TITLE: Needed To
AUTHOR: Ragna (writinggoddess@aol.com)
RATING: FRT
CLASSIFICATION: Cordelia/Lindsey interaction
SPOILERS: Set in an alt universe after "Blind Date."
DISTRIBUTION: Just keep my name on it and let me know.
DISCLAIMER: If you don't recognize it, chances are it's my own creation. If you do, Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Kazui Sandollar, FOX and the WB own it or them. The song is "Low Place Like Home" by Sneaker Pimps.
FEEDBACK: Sorry I'm not home right now I'm walking in the spiderwebs so leave a message and I'll call you back...in other words, I want it.

***

Cordelia hadn't had a wrong vision yet.

She'd seen Lindsey about to jump off the roof of the building, she'd seen Willow stop him, she'd seen him go to Sunnydale and do that atonement Angel kept harping him about.

What she told Willow and not Lindsey was she saw Lindsey becoming very much a part of Willow's life.

So why hadn't Lindsey high tailed it to Sunnyhell yet?

Cordelia knocked softly on his apartment door, surprised when it opened at the lightest touch, She opened her purse and pulled out the stake she carried. What worked on vampires could more or less hurt a mugger, right? The music that drifted though told her that Lindsey was there, and alive...but probably not all right.

How interesting he chose this song, she thought. In the last year he'd had it pretty rough.

Even though the senior partners were impressed with his sacrifice, they never offered to find some way to reattach his hand.

If they had, maybe things would be different.

Because of that and his large workload as a junior partner, he had no time to make friends or to date, and that made him even more ill tempered.

And so pissed off at his employers that he was a good but unwilling ally in Angel's plans to bring Wolfram & Hart down once and for all.

So now he had no job, no real life to speak of in Los Angeles.

And when Cordelia found him, he looked like he'd lost every ounce of life Willow had given back to him, that night on the roof.

He was on the floor, next to the bed, staring vacantly at a picture on the wall. He wasn't his normal well dressed, sneering self...he looked pitiful, alone.

He looked like he'd been to Hell and come back thinking Hell was better than life.

"Lindsey? You okay?"

He looked up, startled. "I guess."

"You guess?" Cordy put the stake back in her purse. "Thought you were supposed to have gone by now?"

"Even though there's nothing here, I just don't want to leave." He looked up at her, eyes puffy and red. "I mean, LA's home."

Cordelia nodded. "Yeah, but there's nothing here, like you just said. Think about it...an almost total fresh start in Sunnydale, plus help. A total fresh start anywhere else but you don't get any help. Angel and Wesley and Kate bugging you constantly if you stay here."

Lindsey shook his head. "Who's going to help me? Who wants to help me?"

"Well, Willow does."

His eyes focused. "I forgot she was in Sunnydale..."

Cordelia smiled, then walked over and grabbed a suitcase. "Look, you have a lot of work to do to make up for attempting to have Wesley killed, hiring Faith to kill Angel, almost killing me, being a pain in the ass to the LAPD...so you better get started." She put the suitcase on the bed. "Now, what do you want to take with you to Sunnydale?"

Lindsey stood up. "You know what's funny?"

"What?"

"I've been sitting here bawling like a baby because I was having trouble getting the suitcase on the bed."

Cordelia looked at him, saw the smile form around the edges of his mouth, and then she burst out laughing. "Then it's a good thing I came along."

"Yeah, Miss Seer, it is a good thing."

Cordelia wiped her eyes, hoping she hadn't messed up her make-up. "I thought you just needed to get pushed a bit in the right direction. North, towards Sunnydale, to be precise. And now that I'm pushing, are you going to go?"

"Yeah, I'm going to go." Lindsey pulled some shirts out a drawer. "You guys really want me gone, don't you."

"Damn straight! Now get a move on, Stumpy!" Cordelia said, starting to laugh at the puzzled and slightly indignant look on his face.

"Only because you're helping me pack will I let you get away with calling me that, Miss Chase." Lindsey balanced his clothing as best he could, then dumped it on the bed towards Cordelia. "But you're going to fold it all."

Cordelia rolled her eyes. "The sooner you get out of here, the better." She only hoped Sunnydale was ready...