Title: Dancing

Summary: Post Dark Age. In between The Dark Age and What’s My Line? Buffy and Angel got a lot closer and a lot more coupley. Why? What happened?

A/N: Went to Challenge In A Can (http://www.dymphna.net/challenge/) got these words: Buffy Alive Bag

 

 

            Buffy held the brown paper bag tightly with both hands. She hesitated outside the door, working up the courage to walk inside. She could slay vampires ‘til the cows came home…and then she could slay the cows, but when asked to actually talk to them…the vampires, not the cows, or rather one vampire…that was another thing entirely.

 

            “Buffy, come in.”

 

            She twisted the paper bag in her hands again. Damn vampire senses. She opened the apartment door and stepped inside. He was sitting in a chair in the corner of the room, a book tuned face down on his knee. He closed it and laid it on the side table, rising to meet her.

           

            “I-I brought you lunch…breakfast…whatever it is you,” she said as she thrust the paper bag toward Angel.

 

            He nodded his thanks and took the bag from her, setting it to the side. “Aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

 

            She sighed dramatically. “Alright…Giles,” she grumbled.

           

            Angel shrugged. “Sorry, it’s two o’ clock; you’re usually in math class around this time.”

 

            Buffy arched an eyebrow at him. “Stalk much?” She shook her head and waved away the protests she knew he was already forming. “I came down with an acute case of angel-ititis.”

 

            It was Angel’s turn to quirk an eyebrow at her in askance. After a moment and several dramatic sighs she indulged him.

 

            “You could have died yesterday. Died, d-i-e-d.”

 

            Angel shook his head and gave her a bewildered look. “I know how to spell died, in several languages actually…”

 

            “Oh God! You don’t get it. That’s so not the point,” Buffy wailed, pacing and working herself into a fit. “Willow put a demon in you. A demon!”

 

            “And like I told you, I’ve had a demon in me for a couple hundred years. I still don’t get what this has to do with you skipping math class and me dying.”

 

            Buffy groaned and buried her head in her hands. “No, you don’t. I’m tired of dancing around this, Angel. I’m tired of pretending we’re not doing what we’re doing.”

 

            Angel sat back down in his chair, a befuddled look on his face. He glanced up at her. “Exactly what is it we’re doing?”

 

            “Duh! I love you, Angel and even though you’ve got scary commitment issues for someone who’s 242 years old, I know you love me too,” she paused, giving him a chance to refute her argument. When he didn’t she continued. “The only time I feel alive is when I’m with you. You get me, the whole package. I mean maybe not the way I talk or the things I do, but you get the important things like the slayer stuff and the girl stuff and just the Buffy stuff. You make my life make sense just by being.”

 

            “Buffy-” he started.

 

            Buffy shook her head and held her hand up. “No, no. You don’t get to argue with me over this. I mean-I don’t mean that. You don’t get to lecture me on how much older you are then me, or why we shouldn’t, couldn’t, can’t, won’t and all those other apostrophe t words that I hate, because the simple fact of the matter is we are. Regardless of anything else. We are.”

 

            Angel sighed, stood up and walked over to Buffy. He looked down at her and smiled, shaking his head as that smile turned into a soft chuckle. He pulled her into his embrace and kissed the top of her head.  Buffy tilted her head up, resting her chin on his chest.

 

            “So can we stop dancing?” She asked softly, her mouth falling into a pout.

 

            He touched her lips with his finger, knowing he’d walk to hell and back when she pouted. “We can stop dancing.”