SOMETHING IN THE WATER
by perletwo
Tara wakened that bright Saturday morning with an odd prickling sensation at the back of her neck. Like an itch she couldn't scratch, or like that nagging feeling you've forgotten to turn the coffeemaker off when you can't get home to check.
Still, she thought as she wandered through her morning routine at the dorms, everything seemed normal enough. Everyone around her seemed fine; even pleasant.
{{I must've been hanging out with the Scoobies too long, if 'perfectly normal' feels this weird to me,}} she thought.
Her first stop of the day was the Magic Box, where she needed to pick up a few herbs for a healing poultice she was making for the scratches Miss Kitty Fantastico had gotten warding off a too-ardent suitor.
She found Anya rearranging the front table. From it she was removing the bowls of toad's stones, newt's eyes and chicken feet, and replacing them with bowls of gumdrops, horehound candy and daisies.
"Hi Tara!" She chirped, startlingly bright-eyed. "Snookums, do you think I should put the daisies to the right of the candy or to the left? Or would the center be better?"
Tara glanced over to the table, where Xander was engrossed in - bridal magazines? "Well, flowers are usually a centerpiece, and they call them centerpieces for a reason, Honeysuckle," he replied.
"Thank you Pookie! Is it okay with you if I move them now, or do you have some manly needs I should drop my every concern to attend to?"
Now *that* sounded more like the Anya that Tara knew - only it didn't. Sound like her, the way she said it. It sounded like Donna Reed.
"No, no, Sugarpuss. I'm still busy over here being sensitive to your deepest needs, fears and concerns about our gala wedding!"
"Awww...." Anya scurried over for a surprisingly chaste kiss for them. She stood two feet away from his chair and bent at the waist, meeting his puckered-up lips in the middle.
"Ummm...g-guys? I, I just, I stopped by to pick up some burba weed and ginseng and nasturtium greens," Tara stammered, mystified. "For a poultice."
"Oh! I got rid of all that smelly stuff," Anya burbled. "I'm turning the Magic Box into a flower shop! We're just going to have the good old-fashioned all-American classic flowers, though, like daisies and roses and carnations. Nothing exotic people have to learn how to grow or can't pronounce. Isn't that right, Pumpkin?"
Tara's jaw dropped.
"That's exactly right, Dewdrop! None of that strange foreign foliage for my best girl!" They did the two-feet-away kiss thing again.
"Uhhh...maybe I better just go to a natural foods store then?" Tara scurried for the door.
"Tara! Wait! I want to show you my new stock of Precious Moments figurines!" Anya chased her as far as the sidewalk, and Tara sped up to as close to a run as she dared.
Next stop was the Summers house, to pick Dawn up for their regular Saturday movie-and-milkshake outing. Dawn seemed a little listless when she opened the door, though. "Oh, it's just you," she sighed. "You might as well come on in, I guess."
Tara studied the girl closely. She was slouching, and her eyes had a dull sheen. "Sweetie? Are you feeling all right?"
"Yeah. 'M fine. Can we see a chick flick this time? 'Cause, y'know, I *am* a chick. And I don't wanna see anything with any icky boys that find somebody way perfecter than you and then up an' leave..." Dawn sniffed, and her lower lip stuck out prominently.
"Oh-kaayyy...Did I miss something?" That got a "hmmmph" from Dawn. "Where's Willow this morning?"
"Upstairs. Primping. She's getting ready to go to the Bronze."
"Uh, Dawnie? It's like 11 in the morning," Tara said. "She's getting ready for the Bronze *now*?"
"Uh-huh." Dawn waved vaguely at the stairs. "She said something about having to start early in the morning if you want to beat all the other girls to get the best husbands."
For the second time that morning Tara's jaw hit the floor. "Annd...Buffy?"
"Oh, she's just waaay too butch to get the best husbands, Tara. C'mon now."
"I meant, where is she?"
"Oh, who knows? Probably out killing something. Y'know, I really miss mom. At least she had some appreciation of the finer things in life." Dawn sniffed again.
"Please tell me you don't mean Precious Moments figurines. I've already heard about them from Anya."
Dawn's eyes finally lit up. "Anya's got some figurines? Golly, that's swell!"
It took them forever to settle on a movie. They finally sat through a Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan thing that set Tara's teeth on edge with its saccharine sweetness. Dawn complained Meg's character was "too easy" and Tom "wouldn't respect her in the morning," and complained in general about the bad language and poor example the characters were setting for the Youth of America.
"If the next words out of your mouth have to do with buying cows and free milk -" Tara muttered.
Dawn looked at her, confused. Then her face cleared. "Oh! Of course! It *is* milkshake time again, isn't it?"
Shaking her head in confusion, Tara led her to the ice cream parlor. "Vanilla shake please," the teen chirped to the soda jerk. "No sprinkles."
"Oh, of course..." Tara muttered.
After she dropped Dawn off at the Summers house - grateful for the solitude for a change - she swung by Spike's crypt. The vampire had lent her an old spellbook of Drusilla's, and she needed to return it before it got mixed in with her own things.
"Spike?" Finding the ground floor of the crypt empty, she peered down the rabbit hole. Spike had a shovel in his hands and was scooping ash from the floor of the cavern beneath. "What happened here?"
"Oh, 'ello Ducks! Buffy blew up m'bedroom, she did," he replied, sounding preternaturally chipper. "Allus said she'd wreck m'bed. I just figured I'd have a lot more fun in the process!" He snickered, a juvenile leer on his face.
Then he sobered abruptly. "That was bad. I'm a bad, rude man, Tara. I'm not fit for nice respectable birds like you to be around." He slapped his own cheek, and Tara jumped at the sound. "I'm just goin' to dig m'self a new 'ole in the ground, 'cause I'm dead, see, that's where I oughta've stayed in the first place so's not to give offense t'you nice folks up aboveground..." He started digging frantically.
"Uhh...I'm just going to leave Drusilla's spellbook up here on the sofa, okay?" Tara said, backing away cautiously.
"Y'know, you really shouldn't be muckin' around with all that magic rot, Ducks," Spike called up after her. "Ever considered takin' up embroidery? That's nice an' ladylike..."
For the third time that day, Tara scurried.
On her way out of the cemetery, she was distracted by the sound of someone crying. She found Buffy, wearing a ridiculously ruffly polka-dot sundress, sprawled on the ground against a tombstone, crying decoratively into a lace handkerchief.
"Buffy? What's wrong?" Tara knelt beside her friend.
"Ev-everything," she sniffled. "I gained three pounds. I broke a nail this morning. My Great Lash mascara went all dry and cloomphy in the tube. Lowry's has a big sale on shoes and-and-and I can't afford those cute white pumps with the little bows and the buckle strap even at half off. And - and - it's been a whole week since my birthday party and Richard *still* hasn't called me!"
"Umm, sweetie? You didn't *like* Richard." Tara felt a headache coming on.
"I *know* that! But, but why hasn't he *called* me?!" Buffy wailed. "Tara? What's wrong with me?" she whined, leaning her head against Tara's shoulder.
"Nothing's wrong with you, sweetie. You're brave, and strong, and noble -" Buffy's lower lip stuck out in a Dawn-like pout.
"POOT! I don't WANNA be brave and strong and noble! I wanna be cute. And fluffy! And, and I want some nice boy to come and sweep me off my feet and take me and Dawn away from all this!"
"I-I-I'm sure somebody will soon, sweetie." Tara patted Buffy's shoulder.
"Even without the pumps with the little bows?" Buffy sniffled, looking up at Tara with teary eyes.
"Even without the pumps. I'm sure he'll overlook your choice of footwear, sweetie." Buffy cooed and set them to rocking, nearly knocking Tara off balance.
Tara rolled her eyes.
Once safely back at the dormitory, Tara dug in every pocket and drawer she had, scrounging for change. When she had a handful, she went out to the pay phone in the hall and placed a transatlantic call.
"Giles? I-it's Tara. I-I'm awfully sorry to bother you - oh, oh, thanks, I-I'm fine, bu-but everybody else is acting awfully strange." Tara spilled out her tale to Giles as quickly as she could, mindful of her limited funds.
"Operator? Reverse the charges, please. We may be awhile." Giles sighed and polished his glasses.
At sundown, a crop duster buzzed low over Sunnydale's unnaturally affable populace, spraying a fine mist over every person and surface. The scent was slightly acrid but not unpleasant, and it tasted quite nice, Buffy and Spike each thought.
Their next thought, from opposite ends of town, was the same. {{Like to lick it off'a him/her - whoa! Where did *that* thought come from?}}
The next morning, Tara stopped by the Summers house again. Willow opened the door, looking hung over. "Tara! I-I haven't been on a magic bender, if that's what it looks like. Unless that *isn't* what it looks like, I mean -"
"It's okay, Will. I know all about it, and the magic was done to you, not by you," Tara smiled. "Just please tell me, what's your opinion of Melissa Etheridge?"
"I'd do her," Willow replied without thinking. "Now that she's single again, of course," she added after a moment's thought. Tara giggled happily.
Just then a string of curses from the kitchen turned the air blue. "DAWN! What've we told you about language like that?" Willow bellowed.
"Yeah, Niblet! At least try to be grammatical about it!" Spike appeared at the top of the staircase. He was barefoot and shirtless, his hair was irreparably mussed and he was smiling wolfishly. "Tara." He swaggered down the stairs, past the two wiccans and into the kitchen to check on Dawn, whistling God Save the Queen.
A second later Dawn came tearing past them in a blur, racing up the stairs and slamming the door to her bedroom behind her hard enough to rattle the plaster ceilings. Spike ambled back out with a mug of blood in his hands, looking like the cat that ate the canary. "Ladies," he purred, moving past them with a seductive tilt to his hips.
Tara's grin split her face from ear to ear, and her eyes were so wide Willow thought they might fall out of her head.
Before she could speak, Buffy appeared at the head of the staircase, wild-eyed and disheveled. She was limping, setting her weight down on each foot gingerly as she descended. "Coffee...eggs...need protein..." she croaked as she passed them.
"Rough night, Buffy?" Tara asked slyly.
Buffy ran her hands over her hips and gave her friends a smoldering glance over her shoulder. "Ohhh yeahhh..." she purred, then crept carefully into the kitchen.
"I'll say. They just about woke the neighbors," Willow said. "Remember what it sounded like the first time Miss Kitty Fantastico went into heat?" Tara nodded. "Trust me. Miss Kitty has no *idea.* It's almost enough to turn me straight again!"
Tara laughed happily and threw her arms around Willow.
"Tara? Something wrong?"
"No. No! Everything's right! It's wonderful!"
"So the demon blood got into the water supply at the reservoir? That's what was causing all the wacky?" Willow asked over cups of tea.
Tara nodded, sipping delicately. "Giles said it would carry the, the personality, the culture of whoever touched it last into the water supply. It's one of the ways that kind of demon disrupts a population before it eats them."
"In this case, Riley. Ewww. You weren't affected because of that allergy thingie you have to the fluoride or whatever in the local tapwater. Right?"
"Yeah. Thank heavens for bottled spring water." Tara took another sip of her bottled-water tea.
"So you guys fixed it all? With whatever was in that crop-duster?" Willow's eyes were glowing with pride.
"Yup." Tara beamed. "I've never been so happy to see Xander and Anya nearly come to blows over wedding plans, let me tell you!"
Willow sighed. "Now I just have to figure out how to help her get rid of seven gross of Precious Moments figurines..."