“It was . . . I don’t know,” she said. “I felt . . . like not talking.”
“I understand,” Buffy told her, and Willow figured she did. After Buffy had been killed by the vampire known as the Master, she had bottled up her feelings for a long time. All her fear and frustration had poured out in a long crying session in Angel’s arms.
“Listen, I hate to do this,” Buffy said, grimacing, “but it’s almost time for class, and I promised to check in with Giles before first period. Will, are you going to be okay?”
“Sure, Buffy,” she said in a small voice. “Go on ahead.”
Buffy looked unhappy about leaving Willow, which touched Willow deeply. She had never had a friend like Buffy. Buffy was brave, and strong, and no dumb mugger would ever take her down . . .
“Aw, c’mon, Rosenberg,” Xander said, as a tear trickled down her cheek. He pulled her against his chest, kissed her on the top of her head. “It’s okay.”
“No. It’s not. Because this kind of stuff is going to keep happening to me,” Willow said, letting the tears flow as Buffy disappeared into the building. “I’m useless, Xander. A liability. Half the time Buffy has to risk her life to save me, and—”
“—and the other half, she has to save me,” Xander finished, trying to get her to meet his eyes.
Willow was miserable. For so long, she had wanted Xander to hold her, and now he was just being nice. Just pitying her. He would never pity Buffy.
“Maybe you should ask her for some fighting tips.”
“Huh?” Willow sniffled. “I could never be like Buffy. I see those vampire guys and I totally freak out. I hate being Velma.”
“Come on!” Xander protested. “Velma’s the coolest! The smart chick always saves the day—as long as she doesn’t lose her glasses. Hey, look, at least you’re not Daphne. Now Daphne was useless.”
“So who’s Daphne?” Willow asked, allowing herself a small smile at Xander’s waxing philosophical about Scooby-Doo.
“Please!” Xander snapped. “Cordy, of course. What, you thought I was Daphne? See, I figure Angel and Buffy are Shag and Scoob. Giles is Freddy.”
“So who are you?” Willow asked, shaking her head in confusion.
“Me?” Xander asked, then his eyes dropped and a deep sadness came over his face. “I’m afraid I’m not even first string, Will. To my everlasting shame, I’m . . .”
He took a deep breath.
“I’m Scrappy-Doo.”
Willow started to smile, just a little, but it felt good. Then Xander stood, held up his right fist and shouted, “Puppy Power!” and Willow laughed so hard that the pain of her injuries came back full force. A few more tears slipped down her cheek, from a combination of amusement and discomfort.
“Ah, Will . . .” Xander murmured.
“Hey, hi,” a voice said.
Hastily Willow dried her tears and looked up. It was her boyfriend, Oz. He was a senior at Sunnydale High, and his band, Dingoes Ate My Baby, played a lot down at the Bronze. He also happened to be a werewolf.
Willow saw the concern in Oz’s eyes and it cheered her up a bit.
“What happened to you?” he blurted.
“I fell,” Willow said quickly, mentally begging Xander not to contradict her. She was embarrassed about not having been able to defend herself. Actually, not even trying to defend herself. But the Scooby Gang knew about that part. “I was doing a chore—a chore of housework—I was painting the house—which is a chore—and I fell off the ladder.”
“Whoa. Bummer,” Oz replied, nodding sagely. “Painting the house, though. That’s impressive.” He took her backpack from beside her feet. “C’mon. The bell’s going to ring. I’ll carry your stuff for you.”
“Okay.” A bit unsteady, she stood up. She looked uncertainly at Xander, who was smiling faintly like a big brother, nodding his approval. Even though she really liked Oz, part of her still wished Xander would get jealous. Maybe he even was jealous, in a way. But only because they were so close, Willow knew. Not because Xander felt anything . . . anything romantic for her. Not like he did for Buffy.
But Oz didn’t lust after Buffy. Nope. He seemed to like Willow just fine. And he was pretty cute . . .
The three of them entered the school and started down the hall.
* * *
“Oh, my God, Willow, what happened?” Cordelia piped. She was flanked by two of her Cordette wanna-bes, who stood just so, smirked just so, and were just . . . not. It was kind of sad, really, to want to be someone else so badly, or so Xander thought. Of course, there had been many moments in his life when he had wanted to be someone else: someone suave, someone rich . . . someone with a car.
Also, someone Buffy would seriously adore. As long as he didn’t have to be Angel. ’Cause, y’know, being dead had to kinda suck. No pun.
“Good morning, Mistress Cordelia,” Xander intoned, extra politely, as if they had not spent an hour this morning being more than polite to each other. It was their shtick around the Cordettes, not being a cute couple, so that she wouldn’t lose her hard-won status as a stuck-up snob.
He looked hard at Cordelia, trying to ESP her a message: Don’t you dare be mean to Willow.
“Did you fall off your trike, or is this just some tiresome bid for sympathy?” Cordelia asked, gesturing to Willow’s face and arm.
“Don’t,” Xander said, and Cordelia looked mildly shocked.
“Or were you trying to use a new masque, and . . .” She frowned at Xander. “What?”
“I know your species culls the weak and the aged,” Xander said, “but they obviously don’t have any rules about the thick-as-a-brick. Willow’s off-limits today, Brunhilde.”
“Well, I was just, I . . .” Cordelia clamped her mouth shut.
“You were just on your way to the library with us,” Xander said meaningfully, “to check the calendar for special gatherings of the crazed and possessed.”
“Are you speaking English?” one of the Cordettes asked, sneering.
“It doesn’t matter,” Xander told her. “I’m talking Cordy’s language. Am I not?”
Cordelia gave her hair a toss. Clearly, she had recovered from the momentary shock of someone pushing her off her venom-powered steamroller. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t have time for your weirdness. The buses are leaving for the museum in five minutes.”
Xander thought a moment. “Oh, the field trip!” In all the worry over Willow, he had completely forgotten about their break for freedom. “What a sweet surprise on a Monday morning!”
“Especially for Buffy,” Willow concurred, cheering a little. “If we pay extra specially close attention to the exhibits, so we’re late getting back, then Miss Hannigan will have to postpone the math test.”
“Oh, good heavens, I see what you mean,” Giles said to Buffy as they approached Xander, Willow, and Cordelia. “Poor Willow.”
“You were supposed to give her a ride home,” Buffy snapped at him.
“Oh, dear.” He was stricken. Giles was good at big-time guilt. Maybe it was a British thing. “She was so insistent about other arrangements . . .”
“Being insistent never does me any good around you,” Buffy huffed.
“So, Giles, Buffy. Field trip,” Xander said, as they approached.
“That’s right!” Buffy clapped her hands. “I’m saved.” She thought a minute. “Am I saved? How long is this field trip?”
“I think it will be long enough,” Xander said with a wink.
“Yes. Quite. There will be a lot to see, from what I’ve read of the exhibit catalog,” Giles said, and gestured for them to keep moving.
“You can buy the exhibits?” Cordelia asked.
“On your mark. Get set,” Xander said.
“No. The catalog merely describes the exhibits. I’ve been anticipating this for months, actually. It’s a traveling exhibition about the art and culture of ancient Japan.” Giles smiled excitedly. “Such a rich and varied history.”
“History.”
Buffy grimaced. “Oh, joy.”
“I believe you’ll find it a nice change of pace,” Giles insisted. “For all of you.”
“Yeah, uh-huh. Reading little plaques about a bunch of old stuff.” Buffy yawned. “Wake me up when it’s over.”
“I just had a thought,” Xander said. “Wait, where’d it . . . ah, there it is! Seems to me that a museum of that size would have a large number of closets.”
“God, you never stop, do you?” Cordelia sighed.
“Me an’ that bunny,” Xander agreed.
They all started for the exit, where the bus was waiting.
“So,” Cordelia said to Xander. “Lots of closets?”
CHAPTER 2
The museum was one of the things Sunnydale’s mayor always crowed about; one of the things he claimed made Sunnydale more than just another Southern California paradise.
However, none of the truly unique things about a town whose original Spanish settlers called Boca del Infierno—the Hellmouth—seemed to make it into the tourist brochures the Chamber of Commerce kept putting out.
Yet, somehow, even with a decent museum and a picturesque downtown that looked like something Spielberg stole from Frank Capra, tourists managed to bypass Sunnydale for the most part. Lucky them, Buffy thought. She and her mom hadn’t just visited . . . they’d moved here!
The exception to the tourist rule seemed to be when an upscale exhibit came to the Sunnydale Museum of Art and Culture, or the Sunnydale Drama Society put on a decent play. There were art galleries—like her mother’s—and an annual Renaissance Faire and a whole host of other things for the aging Baby Boomers to do. But for teens, the ultimate consumers?
Nada.
Or at least so close to nada that it didn’t matter. The Bronze could get boring if you went there every night. At least, Buffy thought so. But when you’d lived in L.A., it was hard to imagine having to cross into the next town just to go to a movie made this year. Sunnydale was no L.A. It wasn’t even L.A.’s little sister.
As the bus pulled into the museum’s parking lot, Buffy sighed and let her head rest against the window.
“Suddenly, I’d rather be Slaying,” she muttered to herself.
And that was saying something.
“Hey, hey!” Xander said. “What’s this I see?”
Buffy glanced up at that familiar, goofy grin, and couldn’t help but smile in return. Xander had turned around in his seat and was looking down on Buffy and Willow, waving a finger in their faces like a stern parent.
“I don’t recall giving permission for glum faces today,” Xander chided. “Okay, so the museum is not the coolest place to be visiting on a Monday morning. Okay, so on our last merry outing to these hallowed halls of pots and pans, we ran into a particularly attractive and exotic young lady who had a . . . all right, I confess, she had a thing for me.” He smiled modestly and touched his chest.
“And turned out to be an ancient Incan mummy, and sure, I was way too young for her,” he added.
Xander tilted his head to one side, leaned over the back of his seat so his face was only a foot away from Willow and Buffy. His smile was manic, impossibly wide.
“But think of the hideous alternative to this trip.” His eyes flicked toward Buffy. “Maaaaath teeeest!” he moaned in a ghostly voice.
“Mister Harris!” a voice snapped from the front of the bus. “Do you mind?”
“Ah,” Xander sighed, an apologetic expression on his face. “The Professor has spoken. I must behave. Or die trying.” He spun and sat down in his seat.
Buffy looked at Willow and grinned. “Mister Harris!” she mimicked.
Willow covered her mouth to hide her smile. Buffy was relieved. Will had been on a major blues trip all morning. Not that she could be blamed. The extreme number of muggings in this burg was another aspect of Sunnydale that never got much press.
“Did a little research for ya last night,” Willow said under her breath.
“The über-scholar,” Buffy replied.
They were riffing off Mr. Morse, the teacher who’d yelled at Xander. Buffy’s usual history teacher was out on medical leave. Nobody knew exactly what was wrong with her, but of course, all the really good gossip ran toward the loony bin angle. For the past several weeks, they’d had to put up with Mr. Morse instead.
He was a little, bespectacled guy with a comb-over that did more to accent his increasing baldness than disguise it. Mr. Morse obviously thought that most of his students were morons, and didn’t do much to hide his opinion. He began each history class session by plopping a huge stack of books on his desk and announcing, “I did a little research for ya last night” as if it had been a major favor and weren’t they so totally fortunate to have him for a teacher.
Uh-huh.
On the other hand, Xander was right. The alternative to the museum caper was even nastier than said caper. Miss Hannigan might be nicer, but Buffy would take a Carnival Cruise with Mr. Morse if it meant missing a math test.
Okay, well, maybe not. But the museum wasn’t half bad in comparison.
The bus screeched to a stop and Buffy followed Willow as they filed off. She glanced up and saw Giles, who gave her the patented Giles earnest nod as he helped Morse shepherd the wayward students toward the museum’s entrance. As Buffy and Willow passed, Giles put a protective hand on Willow’s shoulder. Buffy felt a sudden rush of affection for the proper British librarian. For her Watcher.
Buffy rarely gave him credit for all he’d done for her. Mostly, in fact, she gave him grief. But Giles had taught her a great deal, enough to keep her alive—most nights. Buffy smiled at him. She wouldn’t want anyone else in her corner when it came down to the last round.
She only wished it didn’t come down to the last round quite so often.
* * *
“Y’know, this place is actually pretty cool,” Buffy admitted, glancing around as they walked through the museum. She scanned the ancient artifacts and weaponry from cultures throughout history and across the world as they passed from one exhibit to the next. “I just don’t know how they manage to get all this stuff. I mean, the zoo has a few hyenas, and one saggy old grizzly, and that’s about it. But this place is almost as good as the one we used to go field-tripping to back in L.A.”
“Yeah,” Xander agreed, “Sunnydale is just like L.A. Without the celebrities, the movie studios, the chic eateries, the attitude, the incredibly gorgeous females . . .”
Willow and Buffy glared at him.
“. . . who are so completely unreal. Plastic. Horrible creatures, really,” he said quickly.
“Are you brain-dead, as if I have to ask?” Cordelia chimed in as she caught up with them. “L.A. rocks.”
“Ah, speak of the mannequin, and she appears,” Xander snapped.
Buffy shook her head. Ever since Xander and Cordy had started sneaking off to grope together in the shadows, she’d been expecting them to act all couply. But they were just as vicious with one another as ever. Maybe more so, at times. Ah, love.
“Actually,” Willow said softly, “we’re pretty fortunate to have such an excellent museum. This place is world-class. Sometimes we get exhibits on tour that don’t even stop in L.A.”
“See, now that’s what I don’t get,” Buffy replied. “I’m asking, why? What’s so special about Sunnydale?”
“You’re asking us?” Cordelia said, staring at her in disbelief.
“Definitely the nightlife,” Xander volunteered.
Buffy just gave him the Jack Nicholson eyebrow, and he shot back with puppy-dog eyes and an I-can’t-help-it shrug.
“Which nightlife are you talking about?” Willow asked, and glanced knowingly at Cordelia.
“Oh, please!” Cordy sneered. “Can’t you people just cold shower for thirty seconds?”
“Yeah,” Xander said, making a show of siding with Cordelia. “You people are so smut-oriented. I was referring to the ever-popular, much-anticipated Curse of the Rat-People Night. Wasn’t that what you wer
e referring to, Cor? The specialness of this very special little town?”
Cordelia seethed in silence.
“Seriously, Willow,” Xander continued, “why does Sunnydale rate?”
“The best and most common of reasons,” Willow replied. “Money. The museum’s endowment is huge. Apparently a lot of rich people come from Sunnydale, and even the ones who leave are generous enough.”
“And no doubt sold their souls for those generous riches,” Xander said. “Like those frat boys who almost fed Buffy and Cordelia to their worm-monster god-guy last year.”
He smiled brightly at Buffy. “Just think, there are probably several more secret organizations you’ll have to bust up to save all the town’s virgins—and other people—from certain death.”
“Let’s hope not,” Buffy sighed, then noticed that Cordelia’s cheeks were turning pink.
“And we move on,” Xander suggested.
They passed into the visiting exhibition hall, which was a labyrinth of rooms filled with art and artifacts from ancient Japan. Almost immediately, Buffy became fascinated, despite her earlier grumbling. The culture of ancient Japan was so different from Western culture of the period, and even more so from the Western world of modern times.
In the second room, they came upon Giles examining what appeared to be a tiny plastic garden.
“Ah, there you all are,” he said, as though he’d been desperately searching for them. “Isn’t this a marvelous exhibit?”
“Maybe not the word I would have picked, but it’s pretty cool, yeah,” Buffy admitted, joining him in craning over a miniature curved bridge and tiny evergreen trees. “What is it?”
“Hmm?” Giles hmmed, then glanced back down at the tiny garden. “Oh, right. Quite impressive, actually. It seems that Sunnydale was, at one time or another, the sister city of Kobe, Japan.”
“Wait, isn’t that where they had that big earthquake?” Xander asked.
“Indeed.”
“Wow, that’s a weird coincidence,” Willow said. “I mean, with us having our earthquake and all.”
“My thinking precisely. That parallel is what has captivated me,” Giles explained, pushing up his glasses in his Giles-is-thinking way. “You see, I’m not entirely certain it was a coincidence.”
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