By Gonzai
Author: Gonzai
Title: Waning Moon
E-Mail: LCSTrish@aol.com
Rating: PG - all tame and fluffy
Summary: Doyle tries to convince Angel and Cordelia of his presence.
Feedback: Sure, fine
Disclaimers: They belong to you know who, not me
Spoilers: 'Hero', 'In the Dark', 'Bachelor Party
Author's Notes: In response to the 'ghost Doyle' challenge, a songfic. The song is Peter
Himmelman's 'Waning Moon', because I've been singing the damn thing for three days now.
"Waning moon, hovering the meadowlands
I've been waning too.
It seems our strength has fallen like a rock again
Does it feel for me the way that it does for you?"
Angel awoke with a start, as he had the previous two mornings as well. He awoke for the same reason as the previous mornings too--he could hear the song as clearly as if it were being played in the room with him, but he didn't own a stereo. Or even a radio. And there were no neighbors or windows.
"This is crazy," he said out loud. "Where the hell is that coming from?"
Obviously he didn't expect an answer, since he was the only one in the apartment. But, like yesterday, he got one anyway. Sort of. Yesterday a chair in the kitchen promptly flipped over, as easily as if it had been picked up and dropped, but Angel was still in the bedroom at the time. Today, the light next to his bed turned itself on and back off again.
"I'm not alone here, am I?" Angel asked the air gruffly.
In response, the chair near the bedroom door tipped over.
"What do you want?"
Silence.
"Do you know or won't you tell me?"
Suddenly Angel could hear the song again, playing inside his head.
"Silent moon, gazing at the meadowlands
I've been silent too.
Faces drained of all their heart and innocence,
Waning moon."
"That's all you're going to give me?"
Silence again. Then the chair was picked up and set down again.
"Fine." Angel decided to get up and go upstairs. It was nearly time to go up anyway.
"Faded moon, weeping above the meadowlands
I've been weeping too.
Time will bring the color to our cheeks again
Does it look to me the way that it does to you?"
"WHAT?" Cordelia shrieked. It was the second day in a row she had heard the song playing in her head, almost as soon as she came into the office and only while she was alone. The first time she had searched everywhere for the radio playing it, and even accused the dentist across the hall of playing his stereo too loudly, but in the end she knew the song was only in her head. But two days in a row was too much.
The coffee pot suddenly was lifted out of the machine, poured a cup and set itself back down again without being touched. Yesterday, it had been the water cooler.
"Dennis? Are you following me to work now? Because I am a big girl, you don't have to go everywhere with me. Dennis?"
A book slammed onto the desk.
"Okay, not Dennis. Who are you?"
The cup of coffee floated through the air and settled down in front of her. Then a bottle of scotch left the shelf and settled on the desk across from her.
"Whoever you are, you drink like Doyle. Knock it off." The only thing more annoying than having an anonymous spirit pestering her was thinking about Doyle, and she wished she hadn't. It only made the pain worse.
"Knock what off? I haven't had a chance to do anything yet," Wesley was just coming into the office.
"Not you. The ghost."
"We have a ghost? Do you know what kind?"
One good thing about Wesley, Cordelia thought, at least he doesn't freak out over the idea of monsters in the office. "No idea. He keeps putting some song in my head, but only the verses."
"Not the chorus. If there is one," Angel interrupted as he joined them in the office.
"You're hearing it, too," Cordelia noted matter-of-factly. "Up here or in the apartment?"
"Downstairs."
"I wonder why I don't hear it then," mused Wesley.
"Maybe it's somebody from before you got here, maybe a client we failed to rescue?" Cordelia suggested.
Angel wasn't hearing her. "Since when do you drink scotch?" he asked.
"The ghost put that there. After he poured me coffee. I thought it was Dennis but he's home," Cordelia explained.
Angel was still staring at the scotch. "That hasn't been touched since...since..."
"Since what?" inquired Wesley and almost immediately realized his mistake. "I'm sorry. Didn't intend...I'll be quiet now."
'Too late', thought Cordelia. She was thinking of Doyle again, and this time a tear or two came with the thought.
"I didn't mean to upset you," Wesley tried to make amends. Before he could say anything further, the cup of coffee rose up again and dumped its contents on Wesley's freshly dry-cleaned suit. Fortunately it had been sitting long enough that it was no longer hot, but the damage to his clothes was substantial. Adding injury to the insult, Wesley tripped as he rushed to the bathroom to try and rescue his clothing. Tripped over nothing, in fact, but air.
"Okay, a ghost that doesn't know Wesley and doesn't like him either," noted Cordelia. "Narrows the field."
"But to who? I asked him who he was and he just knocked over more furniture," Angel said helplessly.
Wesley came back into the office and began searching through the desk drawer. "Considering his opinion of me I doubt I wish to stay here with him," he snipped. Wesley produced a bottle of aspirin and it was quickly yanked from his hands. "Really doesn't like me," he muttered.
The now floating bottle slammed itself against the table a few times and twisted in the air. "Oh please, just give it here!" Cordelia snatched the bottle back and popped it open easily, then froze. Doyle could never get that bottle open. For that matter, he could never find it either, she always had to find it and open it for him. And the scotch..."Doyle?"
"Cordelia..." the pain in Angel's voice was obvious. "Please don't."
The song started in her head again, but now she knew it was the chorus.
"I can't touch you yet I feel you breathe
With a longing that is hard to conceive
I can't hear you yet I sing your tune
Waning moon."
Then the voice rang out clearly inside her head, the soft baritone with the lilt to it. "You hear me now, Princess?"
"Yes," Cordelia could barely breathe and what air she still had escaped her as Doyle slowly appeared before her. He was dressed as he had been the night he rescued her from the vampire outside the building, and he had his usual look of adoration for her on his face.
"You see me?"
She nodded. "Doyle..." her voice cracked as she said it.
"You don't have to talk. I can hear you think."
"Okay, that's little too weird," she answered in her head. "Why can't Angel hear you?"
"He doesn't believe it's me. He has to believe I'm here, then he can see me. You believe."
"Cordelia? Are you all right?" Wesley had forgotten his ruined clothes as Cordelia had seemingly left the room, at least mentally.
"Tell him I'm sorry about the coffee. I got a little--he made you cry. I shouldna done that."
"Doyle says he's sorry about your suit."
Wesley was flabbergasted. "You're--talking to him?"
"Sure. I see him too. You're about to step on his foot."
"Doesn't matter. I can't feel it."
"Cordelia, I know this has been hard on us but...he's not here. He's d--he's gone," Angel said shakily.
"Not only is he here, but he's trying to get your attention if you could possibly be bothered," Cordelia scolded. It was beyond her that Angel couldn't comprehend that their spirit visitor was Doyle. She'd wondered almost immediately.
"No. That's not--that isn't true," Angel turned and dashed down the stairs.
"You better go with him."
"I don't think he'll believe me. You have to convince him."
"How? I've been tryin', Princess, I tried."
"I remembered you can't open the aspirin bottle. What does he know about you no one else does?"
Doyle shrugged in despair. He noticed Wesley was still staring in open-mouthed disbelief, and handed him the now open bottle.
"You wanted these, right?" Doyle sat on the desk, head in his hands. "I can't think of nothin' you didn't know, too."
Cordelia found herself reviewing all the moments from the last months that she had tried to forget. But knowing Doyle was at least sort of here, the memories didn't hurt nearly so much. "How did you get rid of the Gem of Amara? You never said how he did that."
"You're right, I never--ya got an old ring I can borrow? I kinda can't give it back though."
"There should be something in Angel's stash shouldn't there?"
"Yeah, there should be. Thanks, Princess."
The bottle of scotch had set Angel to wondering if the visitor was Doyle, but he didn't want it to be Doyle. If Doyle were here, then he would have to remember the past year. Angel had tried so hard to forget Doyle even though he knew he could never forget. But the pain and guilt were too much for him to remember.
'If it is Doyle, what do I say to him? I let him die,' Angel thought bitterly to himself. Then
the song started yet again.
"Patient moon, drifting 'cross the meadowlands
I've been patient too.
I don't know exactly what you're waiting for
But does it hurt for me the way that it does for you?"
"Please stop that," Angel begged.
Instead the spirit opened one of the trunks of treasures Angel kept stored in the apartment and removed a ring--not an especially beautiful one, but an old one, and set it on the kitchen table.
"What are you doing?" Angel asked quietly.
Suddenly he noticed a brick floating through the air in exactly the manner that bricks don't. The brick hovered over the ring, then suddenly smashed the ring to pieces on the table.
"Like what I did to the Gem of Amara," Angel said softly to himself. "When Doyle and I
were on the roof--" Angel felt like he had been struck in the chest. If he could breathe, he
wouldn't have been able to.
"I can't touch you yet I feel you breathe
With a longing that is hard to conceive
I can't hear you yet I sing your tune
Waning moon."
"It is you, isn't it?" Angel asked hoarsely.
"Yeah, it's me. You're a tough one to convince but then ya always were."
Angel could see Doyle now, sitting on the kitchen table like he often did and looking much as he had that night on the roof.
"Ya see what you want to remember. That's how it works. Ya remember what we did with the ring the most."
"Yes...that is...what I remember."
"I know ya loved me, Angel. Ya woulda died for me. But we can't change nothin' about that night now, an' I wouldn't if I could. Well, maybe it wouldna hurt so much. But don't blame yerself for it."
"I have to blame myself. It's who I am--you know that."
"No, ya don't. Ya can blame me if ya wanna, but ya don't have to blame yerself anymore, okay? For me, if not for you." Doyle fidgeted a bit, if a ghost could do that. "I coulda stayed where I was--an' it was pretty nice there. But I wanted to come back, to look after Cordy. An' as it turns out you're the one needs lookin' after."
"You wanted to...you came back for us?"
Doyle nodded. "There's thin's gonna happen yet. Ya both are gonna need me an' now I'm here. I'll be here as long as you an' Cordy are here. I'm not done yet."
Angel thought silently for a long time. "Doyle?"
"Yeah?"
"You're right. I loved you. And I need you. You'll stay?"
"That's the whole point, right?"
Angel smiled. "It is. Let's tell Cordelia."
THE END
©copyright 2000 Gonzai
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