Connor closed the door as quietly as he could. He did not want his parents finding out that he was going to bed so late; he would never hear the end of it. Stepping out of his jeans and slipping off his shirt, he tossed them in the general direction of his closet. He sat on the edge of his bed, checking to make sure his alarm was set for the next morning.
He reached up to turn the lamp off when his hand paused. Connor smiled at the picture in the shiny silver frame - him and Tracy at graduation, his annoying sister in the background. Before turning flipping the light off, he turned the frame face-down.
He didn't like seeing her when he woke up. Not with the dreams he had been having.
The dreams in the beginning were more like nightmares. Blood, death, and tears. He remembered the crying most of all. The pretty girls he had never met just tearing up. He attempted to cheer up the dark-haired girl, but it was never enough. She would cry and cry, whimpering his name at times.
He tried to forget the blood, the blood that always seemed on his hands. Connor hated blood; he could not even stomach gory movies. Tracy had once made him watch a video from PETA and all the blood made him ill.
That is how his father had found out about the dreams. He found Connor in the bathroom, throwing up into the toilet. The boy had tried to pass it off as food poisoning, but had relented and told his dad about the nightmares. The next day Connor went to see a psychiatrist and came home with tiny blue pills that made the nightmares go away.
The dreams that came back a few weeks later - well, they were equally disturbing to him, but he didn't complain. Maybe it was because he liked them, maybe there were many other reasons.
Dream
Connor had put up a punching bag in the basement of the Hyperion, under the pretense of working on his nerves. He preferred to work on his father issues. He could picture the bag as his father - his father who was currently twenty leagues under the sea. Angel couldn't fight back so Connor punched the bag until his knuckles began to bleed. Even then it wasn't enough. He grabbed a towel, wiped off the blood, and started punching again.
"At least you're taking your aggression out on inanimate objects nowadays."
Wes stood on the landing, regarding the situation with indifference. As Connor returned to the bag, he walked down the stairs and headed straight for one of the cabinets.
"What are you doing here?"
"I came to retrieve something that I left here." Wes looked through the mess of stuff that was laying on the shelves. "Don't worry - I don't plan on staying here long."
"Well, that's good because nobody wants you here, Wes. We're doing just fine without you." Connor smirked, throwing a wild punch just for show.
"I'm sure you are. Fred is most likely running everything, since the only thing you know how to run is your mouth. Aha, there it is." He reached back into the cabinet, being careful not to cut himself on the blade. He smiled softly as he took a look at the knife for it reminded him of Faith, the Slayer he failed. "I'll be going now. I have what I came for."
"What is that?" Connor asked, despite himself.
"This knife belonged to a girl I once knew. A Slayer." He shook his head. "You remind me of her at times."
"Because I'm strong, right? But I'm definitely stronger than some girl, even if she is a Slayer."
"That's not why." Wes advanced slowly. "She got herself into a world of trouble - killed an innocent man and then turned on all of her friends. Even Angel. That's why she reminds me of you."
Connor shrugged. "I didn't do anything to my friends. Or Angel."
"We both know you're lying, Connor. I know you had something to do with Angel's disappearance. I just have to figure out exactly what you did with him." Wes twirled the knife in his hand, taking a small pleasure in the fear that slowly crept into the boy. "You could make it easy for everyone and just tell me now, or you could make it harder on yourself. Angel will be back sooner or later and there won't be anyone to protect you from him. Whatever you did to him - he was sent to a hell dimension by Ms. Summers - and he wasn't very happy when he came back from there either."
"Even if I did know something, I sure as hell wouldn't tell you! Angel probably deserved whatever he got!"
"Who are you to judge what he might deserve? I think you deserve to be gutted - that's what this knife is good for, actually - but I may be wrong." Wes shrugged, then made a grab for Connor, grabbing the boy's arm. Pressing the knife down hard on Connor's hand, he waited until the wound was bleeding before letting go. "Your blood is his blood. You can't get away from that, no matter what you do. You may hate your father, but you will always be your father's son. Nothing will ever change that, no matter how hard or how much you try."
Wes wiped the blade clean against his jeans. "Good luck, Connor. I think you are going to be needing as much as you can get." He turned back towards the stairs leading upstairs. He was on the fourth step when Connor jumped him from behind. They wrestled violently; at one point Wes lost grip of the knife and then found himself underneath Connor. He quirked an eyebrow, wondering what the boy was going to do now.
"You don't know as much about me as you think you do, asshole." Connor then did the most expected thing. He kissed Wes hard. When the older man started to kiss back, Connor bit down on his lip, drawing blood. Wes pushed the boy off him with his feet, kicking him back against a bookcase. Connor slumped down onto the floor, with a self-righteous smirk plastered on his face.
Wes wiped the blood off with his sleeve then picked the discarded knife up. Walking upstairs, he paused on the landing. "See you around, kid."
End Of Dream
Pulling his robe off the door hanger, he slipped quietly down the hallway - trying not to disturb anyone else this early in the morning. He shielded his eyes as he entered the kitchen, reaching for the light switch. Feeling that it was already up, he opened his eyes carefully.
"Everything all right, son?"
"What? Oh yeah, everything's fine. I just woke up a bit thirsty. Come to get a glass of water." Connor opened up the cabinet and pulled out a glass. "What are you doing up so early?"
"I couldn't sleep very well. Must be all the excitement about going to see your school today."
Connor about dropped the glass he was trying to fill. "I thought that Tracy and I were going there by ourselves."
"You won't mind if your family comes along, will you? We want to see where you are going to be living. Tracy won't care, I'm sure."
Connor set the glass down in the sink, clenching his wrist tightly. His dad was always doing this. Trying to relive his damn childhood or something. Connor had to be the best in everything so he could play the proud father. Connor was going to the college his parents had chosen, though thankfully Tracy had later chosen the same one. His father wanted everything in Connor's life to be his way.
He smiled, thinking back to the guy in his dreams. 'He's mine, dad, and you'll never have him,' he thought. Turning back around, he took a sip and then raised his glass to his father. "I'm going to try to go back to sleep for a few hours. Wouldn't want to be tired on the visit."