Authors Notes: So no one dies in this one, but it isn’t really cheerful. Heavy spoilers for ‘To Shanshu in LA’ and ‘I Will Remember You.’ Wesley finds out about the forgotten day.

What if She Didn’t Not Remember?

By Cobalite Ice

Wesley stared at the ancient tomb before him. "The beast of Amalfi, a razor toothed six eyed harbinger of death. No, wait, that’s due to arise in 2003 in Resida."

Angel shrugged. "I would have guessed Tarzana."

Cordelia set the sandwich and a glass of milk on the table in front of Wesley.

Wesley is discouraged. "Better cross reference that." Cordelia goes back into the kitchen and gets a plastic cup filled with blood. "I’m sorry, I don’t know what they raised in that box. I’ll keep looking."

"You’ve been looking for two days. You need to relax and charge the brain cells. Cordelia hands him the plate with the sandwich. "Here. Eat." Wesley accepts it and looks over at Angel.

Cordelia hands Angel the cup with the blood. "You too." Angel looks up at her. "Don’t be embarrassed. We’re family." Angel accepts the cup. Cordelia notices Wesley staring at her. "What?’

"It’s just I... I’m not used to..."

Angel lifts the cup to his mouth. "He’s not used to the new you."

"I know what’s out there now. We have a lot of evil to fight a lot of people to help. I just hope skin and bones here and figure out what those lawyers raised some time before the prophecy kicks in and you croak. That was the old me, wasn’t it?"

Angel gives a small smile. "I like them both."

Wesley looking at his books. "Ah, oops. I may have made a tiny mistake." Angel sets the cup of blood down and gets up. "The word Shanshu that I said meant you were going to die? Actually I think it means that you are going to live.

Cordelia looks ready to scream. "Okay, as tiny mistakes go that’s not one!"

"Shanshu has roots in so many different languages. The most ancient source is the Proto-Bantu and they consider life and death the same thing, part of a cycle, only a thing that’s not alive never dies. It’s saying that you get to live until you die. It’s saying, it’s saying you become human." Wesley looks quite astonished.

Cordelia’s eyes almost pop out. "That’s the prophecy?"

"Ah, the vampire with a soul, once he fulfills his destiny, will Shanshu. Become human. It’s his reward."

"Wow. Angel a human." Cordelia cracks her first real smile since she’s awakened.

"That’ll be nice."

Cordelia turned back to Wesley. "Wait. What’s that thing about him having to fulfill his destiny first?"

"Well, it’s saying that it won’t happen tomorrow or the next day. He has to survive the coming darkness, the apocalyptic battles, a few plagues, and some, uh, several, not that many fiends that will be unleashed."

Angel looks unaffected. After all, he has an eternity to wait. "So don’t break out the champagne just yet."

Cordelia is ready to smack him. "Yeah, break out the champagne, Pinocchio. This is a big deal!"

Angel has to admit. "I guess it is."

"Typical. I hook up with the only person in history who ever came to LA to get older."

Wesley suddenly looks mildly concerned. "Angel, although I am in no great hurry to meet your worse half again, but shouldn’t you be ecstatically happy?"

"I’ve been human before, Wesley. It didn’t work out so well last time." Angel downs the contents of his glass while managing to keep his human mask.

"Yes, but that was close to two hundred and fifty years ago. Things have changed a great deal since them." Wesley is confused as Cordelia and Angel exchange a confused glance.

"You didn’t tell him?" Cordelia massages her temples.

"I thought you did. You talk incessantly, you know." Angel’s expression shows he’s just joking.

"Tell me what? I thought you told me there were no secrets here." Wesley looks miffed.

"If it helps any, no one has any recollection of it but me." Angel gets up, and starts to pace the kitchen. "No offense to you both, but I have to get away from both of you for a while."

"Uh, Angel? It’s kind of day out, you might want to take the sewers." Cordelia motions to the drawn curtains.

He nods, and heads down toward the cellar. Cordelia turns back to Wesley. "I’m sorry, I really thought he’d have told you."

"Told me what?" Wesley was at the end of his patience.

Cordelia sighed. She sat down next to him, leaned back, and closed her eyes. "The day before Thanksgiving, our late friend Doyle had a vision of Buffy being in danger. Angel of course panicked, and headed to Sunnydale without so much as a phone call. Everyone assumed the worst, that Angelus was back, but he convinced them he was only there to protect Buffy. He fought the Ancient Indian spirits trying to kill everyone, and came back."

"You still look confused Wesley, I’m getting there. He didn’t tell Buffy he had been there, and when Xander blabbed, she came calling. Things were going fine. They argued, agreed never to see each other again, and that’s where the time lines split. A Morah demon burst through the window, and neither of them knew how to kill it. It escaped, and he tracked it."

"Morah?" Wesley grabbed at the scroll, and studied a passage. "It is to be the final foe he must face, right after the Haurio Plague."

Cordelia nods. "Makes sense. Anyway, so they go down to the sewers to hunt the thing. Buffy makes a fool of herself, and they split up. Angel sends Buffy above ground, and he heads deeper into the sewers. He found the Morah, and killed it, almost. It bled on him. You were there last year when Buffy that aspect of the demon thing, weren’t you?"

"Yes. What aspect could Angel have received that made him change time?" Wesley was enthralled in her story, never pausing to wonder how she knew.

"Morah’s have amazing regenerative abilities. It brought him back to life." Cordelia got up, and opened the curtains. "He and Buffy spent one day of perfect happiness together, until Doyle got a vision telling him the demon wasn’t dead. Angel killed it, and went to see the Oracles."

‘So that’s how he knew of them.’ Wesley mussed.

"He made them change him back, making it so he was the only one who remembered. He sent Buffy home, never told her what might have been. Apparently, she went back to Sunnydale, and immediately got involved with a man named Riley Finn who turned out to be some kind of government demon hunter." Cordelia let the curtains fall, and turned back to Wesley. "The sad thing is, I figure it was part of the plan all along. Give Angel a taste of what’s to come, a bad taste of it, so he doesn’t get a major happy when he hears about it."

"That is remarkably cruel." Wesley paused, something suddenly occurring to him. "Cordelia, how do you know all that? It’s obvious Angel doesn’t talk about it very much."

Cordelia smiled at Wesley, a sad smile. "Angel’s not the only one that had a day of perfect happiness. The gift the Oracles gave me after my first vision was the memories of that day. I was Doyle’s reward, his incentive for good. Even after his death, the knowledge that we had one day together was mine. Angel’s wrong, he doesn’t have to bear the grief alone. I know what it’s like to love and lose."