Back at Casa Summers, Dawn roots through some cardboard boxes in the basement until she find what she's looking for.

Cut to the gym, where cheerleader tryouts are in progress. Pan across a line of prospective bitches, er, "cheerleaders" and, in a turn of events everyone saw coming, over to Dawn in the too-tight cheerleader outfit she scavenged from the basement. Dawn clomps to the middle of the gym floor, where she proceeds to humiliate herself some more with wobbly spaghetti legs and an RJ-inspired cheer. Dawn galumphs her way through the rest of her "routine" and then falls on a simple cartwheel. I guess that Boneless Dawn must some side effect of Poseable Dawn that only kicks in weeks later. Especially as we've seen numerous times that Dawn is not this spectacularly lacking in physical agility. I mean, this is baaaaaad. Even the fat kid in the audience looks mortified.

Cut to Casa Summers later that evening. Buffy ineptly tries to reassure a sobbing Dawn through the closed bathroom door. God! This is so boring. Nothing about this episode is new or insightful or meaningful in any way, and I have no sympathy or compassion for the character of Dawn in this setting. I imagine that most of the viewers watching have already lived through adolescence at least once, if only on this very show, and I just don't have the time or energy for a painfully inept retread. I might have forgiven the people in charge of Buffy for turning it into a crap show, but I'll never forgive them for turning into a boring one. Dawn yells at Buffy to go away as Xander ambles around the corner. Buffy tries to cancel on video night with Xander, but he thinks that despite the histrionics, it's still better than the undead houseguest he's got waiting for him at home. Speaking of compassion and sympathy, I have it for Xander in droves. I can't describe how uncomfortable it's made me on those few occasions when I've been forced to live with someone I loathe. Xander deserves kudos for taking Spike in at all. Can you imagine dealing with the dried blood residue in your coffee mugs, the Weetabix shreds ground into your carpet, and the way he would always be taping his "stories" over your archived Next Generation tapes? As further enticement for being allowed to stay, Xander states that "teens in a snit" like pizza, and offers to order some. Dawn throws open the bathroom door and grits out, "It. Is. Not. A. Snit." She tearfully wails some more about how she "blew it" with the guy of her dreams, but Buffy's attention is caught by a flash of yellow and maroon on the bathroom floor. Dawn stalks off to her room and Buffy bends over for a close look at her old cheerleader uniform, which is all slashed to pieces. Oh, the drama!