I can totally see these two in England, with a shop and a subscription to the TLS, and an account with Oddbins.
The shop is one of those curiously uncategorisable shops with a hand painted sign and small windows. R Giles, the sign reads in clear blue letters. Even the sign seems undecided, as a smaller, newer neon affair juts out from over the door, bearing the legend: A Jenkins.
The windows are small but even the panes that resemble a flattened jam jar are clean and bright, and mobiles turn slowly behind them: a witch on a broomstick, a flock of pigeons, a holiness of Gods. Look closely and see that many of the Gods' faces have been adjusted with an earnest pen, redrawing noses and helpfully adding or subtracting eyes.
Serene, in a quiet street with a cobbled alley running down one side and the shop has shelves of books that snooze gently in the afternoon sun that dapples them.
All the action is going on upstairs, you see.
"You ring them," a thunderous voice commands. "You're the one who's bloody well obsessed with them. You ring them. I'm having no part of it.
"I can't call them," a voice replies. "My name isn't on the account," it points out, pointedly.
The angrier voi... Oh, fuck it; come on, we're going inside.
Giles sits at his desk, that looks out over the street to the rapid rushing river beyond. His shoulders are set to Testy and his tone is ratcheting up to Furious.
"Anya, darling," he says. "I am not phoning Oddbins to ask when they will deliver. It is an utter waste of time. You are going to have to get used to the British service industry and you're going to have to start very soon."
"But they said..." she wails despairingly.
"It doesn't matter," he explains. "It's a lie," he continues, changing down from Testy to Peeved. "It's a commonly accepted fiction. One orders, one arranges a time, one waits at home on the allotted date, one fails to receive one's goods, and one does not complain about it. It's the way of things."
"Well, that's just stupid. I don't believe it. Perhaps they have just forgotten. Anya wheedles hopefully, "If you call them..."
"If I call them it will explode the fiction," Giles's voice softens with gently amused resignation. "Empires will fall, puppies will die, and the receptionist will take against us and we shall never get our order at all."
"And there's nothing we can do about it?"
"Well, we can swear under our breath, argue amongst ourselves, and, after a week or two, we could try writing a letter to the BBC."
Anya perks up a little. "Oh? What will that do?"
"Absolutely nothing, but it will be a terribly English nothing."
Anya flops down onto the sofa, defeated. "Is this like the trains?"
"Exactly, except you may complain bitterly about the trains."
"I dislike this English apathy," Anya declares from behind a cushion. "Although the practical honesty is refreshing, I can't help feeling that the British have taken irony too far. I'm all turned around by these new rules."
"Yes, dear. And..."
"Oh my god!" Anya cries out suddenly.
"What? What is it?"
"I've left the shop unattended! In the middle of the day!" Anya leaps to her feet and began to dash downstairs.
"Anya," Giles calls, standing up from his desk and walking over to her, grinning. "Given that most of our customers come under cover of night and that the rest communicate through telepathy and teleportation, perhaps it is not completely necessary that you man--"
"Woman," she corrects him, smiling.
"Woman, the counter at all times," he wraps his arm about her waist and tucks his head into her neck.
"Rupert Giles, are you seducing me?" she replies.
"I thought I already had," he returns lightly.
"Remind me," she says. "For those just tuning in."
His eyes crinkle at the edges and he pecks a line of kisses up her neck to her ear. "It was a decent interval," he whispers to her. "And we were both still alone." He gently slides his arm under her blouse and fiddles casually with her bra clasp. "I was working with the Council and preparing to hand off to the girls." He snaps the clasp open and pulls her blouse and bra off in one move. "You were running a wholesalers business and I," he laughs into her skin as he presses his face against her breast. "I tried to get a discount."
"Stupid Rupert," she says quietly. "It was already the fairest price on the market." She pushes against him and reaches to untuck his shirt from the back of his trousers. "I told you that flattery would get you nowhere." She scrapes perfect nails along his back, dragging his shirt off and letting it drop. A vivid memory dances between them and she cups his face in one hand.
"You lied," Giles says, looking up at her wickedly. He falls to his knees and slips her skirt down. He lies his hand flat against her knickers and works his thumb as he recites, "I left the next day. You didn't call."
"Neither did you," she reminds him and rocks on his hand.
"It was a year later," he says and runs light fingers up the inside of her thigh. "I was happily running my little shop." He pauses to flick his tongue around the hem of her underthings. "Minding my own business," he rolls off her knickers. "As it were."
"Undercutting me," she gasps as he slicks her with his mouth. "And bankrupting yourself into the bargain."
He pauses to look up at her. "So you said."
She grabs his hair and rams him hard against her. "I had to take charge," she says as she grinds into him. "The way this place was being run was criminal." She moves her hips in a tight figure of eight, "So I stayed." She rises on her heels, thrusting now. "I could deal out of a suitcase and still make more money than you." Anya is riding him and Giles is driving his tongue into her and...
He stands up, sliding heavy pressure up the length of her body and his eyes twinkle at her outraged expression. "You stayed," he says, as he leads her into the bedroom. "And one day that ghastly sign appeared and the suitcase vanished."
"And here we are," she says, stepping out of her clothes.
"Keep the heels," he orders.
She follows him, laughing and continuing, "In England, with a shop, a subscription to the TLS, and an account with Oddbins."
And they lived crabbishly ever after.
The end.
