It's raining again. Giles can tell by the indistinct, smudgy way the light falls, as though it's grown weary on its long journey from the sun. The light limps in from behind the draperies and settles drowsily over the room, not so much illuminating as covering
( ... )
Shading his eyes from the drizzle, drawing his shoulders up to his ears, Oz leans forward when the buzzer squawks. It might be Giles, but it's hard to tell. Giles does have a friend named Olivia, but maybe Olivia is like the Brit version of "Jennifer". Someone with bronchitis, muttering into an obsolete speaker, definitely pissed off. The noise kind of hangs in the air like clouds of gnats at twilight, slow-moving swarms of them.
"Giles?" he asks, then realizes he probably needs to press the smeary button under the speaker's grille. Oz coughs even though he knows it's impossible to catch anything through the mechanism and tries again.
"Giles? Is, um. Rupert Giles there?"
He exhales slowly, but coughs anyway. It really is rainy here.
The voice is flat and distorted, as though it's a copy of a copy, and Giles isn't sure if that's the fault of the intercom or his aching head. Whoever's outside the door says his name, his full name, so it's someone who knows him. Or perhaps not, perhaps it's someone from the council come about his rates or something, although he thinks he's kept up the payments. Or someone from the other Council, the Watchers' Council, come about the final report he never filed and the post-assignment interview he never reported for.
Someone with an American accent.
And then he knows the voice. He's got to be wrong, it's impossible. But he knows.
"Oz?" It comes out as a whisper. Giles clears his throat, waits until his lungs remember how to work, breathes in. "Oz, is that you?"
At this point, Oz practically has his ear against the speaker. Giles's voice, rough and sketchy as it is, drifts right through his skull, meets his memories, matches up and resonates.
His thumb skids off the speaker button when he jabs it. Second, third try. He can't really feel his hands and his chest feels about three inches thick, and hollow to boot.
"Giles. It's me -" Dork. He knocks his palm against the damp bricks and tries again. "Oz. Can I -. Can I come up?"
Giles hasn't been afraid in months. Not since the moment before Buffy dived off the tower, fell eighty feet and infinite dimensions, and died. He thought she took his fear with her. When his flight to London hit a storm, with wind rocking the 747 and lightning skittering and bursting along the wings, he felt nothing
( ... )
Giles's hand in his hair is air and water and food, simple things you never think about until you're choking, drowning, starving. Oz tilts into the touch before he thinks about it, and then it's too late *not* to
( ... )
Under Giles' hand, Oz's shoulder bones feel as smooth and fine as good porcelain, the kind that lets the light through. Giles always liked Oz's thinness, the neatness of his body, the comfortable lapful he made. Now, touching the twig-and-onionskin fragility of a boy who hasn't eaten since Amsterdam, the memory makes Giles want to turn his face away in shame
( ... )
He knows promises aren't worth anything, not coming from him, but he doesn't know how else to say it. He holds Giles's eyes, promising with everything he has, fingers squeezing the blanket as hard as he can, until Giles nods and opens the door. Leaves.
Everything Giles says might as well be you left. It all translates back to that, just like everything Oz says translates down to I'm sorry. But at least they're talking, at least he's still here, with a blanket that - he checks, presses his face into his folds - smells like Giles, and he's out of the rain and Giles hasn't kicked him out yet
( ... )
Giles's face twists as he looks at Oz, as he speaks, penstrokes that skitter restlessly, spilling ink in curves and jagged spatters. His voice roughened and hoarse, and it sounds like the voice that Oz's own thoughts are spoken in, hesitant and confused, fearful and quiet. How long has it been since *Giles* spoke to anyone, really spoke? Since he ate, since he smiled? Is it arrogant for Oz to suspect - to *know* - that it was his doing, that Giles started to close off and shut down the moment they knew about the wolf? He doesn't want that to be arrogant. He knows it is the truth, but there is no pride there, nothing but sorrow
( ... )
"Here," Giles says once more. "With me." Three times they've said it, and three is a magic number. Fates and wishes come in threes; gods live in triple forms and die for three days. Powerful and sacred words, spells and vows, need three repetitions. He wasn't a Watcher until he swore the oath three times
( ... )
Giles stays in the shower until the water goes tepid and then cold. First he washes his hair twice, scraping fingernails over his itching scalp, rubbing the shampoo in. Then he scrubs himself several times with the expensive scented soap he found in the cupboard when he moved back in. Olivia left the soap for him. When he told her he was coming back, she had the flat cleaned ("lorryloads of dust, Rupert, and we won't talk about the nest of mice in the bedroom cupboard"), got his old furniture out of storage, stocked the place with food and toiletries, and even left a vase of irises on the kitchen table. She came round to see him the day after he arrived, and he supposes he must have thanked her. He took her out for a meal, and they talked quite a lot. Those things were easier, then, before he got so tired
( ... )
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"Giles?" he asks, then realizes he probably needs to press the smeary button under the speaker's grille. Oz coughs even though he knows it's impossible to catch anything through the mechanism and tries again.
"Giles? Is, um. Rupert Giles there?"
He exhales slowly, but coughs anyway. It really is rainy here.
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Someone with an American accent.
And then he knows the voice. He's got to be wrong, it's impossible. But he knows.
"Oz?" It comes out as a whisper. Giles clears his throat, waits until his lungs remember how to work, breathes in. "Oz, is that you?"
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His thumb skids off the speaker button when he jabs it. Second, third try. He can't really feel his hands and his chest feels about three inches thick, and hollow to boot.
"Giles. It's me -" Dork. He knocks his palm against the damp bricks and tries again. "Oz. Can I -. Can I come up?"
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He knows promises aren't worth anything, not coming from him, but he doesn't know how else to say it. He holds Giles's eyes, promising with everything he has, fingers squeezing the blanket as hard as he can, until Giles nods and opens the door. Leaves.
Everything Giles says might as well be you left. It all translates back to that, just like everything Oz says translates down to I'm sorry. But at least they're talking, at least he's still here, with a blanket that - he checks, presses his face into his folds - smells like Giles, and he's out of the rain and Giles hasn't kicked him out yet ( ... )
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