The Day of Grief (Buffy/Angel, PG)

[carlyinrome]

Minutes to midnight on the day of grief, Buffy returns from patrol to find Angel has returned as well. The alcohol has loosened his joints; his body is so relaxed that he stretches across the bed six inches further than he normally would. Buffy thinks of Alice in Wonderland, the potion that made Alice grow, and wonders if it smelled like this, sour and smoky and sad.

Buffy settles her weary bones to the bed, settles against Angel. He is flushed, overwarm, and his breaths are so long that he might be asleep, though he isn’t; his eyes are squinted open and he is watching her.

“You smell like a brewery,” she says, because there aren’t words to address the reason he spent his day in a pub, the reasons for his grief.

Angel smiles, languid and long. “Distillery.”

“Huh?”

“Beer,” Angel says, overly careful of the shape of each syllable, “is brewed. In a brewery. Whiskey. Is distilled. In a distillery.”

He’s smiling, because he’s happy to see her, and happy to teach her things. But his eyes are still sad, and Buffy imagines him sitting, alone, in a dark pub, bringing the glass to his lips again, and again.

“You are such a dork,” Buffy says, and she presses her lips to his, and kisses his whiskey sour mouth. Again, and again.