#creating this implication that jenny and angel are constantly perpetually mutually Not Choosing Each Other

[jennycalendar]

i think a lot about a note on innocence -- i don't remember where i saw it -- pointing out that angelus knew to kill enyos, and that he also knew jenny's secret identity. this isn't something that the show draws particular attention to, and one must assume that some of it is about narrative convenience/building tension, but this particular note suggested that angelus's knowledge of enyos in turn implies that angel himself knew why jenny was really in sunnydale.

and this is not strictly canonical of course, so everything following is all supposition, but it's a notion that i kind of can't let go of, because the delicious, awful tragedy of that! that angel knew jenny's secret, and kept it! that buffy very likely never learned this, and resented jenny for keeping a secret that ANGEL WAS ALSO KEEPING! just this idea of there being no one single person to blame. all of these little threads tangling together. angel keeps his mouth shut about jenny because it's her business and he's a gentleman. whether or not jenny knows is immaterial -- maybe she does, and maybe this is part of why she believes in his capacity to do good. to be better. that he doesn't out her to buffy and giles because he knows what it's like to have a complicated past. to be afraid of what your partner will think of you when they know the parts of you that you've hidden in a lockbox under your bed.

and because angel doesn't tell anyone, buffy doesn't know that he knew. blames jenny for not telling. but jenny wasn't the only one who kept her mouth shut -- and the one person that buffy never blames is in some ways just as responsible for jenny's perceived betrayal.