Title: The Happiest Ending
By TrinityLast
E-mail: trinitylast@wambtac.com
Disclaimer: The show's OVER. It clearly does NOT belong to me, or I'd have, y'know, made sure she was cookies first.
Distribution: Hey, at this point, if you want it, take it.
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Ehm...not really anything at all, actually.
Feedback: Yeah. It's been a hell of a long time since I wrote anything...if it's only to scream at me for that, I want to hear it.
Pairings: B/A

SOME ANGST...but I think it works out in the end.

Note: I don't know how this happened. I'm probably lucky it did. I'm sending to my list and to BA_Fluff. That's it. Want it? Take it.

No beta. Find a typo, get a cookie.

****************************

"He's coming in less and less."

"He said he was having problems at home...he won't say what. But I think he's on the verge of quitting."

"He CAN'T quit! We need him. Someone needs to talk to him. There have to be hours short enough he can work. I wish he had a computer...he could work from home."

"How about giving him a laptop?"

"Too expensive. All spending's been frozen until the end of the year."

He walked through the door at that moment and all conversation ceased...four months ago, he'd have noticed, said something, cracked a joke...now, he didn't even see them. He was walking in a haze of pain, and his eyes were never focused.

It was no surprise to anyone that he turned in his resignation that day. No notice. He was gone.

**

"He left two weeks ago. Maybe whatever it was finally blew over, and he wants to come back to work, but he thinks he can't."

"I still think this is a bad idea."

"At least he'll know he has the option, ok?"

"My god, this is where he lives?"

"Why was he working at all?"

"Maybe boredome. Maybe he'll come back because of it." She shrugged at her friend's look. "It's a chance."

They knocked on the door to what had turned out to be a HUGE house, the young blond woman and her brunette counterpart, each a manager...they were, in fact, here to offer him a promotion if he came back to the office. Anything to get him back. Night shift managers who were so empassioned about their work were impossible to come by.

He opened the door, blinked at them, and then just went back into the house, wordlessly leaving the door open for them.

His eyes were almost dead.

As the two women walked in, they noticed the little things...an oxygen tank, women's slippers, a LOT of blankets...medication spread out on the coffee table. Maybe his mother was sick?

He sighed at them as they followed him into the kitchen, and he simply started stirring the soup he'd been cooking.

"I'm not coming back to work."

Melinda sighed. "Look, we've all been through this." She was sure it was his mother, and who hadn't lost a mother? "But the BEST thing to do, really, is to bury yourself in your work when it's over."

He was silent for a minute, then he looked at her. "When it's over, I'll be gone too."

They stared at him...he'd never even MENTIONED a mother. Was he really saying he'd be killing himself when she died?!

Just then, a woman walked in...late 80's, tired, old, shuffling walk...but breathtakingly beatiful...both girls could tell she must have been a knockout when she was younger...and possibly recently, as the ugliness seemed more caused by whatever illness she had...her face was still fairly young, her body trim. She was holding a blanket around herself and shivering at the same time.

He looked at her and sighed, then pulled her to him and cradled her against his side. "I told you to stay in bed, beloved."

She just laughed softly. "Angel, I was supposed to die in hand-to-hand combat over sixty years ago. I'll be damned if I'm going to die in BED like an invalid."

He sighed again, but didn't argue, and kept holding her as he stirred, the two people completly unaware of their visitors now...

The visitors now staring at them in complete shock, and had been since the word "beloved".

After a minute, he turned off the stove, poured the soup into a bowl, and set it on a tray.

He then picked her up, cradling her in his arms, and took her into the livingroom, whispering into her ear and making her giggle, then came back for the soup, his visitors still forgotten.

After a few minutes, Melinda and Gillian left.

**

"His LOVER?"

"No, no...she was wearing a ring just like his...that silver one? I think they're married."

"My god...how old WAS she?!"

"Eighty if a day."

"I can't believe it. He can't be a gold digger. He was always so gung ho to HELP people...aren't gold diggers usually selfish?"

"I don't know..."

**

They went back.

After all, a money-based marriage isn't a reason to give up a promising career.

A woman answered the door...slightly younger than the other one, but still older...this one active and fit. She frowned at them. "Can I help you?"

"We're looking for Angel."

She sighed, then nodded, and motioned them upstairs. They could hear the couple talking as they approached the master bedroom.

"Remember the first time we met?" It was the woman's voice. He laughed in reply, but the sound was pained.

"Yes. You knocked me flat on my back."

"Well, you were annoying me."

"I was following you...the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen."

"Oh, sure, sixty-five years later that's your reason. It had nothing to do with why you were following me THEN, though." He laughed at that, and this time it was a real laugh.

"No, admited, I had other reasons that night."

There was a smile in her voice. "What about the next night?"

His answer was whispered. "Oh, by then, Summers, I was in love."

The two women just stopped in the hall, staring towards the open door...and Melinda suddenly gasped, then covered her mouth as if to call back the sound...but the two in the bedroom didn't seem to hear her anyway.

"What?" Gillian stared at her friend. "What?!"

Melinda just pointed at the walls.

There they were, plain as day...him and her...but she couldn't have been older than sixteen...standing there, laughing, in a library it looked like. A candid shot. Next to it was what looked like a club picture. The woman downstairs was there...a lot of people. A girl with red hair, a boy with blue hair with his arm around her...a taller boy, his arm around a brunette. A girl with a tattoo down farther, smirking at the camera...an older man with glasses...and him. With his arms around HER. He looked no different than today...she looked about seventeen there. And at the bottom of the page, a caption: "The Scoobies, 1998"

"It's not possible. Is it?"

Melinda didn't answer...but she did slowly back out of the hall.

Possible or not...this was love. And it was real.

**

"Has anyone at least checked on him?!"

Melinda nodded, sighing at her boss. "The house is empty. It has been since the funeral."

He glanced at her and nodded back. "OF course. You and Gillian, you went, right? And he was there? You were supposed to try again."

The two women glanced at each other. How could they tell their boss, a man who had missed half his own WEDDING for a business meeting, that they had taken one look at Angel and realized that there was no one left IN HIS BODY to talk TO?

"Well?"

"We did." Gillian didn't even look at Melinda, knowing she'd be given away. "He turned us down."

"He must want more money. Go back and double the offer."

The two women sighed but went.

When they got to the house, there was a note attached to the door.

"Dear Melinda and Gillian,
I know that you'll be back...Cleve will never let you give up. So I'm just going to say this.

I'm dead. I knew when Buffy was gone, I would have to be...she was my world before I even met her...and when she was still fighting, when WE were still fighting, before the war was won, before we knew she would live past the age of twenty-six, I promised her that I would be there, covering her grave with my body's ashes and protecting her for eternity.

And now, there is nothing else for me to do. Her sister Dawn, who you met the second day you came (she told me you were here) was dead within days...her life was as linked to Buffy's as mine is. We were all that was left. I love to help people, but it was Buffy who gave me that love...and there is nothing left for me here. I must follow her, as I know she'd have followed me had we died in battle...and I have to hope that wherever she is, I have redeemed my soul to the point that I will be allowed to find her there.

And if I have not met that level of redemption yet...I must hope that her need for me is as great as mine for her, as I know that no one with a soul as pure as hers could be denied anything by heaven.

Thank you for caring enough to come yourselves, as I know that if it was not you, it would have been Cleve, and I do believe I'd have killed him had he shown up on my doorstep.

You should have wonderful lives, as you are wonderful people.

~ Angel."
 

END

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