DISCLAIMER: I don't own the characters represented in this work, those are owned by their creators, publishers, or distributors. No profit will be made.

Wherein we learn what's happened to Xander and things fall progressively off the rails.

Coherence ceases to exist, things get confusing, author's note deteriorates into gibberish.

Start.


Chapter the Second

His room was starting to develop a funk.

Not in a dancing sense, his life wasn't that strange, but he was starting to believe that he was going to have to do the laundry. Preferably before he was smothered in a pile of unwashed boxers. What an unhygienic way to go. The only consolation prize would be his obituary, which would be legendary. Tales would be passed of the boy who was crushed under a mound of unwashed clothing. Parents would use it as a cautionary for their kids. Scientists would study the odor to use in chemical warfare.

Or something like that.

He dragged himself out of bed and across the floor to a hot shower. The scalding water forced his spine to click back into alignment and he groaned involuntarily at the sensation.

Toast with a side of toast for breakfast and then he was out the door, skateboard under his feet pointed towards Sunnydale High. It was crisp and picturesque and every other word someone might use to describe a bright sunny day. It smelled like daisies.

Xander gripped onto the back of a passing moving truck, living out his Marty McFly dreams. He ducked low to avoid the gaze of the driver, then pushed off and sailed down a hill that would take him to school. Other students were milling about outside, some of them heading for the school building, some content with sitting on the grass. California sunshine was always welcome, and it seemed a few people were doing their best to soak up the rays while they still could.

"'Scuse me, coming through." He muttered, bobbing and weaving through the crowds of other students. At this point he was an expert at ignoring disgruntled complaints as he jostled past uncontrollably.

He wasn't late, which was always a plus and he saw Willow walking up the steps which made the start of his good day even better.

She was dressed like she always was, long sleeve shirt, jeans, but today she looked different. Somehow. It wasn't her hair or makeup (she didn't wear any), but someone about her was bothering him and he couldn't tear his eyes away. Not even the unfamiliar blonde girl he passed on his uncontrolled romp towards his best friend.

He articulated this mass of conflicting emotions with a single articulation: "Whoa."

And then he crashed into and under the railing right in front of her.

Pride was bruised more than anything physical, as was usually the case whenever he was on his skateboard. Red faced, he smiled up at her, which she returned with extra vigor. That helped lessen the feeling he got every time he made a fool of himself.

"Willow! You're so very much the person that I wanted to see!"

"Oh, really?" She said, charming smile still firmly in place.

Xander hauled himself upright, "Yeah, you know, I kinda had a problem with the math."

"Which part?"

"The math. You know him." Jessie said, reaching his arms around Willow and Xander and pulling them together. "How's it going?"

"Great." Xander said, "Willow was just about to promise to help me with math."

Willow scrunched her nose, "I think you're skipping a few steps."

"Oh, please oh please? I promise to love you forever and ever." Xander said.

"Do you have 'Theories in Trig'? You should check it out."

"Oh, no good." Jessie said, "I'm afraid I burned it."

"What?"

"Yep, up in smoke, very tragic. iPhone accident, the batteries in those things are terrible. More importantly, you should study together in the library after school, just ignore the new librarion."

"What's an eye-phone?"

"Nothing important."

Xander shrugged. "Whatever."

"I still don't understand how or why you burned 'Theories in Trig'. It's a good book." Willow said.

"Facebook told me to do it."

Before either Xander or Willow could ask him what that meant, Principal Snyder made himself known in the only way he was capable of.

"Enough chit-chat," He shouted, "You'll be late for class. If you don't hurry up you'll serve a detention after school!"

"Yikes," Willow said, "what's his problem?"

"Wide stick; narrow ass." Jessie said.

Xander snorted while Willow stifled a grin. "Be nice."

"You hear anything about the new transfer student?"

"Buffy Summers," Jessie said while kicking the door to the school open, Snyder glared, "weird name, probably raised by hippies. We should get to class."

"You're not curious?" Xander said, "what if she's a hottie?"

"Probably not worth the freaky lap dance jealousy ploys." Jessie said, face twisting into a look of disgust. "She's so ratchet."

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You're acting kinda strange." Willow said, "Are you alright?"

"Never better." Jessie said, "Want to go to Starbucks after school?"

"No," Xander said, "I don't think anyone wants to go to Starbucks."

"Basic bitches only." Jessie agreed.

"You know, I really don't understand a word out of your mouth today"

Jessie laughed in response.


"What's a radian?"

Willow sighed. "It's the angle subtended at the centre of a circle by an arc equal in length to the radius of the circle."

"That wasn't English." Xander grinned at her from across the table.

"If you're not going to pay attention then I don't know why I'm helping you." She wanted to say it with some heat, but they were in the library so she only dared to whisper.

Xander had to lean towards her whenever she spoke, almost across the table. Her breathy whispers sent a shivers down his spine. The library was an open space and hardly what one might consider comfortable, but sitting across from Willow at the large table almost felt intimate.

"Xander," she said, "focus."

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." Xander said loudly. "I'll be good, I promise."

The volume of his voice made their new librarian look up from his work, but he quickly decided reprimanding them wasn't worth it and returned to whatever he was doing before.

Surprisingly true to his word, Xander focused and worked through another two problems before whatever semblance of calm was interrupted by Jessie bursting through the door, glossy magazine in hand.

"Xander buddy!" Jessie said. And this time the new librarian did interject, saying something in a buttery smooth British accent that Jessie dismissed immediately.

"You mad bro?" Jessie said throwing his hands out in abstract gestures only he understood.

Shocked or perhaps just confused over what the hell that could possibly mean the new librarian said nothing else.

"What are you holding mister?" Willow said. It was a rhetorical question; she was well aware what was clutched between his fingers.

"New Playboy just dropped, check it!" Jessie slapped the sacrilegious rag down onto the table, forever covering 'Revised Theories in Trig' in shame and sin. Xander's eyes widened at the sight of the cover.

Faye Resnick adorned the cover dressed in a black negligee and despite the word negligee already implying sheer cloth, it's worth restating just how sheer that negligee was: very sheer. The signs of a surgeons touch were pretty clear, making her look like Barbie come to life.

"Jessie," Willow said, "that's disgusting. Playboy is demeaning to woman; it objectifies them and reduces them to a sexual object."

"Relax," Jessie rolled his eyes, "I don't read the articles. Besides, it's the 90's, I can be as misogynistic as I like."

Willow leaned across the table and grabbed the magazine, "I'm confiscating this."

"Hey, give it back." Jessie said, lunging at her. Willow jumped back, placing the large table between them. She backed up until her foot tapped against a bookshelf.

Xander smiled watching their antics, he balanced his chair back on two legs. "C'mon Willow, don't make it easy for him."

"I can't wait till you get a load of page three, she's just your type!" Jessie laughed, "or should I have said 'off' page three? Man, I'm so clever today."

The betrayed look Willow was shoot at Xander was uncomfortable for a variety of reasons, but nothing made him feel more guilty than the beginnings of tears forming at the corners of her eyes. He should have felt embarrassed, that was normal, he didn't know where the guilt was coming from.

Willow ducked under Jessie's outstretched arms and charged past the bewildered librarian, throwing the doors to the library open harder than anyone though possible.

Xander looked down at his unfinished math homework then to Jessie who looked a lot less disappointed than Xander thought he would.

"I'm going to go after her," Xander said. "There's no way I'd be able to finish this work with your help."

"There's no way I'd help you." Jessie smiled.

"Ok, see you later then." Xander pushed his work into a pile which he squeezed into his backpack, he threw it over his shoulder on the way to the door.

"Enjoy the Playboy." Jessie called after him.

Xander skipped past the still flabbergasted librarian after his errant best friend. Red hair tended to stand out and as soon as he exited the library he spotted a full head of it partially hidden behind a tree.

He walked across the grass and sat down beside her.

"You okay?"

"Yeah," Willow said, "I'm fine."

"I know you Wills." Xander said, "Better than anyone else, what's on your mind?"

Willow crumbled the Playboy between her hands, "Do you, I mean, do boys think this is attractive?" She was shaking it now. "Compared to her I'm so plain, I'm not attractive at all."

She hadn't cried, but her eyes were red like she could start at any moment. Maybe another day, another minute sooner or later Xander wouldn't have known what was running through her mind. Today, he could see everything clearly.

"No," Xander said without thinking, "You're attractive." He turned to her, letting words he'd always thought spill from his mouth. "You're cute. Really cute, I mean."

"But not beautiful." Willow said, "Cute like a kid is." The tears were coming back, steadily climbing their way forward like Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay scaling Mount Everest.

Xander paused. "You're beautiful Willow. You're more beautiful than that girl on the cover. You're more beautiful than any girl in that magazine."

"You had to think about that for a while." She said.

"It was worth thinking about."

She smiled. "Prove it."

He smiled back like he though Han Solo would, "Okay."

He kissed her or she kissed him. He wasn't really sure and he didn't think it mattered. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her closer. The world seemed to go white and to him, nothing else in the universe mattered but kissing his best friend.


Author's Note:

Jessie McNally waited until the clock struck 11 and class ended. Unlike his peers he didn't immediately shove his materials into his bag and jockey for position out the door; instead he waited with uncommon eagerness until all of his classmates had left before approaching the front of the class. His backpack was slung over a single shoulder and his sneakers were tied correctly for the first time in his life, just in case he had to make a quick escape.

Professor Giles was busy erasing the chalkboard, not unaware of Jessie approaching behind him. He finished off by dusting his hands on a cloth rag before motioning Jessie to follow him to his desk.

"So Mr. McNally, how can I help you?" he said, collapsing into his chair. He brushed his hair and sat straighter, focusing his attention towards his student.

"I was wondering sir, if you got that email I sent you?" Jessie was doing the foot gazing thing that all students seem to pick up.

Professor Giles smiled, "Ah yes, you wanted me to read some fanfiction you wrote. I am curious why you sent it to me and not Dr. Wyndam-Price your creative writing professor?"

"No offense to Dr. Wyndam-Price, but I'd much rather have your opinion."

They shared a quiet laugh and Giles quickly checked that Wesley wasn't anywhere in sight. The man had the annoying habit of popping up wherever and whenever he wasn't wanted.

"As a matter of fact, Mr. McNally, I did have a chance to read your work. I found it rather interesting." Giles pulled a printed copy of Jessie's email from his leather attaché case. "I was surprised about the show you chose to write on, it is rather old and I didn't think it was that popular among students your age."

"It isn't" Jessie said.

"Ah, I see," Professor Giles said. "I actually use to be a fan, back in the day. I like most of Joss Whedon's work. Except Dollhouse of course, that was garbage."

He smiled genially, as if telling Jessie to relax his shoulders and breathe. Jessie was mostly unreceptive to his suggestion.

"You don't look down on fanfiction, sir?"

Giles frowned, "I wouldn't say look down. When it comes to fanfiction, Sturgeon's law is in full effect, I'd say over 90% of the stuff out there is pure garbage. But fanfiction itself isn't to blame."

"I think I get what you're saying," Jessie said.

"It takes a good writer to take pre-established characters and have them behave and act in a canon way to presumably non-canon events. Of course you could always toss that out the window and have them be thinly veiled author avatars that fuck whichever pop culture icon you have a hard on for."

Jessie pushed himself back in his chair at the heat in his Professor's words. Giles had clenched his hands into a fist and for the first time Jessie realized how frightening the normally unassuming literature professor could be. The room was painfully quiet.

"Err, I take it you have personal experience."

Giles coughed awkwardly, "Sorry about that, yeah. I used to contribute to a Doctor Who anthology back when I was in university. There was this one fellow who always wrote the most vapid drivel, but for some reason his submissions always seemed to be the most popular."

"T&A," Jessie said, "It always works."

Giles smiled. "In any case, I had a few comments and questions for you."

"Sure," Jessie said "That'd be great."

"First of all," Giles said, "Just a couple of corrections. I had to Google most of this but, in your first chapter, which shares a timeline with the original first episode; you have Snyder as the principal of Sunnydale High. Unfortunately, Snyder didn't become Principal until after Flutie died in episode six."

Jessie blinked, "oh."

"There's a few other minor issues of that nature, I'm sure that it's merely a matter to be corrected with more proofreading. Style issues too, of course, a little too reliant on visual description, not enough use of the other senses, that sort of thing." Giles waved his hand, "I do have a more important question though: why focus on Xander? I realize he was always a major character, but he seems like a rather boring character to follow. I must admit I never cared for him while watching the show."

Jessie paused, letting his eyes search the classroom as if the answer would be written on the recently cleaned chalkboards. "Empathy, I guess."

"You guess?"

"I mean, Xander was always the normal one right?" Jessie said. "Buffy was the Slayer and Willow eventually became a witch, but other than the whole eye-patch thing Xander stayed human. I kinda figured he'd be the easiest to relate to.

"He's the everyman." Jessie recalled the article he'd read on TvTropes. "I think you mentioned this in class once, but because he's the closest to the audience, that allows us to empathise with him more than we would someone with superpowers."

Giles nodded, "I suppose that proves you have been paying attention during class."

He flipped through the pages of Jessie's story, "Then why did you give him superpowers in the fifth chapter?"

Jessie shrugged, "No one wants to be normal, that's so boring."