AN: Yes, there is a world altering demon out there, Rivana! It's known as a Eawwtmbalagbm (don't worry about the pronounciation, only demons with two tongues can get it right). Rougly translated from the ancient acronymic, it means "Evil author who watches too much Buffy, and loves a good Bogy movie".
Part 6, The Obligatory Angsty and Less Funny Part
It's late and Al's is closed, the garish neon sign off, the doorway lit only by the flashes from the airport beacon. Inside, the lights are out, the customers gone, the vegetables and fruits safe until tomorrow.
Xander sits alone in the dark, with a glass of some dark drink in front of him. Another glass sits opposite, empty, a steel mixing canister between. He refills his glass and drinks deeply. He just sits, stone-cold expressionless, his face revealing nothing of the inner storminess. The five-day forecast is for unsettled emotions to linger, deep valley fog in the mornings.
The flashes from the beacon filter into the room through the windows, creating a surreal atmosphere as Giles comes in. He walks over and stands uncertainly by Xander, watching him a few moments before speaking.
"Xander?" he asks.
No response.
"Xander!" again.
"Yeah?"
"Xander, aren't you going to bed?"
"Not right now."
Giles realizes Xander is in a very grim and morose (and unsettled) mood. He tries to lighten the mood as best he can, which is quite difficult for him; this is really a job for Lorne, but the singing demon who's sideline hobby is collecting and memorizing restaurant menus is off polishing his horns.
"Are you planning on going to bed in the near future?"
"No."
"Are you ever going to bed?"
"No."
Giles takes off his glasses to polish them because he's expected to at this point, "Well, right then, I'm not sleepy either."
Xander glances up at Giles, "Good, then have a drink," waving at the foul liquid in the mixing cannister.
"No, not me," he shudders, "It makes me ill just to read the menu."
"Then don't have a drink." Xander couldn't give a crap one way or the other.
"Xander, let's get out of here," he pleads.
"No. I'm waiting for her."
"Please, Xander. Let's go. There's nothing but trouble for you here."
"She's coming back. I know she's coming back."
"We'll take the car and drive all night. We'll get drunk - on real booze. We'll go fishing until she's gone."
"Shut up and go home, will ya'?"
"No, I'm staying here." and he sits down at the stool he usually uses, picks up the guitar and begins to play soft chords.
This time Xander initiates the dialog, "They grab Doyle and she walks in. Well that's the way it goes. One in, one out." He looks from Giles to the door, and back again.
"Giles?"
"Yes?"
"Giles, if it's December, 1941, in Casablanca, what time is it in New York?"
"1941? Xander, it's 2005!" He wonders if all the Twinkies Xander has ingested over the years have rotted the remains of Xander's mind. Lord knows he has little enough to spare.
Xander rambles on as if Giles had never spoken, "I'll bet they're asleep in New York. I'll bet they're asleep all over America. I'll bet they're even asleep in Pylea!" He pounds the table in anguish and buries his head in his hands, shoulders shaking. Then he looks up, eyes red, clearly fighting for control, as he's about to utter one of the greatest movie quotes of all time:
"Of all the juice bars, of all the towns, in all the world, she walks into mine."
He holds his head in his hands, convulsing with dry sobs.
Giles intelligently says nothing, just keeps on fooling with his instrument.
Xander suddenly demands, "What's that you're playing?"
"A rocking cover of Chattanooga Choo Choo."
"Well stop it! You know what I want to hear."
"No, I don't." trying to beg off.
"You played it for her and you can play it for me!" shouts Xander.
"Well, I don't think I can remember it."
"If she can stand it, I can. Play it!"
"Yes, Xander." As he begins to play an unseen backing orchestra joins in from out of nowhere, Giles and Xander look around frantically in confusion. "I hate when Sweet does that," they both mutter simultaneously.
Xander hears the music fade away as memories come flooding back to him, memories of those long-ago, carefree halcyon days in Sunnydale...
He sees all the ignorant kids of the high school entering under the main entrance archway. He remembers being scared spitless as Cordelia is 'driving' them through the woods to their spot. They are so far lost in each other, as they make out in the broom closet, that neither Rand nor McNally can help them.
In her room, she is arranging flowers at the window. Xander opens a can of chopped spinach, pours the juice into a second glass and adds a squeeze of lime. "Who are you? And what did you do before? What did you do and what did you think?" he asks, adding a dash of sea-salt to the concoction.
"We said 'no questions'," she reprimands him lightly.
He grins, hands a glass of the green fluid to her, and raises his own, "Here's looking at you, C."
They drink the juice, "Gah! Needs more salt!" her face twisting into a rictus of disgust.
They're in The Bronze, he and Cordelia are dancing, very much in love as the music plays.
On a different day, back in her room, she flips a coin and then tosses it to him, "A franc for your thoughts."
"Your vacation to the south of France is over, Cordy. We use pennies here, remember? I guess that's all they're worth."
"I'm willing to be overcharged. Tell me."
"I'm wondering..." he begins.
"Yes?"
"Why I'm so lucky. Why I got trapped in the basement with you, as if you were waiting for me to come along. And then, even after I betrayed you, you finally forgave me and took me back. Why - "
"Why there is no other man in my life?"
"Uh huh, I mean, you were pretty much a tramp. You'd go with any guy who had a buck to his name. And, ewww, Wesley!"
"That's easy. There was another. He's...gone," she says as a stricken expression overcomes her.
He is contrite, "I'm sorry for asking. I forgot we said 'No questions'."
"Well, only one answer can take care of all our questions." And they begin to kiss passionately, the Spinach-Lime Juice Squeeze forgotten.
It's daytime at the Espresso Pump, Xander and Cordelia are reading the future through a looking glass. No one knows what's to come, but they are frightened.
"Nothing can stop him now," says Xander. "The Mayor will be upon us, And then, in something totally unrelated, three years - four at the most - The First will be in Sunnydale, and it'll all go ka-blooey! Or maybe ker-plop. Or maybe kur-blammo, or possibly a ka-chunk. This looking glass is really not clear on the sound effect that ME will be able to afford by then."
"Xander, they'll find out your as-yet unknown ability to see, it won't be safe for you here!"
"I'm on their blacklist already, their role of honor," he answers in bemused confidence.
Later that evening, the night before Graduation, back at The Bronze, Xander steals some glasses from behind the bar and brings them over to Cordelia and Giles. Cordelia is unnerved, there's something on her mind. Xander is wry, but not cynical like he is in Africa. He pours for them.
"The bartender wants us to finish this bottle of Coke," Xander says wryly, "and then three more. He says he'll water his garden with Coca-Cola before he serves any to the Mayor and his minions."
"This sort of takes the sting out of being eaten by a snake, hey Xander?" comments an uncertain Giles, not really sure why he's in this flashback.
"You said it! Here's looking at you, C!"
Cordelia is falling apart, "With the whole world crumbling, we pick this time to fall in love."
"Yeah, pretty bad timing. Just when you've forgiven me and taken me back!. Where were you, say...ten years ago?"
"Ten years? Daddy was showing me brochures on all the latest BMW models. Said I should already know what option packages I want when I turned 16. And you?"
"Running from the clown at my birthday party," he cringes a bit.
Cordelia looks at him tenderly. They fall into each other's arms and kiss passionately, tongues battling for gold in Greco-Roman wrestling. Giles is busy polishing his glasses, shoes, cuff-links, tie pin, anything to keep his eyes off the young couple with their disgusting PDA.
Echoing booms suddenly rattle the rafters as they continue groping each other. She turns away, fearfully looking at the front entrance to The Bronze.
"Is that cannon-fire, or my heart pounding?"
Xander listens for a few more seconds. "Ah, I think that's the sound of the Mayor passing gas after eating those spider things. Fiber will do that to you. And from the sound of it, it looks like he ate a bushel full!" He chuckles as he picks up her glass of Coke. "Here, drink up. We'll never finish three before we have to fight him at the graduation ceremony."
Cordelia reacts badly. "The Mayor's minions will be here pretty soon! And they'll come looking for you, key soldier guy! There's a price on your head."
"Don't worry. They'll know where to find me."
"Strange. Sometimes it seems I know so very little about you."
"And I know very little about you. Just that you were already a snobbish prissy and greedy bitch by the time you were eight. And that those bad-boys," glancing down, "are real!"
"Be serious! You're in danger, and you must leave Sunnydale!"
"No, no, no, no. Screw my road-trip! We must leave Sunnydale!"
"Yes, of course, we - "
"The bus for Santa Barbara leaves at eight o'clock, right after the ceremony. I'll come by your apartment at seven-thirty."
She turns from him, unable to look him in the eye. "No! no, not my pathetic excuse for a home! I have things to do before I leave. I'll meet you at the station?"
"All right, at a quarter to eight." He gets a devilish gleam in his eye, "Say, why don't we get married in Santa Barbara?" he chuckles again.
"That's too far ahead to plan," she replies evasively.
He assumes a slightly downcast expression, "Yes, I guess that is a little too far ahead. Well, let's see..." His face lights up, "What about the bus driver? Why can't he marry us?"
She is in torment, "Oh, my gorgeous lame-o!" Suddenly she turns even further and starts to cry. He's still giggling at his bus driver idea and doesn't see her crying at first.
"Well, why not? The captain on a ship can. I doesn't seem fair that...Hey, hey, what's wrong, Cordy?" taking her in his arms.
She leans her head against his shoulder. "I love you so-o-o much! And I hate this constant fight against evil so much. Oh, it's a bizarro world and anything can happen." She pulls back a bit and looks up at him earnestly, "If you shouldn't get away, I mean if - if - if something should keep us apart, wherever they put you and wherever I'll be, I want you to know..." she falters, unable to go on. He pulls her in and kisses her gently on the forehead.
She is breathless, "Kiss me, Xander. Kiss me as if it were the last time."
He looks into her eyes and kisses her as if it were the last time.
The next day and they have defeated the Mayor!
At the the Sunnydale bus station, Xander is ready to leave with Cordelia, but she is nowhere in sight. As a result of strange weather brought on by the unexpected eclipse, it is raining very hard. The station is filled with frantic crowds who are still scared by the events earlier that day, and those unable to put up with the stench from the earlier spider eating incident. This will be last bus out until the next day. Xander puts his backpack down and looks at his watch. The driver calls out, "All aboard! Last bus, leaving in 3 minutes."
Xander is getting soaked, but he doesn't seem to notice as he nervously checks his watch again. Suddenly Giles appears. "Where is she? Have you seen her? And why are you coming with me? Remember, this is only a PG-13 fic, and no kinkiness will be tolerated! Now, if Jenny would get better and wanted to come along instead of you, well then maybe we could talk."
"Shut up, you prat! I've been fired, y'know, and I've always wanted to see Santa Barbara. And, no I didn't see her. She left her apartment, but this note came just after you left," as he holds out an envelope.
Xander grabs it from Giles, tears it open and reads.
Xander,
I cannot go with you, or ever see you again. I must go to LA. Do not ask why. Just believe that I love you. Go, my darling lameness, and may your days be filled with Twinkies.
C
the rain pours down, the drops smudging the letter.
The bus's horn blows.
Giles looks at Xander in worry, "Thats the last call, Xander. Do you hear me? Come on Xander, let's get you out of here. Come on, come on." Giles pushes a stunned and expressionless Xander aboard just as the bus starts to move. He stares back from the steps, then crumbles the letter and tosses it down.
The memories are so painful!
He thought they'd worked things out. He'd thought they could begin a normal life together after high school. But such was not to be. Instead, he came back a few weeks later to begin his big road trip. He needed to get away from all the places that reminded him of her. He eventually returned to Sunnydale to endure four long years, four years knowing that she went to LA without him, that she joined Angel and his gang.
Xander reaches for the glass on the table, his head down. He reaches for it and knocks it over. He is on an extreme sugar and caffeine high from a new concoction he's trying out, a Mango-Choco-Java-Brown- Sugar-and-Molasses-Mind-Bender.
Cordelia appears at the doorway. Xander merely stares, bug-eyed, as she comes over.
"Xander, I have to talk to you." She is uncertain, but determined.
"Oh, I saved my first drink to have with you, Here."
"No. No, Xander. Not tonight."
"Especially tonight!" he shouts.
She sits and looks into his impassive, expressionless, stoical face, one that he's been working on from an on-line course offered by he pours himself another draft from the steel cannister.
"Please," she begs.
"Why did you have to come to Casablanca! There are other places." he wails and bemoans.
"I wouldn't have come if I'd known you were here. Believe me, Xander it's true. I didn't know!"
"It's funny about your voice. How it didn't change. I can still hear it. "Xander, dear, I'll go with you any place. We'll get on a bus and never stop."
"Please don't. Don't, Xander. I can understand how your feel."
"Huh? You understand how I feel. How long was it we had, baby?" now angry, unable to maintain the First Position of the 'Oz Face' repertoire.
She can't meet his stare, "I didn't count the days."
"Well I did! Every one of them. Mostly I remember the last one. A wow finish! A guy standing in a bus station with a comical look on his face, because his insides had been kicked out."
He takes a big gulp, the sugar and caffeine making his body vibrate in the key of C#.
"Can I tell you a story, Xander?"
"Has it got a wow finish?"
"I don't know the finish yet."
"Well, go on, maybe one will come to you as you go along."
"It's about a snobby bit-cah who grew up in Sunnydale. At a party at a friend's house she meet someone. Someone who was even more of a pathetic loser than you, but had the potential to be a very great and courageous champion. He opened up for her a whole world of thoughts and ideas, new concepts in hair and hair products. She looked up to him and worshiped him with a feeling she supposed was love. And also, my Dad must have known about his impending finical situation and was trying to unload me on anyone who would take me."
"Yes, that's very pretty. I heard a story once. In fact, I've heard a lot of stories in my time. They went along with the sound of an electric organ playing in a funeral home, 'Mister, I met someone once when I was a kid,' it always begins. Huh. I guess neither one of our stories was very funny. Tell me, who was it you left me for? Was it Angel, or Doyle, or were there others in between? Or aren't you the kind who tells?"
Disgusted, Cordelia gets up and leaves in a swirl. Even more disgusted with himself, Xander slumps head first onto the table.
