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Rain patters against his windows, and from behind the safety of the reinforced-for-Hell’s-weather glass, Angel finds it kind of peaceful.
Used to be when it was acid rain in the forecast, he’d have to hear every poor schmuck who’d gotten caught in it screaming.
But Charlie’s got the Hotel so far back from the city, it mostly just looks and sounds like how it had back in New York; grey and dreary.
Nobody wants to go out in this, and anybody who would isn’t sane enough to run into in a dark alley out in the Pentagram.
He likes his cushioned window seat; Vaggi’d put it in for him when he’d mentioned wanting one when he’d been alive. ‘Course, he thinks she and Charlie might be willing to install just about anything he asks for, if he were so inclined to abuse the power.
He isn’t.
Being back at the Hotel makes him feel guilty enough already. They’d welcomed him back with open arms-Charlie with a tearful, snotty hug-and nobody’s said a goddamn thing about it since.
Angel sort of wishes that they would.
The walking on eggshells around him is starting to piss him off.
Cherri ain’t treating him any different, but he can see the sadness at the edges of her smiles anyway.
And Husk-
Well. That’s a horse of a different color, actually.
Husk is treating him different.
But it’s a good sort of different.
Speak of the devil.
The careful rapping of claws on his door breaks into his thoughts, and Angel huffs a laugh.
Ain’t that just like him.
And a year ago, Angel wouldn’t have believed that he’d tell someone to come in to his unlocked room while he was in his sleep shirt and shorts, mismatched fluffy socks scrunched around his calves, no makeup and hair a mess.
But it’s Husk. So he does.
He’s got two coffee mugs by their handles in one hand, the other on Angel’s doorknob. Husk gives him a warning look over his readers, and Angel does his best not to snort about it.
“Do not bitch at me when I hand you this,” Husk says, padding his way across the room. “All your coffee cups are in the dishwasher.”
Angel takes the mug from him, amused as Husk drops down opposite him on the window bench.
“Did you put my cappuccino in a mug?” he asks, peering into it. Sure enough, foam. “Husky, my Nonna’s tossin’ in her grave.”
“Keep complainin’, I’ll put your martini in a lowball.”
Angel jabs him in the thigh with his foot. “Like you’d ever,” he takes a sip, and considers the burn on his tongue. “And ya put rum in it, too?”
“Figured I’d already fucked it up, may as well commit,” Husk tells him, grinning lopsidely at him. It makes Angel’s dead heart skip a beat in his chest.
See? Different.
He likes this kind of different, though.
This kind of different has Husk bringing him his coffee on a rainy morning in his lounge pants and the glasses he doesn’t let anyone else in the Hotel know about.
Says they make him look old.
“Oh, honey,” Angel had said that first morning he’d seen them. “The grey in ya fur already did that.”
“We wanna talk about your crows feet, or should we drop it?” Husk had fired back as Angel cackled, Husk’s arm around his waist as he’d pulled both of them back into Angel’s rumpled bedding.
Different’s not half bad.
“Watchin’ the rain?” Husk asks.
Angel hums, sipping at his boozy drink; it might be sacrilege, but he’s already in Hell. “It’s kinda nice when ya forget that it’s acid. Reminds me of home.”
Husk sips at his own coffee; Angel would put money on bourbon in his, but that’d be a sucker’s bet. “Guess I can’t relate. Didn’t rain much in Vegas.”
“And what, ya never went anywhere else?”
Husk snorts at him. His wings are pressed against the wall behind him, tail flicking absently against Angel’s floor. “Not really. Kept the car gassed up and the Green Book in the glove compartment with my cigars and a flask for if I ever got up the guts to get out, though,” Husk stares out the window. “Never did.”
Angel sighs. “At least ya still loved Vegas, at the end,” he says into his mug. “Brooklyn started to feel like prison somewhere around when I hit thirty. My version of gettin’ out was hoppin’ the Staten Island ferry for the day.”
The pattering of the rain fills the comfortable quiet between them, and Angel watches droplets chase each other down the glass. It’s easy to forget that this is Hell, in moments like this.
“You’d have liked Las Vegas, Angel,” Husk tells him softly. “Glitz and glamour all the way down the Strip. All the showgirl costumes you could ask for. And the music back then.”
Angel laughs, and can’t help the fond warmth that blooms in the cage of his ribs. He looks at him over the rim of his mug. “And you’da fuckin’ hated New York.”
Still, there’s a part of him that wishes-
Look, finding out that he and Husk had been alive for a lot of the same years had put some ideas into his head, alright?
And he knows. He knows it’s not realistic to think about.
But he likes to imagine that in another life, another alive life, maybe they coulda met. On the Strip, in the boroughs, somewhere in the middle of them both in BFE nowhere, who cares, and maybe-
Well, maybe they coulda been like they are now. Just…human.
Anthony could have done with someone like Husk in his life. And while Angel had buried Anthony with the rest of his past, he can’t help but be haunted anyway.
He hadn’t had a whole lot of friends, back then.
It’s why it’d been hard, losing the ones he’d earned here.
And Husk’s one of the best friends he’s ever had.
Top spot goes to Cherri, of course, and now that they’re…what they are, Angel thinks he’d feel a little silly telling Husk what he means to him on top of the whole making his heart race thing.
Husk’d listen; of course he would, and he’d probably be flattered.
Maybe he’ll mention it at some point. He might get a kiss out of it.
But for now, Angel shuffles his mug around, switching to a lower hand to keep it level as he shifts in his seat.
He doesn’t even need to ask; Husk moves to accommodate him as Angel crawls over, tucking himself under Husk’s chin. He gets Husk’s free arm over his waist for his troubles, palm warm as the golden heart there rests against his stomach, threaded between the sets of his arms.
“Sentimental today, aren’t ya?” Husk murmurs, his voice a deep rumble against Angel’s shoulders. “You alright?”
He shrugs in reply, sipping at his cooling cappuccino as he settles in. “You make me sentimental, ya jackass. I’m fine.”
Husk presses a kiss to his temple, not bothering to respond to Angel’s barbs.
And y’know. That’d been the other thing.
He couldn’t have predicted that Husk, Husk, pour-em-up, let-it-ride, house-always-wins, Husk-
Would be such a fucking tender-hearted romantic.
Some days he doesn’t know what to do with something like that. It’s part of the Good Different. Husk still snarks at him the same as he always has, but now he does it while tracing the joints of Angel’s fingers, running his thumb over his knuckles in soothing circles as he snipes back at him.
So it’s not like. It’s not like Angel really lost anything, when they’d started this. They’d just…added to it.
And he’s got the new bonus of being able to shut Husk up with kisses, if he wants.
And he does. He does want. All the time.
There’s something to be said in there about him being an addict down to his bones, but Angel’s too tired to be that self-deprecating this early. And besides, Husk is warm against him, lulling him down just by breathing, and he’s pretty sure he’d pluck that thought right out of Angel’s skull if he knew it was antagonizing him right now.
He’s good at shit like that.
Angel finishes off his cappuccino, and Husk takes the empty mug from him, jostling him to set both mugs on the floor.
He makes up for disrupting Angel’s comfort by settling them both back in, tucking a wing around Angel’s back to help support him as he curls up against Husk’s chest.
He threads careful claws through Angel’s hair, carding soothingly the way he knows Angel likes. Angel stretches up just enough to tuck his face into Husk’s neck, dropping a kiss there in thanks as he sighs contentedly.
And between the rain and the rumbling purr starting up under his ear, Angel doesn't think he can be blamed if he nods off again.
It's blasphemous, but Angel can't see how Heaven is supposed to compare to this.