They say that when a person dies, a troubled soul will never find peace... destined to roam the earth until someone can release them.

Perhaps that it the reason why I see Buffy’s ghost almost every night in my dreams. Perhaps that is why I sense her shadow upon me each time I visit Sunnydale.

Now, hours away from the simple service, I clutch her un-opened letter in my hands. I can still remember the day Xander handed it to me after her funeral. It had been her last request. He made me pinkie swear never to tear it up, or throw it away.

I kept it, hidden from view in the picture frame that held the drawing of Angel’s handsome face. It the was only thing that I had kept.....the only physical reminder of him, for he haunts my heart and soul every day and night.

 I’m scared to read it....I fear she might ask me for something I cannot do...or condemn me for an absence she caused. But he has found me and that makes my world an abyss of loneliness once again.

My name is fading on the letter....once write paper has now grown yellow and dusty. I can’t help but touch his face once more.... a face I will never forget...can never forget.... After so much time, it still bring me to tears.....because after so much time I still love him..... as much as the first night I gave him my mind, body and soul.

These two items are the only things that have remained by my side for the past 215 years....a time so long ago. I dry my tears as I open the letter and place the frame I had clutched to my chest on the table in front of me.

For the first time in years, I pray...

Willow,

My last few days have been filled with memories of you, for it will be you that I ask the impossible from.

I regret many things in life, but the one thing I regret most of all is what eats at my soul every night...what does not let me sleep...what does not let me live.

I ask for your forgiveness, Willow, I beg for it. I am the cause of such misery...I am the cause of such hate...I am the cause of such loneliness.

I took Angel from you, not because of a greater love......but of deceit and lies. I did the unthinkable, I did the horrendous, because I would not live with the fact that he could love some else and not me, that he could marry someone and not me...that he could want another and not me.

The night you left, I will not lie, I declared triumph, because I had won him, I had kept him...but what I never knew what that I could never have his heart.

I tried my best to ignore it...the distance between us...the way he looked at the mention of your name.....the way he closed his eyes each time he touched me, or kissed me, or the way he would look away each time we spoke.

I followed him each night to see him visit your memories, visit his hopes, visit your love.

Dear God, what I did was out of pure desperation...out of jealous...out of selfishness...and upon my knees I plead for your forgiveness......I lied to Angel... one lie that caused him to choose me....I played on his guilt..I played on our past...I wagged on his duty..

The night he you left......
    ......the night he choose.......
        ..........was the night I told him I was dying.

And I groveled, and I begged and I cried, and I placed the burden of my death onto his soul. A death that I had made up, an illness I had placed blame on him when I saved him from dear death himself.

I have no excuse for such deceit, I was just trying to keep the man I loved from leaving me.....A man who did not love me.....for you see Willow, he had made his choose that night....he had chosen you and not me.

I had lived a year in your shadow and I could take no more...I left him... and as my heart tore... I accepted the fact that what we once shared was nothing in comparison to what you two have. And so I left to try to find that in someone else...and by pure luck I did....but as I see Angel stand before me and see such pain I have caused....I know he has not found you...and how so much he needs you......

Willow, as I confess to you, I will also tell you that the small clues in what once was your apartment were left my me.....Angel never married me..... he never gave me child... he never was happy with me...... because he loved you...solely you.

He has searched for you since the day you left...... he left me a year later.... now thirty years I see him again and I plead for his forgiveness as I am asking for yours....

I am sorry....I am sorry that I lied...that my deceit caused so much pain...I am sorry that I see such hurt and betrayal in his eyes...I am sorry that I caused your ache...I am sorry......

He has only loved you...... he has never stopped..... he will never stop.....

Forgive me......please.....forgive this horrid soul......forgive.....me....

                                                                                                            Buffy
 

My face burns with tears.....
        ...........my heart aches.........
            ...........and my soul finds its peace.