I.

Riley was taken when Oz was twelve. Riley was older, stronger, wiser, better with the ladies and just starting high school. He had Midwestern good looks and a charming personality that had drawn Oz and countless freshman girls. He and Oz had been best friends since Oz was eight and Riley was eleven. Despite the age difference, they had settled into a quiet routine in their playtime: explorers in the forests, drag racers on their bikes in the streets, Olympic swimmers at the beach at night. That was how Oz would always remember Riley: pale against the moonlight at the beach in early twilight, laughing and running into the ocean, jumping back up and spraying Oz with an armful of water. Oz clumsily wiping his eyes as Riley began to freehand out past where his toes could touch, and Oz calling after him, begging him to come back.

Oz always tried to look after his friends.

He had been quiet at the funeral. Watching Mrs. Finn curl up against the cold pine, hand grasping and finding no purchase as she sobbed.. Her husband gently picking her up and carrying her out of the church into the harsh sunlight. Oz had waited for everyone to leave until he was the last one in the room, empty pews and empty prayers surrounding him. He had walked to the coffin, kneeled before it, and said a prayer, as empty as the rest. Standing, he had risked a glance: waxen face, eyes glued shut and tight against the brightness of the room and the concept of death, two clean bite marks almost but not completely concealed. Oz would have to be ready.

The Finns were standing at the bottom of the stairs outside, seeming hunched and small. Their hands clutched at each other, fair skin burning in the summer sun (that’s why Riley had only been allowed to go to the beach at night, his delicate skin). They were surrounded by a small crowd, anxious to get away but unwilling to leave without first saying the meaningless words that had become so familiar to them. Oz left the church behind without saying anything to Riley’s parents. He had to be prepared for what was going to happen. And that was worlds more important than comforting two people so clueless their only son had been killed because they had let him stay out past curfew alone.

He should have been there. Maybe, if he had been there, he would have been able to help fend them off. Call for help, or find a decent hiding spot. Instead, he would have to wait for the inevitable knock on his door, the pale imitation wearing his friend’s skin. The thing that would talk a little too smoothly, move a little too surely, act a little too hungry.

He broke off a chunk of Mr. Parson’s wooden fence on his way home. He certainly needed it more than the old man did. Next order of business was a cross. He could do this.

II.

The first day of high school was something that had both intrigued and frightened him. The potential for so much more knowledge, weighed against the potential for so many new friends who would only die, killed by their own stupid actions. After Riley, he had become much more of a loner, preferring the company of books and his guitar to other people who were flawed with mortality. Words lived forever.

And after awhile, his mother had finally given up on asking what the little jar with the dust in it was. Eventually, she had stopped asking him anything. And that was the way he liked it.

During his free, after English and Geometry, he had decided to investigate the library. His locker was close by, and after watching a boy of similar size and stature get beat up by a unambiguously insecure freshman named Larry, the library seemed warm and inviting. A place to hide in the stacks and forget about nighttime, dust covering the tops of his sneakers, twelve year old hand shaking and a splinter deep into his thumb. Digging it out and watching it bleed, remembering he was alive. Here, the largest risk was a paper cut. That was one that Oz felt safe with.

Some days he didn’t mind the fact that all he knew how to do was hide.

III.

A week into the school year he finally met the librarian, having mustered enough courage to walk straight up to the desk instead of running straight up the flight of stairs into the relative darkness of the stacks. He was willing to put aside his dislike of any sort of closeness or intimacy to find a certain Dante volume. The cards had proclaimed it was with the classics, but Oz had spent a full hour searching, and it was most definitely not present.

The man had looked up from his book with an absent expression, starting to say something but cutting himself off when he realized Oz was not the person he was expecting.

“Buf-. I apologize. Can I help you find something?”

“Yeah, I was just looking for a book. I think your cards are a little outdated.”

Tight smile and nervous gesture of smoothing down the front of his shirt, even though the shirt looked like it was fresh off the ironing board at one in the afternoon.

“I have rather been meaning to fix those. It seems my predecessor became rather careless with their order in her final days.”

“It’s cool. Looking for Dante.”

“Light reading?”

“I try.”

The man had walked off without a word into the stacks, feet hitting the stairs lightly. He had come back scant minutes later, holding three books, all looking well past their prime.

“I’m afraid that’s all we have.”

“No, this is the one I was looking for. Thanks.”

“Checking it out?”

“Oh, yeah. Osbourne, Daniel. I think the number is 69252. I’m pretty bad with them though. Like words better.”

“Here it is. Daniel. It’s due back in three weeks.” He handed the book back and their hands hit clumsily, awkwardly, but with enough contact for Oz to feel the heat in the other man’s hand, to feel the bend of fingers and parchment texture of his skin. He felt like a librarian should feel: dry but well taken care of. Loved even.

“Thanks, Mr.-”

“Giles.”

“Right. Mr. Giles.”

And that had been the end of that.

IV.

Oz had always been an aficionado of routines. So that November, after Mr. Giles had walked by him at 7:24 exactly on the 61st morning of the school year for the 61st time, Oz had finally given up and investigated what, exactly, was bringing the man to the high school at such a precise time every morning without fail. He had looked through the library window: the lines on the glass creating shadowy counterparts on his face that divided him into pieces. But he watched, dumbstruck, as Mr. Giles headed into the caged-off portion of the library and opened a large chest of weapons.

Maybe there was someone in this town who knew what the hell was going on besides him after all.

V.

“Oz, the crossbow? I should take another glance at it, since Larry said it was faulty during his last patrol.”

Oz had paused from the dull repetitive task of whittling a new stake, and reached for the crossbow on the other end of the table. He passed it to Giles, who was sitting next to him, quiet as ever. Right at that moment it had been just the two of them, working silently in the library since Larry was at class. Three men, though he found it hard to classify himself and Larry as men instead of boys, or teenagers, or smaller versions of adults who truly should have fewer responsibilities. Soldiers in an impromptu front line, causeless and weaponless. With very little keeping them motivated.

This war had wearied them to the bone.

Oz had been watching a new girl, Nancy, and Giles had already cleared her acceptance into their little ragtag band of brothers. She had lost both her parents to a vampire attack, and apparently she had lived to tell the tale. Though she certainly wasn’t telling much of anything to anyone. Oz sighed, and Giles looked at him, smiled a tired and entirely unenthusiastic smile through his five o’clock shadow. He knew Giles had given up, he knew they all had. But Giles had the largest part to lose: This was his calling, his destiny. And when instead of a slayer, a skinny white boy with baggy pants and an irrational fear of people had knocked on his door, that’s when the giving up had started.

Between the two of them, they could have turned defeatism into an Olympic sport.

VI.

Oz, of course, had been the one to make the first move. They had patrolled together, which was rare enough, but Giles had faltered midfight and clutched at his ankle before remembering where he was and reaching for his sword. But Oz had been there fast enough, and staked the newly risen vampire before it got too close to Giles. Still, a fine coat of dust had covered the injured man. He had tried not to watch Giles’s hands shake. Tried not to notice that maybe Giles was a little slow reaching for his sword because he was ready for it to be over.

Oz had driven him back to his apartment in the van, radio off, silence except for the sounds of labored breathing and the engine sticking whenever Oz attempted to push it above forty. He had half-carried Giles to his door, apartment courtyard green and glittering in the vacant night, door imposing and looming. Locked up as tight as Oz. He was trying overly hard not to notice the smell of fear and dirt on Giles, and the underlying familiar scent of tea and books and Giles himself. About how he was trying even harder not to pinpoint every bit of pressure on his body from where Giles was leaning on him.

It was stupid: hopped up on adrenaline and the thought he might have lost the one person he seemed to care anything about (never mind words like want, like, love). It was inappropriate, against all the rules: the law, the unspoken friendship they had.

Well, fuck the rules.

If they were going to die, at least he was going to do one thing in his life right.

VII.

Desperate kisses, hard and bruising, lips swollen but waiting for more. Oz had wanted to put his hands everywhere, but settled for using them to push Giles back onto his bed, to awkwardly unbutton Giles’ shirt while trying to claim his mouth as a new territory. But Giles had given back as good as he got, biting at Oz’s lips and divesting Oz of his jeans. Heaped together on the bed, it was an act of the dead trying to claim one solitary minute of life. When Oz came, it was long, shuddering, and he had become hyperaware of his limbs and how heavy they were. Through the aftershocks, he had leaned over and sucked at Giles’s neck, marking him, and ran his hand over the erection pressing into his thigh. Giles had come with a hoarse shout and collapsed in on himself and into Oz.

They had stayed, unmoving, for awhile. Unwilling to let the night reclaim them, unable to let go of the other.

VIII.

“Sometimes it’s hard to forget. Who we are, what we do.”

Giles had nodded. Curled his hand up against Oz’s side, pulled him a little tighter.

“It seems like we don’t have much sometimes.”

His voice had rumbled out from under Oz’s ear, pressed against Giles’s chest (he was listening to Giles breathe, to the rhythm of his heart, like clockworks, all it did was remind him that time was passing and there was nothing he could do). “We have this.”

“We do.” A lapse into silence, filling out into the corners of the room.

The quiet moments were all they had left.

IX.

One girl had changed everything. And surprisingly, it wasn’t the Slayer that Giles had hopelessly been waiting for. It was Cordelia, bright clothes and bright red blood against her neck. Tiny necklace that apparently held the key to their tiny form of existence, their off-kilter universe. She had wished for that.

And as hard as Oz could try, he still couldn’t understand who would wish for something like this. Not that it was exactly working out for Cordelia right at the moment, of course, but hell, he had expected to see her obituary freshman year. She had made it a lot longer than he would have given her credit for.

Even if Oz was internally reeling from this new knowledge, it was nice to see Giles back in old form, flustered and excited to be able to research, to know that he had been able to do some good with his mind for once, instead of pushing his worn body past its limits in patrol every night.

Giles had left, telling them to get some rest. Oz could feel each cut on his body, each sore muscle, every protest his body was registering against him. All it did was remind him that he was alive, while others were not so fortunate. He had chased after Giles, wanting to kiss him goodnight, and only half heard Larry’s shout of “Catch your boyfriend, Oz!” as it echoed down the lonesome and forlorn halls, its approximation of teenaged exuberance out of place.

He had caught up with Giles right before he had walked outside into the dark, and while they certainly weren’t any safer in here, it was at least better than out there where the stars could fall upon their shoulders and where the darkness could separate them.

“Love you.” He had murmured into warm neck and beating arteries, hoping the blood would carry it to Giles’s heart, to his brain. He was just a slip of a boy, clinging to tight to his all-too-human savior. But his savior was clinging back. Whispering the words back into his hair, hands rubbing at his arms and back. They were trying to find their faith again.

“Love you too.”

And then Giles was gone, slipping through the night and into his ancient car (the one that they had kissed across the front seat on the way to school, when Giles had pulled over because Oz had his a infuriatingly shameless smirk on his face and his hand on an entirely inappropriate place for safe travel).

Oz wondered if he would ever see Giles again.

X.

He had always chosen to fight each battle as if it could be his last, but in this case, despite the presence of the Slayer (when had she shown up?), it looked as if it would be. There was a master vampire in the room, plus at least fifty other vampires. And there were fewer than half a dozen people to fight them off.

That didn’t mean he wasn’t going to take as many vampires as he could with them.

The sounds of battle flooded his ears and blocked out any conscious thought: He had spared glances whenever he could to watch the girl, the tiny one with the scar across her mouth and a larger one across her heart.

He and Larry had slammed the powerful girl vampire against the broken bit of wood hanging from their cage. Oz had briefly thought of how asinine it was that vampires built anything with wood, but stopped in horror when something caught his eye. History was unfolding before him in their brave new world, and he feared that soon there would be no one left to retell it.

He had watched as the Master snapped the slayer’s neck and she seemed to fall forever, eyes hollow and jaw slack. Ponytail twisting around and slapping the side of her head gently, cross twisting around broken bones and lifeless flesh.

But his last thought, desperate and aching and nearly as painful as his wounds, was of Giles, if he was safe. If Giles would be the one to find his body. If Giles would cry, or if Oz would be just another casualty, faceless and nameless.

The world faded to white.

xxx

Oz had never really considered Latin sexy, to be honest, he had never really considered Latin at all, beyond the way he associated it vaguely with the smell of sage and Willow’s hands and neck, or the way he had once carried around a book of ancient mythology completely written in Latin and picked out random words that he knew like carpe diem and had smirked over the literal saying of semper ubi sub ubi, always wear underwear; but now he was definitely considering Latin sexy and had also found that perhaps semper ubi sub ubi was not always the best plan, especially when there was that thrusting motion and the whispered Latin behind and in his ear that seemed to make stars explode behind his eyes and god, he couldn’t think when Giles got like this. Yes, Latin and the magic of the words that spilled across his tongue and the way he trailed his fingers across Oz’s chest just so. There was a lot to be said for Latin.

There was also a lot to be said for the shivers that were running through him that seemed to go on forever like the run-on sentences he kept arranging in his head, that perhaps weren’t as articulate as he cared to be, but in the end truly got his point across, when he thought about the way that Giles buried his face in his neck when he was close or how those hands seemed to be everywhere and Oz felt so young and inexperienced yet older and mature and sophisticated because, god, he was fucking the school librarian and it was the best sex of his life. Of course, Giles wasn’t really a school librarian anymore, since there was no school anymore either, but had created a taboo well enough, one that Oz had to break by practically crawling into his lap and molesting him; which, on second thought, apparently Giles wouldn’t have minded judging by his enthusiasm now.

Not that Oz was complaining.

Not that Oz thought he would ever be able to walk again, the way that Giles was breaking him and then slowly and lovingly putting him back together, perhaps like one of those Russian dolls that hid a layer underneath and a layer beneath that one, and so on and so on. There were layers… places… Oz had never thought of, that Giles was breaking and reforming and breaking all over again.

And Giles’s eyes were boring into him yet not really focused, that glazed look that Devon had perfected so well that Oz had never expected to see in the green-hazel depths of Giles’s eyes, but then again they weren’t really glazed just eager and wanting and practically black with need and now Oz swore he must be coming unhinged because nothing, nothing could ever feel this good.

Not even the first time when they did this and Oz wasn’t being broken but practically ripped in half and he had growled, Jesus, like Giles was some dog invading his territory when the thrusts had been so slow and the contact so gentle and he hadn’t meant to but when the ripping turned to something else and Giles had seen the change in him and knew that it was ok, and god, it had been amazing.

Who knew the school librarian could fuck like a god? Like a god amongst the pantheon of Jagger and Bowie and Jim motherfucking Morrison.

Well, Buffy maybe although Giles had denied it no matter how Oz had phrased the question, hidden in discussions of the way Giles arranged his vinyl collection, not by artist or album but by year and autobiography, anyway not that it was important to Oz because he had known sex, love, heartache before in Devon and Willow and so had Giles in Jenny and god knows how many others that were before his time. Not that it mattered to be dwelling on such thoughts when there was this heat inside him and he had more important things to focus on, namely first biting on Giles’s ear and sloping down to his jaw where the hair had just started to grow in again and felt rough against his already slightly swollen lips, and hell, Oz was inclined to admit focusing on the task at hand could be just as sexy as Latin.

The first shudders of orgasm arrived then, and he knew that it would be just as good as the first, the second, the thirty-ninth time Giles had fucked him, but it wasn’t fucking it was something more that had just as much something as Giles had to him, but Oz couldn’t say love yet, couldn’t see beyond the way Giles’s hair was currently standing in every direction, or the way the sweat clung to the fine hairs on his chest and the way Oz could lean in and smell everything that made Giles Giles; couldn’t hear beyond the fragments of Latin that Giles panted between moans and the whispered Daniel or when he had forgotten himself, Oz.

Because maybe this was more than love.

Maybe, this was just fitting.

The library's changed since he took his books out: although Dickinson and Twain and Homer remain, silent testimonies to years already passed, but the empty shelves only confirm what you already knew: your time here is finished. The office is dark, the door locked, the glass cool. Your breath fogs the window when you lean against the door. Would it be silly of you to smudge your initials in with his on what used to be his door? You suppose not, as you trail your finger across. D.O. + R.G. Dorg. Hm. Not exactly the key to unlocking all the secrets between you and him, but it will have to do. Daniel Osbourne-Giles. D.O.G. That's only slightly ironic.

You turn away from the door now, and head up the stairs to the stacks. Your first kiss was here, while dust motes danced around you and settled forever on ignored volumes as your hands found the heat in his neck, as your movements disturbed the quiet air. He had resisted, but you had planned ahead for that, a prepared speech of responsibility and the nature of love and what exactly you felt for him. Of course, it was thrown out the window once you had tasted him: tea, apple, the faintest hint of toothpaste clinging to his teeth. You had to use other means to convince him.

He asked you about Willow. What you felt about her. What you feel about her. You struggled to explain. You still can't, not precisely, but then again, when is love precise? You wished you could use Venn diagrams, equations of attraction to tell him you love them both. You need them both, because Giles and Willow complete different parts of you. She'll be gone for the summer though, and you'll miss her, but he's not taking her place. But you can't ignore the fact that he's here.

You had kissed among these stacks countless times after the first, and while these shelves are still full, the same volumes covered by the same dust that you had watched filter in the still air as you kissed him, the nostalgia has overwhelmed the actual memories. The library won't be here forever though, you know that it will be lost along with the rest of the school in the battle against the Mayor. So you're here to savor the last few moments you can.

You should have expected him. He knows you better than you know yourself sometimes, and that's saying something. Because it's hard enough being expected to think like a teenager once, let alone again because he happens to be dating one. At that, you smile. You're going out with your librarian. That's one to write home about. But he's here, and thoughts like that are slightly pointless when you could be capitalizing on other thoughts, such as the ones that involve kissing.

You decide that's a good plan of action. You are Oz, man of action. Perhaps Giles can be man of reaction, because the way he's kissing you back certainly leaves nothing else to be desired. You make a mental note to examine the chemistry of your lips together later, but right now, there's too much to be enjoyed. His heat especially. He's solid while Willow is soft. There's a thousand other differences: short hair versus long hair, laugh lines versus smooth skin, and on and on. You love them both in your own understated way. But while she finds you quiet and aloof at times, he understands. He knows how it is to be in love with more than one person at the same time, to be so filled with love that one person won't suffice. So you kiss him harder to show everything you're thinking, and god, he knows.

When you finally separate, you know your time is up here. It's time to graduate. It's time to make a choice. You smile at him, and walk over to the door again. This time you purposely fog up the glass, and around the initials that appear, you draw a heart. Sometimes it's the little things that show the most. When he walks up behind you, you know it's going to happen now. You've been waiting for it, and this might be it, the last chance you have together. The summer will be here soon, everything's unsure. You might die, he might die in the upcoming battle. It has to be now.

He's gentle as he leads you to the table. The wood table that you studied on, and read countless prophecies and demon descriptions on will also be the place you make love with him for the first time. You nuzzle into his neck as he lays you across the table, and he smells of cologne and tweed, he smells old-fashioned. You never thought you'd fall for an old-fashioned man. Not that he's old - well, he is old, but you're all old here, life on a Hellmouth will do that to you - but he's been aged, like fine wine. He was on a roll with the asinine metaphors. His Willow: love makes you do the wacky. He asks why you're smiling, and you kiss his ear as you tell him its because he's perfect in his own way. His answering look is all the reminder you needed of why you kissed him the first time.

The library is dark, the double doors leak small traces of the fluorescent lights down the hall through their gridded windows. There's no danger of being caught tonight, despite it only being a few days before graduation. And this is where it should be done, this was your space together: the only place where a middle-aged British watcher and a teenaged musician on the cusp of enlightenment could find each other.

You're both pale, which amuses you slightly. And he has hair where you're smooth, so you trail your fingers across his chest, and write D.O + R.G over his heart. He kisses you as he enters for the first time, and you twitch, adjusting. It's painful. He told you it would be painful. But then he moves again, and the pain melts into something else. You catch his eyes, and the dance begins. There's a sad beauty in it that only the two of you could share.

He's holding back for fear of hurting you, you're holding back for fear of hurting yourself. You cant give all of yourself to him. It wouldn't be fair. He has his Buffy, you have your Willow. Life isn't meant to work out this way. But damned if being wrong didn't feel so good.

You thought the table would be uncomfortable, you were expecting it actually. Instead, you barely even notice. All your attention is focused on the man above you, the man inside you, to use a cliché that you always hated, he's surrounding you. Outside, there's a world of vampires, demons… werewolves. Vampire slayers, watchers. In here, there's only two men who have found sense in the ordinary act of love.

When he comes inside you, something deep inside you breaks and you're shuddering and trembling, and you're his. You can't breathe underneath him without breathing only him, and you flatten your nose against his neck and neither of you can breathe when this is happening, when the pleasure overwhelms you both and all rational thought and the way your nerve endings are supposed to work.

When you reconstruct each other in kisses and touches, you understand what being an adult is. Compromise is not a part of childhood, or even a part of being a teenager. But you can compromise on this. There might not be a happy ending for the two of you, in fact, you're almost sure there won't be one, but there's the time in the middle that you get to have. The time where he's yours, and you're his, and there's more of this making the nerve endings explode.

When he takes you hand, and the double doors swing behind you for the last time, there might be no hope left. Why have hope in a place like this? It's a foolish notion, but one that you'll rely on until the end. You hope. You hope that you can live up to their expectations: his Daniel, her Oz.

When you leave the library together, the darkness wraps around you, almost separating you from him, if not for the final gesture of your entwined hands. Painted fingernails against his clean and neatly trimmed ones. Both callused: one from band practice, one from battle training. Can anyone train you for this? And there's a battle to live through, a summer of uncertainty ahead, but on this night, you're Oz, man of action. And for the first time, you understand love.

When he shows up on the doorstep, it's a surprise. Not so much as a shock, since that tiny voice you always tried to ignore had always told him that Oz would be back, but a surprise nonetheless. He looks well. The tiny voice tells you that he looks entirely fuckable, but you shake it off and tell yourself firmly, he looks thin, he looks pale, he looks… changed.

You hide behind offers of tea and defense in his honor, telling the others not to "bombard the poor chap with questions," when all you want yourself is to grab him and ask him why he left without saying goodbye, were you that unworthy, and then forget it all, forget this boy, this young man with his notions of love and life, that he hurt you and kiss him until you both can't breathe.

Instead he declines, and walks right to Willow without even looking at you, and he smiles that infuriatingly quiet smile that he used to have only for you, and god, he's going to stay at Devon's. What did you do to deserve this? And he's already making excuses to leave, his eyes are flickering quickly past yours and the hurt you both know is there as you clean your glasses so you can hide. And then the door is closing and he's gone again.

He spends all his time with Willow, and you spend all your time staring at the liquor cabinet while Velvet Underground plays so loud you can't think. It helps, but only a little.

He used to tell you his theory about life, and you marveled at how a boy his age could think such thoughts. You call him a boy now because it hurts you less, it makes him seem inferior to the Daniel you didn't mean to fall in love with, but did anyway. So he used to tell you, he loved Willow, he loved you, there were two parts of him sometimes, and well, Devon was another story. He wasn't a slut, by any nature of the word, he just understood love was flexible. He had too much love in him to be confined to a single person.

You used to think you could handle that.

You know now that was stupid of you. You're a selfish, weak old man. You want him all to yourself. You want all that love, you want to feel needed again, you want him naked beneath you. You want Sunday afternoons spent in front of the record player debating the merits of some obscure album that only the two of you would have.

Xander stops by and tells you Oz is registered at the University again. He's staying. Xander also tells you something you didn't need to hear. Oz asked if Willow was seeing anyone. He's not staying with you at any rate. You've lost again.

You suppose he's changed, maybe that's what was different when he showed up on your doorstep. He had lost some of his love, his love for you. He traded his spare emotions for a chance at control. You don't want to dwell on the fact you loved him most when he almost lost control, when he would make you bleed, when you would feel the ache the next day and know he had claimed you in the night. You don't want to dwell on that because it makes you feel old, like you were trying to recapture your youth.

It's time to accept that you're old. It's time.

And after the mess with the Initiative, when he's been captured and you've been pacing a new hole in the rug, after you plan and scheme and he's free but bruised and cut, and smaller if that's even possible, that's when he shows up on your doorstep again, offering himself. Delivery. Damaged goods.

This time you're not expecting it at all. That tiny voice has been on vacation in the scotch.

"I came to say goodbye."

This is more than you got the last time at least, last time you got a curt report from Buffy over the phone that he had left, that he had left Willow. You're not sure which hurts more.

"Have a safe journey." You can't be expected to say anything more. What does he want? A strangled declaration of love, for you to get on your knees and beg him to stay? You're too wise for that. You know it will never work.

"Yeah. Look-"

"You don't need to explain yourself to me, Daniel." He flinches slightly, but you can barely tell in his oversized clothing. He is smaller.

"I don't regret what I did with you. I regret that I left last time without saying goodbye. Without… doing this." He paused, and you watch him. While he collects himself, you can see him trying to pick up what's left of himself, of the person he used to call Daniel. You've all changed, but Oz most of all. There's less of the idealist there, he's older. He's seen life. You almost feel guilt for that, though you know you can't stop time. You can't stop Oz from having to grow up.

"Shit happens." He shrugs. You quirk a smile, and you sense his relief. "So does change. I guess I'll see you around?"

"Indeed. You will write, if you get a chance?"

"No promises. But I'll try."

He's closer now that you realized. You reach out a hand, the last time you might ever be able to touch him, and then suddenly he's even closer and then he's kissing you. And god, you can't complain. It's the last time. It's all you have left of him.

So when you find yourselves upstairs, and you've got him half-naked already, you take care to kiss every one of the bruises the soldiers gave him. He's being painted in shades of yellows and browns by the afternoon sun slipping in through the shades, and he looks utterly natural against the practical white sheets. He looks as if he's been there forever. He can't quite meet your eyes when you're inside him though. He stares off past your left ear, he breathes in sharp when you kiss him against his collarbone, his hands melt into your back.

It's not the perfection that you remember, but he's moved into the sublime as you've remained in the ordinary. So you meet halfway in the setting sun, with closed eyes and rough kisses.

You try not to notice how he's changed. He probably does the same for you. There's no middle ground here. Change has taken you both prisoner. So you do the best you can do, trace memorized lines across his body, stare at a prominent hip bone and call him Daniel.

It's just sex this time.

He gets up to leave not long after you've finished. You don't mind too much, there comes a time when rationality kicks back in and you can remember the concept of what needs to be done, as opposed to what you want to be done. This is one of those things you both need to do. You dress. You help him pull his sweatshirt over his head, and walk him downstairs.

You don't mind the silence between the two of you. It's not uncomfortable. When the door shuts, you barely notice. He's gone.

"Goodbye."

For the last time.