Part 75
“So, Angel is coming back.” Fred said again just to be sure.
“Later tonight.”
“Does Cordy know?” Gunn jumped on the counter.
“I didn’t get that impression.” Wesley shook his head.
“So, he‘s coming back, fine, but did he dump Cordy?”
“Angel would be surprised if he had.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Yes, Gunn, I am aware of that, but Angel wasn’t making much sense. He’s under the impression that Cordelia was yelling and trying to kill the punching bag, just like I’m sure he would attribute her slamming around upstairs to the fact that she doesn’t want to go to the doctors not because he is going to see Buffy, his I quote ‘old girlfriend’. In fact, he expected Cordy to go with him but for the doctor’s appointment. Of course, Angel didn’t tell Cordy any of that.” Wesley began to rub at his temples again.
“For 250 year old vamp, he’s not real swift in the ladies’ department, is he?”
“I would have to agree that, he’s a dumbass.”
Fred chewed on her thumbnail, hating to agree but she had to add her meek ‘me too’.
***
“Cordy, are you ready to the go to the doctor’s.”
“I told you, I’m not going.” She glared at her watcher.
“Yes, you are. If I have to tie you up and drag you there.” Wesley glared.
“I’m fine. Angel’s just paranoid. Probably just doesn’t want his seer’s head to blow up.”
“That’s a good thing to want, Cordelia.”
“Yeah, you got to go, girl.” Gunn nodded strenuously.
“Don’t either of you EVEN TRY to start telling me what to do.”
“Cordy, you have to go, if not for you than for our peace of mind. Please.” Fred asked.
Cordelia wanted to yell at the young woman. But she just couldn’t get mad at the pleading young woman. “Fine.” Cordy grunted.
“I’ll drive you.” Wesley went for his keys.
“I can drive myself.” Cordelia huffed.
“Cordy.”
“Wesley, I said I could drive myself. Don’t worry, I won’t duck it.” Cordelia slammed the door on her way out.
“Um, Wesley,” Fred pushed at her glasses, finally noticing what the others had still missed.
“Yes, Fred.”
“Why did Cordy have her bags with her? Why would she need her clothes to go to the doctors?”
“Shit.” Gunn jumped off the counter as Wesley grabbed for his keys again.
“Maybe, we should have told her first that Angel was coming back tonight and that girl with the funny name was an ‘old’ girlfriend.” Fred ran after the men.
Part 76
Angel yanked at the radio, finally shutting it off as he sped further down the road. Cordelia should’ve told him that she was going to the doctors before he talked to Buffy and made arrangements to see her.
There was no question that Angel was happy and more than a little amazed that Buffy was alive but it was more than that, Buffy had sounded a little off on the phone and that‘s why he had to verify that not only was she alive but also alright with his own eyes. But it could’ve waited until after Cordelia had gone to the doctors.
Damn. Cordy had been so mad in the basement, which probably meant she was scared. Angel wanted to kick himself. He should’ve called and rescheduled the meeting with Buffy once the shock of the telephone call wore off and he realized the meaning behind Cordelia’s anger.
Angel pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and made sure it was on.
***
Angel pulled into the diner. The old diner was located on the bluff outside Sunnydale’s town limits. It was the place that Angel and Buffy had come during their old romance when they had the infrequent time to be able to shut out the hell mouth and everything else.
Angel hadn’t wanted to meet Buffy surrounded by all the Scoobies and it seemed Buffy didn’t either as she readily agreed to meet him at their old place. Angel glanced out of darkened car window. Good, the sun would be going down soon.
Angel was getting nervous. Maybe it was good that Cordelia wasn’t with him, but she could’ve probably joked, teased, whined, and/or talked him out of his nervousness, she always did before. Angel checked his phone and watch again as he waited. He had been on the road for three hours, how long did a cat scan take?
Angel shoved the silent phone back into his jacket and got out as the sun hit the horizon and a dark SUV pulled in the parking lot.
Angel smiled as the pretty petite blonde climbed out the driver’s window. Angel forgot how beautiful she was, but she was small. Not like Cordelia…Cordy was…lush, full, firm, begging for his touch. He shook the comparison from his mind as he welcomed the sight of a live Buffy.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
Angel and Buffy stared at one another for minute, not sure how to react. Finally they both gave a small chuckle and reached out their arms for tight hug. Angel’s body enfolded around Buffy’s he face nuzzling into her hair.
Buffy pushed back. “Are you sniffing my hair?”
“Just checking, yep, you really are alive.”
“Duh. Walking, talking, breathing, and…my hairs smells? That‘s a sign of life now? Should I be flattered or insulted?”
“Flattered. It smells like you.”
“Still not sure of the flattering bit, but I’ll take your word for it.” Buffy smiled.
Angel grinned.
“Whoa that’s a happy smile, not too happy I hope.”
Angel laughed.
“Should I be running for my stakes?” Buffy blinked at the laughing vampire.
“I can laugh, Buffy, and I’m happy to see you, but no need for any stakes.”
“Well, since, you haven’t tried to kill me or anything evil, I’ll believe you.”
“Thanks.” Angel’s smile dimmed. Buffy said she believed him but she was still eyeing him cautiously. Damn, had he never laughed in her presence before except as Angelus.
“You hungry? We can go in.” Angel asked to move past the descending uncomfortable silence.
“Not really a blood diner.”
“I can drink coffee, eat too, we’ve gone in before. .” Angel frowned.
“Oh sure, right. I knew that. You just never do, just stare as I slurp, you sure you want to.”
“Actually, I drink coffee all the time now, I think I’m addicted, I blame it on Cordy,” leading Buffy towards the diner.
“Cordelia,” Buffy nodded going past Angel into the small restaurant. “Willow said she was still working with you…as a belly dancer.” Buffy cocked her brows. “Bikini top and bangles. Quite the sight around the office, uh.”
“Uh, oh,” Angel realized suddenly what Buffy meant. “No. She doesn’t wear that around the office, though it would be a sight.” Angel smirked imagining Cordelia in the revealing costume running around the office. The small top exposing warm flesh barely hiding the breasts that ached to be touched, the bangles along the low waist swaying with her hips, the shimmering translucent scarves that covered but showed everything of her long legs.
“Angel.” Buffy coughed.
“Uh.” Angel blinked. Shit, he had been about to visualize which garment he would take off first. Angel quirked a small smile, squirming in his seat, adjusting his pants. Rule one. Don’t fantasise about Cordy when not alone or when she wasn’t in grabbing distance. Otherwise, it’s uncomfortable and potentially very embarrassing.
Angel shook away the remainder of the vision. Shit. His fantasy Cordy just winked and flashed him before she disappeared. Damn, she was a tease even in his thoughts. He needed to get home soon.
“Um, what. Oh. That wasn’t a belly dancer outfit. She had to wear that when she was made a Princess in Pylea. I don’t know even if she still has it.” Angel wrinkled his brow. He’d have to find out when he got home and if she did, he had to make sure it stayed in their bedroom. Angel shook his head at the new image that was forming trying to concentrate on Buffy.
“Pylea?”
“Hell dimension. Cordy got sucked through a portal. We had to go get her. We had just gotten home when Willow told us….about…”
“Me dying, right.” Buffy looked up as a waitress came by. “Coffee, thanks.”
Angel nodded the same.
“Cordy- a princess of a hell dimension, some how that doesn’t seem so surprising.” Buffy twirled the sugar packet on the table.
Angel puzzled, not sure how to respond so he changed the subject. “How are you?” He chuckled self-consciously, “that’s a stupid question, but…how are you.”
Buffy raised her eyes. “Laughing, chuckling, everything changes doesn’t it.” She sighed.
“Buffy, what is it? Are you not all right? Tell me,” he reached over and covered her small hand in his, picking it, studying the delicate hand that hid such tremendous strength. “You look sad, great, but sad, talk to me. I’m here for you.” Angel dropped her hand as his phone rang.
“Hold on.” He scrambled in his pocket. “I’m expecting a call. God, I hate these things,” he cursed at the cell phone.
Part 77
“Okay, where to?” Gunn said from the front seat of Wesley’s car.
“Airport? Oh, god, you don’t think, Cordy went to Duncan, do you? He wanted her to leave with him. Maybe, I should call Methos.” Fred suggested.
“Methos? What’s with you and him, girl?” Gunn shot over the seat.
“With? Nothing, I just thought if Cordy went to Duncan….”
“Please, why don’t we start with the doctor’s office? Cordy, said she was going there.” Wesley took a deep breath.
“Should we call Angel?”
“Shit, it’s the damn vampire’s fault she all freaky.” Gunn shook his head.
“Would you stop with the ‘freaky’.” Wesley retorted.
“What’s wrong with freaky?”
“It’s not a word.”
“It is too.”
“Guys, stop. Wouldn’t Angel want to know that Cordy took her bags and left?”
“She just left the hotel, we don’t know that she left the city, let’s not panic. Look for a parking space, the doctor’s office is over there,” Wesley indicated a large high rise.
***
“Excuse me, Excuse me.”
“Yoa,” Gunn pounded on the counter, ignoring the glances of the patients waiting in the lobby, when Wesley’s polite attempts to get the receptionist attention resulted in a blank stare and a back.
“Sir, this is a doctor’s office.” The horned rimmed blue haired woman pinched her lips at the young people huddled around her space. “No disturbances, please.”
Gunn hung over the high surface. “Then tell us where Cordelia Chase is then I won’t pound anymore.”
“Hmmph.” The woman lowered her glasses and peered at a chart hidden on her desk. “She’s with the doctor.”
“Thank you.” Wesley pulled at Gunn. “Sit down, we’ll wait.”
Fred leaned over Gunn who had sprawled his large frame in a small chair, to tug on Wesley’s shirt. “You will tell Cordy right away that Angel is coming back, right? That he didn’t mean to dump her, right?”
“Yes, Fred.”
***
Gunn turned the children’s magazine upside down.
“There.” Fred jumped up in her chair, pointing at the word hidden in the mismash of letters.
“Cool.” Gunn circled where Fred indicated.
“It’s just like numbers, you just got to know what you’re looking for. There,” Fred happily pointed out another word.
Gunn narrowed his eyes. He was getting killed. He turned his attention elsewhere, throwing the magazine over his shoulder.
“Three hours, Wes man, three hours, what kinds of tests are going on back there?” Gun shifted uncomfortably in the shrinking chair.
Fred jumped quickly grabbing at the magazine.
Wesley shook his head, put down the scientific magazine, and went back to the counter. “Excuse me, Mam, MAM,” Wesley said louder.
The older woman pushed at her hair sprayed colored bouffant, taking a loud breath. “Yes.” She sighed with the burdens of the world on her shoulders.
“Miss Chase, is she done yet.” Wesley tried to maintain his patience at the caricature’s attitude.
“Oh, Miss Chase, left over an hour ago, through the exit,” She pointed into some hidden maze beyond her shoulder.
Wesley lowered his head, bright pink spots flared over his fair skin, settling around his neck. He calmed his urge to throttle the old woman. “Why weren’t we informed, I believe you had to know that we were concerned about her?”
“You’re her friends?” She peered over her horn rims.
“That’s why we were asking about her, why we were concerned. Why we’ve been waiting three hours, obviously one hour too long.” Wesley said tightly.
“Well, then she said to give you these.” She handed Wesley a large vanilla envelope. “I believe she left you a note.”
“Thank you.” Wesley squeezed out the words of gratitude, forcing down the expletives that rolled on his tongue.
***
“So,” Gunn waved the X-rays in the air. “The red is good.”
“The red is good. This X-ray looks the same, as the one taken after she became Immortal that last vision did no damage. The report says the same.”
“Cool.”
“And, this means we leave her alone,” Fred fluttered the paper filled with Cordelia’s scribble stating clearing I’m at home with Dennis, do not call, come by or anything. I”LL call if I get a vision’.”
Wesley nodded.
“What are you going to tell Angel” Fred leaned in between the two front seats.
“That Cordelia is healthy.” Wesley dug into his jacket for his cell phone.
Part 78
Buffy wrinkled her brow she listened to Angel’s half of conversation on the phone. It was a little bizarre.
He had just been in the middle of comforting her begging her to talk, when in a blink of a telephone ring, she was out of his mind. She couldn’t remember a time when they had been together that his attention hadn’t been completely focused on her and… he had a cell phone.
“What?”
“Are you sure?”
“No damage at all?”
Buffy watched as another unexpected smile appeared on Angel’s face, only bigger than before. She listened closer.
“Let me talk to Cordy.”
“What do you mean I can’t? Why not? She’s still mad isn’t she? Damn. Put her on the phone.”
“What do you meant you can’t?”
“Well, where is she?”
“Home? Why aren’t you with her?”
“I told you to go with her.”
“How do you know again that everything is fine?”
“Oh.”
“Well tell her to call me. I’ve my phone. It’s on.”
“Sarcasm is unnecessary Wesley, just tell her to call.”
Angel frowned as he flipped the phone shut.
“Everything all right?” Buffy asked.
“Yeah, great, I think. Cordy had a doctor’s appointment. She didn’t want to go. But she promised- she had a …slight problem earlier in the year, just checking that it didn’t come back. Wesley said the reports were fine.”
“So, why are you frowning?”
“I told Wesley to go with her, she was scared to go. But, did he listen to me, no, he let her bully him into going alone. She shouldn’t have had to go alone. I should probably call her.”
“Angel?”
“Right, she’ll call me, though she should’ve called me when she found out. She’s mad.”
“Oh.” Buffy wrinkled her brow again. “Um. Do you need to leave?”
Angel looked at his watch. “Um….” Then looked at the blonde. “No, she’ll call, I’ve got plenty of time, where we’re we? Sorry.”
Buffy bit her lip. She didn’t want to have to tell Angel that he had been on the way to make her feel better. His presence, his concern almost seemed to be normal, the way things should be, well, minus his smiling, his coffee addiction and seeming need to interject Cordelia’s name in every other sentence. She took a deep breath.
She hadn’t wanted to tell him how she was really feeling anyway. Buffy had already made that decision before she came, she hadn’t wanted to burden Angel with the fact that her friends had dragged her from heaven’ that she had been in a place that was safe where she was warm and loved, where she was complete and now she felt like she was in hell.
Buffy had thought it was because he would react badly, blaming her friends, feeling guilty, aching for what she lost, but now she began to think that it was because he wouldn’t feel so much. Life had changed since she died, she knew that, but she just thought….
She leaned her head against the back of the tacky booth. Buffy just hoped that seeing Angel would give her the rush of feeling something. She remembered when seeing him brought a flush to her cheeks, causing her heartbeat to speed up, and a tingling in her belly.
But now, it didn’t. God, she needed to feel something other than the loss of that peaceful place she had been, making her unfeeling to her family, making her blame them for her loss. “Let’s get out of here.” Buffy said suddenly jumping up.
“Uh. Okay.” Angel pushed his cell phone into his pocket after making sure that he hadn’t inadvertently shut it off.