Habit, Part Three

[thebratqueen]

Previous parts can be found here.

PART THREE

When Fred died she died bravely.

Wesley thinks of that. Wesley thinks *only* of that. He does not think of the fear in her eyes or the quaver in her voice. His mind recorded those facts, true, but he does not give them any form of historic validity. Fred wished to die bravely, and for Wesley that wish was enough to make it so. It's the only wish he *can* make so for her, and he swore not to fail at it.

Bravely, then. Refusing, as she always did, to succumb to the horror of what life had presented her. Slavery had not destroyed her. Demons had not destroyed her. Death, too, had not destroyed her.

Well, not her spirit. Death had quite literally destroyed everything Fred had ever been, but this too is something Wesley never thinks of long in the tales. Even his journal entries about it, written months after the fact when he could finally bear the thought of making it real with ink and paper, he recorded only her courage, and her hope.

Fred had still contained hope. Even as the very marrow of her being was ripped apart and taken from her she still had hope. It had only been in that very last moment when she'd realized there was something stronger than hope, and that that something was not kind, nor friendly.

Fred hadn't been frightened in that last moment. There had been fear, yes, but that wasn't the core of it.

No, in the very last moment of her life Fred had been sad. She had learned, finally, that believing in goodness wasn't enough. That it was never enough. Wrong things - evil things - still happened.

Wesley had never wanted Fred to learn that lesson. He'd often dreamt of keeping it from her. He'd been murderously angry at Gunn and Knox for killing her. Betrayed by Angel when the vampire had agreed to let it happen.

But in the end he blamed himself for Fred's true death. It had been his job, after all, to protect her heart.

***

When Illyria died she was furious.

The office of Wolfram & Hart - and, indeed, several key locations of Los Angeles - suffered the brunt of the demon's rage. People died. Still more were injured. Wesley himself earned a jagged scar on the back of his right leg which might have healed when he was younger, but which now refused to fade.

Illyria could not understand death. Not in the way she was forced to experience it. The death of half-breeds, animals, and humanity she found acceptable. Mostly because she saw no difference between the three. But her own? No, that she couldn't abide.

She ranted and raved, cursing what she called the feeble shell which held her. For in the end that was what destroyed her. Fred's body could not handle the demon's strength, and just as Illyria had violated a mortal body for her own purposes, the mortal body violated her right back. It weakened. Refused to work right. Began to decompose.

Denial stayed with her right up until the end, however. She railed against her fate, even to the point where she hadn't strength enough to stand. She crawled along the lobby floor, her hands clawing into the carpet as though she could tear energy from the fibers she was clinging to. She snarled insults. She lashed out at anyone who came near her.

Except, of course, for Wesley.

Him she tolerated. And it fell to him to pick her up and carry her into the vaults where her sarcophagus had been stored. To place her there, carefully, so as not to cause any harm which would unleash her on the whole of humanity just as trying to save Fred would have done.

To do all that, and not once beat her until her eyes swelled shut and her nose rained blood and her jaw misaligned because she dared, after all she had done, to insult the very thing that had brought her back into the world. Fred's body had been perfectly Fred-shaped. If Illyria had wanted something bigger then she could have taken *his*.

After all, it wasn't as though Wesley was doing anything better with it.

When the end had finally come Illyria understood it. She took hold of his hand, looked up at him with wide, blue eyes and spoke, with all sincerity, the only language of death that she knew:

"Why can't I stay?"

Everyone else was too injured. There was only Wesley to seal the sarcophagus shut. He did it then, while she still spoke to him, because if she died outside of her prison the world would have been doomed.

He could still hear her speaking when he walked out of the vault.

Nobody questioned it when he announced he was taking a leave of absence, duration unknown.

***

As the years passed, the death of Fred and the death of Illyria were never very far from his mind. But as time went on, and Wesley's own fate was handed to him, he found himself thinking of one death more than the other.

He wished that it was Fred's.

***

The pill bottle misses the table. It hits the edge and tips over to the floor. Pills - carefully counted, hard-earned pills - cascade down to the floor in a shower too fast for his eye to track. Wesley curses. In part because he can't make mistakes like this - not while in the building, when there are undoubtedly security cameras recording his every move - but also in part because he *needs* them right now. He's been pushing himself too hard, going for too long without taking them. His body aches, his hands are trembling, and if he doesn't swallow them and do so fast he knows that worse is on the way.

He pushes his chair back. Tries to scoop them up with unsteady fingers. Putting them back in the bottle causes as many of them to slip back onto the floor as safely rattle inside for later use. He rests the bottle down on one of his books, then searches for the missing tablets. He finds them under his chair, against the wall, tucked away into dusty corners that vacuums can't reach.

This is the hardest, for him.

The pills aren't medicinal. They don't fix him. They don't give him what he needs. He didn't lie to Spike. The pills aren't his cure. They only treat the symptoms.

There is, actually, no cure. At least none that he's found. He's looked, and he keeps looking, but as time goes on he finds the hope of his recovery harder and harder to hold on to.

In the meanwhile there is what life he has left, and his ongoing attempt to exist in it.

Existence is possible, but not with these pills. These are only a stopgap. A temporary measure. He takes them because he is in Los Angeles, and around old friends, and he doesn't dare leave any hints of what is wrong with him. He doesn't want them to know. He doesn't want anyone to know.

He would like, honestly, to die in peace.

So he can't take anything stronger than the pills. Not if he wishes to continue to fly under the radar. He can take the pills, and control the symptoms, and hopefully return to England with no one being the wiser.

But at moments like this, when he is on his knees and straining to grasp a tablet that is hidden behind a file cabinet and which is wrapped in so much lint and stray hair that it's almost impossible to see, it's very difficult for him to not reach into the hidden lining of his satchel and stop pretending that a touch of the flu is the only thing wrong with him.

Wesley retrieves the pills. He sits back in his chair. He counts out four - twice what he normally takes, but he knows to double up when it's gotten as bad as this - and takes them with a single gulp of water.

The symptoms start to fade.

His self-hatred is another matter entirely.

***

Angel bumps into him, literally, as Wesley is in the break room making tea.

"Sorry, didn't see you," the vampire says.

"Quite all right," Wesley replies. He holds up the book he was reading. "My fault for not looking."

Angel turns his head to read the spine, looking as though he might ask about the contents, but then he reads the title and clearly thinks better of it. Instead he says, "Let's get out of here."

Wesley frowns. "The room?"

"No," Angel says. "The office. I gotta get some stuff and there's this thing - "

Wesley stares at him. He folds his arms patiently, as though no years at all have passed.

Angel grins. "I got a new car. Wanna see?"

Wesley pretends to ponder the alternative of reading, then tosses the book aside. "Sure. Why not?"

***

Angel's new car is a BMW. It's sleek and black and hugs the road as though having obscene relations with it. Angel quickly gets them out of the congestion of the city and then lets the speedometer climb as the highway opens up before them. Wesley watches this, feeling unmistakable masculine envy and the strong desire to open up the hood to either examine the engine or simply pledge marriage to it.

"Handles like a dream," Angel says.

"I can see," Wesley says, watching him.

"If you want I can let you play with it," Angel says. He glances over, then realizes Wesley had been looking at the gear shift. "Okay. That came out a lot less gay when I said it in my head."

Wesley laughs, then diffuses the situation by saying, "Most things do, I find."

Angel flashes a grin at him, then passes a sedan so he can move the speedometer up to ninety.

Vaguely reminded, Wesley says, "I'm sorry about Nina."

"What?"

"Nina," Wesley says. He shifts in his seat, making himself comfortable as he watches the view go by. "Spike told me that she left for Tibet. I'm sorry."

Angel spares him quick looks as he gives most of his attention to the road. "Why would you - Wes, that was four years ago."

Wesley looks at him. "It was?"

Angel smirks. "It was. Believe me, I'm over it. Was pretty okay with it at the time, too."

"Oh," Wesley says, feeling foolish.

"Try to push Spike for details when you can," Angel says. "Because he sucks at office gossip. Gets everybody's name wrong too."

"Were you ever better with that?" Wesley asks, remembering when Angel had a hard time addressing employees without making surreptitious glances at the nameplates on their desks.

"I'm the CEO, I don't have to be better at it," Angel replies, but the light in his eyes shows that he doesn't mean it seriously.

"It seems that you're doing a good job with that," Wesley says.

"Been trying," Angel replies. He shifts gears as they climb up a hill. "Watch when we get to the top of this. The view's spectacular."

Wesley looks out the window, and marvels as a rich, green valley opens up before them. "You're right. You know, I don't think I've ever been this way before."

"Little off the beaten path," Angel agrees. He changes gears again. "So, you seeing anybody?"

Wesley frowns, certain he didn't hear that right.

Catching Wesley's reaction, Angel tries to recover. "You know when I rehearsed *that* in my head it sounded - "

"Less gay?"

"Less forced," Angel finishes.

The vampire's candor disarms him so much that Wesley answers "No, I'm not." before remembering that when *he* had rehearsed this conversation in his head, he'd answered in the affirmative. "I - I mean - "

"It's okay," Angel says.

"No, it's - " Wesley struggles, miserable. He can't lie to Angel, but neither can he say the full truth. "It's… not a good idea for me to be involved with anyone, right now."

"Sure," Angel says, but now he isn't making eye contact.

"I mean considering - " Wesley starts to say, but stops himself. Anything more than what he's spoken crosses the line he's set. It's a pale imitation of morality, but it's all he has left.

"It's okay, Wes, I get it," Angel says.

Wesley wraps his arms around himself. He's begun to shiver, which isn't uncommon as a side-effect of the pills. He adjusts with the car's climate control, hoping that he can pass it off as a response to the air conditioning. He doesn't look at Angel. Looking at Angel might inspire a confession.

"It really is okay," Angel says. His voice is quiet, but firm. "Wesley, what you're going through right now -"

"I don't want to talk about it," Wesley says, willingly encouraging the belief that this is no more than aftermath of his parents' funerals. "Please. It's too soon."

"I think you should talk about it," Angel says. "I think you should talk about it and besides that I think you should stay here."

"No."

"You don't have to work for the firm," Angel says. "You want out of Wolfram & Hart I'm fine with that. I wish you'd come back to the team but I get it. But you should *not* go back to England, Wes. It isn't good for you."

"It's fine," Wesley says. He changes the temperatures again as his body becomes too warm.

"It's not healthy."

Wesley freezes, then tries to act non-chalant. Again he speaks with words that are mostly true. "I like it. I enjoy it. I prefer living in England."

They come up to an overlook. Angel pulls the car into it, parking so that he can turn his attention to Wesley. "You're alone. You - you have had a *shit* year and you've got nobody to lean on, or help you. It shouldn't be like that."

"It's fine," Wesley repeats. "I want to be alone. Angel, I *need* to be alone."

Angel shakes his head. "No, Wes. Alone is the last thing you need."

"Angel - "

"Stay," Angel says, and the words are so firm as to almost be a command. "Screw however long this case is. Get an apartment, send for your stuff, and *stay*. Don't go back. Be here with us. With me. Where you've got people who care about you."

"I can't," Wesley says.

"You should."

"I want to go back to England," Wesley says, forcing the words out when his mouth threatens to betray him.

"I want you to stay here," Angel tells him.

"No," Wesley says.

Irritation flickers over the vampire's face. He keys the ignition and aims the car back towards LA. "You should at least consider it. Can you do that? At least think about it?"

Wesley doesn't answer. He doesn't want Angel to know that when he rehearsed *this* conversation in his head, he couldn't stop his imaginary self from saying yes.

***