gah, meant to finish this tonight. Stupid distracting stuff on my desk. Oh, well
The sounds of subdued conversation, car doors, and retreating engines drifted past Angel's attention and faded into silence. He stared at the phone in his hand, at the little screen and buttons so tiny he could never hit just the one he wanted with his big fingers. Harmony was sworn to secrecy that she programmed the speed dials for him and that he rarely even attempted to dial anything by himself. How many times had Cordelia tried to unravel the mystery for him? He'd been looking forward to taking her to the Starbucks in the Wolfram & Hart lobby, where he'd demonstrate that he finally knew the difference between a latte and a cappuccino, and somewhere in all that he'd casually flip out his fancy little phone and call up somebody. But that was before he found out that her return was a mystical "wise up!" and not the first truly good news he'd had in many long months.
She'd given him hope. That should have been his first clue of the horrors to come. He'd watched her cuddling baby Connor, cooing and singing to the infant in her arms, and he'd dared to hope that maybe this was what they'd meant by Shanshu: himself made human in the form of a baby boy. A son, plus a woman to share the joy of raising him. A family.
If Connor had been the main reason for accepting the W&H job, then Cordelia had been a very close second. The best of care, medical and mystical. He had always expected her to wake up, that she'd open those gorgeous eyes, smile that million-dollar smile, and tell him his expensive suit was just all wrong for him. He had dreamed of that day. He was really sick of the Powers tormenting him with the taste of joy that would never be his.
He slowly realized there was a heartbeat not too far away. Of course, the mortuary staff had seen the cars leave and wanted to finish their work.
"I'm sorry," he said, not looking up. "I just wanted to pay my respects in private. I'll get out of your way now."
"You're not in my way, deadboy. I got used to maneuvering around you a long time ago."
Angel frowned as the figure in the shadows walked closer. The voice was familiar, too familiar, but the man might have been a stranger. He moved too easily, with a lazy stride that was used to crossing wide open spaces. And the eyes --or, rather, eye . . . Angel's gaze was met with a level stare that still held all the unthinking courage but none of the lurking self-doubt that had defined Xander Harris.
"How did you know?" Angel finally asked.
Xander looked at the casket in its niche. "She came and said good-bye. I thought it was just another vision quest or waking dream thingie, until she kissed me." He saw Angel looking at the shadows. "No, just me. Don't know why I was the only one to get a Cordy-gram, but if she didn't want to tell the others, I don't see why I should second guess her."
Angel watched cautiously as Xander walked to the niche. He was bigger than Angel remembered, taller, broader. He was dressing differently, too. Khaki pants and shirt with many pockets, frayed on the edges and weatherbeaten. The heavy boots were scuffed and gouged, with what looked like tooth marks on the top of the left one. Around his neck was a length of rough twine, with several multi-colored fetish beads, the fang of something, and two lion claws.
"What did she say?" Angel asked when the silence got too long.
Xander glanced over his right shoulder. He smiled sardonically. "Not to take it out on you. That it didn't hurt." He turned away. "And a bunch of stuff that's none of your business."
Angel debated feeling jealous, but he didn't have the energy. He slowly went to stand beside Xander, making sure to stay on his right side. "You're being very civil to me. The 'deadboy' notwithstanding. I appreciate it. Especially with the whole 'You're in charge of Wolfram & Hart, we don't trust you, blah blah' I got from Andrew when he was here."
"Andrew was here?" Xander frowned, then nodded. "Oh, yeah, that girl in the mental hospital who woke up a Slayer. Poor kid. As for being civil, I'm working off the premise that all of this is a jetlag hallucination. Twenty-four hours ago I was in the Olduvai Gorge. Twelve hours ago I was in Johannesburg. Twenty-four hours from now I should be back at Olduvai, wondering if I imagined all this. It'd be nice if I could tell myself that, that this was just some dream."
"I know," Angel agreed.
Xander stared at the casket. "All the women I love die on me," he whispered. "I think there's a hint I'm supposed to be taking."
"I know that one, too."
Still Kay, talking things with Cordy.
I know Munchkin used to say the country was looking the same and losing its soul and stuff, so it could be a coincidence, but the building in this ad could be the spitting image of the Waterfront.
“What’d he say?!” Cordy said.
“I think it was more what he didn’t say, huh?”
“What does that mean?”
“Hello, roomie.”
“Why is it that everybody who’s about to die comes to my house? No offense.”
“Maybe you’re just lucky, hon.”
“Yeah, I’m sure that’s it. If we had to get a guest from Baltimore, why couldn’t it have been Barry Levinson. I’ve got things I could show him.”
“I’ll bet you do. Maybe I’m lucky too...”
“Well, I’m gonna go home for lunch today...pick up the place. “ I looked over at the disaster area that is Cordy’s desk.
“Don’t trust me, huh? I’m a decorated police detective...”
”With a perfect clearance rate...” Cordy finished, sounding bored. “And really tragic cuticles.”
I looked down at my hands. I don’t see anything. Cordelia acts like she can’t look. “Actually, I’m locking up the Bailey’s. I heard about that little strip show you put on at Lorne’s.” She looks satisfied, like that’s the best thing she’s heard all year. Definite ex-cheerleader. Those girls never could resist picking on me.
“It was *not* a strip show. A little sexy, maybe.” Why do I let this bug me? Before I can stop it, I’m thinking about that night again...especially that crazy kiss. Damn.
“That’s not what I heard.”
“Well, if you’re gonna believe a bunch of demons...”
“At least demons aren’t shaking me up for dimes every day.”
“Down,” I say, “Shaking you down. You couldn’t say that wrong with Levinson, huh? I hear he’s looking into police drama these days."
There. I missed my usual bus home, but it's worth it.
Angel was still trying to feel some sort of jealousy, maybe just so he'd have something recognizable to feel. All he had, though, was wistfulness. He couldn't even come up with the usual annoyance at having Xander around. Maybe he'd grown up. And why did Angel hear Cordy's voice in his head saying, "Yeah, one of you grew up. I wonder which one?"
"Did you want to see the others?" he asked.
"What?" Xander glanced towards the doorway, as if expecting to see people returning. "Wesley and them? No, no need. I've got nothing to say to them. Say Hi if you think they'll care."
"Harmony will be disappointed. She gets a kick out of seeing people she used to know."
Xander smiled. "Harmony. What is my world coming to when I think of unsouled vampires and I don't automatically look for a stake?"
"Well, it is Harmony."
"Yeah." He studied the floor for several moments. "No. I don't want to see them. I won't be coming back here, no reason to talk to them."
"Not coming back? At all?"
Xander raised his head and stared at the casket. "Nothing here I care about anymore. My hometown is a smoking hole. Cordy . . . It's all gone now."
"So what will you do now?"
Xander glanced at Angel curiously. "Back to Africa, like I said. We've kind of split up the world between us, and I'm driving around the Dark Continent looking for Slayers and trouble. Which is a whole lot less in the way of wacky roadtrip hijinks than I was expecting." He shook his head. "But that's the job. At least I'm getting paid."
Angel tried to ignore the suggestion that was poking him in the soul like a well-manicured finger. He got the feeling that if he did ignore it, the urging might take on the force of a Prada-shod kick.
He cleared his throat. "You, um, don't have to go just yet, if you don't want to. I can get you back where you need to be quicker than an airline could. If you, you know, wanted to spend some time in civilization."
Xander turned completely to face him. "Angel, why the hell do you want me to hang around? Me? Xander Harris, never a member of the Angel fan club, you know."
"I know. I just thought--we could talk."
Xander blinked several times. "About what?"
Angel glanced at the casket in its tomb. The suspicion faded from Xander's face to be replaced by a rueful smile.
"I don't think so," he said with something close to friendliness. "What good would it do?"
"It's something people do when they say good-bye to a friend." Angel grimaced. "You're the only one around here who remembers her as well as I do. When you leave, when I walk out of here, she'll really be gone."
Xander's face went blank. "No use holding on. She is gone. First her, then all our memories of her when everyone who remembers is gone."
Angel nodded slightly. "Then she'll last a long, long time."
The smile he got from Xander held a bit of the old mockery. "So vampires are like elephants?"
"Yes. We never forget."
The smile went away, leaving pain. "That's too bad. Letting the memories go is the only to make the hurt stop."
Angel knew that look. It told of a man who had endured too much, who had decided that the only way to cope was not to care anymore. A man like that had lived in the Hyperion in the early 50s, and it was nearly fifty years before he larned otherwise. Xander Harris probably didn't have fifty years to get better.
"Something she told me, before--before she finally left. She asked me why I ran Wolfram and Hart, why I kept doing what I do. I said it was to help people." He very carefully didn't look anywhere other than a plain slab of marble, not wanting to see either the man with the distrustful gaze or the metal box containing his hopes. "She had to remind me that I was people, too, and that I need help sometimes, too."
"So?" The voice was a lot closer to the sullen, resentful tones of that young man who was having a hard enough time dealing with his life without having vampires messing with it.
Angel hesitated, then shrugged. "If you're too stupid to get the point, then never mind. Go back to Africa, lose yourself in the wilderness, forget everything that ever hurt and everything that ever made you you. At least you probably won't be driven to eating rats to survive." He gave Xander a straight look. "But even with everything else, I never thought you were stupid."
Xander started to speak, then shook his head and walked towards the door. After a few steps, though, he stopped. "She told me not to take it out on you. I suppose that means I should at least listen to you when you start making speeches. At least yours are shorter than Buffy's."
The name sparked uncomfortable silence, but that evened out after a couple of moments.
"How is she?" Angel asked.
Xander shrugged. "Fine the last time I talked to her, which was a couple of months ago."
"You should call her."
"Yes, mom. But there aren't a lot of cellular towers in the bush."
"Thousands of them in L.A."
"I've got a plane to catch."
"The offer of a ride back still holds."
Xander shook his head. "You have a private plane."
"I've got three. I've even got a helicopter." He managed not to smirk at Xander's look of disgruntled amusement. "I also have business cards, with my email address and my phone numbers."
"Numbers, plural."
Angel shrugged. "Harmony answers them. I can work my own email, though, finally." More memories hit, of Cordelia throwing up her hands and declaring him incapable of working any technology past the Steam Age. He shook himself, pulled a business card out of his pocket and held it out. "Go on, take it. There's a garbage can right outside you can drop it in if you like."
After a moment, Xander ste
