"This Bed", a Giles ficlet

Title: This Bed
Pairing: Giles/Ethan
Summary: smell memory
Note: funny structure



He drops on his back on the clean sheets he just changed, and thinks back.

Back to a smaller flat,
darker,
dirty sheets,
thinner mattress,
by far.

Smell of old sex
and old friends
and Old Spice.

Now his place smells of clean sheets and baked scones - not home baked, from the café downstairs. The sheets are white and pristine and well-stretched, and cold. And lonely.

He remembers Ethan on the sheets.

Not these sheets; the ones back in that small, dark flat. Ethan didn't look the way he does today, he looked so young, so young. And he himself looked young, acted young. Acted out. With Ethan. On the sheets.

Nothing in that flat smelled of laundry detergent.