Fic: The Daniel Osbourne Farewell Tour

[allyndra]

This was written for the tenyearsofbuffy community challenge. The prompt came from kindkit, who requested: 
1) Set post-"Wild At Heart"
2) Xander misses Oz
3) A skateboard
4) No Xander/Spike

And *gasp* I wrote a gen Xander story. Egads! 

Title: The Daniel Osbourne Farewell Tour

Author: Allyndra

Fandom: BtVS

Rating: PG

Spoilers: Through Wild at Heart

Disclaimer: If I owned them, I'd be living in a much nicer house.

Summary: Oz is gone, and Xander realizes it.

 

It was Wednesday morning when it suddenly hit him. Xander was standing in the comic book store, leafing through the latest Tom Strong, and he turned to show a particular frame to Oz. Only Oz wasn't there. Of course he knew Oz wasn't there, but he suddenly realized that Oz was *gone.* He nearly crumpled the comic.

 

Xander blinked and forced his hands to relax. The usual Wednesday morning crowd flowed around him, and Xander felt like they were stealing all the oxygen, because he couldn't quite catch his breath. He put the comic back on the rack with deliberate slowness and headed for the door. He dodged around the pockets of gamers in the corner, wound his way through the racks of manga, and emerged out into the sunshine.

 

He breathed deeply, though he knew it wasn't really the oxygen he'd been missing. You wouldn't think such a little guy could leave much of a hole, but it was this giant, gaping, sucking thing that Xander had somehow managed not to notice for entire week since Oz had left. Score for being completely oblivious.

 

This wasn't normal, right? Xander leaned against the wall of the comic book store, panting in the midmorning sun and freaking out about how totally he was freaking out. It couldn't be normal. People left all the time. Hell, most people barely saw their high school friends after graduation. He should be grateful he even got to see his friends after they started college. Maybe it was some kind of delayed traumatic reaction to losing Jesse back in sophomore year.

 

Or maybe he just missed Oz.

 

Xander found himself walking before he consciously had a destination. But his feet led to the skatepark, so Xander followed along. He stood at the fence and watched the cool kids grinding and jumping and the lame kids falling and falling with a sense of nostalgia. He'd been lame. Very, very lame. But the fact that Oz came here with him had given him a boost. The one and only time he'd landed a frontside ollie, Oz had been there, leaning against the wall with an approving tilt to his head. It had felt like a pat on the back and a victory cheer from anyone else. Xander had glowed with pride for days. There was a tall girl with knee pads and braids leaning against the wall now, and Xander couldn't help thinking that was wrong.

 

Xander sighed and turned away. He came to a decision by the time he reached the end of the block. If he was going to do this over the top mourning of his lost friendship, he was going to do it right. He was going to do the whole pitiful Lloyd Dobbler thing. Only without the tape recorder, because he didn't own one and no way was he going to ask to borrow Willow's. She'd been ripped into tiny little pieces by Oz's departure, and Buffy was busy trying to glue her back together using the adhesive powers of ice cream and female empowerment. He knew better than to venture near them. He'd just have to do without the audio commentary.

 

Xander stopped by the convenience store nearest the high school and bought a box of animal crackers, a Big Red soda, and a bag of gummi bears. Okay, he didn't have personal experience with the animal cracker voices, but Willow had told the story often enough, in gooey, girl in love tones, that Xander always associated animal crackers with Oz now. Big Red was Oz's post-gig, coming-down-off-the-performance-and-caffeine-high beverage of choice. He bought the gummi bears because Oz usually smuggled them into the movies in his pockets and then offered them to Xander with that quote from Ferris Bueller. Xander stuffed them into his own pocket for later. It wouldn't do to eat them cold, anyway.

 

Suitably supplied, Xander walked to the ruins of the high school. He scowled at it. When he'd helped blow it up, he hadn't thought he would need to visit it later for sentimental reasons. He wasn't stupid enough to go in, so Xander stood across the street, looking at the collapsed ceilings and fallen walls. He remembered nights on wolf watch in the library, when he'd read aloud and dozed on the long table and poured out the rambling story of his life to the vicious creature lying in its cage. He remembered lunches in the shade, when Oz would hand over an extra sandwich without Xander even asking, and the two of them would lay back against the grass listening to the girls talk. Xander stared at the school, remembering. He drank the Big Red and ate the animal crackers and wondered if the monkey voice had really been all that funny.

 

Finishing off his last dry, little hippo-shaped cookie, Xander stuck his tongue out at the school and walked away, hands stuffed into his pockets. He couldn't go to the Bronze this early in the day, so he went to the house that had hosted the Halloween party. He loitered across the street, shaking his head disapprovingly at the patch someone had put over the entrance Giles had made. Xander hadn't been working in construction very long, but he was pretty sure even *he* could do better. He looked at the upstairs windows and sighed. Oz's fear, the one that trapped him and broke him down, had been the wolf. Xander should have known then that this was going to happen. He was struck by an irrational, overwhelming wave of anger at the stupid house, stupid party, stupid fear demon that had been responsible for waking Oz's fear of his wolf. If they hadn't gone through that Halloween, Oz might not have been so sure he couldn't keep control. Xander picked up a rock and shied it at the house. It hit the wall with a weak clatter and dropped to the ground, and Xander felt lost and impotent.

 

The gummi bears were suitably squishy, but Xander didn't think he could eat them. He wanted ... He didn't know what he wanted. Some kind of closure, some kind of comfort. He wanted to be able to talk to Buffy and Willow, reminisce about the time Oz had lashed out at Wesley's stupidity. Or the time he'd turned in a term paper about Oscar Wilde that was only three words long, and Oz had convinced the teacher it was worthy of an A. Xander shuffled down the street, kicking at leaves and pebbles. He wanted an acknowledgement that Willow wasn't the only one who had been left behind.

 

It was late enough for the Bronze to be open, though the crowds wouldn't arrive for hours. Xander ordered a soda and wandered around the empty club, watching the stage and trying to make the music that was playing over the sound system mesh with his memories of the Dingoes last performance. A hand on his shoulder made him jump so badly he almost spilled his drink; he'd thought he was alone. Xander finished choking and sputtering and turned to see Devon standing beside him, looking only half awake despite the hour.

 

"Hey," Devon said.

 

"Hey." Xander took a sip and stared at the stage some more. Devon sighed.

 

"Have to audition new bass players tomorrow," Devon said mournfully. It was possibly the longest sentence Devon had ever directed toward Xander.

 

"That sucks," Xander told him. He meant it. Oz and Devon had been friends, band mates, and housemates. It totally sucked that Devon had to deal with all the missing Oz feelings Xander was going through while trying to replace him.

 

"Thanks." Devon seemed surprised by the sympathy. He looked up at the stage, and his mouth twitched at the corner. "Did Oz ever tell you about the time he hid all our music until we learned how to play in time?"

 

Xander shook his head, and Devon kept talking, telling Xander about ridiculous and sometimes legally questionable Oz-related incidents. They wound up on one of the sofas, sprawled out on the cushions. When Devon paused, the laughter in his eyes fading into regret, Xander fished a bag out of his pocket.

 

"Want a gummi bear?" he asked. "They've been in my pocket for a while, so they're nice and warm."

 

The regret was wiped out by a surprised smile, and Devon took a handful of gummi bears. "Thanks," he said, sinking lower on the sofa. "What's the craziest thing you ever saw Oz do?"

 

It was acknowledgement enough.