Restless Sleep

Title: Restless Sleep
Author: PuppyPooka
Fandom: BTVS
Pairing: Andrew/Oz (eventually)
Rating: PG
Feedback: [e-mail] Please, this is my first fanfic....
Disclaimer: BTVS belongs to the genius of Joss Whedon and the good people at Mutant Enemy. I’m just borrowing them.
Summary: This is the first in a series of BTVS season seven AU fics.
Spoilers: Up to ‘Potential’ or so... AU but related after that.


         Andrew took a deep breath of the cool night air, slowly exhaling it. His breath hung heavy on the air like a cloud of fog, before drifting away into nothingness. Behind him, the shrill noise that was a group of potential slayers getting ready for bed continued unabated. More slayers had come in after Giles and the others had arrived last week, building a force to deal with this First Evil, and the tension and cramped living quarters were already making people irritable.

         Even him, but he knew he had no right to be irritated. He was just their hostage, not their friend, and he knew it. Was even mostly ok with it – after all, he deserved worse. So when the girls were fighting over who got which bit of floor, or who slept with Willow (he grinned a bit to himself, because Willow’d looked awfully surprised when Kennedy had decided to sleep in with her), or who used whose toothpaste... Andrew just left. Left and breathed and waited until they’d all settled themselves before creeping in to find what they’d decided was available to him.

         Out of the corner of his eye, he saw movement. Afraid it might be the First, again, he turned to look, letting out a small yelp which he tried to hide. It was just Spike, though. He was smoking, staring up at the sky and thinking. The vampire’s face was half-hidden in shadow, but the part Andrew could see was troubled. For a moment, he felt akin to the blonde vampire - after all, they both knew what it was like to do wrong and then try to make it right – but he knew if he went to Spike, to try to talk to him, he’d just see that contempt he saw in everyone else’s eyes in Spike’s. Bad enough that his crush hated him - had told him off as a murderer - but why subject himself to the contempt of the coolest guy he’d ever actually met?

         Andrew bit his tongue, which was something he was getting better and better at, and turned his gaze back up to the stars. Sometimes it seemed his whole life was intervals between staring at the stars. In Mexico, he’d shared a platonic bed with Jonathon, and they’d watched the stars through a cracked window while talking about their fugitive state. Right now, it was easy to imagine that Jonathon might – no. Because even if he did see Jonathon again, it wouldn’t be him. It would be the First. Just like Warren, who’d died and come back and let him trick himself for love.

         Before Mexico, before he’d marked his life forever, there had still been the stars. As a child, when his parents fought, he’d go onto their porch with comics and his flashlight. He’d read and watch the stars, all snuggled up in a blanket, until he fell asleep. He’d explained, or tried to explain, to Warren. Warren thought it was silly, though. Told him to act like a man and not bother wishing emptily for things. And now Warren was gone, and Andrew was alone, and all that was left was to stare at the stars and wish. Even though he knew that sometimes wishing got you in trouble... vengeance demons and such... sometimes you just had to make a harmless little wish.

         So he did. He picked out a nice star, friendly and twinkling, closed his eyes and made a wish. I wish that there was someone here who would be nice to me. A friend, so that maybe these people would see that I’m not all bad and maybe they’d treat me better. There. No harm in a wish like that, was there?

         Nervous, but somehow reassured, he looked up at his star again, then turned and headed inside. The potentials were mostly settled now, so he could find himself a corner somewhere and try to sleep. Just keep breathing and try not to dream.

******************************************************************************

         Another motel, filthy but cheap, and Oz stared at it from behind the wheel of his van, trying to decide whether he could make it a few more miles closer to Sunnydale, or whether he ought to take a room and crash for a few hours. The burning in his eyes eventually decided him – the last cup of coffee had made no dent in his fatigue.

         The room was everything its price had advertised. The TV set had a jagged crack running across the screen, the room clearly smelt of sex to his sensitive nose, and there was a strange fungus growing across the bathroom. He’d been driving for almost a week, though, and this one was no worse than some of the other places he’d stayed.

         He didn’t waste any more time whining about the state of the room. He’d made his decision - to go and help with the impending apocalypse - and once he’d made a decision, he didn't obsess over it.

         He took a few calming breaths outside the room, glad that it was far enough from full moon that the varied scents of the bedding wouldn’t affect him too much. He’d got Willow’s latest letter about two weeks ago, and he’d set out shortly after, as soon as he’d quit his job and packed up his stuff. It hadn’t been much of a job anyway, just a way to keep body and soul together without trouble. It had taken him a little while to make up his mind to go. Sunnydale would test his control, especially with the Hellmouth out of control; he’d also worried about seeing Willow again - just because he thought he had dealt and moved on as she had, didn’t mean that seeing her again would be easy.

         But in the end, he’d decided to go. Because his friends were in danger, the kind of danger where every willing fighter might make a difference, and he wasn’t going to leave them to die alone. He opened the letter he’d printed off of his email, reading it again as he did every night:

                   Oz,


         Hey. I know it’s been a while since I responded – things have been picking up around here lately. You know those dreams Buffy was having, the ones I wrote to you about? “From beneath you it devours?” Well, we think we’ve got some clue on what that means now, and things are heating up. Potential slayers have been coming in from all over, and we’re going to need every one of them, I think. This is bad, Oz. It’s as bad as it’s ever been. If you think you could manage coming back here - I know it’d be tough for you - well, we could use you.

         Willow

         Simple and direct, much less babble than the Willow he was used to. He supposed that was fair, though – what she’d been through would change anyone. She’d tracked down his email after Glory... to tell him about Buffy. He’d written back, offering support but not planning to go back to Sunnydale. And they’d fallen to talking, Willow giving him news on the gang by email, him responding by helping with the research as best as he could from Ontario. A byproduct of the process was the easy confidentiality they’d slowly rebuilt. Oz came to realize that Willow had changed, and that he had too. He’d been gone so long, struggling to build control over his werewolf side, that when he turned and looked back, he barely recognized the man he’d been. That was the nature of life, and there might have been a song in that, once. Right now, he just wanted to sleep.

         Oz wasn’t idealist enough anymore to imagine that he was rushing to Willow’s side where she’d welcome him with open arms. She’d moved on, and so had he. And she’d moved on to women, which would require changes he wasn’t willing to make. He grinned slightly to himself at that wry thought, then refolded the email and put it back in his shirt pocket. He was going back because he might be helpful; not because he planned to get some. If that was all he was after, well, there were much easier ways to get laid than risk your life in apocalyptic battles.

         He sat on the edge of the bed and untied his heavy black boots. Pulling off his thick socks, he tucked them into the boots and placed the pair under the edge of the bed. He stood up and took off his jeans, tossing them onto the broken TV (the only other furniture in this place). His loose shirt followed, and that was enough clothes to sleep comfortably. He didn’t want too much of his bare skin touching the bed here. He was fastidious by nature, and that had only been enhanced by the wolf.

         Closing his eyes against the squalor, Oz repeated one of his calming mantras until he finally fell into a restless sleep.