[location: a sidewalk cafe] hours of happiness more or less

[inquitvigiliant]

It's early evening, and a pair of men are sitting close together at a small table outside a little cafe. It looks like tea or coffee now, although there are the remnants of something that might have been a light supper or possibly dessert. Giles is dressed somewhat uncharacteristically in an old leather jacket that looks like it could have been

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[ location: a sidewalk cafe ]

[tothelibrary]

Because they're in a weird underground city where people who don't even know who you are think they have the right to talk to you like they know you, it isn't too much of a stretch that Dawn stumbles on Giles and Ethan while going to get her own food. (No more free stuff kind of sucks, but Dawn is saving up a truly massive told you so dance about the sheer number of clothes and shoes she hatched prior to the cutoff. She wasn't being frivolous, she was planning ahead.)

There are two options, here. Turn around and hope they don't see her, or... do what she does, which is plop her ass down in a chair at the table next to them-- but she does turn it towards their table, so that's something-- and then just stare, arms crossed over her chest defensively. This version of Ethan will recognize the stubborn set of her jaw as translating to something like 'I don't want to, I don't have to, you can't make me'.

[fuckyouripper]

...and if he'd been thinking that that heartwrenching conversation with Buffy might be the worst today had to offer, apparently whatever powers that be really have it in for Ethan. He can't even hand this one off to Giles - or at least he refuses to consider doing so, because it is Dawn and she's his girl-

Only she's not. Not even slightly. He avoids Giles's gaze as he makes up his mind and shifts a little so he can meet Dawn's defiant gaze. (Yes, he knows that look. He's even had it pointed his way more than once. Just- not like this.)

"Would you like the cliff's notes from our conversation with your sister before we start?"

[tothelibrary]

Her arms don't get any less crossed, but the hard set of her jaw softens slightly. (She doesn't like Ethan, he doesn't like her, but a mix of 'maybe in some world I actually have parents' and the deep, intense fear that someday she's going to wake up and no one will remember her means that he gets slightly less hostility-- and more leeway-- than he did at first. Solidarity in potential not existing, or something.)

"No. Just explain it."

[fuckyouripper]

"It's probably a glitch and it's definitely an alternate universe either way," he says, tapping his fingers against the table. He's restless and his gaze keeps wandering, but it always comes back to her- searching for just a hint of recognition, for indications that he already knows better than to think he'll find.

She looks older. He just feels old.

"Or were you looking for something more specific?" You know. Why he's acting like he's her dad, maybe.

[tothelibrary]

It's a little weird to have Ethan of all people looking at her like that. She's used to being ignored, in Taxon and at home it was about the same. She's still not entirely sure this isn't a trick, but... there's being wary and a brat, and then there's being cruel. (And then there's longing for a father you've ever actually met.) "You didn't know who I was when you first got here. The monks never gave you the memories."

She stares down at the table, tapping still short nails against it. (They almost all broke trying to get away from Angelus, so after Dr. McCoy took off the cast she cut them; the bruises are kind of stuck but she could fix the nails.) "You have them now. So." Another long pause. "Do you have shrimp?"

As olive branches go it's teeny and breakable and kind of crappy, but considering all her instincts say now is the time to whack Ethan over the head and snatch Giles back to the castle where they can de-spellify him, it's the best she has.

[inquitvigiliant]

Thus far in the conversation, Giles has been sitting quietly, watching his tea grow cold and doing his best to be as unobtrusive as possible. He's pretty angry with Dawn still, but things will repair themselves better if he lets Ethan do the talking right now. They always did have a connection that Giles never quite managed with the younger Summers girl, and he's hoping some little spark of that will make itself felt now.

He looks up at the seemingly incongruous question, catching it for what it is -- a sort of olive branch, an offer to at least consider the possibility that this Ethan hasn't hurt her the way some other version of him must have. Giles doesn't want to think about that Ethan, frankly.

"Yes, we have shrimp. It's...well I want to say it's perfectly normal sort of place, but then I suppose everyone would say that about the, um...the dimension they inhabit." It feels almost too bizarre to talk about his life that way.

[fuckyouripper]

Ethan appreciates the way Giles is refraining as much as he's appreciated the white knighting his partner has done on his behalf elsewhere in this ridiculous mess they've all found themselves in, and he links their hands almost absently. It's a toss up as to which of them he intends to comfort with the gesture.

"Shrimp and fond memories of the day I introduced my partner and a certain little girl finally accepted I wasn't dating her mother," he says, dryly, sipping his coffee. "The 'we wouldn't let you come if they were dates' excuse never held a lot of water. Rupert had to pony up as proof."

In fairness, actual dates had sometimes been 'taking Mia with them to the movies and calling it a day'.