"Well, you two look like you had quite a night," Buffy said. < At least somebody got happies out of this, > she thought enviously.

"Yeah, I spent the entire night making Xander happy," Willow said.

"I'll bet," said Buffy.

Willow's face clouded in puzzlement for an instant. "Not like that!" she added.

"Oh," said Buffy, not getting it.

"It's just that he got all sad...I mean we were doing great --" Willow began to explain.

"Still are --" Xander protested.

"Really? So why did we have to spend the entire night talking and watching TV and not, not -- NOT!" Her face bunched up with indignation. "I mean, you'd have thought the cookies would help, but noooooo...." Willow complained. "All of a sudden, Alexander Harris is a perfect gentleman." She pouted. "A perfect, wonderful, romantic, gentleman." She sighed. < Why is it that when our dreams come true, it's never in the way we want? > she wondered. < I guess Oscar Wilde was right....you can destroy someone by giving them their dream. >

Xander interrupted her reverie. "Shouldn't we tell her about the potion?" he asked.

"What about the potion?" Willow asked innocently, hoping he had forgotten.

"The mixup," Xander replied.

"Mixup?" Buffy asked. "Oh I figured that out."

"You did?" asked Willow and Xander simultaneously.

"I mean, what were the odds of Xander making a working love potion anyway?" Buffy replied.

"Oh the potion works," Xander said. "Only Angel, uh, didn't get any."

As they walked into the library for their early free period, Buffy's face gradually transitioned from confusion to shock to....

"I DON'T BELIEVE THIS!" she yelled as they entered the library.

"Shh!" came a noise from behind the stacks. Giles. "This is still a library, after all."

"Giles, we have a problem," Buffy said in her best Tom Hanks imitation.

"What-what? New demon? Vampires? I've heard that the Master is sending someone..." he started.

"Yeah, yeah. The Three," Buffy said, brushing off Giles's concerns. "This is much worse."

"Worse?" Giles asked. "That would imply a rather significant threat."

"Xander dosed me with love potion," she replied.

"Oh, is that all," said Giles, relieved. "It should only be necessary to fabricate the counterspell to..."

"There is no counterspell," interjected Willow.

"What?" asked Giles, becoming flustered. "Well, I suppose we'll just have to wait for it to wear off then...why are you shaking your heads at me like that? Surely even Xander isn't fool enough to dose you with the same enhanced love potion he used on Willow and himself. That would be, would be...." His voice trailed off as he realized everything.

"We need to have a little talk," said Giles to Xander, hauling him away none too gently to a corner of the library.

Buffy looked at Willow morosely.

Willow looked Buffy sympathetically.

"Don't worry, Buffy," Willow said. "It's really not so bad being a star-crossed lover." She paused to look at her for emphasis. "Really."

"Giles told me these things tend to end in violence, if the couple isn't absolutely perfect for each other," Buffy replied.

"Well that's no problem," Willow said. "I mean Xander and I, we -- " They both turned, as the conversation between Giles and Xander became heated.

"And if you even THINK of removing the spell, I'll rip off your stuffed British head and play polo with it!" Xander half-yelled at Giles. "Are we clear?"

"Crystal," replied Giles dryly.