Seeing Is Believing

Seeing is believing
I never thought I'd be here.
Is this really me?
Am I dreaming?

When you live the life I do, you ask questions. Stupid questions often, unanswerable questions mostly. Will this be the day my luck finally runs out on me? Will some of that evil running rampant in Sunnydale suddenly find my name on top of their to-do list? Will Buffy ever get over her soulful vampire kick and notice me at last? That kind. Not that much different from any other teenager. Except for the rampant evil maybe.

This one somehow never had the decency to rear its little head; will I ever find myself lying awake in the middle of the night with a stuffy, stammering, English-flag-up-his-butt, caring-beyond-healthy, boy-just-look-what-happens-when-you-push-the-right-buttons librarian slash Watcher in my arms.

How did we get here, Giles? Where did it start? For you? For me…

You laughed at my joke. I couldn't believe it. Will and Buffy were giving me that 'just ignore it, it's just Xander' look that I'm so used to by now I'd be stunned speechless if they didn't express it. Okay, speechless is a big word.

But you laughed. Not smiled. Laughed. You have such a wonderful laugh, Giles. I want to hear it more often.

It wasn't even that good a joke. And don't expect me to ever admit that.

The next time I saw you, you were crying.

Fucking Angel.

She's right, you know. I use Miss Calendar as an excuse to hate him and I don't feel the least bit guilty about it. She calls it convenient. I just call it right. He didn't just kill Miss Calendar. He hurt you. And I'm not talking about that torture-deal here, Giles, that's something I can't even think about without the need to toss the contents of my stomach. When we walked into your house and I could see the stage he'd set for you, my heart broke for your pain, like the shards of glass still lying on top of the stairs where they'd fallen out of your grasp. Every time I close my eyes, I see you standing there. And the look that must have been on your face.

He killed her. Snapping her neck like a little twig was the easy part. That can, in some twisted way, be forgiven. What followed never can. How sick and twisted do you have to be to put so much effort, such detail into this mental torture? Cruel is too kind a word for it.

You once said that Angelus lashed out at those who made him feel the most human. Is that the reason for what he put you through? Did discussing old texts, sharing knowledge, yours required through books, his through experience, make him feel part of the human race again? Buffy touched his heart, you touched his mind. That's it, isn't it?

Strange, how that big ol' yen of mine to see Angel get really brutally killed suddenly lost all it's urgency when I saw you lying there on your office floor. It would have been so easy to blame it on Buffy's big bad ex, get Faith to do a Robin Hood number with Angel's heart as bull's eye, but I just couldn't. I just wanted you safe. Nothing else mattered.

I ever tell you that he came to see Buffy in the hospital? Guess not, huh? I was shaking so hard it felt like Sunnydale'd been hit with an earthquake. You wanna know something really funny. He called me Buffy's White Knight. Said I was still in love with her. Guess I was. Guess I'll always be. She has that effect on people. You know that. I have no idea where I got the courage from, but I stood up to him. Shoved my face into his, stared him right in the eye and told him he'd die. And I was gonna be there. He just glared and I probably would have pissed my pants if I hadn't been too scared to remember how.

Buffy's White Knight, my rosy behind! Cordelia, bless her self-involved little heart, had one thing right. I'm the useless part of the group. The only thing I contribute is a target for everyone's derision. Oh yeah, and I fetch the donuts.

I can't decide what you smell like, Giles. I thought it was books, but maybe it's just knowledge. Does knowledge smell? Boy, Xander, you've really topped yourself in the silly questions department.

You laughed at my joke. Nobody laughs at my jokes!

Disappointment.

You get used to it after a while. The less people expect of you, the less you start to expect of yourself. A twisted version of living up to other people's expectations. It's easier all round. You start looking for the disappointment in people's eyes, almost disappointed yourself when you don't see it. The first time I saw disappointment in yours it hit me like a punch straight to my stomach. That coldness in your eyes when you hissed 'get out of my sight' hurt more than the blow Oz had just delivered to my jaw. Of course I deserved it. I'd just become so used to it, it never occurred to me that it could still cut so deep. Xander Harris, proving once again just what a screw-up he is.

Sorry. I know it upsets you when I do that. I'll try. That's all I can promise. To try. A crappy self-image isn't something that just vanishes overnight. No matter how incredible a night.

My father'd have a field day if he saw me now. 'I always knew it, you pansy'. I can almost hear him say it. Almost. Isn't that a start, Giles? There was a time when I wouldn't only have heard him, I'd have seen him standing there large as life looking down at us.

You need a licence to keep a pet but any stupid bastard can have kids. Doesn't seem right somehow.

I once accused Buffy of being Watcher's pet, didn't I? Does that make me Watcher's pet now? Or just being petted by the Watcher? Ok, I'm back to the silly questions so this isn't going in the right direction.

Do you know your hair's thinning?

Why do you always do that, Xander? I don't know. It's always been that way. Change the subject when the subject gets too painful. Make fun of yourself before somebody else does, it takes the sting out of it. Also sends your self-esteem hurtling in the wrong direction, but what's a little thing like that compared to public humiliation, right?

The more you deny something, the more you confirm it, isn't that how it works? Maybe it's time for Larry to send out those tasteful announcements after all.

You stir. Did my giggles wake you, Giles? I'm sorry. I'm just lying here with my arms around you, thinking silly random thoughts. I'm just a stupid kid, Giles. You'll have to teach me stuff. The last time I held someone in my arms like this, I found myself on the other side of the door in my boxer shorts, clutching my clothes. Or flat on my back with her hands around my neck trying to strangle me. At least I can say I bring out the worst in people.

God, don't let me screw this up. You matter too much to me, Giles. If I lost your friendship on top of everybody else's, I think I might lose it. I put myself completely in your hands. And yes, pun most definitely intended.
 
 

He's young, very young,
But appealing...
I feel I know him.
Seeing is believing
And I like what I see here
I like where I am
What I'm feeling

I've got a sneaky suspicion that the Watcher Council might frown on this. Not to mention the school board. Let's not leave out about ninety percent of the Sunnydale community.

"We're sensitive to wrong touching", Principal Flutie said the first day I arrived at Sunnydale High. My first instinct had been to reply, "I'm British. What's touching?'" I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark and assume that this would be considered as wrong touching.

You have the most beautiful eyes, Xander. You're hiding such a bright mind behind them and hiding it so well that even I needed some time to find it.

Do you know how easy you make it for everybody to underestimate you? Sometimes I'm overcome with the urge to grab your shoulders and simply yank you in a straight position. Your whole body language screams failure. And that's the whole look you're going for, isn't it? Yes, even I've been guilty of jumping to that misconception. But you make it too bloody easy, luv.

You came to the library to check out a book on mathematics and you made such an impression on me that I'd completely forgotten you were still back there in the stacks when I chewed Buffy out for her cavalier approach to her sacred duty. It's our prime directive. The Slayer's identity must be kept secret at all cost. Yes, of course, excellent Watching, Mr. Giles. Your first day on the job and you've already blown the girl's cover.

I had to take my medicine like a man, which I'll have you know wasn't easy. There definitely isn't a chapter in the Watcher handbook covering Slayerettes. Improvisation suddenly became my most trusted companion. Like I told Quentin, the Council sits around theorizing and chattering, but I'm the one in the thick of it. Was the one...

If I could do it all over again... I probably wouldn't change a thing. I believed in what I did, still do. But that it almost cost Buffy her life is something I'll never forgive myself. It only seems right that I should be relieved of my duties as her Watcher, not for disobeying the Council's orders, but for putting my Slayer in jeopardy.

Quentin told me I feel a fatherly love for my Slayer. Maybe he's right. I've never had children, so I have no frame of reference. But I do know one thing, if parental love is anything resembling the rubbish you have to put up from your parents, or Willow from hers, I don't want any part of it.

You think you have a crush on Buffy, Xander? Wrong, luv. It's an obsession. You cling to your self-righteous hatred for Angel - and I have to tell you that your insults are sometimes so imaginative that I have to bite the inside of my cheek not to smile - with such an irrational tenacity. That is not infatuation. It's obsession.

True, my heart's not exactly overflowing with tender feelings for the man either, but then my reasons are a little more personal than yours. I may live to be a hundred, but I don't think I'll ever be able to think of Jenny without this burning ache of guilt. Buffy decided Jenny needed to be punished for her part in the Angel-turned-bad debacle and it was easier for me to choose Buffy's side on the self-righteous camp than to make a stand for myself. Maybe if I had, Jenny would still be here.

No, down that road lies madness. And I've gazed into the face of insanity, an experience I'd rather not repeat if at all possible.

"You're not real. It's a trick. They get inside my head, make me see things I want."

"Then why would they make you see me, Giles?"

Was that when I started paying closer attention? Well, as much as I could allow without being noticed. You're too used to being ignored, you immediately sense it when somebody takes notice of you. It's like this sixth sense you've developed.

Maybe you've even got a seventh.

One of the most devastating moments of my life was when you burst into my house with the message that there was a problem with Buffy. The words "Timing is everything, Xander" would have been uttered if Gwendolyn Post hadn't been smiling so smugly at me, but I'm sure you could read the irritation in my expression. But you knew what the news that Angel was back and that Buffy'd been deliberately hiding him from us would do to me. I don't think you were even aware of it, but your hand touched my arm, as if in silent support. It was there for just a fraction of a moment, but I've got a feeling you knew exactly what it would mean to me.

You always knew that. A quick stroke down my back, even though you were in as bad a shape as we all were when we found out that Willow was still our sweet, living Willow and not the vamp you and Buffy had encountered at the Bronze. Sometimes I wonder if you crave that touch as much as I do.

There's one moment though that redefined all of those instances. I was just regaining consciousness when you and Faith came running into the library, going straight for the weapons. You probably wouldn't even have seen me if I hadn't groaned very heroically. You dropped everything, even your hatred for Angel. Your voice had never sounded so sweet, choked up and breaking apart with worry. But what stands out in my memory, or I should say, is seared into my memory, is the touch of your hand on my cheek. It was the most intimate touch we'd ever shared. And I couldn't help but start craving for more.

And now here you are. Your mouth tastes as sweet as I knew it would. Your naked body feels as good against mine as those fleeting comforting touches on my arm always did. It's perhaps a blessing that Flutie got eaten. He would definitely not approve.

You giggle into my neck, and the combination of the sound and the exhalation of breath against my skin makes me squirm in your arms. I thought you were asleep. Have you been lying here like me, thinking these ridiculously random thoughts.

Now you hold your breath, feeling me stir. I turn in your arms, needing to look at you. Your eyes are huge, such insecurity shining in its dark depths. Don't do that, Xander. Don't keep doubting yourself like this. Let me take that insecurity out of your eyes forever. And I know just how...
 

Seeing is believing
My life is just beginning
We touched
And my head won't stop spinning
From winning
Your love