Ten minutes into it, Cole decided he hated waiting. It was terrible sitting back, doing nothing, letting everyone else get the action. Waiting - it had to be the most awful thing in the world.
He had locked the front door like a good boy after Prue had left. If he was going to follow the sisters' orders, he thought he might as well follow them full-heartedly.
At first, he paced. While the Halliwells were out there protecting Davidson and looking for the Seekers, Cole walked the first floor circuit. From the hallway to the kitchen to the dining room to the living room, back to the hallway, he walked endlessly. Endless was actually an exaggeration; he stopped after three thousand, five hundred and forty-four paces. He had counted; there was nothing else to do.
All that walking only took about half an hour. Cole needed to find something else to do.
He cleaned. He straightened up the already tidy living room and from there moved on to the rest of the ground floor.
The second floor and attic were out of bounds because he was sure neither Prue nor Piper would appreciate him nosing around their room. For that matter, he didn't know Phoebe would be all that pleased, either. The attic with the Book of Shadows would just bring up arguments, or rather would just cause Prue to yell at him and Phoebe for a few hours.
He wasn't bored enough to tackle the basement. Even waiting was better than that.
He paced again. This time, he walked an even five thousand paces before giving up.
Tic-tac-toe was next. Cole would have preferred solitaire, but the girls didn't seem to have a deck of cards anywhere. They did, however, have an old tic-tac-toe board hidden away in a table drawer that Cole took out. It was bound to amuse him for a little while, at least.
After losing thirty straight games, a feat Cole had thought impossible, considering he was playing against himself, he decided tic-tac-toe wasn't for him.
Part of him still couldn't believe he was meekly obeying Phoebe and Piper's orders and staying at home. He, Belthazor, hiding cowardly behind some witches.
He had been shaken when Prue and Phoebe had pointed out that, by trying to protect them, he had put them into even more danger.
Looking out for other people was a new experience for Cole. He had never done it before. New territory always brought new dangers. The last time he had gone behind the Charmed Ones' backs, he had almost gotten them all killed. He wasn't about to do it again. They had been in the looking-out-for-others business for far longer than he had and they presumably knew more about it than he.
After the disastrous tic-tac-toe incident, Cole decided it would be best if he stuck with pacing. This time his goal was ten thousand steps.
When he lost count somewhere around the seven thousand mark, he didn't really care, he just started all over again. After all, what else was there to do besides wait?
Sometime later, a miracle happened and the phone rang. Cole pounced on it. The Waiting Game had finally ended.
The End
Wednesday, April 04, 2001