Richie was sitting on the bench, hunched into his jacket when he felt another immortal approaching. He looked up and spotted Connor rounding the corner, heading to the rescue. Richie got up and met him half way up the block.

"Sorry," he mumbled, falling in step as Connor turned and headed back.

"D train," Connor told him. "West 24th Street station. It's right across the street from me… us," he corrected. "If you can get on a train, you can get home. Worst case, take a taxi to Broadway and Wallstreet."

Richie nodded.

"We'll get you a few extra tokens tonight. If they ever get the card system up and running we'll get you one of those. But for now always keep a couple extra tokens in your wallet."

Richie nodded again.

"It's just like the trains in Seacouver and Paris."

They made their way into the nearest station and as promised, Connor slipped Richie a few extra tokens. As they waited for the train, Connor leaned over and whispered in Richie's ear:

"You can take your tail out from between your legs."

Richie looked up at him, surprised to see the smile on his new teacher's face.

"No one has a rolled up newspaper."


Richie woke up on the couch in a blur of alcohol and something he couldn't recognize.

"Why is he still on the couch?" he heard Rachel asking.

"I wasn't going to spring that on him after last night," Connor answered. "He can't take that right now."

"Can't take what?" Richie asked, trying to get his eyes to focus.

"Don't worry about it," Connor told him.

"Worry about what?"

"So, I'm noticing you don't take direction well."

"Took you this long?"

"You hungry?" Connor distracted him.

"At least you figured that part out." Richie sat up and stretched, closing his eyes against the sun light.

"You have to stop getting him drunk," Rachel complained, closing the shades. "You're making him an alcoholic."

"It gets him to sleep." Connor moved to the kitchen and Richie followed. "Eat something light, we have things to do today."

"Is there ever going to be a day where I get to pick what I do, or, I dunno, find out what you've decided before you drag me out the door?"

"Maybe later. For now, I'm just getting you started out."

Richie snacked on an apple from the fruit bowl and leaned against the counter. "So what's this thing I can't take?" he asked.

"Nothing," Connor told him.

"Uh-huh. If it's nothing, why the big secret?"

"Now I understand why you drove Duncan nuts," the older immortal mumbled as he put on water for oatmeal.

Richie got quiet for a moment, then shrugged. "You MacLeods think you invented stubborn or something."

"I'll show you," Rachel said coming up behind Richie. "It's upstairs. It's no big deal; I don't know what Connor is going on about."

Richie followed Rachel upstairs to the spare rooms that had been used for storage. She opened one door, revealing what was now a bed room, small and bare with only a bed and a side table, but a real bedroom. And next door had been cleaned out.

"I thought you could use your own office space," Rachel told him. "We'll get the furniture for it today."

"I don't really need much. Maybe a desk, chair…TV or something."

"We'll take care of it. What do you say you and I go shopping today and leave the antiques at home?" Rachel offered. "If we're family now, I suppose we should know each other better. I'll show you around, take you to lunch, we can talk."


With his new credit card attached to Connor's account activated, Richie went out for a day with Rachel. Connor had seemed more than happy to let Rachel take over babysitting duty for the day and left Richie with the instructions of "If she says you need it, you need it."

They started out at the mall and Rachel loaded Richie down with arms full of clothes.

"That stuff you brought will only work for part of the year. We actually have seasons here," she told him.

"Uh-huh." Richie knew the drill. He had gone shopping with Tessa under other such flimsy excuses. Duncan had said shopping was the female equivalent to going to bars or basketball games. "How exactly are we planning on getting all this back?" Richie asked, dumping the clothes on the check out counter, glad Rachel had no intention of following him into a dressing room to second guess his judgment as to weather something fit or not.

"We can carry this. It's not too much."

The cashier quoted the total and Richie handed over the credit card. "I'm blaming you for the expenses," he told Rachel. "I'm not gonna get in trouble to protect you."

"This?" Rachel waved her hand dismissively. "All necessities. Besides, this way you won't have to buy clothes for a while."

Somehow four pairs of pants, two pairs of jeans, twelve shirts, and three sweaters all fit neatly into three relatively light weight bags. Rachel took one, Richie the remaining two. The next stop was a home furnishings store just around the block.

"Pick out what you want," Rachel told him, gesturing to the store at large. She followed as Richie wound his way around until he found the office furniture.

"I think I furnished my whole apartment for this much back home," he gawked at a price tag on an oak desk.

"What about this one?" Rachel offered, standing next to a Pedestal desk.

"That's more than the other one."

"It comes with the shelves and the hutch, too."

"Where am I supposed to put all that? What am I supposed to put in all that?" He pointed out reasonably. "I need a flat surface with a drawer or two." He glanced around the group of desks. He spotted one in the back corner. "Like that."

Rachel looked at it. It was nothing but a piece of wood laid across two other pieces of wood. "Where are you going to put your computer?" she asked. "You don't have room to write and put a monitor up."

"Computer?"

"Every college student needs a computer."

"Can I help you?" a sales assistant approached them.

Just as Richie was about to say "no", Rachel said: "Yes. My nephew just got into college and we're looking to update his work space."

Richie learned very quickly that his presence at the store was a mere formality. Within a matter of minutes everything had been decided, ordered, and about to be shipped if he would just give over the credit card.

"I hope deal old Uncle Russell isn't the violent type," he said as they left. "Three thousand dollars for desk?"

"And a book case and filing cabinet."

"I don't need all that."

"I believe the agreement was if I said you needed it, you did." She kept walking down the sidewalk.

"Well, I have a whole new wardrobe and the most expensive piece of compressed sawdust in existence. What else do I need?" he asked following her.

"The computer, of course, a TV, maybe a VCR, I'm sure you and Connor don't share the same tastes, a stereo…"

Richie gawked at the list of electronics.

"And of course some sheets, a bedspread, alarm clock, posters, paint, or whatever you want to do to the walls, a phone…" she continued.

"Why don't I get a couch and refrigerator and just have my own bachelor pad?"

"That would be a great idea," Rachel agreed. "I wonder if Connor would let us knock out that wall and make you a loft?"

"I was kidding!"

She smiled. "I know, but it's worth asking."

"Do I need anything else?" he asked, slightly intrigued at the idea of getting his own loft above the…well, loft.

"School supplies… and we should probably get you some shoes…but for now, you need lunch."

She took him to one her favorite pizzerias which happened to be a short walk away from the furnisher store. It was a prime example of the stereotype of New York City Richie had grown up watching on TV. One side of the space was dominated by a high steel counter in front of a brick oven with flames licking the roof. The rest of the restaurant was made up of crowded tables with white and red checker clothes and pizza stands in the middle to help with the space crunch. The walls were decorated with black and white pictures of the owner's family in Italy and the generation that had grown up in the states all working behind the very pizza counter they had ordered at.

"So this is the famous Richie specialty," Rachel said, looking at the pie on the rack over the napkin dispenser. It was piled with extra cheese, pepperoni, sausage, peppers, olives, and garlic.

"I'll eat anything on a crust. We could'a got something different," he told her.

"No, I've been hearing about this for ages now. I hear this is the very recipe that got Duncan eating pizza again."

Richie smirked. "Well, between me and Tess he didn't have much of a choice. She was almost as addicted as I am."

"I'm not even sure this thing is going to hold up." She took a slice and it drooped with the weight of the toppings.

"Guess we make it thicker in Washington."

"So, I have to ask," Rachel hedged, wiping sauce of her chin. "Are you okay with school now?"

"Hell no. But when you get no say, you get no say, right?"

"Is that really how this works? He's older so he's in charge point blank?"

Richie smiled thinly. "It's an ancient tradition as old as we are. Some people go for it, some people don't, and unfortunately, I have to change with the tides."

"You know, when I was your age, I though being immortal would be the best way to live, all the adventure and romance."

"So did I, til it happened."

"I can't imagine how hard it is."

"It's not even worth the cool stuff," Richie confided in her. "All I've ever really wanted is a normal life, and now there's no way I'll ever get one. People dying, disappearing…"

Rachel put her slice down and thought for a moment before speaking. "You really don't think Duncan is dead?"

Richie stared at the pizza and shook his head. "No, I don't."

"Do you think he's in trouble?"

"I think that's the only reason he'd leave, if he had no other choice."

Rachel didn't respond, Richie's eyes were unfocused and his attention was lost in thought. After a while, she gently placed her hand on his arm, getting his attention.

"Do you want to get mad about school again?"