(no subject)
Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap…
I’m missing something. There’s no way in hell this clause doesn’t have some sort of loophole that they’re going to use against us (the law being, after all, not a book of rules, but a spider web), and it’s way too late at night for me to still be working on this case, and the uncontrollable staccato beat I can’t seem to stop tapping with my pen is only going to drive me nuts that much quicker.
Sparing a glance over at Wesley’s already abandoned desk across the room makes me grin and wonder how a guy so damn precise about the rest of his life can stand working at a desk that looks like an ancient library exploded on top of it. Or, for that matter, why a guy like me whose grand plans seem to keep getting whittled down until they encompass a week into the future at most, would have a desk spotless enough to please Martha Stewart. Wes calls it ‘professional habit’, which I think is probably his really tactful way of saying that I’ve been a little bit brainwashed from my time at Wolfram & Hart.
Kind of like what’s happening to the rest of Team Angel these days. It’s an understandably touchy subject… I try not to bring it up too much.
Closing the file with a defeated sigh, I pack it in for the night.
It’s been more than a year since I received a better second chance than I ever could have hoped for. It wasn’t what I came looking for when I wandered back into town, drawn by the siren-call glance of some gorgeous lady who had appeared on the television set at the little motel where I’d been hiding out at the time. Jasmine. God, I found more purpose in that one little smile from her than I’d felt since I clawed my way up out of Nowhere-ville, Oklahoma all those years ago.
So I came back to L.A., just in time to feel it all fall apart. Then I had drifted. Cheap rooms, demon bars, and a glance over my shoulder about every half minute, despite the tattoos supposedly keeping the Partners off my case. I’d been called a rat before, but this time I was starting to feel the part.
And then, wonder of wonders, I ran into one Mr. Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, a novelty in the fact that here was a White Hat who didn’t seem interested in making me bleed, for kicks and the Greater Good. It doesn’t seem strange now, how well we got on during that first evening. We’ve both got much more in common than we’d like to admit.
I don’t remember exactly how long it was that we went on bumping into each other at ‘his’ pub like that before he trusted me enough to introduce me to his family, but I do remember being shocked as hell. A family! I’d always thought grey-area boys like us didn’t get to have families. But there they were, two adopted daughters as cute as anything who’d hid behind his pant legs the first time I came over.
It all fell into place pretty quick after that.
I got the Brewer-Pryce stamp of approval from Alicia and Marilee, and switching from defense to prosecuting in the courtroom wasn’t really that tricky. Just aim for the sticky parts of the spider web instead of the loopholes and you’re golden. I also got one big thumbs-down from Angel, in the form of a wicked bruise on Wesley’s face. Bastard.
What happened next… well, Wes would say that it was the alcohol that sped the falling-into-bed-together process along, but hell, I’d had a crush on the guy for weeks by then. Maybe ‘crush’ doesn’t do it justice. A ‘crush’ is the sound of a steel-toed boot coming down on an empty soda can, which is also a fairly accurate description of how a ‘crush’ feels. A crush was what I’d had on Angel, once upon a time.
But Wes… when we woke up the next morning and he kissed me on the lips instead of kicking my sorry ass out like I’d half expected? Him, I was falling for.
Two months later, I’d insinuated myself into that unexpected family easier than I would have thought possible. I’d finally gotten the thing that Holland promised me all those years ago that had me turning a blind eye to the evil I was doing; a place where I belonged.
I was happy, and Lorne was downright thrilled, babbling about my path not going down the way of darkness anymore before giving us both a big hug. You’ve got to love Lorne.
But the one thing that just broke my heart was Cordelia Chase, Wesley’s good friend and a distinctly unhappy ending in her own right. She’d been drifting in a coma since some higher powers decided to play puppet with her body. And Wesley’s conviction that she’d wake up… maybe next week, or next month, or next year… it hurt me to watch him like that.
I went to see her on my own, just once, when Wes had taken the girls out for the day.
“If you can hear me… Listen, I know we don’t know each other that well. Or at all, I guess. But I wish you’d wake up. Wes misses you. He worries about you, and that makes me worry about him.” Her hand had been surprisingly warm and soft when I picked it up. I’m not sure what I’d been expected. “I think it would be a nice change for him to have a conversation with you where he wasn’t the only one doing the talking. So please wake up?”
It’s been a month or so since then. Nothing. But it was worth a try.
My mind is finally letting go of that frustrating case by the time I tiptoe into the bedroom that me and Wesley share, trying not to wake him up. He stirs and murmurs groggily when I slip into the bed next to him, so I put my arms around him and kiss his shoulder, his skin already warm from the bed.
“Shh… go back to sleep.”
Call me an optimist. Tell me I’ve got rose-colored lens firmly over my eyes. But right now, I’m more content than I’ve been in ages, and I can’t help thinking that everything will turn out just the way that it’s supposed to. This is, after all, my second chance.