Gabrielle sat in a coffee shop that she didn't remember walking into, and was seated beside a person she didn't know, who seemed to know her. He had carmine hair, pulled back loosely into a low ponytail, with various stray hairs looming across his face. He wore dark sunglasses with black rims, and she could almost detect a glowing redness underneath, but assumed it was her imagination. He rubbed his neck, and she could make out two needle-sized pricks, probably from her. That would explain the daze, and the fact that she didn't remember much, if anything at all. After a quick glance around the room that made her head spin, Gabrielle noticed that the only other people there were three men, truckers probably, seated on stools at the counter.

"Ya can hear what I say now?" she heard a voice with a distinct Cajun drawl say to her. It was the man seated with her.

"Yea…don't be offended if I ask, but who are you, how did I get here, and what's happened?" he smiled sweetly, bringing out a pack of playing cards and toying with them.

"It don't matter who I am, least not anymore." His hand ran unwittingly over his neck. "I guess I aided you. T'aint very often I find a half dead more beautiful that the devil herself vampire layin' half dead on the side o' the road."

"I was at the side of the road?"

"Ya. You're runnin' 'way from somet'ing, no?" she struggled to remember and then thought of the house in the city, and the days events.

"Yea." She mumbled.

"Well, I could tell that much. And I could tell that you hadn't fed for a good long while." Her head spun again.

"But…how did you know I was a vampire?" he laughed at her glance.

"Chere, I deal wit' the supernatural all de time. Its part of da job."

"And what job is that?"

"Hey, we goin to stop talking about me, and focus on your problems, okay?" she sighed deeply, knowing better than to argue. This man had a way with words.

"Well, what about my problems?"

"Let's start at the beginning, shall we? What are you running from?"

"My life."

"Which one?" he asked flatly, yet seemingly knowingly. Gabrielle looked down into the blackness of her coffee, wishing she could jump into it, rather than answering this mans questions.

"My vampiric one." She glanced at him questioningly. "Why do you care anyway?"

"Cause I know what its like to run away, and to think you don' care, and to be trapped in a life you don' want. I been dere. And runnin' away is no way to help anythin."

"Do you have a better idea? Something else I should do?" she said bitterly.

"Face it, whatever it is." She looked skeptically at him and he continued. "I know it has somethin to do with whoever you're with, you lovers, or whatever. And I know from experience that vampires have a his'try of livin more complicated lives than mortals."

"You're telling me."

"I am. So what's your story?"

"You don't quit, do you?" He shook his head. "Well, I've got two to choose from. My soulmate or my lover from a past life. And before you ask, I love them both with all my heart. Something made me want to go back home, and I think that’s why I left. But I don’t know if I can go back home. And then I ended up here, with you."

"Don' go home. Cause they won't accept you there, I can tell ya that much. Even if you don't think it, you changed. When you cross over, you change forever."

"But I can't go back anywhere else." She said desperately.

"Maybe you can. Have you actually thought about it?" she frowned. "And how did you leave? In the middle of an argument, in tears?" she nodded slowly. "Then you can go back if you want."

"But I don’t know if I want to or not."

"Exactly."

"You're not helping. I don't even know you and you're trying to make me think about everything? Somehow it doesn’t work."

"Ah, but it does. See? You can go back, or you can keep running. And once you run, you can't go back because of the shame. So choose wisely." They sat in silence, Gabrielle pondering the strangers words that made perfect sense.

"Thanks for the therapy session." She said, taking one last drink. "And the coffee. So what do you do?"

"I'm a t'ief."

"What like Remy fuckin' LeBeau?" she laughed, and he took his glasses off. Gabrielle's laughter stopped in her throat as she stared into glowing red eyes. "Holy shit…" she muttered under her breath. "You're a thing of fiction…" he chuckled softly.

"And so are vampires."

"Point taken." She said, smiling wryly. "So is this what you do?"

"Quoi? Rescue half dead vampires? Nah, just a hobby, when I'm not out stealin and savin mortal femmes from the clutches of evil, that is." She found herself staring at him, a thing of fiction come true. "What you starin at me for?"

"You don't like it? I'm just wondering if this isn't my screwed up head trying to make sense of whats going on now, by making a childhood mortal crush into flesh in front of my eyes." He raised his eyebrows.

"Childhood crush?"

"Yea…that would be were you're classified."

"I'm flattered. I never thought I was the object of anyone's affection. Let alone yours." He added in a low voice. She couldn't help but giggle. "Oh, so now I see the enfant coming through." She blushed. "Nah, its okay. I don't mind it. " He rose to leave. "You need a ride back to wherever it is you came from?"

"Sure..but didn't I have a bike?"

"Trashed. That thing ain't gonna work anytime soon."

"Shit. It wasn't even mine."

"You're in trouble then." He remarked, tossing her a helmet and motioning for her to climb on behind him.

Remy LeBeau, figment of her imagination and comic books until this night, drove Gabrielle home, and then disappeared, when she had all intentions of bounding in the door with him in tow, to introduce him to everyone.