"Hi ... Cordelia. Are we? ... I think we're early."
Cordelia stared at the deceptively petite-looking Slayer in front of her. Impeccably dressed, although a little too retro for good taste, Buffy Summers peered curiously at the former cheerleader through eyes that betrayed a sparkle of a smile. Evidently she too had never had the privilege of seeing Cordelia Chase in this condition.
It was a privilege shared by the rest of the Scoobies, notably Xander, Willow, Giles, Dawn and ... Spike.
Spike?
"What's he doing here?" The question popped out of her mouth unbidden, and it was all she could do to stare incredulously at the lean vampire, blinking through semi-bleary eyes at his bleached blonde hair. "Why is Spike, undead vampire guy here? Outside my apartment?" She pointed an accusing finger at him. "And you are so not invited in dead guy! I've got a G-H-O-S-T protecting me, so try anything and you die." She paused, repeating her own words in her head. "Okay, you know what I mean."
"Yeah," Spike paused sardonically. "It means you can S-P-E-L-L. Nice that. Imagine that comes in handy at work and all. Nancy boy must really appreciate that."
"Enough!" Buffy stepped in, putting a stop to what promised to be an entertaining few hours of bickering between Spike and Cordelia. She addressed the blonde vampire. "Spike, you promised you'd behave yourself if you came along. It's not like we had to take you with us. This isn't apocalypse-type stuff, this is a social call. On friends. Our friends. Now stop with the nasty or next time we head out into the sunlight there won't be a nice blanky between you and exploding into flames."
"No one knows why you're here Spike. We won't miss you for example, if you, oh I don't know, disappear and never be heard from again?" Quipped Xander, turning around to the vampire.
"Yeah okay, I get the point." Spike smiled sarcastically at Buffy, totally ignoring Xander's jibe. "Get rid of me good and proper. I told you to come up with a better line than that Slayer."
She ignored him. "I'm sorry Cordelia, I know we're like, a couple of hours early. But we thought that it'd be better if we did most of our driving at night, since, well--" she turned and gestured to Spike, "and we thought we'd get settled into the Hyperion and stuff, before you guys had to do your investigating ... and other stuff."
"... And then, well, when we got to the Hyperion, there was no one there." Willow, her short, layered hair flying unruly due to the long car ride, waved her hands expressively. "And then we thought, oh, Angel must be doing his super investigating stuff, and so we ..." She trailed off.
"... So you guys came ... here." She glanced over to Giles, standing wearily at the edge of the door as he smiled apologetically. Spending a couple of hours in the car with the Scoobies, a teenage girl and a bratty English vamp must've taken a lot of energy for the quiet librarian.
Cordelia smiled back. No matter what her outward mortification was at allowing herself to be seen in this less-than-stellar condition, the materialising of a large part of her high school past had a surprisingly uplifting effect. She unleashed her full-blown, devastating Queen C smile.
"Don't worry about it guys ... come on in." She stepped aside to let Buffy in, and the rest of the gang followed. She smiled tentatively at Dawn as she walked past, wondering fleetingly how long it'd take her to teach a ball of pure energy to dress properly. But then she realised that Dawn was Buffy's sister, so ... the lack of style was fully explained.
Spike stood in the door way, unable to enter. Seeing Cordelia's mouth harden, he protested aloud. "Oh come on! I can't hurt anyone! Ask the Slayer! I can't bite anyone, can't hurt any living thing, blah blah blah." He appealed to Buffy. "Go on, tell her."
Buffy looked tempted to leave him out in the hall way, but softened a little, sighing resignedly. "He's right. He's impotent. The Initiative put some sort of chip in his brain that prevents him from hurting people. He's like ... not dangerous. He can't even bite you."
Spike protested loudly once more. "Ooi! Nice way to make a guy feel not-evil there. Might as well dress me up in one of those white fluffy bunny outfits and have me give out Easter eggs to the kiddies. I'm a bloody vampire. I should be dangerous!"
Cordelia lifted a perfectly plucked eyebrow but decided to accept Buffy's assurance. If the vampire slayer was okay with a vampire, who was she to question it? Besides, she didn't really care.
"Oh all right." She threw a warning glance at Spike. "I invite you in. But if you damage anything, or suck my blood, you're dead mister! As in, you'll be way deader than you already are!"
Spike smirked at her as he stepped into her apartment but kept silent. He was really looking forward to how Angel handled this little spitfire. Should prove interesting.
Cordelia switched into hostess mode. "Okay, anyone want drinks? Giles? Tea? Cos you know, I actually have some."
Before Giles could express his surprise at finding tea in Cordelia's apartment the bathroom door flew open, framing a semi-naked Angel against a back drop of steam. His glistening, athletic body was covered only by a hastily wrapped towel. His eyes were focused on a small tub of gel in his hands, and his demeanour was one of typically repressed agitation.
"Cordy! How many times have I told you not to use my hair gel? It says 'Angel's hair gel' for a reason you know! Maybe next time when you run out, you should, oh I don't know, tell me, because ..." Angel's ranting was cut off abruptly as he stood in full view of everyone in the room, standing stock still in absolute shock.
Cordelia pressed her lips together and tried vainly not to smile. She had almost forgotten that Angel was in the bathroom, and ... well, she guessed she could've warned him. Or something. Buffy's mouth formed an 'O' in astonishment, but oddly, there was little else in her eyes but surprise. And some repressed laughter. And maybe a little admiration, if Angel had possessed the ability to flatter himself at that moment.
"Wow Angel, that's ... more of you than I ever wanted to see." Xander's voice snapped Angel out of his prone state, and his hands fumbled clumsily at his towel. Damn. The towel seemed to be slipping ... which didn't make his situation any better.
He couldn't think of a smart reply to Xander's sarcastic jibe. Could this day start off any worse?
"Hey Xander. Buffy. Giles." He looked over beside the librarian, and greeted Dawn and Willow in turn, who were both smiling openly, not without some element of appreciation. And Spike.
Wait a minute.
Spike?
"What the--?" Suddenly forgetting the fact that he was a) almost naked, b) in the presence of the Slayer and c) thoroughly unintimidating without his game face and black coat, he lunged without thought at his former acquaintance. And was stopped by Cordelia.
"Angel!" She lightly touched his elbow in restraint. "Buffy says he's all impotent now, the Initiative guys put something in his head that prevents him from hurting living things. So it's okay ... okay?" She smiled at him, and Angel felt the tension draining out of his body.
He felt odd. And then he remembered his unclothed state.
"Ah ... okay, ah ..." Angel gripped for the right amount of dignity. For any dignity. "I'll ... just go get dressed now. Away from here."
"That's ... a good idea. L.A's kinda chilly and all in the mornings ..." Buffy quipped, her tone decidedly neutral.
Suddenly struck by the weirdness of the situation, Angel made a hasty exit from the room.
There was crystal still silence for a moment, and then Xander spoke up to allay the curiosity of the Scoobies. "So ... Angel takes showers here much?" Buffy perked her ears up, although she outwardly remained quite calm and controlled. Seeing Angel, comfortably walking around in Cordelia's apartment almost-naked without any awkwardness seemed to her quite impossible from what she knew of him. She sighed inwardly. But then again, he was different now ... she was different now, and strangely she was looking forward to getting to know a bit more about Angel and his life in L.A.
This was what their trip had been about. Ostensibly it had been by group consensus to visit Cordelia, and to a lesser extent, Angel and Wesley in L.A. After the recent traumas with Glory and the associated apocalyptic-induced stress, they'd all come to realise just how important their world was. And in particular their friends, and to an extent, the people they had never had time for.
So it was a time to mend fences, bridge gaps ... and stuff like that. Things were slow, or as slow as they would get around the Hellmouth, and Giles had even expressed enthusiasm for the trip despite loathing long car trips with loud pop music in general.
But for Buffy, the reason was clearly Angel. Yes, she definitely wanted to get to know Cordelia better, but her ultimate goal was to have a chance to get to know Angel. Really know him, as she had never known him before. Retrospectively she sensed that she had never really known him, never really peeled back the outer shell that he used to envelope his self-loathing. Their world had been completely filled by each other, their passion and love crowding out anything and everything between and inside them. It had been all consuming, irrepressible and ultimately, it had overtaken them. A dangerous passion. Something that could wipe out who they were without effort, a tide of inexorable feeling that could wash away their feeble resistance with a blink of an eye.
That was why they could never really be together. She understood that now, understood better now that Riley and her mom were no longer with her. That talk with him in the cemetery opened her eyes for the first time -- to Angel, to life, to love.
Love can be everything or it could be nothing; and love between people will last forever, no matter how it was they loved each other.
She loved Angel and always would, and he would always love her. She no longer feared that one day he would find his love for her to have melted away like last season's snow, or washed away like sand from a beach. Love was a permanence, a comfort, because it was eternal. Riley had loved her and always would, even if he was dead and gone.
With this understanding it had become increasingly difficult to not re-establish contact with her former lover. There was doubt in her mind as to whether they could make that difficult transition from passionate lovers to close friends. Could it really be done? And then she had realised just how little she knew of his life here.
What kinds of demons did they fight? Cordelia had mentioned to Willow about a rough patch a few months ago. What had that been about? Questions buffeted her mind with a ferocity that was hard to quell.
Cordelia was explaining matter-of-factly to Xander about her and Angel's curious arrangements. Deciding to discard awkwardness at the outset, Cordelia didn't let the semi-shocked and amused glances from her former high school friends perturb her. After all, they weren't in Sunnydale any more. This was her turf.
"So, Angel sleeps here sometimes 'cause of your visions?" Willow said sympathetically.
"And also the gourmet food. You'd think a guy with a steady diet of blood, blood and oh, blood wouldn't know that much about you know, food, but he does. He cooks the most delicious omelettes!" Cordelia could hardly contain her enthusiasm, especially due to the fact that her stomach was now actually growling at her.
As if on cue, Angel stepped back out into the living room. "Okay, so I'm thinking that Cordy's filled you in about the important ... stuff." He paused dramatically, scanning the room. "Whose up for omelettes?"
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