Part 5: Wait for the Midnight Hour
It was a little after midnight Angel noted. It was a very sad day when a vampire was exhausted before the night had really started. But most vampires don’t have to deal with teething babies and houseguests.
Connor wouldn’t go down, which was understandable cause hey, teething, that had to hurt. Angel had tried all the suggestions in the baby book and so far had only seemed to make Connor crankier. Angel was actually feeling a little cranky himself.
Dinner hadn’t exactly been fun. It was exactly like one of those scenes from a movie, where everyone is uncomfortable and everyone knows that everyone else is uncomfortable and there is nothing they can do about it. Buffy had been quiet and Angel didn’t know if that was shock or what.
Wes harassed poor Dawn with questions about her origin until he finally realized he was pissing her off—he spent the rest of the meal quietly whispering to Fred and making notes on a paper napkin. Angel thought Gunn might have been a little upset at the sudden Wes and Fred chumminess but Gunn apparently didn’t notice. Probably since he had been too busy hating Xander.
Xander and Cordy had bickered for most of the meal, and it was hard to tell if they were kidding or not. Twice Angel had to kick Gunn under the table to keep him from lunging at Xander (once because he asked Cordy if her breasts were real cause he “wasn’t sure they had felt real that time in the closet”, and again when Gunn caught Xander looking at the aforementioned breasts). In between bouts with Xander, Cordelia and Willow made awkward small talk.
Angel didn’t really know what to think. He knew that Cordy was always a little outside of the group, but he hadn’t been aware of the whole weird dynamic. When he was in Sunnydale he was too focused on Buffy to pay much attention to Scooby interaction and in LA there was pretty much a silent agreement to forgo discussions of time spent on the Hellmouth.
It was just a little sad, that these were her closest friends from high school. These were the people she kept pictures of on her refrigerator. She had to know that there were no pictures of her stuck to Buffy’s fridge with a magnet shaped like a giant pair of lips. Angel frowned at that. Cordy deserved better.
“Special delivery for Mister Fussy Vampire Spawn,” Cordelia said as she opened the door and walked in. She didn’t bother to knock and once again, Angel was more pleased by that than annoyed. “Let’s see I’ve got some yummy pacifiers, straight out of the freezer and…oh some ice chips and if that doesn’t work…um…I’ll sing “Somewhere out there” until he realizes that sleep is the only escape.”
Cordelia shrugged and hopped on the bed next to Angel. She was silent for a moment, but both parties knew that couldn’t last long. “So why were you frowning when I came in?”
“Could it have anything to do with the fact that my child is in pain and I can’t help and all I want to do is lie down and sleep for the next…ever?”
“First of all, you are talking more and more like me everyday and I have to tell you, I am very flattered. Second, you could have been frowning about all that stuff but you weren’t.”
“You don’t look so perky yourself right now,” Angel commented.
“They don’t like me,” Cordelia responded with a shrug of her shoulders. “And I would have once said it didn’t bother me even though it did bother me, even then. And it doesn’t bother me A LOT now, but it does bother me.”
“Cordy, of course they like you.” Cordy gave him that look; the “are you crazy” look and Angel realized this was the wrong tactic to take. He knew, after the incident with Angelus, that Cordelia preferred honesty to politeness. “Okay, so they aren’t your biggest fans. But who cares?”
“I just told you. I care.”
“Why? I mean, you have friends, friends who adore you and would do anything for you. How Buffy and her friends feel about you shouldn’t be so important.”
Cordelia sighed. He doesn’t understand.
“Angel, I totally agree with you, IN THEORY. But the Scoobies, they are important. I mean, hello, we wouldn’t be together today if it weren’t for them.” Oh shit, please don’t let that sound like I meant we were together together. “Besides that, their opinions do matter. You know that. Unless you’re trying to tell me you don’t care what Buffy thinks.” Angel didn’t disagree right away and Cordy was about to continue when he finally spoke.
“You don’t need to try and impress them. If they can’t see all the wonderful things I see when I look at you, then….”
“Then… what?” Cordy said. Did he really just say that? What wonderful things does he see? How come he never tells me the nice stuff? “Then…you’ll beat them all up?” she asked with a smirk.
“Well, I won’t beat all of them up. How about we just let Gunn have a go at Xander?” The baby was quieter now and Angel didn’t think it was wrong to attribute a little of that to Cordelia’s presence.
That’s what she did, to both men—she swept in and started making them feel better without them even noticing. “Connor’s settling down now.”
“Not for long. I give it two or three hours before he’s up howling again. You’d think his father was a werewolf.” Cordelia caught Angel’s eye and made a face. “Okay, I just got the grossest mental picture of Darla with Oz.” She shook off the icky-ness while Angel put Connor down in his crib.
It didn’t matter what he was doing, anytime that man moved he was sexy. How someone so big and strong could move so quietly was beyond her. Ooops, Danger Will Robinson! Shake off those kinds of thoughts. Angel sat down again on the bed and the two found themselves lying on their sides facing each other.
It was odd the difference one tiny baby could make. Without Connor’s presence in the bed everything seemed different, scarier. Cordy bit her lip to hold herself back from doing what she really wanted to do cause what she really wanted to do involved lunging at Angel and no good could come of that.
She had learned to take rejection from directors, she had learned to take rejection from the stupid Scoobies, but she’d be damned if she got rejected by her best friend. And the only way to avoid that was to avoid offering him certain things to reject.
You so need to get out of here Cordy.
“I should be getting home.” She looked at Angel, who only gave a slight nod. “It’s getting late and knowing Buffy there will be some sort of apocalypse tomorrow and if the world’s going to end, I definitely want my beauty sleep.” Angel still didn’t talk. He gave a half-smile and just kept staring at her with those eyes of his. She wondered what he saw.
Cordy looked down and then back at Angel. “Yeah,” she said softly, “so I should…go.” Angel didn’t speak or move.
Say something damn it! Say “okay see you later” or “don’t let the door hit you on the ass on your way out” or grab me and say “I’m not letting you leave this bedroom until I’ve found erogenous zones you didn’t even know you had.”
Angel didn’t of course say any of those things and Cordelia realized she would have to get up. She let out a soft sigh that she didn’t realize he heard and had moved maybe half an inch when a hand on her thigh stilled her.
“Stay.” He didn’t growl it or beg it—he wasn’t even really asking it, he just said it, like it was a fact. Cordy’s eyes widened involuntarily and that must have scared him a little because he removed the hand from her thigh (No, you can keep that there she thought) and he said, “I, I mean you should stay. For Connor.”
“Connor’s asleep,” Cordelia said, but she had a tiny smile on her face that made Angel confident. The hand that had been on her thigh moved to her shoulders. He began rubbing and kneading the tension out.
“Sure he’s asleep now. But you yourself said that wouldn’t last long. How can you abandon us now?”
“I…,” Cordy trailed off. She couldn’t talk, she could barely breath. Angel knew just where to touch. Oh Jesus! “Fine, I’m staying. You don’t have to bribe me with backrubs,” she said, more harshly than intended. Well, one of us has to be sensible.
Cordelia turned over onto her other side, so that Angel now faced her back. He didn’t move, but all of the sudden Cordelia swore that she heard another soft disappointed little sigh, and this time it hadn’t come from her. In that moment Cordelia didn’t know what to do. She didn’t have a clue what was going on here.
It almost seems like…he likes me. No, that can’t be. Besides, even if he does sorta like me, it’s not like love, it’s not like how he feels about Buffy. Which so makes anything between us just so completely doomed. Cause ultimately, it would be just like Xander, where I am constantly reminded that I run a far second to the Slayer.
She didn’t want to hurt his feelings but she didn’t know what he was wanting to happen and she was worried they were playing with fire and she really didn’t want to be the one that got burned. She shut her eyes tightly and heard another little sigh. With that sound, Cordelia decided that she was sick of being the smart one.
If Angel didn’t have to be sensible, than why should she? She didn’t do anything crazy like rip off her clothes and jump his creature of the night ass.
Nope, she wasn’t going to be the smart one but that didn’t mean she was the crazy one either. Instead, she just reached behind her, grabbed Angel’s hand, pulled his arm down over her, and yanked his body closer. Ha! I’m being spooned by Angel and it’s probably a horrible idea but I’m not going to think about the stupid consequences, cause I’ve had a really hard day and dammit, I deserve this.
Angel gave her a little squeeze and let out another sigh, but it was different than the other two—it sounded content.
And Cordelia, glad to know that she was neither smart nor crazy but rather a combination of them both, fell asleep.