Chapter 8: Still Grounded...

A/N: Chapter written by Ozlover.

"Giles, honey? Wake up!" Jenny chirped as she bustled around the bedroom.

"Huh?" Giles sat up and reached over onto the nightstand by the bed to retrieve his glasses. Once he had them he wiped the lenses repeatedly and put them on. "Why so early, Dear?" He asked, trying not to sound mad, although he was.

"It's your turn to baby-sit the delinquints." Jenny replied simply. Giles sighed and fell back onto the pillow. "And I suppose your going shopping."

"We have a winner." Jenny leaned over and pecked him on the cheek. "See you in a few hours. Have fun." She called over her shoulder, loving how she was putting him through the same torture he put her through yesterday. Giles groaned and practically fell out of bed. He trudged downstairs to make a pot of tea. He had a feeling he was going to need it.

Giles saw that Oz was awake on the couch, staring at the ceiling in silence. So he turned on the TV. They sat together in silence for about five minutes until Willow came down the stairs.

"Morning..." She mumbled, nearly tripping on the bottom step.

"Morning, Will." Oz replied sweetly. Willow sauntered over and plopped down on the couch next to him.

"What are we watching?" She asked.

"Morning news." Oz said.

"Mmmmkay." Willow replied sleepily. Oz smiled and gently put his arm around her shoulder.

Shrill yips sounded from upstairs. Willow sat upright. There were more yips. Seconds later a pissed Buffy came thumping down the stairs.

"Somebody shoot me." She replied dryly. Beans and Snoopy bounded down the stairs, heading straight for Buffy. Willow, seeing that Buffy was about to snap, reached over and scooped Snoopy up and handed him to Oz. She then grabbed Beans and set him on her lap.

Buffy muttered a 'thank you' and went into the kitchen.

"She's not a morning person." Willow whispered, afraid that she would hear. Giles and Oz nodded in understanding.

Dawn and Cordelia were the next to come down. "Hey." Dawn greeted.

She was greeted by a few smiling faces. She and Cordelia went into the kitchen looking for cereal. They were greeted with the site of Buffy sleeping with her head literally centimeters from a full bowl of cereal. Dawn and Cordelia giggled.

"Spike..." Buffy mumbled into the table. "Give me back my 'drinking pants'. I need those...I need the Corona you took from me last night...and I want those grey pickles too...I thought I told you to go to McDonalds and get me some...What happened? I need to present those pickles to the judges...Angel will be mad if you don't give me my Corona back..."

"Oh, boy." Dawn replied. She slid the cereal bowl away from her sister's head, incase she decided to spaz out and knock things over in her sleep. Buffy had used the last of the cereal, so Dawn and Cordelia brought out left-over chips from the night before. They went into the living room and offered the chips to anyone who wanted them. Xander, who had woken up a few minutes before, snatched them first and refused to share.

"Xander..." Willow warned. She looked at him sternly. he sighed and set the chips in front of him. By that time, Connor and Angel were downstairs as well.

"I can't believe I'm up this early..." Connor muttered.

"It's not early. It's ten o'clock." Willow replied. It was true. It only seemed early because of the dark thunderclouds hovering over the beach. Cordelia walked over towards the sliding glass door and peered outside at the ocean being sloshed around by the wind, spewing foam left and right. Then something red caught her eye. It was her beach towel sliding across the shore, being picked up and dropped again by the violent wind.

She cursed under her breath and pulled the sliding door open without thinking.

"Cordy, what's wrong?" Buffy asked from the kitchen doorway. Apparently she had just woken up again.

"I'll be right back!" She called over her shoulder. Giles was too flustered to say anything. Dawn lept off the floor and followed her onto the wet, sticky shore. It wasn't raining hard yet, but the wind sent it driving into the girl's faces. By the time they reached the spot where the towel was, a strong gust of wind blew it out of Cordelia's reach. It went flying behind over by some houses next to hers (not hers but you know what I mean.) As they were getting close to it, a hand reached out from between two houses and grabbed it.

Cordelia stopped dead in her tracks. How dare someone take her fifty dollar beach towel? And right in front of her too! She thought. She plowed through the wet sand to where the hand had appeared from. When she and Dawn reached the space between the two houses they saw a man standing there, holding her towel. Cordelia forgot all of her rage towards the man. He didn't look like he took her towel to piss her off.

"Um, that's my towel." Cordelia replied, refusing to make eye-contact with the man.

"Oh? This? I just saw it flying around and figured that I'd take it and turn it in to the lost and found at the other end of the beach." The man told her. He handed it to her.

"Thanks." Cordelia finally looked up at the man. He was tall, with nicely bronzed skin. He had sandy brown hair and big, hazel eyes. But he looked almost thirty, which was too old for Cordelia. Besides, she had Xander...well, maybe...and she had Angel...

Dawn also thought that he was too old for either of them, but he was still nice looking...

"By the way, my name's Mike." He informed them. he extended his hand and both girls shook it politely.

"I'm Cordelia."

"And I'm Dawn."

"Well, I have to go, but it was really nice to meet you." Mike told them.

"You too." Dawn replied, smiling warmly. She and Cordelia jogged back to the house, trying to use the towel to shield themselves from the pelting rain. Mike watched them until they disappeared inside the house. Then he left. He had somewhere to be.

When the girls returned they dried off, then received a stern lecture from Giles about the dangers of going out onto the beach during a thunderstrom. He didn't take back their priviledge of leaving the house, though.

The guys were about to head downstairs to play video games and the girls were going to go with then to cheer their boyfriends on, but a special news alert came on the TV.

A woman was sitting in a news room. The words "Missing Girl" were written boldly in red on the screen above her.

"This just in, a girl has disappreared in the immediate area, around Carolina Beach." She paused, taking a breath. Carolina Beach. That was where on the Atlantic Coast they were staying. "She was reported missing around six AM this morning. The last place she was seen was down near the beach with some friends. The friends have been questioned and all have said that the girl, Brooke Saunders, left the beach around midnight to head back to her home, which is ten minutes away. She never made it there." The woman paused again. A picture of the missing girl was up on the screen.

She had long, curly dark brown hair and big blue eyes. Her skin was fair and she looked to be about seventeen. The same age as them.

The picture stayed up for awhile before shrinking into the corner of the screen. The woman continued "If you've seen Brooke, or have any information that might help us in our search for her, please call this number." A phone number appeared on the screen.

The eight teens plus one librarian didn't know what to say.

"Wow. She disappeared so close to here." Buffy said. She was petting Beans and Snoopy who had calmed down and were snoozing in her lap. Turtle was in his usual spot under the coffee table and Fuzzball was sitting on the couch in front of Willow and Oz, who were both petting him.

"Yeah..." Willow said, obviously nervous. Oz held her hand comfortingly.

"I know you kids have enough common sense to know this, but you need to be extra cautious outside the house." Giles said, taking off his glasses to wipe at them with a cloth he pulled from his shirt pocket. All eight teens nodded solemnly, then left the room in silence. They headed downstairs to the basement.

Giles needed to research...

It was quiet for awhile until the seriousness from before wore off.

"Oz is gonna kick your butt!" Willow told Xander.

"We'll just see about that." Xander countered, grinning like an idiot.

It turned out that Oz won...again. They really needed more video games. Maybe Dance Dance Revolution...

Since the only thing that Giles could make were scones and tea the teens had to make their own lunch. They mostly ate chips, left-over hotdogs, popcorn and microwavable lasagna.

The sky was getting lighter, but it was still fairly dark and raining. But there was no thunder, which meant they could go swimming in the pool. So everyone changed into their bathingsuits and went outside. There was no screen over the pool, so the plump raindrops splashed down on them as they got into the pool.

Xander was the first one in, doing a maniac-like cannonball. Everything that wasn't wet from the rain got soaked from his jump. Poor Turtle was so shocked that he picked up his huge body and sped away faster than anyone had ever seen him run.

Everyone decided to play Marco Polo. It was hard, because the pool was close to Olympic-size. When Cordelia was Marco, she 'accidentally' grabbed Angel. Okay, so maybe she peeked once...

They stayed in the pool for another hour or so. After that they went back downstairs. Connor and Dawn went upstairs to get the disposbale cameras. They also had some alone time together, which they used to their advantage...until Dawn was afraid it would be suspicious how long they were taking. Connor was upset at first, but he cooled off quickly.

Their camera war lasted for nearly an hour. Or, until they ran out of film. They got some good pictures of their signifigant other, coupled with them and then all hell broke loose when Xander randomly started to run around snapping pcitures. By the time the war ended everyone was exausted. Not to mention very hungry. Jenny was home by then, and they wouldn't have to make their own lunch again. Thank God...

Jenny didn't make anything. Instead she ordered out for Chinese. She ordered too much, so they'd have left-overs for who knows how long. Not long after dinner the phone rang.

"Hello?" Jenny asked into the phone. She was silent as she listened to the person on the other line. "Ok, I'll get her."

"Cordelia? The phone's for you!" Jenny called into the living room, where the kids were watching TV. Cordelia looked around, seeing confused expressions that matched her own. How would someone know she was staying there? She picked up the phone in the living room.

"Hello?" Cordelia asked shakily.

"I know where you are. It's only a matter of time before I make an impression that no one will ever forget." A man's ragged voice said.

There was a long beep. He had hung up.

Cordelia could feel herself being drained of color. She probably looked albino or something. Her friends looked at her expectanty.

She couldn't think of anything to say. She sure as hell didn't want to scare her friends..."Wrong number." She replied dully.

"I'll be right back." Cordelia got up and went upstairs. Dawn followed her. The others knew she was lying about the call. they decided that they'd ask her about it later.

"Who was on the phone?" Dawn asked nervously. "Who?"

"I think it was the guy f-from Rite Aid."

"Oh my God. What did he say?" Dawn asked, the color draining from her face as well.

"He said...that...He knows where we are. And it won't be long before he does something no one will ever forget." Cordelia looked like she would burst into tears.

"What should we do? Should we tell everyone else? Should we call the cops?" Dawn asked frantically.

"No. I don't want to scare anyone...We should keep this just between us, okay?" Cordelia asked.

"Okay." Dawn agreed.

The two girls headed back downstairs, more composed than before. They stayed up until three AM before going to bed. All but Cordelia and Dawn, that is. There would be no sleep for them for awhile.