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~Packing your bags like people in the movies do,
All severe and not saying a word
And I'm sitting down here just watching you
And I'm thinking
Where has all the love gone?
Where's the love gone to?
Don't leave
You got me hurting
Don't leave
You know its never been easy to love someone like me
(Don't leave)~
Her hands shook slightly as she fished through the drawers, checking and re-checking to make sure she'd removed all of her clothes. "I guess that's it." Though Cordelia's voice remained steady, her downtrodden stance betrayed how much the decision to leave her husband really hurt. She felt a gentle touch on her arm and kept her eyes down so he couldn't see the tears in them.
"You don't have to go."
Unable to speak, Cordelia shook her head, finally choking out, "I have to. I can't do this anymore. It just . . . it isn't how it used to be." She knew the explanation didn’t truly explain anything, but she couldn’t take the pain of staying any longer.
The voice she had loved for so long pleaded, "Things change! I know it's bad now, but it'll get better. I promise. I'll find another job, lay off drinking. We can make this work. I love you."
Pulling away from the insistent draw of his voice, Cordelia grabbed a suitcase handle in each hand and the cage of the mouse they bought together--which Cordelia had named Doyle while they lay in each other's arms brainstorming about the best moniker for the little creature--under her arm. "No. You said that before. I'm not doing it again. I can't. Not after . . . I can't." Head still down, she hurried out of the bedroom and through the small living room to their front door. His jacket hung over the stuffed chair in front of the TV just like it did every day; the curtains thick curtains were still closed, as if Angel might still drop in for a visit; the adjoining kitchen was a mess as usual, dirty dishes in the sink and packages of food on the counter. Cordelia fought the urge to cross the room and tidy up, to grab the jacket and hang it in the hall closet, to throw open the curtains. She opened the front door and looked back at her husband for the first time. "Good-bye, Doyle."
~Hanging with friends like we used to do
I didn't know anything was wrong
Last night when I was thinking it through
Trying to find
Who am I?
And what you need me to do
(Don't leave)~
The Polgara demon grabbed Doyle and threw him against the cement wall, a blow which would have killed him in human form. Instead, it merely winded him, delaying his attack and giving the demon a window. As usual, though, Angel stepped in, using the demon's arm to throw it too against the wall, then to the ground. Angel's thick-soled boot smashed into the demon's face and made it bellow in rage and pain.
Before the vampire could make a killing blow, however, the demon raked Angel's legs out from under him and sprung to its feet. Doyle charged it from behind, but the Polgara kicked him aside effortlessly. Angel ran forward to meet it but the demon extended its forearm claw and plunged it through Angel's chest. Shock didn't even register on Angel's face before he disappeared into a cloud of dust.
Doyle sighed. He had killed the demon, but going back to the office and telling his wife that their best friend, the man who had brought him back from the dead and saved them both more than either one of them cared to count, was dead proved harder than he had ever imagined. After almost four years as a family, Angel was gone and the tenuous harmony that had kept them sane and safe was broken. He remembered holding Cordelia while she sobbed in his arms, fighting the tears falling down his face and the rising feeling of helplessness.
That was when Doyle began drinking in earnest. Most of the jobs he got—-generally low-paying construction gigs—-did little to cut down the cost of the bills which seemed to appear and multiply each day. Cordelia took a secretarial job at a large company and brought in most of the money. Doyle’s messages from the Powers That Be became rare as even they gave up hope in his abilities.
He wiped away angry, bitter tears with the back of his hand. Doyle reached for the bottle of beer and then withdrew his hand. Drinking was what drove his wife away to begin with. Looking around the room, he vowed to stop feeling sorry for himself and start getting Cordelia back.
~There's a record you used to play
There's Joni singing
Best to be without you
And I know just what she's singing
Where did all the love go?
Where's the love gone to?
Don't leave
You got me hurting
Don't leave
You know its never been easy to love someone like me
Don't leave~
But the drinking and Angel’s death and all the money problems in the world failed to account for the loss of the bond Doyle and Cordelia had shared. Almost from the second he returned from the Void, the two had been inseparable, spending every spare moment together. Attraction and friendship blossomed slowly into love and they were married in a beautiful candlelight ceremony in Cordelia’s apartment with Angel and Dennis as their witnesses. The priest had looked at them strangely, but nothing mattered but the fact that they were happy. And together.
The real problem came close to a year after Angel’s death. Cordelia became pregnant. They were both thrilled despite the possibility of the child having a green face and blue spikes. “Hey, she’s only a fourth demon,” Cordelia protested. She insisted the baby was a girl and planned to name the child Madeline after her grandmother. Then in her second trimester, Cordelia awoke with shooting pains in her abdomen. Doyle immediately called an ambulance and she was rushed to the hospital, but the doctors couldn't do anything. Cordelia miscarried.
She withdrew into herself for awhile after that. Doyle pushed at first, not wanting his wife to suffer alone, wanting her to see that it had hurt him too, that they could survive it if they held on to each other. Day after day things continued with fewer words, nights spent with their backs turned to each other in the name of "space." Even when Cordelia finally did want to reach out, she long since forgotten how, and Doyle substituted alcohol for affection.
It all got out of control. Doyle sighed and ran a hand through his already-disorderly hair. All she needed was to know that she still meant more to him than anyone. She needed to remember how they felt about each other. They both did.
~Where did all the love go?
Where's the love gone to?
(Don't leave)
I wanna fly you ‘round the world,
Give you what you're giving to me.
I should've dressed you up in pearls,
The finest silk to touch your skin.
Don't know how to write a love song
Don't leave
You got me hurting
Don't leave
You know its never been easy to love someone like me
Don't leave.~