Walk Away (Fall Again)

"You may walk away from love, but you'll fall head and heels again."


Xander slammed the door. That was it, he was done. He'd had enough of everything, expectations and promises; all those things you couldn't or shouldn't say. Secrets.

Fuck, he was gone. She wouldn't miss him anyway, she'd said so. That much had been clear, at least. And it wasn't just from anger; nothing had been right for months.

* * *

England was definitely the right place for him to be. He'd given Giles a call from the airport in Kinshasa, gotten on the next flight out and here he was, no questions asked.

"Elyse called," Giles said on evening when Xander came home from late patrol with some of the girls.

"What did she want?" He'd left almost a month ago now, and she'd never tried to call. Neither had he.

"She only said she was shipping the rest of your things, and oh, that perhaps you'd like to think good and hard about what she'd told you." Giles looked up at Xander, glasses low on his nose. "Not that I asked."

Yeah, as if. Of course Giles wouldn't asked, but Xander wouldn't think either. At least, not about that. Not that Xander had totally ignored everything she'd said that last... day. Fight would work too. But either way, she was wrong. Very wrong.

Giles was already back to reading his book, seemingly uninterested in Xander's love troubles. Xander left him there and went into the kitchen to get himself something to drink.

* * *

Elyse had been the last one. Xander was done with love, with relationships. He'd had more than enough of all of it. Too much heartache, too much damn fights, misunderstandings, issues.

He'd done everything for Elyse, given her every part of him he could, and it still hadn't been enough. She'd wanted more, more, and yet some more, until Xander had felt trapped. And then...

"Didn't you ever think that maybe, you know, maybe you weren't as straight as you bloody think you are?"

The blow that had ended it all. Denial was a nice place to be, and Xander was sticking to it.

He didn't need a super-powered girl to break down the perfectly sturdy wall he'd built over the past... many, many years. One look at Giles, sitting down in the kitchen, the living room, the study, and it was enough for Xander to do it himself. Not that he was doing that right now, oh no.

That wall still had a good long life ahead of it.

Until Giles looked at Xander one evening over dinner, and smiled. Whoosh, the sound of crumbling brick in Xander's ears was deafening. Xander had to shake his head to make it stop. Giles had been talking. "Huh?" Smooth, very smooth.

"I was only wondering if you were staying home tonight or going on another outing with the girls." Giles' look was speculative. Xander was aware that there were rumours about him taking it up with yet another Slayer--and fuck knows he'd gotten a lot of looks from, he figured, interested parties; but he wasn't. Interested.

Forever single guy, that was him now. Not interested in anyone, no matter what crumbling brick walls were trying to make him think about.

Except that Giles had smiled that smile that made him look a good ten years younger, and maybe the fallen wall had a point and Xander wasn't so much in denial anymore. Maybe he was... in limbo. That had a decent ring to it. Limbo.

Xander's stomach had done that twisty thing. The one that meant absolutely nothing good.

"I think I'm gonna go for a walk." He left his half empty plate on the table, and left.

* * *

"Love is like a tree, it grows of its own accord, it puts down deep roots into our whole being."


Xander could have, if he'd really wanted to, run away far enough that Giles couldn't have followed him. A trip to South America, for example, wasn't all that difficult now that he had a company credit card and a boss who wouldn't question Xander's need to see his best friend.

At least not to his face.

As it was, Xander only walked down the street to the park around the corner. He sat down on a bench, opposite a bunch of pigeons who scrambled away from him. It was almost twilight already and there were few people on the street. Xander barely noticed the stragglers hurrying home. He stared at the pigeons, heart hammering in his chest.

Every attempt he made at reconstructing his wall of denial was a failure; a complete, well, failure. Giles and his smile and... he'd said home. Home. Home.

Home.

It was home, and that, that was... surprising.

When he'd left Elyse and Kinshasa, he hadn't gone to Buffy or Willow or anyone that made sense. Xander had gone to Giles. He'd come here. Xander hadn't even thought about it, he'd just gone to the airport, and...

"Xander? Are you all right?" Giles was standing right there, next to the bench, and when Xander looked up, he sat down next to him.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm okay," Xander said, trying to smile. Giles wasn't fooled. "I just... had a whole..." He waved his hand around. "Epiphany."

"What about? Elyse?"

"What? No!" He rubbed his forehead. They hadn't even been talking about her had they. Why was Giles bringing her up? "Er, sorta. Not, not about her specifically, but she said something and I--" He stopped and shrugged.

"Would you like to, er, to talk?"

"Talking won't get me anywhere."

"Well, there are leftovers at home, as you seem to have left before you could finish eating, and I believe I have some whiskey in the liquor cabinet."

"Not much of a whiskey kinda guy."

"I might have some beer left in the cupboard," Giles added. "Or we could stop at the store if you'd like."

Xander considered that for a second. "I could go for a beer."

* * *

A beer had ended up being two, and when Giles had lifted an eyebrow, whiskey in hand, Xander had nodded, agreeing to a glass of it too. It had burnt going down, but everything had seemed blurry afterwards, and that kind of made up for it.

"I didn't--" Xander took another swig of his beer, hoping to shut himself up. Unfortunately for him, he was drunk enough that it didn't work for very long. "You know how sometimes, something hits you over the head so hard it's like your whole world's gone out of whack?"

"Actually, yes, I do know. Quite literally, in fact." Giles smiled ruefully.

Xander laughed. "I didn't mean it that way."

"No, I didn't think you did."

"Do you have a job? I mean, for me, here."

 

Giles nodded, handing out another glass for Xander to take. "There is more than enough work; I'm sure we can find something for you to do."

 

Xander took the glass. His fingers touched Giles' and he shivered, looking up. He noticed a look going over Giles' feature, a moment later, it was gone. Okay, maybe, if he... there was a chance...

 

Maybe the denial was really gone, and maybe he wasn't wrong to think...

 

Xander put the glass down on the coffee table, and reached out to cup Giles' cheek. His mouth was dry and he passed his tongue over his lower lip. Giles' eyes never left his. He didn't say anything.

 

Xander leaned forward and kissed him.

 

* * *

 

"Love, you're news to me. You're a little bit more than I thought you'd be."


Xander hadn't expected it to be that way at all. He hadn't planned any of it, true, but apparently he'd had expectations anyway. One of those was that Giles was going to ask questions, want answers, explanations, anything to justify Xander's action.