Chapter 6

Angel looked uncertainly at the group; his eyes lingered on Cordelia, who had a lost look in her eye. "This couldn't be happening; everything was going to be all right tomorrow Doyle would be fine." Angel thought.

"Angel I know it's hard to except, but it's more than likely true." Wesley said, looking at his friend with concern. "The longer Doyle is here the more he'll retreat into his memories. First only major points in his life and then more detailed."

"It's just a theory Wesley, it doesn't mean it's true." Angel replied, he looked at Cordelia, she looked like she couldn't take much more of this.

"It might not be Angel, but if Doyle was in heaven, like I suspect, then he'll miss it more and more as time goes on. Therefore he'll be driven more and more into his memories before there was a heaven to miss."

"What if he wasn't in heaven, what if he went to…to hell?" Even as the words were coming out of her mouth, tears were falling down Cordelia's cheeks. Fred rushed over to comfort her.

"If he was in hell then all this would be a side effect of being tortured." Fred tried, "It might be easier to help him then, since he won't really miss that."

"But he'll still want to forget." Cordelia said.

"We won't know what to do until we know where he was." Wesley said.

"We came up with the plan that both you try to talk to him." Gunn said, "Since he don't know about any of us yet."

Cordelia and Angel nodded in agreement.

"In the mean time," Angel said, "You four should probably get the business running again. Spike go look for workers, one's with good intentions, not evil. Everyone else do what you normally would do, and any other odd jobs that need done."

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"You can go talk to him first."

"Why me?"

"Because this is MY house and I can talk to him anytime. Plus I want you out of my house."

"Thanks Cordelia." Angel sighed he new he wasn't going to win this one. Doyle was sitting on the couch, arguing with Dennis about what to watch on TV. "Here I go."

"Good luck." Cordelia said and walked toward the kitchen.

Angel came over and sat down on a chair opposite of Doyle. It was late, he was tired and he didn't know what to say.

"What's up man?" Doyle was looking over at Angel now, letting Dennis take control of the remote.

"Nothing…really…" Angel said nervously.

"Come on man I know you well enough to know when some thing's up." Doyle said.

"It's just that you've been, I don't know, avoiding conversation with me and Cordelia. About everything that's been going on…" Angel trailed off, he had Doyle's full attention now, but he didn't know how he should ask.

"You explained it last night right? What more is there to talk about?" Doyle didn't seem keen on the subject. "One thing we do need to talk about is that girls taste in beers." He went on nodding in the direction of the kitchen where Cordelia was.

Angel couldn't help but smile; Doyle wasn't acting strange now. Maybe he wasn't going crazy or back into his memories or whatever. Doyle had resumed his battle with Dennis over the remote; Cordelia came in and looked questionably at Angel. Angel shrugged and leaned back to watch Doyle and Dennis, or more Doyle and a floating remote. Cordelia turned to watch also and the first smile, in weeks came to her lips.

An hour or so later Angel said he should probably get to the office and check on things there, Cordelia walked him to the door.

"Well?" she asked.

"It's obvious he doesn't want to talk about it yet, we can't push him. Call me if he starts…you know…again." With that Angel walked out the door into the night.

Cordelia sighed and went back into the kitchen where Doyle was finishing his supper. She looked at her friend a moment before moving into his sight. He looked up at her, pushed he plate away and leaned back in his chair.

"Best meal I've had in a long time." He said, and then smiled like it was a joke.

"What you up for tonight?" Cordelia asked, "TV, going out, I still have a few board games and stuff, from when I was younger."

Doyle's smile got a little bigger, "A game sounds fine with me, but not a long one. I'm a little tired." Cordelia nodded and lead him to where she kept her games and let him chose. He took checkers out and smiled a mischievous grin. "I think this one will be good." And he led the way to the living room.

"O no I don't like that grin." Cordelia said following, "Don't tell me you the master at checkers." Cordelia almost stopped in her tracks as realization hit her. She didn't even know what games he like or was good at.

"You can say that." Doyle was saying, he hadn't noticed her hesitation. They played a couple games. In all of them Doyle creamed Cordelia, partly because of his talent and partly because Cordelia was getting more and more worried about Doyle as the games progressed. The time between his moves, thinking, became longer and longer. He kept getting a far off look and then would shake himself, returning to the game. "Well I'm tired." He said after the last game. "I think I'll turn in for the night."

Cordelia nodded and said good night. After she heard him close his bedroom door she rushed to the phone.

"Hello." Came the voice on the other end.

"Spike, it's Cordelia, get Angel for me." Cordelia whispered, as if Doyle was trying to over hear her call. She heard rustling on the other end, a faint call and more rustling.

"Hello." Came Angel's voice.

Quickly Cordelia told Angel what she had witnessed during their checkers game. "I think he's going to have another flash back thingy." She said, "The last time he had one Emma said he'd been zoning out."

"Emma's here let me check if it's the same thing." For a second Cordelia was shocked to hear that Emma was there, then she remembered they had arranged for her to meet Willow today. "Ok, Emma says that it's similar, but I can't come over right now. Spike recruited some demons that are stealing things."

Cordelia cursed Spike under her breath. "I can't deal with this on my own."

On the other end she heard Angel sigh. "I know, look Doyle knows who Emma is, is it ok if I send her over."

"Yes."

"She'll be right there."

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Cordelia answered the knock on the door. She found Emma in the hall with an apologetic smile on her face, her hands behind her back. She withdrew them and Cordelia saw she had her brass doorknocker in her hand.

"Sorry I can't really control my slayer powers yet."

"It's fine, thanks for coming over."

"It's no problem really, don't have much better things to do. I hope you don't mind me doing a bit of homework though."

"I thought you said you didn't have better things to do?"

"Well I don't count homework has something better to do."

Cordelia smiled, this was the kind of thinking she had when she was younger. Lately though, everything had been so crazy. Emma had agreed to come over when ever she could and Angel couldn't. They moved to the kitchen, where Emma spread her homework over the table.

"You know I'm glad I'm doing my homework here, I didn't think Angel would get modern day school." Emma said.

"Trust me, Angel doesn't get a lot of modern day things." Cordelia replied.

They worked like that for an hour or so, then sat and chatted for a long while. Cordelia was beginning to like this girl. She had plans for the future and was already figuring out how to balance being a slayer and college.

Suddenly Doyle came into the room, he had that far off look in his eyes.

"You didn't need to follow me, I'm just getting a glass of water." He said looking over his shoulder.

"Doyle?" both girls asked at the same time.

He seemed to be listening to a reply before he walked over to an invisible person.

"Harry you don't need to worry, we just got married and I'll be there every morning when you wake up; I promise."

"O no," Emma said, "He's back in his memories."

"Doyle, please." Cordelia had gone up to him.

"Harry I love you too, now go back to bed. I'll be there in a minute." Doyle was saying to his wife.

"Harry's not there, Doyle please." Cordelia begged.

Doyle ignored her pleas and started toward the sink for his glass of water, but Emma block his way. He stood still, looked confused, then turned around. Cordelia blocked his way there too. He looked closely at Cordelia.

"Princess what's going on?" He asked. Cordelia let out a sigh of relief and Emma fell back into her chair. Doyle turned around. "Emma?"

"Doyle why don't you go back to bed and I'll come in and talk to you later." Cordelia said.

"Now wait a minute, I'm not a kid Cordelia…" Doyle started to protest, but Cordelia cut in.

"Please, Doyle."

Doyle saw the pleading in her eyes and nodded. After he left Cordelia turned to Emma. "You can go home now, I need to call Angel."

Emma nodded and gathered up her books. On her way out she put her hand on her shoulder and left. Cordelia sighed and picked up the phone to call Angel.

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Doyle wasn't quite sure what was happening; first he was in his room, getting ready to go to bed. Next thing he knew he was standing in the kitchen in front of Cordelia, who looked very worried. "And what's with her treating me like a child, I'm older than her. Or maybe I haven't aged at all since I…NO! Don't think about that Doyle. Wait, who's she calling now?"

Doyle peeked out from behind his door and saw Cordelia dial a phone number.

"Spike…no Wesley, sorry you both have English accents, don't take it personally. Is Angel there?" Cordelia said into the phone.

"So she's just calling Angel, no big deal there. Spike…wasn't he that evil vampire who tortured Angel for that ring, and Wesley…the Wesley from the desk plate?" Doyle tuned out his thoughts so he could listen to Cordelia again, he felt like a little kid, spying on his parents to see if they'd let him get that new game or something.

"It happened again," Cordelia was saying, "only this time it was harder to get him to come out of it. …No I'll talk to him, but I think the best thing is if he gets out of the house, familiar things only drive him farther back into his memories. …Ok see you then. Bye."

"Leave the house? Go out and see some new things, because familiar things just drive me back into my memories? What is going on!?" Doyle climbed back into bed, again feeling like a little kid, before Cordelia came in. She walked in, not taking her eyes off Doyle, and sat down on a chair she pulled over beside his bed. "So what's up Delia?" Doyle asked in a would be casual voice.

Cordelia took a deep breath before talking, "I'm not going to beat around the bush Doyle, that has gotten us no where. You have to stop going back into your memories, no more zoning out, no more let's act out scenes from my life. Ok?"

Doyle looked puzzled; "She's worried about me thinking about he past?" Out loud he said, "Princess I don't know what your talking about, zoning out? And, what was it, acting out scenes from my life?"

"You keep thinking about the past, and when you do that you zone out. Then, later, you start acting like something in your life is happening all over again. Like people who aren't there are, well there. It's hard to explain…"

"Look, Cordelia, I'm perfectly fine, just…just a little tired. I think I'll go to sleep now ok?" Cordelia nodded then stood up.

"Doyle, I've really missed you." She said, "I've had so many nightmares about the day you…died. I haven't talked about it much, but I've always wished you'd come back. Now that you're here… I just want things to go back to they way they were, as close as we can get ok?" Without waiting for an answer she left the room, eyes filling with tears.

Doyle was startled by her confession, he wanted to "get better" even though he didn't know what was wrong. But suddenly, he didn't want to leave the house.

That night two people, a room or two away from each other, slept restlessly. Dreaming about the same dream. Doyle's death flashed in their minds. The pain both of them felt came back like and old wound. Then before all the pain came back the moment of their farewell. "To bad we'll never get to see…if this is a face you could love." Then their kiss, the first and last.

Cordelia and Doyle, both woke with a start, small beads of sweat coming down their faces.

Doyle went back into a fitful sleep soon after he had awoken. At first he slept dreamlessly, but just before dawn the nightmare came back to him. All the pain was fresh once more. He thrashed about in his sleep for a bit before a voice called him back to reality.

"Doyle! Doyle wake up!"

"Huh?" Doyle opened his eyes to see Cordelia leaning over him, looking very worried. "Delia? What are you doing in here?" he said confused.

"I…um…Dennis heard you thrashing around, he came and got me." She replied.

Doyle looked around and saw his sheets all over the place, and as he looked more closely he saw that the chair that Cordelia had been sitting in the night before wasn't against the wall, where he left it, but pulled back up beside the bed. He realized she had come in and had been watching him sleep. Suddenly Doyle felt touched and glad that she cared so much.

"Angel's coming over today, um…we were wondering if you were up to meeting some knew people. We've been working with them over the years. Is it ok if they come over too?" Cordelia seemed hesitant in asking him this.

"Sure Delia, um…will one of them be that Wesley you were talking on the phone with last night?" At first Cordelia looked shocked that he knew this, but then she nodded her head. Doyle continued, "He wouldn't happen to be the same Wesley that had my old desk back at the office, would it?"

Cordelia's expression changed from curious to concern in a flash. "Yes, but Doyle if you don't want them to come over it'd be ok…"

"It's fine Princess," Doyle cut in, "I was just wondering, that's all." And with that he walked to the kitchen for breakfast.