Part 23: Three Faces of Xander Harris
Xander glanced at the dashboard clock, vaguely registered that it read 12:05 a.m., and killed the engine. As the day's events caught up with him, he resisted letting his head drop to the steering wheel with a resounding thunk. If he did that, he was pretty damn sure he'd fall asleep in the driver's seat still wearing a seatbelt.
Note to self: spending almost six hours at an airport on stand-by is not the most relaxing way to spend your time.
He initially relegated himself to shepherding Rona and Vi through Hopkins from a distance. At first, the girls leaned on each other as Vi tried mightily keep up Rona's flagging spirits. When it got to be too much for her, Xander had to step in with his own brand of chin-up reassurances.
At some point the three of them wound up sitting in a puppy pile on uncomfortable seats, one Slayer installed on each side of their teddy-bear-for-the-day.
The mental and emotional effort of keeping a stiff upper lip while Rona and Vi slowly fell to pieces really didn't hit him until Rona finally landed a spot on a Southwest flight to Austin and gave them a final tear-filled backwards glance before she disappeared through security. While Vi strained her neck to watch Rona's retreating back, Xander called Willow to give her the latest news and make sure someone would be waiting for Rona at the other end.
Miracle of miracles, Rona's brother would be the man to do it. Three cheers for something going right.
Frankly, if he didn't have to deal with Vi, he probably would've pulled up a corner table and catnapped before even attempting to drive home.
A sad sniff served to pull him a little more into alert status and he glanced over at his traveling companion. Rona and Vi were tighter than most sisters. They'd adopted each other after Sunnydale as Vi, who at least had a Watcher and some training before she ended up at Camp Summers, helped Rona adjust to the weird world of vampires and other things that go bump in the night. Rona, for her part, seemed hell-bent on inserting some kind of coolness gene into the sweet girl who pretty much thought that Jessica Simpson was the Next Hot Thing to shake the music scene.
A house meeting without Vi and Rona sitting in a corner giggling and whispering together was just not going to be a house meeting.
"You okay?" Xander croaked.
He sensed a slight nod.
"Once Rona gets in with her family in Oregon, what say we shake you loose for a visit?"
The offer was enough to get Vi to look at him, her expression shadowed in the dim light. He noticed she was still clutching the crumpled paper with Rona's email address in her right hand.
Jesus, did I ever look that young? Xander wondered. "Unless you want to visit your family instead? Scratch that. When our crazy-but-lovable visitors Dr. Who themselves back to whenever they came from, why don't we make arrangements for you to spend time on your homestead and throw a side visit to Rona in the bargain."
"But…"
"No buts. Outside of a few days after Sunnydale went bye-bye, none of us have taken time off. We'll work up a schedule for vacay so everyone gets a shot at taking a break and I'll make sure your name's at the top of the list."
"But what about Robin?"
Xander squelched a curse. This iron-hand general business had to stop. First Buffy, now Robin. "I'm sure Robin won't have issues," he said with more certainty than he really felt. "Let me worry about it. We'll work it out, okay?"
"Okay," Vi whispered.
As Xander removed the keys from the ignition, Vi asked, "Do you think he'll be okay?"
"Robin?"
"Michael."
Oh. Rona's brother. "I hope so," he said without thinking. Realizing what just came out of his mouth, he started babbling to cover up. "Hey, maybe he'll get lucky, trip and fall as he gets off the plane at a transfer point, tear a few ligaments, and then get himself Purple Hearted back to the good ol' U.S. of A. where he'll be flying a desk for the rest of his military career." And geez, could he sound any more like a jerk?
To his surprise, Vi giggled. "How about he meets Rona at the airport and while walking to her to his car, he falls, breaks his leg, and never leaves the U.S. at all?"
Xander relaxed. "I like your version better."
"Yeah, mine's pretty good," Vi gave him a crooked smile. "How do you do it?"
"Do what? Talking? I pretty much shut off my brain when I open my mouth."
"I don't mean that," Vi giggled again. "I mean…well…what I mean is, how do you do it? Night after night? Patrolling, walking around with that compound bow or a crossbow, making sure we don't do something too stupid."
Hunh? Wha? "Unh, Vi? I don't know if you noticed, but the Slayers are pretty much the soldiers around here, not…"
"Yeah, but, we've got something 'special,'" Xander could hear the bitter quotes Vi put around 'special' as she said it, "which means we don't have a choice. Plus, it takes some serious whomping to take us out. You don't have that."
Xander shifted uncomfortably at the unexpected turn the conversation was taking. He really wasn't sure what Vi was getting at here, but the Slayer obviously needed to get something off her chest. "Yeah, but I've got myself a bevy of beautiful Slayers to cower behind. So my position? Not so bad."
"Like you cowered behind a gravestone in Erie Cemetery last week?" Vi asked. "Yeah, dusting one vamp with a bolt and then running up and whacking the other vamp silly with your crossbow so Kennedy could stake it really looked like hiding to me."
"Have mercy. I'm operating on brain dead. What are you saying?"
"Just that…well…I guess…I don't know," Vi stumbled. "I'm trying to figure out how Michael can seem so okay with walking into a war zone when he didn't have to sign on to the military in the first place, so I thought maybe you could explain it to me."
"Number one, I'm pretty sure he's not 'okay' with it. It's his job, sure, and he knew it was a possibility when he signed up, but doing your duty and being okay with it are two different things," Xander explained. "Two, me and Michael are nothing alike. He's gotta deal with guns and bullets and people shooting at him for a start. I'm basically 4F bait, so I'm pretty sure I'll never be wearing a military uniform. And he doesn't have a Slayer to hide behind when things get really hairy. Probably. Maybe. These days, who knows? Not that being a Slayer can protect you from a sniper. Aw, hell. You know what I mean."
"But you're both fighting on the front lines of a…"
"Vi," Xander interrupted as he rubbed his temples to ward off a headache. He wasn't really connecting here and he wasn't entirely sure what the Slayer expected from him. Maybe if he were a little less tired he could see what she was getting at with the 'how do you do it' question.
"I guess I'm trying to figure out why."
"I don't follow."
"Okay, I get why Michael's in the military. ROTC. But I wonder if there's something more to it. Like, why people sign up to fight when they don't have to and there are other people who are willing, well, maybe not willing, but don't have a choice." Xander could see she was desperately trying to explain. "Which is why I'm asking you, since you don't have to be here and you could, you know, walk away at any time. Why do you do it? Because maybe it'll help me understand why he can do it."
Why? "I don't know." Jesus, he must be more tired than he thought because he had no idea where that answer came from.
"You don't know?" Vi sounded like he'd just let her down, but between his oncoming headache and aching muscles, he can't even begin figure out a way to explain himself.
So he went with honesty.
"Look, right now, I don't know why I'm here or how I do whatever it is I do around here." He steadfastly fixed his right eye on the streetscape through the windshield while wiping absently at his tearing left. "What I can tell you is that if you asked me last year, I would've had an answer. And that answer would've been different than the one I would've given you the year before that. I can't tell you what my answer will be a year from now or even tomorrow." He swallowed hard and dared to glance back at Vi again. "I'm sorry, but that's the truth. It's not much, I know," he shrugged helplessly, "but there it is."
Vi surprised him again by blessing him with her sweet, crooked smile. "Sounds like I'm not the only one who needs a vacation."
"Oh, yeah," Xander agreed, sensing this very weird conversation was coming to an end, "or at least some sleep, preferably lasting three days."
Vi nodded and opened her door. Whatever she was looking for, she obviously found it. He just hoped he didn't just give her permission to go postal somewhere in this discussion.
He hauled himself out of the car and began trudging to the front door, the two questions niggling at the back of his brain. How? Why? Had any one ever asked him those two questions? He scrambled through his memory and kept coming up with a blank.
"Thank you," Vi's voice said next to him.
Thank you? "For what?" he asked.
"For being you. For being here because I really don't know what Rona would've done if you weren't. For being honest and not giving me a PowerPoint presentation complete with bullet points on 'why we fight.'"
Thank you? If anything, Vi's little ode to Xander made him feel worse. He just couldn't escape the notion that the Slayer was giving him more credit than he deserved. "If you want the standard PowerPoint show, you'll have to ask Wills."
Vi grabbed his arm and held it. "You know what I mean."
"Vi? If you're having trouble adjusting to being a Slayer, I'm not the person to talk to," Xander said. "I'm not a Slayer. I never was, never will be. Wrong equipment. You really need to talk to Buffy or Faith, preferably both, if you want…"
"So Buffy can give me a prepared inspirational speech about what it all means?" Vi snorted. "Faith'll just probably tell me to go talk to Robin because he's got the Slayer mom and all the answers."
Xander scrubbed his free hand through his hair. He really, really didn't want to get into explaining how Buffy in the last year wasn't the Buffy he knew back in the day, mostly because he knew that Vi would never, ever believe him. His friend may have done more long-term damage to her own credibility in the eyes of the Sunnydale Slayer veterans than anyone realized because of the way she treated people during the battle with the First. Worse, Robin was making the same mistakes.
"Give it a shot," he finally said. "Buffy'll surprise you. Faith probably will too. I promise."
Vi looked doubtful.
Xander sighed. "Fine. At least think about it, okay? If worse comes to worst, you know where I live."
She nodded and let him go.
He managed to fit the key into the lock to let them in as How? Why? and Thank you. circled the black hole in the center of his brain. He opened the door and with a half-bow let Vi walk in before him. "Night," her voice floated back to him as she merged with the post-midnight gloom.
He steeled himself with a deep breath before shutting and locking the door behind him.
"Catherine and Willow are waiting in the library to brief you."
Xander jumped and whipped around to his left. Damn it! Robin up on his blindside again! He's just walking into the goddamn house and…
Robin shuffled uncomfortably. "Didn't mean to startle you. I know you're tired."
Xander couldn't quite get his shoulders to relax or his heart rate to slow down. "Rona's off. I don't know when she'll be back since she needs to spend some me-time with her family. She'll be keeping us in touch. Vi's got her email, if you're interested."
"How's the bruise?"
Right on cue his left cheekbone gave a throb. He's been so tied up between Catherine training and Rona supporting that he'd literally forgotten about it. He clutched his left hand into a fist and hid it behind his back as resistance against reaching up and touching the sore area. "I'll live," he said shortly.
More uncomfortable shifting from Robin. "I'm sorry. About that. I overreacted to…and just…sorry."
I'm sorry? This night was full of surprises with its hows, whys, thank yous, and now sorrys. His poor, overtaxed brain was shorting out under the stress of applying these words to himself in any way that made sense.
He can't deal. He needed bed. Sleep. And a late wake up call. Maybe he'll be able to make sense of it in the morning.
Aw, shit. What did Robin say? Catherine and Willow are waiting for me? So much for bed, although I can't see how anything they say is going to sound anything like English right now.
Robin was still fidgeting in the hallway, which Xander thought was a pretty hilarious sight. Robin, the big, bad demon hunter with all the big, bad moves looked like he'd been caught doing the naughty by a little old lady in a candy store. Christ. Any minute now he was going to start giggling and blow the mood. "Forget it. Not the first time my mouth dug my grave."
Robin seemed relieved. "I'm glad you're aware of that."
Last I checked you were the one that got bruised just for talking shit.
Ooooh, look at that. With six little words, Robin not only managed to wake him up completely, but to completely piss him off. "Next time you have an issue with my mouth, say something. I'm not your punching bag, flunky, or sidekick," Xander said tightly. "Although if that's what you need, I'm pretty sure Andrew might be willing to fill that slot."
"Andrew's the only one around here even attempting to keep spirits up," Robin said evenly. "Your attitude and smart remarks are serving to damage the morale in the house. You're supposed to be an example to the others and you're not living up to your responsibilities."
"I'm…I'm…whatthehelldidyoujust…"
"Keep your voice down. People are trying to sleep."
"So am I, but I'm pretty much still talking to you."
Something was slipping right through his fingers here. He could feel it along with his strained temper, but he would be damned if he could figure out what, exactly, he was blowing. He was exhausted, he was faced with yet another long meeting probably involving a lot of long words, an early bedtime if "early" could be defined as 4 a.m., followed by days full of trying to resolve the latest crisis. In between all of this, he had to deal unhappy baby Slayers, Andrew being Andrew, Robin being Robin, and him being him. It was enough to make him want to put his fist through a wall.
How the hell did Giles do it? Giles had even more responsibility since he was the Watcher man. Yeah, but Giles only had to worry about one Slayer and everyone knew who she was. We get a planet full of 'em and we don't even know where they are, his mind growled.
"You know I have a point," Robin stated.
Clenched right fist joined clenched left fist behind Xander's back, this time because he was afraid he'd take a swing at Robin. "Have I ever, and I mean ever, started a fight in a house meeting? No. Have I ever inspired any of the baby Slayers to rebel? Again with the no. Every time my 'smart mouth' has opened up with something resembling a criticism it has been when the 'adults' are alone and not in front of the 'kids.'"
"No," Robin allowed. "But the attitude you have in private spills over into your public actions, so maybe…"
"I should just think happy thoughts, kill what's left of my brain cells, and let you do my thinking for me? No thanks. Last time that happened, I lost an eye," Xander gritted. "As for you? Last time you went alpha male you tried to off Spike. While that's a noble goal and I'm with you 100 percent, your timing sucked. What the fuck did Spike do to you, aside from existing, that you felt you had to off him right away? If this was about some personal vendetta from Spike's school basement days, you should've waited until after the big battle. On top of that, you lied to everyone about what you were doing. You're partly responsible for planting that big ol' wedge between Buffy and everyone else at just the wrong time. A wedge, I might add, that's still causing more problems than you can even imagine."
Robin went deadly still somewhere in Xander's rant. "You really shouldn't comment on things you don't know about, boy."
"Oh, really?" Xander's voice was dripping in sarcasm. "Here's what I got out of it: if that's how you come up with a plan and execute it, you are the last person who should be dictating anything to anyone."
He spun on his heel and stalked away from the eerily quiet Robin. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I just made everything worse. I let my inner Daddy Harris do the talking. I'm no fucking better than I was in high school. He just couldn't find it in him to go back and make peace, mostly because he had an unerring sense honed by years of growing up in the Harris household that he'd not only stepped over a line, he obliterated it.
He just wished he knew what it was he said that managed to kill all hope of he and Robin ever having something resembling a friendly conversation.
His subconscious directed his feet to the library instead of his bedroom, yet another surprise in a long night of surprises. He stopped right at the doorway and leaned against it, too exhausted to take even another step.
His arrival was still unnoticed by the room's occupants. Willow was sipping something, probably herbal tea, and watching Catherine who was engrossed in listening to Faith tell some tall tale. Faith's presence shouldn't be the surprise it was, especially since she was one of the designated babysitters. The surprising thing was that Robin failed to mention Faith was still up.
He couldn't help the smile. There was Catherine looking like she wanted to reach out and touch Faith to make sure the chatting Slayer as real. Faith was so lost in telling whatever story she was telling that she didn't seem to notice the way Catherine's dark eyes shined as the Watcher Honoria absorbed every single precious word.
In the dim light of the desk lamps, Catherine and Faith looked like they might be…well, not sisters exactly, but at least distant relatives. He suddenly frowned. The illusion had to be a trick of the light and his overtired eye. Sure, the shape of their faces was similar, especially around the eyes, and both heads of hair looked like the natural curl was going to fight any attempt to control them. He doesn't think he'd ever noticed Faith bothering to try, while Catherine did her best to keep it tied back and out of the way.
He snorted at himself in amusement. Right. It was official. He was in full meltdown.
The noise distracted Willow and the witch scanned the room until she met his gaze. "You look like hell," she stated.
"Remind me to pay you the same compliment after a long day in the very near future."
Somewhere in there Willow must've moved because she was in front of him shoving a warm cup into his hands. "Coffee," she explained, "you get yuck face when I try to get you to drink my Up All Night mix."
Xander bent low over the cup, letting the smell and steam wash over him. "Thanks."
"What happened here?" Willow reached out a hand to gently caress the bruise.
He desperately wanted to lean into the soothing heat of her palm, but backed off, forcing himself to stand upright. "I took a spill during training. No big." Too late he realized that Faith and Catherine were both actually there when he got his injury.
"How's Rona?" Faith asked from her seat while Xander silently thanked her for changing the subject.
"Good as can be expected."
"How are you?" Willow asked.
Sweet Willow. Good Willow. Best bud Willow. He reached out and played with a strand of her hair as he tried to answer that loaded question. Let me see, I'm pretty sure I just said everything wrong to Vi and managed to get into a fight with Robin while he was apologizing, so all in all, it's not been a good night. What I need is some advice on how to fix it because, I gotta tell ya Wills, I don't know what I'm doing.
"Xander?" Willow pressed.
"Sorry. My neurons are about to go on strike for more vacation time, preferably in a tropical climate with a lot of nude beaches populated by sexy young women."
Willow gave him a playful hit. "Hey! No talking like that unless you plan to take me with. So when do we leave?"
"Leave?"
"Yeah. Leave. I hear Tahiti is just the place. I'm sure Kennedy won't have any problems with it as long as I take pictures."
Xander let his hand drop. If someone told him when he was fifteen and drooling after Buffy that the day would come when Willow would not only get possessed by the ghost of Anya, but would be offering to go trolling for nubile, young, and willing women with him, he'd've never believed it.
The future was definitely a scary place, sometimes even when you were living in it.
Faith cleared her throat. "While you two fantasize about finding your perfect woman in places not named Cleveland, we're still waiting. Xander's not the only one ready to drop."
Xander glanced around the giggling Willow and saw Faith with crossed arms and Catherine trying to look like she wasn't tasting something bad. "Sorry," he apologized. "I'm not firing on all cylinders right now."
"We could wait until tomorrow," Willow offered.
What a tempting thought. What he wanted to do was go to bed. What he had to do was walk in, sit down, and get the lowdown on what he missed.
"Nah. Let's get it over with," he replied as he drifted over to a seat. "Not sure how much I'll absorb, but…" his voice trailed off in a shrug.
"Well, you are in luck," Willow skipped over to her seat, snatching a sheaf of papers off the research/computer table along the way. She presented the pile to Xander with a flourish. "Jeanne took notes and then typed them up for you. You know, Jeanne, right? She's the one…"
"…who was planning on become a secretary to support her poetry habit, worships Trent Reznor, and believes that Prince is right about all artists being slaves to society's corporate machine," Xander finished for her, completely missing Faith's 'toldjya' look of triumph at Willow's shocked expression. "She went into the battle with the First smuggling a copy of The Downward Spiral in her back pocket. She was pissed that she lost it anyway."
"Unh, right. That's her. I think. Didn't know about the poetry. Or Trent Reznor. Or about the Prince thing. And did she really think a CD was going to survive a sword fight with Turok-Hans?" Willow asked.
Xander shrugged. "Said she wanted to be buried with it if she died in the battle, so I think that's why she had it. That's also probably why she hasn't replaced it yet. I've been noticing she's been leaning more towards Everclear these days anyway."
"Not that I understand anything you said, but how do you know this?" Catherine asked.
The source of the question was so unexpected that Xander was pretty sure he broke something when he quickly turned his head to face the Watcher Honoria. She was looking at him with something akin to respect topped by a healthy dollop of approval while Faith smirked mysteriously behind her.
He shook his head and shrugged. Why the hell is this such a mystery? You'd think I read minds or something. "We've talked?"
"Oh." Catherine leaned back in her chair, looking the picture of smug satisfaction.
The sense of unreality was just getting more unreal by the moment. He wondered how much he was missing because he could hear his bed forlornly calling to him. He needed to focus on something before they even started talking. Get the brain cells working on…
"Oh, wait!" He smacked himself in the forehead. "Hey Faith? Think you could kinda take Vi under your wing? With her soul sister out of town, I think she's a little out of sorts."
The smirk was replaced by a frown of surprise. "Well, I know they're best pals and all, but I really don't see how I can…"
"What I mean is, keep her in your patrol group, maybe get her talking, you know?" Xander was trying to think of a way to tell Faith that Vi really needed a Slayer-to-Slayer chat without betraying the girl. "Maybe you could lend and ear, maybe two? Help her find her bearings now that her best bud is temporarily unavailable."
Understanding clicked in Faith's eyes as she leaned forward and rested her elbows on her knees. Xander discovered he couldn't quite sit still under the intense expression. "Happy to give it a shot, not too sure if I'm the best Slayer for the job, though. Get B in it too. I'd feel better if I had back up."
"You are the best Slayer for the job, at least in this situation. I'd ask B, I mean Buffy, except I'm not too sure Vi'd listen to her." God, this was killing him to admit it. "Besides, you gotta fly solo on this one. If the two senior Slayers are making with the girl talk over ice cream sundaes, Vi's gonna figure I said something out of school. Better if you just make yourself available and keep the ol' ears open, 'kay?"
Faith's expression didn't change, nor did her eyes leave his face. There was a long pause before she slowly nodded her assent. "I'll see what I can do," she promised.
Xander let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. "Thanks. And Willow?"
"Eeep?"
He grinned. "No blabbing. Not even to Kennedy. Keep it low key so we don't end up love bombing Vi."
"No love bombing. Check." Willow nodded as she dropped into her own chair. "Which means I better not talk to Buffy or Giles or Robin or Kennedy or anyone ever because I'm really bad at this sneaky keeping secret-y thing."
Xander gave her a dark look.
"When it doesn't involve me being naughty," she readily amended with a sigh. "I'll be zipped lip Willow."
"Thanks," he said, shoving as much sincerity as his scrambled brain could muster into the word. "Well, let's hear it."
The Faith smirk was back. "I can't wait to see your reaction."
TBC…