How To Disappear Completely (A:ts, Angel)
Jun. 26th, 2006 05:46 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
thedeadparrot.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
parrotficTitle: How To Disappear Completely
Fandom: Angel: the series
Summary: Every morning, Angel wakes to the sun on his face and the taste of blood on his tongue.
Notes: Many thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
xyellowroset for her beta. Takes places season 5 somewhere between Smile Time and A Hole In The World.
Every morning, Angel wakes to the sun on his face and the taste of blood on his tongue.
---
When Nina comes by, he watches her sniff the air. It's not an obvious motion, not that anyone (not a monster) would notice, just a tilt of her blonde head and a flare of her nostrils. He doubts that she realizes that she's doing it, taking in the scents, because it's not really her who's doing it, is it?
That's why he can be with her with (almost) no guilt. She knows what it's like to carry something inside you, something dark, something different.
It took him decades to stop doing that around humans, to fight down the urge to sniff the air for traces of blood.
(Though sometimes, he still does, so that he can remember what it was like, so that he doesn't forget.)
---
Angel fights like he has nothing to lose these days (because he doesn't), and the demon in him roars like it always does when he dances close to death.
When Angel fights, he feels the almost solid, almost substantial. When Angel fights, he knows who is, what he's doing. When Angel fights, the world is clear and simple, and he only needs to live for the next second or the one after that.
When Angel fights, he can believe that he's doing the right thing.
---
The demon clients like to call him "vampire" with a sneer, reminding him of who is, what he is, as if he cares, as if he doesn't already know his place.
Spike likes to eat human food in front of him. Likes to eat it messily, fingers covered in sauce and grease and oil, all of it the wrong color so that Angel cannot mistake it for blood.
Spike thinks Angel needs to be reminded of his place as well.
He's much better at it.
---
Angel keeps things, even though he knows he shouldn't, even though they hold him back, hold him down.
There's a box he keeps, with Doyle's video, some of Cordelia's shirts, a stack of old Angel Investigations files (still out of order), a lock of Darla's hair, a silver cross he stole from Buffy's house.
After he left the Hyperion for the last time, he brought the box up with him to his new penthouse and placed it there, in the back corner, hidden behind his jackets.
He hasn't touched it since.
---
He doesn't talk to them much anymore, Wesley, Fred, Gunn, Lorne. They have their own departments to think about, their own problems.
They have meetings, sometimes, but those conversations are distant and stilted, full of formal discussions about budgets and clients and projects.
That doesn't mean Angel doesn't see them, however, through the windows in his office, doesn't mean he doesn't watch as they go about their business, have meetings, talk to clients, live their lives.
That doesn't mean Angel doesn't wonder if he's better off on this side of the glass.
---
There are moments, when every cell in Angel's body wants to take a car to see his son, to see how he's doing, if his grades are good, if he's fitting in at college, if he's getting along with his sister, if he's cut his hair, if he's still happy.
Then he remembers that he doesn't have a son.
---
Every night, Angel brushes his teeth in front of a mirror and stares at the empty space in the reflection where his body is supposed to be.
FIN.
Fandom: Angel: the series
Summary: Every morning, Angel wakes to the sun on his face and the taste of blood on his tongue.
Notes: Many thanks to
xyellowroset for her beta. Takes places season 5 somewhere between Smile Time and A Hole In The World.Every morning, Angel wakes to the sun on his face and the taste of blood on his tongue.
---
When Nina comes by, he watches her sniff the air. It's not an obvious motion, not that anyone (not a monster) would notice, just a tilt of her blonde head and a flare of her nostrils. He doubts that she realizes that she's doing it, taking in the scents, because it's not really her who's doing it, is it?
That's why he can be with her with (almost) no guilt. She knows what it's like to carry something inside you, something dark, something different.
It took him decades to stop doing that around humans, to fight down the urge to sniff the air for traces of blood.
(Though sometimes, he still does, so that he can remember what it was like, so that he doesn't forget.)
---
Angel fights like he has nothing to lose these days (because he doesn't), and the demon in him roars like it always does when he dances close to death.
When Angel fights, he feels the almost solid, almost substantial. When Angel fights, he knows who is, what he's doing. When Angel fights, the world is clear and simple, and he only needs to live for the next second or the one after that.
When Angel fights, he can believe that he's doing the right thing.
---
The demon clients like to call him "vampire" with a sneer, reminding him of who is, what he is, as if he cares, as if he doesn't already know his place.
Spike likes to eat human food in front of him. Likes to eat it messily, fingers covered in sauce and grease and oil, all of it the wrong color so that Angel cannot mistake it for blood.
Spike thinks Angel needs to be reminded of his place as well.
He's much better at it.
---
Angel keeps things, even though he knows he shouldn't, even though they hold him back, hold him down.
There's a box he keeps, with Doyle's video, some of Cordelia's shirts, a stack of old Angel Investigations files (still out of order), a lock of Darla's hair, a silver cross he stole from Buffy's house.
After he left the Hyperion for the last time, he brought the box up with him to his new penthouse and placed it there, in the back corner, hidden behind his jackets.
He hasn't touched it since.
---
He doesn't talk to them much anymore, Wesley, Fred, Gunn, Lorne. They have their own departments to think about, their own problems.
They have meetings, sometimes, but those conversations are distant and stilted, full of formal discussions about budgets and clients and projects.
That doesn't mean Angel doesn't see them, however, through the windows in his office, doesn't mean he doesn't watch as they go about their business, have meetings, talk to clients, live their lives.
That doesn't mean Angel doesn't wonder if he's better off on this side of the glass.
---
There are moments, when every cell in Angel's body wants to take a car to see his son, to see how he's doing, if his grades are good, if he's fitting in at college, if he's getting along with his sister, if he's cut his hair, if he's still happy.
Then he remembers that he doesn't have a son.
---
Every night, Angel brushes his teeth in front of a mirror and stares at the empty space in the reflection where his body is supposed to be.
FIN.
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no subject
Date: 2006-06-27 06:01 am (UTC)I don't think there's anything to be self-conscious about. I'm a long-time member of the Buffy fandom(s) (ah, I wish I had a copy of my poorly written first Buffy fic), and I will admit I've not seen a lot in the fandom written like this, but that makes it all the better.
I kind of drifted away from Angel there toward the end (somewhere along the time of confusing stuff with Cordelia, and the loss of Fred), so some of this honestly doesn't make /that/ much sense to me, but it's still good. ♥
no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 02:09 am (UTC)Yeah, Angel does get pretty crazy around Seasons 4 and 5, but they're some of my favorites. :p You should totally give them a chance sometime.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-27 11:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 02:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 12:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 08:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 12:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 01:13 am (UTC)I don't think you could have given me a better compliment. Thank you. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 01:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 01:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 03:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 01:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 04:01 am (UTC)while i loved season 5 (most espescially considering season 4. *gag*), it was the final straw in losing that familial aspect of the series - same thing with later seasons of Buffy. i know people grow apart, but there are some things that never change. it is the things that do, without your even noticing, that is so emphasized and so hard to accept. and rather sad.
i think you captured that idea beautifully.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 01:51 am (UTC)And yeah, I kind of missed the closeness of the characters in the later seasons too.
Thanks for the feedback.
(I would also just like to say that I like season 4 a lot, but I understand why other people would not feel the same way I do.)
no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 02:50 am (UTC)once i "got" it, i was just so upset that i'd been played that i think most of the rest of it was a blur. i didn't engage with it like i was trying to before or like i'd done with the first two seasons.
season three i'm still up in the air about. while i understand that something was needed to shake things up, and to take characters (ie: wes) in different/new directions, but i am totally not down with the whole "pregnant vampire" thing.
and yet, i still wouldn't say i hated the show. there is enough good about it, and themeatically, overall, i DO like it...i guess i just got stuck on a few bits of characterization which diminished my enjoyment...
(okay, sorry. end rant. holy guacamole.)
no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 11:51 am (UTC)Then he remembers that he doesn't have a son.
that is so sad. *sniff*
no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 02:13 am (UTC)But he hurts so pretty!
And of course, most of that pain is reserved for Connor. :p
no subject
Date: 2006-06-28 03:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 03:07 am (UTC)Yeah, Angel's got a lot of loss going on Season 5.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-30 04:24 am (UTC)And I think, perhaps, that Spike and his human food thing was my favorite part in the entire story. :)
(Sorry this is so late, I've been busy.)
no subject
Date: 2007-01-05 04:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-05 07:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-26 08:54 pm (UTC)Also, my fic tag kind of sucks, so if you want to look for more House/Wilson, check here (http://community.livejournal.com/parrotfic/tag/house/wilson).