Disclaimer: See initial chapter.

A/N: Inspired by a prompt sentence from a friend. Different, in tone, from the initial chapter.


He stood outside the house he used to call his home, hand poised ready to knock. The wind was bone-chillingly cold; it made a mockery of his inadequate clothing, and he knew then that he should have listened to Angel. Much as it pained him to admit it, the brooding vampire did know what he was talking about, from time-to-time.

"Southern California is experiencing record breaking, unusually cold temperatures," Xander muttered beneath his breath, mocking the radio broadcaster he'd been listening to on the drive over to his parents' place. The car was Angel's, he'd borrowed it, with Angel's permission.

Xander blinked when he could actually see his breath, misted before his face, in a puff of opaque whiteness. It disappeared almost as quickly as it had formed.

He was no longer welcome at home, if he'd ever really been welcome there in the first place. He shoved his hands into his pockets and stared at the door – at the chipped paint that edged the rusted screen door, it used to be white once upon a time, well before he was born – trying to work up the nerve to knock.

It was the right thing to do. He told himself that, again, and again, even as he stood in front of the door, rooted to the spot, hands digging deeper into his threadbare jeans.

He'd told Angel that very same thing, multiple times, and in a multitude of ways – words had never been a weakness for him – ignoring the overly protective vampire's insistence that he not do this alone. That, because they were, 'married' – that word still jarred him – Xander could always count on him to have his back, no matter what.

It was unnerving, thinking about Angel having his back, and Xander shivered, refusing to go down that particular path of muddled thinking, knowing that, if he did, he'd soon be mired in it. It was quicksand, thinking about Angel. Dwelling on the vampire always caused Xander to think about Angel's killer looks, and breath-stealing kisses that brought Xander warmth which belied the perpetual coolness of Angel's skin.

Vampires didn't generate their own heat. That was knowledge which Xander had, unfortunately, learned the hard, honest way. If being shanghaied by Spike and Drusilla and being shackled to a metal table in the basement of a mad gypsy's lair, could be considered honest.

It certainly had been hard. That he could attest to, and would even testify to, in a court of law, if there was a court of law that would take on such a case. Xander knew there wasn't.

If Angel hadn't come along when he did – the master vampire having been tricked by mysterious supernatural forces (Powers of some sort, Xander was a little fuzzy on that) into thinking that it was Buffy's life that was on the line – Xander would have been 'married', for eternity, to Spike who'd made it clear just what role he expected Xander to play in their 'marriage'. It hadn't been pretty, and Xander shuddered just thinking about it.

Spike's fingers had been supernaturally cold, leaving little trails of miniscule icicles in their wake wherever Spike had touched him – and the vampire had touched almost every bit of Xander's exposed skin. Drusilla's eyes had been wild and crazy, filled with bloodlust.

Xander had been a terrified, gibbering mess, unable to accurately articulate his fear, and not just because the demented gypsy, hired by the vampire duo to perform the unholy ceremony, had shoved a stick in his mouth, making him bite down on it and hold it there, saliva sliding out of the corners of his mouth, pooling somewhere behind his head. Uncomfortable hadn't even begun to cover how Xander had felt.

It had all been part of the strange ceremony, as had the drugs Xander'd been force-fed, and the stripping down to boxers, bruised chest (his father's handiwork from the night before when the man had been drinking –when wasn't he drinking?) bared for vampires and madman to see clear as day.

Angel had swooped in like some kind of avenging…well, angel. Clad in black leather, eyes shadowed with a darkness that looked almost feral, and made Xander think of the fires of Hades.

He'd arrived just in time for the gypsy's magic to swirl around and encompass him and Xander both, binding them together for as long as they both should live. The gypsy had been nonplussed, continuing the ceremony as though it hadn't been interrupted by an irate vampire with fire that glowed in his eyes.

He'd continued chanting – some kind of magical phrase that Xander, in his drugged state, hadn't been able to follow – in spite of the fact that Spike had wrapped his hands around his throat in an attempt to stop the ceremony before it could be completed. But, the gypsy's voice couldn't be stopped, and the words had hung in the air, echoing long after the gypsy'd been bled dry by an incensed Spike.

Angel had stared and blinked at him, once Spike and Drusilla had fled, and the echoes of the gypsy's words had died down to nothing.

He'd said, "You're not Buffy," and then, with a furrowed brow, he'd plucked the stick from Xander's mouth, and, sealing his lips over Xander's, he'd kissed him.

A jolt of lightning, or rather what had felt like lightning, struck Xander in the chest, and he knew, instantly, that he and Angel were now eternally bound – just like the crazy gypsy man had said. And, then, he'd promptly passed out and woke, hours, maybe days later, in a large, luxurious bed to find Angel watching him with an intensity that nearly caused him to piss himself, and without a clue as to what had happened.

Angel had filled him in on the finer points of what had happened – the eternal 'marriage they were now bound heart, soul, mind and…in time….body to – and Xander had panicked. He'd fled from Angel's mansion to the not-safety of his home.

Unwittingly, he'd babbled the whole sordid story to his parents, who'd stared at him like he was crazy. And, well, in a way, he was – crazy.

His father, having latched onto the only thing that he could understand out of all that Xander had stupidly said – that he was 'married' to Angel, a guy – had beaten him, because he'd be damned if he had a fag for a son. That hadn't been a surprise. What had been a surprise, however, was Angel showing up, again, like a dark, avenging…well, angel, and rescuing him from his father's fists and vicious words.

It was then that Angel – absentmindedly mopping at some of the blood on Xander's chin with a thumb – had first declared that he'd be there for Xander, no matter what, and that they'd sort through all of this together. And, it was on the very porch that Xander now stood, hands shoved in his pockets, where he'd first discovered that, though a vampire's lips were cold as ice, when they pressed to his, they could warm him down to his very toes. Or, maybe it was only Angel's lips that could do that to him.

Xander snorted at the memory, and shook his head, effectively clearing it. He knew that he was turning red, his neck and his cheeks becoming a sort of fuchsia pink, because he felt a familiar warmth sweep over him as he thought about the vampire he was now saddled with for eternity. Or, well, for as long as they both lived, and, given that Angel was already a centuries old vampire, and Xander was a demon-magnet, the eternity thing could go one of several different ways.

Xander swallowed, and looked at the door. This shouldn't be so hard, he thought, just knock, and, when/if the door opens, smile, and ask if you can get your stuff. Nothing to it.

"And, if your father tries to kill you again?" Angel's voice, overly serious, threatening death should that actually happen, rang in his memory, and Xander almost laughed aloud, even though there was nothing funny about it. Because, although Xander had said something witty in return, he really had no idea what he would do if his father came at him swinging.

"Duck," Jesse's voice, along with an eerie peal of laughter, came to him, unbidden.

Spooked, Xander looked over his shoulder, wondering if he'd somehow conjured the ghost of his best friend, second only to Willow. There was no ethereal specter standing behind him, but Xander did catch a dark shape – a bulky form hidden, a little conspicuously, behind a tall tree that lined his former front yard – out of the corner of his eye, and he turned his back on it to study the front door once again.

Taking a deep breath, knowing that Angel had, against his wishes, followed him there (something for which he was secretly thankful, but would later scold Angel over, provided that he survived this encounter with his father) Xander pulled one of his hands from the warm depths of his pocket. He formed a fist, looking at the way his skin stretched taut over the knuckles, how white it looked in the waning shadows of the day.

He was cold. His ill-fitting clothing, worn in places that exposed certain areas of his body to a distinct draft, wasn't going to hold up much longer. He needed to do this.

He'd only been with Angel for a couple of weeks now – after the bonding ceremony, and the averted apocalypse. And, hadn't that been an unexpected twist? Not.

Xander wondered if Spike had known about that little tidbit before hiring the odd gypsy man. If the bleached out vampire would have gone through with the ceremony which was supposed to make him stronger, and virtually invincible (being bound to a human – mind, heart, soul, and eventually body – something that Angel was more than content to wait a couple of years for, at least until Xander was legal, and ready) if he'd known that it would thwart an apocalypse.

Xander had been living in the same outfit that he'd been stripped of for that very ceremony, for going on a couple of weeks now. He'd refused to let Angel buy him new clothing – aside from boxers, because, ew.

It was a matter of pride, more than anything else. Xander freely acknowledged that. He was good with it. Copacetic with his pride getting in the way of how well, or, rather, in his case, how poorly he dressed.

Xander ignored the way that his classmates pointed at him and snickered as he passed them by in the hallway. He ignored the things that they said behind their hands and whispered into ears eager to hear the gossip regarding Xander Harris, adopted (that was the official lie concocted by Giles and Angel) by a wealthy recluse. Like he was Dick Grayson, moonlighting as Robin, and Angel was Bruce Wayne. Angel'd make a kickass Batman – if a little on the vamp-y side – having muscles in all the right places.

Ohmygod…he lives with a billionaire, and he still wears those rags? I think the man's fucking him …he's nothing more than a boy toy…but seriously… the man could dress him better, you know? …It's sick. Xander let the words of his insensitive classmates fall off of him, like water off a duck's back, or maybe he was thinking of oil and water. Something and water, he was half-certain of that.

If Harrises had nothing else, it was their pride. Even if it was a little warped at times, such as this. It was the only thing that Xander could take from his father that didn't turn his stomach, or make him feel like he'd be better off dead, or worse, 'married,' for eternity, to Spike.

He took a step forward, the loose floorboard on the porch, the one he normally avoided when coming home late, sagged and squeaked beneath his foot, and he winced. Holding his breath, Xander waited a heartbeat, and when no one appeared in the doorway, no hands grabbing at him from within the warm, if a little stuffy, confines of the place he'd called home once upon a time, Xander let his breath out, watched it crystallize in the much-too-cold-for-Southern-California air.

When the white fog of his breath disappeared, Xander took another step, and then another, and when he was within a breath's reach of the door, he raised his fist, and let it fall to his side. Hanging his head, Xander stood there, unable to follow through with the simple act of knocking on his parents' door.

A gust of wind swirled around him, whipped at his hair, and worked its way down to his very bones. He was beyond shivering now. His shoulders slumped, and he felt the treachery of a wet warmth slide down his cheek.

"Xander." Angel's hands were on his shoulders, pulling him around.

Before Xander could fully register what was happening, his face was being pressed to the vampire's chest, wet cheek rubbing against cool, smooth silk, and Angel's fingers were in his hair, soothing him. He didn't resist when, after a moment of just standing there, Angel led him across the porch. This time he automatically side-stepped the squeaky step, and didn't protest when they reached the end of the porch and Angel lifted him, carrying him the rest of the way to the car.

Pride could only take him so far before it crapped out on him. Apparently the limit of his pride was this point, before he'd even knocked on his own front door to gather what remained of his former life, his dignity – a closetful of second-hand clothing purchased at Goodwill™ and various garage sales over the years.

Angel settled Xander into the passenger seat without saying a word. Finally coming to his senses, and realizing what was happening, Xander batted the vampire's hands away when Angel tried to secure the seatbelt across his lap. He was perfectly capable of doing that himself. He still had a modicum of pride left, even if it had taken a rather decent blow just now. Angel didn't say anything as he shut the door, and walked around the front of the car, sliding into the driver's seat with more grace than Xander held in his little pinky toe.

The engine roared to life with a simple flick of Angel's wrist, and Angel quickly turned on the heater. They sat on the side of the road for a time. Xander shivered to regain some of the warmth that he'd lost. Holding his hands up to the air vents, he closed his eyes to savor the heat as it slowly began to thaw him. When he started to regain feeling in fingers and toes, he opened his eyes, and cast a sidelong look at his knight in leather armor. The Batman to his Robin.

Angel was watching him, brow furrowed in concern, a look on his face that, before now, Xander would have misunderstood. The vampire traced a dried tear-track on Xander's cheek, and Xander leaned into the touch, craving the odd sort of warmth that Angel brought him.

Before Angel put the car into gear, Xander saw the dark shadow of a silhouette slip into one of the front room windows of his childhood home. Though the shape was obscured by curtains, the pale yellow light behind it doing nothing to make it any more distinct, Xander recognized it as his father, the bottle of whiskey dangling from his fingertips. He could practically smell the smoke, and see the plumes drifting from the glowing cigarette that no doubt hung from the man's lips.

"Want me to go with you?" Angel whispered, and Xander could tell that Angel would rather that he not do this, at all, even with him by his side.

Shaking his head, Xander tore his eyes away from the window, and took a deep breath. He was still cold, but it had nothing to do with having stood outside for half an hour in a record breaking cold-spell, and everything to do with the fact that he'd stood, unable to move, on the doorstep of a place he should have felt welcome at, a place that, once upon a time, he'd called home.

He reached for, and grasped Angel's hand, bringing it up to his lips – for the first time since this whole thing started, initiating what might pass for an intimate touch with the vampire he was united to, in all ways, but one. Angel stared at him, unblinking, for what felt like an eternity before turning his eyes away and focusing them on the road before them. Xander thought he could see the corner of the vampire's mouth curled upward in a smile.

"Let's go home," Xander said, his head falling back against the headrest. Suddenly exhausted, though he hadn't done anything other than stare at a closed door for half an hour, he closed his eyes, letting another chapter of his life come to a close with a sigh of resignation.

He held fast to Angel, letting their entwined hands fall into the space between them, relishing the strange warmth that stole through him from the simple act of holding Angel's hand.

Giles had mentioned something about there being some kind of impulse for them to kiss and touch, and to do other things that Xander did not yet want to think about. An impulse which would only grow greater with the passage of time as the bond between them, 'matured'.

"You going to let me buy you some new clothes?" Angel asked once he'd pulled onto the main road, leaving Xander's mother and father – his former life – behind.

"I won't be able to pay you back," Xander said, weighing his words carefully. "Not until I get a job, and…"

Angel squeezed Xander's hand, causing Xander to lift his eyes and look at him. "Xander, don't…" He didn't add anything else, let whatever it was that he'd been going to say remain unspoken, heavy between them. "Just…let me do this for you."

Angel's eyes were glittering with something that Xander couldn't identify, before he turned to look at the road again, and Xander found himself nodding, enjoying the way that Angel's hand felt in his – how it seemed to fit just right. The comforting way in which the vampire was rubbing the pad of his thumb across the outer edge of Xander's thumb sent a little thrill down his spine. Something for him to examine later.

"Okay," Xander said, after a pause.

He could do this. He could swallow his pride (there was so little of it left) and let Angel take care of him. At least for the time being, until they got this whole mess sorted out, and Giles, or Buffy, or Willow, or Angel, or he found a loophole in the gypsy's magic. There was a part of Xander, not as small as it had been at the beginning of this that almost wished a loophole wouldn't be found.

"Thank you," Angel said, and he lifted their entwined hands, kissing Xander's knuckles, and Xander wondered if maybe things were moving more quickly for Angel than they were for him. Maybe it was the difference in their ages, or maybe it was something else. Whatever it was, Xander wasn't going to question it. Not now, maybe not ever.


Please let me know if you enjoyed this, and if you are interested in more of this 'universe'. Mahalo