"I know," he said, turning back around and moving until he was standing at her left, hands shoved into his pockets. "But there isn't any way to be far away here. Things between us, Buffy, are...awkward," and he wasn't just referring to the fact that they were in relationships that weren't with one another. "There are things that happened in LA that you don't know about. That I can't-- That I haven't told you about. Things that are going to hurt you to hear. I thought that keeping all that to myself would make it easier on both of us, told myself that there wasn't any reason to bring up what I felt for Cordelia, my second run as Angelus--" Or Connor. "--among other things."
That seemed to be the worst angle to go for, though for now he felt like the bad guy who worked for Wolfram & Hart and kept all the truths filed away in cabinets instead of sharing them with the world that Giles had painted him as and Andrew had reiterated to him. No one trusts you. With good reason, he realized now. What good was keeping secrets that would hurt people from them if all it did was hurt them more than what the secrets contained?
Angel knew, though, that Connor was going to hurt her. If her reaction to him kissing Cordelia was anything to go by, learning that he'd had a son with Darla would... He didn't know if he should come clean about that just yet, though the urge to tell her everything in an attempt to make things right was hard to ignore.
"But, I'll tell you. If you want to know. You deserve to know. I just... Things are different. I'm different and so are you and there are things that happened in LA that I... I don't necessarily want to forget, but have made it so the rest of the world does. And I'm okay with that. It was part of my agreement to take over Wolfram & Hart, though some days I think that was a bad idea, too." He looked down again, kicking at a stray rock. "I guess it comes down to me not knowing what I'm doing anymore. I used to have a goal, this purpose... Now? There's a direction to head in and while following it may be the big step the world needs, it's taking me several steps back on something I might never be able to grasp hold of again."
A beat.
"Not even Cordelia knows about all that. She's just recently stopped being mad at me for keeping things from her."
no subject
"I know," he said, turning back around and moving until he was standing at her left, hands shoved into his pockets. "But there isn't any way to be far away here. Things between us, Buffy, are...awkward," and he wasn't just referring to the fact that they were in relationships that weren't with one another. "There are things that happened in LA that you don't know about. That I can't-- That I haven't told you about. Things that are going to hurt you to hear. I thought that keeping all that to myself would make it easier on both of us, told myself that there wasn't any reason to bring up what I felt for Cordelia, my second run as Angelus--" Or Connor. "--among other things."
That seemed to be the worst angle to go for, though for now he felt like the bad guy who worked for Wolfram & Hart and kept all the truths filed away in cabinets instead of sharing them with the world that Giles had painted him as and Andrew had reiterated to him. No one trusts you. With good reason, he realized now. What good was keeping secrets that would hurt people from them if all it did was hurt them more than what the secrets contained?
Angel knew, though, that Connor was going to hurt her. If her reaction to him kissing Cordelia was anything to go by, learning that he'd had a son with Darla would... He didn't know if he should come clean about that just yet, though the urge to tell her everything in an attempt to make things right was hard to ignore.
"But, I'll tell you. If you want to know. You deserve to know. I just... Things are different. I'm different and so are you and there are things that happened in LA that I... I don't necessarily want to forget, but have made it so the rest of the world does. And I'm okay with that. It was part of my agreement to take over Wolfram & Hart, though some days I think that was a bad idea, too." He looked down again, kicking at a stray rock. "I guess it comes down to me not knowing what I'm doing anymore. I used to have a goal, this purpose... Now? There's a direction to head in and while following it may be the big step the world needs, it's taking me several steps back on something I might never be able to grasp hold of again."
A beat.
"Not even Cordelia knows about all that. She's just recently stopped being mad at me for keeping things from her."