“So, you met her.”
Ethan is in the kitchen, his hair pulled back in a ponytail. He is, naturally, not cooking dinner. He’s eating something, though, most likely to tide him over until Rupert cooks.
“I did, yes. She--well, she’s--”
“Let me guess,” Ethan says, wandering out into the flat proper, eyes shining with amusement. “She’s a sixteen-year-old girl?”
“Um. Well, yes. Rather disconcertingly so.”
“Since that was oh so very unexpected. Given that her birthdate is in 1981.”
Their stuff is still mostly in boxes, but the furniture is in place. Ethan is leaning against the wall now, still smiling.
“I--I didn’t expect her to be quite so...” he searches for the right word, and finally comes up with, “Angry.”
“Oh, of course. Because you were in no way an angry adolescent yourself.”
Rupert smiles a bit at that.
”Touche.”
“So, shall we go out tonight? Celebrate this momentous occasion?”
“You’re incredibly transparent today, dear,” Rupert says.
“Oh?”
“You just don’t want to cook.”
“Well, yes. But we could pretend we were celebrating.”
The shadow of doubt falls over him again, as it has been on and off all day, like scattered clouds passing over the sun. He can feel the resentment across the room. See it in the way Ethan’s arms are crossed over his chest. Hear it in the small sneer in Ethan’s voice.
“Ethan--” he says, and suddenly, he’s very tired. Torn two ways and facing resistance from both fronts. The Slayer doesn’t want to be a Slayer, his lover doesn’t want him to be a Watcher.
In truth, what he should really do is eat something quickly and then patrol the local teen hangout, but Ethan has that look, the one that says he’s feeling neglected and uncertain. And god knows, a neglected Ethan can be far more dangerous than any vampire.
Rupert makes his decision.
“Well, going out all depends on how you feel about establishments aimed at clientele half our age.”
So, in the end, it turned out there wasn’t really a conflict of interests after all.
The End
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