So What Happens Now?
As soon as Spike had mentioned his own fatigue, I took a quick look around and realized that we were all looking more than a little weary. More than unerstandably, none of us was at our best, physically or mentally, and some rest would almost certainly be the right thing to do
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I watched in silence as Cordy and Spike made their way upstairs, only slightly surprised at how much a 'their' was...there. Once upon a time the diary full of differences between them would have carried my thoughts on for hours, but now it was simply another foriegn thing in increasingly foriegn world.
The more I was in it, the less I knew.
"It is a good idea," I finally answered Wesley, taking in a deep breath as an accepting look passed over my features. "In theory."
I was developing a deep dislike for the sound of my own voice, or better yet what it was saying. Five words here, two more there...my self-admitted long lost rambles might have been hard for even me to follow, but at least the were filling. And alive. What's worse is that everything I might, or would have said was still in my head.
That using the word 'good' on any day in our line of work was always had an air of bravery to it, but now it seemed utterly out of place. And that even though I was sure that all of us would try and sleep, not a one would find the peaceful, cleansing hours that we needed. That no matter how we tried, it just simply would be...good.
All of it, still there inside. I just couldn't seem to get it out. Forever ago, when I used to sit and watch Angel lost in himself, I used to think that he was slowly sorting through things, at his own pace. Or simply allowing himself to get lost in the nothingness for a while. But was the quiet not quiet at all? Was it like me...like now? Racing and pounding and beating out at me from the very center, hurtful and unvoiced? Questions and answers...all of it.
I opened my mouth, and nothing came out.
I though back to Charles, and the sheet. Me, and the ax. Illyria, and my echo. I still was...echoing each and every word that she said to me. So who was the beginning now?
Finally...finally some words broke free. Not even what I felt so much as what I wanted to feel. Because it is what she would feel. Maybe it I kept saying 'those' things enough, they would come true.
"We keep trying though, right?"
Looking towards the stairs, I began to climb, silently letting Wesley know to follow. At least...thankfully...sometimes I didn't need the words to get out. I hope. Reaching my room, I pushed my way inside...
And left the door open behind me...
It was far from my best...
But it was there.
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Nodding, I began to more fully recognize the kind of fatigue that was written on Fred's face. Like the dull ache that had set up shop inside my head, and the chain-dragging heaviness that was pulling down at my shoulders and back, it was a tired beyond mere physical exhaustion. It was the fatigue that came from every last bit of a person's being having been tasked past the point of reason.
And the worst part of that kind of tired was that there was no escaping it, and almost no way to rest until at least some of the causes were addressed. We had all been there before, but perhaps never quite so badly. I'd known this feeling during my exile from Angel Investigations. We'd all reached this exhaustion after Jasmine and all that had come before. But this, I think, was the worst ever.
"We keep trying though, right?"
I looked at Fred, wondering which of the many, many ways in which that question could be taken that she intended for it to be. Whatever she'd meant, though, there was, I knew, a correct answer.
"We do indeed."
Following Fred up the stairs and down the hall toward her own room, we stayed in complete, exhausted silence. Once we'd reached her door, she pushed it open and stepped inside without a word, leaving the door open. I could only assume the invitation and followed her into her room, closing the door behind me.
Fred had dropped herself into the first available chair, collapsed almost bonelessly into it. I was not quite as fortunate, as my own joints seemed to creak as I set myself down into the chair beside. Silence reigned for a few long minutes, though it didn't strike me as awkward, just... tired. Finally, I felt a slight heaviness in my jacket that I'd been pointedly ignoring all day. An old habit, from my days away from the Hyperion, then taken back up after Illyria.
Reaching into my jacket, I extracted the sterling silver flask, engraved with a simple 'WWP', and held it up in offer to Fred.
"I don't know about you, but after all this? I need a drink."
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Settled into my chair, I rested there for several moments, right where I landed...before pulling my legs up beneath me in a mindless motion. Whatever functioning thoughts I had were focused on Wesley's words. I wondered if, and how much he really meant them. Was he really that sure right now? Maybe...perhaps Wesley was saying what he felt I wanted to hear? Or could the idea of make believe appeal to him as well?
I...I think that he truely meant them. I think that after everything he had been through, both in the before and after sense, he really did. This was who Wesley was, and what he believed in. And even while he shared that knowledge with me, ready and willing I think to help me relearn my way, it was just as much a place that was all his own too.
We keep trying.
Wesley believed that.
The idea of such a thing was..less cold. Warmer even, than I had known all day. All of this lifetime.
"I don't know about you, but after all this? I need a drink."
Through the dim light provided by the small lamp just behind me, I met Wesley's eyes and asked for silent permission. When it was granted I reached out and took the flask, noting how warm the metal felt where Wesley had worn it close. I turned it slowly in the shadows, studying it intently...but not really sure what answers I was looking for.
"Did it come back with you?" The question came out suddenly, a surprise to even myself. Thoughtfully, I steadied myself and continued on. "Aged...in a different sort of way?" Were the contents now watered down, diluted from timely traveling? Or more potent, for all of the same reasoning?
As I retured the flask to Wesley, it struck me that the inner ramblings of my mind moments before could just as easily been about...us.
Us.
That was a word...wasn't it?
Shrugging back to reality, I looked up to Wesley again and accepted his invitation.
"I don't have any glasses in here," I apologized softly.
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At Wolfram & Hart, though, I'd very obviously faltered in that ability. I'd wondered before just how I'd managed to read so very poorly Fred's intentions? The answer, of course, was that by then, I'd no longer been reading Fred's emotions, and was rather projecting what I expected of them. As ever, I was sure I would be quite the field day for a psychologist's examinations.
Now, though, I felt like a little of the old insight was still available. Little by precious little, Fred seemed as though she were becoming just a bit brightened, maybe even heartened at my insistence that no matter what, we continued to do as we had always done, that we 'kept trying', as I'd said.
It heartened me in turn to know that the words had helped her, especially in the light of knowing that they'd been sincere on my part, and had been no empty platitude.
Though the shaded lamp set behind her chair haloed Fred with scattered light, I still saw enough of that expression to also see the question in her eyes when I'd set the flask down on the table. I nodded, not entirely certain what was being asked, but unwilling to say 'no' to anything.
"Did it come back with you? Aged...in a different sort of way?"
Shaking my head, I took the proffered flask back.
"Honestly, I haven't given it a single thought until just now. It, ah, it was never very far away before... and so I suppose I mustn't be surprised to have it turn up on this side of things."
Fred was still, I thought, not entirely at the table, her own mind still quite far away in whatever ether fed her thoughts. Still, she gave what was nearly a wan smile back to me.
"I don't have any glasses in here."
I unscrewed the small top of the flask, swirling the flat silver container a bit, verifying that it was, indeed, full. Taking a short sip, I tasted the familiar burning, smoky smoothness of my favorite Lagavulin, its potency not faded a whit. Raising the flask, I held it out to Fred.
"I trust you," I said. Simply. And anything but simple.
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"So it either goes the way of a bad penny, or an old friend, turning up and all," I nodded towards the flask, watching the the practiced way Wesley handled it. "I guess it is up to us to work through exactly which one that may be."
It was rather a good string of words, and I settled even deeper into the chair as a form of personal reward. But I couldn't seem to rest there, and I sat back up, leaning towards the small table.
"Bad pennies turning up?" My eyes were on the flask again, if only because it required the type of courage I seemed to have access to at the moment."I have always wondered what that could possibly mean. Bad things, they doesn't tend to rise, more...settle," one hand came to press low on my chest, right where the ache still sat. Even though -- lessened? "Bad pennies, no sense," I echoed to myself once more, still surprised at my own voice. When had I started talking?
"I trust you."
"Mummy free," the words were out of my mouth before I even could think to stop them. There it was, the echo again. Face frozen, I finally looked up to Wesley as I fought the desire to reach out into the air and somehow pull it all back. "I mean," I tried to explain, my voice dropping ,"I'm safe. I don't think I am...catching."
How could I possibley have just said that. Thinking or not, I knew it was wrong. It was one of the few things I was assured of on this day that seemed to never want to let go.
I closed my eyes just for a moment, then reached out to take the flask in my own hand. Tilting the still-warm surface to my lips, I managed to choke only a little as I took a solid shot of the strong liquer. I was unable to stop the tears that caught themselves in the corners of my eyes...but it was alright. It was familiar, and a feeling. I welcomed them really.
Now if I could only decide what to say next. Silently the flask passed between us one again.
I trust you too.
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I smiled ruefully at the thought Fred had posited. We'd both been in more than our share of situations where we'd had to deal with one or the other of the possible outcomes.
"Speaking as someone who's been considered both? I have no doubt we can adapt to whichever it proves itself to be."
"Bad pennies turning up? I have always wondered what that could possibly mean. Bad things, they doesn't tend to rise, more... settle. Bad pennies, no sense."
My mouth was moving before the thoughts that spilled out of it had a moment to register with my conscious intentions.
"The phrase is English in origin, actually... and it used to be 'bad shilling'. I think it referred to counterfeit currency, if I'm not mistaken."
I hadn't meant to lapse into my usual post of resident know-it-all, but I supposed that old habits died hard, and at the moment, I was welcoming anything that was familiar and friendly. And right now, I would have been very glad to be that old Wesley once more, even if just for a little while. I shook out of that reverie when I noticed Fred pressing a hand to her sternum.
"Not feeling well?"
"Mummy free. I mean, I'm safe. I don't think I am... catching."
The words triggered an unpleasant jolt of memory, but as it seemed they'd done the same for Fred, I didn't comment. Better to let it go, I thought, and chalk it up to the worn-raw nerves we both surely had. Fred took the flask, and tilted it back. I was surprised at how relatively easy it had gone down for her, but as we'd tacitly agreed, we both could use the belt.
Fred handed the flask back, and I couldn't help but brush my fingers against hers as I took it. A casual touch in any other circumstance, but after two deaths, two resurrections and Illyria, there was nothing typical about these circumstances. I tapped the flask softly against the tabletop, wondering what I could possibly say next.
"So," I ventured somewhat lamely before taking another pull from the flask, "where the hell are you and I now?"
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I nodded, taking his words and curling them up inside me, somwhere just above that part of my chest that ached. Every thing was different, and just inside that simply-structured thought were a whole lot of heavy spaces. I was different, Illyria was hurtfully so...even the hotel couldn't feel the same. No matter how much we might wish otherwise.
But somehow I couldn't direct that sentiment towards Wesley. Just across from me, there seemed a sense of acceptance settled about his shoulders...or at least the understanding that we would have to ready ourselves for whatever was next. Because, well, 'that is what we do'. Once upon a time, a part of me had felt betrayed by the changes I witnessed in Wesley...I was sure that he was leaving us behind. But sitting here now? I could finally see that the change was who he was.
A bit of Darwin shadowed the eyes I couldn't look away from, a reminder that to survive, we must adapt. It stirred a part of myself I had put away ever so long ago...Pylea ago. I needed to remember what is was like to survive again. After all, surviving meant alive -- at least mostly. So when had something so strong started to sound to defeated in my mind?
"I never thought you were a penny," I said finally, making a soft attempt at humor. "Not even once."
"The phrase is English in origin, actually... and it used to be 'bad shilling'. I think it referred to counterfeit currency, if I'm not mistaken."
The word counterfeit quieted me again, if only for a while. To call Illyria a copy was an injustice to us both, as much as right and wrong entered into these things. There had been nothing artificial about are argument...if anything it had been too real.
For everyone involved, I think. And...
"So, where the hell are you and I now?"
I was startled right out what might have been a promising ramble. Something of old even. I actually tried to stay in that moment for a bit.
"Well," I offered. "You are sitting right there, and I am..." I broke off, embarrassed. Whatever the Fred of old might have found to say, hadn't I already concluded that I was as far from her as could be? Wesley had asked the hard question, forming the words that seemed to be circling for the longest time. All of this time, really.
He deserved an answer that was just as direct.
"I'm different," I tried again. "This is different," my hand reached out to travel the space between us before coming to rest on the flask. Fingers laced over Wesley's, forcing his steady tapping to come to a stop. The sound of it had felt entirely tooeven for the moment.
"This is different," I repeated. "But it's still this."
A warmth sparked where the flask had somehow managed to remain cool, perhaps drawing heat from my body where it cast itself across the table as I leaned in for a kiss. Words seemed to be fail me more often than not now.
But maybe I didn't need them.
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"Good to know," I responded. A weak offering, but about all of the mirth I had the ability to summon at the moment.
The entire room still seemed to exist under some somber, weary weight. We were still illuminated only by a small light, leaving us surrounded by darkness, and everything was quiet, except for the brief and intermittent attempts on our parts to speak. The slow, steady tap of the flask against the table, the almost imperceptible movement of my wrist I barely noticed.
I'd asked the question that seemed to hang heaviest and most unspoken between Fred and I. A bold gambit for me, in this situation, involving this person-- I was the one who tended to be the reticent. Fred seemed startled, and took a moment to leave whatever thoughts she'd been gathering and address the question.
"Well... You are sitting right there, and I am..."
It began as a typically Fred, strictly literal interpretation of the query, but I watched the wheels turn behind those impossibly wide brown eyes as the gears shifted.
"I'm different. This is different."
Nodding, I found myself reflexively holding my breath as Fred's hand found mine and stilled it, forcing us again into silence punctuated only by breath and word, and at that moment, only Fred had either.
"This is different. But it's still this."
Fred leaned forward across the tiny table. There was no thought involved in my closing the gap, my lips meeting hers in a kiss that brought on a torrent of memories so strong it nearly made me break the connection. After a moment or two in which neither of us seemed likely to pull away in anything approaching regret, I did ease away from Fred, rising from my chair and stepping around to her. Guiding Fred to her feet, my arms had snaked around her faster than I could ask them to, and I resumed the kiss, more fervently this time, pressing my mouth to hers.
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Once Wesley leaned in to meet my kiss, granting a certain permission I didn't even know I was waiting for, I finally felt a little of something inside me let go. All day -all of this life- had been about taking in. Holding in...the words and the thoughts and the hurt my heart couldn't let go of.
Until now. He tasted like the whiskey we had shared, only different. Not like that different that was surely me...the one that was so frightening. Sharp and bittersweet on my tongue, this was a different I wanted to explore. Reaching up with the hand that had once held his, I felt the table shift, and the sound of the flask tilting down onto its side seemed very, very far away.
And I was willing...desperate even...to leave it unnoticed and abandoned until Wesley pulled away. Almost immediately the cold began to settle back in, starting right in the middle of my chest, like before.
"Wesley?"
It was all I could manage to say. It was all I really had the courage to say. And then it was all I had to say because then he was there, just in front of me and guiding me upwards. The direction alone was a pleasant enough sensation, but once Wesley's arms wrapped around me my mind was whirling again. Demanding to know why I would ever have been satisfied with something so simple as direction.
"Wesley," I whispered once more, just before our lips met again. His name. I hadn't ever really been able to understand why everyone always shortened it before, cutting away that half of who he was. Surely as I was Fred, he was Wesley. But now, with everything that was, and wasn't, I could begin to understand the process. Corners and hearts get sharper and harder, and people get tired. Sometimes even a syllable is too much, I suppose. And yet it seemed to me one of the few parts of who I was, that I was willing to cling to. Even as I clung to him.
I might have murmered his name just one more time, trying the new-old sound of it and sharing it between us as I continued to taste the whiskeyed corners of his mouth. Lips trailed downward, tracing over his scar in an overly aged and silent apology...I sadly lacked in courage when I needed it most it seemed. In some ways it tasted just like the whiskey.
My fingers traveled upwards...just like I had moments before...gently undoing the first button of his shirt so that my mouth could continue to Wesley's colarbone.
The warmth there was....
...and the weakness came back. And for a moment all I could do was bury my face there, skin to skin.
I kept waiting for the next thing to happen. For whatever was bound to come next, or just as surely to be taken. We only lost them when we loved them most, and while visions of Charles and Angel and Cordy played through me I couldn't help but feel the part where Wesley and I belonged there to.
But as I held him tighter a different thought came. Even with that ache we were still here. And this time it wasn't just Wesley holding me, supporting me even when I still wanted to pretend I could stand. No, this time we were holding each other...with something that felt, and tasted like equality.
It was more than enough to tilt my face upwards again, towards Wesley's mouth.
I...
I wanted more.
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