__A Watcher In Springtime__
By Dutchbuffy



Leaving the taxi's cool embrace felt like a bun must when being popped in the oven, and I could feel myself flush bright pink all over and my feet start to swell. The big and unprepossessing faux Spanish building in front of me reassured me in foot-high letters it was indeed the Sunnydale High School. I stood on the sidewalk for a second or two, trying to regain my composure and condemning the California climate to merry hell, since it was making the wearing of even summer-weight tweed akin to a death sentence. I mopped the veritable flood of sweat oozing from my brow with my handkerchief, reducing its crisp and pristine whiteness to a sodden grey.

I righted my posture against the suffocating blanket of heat pressing in on me and entered the building. Now to the library. I spoke to several youths in an attempt to ask them directions, but they seemed disinclined to answer me, contenting themselves with sniggers and rude looks at my suit. Considering the violent state of undress most of them sported, I didn’t feel inclined to take their strictures on matters of fashion to heart.

Finally, a teacher, a most peculiar deformed little dwarf of a man, whose ears seemed better suited to a role in a science fiction series than to teacherhood, directed me to the library, looking almost as oddly at me as his hapless students. No wonder they were ill-mannered and uncouth if they took this man as their shining example. I shuddered and made my way to the library doors. Before the double doors I stood still for a moment to let the importance of the occasion sink in. The moment of our meeting was nigh.

I threw open the doors and the unmistakable scent of libraries throughout the ages assailed my nostrils, enabling me to inhale the divine odor of musty books, ink and tweed. I stood a moment too long in my fond reverie and received a resounding thwack in the face from the returning library doors. I barely escaped from uttering a very unseemly curse and had to press my wilted handkerchief into service again, this time to stem a small nosebleed. I congratulated myself on having the foresight of using unbreakable glass in my spectacles.

A greying shock of lightbrown hair was stuck around the door of the cubicle and the eyes underneath it stared at me. After only a few seconds of annoyance at the directness of the gaze in those keen, piercing eyes, I recognized the man I'd come to see; aged, as was only proper, a decade or so from when I first saw him striding past me in the hallowed halls of Watcher Academy, oblivious to our whole class goggling at him with awe. The former watcher, sadly fallen from his pedestal, emerged slowly from his lair and approached me, concern etching the strong lines of his noble face.

If you prefer you librarians slender and willowy, you would not have cared for his figure. I took in the magnificent body, straining to escape the leash of its scruffy tweeds and checked a deep sigh. It wouldn't do to swoon at the first sight of my fellow Watcher. I must not let him see how deeply impressed I was, lest he take me for an inexperienced youth.

So I pretended not to be drowning in the blue of his eyes, the blue of a March sky over London, so refreshingly cool after the unremittingly azure expanse outside that had plagued me ever since landing at LAX.

His mien was at first polite and concerned for my mishap, then turned haughty and distant at the first whiff of my accent. I stuck out my hand and advanced with a winning smile, forgetting in the heat of the moment that the handkerchief would obscure it.

Mr. Giles inspected me thoroughly and without apology, hands still in his pockets. How I admired his composure! He wasn't showing his true feelings. He was probably wondering what this incredibly handsome and intelligent looking young fellow was doing here in this dingy school library.

Well, in a way I was his replacement, although a man of his stature could never be properly replaced, of course. He seemed to have recognized this fact almost immediately, which impressed me deeply. It's a mark of one's own intelligence to recognize a fellow intellect nearly on sight, I suppose. Then again, Mr. Travers might have written about my arrival, although that worthy gentleman has always been in the habit of throwing his juniors in at the deep end, as I had found out to my detriment when unexpectedly facing a vampire in the gym one morning.

A young and scruffy person emerged from the stacks and shuffled off, his posture a disgrace to the pioneer mentality and making one wonder about the American Physical Education program. Mr. Giles merely allowed his upper lip to twitch by way of indicating that he agreed with my assessment of him.

A powerful convulsion shook me from base to apex. My imagination bounded off like a hare in springtime, giddy with the vernal saps rising in the foliage. We would study, our heads bent closely together over the venerable tomes, fair hair mingling with dark. Perhaps our knees would touch. My shirt collar and tie suddenly conspired to strangle me, and I had to loosen them a bit. I would be able to feel the warmth of his leg through the two layers of tweed separating us. Our hearts would kindle in our breasts and be bound close by the silken fetters of love.

Mr. Giles coughed sharply, dislodging me from my brief sojourn in a happy future. He frowned at me, keeping his hands in his pockets. "You’re from the Council?" he said.

I threw him a smoldering look that must have spoken volumes of my feelings about our impending relationship and after a few tries managed to answer him with creditable composure. "Mr. Giles, I presume?"

"Wyndam-Pryce, Travers said in his letter. Aubrey?"

"No, no, no!" I hastened to enlighten him. "I'm the younger brother, Wesley."

"Ah. I knew your father." A pregnant pause fell. This was a regular occurrence in my life. Both my father and my brother seemed to inspire savage loathing in most people, and consequently very little was expected of me in social intercourse.

"Hated the old bastard," Mr. Giles resumed.

I never knew how to respond to these remarks. To agree enthusiastically would have been socially unacceptable, and it went against the grain to defend the old man.

"Quite," I answered, still trying in vain to dislodge the boa constrictor like grip of my tie.

He turned away from me and sat down on the big table in the library, loosening his tie completely and rolling up his sleeves, effectively ending our conversation.

Not many are aware of this, but the Wyndham-Pryces are not only renowned for their lofty ideals and romantic hearts, but also for their ruthless realism and proud practicality.

In a matter of mere minutes, it had become completely clear to me that Mr. Giles would never call me dear old Wezzer and did not see me as his pupil or his worthy successor at all. I wouldn't sit at his knees as Jonathan sat with David, lapping up the pearls of wisdom falling from his peerless lips. Instead, I was unwillingly cast in the role of rival, or even worse, usurper! We would not stand shoulder to shoulder, man to man, against the foes of darkness, in the warm intimacy of shared purpose and respectful friendship. I reined in my imagination sharply at the warmth and tenderness of these intimate visions, the imagination that had been galloping from the inn of mutual respect to the hotel of manly love, and tried be content to graze the marsh of grudging cooperation or even the meager plains of enmity.

I bowed my head gracefully to the inevitable outcome of our meeting and mourned for what could have been. The library door clanged and a young person of the female persuasion entered the library, attired in most improper clothing, more suitable to a cocktail party than a school day. The Slayer, presumably.

I straightened my person, my hair and my tie, hastily pasting back the winning smile on my face. Here was a person who would need my expertise and wisdom and would not turn away my help!

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