This is the first time Giles has ever been afraid to fly. Every midair bump seems to knock the breath out of him, and he looks up and down the aisles with a little too much attention.
He didn't feel this way when they flew to Sunnydale, and he ought to feel even securer now, with the attacks a few weeks farther in the past. But what he's afraid of, he realizes after the poor chap with bag hides his red face in a book, is not terrorism. It's irony.
He's lived for years on a hellmouth, and now he's leaving. With Oz. If there's ever a moment for engine failure or exploding semtex to end his life, it's now.
Giles shifts in the narrow seat, turning towards Oz and away from the other passengers as much as he can. Nothing is going to happen. He knows it, but he also knows he won't stop worrying until they touch down at Heathrow, a little more than six hours from now. "Right," he says to Oz, whose mouth is quirked up in a way that makes Giles think this round could go on forever before he guesses right. "Are you . . . a Russian czar who toured Europe in disguise?" Playing this game is especially tricky with Oz, because he knows so many odd and unexpected things. But that might stump him.
Giles draws the question out as his glasses slip slightly down his nose and he has to squint. He's fiercely competitive, which Oz supposes he should have already known - ticklefights and various trivia games in the mountains and on the road and that *long*, distressing argument they once had about the Boston Tea Party - but there's something about seeing Giles' competitiveness up close that makes Oz want to smile.
And beat him.
"Ummm," he says, closing his eyes and pretending to concentrate. "Nope, sorry. Not Peter the Great." He opens his eyes and frowns apologetically. "Not even close, actually."
"I should've known that was too easy." Oz's attempts at keeping a straight face don't quite hide a certain gleeful relish. It's one of the first, best signs of leaving Sunnydale--Oz is letting himself have expressions again, even if they're subtle ones that only Giles can read. Oz is always understated, but when he's uncomfortable he turns into a plank of wood. "I'd hoped they covered Peter the Great on one of the days you skipped school." Of course, it's entirely possible that they did, and Oz read about him anyway.
"How about this: are you a theologian who wrote that it's the cause and not that suffering that creates martyrs?" Last round, Oz asked him about a voiceover actor on The Simpsons; this seems only fair in return.
Now he's frowning for real; Oz read about Peter the Great when he was on his Russia-kick, the summer after eighth grade, but he never really had a theology-kick. Unless Tibet counts, but there are relatively few Buddhist martyrs.
Which Giles, of all people, knows. "Bastard," Oz says lightly, shifting in his seat and recrossing his legs so he can hold Giles' hand in both of his. "Fine. Ask me a yes or no question."
Since they're alone in the row (there's a silver lining to this new fear of terrorism), Giles kisses Oz's cheek. "I'm an utter, utter bastard. Flee while you can." Instead of fleeing, Oz half-smiles and brushes his leg against Giles'. "And that's cheating, by the way."
The air is getting that close mugginess that always happens on long flights; Giles, feeling sweaty, shrugs the blanket off his shoulder. He doesn't really care if people see him holding hands with Oz, and anyway it's not as if sharing a blanket isn't a giveaway. "Are you fictional? Oh, and the theologian was St. Augustine. I had to read entirely too much of him when I was writing my dissertation. In Latin, no less. I can't be blamed if he sticks in my mind."
"Isn't he the one who liked his boyfriend too much?"
Giles gets that blank look, the one where his lids tilt a little and his mouth thins out. The one he tries to *hide* feeling blank with. Oz swings his leg again and waits for the renewed accusations of cheating.
But Giles is really thinking it over, pursed lips and unfocused eyes and all, so he doesn't accuse, just unconsciously nudges Oz back as he smiles to himself.
Oz rubs his chin meditatively. "Who can say if I'm fictional? Maybe you're fictional. Maybe we're all the dream of some autistic in a basement apartment in South Boston." Giles opens his mouth to speak. "No, I'm not fictional. Tell me more about St. Augustine."
They're 30,000 feet in the air over Canada, stuck in seats that are only comfortable for people Oz's size, breathing stale air that smells faintly of plastic, but Oz's play-philosophy makes Giles think of Diedre's bedsit in Earl's Court. They all used to gather there to lounge on Diedre's Indian bedspread and braided rugs, to get high and offer opinions and create grandiose schemes for making the world interesting again. That was before they started buggering around with magic, and Giles can still remember it fondly.
"Augustine's a bit dire. Loved his boyfriend too much, didn't much care for heretics at all. A lot of Christianity's confusion about sex is his fault." Giles lowers his voice and leans in towards Oz, closer than he strictly needs to. "Augustine wrote that uncontrollable erections are a consequence of the fall. In paradise, Adam's penis was like a hand--he could raise and lower it at will."
While Oz is thinking that through, Giles asks, "Are you the author of the epitaph for the Spartan dead at Thermopylae?"
Willow used to worry that Giles was making fun of her, because he'd mention names or make references that she'd never heard of. Oz never quite understood that logic; if Giles wanted to make someone feel bad, he was pretty good at doing it directly. Those glares at Angel and swipes at Wesley, after all, did far more than name-dropping ever could.
The fact remains, however, that Oz has no idea who Giles is talking about right now. He'd much prefer to hear more about Adam's Sting-level control of his hardon.
"Why would he want to lower it?" he asks, and Giles' mouth stretches into a wide, kind smile. "Could he keep from coming, too? Probably. Anyway, um." He closes his eyes and lets himself remember reshelving Giles' books after they painted the flat. Small maroon book, just a little larger than his palm, with fountain-pen ink in the margins. "I'm not Simonides. Wow."
Sometimes, Giles decides, losing is even more enjoyable than winning. "Yes, Simonides. You really are terrifying. I think it's unfair that you know about Greek literature and South American pop music."
Slipping his hand back under the blanket, Giles says, "Perhaps I ought to cheat." He strokes the inside of Oz's thigh and whispers, "I don't think Adam could stop himself from coming. Sex was supposed to be about being fruitful and multiplying. Not about drawing out the pleasure until you're both breathless and trembling and so, so desperate. Not about spending hours licking-" He hears the creak of the drinks trolley just in time, and when the air hostess arrives, his hands are back where they belong and there's a magazine open across his lap.
"Well," he says, taking a long swallow that almost empties the tiny cup of Evian, as the trolley rumbles onward. "Are you the artist who supposedly invented pointillisme?" Talking about sex seems much more fun than this silly game. But they're stuck on this damned plane for hours yet, and Giles isn't such an exhibitionist that he wants to try anything in an airplane lavatory.
Shivering, tendrils of warmth snaking up his thigh and spinning around in the bottom of his gut from the pressure of Giles' hand and slinking down his chest from the whisper of Giles' voice, Oz shakes his head firmly. "I'm not, um. Sunday in the Park with George guy." He hums the first few bars of "Color and Light", trying to remember George's last name.
It's a broken sort of humming, though, and Giles is patting his knee. Fondly, almost fraternally, but that touch, plus the stale air of the plane and the heat under the blanket are just making him wigglier and shorter of breath.
"Seurat," Oz says and slides to his feet. "I'm not, though. Nice try, with the cheating." He slides past Giles, pausing to kiss his wrinkled-up forehead. "Do I forfeit if you manage to drive me to the washroom?"
The skinny lady in the garish pumpkin-and-witch patterned top from four rows up is heading for the washroom. Oz lets Giles think over the forfeiture and hurries to grab the place before she can push past him. The washroom's even smaller than the one he remembers from their flight over, shivering like it's more exposed to the wind than the rest of the plane. That fits, though, the shudders and rattles and strange groaning of the blue water sloshing in the metal bowl. Oz leans against the door, one foot up on the toilet, opening his zipper and reaching inside. Eyes closed, *flying*, and it's Giles' hands on him, one in his pants, the other on his mouth, fingers over his teeth, pulling his jaw open, and the wind is Giles' voice, and he stops teasing himself - fingers crooked around head, stroking balls, knuckles up the underside vein - and wraps and pulls, head thrown back and knocking the door, hips pushing against his fist. Flying, pulling, and he comes faster than he thought would, with Giles' voice in his mouth and the shudders of wind chasing down his spine.
Shaky-legged, antiseptic stink on his hands and heat overbrimming his skin, Oz shuffles his way back to his seat. His cheeks are burning and he *so* lost this round.
While Oz is in the lavatory, Giles catches himself staring at the closed door and blushes when he accidentally meets the eye of the woman waiting irritably outside. At first he thought Oz was joking, but several minutes have gone by. Giles opens the copy of The New Yorker that he bought in the airport and looks determinedly at the page. What he sees is Oz, like a superimposition, a film on a screen. Oz leaning against the sink with his head thrown back, his mouth open, hands tugging his balls and jerking his cock in rough fast strokes . . .
Not until Oz clears his throat does Giles realize that he's back. He has the glowing, disordered look he gets after sex, as though his internal illumination has been turned up high. He's pink, loose around the mouth and sleepy around the eyes, and Giles swallows with a dry throat. "You didn't." Oz lifts an eyebrow and runs a finger along Giles' lower lip. Through the reek of harsh soap, Giles imagines he can smell secret things, musky skin and semen. "You did," he says, and the words sound throaty and entirely too sexual.
Giles is hard, his cock bent painfully under his y-fronts. His fingers clench on Oz's shoulder, and in a heated flash he pictures himself pushing Oz's head down, getting a quick, indiscreet blow job under the blanket. "When we get home-" He'll probably be too exhausted to want anything, but the thought lets him breathe again, lets him wait.
Oz smiles, slowly and full of promises, and then audibly catches his breath when Giles bends and licks his ear. "Do you know how long it's been since we had sex?" Giles whispers. "About twelve hours. And I . . . you are the world's best aphrodisiac, truly." It's as though Oz brought desire, brought youth, that day he turned up at Giles' door. Since then, Giles is continually surprised by his own body, by its capacity and its hunger.
He squeezes an arm between Oz and seat and pulls him closer. "Tell me what you did. What you thought about." Giles can think of the next frustrating hours as an elaborate, slow sex game. A better game than guessing.
He didn't feel this way when they flew to Sunnydale, and he ought to feel even securer now, with the attacks a few weeks farther in the past. But what he's afraid of, he realizes after the poor chap with bag hides his red face in a book, is not terrorism. It's irony.
He's lived for years on a hellmouth, and now he's leaving. With Oz. If there's ever a moment for engine failure or exploding semtex to end his life, it's now.
Giles shifts in the narrow seat, turning towards Oz and away from the other passengers as much as he can. Nothing is going to happen. He knows it, but he also knows he won't stop worrying until they touch down at Heathrow, a little more than six hours from now. "Right," he says to Oz, whose mouth is quirked up in a way that makes Giles think this round could go on forever before he guesses right. "Are you . . . a Russian czar who toured Europe in disguise?" Playing this game is especially tricky with Oz, because he knows so many odd and unexpected things. But that might stump him.
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And beat him.
"Ummm," he says, closing his eyes and pretending to concentrate. "Nope, sorry. Not Peter the Great." He opens his eyes and frowns apologetically. "Not even close, actually."
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"How about this: are you a theologian who wrote that it's the cause and not that suffering that creates martyrs?" Last round, Oz asked him about a voiceover actor on The Simpsons; this seems only fair in return.
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Which Giles, of all people, knows. "Bastard," Oz says lightly, shifting in his seat and recrossing his legs so he can hold Giles' hand in both of his. "Fine. Ask me a yes or no question."
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The air is getting that close mugginess that always happens on long flights; Giles, feeling sweaty, shrugs the blanket off his shoulder. He doesn't really care if people see him holding hands with Oz, and anyway it's not as if sharing a blanket isn't a giveaway. "Are you fictional? Oh, and the theologian was St. Augustine. I had to read entirely too much of him when I was writing my dissertation. In Latin, no less. I can't be blamed if he sticks in my mind."
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Giles gets that blank look, the one where his lids tilt a little and his mouth thins out. The one he tries to *hide* feeling blank with. Oz swings his leg again and waits for the renewed accusations of cheating.
But Giles is really thinking it over, pursed lips and unfocused eyes and all, so he doesn't accuse, just unconsciously nudges Oz back as he smiles to himself.
Oz rubs his chin meditatively. "Who can say if I'm fictional? Maybe you're fictional. Maybe we're all the dream of some autistic in a basement apartment in South Boston." Giles opens his mouth to speak. "No, I'm not fictional. Tell me more about St. Augustine."
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"Augustine's a bit dire. Loved his boyfriend too much, didn't much care for heretics at all. A lot of Christianity's confusion about sex is his fault." Giles lowers his voice and leans in towards Oz, closer than he strictly needs to. "Augustine wrote that uncontrollable erections are a consequence of the fall. In paradise, Adam's penis was like a hand--he could raise and lower it at will."
While Oz is thinking that through, Giles asks, "Are you the author of the epitaph for the Spartan dead at Thermopylae?"
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The fact remains, however, that Oz has no idea who Giles is talking about right now. He'd much prefer to hear more about Adam's Sting-level control of his hardon.
"Why would he want to lower it?" he asks, and Giles' mouth stretches into a wide, kind smile. "Could he keep from coming, too? Probably. Anyway, um." He closes his eyes and lets himself remember reshelving Giles' books after they painted the flat. Small maroon book, just a little larger than his palm, with fountain-pen ink in the margins. "I'm not Simonides. Wow."
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Slipping his hand back under the blanket, Giles says, "Perhaps I ought to cheat." He strokes the inside of Oz's thigh and whispers, "I don't think Adam could stop himself from coming. Sex was supposed to be about being fruitful and multiplying. Not about drawing out the pleasure until you're both breathless and trembling and so, so desperate. Not about spending hours licking-" He hears the creak of the drinks trolley just in time, and when the air hostess arrives, his hands are back where they belong and there's a magazine open across his lap.
"Well," he says, taking a long swallow that almost empties the tiny cup of Evian, as the trolley rumbles onward. "Are you the artist who supposedly invented pointillisme?" Talking about sex seems much more fun than this silly game. But they're stuck on this damned plane for hours yet, and Giles isn't such an exhibitionist that he wants to try anything in an airplane lavatory.
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It's a broken sort of humming, though, and Giles is patting his knee. Fondly, almost fraternally, but that touch, plus the stale air of the plane and the heat under the blanket are just making him wigglier and shorter of breath.
"Seurat," Oz says and slides to his feet. "I'm not, though. Nice try, with the cheating." He slides past Giles, pausing to kiss his wrinkled-up forehead. "Do I forfeit if you manage to drive me to the washroom?"
The skinny lady in the garish pumpkin-and-witch patterned top from four rows up is heading for the washroom. Oz lets Giles think over the forfeiture and hurries to grab the place before she can push past him. The washroom's even smaller than the one he remembers from their flight over, shivering like it's more exposed to the wind than the rest of the plane. That fits, though, the shudders and rattles and strange groaning of the blue water sloshing in the metal bowl. Oz leans against the door, one foot up on the toilet, opening his zipper and reaching inside. Eyes closed, *flying*, and it's Giles' hands on him, one in his pants, the other on his mouth, fingers over his teeth, pulling his jaw open, and the wind is Giles' voice, and he stops teasing himself - fingers crooked around head, stroking balls, knuckles up the underside vein - and wraps and pulls, head thrown back and knocking the door, hips pushing against his fist. Flying, pulling, and he comes faster than he thought would, with Giles' voice in his mouth and the shudders of wind chasing down his spine.
Shaky-legged, antiseptic stink on his hands and heat overbrimming his skin, Oz shuffles his way back to his seat. His cheeks are burning and he *so* lost this round.
Worth it, though.
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Not until Oz clears his throat does Giles realize that he's back. He has the glowing, disordered look he gets after sex, as though his internal illumination has been turned up high. He's pink, loose around the mouth and sleepy around the eyes, and Giles swallows with a dry throat. "You didn't." Oz lifts an eyebrow and runs a finger along Giles' lower lip. Through the reek of harsh soap, Giles imagines he can smell secret things, musky skin and semen. "You did," he says, and the words sound throaty and entirely too sexual.
Giles is hard, his cock bent painfully under his y-fronts. His fingers clench on Oz's shoulder, and in a heated flash he pictures himself pushing Oz's head down, getting a quick, indiscreet blow job under the blanket. "When we get home-" He'll probably be too exhausted to want anything, but the thought lets him breathe again, lets him wait.
Oz smiles, slowly and full of promises, and then audibly catches his breath when Giles bends and licks his ear. "Do you know how long it's been since we had sex?" Giles whispers. "About twelve hours. And I . . . you are the world's best aphrodisiac, truly." It's as though Oz brought desire, brought youth, that day he turned up at Giles' door. Since then, Giles is continually surprised by his own body, by its capacity and its hunger.
He squeezes an arm between Oz and seat and pulls him closer. "Tell me what you did. What you thought about." Giles can think of the next frustrating hours as an elaborate, slow sex game. A better game than guessing.
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