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New All Over, Part Three
“Giles, where the hell have you been?”
Giles stopped in his tracks as he stepped into the Library and was confronted by a furious Buffy, still with the phone in her hand. Willow was standing next to her also looking most uncharacteristically cross. Oz gave Giles a rueful ‘you’re in it now and I can’t help you’ grimace while Xander just shook his head.
“Boy, are you in trouble....” he observed.
Buffy slammed the phone back down onto the handset. “Big trouble.”
Giles gently eased Wesley into the room so the doors could swing closed behind him, the little boy gazing up at him with big scared eyes. “They’re not cross with you,” Giles assured him.
“Wesley...!” Buffy threw herself across the room and scooped the little boy into her arms, giving Giles another glare as she carried him over to the Library table. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?” She sat him down on the table and began to gently pat him for injuries.
Wesley nodded up at her, wide-eyed. “I’m very well, thank you, Buffy.”
“Giles, how could you just take him off like that without leaving a note?” Willow demanded. “We didn’t know where you were. Buffy’s been going crazy. We sent Xander round to your house, but you weren’t there. We were calling and calling!”
Buffy glared at Giles. “If you’ve been making Wesley do stupid Watcher lessons....”
“We went to the park,” Wesley told her quickly, clearly worried about Giles getting into trouble. “Mr Giles bought me ice cream.”
Buffy looked slightly mollified although she was still stroking Wesley’s hair.
“I need to hug him,” Willow explained, putting her arms around the little boy and hugging him as gently as if he was made from crystal.
Wesley went bright red with happiness and gazed up at Willow in shy adoration.
“Would you like to introduce them to Cuthbert?” Giles suggested. The little boy was already blushing up to his ears, so he thought he could hardly blush any more.
Shyly, Wesley produced Cuthbert from the adult Wesley’s shoulder bag that he had insisted on slinging over his own diminutive body. As expected, at the killer combination of cute child shyly proffering very battered teddy bear, Willow practically melted. She took the teddy bear, made little squealing noises about his cuteness, then noticed the little Watcher bag with its contents and was entirely lost to all normal speech for at least a minute.
“Cuthbert is a very cool name for a bear,” Oz observed.
Wesley lit up once again at some praise and then lowered his head to hide how happy that had made him.
Buffy picked Wesley back up and deposited him on her lap, presumably so that Giles couldn’t make another dash for the hills with him. “You can’t have been at the park all afternoon...?” She felt Wesley’s forehead. “You weren’t there all day, were you? Because it was hot and you don’t have a hat and....”
“No, we just had ice cream and then we fed the ducks and then we had lunch in a Mac-Something place.” Wesley beamed up at her as Xander solemnly shook Cuthbert by the hand.
“Look at the teeny weeny holy water bottle!” Willow showed it to him.
Oz smiled at the contents of the bag along with Xander. “That is beyond cool,” Oz observed.
“Did you make this yourself?” Xander asked.
Wesley looked around casually. “I suppose so, but not yet. Maybe I did it when I went to boarding school.” He looked at Giles. “I did go to boarding school, didn’t I?”
“Yes, you did,” Giles assured him.
Wesley smiled. “Good. I was looking forward to that.”
They all exchanged a look while Giles thought grimly: I bet you were. It got you away from Daddy.
Buffy was still glaring at Giles. “You didn’t make him do lessons, did you? Because if you did I may have to do something we’ll both regret.”
Wesley looked up anxiously. “We went to a bookshop and Mr Giles bought me some books.”
“School books?” Buffy enquired.
“Reading-for-fun books.” Wesley struggled a bit over the ‘reading-for-fun’ idea; it was clearly a novel concept to him.
“Were they in English?” Willow pressed.
Wesley nodded, adding in surprise: “All of them.”
Giles met Buffy’s eye over Wesley’s head. “Apparently, he was only allowed to read Winnie the Pooh in Latin.”
“You look hungry to me, Wesley.” Xander examined him critically. “I think you need chocolate.”
“Chocolate?” Wesley looked shocked at the idea. “But it’s not my birthday.”
“Well, you’re in a different country now,” Xander explained. “With different customs and culture, so you need to join in with those different customs or you could risk offending the natives. Over here, small boys eat Snickers bars at regular intervals. Otherwise they can’t have the requisite sugar rush that makes them run around being very noisy and climbing on the furniture.” Xander held out his hands and Willow, Oz, and Buffy all contributed their change.
Wesley watched wide-eyed as Xander went off to feed the snack dispenser. “I’m not allowed to climb on the furniture.” He looked genuinely worried that that might be required of him. “And I’m not supposed to make any noise unless I have a question.”
Buffy gritted her teeth. “Because God forbid you should just get to talk like a normal child.”
Wesley looked downcast. “You don’t think I’m normal?”
Buffy looked into his eyes. “I think you’re adorable.” She pulled him into a hug, rocking him in her arms and then gazed up at Giles in renewed indignation. “How could you just run off with him like that? Didn’t you know we’d be worried sick?”
“I was actually thinking about Wesley.” He went to put the kettle on so as to avoid the reproachful eyes from Willow and Buffy. “I didn’t realize you were going to call out the Coast Guard because I decided to take him to the park.”
“And MacDonalds.” Oz gave Giles a sly look.
Giles couldn’t quite conceal a smile. “All right, and MacDonalds and a bookshop and a toyshop. But then we went back to Wesley’s apartment to collect a few of his things.”
“Back up…” Xander ordered imperiously, coming in with an armful of assorted unhealthy snack food which he dumped onto the table. “Did I hear the word ‘toyshop’ in there?”
“We may have paid a brief visit, yes.”
Xander turned to Wesley. “Did Uncle Giles buy you something in a toyshop, Wesley?”
Wesley looked at Giles. “Am I allowed to tell?”
Giles smiled. “Yes, Wesley.”
Wesley looked at Buffy. “You won’t be cross with him?”
Buffy narrowed her eyes. “That depends on whether or not he bought you a bunch of boring educational toys or if he bought you something…fun.”
“He spent rather a lot of money.” Wesley winced in anticipation of her wrath. “I told him not to.”
“You did.” Giles came out with the tea and handed it round. “You did your absolute best to stop me but I wouldn’t listen to reason.”
Xander looked at Giles sideways. “Giles, did you forget to be stuffy and British while in charge of a credit card?”
Giles sighed in mock regret. “I’m afraid I did.”
Xander jumped off the table and held out a hand. “Car keys. Me like toys. Me want to see toys. Me want to play with toys.”
As Xander ran off in the direction of Giles’ car, Wesley called after him diffidently: “You may need a...trolley...”
“‘Trolley’...? Like a shopping cart...?” Willow turned to Giles. “How crazy did you go?”
Giles shrugged. “I did miss twenty-six of Wesley’s birthdays.” He handed him his cup of weak, milky sweet tea and the boy accepted it gratefully.
Buffy accepted her tea from Giles. “I’m debating whether or not to start liking you again.”
“Oh, please like him, Buffy.” Wesley gazed up at her earnestly.
“Did you have fun?”
“Lots of...fun.” He did stumble slightly over that concept but there was no doubting his sincerity.
There was the crash of the double doors as Xander backed into the room, completely hidden behind a towering pile of boxes. Willow and Oz hurried to help him, plucked the smaller boxes from the top of the pile and helping him to put them down on the table.
Buffy looked at the boxes in disbelief. “You weren’t joking about forgetting to be stuffy, were you?”
“There’s more.” Xander beckoned to Oz and the two of them headed back to the car while Giles smiled smugly and sipped his tea and Willow gazed at the boxes.
“Oh, I always wanted one of these castles!” She turned to Wesley. “Are you going to open them?”
Wesley looked up at Giles. “May I…?”
“Of course.” Giles nodded his head. “Open all of them.”
By the time Xander and Oz returned with another pile of boxes and carrier bags, Buffy and Willow had cleared the table of all extraneous non-toy-related things and were starting to build the Fairytale castle.
“We are so going to besiege you.” Xander undid the box containing the enormous mediaeval castle while Oz picked Wesley up and sat him on their side of the table.
Oz whispered to Wesley: “If we’re building this castle, we get a better view of Willow than if we were right next to her.”
Wesley gave him a shy smile and whispered back: “She’s very pretty.”
Oz looked across at Willow who smiled at him. “I can only concur with that viewpoint.”
“I like her hair,” Wesley added in another whisper.
“Me too,” Oz assured him.
Giles sipped his tea and sat back on his chair to enjoy the view of Oz and Xander encouraging Wesley to eat chocolate in between fitting together the plastic sections of castle. He was pleased to notice that Wesley had a very good grasp of the way a mediaeval castle would fit together, diffidently suggesting where the gate would go and how the battlements would work. Buffy and Willow were having way too much fun building the fairy tale castle.
It was a shock to everyone when Cordelia walked in, saying, “I was just looking for a book on....” She broke off at the sight of everyone fitting together playmobil castles. “Did everyone take a regression pill or are we having a ‘let’s all be as dumb as Xander’ day?”
“We’re having fun, Cordy,” Xander retorted. “You can look that word up in your ‘things not in my dictionary’ dictionary.”
She rolled her eyes, still looking around the library. “Where’s Wesley?”
The little boy had been gazing at her in some anxiety and his eyes now widened in fear. He took a tentative step forward. “I’m here.”
She turned eagerly and then seeing no one of Wesley’s height dropped her gaze and saw the little boy. Much to Giles’ amazement she immediately crouched down to his level and beamed at him. “Well, aren’t you adorable? What are you doing in here with this bunch of losers?”
Wesley looked shocked. “They’re - my friends.”
“That accent is to die for.” Cordy looked up at Giles. “Who knew they could sound like that right from when they were kids? Wait...? Did you say you were called ‘Wesley’ too? That is so cute.” She looked around the library. “Is Wesley your uncle? Please tell me he’s not your father because I was so hoping he was single...?”
“He’s me,” Wesley explained awkwardly. “I was him and then I wasn’t. I don’t remember being him though.”
Cordelia straightened up, fixing Giles with a steely glare. “One, that isn’t funny. Two, dragging a kid into your stupid practical jokes - so not cool.”
“Cordelia...” Giles fixed her with his most quelling glare. “Before you say anything you may later regret - well, that someone else may regret - Ethan sent me a package which Wesley opened. This was the result.”
“Halloween costume and wacky candy Ethan?” She looked down at child Wesley and her face fell. “Okay. Now I’m angry.”
Wesley looked up at her fearfully. “I’m sorry.”
Cordelia amazed Giles further by immediately sinking back down to the floor and saying gently: “Not with you, sweetie. Just with all the other people in this room who were too stupid to keep Wesley from being burned by Giles’s old flames.”
Willow gasped and Buffy grimaced. “We so weren’t going there,” Buffy murmured.
Cordelia glared up at Giles. “How could you let Wesley handle something of Ethan’s...? Oh ewww...! That so didn’t come out right. It’s bad enough you used to let Ethan handle...”
“Cordelia!” Willow squeaked. “Remember - very small child, not supposed to be hearing about things like that. And I don’t want to either.”
“Can I go on record as saying a big ‘me too’?” Xander put in.
Wesley said tentatively: “Do you have any sisters?”
Cordelia automatically straightened his shirt collar, checking the label as she did so. “I can’t believe they didn’t at least take you to Gap. What’s that, sweetheart?”
“Like Cordelia in the play...?” He looked at her shyly. “She had two sisters who were bad.”
“Actually, Cordy’s the Webster's definition of an only child,” Xander supplied helpfully.
“What play?” Cordelia asked him.
“King Lear. Cordelia is the good daughter who really loves her father but he sends her away even though she loves him. But in the end he realizes that she was the one who loved him all the time.” He gazed up at her. “And he feels very sorry that he sent her away.”
Cordelia checked the label in the little jacket Giles had bought him and shook her head. “No sisters. I think my mom just thought it was a pretty name.”
“I think it’s a very pretty name,” Wesley told her earnestly. He dropped his gaze to say: “It suits you.”
Willow and Buffy exchanged a glance. “He’s a regular heartbreaker, isn’t he?” Buffy observed.
Cordelia gazed at the little boy for a moment and then held out her hand. “Let’s you and me build a condo.”
Buffy pushed her the box with the fairy bower. “Here you go.”
Cordelia sniffed. “What, no penthouse?” She picked the boy up and sat him on the table. As everyone stared at her, she said: “What? So, I like kids. Get over it.”
“When you used to say you liked children, we always assumed you meant as a snackfood,” Xander observed.
As Cordelia expertly began to assemble the fairy bower, she said to Giles: “And I presume there’s a good reason why you’re just sitting around instead of trying to find the spell to turn Wesley back into a grown up, right?”
There was a moment’s awkward silence and then Giles sighed and got to his feet. “Yes, I was just about to continue my research into that...”
As he headed off for his office, Buffy glared at Cordelia. “It may not be possible to turn Wesley back but that doesn’t matter because we like him fine just how he is.”
“Well, unlike the rest of you I actually liked him the way he was before as well...”
There was a stricken silence as Wesley looked up at Cordelia and then across at Buffy. “Did-Didn’t you like me before…?”
“Yes, we did.” Buffy gave Cordelia a look that threatened ritual dismemberment if she dared contradict her. “We liked you before and we like you now.”
Cordelia made to argue, looked at the little boy’s shocked face and said quickly: “Yes, of course, they liked you. Who wouldn’t like you? You were adorable then and you’re adorable now. You’re just shorter and not so well dressed.” She peered at the label on his jeans pockets. “I really need to take you shopping. Hold on....” She fished a comb out of her purse and combed his hair carefully, wiped his face with her handkerchief, straightened his cuffs, and then nodded in satisfaction. “You like to be tidy,” she told him.
He looked across at Buffy again, clearly needing more reassurance. She picked him up and cuddled him and he automatically curled up against her neck. “Did you really not like me...?” he whispered.
“We didn’t know you,” Buffy whispered back. “We’d hardly got to know you when you changed but I love you now and I am not going to let anything happen to you. Do you understand? Nothing bad is ever going to happen to you again.”
Oz looked up at her. “That’s quite a promise.”
Buffy rubbed her cheek against Wesley’s. “I’m going to keep it.”
Cordelia looked at Buffy and seemed to get a lot of things in a moment. “Giles, would I be right in thinking that if there were spells that could just turn back time with no side effects and no problems, that everyone would be doing them…?”
Giles came back out with a book in his hand. “Well, Ethan is a chaos mage. He does have unusual powers.”
Cordelia grimaced. “I really don’t want to know about Ethan’s ‘unusual powers’, Giles.”
“Power of magical ability,” Giles said tersely.
“So, if this spell is so hunky dory wonderful, how come he hasn’t turned himself into a twenty-something again?”
Giles opened his mouth and then took off his glasses. “That’s a good point.”
“Yeah, I thought so. And maybe what we need to focus on right now is not just how adorable Wesley is but how alive we want him to stay.” She gave Giles a fierce look. “It’s not as if Ethan doesn’t think the world can spare you, now, is it?”
With a jolt, Giles realized that she was absolutely right. He had been so busy fighting a rearguard action against falling in with Buffy’s plan to keep Wesley as a child that he hadn’t fully considered just how dangerous a spell this could be. This time when he turned back to the books it was with a renewed sense of purpose and a whole new anxiety.
Cordelia snapped together a few more pieces of plastic and said, “Okay, there’s your fairy bower up and running. Wesley, what do you say we ask Aunty Willow to cast a nice protection spell over the whole enchanted fountain thing?”
“So vampires can’t come in?” he asked.
Cordelia blinked. “You know about vampires.”
Xander passed over the teddy bear and nodded at the bag. She examined the tiny crucifix and holy water in silence for a moment and then said: “You know what would also be good here? A mirror. That way Teddy here - ”
“He’s Cuthbert,” Wesley explained.
Cordelia looked at him and bit her lip. “There really are no words for how cute you are.” She took a compact out of her purse and held it up. “See? A mirror so Cuthbert can always check if someone has a reflection. That way he’s extra safe.” She dropped the compact into the bag, earning herself a big smile from Wesley.
“What if you have a hair emergency, Cord?” Xander observed.
Not bothering to glance at him, she said, “I’ll manage. I survived dating you. After that, death kind of loses its sting.”
Wesley looked between them wide-eyed and Willow elbowed Xander in the ribs. “Can you not fight in front of him, please?”
Xander looked a little ashamed and muttered, “Sorry.”
Cordelia straightened Wesley’s shirt again, gave him another bright smile, and said, “I’m going to go and help Uncle Giles with the research now. Why don’t you help Uncle Xander and Uncle Oz build their castle, and then we can besiege it later and push the walls down. Won’t that be fun?”
He smiled at her shyly. “Yes.”
She kissed him on the forehead and looked at Buffy. “We all want the same thing here.” Then she was heading for Giles’s office, her heels going click-click-click on the floor.
This time when Buffy tightened her grip on Wesley it was with a new anxiety. Fiercely, she repeated: “Nothing bad is ever going to happen to you again.”
Wesley looked up at her. “Bad things just happen sometimes. They’re not anybody’s fault. Like spilling,” he added bravely. “Sometimes - that just happens.”
“Yes, it does.” She kissed the top of his head and he curled in against her contentedly, drowsily watching Willow as she filled the Fairy Tale castle with dining tables, princesses, and unicorns. But mentally Buffy was adding a fierce: But not to you. No more bad things are going to happen to you - while the sick feeling in her stomach was telling her exactly the opposite.
***
Wesley was happily playing storm-the-heavily-fortified-plastic-mediaeval-castle with a mixture of siege tower, unicorns, and various over dressed royalty, and Willow’s magical assistance, while Oz and Buffy rebuffed them with volleys of plastic arrows, when Xander came back into the Library. Giles and Cordelia were both at the other end of the table still working on their research, Cordelia kneading the back of her neck from time to time but not stinting in her work. Wesley had kicked off his new leather shoes as they were giving him blisters and everyone had told him it was all right for him to just wear his socks.
“Ethan’s current address.” Xander waved a piece of paper under Giles’s nose. “I beat it out of Willy the Snitch.”
Buffy looked at him sideways. “ ‘Beat it out of him’?”
“With my wallet,” Xander conceded. “But the point is, Giles was right, chaos guy is still in town.”
They all looked at Wesley who gazed up at them in some anxiety. “How are we going to do this?” Xander asked. “Because I think Buffster and G-man are both going to be needed to deal with Ethan, but that leaves the munchkin....”
“I don’t want Ethan to see Wesley.” Giles turned his grave concerned gaze onto Wesley. “As far as Ethan knows, his spell didn’t work. If he thinks there is nothing to lose, he may be more willing to talk than if he knows he has something we want.”
“We’ll take care of Wesley.” Willow smiled at him.
Buffy looked anxious and Oz and Xander nodded to her. “It’s okay,” Xander assured her.
Cordelia looked up from her research and said matter-of-factly: “Think of it this way, Buffy. Any harm comes to Wesley over my dead body so either way you’re a winner.”
Buffy held her gaze. “Trust me, Cordelia, that wouldn’t be any kind of compensation.” She snatched a breath and then gripped Wesley’s shoulders lightly. “I won’t be long, okay? You stay here with Willow, Oz, and Xander, and Giles and I will be back very soon.”
“Yes, Buffy.” She squeezed him into a hug and he felt another kiss pressed into his hair. It was strange to be hugged and kissed so much but he couldn’t pretend that he didn’t really like it.
She said to Xander in a way that was half an order and half a plea: “Take care of him.”
“You know we will,” Xander assured her quietly.
After the door closed, Cordelia said: “So, what’s the cover story on Wesley?”
Willow blinked. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I don’t think we should tell everyone who wanders in here to borrow a library book that Little Wesley is…Wesley. What if it got back to the Council? They’re very strict. He might get his pay docked for the days while he wasn’t able to be a Watcher or whatever. I mean if those guys are happy to lock Buffy into a room with a vampire when she doesn’t have her super powers, I’m guessing they wouldn’t be slow about doing other nasty things.”
They all looked at Wesley, who fidgeted uncomfortably under their scrutiny. His father was a Council member and he certainly would have thought it had to be Wesley’s fault that he hadn’t been available to do his duty, so Cordelia was probably right. Shyly he said, “When Principal Snyder was in here earlier, Mr Giles said I was his nephew, and he said the Big Me was away at a book fair.”
Oz nodded. “That works.”
“Do you want to go on pretending to be Giles’s nephew, Wesley?” Willow asked.
He nodded. “Yes, please.”
“Okay, if anyone comes in here and asks about you we’ll tell them that the Big You is away for a few days and that the Little You is Giles’ nephew - Wesley.”
“Presumably we’ll also tell them that every other guy in England is called ‘Wesley’,” Xander murmured.
Willow said firmly: “I think Wesley has enough to put up with being eight years old and in a strange country surrounded by strange people and having to remember that Giles is his uncle now without having to remember a different name as well.”
“I don’t think you’re strange,” Wesley offered tentatively. “I think you’re nice.”
Cordelia looked at him in fond exasperation: “How weird is your home life if you don’t think that Willow the Witch, Oz the Werewolf, and Xander the Loser are strange?”
“Not to mention Cordelia the Princess,” Xander retorted.
But Wesley was gazing at Oz open-mouthed. “Are you really a werewolf?”
“Only for three days a month,” Willow said hastily. “The rest of the time he’s just Oz.”
He had seen woodcuts of werewolves, and they were huge and slavering and evil. He looked at Oz, who looked very unhuge, not at all slavering, or remotely evil. But he had read what werewolves did to people - to girls who went walking the woods and were found torn to pieces, and to...children. He gulped and looked at Willow then looked at the castle he had helped build with Oz; remembered the young man lifting him up to reach the taller towers, unwrapping the chocolate for him and handing it over. Oz seemed so nice but if he were really a werewolf - he thought how angry his father would be with him for being friends with a werewolf, and the Council would probably never allow him to be a Watcher if they ever found out he had played with a werewolf all afternoon and not even tried to kill him. He felt a lump in his throat as he thought about killing Oz. Willow loved Oz, he could see it in the way she got that light in her eyes when she looked at him, and Oz loved Willow. Worst of all, Wesley really liked Oz. He had felt safe when he was with him. At the thought of having to shoot him with silver bullets, he began to tremble.
“I was joking,” Cordelia said quickly. “I’m not a real Princess either and Willow is still definitely a wannabe when it comes to witchery. Xander is a real loser though.”
Wesley looked at Oz sadly. “Are you a werewolf?”
Oz nodded. “Yes.”
Wesley swallowed painfully. “Do you - kill people…?”
“No.” Oz held his gaze. “I’m lucky. I have people who care about me and every month when it’s the full moon they lock me up and make sure I can’t hurt anyone.”
Wesley felt the weight on his heart lift a little. “So, you’re not a bad werewolf?”
“No, he’s a good werewolf,” Willow assured him. “Very good.”
“Are we still friends?” Oz asked. “Because it’s cool either way, but I’d like to know.”
Wesley knew that his father would never accept that as an excuse, that people locked Oz up and stopped him killing anyone, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t use it as an excuse. If it came out he could tell his father that he hadn’t thought that he would mind because Oz never hurt anyone, and perhaps his father would never find out anyway. It occurred to him that if he was really twenty-six then perhaps his father liked him more. Perhaps he just didn’t like him now because he was a child and his father had no patience with children. He knew that because his mother was always saying it: ‘You have no patience with him, Roger.’ ‘He doesn’t need patience, he needs discipline. Do you think the vampires are going to be patient with him? He needs to do what he’s told when he’s told to do it!’ But as he evidently had done what he was told when he was told to do it and had been made Head Boy and become a Watcher, just the way Daddy wanted, perhaps now they were friends, and if he told his father that Oz was a good werewolf who didn’t eat people then everything would be okay? Wesley thought about that for a moment and then decided that was something he couldn’t really take on trust.
He glanced up at Oz cautiously. “As you don’t kill people and you’re a good werewolf I don’t see why we can’t still be friends. Just - please don’t tell my father.”
Oz held out a hand. “Let’s shake on it.”
They did so solemnly and Oz said with an odd sort of smile: “And, trust me, if your father and I ever had a conversation there would be other things we were discussing.”
“A-men to that....” Xander murmured.