Here’s a story about me naming things after Buffy characters since I keep seeing people posting about animals they’ve named “Spike” or “Angel” or whatever.

So the setting is 8th grade, early year before COVID. In our Health class, we had a whole section about being parents and taking care of a baby. For the baby project we had to do, we had to bring a robotic baby—almost toddler-aged—home for the weekend and... yk, take care of it (and try not to k!ll it or we’d get an F). You couldn’t fake it either because the teacher would monitor the class’s babies.

I’m pretty sure we took turns, so maybe only 5 of us at a time. We had these bracelets and couldn’t go more than an arm’s length away from it. We had a bag with instructions saying no one else could touch it except you and your parents. So not even siblings or friends you knew would be careful could touch it. (I was very upset by this because I wanted my brother to be able to see his fake-just-for-the-weekend nephew.)

We had to act as if we were actually parents, so we named it and our teacher gave us a birth certificate.

For background, 6 years prior, my brother did said project with (I believe) the same teacher, and got a girl. He named it Buffy, but it was funny because neither he nor I had seen Buffy or Angel yet at the time—it was just a name my dad threw at him. He liked it, of course. So my brother had a little girl named Buffy.

Now, 6 years later, I ended up with a boy. And of course, I was a Spike fan (yes, I was one of them), so I named mine William.

My teacher knew who I was because of my brother (our last name isn’t common), and I think she remembered Buffy. So she was curious about where “William” came from—knowing my brother was actually oblivious about who Buffy Summers was, maybe she thought this was just a coincidence or me picking a normal/common name.

In front of the whole class (thinking I was SO EDUCATED and SO SMART 💀), I proceeded to say:

“Well I LOVE Spike. He’s a vampire who I personally don’t think is evil. He’s misunderstood.”(I was very persistent about that fact at the time) I continued with: 
“And his human name was William Theodore Pratt.”

Btw, quick holt on my previously quoted statement:
Idk how I figured that out so quickly. Meanwhile, I was talking to my dad last week (because we are excited for the reboot) and HE had no idea Spike HAD a middle name—nor did he actually remember what Spike’s  mother’s name was. I had to tell him it was “Anne Pratt.” Bet you he’s SO proud of me 💀
Anyway... I proceeded to open my mouth:

“So where this is supposed to be a HUMAN baby, I figured I might as well name it William. Not Spike. I’m not raising a vampire, Mrs. [teacher name].”

And then I promptly fucked off 💀💀

I continued my day with a small robotic child named William Theodore Pratt, who would cry every 3 goddamn minutes.

I had this little bracelet—not to stop it from crying, but just to let it (or my teacher, perhaps) know I was there, and then figure out what the thing wanted from me. I had to leave band every few minutes, and my dumbass thought it could hear the music, so I ACTUALLY told my band teacher:

“Hey Mr. [name], I think it’s hurting William’s ears.” 💀💔

And then finally, I got to take the thing home for the weekend.

Note: My mom ended up taking care of it during the night and just kept my wrist with the bracelet hanging over my bed. My mom (God bless her) did all the work at night taking care of little William T. Pratt while I (kind of) peacefully slept.

My Lord.If you got this far reading, I appreciate it. Enjoy some of the pictures of good old William Theodore Pratt-[my last name] 
(because it made sense at the time).

Thanks for reading. God bless you FOR reading this roller coaster of a story 💀🙏


Here’s a story about me naming things after Buffy characters since I keep seeing people posting about animals they’ve named “Spike” or “Angel” or whatever.