Author: Inca
Feedback: Don�t make me come after you - [email protected]
Rating NC17
AU Liam/Spike
Disclaimer: Whedon, Mutant Enemy and all that jazz
Spoilers: AU
Summary: Liam�s an addict
Authors notes: Consulted heavily with a friend who used to mainline. Feel free to berate me and inform me that your withdrawal wasn�t as depicted here, but I probably won�t change anything.
***
Four months later.
***
Liam checked his watch for the forty-third time in half an hour. He rubbed his hands together nervously and did another paranoid sweep of the tiny apartment in case a stack of dirty washing had suddenly leapt out from between the couch cushions, ready to make a bad impression, ruin the pristine cleanliness.
He�d been working for two and a half months now, at a photo copying place just down the street, forwarding as much of his pay as he could afford, onto Cordy.
He was kinda proud of himself. He�d only stumbled once, one night, feeling the loneliness try to choke him in his bed, he slipped on the bus and travelled shaking and jittering to Doc. But it was once. Only once. He could get past one mistake.
He checked his watch again. It was six minutes past, but that was alright. She hadn�t forgotten. No way would she have forgotten. His eyes strayed to the phone. Maybe he could just give her a buzz, make sure she had left the house alrea �
Knock knock.
He resisted the urge to bolt to the door and walked slowly, not wanting it to seem like he was hovering, waiting for them. The closer he got, the more worried he became. Would she be angry? Had enough? What would he look like to them? He paused, his hand on the cold doorknob.
He�d look like a junkie in a beat up apartment a rehab clinic had found for him. He suddenly wanted to collapse but the knock knock made him gasp awake where he stood.
He pulled open the door before he could do something stupid, like hide in his room.
�Daddy!� Connor squealed, always happy to see him, always. He ran into his leg and held his arms up, wanting to be picked up. Unexpected blue eyes under a heavy straight fringe. Upturned nose, fingers outstretched waiting to be lifted. He obliged happily, always wanting to hold the small boy in his arms.
Cordy watched with an amused half-smile, dressed in jeans and a plain white tank top. She looked gorgeous.
�Hey.� He tried, quietly; hoping she�d ignore it if that�s not what she wanted to hear.
She�d cut her hair. It was short now, in a small blonde bob thing. He should comment on it.
�Hey.� She said, cheerily. She wasn�t happy to be there, he knew. She looked out of place in the ratty apartment. He decided she probably didn�t want to hear his comments on her hair, although it looked nice.
He always preferred the old haircut.
The high school hair cut, long straight hair with a fringe. He always thought that looked the best on her. But even the long curly hair had looked good, and then the rocker boofy thing, those all looked good too. But then again. She was Cordelia.
She was so beautiful.
Connor was burbling happily about ice-skating and he realised he�d been staring at her. Great impression. She was probably going to think he was stoned.
She smiled down at something Connor said.
�So�� she tried after Connor had stopped.
He should comment on the hair. He couldn�t find the words.
�This is�� She looked around the dingy apartment, �big.� She tried for optimism.
It wasn�t really. It had a high roof, with a pretty big living room that was the first thing you saw. It was one of those apartments that had been created by dividing up a few levels of warehouse. The windows were small squares and smudged, thus creating the gloomy atmosphere.
�Yeah, big.� He agreed, shifting Connor in his arms. He was never good with conversation.
They stood awkwardly, silently for a few moments, as Cordy blanched and curled her prom queen lips slightly at something in the apartment that caught her eye. She was never good with tact. She swung Connor�s bag off her slim shoulder and handed it to him.
�So, where you gonna go?� She asked, raising her eyebrows into little points. It was probably harmless curiosity but Liam felt like she wanted to keep tabs on him, make sure he didn�t do anything stupid.
Probably a good idea.
�A park. On seventh. Get some hotdogs, maybe walk � to the� street markets�� he trailed off quietly.
�Sounds great.� She enthused, and he felt better. She leant in to Connor and he leant forward to give a peck on her cheek. �See you at eight champ.� She smiled widely at him, then gave Liam a smaller smile with a nod, before trotting off down the stairs.
He turned his face to Connor, still in his arms. �So, you wanna go to the park first, or maybe get some breakfast?�
�Breakfast.� The boy grinned, impishly.
�McDonalds?�
�Yay!�
He carried Connor around as he got his wallet, his keys and made sure the apartment was locked, but all those things were just an excuse. He never wanted to let him go.
**
�No way! Skeletor could beat Venom any day.� Connor said, holding his hot-dog up to make his emphatic point.
Liam leant down and pushed the hot dog back into the box so it didn�t spill across the foot walk. He stood back up, taking hold of Connor�s hand again. They were walking through the park to get to the markets. It was a great day. Sunny but still cool. Perfect. He�d already bought Connor a bacon and egg mcmuffin meal and then an ice cream, then donuts and now he was having a hot dog. He hoped he didn�t throw up.
�But Venom has the tongue. And the claws and the teeth. Skeletor�s only got the skeleton head on top of a strangely buff body.�
Connor looked at him as if to say he didn�t know anything, and Liam laughed. �Okay fine.�
�What about�� Connor drawled, waiting for inspiration. �The ni�ja turtles vs Mothra?�
�Uh� Ninja turtles?� Liam asked, feeling the small hand pull on his as Connor stumbled slightly. He tensed his arm ready to hold the boy up if he fell.
�Yeah. I agree.� He said, as if the stumble had never happened.
He smiled and looked down to see Connor had his face buried in his hot dog, trying to eat with one hand as they walked, and he laughed again.
�Look, they�re on stilts.� He said to the boy, pointing at the clowns entertaining at the markets they were headed towards. He lifted Connor and sat him on a park bench as he tried to clean the mustard and cheese off his face. Connor watched the stilt walkers, his mouth open.
�How�d they do that?�
�Impeccably good balance.�
Connor took a huge bite of his hot dog and chewed as he watched them with wide guileless blue, contemplating. Liam realised Connor had a bit of cheese in his hair and pulled it out, flicking his fingers over the grass to dislodge the sticky thing.
�Could I learn to do that?�
�If you wanted to, I suppose.� He grinned, sitting back on his haunches in front of the seat, looking up at him. �You�d have to start off on teeny stilts.� He teased.
�Nu-uh.�
�Yuh-huh!� He argued, widening his eyes as he smiled.
�Nah I wouldn�t� He said, biting into his hot dog to show the conversation had ended.
They wandered around the open air street markets, getting distracted by the colourful clothes and the jugglers and then the small petting zoo that had been set up. A spiderman mask had caught Connors attention and Liam had bought it for him, grinning as he insisted wearing it there and then.
After they had tired of the markets, they had rented a movie, Brother Bear, and Liam had bought them both a pasta meal from the small, tasty, Trattoria along the street. Connor alternated between laughing at the cartoon bears antics and watching seriously as Disney tried to inject it�s �lesson� in a heartfelt scene of the bear finally finding its brother or father or whatever it was trying to do. Liam wasn�t paying attention. He was watching Connor with an irrational bubble of pride in his chest. He�d grown a lot since he had seen him last. But then he always thought that. Cordy had rung the day he was released, to tell him that she wanted him to get his act together before Connor came over this time. He was always floundering and messed up when he came out of treatment. He gotten the job, kept the job, which in itself was new, and was rewarded with a visit from his son. Connor had been on a camp for a few weeks so this was the first chance he�d had to take him out in about half a year. He had lots of phone calls though, in rehab and in his new apartment. He�d been to his soccer matches and his school play. For his own birthday, they had all gone to a restaurant together, like they were a family again, an aching tease of what he could have. And he�d seen Connor for his birthday, gone to the party and watched him happily as he�d squealed with glee on opening his present of transformable ninja turtle.
He was seven now.
Seven years old.
�Are you cold?� Connor asked him.
He looked down at himself; he had his arms crossed over his chest, innately afraid that Connor might be able to see through the long black sleeves to the ugliness below.
�Oh, yeah, maybe a little. I�ll just go throw on a jumper. You good?�
Connor nodded and went back to eating his pasta.
�This is nice.� He heard the young voice call out as he entered his bedroom.
�Isn�t it? I love that place, go there at least twice a week.� He called back.
What was he doing in here? He asked himself silently. He wasn�t even sure. He�d had to leave, it all seemed so strange sitting on the couch with him. He breathed. Slowly. He felt a gnawing at the back of his brain but he tamped it down. Connor was here. He needed Connor, not a hit. And Connor needed him. He slowly opened the door and headed back out, dropping back down onto the couch. Connor crawled over and leant against him.
�You didn�t put a jumper on.�
�Decided not to.� He murmured, enjoying the weight of Connor against his arm.
He could feel Connor chewing, his jaw moving as he rested his head against Liam�s upper arm. The bear movie finished and Connor yawned and put his empty container and fork on the ground in front of the chair. He stretched.
�Now what?�
Liam looked at his watch. It was eight-twenty. Cordy would be here to pick him up any moment.
�Wanna play snap?� Liam asked.
�Yeah kay!� Connor said. He loved snap. Snap and Uno. Maybe he could get some board games for the next time Connor came over. He loved things like that, Monopoly Jr or that Operation game or even snakes and ladders. He�d get one or two so he could play the next time he visited
They went to the dining room table and sat across from each other. Liam grabbed the pack of well-loved cards from the small cupboard and shuffled them, dealing them out.
�Okay, ready?�
�Ready.� Connor said, eyes on the one card already down.
Liam went first. As the game progressed, as usual, Connor leant closer and closer to the pile, hands right over it ready to slap the cards. Liam smiled. He loved watching Connor play it; he was always so serious.
�SNAP!� Connor screamed.
Liam laughed as the shriek reverberated around the wood and plaster. �You don�t have to yell, you�re gonna scare the neighbours.� He said. Connor looked abashed.
�Sorry.� He said with a huge embarrassed grin on his face.
Liam laughed again. They kept going. Liam waited for almost five seconds for Connor to see that two queens had been placed on top of each other, diamonds and spades. When he did, his fingers slapped down on the cards and he dragged the small pile towards him jiggling a little victory dance in his seat.
The next pair Liam slapped. Connor became more involved; his eyes stuck to the cards, unblinking.
�SNAP!� He screeched, louder than before.
Liam broke up into cackles again as Connor pulled an embarrassed face as he realised he�d screamed again.
�Sorry.�
�Its fine, don�t worry about it.�
A knock on the door dragged Liam out of his seat. He opened the locks to reveal a smiling Cordy.
�Playing snap I�m guessing?� She asked, big grin and raised eyebrows.
Liam laughed a little, embarrassed. �Yeah, you heard?�
�All the way down the stairs.� She nodded.
�Mom!� Connor said, slipping off the chair and running over, reaching up for a hug. Cordy picked him up with an �oooh�, grunting a little at the weight.
�Have a good day?�
�Yep, we went to McDonalds and then the parks and then the markets and then we went to a trato-ria, and then we watched Brother Bear.�
�Oh, well that sounds like a great day! You had fun didn�t you?� She enthused, smiling at him as he wriggled on her hip.
�Yeah! I got a mask!�
�A mask?� She asked Liam.
�Spiderman mask.� He filled in the details.
�Oh, well, you love Spiderman. Ooof, Mommy�s gonna have to put you down now.� She said, bending over to place the boy on his feet.
�It all went okay?� She asked Liam.
�Yeah, it was great. I may have fed him a bit too much.� He apologised.
�Well, we�ll see in the car on the way home.� She said, faking an air of frustration, ending with a smile so he knew she was joking.
�Do you want to come in for a coffee?� He blurted.
She looked apologetic. �I would, but Connor�s got to get to bed for school tomorrow�� she said, lifting her voice into a sing song, teasing Connor about his fate.
�Oh, right. Well, maybe next time.� He nodded, unknowingly crossing his arms and shuffling back a little.
�Mum, I feel sick, I don�t think I should go tomorrow.� He said unhappily. �I�ve got a fever.�
Cordy pandered to him and felt his forehead. �Feel fine to me.�
�No, it�s just you have a fever too.�
She nodded her head unbelievingly and then turned back to Liam, looking at him like she was waiting for something.
�Oh.� He said, remembering Connor�s bag of stuff. He turned back and grabbed it off the couch, bending back when he realised he�d forgotten the mask. He came back to the door. �Here, I�ll walk you down.�
�Sure.� Cordy said as he locked the door.
Connor smiled and he picked him up, resting him on his hip as his mother had done, letting Cordy take the bag and mask as she lead the way down the stairs. It was cold outside, Connor immediately shivered in his short sleeve shirt.
Cordy unlocked the small Subaru Impreza and put Connor�s bag in the backseat.
�I wanna wear the mask, Mom.� She dutifully leant back in and pulled the spiderman mask out.
Liam hugged Connor, feeling the small arms lock tightly around his neck for a few moments and then put him down onto the footpath.
�Bye Dad, see you later!�
�Yeah, bye!� he waved as Connor opened the door and got into the front seat.
�So, we�ll see you in two weeks?� Cordy asked.
He nodded. �Sure. And if you ever need me��
�I know.� She smiled and walked round to the other side of the car, opening the door. �You look good Liam. I�m glad we waited before Connor came to see you this time.� She said, pausing for a moment, faded smile on her face before sliding into the driver�s seat with a wave.
Connor, in his mask again, waved furiously through the dark window as Cordy backed up and pulled out into the street. She honked and then they were gone, disappearing around the corner. He stood out on the dark footpath for a while, watching the quiet street, before he turned and slowly made his way up the stairs.
***
�Welcome to Colour Copy, how can I help you?� He even said the recitation with a smile on his face.
The woman handed him a stack of folders. �Ten copies of each, in the same binder as those.�
�Okay, and your name?�
She flipped her long shiny hair back over her shoulder. �Laurell Marks.� She said, her eyes never making it up past his shirt. He wasn�t even there to her. He may as well have been a recording.
�Phone number?�
�555-6589.� She recited, looking bored.
Liam nodded, �Okay, come back after �Um, three today?�
She nodded, gave him a cursory smile that seemed directed to the counter and left the store. Liam piled the folders into his arms and went out the back, starting on them right away. He diligently fed the paper into the copiers and occasionally poked his head round the adjoining doorway to watch the store. Not that anyone could or would really steal anything, but he didn�t want anyone standing around waiting.
He bound the books one by one, putting a little sticker with �Marks�, on the finished job. He stepped back out into the shop, watching disinterestedly as a young boy copied what looked like about five hundred sheets of something on one of the public use copiers.
The job was pretty good. As long as he stayed up to date on the copy jobs and pulled the damn copiers apart when they broke down, he was allowed to use the net on the lap-top kept behind the desk in the quiet times.
Connor sent him emails sometimes, or Cordy did, typing them for him, and that was nice. He went on chat rooms, to give himself the illusion of being social, or just looked up apartments. He wanted to get something a little better than his humble fourth-floor walk up. Nothing was really in his price range, but he kept looking anyway.
The shop was in walking distance to his home now anyway, that was a plus, so he didn�t have to pay for transport.
He sat and served the odd customer, fixed the odd copier until lunchtime. He grabbed some grilled fish and a salad for lunch and tried to finish it � the doctor had told him to eat healthier, and then came back to repeat the serving and fixing until he closed the shop at five-thirty.
He was tired as he locked the front doors, pulling the shutter down over the glass. Tired and very aware he didn�t want to work at Colour Copy for the rest of his life. He stopped at the small mom and pop store on the way home and bought some heatable dinners, lots of orange juice and candies to help with the cravings, and some frozen vegetables.
The streets were dark when he left the store and he juggled the paper bags onto a comfortable place on his hip as he started the walk up to his apartment. His feet echoed in the grey concrete stairwell, and a baby was wailing loud and insistent in one of the rooms. That broken crackle in its screams made it obvious it had been crying for a while. He sighed and juggled with the bags again; this time so he could pull his keys from his pocket to unlock the front door�s many locks.
He hated coming home. It was this time at night that got to him the most. The apartment seemed bigger and darker and a whole lot colder when there was no one in it to come home to. He flicked the light on and closed the door immediately. A safety conscious neighbourhood was not the reason Liam had rented the apartment. He heated one of the small dinners, throwing the rest in the freezer and put away the few groceries. He stood and, almost mesmerised, watched the dinner revolve in the microwave until it beeped and the inner light blinked off. Careful of steam burns, he walked to the couch and sat down, blowing the heat off the dinner before he started picking at it disinterestedly with his fork. It was some sort of chicken and rice mess. With some token broccoli pieces tossed in.
He couldn�t be bothered turning on the TV. There was never anything good on anyway, nothing he�d want to watch. He sighed and looked down at himself, realising he still had his work shirt on. He sighed, realised he�d been walking the streets wearing a bright yellow and blue sign of how much he�d accomplished in his twenty seven years and put his dinner down to unbutton the shirt and slip it off over the long sleeve tee he left on. He didn�t want the uniform to get dirty before tomorrow. His other one was still waiting to be washed. He sighed and looked around the empty apartment. Maybe he could call Cordy�s house and talk to Connor.
�No, Connor doesn�t wanna talk to his dad, he�s probably out with his friends.� He told himself, a voice sounding strange and new as it bounced through the apartment.
It was Thursday. He wondered if Connor did actually go out with his friends on Thursday. Probably not. But maybe he had someone over working on school-work or his homework or was playing the Playstation. He didn�t really want to interrupt.
He�d told Connor every time he saw him that he could call whenever he wanted, but he seemed to forget after a while. He sent emails though. That was enough.
Liam curled up on the couch and put the hot tray on his knees, eating from that postion, fingernails holding the tray in place. He jumped, scared, when the phone suddenly rang.
He hopefully thought that maybe it was Cordy, wanting to ask him to look after Connor for an evening. He quickly put the dinner down on the floor and rushed to the phone, picking it up.
�Hello?�
�Hey, Liam there?� A voice asked. A cockney voice.
He only knew one person who spoke in cockney. But he didn�t think it was him. Why would he ring?
�This is Liam. Spike?� he guessed anyway. It sounded like Spike.
�Yeah, hey. Got your number from the girls at the clinic.�
He blinked. �Oh.�
�That�s alright yeah?�
He stumbled over the words, surprised. �Yeathat�s .. fine.� He ended with a little laugh. �So, you�re out then?�
�Yep. Told you I�d look you up.�
Liam nodded, and then realised Spike couldn�t see that through the phone line. �Yeah.�
He�d never been a great conversationalist.
�So wanna do something tomorrow?�
Hmm, stay at home and enjoy the company of a reheated dinner, or go out and actually talk to somebody.
�Or are you busy?� The voice continued, without a hint of discouragement.
�No, not busy.�
�So what do you do?�
�Do?�
�Club, drinks, dinner, what do you do for fun?�
Oh.
�Um� drinks?� he said, thinking dinner seemed too intimate and clubbing � wasn�t really Liam�s style anyway.
�Okay. So there�s a bar on west fourth. Three Monkeys.� He continued like he had already known what Liam was going to say.
�Yeah, okay I know it.�
�Sure. Meet you at seven?�
�Um. Sure.�
�Kay, see you then, then.�
�Bye.�
The phone disconnected, leaving a steady beep-beep in his ears. Liam put it back into its cradle, feeling somewhat lighter. He�d thought he wouldn�t hear from Spike again after how they had � parted. But it obviously hadn�t hurt him if he was calling. And now Liam had something to do. He smiled. He felt good. He walked back to the couch with a little bounce in his step.
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