Author's Note: Thanks for the kind reviews. I'm glad to know that people are reading and enjoying this.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything here and am just doing this for fun and to pass the long months until Season 4.

Living with Al was all about silence, rules, and routines. Tim wasn't much for talking, but he'd never met another person who could be as quiet as Al. She was different at work, very outgoing with the customers and always teasing him and Billy about something. But when it came to talking about herself or her feelings, she was a master at dodging the questions.

Tim didn't mind the silence. It's not like they never talked, they just never talked about Al. He found himself in a strange role reversal, where he was the one pouring words into the space between them, trying to get her to open up.

It never worked on Tim when girls did it to him and it didn't work on Al either. He had to confess that on more than one occasion, he had kissed a babbling girl just to shut her up. He also had to confess that part of him was disappointed that Al hadn't tried that tactic on him.

Al was a complete mystery, a strange mix of laid-back and rigid. She was easy-going and fun to be around, but then she swore by routine and was firmly insistent about following a few rules. Well, really, it was just one rule that could be twisted around to apply to many situations.

"I am not your maid or your mother, Tim," she said on the first Saturday, pointing to the socks he'd left on the floor next to the couch.

She said the same thing about laundry. She'd throw his clothes in with hers, as a courtesy, but would not fold them.

She expected him to clean up after himself, but didn't care about his room or bathroom, since she never had to see them.

She was deadly serious about the division of labour on cooking and cleaning. And she wanted the cleaning done as soon as possible after dinner. The first time he left the dishes and pans in the sink, she refused to cook dinner for him the next day, even after he'd washed everything.

It took a little getting used to, but Al's attitude made it easier. She was clear and consistent about what she wanted. Tim liked knowing what her expectations were, liked knowing that anyone even had positive expectations for him. He didn't want to disappoint her.

The routine part of living with Al was also easy to fall into, although most mornings, he went into the garage later than she did. She seemed to wake up at ungodly hours and was a morning person on top of that. Not one of those annoying in-your-face types, but she was still a lot more with it in the morning than he ever was going to be.

The only part of her routine that he didn't like were Friday nights. He'd come home from watching the night's football game and find her drinking on the back deck. He knew a bit about drinking to forget and drinking to not feel. It never worked as well as you hoped it would. The feelings and thoughts always caught up with you eventually.

The first Friday night, he'd left her around midnight and gone to bed. He woke up at seven the next morning with a pounding head that demanded attention. Stumbling downstairs to get some juice and see if he could find the supply of pain relievers, he found the sliding glass door was still wide open. Al had fallen asleep, or passed out, on the lawn chair with Bruno sleeping beside her.

He'd left her on the deck, unsure of whether leaving her was the best course of action. The next Friday night, the same thing happened: he went to bed and she passed out on the deck. The nights were getting colder and even though she had a blanket, he worried that she'd get sick or even freeze to death. He tried to talk to her about it, but she just changed the subject.

The look in her eyes reminded him of the time on the boat in Mexico, when Six said he was okay if he died during the operation. Not suicidal, exactly, but resigned to whatever happened. Like dying would be about the same as living in his current condition. That look had scared Tim then and it scared him now.

The third Friday, Tim limited his Scotch consumption and watched Al carefully. He tried to encourage her to join him back in the house. When that failed, he just waited her out. After her eyes closed and her breathing fell into a normal rhythm, he carried her into the house and gently placed her on the couch. Then he went up to his own room.

In the morning, she didn't say anything to him, but there was something different about her. A little lighter, a little less down than she usually was on a Saturday. Tim didn't say anything about it either, but his carrying her into the living room became part of the Friday night routine.