My Soul Is Hurting
And I Know, I Cause My Own Disgrace
My Eyes Are Blurring
And I Strain To See Beyond This Place

Lindsey McDonald had a big ol' grin on his face as he came to stand in front of the dirty, smelly cage currently holding Angel captive. He was sure it was more from the lead singer than the cell itself. "You, my friend, officially owe me the biggest goddamn raise in the history of time."

Angel barely heard him, barely realized he was in his presence. Hell, at this point he could hardly even recognize anything going on around him.

Angel's body was in a tight ball, but he was sitting up again. It hurt, but no matter what he did he was in pain. He could no longer even grasp the concept of trying to figure out how long it had been going on or what exactly was happening to him. His body rocked back and forth, shaking violently, his teeth chattering. He was both freezing and burning up, feeling sick, which he'd gotten more times than he could count. From the room, to outside in the scuffle, the hospital and everywhere between there and here. And the disgusting evidence of such was still in the cell with him, no one having clean it up. Not that Angel noticed or minded anyway. He could vaguely remember some poor fellow having to come in here with him, attempt to clean him off as apparently he was cover in blood and urine, sweat and sickness, dirt and who knew what else. He'd been washed down some, had his clothing changed and been forced to eat and drink something he thought... but it was all hazy. And it seemed like it was days, maybe even weeks, if not longer, ago.

The grin on the lawyers face had long been forgotten, now it was covered in disgust, sadness and empathy. "You look like shit," he commented. 'Smell like it, too,' he added silently, wrinkling his nose. "Angel?"

Angel's shifty eyes landed on him but Lindsey wasn't sure that actually meant anything.

"We're taking you home, alright?" he said softly. "They're taking care of the last few details right now then..."

Angel's head began to shake from side to side. "N...no," he managed to grit out, after several tries.

Lindsey's forehead crinkled up. "No?" he questioned. "What do you mean 'no?' And stop scratching at your arms," he added, flinching at the sight of Angel's flesh, all raw, scratched up and bloody. Gross.

Angel stopped almost all movement for a moment, his eyes looking down. He hadn't even noticed. Then, as fast as he'd stopped, his body returned to its previous state.

"Angel?"

"Ca..can't lea..leave," he forced out.

"Yes, you..."

Angel's head shaking crazily cut him off once more. "Clean. N...need...clean."

Lindsey closed his eyes and sighed. He knew what he meant. If they let him out of here, he knew he'd just go out and find the closest 'pain reliever' and who knew what would happen then.

Lindsey took a step closer to the bars. "Tomorrow you are going to rehab. And before you start, I mean serious rehab. Rehab where they strap you to a table while you ride this shit out type of joint, not the pansy ass places they've been dropping you off at who just let you come and go as you please and haven't done a thing for you." The lawyer saw a hidden spark flare up in the glossy brown eyes of his friend, both of hope and of fear. "They'll take care of you there, Angel. Not this broken shit," he grumbled, ready to go off into a rant of his views of prison related "detox systems."

He didn't get the chance to however as company came to join them.

Angel did his best to concentrate, to watch Lindsey speak with a few other suits and a guard he thought he recognized. "Linds."

"Yeah?"

"No."

"Angel. You're free to leave. You're free to go... take a shower, clean up, eat, sleep... be out of this dump for the night..."

Angel shook his head. "Can't. Need... s..s...stay here."

Lindsey sighed and tried to argue with him, promising to keep him safe for over twenty some minutes before giving up. "I'll see you in the morning, alright?"

Angel nodded.

OoOoO

Angel didn't remember if that had ended up being true, but he figured it probably was and he had. He really had no idea what had happened to him after that. He couldn't recall the rest of that evening, the moring, leaving the cell, how he got here... much of anything. However, he did seem to have a brief memory in there of random things on the walls though he couldn't make out exactly what they were supposed to be, a cluttered desk, people standing around him, him throwing up on an assumed nurse... then... well, pretty much nothing. Bits and pieces from brief, not very lucid moments since then were here and there but for the most part nothing. He found himself more or less familiar with the sight of the walls surrounding him though, the ceiling, an IV bag to the side of him. He could remember more nurses coming and going, though not very well, he couldn't make out a single one of their faces. He remembered sounds, feelings... none of them good, being sick and in so much pain he was wishing for death... but everything was just... a jumble, fuzzy and not making all that much sense right now.

"Are you awake?"

With enormous effort, Angel turned his head slightly. It was the second time this strange woman had asked this, that he could recall anyhow. He looked at her for a moment. When he tried to swallow so he could speak, tears actually came springing to his eyes from the pain.

"Sorry about that, here," she said, popping up and reaching off to where he couldn't see. A few short seconds later there was a small cup in her hands and in his line of sight. She put a small straw inside then came to help him with it. "Slow, easy sips," she said softly, rubbing his hair as he coughed and choked. "How are you feeling?" she asked once he'd had enough, for now.

Angel just made some noise as his response.

She smiled softly. "Understandable. How about we take those off?" she said, pointing to his wrists. Moving back off the bed, she stood and crouched over him, unlocking his cuffs from his wrists then his feet. "I wouldn't try to move just yet though," she advised. "I'm Jenny, by the way."

He coughed again, then swallowed very painfully. "Angel," he said in turn, his voice very scratchy, sore, foreign.

She smiled. "I know who you are."

His eyes closed and he attempted to nod. "I'll bet."

Her smile widened.

OoOoO

"So. How are we doing today?"

Angel was sitting up on his small but comfortable enough detox used bed. His body was slouched and even the upper half of him was hanging off to the side. When Jenny took her seat, he groaned, pulling himself right back up. "Have you ever done drugs?"

She surprised him with a chuckle and then a nod. "Actually, I have."

He blinked and raised an eyebrow. "Huh. Well, okay, have you ever had one of those... you're floating, everything around you is cloudy, tilted, seemingly far away and yet like you could reach out and touch it... if that makes any kind of sense?"

She chuckled again. "I believe I know where you're going, yes."

"I kind of feel like that. But without the fun."

She was silent for a moment, watching him. "You're shaking less."

He nodded.

"Still in pain?"

He nodded again.

"How bad?"

He shrugged. "Bad. Beyond bad. Beyond imagination. But less... than it was," he answered truthfully.

She nodded, writing something quickly down in her notebook. "You know we can help. You weren't ready to just quit like that, cold turkey."

He sighed. "You have the power to force it."

"It's your decision, Angel."

"And I made it."

Jenny sighed, clicking her pen a few times. "You may think we've gotten you through the worst of it, and truthfully, in some ways, some ways not all, we have, but you're still a long way from where you need to be. You can do this more gradually, less painfully. Not pain free, but less painfully. You don't have to keep punishing yourself."

Angel looked away. They'd already had this conversation.

Sometimes she pushed him, sometimes she didn't. Sometimes he'd go with her, sometimes he'd yell, sometimes he'd just shut down. Today she wasn't pushing the subject though. "How do you feel about getting a new room today?"

"I don't even know what today is."

She patted his hand.

OoOoO

Angel was nervous as he took a seat.

He'd refused and avoided to do this for several weeks now.

He was calmer now, again, but he really hadn't been there for awhile. They'd been hard, long, and he'd been crazy and erratic. He twitched, wondering how to apologize, how to act, what to say, what to do.

Swallowing, he looked around the room before randomly picking up one of the magazines laid out on one of the small side tables.

OoOoO

"You know, you're not what I expected."

Angel tilted his head slightly. "Oh?"

Jenny smiled a little, her hand coming up to the arm rest, her chin resting on top of her knuckles. "Well, you were. Over the past several weeks, you were. Those bad days, bad moments you've had here and there, sure. That was expected and saw coming, but I don't know. This... this real you, it's nice. Better than I was imagining."

"I thought you knew all about me."

She smiled again. "Hmm. True. Maybe we just all forgot," she said, a little sadly.

He nodded, his eyes lowering back down to the page he'd left the magazine open to for a moment. "Well, this place isn't exactly what I imagined."

"Oh?" she teased with her response.

He chuckled, feeling his anxiousness fall away little by little. "Never been to a rehab quite like this what you've got here. And let me tell you, I've been to plenty."

"I've never had a patient quite like you before," she countered. "And, I've head... well, I suppose I can say plenty, too."

He paused for a moment. "I'm not sure how to take that."

She laughed softly before leaning forward to pat his knee. "I've never had a patient sitting around reading a magazine that they were on the cover of," she clarified.

His hands kept the page but he brought the cover back down over it to check it out. He hadn't even notice. "Huh. How about that."

Jenny smiled. "Yeah. How about that."

He studied the still fairly glossed cover before letting it fall back open. "So, you're saying you don't get too many celebrities around here?"

Jenny shook her head. "You guys usually head off to somewhere like Betty Ford, Crossroads, Promises..."

He smiled. "Or get shipped off to Utah?"

"Or get shipped off to Utah."

"I like it here though," Angel said after a quick moment of silence fell between them. He began to finally apologize for his behavior, but she cut him off before he got too deep into it.

"That must be one interesting article."

"Huh?"

She nodded toward the spread out magazine in his lap. "You've been staring at that page since before I even walked in here."

Angel's eyes looked down. "Right," he said quietly.

She waited for another pause. "Going to share what it's about? And I do hope it's not the big story that's about you or something."

Angel blushed a little. Looking up, Jenny raised an eyebrow and he shook his head before lifting the slick bundle of pages up and handing it over.

At the very first tiny glimpse, Jenny knew what he'd been staring at. She watched as his eyes remained on the page as he lifted it toward her, the look on his face, the way his hands trembled. "Thank you," she said softly, taking it from him. Jenny flipped it around and placed it in her own lap, looking over the two pages. There was a continuation of the story of Angel and his band taking up the better part of one of the sides but she knew that hadn't been what his focus had been on.

No, instead it was the gathering of several photos cluttering around the words and overflooding the opposing side. In truth, there were several of the band members, even a few tiny ones of some of their lucky fans, but the majority were of their devilishly handsome lead singer, Buffy, or, more importantly, the two of them together. After all, that is what truly sold these things.

"That's a fairly old publication," Angel said nervously. "Should really update your stash."

Jenny smiled, her hand smoothing over some of the photos on the page. "Do you want to talk about her? About Buffy?"

He looked away. The last time he'd tried that... he'd already been feeling horrible enough with his withdrawl and everything... then he tried... and well, it had lead to a few hellish weeks around here. Angel took a deep breath. "No. Not yet."

Jenny smiled. "That'sperfectly fine, Angel. You will when you're ready. And I'll be here to listen."

He nodded, looking down.