******
Accidents, they were: when he closed his eyes and the
flickering flame and sickly sweet scent of roses crept back in
to remind him of dreadfully human flesh marked with the
pale shades of death.

Arthur Northam, a snivelling young Watcher if ever there had
been one, and a boyhood acquaintance, was the Council's
inquirer in the matter, once they got full wind; a day late and
a dollar short, so to speak, but as luck would have it he
arrived the day after school let out.

And he left the next, the cold look on Giles' face at hearing
Jenny's name in any official capacity enough to scare him
into imagining unspoken threats, and the newly missing
Slayer no longer a point he was willing to uptake alone.

The scotch ran out, eventually; too drunk to go get more,
Giles moved on, into the realm of whiskey, and bourbon, and
finally, two weeks into summer and without a word from his
charge, the detested vodka. Later, when his senses came out
from under the heavy anesthesia, he would shake his head
slowly, marvel at having been able to swallow at all.

As it was, though, his senses were numb; only the drumming
consciousness was to be realized within his head, where
locks of black and blonde hair performed a dizzying dance
that forced him to the toilet more than once.

Gone, the both of them, and sheer incompetence to blame.
His entire life, always the incompetence came back to haunt
him. Eyghon, now there was a disaster, and every encounter
he seemed to have with Ethan, even before, could be chalked
up as another episode of bumbling idiocy on his part.

He resisted closing his eyes again, avoided the black space
where they both waited to mock his failures. But sleep
somehow happened, for when the doorbell rang he bolted
upright, drenched in sweat and shaking with drowsy sobs,
and wasn't clear-headed enough to pretend he wasn't home.

Xander took one look at him, at his frightfully red eyes,
mussed hair, rumpled clothes...and did nothing. Silently
shifted his weight onto one foot in a perfect show of
hesitance, and lowered his eyes. It could be taken for
embarrassment, coming from anyone else, but Giles was all
too aware of the boy's respect, and that it had taken falling
flat on his face at rock bottom to gain it once and for all.

Only the most obvious question entered his mind; no
formalities, no niceties. Pressing and unquenchable curiosity:
"What are you doing here?"

The fatalistic rasp in his voice surprised him, but Xander
didn't flinch. "Oh, you know, this and that. Making sure you
hadn't choked on your own vomit or anything." Giles knew
he should be angry, knew he *would* be, had Xander's eyes
held the slightest bit of challenge. But that wasn't there; only
understanding, and unspoken acceptance. "Can I come in?"

He only allowed it because the sun hurt his eyes -- he told
himself this later in a last-ditch attempt at denial. The door
needed closing, and no way would Xander be so kind as to
*back* his way out of it. Never mind how the air just
suddenly became more breathable with the boy in the room.
"Then let's start, shall we?" he muttered, opening the liquor
cabinet before remembering it had been empty for days.

"Here." Xander nodded to the nearly empty bottle on the
kitchen counter. "Start what?"

"Whatever obstacle course of questions I have to go through
to get you to leave."

"If you want me to leave, just ask. I don't want to be where
I'm not wanted."

Funny how such a simple request wouldn't form itself in
Giles' mouth: Go away. Instead, he stared. At the floor, at the
shattered remains of a decanter he couldn't remember having
broken. "So what is it you do want?"

"Like I said, to see if you're okay." Stuffing his hands in his
pockets, Xander did some staring of his own, right at the top
of Giles' bowed head.

"You never said that."

"I meant to. Does it make a difference that I didn't?"

The subject needed changing; Giles looked up and fought to
regain sensibility even as he tilted the last bit of vodka into
his mouth. "How is Willow? Recovering well, I trust?"

"Willow is fine. She's with Oz. Any other things you're
already aware of that I could fill you in on again?"

It wasn't fair, for Xander to make it so evident he was more
than anyone gave him credit for. Not now, it wasn't; now it
was just a headache that had already happened and was
fighting for recurrence. Giles tossed the empty bottle onto an
overflowing trashcan, wound up surprised that it didn't miss,
and set about the task of rubbing the stinging protest from
his reluctantly open eyes. "Have you heard from her?" he
finally asked softly. "Have you..."

No, not fair at all for him to glance into sympathy and
concern, to have to come to grips with someone else feeling
they were the failure in it all. "You don't really think she'd
come to me?" Xander replied. There was the Xander he knew,
the resigned defeat engraved in his voice. "She'd never expect
me to understand, no matter how well I do."

"You're her friend. She knows that your understanding isn't
the important part."

"Do you ever actually listen to yourself?" Giles found
himself lost as to what had finally made Xander angry.
"What the hell do you think you are, Giles? You're every bit
as much a friend as any of us, and it's clear you don't expect
her to come to you."

"It's different, Xander."

"It's not." Xander glared at him, pacing a three-foot section of
carpet. "Think that if you will, but don't try to shove your
crap down my throat."

"Xander." Christ, when had his typical adult nature returned?
"I don't want to talk about her anymore."

"Yeah, me neither." Relief never seemed to come in quite
such a rush before, or vanish so quickly as when Xander
spoke again. "Let's talk about Ms. Calender instead."

It was interesting, in an offhand sense, how he could actually
*feel* the fury boil up inside his chest. "Or why don't we
talk about your friend Jesse? Maybe just how it felt when the
stake broke his skin?"

"No."

"You felt it all the way up your arm, didn't you?" Giles
growled. "Right into your shoulder, right?"

"Stop it." Xander had frozen, looked on the verge of lunging
for him. "Please."

Defeat; he couldn't press on and the couch suddenly seemed
one step too far away. But he made it, and sank down to lean
his head wearily on the back. "We aren't going to talk about
Jenny, Xander."

Hesitating, Xander fell next to him, and folded his hands
nervously in his lap. "So we don't talk about her, and we
don't talk about Buffy. What do we talk about?"

"Perhaps something that doesn't make us feel like colossal
fools?"

"Well, then, that leaves out Cordelia."

Giles lifted his head, struggling not to laugh, and Xander
couldn't help but grin. "And anything pertaining to my past, I
would suppose."

"Or the rest of my social life," Xander offered up.

"I think it's damn good thing I'm out of liquor." Giles
laughed ruefully. "We're a sad lot, all two of us."

The fingers spreading his apart caught Giles off-guard; he
raised his eyes to the uncertain frown that often accompanies
risk, and he matched it with a breathy sigh of reluctance,
curling his hand around Xander's and taking note that the
union trembled on account of them both. "It's hard, you
know," he mumbled, wishing he could assert himself more, in
tone if not in gesture. "Knowing you could have made things
different."

Xander nodded. "But not knowing if different would have
been better? If maybe the way it has worked out --"

"-- is really the best case scenario. Yes, exactly." He didn't
know when he'd begun to trace his other set of fingers across
the back of Xander's hand, but he had, and on top of it, he
didn't remember the boy's face being as close as it now
seemed to be. "So you just keep wondering --"

"-- and hating yourself in the meantime."

Xander's lips were warm, above all; their heat radiated into
Giles' own even before he registered the marvelous softness,
and the ease of parting them with his tongue was just another
excuse to forget that this *shouldn't* be happening.

But it was, and it was sweet; not just the vaguely sugary
undertone of Xander's mouth, but also the way Giles was
able, for the first time in weeks, to lean back and close his
eyes and not see all the things he'd done wrong.

And yes, so his conscience would kick in, and he would have
his doubts. It would be later, after he had showered and
cleaned and kept himself sober for the longest stretch in
awhile, and the guilt would be nearly enough to get him to the
liquor store. Nearly, but not quite. And the dreams would still
come, with Jenny's frozen face and Buffy's absence, and the
panic that forced tears each morning.

But then, later again, there would be the soft rapping on the
door; the quiet rightness of sitting and lamenting chances
lost, and the comforting scratch of the stubble that Xander's
razor had overlooked that morning under his palm.

And for once, he felt strong enough to wing it until later
arrived.