B/A (BtVS & A:tS)

[myhappyface.livejournal.com]

Title: Always
Author: myhappyface
Fandom: BtVS, A:tS
Pairing: Buffy/Angel
Spoilers: Both series.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Warning: Um, cursing and schmoop to follow.

I feel more than a little stupid writing this manifesto because Ducks, who is quite the badass when it comes to B/A, has already written one that is brilliant and wonderful. So if you want understand the 'ship and get one of the most seasoned writer's opinions on it, go read hers. Really. I won't be offended. This is just me getting some things off my chest, and then I promise to stop abusing free month.

b/a, or: why am i suddenly twelve years old again?

Around Christmas time last year, I got my dad the first season of BtVS because we're nerds like that, and I found myself unwillingly - at first - rewatching the episodes. This was my first fandom, after all. Maybe I needed a refresher course, but who's admitting it? And then we got to that part in "Welcome to the Hellmouth," where this mysterious shadowy guy shows up and gets knocked on his ass and says he's a friend. Buffy says something about not wanting a friend, he says, "I didn't say I was yours," and I was like, "Boy, the only one you're fooling at this point is Buffy," because hindsight is twenty-twenty, right? I've seen the "Becoming" episodes and all of everything, and I know that he was hers as soon as he saw her for the first time, saw her being Called and killing her first vampire and crying while her parents fought. And I know that in season three of his own show, after he spends three months away in mourning for her, he says, "No one ever mattered, not like she did."

That's sweet, but why do I love them? I'm trying to think of how I got into this whole thing in the first place. I was bookshopping back when I really was twelve, and I saw this book called The Angel Chronicles on the shelf. I paid for it, flipped through the pictures, read the book, and by the time I put it down I was head over heels. For Angel, for Buffy, for their romance, the whole shebang. And I haven't looked back since. Not that B/A was all I ever read in this fandom! Far from it. I'll read Angel with just about anything that moves, and I love Buffy/Faith and a lot of other wonderful pairings with brilliant fic for them, but still. They were first, and they were special. I still love them. "I try not to, but I can't stop."

And it's not like they touched each other and no one else, either. Because Buffy tried to move on after Angel left for his own show for LA with this nice guy named Riley, who was sweet and handsome and everything Angel wanted her to find that he couldn't give her, except how he worked for a secret branch of the government that experimented on and killed demons, and how in the end he couldn't handle the fact that Buffy wears the pants in whatever relationship she's in. He couldn't handle her strength, and the fact that she didn't seem to be wholeheartedly invested in their relationship. So he leaves. (Listen at me, all mature. You'd never know I used to belong to a group called DIERILEYDIE, would you?)

And then she dies, but Willow can't leave her resting and brings her back, only she wasn't in hell, because in what universe would Buffy Summers be sent to hell? She was in heaven, and she was at peace for probably the first time in years, so she comes back fucked up. In more ways than one, too, because it turns out Spike, who had been chipped and was therefore not able to hurt humans, could beat up on her, and did. Actually, they both beat the hell out of each other and had a lot of sex, which ended when he tried to rape her and she beat the hell out of him one last time. (Really, dude. You tried to rape the vampire Slayer? Do you even have a brain?) He goes off and gets a soul, although I maintain that he wanted the chip removed and the soul-wanting was retconned, but those are my own issues, and comes back in time to help her out, and he probably did love her. I don't blame him. But he gets that she doesn't love him back - says so, even, when he's about to die and she's trying to make it hurt less by giving him what he wanted, and maybe she does love him in that moment, but not how he wants her to.

(I forgot about the Immortal while I was doing this the first time. Does he still count if Joss is in the process of retconning him through comic books?)

Angel's not exactly a priest, either, although Cordelia maintains it's a no-sex/eunuch curse. She never really lets herself understand that it wasn't the sex that set Angelus free in Sunnydale, it was feeling safe and trusted and loved for the first time in centuries, and Buffy's the only one he has to worry about that with. He and Cordelia are this crime-fighting team in LA (they run through sidekicks pretty quickly, though: my man Doyle died in the eighth episode, and then Wes and Gunn show up, which helps a little with the pain, but not much) and they're best friends. Really. They were my favorite platonic relationship on television, and then season three happened, and the hardcore flirting starts. Which I accept, because the love of his demonic unlife just died and he's reeling, and Cordelia is his best friend. They spend most of that season building up to what I assume will be a dramatic confession of love, but then Angel gets thrown into a box by his son - it's a long story - and Cordelia gets ascended.

(Cordelia never really comes back from this, and something evil possesses her body for all of season four, until she gives birth to an apocalypse and lapses into a coma.)

In the midst of all this, Wolfram & Hart resurrect Angel's sire, Darla - whom he staked way back in the first season of BtVS to save, you guessed it, Buffy - to make him crazy, which works for a while. He figures out she's human and tries to save her soul, even though she's been trying to get turned again, and when he's given everything to save her but been thwarted by the Powers, and she realizes how much he cares and accepts her mortal lifespan, she gets turned by Drusilla. Thence insanity. Angel's spiral lasts until he and Darla have some crazy hot sex in "Reprise" and he realizes - I can't say this without it sounding hokey, but you better believe when it aired I was sniffling along with the best of them - that the smallest act of kindness is the greatest thing in the world.

When I'm going over Angel's romantic entanglements, I always forget Nina, but I made myself a note this time so I wouldn't. She's this adorable werewolf who shows up in season five of AtS for sex and cuddles. I kind of adore her.

Why, you may be asking, did I just spend what will probably be the majority of this essay talking about their other relationships? Fair question.

Because it's not every guy you send to a hell dimension who forgives you the second you run a sword through his stomach. Because it's not every girl whose friends you kill and whose heart you break who forgives you the second you come back to yourself. Because it's not every show that starts with a shadowy mysterious guy getting knocked on his ass and falling in love and ends with that not so mysterious but still pretty damn shadowy guy watching his girl kick all kinds of ass and then making out with her. (I hold a special place in my heart for those "End of Days"/"Chosen" kisses, and I'm not sorry.) It's not every girl who says your name the same way all seven years you know her, like you're the best thing she's seen since she got dragged out of heaven by well-intentioned friends. It's not every guy who says you're the only thing he's ever truly loved and means it.

That's it, I guess. Except for how AtS doesn't end like BtVS does - Angel doesn't get good things, remember? He's traded away his chance to be human in order to bring down these big bads called the Black Thorn, and most of his friends are dead. In the end, it's him, Spike, a bleeding Gunn, and a god-king who stole Fred's body, standing in an alley in the pouring rain, facing down a slavering horde of demons from the Senior Partners. I tend to think they didn't survive, even though it breaks my heart. A visual from kita0610: Spike and Angel go out back-to-back, grinning, with their boots covered in dragon. Which, nice as it is, makes me want to cry, so sometimes I indulge myself and say, no way Faith lets Angel have an apocalypse without joining the party. Then, no way Buffy lets Faith and Angel have all the fun. Then, no way she gets out of LA without major smoochies, Immortal or no.

That's it.

caps, or: wow, that boreanaz fellow is rather attractive, no? You may think you've gotten away from the babble, but it's only just begun. (All caps from Screencap Paradise, my favorite place on the net.)

There's this first season AtS episode called "I Will Remember You," also known as the episode that broke a thousand shippers in two, where Angel is turned into a human through the regenerative powers of a Mohra demon's blood. He and Buffy spend a couple hours burning through their previously unresolvable sexual tension, but then he finds out that if he remains human, she'll die before she's supposed to. He gives it up. Of course he gives it up. And he's the only one to carry the memories of that day, which may either break him or keep him fighting, depending on how he feels.



And there's this fifth season BtVS episode called "Forever," where Buffy has to bury her mother. God, that hurts. Angel shows up after dark, and they're still them, he's still the one she opens up to. And of course he shows up, even though this is right around the time of "Reprise"/"Epiphany," when he's trying to (a) kill himself and (b) win his friends back, because she's his girl. Always. (Oh god, I'm so not mature. That still makes me want to cry.)



recs, or: oh god, do i do anything but read fanfiction?

Anything by carlyinrome, but especially Gods and Monsters, where Buffy is turned into a god and Angel is made human and nothing is simple, and Return to Me, which is the first fic I read in my B/A revival thing I've got going on now. Most things by maquisleader are tasty, but my favorite is Ever After? which is post-loosing of Angelus upon LA and various other bad things. It's my favorite fic right now. Oh, and The Grass Isn't Always Greener in the Sunlight by ralkana, where Spike gets Angel's shanshu and everything hurts, but it gets better.

You know how I mentioned "Not Fade Away" breaks my heart? This, All Souls' Day by Spiralled, makes it hurt less. Buffy, trying to get through the agony of not knowing what happened to either of her vampires, does a little magic and gets a broad-shouldered surprise. There's also this huge, wonderful, post-"NFA" series called Project Paranormal about the adventures of Angel, Buffy, and Giles in England. It's heavily B/A, and there are some brilliant writers attached. There are three seasons currently up.

And, and! Domestication by peaches indie is an AU where humans are the hunted ones, all of them living in a protected city, and vampires are occasionally to be kept but never trusted. Buffy's still the Slayer, and Angel still loves her at first sight, but they've got issues to work through, like a Council that burns Slayers at the stake and a power-mad scientist. Ridiculously hot. Don't know why.

To sum up - I find I can't actually sum up. I know there are people who don't like the 'ship, who think Angel used Buffy as a crutch and Buffy was just infatuated, or who don't like either of the characters, but whatever. I just love them.