If we had to get a guest from Baltimore, why couldn’t it have been Barry Levinson.

BWAH!

Thought you'd like that. And, hey, shoutout! Later, Kay's gonna finally meet Phantom Dennis. But he's her second ghost, of course.(Joss Bless whoever wrote that Agnes Saunders thing. I wouldn't have done this without them.)

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

After a moment, Xander stepped forward and took the card. He studied the printing. "So, you want me to pass these numbers on to anyone in particular?"

Angel grimaced. "They know how to reach me if they want."

"Yeah. Funny how those calls seem to get lost, huh?"

"Yeah."

Xander tapped the card on a thumbnail, then tucked it into the back pocket of his slacks. "Thanks for the offer of a ride, but I've already got my ticket. They're showing the whole Lord of the Rings trilogy on the flight, and I don't want to miss that." He nodded and headed for the door again. Just as he reached the doorway, he paused. "Thanks," he said, not quite looking over his shoulder. Then he was gone.

Angel listened to the footsteps going down the drive to the street, then getting lost in the sounds of the city. He nodded to himself, then pulled out his cell phone to call for a car to pick him up. Before he hit the buttons, he looked one more time at Cordelia's resting place and smiled.

"You're welcome."

Le Sigh

Yeah, that doesn't suck. It's always nice when the stories roll out without taking much work and you don't have to worry about forgetting bits. As opposed to V!Giles, who requires plotting and character debates and organizational charts and all that.

MUNCH

I watch as the shadows get long and purple around the Hyperion. Why hasn’t she left yet? Go, Kay, for Christ’s sake. I can’t fend the dragon lady off forever, especially since my wiles didn’t work. She’s with someone, a young pretty shrill-voiced someone...is every woman in this town gorgeous? I’m surprised nobody has asked me to leave...arrested me for felony non-sexy or something. I like Kay’s companion, too. She complains as much as I do. God, I miss that. The Princess is so used to being anticipated she has no need to kvetch, and Dru has an enviable ability to make reality fit the pretty dancing pictures in her head.And that sounded like her, didn’t it? Don’t think that’s not a frightening thought.

“So, you really think this guy left this threat because he...can’t perform?” the brunette asks Kay. Hey, standing right here. I almost feel like consoling my equipment, telling the boys that the lady...girl, really, with the perky breasts and the big mouth doesn’t know whereof she speaks.

“Not exactly.” Thank you, Kay. “It’s more...what-do-you-call it...symbolic. He’s powerless...some little weasel living in his mama’s basement. Has to fold up his plastic woman in the box with his Star Trek figurines.” I want to come out of the shadows, and explain myself, but I can’t.
“Yuck. Two words: Xander. Harris.”

“This Xander, has he ever been to Balmer?”

“Not that I know of. But I try to put my mistakes behind me.”

“One of those, huh?” And Kay smiles a crooked smile that tears at my heart. Love should never make *her* make that face. Just idiots like me. Just get in the car, babe, I think.They do, but I can’t leave. A smarter creature of the night/mercenary/ double agent would have, but I’m a schmuck.

A smarter creature of the night/mercenary/ double agent would have, but I’m a schmuck.

Damn it. That kinda sorta broke me, erika. Poor Munch, never a genuine badass, except when he's assing himself.

I know.(and that sounds conceited like I'm saying "Aren't I emotionally affecting?" but when I'm writing him or Kay...it's like it's not me. Really. I didn't see that coming. It's like taking his dictation. Creepy but true. Poor Munchkin...he's a Fool for Love, too.(substituting manifestos for Bloody Awful Poetry, of course.) Not gonna write it. Not.

KAY

We pull into Cordy’s place and immediately the lights turn on.”Funny wiring?” I ask.

“No, that’s Dennis. Dennis is a G-H-O-S-T.”

“Oh, hi, Dennis. “ I say, feeling a little stupid, but you gotta have manners, right? Mom always said they didn’t cost anything. “Look, I’m not sure what communication’s like where you are, but if you ever run into another gh—g-h-o-st named Agnes Saunders, let her know that puke Fenwick got life. I couldn’t have done it without her. I know she wanted him to walk the Mile, but this’ll be a better punishment, maybe. Let’s see how much cons want to hear about blue in the Old Testament, huh? Asshole.”

“Every day is a casefile for you, isn’t it?” Cordy asked.

“Aw, once and a while you bring one home...you’ll see. By the time you’re my age...”

“No,” Cordy says.

“I’m not as old as all that, you know.” I couldn’t help feeling a little offended.

“I’m just here till the acting takes off...of course I’ll never forget the little people but...”

“Uh huh. What if I told you it’s in your blood? That almost in spite of yourself, you’re a natural evil-fighter. That if you could get your old life, it’d never feel right? It happens...that’s what my Job and your Job does. We’re just a little bit ruined for normal life, huh?