Chapter Eight

Cordelia heard the car long before it turned into the driveway.  A muffler was the least of its needs, but one would do for a start.  She decided she'd go after Rupert to replace it.  Maybe tomorrow, as he didn't have to work.

When the muffler gave its last clack, she sat up in bed and waited for him.  In contrast to the car, she could hardly hear him.  A small click of the front door, the slightest rub of a shoe on the carpet.  Then, nothing, until he was suddenly in the doorway.

"Are you feeling all right?" he asked, when he saw where she was.

Cordelia nodded.  "Just tired, so I thought I'd crawl in here and read.  I'm picking up on your awful habits."

She was on his side of the bed.  He opened his mouth to say something about it, then closed it again.

"Get a muffler tomorrow, Rupert.  I could hear that thing cranking from blocks away," she said, her unruffled casual tone a contrast to the tense set of her shoulders.

"Yes, dear."

"I mean it."

"Yes, dear."  He took off his jacket and tie, and paused, looking out the back window.

She muttered a small curse.  When she'd first moved in, she got every single thing she asked for through an easy maneuvering of either giving or withholding sex.  Lately, it seemed, he was doing the withholding, and she was losing her position of power.  Five days now.  Here she was, in her sheerest nightie, the covers well down below her breasts, and he wasn't even looking at her.  Instead, he was staring at something in the fading light of the back yard, his profile mute and intent.

Probably, that car again.

"Could you pull the muffler off the Impala and put it on the Citroen?" she asked, not willing to let the subject drop, and also thinking it would keep him busy and hopefully clear of moody spells.

"It's Michael's Impala, not mine."

"I don't think he cares about the car anymore."

"It wouldn't fit."

More quiet.  Cordelia almost wished for the sound of the muffler again.

Then, entirely unnerving her, Giles whirled to face her.  "He said I need to remember."

"That Rabbi?  So you *did* go," she said, trying to recover her equilibrium.  "You remember some of it, Rupert."

"He said I need to remember it all, everything."

"How are you going to do that?"

"He says he knows a way."

A chill ran into her stomach.  "Remembering is supposed to make everything better?" she asked dubiously.

"It's the beginning.  We didn't get into details.  I…..left."

"Will you be going back?"

He didn't answer.  She sat forward and propped her elbows on her knees.  "Maybe he knows what he's doing.  Wesley thinks he does.  Anyway, all those iron pills aren't doing a damned thing, except making you impotent."

He put a hand to his forehead.  "Oh, Cor.  That's hardly--"

"Your hormones were ok in Long Beach.  Well, almost."  Cordelia straightened the covers over her legs, smoothing the satin edge over and over.  Her gaze fixed on that, she said, "Rupert, I want the man back that laid me in a frenzy in the school bleachers, the man that carried me into this house like I was a princess he'd just carted off from a tower.  All this gloom and quiet is getting on my nerves and the way you sleep like the dead…..God!  Frankly, I'm not sure why I'm putting up with it."

"Not again," he said, irritation in his voice.  "How many times do I have to reassure you that--?"

"Yeah, yeah, that we're in this together, yadda yadda," she scowled.  "But I'm not your partner Rupert.  I'm *waiting* to be."

He sat beside her, his weight rolling her towards him.  "Rabbi Mendi told me that anger, carried over a long period of time, turns into sadness."

Cordelia raised her chin.  "Are you angry at me?"

"Years, Cor," Giles emphasized.  "This is anger over years."

"Which takes me right back to, are you angry at me?"

"No, no."

"The pregnancy?"

"Ssh, Cor.  Not that.  Not the pregnancy."

"At Buffy then," she decided.

"It's not that simple."

"It's not, huh?  I can think of a few reasons in that particular area."  She met his eyes.  "And so can you."

"Don't.  Let it go."

"Maybe we could if you weren't joined to her, or whatever that claiming thing is that the two of you did.  This all started from that."

"We're not joined, that I can sense anyway," Giles said.  At her frown, he continued, "Cor, right now I can hear a drop of water travelling down a pipe in the kitchen, and the shift of the motor in the refrigerator's thermostat, just before it turns on.  I can hear the blood travelling through the artery in your neck."

"Rupert, that's freaky."

"But I can't hear Buffy.  Unless she's right in front of me, I can't see or hear her.  She's becoming blind to me."

"Angel said that claiming thing was forever, that it couldn't be broken."

"But I'm losing her."

"Fine.  Cut the apron strings, Rupert."

"I'm not her parent."

"And you're not her Watcher either.  I don't know what we all mean to one another anymore."

"Neither do I," he admitted.  He quieted for a moment, then said, "Rabbi Mendi said *I'm* doing it.  This…..blind spot…..I'm creating it myself, even though I'm not quite sure how."

"Maybe, Rupert, you've just had enough of her," Cordelia said softly.  He snapped back so quickly that he banged the bedside table and nearly toppled the lamp.

"No, Cor."

"Rupert--"

"Are you telling me I want to abandon her?  No, Cor.  I want her to survive, to live, to have things that other women do.  To have hope and a future."

Cordelia crossed her arms over her chest and asked, "Rupert, did you or did you not sit at that library table and declare that Buffy no longer needed a Watcher?"

"She doesn't."

"Well then!"

"Not for training," Giles said.  "Not to stand over her and make sure she knows how to work a crossbow, or to nag her into keeping up her accuracy with broadswords.  There is more to supporting the Slayer than that."

Cordelia thought for a bit.  "I guess.  I used to think of you as the detective, gathering clues, and she was the bloodhound, but she has Wesley and he has all of your books, though….."  It took a moment, then she said, "he's not quite the same as you."

He silenced, not sure if she was complimenting him or cutting the rug out from under him.  She had an ability to do both at the same time.

"Wesley is very smart," she said.  "Buffy also has Willow and Xander."

"So, whether I'm there or not is meaningless?" he asked harshly.  If she wanted a fight…..

Cordelia didn't take the opening.  "Rupert, I've never understood what it is between you and Buffy.  She has all these people around her.  More than, I think, other Slayers had, but she only seems to trust you."

"Me," he repeated uncertainly.

"Well, only if Angel's not around."

Giles abruptly rose and paced over to the dresser.  "Cordelia, you have an amazing ability to leave absolutely *nothing* unsaid."

She watched his ring and watch wing onto the dresser, then the belt fly towards the closet.  His shoes cracked the wall hard enough to leave dents.  "Rupert, we have to work on this British tendency of yours to repress everything before taking it out on your clothing."  Cordelia managed a nonchalant voice though, underneath, she was frightened.  Outside of how he'd been when he'd first come out of the hellmouth, she'd never seen him like this.

He stilled, stopping as quickly as he'd begun.  "Are you going back to see that Rabbi?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, sounding as though he'd just suddenly decided it.

"Are you coming to bed?  I don't want you to, unless you're…..finished."

He turned slowly and glanced at her small form in the bed.  In a quiet, wretched tone, he asked, "Cor, earlier you said I, uh, sleep like the dead.  What did you mean?"

"You get all cold and you hardly breathe."

"How long have I been doing that?"

"Guess," she scowled.  "And you think I leave nothing unsaid."

"You truly believe I'm dying."

"You seem to be headed in that direction, Rupert, though you're taking your sweet time about getting in your coffin."

She had a brusque manner, her head up defiantly, but a tremble was giving her away.

Giles pressed both hands to his forehead.  "Sometimes, Cor, I can't breathe.  Sometimes, I can hardly take another step."

He heard her move.  Her warm arms came around him, drawing him down beside her.

"And you never thought to tell me?  Sometimes you're such a dense man.  A dense, stupid man," she said soothingly.

"Your comforting leaves a little to be desired," he said against her neck.

She shrugged.  "For sure you'd better give that Rabbi another shot.  What are you doing Friday at one-thirty?"

"What?"

"I have my ultrasound then.  Come with me and see your baby."

"Already?  There's something to see already?"

"So the nurse told me.  A little head, two arms, two legs."

"So soon?"

Cordelia smiled at him, feeling a little bewildered by it too.  "Judging by the due date, it must have happened soon after our encounter in the bleachers.  You were kind of horny there for a while."

He knew what she was doing, and he was grateful.  On the other hand…..he blushed slightly.  "I think we, ah, both were."

"I don't recall pulling the car over in the middle of a highway and trying to get *you* in the backseat.  'Just for a few minutes, Cor,' you said, as if *that's* an incentive.  Did you think I was into speed racing?"

"You got into that back seat pretty damn quickly, as I recall."

"Faulty memory.  Alzheimer's."  She tapped his temple.  "Give me your bank account numbers before I have you put in a home."

Giles ran his fingers below her navel and touched her abdomen through the lace.  "We'll actually be able to see the baby?" he asked again.

"So I'm told.  You're tickling me.  Either press more firmly or not at all."

He removed his hand.  Sighing, she said, "You *can* press more firmly."

"I don't want to squash anything."

"I hope you're not like this with the second one, or the third."

"You're going to be fairly busy caring for these three children while you're going to university, studying, *and* doing all the cooking, cleaning, laundry, washing the car, re-shingling the roof, insulating the basement."

She slugged his side.  "I intend to sit around eating grapes."

"Let's just get through the first one, shall we?"  He sat up, though he still looked pale.  He undid a few buttons on his shirt before pausing to say, "Buffy came by the Museum today."

"So, they're back from the beach."

"She told me that Willow and Wyndham-Price have been seeing each other."

Cordelia looked stunned.  "Really?  She and Oz are over?"

"I didn't inquire.  It seems likely."

"Willow and *Wesley*?  How did *that* ever happen?  Oh, forget it.  You probably didn't ask."

"It was hardly my business, Cor."  He took off his shirt and folded it before putting it in the hamper.  Then he stilled again, half-turned away from her.  "I told Buffy about the baby."

"And did your secretary complain when Buffy started doing cartwheels out of your office?"

"Do you or do you not want me to tell you more about my days?" he asked tiredly.

"Actually opening your mouth and talking are part of the changes you promised to make if you want me to stick around here with you."

"And the changes you're supposed to make are?" he asked.

"I can't think of any," Cordelia said guilelessly as she laid back in the bed and stretched.  "If you can think of any little improvements for my end, let me know.  Just remember how vengeful I can be, Rupert."

He took off his undershirt and started on his trousers.  "Are you going all the way with this?" she asked, watching him through half-closed eyes.

"I, ah, was going to take a shower," Giles said, unsure of her meaning.

"Which requires taking your boxers off.  Why don't you do that here?"

"Sorry, I don't give a free show."

Cordelia grinned and flexed her legs again, which brought the covers down over her thighs.  "Lie down here with me first, Rupert.  You can touch me.  I can touch you.  Then you can touch me again."  She licked one of her fingers, running her tongue over and over the tip, while using the other hand to lift her nightdress.  Gazing at him intently, she spread her legs and pressed her wet finger into her vulva.

"I'll make you come," she promised.

He was hardening, the front of his boxers distending.  "Are you sure it won't--?" he started, but couldn't finish, mesmerized by the sight of her masturbating.

"I'm sure it won't.  Now take off your underwear and come to bed before I have second thoughts about *my* free show."  She stroked down between her folds, then up to her clit, rubbing it with the pads of her fingers.

He did as she requested, removing the last of his clothing and lying down beside her slowly as if worried that a fast movement would make her stop.  She lifted her mouth to his, flicking her tongue along his lips before kissing him deeply.

"It's ok," she whispered into his mouth as she guided his hand to her vagina.  Just as he delved into the slick moisture, she was urging his hand over to his penis.

"Show me, Rupert."

He rubbed down his shaft, spreading what he'd garnered from her sex.  Her fingers swept alongside his, adding more lubrication.

"Show *me*," he insisted, and she smiled before cupping her mound with her free hand.  She separated the lips, then arched into her palm.  The sight made him groan.

She grinned as she brought her fingers to his mouth.  He licked her wetness off them, catching his breath as she fondled his testicles.

He moaned once more before suddenly rising up to straddle her.  He put her hands over her head and held them there as he slid one knee, and then the other, under her thighs.  The position made her feel uncomfortably vulnerable.

"Lift your legs, honey," he murmured as he pushed the head of his penis between her folds.

"Let go of my hands first," she said, for, in truth, she couldn't get herself free, and her wrists were starting to ache from the pressure.

But he managed his way in without her help.

"Rupert, let go."

He didn't, nipping instead at the skin under her ear as he made a low sound that sounded like a growl.

Unnerved, she waited until he was in the high position of his thrust before knocking a knee hard against his ribs.

"Let *go*!" she snapped.

Startled, he did, then halted his movements completely.  His eyes, dark and unreflecting, met hers.

"*Don't* hold me down, Rupert!"

"Do you want me to stop?" he asked quietly.

"Yeah?  Would you?" she asked angrily, disbelieving him because he was close.  His erection throbbed brutally in her.

Instead of waiting for her answer, he completed his thrust.  She felt his hand come under her to cradle her up.  Then he began to rock.

"I don't want one now," she tried, but it was pleasurable regardless.  "Damnit, Rupert," she said between clenched teeth, but her hands were free, which was what she'd wanted.

"Tell me to stop," Giles said, though he wasn't sure, at this point, if he could.  He had no idea why she was angry at him, and a sickening cold fury at her teasing was very near to wiping out what little self-control he had left.  It was only the thought of the baby that kept him from shoving her down into the mattress and letting his own crisis come.  He could feel the burning tingle of it now, so near, setting his teeth on edge.  When, at last, he felt the rhythmic waves in her vagina, he cried out in relief and emptied his seed into her.

Immediately afterwards, he extricated himself and rolled to the edge of the bed.  "What the hell are you up to, Cordelia?"

"You held me down!"  She sat up, then hit him.  Hard.

He grabbed her hands, to keep her from another shot, and she yelled, "See?  You're doing it again!"

"Doing what?"

"Let go."

Confused, he did.  "Cordelia."

"You held my arms down and I couldn't get them free.  I felt like I was being raped."

Aghast, Giles stared at her.  "Raped?"

"You held me down," she repeated while she tried to cover herself with her nightie.  "I was afraid."

"Of me?  Goddamnit, Cordelia, *I'm* the one who's going to end up with the bruises."

"So that makes it ok?" she snapped back.

There was a moment of utter stillness, the only movement a twitching in his jaw, then he launched into a string of curses that would have sounded ludicrous to her coming from his mouth, except that the majority of them were so vile.

When he finally wound down, she muttered, "Holy shit."

"I'm sorry."

"Well, you did offer to stop.  It was just…..my hands.  It was starting to hurt."

"It shouldn't have come to that."

Cordelia studied him pensively.  "Rupert, do you think Rabbi Mendi can help you?"

"He says he can."

"What do *you* think?'

"I don't know," he admitted.  "I didn't want to see him in the first place.  I definitely don't want to return."  Giles looked over when she didn't respond.

"Do you know what you did at Angel's mansion, Rupert?"

"I remember Buffy.  I didn't know her name, but I knew I had to stay away from her.  I remember Angel at my feet, and then I was running towards you.  You kicked me in the groin.  *That* image is pretty clear."

"You were setting things on fire," she said.  "The couch, the floor.  You chewed a hole in Angel's stomach and nearly crushed his windpipe.  Despite all that, Rabbi Mendi knelt right beside you and prayed."

"You already told me that he did," Giles said, not wanting to hear this.

"Rupert, I don't really know what he was doing.  I mean, the praying part I got, but most of it wasn't in English.  And there was something going on with it.  It was more than the prayers you make in church.  I could tell by the way you reacted, and the way it felt in the room."  She met his eyes, then continued hesitantly, "In grade seven, a kid in my class did this thing for a science fair.  Static electricity.  He had a metal ball and, if you touched it, all the hair on your arm stood up.  It felt like bugs crawling all over you.  Well, that's how it felt when Rabbi Mendi was praying, like millions of lightning bugs were zipping around the room and landing on me.  You didn't like it at all.  You kept trying to edge away, but he moved with you.  Do you remember this?"

He shook his head.

"Wesley says this man knows about this stuff," she continued, "but I wonder how?  Because he lives in Sunnydale, or is there something more?  I mean, he seemed awfully familiar with it."  She checked a clock on the bedside table.  "It's too late now.  I'll call Wesley tomorrow, or," she straightened.  "Maybe I could call Rabbi Mendi myself."

"Why would you do that?" he asked harshly.

"I want to know what he plans to do, and you don't seem like you want to ask him."

"You want to know if it's safe for you to be here.  With me."

Cordelia pressed her hands to her belly.  "No," she said, in a strange voice, not looking at him.

"Let me see your hands."

"They're fine.  It's nothing."  Still, that odd tone.

He got up.  "I'm going to sleep on the couch."

"No, Rupert."

"Cor--"

"No.  I told you what happens when you sleep.  Stay up here, so I can keep an eye on you."

He stood, hating this feeling, everything out of his hands and the inevitable looming up like the black maw of a cave before him.  And no choice.  He had no say in it anymore.

"Lie down, Rupert.  Lie down and we'll go to sleep.  Don't go downstairs because I'll only have to go down there to check on you."

"Then don't check on me."

"But I have to.  It scares me."

"I scare you."

"No, whatever this is that's happening to you scares me.  I love you, Rupert.  Don't go downstairs.  Please."

Giles went to her, gathering her slight form in his arms and holding her gently to his chest.  "I'm so sorry," he said, his voice breaking.  "I'm so sorry."

---

Buffy opened Wesley's front door and peered around cautiously, but there was, fortunately, no reckless scene of passion to disturb.  Wesley sat at one end of the room and Willow at the other, both reading, heads bent over their texts like twin bookends.

They looked up simultaneously at her entrance, furthering the twin aspect.

"Ah, good.  You're here.  How did it go then?"  Wesley was on his feet immediately, swinging his hands behind him like he'd just begun guard duty at the Queen's palace.

Buffy sank into a chair, sliding forward until her posture was the complete opposite of his.  "Nothing to report."

"No vampires?"

"I think that falls under the nothing."

"Ah."  He regarded her curiously.  Another mood.  Really, the young woman seemed to have an endless supply of them.

He glanced across the room, meeting Willow's eyes, and caught the silent message behind the look she returned to him.  Yes, something was up.  No, she didn't know what it was either.

"Shall I make tea then?"

"Tea?" Buffy repeated dubiously.

"Something stronger?  Uh, coffee?"

"The coffee you make is pretty strong, Wes."

Was that good or bad, he wondered?  But Willow cut in, "Coffee would be ok, Wesley, please."

He went into the kitchen, grateful for the task.  He'd offered tea to Willow earlier, but she'd declined.  Wesley wondered if she actually did like coffee, or if there was some other beverage she preferred.  He should ask, and then stock up, some encouragement for her to come here, to have more evenings such as this one.  It had been tranquil, her reading across the room while they waited on Buffy, and the shy smile she gave him every time she caught him looking at her.

He could hear her now.  Yes, those were definitely her footsteps, not as light as Buffy's but still graceful.  He waited until they stopped before opening a cupboard to get the coffee filters.  Extraordinary how a few seconds of footfalls could sound so pleasant.

There wasn't much noise around him.  The Slayerettes had invaded his home, creating an inordinate amount of clutter, but they hadn't brought much in the way of actual sound.  Farther back in his life, there'd been two energetic sisters, four feet pounding like ten, scampering up and down stairs and calling for him endlessly it seemed.  Adorable little tormenters who sent his books crashing to the floor every time they flew in his room.

He'd had a private room in university, but one within the dorm, the hallway a venue of constant traffic from the serious students in the morning to the drunk ones wheeling in at night.  The quiet started when he'd gone to the Watcher's Compound, placed within the monk-like interior of the student building while he strained to hear the hushed tones of the tutors.  Quiet now expanding to this place, this city, whose streets felt empty even during the brightest days.

He'd once driven down the main road with his stereo turned so loudly, he could feel the bass vibrating in his skull.  Ridiculous, really, but he'd been driving away from the library after yet another figurative kick in the teeth from his supposed Slayer.  If she could make a racket, so could he.  But the clamor from his stereo dissipated almost immediately after leaving the car, as though Sunnydale possessed an invisible black hole that absorbed sound waves into nothingness.

He heard a chair scruff over the carpet and debated going upstairs in order to give the two women some privacy.  Wesley wanted to call Giles anyway.  Buffy and her former Watcher were tied together, and perhaps her mood had something to do with that end.

As Wesley started towards the doorway, he heard Willow's footsteps once more, then she came into the kitchen.

"Can I help?" she asked.

"Yes, um, cups and saucers are in the cupboard behind you."

He got a tray as she located the china.  "Cream and sugar?" he asked and she nodded quickly.

"Lots of sugar.  Your coffee is strong."  Willow bit her lip.  "Not that it's awful or anything."

"It likely is awful," he admitted.  "I'm a tea drinker."

She reached for the sugar bowl behind him, brushing his sleeve.  "I could teach you how to make it, um, coffee…..if you wanted."

"I would appreciate that."

She smiled, a warm smile meant just for him.  Then she went up on her toes to kiss him, before taking the creamer from his hands and setting it on the tray.

"It's ready," Willow said, after a glance at the coffee maker.

"What?  Oh!"  He poured it out while standing near her, hoping she would kiss him again and apprehensive that she might while he had a hot carafe in his hand.  She let him be, so after he replaced the pot in the machine, he leaned down and gently kissed her.

"I wondered what was taking so long."

They broke apart at Buffy's voice.  As she took the tray, she added, "That was *not* a sight I needed to see."

Self-consciously, they followed her out to the dining room table.  Buffy took a cup and started plunking sugar cubes in it.  To Wesley, she said, almost off-handedly, "I saw Giles today."

Perhaps he didn't need to make that phone call.  "How is Mr. Giles?"

"He still looks white around the gills.  And his secretary is going through menopause."

Willow made a startled noise, and tried to cover it by hiding her mouth with her cup.  Buffy looked over.  "I'm sorry, Will.  That's what Giles told me."

"I-is he feeling any better?"

"I don't know," Buffy took a cautious sip of her coffee and reached for the sugar bowl again.  "He's lost weight since I saw him last.  He didn't get much of a tan in Long Beach either.  Oh, and he and Cordy?  It's not a fly-by-night deal.  I think they're in for the long run."

"They have been together for a few months," Willow said softly.  Then she thought through Buffy's statement.  "What did Giles say?  I mean, about Cordelia?  Did he say the "m" word?"

"What word?" Wesley asked.

"Marriage," Buffy said.

Willow bolted upright, nearly spilling her coffee.  "He *did*?"

"No, no," Buffy said quickly.  "He didn't say that word.  *Nothing* about that word."

"Then why would you think--?" Willow started.

Buffy shrugged.  "Just the way he talked about her.  It sounds like the 'till-death-do-us-part thing."

Wesley didn't really care to hear this part.  Bringing the conversation back to an earlier point, he interjected, "But he didn't look well?"

Buffy shook her head.  "Actually, Wes, he looked terrible.  Did you say you sent someone to see him?"

"Rabbi Mendi."

"Could you ask him to go again?  Either him or a doctor?"

Wesley nodded.  "I'll call him tomorrow.  First thing."

Was it a trick of the light, or did Buffy look relieved at his reply?  He'd actually said something she wanted to hear?  He looked to Willow, but she was focussed on Buffy, her look almost one of trepidation.

Wesley waited until Buffy finished her coffee before saying, "I'll drive you both home."

Noting the emphasis on the word 'both', Buffy cast a significant glance between he and Willow.  "Wes, you don't have to be a gentleman in front of me."

"He's a gentleman behind your back too," Willow said.  "That didn't sound right, did it?"

"I got it," Buffy said as she got to her feet.  "Besides, I'd rather walk."

Willow well recognized when Buffy was pivoting around the unspoken.  She thought of it as fringe talking, running around the big ball in the middle while pretending it wasn't time to give it a stiff kick.  Oz had the same quality, but he'd only ever required asking.

"We can walk together."  Willow put on her resolved face.  The fact that it didn't work on Buffy made Willow wonder just how big the ball in the middle was.

"I want to look for some vamp to beat senseless.  It's a Slayer thing," Buffy said.  "I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"

"Beating demons senseless is not actually part of Slayer training," Wesley said.

"Yes it is, right under 'Fun Things Your Watcher Doesn't Want You To Know About'."  Buffy pulled on her shoes but, at the door, said, "Remember Wes.  Watchers who are not nice to Slayer's best friends get beaten senseless too."

"Bewildering," Wesley stated, after the door shut.  "Something to do with Mr. Giles, no doubt."

"And with Cordy," Willow added, not looking at him as she put empty cups on the tray.  Cordelia wasn't a subject Wesley cared for, and Willow wasn't sure she wanted to know any particulars of why.  "I haven't seen Giles' office.  I could take him a plant.  He used to have a spider plant in the library, only he usually forgot to water it and it died, so maybe I could get him a cactus.  They don't need a lot of water, do they?"

Wesley took a moment to catch up after her run-on sentence.  "No, they don't, generally."

"I'm not sure when Giles' hours are.  I'll have to call the museum.  And you're going to call Rabbi Mendi, right?"

"Yes."

Willow sighed as she took the tray to the kitchen.  All this running around.  It would be so much easier if people just opened their mouth and spoke right at the beginning of things.  She didn't have that direct quality herself, but, darn it, she was sure starting to miss Cordelia who possessed it in bulk.  Cordelia who just opened her mouth and *told* you.  And if you didn't like it, tough tarantulas.

Giles, in contrast, was the quietest, most cautious man on the face of the planet, which made Willow wonder again how Giles and Cordy had *ever* come together, and how they still were.  In it for a lifetime?  How could Buffy tell?

It might be easier to go to Cordelia, the source as it were, but Willow never emerged unclawed from a conversation with Cordelia.  Giles would be the longer route, but definitely safer.

She heard Wesley come in behind her.  "What are you doing?" he asked.

"The dishes."

He opened a lower door.  "There is a dishwasher."

"I guessed there was one, but I didn't want to go poking."

 He took the cups from her and put them in the appliance.  "I should drive you home, Miss Rosenberg."

She loved the way he said that.  Such high formality, even when they'd been in the middle of…..she reddened.  '*Not* thinking of that,' she told herself.

Which didn't help.

If they actually went all the way, would he call her by her first name then?  She considered it as he got his keys and bent to tie a loose shoelace.

Probably not, she decided.  If they got married, however, then he'd have to…..

Whoa!  Marriage?

Sane people did not think about *that*, especially when they hadn't even been dating for a week.

Willow straightened so suddenly, her side whacked the counter.  Wesley's head came up in concern.

From his half-crouched position, his head was on a direct level with hers.  Willow studied him, wondering if she could bear to look at his face for *her* lifetime.  She'd once read that criterion in a magazine.  Before you say yes, make sure you can stand to look at him day after day after day.

"Miss Rosenberg?" he asked, struck by her inexplicable expression.  "What is it?"

"I think I could stand to look at you," she said.

He peered at her.  "Oh…..good."

"I'm not saying that I would.  Just that I could," she added, flustered now.  "I know it's only been three dates, and that night at the Bronze *does* count which makes it three rather than two, but it's like I've been talking to you for eons.  And that's all I'm going to say because a sane person wouldn't even have said this much."

He wasn't sure, but it sounded like a compliment.  He'd missed the gist of it, however, he usually did.

"I tend to babble.  I guess you've noticed," she said unhappily.

"I prefer the--" he almost said noise, but finished, "conversation."  He straightened, then added thoughtfully, "Has Sunnydale always been so quiet?"

"Quiet?"

"There are no hooligans playing stereos or banging drums at ungodly hours.  No stadium.  No sports activities or parades."

"We are only the size of a village, after all," Willow said.  "And on a hellmouth.  That tends to dampen people's spirits."

"Most of the residents do not know this is a hellmouth."

"But you can feel it all the same."  She glanced outside the dark kitchen window and shivered.  "It's oppressive."

"Yes," he agreed.  "And something is coming.  Look at those clouds."

Willow hated looking at clouds.  She knew that, out in the world, there were white billowy clouds resembling bunnies or dogs.  She'd actually seen a few in Long Beach.  In Sunnydale, the cumuli were always gray and heavy, like the dust of a thousand vampires obscuring the atmosphere.

'And might well be,' she thought, after a glance at the dark streaked sky.  Who was up there?  Balthazar.  Luke.  Darla.  The Master.  Unmentionable and unknown others, dispersed but not gone.

As she stood there, looking out, she sensed Wesley behind her.  He must have moved from the doorway to the window.  She could smell his herbal cologne, feel the warmth that came from the presence of a living person.  Maybe this was what Giles and Cordelia understood.  Even if you were only looking out a window, it was much nicer to be doing so with someone.

She moved back, settling against his chest.  His arms came around her, his forearms crossing over hers, his height making her feel as though she were enclosed in blue twill.  Ever since his arrival, she'd heard the jokes.  Wussley instead of Wesley.  The comment that he screamed like a woman, which he'd apparently taken to heart.  He'd well earned it all, with his soggy Council-bred conceit and inability to bend even the tiniest rule.  And, when she'd been held hostage by the Mayor, he'd argued against trading the box of spiders for her.  Not a big plus.

Willow sighed inwardly.  When Xander told her about it, she'd been hurt beyond belief.  Reluctant confirmation from Oz made her unable to look at Wesley, much less be in the same room with him.  Underneath her anger was the cold belief that he'd been right.  The cost of her life to prevent an Ascension.

She'd been to the memorial afterwards, heard twenty-three names called out, most of them belonging to people she'd known…..Harmony, Larry, two teachers, eighteen assorted parents, uncles, aunts…..and Snyder.  Twenty-three people because she'd been saved.  Every single graduating student forced into a terrifying screaming battle, because she'd been saved.  The loss of Giles' library, which had been his home more than anywhere else…..her again.

Buffy had shrugged it off.  There'd never been any choice.  The box of spiders for you?  Of course!  That couldn't have been the only box in the world.  We're talking a delay here, Will.  Wilkins would have just opened up his Sears catalogue and ordered another.

But Willow had spent hours upon hours in Wesley's house since, and the books were all here.  Giles', Wesley's, all of them.  And she'd found it.  The Box of Gavrok.  There'd only been the one.

She'd spent days crying.  Actually weeping until her eyes were so red and swollen, she couldn't see across the room.  She didn't want to die, not yet, not for years and years.  But twenty-three people had, two of them her age, and they'd probably not wanted to die for years and years either.  What had they felt in that last moment?  What sort of terror had they known as black oblivion grabbed them?

There was no resolution, no getting around it.  She'd cried herself to pieces, and it hadn't mattered, hadn't lessened the burning comprehension whatsoever.  This understanding was far more loss of innocence than when Oz had taken her.  She wanted to live.  If the circumstances repeated, she'd still want to live.  But, oh God, the cost.  She didn't have the right.

If this was a glimpse of what Buffy and Giles carried around with them, then how did they do it?  How did they go on?  No wonder Giles so rarely smiled.  Buffy too, for that matter.  Since her eighteenth birthday, Willow had hardly seen her smile at all.

She must have trembled again, for Wes' arms suddenly tightened around her, as if to steady her.

"Wesley," she asked slowly.  "If that box of spiders circumstance ever came up again, would you trade them for me?"

"What?  What?" he asked, sounding stricken.  Why was she asking such a thing?  How had she thought of it?  How had she gone from clouds in the sky to *this*?

"You know, when the--"

"Yes, yes, I know."  In his agitation, he was rocking her side to side.  "But there won't be.  An Ascension is once in a thousand years."

"But, would you trade me?"  Her voice was so small, so low, he could hardly distinguish the words.

"Yes," he said.  She knew, he realized.  She knew what he'd said, that he wouldn't have exchanged for her.  Who had told her?  The werewolf?  Buffy?

"Please understand," he tried.  "The way I was trained, the logic, soldiers died, civilians died, but we couldn't stop for them.  It was bigger than the cost of--"

"Of a single life?"

"I thought it was wrong, when I came, to see how much Mr. Giles loved the Slayer.  I thought, because of it, he'd forgotten what he'd been taught, that the battle would be lost because he wouldn't….."  Wesley took a breath.  "But now, I see.  For one life, the cost can be immeasurable.  If it came up again, I would trade those damn spiders, each and every one of them.  I wouldn't hesitate.  Please believe me."

"But it would be wrong."  Willow felt the tears start again as she said it.

"No," he said, firmly now.  "I would do it."

"Wesley, twenty-three people died because--"

"Yes," he said.  "Because of you, because of me.  Mr. Harris wonders if he made a mistake, if he didn't call the retreat soon enough.  Miss Summers thinks she waited too long to goad the Mayor.  Me, I was of no help to anyone, down on the ground within the first second.  This hurts us, all of us."  He eased his grip, turning her around so that he could see her.  "Have you been holding onto this all of this time?  Why didn't you say something?  I thought we were able to talk, you and I."

"Over the phone."

"Then, why didn't you call me?"

Willow found herself smiling somewhat.  "As jokes go, that's lamer than Xander's puns."  She burrowed back against his chest.

"Everyone hurts in this," he murmured.  "I don't suppose that makes you feel any better, though."

It didn't, and it did.  She closed her eyes as he hugged her again.  He was rocking her too, or it was herself, swaying unconsciously.

"Miss Rosenberg, what did you mean when you said you could 'look' at me."

She felt the heat of her cheeks redden.  'Nothing.  Just something dumb."

"I suppose I should find it comforting that you can actually stand to look at me."

She caught the joke that time.  "You're bearable."

He laughed.  She felt it in his chest before she heard it.  Then she felt him bend to kiss her, light kisses on her forehead and cheeks.  She reached up to put her mouth to his, deepening the embrace, feeling a tingle start as his hands stroked down around her waist.

He broke the kiss before the sweetness gave way to hunger, and said, "I have an appointment in Rohler the day after tomorrow, a book dealer.  He may have a particular volume which would be of use to us.  Anyway, I mean to check it out.  Perhaps you might accompany me?  We could stop for tea afterwards."

"I'd like that.  Giles and I used to haunt bookstores, before he got…..busy."

His hands resumed caressing her, moving down over her hips and around to her back, but lightly, his touch slow and careful.  "It's late," he said, after a glance at the kitchen clock.

"No, it isn't," she said, which made him smile.  He put his lips back on hers.

---

Chapter Nine