Title: Gathering Dust
Author: Ling
Posted: 08-10-2002
Rating: R (What can I say?  I've got a dirty mouth, er, fingers, er, mind.  Um.  Shit.)
Email: lifebounce@yahoo.com
Content:
Summary: "You'd write a eulogy for me?  That's sweet, in a creepy way, considering you're probably the person who'd kill me."  Cordelia removes the last pieces of her life from Sunnydale, and in the process runs across an old, familiar face, much changed by time and unhappy love affairs.  It is in mutual misery and blustering unawareness that something sparks between the two, and in L.A., at Angel Investigations, a love already blossomed is threatened by an attraction revealed. 
Spoilers:
Disclaimer: The characters in the Angelverse were created by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt. No infringement is intended, no profit is made. John Milton's work is, of course, his own, and used with only deep respect for one of the Masters.
Distribution: Nothing Fancy has express permission; anyone else, please inquire at lifebounce@yahoo.com before posting this story.
Notes: This story is not fluff. Go away.
Feedback:

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Part 3

The destroyed building reeked of Peaches.

Spike felt that if he and Angel were to meet without one or both of them ending up in a dust pile, it was of paramount importance that they discuss his Sire's methodology of killing.  Angelus had been one of the most stylish murderers in the history of the world; in fact, in England, some years prior, one flaming git had even ripped off Angelus' kill, and kept on doing it for an ungodly string of prostitutes.  While Angelus hadn't exactly been amused with the copycat, at least he'd been somewhat flattered.

But now, Spike noted with some disgust, picking through the remains of the vampire nest, Angel was apparently a member of the "smash-and-dust" club.  Furniture was broken everywhere, and there was a heavy coat of dust on everything in sight.

"Disgusting!" he cried.  "Christ, even the Poof should be able to do better!"

He'd considered a hotel, and realized he'd blown all his money on cigarettes.  Lacking the urge to rob anyone, he'd just asked around to find if there were any passable nests of vampires around, even though he was really above that sort of crap.  It was only one day, he'd comforted himself.  The next evening, he'd go straight back to find the Cheerleader, and he'd ask her a few questions.  Not that his being able to ask was any guarantee that she'd answer him.

The more he'd thought about it, the more something seemed off.

He kicked away a few stray pieces of debris to reveal a dust-covered bed.  Rolling his eyes, he set about shaking former vampires from the sheets, lost in his own thoughts.

The Cordelia Chase he remembered from Sunnydale was special: well-dressed and armed with a quicksilver tongue that was razor sharp.  Still, these weren't characteristics that defied explanation or repetition, he'd seen more than his share of stylish, quipping females.  But now, Los Angeles Cordelia who was bronzer and curvier and who seemed to have aged a decade in just three years had something indescribable about her.

He'd been distracted by the scent of her menses the first time he'd seen her, but the dance club had given way to strange new realizations: Cordelia was more than human.

She wasn't...not human, but she was more than human.

It was almost as if someone had added something to her, poured in a capful of the divine while they were remolding her, wiping away a soul's excess to replace it with pure, white light.  He'd never felt that burning on his dead flesh before, and something told him that lacking Cordelia, he'd never feel it again.  It wasn't a flash of sensation, it wasn't the moment; it was 100% pure Cheerleader mojo; and he was desperate to find out what exactly she had been tainted with.

He lay down in the bed, staring at the old, watermarked ceilings and sighed.

If she wasn't human, he let himself wonder, then what?  And why hadn't anyone in Sunnydale heard about it yet?  Or had they already, and decided to keep it a secret?

And if she wasn't human, would he hurt her?

William the Bloody said both "yes" and "no" at the same time, torn between the visceral need for a kill, and the unquenchable thirst of curiosity; dead women didn't tell secrets.

+++++

Cordelia, despite the Cheerleader stigma, had not been much of a hard-partier or drinker while in high school.  She'd made idle plans to go to keggers in college, but everyone in Sunnydale and on her father's side of the family already knew how that had worked out.

And while there'd only been three Alabama Slammers involved in last nights festivities, she'd listened to pounding techno until God-knows-how-late, and danced with Spike.  She had good reason for feeling nauseated; no one in their right minds would hold it against her if she was late for work, or if she skived off completely.

But then Wesley's hopeful-cum-nervous-cum-disapproving face appeared in her mind, and she sighed in misery, resting her hot cheek against the cold tile of her shower. 

She'd always been told that life was filled with difficult moments, hard decisions, and awkward-to-painful love affairs, but as a younger woman, she'd never really bought into it.  As Cordelia Chase, she felt she was somehow immune to all the crap that seemed to plague the human race in general and more specifically Cry-Buffy.  But then there was that ugly Boyfriends Turning Evil and/or Dying thing, followed by The Rebar Incident, and she didn't even want to remember the Being Impregnated by Demon Spawn thing.  It was undeniable now: her 'perfect' life was just as fallible as anyone else', probably more so, if only because she'd lived in deluded seclusion so long.

And having to tell Angel about Spike first thing in the morning was proof positive that there was some greater force out there in the Universe that hated her with enviable passion.  It had propelled her toward L.A. when she could have gotten a somewhat less fashionable job and put herself through school, despite her family's problems; it was the same force that had instructed her to bite back her pride and ask Angel for a job.  It was the same force that made her stay, that made her care, that made her spend some nights staring at the sodium-orange lit streets of L.A., torn between the urge to run screaming into the wind, and the need to creep into the Hyperion, to settle at the edge of Angel's bed and watch over him, to stoke his hair and comfort him.

She allowed herself a pitiful moan, happy to know that only Dennis could hear her, and that he was bound in silence and loofah-secrets forever, anyway.  She could already imagine the consequences of her telling Angel, and before noon, too!  "Angel," she'd say hesitantly, almost afraid, looking already for the nearest exit, preferably into sunlight.  The brooding Champion would turn around and pin her like a butterfly with one of his "well, what are you going on about?" looks and render her completely stupid-nervous, and she'd babble for a bit before saying, "So, yeah, anyway, I danced slutty with Spike last night and he didn't try to bite me or kill me or even hit on me, and well, I was sort of insulted, but I was pretty buzzed at the time - "

And then Angel would simply die on the spot. 

He'd just burst into spontaneous flames and fizzle down to a pile of ash, still glaring at her accusingly, as if to say, "Look what you did!"  When it came to his crazed grandchilde, Angel was short-tempered, when it came to his Seer being stupid, he was short-tempered and markedly violent; mixing the two could only have negative consequences.  Then, a few moments later, Wes in all his wide-eyed British curiosity would come in and throw a fit ("Oh, goodness, Cordelia!"; showing his extreme surprise and disgust with a slight, barely noticeable widening of his eyes, repression leaking over into physiological responses) before ordering her to find the vacuum cleaner and have a vision simultaneously.

She grabbed for her shampoo, idly pouring some out into her hands and working into her hair, realizing only when it was too late that she'd used too much.  It was a habit borne of an entire life spent with long locks.  Her father and mother used to think that she was such a beauty, such a perfect example of all the positive Chase genes.  "Grow your hair out, Cordelia," her mother had said, softy, wistfully.  "It's so pretty."  And so she had, until she'd gotten to L.A. and decided that enough was enough, and chopped it all off.  So, the new Cordelia Chase could balance their books, wrestle fees out of reluctant clients, fight evil, get visions from the Powers That Be...and be defeated by copious amounts of shampoo.

She chuffed in annoyance and let the hot water sluice down her back; these were things to worry about when she arrived at the Hyperion, not for her relaxation time in the shower.

Not that her obligations at the Hyperion were ever separated from her life at home: visions couldn't be turned off because she wanted to crawl into bed early, demons didn't take evenings off, and it could be cold, damp, and foggy, and some God-forsaken vampire would still decide to go and kill people.   Evil did not break so that the forces of Good could regroup.  She turned the water off, finding that the water was no longer relaxing, and stepped out of the tub into the steam-filled bathroom.

Each day was another fight; she'd just have to learn to face whatever came her way.

+++++

Angel was almost glad when Connor woke up and started to cry.  Normally, as a new, single father, he spent most of his day tiptoeing around his son, intermittently terrified of the infant, annoyed beyond words, and madly in love; crying was just background noise, but still, it could be earsplitting.  Today, it gave him an excuse to get up without having to dignify something that was definitely contradictory to a safe and friendly work environment.

"Morning, Connor," he said softly, patting his son gently on the back, the hiccupping sobs of the baby quieting.  "I gotta say, kiddo.  You've learned some pretty good timing."

He'd spent most of the night previous clutching his pillow, wide-eyed and miserably half-asleep-but-not-quite.  He alternately stared at the ceiling, out the window, and at Connor.  It was nearly four in the morning already before he'd been able to drift off, and then he'd found himself awake moments later with a painful hard-on and blushing the color of a beefsteak tomato: the human body was not meant to bend like his dream had shown; unfortunately, his mind kept reminding him that Cordelia had taken dance most of her life.  She was probably more flexible than most.  'Oh, God,' Angel thought miserably.  'This can't go on.'

But the slick-hot smell of her menses stayed, as well as the silken texture of her skin, the softness of her hair, the look in her eyes when she held Connor.  All of these things were burned into his mind, with great and worrisome detail.  Angel had never had a bad memory, but it had never been this sharp before either; it was as if his consciousness was taking snapshots of her at hundredth-of-a-second intervals, and his subconscious mind was hoarding all the developed images. 

As far as coming clean about how he (might, he told himself) feel about her, the whole thing was unacceptable.  He'd loved only one woman his entire life, and it was Buffy.  When she'd died, it had killed him all over again; when she'd been revived, he felt newly scarred, not nearly as relieved as he should have been.  Some part of his mind understood that what had happened in Sunnydale and the kisses that he and the oh-so-young Slayer had shared were something sacred, bound by the strength of first loves and soulmates.  He'd built himself a shrine of grief, and he had no right to stray from it, much less betray by admitting a (possible) affection for someone else.

That and there was the curse.

Oh, sex wasn't everything, people would kid themselves.  But when it came down to it, sex was the end all and be all of a romantic relationship, cuddling and sweet nothings were nice, but nothing quite replaced the need for enveloping heat and the utter bliss of being completely contained by another human being.  It was a necessary closeness that sex provided, and not just the sex itself; making love was another form of communication, and as every pop psychology book enjoyed saying, communication was the key to any relationship.

The night before had been a big mistake: even just one evening together had left him completely addicted to her. 

Vaguely, bouncing Connor on his shoulder, he thought back to a movie he'd seen some years back, about some heroine addict locking himself in a room with a bucket for three days straight in order to clean up.  'I just might have to,' he thought painfully.  Three days, on the other hand, would not be enough in this case.

It was at that moment he heard the security alarms being disarmed and the sound of Wesley's voice bouncing off the walls of the Hyperion's enormous open lobby:

"Morning, everyone."

There was the sound of rapid footfalls before Fred's high, sweet voice called out in reply, "Mornin', Wes!  Gosh!  I'm just as hungry as a horse!  You think Gunn'll be here soon?"

Angel strolled out and looked over the second floor railing, taking in the images of Fred and Wes, leaning casually against the Hyperion counter, smiling.  They looked nearly carefree.  Cordelia had been vision-free for nearly a week already, and there weren't cases of any particular import waiting for their attentions.  The vampire could not keep the fatherly smile from his face: they were his family.

As much as he might have wanted to, yearned to taste Cordelia and to fall asleep beside her more often, and less clothed, that was not an option.  Laying waste to this fragile reality that harbored him, that cared for his family and created a safe place for his son was out of the question.  It was unimaginable; what if Angelus arose again?  Connor would be dead before he had a chance to cry, Cordelia would be next.

There were so many horrible things that Angelus had done to women, and he'd  savored them all.  He'd seduced them, tangled his skilled fingers into their tresses and gazed deeply into their eyes; he'd stolen their hearts and then stolen their breath, keeping them in bed and fuzzy-almost-awake for days, lingering on the edge of ecstasy before taking it all away.  The difference between the forceful, violent nature of earlier lovemaking and rape seemed a gaping void, and the screams still echoed in his nightmares.  Women, so many beautiful women who had been cored and died and bled on his hands.  So many firelit nights of silken sheets and honey-sweet terror, innocent and pure-tasting.

No, he could not risk Connor, and he could not risk Cordelia.

And so the spell was broken, the decision made.

Angel took a deep breath and hit the top stair, pausing just a moment longer to stare at the people in the lobby, to take in their warm, chattering voices, and to thank whatever faceless force was kind enough to offer him this for however long it might last.

+++++

In the middle of breakfast biscuits, Cordelia made her entrance.  She was stunning in a white chemise shirt and dark jeans.  Angel made a conscious effort not to gape, but realized that it didn't really matter: she wasn't paying any attention to him, and he had Wesley to thank for that.

"Looking good, Barbie," Gunn commented, almost leering.  Angel noticed peripherally that Fred's smile seemed to harden a bit at the young man's tone.  Almost unconsciously, the young physicist took a few possessive steps forward to place her shoulder just before that of the black man's, almost as if she was marking territory.  The vampire shrugged it off; Fred couldn't like Gunn, could she?  He'd only just spent an hour a week previous listening to Cordelia complain about how Wesley and Fred had a great "chemistry thingy going on," and how neither of them had "the balls to do something about it."

"You know, Cordelia," the ex-Watcher said in mild amusement, "that shirt you're wearing was considered underwear back in Angel's heydays."  Angel's eyes widened as he realized that Wes was right: he remembered paying a good bit to see bar wenches in more than what Cordelia was wearing.  He bit back the roaring urge to toss his duster over Cordelia and shoo her toward some more respectable place to buy clothing.

The Seer sniffed at the comment, saying only, "You have no eye for fashion, Wes."

"But a great eye for underwear, apparently!" Fred chimed in.  The entire lobbyful of people turned around to stare at her, and Wesley turned an uncomfortably red color.  "That came out all wrong," Fred added, voice small and squeaky.

"Of course it did," snapped Cordelia, who had been first to recover, "we all know that Wesley lives on a fastidious diet of boring gray boxers and Hanes undershirts."  Wesley made a sharp, enraged sound, and his eyes flared in annoyance; Angel did nothing to hide his chuckle; Gunn was seized by a coughing fit that sounded suspiciously like hysterical laughter; and Fred still stared down at the ground, her cheeks flaming. 

While the crew was occupied with laughing at Wesley, Cordelia set her purse down and tugged on Angel's sleeve; she jerked her head toward Wesley's office, and mouthed, "Gotta talk."  The vampire almost gulped, but only remembered at the last moment to show no fear.  Behind them, Gunn murmured something else, which made Wesley yelp and Fred giggle. 

Angel was normally collected, calm, and the epitome of the dark, handsome stranger.  He did not fall victim to such things has babbling.  It was beneath his station in life and unlife to act like a blithering idiot.  Though, ever since he'd found himself dreaming impossible things, caressing impossible things, and fathering impossible things, "blithering idiot" had come up a lot more often than he was altogether comfortable admitting.  It was starting to wear on his last nerve: even lovestruck as he had been with the Slayer, she'd never caused a traffic accident in his brain.  Angel was convinced that it was the combined effect of Connor and Cordelia, an inescapable pairing that held worrisome weight in his mind.

Cordelia was leaning against Wesley's desk, looking conflicted.

Angel closed the door behind himself and crossed his arms tensely, looking at Cordelia with a nervous glint in his eyes.  He knew that if he opened his mouth, "blithering idiot" would return with a vengeance, and so he kept it stubbornly shut. 

"So," Cordelia started, her voice catching a bit. 

Angel cleared his throat, and picked at the wallpaper.

Cordelia played with her hair and said.  "I went out.  Last night.  Dancing."

He looked up at her oddly.  So it was That Conversation, the one that he had he'd never have to have with anyone from Angel Investigations, but most especially Cordelia.  "I've met someone," she would start, a bit nervous, but warming up to the idea.  "He's, he's a stockbroker."  He would cock an eyebrow at her, frantically trying to stop himself from running him down to the basement, into the sewers, toward whoever the stockbroker was, and to kill him slowly.  "A stockbroker?" he'd say tonelessly.  She'd nod, and continue, enthusiastic now.  "His name is Heath, and he's worth oodles of money.  We've been dating on and off for months now, you know, in between visions and quests and that junk - " Angel would wince at this " - and he proposed last night!  While dancing!"  And then, Angel thought, he would reach his absolute low with the thought: 'I bet he's a much better dancer than I am.'  At that point, Cordelia would declare her intention to quit her day job, run off to Morocco for her months-long honeymoon (insert liberal teeth gnashing), and phone in all her visions.  Eventually, Angel would get stupid and desperate and try to use Connor to blackmail Cordelia into staying in L.A.; then all hell would break loose.  When it came down to the end, Cordelia would threaten him with Holy water, slip on her new Jimmy Choo's, and walk right out of his life.  Variations of The Conversation had played in his mind for as long as he'd known that he couldn't work without Cordelia.  Though the profession of the man in question and Cordelia's hairstyle had changed, the end result had not: he was alone again.

"Dancing," Angel forced himself to say. 

She nodded eagerly.  'And so it begins,' Angel thought.  "Yes, with the dancing."  She paused before taking a deep breath, gathering her courage.  Forcing it out in one long sentence, she said, "I went to Sunnydale and gave Spike an umbrella and yesterday night when I went out dancing he came and found me and we made with the slu - uh, dancing and I think he's in L.A. because of me or you but probably you and he wants to give back the umbrella and I don't know why."

Angel blinked at her.

Cordelia held her breath.

'It's not The Conversation!' one side of Angel's mind rejoiced.  'She danced with Spike!' cried the other half.  Neither seemed to be winning the war of wills over whether or not to be enraged, so Angel just stared at his Seer for a moment before asking:

"Has he threatened you?"

She shook her head.  "No, but he was all, um, touchy."

Angel raised an eyebrow and his muscles tensed.   "Ah."  The latter voice overcame.

Cordelia opened her palms and raised her arms in a peacemaking gesture.  "Look, don't do the stalker, crazy, "I have to kill him now" thing with Spike just yet okay?"  Angel looked at her as if she'd grown a second head, which, even with the oddness of their day-to-day workload, wasn't seen as frequently as Cordelia had supposed.  "I mean, he doesn't kill people anymore!" she argued.

"He can't kill people anymore," Angel argued.  "That's not the same thing."

"It's close!" she said.

"Not even in the same neighborhood."  Angel glared at her before asking, "Why did you dance with him, Cordy?"

There was silence. 

It shouldn't have been the heart of the issue, but it was, and Cordelia knew it.  Sometime in between peppering his blood with cinnamon, pulling shotgun pellets out of his body, and being verbally mauled by his wicked side, they'd made a segue.  It was so subtle and soft a change that she'd barely noticed it; but The Change had existed all the same.  They were not lovers, not spouses, but they were more than friends.  Neither could freely go and be with other people, not with responsibility withstanding: Seer and Warrior, there was a bond there that they couldn't carelessly abandon.  And even if she didn't care for him so, there was that divine responsibility.  She'd spent a great deal of time earlier in their relationship being incredibly angry with the brooding vampire: what great force had allowed for all of this to happen?  What made Angel so goddamned important that the Universe could force to a halt her life and all that she deserved in order to die for his redemption?  Why did she have to stay?  Why did all the helpless need her to offer hope?

And then she'd buried the question away, decided that it wasn't as important as each grateful faces that she saw while leading them away from the scene of disaster.  In the background, the almost-comforting sounds of Angel mauling and maiming yet another monster drowned out the terrified screaming of one barely twenty-one year old girl in the back of her mind, weeping as she cried, "I never wanted any of this to happen!"

She was as faithful as she could force herself to be, and sometimes, it was an uphill battle.  More than once, she'd taken Angel's car keys and the emergency cash supply that they kept at the Hyperion and started driving away.  Her most spectacular breakdown, she'd made as far as Salt Lake City before throwing up behind a diner and driving back to Los Angeles, shaking and pale.  Angel must have smelled the sick and motor oil on her, felt the very exhaustion and terror seeping from her skin, but gave no comment aside from a flicker of his dark eyes as she placed his car keys back into the right pocket of his black leather duster.  He had not comforted her then, so dangerous was the line they walked upon: if he allowed himself to give her warmth, protection from herself, then he would no longer be serving some preordained force, instead, he'd be indulging in feelings that he was not allowed to have towards his reluctant Seer. 

Oh, Cordelia Chase was scared: night-terrors and cold-sweats and dry-heaves and scared about everything and anything, but that couldn't rule her life.  She wouldn't allow that to happen.  It simply wasn't an option; what would happen if she did?  How would Angel get from place to place without his car?  He'd have to walk, and that would equal one crispy-fried vamp before one certain Shanshu.

She finally took a breath and answered him honestly.  "I wanted to."

Angel raised his eyebrows, numb with surprise.  "Why?"

Cordelia Chase narrowed her dark eyes as him in mute anger, the same rage that built up behind her eyeballs every time she found herself passed out on the floor of the lobby or on the steps or in some ungodly corner of the Hyperion, head throbbing from her latest vision. It was the same rage that had consumed her for four straight days, that had shattered all her crockery and dishware when the doctors had told her the truth about her "condition."  The same anger that - if she was brave, if they were different - she longed to unleash upon the vampire before her, to inflict her pain upon him, to make him see. 

"I've been in Los Angeles for three years, Angel," she said softly, through gritted teeth, "and the only time anyone has ever looked at me with want in their eyes was the first time I ended up preggers with demon offspring."  She did not bother to wait for a reaction before adding, "I wanted to be wanted."

Angel gasped for unneeded breath.  "You are wanted, Cordy."

The nickname made her flinch.  "I'm needed," she corrected.

The want which filled the vampire would have frightened her, and that was the reason that he could only need her, that he could not simply desire her as a normal man would an average woman.  They could not pretend to live the status quo; it had been the down falling of his relationship with the Slayer, and the eventual justification for his departure from Sunnydale.  He could not show her half of what he wanted from her, and conceal the rest: madness obscured; he just didn't have the strength.

"That's close," Angel whispered, feeling dangerous; something had happened to Cordelia.  The open, honest smile that usually started at her lips and sparkled in her eyes was nowhere to be found and she looked bitter.  Somewhere inside, a petulant voice said, "She started this conversation!  Why is she getting angry?" while another part murmured, "Because it's so long overdue."

Cordelia hissed.  "Not even in the same neighborhood."

+++++

"No," Cordelia said with gritted teeth.  "Go do the fighty thing."

It was the first thing she'd said since the fight.

Typically, when Cordelia and Angel argued (which was actually more rare than it sounded), they'd snipe at one another and the rest of the Angel Investigations crew would snipe at them in return. 

This had been something unusual.

There had only been one disagreement during which Cordelia had reacted with silence as opposed to screams, and that had been when Darla had appeared at the Hyperion nine months pregnant with Connor.  Cordelia had subjected Angel to the silent treatment for over four hours, and then it had gotten frightened out of her after Darla had bitten her.   Still, during that brief span of time, Fred, Gunn, Wes, and Lorne had all been on edge, not to even make mention of Angel's state of mind.  Cordelia wasn't a frightening entity when she was silent: the possibility of what she was plotting was.

This had been without precedent.

The Angel Investigations crew had heard no yelling from Wesley's office (they knew this for certain, as they'd all pressed their ears up to the door with water glasses); they'd heard no sounds of physical violence; and they detected no signs of bad magic altering Angel or Cordelia's behavior.  So whatever had happened between the two of them, it had been quite, hurtful, and absolutely disastrous to the general filial atmosphere of Angel Investigations.  The pressure was horrible, and Fred swore she was actually suffocating from the quiet that seemed to eat away at them all.  Wes, the traitor, was hiding in his office, slightly removed and comforted by his books.  Gunn, that even worse traitor, had muttered something about needing to get his car serviced, and stumbled out of the Hyperion without so much as a glance backward...which left Fred alone.

Which had been her worst nightmare since the beginning of time, anyway.

But twenty minutes of deathly misery later, Cordelia had rattled off an address, mentioned something about bloodthirsty demons, and went to get a V8 Splash.  Angel hadn't batted an eye before tossing on his duster and stalking after her, demanding that she speak to him about what had happened that morning.

Fred thought that he would be better off just leaving, but didn't say so.

"Cordelia - please - "

"No!  Go away!  Do the fighty thing!"

'This,' Fred thought darkly, 'is getting really stupid.'

Obviously, it was not a very serious vision or else That Tone would have come into Cordelia's voice and not even the prospect of having a vicious argument with his Seer would have stopped Angel from booking it to the site of injury.  Cordelia, on one level or another, entertained this argument simply because she could: both Fred and Angel knew this, and understood it to be a good sign, if not great, by any measure of the word.  Cordelia had been known to entertain all sorts: if it wasn't Xander, then it was goofy, half-demon warriors from hell dimensions and their offers for com-shucking.

"Cordelia!  I am not moving from this spot until - "

And at that moment, Fred knew something was coming. 

It was all in the widening of Cordelia's brown eyes, the way her lips narrowed to a straight line, and how spots of red came to her high cheeks.  Some selfless part of herself wanted to save Angel, the other parts knew to run away instead.

"I'm kept around this rotting old hotel because you need Vision Girl!" she suddenly exploded, the red spots on her cheek growing darker with each word.  "Wesley is so in love with Fred and preoccupied with his research that he hardly looks at me unless I'm on the edge of death or I've done something incredibly stupid!"  Fred tumbled from her perch on the counter, but neither Angel nor Cordelia noticed.  "Gunn is so twisted up between hating you and being your best friend and beating himself up over his sister that he can hardly care about anyone else!"

Cordelia paused for breath, heaving, tears shining in her eyes.

"And you," she said in a hush, "you're the worst of all."

Angel gaped at her in horrified silence.

"You...you walk around here being everyone's hero, you slap us on the back, you help us when we're down, and you lie to me all the goddamn time!  When it comes down to it, I'm just here because you need to shanshu."  She was sobbing openly now, the tears streaming down her face and her breath hitching in her throat; she was trying desperately to talk around the lump in her throat.

This had been building for so long.  The muted anger of that morning had only acted as a catalyst for The Argument that both had been avoiding.  They could not hope to live in infinite ambiguity; personal relationships were defined not because they could be, or people wanted it so: they were defined because lack of clarity led to implosions.

And for the moment, they fell silent, too exhausted to go on.

TBC