked in the door, she headed to the back where the pharmacist seemed to be holding court. He was talking as if he had a great story to tell, holding a bottle of pills in his hand like it was a beheaded corpse. Intrigued she moved closer to listen in too.

It only took about three seconds for her to realize he was talking about the town’s newest HIV resident - the girl with AIDS. She lifted her chin and stepped forward, but couldn’t help narrowing her eyes at him.

“Don’t you have a rule or an oath or something about giving out personal information?” she asked between gritted teeth. Fumbling nervously, the man almost dropped her prescription on the counter.

“E-excuse me?” he stammered.

“Buffy Summers,” she said, plopping down her prescription insurance card. She glanced over at the people backing away from her like she was letting off noxious fumes. She had half a mind to go around touching them at random. Maybe she could chase one around the store.

Trying desperately to hold in the hurt he had caused her, she hurriedly paid for her medication and left. If she thought she could have done it without bursting into tears, she would have threatened to sue him for giving out confidential information. She knew that it would be a fruitless cause, of course. It would be a matter of days before everyone in Sunnydale knew about her.

***

After she snuck past Willow’s group and dropped her medicine off in her room, Buffy went downstairs and sat on the porch waiting for Angel to arrive. She wished she had started seriously reading that meditation book right about then. Her hands were shaking and she wanted nothing else but to go upstairs and curl up in bed.

She was already tired just thinking about the looks she would get on the street, the people who would point and whisper as she went by. Sighing, she put her head in her hands and continued to wait. When she heard footsteps coming up on the sidewalk, she looked up expectantly.

“I’ve been looking for you.”

Buffy’s mouth dropped open as she rose to her feet. Parker Abrams stood on the path to their house with his hands shoved in his pockets. She looked around her nervously. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

“It was really responsible of you to leave your forwarding address with the school,” Parker said. “But I’m sure I’m the only person who would want to talk to you from there, huh?”

“I don’t have anything to say to you,” Buffy said quietly. She inwardly cursed the hoarseness in her voice.

“I have some shit to say to you,” Parker sneered. “You ruined my godamn life. You were supposed to be a sweet piece of ass, just a good time on a Saturday night. And you made me work for it, didn’t you, you fucking whore?”

“Just leave,” Buffy said, backing away as he got closer. “You’re not welcome here.”

“Yeah, well, I’m pretty much dying, aren’t I, so I guess we can’t all have what we want,” Parker sneered. He grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and shook her hard enough to make her teeth rattle. “You and all that fake virgin shit. How many guys did you use that on? How many people are dying because of your death pussy, huh?”

“I got it from you,” she ground out, struggling to get free. “You know it’s the truth. You just don’t want to believe it. Let me go!”

“Let you go?” He shouted, shaking her harder. “You did this to me! You ruined everything!”

Buffy twisted and turned trying to get away and looked up in shock when he was gone. Angel stood in front of her and she peered around him to see Parker recovering from his stumble back, heading in for more. Angel stood, deliberately blocking her and not even flinching as Parker came forward, already swinging. Blocking with his left arm, Angel’s right flew forward, but instead of the punch she was expecting, the heel of his hand collided with Parker’s throat.

Angel watched emotionlessly as Parker fell to the ground, holding his throat and wheezing as he tried to take air into his collapsed windpipes. Buffy stood and watched in shock, tears hovering in her eyes. She barely registered the movement when Angel took her hand and gently lead her away.

“Did you kill him?” Buffy asked, glancing back over her shoulder where Parker still lay on the ground, struggling to breathe.

“No,” Angel said quietly. “He’ll be okay in a few minutes.”

***

Angel led his tearful companion to his house and sat her down on the couch. He made her tea and handed it to her. He perched on the couch at her side and looked over her for a moment thoughtfully. He hated to see her in tears. It made him want to go back and find the kid he knocked the wind out of and finish the job right.

“You’re not going to tell me who he was, are you?” he asked.

She opened her mouth to speak but then thought against it. Instead, she kept her tearful gaze averted and shook her head no. Angel nodded. He threw a pillow on the floor at her feet and then settled down on top of it. She wouldn’t meet his gaze, embarrassingly brushing her tears away. Her sniffles weren’t slowing after a few minutes. In fact, it seemed like she was trying to hold in greater sobs.

He took hold of one of her feet. “Can I take your shoe off?” he asked. She nodded, not yet trusting her voice and he slipped off her shoe and sock. He held her foot gently in his strong hands and began massaging it.

“My parents died when I was sixteen,” he said, concentrating on her delicate foot, massaging each toe, leaving no part unsoothed, “and I went to live with my Uncle Holtz. His first name was Daniel but everyone called him Holtz. I don’t remember my Aunt, but I’d be willing to bet she called him Holtz too.

Buffy relaxed, leaning her head back on the couch and taking the opportunity to study him. He looked up at her every once in a while as he spoke. His voice was low and didn’t carry in it much of the emotion he must have been feeling.

“He was a mean old bastard.” he continued, making her whole body tingle by just caressing her feet. “He was pissed off at the world for one thing or another every second of his miserable life. He blamed me for everything that went wrong. It wasn’t until I turned eighteen that I found out that he had been trying for years to somehow access the money that was left in a trust for me until I came of age. He tried both as my father’s brother and as my legal guardian to get to it.”

Angel lifted her other foot, slipped off her shoe and sock and started massaging as he talked. “By that time, a lot of Holtz had rubbed off on me. As much as I wanted to blame him though, I couldn’t. I didn’t want to be a good person. I wanted to screw women and drink and do as many drugs as I could. I joined martial arts classes just so I could kick ass on the streets and I put my lessons into practice every chance I could, beating people up who got into my way.

“I eventually started working for the local drug dealers as muscle. That’s how I met Darla. She was a little druggie prostitute who had a hard time paying up for what she owed. I was sent to her a bunch of times, but she always wanted to give it to me in trade. I started sleeping with her all the time after a while and eventually she’d stopped hooking and moved into Uncle Holtz’s basement with me.”

Slipping up from her foot, he took her ankle in his hands and began massage up to her calves. His movements were slow, almost lazy and incredibly gentle as if he weren’t just telling her about drugs and hurting people and living with prostitutes. Buffy sipped her tea and said nothing, listening to his story with rapt attention.

“It was about four o’clock in the morning about three months after she’d moved in that I stumbled home from one my newest jobs to find Holtz and Darla waiting for me in the basement. When I walked in, her dress was around her waist and he was sucking on her nipples, shoving one hand between her thighs. The other hand was holding a gun. When I walked in, they didn’t jump and hide like they were ashamed.

“Holtz raised his gun on me and told me calmly that they’d been fucking for longer than I’d even known her. Then he laughed when the shock registered on my face and he said, ‘What? You actually think your dick was so special when you were fucking a whore?’ I’ll never forget that. They wanted my money and since Holtz was my last living relative, he figured he’d get it all when I died.”

“But you didn’t die,” Buffy whispered finally. He switched to her other ankle and began massaging that leg as well.

“No,” he agreed. “I egged them on and got the whole story out of them, trying to keep them talking for as long as possible. I knew I wasn’t much, but I wanted to be more than a dead body in the basement at the feet of an old man and his hooker. I waited for my moment and when Holtz made the mistake of turning his head for a second to look at Darla, I ripped out his throat with my bare hand.”

He felt her leg jump in his hand and continued to massage, meeting her eyes as he did. “I gave Darla time to put on her dress before I did the same to her.”

Angel stopped massaging when Buffy went completely still, her mouth slack as she stared at him with new eyes. He was expecting it, but he wasn’t ready for it. He knew he had to be honest, had to come clean, but that look made him wish he had just lied. He could have told her anything and it probably would have had a better reaction than the truth. The truth was so much more ugly than anything he could make up.

He took a deep breath and continued. “I wasted five years in my life in jail for that. I killed two people and although it was partially in self-defense, I didn’t have to kill. I’d trained hard enough to know a hundred other ways to take that gun from him. I didn’t have to kill Darla either. I was angry that she turned against me. When they took her in and performed the autopsy, I found out she was pregnant. I spent five years wondering if I was in jail for murdering my own child.”

“Oh my god,” she gasped, pulling her legs up to her chest and out of his grasp. He released her and looked up at her for a moment.

"In prison, I studied. I got my high school diploma and worked my way through a degree in psychology. I mastered several forms of martial arts and I thought about what I did. Prison gives you a lot of time to think about things, to regret them, to hone your brooding skills."

He stood, picking up his pillow and tossing it back on the couch. “I’m not that monster anymore, Buffy, but If you’re going to be my friend, I thought you should know who I once was.”

“Thank you for telling me,” she rasped, reaching for her things. “Thanks for helping me with P… thanks for helping me. I’m just really tired. I should probably go home and lie down.”

“Course,” he said, nodding tiredly. He stood in the center of the great room, giving her plenty of space and watched her put on her shoes and socks.

“You just need some time to think,” he said quietly as she hurried out of his house and away. “It’s not every day a murderer falls in love with you,” he said. But she was already gone.

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