Unsent Letters

"Angel, I have a question for you." Cordelia walked in the room, ignoring Wesley who sat on the couch across from Angel. "How do you know when the time is right with that certain…someone?" Angel looked at Wesley, very perplexed.

"Cordelia, that’s a very personal question…" Wesley started. He never got to finish his thought. As usual.

"And that’s why I asked Angel, and not you!" Cordelia sarcastically responded. "So Angel, what do you think? I mean, it’s totally a high school ‘Can’t Hardly Wait’/’American Pie’ type question, but…" Wesley took this opportunity to walk out of the room to the main office, his coffee cup seeming to be suddenly less than full.

"Well, Cordelia, it’s a very personal question." Angel responded quietly. She rolled her eyes and increased her volume.

"Now you sound like him! You two are spending too much time together! At least Doyle got you out to a bar every now and then." They both smiled momentarily at the memory of Doyle’s habits. After a silent moment of reflection for both of them, Angel spoke. He spoke so softly that Cordy had to get closer to hear him.

"When you’re…" he seemed to falter for a moment, as if he didn’t know the words, or didn’t want to admit them. Angel swallowed. "When you’re in love with someone, everything you see reminds you of them. The wind blowing through the trees reminds you of fall walks in the park. The scent of their perfume on someone that walks by instantly makes them leap into your mind." Angel stared off as if he was living the moment. "The sight of the moon against blond hair reminds you of…" He stopped, suddenly becoming conscious of what he was doing, and the feeling of some tears welling up in his eyes. He swallowed again and looked at the book in his hands, which had Buffy’s picture sitting as his ‘bookmark’.

"Love? Angel, I was just thinking about letting Wesley take me out. Sheesh!" Angel looked up suddenly from his book, and Cordy could read hurt, or betrayal in his eyes. Why did she always make light of his thoughts on things? She got up, silently and stormed over to the back door and went down to his loft.

"Sorry…" she said quietly to no one in particular. She looked down at his desk… sometimes she didn’t realize what a different person Angel was, and her ‘tongue and cheek’ quips where her way of talking. But he was so emotional…

She saw a letter in a slot of his mini-sorter on his desk. Outgoing mail, she thought. Picking it up, it had no stamp, no return address, and no ‘to’ address either. One word was written on the letter.

It was not sealed, and after looking to the door where Angel went downstairs, she opened it. It was wrong, she knew, but then again, I am Cordelia Chase, and this is the kind of stuff you do when you’re Queen Bitch of Sunnydale High School.

As she read, her eyes teared up, and she knew what Angel was talking about when he spoke about love.

Angel Investigations

Buffy,

We once argued and I told you that I had no one to talk to.

That’s true.

Only myself. Well, for the longest time, there was you. Even then, I could have little else to say about myself or my feelings. Whenever I was around you, I was too awestruck by your beauty. And you thought I was quiet because something was bothering me…

Well, there was you before. So you get to hear this again.

Buffy? She’s the only thing I’ve ever cared about in my life. Ever.

In the 244 years now that I’ve been alive, I have not cared about anything. I didn’t care about my family in Ireland. I didn’t care when Darla took me and banished my soul, replacing it with a demons. I didn’t care when gypsies restored that same soul into the body with full knowledge of what the demon had done in my form.

Well, I guess I cared about that a little.

But I didn’t care about myself then. I was a miserable excuse for a monster. I wandered the streets, desolate, alone, unfeeling anything but remorse until someone found me. And pointed someone out to me.

Buffy.

It was then that I started to care. I took one look at her standing at her school that day, and instantly found reason to care, reason to believe again, reason to love. Yes, love. That fate drove me in the direction it did was a small miracle. But one thing I’ve learned in all my years is that there are forces greater than just ‘fate’ that move us in certain directions.

Take your mother for example. Because of a few choice words from her, I started to think that I needed to go away to allow you to grow. To be more than just a vampire’s girlfriend. To have a normal life, with a normal man.

So you found Riley the commando? What a putz.

I digress. When you got mad and we had the argument I was mentioning earlier, I could think of little else except going after you. I mean, I’ve met others… Cordelia, she’s really… Cordelia, and that’s a great thing… she’s had a few parties, and I’ve met a few interested girls. Then there’s Kate, but she’s not handling the whole immortal unlife thing well…

I guess what I’m saying it this… even as I stepped away from you on graduation day, I would feel little emotion. Someone once mentioned the Phil Collins song ‘Against All Odds’ to me. The whole "how can I just let you walk away…" thing. That was me.

Except that I was a shell inside, a man without a heart. Because, Buffy… you’re the only thing that I’ve ever cared about. You’re the only thing that I need. You’re the only thing that I’ve ever loved in my life… please… you have my heart.

I try and try to deny it, to involve myself elsewhere. But everyday my thoughts dwell on one thing… you. You let something go, and I know there’s that saying… But I have talked to God. For the longest time I thought I was abandoned by him, because of what I had become.

Then again, that was before I laid eyes on you. He must have smiled on me, because I had that vision.

I’ve asked him for the one thing that can ease my tortured soul. The sun in my sunless life.

You.

My love eternal,

Angel

Angel looked up from his research he was doing on a particular demon. He heard the front door to the office open, and voices speaking in muffled tones. Maybe Wesley came to work early today. He looked up, and noticed his letter to Buffy was gone. Where… He began to scrabble about his desk looking for the envelope.

"Cordelia…" Angel called from his office the next day. "Have you seen an envelope on my desk?"
"Oh yeah, I mailed it." She called from the other room. Angel’s face turned red and his voice broke.

"You mailed it??!?!?" He yelled as he got up, walking up to the door. Cordelia stood in the doorway looking at him. He looked almost furious. "How… why?"
"Because you said something to me yesterday. Nothing will dominate your thoughts like that one person." She paused, looking a little remorseful. "I wish someone would say that to me. So I thought you should tell her." Cordelia stepped aside, and a familiar blond haired slayer stepped into the doorway beside her. Angel’s jaw dropped. That was why he had paused when he was working. He had felt her. His anger melted as he drowned in her presence as a man in the desert would finding an oasis.