Therapy. [indesolution]

[amber]

therapy

fandom buffy the vampire slayer. [indesolution]
characters jonathan levinson, faith lehane.
notes written with exuberance for indesolution rpg. 17.01.08.


Faith had gone to football practice, mainly because she wanted to show Yoichi that fight or not, she was still in this. Fucking taskmaster. Now her entire body is awake and screaming — her broken arm burning hotly in its sling. She ignores it, with a little help from the hip flask in her pocket, and she waits.

Slayers heal fast, but Faith's still in pretty bad shape. It isn't just the pummelling she'd taken from Buffy; Mukuro's possession had chewed her up and spat her out bleeding. It has only been twenty-four hours since she'd punched a nurse and walked out of the hospital and now Faith is standing outside the building again, hand on her leather-clad hips, head tilted in that arrogant don't-fuck-with-me way that sent the people straggling in an out of the sliding doors give her a wide birth. She flicks a crumpled Marlboro from her pocket and lights it.

People here use more than just the journals; she'd emailed Jonathan to let him know she wanted to talk to him but she wasn't going back inside that goddamn place. Then a text message a few minutes ago; I'm outside. She'd scoped out a nearby burger joint, figuring if she fed the kid they wouldn't have to talk like, the entire time. Faith doesn't share and she doesn't do the whole sympathetic ear thing, but she feels kinda sorry for Jonathan. She's glad he sits by Andrew's bedside, glad he insists on being there when he wakes up, 'cause god knows no-one had ever done the same for her.

She spots him coming through the door and knows instantly that there's been no change since the last time she asked. "Hey," she says with a cloud of smoke, throwing down her cigarette and stamping it out with her Lara Croft boots. "You look like shit."

So, maybe Jonathan is shaking. Maybe just a little. He tells himself it's caffeine jitters and the whole two hours of sleep a night thing he's got going on, but mostly it's having to tear himself away from Andrew. He appreciates the company, always appreciates it, but without Andrew at arm's length he feels a little lost. Maybe just a little. Still, Jonathan does his best to convince himself that nothing is going to explode if he's gone for a short while (though knowing both of their luck, he'll finally wake up the second Jonathan steps out those double doors, and he'll be alone and oh god, stop thinking now) and that there's still a world outside of the hospital.

Not to mention that it's Faith. He had heard about her before, hadn't worried when she turned up in Babylon, but he never expected this...whatever it is. Not friendship, necessarily — though Jonathan has always found it difficult to define friendship, considering the gamut the Trio runs and his lack of experience otherwise. One hot Slayer begrudgingly paying attention to him is mind-blowing enough; two is something akin to euphoria.

His exhaustion is palpable and he knows it, so he tries to put on a smile for her, even a small one. "Hi," he says quietly, drawing one hand quickly through his hair. "Thanks. Is—?" Jonathan chokes on the words is everything okay, because that's not even a question anymore. He backpedals quickly, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets, just trying to relax the tiniest bit. "Um, what I mean is. How are you?" Jonathan's gaze lingers on Faith's arm for a moment before flicking back to her eyes. He means it in more ways than one. She had said she wanted to talk, after all.

Faith gives a hoarse laugh and shrugs her good shoulder; there's nothing funny, really, she's just sick of hearing that question, and the expression on Jonathan’s face makes it all meaningful and ridiculous. She bounces back and forward on her feet a little, energetic even though she's so exhausted she doesn't know how she's still standing. "I'm whatever, you know?" There’s too much history for a casual explanation. “Tired,” she adds, as though it isn’t obvious.

She considers asking him the same question, but takes a moment to look him over instead. First time in person, and all that. Jonathan's short — well, she had known that, and it's not like she's supermodel giantess girl herself, so they’re not too uneven… but it's still a little strange. He looks older than she had thought, but that's probably just the way lack of sleep draws lines on his boyish face. Not the kind of guy she'd pick out of a crowd — but then, she'd known that, too. Still, the way he asks about her makes her sneer inside, the way a part of her always does when people make themselves vulnerable.

"C'mon," Faith says, banishing that thought and thrusting her chin towards the cluster of buildings on the other side of the street. "I'm not doing shit in this place." She grabs his wrist without ceremony before taking off in that direction. Normally she moves like a wild horse, but today she's favouring her left leg, and she winces when she has to step down off the curb, covering with: "Let's get some food. I could eat an elephant." She gives Jonathan a look that says, I don't do this often. "My treat."

If Faith feels his pulse quicken, she doesn't let on. She doesn't even give him the time to look back at the hospital before they cross the street. It's probably a good thing — Jonathan really has spent enough time in there to drive a man mad. He can't promise that it isn't already happening. But the feeling of Faith's fingers around his wrist grounds him, and her words make him laugh a little. It's a welcome change.

This isn't the first time he's seen her, but it is the first he's heard her voice. Language is everything to Jonathan, idle pipe dreams of teaching French, his penchant for remembering voices in place of names. Faith's is unfamiliar and grates just a little, but it fits the way she effortlessly strings words together. "If you're sure," he says carefully. Being treated would be nice. In comparison, medical bills aren't high up on the long long list of worries, but they still rank. Every time someone mentions psychiatry or transplants or physical therapy, his first thought is always we'll make him pay. Not quite the type of revenge he and Warren have been skirting around, but everything is metaphor by now.

Jonathan doesn't pull his wrist away, doesn't move it a tiny bit even as she's no longer dragging him. "Faith," he says, still speaking carefully around her but liking the way her name sounds. He's been praying for days, after all. "Um. Just to get it out of the way. You were really awesome in the fight. You and—" Buffy's name bubbles on the tip of his tongue, though he swallows it back down. "So. Thank you." He looks at her quickly (doesn't have to crane his neck, it's nice) and feels his cheeks colour. "I won't say it again," he promises, eyebrows raised. At that, he twists his wrist gently and replaces the hand in his pocket.

"I would have helped if I could." It's quiet and almost an afterthought, because Jonathan is still steeping in guilt. "It wasn't a fair fight." His tone leaves an implied he's insane hanging there, but he holds back again. It's less the fear of pissing Faith off and more the creeping sensation that he has no room to talk.

There is no way Faith is going to let Jonathan buy his own lunch. On the plus side, she's paying, so she figures she gets to choose where they eat. "I'm sure," says Faith, heading towards the little cafe that sold burgers and fried rice and mountains of greasy food.

She turns at the sound of her name, mixed in with a car driving past, and the slight breeze blows her hair in her face as she raises an eyebrow. The hint of a smile on her face vanishes, however, as Faith listens to his words. "I shouldn't have--" she presses her lips together, lets his wrist go and turns her face away from him. "Yeah, I'm sure I was real fucking awesome," she mutters. She doesn't want him to say it again - not because she can't take compliments; hell, she knows she's kickass. But because she had gone to fight Mukuro, and she'd ended up fighting for him. It felt like one big avalanche of backsliding.

"Leave the fighting to the pros, J-man," she manages to get out, turning sharply in her stride and walking backwards, watching his face. Guilt, everyone's so fucking guilty. She isn't really sure how to snap him out of it; a long time of pushing blame everywhere but herself has kept her following the same tired mental paths these last twenty-four hours. "All you would have done is get hurt, and you can't sit and hold his hand if you're unconscious."

She sidesteps neatly out of the way of a sidewalk ice-cream board and gestures to the place they're standing outside of; EATERY is printed on a faded sign over the door, and there are Coca Cola advertisements lining the walls. "Just like home," she says, almost sighs, nostalgia washing away a truckload of anxiety. She pull up a shaky plastic chair and drops her bag onto a sticky outdoors table; there's the click of wood on wood from within it, because old habits die hard. "I hope you don't mind junk food."

There are so, so many things he wants to say. Jonathan swallows down almost all of his words and finally settles for the all-encompassing, "It wasn't your fault." Because it really wasn't. Before Mukuro had shot himself — he'd be lying if he said he didn't scream — Faith had been all kinds of amazing. And even then. He knew it wasn't really her (though to be fair, Warren was the first to elbow him and mouth the p-word).

But as they near their destination, Jonathan knows she has a point. He's not a fighter. He's not really anything, and that familiar feeling of hopelessness is only a brief wash. There's just too much else to focus on. And anyway, being around Faith is a little like being around Warren, minus the bitterness and resentment and that lingering sense of respect and, yeah, a little awe that still catches in the back of his throat, makes him feel absolutely sick. Still, though, she makes him want to take himself less seriously. If that's possible at this point.

"I can't hold his hand anyway," he says, just the facts, but there's still that stupid melancholy undertone he can never get rid of. Because there is pretty much nothing he wouldn't give to be able to hold Andrew's hand. He doesn't tell Faith any of this (ah, that last shred of dignity) but sits across from her instead, taking in their surroundings. "I don't mind. I mean, hi, hospital food," Jonathan mumbles absently, folding his hands on the tabletop. The silence is awkward for a moment, but to his credit, Jonathan doesn't bring up Han versus Greedo, cavepeople, Buffy, or that weird game they played on the journals. He just clears his throat and nods to her arm. "So. Um. Why didn't you stay in the hospital?"

For a moment, Faith looks at him like he's crazy; well, maybe he is. Just because she hadn't been the person at the wheel didn't mean the damage wasn't her fault. Crossing the line wasn't because of some crazy mafia voodoo; it was regression. But she just shrugs, lets him think she agrees with him, because she doesn't want to argue the point.

"You seriously don't know?" she asks, and her face relaxes into a grin. "I figured B went around telling everyone, just for kicks." She tilts her head and lets her hair fall across her bare shoulder, studying the chalkboard menu through the window. Her voice, when she speaks, is a little bitter and a little nostalgic. "Last time we fought, she kicked my ass. Put me in a coma for eight months. When I woke up..." she snaps back to Jonathan, her brows drawing down and her eyes darkening. "Well, let's just say I've spent enough time in hospitals. I'm not letting them keep me there again." Maybe, she would admit, punching the nurse had been a little rash, but she'd been on an adrenaline rush from the moment she'd woken up and the pain had flooded through her.

"I'm thinking burger with the works and curly fries. And a shake. I could go a shake like nothing else. Football takes it out of a girl, I can tall you." She pulls out her wallet and jingles it before tossing it to him. "Not so much on me as courtesy of morally ambiguous government fucking allowance, of course, but you know what they say about the thought counting."

Jonathan misses hearing stories. It's just one of those things he took for granted without realizing it, and he pillows his face in one hand as she talks. "Buffy did what now?" He doesn't know why it still surprises him when people talk about these things. He's seen her fight, after all. Was almost on the receiving end of it and everything. Yet it still puts everything else on pause and reminds him, no matter how sad she seems, no matter how nice she is to him, she could probably kill him if he breathed the wrong way. He's lucky to have escaped that once.

"I'm really sorry," he murmurs before catching the wallet and, okay, yeah, maybe he fumbles it. Hand-eye coordination isn't his thing, but even that hurts to think about, so he just smiles at Faith. "It's good you got out, then. Um." He stalls for a second before pushing his chair back. "I'll go do that."

The inside of the little restaurant is hot and stuffy, all the foody smells hitting him at once. Jonathan just stands behind the man in line and turns the wallet over in his hands, repeats the order in his head, trying to get Faith's voice cemented. The guy in front of him glances back. He doesn't look familiar. A tiny part of Jonathan's brain starts off on a tangent about the possibility of Babylonian civil war, and it keeps running even as he gives their order. A chicken sandwich for him; he's not really feeling up to the whole big meal thing, more interested in seeing if Faith actually eats that much.

"They'll bring it to us," he says unnecessarily when he returns, setting the little plastic card with 'four' printed across it on their table. Jonathan resists the urge to ask what a coma is like, or to bring up Andrew, or to ask after Buffy. He needs to forget all of those things as best he can, at least for a little while. But then, of course, Jonathan is never good at controlling what comes out of his mouth, and he's definitely not good at forgetting. "So, um, I don't get it. Are you and Buffy friends?" He knows it's a bad idea halfway through the question and clearly looks pained as it keeps spilling from his mouth, and immediately follows it with another muttered apology.

"Don't be," says when he says he's really sorry, which is so unlike Faith; normally, she thinks, she'd just ignore it but his first apology is sincere. She has time to think about it as he gets the food. To think that maybe she should just stand up and walk now, before she says something that gets her in too deep, goes a little past, a little deeper than her normally abrasive self. But she gave him her wallet in self-defence, and she stays waiting for the next apology. It comes, and she says "Don't be," again, meaning it a little less this time. Buffy is a tough topic.

Faith takes the number and plays with it, flicking the card on its corner on the table, seeing how many times it spins before it falls down. "Jesus," she mutters softly to herself. Images are flashing through her brain; there's the feel of cold steel in her side, yeah, but there's also B grinding down in the Bronze, her fist slamming into Faith's bruised eye in a dark and empty alleyway, the feel of freshly-washed cotton between her fingers as they made the bed. "You got a year or ten?" She laughs bitterly, choking on it.

"We were friends for a while, back when I first showed up in Sunny-D, but we got over it," she says bluntly. "I don't fit in with the Scooby world. I mean, I went a bit dark then, for a while—" she laughs again, unable to keep it in, running a hand through her long hair and then pulling it away as though there was still blood on it. "But even after some celltime and a few rounds in the Angel-Angelus subconscious I still didn't quite get it. I'm used to fighting alone, y'know?" She glanced up, caught his eye; she didn't mean vampires. "But I can't be alone. I was the second one, so everything I do, everything I am, it all ends up coming back to B."

Faith doesn't care what people think, especially not this pipsqueak, but she's annoyed at the way the words keep dripping from her, like Jonathan's lanced a wound. She's so tired and all she wants is her damn burger. "I hate to break it to you, but she wasn't the one who led me down the trail of redemption." Her eyes are hard and cold, reflecting the gaze she sees in her mind's eye. "She wanted to put me down like a dog." A pause — Faith knows she should maybe apologise for shattering his cute little idealism, but she doesn't feel like it. "She probably still does," she mutters, and fishes in her bag for a cigarette.

Everything I do. Jonathan looks down at his hands and taps one of his fingers on the table idly, just for something to move himself to talk. "I know how that is," he says quietly. "Not in the same way, but." He can't make words work whenever he tries to talk about this, even though it's so clear in his head. All the times he's overthought and come to the conclusion that other people define his life. Jonathan doesn't know, has never known what he is or what he wants to be. Just what he's not, not a supervillain, not a superstar, and not a nothing, please, anything but a nothing. But that's what he was until Buffy stopped him from making a stupid (smart, though, he's beginning to reconsider) decision, and then everything was because of Buffy. He was nothing until Warren and Andrew picked him up as their thirty-three point three, and now everything is because of them. For better and for worse.

"I don't think she wants—" His words die quickly, because he has no room to talk about this, so he tries a different road. "I don't, um, automatically assume that Buffy just goes around redeeming everyone." Jonathan's smile softens his words a little and he lets his mouth get away from him, just for a second. "I mean, um, Andrew, yeah, but Andrew was never that— Um. Bad. Despite everything. You knew him before Babylon, you know what I mean."

He glances around for a second to see if food is coming, still not particularly hungry, but wanting something to shut him up. And yet. He likes Faith's accent and wants her to keep talking. She doesn't mince words (like Warren, like Warren) and it makes him want to be a little blunt, too. "Buffy helped me a lot," he says, "But I don't think that she's god or anything." And he's proud, because it's only partially a lie. Not god, no, but maybe a saint. Or a prophet. Then again, his head isn't making much sense right now, so he bites that back and threads his fingers together to make a little steeple. "We don't have to talk about her."

"Andrew pretty much lived in his own head," Faith mutters dismissively. She's never really liked Andrew, he was a supanova of pure annoyance and Faith got irritated easy in those last few Hellmouthy days. Too many people. Not to mention all the way down from LA and she still felt unwanted, like the bad guy - and she'd seen a little of that desperate desire to fit in within Andrew and shunned it in the same way she shunned it in herself. So she's sympathetic, sure — no-one deserves to be tortured like that, she gets that now — but it's not about any friendship between them.

She sighs at Jonathan's smile, putting her temples in her palms and elbows on the table, cradling her forehead in both hands. "No, we don't have to talk about her," Faith says, her eyes distant, and then she snaps back to Jonathan. As though she hadn't repeated what he had just said: "How'd she help you?" she asks, and maybe there's a little wariness in her tone, and maybe the you is a little too emphasised as though the idea of Buffy paying attention to him is laughable (B's never had an eye for the human cereal she was crunching underfoot, but then, Faith had found out why that was when she'd stepped up and taken leadership.) "I mean, all your up and down and up again on the scale of good and evil, what's it bout B that makes you so damn thankful?" She doesn't mean to sound bitter, but maybe it's because she has to know just because it's Buffy, and no matter what Jonathan says, that is what she has to talk about.

The food comes; a tiny plate for Jonathan and a huge one for her, and she doesn't even look ashamed as he picks the burger up in one hand and tucks in, demolishing the meal with frightening swiftness. She lefts his words wash over her, holding his eyes when she isn't ducking for a slurp from her shake or to ash her cigarette (she knows it's a disgusting habit, especially eating and smoking, and she just can't bring herself to care.)

Jonathan just blinks a few times and reminds himself, Andrew must have been different in the post-Trio, pre-redemption days. The Andrew in his head is more or less static, and it doesn't compute with the one Faith probably has in hers. He thinks he should track down those episodes, just to see what he was like, even though he's fundamentally against that. It's better to ask people up front, not do the creepy stalker thing — but now that's impossible at best, and maybe he needs to hear Andrew's voice somehow. Maybe this is the answer.

"You really want to know?" When Faith doesn't say no, just keeps eating, he picks at his own food and starts in on the story he feels like he's told a thousand times. Probably not that many by far, but all that therapy — he's just used to rehashing it by now, is all. "So, um, forewarning, I have issues."

Again, Faith doesn't make a move to stop him. "There was this one time where I thought it'd be a good idea to shoot myself," he starts, stirring the lemonade with his straw. "Um, Buffy stopped me. Only because she thought I was going to kill everyone else, though. It was weird. But um, if she hadn't. I mean. Obvious, right? But I got a lot of help because of that." Jonathan takes a few bites of his sandwich and thinks this over for a while. "There were a couple other times, but, um. That's the big one."

Jonathan locks eyes with Faith, and there's an unreadable moment where he feels like he should tell her more. She probably doesn't care. In fact, he's pretty positive that she definitely doesn't care, but still. "I tried a few other times." Most people wouldn't expect him to say this with a straight face, but he does. By now, they're just facts, words without any real meaning. "No one stopped me then, just myself. But, um. I wouldn't have, if it weren't for Buffy. Yeah."

There's a pause to take another drink and mentally go over what he just said before Jonathan laughs a little at himself. "And now you think I'm crazy."

Faith swallows, and it's a touch too soon because the food gets stuck in her throat and her eyes prick a little. It's not the story, it's the way he says it, like that part of his life's over now — when it never really can be. "I already thought you were crazy, J-man," she says, pushing her carton of chips towards him because she hates watching people nibble. The words are just matter-of-fact; she gives him something that's sort of an eyeroll but actually a smile.

"Still, I get it. I mean, my shit's a little more on the supernatural side but then hello, Vampire Slayer." A hand gesture. Faith takes another bite of burger and licks her fingers, talking with her mouth half-full. "And I mean, even before then, I had some pretty rough moments. Adolescence fucking sucks. Chick who called herself my Watcher came through for me though, and then later... later I kind of killed a guy." Faith can't meet his eyes for this bit; but hey, he overshared so she's gonna do the same right back. As much as she can, anyway. "Um, at first not on purpose but then other guys. Moreso. Long story, but I ended up being saved by fucking Angel." It hurts to say his name; especially since she hasn't heard shit since LA went down in flames. He should be here, even if he'd go chasing after Buffy again. "His dark side kinda tends to put absolutely everything into perspective. Like, what's one little accident versus cold-blooded mass genocide?" She shrugs a shoulder, all faux-carelessness. "I guess Buffy just never felt like saving me. She had her own issues."

She traces her lower lip with the straw of her shake - a mostly unconscious gesture. "So, how about we talk about something that isn't super morbid crap." Faith taps the top of the chips container. "And you've gotta eat, or you'll end up in the bed beside Andy." She twists her mouth in self-deprecation; how fucking motherly of her. Next she'll be telling him to take a sweater.

Jonathan kind of feels like he shouldn't eat too much, for whatever reason. His little vigil shouldn't be a fast and he knows that, just. Sometimes, he's beyond caring anymore. "Did you shoot a man in Reno, just to watch him die?" he asks before digging into the chips, going over her words in his head. Their worlds are so different. To him, Angel is just a bunch of stories Andrew told him, and that guy who showed up at the prom for Buffy.

"I think you did okay without, um, Buffy saving you." He tries to smile again but settles for eating instead, just to make her happy. Something that isn't super morbid crap, right. That kind of rules out... most of the things he thinks about, ever. No Andrew, no Warren, mostly no Buffy, no Mukuro, no recent events. Which leaves, well, not much. Jonathan swallows the urge to bring up Bobby Drake (he's not that kind of counsellor) and realizes he's chewing his straw. Seriously, come on, brain. Anything. Nothing? God, he fails so hard.

When the silence stretches for too long, he finally decides to say something. Anything. "I'm glad you're here." It's sort of out of the blue, and he can't look at Faith when he says it. "Um, even if I didn't know you before. It's just good to have someone else from home. Kind of." To be honest, Jonathan is kind of sad that this is the first time he's met Faith. Then again, from the sound of it, she probably wouldn't have been too much fun back in Sunnydale, if she even had it in her to pay attention to him at all. But he likes her. Not even the stories Andrew hissed over his shoulder can change his mind about that. "I want more people to show up," he says quietly, though he'll never say their names. It's selfish and could cause even more problems when they really, really have enough as is.

The silence goes on, and Faith's tempted to take back her veto on miserable topics because she kinda feels like Jonathan's the hug and share and cry and grow type, which would at least take her mind off her own issues. Also, listing to him babbling about his epic pseudo-supervillain angst would be better than awkward silence, which Faith hates. She tries to fill it with eating (football, in this state, is just as exhausting as Slaying, and Slaying always made her hungry and horny.) The burger's gone by the time Jonathan speaks again.

Faith raises an eyebrow and sucks up the last of her shake, slurping through the straw before replying. "Thanks," she says, a little deadpan. "You're probably the only one though, not that I care." Which is a lie, of course, but it's not like she'd been expecting a party thrown in her honour. It just shits her that Jonathan's the first person to tell her that. She tries to think of someone who would have been glad to see her, and thinks; Angel. Maybe Spike. Maybe Xander. Probably not Wood. Whatever, she only knows how to deal with guys. "It's good to have someone who isn't expecting me to fuck up," she adds, figuring she should return the compliment.

Pushing her cup and plate to the side, Faith leans forward on the table, confessional-style. "Like who?" she says, and then, thinking of the reasons behind her own list, waves a hand dismissively. "Actually, you don't have to tell me, I don't care and uh, it's not like we get a choice." She twists her lips, not wanting to return to awkward silence or her own fucking issues. Veto time. "So tell me about the deal with you and Andrew and Princess. I mean, Andrew and I were never close, he was too..." she tries to think of the word, finds 'annoying' and decides that isn't the best option given his recent hospitalisation, and settles for shrugging. "Buffy and Willow both mentioned some stuff, but I'd like to hear it from the horse's mouth." She raises an eyebrow, mischief sparkling in her eyes. "If you don't mind satisfying my... curiosity."

A returned compliment, however masked, still makes Jonathan flush a little. He's glad that he doesn't have to tell her who. They're all for selfish reasons; so he can have the friendships he never got to have in Sunnydale, so Warren can learn. It's not exactly a plan, but he's thought of how he'd go about it, if Willow was here. Just idly, usually with no real intention of following through. He slips into it again easily (if it happened now, any time within the month, it'd be bad, bad, bad) and the question catches him off guard.

"The deal?" he chokes. He isn't quite sure what deal she's talking about, though he has some idea. "There's no deal. I mean. It's not." Oh my god, he can't ever make words work for this. Their thing, their dynamic really only makes sense to them. And even then, not so much. "They're my best friends," Jonathan says carefully. "They get me. And, um, for the most part, I get them."

This is all just surface stuff. Jonathan pushes his food to the side as well and props his chin up on one hand, tracing his other in fractal patterns against the table. "We went through a lot of stuff, um, obviously." His face darkens briefly; he really doesn't want to go into just how much stuff. And hey, Faith doesn't want to hear it, so that's good! "But they're really important to me," he says, gritting his teeth a little in embarrassment. This still isn't really their deal.

And then, it hits. The babble. "Andrew's awesome," he starts, eyes drifting off to scan the shops and sidewalks. "When stuff like this, bad stuff, happens to him, we both freak out. Because— I don't know, because he's Andrew. He's my best friend. Warren is..." Jonathan switches the hand cradling his head and stares down at the invisible design he's made on the table. "Warren just is. He's important, too. Um, probably more than I can tell you without it sounding really bad. It's complicated. I'm on his side—" Jonathan chokes a little on those words when he realizes just how they could be misconstrued, but Faith isn't exactly the paragon of all that's good and pure, so he keeps going. "I'm on his side. I know that. But mostly, I'm fighting against him...because he needs it, and maybe so I can stay on his side, I don't know," he finishes quickly, mumbling the rest into his hand.

Jonathan runs this over in his head before nodding slowly. "That's, um, that's our deal. Unless there's anything else you wanted to know." And Faith could run the gamut with that one. He's not sure if he wants her to or not.

Most people tended to take friendship and all its complex paths for granted, but never Faith, she'd worked to study every connection she ever received, follow each string of friendship back to its real intention. Now she's watching the way Jonathan seems to strain to hold things back but it all comes pouring out anyway. He's torn up over this; it's there in the line of his face, the way his eyes cast about for somewhere else to be, the tiny gestures of his fingers. A lot of stuff. Because he's Andrew. On his side. And that endless fucking umming, it makes Faith want to hit him until he promises not to stutter anymore.

When he finally meets her eyes again she gives him a real smile. "Shit yes I want to know more," she says. "For a bunch of freaks and geeks you're pretty fucking fascinating." Perhaps part of this is the fact that of all Faith's friends, none of them have really ever held that precious 'best' title — not even Buffy as Faith had watched her through the classroom windows, flicking around her pencil and daydreaming of fighting. Normally Faith hates hearing people talk about their friends, ohhh I went to the beach, we got icecream, she's dating the guy I like, we both play netball, blah blah fucking blah. But Jonathan cuts to the heart of things. We're best friends, Faith hears again in her head, and even though she doesn't get it she knows it's true. The kind of friendship that changes your whole damn life.

"I dunno what I want to know, though," she says, finally leaning back, stretching one arm long and lithe above her head and giving an eyes-closed yawn as the food really hits her stomach. "You could tell me why Warren's a giant prick, I guess," she says with a bit of her laugh; she only half means it, at least at this point. "No, I'm kidding, no-one can answer that question. So how's the whole keeping him away from evil stuff working out for you J-man?" She doesn't mention Andrew. It's probably best not to talk about the camera-man, all things considered, though it's probably hard not to events being what they are. Still, there's echoes of all of it in her voice. What are you going to do now. Buying the kid lunch is all well and good but she still wants to know if someone's going to get hurt.

Her laugh echoes in Jonathan's ears, and he joins in a little late — only because it's a good question, and it's one he can answer. Kind of. He almost does, but there's that little Andrew who lives in the back of his head. Ah ah ah, little one. Priority number one: making sure that the Slayers know that they aren't evil, and won't be returning to evil any time soon. Jonathan isn't sure of that anymore, never was in the first place, but it's still his top concern. For everything Warren has done, does, and will continue to do, Jonathan still has nightmares about him ending up in jail. The thought of him ending up dead doesn't even get a chance to cross his mind before he banishes it; incarceration is the worst possible scenario he'll allow himself.

"We're not that fascinating," he says easily, lifting his head up and threading his hands together. This is something he can talk about, and what that says about him, god only knows. "It's working out okay." Even if this is an easier subject to tackle, Jonathan knows that he still has to choose his words very carefully. She's a Slayer. Warren is his best friend. Any hint of impending doom, and it won't be happy fun times for any of them. And if Warren knew— but he doesn't, Jonathan reminds himself.

"I mean, it's worked so far. Warren doesn't really tell either of us what he's doing unless he thinks we can help, so. It's hard." The gravity of the situation hits him again. Just how hard it really, really is. How much energy he's expending on just trying to keep Warren talking to him, even if it's not about revengey secret plots. "But you don't have to worry about him," he lies, and wonders if Faith can tell. "I can take care of it. Me and Andrew, when he wakes up, or just me. It's, um. Kind of what I do."

Jonathan tilts his head to one side and looks up at the fake sky. He doesn't believe in much, but if he believes in his ability to help (stop) Warren, maybe it'll work. Maybe. "If I need help, I'll, um. I'll let you know."

"Guess you'd better get more helpful then," Faith says obliquely at one point, but doesn't expand upon it. She watches the afternoon blue reflect in Jonathan's eyes, tossing over the words in her head. It's like her Slayer instinct is all Terminator. No threat — well, no more threat than a guy with self-esteem issues and techno-savvy, which if she remembers the stories Willow told her on the drive back from LA, turned out to actually be quite a bit of threat. Still, it's not enough to get her leaping up and off to check on him, or anything so active. The sunshine's nice, here, even if it isn't real.

"Five by five," she says, and looks away, shooting a glance still sharp with curiosity at him from under her lashes. She's going to have to watch him just as much as she plans to watch Warren. It's not that she doesn't trust Jonathan, but she's beginning to get that he practically has a hard-on for other people's problems, and that can't be healthy. Still, Faith wants to change her reply almost instantly — she may be fucked up, but she knows when she's withdrawing on purpose. She's still working hard for her spitshine redemption, and letting Jonathan tell himself it's all going to be okay is a little off that beaten path. But the other option makes her cringe.

"So listen," she says, trying to fight back the urge to do this when she's already piled so much on her plate already. That's my little firecracker, eyes always a touch too big for her stomach. "I know that you want to seem cool to me and all, but you'd fucking better." She's still smiling, a little disparagingly but it's there to belie the demanding anger in her tone. Her free arm is flat-palmed against the table, sticky residue clinging to her fingers. "Seriously, Jonathan, if shit like this ever seems like it's going to happen again, I want to be informed. I don't care if you have to walk over and knock on my damn door to do it."

Jonathan just keeps staring upwards for a little while with a vague smile on his face. He's not afraid of fighting against Warren. When it comes down to it, at the end of the day, he's not afraid of having to do that. Because when he does, he won't really be against him. No. He wants them to be a team, and more than that, to be okay. Baby steps. Warren may have been their leader, but Jonathan has learned his lesson about blindly following anyone. He'll fight. Not to lock Warren away (nightmares, nightmares) but to calm him down. Fix him. Keep it so that his side is one that Jonathan actually wants to be on. Maybe, one day.

But it's bigger than them, than that. Warren has always thought on a grander scale than he has, and he's more willing to lose a part of himself in the pursuit of that. It's going to be much bigger than either of them. So Jonathan slides his hand over Faith's, unthinking, and brings his eyes back to her. "Warren had nothing to do with what happened. Um, please don't think that he did." He chews his cheek and drums his fingers against the back of her hand. "Andrew is really important to both of us, even if he'll never say it," Jonathan murmurs. "And he might— I don't know."

He knows. But he'll never say it. Jonathan realizes what he's doing, finally, and quickly removes his hand. "Help would be nice," he says. "But if he knows that we're, I don't know, watching him…" God, he can't finish a sentence lately. Finally, a few deep breaths later, maybe he's come to something. "It's stupid of me, um, believe me, I know. But I want to help Warren, not hurt him, because he needs it. He just has this tendency to, you know, hurt the people who are helping him."

It's that simple. Jonathan rubs his jaw (not bruised anymore, but it still clicks a little where it didn't before) distractedly and holds firmly onto the belief that, if Warren gets help, everything will fall into place. They'll all be okay. Finally. "I should get back to Andrew soon," he adds with an apologetic smile.

Faith flinches at the touch but doesn't swat his hand away, eying the movement on his fingers speculatively. She didn't just mean Warren; she meant anything. Everything. It's fucked up, but she kinda likes Jonathan. Obviously she's going to have to kill him to stop him sharing all the damn secrets that kept spilling stupidly out of her, but otherwise he is good people. When he pulls his hand away, she does too, reaching for yet another cigarette.

"People do that," Faith says. Like she would ever, ever want to be compared to a horny twenty-something shut in who'd probably lived at his mom's until he was pulled into Babylon, but she's not just talking about Warren.

"Sometimes you've just gotta let them go off the deep end and then pick up the pieces." She's mixing her metaphors, but she means it (thinking of her own deep end, sobbing in the rain in Angel's arms, begging him to kill her.) Maybe it's too American History X of her, but she actually thinks Warren would benefit from a year or so in jail — proper American jail, that is, not whatever fucked up incarceration system they have here.

"Anyway. I'm all strong like Popeye, so if you ever want someone with inbuilt Warren immunity, lemme know about that, too." She shrugs, taking a drag. "But it's your thing, I get it, I'm not going to intrude. Just don't uh, get your hopes up too far, okay?"

She lets smoke curl out of her mouth and around her face, picking up her bag and making sure she has everything in it. He has to get back to Andrew. Which is sad, but oddly sweet, and Faith almost wishes she had the temperament for bedside sitting so she could keep him company. "It's been wild," she says, standing up and hovering for a moment before rolling her eyes and spreading her good arm for a hug.

There are so many pieces already. So, so, so, sososososo many. It starts a dull throb in Jonathan's head to even start listing them all. Starts with "stealing big stuff" and ends with "it was the first evil, it knew my weaknesses." There's enough in between to fill a couple novels. It's like no matter how hard he keeps trying to build this nice glass house, the big bad wolf just keeps blowing it down, and blowing it down, and one day he knows he's going to give into his defeatist tendencies and just. Stop. But in the meantime, the deep end. And picking up the pieces. Again. And again, and again, until he gives up or finally does something right. Faith doesn't know the half of it.

Still, though. He appreciates this — all of this. "Hopes aren't up," he says, trying to sound cheerful instead of resigning himself to what he knows is true. "Hopes way down low. You're not intruding. Immunity— That would help, yeah." Jonathan knows he's babbling as he stands, just as he knows he does a sad little double-take when she opens her arms. He misses hugs. It's not that he's gotten desperate enough yet to try Warren (that could probably take years of Andrewlessness, and even then) but this is a hot Slayer who's actually nice to him, in her way.

And, okay, so it's nothing compared to an Andrew hug. It definitely doesn't go on as long, and that's okay. Faith thumps his back a little too hard and winds him, and there's something else there that makes his face flush, but Jonathan doesn't mind. This is kind of exactly what he needed. "Thanks again," he mumbles as they break, his face hot. They're going opposite directions, and it's probably a good thing, because Jonathan needs the walk back to sink back into his mind. Let himself freak out, just for a few minutes, before he has to be strong again. He walks backwards for a few steps and gives a little wave. "I'll talk to you later."

When he turns and sees the hospital looming, everything bottoms out. What if Andrew woke up while he was gone? What if he was alone? Worse yet, what if it was just Warren — he would never, ever hear the end of it. And if Warren knew, if Warren knew. Jonathan's mind is off and racing again, and he presses his palms against his eyes briefly, trying to block the inevitable blackout when everything comes rushing back too quickly. Faith knows everything about them, now. More or less. She knows about the clock tower, about his Buffy issues, about Andrew having the power, about Warren. About his stupid faith in Warren, despite low expectations and a general feeling of nauseous contempt. About how scary Warren can get. Kind of. He's glad he had enough sense to leave most of that out. Jonathan isn't sure Slayers are immune to bullets. Buffy healed, but a lot of weird things were going on at that time. Who knows. If Faith gets hurt because of him—

This train of thought takes him all the way to the double doors, where he cuts it off abruptly. There's only two people he needs to worry about, for now. Andrew will wake up and Warren will be okay, it's a mantra constantly looping in his head. The rest will come later. It always does.