History

by nwhepcat

It's a gorgeous day to be visiting the dead.

Not anyone Xander knows -- they're all back in Sunnydale, buried now in a common grave. This is one of the cemeteries he's been patrolling with Jenny. He's been promising her a daylight excursion to the Civil War-era section.

Change is in the air, in any number of ways. The day is crisp and clear, the sky a blue that seems to go on forever. The grove of trees bordering the western section of the graveyard has gone to fiery reds and golds, and the air smells different. Xander finally gets why people rhapsodize about this fall business.

There's more change ahead. He's been having dreams. Not only the virtual reality visions he drops into when he sleeps, but more fragmented, confusing jumbles of images -- real dreams, in other words. He's not getting a lot of rest these nights.

There's another slayer coming into his life -- he just doesn't know when.

Seemed like this would be a good time to spend a day with Jenny, get them both a little readier for whatever's next.

Willow's come along too, mostly for the Grimaldis' sake, to dispel any weird Neverland vibe. He'd originally asked Faith, but she thinks the cemetery's boring enough at night when there's a chance of a fight with a newly-risen vamp. It's been a while since he's had any quality Willow time, so he's glad to have her here. She's been quiet, though. Thinking of Tara, he's sure. After the three exchange a few comments about the peaceful setting and beautiful day, Will says, "I'm going to wander up this way." She heads into a newer section, one where the new slayers find a lot of reluctant customers for the service they provide.

Xander and Jenny walk on in silence, until Jenny finally speaks. "I'd kind of forgotten how this kind of day feels." She hunches into her jacket, sticks her hands in the pockets, even though it's not quite that cold. "Something's coming. Something else is going."

"I know. It's an entirely new feeling for me." He picks up a small stone from the path, slips it into his pocket. "Which do you feel more, the coming or the going?"

"Right now, right here, the going. Cause, you know, the angels and the lambs." She's referring to the old section they're headed toward, dotted with smaller headstones and age-discolored statues. "But I'm kind of excited about having a winter again." Jenny picks up a fist-sized rock, offers it to him. "This'll do more good in a fight than the one you grabbed."

"Oh, no, that's not why I picked it up. It's just a habit. There's a Jewish tradition I learned from Willow, that when you visit a grave, you leave a pebble on the headstone. I guess as a way of saying you were there, that you think of the person."

"That's nice." She carefully places the rock beside a bench, picks up a smaller one. "I'll do that too."

"Something's coming, too, if I'm right," he tells her. "Another slayer."

"You found her in the newspaper?"

"Not this time. I've had some dreams."

"Oh," Jenny says. She sounds a little taken aback, knowing dreams didn't lead him to her.

"I think she lives someplace I'm not gonna see in the papers."

"Where is she?"

"I don't know yet. I saw the ocean. Stilt houses in a bay, but in a city. Jungle, too. I heard the name -- I guess it's a name -- Sanguma. Maybe Giles and Willow can narrow this down for me."

"Wow. She sounds like she'll be really different." He picks up on a thread of anxiety in her voice.

"Maybe. But she'll also be a slayer."

She nods. "Once we figure out where she's from we should think of ways to make her feel at home. Fix the food she's used to or something."

"That's a great idea," he says.

"If you don't care, I'm going up to see the lambs." Alone, she means.

"Sure. I'll be wandering around close by."

She cuts across the grass toward a tall statue of an angel. In the unaccustomed daylight he sees it's marked with streaks of black running down its surface like tears. Xander chooses a direction at random and browses the headstones with little interest, much as he used to trail Anya through any clothing store that wasn't Victoria's Secret.

Faith's not so much with the joined-at-the-hip mall experience. He suspects she has as little patience for shopping as he does. She needs things, she sets off, she comes back with things. Not that she doesn't model her new stuff for him (if that's the name you want to give teasing the living crap out of him before shucking back out of them and getting down to the wild thing). She just doesn't drag him through the whole hunting-and-gathering business. She's the perfect wife that way. Who would've guessed it?

Who would've guessed any of it? It's generally not what you think when someone's in the process of trying to murder you: There's the girl I'm going to marry one day. When he stops and thinks about it -- thinks about the last year or so -- it just about blows the top of his head off. Living in a whole new part of the country, after twenty-three years in the same little town. Visions ricocheting around inside his head, after all these years of wishing he weren't the only average-guy Scooby. A Watcher, Giles's protege, for god's sake, after all those teeth-grinding exhibitions of exasperation.

A married man, after --

After that cluster-fuck of a wedding. He realizes he'd hoped Anya would find someone she could marry and have everything she'd been longing for. The adoring husband, the white picket fence, 2.5 kids running up a pre-school bill roughly equivalent to the program budget of the first moon walk. Fast forward to grandkids, RVing to every corny tourist attraction in North America, eating the early bird special at Bob Evans once a week. The whole average-American package he and Faith are probably not going to have.

Because she deserved it.

Because -- admit it, you selfish shit -- he'd be off the hook if some other guy came along and made her happy.

Now that's never going to happen, and he'll never have proof that he did the right thing when he walked away from the church. He knows he went about it the wrong way, but he'd always hoped he'd be sure someday --

Now he's married and happy and Anya is dead and he'll always wonder if the pain he put her through was just cruel and useless stupidity.

He stops in front of a stone with the epitaph BELOVED WIFE. Grief pierces him, an unexpected spear in the heart. Xander sinks to his knees on the soft grass. "Dammit, Ahn, I wish --"

He has never been able to finish that sentence. Not since he first met Anya.

"I'm sorry." No problem getting that out. It's been his mantra for years.

He lets himself miss her, and he can't believe how much he does. It's been five months and he's got Faith now, but she's not a replacement, she's her own person. He can love her and still miss Anya because they occupy different parts of his heart and his mind.

He gives in to it, but only so far. After a while he decides he'd better at least locate Jenny. He rises, brushing off his jeans, and places his pebble on the stranger's headstone. As he cuts across the grass toward the path, Xander passes a bench on his blind side. Someone's there, a woman, and he nods a silent greeting and keeps moving, not wanting to intrude.

"She'd be pleased to know you still miss her," the woman says to his back. "And I think she'd be glad you found somebody."

Unfuckingbelievable. Goddamn reality TV makes people think everyone's life is up for comment. He turns a glare on the woman. She meets his eyes without self-consciousness, her own a dark blue like he's never --

Like earth from space.

He feels like he's known her from --

She offers a small smile. "Go ahead. It's all there."

And suddenly it is, everything. "Vaughnie." As she stands and moves toward him, everything is familiar -- her walk, her unbelievably light blonde hair. She hasn't changed much, just enough that she's kept pace with him. She looks twenty three, not eighteen.

"Xander." She keeps coming toward him, and an embrace seems the most natural thing in the world. "I was so sorry when I heard about Anyanka," she whispers. Heard which thing, he wonders -- her second defection from the demon ranks, or her death? She pulls back, looks at him. He could swear there are tears shimmering in her eyes. "You guys got to be kind of a legend, you know that? Not where D'Hoffryn could hear, of course. I never told anybody about the time we spent, but it was kind of secretly thrilling when you got so famous."

Famous? He can't quite take that in. He tries instead to think of the last time Vaughnie crossed his mind, and he can't. Sometime in that first year after high school, her memory had faded as he'd gotten busy with Anya and adjusting to the new edition of Scooby life.

Vaughnie puts a hand to his face. "Don't worry. All that was cloaked, that's the way it works. Even if you make a wish, a week or two later, the whole encounter is pretty much lost to the mists." She strokes the left side of his face, pushes his hair back from his eye. "I've still got a wish with your name on it," she says softly. "Who did this? Who killed Anyanka?"

"They're gone. It's all right, it's already done."

"You could wish for--"

Xander touches his fingertips to her lips, his heart hammering. God, to be whole again. Or to have the visions fall away, have some peace at night. But what else would it change? Would he still have Faith? Or Jenny? Would it leave this new girl stranded in whatever wild place she's living now? Would he even be alive?

He remembers Anya at the prom, chattering happily about the world Cordelia's wish had created -- which had been about the last thing that Cordy'd done.

"No," he says gently. "Thanks for the offer, but I'm not sure the trade would be worth it."

He sees in Vaughnie's face how much she wants to change his mind, and he believes there's nothing malicious in it. Still, he won't risk losing what he's got. "But I'm glad I got to see you again --"

"A.L." Jenny's voice is puzzled, curious as hell as she crosses the last couple of rows of graves to reach him. How much did she see? "What's up?"

"Don't --" He shows her his palm, the cop hand. "Don't say anything."

"But--"

"I mean it," he says sharply. "You don't know --"

"It's okay," Vaughnie says. "It's not her turn." She extends her arm toward him, not touching him although she could do so easily. "I am for you, James T. Kirk," she intones.

The surprise pulls a honk of laughter from him. "Lee Meriwether," he says, astonished. "That Which Survives." For about five days of that summer, he'd thought Vaughnie was his perfect woman, and now he remembers why.

She grins now, pleased with herself. "I was right about you, y'know. Big destiny and all. You've done all right for yourself."

"Yeah. I guess so."

"This the wife?"

Xander turns and there's Willow approaching, her puzzled expression all bookend-y with Jenny's as she reaches them. "No, this is Willow." He's much less reluctant to offer up names now. "She's one of my --"

"Oh my god. Willow. I heard so much about you. Vaughnie." She offers her delicate little hand.

"Oh. And I, um, heard exactly zero about you." Will shoots Xander a look.

"Oh, this was a long time ago. Right after high school. Xander was doing that summer road trip."

"Oxnard," he says brightly. "And, uh, this is Jenny. My student. And I guess it's time we got back so she can write up this field trip report." Jenny and Will say their goodbyes and start down the path.

Vaughnie catches his left hand in hers. "I've gotta run too. Duty calls." She fingers the gold ring. "You happy?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I am."

"Well, then. You have no need of my services." She draws close for a brief peck by the corner of his mouth. "Try and stay that way."

"I will, Vaughnie."

She releases his hand and takes a couple of steps backward as he turns to go with Jenny and Willow. Jen starts talking about the old gravestones as they amble down the path. He wonders why they have such a hold on her imagination.

When they reach the car, he turns back for another look at the autumn-burnished leaves. There's a mist settling at the edges of the grove, and the only other person he sees is some woman in black with pale blonde hair.