It had started one afternoon at their flat in Rome.  Dawn had tossed a stress ball she’d gotten at one of her college events to Spike.

He caught it and tossed it back.

She did the same.

And so on, and so on, until Willow dropped by that afternoon.

“Hey guys, is Buffy here?”

“No, she’s been in class since before I got home. They’ve got her teaching like 7 of them now.” Dawn said, all the while tossing the ball back and forth.

“Only 4, Bit, don’t exaggerate.”

Dawn stuck her tongue out, and Willow asked the next obvious question.

“What are you two doing?”

“I dunno, we just started tossing this stress ball back and forth a while ago.”

Willow looked at them curiously as they continued passing the ball between them.

“How long have you been doing that?”

Spike glanced over at the clock on the microwave.

“Hour and a half, two?”

“I wonder what’s the longest someone’s ever kept that going,” Willow wondered thoughtfully. “You could break a world record!”

“Really?! We have to keep going then! Do you want to join?” Dawn asked the redhead excitedly.

“Sure!” she replied, holding her hands up for Spike to toss the ball over.

Another hour or so passed and a knock was heard at the door.

“You two keep it goin’, I’ll go get that.”

Spike answered the door to find Xander and Anya waiting outside.

“Hey, Spike, is Buffy here? We wanted to invite you guys to dinner.”

“She’s in class for a while yet, but Red and the Bit are here if you and Demon girl want to stay.”

Xander agreed, and Spike led them into the living room.

“Okay, I’m back in,” Spike informed the two girls tossing the ball back and forth.

“Did you three hit your head or something?”

‘Good old Anya, blunt as usual,’ Spike thought, but Dawn replied excitedly before he could speak.

“No, we’re going to beat the world record for throwing this ball back and forth!”

“Oh, can we join?” Xander asked, suddenly excited.

Anya looked skeptical for a moment before coming to a realization.

“Some of these records award prize money…” She paused for a second before continuing. “Xander shouldn’t be allowed to play, his lack of depth perception might make him drop it,” Anya chimed in matter-of-factly.

“Hey!” Xander objected.

Dawn tossed the ball over to Anya, including her in the rotation. “She’s right Xander, I’m sorry. But we’ll make sure to mention you in the interviews!”

Spike almost couldn’t keep himself from laughing when he heard the Whelp grumbling about disability rights.

They were all tired by the time Buffy returned home, but still managed to keep it going. Xander was asleep on the couch, having passed out watching them about an hour before.

Buffy surveyed the scene in front of her.

“What the hell is going on, guys?”

Dawn didn’t turn to look at her sister, but did speak up.

“We started throwing this ball back and forth and realized we’d been doing it for a long time. So then we decided to go for a world record and Willow and Anya joined us. Xander would have but the broken eye makes him a drop risk.”

Buffy just stared at them for a minute before responding. “You know that isn’t how it works, guys?”

Dawn caught the ball and whirled to face her sister.

“What do you mean?”

“You have to have the official world record people confirm it. You’d need solid evidence of when you started, and they’d probably put some limit on how long you can hold the ball like that,” she said, nodding to the ball, now bulging out from Dawn’s tightening grip.

“So we’ve been doing this… for no reason?” Dawn’s voice was strained.

Buffy looked around at her embarrassed looking friends, all of them trying to avoid her gaze.

“Oh come on, it can’t be that bad, how long were you doing it?”

Spike’s response was quiet, but not quiet enough.

“Six and a half hours…”

Buffy’s laughter could be heard halfway down the block.