Fic: Life - An Experiment (2/?)
Title- Choices
Summary- Dawn and Angel have a heart to heart
Characters- AtS/BtVS
Rating- PG-13
Disclaimer: To Joss we thank
Note- In the same storyline as "Life- An Experiment". I have no beta, so any mistakes are my own. Characters belong to Joss :) Any and all feedback would be appreciated - I've never written any form of fiction before, but Dawn is a character that I felt needed more time and what needs to happen I can't do in an essay - so here it is.
"We got a package from Willow!"
Dawn peeked through the window in Wesley's office to the entrance, Angel was standing there grinning like a kid at Christmas, holding a small box. Connor stood slightly to the right of him, trying to look manly and uninterested. Packages from Willow oftentimes meant something stinky and/or old for Dawn to research and while generally - Cool - tonight she was studying for a midterm in Statistics. Spike stood up from the arm chair in front of the desk where he had been painting his fingernails with the polish Dawn had brought with her and beckoned her out the door to where the others were gathering. Dawn looked down at the piles of paperwork, scrolls, and textbooks - Wesley's desk was now where Dawn's homework met the weird and wacky. Through the door came ooh's and ahh's that typically.... wait. Dawn perked up - Actual presents? She hustled out the door and into the lobby where Angel, Cordy, Spike, and Connor were staring intently at what appeared to be...
"Willow sent us iPhones?" Dawn queried. Cordy smiled up at her, handing over a crumpled piece of what appeared to be parchment.
"No one can read her chicken scrawl like you can, hun. Now tell us why we are all so blessed!?" Cordy's question ended on a little bit of a squeel. She had been wanting to upgrade her phone for months, but Angel still didn't know how to use his and felt it was a waste of money. Dawn had heard them arguing about it for a while, apparently being a PTB didn't change Cordy's need for the fashionable.
"Blessed?" Angel scoffed, "What is this thing? Are they weapons or some sort of fancy .... What is this? I need to get back to work."
"Come off it you...!--" Spike started to splutter, but Dawn interrupted him quickly. Lately Spike had been less than talkative, but when it came to Angel... well, things were worse between the vampires than ever before. Dawn shivered with the tension.
"Willow says that she magically upgraded the phones so that we can talk to each other face to face from now on." She looked up at Angel, "So now if you want to talk to Cordy, you'll be able to see her face on the screen." Angel looked down at the shiny black article dubiously. Dawn coughed slightly. "She also says that they're magically enhanced for each of us personally, we can't ever lose them because they'll find us, and can even work under water and are fireproof." Dawn looked up at them after skimming over the rest of the letter. "Since they're technically magical, that also means no more phone bill for you Cordy and--" Dawn paused while Cordy did a little dance, imagining all she could do with the extra money, "-- from what I can tell, if we're dealing with any one of over a hundred demon dialects, all spoken human languages, and a few dead ones - the phone will translate for us." Dawn tossed the phone in her hand to Illyria, "That one is yours, it will sort of hum or give off an unpleasant heat if you're holding one that doesn't belong to you." Illyria handled the small black device like a child would a shell found on the beach, turning and twisting it around expectantly.
"Sounds too good to be true," Connor mused while staring into the phone's shiny surface.
"How did you know that was Illyria's?" inquired Cordy. Dawn looked up at her in surprise.
"How--? Well... um... he... she - there was... um..." Dawn knew, just knew instinctively that the phone she had been holding had been Illyria's. Just as she had realized earlier that day that the small pendant she had found on the landing in her building's staircase belonged to Mrs. Frederickson's niece that visited her on Wednesdays after school. Dawn had never spoken to the niece and didn't know that she visited the old lady every week, but she knew. Somehow. As she struggled to put into words something, anything that would make sense to them, something from Willow's note - anything, she felt Spike tense up and move toward her protectively. Crap. If you and Angel get into an argument today I'll scream, she thought. Spike looked towards her suspiciously and backed of half an inch. "It's probably something Willow did... we'll all just know, you know?"
"She can read the auras of things," Illyria said flippantly, bored with the situation and taking the shiny new toy down to the basement.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
Connor put his rickety Jeep in park outside Dawn's apartment building, but didn't turn off the gas. Dawn murmured a polite "Thanks for the ride" and pulled at the door handle - but his hand on her arm stopped her for a moment. She waited, not looking at him. He sighed and let go of her arm, staring down at the steering wheel.
"Listen, Dawn," he always struggled with her name. Sometimes he ignored it altogether, preferring pet names like Spike usually did, but when he said it, it always sounded choked and unfamiliar. Like an English speaker trying to combat the name of an exotic ethnic dish. "Dawn," he said again, this time clearer and stronger as he turned to look at her, "I can't imagine what you're going through - what you've been going through, but--"
"Stop." Her voice was calm but emphatic. She couldn't take this talk from him. "You can't do that. You can't tell me that there's no way to know what it's like to live 14 years and then find out you're only a ball of energy 'but' .... there is no 'but' in this scenario." She looked steadfastly into his eyes, daring him to turn away. "You lived for 17-or whatever years in a hell dimension. I don't know what that's like. Period. I won't try to give you any thoughtful advice on what it means to be a "normal" human college student, or how to balance our wacky supernatural families with everything else... and neither will you - got it?" He nodded and smiled ruefully.
Dawn grabbed her bag and jumped out of the Jeep. "Hey Dawn," he said, leaning over the seat to talk to her. "One question - just between us freaks?"
"Sure."
"How do you deal?"
"I forget."
"Yeah." He nodded, understanding instinctively. "Me too...." he paused for a moment. "At least.... when I can, you know?"
Dawn nodded and turned towards her apartment where Phantom Dennis would be waiting with a pack of cards in the kitchen, and Spike would be perched on her balcony window, making sure Connor didn't take her for a joy ride.... or at least, got her safe home afterwards. Only, standing at the landing in front of her door was another vampire in a black coat with a weird obsession with hair gel - only this one wasn't as welcome.
"Angel," was all she could muster in greeting. He was holding a filled grocery bag, filled with either mystical wards or snack foods. Everyone knew Dawn's attention to sugary detail in her kitchen, she was never found with out Mambas in her purse, or peanut butter m&ms stashed away in a drawer. She'd been that way since.... Dawn shook her head and opened the door, beckoning Angel in with a nod and turning on the lights.
Sure enough, Dennis had the poker chips set up on the kitchen table, and a weird hint of peroxide was coming from the bathroom. Dawn peeked at the calendar on the refrigerator, it was the 15th: a bleaching day for Spike. Dawn had tried to break him of the habit, arguing that his natural, dark hair was more attractive, but he wouldn't hear of it. He'd been blonde since the late '70's and that was that.
Dawn ignored Angel and went to the kitchen, pulling out a bag of pita chips and some hummus. It had been a long day and there was no sense in cooking a large meal just for herself... though Dennis would sometimes snack a little and Spike seemed to enjoy the domestic setting that was created when she was cooking, tonight she'd just snack, maybe bake bread for tomorrow. Angel watched her from the entryway curiously. This mild mannered, careful and methodical Dawn was not the one he remembered from Sunnydale. He set the large bag of candy and snack foods on the counter and began unpacking it for her. He watched her busy herself with the task of laying out food, emptying the dishwasher, checking the expiration dates on cheeses and containers of pig's blood. Her long hair swayed as she danced nimbly around the kitchen and he began to have a sense that this scene was not for him. The pig's blood was decidedly not for him, he had not been to visit Dawn since she moved in months ago.
Does Spike come here so often that she keeps that much blood in the fridge? Angel thought. He really didn't know how to feel about that, he had guessed that Buffy left without Spike because he wasn't invited, but as he looked around the small apartment another picture began to emerge -
Spike hadn't left because of Dawn? The thought smacked him right in the face, leaving him a little shell shocked. Spike and Dawn? It was bad enough trying not to think about that year Spike had had with Buffy but this- No. It was impossible. He itched to confront the cheeky bastard, his fingers suddenly tap dancing across the table, his whole body restless. He grabbed a pen from out of an old jar on the counter and began twirling it between his fingers, concentrating on the action, trying to think of something to say - something, anything to break the stifling silence.
Dawn reached over and gently took the pen out of his hand, "If I was sleeping with Spike, wouldn't you have been able to smell it? Hell, Angel, when I lose my virginity I know you'll be able to smell it. So stop being weird." He stared at her blankly. She looked down at the piles of candy, cookies, and chips: "Who is planning on eating all of this?"
"Well... you?" Angel was still reeling from her previous statement and almost didn't catch the look of surprise on her face. As she looked up at him her face slowly moved from one of shock, to understanding, to sadness. She grabbed an armful of goodies and turned to place them in a drawer next to the oven.
"Right," she murmured softly to herself, "because you're supposed to love this, Dawn, remember?" She turned to Angel brightly and said, "Thanks!" a little too emphatically.
"Dawn listen, I didn't come here to bring you candy... Well I did.. but that's not the point. The point is--"
"The point is," she broke in, "you want to have a heart-to-heart about what Illyria said today." She looked up at him sadly. "Can we let it go for now? Please?"
"Dawn... you've been so.... different. Right? Since you got here you seem.... are you depressed?" He blurted out the last statement as if it was the hardest answer, but the one he was hoping for.
"Angel," Dawn sighed. "You remember me- right? As a little girl, as Buffy's sister. But everything you know about me.... it wasn't me. I didn't become me, the real me, the one standing here in the flesh, until after you left. So everything you know? Everything that..... that they wrote for me. Forget it."
"Forget it? I can't forget you... What are you saying here Dawn?" He looked to his left suddenly, "Is that an ash-tray!? Do you smoke?"
"Angel for god's sake!" Dawn started yelling out of frustration. "This isn't about Spike!" She sighed and sat down, silent for a moment. "For fourteen years someone else was writing my life, can you just try to remember that for a moment? My favorite color, my first day of school, my first word, my best friend - these things were created for me, not chosen by me. So - Willow, and Giles, have been helping me.... re-write things." She looked up at him sadly. "I'm working really hard to forget everything.... Well, I've kept mom and Buffy, some memories of you and Riley and the Scoobies. But everything else...." She sighed and Angel noticed for the first time how thin and tired she looked. "Every night I meditate, I take something away from myself so that I can start over."
"And Spike is here--"
Dawn interrupted him, "Spike was the first thing I chose for myself. Ours was the first friendship that I created... that I chose for me just for me all on my own." She shook her head. "He shouldn't have stayed here in LA... Buffy wants him with her--" she choked a little. "He's the family that I chose. This, LA - is the family that I'm choosing for myself. You, Cordy, Connor," she nodded her head with a smile towards the bathroom door that was slightly ajar, "Dennis."
"Dawn," Angel took a step towards her, "Buffy loves you..."
"I know," Dawn said softly. "But she wasn't meant to have a sister. And that's okay. She doesn't know it and -- it will always just be something that I know that she can't know. I have to hide that from her she'd... she wouldn't understand. Willow doesn't really understand most days... You'd think that you would, after everything that happened with Jasmine." Dawn stood up to put some more ingredients into the bread machine on the counter.
At that moment the door opened and Connor burst in. "I decided homework is for suckers..." he saw Angel in the kitchen and added, "No pun intended, pops." He grabbed a bag of chips and a package of licorice off the counter, "Sweet! High fructose corn syrup... usually Her GlowyOrb-ness only allows organic snacks." The look he shot Angel clearly said, "How oblivious are you, anyway?" Soon Connor was settled on the couch, the television blaring with the sounds of a post-apocalyptic video game. Angel stood silently in the kitchen as Dawn bustled about and Spike emerged from the bathroom, newly bleached by Dennis. After a half hour or so, Angel left, running home over rooftops. Dawn watched through the window as the men behind her laughed and joked until he was long out of sight.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
"You accused Dawn of shacking it up with Spike?" Cordelia shouted, throwing a pillow at his head the minute he entered the room that night.
"You sent me over there ... what was I supposed to think--"
"You really are dense sometimes, aren't you? Do you really think that Dawn or Spike would choose to be away from Buffy and the glorious mission if something wasn't up?" Here she paused, "Would you have?"
"Wait a second. How did you even find out? For that matter, how did she even know that was what I was thinking? I didn't even say anything..."
"Duh. Dawn's been hyper-intuitive since she got here. She txted me the minute you left the apartment. Haven't you been paying attention? Did you ask her about what Illyria said?"
"She needs more time."
Cordy nodded. "Good, that means when she's ready to talk, she will. If you can stop being a blind idiot, maybe she'll even choose to come to you first this time."
"She told me...." Angel looked down at Cordy, struggling to understand what had happened that night, and how to tell her.
"She told you that she's erasing the memories those monks gave her. I know. Willow told me. And Giles sends me an email every week, detailing what she's given up. She's made a lot of progress the past couple months. Completely changed even her taste in food."
"The candy thing."
"Right."
Cordelia sat down on the bed and patted the spot next to her for him. He sat down and she turned to him. "It's got to be difficult for her, to reinvent oneself sounds like a dream come true, but it's taking a toll. She knew it would."
"She said Buffy--"
"Let it go." Cordy rubbed his back affectionately. "Dawn and Buffy are sisters, they'll always love each other. Dawn just needs some time to.... well, to be something other than ---"
"Her GlowyOrb-ness?"
Cordelia laughed, recognizing Connor's pet name for Dawn. "Wouldn't you want that chance?"
"So the aura-readings, that's...?"
Cordy sighed. "I talked to Lorne about it a few weeks ago. Dawn won't let him hear her sing, not until she's finished what she has to do with the monks and the meditation and all that. What he did tell me is that someone like her - all of that energy and power, has to be used by someone sometime. She has the opportunity to choose how to use her power and where to pour that energy into. Whether this new.... it could be part of her that we never saw before because... well, we weren't really seeing her. Or - this could be her choice."
"So we have to let it play out"
"We have to let her know she has a family here." Cordelia took his hand in hers and squeezed, "We're the family she chooses for right now. So yes - we have to let her grow at her own pace." She kissed his cheek and smiled. "We don't really have a choice, anyway."
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Summary- Dawn and Angel have a heart to heart
Characters- AtS/BtVS
Rating- PG-13
Disclaimer: To Joss we thank
Note- In the same storyline as "Life- An Experiment". I have no beta, so any mistakes are my own. Characters belong to Joss :) Any and all feedback would be appreciated - I've never written any form of fiction before, but Dawn is a character that I felt needed more time and what needs to happen I can't do in an essay - so here it is.
"We got a package from Willow!"
Dawn peeked through the window in Wesley's office to the entrance, Angel was standing there grinning like a kid at Christmas, holding a small box. Connor stood slightly to the right of him, trying to look manly and uninterested. Packages from Willow oftentimes meant something stinky and/or old for Dawn to research and while generally - Cool - tonight she was studying for a midterm in Statistics. Spike stood up from the arm chair in front of the desk where he had been painting his fingernails with the polish Dawn had brought with her and beckoned her out the door to where the others were gathering. Dawn looked down at the piles of paperwork, scrolls, and textbooks - Wesley's desk was now where Dawn's homework met the weird and wacky. Through the door came ooh's and ahh's that typically.... wait. Dawn perked up - Actual presents? She hustled out the door and into the lobby where Angel, Cordy, Spike, and Connor were staring intently at what appeared to be...
"Willow sent us iPhones?" Dawn queried. Cordy smiled up at her, handing over a crumpled piece of what appeared to be parchment.
"No one can read her chicken scrawl like you can, hun. Now tell us why we are all so blessed!?" Cordy's question ended on a little bit of a squeel. She had been wanting to upgrade her phone for months, but Angel still didn't know how to use his and felt it was a waste of money. Dawn had heard them arguing about it for a while, apparently being a PTB didn't change Cordy's need for the fashionable.
"Blessed?" Angel scoffed, "What is this thing? Are they weapons or some sort of fancy .... What is this? I need to get back to work."
"Come off it you...!--" Spike started to splutter, but Dawn interrupted him quickly. Lately Spike had been less than talkative, but when it came to Angel... well, things were worse between the vampires than ever before. Dawn shivered with the tension.
"Willow says that she magically upgraded the phones so that we can talk to each other face to face from now on." She looked up at Angel, "So now if you want to talk to Cordy, you'll be able to see her face on the screen." Angel looked down at the shiny black article dubiously. Dawn coughed slightly. "She also says that they're magically enhanced for each of us personally, we can't ever lose them because they'll find us, and can even work under water and are fireproof." Dawn looked up at them after skimming over the rest of the letter. "Since they're technically magical, that also means no more phone bill for you Cordy and--" Dawn paused while Cordy did a little dance, imagining all she could do with the extra money, "-- from what I can tell, if we're dealing with any one of over a hundred demon dialects, all spoken human languages, and a few dead ones - the phone will translate for us." Dawn tossed the phone in her hand to Illyria, "That one is yours, it will sort of hum or give off an unpleasant heat if you're holding one that doesn't belong to you." Illyria handled the small black device like a child would a shell found on the beach, turning and twisting it around expectantly.
"Sounds too good to be true," Connor mused while staring into the phone's shiny surface.
"How did you know that was Illyria's?" inquired Cordy. Dawn looked up at her in surprise.
"How--? Well... um... he... she - there was... um..." Dawn knew, just knew instinctively that the phone she had been holding had been Illyria's. Just as she had realized earlier that day that the small pendant she had found on the landing in her building's staircase belonged to Mrs. Frederickson's niece that visited her on Wednesdays after school. Dawn had never spoken to the niece and didn't know that she visited the old lady every week, but she knew. Somehow. As she struggled to put into words something, anything that would make sense to them, something from Willow's note - anything, she felt Spike tense up and move toward her protectively. Crap. If you and Angel get into an argument today I'll scream, she thought. Spike looked towards her suspiciously and backed of half an inch. "It's probably something Willow did... we'll all just know, you know?"
"She can read the auras of things," Illyria said flippantly, bored with the situation and taking the shiny new toy down to the basement.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
Connor put his rickety Jeep in park outside Dawn's apartment building, but didn't turn off the gas. Dawn murmured a polite "Thanks for the ride" and pulled at the door handle - but his hand on her arm stopped her for a moment. She waited, not looking at him. He sighed and let go of her arm, staring down at the steering wheel.
"Listen, Dawn," he always struggled with her name. Sometimes he ignored it altogether, preferring pet names like Spike usually did, but when he said it, it always sounded choked and unfamiliar. Like an English speaker trying to combat the name of an exotic ethnic dish. "Dawn," he said again, this time clearer and stronger as he turned to look at her, "I can't imagine what you're going through - what you've been going through, but--"
"Stop." Her voice was calm but emphatic. She couldn't take this talk from him. "You can't do that. You can't tell me that there's no way to know what it's like to live 14 years and then find out you're only a ball of energy 'but' .... there is no 'but' in this scenario." She looked steadfastly into his eyes, daring him to turn away. "You lived for 17-or whatever years in a hell dimension. I don't know what that's like. Period. I won't try to give you any thoughtful advice on what it means to be a "normal" human college student, or how to balance our wacky supernatural families with everything else... and neither will you - got it?" He nodded and smiled ruefully.
Dawn grabbed her bag and jumped out of the Jeep. "Hey Dawn," he said, leaning over the seat to talk to her. "One question - just between us freaks?"
"Sure."
"How do you deal?"
"I forget."
"Yeah." He nodded, understanding instinctively. "Me too...." he paused for a moment. "At least.... when I can, you know?"
Dawn nodded and turned towards her apartment where Phantom Dennis would be waiting with a pack of cards in the kitchen, and Spike would be perched on her balcony window, making sure Connor didn't take her for a joy ride.... or at least, got her safe home afterwards. Only, standing at the landing in front of her door was another vampire in a black coat with a weird obsession with hair gel - only this one wasn't as welcome.
"Angel," was all she could muster in greeting. He was holding a filled grocery bag, filled with either mystical wards or snack foods. Everyone knew Dawn's attention to sugary detail in her kitchen, she was never found with out Mambas in her purse, or peanut butter m&ms stashed away in a drawer. She'd been that way since.... Dawn shook her head and opened the door, beckoning Angel in with a nod and turning on the lights.
Sure enough, Dennis had the poker chips set up on the kitchen table, and a weird hint of peroxide was coming from the bathroom. Dawn peeked at the calendar on the refrigerator, it was the 15th: a bleaching day for Spike. Dawn had tried to break him of the habit, arguing that his natural, dark hair was more attractive, but he wouldn't hear of it. He'd been blonde since the late '70's and that was that.
Dawn ignored Angel and went to the kitchen, pulling out a bag of pita chips and some hummus. It had been a long day and there was no sense in cooking a large meal just for herself... though Dennis would sometimes snack a little and Spike seemed to enjoy the domestic setting that was created when she was cooking, tonight she'd just snack, maybe bake bread for tomorrow. Angel watched her from the entryway curiously. This mild mannered, careful and methodical Dawn was not the one he remembered from Sunnydale. He set the large bag of candy and snack foods on the counter and began unpacking it for her. He watched her busy herself with the task of laying out food, emptying the dishwasher, checking the expiration dates on cheeses and containers of pig's blood. Her long hair swayed as she danced nimbly around the kitchen and he began to have a sense that this scene was not for him. The pig's blood was decidedly not for him, he had not been to visit Dawn since she moved in months ago.
Does Spike come here so often that she keeps that much blood in the fridge? Angel thought. He really didn't know how to feel about that, he had guessed that Buffy left without Spike because he wasn't invited, but as he looked around the small apartment another picture began to emerge -
Spike hadn't left because of Dawn? The thought smacked him right in the face, leaving him a little shell shocked. Spike and Dawn? It was bad enough trying not to think about that year Spike had had with Buffy but this- No. It was impossible. He itched to confront the cheeky bastard, his fingers suddenly tap dancing across the table, his whole body restless. He grabbed a pen from out of an old jar on the counter and began twirling it between his fingers, concentrating on the action, trying to think of something to say - something, anything to break the stifling silence.
Dawn reached over and gently took the pen out of his hand, "If I was sleeping with Spike, wouldn't you have been able to smell it? Hell, Angel, when I lose my virginity I know you'll be able to smell it. So stop being weird." He stared at her blankly. She looked down at the piles of candy, cookies, and chips: "Who is planning on eating all of this?"
"Well... you?" Angel was still reeling from her previous statement and almost didn't catch the look of surprise on her face. As she looked up at him her face slowly moved from one of shock, to understanding, to sadness. She grabbed an armful of goodies and turned to place them in a drawer next to the oven.
"Right," she murmured softly to herself, "because you're supposed to love this, Dawn, remember?" She turned to Angel brightly and said, "Thanks!" a little too emphatically.
"Dawn listen, I didn't come here to bring you candy... Well I did.. but that's not the point. The point is--"
"The point is," she broke in, "you want to have a heart-to-heart about what Illyria said today." She looked up at him sadly. "Can we let it go for now? Please?"
"Dawn... you've been so.... different. Right? Since you got here you seem.... are you depressed?" He blurted out the last statement as if it was the hardest answer, but the one he was hoping for.
"Angel," Dawn sighed. "You remember me- right? As a little girl, as Buffy's sister. But everything you know about me.... it wasn't me. I didn't become me, the real me, the one standing here in the flesh, until after you left. So everything you know? Everything that..... that they wrote for me. Forget it."
"Forget it? I can't forget you... What are you saying here Dawn?" He looked to his left suddenly, "Is that an ash-tray!? Do you smoke?"
"Angel for god's sake!" Dawn started yelling out of frustration. "This isn't about Spike!" She sighed and sat down, silent for a moment. "For fourteen years someone else was writing my life, can you just try to remember that for a moment? My favorite color, my first day of school, my first word, my best friend - these things were created for me, not chosen by me. So - Willow, and Giles, have been helping me.... re-write things." She looked up at him sadly. "I'm working really hard to forget everything.... Well, I've kept mom and Buffy, some memories of you and Riley and the Scoobies. But everything else...." She sighed and Angel noticed for the first time how thin and tired she looked. "Every night I meditate, I take something away from myself so that I can start over."
"And Spike is here--"
Dawn interrupted him, "Spike was the first thing I chose for myself. Ours was the first friendship that I created... that I chose for me just for me all on my own." She shook her head. "He shouldn't have stayed here in LA... Buffy wants him with her--" she choked a little. "He's the family that I chose. This, LA - is the family that I'm choosing for myself. You, Cordy, Connor," she nodded her head with a smile towards the bathroom door that was slightly ajar, "Dennis."
"Dawn," Angel took a step towards her, "Buffy loves you..."
"I know," Dawn said softly. "But she wasn't meant to have a sister. And that's okay. She doesn't know it and -- it will always just be something that I know that she can't know. I have to hide that from her she'd... she wouldn't understand. Willow doesn't really understand most days... You'd think that you would, after everything that happened with Jasmine." Dawn stood up to put some more ingredients into the bread machine on the counter.
At that moment the door opened and Connor burst in. "I decided homework is for suckers..." he saw Angel in the kitchen and added, "No pun intended, pops." He grabbed a bag of chips and a package of licorice off the counter, "Sweet! High fructose corn syrup... usually Her GlowyOrb-ness only allows organic snacks." The look he shot Angel clearly said, "How oblivious are you, anyway?" Soon Connor was settled on the couch, the television blaring with the sounds of a post-apocalyptic video game. Angel stood silently in the kitchen as Dawn bustled about and Spike emerged from the bathroom, newly bleached by Dennis. After a half hour or so, Angel left, running home over rooftops. Dawn watched through the window as the men behind her laughed and joked until he was long out of sight.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
"You accused Dawn of shacking it up with Spike?" Cordelia shouted, throwing a pillow at his head the minute he entered the room that night.
"You sent me over there ... what was I supposed to think--"
"You really are dense sometimes, aren't you? Do you really think that Dawn or Spike would choose to be away from Buffy and the glorious mission if something wasn't up?" Here she paused, "Would you have?"
"Wait a second. How did you even find out? For that matter, how did she even know that was what I was thinking? I didn't even say anything..."
"Duh. Dawn's been hyper-intuitive since she got here. She txted me the minute you left the apartment. Haven't you been paying attention? Did you ask her about what Illyria said?"
"She needs more time."
Cordy nodded. "Good, that means when she's ready to talk, she will. If you can stop being a blind idiot, maybe she'll even choose to come to you first this time."
"She told me...." Angel looked down at Cordy, struggling to understand what had happened that night, and how to tell her.
"She told you that she's erasing the memories those monks gave her. I know. Willow told me. And Giles sends me an email every week, detailing what she's given up. She's made a lot of progress the past couple months. Completely changed even her taste in food."
"The candy thing."
"Right."
Cordelia sat down on the bed and patted the spot next to her for him. He sat down and she turned to him. "It's got to be difficult for her, to reinvent oneself sounds like a dream come true, but it's taking a toll. She knew it would."
"She said Buffy--"
"Let it go." Cordy rubbed his back affectionately. "Dawn and Buffy are sisters, they'll always love each other. Dawn just needs some time to.... well, to be something other than ---"
"Her GlowyOrb-ness?"
Cordelia laughed, recognizing Connor's pet name for Dawn. "Wouldn't you want that chance?"
"So the aura-readings, that's...?"
Cordy sighed. "I talked to Lorne about it a few weeks ago. Dawn won't let him hear her sing, not until she's finished what she has to do with the monks and the meditation and all that. What he did tell me is that someone like her - all of that energy and power, has to be used by someone sometime. She has the opportunity to choose how to use her power and where to pour that energy into. Whether this new.... it could be part of her that we never saw before because... well, we weren't really seeing her. Or - this could be her choice."
"So we have to let it play out"
"We have to let her know she has a family here." Cordelia took his hand in hers and squeezed, "We're the family she chooses for right now. So yes - we have to let her grow at her own pace." She kissed his cheek and smiled. "We don't really have a choice, anyway."
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