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Andrew waited patiently - or at least as patiently as he was capable of waiting. Which generally involved a lot of fidgeting and jumpiness, enough so that Jonathan snapped at him to just sit down already. Andrew was supposed to be helping him set up the snack table in what used to be the Hyperion’s dining room and had now been converted into a state-of-the-art entertainment room, perfect for watching movies projected onto a large sheet hung from one of the walls.
“Why are you being so weird, anyway?” Jonathan asked.
“I’m not being weird,” Andrew protested.
Which, to be fair, was true. Fidgety for Andrew was as normal as sarcasm was for Xander or broodiness for Angel. It wasn’t unusual for Andrew to be a complete flurry of activity leading up to the start of the movie, and sometimes beyond (Wesley’s choice of Memento had been particularly fidget-worthy to the point that Andrew got banished to the back of the room, from where he eventually sneaked out and started playing around in the kitchen).
But there was something different in his manner right now; Andrew wasn’t just excited for the movie to start - he was waiting for something specific. And judging from the way he kept watching Lorne, who was holding baby Connor and currently deep in conversation with Giles, whatever he was waiting for involved one of them. And knowing Andrew….
As soon as Lorne’s conversation ended and Giles walked away, Andrew hurried forward and blurted out, “Ko-reyl hinan jek-ra.”
Lorne winked at him. “I’d love to, crumpet, but you’ll have to buy me a drink first.”
Andrew stared at him in bafflement, not really sure if Lorne was teasing; the Scoobies were still getting used to Lorne’s flamboyant flirtiness and it was hard to tell sometimes when he was joking. “Wh-what?”
Lorne laughed. “Inflection is very important in Pylean. I take it you were trying to say ‘May the sun set on your glorious victory’?”
Andrew nodded vigorously. “Yeah!”
“Then you’ll want to put the emphasis on the second syllable of ‘hinan’ and use a hard ‘e’ sound in ‘jek,’” Lorne instructed patiently.
“Ko-reyl hinan jek-ra,” Andrew tried again, carefully following Lorne’s advice.
Lorne beamed at him. “Good job, kiddo. You keep practicing and you’’ll be dining with the Warriors of Hrrzlklbnr in no time.”
Andrew looked awed. “You really think so?”
“Of course,” Lorne assured him.
“But what did he actually say to you?” Jonathan wondered out loud.
“‘I’d like to set on your glorious kneecap,’” Fred told him, giggling.
“I guess that doesn’t sound all that dirty,” Jonathan said. “Lorne made it sound like Andrew had propositioned him or something.” He blushed as he said this, not wanting to think about his best friend accidentally propositioning a demon who was much older than him.
“Well,” Fred drawled, still giggling, “kneecaps are fairly erogenous for Lorne’s species.”
Everyone who had been listening in on the conversation burst into laughter as Andrew choked on thin air.
“I-I-I don’t want to sit or set on your kneecap, Mr. Lorne,” Andrew said when he could speak again.
Lorne patted him graciously on the back. “I understand. If you need help with inflection, feel free to ask me any time. When I lived on Pylea, having to hear that language every day of my life was like getting punched in the gut constantly, but living on Earth and hearing it spoken so rarely makes it a nice reminder that ‘thank god I’ll never have to go back to that place if I don’t want to.’”
“What about you, Anya?” Fred asked. “Do you speak any Pylean?”
“A little,” Anya admitted. “Travel to and from Pylea is harder than some other demon realms, so I never got the chance to practice it all that often.”
From there the conversation continued into which demon realms were the easiest to get to (though why anyone would want to was a complete mystery to most of the participants except Andrew), complete with a tangent on Melknar demon mating rituals, but Jonathan had stopped paying attention. Tara hadn’t said a word through the whole exchange, which was hardly unusual for her, but there was something wary in her expression. Guarded. She moved subtly towards the back of the room where no one would pay attention to her.
Or so she thought.
Jonathan caught her eye, a question in his glance. She smiled back, reassuring. Talking about demons like they were just regular people always made her nervous. Jonathan only knew bits and pieces of her life before the Scooby gang, but what he did know made it understandable that she would be kind of wigged by the idea of not only being comfortable with your demonhood, but proud of it. She was gradually becoming used to having Lorne around, especially since he was such an easygoing guy who gave her the space she needed.
“And so I said to him, ‘sure you can put it there but only if you want to see me run away faster than a Kurnog whose shirt’s on fire,’” Lorne said, much to everyone else’s amusement. Jonathan had been too distracted to hear the rest of the story, but he was ninety percent sure Andrew would recount it for him later anyway.
“Okay, everyone,” Wesley said, clapping his hands as the laughter faded away. “Are we ready?”
There was a general murmur of assent as everyone grabbed some snacks and a seat. Lorne playfully patted his lap as Andrew went past, causing Andrew to blush wildly and nearly stumble into Jonathan who was going by in the opposite direction. Jonathan rolled his eyes without any real annoyance.
It would be a long time before Andrew would live down the kneecap incident.