Old

The second it was 6 PM, the Janus curse gripped the large town of Sunnydale, and Xander’s vision immediately halved. But Xander didn’t panic. He was in his dirty room, laid out on his dirty bed when the chaos started. He didn’t believe an eighty-year-old had any business in the violence taking place outside. As the magic of the curse turned his Old Man costume into a reality, he was safe. Xander was harnessed within his mind when the white wig became real white hair. The thick-framed black glasses, red bow tie, matching suspenders, and ‘Hello, My Name Is,’ name badge with the name Xander Harris written matched his old, spotty, and wrinkled skin. Gazing up at his water-stained ceiling, Xander didn’t even have to worry about his older self leaving, since his body hurt everywhere.

‘Old people have the worst bodies,’ he bemoaned from within his mind, tallying his aches and pains. His knees, ankles, elbows, wrists, shoulders, and lower back all ached at the slightest movement. Xander felt he could break something if he moved too fast. He was always short of breath or felt the immediate urge to pee. Xander doubted the Old Man would live any longer than eighty. Fortunately, he still had his hair, silver though it was.

Though he was blind in his left eye, Xander could see decades of his elderly memories; Memories of his very own life that he hadn’t even lived yet. The adult life he might one day live if he ever escaped the time loop.

‘This is balls to walls crazy,’ Xander voiced as he scanned the millions of memories like he was stargazing under a brilliant night sky. Traveling backward from old age to young memories was a majestic experience for several minutes until he came across the first few problems with his old self. Some memories were hard to see clearly. The clearest and most detailed memories were from his mid-twenties to the eighty years he managed to survive through. Memories from his early twenties were hazy, and his teenage years were not nearly as clear or detailed as he’d like.

‘Well, that sucks,’ Xander complained as he tried to see the teen years. ‘You couldn’t be easy, could you?’

The Old Man knew of the big battles they won or lost, like he knew a sentence to be true. But the circumstances leading up to the big moments weren’t as clear, especially if it didn’t involve him directly. To illustrate that point, he knew they beat a giant reptilian demon on graduation day, but he couldn’t recall the details of how it came to be. Even though it was all new to him, it felt like an eighty-year-old trying to remember what he had for breakfast when he was nineteen; an impossible feat without an eidetic memory.

Even so, Old-Man Xander could remember all the big events, especially when they impacted Xander directly. Sadly, the shameful moments came through very clearly as well, of which there were plenty. He could also recall bits of the minor events, but he couldn’t remember any of the trivial, week-to-week stuff.

No matter how many loops it took or how hazy the memory was, Xander sifted through every recollection. For the young teen, it was like living so many tomorrows vicariously through… himself?… Even if it was a life he couldn’t control. It was like reading an autobiography of himself if the book was from the future. It was a slog to watch his younger-though-older self attempt to flirt with women; a brutal barometer of how much he’s progressed with the help of Casanova’s genius. Though he was thoroughly surprised to learn that Old-Man Xander lost his virginity to a slayer named Faith—a night he never forgot—he was upset that they only went one round.

‘Come on, Old-Me,’ the harnessed Xander called out from within his mind. ‘We’re young! We can go at least four rounds! And she’s freaking hot too!’

Faith wasn’t the only Slayer, either. The additional thousand plus Slayers that activated in a world that became aware of the paranormal was mind-boggling for Xander to accept. ‘Wow,’ he couldn’t help gasp at such a monumental change in the world. He also wondered why all the slayers were beautiful; every single one.

‘You mystical forces are a bunch of pervs, but I approve,’ he marveled before noting another giant change he couldn’t have predicted. Willow becoming a powerful witch; even more powerful than the group of men who created the Slayer line. Willow became so strong, she could activate all the Slayers on the planet. He was astounded by the feats of his best friend.

Despite the benefit of having a powerful witch by the Slayer’s side for all those years, the cost of such a life-altering feat was demoralizing. Seeing how far Willow fell into her magic abuse was gut-wrenching to see; like seeing a friend succumb to substance abuse. Xander really empathized with his best friend and all those around her. Xander saw how much the others around her suffered as well.

‘Tara?’ Xander questioned from the memory threat he’s following. ‘What the hell… Willow’s kissing her… Willow’s kissing a girl… Oh! OH! Willow’s a lesbian,’ he mentally yelled with wide eyes; that shocked him. Xander immediately felt horrible for discovering that very personal information about his best friend, as if he violated her privacy by reading her diary.

Upon closer examination of that cache of memories and the branches they were connected to, Xander found it odd, that by some miracle he was in a romantic & public relationship with Cordelia Chase, of all people, but then cheated on the beautiful girl with his best friend, who would eventually come to realize her preference for women. He and Cordelia never even went past kissing and petting in closets, but he threw that away for his best friend? A sweet girl who would eventually be attracted to girls instead? Xander gasped at how bafflingly nonsensical it all played out.

‘Wow, I dated Cordelia, and then I cheat on her with Willow,’ he repeated, unsure of how he felt. He couldn’t be sure of his emotions, but he knew he didn’t like it. He could’ve sworn he hated Cordelia, but looking at these memories, he finds fondness for her he couldn’t have anticipated.

‘There’s Buffy,’ his mind located.

Xander was both terrified and amazed to recall Buffy, the leader of the Slayer Organization and its army. In fact, much of what he saw connected to Buffy’s life was amazing, sad, or disturbing. Ripping Buffy out of heaven after she sacrificed herself to save the world was devastating for Xander to learn. Truly, his young and unblemished mind needed to take a break from recalling before he threw up. He couldn’t even blame her for pulling away from the gang and suffering all by herself after coming back to life. It would be better than being constantly reminded of the heaven they ripped her from.

‘Even still,’ he began as he paused on the newest revelation about Buffy. ‘Locking her up in a padded room and making her wear a straight jacket would’ve been a much better alternative than being in some weird, demoralizing relationship with fucking Spike!’

“Spike!? What the flying fuck man?!” he screeched loudly, fantasizing about murdering the vampire if he wouldn’t loop back, or could actually fight him. Xander couldn’t see how Spike and Buffy ever came to pass, and despite the answers to his questions simply waiting to be learned in his head, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

Because less than a few seconds later, Xander was bouncing off the walls as he yelled, “He even tried to RAPE you! That bastard tried to rape you! What the-” Xander’s gut twisted horribly, disgusting him to no end. With the vomit nearly to his throat, he knew he’d never like that unholy union nor ever get over it. The proof, of which, was in his eighty-year-old self, who still felt pained to recall it.

“Wait,” Xander voiced when a thought popped into his head. “What about Angel? Where’s Angel? Angel, Angel, Angel, Angel- Oh. ….Oh.”

Moving away from that assortment of horrifying memories, Xander stumbled upon the short hazy knowledge of Jenny Calendar dying; another punch to Xander’s queasy gut. She was such a smart, spunky, and sexy lady who he couldn’t ever BS… it was just too sad. The secret Casanova seemed to sense in Jenny was hiding a secret identity. Jenny was actually a gypsy named Janna. Old Man Xander didn’t see it, so young Xander couldn’t either, but he knew Angelus killed her and it devastated the group afterward. Hers was a death they never forgot about.

“Angelus?” Xander questioned.

He had no context to the name aside from knowing that at some point, Angel turned into the evil Angelus and terrorized them for half a year, especially Buffy. He couldn’t tell how or when, but the Old Man knew that having sex with Buffy was what triggered the transformation. The fact that Angel took Buffy’s virginity seemed to be the only reason why the Old Man remembered, but it’s difficult to remember all the details surrounding that memory point. And then, at some point, Angel simply comes back.

Xander sympathized with the decent ups but turbulent downs of Buffy’s life, especially the criminally disgusting Spike parts. Losing Angel to his curse, losing her mother at some point, Glory, Caleb, so many battles…

‘Dawn,’ Xander gasped at the sight of the slender brunette, voicing with disbelief, “my girlfriend? My wife? I marry Dawn Summers? I marry Buffy’s little sister?!” He looked at the action figures of Lion-O and He-man holding their awesome swords for answers, but they remained silent.

From a single teen to suddenly married to the little sister of the love of his life was jarring. Xander couldn’t believe he forgot about Buffy’s little sister. Then saw that Dawn was actually a concentrated living energy transformed into a human by the monks of the Order of Dagon. And the memories of her being Buffy’s younger sister were implanted in all of their minds later.

‘She was made out of living energy,’ Xander’s mind marveled.

Xander was thrilled to see how much his older counterpart loved her. It took Old Man Xander a while to see Dawn as a love and life partner instead of Buffy’s little sister, but eventually, he did. Their ups and downs were also very detailed within the old man’s mind, because, with seemingly every girl he dated, he always felt deep down that they never truly loved him. Cordelia was an anomaly they shared. Faith essentially picked him for the night. Anya asked him out, and many of the girls he dated took the lead and approached him. Even though he stayed with Dawn and loved her to pieces, he always seemed to feel like they could fall out of love any second.

Young Xander recognized what that feeling was; inadequacy. He’s felt that dark consuming burden since first meeting the super-smart Willow, or the hilarious Jessie and hated that it would, apparently, continue for the rest of his life. Xander could have a wonderful and beautiful girlfriend in the future, but deep down, he would still have an uncontrollable expectation of being undeserving, like they were with him because of a fluke rather than anything genuine. As if a girl chose him like she chose a dress to try on, and if he didn’t make her feel special, she would simply put him back where she found him. Being with Dawn seemed fun, and they shared a lot in common, but he would love that relationship even more if the Old Man felt more secure in himself.

“Not that it’ll matter if I don’t get out of this stupid time loop,” Xander yelled.

Faith, Riley, Anya, Tara, Andrew… Xander remembered them and saw many moderate to big events within the grand library of future memories, but he saw no clues as to how he might escape the time loop. From what he could tell, this Groundhog Day’s repetition never happened to Old Man Xander. He saw plenty of stuff about alternate dimensions, higher planes of existence, and different timelines, but only a single spell about looping time. It was for a single person, for a few minutes, in a small space. Nothing like the massive full day, all across the world curse that he was suffering through.

The more Xander looped as the Old Man, the more subtle details he absorbed about the same memories, saddening him continuously. Xander laid on his bed as he recalled so many of his blunders and shortcomings as a friend and a lover. It truly sucked the joy and positive outlook right out of him. Xander felt depressed as he repeatedly watched these memories. Buffy, Willow, Giles, Dawn, Cordelia, Faith, Angel, and even Spike, all go on to be remarkable figures throughout the world and accomplish many astonishing accolades.

Buffy, the world’s savior; Willow, the greatest witch in the world; Faith, the second greatest Slayer in the world; Giles, the father of Slayers and co-creator of the Slayer Organization; Angel and Spike, the leading heroic vampires on the planet. Even Dawn developed strong magical abilities later on in life; Old Man Xander even learned that Cordelia became a Higher Being, serving the Powers That Be.

“Woooow! Cordelia Chase is an angel?” his flabbergasted face repeated with incredulity. “Just, how?” Though he asked, he already had the memory of Angel recounting his time with Cordelia. Xander was thirty at the time and randomly asked Angel about Cordelia. He simply wanted to know how she passed and they spent the night drinking and talking about how one of a kind she was. Angel told him everything they did together at Angel Investigations, then Wolf, Ram, & Hart; even when they got closer.

“Wow, Cordelia and Angel?” Xander gasped, needing to stop the memory until he settled down. “I guess she does end up getting with him in the end. Sucks she dies though.”

Faced with these memories, Xander didn’t know quite how to feel about Cordelia. He always felt an unorthodox bond with her. Obviously, she was gorgeous, but more to the point, no one traded jabs better than her, and he had to respect that. Learning that they eventually do date and it was good, despite the mistake of his infidelity, he was seeing her in a new light. The possibility of a romantic relationship with Cordelia was a concept he never expected—not as treasurer of the We Hate Cordelia Club—and it made him uneasy.

To his ever-growing despair, however, among the world-famous Scooby Gang, Xander Harris was the one member who started with nothing, remained nothing special, and ended with little more than the ability to repair broken windows. The more the young Xander saw in the future memories, the more Xander realized, “please don’t tell me that I’m a joke.”

It was heartbreaking to see how he worked for a vampire. “A manservant for Dracula!? How? Why? Just why?” he asked himself with shocked disbelief.

Xander had to ask himself how he could become so meaningless, so inconsequential, when he was surrounded by so many extraordinary friends. It made no feasible sense to survive so many pivotal battles for the future of mankind and still amount to nothing in the end.

“Even if Old Me didn’t get stuck in a time loop, he still had the memories of the Soldier he became for Halloween and could’ve done something with that,” Xander called out to his He-Man and Lion-O action figures in their action poses. He quickly mimicked Lion-O holding his magical Sword of Omen in a cool pose as he glumly stated, “getting super-strength or magic may have been impossible, but I became a carpenter! I could’ve made things, or dabbled in forging weapons for Buffy and Faith!”

Xander fell backward in his bed, making it squeak horribly as it caught his weight, and stared up at his yellow-stained ceiling as he repeatedly thought all about the Old Man’s mistakes and moments of deep shame; Leaving Anya at the altar, cheating on Cordelia, not being a great friend, willingly choosing to be Dracula’s manservant, being possessed so many times, or rejecting Buffy’s confession to him.

“THE GIRL I’VE LOVED SINCE THE VERY BEGINNING,” he yelled. She was his hero and, for some mystifying reason, he turned her down when she confessed her feelings for him.

Xander lived in that memory as if he were standing right next to them. It was a sunny day, and Buffy and Xander were walking through a beautiful garden at a temple in Tibet after a fierce battle against the forces of Twilight. They were talking about relationships; hers with her past and his with Dawn. Her big, sad eyes peered into his single brown eye and she tentatively asked, ‘What about me?’

It broke young-Xander’s heart to hear his future self reply, ‘I would’ve loved to hear that… if it was a bunch of years ago and you actually meant it.’

“I can’t believe he rejected her!” Xander yelled to his action figures. “IDIOT!”

While Xander couldn’t fault his older self for feeling as if it was simply his turn with Buffy, after her tryst with a girl, it was still demoralizing for the romantic moment he always dreamed of being too little, too late; as if they were an afterthought.

“If it’s meant to be, how can it be too late?” he yelled some more, straining his vocal cords. Frustrated, Xander grabbed his Lion-O statue and threw it against the wall, breaking it into several pieces. He kicked off the bed and paced in his gross room as he laughed with no humor, “In what fucking life is a retched decision like that allowed to manifest into reality?”

Though he couldn’t remember the context, Old Man Xander recalled Angelus mocking him when he accused him of being ‘Buffy’s White Knight.’ Xander also recalled Caleb referring to him as ‘the one who sees everything,’ before gouging his left eye out.

Xander continued laughing maniacally in his dirty room at their high estimation of him. What did those impressions really amount to in the long scheme of things? The only amazing claim to fame Xander felt he had was somehow surviving several apocalypses and global magical disasters to see the ripe old age of eighty. Buffy was gone, Willow traveled between dimensions, Dawn passed away. Faith passed away. Giles passed away. Spike was dusted, and Angel became human and died. He outlived all of them, but accomplished far less.

Laying in his bed looking at the ceiling he hated, the deranged teen coldly voiced, “I’ve been suffering these loops for what feels like centuries, and the future I’ve been dying to get back to… is a glorified bricklayer?” He felt like the king’s clown, or the queen’s clown in this case. Useless but for making the people around him laugh and forget their worries.

‘They'll never know how tough it is, Dawnie,’ he recalled his older counterpart telling Dawn to comfort her. She wanted to be special, just like he always did, so he understood her. ‘To be the one who isn’t chosen. To live so near to the spotlight and never step in it. But I know. I see more than anybody realizes because nobody’s watching me.’

Those words stayed with the old man throughout his years, and little by little, always ate away at him. Xander could understand that not everyone can be in the spotlight, but he could’ve done far more than what he did. Xander thought, ‘Who would ever be fine with no one watching them? I’m nothing now, but that wasn’t what we wanted! Why did you stay that way?’

“This can’t be it,” Xander called out to the yellowing ceiling of his room. “This can’t be. Who allowed this? Cuz, it wasn’t me. That old bastard can’t be me! And even if it was, it’s gotta be a lie. It has to,” he said. “I need more than that. Ending my life like that? The one-eyed nobody… the weakest friend of the world’s saviors… The only autobiography collecting dust in warehouses… I can’t let it end like this. I need to get out of this loop! I NEED TO GET OUT! I can do way better than that! I can! Just let me out! Just… Just let me out… and I will… I will…”

Xander cried himself to exhaustion and eventually fell asleep. The following morning, he woke up to November the 1st.