Title: When Will Met Sydney

Author: Airebella Spencer

Rating: R…some implied adult situations

Feedback: his_gray_eyes@hotmail.com all and any is welcome :D

Distribution: Why not? Follow the Golden Rule: Ask first, post later

Disclaimer: As much as I'd really like to know what goes through Will's mind, I don't. He's not mine, I just borrowed him for a while… P.S. everyone you don't recognize is mine, except for Buster's…that's real…if you're ever in Pasadena go check it out!

Classification: Angst

Summary: Taking a brief look into Will's mind…read on! Note to all Will lovers…I don't mean to offend (pertaining to the second sentence)…I love Will too!

"I've searched for you' I heard him cry

I smiled and asked him 'Why?'

He looked confused when I replied,

'I thought you'd realize; it was just a lie' " ~ A. Altschuler

When Will Met Sydney

I've never felt this way before. Yes, I know I can be pathetic sometimes, but it's not my fault. I mean, have you ever been with her alone? It's like she puts this spell over you, and you think you can do anything. You feel empowered. Invincible. Immortal. Like you can save the world.

Wait a minute. I have felt like this once, only once before. Before I met Sydney Bristow. Before she turned my world upside-down.

I was nineteen, and it was the first day of classes my sophomore year in college. My little sister Lori had somehow convinced me to sign up for Creative Writing 101, a class that was only two years old, but infamous for it's wacky hippie-like teacher. That first day we met in a quaint coffeehouse called Busters in a small Los Angelean suburb, one with its streets lined with bohemian artists, young couple and goggling tourists.

The moment I stepped into that coffeehouse, I felt a homely buzz wash over me. I've always loved that buzz, the unique buzz of small, quaint coffee shops. Screw Starbucks. I love walking into a coffee shop and feeling nothing but the buzz of caffeine. One of my professors once told me that every true writer has a hidden gene in their DNA that makes caffeine a vital part of survival.

I ordered my coffee, strong and black, and followed the sign that directed all students in my predicament towards the right stage. Five minutes and a flight of stairs later I found myself staring into the buzzed eyes of about fifteen fellow writers, all clustered around individual tables; my discovery was interrupted by this horrific screech that came from the corner of the room.

"Julia! Julia Wales!" The siren screamed, her voice flowery, yet somewhat deep. But the way she said it was different and unique. She accentuated each syllable, lacing it with her own charm and charisma so it came out sounding like "Ju-u-llll-I-a-a!" I tensed and did a double take at everyone around me to see who this Ju-u-llll-I-a-a was, because all thirty of those eyeballs were fixated on the infamous woman behind me.

Staring back at me were a pair of the most exotic eyes I'd ever seen. A border of midnight blue boxed in a thick ring of light cerulean. The creepiest, or the most beautiful part of it all, was this golden orange star that encircled her pupils. They were blunt and shocking, only intensified by the deep shade of her black hair.

There's a reason her name was pronounced as it had been. It was as if Julia wasn't special enough for her. She smiled at me and I swear this corny inner monologue started in my head narrated by the Peter Gabriel song "In Your Eyes".

My inner speech bubble was burst as the screeching siren came up to us both, stopping to embrace Ju-u-llll-I-a-a before placing a hand on my forearm. Her hazel eyes widened as she smiled.

"William Tippin, yes?" our siren asked, her freckled brow slightly creasing. Her auburn hair was wild and as tamed as possible, her touch electric. She smiled brilliantly, and motioned me over to an empty table, stopping for a one-on-one with the goddess who now stood next to me.

Just when I thought my day couldn't have gotten any stranger, I was once again proven wrong. The conversations ended, the buzz died, Professor Hippie called the attention to herself, and the exotic gazelle sat down next to me.

Me.

Not the jock who took the class to meet girls. Me.

Me with my I-just-rolled-out-of-bed hair and my wrinkled white linen shirt.

And she just sat down next to me and smiled, flashing her perfect white teeth and classic grin. She slipped off her reed sandals, curled her feet underneath her Persian rug-like skirt, and purred a hello in my ear.

The way she said my name sent this jolt of adrenaline up and down my spine. Her strangely unique eyes were motivating, arousing, and even comedic. We started the oddball exercises that the lady of the sixties (whose real name was actually Professor Brenna Jenkins) gave us to work on, authorizing us be motivated by our surroundings.

Motivation isn't the only thing she gave me.

I watching her pen run quickly across the page, leaving elegant, swooping letters in its path. She sat there like that as time slowly went on, spilling whatever had been brewing in that head of hers out onto the paper in front of her. I spent all sixty minutes allotted to that exercise staring at her, leaving my paper marked with the barest of my infamous chicken scratch. Somewhere between that and the next coffee break I found myself staring at a small scrap of paper tucked into the folds of my notebook.

They call me Julia. You can call me here, it read, her characters long and loopy, the digits to her phone number small and stark.

And I did.

--

If I had ever considered being a priest, I never considered it again after her. Whoever thought up the concept of celibacy had obviously never spent the night with Julia Wales. After the sex I experienced a week after our meeting, it's not a surprise that I'd never said "no" to her. Amazing is an adjective that doesn't even being to describe it.

For a while it was intellectual. I made her laugh, and I learned something from her insanely genius writing. But when it came down to it, Lori had been right. It was a relationship built solely on lust. Many were surprised that we made it six days before ripping each other's clothes to shreds. Hell, even I was surprised we lasted that long.

But we managed to remain celibate just as long as we managed to stay together. She was an exotic, beautiful, free roaming spirit, and monogamy was definitely not for her. But I couldn't help myself. She was different. Nobody had ever made me feel that way before.

We attempted to continue a strictly "platonic" friendship; if I heard the words 'I told you so' once more from either of my sisters I would have driven myself off the Colorado Street Bridge. After a while we finally proved them wrong and became strictly friends: she called me for guy advice and what not, and she helped me when my creative edge was slipping.

Julia spent a year or two in Paris and came back as wacky as ever. She called me up one night from some club on Highland and said she was just dying for me to meet some of her new friends. She'd tried to set me up before, most of her attempts ending miserably, but something sent me out there that night. Okay, someone. Julia had become attached to Amy during the months of our romance, and my big sister is definitely a force not to be argued with.

The atmosphere there was intense. They were all in a booth in the back, gathered around a table barely visible under the number of cocktails it held. I recognized Julia, her brother James, and her twin brother Noah: the handful of females cluttered around them were strangers to my memory.

Noah had always puzzled me: he'd always been an intelligent man, funny, charismatic, and reliable. But two of his actions would always have me stumped. First, he legally changed his last name to Hicks two months after we met; next, five years after we met at that club he completely disappeared. According to Julia he was on a hiatus from his incredibly stressful job, which I still can't remember to this day. Maybe he was a banker…

Out of the present and back to the past. Julia reintroduced me to her siblings, then made the rounds to her female friends. A blonde named Kate Moore, a redhead they called Lola, a smart-alec chick named Francie Calfo, and a stunning brunette. Sydney Bristow.

Julia's black magic affect on me was nothing compared to Sydney's. She had a bright dimpled smile for me then, the same way she always has one for me now. We talked all night alone, while everyone else made their way to the dance floor and the turntables to request the occasional song. I was completely confident that our meeting would result in a happy ending when someone burst my bubble. Noah.

When she went home with him, I was more pissed than I had ever been in my life. Why the hell did I always have this kind of luck with women?

So began my friendship with Sydney Amanda Bristow. We went out for coffee, we talked: we laughed, and as much as I don't like to admit it, we cried. I took her to Lori's junior high graduation, and her high school one as well. She became my best friend, and I never stopped wanting our friendship to become more.

I waited five years. I watched for five years as he kissed her lips, caressed her curves, and made love to her into all hours of the night. Then he disappeared.

I watched her heart break. She showed up on my doorstep more times than I'd like to count drunk into the next week and I did the right thing. I either drove her home, or glued her to my couch until she was capable of coherent thought. Just when I thought my timing was right, someone came in and swept her right off her feet. Danny.

That ended horribly. No matter how much contempt I felt for the man there was no way I wanted it to end the way it did. Watching Sydney go through that mourning process is something I'd rather not experience again. Maybe that's why I was so motivated to solving the mystery in Danny's death. She needed closure, and I wanted to be the one to give it to her.

But something's different with her now. She comes home from those long crazy trips the bank sends her on in all hours of the night with this lovesick grin on her face and this glow radiating off her skin. She tells Francie and me that it's nothing, but if she were a certain wooden puppet, her nose would be the length of a yardstick. Francie is happy for her, and I am too. I'm not jealous, I'm curious. I'd like to meet this man and see what makes him tick.

There's a knock on my door. I'm sure it's her: I can see her car parked out on the street. I open the door and see her standing there with two bags full of groceries and a huge giddy grin plastered on her face. Maybe third time's a charm…