AUTHOR: Goddess Isa
EMAIL: goddessisa@aol.com
SUMMARY: In his thanks to Joss and the cast inside Unatural Selection, Mel Odem said he can't wait for the 20th Anniversary Buffy show with all their kids relating to each other. I wasn't sure how to take that at first, because it's my opinion that no matter what, Xander, Willow and Buffy will ALWAYS be best friends. Then I read his little mock script of a teacher and Xander's son and what he said was made more clear. Nevertheless, I wanna write this, and that is where the inspiration came from. I've written other stories where the Slayerettes have kids, but in this story, a couple of them have kids in high school. Sunnydale High School. Set twenty years from Graduation Day
SPOILER: Everything and nothing
DISTRIBUTION: Sure, just email me & lmk where it's going - I like seeing my name in print =)
FEEDBACK: Please, I'd hate to have to Slay for it. =P
RATING: TV-14
DISCLAIMER: Carson, Christian, Kelsey, Brenden & Alec are mine, but everyone else belongs to Joss. He's brilliant. WB sucks. They've got the money, but they suck.
May 25th, 1999
"So," Oz said as they looked through the ash that was now Sunnydale High School. "What do you think life'll be like in twenty years? I mean, where are we all gonna be?"
"I hope I'm a doctor," Willow said brightly.
"I'll be Slaying." Buffy said without enthusiasm. If I'm still alive, she added silently.
"I'll be here, doing nothing, same as always." Xander said.
"I wanna be famous," Cordy said. "If I get famous, you can all come see my house. As long as you don't make tracks in the carpet. I hate that."
"What made you ask that question?" Willow wondered.
Oz pulled something out of the rubble. A Sunnydale yearbook dated 1979. "Gotta wonder where all those people are today."
"Do you guys think someday someone'll find one of our yearbooks and go through it and wonder about us?" Willow asked.
The gang exchanged looks. "Nah."
*****
May 20th, 2019
"This doesn't feel like a reunion," Buffy said after they'd gotten a table for the Scooby Gang. "I see most of you all the time. Giles and my mother didn't even come."
"Why not?" Amy asked. "I haven't seen your parents in a really long time."
Buffy snorted. "That's the reason. He and my mother are so busy with the new baby. Do they really realize how old they are? I am thirty-six years older than Brenden is."
"Well, at least your daughter isn't trying to bind you from your own house." Amy made a face. "I can't get her to behave lately. She's even dabbling into the bad kinds of magick. Willow, maybe you would talk to her. Soon, since you're going to be leaving and all."
The table fell quiet. It was true, they wouldn't be the Scooby Gang much longer. Oz had finally hit the big break, and with the album going platinum it only made sense that they would move to LA where everyone else lives. They'd gotten a house and were supposed to move in a few days. Willow wasn't overly happy about it, and neither were her eight year old twins, Carson and Christian. Despite however bad Willow felt about the move, it would be the worst for her daughter Kelsey. At sixteen, she was beautiful, popular, and completely in love with Alec Harris, Xander's son.
Xander's son with Cordelia.
Willow had been thinking about their lives after high school a lot lately. She'd hurried up and married Oz for fear that she might lose him, and she'd gotten even more freaked out when she found out that Cordelia and Xander were planning a wedding of their own. Xander promised her that if he made it thought his basic training, he would marry her.
Willow had been silently jealous that he hadn't made her that promise, but she was already married to Oz by that point, anyway. Seven months later, Xander came home with a shaved head and a fancy uniform. He and Cordelia got married at Sunnydale's largest church and bought a huge home with money Xander inherited from his grandfather when he died. They were what Willow had always considered uber-happy. They had the whole deal, the house, complete with a white pickett fence, and their son, Alexander Jr., called Alec because Xander said that his name was "all for him".
"I still can't believe it," Buffy said as she shifted Eric to her other arm. "I'm going to miss you a ton. More than a ton. What are Angel and I going to do when there's a case that requires information from the Internet?"
She giggled. "Buy a computer!"
"You know," Cordy began. "Everything seemed so simple when we were young. Yu graduated, got married, lived off your husband's money. But in reality it's so hard."
"Because you live off your money, too?" Buffy asked. Cordy had become a very popular accessories designer and had her own boutique just outside Sunnydale.
"Yeah." she was about to ramble on when they were interupted by a high pitched squeal.
"Cordelia!" the voice shrilled again and then they saw that it came from a girl in a simple black pantsuit and flats.
Both Buffy and Willow did a double take and Cordelia did a triple.
The girl now standing in front of them was Harmony.
Only, not. Gone were the cool clothes and the makeup. Her long, fluffy locks had been traded in for a short, simple bob and Cordelia noted that she wore a diamondless wedding band on her left hand.
"Cordelia Chase!" she cooed. They did the kissy-hug thing they'd done in high school and Cordy got the sense that there was something very different about Harmony.
That was when Cordelia noticed that she was pregnant.
"How have you been?" Harmony went on. "I can't believe they didn't have a reunion before this one, but then, I guess I can with the school being burnt down and such. I cannot believe the horrible things that take place in high schools nowadays."
"First of all, it's Cordelia Harris now," Cordy corrected her. "And they didn't have a reuinion before because it's pathetic before twenty years."
"Harris?" Harmony asked. "You married Xander? That's great! Where do you live?"
"We live just outside Sunnydale, in Carsondale. I own a boutique there."
"Really? It seems I never get out anymore, what with schooling the children and all." Harmony rubbed her belly.
"Schooling the kids?" Willow asked, not caring that she wasn't really in this conversation.
"Yes, my husband and I teach all our children at home. It's a very warm, loving atmosphere for them, nothing like the high schools of today."
"How many kids do you have?" Buffy asked.
"Six. Well, this makes seven." she rubbed her belly again. "Unless, of course, it's twins. I've always wanted twins."
"Willow has twins," Cordy piped up. She so badly wanted to get Harmony off the subject of her shoe full of children.
"Yes, I read about that in the paper. Oz must be way famous. Is he here? I know my Enid would like an autograph."
"Enid?" Cordy whispered to Buffy. The Slayer shrugged.
"No, he didn't come, but I can send you one." Willow offered.
"No matter." Harmony shrugged. "So, Cordy, who runs your shop?"
"I do," she said defensively.
"How could you have time to do everything? And to cook?"
"I don't cook." Cordy said. "Xander likes to cook and I like his cooking."
"And your children feel the same way?"
"I've just got one. Alec, he's seventeen. Tell me Harmony, where are you living now?"
"Oh, still in Sunnydale. We live in the house I grew up in, actually. My parents left it to us."
"Who's your husband?" Buffy asked to polite.
"Oh, I'll call him over." she looked around the grounds. "Jonathan!"
The three girls mouths dropped as Jonathan approached them. He took Harmony's hand and smiled proudly even though he was a foot shorter than her.
*****
Later, when everyone had left and the school was as empty as it had been when Willow had taken her last stroll down the halls a few days previous, she had her family drop her back by the school on their way home. She promised she'd call Oz for a ride, but she had every intention of walking home alone when she was done with her reminiscing. This may not have been the school she attended, but these were, after all, the same grounds, and she had spent a good portion of the last fifteen years teaching on and off at the high school. It had been her first job after having Kelsey, and she still sometimes wondered why Mr. Kellner had been so eager to hire her without so much as an interview. Any good commentary that Snyder or even any of her teachers had left behind would've been destroyed in the explosion. Nevertheless, she had enjoyed her job and would miss it.
She walked over to the swing she'd watched so many couples sit on over the years. She couldn't even begin to count how many initials were carved into its dark wood. She sat down and began to swing, slowly, thinking about her life in and out of high school.
"Hey."
She looked up, ready to pull a stake out of her bag, and then relaxed. Xander.
"Thought I was a vamp?" he sat next to her.
"It's Sunnydale, you never know."
"Vampires rarely make small talk," he reminded her. They swung in silence for a few moments and then he sighed. "I just knew you would be here."
"It's only right. It started here, this is where it has to end."
"You're happy with Oz." it was a statement not a question.
She nodded. "The house in LA is beautiful. You'll love it. And we'll be closer than you think, it only takes two hours to get from there to here. We'll visit back and forth all the time. Kelsey and Alec wouldn't have it any other way."
"Good point," Xander used his feet to give the swing a good push. "Willow?"
"Hmmm?"
"Do you ever think about how weird it is? My son and your daughter? I mean, did you ever think--"
"Not in a million years," she admitted.
"It's funny," Xander went on. "I look at them so happy together, see the way they look at each other, and he looks so much like me, and she looks so much like you....Willow, it should've been us."
"You're crazy." she said half-heartedly. "Besides, if we were together, they wouldn't be, because they wouldn't be who they are."
He shrugged. "I guess you can't change the past. Even if you want to." he reached for her hand but she pulled away.
"I want to show you something." she pulled him around to the back of the swing. She held it still and pointed to the bottom left corner. Carved in the wood, in four different, messy writings, were four sets of initials.
BS + AC
WR + OO
CC + XH
KF + AH
"Buffy and Angel, you and Oz, me and Cordy and Kelsey and Alec?"
She nodded. "I saw them doing it the other day. They're going to be lost without each other."
"They'll survive." he shrugged. "Couples always do."
"I guess," Willow stood up and brushed her knees off. "I'm leaving now Xander."
"I'll miss you," was the only reply he could get out.
She hugged him, and then she kissed him, and then she walked away.