Cordelia was just getting off shift at the restaurant. She pulled a double to help out a friend -- it gave her a three day weekend -- and was taking out the trash before heading on her way out to her car. The morning's conversation had been ... rougher than she would have liked, but she supposed that was what she was supposed to be learning. How to gently break it to someone that they have a larger destiny than the suburban life and not come off like a complete psycho. Someone really needs to write a how-to manual for that.

But that wasn't the point.

The point right now was getting home, taking a bath, and soaking away the stress of the workweek while trying to get Dean Winchester and the real job she was supposed to be doing off her mind. No one really expected her to be perfect at this on her first go-round, did they? She'd had five years between Angel and now, and that was a long enough period of time for her pep talk to get a little rusty. Never mind the fact that you couldn't just walk up to people and go 'Hey! You're meant to be a champion!' anymore. That just wasn't how it worked.

She tossed the bag in the dumpster, and was turning around to head back out to her car, when she caught the headlights of the incoming car heading her way. She raised her hand to shield her eyes from the light, and she could have sworn that that car looked very, very familiar. Probably because it was.

"Huh," she said with a shrug. "Maybe that pep talk did work."