Buffy put the pillow over her head. Who the hell was calling in the middle of the night? Had they no decency?

The answering machine started doing its thing, but whoever it was didn't leave a message.

She groaned when it rang again a few minutes later. Dawn. Only Dawn would be that insistent.

Fumbling for the phone, she knocked over the clock in the process. "Amazing, o.k.?" she said without waiting for a greeting. "The earth moved. Screaming was involved. He remembered all the right..." She stopped talking when she realized Dawn hadn't uttered a sound. "Um, Dawn?"

"No," Angel said, a bit coldly.

"Oh," Buffy replied. "Angel." She was sure he could hear the blood rushing to her head; at least he couldn't see how red her face was. "I was going to..."

"Late night?" he asked, cutting her off.

"Kind of," she mumbled.

"Did you get my messages?"

She looked over at the answering machine on the desk. It was blinking furiously.

"Dumb question," he answered for himself. "If you had gotten my messages, you would have been on the conference call I just had with the new client. But, obviously, you weren't."

"Hey," Buffy said. "Easy, o.k.? It was a holiday. I took the day off. That is allowed isn't it?"

"Sorry," Angel finally said after a long minute of silence. "This client is difficult. I shouldn't be taking it out on you."

"No, you shouldn't. Especially when you wake me up to do it." She pushed the pillows up against the headboard and sat up, leaning back against them. Much better to be talking about Angel's being snitty than about what she had been doing last night.

"It's 9:30," he pointed out. Or, rather, he seemed to enjoy pointing out.

She bent down to pick up the clock, seeing that it was, indeed, 9:30. A perfectly reasonable time for someone, especially someone who was currently serving as her boss, to call. "Oh."

"You met someone?" he asked. "That was a little quick, no?"

Damn it, damn it, damn it. She had been hoping to keep this to herself for a little while -- she wanted to just enjoy it, not have to answer anyone's questions. Especially not Angel's. It was still awkward to talk about her love life -- or usually lack thereof -- with him even though they had spent the last eight years coming to terms with where they stood in each other's lives.

She rolled the phone cord between her fingers. "I ran into an old friend."

"So I gathered," he snapped. "Spike?"

Buffy was amazed that he managed to keep his voice mostly neutral given how not happy he'd been when she and Spike had gotten together. He'd held his tongue when things disintegrated, but she knew he was glad to see Spike go. Only once, when she had really pushed him, did he offer any opinion, and all he had said then was that he had never trusted Spike, and he never would.

"No," she replied. "Riley." Angel didn't say anything for so long that she finally said, "You still there?"

"So he's alive after all, huh?"

Uh, yeah, she thought, blushing. Quite. "Don't even try to say 'I told you so.'"

"You remember that?" he asked.

"Of course." You don't forget the second-worst year of your life no matter how hard you try. Or, as Xander had said at the time, the worst year of your life, take two -- losing the people you love as they moved on, living their lives. An overwhelming sense of uselessness, wondering exactly how much longer you'd be required to be on this earth, marking time. The heavens claiming another good guy, far before his time.

Not that she had been able to articulate all that at the time; not that she had even been aware of it, or of how alone she felt, how desolate everything seemed. It was a gradual thing, a molehill that became a mountain while she wasn't looking.

It started with the house. A fight about the house, actually. When Dawn told Buffy that she wouldn't be coming home after school ended; that instead she was going to extend her junior year abroad through the summer, leaving no time for a visit home before classes started up again in the fall.

'But we were going to redo the backyard,' Buffy had said, recounting all her plans for flowers and trees and...

'Listen to you,' Dawn replied in disgust with a stridency that could only be managed by a college junior who had no concern in the world except whether or not she was going to sleep through her first class of the day. 'Why do you stay there? Don't you ever want to leave that place? You're living on borrowed time as it is - go see the world you keep saving. Do something with your life instead of saving Sunnydale High and fucking Spike.'

'Excuse me?' What life? I Slay therefore I am. 'I don't get to go away to college and travel the world and plan for a future. I get to pay your tuition and kill the damn demons and scrape by on whatever's left after paying the mortgage and...'

And, God, I sound like my mother. On the really bad days after the divorce.

'God,' Dawn had said. 'You sound like Mom used to. Maybe you're not fucking Spike enough.'

That remark would have been greeted with a smack if Dawn had been standing in front of Buffy instead of in a dorm room clear across the country. Even Dawn, through the haze of her haughty, righteous, almost-adulthood, had realized that she'd gone too far.

'So why don't we sell the house?' Dawn had asked, the tremor in her voice being the only thing that kept a still furious Buffy from slamming the phone down. 'Do you really think Mom would have wanted things to turn out this way?'

Whereas a moment before Buffy's head had been filled with a million nasty things she could be saying back to Dawn, she was suddenly speechless. Sinking down onto the stool, she had rested her head on the kitchen counter, as she thought of how many hours had been spent in this very room, cooking and laughing and fighting. Being a family. Dreaming about a life. Mourning too many losses.

She closed her eyes, trying to shut out the tears as the ghosts overtook her: Tara's happy face pancakes. Riley's grin as he leaned against the counter. Giles in an apron washing the dishes. And Mom... Mom's everything.

Sell the house? Her one constant? The only place in the universe where she belonged? Without it to anchor her, she would be lost. Adrift in the dark sea that was her life, the only beacon being the memories that this place held.

But that's all they were: memories. It was unlikely that Xander and Willow would ever again sit on the couch with a bowl of popcorn and bad Indian soap operas on the TV. Or that Giles would ever again bemoan the lack of proper reference materials while trying to explain a point.

Tara would never again glide down the stairs and Riley would never again bound up them. Angel wouldn't be waiting in her bedroom window when she got home and Dawn wouldn't be finding yet another place to hide her diary.

And Buffy would never, ever again come home to an old movie and a birthday cupcake. Would never, ever again be greeted by that one person who loved you no matter how mean or immature or rude or just plain stupid you were. Would never, ever again have a mom. No house could provide those things.

Ghosts and memories.

Time to move on.

Putting the house on the market had taken all the emotional energy that Buffy could spare and she hadn't been surprised that months went by without her laughing or smiling. Spending her days and nights working and slaying and packing up years' worth of stuff. Praying that the house wouldn't be sold before she could figure out where she'd go when she didn't have a home anymore.

Xander and Anya had offered her a room in their brand new house for as long as she needed.

'Right,' Spike said. 'I'd get a bleedin' stake through my heart before they'd ever let me in.'

'I spend my nights in graveyards, Spike,' Buffy had replied to the unasked question. 'I don't want to live in one.'

'Probably gonna die in one. May as well get comfortable.'

'Human, remember? A crypt is a place you go after you die.'

'Or when you want to shag someone who's already dead.'

Years, maybe even months, earlier, that comment would have come by way of a sultry voice murmured into the hollow of her neck while his tongue darted out and his teeth pulled her in. Knees weakening, she would have collapsed into his arms and let him take her however and wherever he felt like going.

But now, amidst half-packed boxes, with a 'for sale' sign on the lawn, it was just muttered with a derisive snort and a cigarette flung to the ground as he walked out the front door. 'You know where I'll be,' he said, not even bothering to give her a glance as he left.

Reliving Mom's death? Check. Angry boyfriend slamming the front door as he leaves? Check.

The year continued along those lines. Not wanting to live in the house a single minute more after making the decision to sell, she split her time between Spike's crypt and Xander's place. (Nightly walk of shame? Check. Xander and Anya clawing and pawing each other constantly? Check.)

Being thrilled for Willow when she defended her dissertation on the parallels between Christianity, Judaism, witchcraft and native traditions. And, a couple months later, trying to be thrilled when the newest Dr. Rosenberg landed the job in Chicago, the only university willing to let her be part of the departments of history, religion, sociology, anthropology, and psychology simultaneously. (But absolutely not computer science, according to the department chair. Maybe she could teach a night course for them once a semester. If she proved herself first.)

With Willow gone, and no hope of Dawn returning for the summer, Buffy got more and more lonely, and more and more irritated with the constant snide remarks flying between Spike and Xander. Or directed at one by the other, often to her.

Enough, she finally decided. Good-bye Sunnydale, hello L.A.

'Yes, Spike. With Angel.' And in response to Spike's outburst, an exaggeratedly slow, 'It's a hotel. With lots of rooms. And other people living there.'

Not that she had intended to live there. Just to spend a week. Away from the sniping. Away from the slaying.

Away from Xander and Anya, so in love with each other again, surviving their own hell and coming out stronger. Away from Spike, who had loved her for years. Who had helped her get through the worst year of her life (and death), Part One, but who this time around, didn't quite have the patience or the right words to say.

Away, away, away.

One week in L.A. turned into two when she couldn't get out of bed on the day she was supposed to go home. Had basically stayed in the bed for the entire week, in fact. Changing into real clothes only because after four days her pajamas had started to smell even worse than the Doublemeat. Angel had pleaded with her that if she wasn't going to be good company, she should at least respect the fact that he had an excessively good sense of smell and could she please do a load of laundry.

After she put on a clean t-shirt (and then climbed right back into bed), Angel had started to come in and sit with her in the evenings. He rarely said anything. Two hundred and fifty plus years had taught him a lot of patience, which was serving him well since all she wanted to do was watch TV and drink Diet Coke.

When he couldn't be there himself he sent others, ostensibly to bring her meals, but she knew it was to check in on her. She had cried far too loudly at far too many tire commercials for him to feel comfortable with the state she was in.

Not that she was in a state, she had complained to Gunn. She'd decided he was her favorite of the overseers thanks to him being the one who introduced her to the wonders of ESPN -- a channel on which there was very little baggage. Unlike the Home and Garden network that reminded her of the house that was on the market and the garden that was never redone; or, God forbid, Lifetime: Television for Women.

Good old ESPN. Lots of men pounding baseballs with bats; golf balls with clubs; and each other with fists, feet, humongous Sumo bellies, and a race car or two. Blood, guts, and eye candy - no baggage whatsoever.

'Please,' she said, exasperated with Angel after the sixth night in a row that he had asked her what was wrong. 'I'm fine. Totally fine. A little tired, maybe.' Not at all depressed or lost or lonely or without any sense of hope at all. And certainly not about to cry except in the presence of sappy television ads. 'Just needed a vacation.'

'Well, good,' he had said. 'Fine. Then that's what you'll get. Wake-up call is at nine.'

'Wake-up call for what?'

'You'll see. 'Night.' He'd turned out the light and closed the door behind him.

The wake-up "call" was actually Cordelia and Fred, bearing fresh squeezed orange juice and the company credit card that had been specifically provided by Angel for a day of fun. Two weeks of moping was apparently more than enough.

And surprisingly, given that this was Cordelia and the Fred person who was nice but seemed just a little too cute for Buffy's taste, she truly did have fun. In the most ridiculous, girly-ish way possible - manicures and pedicures, highlights and a bit of a trim, high-powered shopping, and a three hour lunch complete with many brightly colored drinks, not nearly enough food, and the company of four outrageously young up-and-coming Beautiful Men, who were still unjaded enough to beam with pride when the teenage girls at the next table asked for their autographs.

Maybe that was all she had needed, Buffy thought. A couple of weeks away from Sunnydale. A girls' day out. A day where she actually smiled more than she frowned. Laughed even. No hopelessness or despair, no-siree-Bob. Things were looking up. Maybe Brutal Year #2 was finally over.

Oh, Buffy. 'Buffy, Buffy, Buffy,' Dawn would have said. 'Weren't you the one who said not to ever tempt fate like that?'

The words had already been spoken, however. Thought, actually; but out there all the same.

Into the lobby they had walked, still a little drunk, laughing at the story Cordelia was telling. Showing off their hair and nails and purchases when the phone rang.

'For you,' Gunn had said, holding the phone out to Buffy.

'Where have you been?' Xander asked as soon as she said hello.

'Shopping,' she answered, thinking how lame that sounded. Lame and very girlish.

'For a week and a half?'

'No.' She'd looked at Angel, thankful that he had seen that she just couldn't deal with anything for a little while; annoyed because he had taken it upon himself to hold her calls. Old habits die hard. 'Why -- is everything o.k.?'

'Hopefully,' Xander answered, exasperated. He had been picking up her mail and had run into the realtor who, after calling three times a day for four days in a row, had finally just driven over. 'There's an offer on the house. Or at least there was. You need to call him, like, now.'

'Oh,' she had said, flashing on an image of the words "giddiness" and "happy" turning to dust as a stake ran through them. 'I mean...oh.'

'This is good, right?' he had asked, more perceptive than she would have thought given that his attention didn't seem entirely focused on the conversation at hand.

Good. Right. This is good, she tried to tell herself. Ghosts and memories -- that's all they were. They live in my heart not the house. They'll stay with me no matter where I am.

'Hey,' Xander said, oblivious to the fact that she hadn't answered him. So maybe not really that perceptive. 'Why would you get something from the Army?'

'What?' She'd been fighting not to cry -- it's a bloody house, as Spike would say. Wood and glass, not skin and bone -- no life there. Attempting to switch gears, she asked, 'The Army? For me?'

'It's in with the rest of your mail. Addressed to you. So, yeah, looks like.'

'Well, open it.' The words jumped out of her mouth before she could fully grasp the idea that this was probably not something she wanted Xander to be reading to her over the phone. Especially not while she was standing in the middle of a group of people very obviously trying not to eavesdrop on her conversation, yet rooted to their places because of this cosmic force that had suddenly taken over the room.

Brutal Year #2. Strike three, you're out.

Riley gone. Check.

She tried to open her mouth as she realized this couldn't possibly be something good. Wait, she wanted to scream. Please don't do this. Not now. Not when I need to say good-bye to my mom, to our home. Not when Dawn is all the way across the country and Willow halfway there. Not when Spike and I are so fragile that we can't say a word to each other without snapping.

Not when Xander, the only one who ever truly understood what happened that night, is two hours away and can't catch me before I fall. I can't do this right now. Not this, too. Please, God, don't-

'We regret to inform you...'

Xander's voice trailed off, and she could hear a thunk as he sat down hard.

'Shit... Buffy,' was all he said after that.

Or all she heard. She couldn't really remember what happened after that. Didn't remember that Angel had somehow appeared by her side, taking the phone she wordlessly handed to him. Didn't remember walking to the stairs; didn't remember getting to her room or climbing under the covers or turning on the TV.

Good old ESPN. Always coming through in the clutch.

What she did remember was the commercial ending and the -- of all the stupid, stupid things to be on at this particular time was a stupid, stupid basketball game. The stupid, stupid L.A. Lakers who Riley used to make her watch because he said it was her local team and it was blasphemy that she didn't even know what color uniform they wore.

She also remembered dissolving into tears and being taken into Angel's arms and sobbing for the entire rest of the game that she wouldn't let him turn off even though she couldn't bear to look at it. And when the game was finally over, and her tears were finally subsiding, she made Angel tell her the rest of what the letter said, knowing that there was no way he'd have let Xander off the phone without getting the full story.

'Missing in action. That's all they said,' he replied, obviously deciding to leave out the 'presumed dead' part -- as she later found out -- when a new round of tears came. 'Buffy -- what we do... What he does...' Trying to find something, anything that would calm her down. 'Can you really trust people who don't even tell you this in person? Send it to you in a letter?'

Pulling away, her breaths ragged as she looked at him. 'What do you mean?' ('What... sniffle... do... hiccup... you... sniffle... mean?')

'I don't know,' he said, clearly telling the truth since he looked like he wished he hadn't said anything at all. 'I just don't think you can trust those guys.'

Of all the... He was doing this now?

'No,' he added quickly, as her eyes hardened and she started to protest. 'I don't mean Riley. I mean the Army. The government. Do you really think they know what they're talking about?'

'They knew to send me something,' she answered. 'They wouldn't know that unless it was in a will or something. A next-of-'

'I thought you said he was married.'

'Oh.' Of course she wouldn't be next of kin. Dumb of the blondest kind. 'Right.'

'Maybe he was sending you a message and that's the only way he could get it to you,' Angel offered.

She tried to smile. It was sweet of Angel to be trying so hard, but he wasn't really making any sense. 'Because in this day and age there's no way he could let me know otherwise?' Seeing as there was no such thing as phone or email or a letter that said 'had to go even more undercover' instead of 'we regret to inform you.'

Angel had just shrugged. He sat back against the headboard and pulled her to him, cradling her. 'Look, all I know is that you were dead. And then you weren't. And maybe this isn't what it seems. Maybe someone sent the wrong letter. Or maybe there's some other Riley Finn. I don't know - just... I don't know.'

A few minutes later, in a somewhat strangled voice, Angel asked, 'Do you want to talk about him?'

'No,' Buffy answered, feeling Angel's body relax in relief. Thinking how odd that it should be Angel that was sitting here comforting her, especially considering that the last time they had even spoken of Riley had been in a scathing argument begun only moments after Buffy told Angel about Spike. An argument started when Buffy said that at least Spike had never just walked out on her, the way Angel had. That Angel only had himself to thank for this turn of events because if it weren't for him, Riley never would have left and she and Riley would have lived happily ever after.

Not that she really believed it was that simple, but at the time she had wanted to avoid all discussion about Spike. And even she had been surprised at the anger behind the words, anger so vehement that she and Angel had never spoken of it again.

Because on some level, she did blame him. For leaving her so broken that she closed herself off, thinking that if she never spoke the words again, nothing would ever hurt quite so much. For the heartbreak that came when she discovered that wasn't true.

'I just...' She fought to control the tears that were clogging her throat as she tried to speak, feeling that she had to say it. Had to just once say it out loud. Even though if Riley truly were dead he wouldn't be able to hear it, because it didn't really work that way. She knew that one from experience.

'I just wish...' She shook as another sob wracked her body and Angel held her tightly. 'I just wish I could have told him how much I loved him.' There, she thought, letting the tears flow freely again, having said what she needed to say. 'I hope he was able to understand that.'

Angel stayed with her that night, holding her until she fell into a restless sleep. And when she woke the next morning she knew there was no way she was going back to Sunnydale. The only thing that town held for her was a tether to the past. It was time to think about a future. Time to think about finishing college and finding a tolerable way to spend her days -- something more along the lines of kicking ass than what she'd been doing lately.

She'd been grateful that Angel was willing to let her live in his hotel, work for his agency, and generally just take full advantage of whatever he was willing to offer while she got her life back together again. His emotional support had been just as important, because it took her a while before she could actually get through a day without crying, but she still marked that morning as the moment she broke free. When she finally decided that she was going to live her life, rather than just try and stay alive.

And now, almost ten years later, sitting in her bed in the perfect house she'd bought with money she'd earned in a job she still loved, she was happy to say that it finally took. Not that there hadn't been sorrow and disappointment along the way, but she had managed to build a life she was proud of; one in which she was content. And maybe, with this incredible gift of having Riley back, maybe she might even get the cherry on top.

"Angel?" she asked, wondering if he had been lost in thought, too, or if he was just humoring her.

"Is he still married?" Angel asked.

"Widowed."

He was quiet for a minute. "Is this what you want?"

Oh, God. The billion dollar question. "I think so. I really do."

"Then I'm happy for you." He said it softly. There was pain in his voice.

Though she thought he spoke the truth, she knew no matter how much he wanted her to live a normal life, there was no denying that Riley's reappearance marked an ending of sorts to the deep bond they had shared for so many years.

"I wish you the best," he added.

"Thank you," she said, with sadness in her voice as well. "So tell me about this client."