AN: Sorry about the late-a-tude, been busy with uni, well read, review and enjoy!

Chapter 11

Cordelia sat on the floor in front of the low coffee table, staring into the log fire. She had put Josh to sleep hours ago and set the table up ready for their meal.

She was thinking of the day's events, Josh had said his first word, and he had called Angel dada. It's reasonable, she thought to herself, I mean Angel watches him everyday while I'm at school and evenings and weekends we pretty much hang out with Angel. Yeah it's perfectly natural, she said happy she had reassured herself. But why had Angel run as soon as it had happened? With Josh calling him dada she realised how the situation actually looked. They were a family in a sense, Josh saw Angel as the dad and herself as the mom. Now she started thinking about it, she herself saw Angel as the dad. Sure before she had been interested in Angel, but that was during her bitchy I-can-have-any-man-I-want stage, before she really knew him. She was so caught up with Josh and actually having a friend like Angel that she had pushed all her romantic feelings for him to the back of her mind, and this event only brought it back.

Angel was almost home. He had been running his conversation with Buffy over and over in his head. Specifically the part where Buffy had pointed out he was in love with Cordelia. It was perfectly natural, they had spent a lot of time together and understandably his feelings for her had evolved. But this caused him to think, had Cordelia's feelings evolved too? He was starting to panic now, what if he decided to profess his undying love to her and she simply passed it off with a friendly 'that's sweet', or even worse, 'thank you'. He had started to slow down now, he needed to figure out what to say to her before he got back and made an idiot out of himself. Practicing, he stumbled to find the words.

"Cordelia, I...well we've...you and I, we're both single people, in a world of...many other single people..." he trailed off lamely.

"Why is this so hard? It's only Cordelia, like my best friend." He sighed, giving it another shot, he had to hurry he was almost at the door.

"We're both adults...well your almost 18 and I'm, well I'm a little older than that...but I'm rambling, what I mean to say is...what did I mean to say? Oh for God's sake I might as well just say lets get to it."

"Angel is there something you want to tell me?" she asked grinning.

"Cordelia...I...ah...what did you hear?" he asked panicked.

"Just that you 'might as well get to it'. Why did I miss more good stuff?"

"No I ah, just..." He trailed off putting his hands in his pockets, that's when Cordelia noticed.

"You forget something?"

He was confused, and after the night he had, it was taking very little confuse his already muddled mind, he stared at her blankly.

"Nothing I can think of."

"Dinner?"

"Oh dinner, sorry I forgot, I'll go now."

"No I'll go, I've been cooped up all night. You stay and watch Josh I won't be long." Grabbing her coat and bag she kissed him on the cheek and made her way outside.

She sat waiting for her number to be called. Flipping mindlessly through an old issue of Good Food, the smell of Chinese food invading her senses. She was still thinking about today, and how Angel had showed up empty handed, he never forgets the take out, she thought frowning. She was about to read an interesting recipe for chocolate fudge cake when she was interrupted.

"Cordelia, hanging out at local take outs, making sure the lonely population of Sunnydale have your phone number?" Xander said crudely.

"You here to meet your 'date', or did he stand you up?"

"Ouch, one more fatal blow and I'm done for." He said melodramatically, resting the back of his hand against his forehead, mimicking some damsel in distress.

"Wow if I knew it would only take one more, I would have finished you off ages ago."

"Ha ha." He replied sarcastically. "What are you really doing here?"

"I'm waiting for a bus, what does it look like I'm doing?"

"It looks like you're a little preoccupied, are you some place that's else?"

Wow was Xander actually being nice? For a moment she faltered.

"I've kinda got stuff on my mind."

"Well I find take out is the ultimate cure."

"Is that why you're here?" she asked genuinely.

Xander was surprised that she cared, but not wanting to frighten away this 'new Cordelia', he nodded.

"Yep, anything to get out of the house of horrors. But what about you?"

"Just stuff you know."

"A guy?"

"How did you...?"

"It's always about a guy, yep with Willow it's Oz and Buffy it's Angel." The smile that was on her faced dimmed slightly at the use of Buffy and Angel's name in the same sentence. "Oh." Xander replied, starting to catch on.

"This guy is a really good friend, the best, the only real friend I've got."

"I heard the two of you were getting friendly, I just didn't know how much until now."

"What?" she asked puzzled.

"You and Angel."

"What about..."

"Buffy saw you buying blood, and she said Angel let slip he could understand what you were going through, by the way what were you going though?" he asked being nosey.

"Twenty six." The guy behind the counter called.

"Nothing." She said gathering up her bag.

"You like him, don't you." He said following her to the counter. "And I'm guessing there's more than enough for one in there." He said pointing to her take out bag.

Cordelia was starting to get frustrated. "Look Xander will you just drop it."

"No Buffy's my friend, and if there's something going on between you and Angel, I think she has the right to know."

"Oh course she does, because she's Buffy, she's the centre of the universe. Nobody can have a life unless she's permitted it, nobody can go anywhere near Angel, even though they're not together, if she can't have him no one can. I'm tired of people telling me he's Buffy's property, if he belongs to anyone, it's himself." She paused, looking down avoiding Xander's gaze.

"Sorry, I didn't know you were in love with him."

"I'm not." she said lying.

"It doesn't look that way to me." He paused sighing. "Cordelia if you love Angel, you should tell him, this has nothing to do with Buffy, even though she is my friend."

"When did you become all good with the advice stuff?"

"It's something I've perfected over time." He nodded.

"Wow, must've took awhile." She joked, and they both smiled.

He paused. "Are we actually bonding here?" he asked.

"Hell no." she replied as they both smiled. Thanking him for his help, she headed back to the mansion.

TBC