JERK

They were sitting together on the sofa, she on one end, he on the other. There was nothing particularly unusual about it. Just another day of research before heading out on patrol. Reading up on the various demons they had spotted recently, checking for anything strange or particularly dangerous, looking for anything that might mean a prophecy coming true, or some other portent of ill. The same old stuff they did every night, except Saturdays.

Because she refused to do book work on a Saturday night, even when she had to patrol.

He was not paying attention to anything but the book, as per usual, his head bowed, his eyes shifting over the pages with a speed she could not hope to match. Especially when her own book was strewn haphazardly over the arm of the sofa, some pages scrunched up into each other due to the hasty way she dropped it down. Sometimes it felt like books would burn her hands if she held on to them too long. Like tonight.

Sometimes she wondered how he managed to survive. His house was very much a bachelor pad. It was empty, for the most part. He did not believe in much decorating, and what he did have out were likely all magical items of some sort, or trophies from some insane endeavor he had managed to survive. Strange souvenirs from a lifetime of living the unbelievable.

She got up and wandered to the fridge, though she knew before she opened it that she would not find any food there. There was never much in his house except for tea and sometimes alcohol. What food he existed on when they were not bringing over take out she had no idea. Maybe he had evolved beyond the need to eat, to make his researching more effective. Or maybe he was just not very good at taking care of himself. Something told her that it was more the latter than anything else.

Sighing profoundly and getting no response from him, she wandered back to the sofa and plopped down as theatrically heavy as she could, rolling her head to the side to regard him pitifully. He was bent forward over a book, glasses resting at the very tip of his nose, eyes scanning the pages in that same trance like way that they had been before. He did not seem to notice when his body bounced from her landing on the sofa.

"I'm going to explode if you don't let me go out and patrol, Giles. We've been here for four hours already and you haven't find anything. I can't look at these tiny letters and see words any more. My eyes are broken. I need to go out, I'm going crazy."

She watched him as she pleaded and could almost see her voice heading toward his ears, hitting an invisible barrier, and careening off to the side without ever being heard. She made a long whine of a sound, writhing on the sofa and draping herself over the arm of it miserably, hanging her hands toward the floor and looking as pitiful as possible.

He continued not to notice.

"Giles!" She yelled suddenly, but that only resulted in his reaching over, not tearing his eyes from the page, and picking up another book. He shoved it in her direction and returned his hands to the pen and paper he had been scribbling on. She gripped the book with a terrible pout on her face, scowling at him. He had been hearing her, he was just choosing to ignore her, and letting her suffer.

But he had not looked up from the page, and his expression was blank and innocent, intent on his work and seemingly oblivious to the world around him. Maybe he really was just so focused on the research at hand that all he noticed was her not doing anything, and that was what had made him react. There was no way he could be ignoring her when she was yelling at him, but the way he was acting made it seem like he had no idea she was actually mad at him.

She was not sure if he was just the most patient man on the planet, or the most oblivious one.

"There's no food here. Should I go out and get us some food?" She tried, her tone close to calm, though it was shaking a bit with her frustration. Giles did not heed the question, scribbling on his notepad as an idea struck him. She took a breath and tried again. "Are you thirsty? I can get you some tea if you want, I know how to make it now. I've seen you do it enough."

Not even the promise of tea stirred the Englishman to look at her.

"Ughh. Why am I here? I'm not doing anything? I'm not even reading! Most of this stuff I can't read! I could go out and find the demon and kill it before you find anything in these books about it! Come on Giles, just let me go out!" This was torture. This was punishment for her missing patrol the night before. Now he wasn't letting her out of his sight. That had to be it, just because he had gotten himself a black eye from a new born vampire that she had missed. That had to be it.

"I'm sorry you're mad, Giles. I promise, I won't let it happen again."

Silence. She let out a rib shaking sigh and collapsed forward in her seat, reaching forward and grabbing the book she had been handed before, opening it to a random page and staring at the words. She blinked, recognizing the picture that leered up at her. "Oh, look, isn't that it?"

Giles looked up then, though her tone had been mostly to herself and barely passed as audible even in the quiet room. He leaned over to look at the picture and she glared at him, incredulous fury rising in her. He looked up to her and smiled sheepishly, and she kicked him away almost but not quite playfully. It sent him careening harmlessly to the other side of the sofa.

"Jerk."