"Sorry," Oz says, sitting back down and retrieving his napkin. "Hey, food. Awesome."
As Oz approached the table, rubbing his hands dry and trying to warm them from the cold water he'd washed up with, Giles and Olivia stopped talking. They turned toward him, Olivia's hand on Giles's wrist, and Oz got a flash of a family dinner, mother and father smiling at him, celebrating something important, a graduation or a birthday or perfect attendance. The image was inaccurate, out of focus, because Olivia was looking at Giles, watching him, but Giles's eyes were on Oz. Not as father or librarian, not fond pride or the guarded gaze Giles used to turn on him, but Giles, expression loosening, eyes narrowing into joyful half-moons. It's the look he gives Oz when Oz glances up from a book or Giles reenters a room: Recognition, and welcome, and a tinge of lucky surprise.
Anyway, it's not like Oz ever went to many of those family dinners; the last one he remembers was at the Ponderosa Steakhouse & Buffet. He was eight, his father flirted with the cashier, and his mother wouldn't talk to anyone; Oz spent most of dinner sculpting turreted forts out of scoops of mashed potatoes and cottage cheese.
Olivia says, whether to Oz or Giles, Oz can't tell, "So the unpacking must be finished, I expect. Unless all those books breed like rabbits, which I've always half-suspected." Oz has two fingers on his mala and he tries to finish his silent grace - May you be filled with loving kindness. May you be well. May you be peaceful and at ease. May you be happy. - before glancing up. Giles holds his fork over the wing of his bird, watching Oz from the corner of his eye, waiting to start eating. Oz is grateful for that, for the familiarity with his rituals, and he smiles quickly at Giles.
"It's almost done," Oz tells her. "Took a digression to paint and I think some more shelves need to be built." He's not telling the whole truth; they stopped, often, to hold each other, and kiss, and there's been nothing done since Tuesday, lunchtime, nothing but holding Giles, warding off the plummeting terror inside his chest, making sure he eats and knows Oz is right here, just in case. "But we're almost there."
"Such a messy business, combining two sets of possessions," Olivia says and Oz puts down his fork. "I don't envy you two."
"I travel pretty light." Oz spears several shreds of green bean and tips his head toward Giles. Olivia talks to him as if he's not a kid, like he is simply - if it's simple - Giles's new lover. "So it's not too bad."
Not a family meal, at least not the usual kind, but as Oz works through the smoky, stringy venison and his vegetables, talking to Olivia about Giles's fear of strong color and his own childhood room that he painted the deep green of pool-table felt, edging closer to Giles and keeping an eye on him, he starts to think this does count as family. Secrets and protection, jokes and scraps of history.
This is the first time Giles has ever heard Oz lie. Well, not lie exactly; he doubts Oz has ever told a direct lie in his life. Everything Oz tells Olivia, in a sudden outpouring of words like rain from a blue-white, arid desert sky, is factually true: their long disagreement over what constitutes a neutral color; paint that dried to a grim yellow-beige and had to be redone; a collapsed shelf; and the complications of Giles' preferred book-organizing system. It all happened, but none of it is the reason why there are still a dozen heavy boxes in the sitting room and they've barely begun trying to arrange the kitchen to suit them both.
As Oz talks, he glances sideways at Giles every so often, as though making sure this wall of half-truths is thick enough for Giles to feel safe. I'm all right, he wants to say. Ten minutes ago I was worrying about you. Instead he rubs Oz's shoulder for a moment and goes back to his half-eaten grouse. But the flavor's gone out of it now, leaving only a chewy blandness like a mouthful of rubber. Giles is all right, provided he doesn't think about certain things, but not thinking numbs him, turns the world to a distant, untouched image. Novocaine in the bloodstream, deadening every limb and every sense.
There's only so long he can bear not thinking. Oz has given up trying to stop him reading the papers or watching new programs, although he's careful not to leave Giles' side. Always there, ready to bring Giles paracetamol if one of the headaches comes on, ready to hold him if he starts to shake or to cry. Every day Giles has to know the news, has to think about it all. It's a sort of painful relief, like scratching an itch raw and bloody.
Now, though, is not the time. Numbness is better than the risk of breaking down in the middle of a restaurant. Giles moves a couple of slices of grouse around with his knife and fork, but Oz must notice that he's not eating. His hand creeps over to Giles' and holds it, while he gamely listens to Olivia's explanation of her joke about Changing Rooms. "It's a sort of decorating program . . . " She talks about zebra-striped walls and gothic four-poster beds constructed out of industrial plastic, but her eyes keep coming back to their joined hands and her smile looks puzzled.
"Didn't you meet that designer once at a party?" Giles asks Olivia. "The mad one with the chintz suits?" It's important to keep the conversation going, to look as though he's perfectly fine. To Giles' surprise, he doesn't want to tell Olivia about the last few days. She's worried enough over him lately, and anyway, it's his secret and Oz's.
"I used to have a jacket made out of a couch," Oz says, drawing his thumb slowly back and forth over Giles's knuckles. Patterns and rings, slow steady things to keep him here and relatively happy.
"I recall doing something extravagantly stupid with sheer curtain and some beads," Olivia says. Her gaze keeps darting to Giles, down to their hands, then back to Oz's face. "Although I *believe* that was out of necessity, as I'd lost my trousers somewhere that evening."
At Giles's inquisitive murmur, Oz twists a little in his seat. "The brown corduroy one, remember -" The one he wore the *last* time he was in Sunnydale; everything, given half a chance, seems to hold the acid of bad memory. He's just not ready to cede that chance. "Devon's latest girlfriend was into costume design. Why it didn't fit, probably."
Olivia laughs and Oz smiles, not sure what's so funny but grateful all the same. "Shades of Beryl Brownlee, don't you think, Rupert?"
As the waiter clears their plates - and he notes that Giles didn't finish his lunch - Oz thinks that Giles and Olivia remind him, strangely, of Xander and Willow; their memories are shared, entwined, so they're abbreviated in expression. But he and Giles are like that, too, and Olivia watches them with a faint smile on her face. Oz feels appraised, held up to her judgment, but she's so confident and kind that there isn't any anxiety attached to her appraisal. He's glad, too, to know someone else who doesn't think Giles is just a Watcher, for whom, actually, the Council stuff is more than secondary. She loves Giles, and she's protective of him, and Oz wants to hug her for that.
"Shall we think about dessert?" She pokes Oz's elbow. "One of us should, at any rate. What I wouldn't give for that tiny waist of yours."
"We all should," Giles answers her. If she knew why Oz was so thin, she wouldn't joke about it. "Olivia, you're entirely too beautiful, and too intelligent, to worry about getting fat."
"Flatterer," Olivia says, scanning the dessert menu. "But just this once, I'll believe you."
"I never flatter. But I do remember how much you love chocolate mousse, and I'd hate to see you deprive yourself." It's becoming easier for Giles to talk again, with Oz touching him and several minutes of DIY babble between himself and the things he doesn't want to think about. He flexes his fingers against Oz's and smiles at him as reassuringly as he can.
"Ah. How lovely of you to look out for my interests. If not my figure." This is like a game, keeping the conversation trivial and light, batting it along like balloon, and Giles realizes Olivia is taking care to help them do it. She's letting Oz shelter him, letting them keep their secrets. Letting them shut her out, the way lovers inevitably do. Gratitude prickles at Giles' skin, like numbness wearing off and circulation returning.
When the waiter comes, Oz starts to move his hand away, but Giles holds on. He's not sure if it's a way of showing Oz that he's not embarrassed, not willing to hide anymore, or if he just doesn't want to give up the comfort. Either way, Oz settles his hand back over Giles' and doesn't even seem to notice the waiter's quickly suppressed smile.
Giles still isn't confident that he can eat more, but something sweet might be easier to manage than the gamy meat. He orders bread and butter pudding, and is confused by Oz's sudden grin until Oz orders the same thing. Their tastes aren't usually that similar, but this need for nursery food, sugary and heavy, isn't surprising. Bread and butter pudding is like handholding or a warm blanket, only edible.
Oz can nearly feel the effort Giles is taking to look relaxed and keep his voice light and natural. He figures Olivia must know, too, since she's known him so long and left all those messages on the answering machine that Oz woke up early one morning to erase so Giles didn't have to hear them. Everyone is smiling and teasing, and he can play along, too; it seems to be helping.
"Am I in for a nasty surprise?" Oz asks. "'cause I've had bread pudding, but it's the butter that's worrying me here."
"Oh, yes," Olivia says. "Although Rupert knows more about such things, but I believe the recipe's Lancastrian. Not at all like your delicious bread pudding. Rather sour, isn't it? Anything would be, of course, after fermenting in ale for five years..."
When Giles laughs, he grips Oz's hand tightly, and for the first time in days, it's a pleased gesture without a trace of anxiety or sorrow. A rope of tension Oz didn't know he had suddenly slides out his shoulders and Olivia grins at him. No appraisal there, at least not so obvious, just something a little like friendship.
"I can handle it. Lived on tripe pupusas for a month last winter."
"This from someone who once tried to feed me kelp-based burger patties," Giles says and Olivia's face twists into a grimace. "Thank God he's seen the light."
"I *like* those," Oz says. "Tofu pups, too. I just, you know. Don't mind the flesh any more." Giles leans across the corner of the table and kisses his cheek very quickly. Oz is grinning, Olivia is poking her fork at Giles and threatening to report him to the authorities, and it all feels good. Good and happy, and Oz never expected to feel like this so soon outside of the apartment.
"You never would've known, either," Oz adds, "if you didn't go digging through the trash for the box, all suspicious and paranoid."
"I was not paranoid," Giles says, reluctantly letting Oz's hand go so that they can both eat. "I was cautious. As anyone would be after the kelp burger incident and the shepherd's pie with the-what's it called?-textured vegetable protein." Oz laughs and mutters something about how it tasted just fine. Only Giles' knowledge that he's getting very silly, that his mood has swung from numb anxiety to a giddiness that makes him laugh a little too loudly, stops him from kissing Oz again. "In any case, I think the fact that tofu pups taste like tofu and nothing at all like sausages would have been a clue."
"It's a very good thing that you've become innured to tripe and so forth," Olivia says. "Otherwise English food would've come as a terrible shock." She waits until Oz has taken a bite of his pudding, then adds, "We eat tripe too, or at least they do up in the benighted north. We also eat lamb's kidneys. And eels."
Oz, smiling, swallows and takes another bite. He scarcely seems like the same person as the boy who couldn't bear to look at the bones from a roast. "Olivia," Giles says, "I've been trying very hard to convince him that England offers more than rain, bad cooking, and the royal family. Do help me, won't you?" There's really no need to protect Oz, who's calmly dabbing a bit of custard sauce off his lips. The expression on his face challenges Olivia to do her worst, and Giles knows that if Oz had seemed at all bothered, Olivia wouldn't have said a thing. If Oz can eat tripe, he can hear about eel pies (which, now that Giles thinks about it, no one seems to make anymore). But Giles needs to offer something back to him, return safety for safety.
"Of course, Rupert," Olivia says, between bites of chocolate mousse. "Besides rain and greasy chips and indolent aristos, we also have cricket."
"And hundreds of concert venues," Giles counters. The pudding is just as comforting as he'd hoped, and after the first bite he realizes he's still a little hungry.
"Gardening programs."
"They have those in America, too." Giles sips at his cappuccino and glances at Oz, who's watching them with bemusement. "But the BBC has fairly intelligent comedies as well. On occasion."
"The Millennium Dome."
Giles eats a bit more of his pudding and lets Olivia think she's won, then says, "Temple Church."
"Oh, that's unfair, Rupert. How am I meant to beat twelfth-century Norman architecture?"
"It's perfectly fair, and you can't." Victorious, Giles grins and, seeing Oz has finished eating, takes his hand again. "Ignore this cynical woman. You'll like it here, really."
The pudding sits in his belly, warm and sweet, and Oz feels cuddled from the inside while outside, his skin is hot and sore from laughing and grasping Giles's hand.
"Already love it here," he says, and then his eyes drop to his empty bowl. Even *he* knows how just how cheesy that must have sounded. But Giles tickles the inside of his wrist and Oz looks up again. "And I like eel, actually. Japanese, anyway. Barbecued, with lots of sticky rice."
"Then all you need is some tweed and gardening gloves," Olivia says, "and you'll be a real Briton."
"And a weird taste for Benny Hill."
"Well, of course," she says, placing her napkin on the table and massaging the side of her neck for a moment. "Lecherous men chasing after the bosomy girl. It's a national tradition."
Every place, Oz thinks, is full of both the gross - Benny Hill, Cliff Richard - and the wonderful - the Eye of London, Giles's favorite bookshop, deep and dark as a cave - and the sublime - cathedrals, he supposes, and Giles's body, full of whorls and secret strength, scars and soft fragrant hair. He swallows and shifts in his seat, surprised at how easy it is, these days, for his thoughts to slip into the sexual. He used to hold them back, take another drag of whiskey, pass out before he let himself think sexually.
It doesn't matter *where* he is, not any longer, not as long as he's out in the world, not hiding.
Silence has settled over the table as Olivia roots in her purse and Giles leans back in his chair. Comfortable silence, a pause and a shift, and Oz leans a little toward Giles.
"Happy birthday," he whispers and squeezes Giles's hand. No bad memories this time, just good wishes and more care than he can possibly express. "Love you."
Giles leans in a little closer, almost dragging his sleeve in the coffee, and says, "I love you too." Whispered words, secrets, and after Sunnydale he'd never have imagined that secrets could be a good thing. But everything has changed now, clocks have gone back to midnight and calendars to the year one, and they're beginning again. In Sunnydale their secrets turned to walls, razor wire, claustrophobic cells, both fortress and prison. Here secrets are no more than curtains, thin and fluid, letting in the breeze. Privacy, not concealment.
"Thank you," he says, a murmur in Oz's ear and then another kiss on the cheek before he sits back. Oz smiles, a wide slow smile that Giles usually only sees when they're alone, and Giles knows that he's understood. The thanks are for more than birthday wishes, or Oz's care over the last few difficult days, or even for coming back to him. They're for something a good deal too large, too essential, to put into words.
"Is it safe to look up again," Olivia asks, elaborately searching through her very small purse, "or are you two going to whisper tenderly for a bit longer?"
"I think the all-clear has sounded," Giles says, catching Oz's hand in case he doesn't realize that Olivia's joking.
"Thank god." Olivia emerges with some sort of electronic gadget and fiddles with it for a few moments. "Sorry, I couldn't remember whether my meeting was at three or half-past. Ah, half-past. Good." Slipping it into her purse again, she looks from Giles to Oz and back, smiling. "So, what plans do you have for the rest of your birthday? Or should I not ask?"
Oz seems to be getting used to her; he doesn't even blush this time. "I believe we're going to see a film," Giles answers. "That Mexican one-Y Tu Mama Tambien. It's playing at the art cinema in Leicester Square, so we'll probably poke around Soho a bit as well." They're never seen a film together before, and Giles is unreasonably excited at the prospect.
After several minutes of banter over the bill and the tip and Giles's propensity for ingratitude, Olivia catches Oz's arm as they rise from the table and tugs him close. Giles walks on ahead, his brown suede jacket almost glowing under the soft lights of the dining room, his back straight and head held high. Oz watches him, stumbling a little against Olivia and inhaling her crisp perfume.
"You ever think of pissing off on him again," she whispers with a sweet, sincere smile and a death grip on his wrist, "and I'll have to break every delicate little bone in your body."
"I'm not -"
"Consider yourself warned," she says. "I think I might be quite fond of you, so it would break my heart."
"Fair enough," Oz whispers back. She's both serious and not, and maybe later he'll let himself worry just how much she knows about him and what he did to Giles. They step out onto the sidewalk and he hunches his shoulders automatically against the drippy rain that doesn't come. The air is, actually, dry and warm, and the edges of the high clouds are ribboned in silver and gold. When he sees them together, whispering, Giles frowns a little and Oz sees his fingers curl up; he'd been about to reach for Oz, and Oz smiles at him.
"She's doing the best friend thing," he tells Giles as he moves to his side. "Also, she says I'm allowed to go to some vintage stores someday."
Giles looks a little lost - happy still, but confused - looking back and forth, down, then up, between Oz and Olivia as Olivia laughs. Her laughter is as bright and clear as the clouds and Giles ducks his head, smiling. Olivia is fussing with her jacket and purse, scanning the street for traffic and a cab.
"Thanks for lunch," Oz tells Olivia. He's known people like this, who are somehow able to segment their lives as carefully as day-planners pretend you can, and he doesn't want to keep her. "I'm glad I met you."
As Oz approached the table, rubbing his hands dry and trying to warm them from the cold water he'd washed up with, Giles and Olivia stopped talking. They turned toward him, Olivia's hand on Giles's wrist, and Oz got a flash of a family dinner, mother and father smiling at him, celebrating something important, a graduation or a birthday or perfect attendance. The image was inaccurate, out of focus, because Olivia was looking at Giles, watching him, but Giles's eyes were on Oz. Not as father or librarian, not fond pride or the guarded gaze Giles used to turn on him, but Giles, expression loosening, eyes narrowing into joyful half-moons. It's the look he gives Oz when Oz glances up from a book or Giles reenters a room: Recognition, and welcome, and a tinge of lucky surprise.
Anyway, it's not like Oz ever went to many of those family dinners; the last one he remembers was at the Ponderosa Steakhouse & Buffet. He was eight, his father flirted with the cashier, and his mother wouldn't talk to anyone; Oz spent most of dinner sculpting turreted forts out of scoops of mashed potatoes and cottage cheese.
Olivia says, whether to Oz or Giles, Oz can't tell, "So the unpacking must be finished, I expect. Unless all those books breed like rabbits, which I've always half-suspected." Oz has two fingers on his mala and he tries to finish his silent grace -
May you be filled with loving kindness.
May you be well.
May you be peaceful and at ease.
May you be happy. -
before glancing up. Giles holds his fork over the wing of his bird, watching Oz from the corner of his eye, waiting to start eating. Oz is grateful for that, for the familiarity with his rituals, and he smiles quickly at Giles.
"It's almost done," Oz tells her. "Took a digression to paint and I think some more shelves need to be built." He's not telling the whole truth; they stopped, often, to hold each other, and kiss, and there's been nothing done since Tuesday, lunchtime, nothing but holding Giles, warding off the plummeting terror inside his chest, making sure he eats and knows Oz is right here, just in case. "But we're almost there."
"Such a messy business, combining two sets of possessions," Olivia says and Oz puts down his fork. "I don't envy you two."
"I travel pretty light." Oz spears several shreds of green bean and tips his head toward Giles. Olivia talks to him as if he's not a kid, like he is simply - if it's simple - Giles's new lover. "So it's not too bad."
Not a family meal, at least not the usual kind, but as Oz works through the smoky, stringy venison and his vegetables, talking to Olivia about Giles's fear of strong color and his own childhood room that he painted the deep green of pool-table felt, edging closer to Giles and keeping an eye on him, he starts to think this does count as family. Secrets and protection, jokes and scraps of history.
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As Oz talks, he glances sideways at Giles every so often, as though making sure this wall of half-truths is thick enough for Giles to feel safe. I'm all right, he wants to say. Ten minutes ago I was worrying about you. Instead he rubs Oz's shoulder for a moment and goes back to his half-eaten grouse. But the flavor's gone out of it now, leaving only a chewy blandness like a mouthful of rubber. Giles is all right, provided he doesn't think about certain things, but not thinking numbs him, turns the world to a distant, untouched image. Novocaine in the bloodstream, deadening every limb and every sense.
There's only so long he can bear not thinking. Oz has given up trying to stop him reading the papers or watching new programs, although he's careful not to leave Giles' side. Always there, ready to bring Giles paracetamol if one of the headaches comes on, ready to hold him if he starts to shake or to cry. Every day Giles has to know the news, has to think about it all. It's a sort of painful relief, like scratching an itch raw and bloody.
Now, though, is not the time. Numbness is better than the risk of breaking down in the middle of a restaurant. Giles moves a couple of slices of grouse around with his knife and fork, but Oz must notice that he's not eating. His hand creeps over to Giles' and holds it, while he gamely listens to Olivia's explanation of her joke about Changing Rooms. "It's a sort of decorating program . . . " She talks about zebra-striped walls and gothic four-poster beds constructed out of industrial plastic, but her eyes keep coming back to their joined hands and her smile looks puzzled.
"Didn't you meet that designer once at a party?" Giles asks Olivia. "The mad one with the chintz suits?" It's important to keep the conversation going, to look as though he's perfectly fine. To Giles' surprise, he doesn't want to tell Olivia about the last few days. She's worried enough over him lately, and anyway, it's his secret and Oz's.
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"I recall doing something extravagantly stupid with sheer curtain and some beads," Olivia says. Her gaze keeps darting to Giles, down to their hands, then back to Oz's face. "Although I *believe* that was out of necessity, as I'd lost my trousers somewhere that evening."
At Giles's inquisitive murmur, Oz twists a little in his seat. "The brown corduroy one, remember -" The one he wore the *last* time he was in Sunnydale; everything, given half a chance, seems to hold the acid of bad memory. He's just not ready to cede that chance. "Devon's latest girlfriend was into costume design. Why it didn't fit, probably."
Olivia laughs and Oz smiles, not sure what's so funny but grateful all the same. "Shades of Beryl Brownlee, don't you think, Rupert?"
As the waiter clears their plates - and he notes that Giles didn't finish his lunch - Oz thinks that Giles and Olivia remind him, strangely, of Xander and Willow; their memories are shared, entwined, so they're abbreviated in expression. But he and Giles are like that, too, and Olivia watches them with a faint smile on her face. Oz feels appraised, held up to her judgment, but she's so confident and kind that there isn't any anxiety attached to her appraisal. He's glad, too, to know someone else who doesn't think Giles is just a Watcher, for whom, actually, the Council stuff is more than secondary. She loves Giles, and she's protective of him, and Oz wants to hug her for that.
"Shall we think about dessert?" She pokes Oz's elbow. "One of us should, at any rate. What I wouldn't give for that tiny waist of yours."
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"Flatterer," Olivia says, scanning the dessert menu. "But just this once, I'll believe you."
"I never flatter. But I do remember how much you love chocolate mousse, and I'd hate to see you deprive yourself." It's becoming easier for Giles to talk again, with Oz touching him and several minutes of DIY babble between himself and the things he doesn't want to think about. He flexes his fingers against Oz's and smiles at him as reassuringly as he can.
"Ah. How lovely of you to look out for my interests. If not my figure." This is like a game, keeping the conversation trivial and light, batting it along like balloon, and Giles realizes Olivia is taking care to help them do it. She's letting Oz shelter him, letting them keep their secrets. Letting them shut her out, the way lovers inevitably do. Gratitude prickles at Giles' skin, like numbness wearing off and circulation returning.
When the waiter comes, Oz starts to move his hand away, but Giles holds on. He's not sure if it's a way of showing Oz that he's not embarrassed, not willing to hide anymore, or if he just doesn't want to give up the comfort. Either way, Oz settles his hand back over Giles' and doesn't even seem to notice the waiter's quickly suppressed smile.
Giles still isn't confident that he can eat more, but something sweet might be easier to manage than the gamy meat. He orders bread and butter pudding, and is confused by Oz's sudden grin until Oz orders the same thing. Their tastes aren't usually that similar, but this need for nursery food, sugary and heavy, isn't surprising. Bread and butter pudding is like handholding or a warm blanket, only edible.
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"Am I in for a nasty surprise?" Oz asks. "'cause I've had bread pudding, but it's the butter that's worrying me here."
"Oh, yes," Olivia says. "Although Rupert knows more about such things, but I believe the recipe's Lancastrian. Not at all like your delicious bread pudding. Rather sour, isn't it? Anything would be, of course, after fermenting in ale for five years..."
When Giles laughs, he grips Oz's hand tightly, and for the first time in days, it's a pleased gesture without a trace of anxiety or sorrow. A rope of tension Oz didn't know he had suddenly slides out his shoulders and Olivia grins at him. No appraisal there, at least not so obvious, just something a little like friendship.
"I can handle it. Lived on tripe pupusas for a month last winter."
"This from someone who once tried to feed me kelp-based burger patties," Giles says and Olivia's face twists into a grimace. "Thank God he's seen the light."
"I *like* those," Oz says. "Tofu pups, too. I just, you know. Don't mind the flesh any more." Giles leans across the corner of the table and kisses his cheek very quickly. Oz is grinning, Olivia is poking her fork at Giles and threatening to report him to the authorities, and it all feels good. Good and happy, and Oz never expected to feel like this so soon outside of the apartment.
"You never would've known, either," Oz adds, "if you didn't go digging through the trash for the box, all suspicious and paranoid."
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"It's a very good thing that you've become innured to tripe and so forth," Olivia says. "Otherwise English food would've come as a terrible shock." She waits until Oz has taken a bite of his pudding, then adds, "We eat tripe too, or at least they do up in the benighted north. We also eat lamb's kidneys. And eels."
Oz, smiling, swallows and takes another bite. He scarcely seems like the same person as the boy who couldn't bear to look at the bones from a roast. "Olivia," Giles says, "I've been trying very hard to convince him that England offers more than rain, bad cooking, and the royal family. Do help me, won't you?" There's really no need to protect Oz, who's calmly dabbing a bit of custard sauce off his lips. The expression on his face challenges Olivia to do her worst, and Giles knows that if Oz had seemed at all bothered, Olivia wouldn't have said a thing. If Oz can eat tripe, he can hear about eel pies (which, now that Giles thinks about it, no one seems to make anymore). But Giles needs to offer something back to him, return safety for safety.
"Of course, Rupert," Olivia says, between bites of chocolate mousse. "Besides rain and greasy chips and indolent aristos, we also have cricket."
"And hundreds of concert venues," Giles counters. The pudding is just as comforting as he'd hoped, and after the first bite he realizes he's still a little hungry.
"Gardening programs."
"They have those in America, too." Giles sips at his cappuccino and glances at Oz, who's watching them with bemusement. "But the BBC has fairly intelligent comedies as well. On occasion."
"The Millennium Dome."
Giles eats a bit more of his pudding and lets Olivia think she's won, then says, "Temple Church."
"Oh, that's unfair, Rupert. How am I meant to beat twelfth-century Norman architecture?"
"It's perfectly fair, and you can't." Victorious, Giles grins and, seeing Oz has finished eating, takes his hand again. "Ignore this cynical woman. You'll like it here, really."
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"Already love it here," he says, and then his eyes drop to his empty bowl. Even *he* knows how just how cheesy that must have sounded. But Giles tickles the inside of his wrist and Oz looks up again. "And I like eel, actually. Japanese, anyway. Barbecued, with lots of sticky rice."
"Then all you need is some tweed and gardening gloves," Olivia says, "and you'll be a real Briton."
"And a weird taste for Benny Hill."
"Well, of course," she says, placing her napkin on the table and massaging the side of her neck for a moment. "Lecherous men chasing after the bosomy girl. It's a national tradition."
Every place, Oz thinks, is full of both the gross - Benny Hill, Cliff Richard - and the wonderful - the Eye of London, Giles's favorite bookshop, deep and dark as a cave - and the sublime - cathedrals, he supposes, and Giles's body, full of whorls and secret strength, scars and soft fragrant hair. He swallows and shifts in his seat, surprised at how easy it is, these days, for his thoughts to slip into the sexual. He used to hold them back, take another drag of whiskey, pass out before he let himself think sexually.
It doesn't matter *where* he is, not any longer, not as long as he's out in the world, not hiding.
Silence has settled over the table as Olivia roots in her purse and Giles leans back in his chair. Comfortable silence, a pause and a shift, and Oz leans a little toward Giles.
"Happy birthday," he whispers and squeezes Giles's hand. No bad memories this time, just good wishes and more care than he can possibly express. "Love you."
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"Thank you," he says, a murmur in Oz's ear and then another kiss on the cheek before he sits back. Oz smiles, a wide slow smile that Giles usually only sees when they're alone, and Giles knows that he's understood. The thanks are for more than birthday wishes, or Oz's care over the last few difficult days, or even for coming back to him. They're for something a good deal too large, too essential, to put into words.
"Is it safe to look up again," Olivia asks, elaborately searching through her very small purse, "or are you two going to whisper tenderly for a bit longer?"
"I think the all-clear has sounded," Giles says, catching Oz's hand in case he doesn't realize that Olivia's joking.
"Thank god." Olivia emerges with some sort of electronic gadget and fiddles with it for a few moments. "Sorry, I couldn't remember whether my meeting was at three or half-past. Ah, half-past. Good." Slipping it into her purse again, she looks from Giles to Oz and back, smiling. "So, what plans do you have for the rest of your birthday? Or should I not ask?"
Oz seems to be getting used to her; he doesn't even blush this time. "I believe we're going to see a film," Giles answers. "That Mexican one-Y Tu Mama Tambien. It's playing at the art cinema in Leicester Square, so we'll probably poke around Soho a bit as well." They're never seen a film together before, and Giles is unreasonably excited at the prospect.
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"You ever think of pissing off on him again," she whispers with a sweet, sincere smile and a death grip on his wrist, "and I'll have to break every delicate little bone in your body."
"I'm not -"
"Consider yourself warned," she says. "I think I might be quite fond of you, so it would break my heart."
"Fair enough," Oz whispers back. She's both serious and not, and maybe later he'll let himself worry just how much she knows about him and what he did to Giles. They step out onto the sidewalk and he hunches his shoulders automatically against the drippy rain that doesn't come. The air is, actually, dry and warm, and the edges of the high clouds are ribboned in silver and gold. When he sees them together, whispering, Giles frowns a little and Oz sees his fingers curl up; he'd been about to reach for Oz, and Oz smiles at him.
"She's doing the best friend thing," he tells Giles as he moves to his side. "Also, she says I'm allowed to go to some vintage stores someday."
Giles looks a little lost - happy still, but confused - looking back and forth, down, then up, between Oz and Olivia as Olivia laughs. Her laughter is as bright and clear as the clouds and Giles ducks his head, smiling. Olivia is fussing with her jacket and purse, scanning the street for traffic and a cab.
"Thanks for lunch," Oz tells Olivia. He's known people like this, who are somehow able to segment their lives as carefully as day-planners pretend you can, and he doesn't want to keep her. "I'm glad I met you."
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