THIS WEEK'S EPITAPHS:

• Please clap your hands and do a jig on the grave of Rico's flagging storyline.
• Join with me in lamenting the fact that Brenda's mom might actually be right for once.
• Let us celebrate Claire's creativity as it claws its way up from the cold ground.
• We stare, shocked, as David dances with death.

Anne Marie Thornton (1938-2003) — A man and woman are fucking in a hot tub. She's screaming and splashing and probably faking it. He's panting and moaning and doesn't look particularly healthy. Afterwards, she gets out to go take a shower and he stays in — she says "Don't cook yourself," and that's how you know he's not going to be the one to die. We hear a crash and a scream from the house. The guy gets out of the hot tub and runs across the lawn to the house, and that's how I know I did not need to see his flabby ass.

So she died, but we don't get to see the body. Don't we usually? Or at least some part of the death? Hmm.

Keith and David's place — Keith is going on tour with Celeste and will be gone for three months. He doesn't think it's a big deal; David worries that Keith will find a "cooler, smarter, hotter guy."

David: "Don't you know I ain't lookin'? I'm settled down. I found what I want."

Whatever. (Kidding! It's sweet and I love it.)

They talk about whether they can fuck other guys while they're apart, and of course they can, because they're exceptionally evolved about these things. But David still looks worried as Keith leaves.

Breakfast at the Fisher residence — Nate is reading the paper. He mumbles, "Bush just lies, and no one cares." Actually, a lot of us do, but we're too busy watching TV to do anything about it.

There's oatmeal on one of Claire's prints. Apparently Maya is the culprit — do they keep that kid sedated? Is that why she's so cute? Ruth tells Nate that the prints are for Claire's "crit."

Claire: "Mom, don't say 'crit.' It sounds weird coming from you."

Well, it sounds weird coming from anybody, but I might just be saying that because I'm thinking about you and Edie.

Nate grumbles that Claire should sell out to the highest bidder before her life blows up in her face, because it will. Ruth gives Nate a look and suggests that he do something to make life better: go on a date, or just have sex, or at least get a job. Hey: why not become an escort so you can do all three at once? But Nate is not interested in any of it. Claire insists that it's fine to be celibate, but what she really means is "I can't wait to go on a date, or just have sex, or at least get a job with Edie."

Nate says it's hard to get a job these days and he's too busy thinking about what's best for Maya. Does that include wondering why the kid never makes a sound?

Ruth gives Nate a brochure for a bereavement group, and reveals that she went to one of those when Mr. Fisher died, once a week for several months.

Claire: "Why didn't you tell us? One of us could have gone with you."
Ruth: "I felt like it would have been wrong to burden my children."
Claire: "Maybe I could have used it too. Why is this family so repressed?"

Nate says he doesn't need a group: he's done plenty of grieving, and he's just stuck in quicksand. Yes, and the quicksand is pouring from your own sludgy soul, Nate.

An intake room — Mr. Thornton, the guy from the hot tub, wants to know why God is punishing him. David and Rico say the usual things. Is it just me, or is really hard to have sympathy for this guy? Maybe it's because I don't like hot tubs. Or maybe it's because he sorta looks like a less interesting version of Tony Soprano.

A fabric store — Ruth is buying fabric and a pattern so she can make George some pajamas. Here's an idea: buy a book on how to sew, so the man can make his own damn pajamas. Ruth asks the cashier how her love life has been. Not so good, apparently: the woman was recently dumped, and also recently left a dump (of dog poo) on her ex-lover's doorstep. This reminds Ruth of something, of course, so she suggests that the woman come over for dinner sometime to meet George's son. Ruth, maybe that's not such a great idea: common interests are good, yeah, but not when they're scatological. On the other hand, if you have that in common with someone, I suppose there's no way they'll ever do something that disgusts you.

Claire's crit — It says crit, dammit! Don't be so dirty-minded! And don't try to say "Claire's crit" three times fast.

There's the brilliant Brooke Smith again, as the art teacher. She's sort of walking around as the other students comment. Anita says that Claire's prints remind her of Katy Grannan's stuff. Well, that can't be all bad. Russell says the work is simple, unpretentious, and pretty, "like Claire herself." Geez.

Anita says they seem staged — "not just staged, but stagey." A rather creepy person in the back of the room says the prints seem dead: "this girl who's like dead and beyond everything. Beyond hunger, beyond sex, beyond boredom... like nothing can get to her." Claire just squints and thinks.

Brooke Smith says she wouldn't say dead; she would say empty. Claire says that wasn't her intention at all; she was trying to capture the stillness that she feels sometimes. Russell says some other lame thing, and then the instructor instructs:

Instructor: "Okay. Let me ask you this, and feel free to roll your eyes. Do you really want to perpetuate the idea of woman as a vacant vessel?"
Creepy student in the back: "Is this more lesbian stuff?"
Instructor: "Yes. I have to meet my quota so I get my toaster oven."
Claire: "Okay, I'm not trying to perpetuate anything. I don't have an agenda. I shoot from a more instinctual place."
Instructor: "An empty place?"
Claire: "I'm not empty."
Instructor: "No. Of course not. So maybe with your next work we can see something that actually is inside you."

Okay, wait. Brooke Smith's character is a lesbian? I'm glad I didn't know that when I said all those nice things about her in the last recap: that way it will seem a little less lame when I ask her out in this recap. Which I just did: drop me a line, Brooke. You can see what's inside me. (Yeah, I did say a little less lame. Feel free to roll your eyes.)

Also let's applaud the shout out to Ellen! I don't have a toaster oven: I need to get busy.

Fisher & Diaz — Speaking of gettin' busy, there's Rico's ho. Ruth is her usual polite self, but she's also her usual disapproving self, and this time she's right.

The corpse van — David is transporting a body. His cell phone rings; it's Keith, who manages to not say much, which is how you pretend not to be gay when you're on the phone. I haven't done that in about 10 years, but it's probably like riding a bike.

David is concerned about the awkward conversation he and Keith had, but Keith is flying high, literally, in the tour plane, and too busy eating yellowfin to notice that David's not happy. He calls David "honey":

David: "Honey? When do you ever call me honey? Because you don't want them to know you're talking to a guy? Jesus, why don't you just call me Darlene?"

That made me guffaw. Nice job, David. This closeted-on-the-job thing is getting tiresome, Keith.

The offices at Fisher & Diaz — Rico's ho is high, and I'm still not recapping this crap. It's funny when Nate shows up, though — he's just there to play Doom, because he's a slacker, and he gives Rico a look like "You dog, you." The other funny thing is that when the ho — okay, I'll stop calling her that; her name is Sophia — when she says she has a really short skirt, all I can think is that she also has a really short sugar daddy, because Rico looks like he's about 13 when he stands next to her.

The van — David is listening to NPR. Great, now every time I do that in the car, I'll think of this episode, which is about to get very weird and damn upsetting.

There's a guy on the side of the road, signaling for a ride or help or whatever. David stops to pick him up. The guy says he ran out of gas, and thus feels stupid, but David says it's happened to all of us at least once. No, I don't think it has: it hasn't happened to me, and I don't really understand why it happens to anyone. You get in the car and you check the gas gauge. What could be simpler? Well, other than not picking up hitchhikers, that is.

So the guy tells a story about needing to help his grandma, who has broken her hip or something. That's even lamer than my sorry-ass attempt to ask Brooke Smith out. But David believes the guy, or maybe he doesn't care because he's hoping to get a blow job.

The guy's name is Jake; he introduces himself, puts his seat belt on, and seems generally polite as David drives him to the gas station.

On campus — Brenda and her mom are having lunch. Brenda's mom flirts with college boys, disses cognitive psych, talks about a professor's unusually shiny penis, and reveals her plans to get her vagina rejuvenated because "nobody wants to fuck a glass of water." Yep, just an ordinary lunch with mom.

And of course, since she mentioned vaginal rejuvenation, I can't help but think of The L Word and Alice's adorable investigation of rejuvenation. Well, maybe the investigation wasn't adorable, but Alice is. Brooke, I'm gonna have to put you on hold if Leisha calls.

Brenda thinks she wants Joe to be the father of her children. Her mom asks how the sex is. Brenda says it's fine, creative, and interesting, so her mom says "you have to dump him" because sex shouldn't be a "cerebral exercise": it's "something you should feel, not something you should think." Brenda points out that she has to think because of the compulsion thing, and that it's the healthiest relationship she's ever been in. And that's how we know it's doomed.

The bereavement group — Some old people are sharing their memories of their dearly departeds. Nate looks even more out of place than usual.

On the road — Jake can't get money for gas because the ATM is down, so David buys the gas and gas can for him. Can you really be that trusting, David?

The Fisher residence — Ruth tells George about her matchmaking plans. He gets annoyed. I still find them extremely boring as a couple; there's no chemistry. Frances Conroy had a lot more chemistry with Kathy Bates. George tells Ruth that he's "very disappointed in her," and now I'm completely done with him.

The bereavement group — Nate finally unloads on everyone; he tells them he doesn't have a lifetime of memories with his loved one, and now he goes from feeling numb to feeling terrified to feeling angry to feeling thankful to feeling crazy. That's a grief thing? I thought it was a life thing.

Before Nate can completely go nuts, a fire alarm goes off and everyone clears out of the building. Nate, that was the universe's way of telling you to get over yourself.

On the road — David imagines Jake offering to be his guy on the side who loves him unconditionally and lives just to please him. Sometimes I don't like the way these little hallucinations (or whatever they are) happen with no warning. I worry that some day we'll find out that everything since Nate's surgery has been a hallucination, or some other Bobby-Ewing-in-the-shower sort of thing.

The bereavement group — The false fire alarm is over, so they can all go back in. Except for Nate: he's had enough, so he turns around and goes back into his own little lonely world instead.

On the road — Jake tells David some stuff about his childhood, about moving around a lot and whatever.

They finally find an ATM, and as they head toward the place, Jake punches David and then shows him a gun. He tells David to get as much cash as he can out of the ATM, etc., and it's a bit too similar to that gay-bashing episode during the first season.

Outside, Jake apologizes and tells David not to be angry. He threatens David again, so they get back in the van; on the way in, David takes his cell phone off his belt and puts it in his pocket.

They decide to go to MacArthur park because Jake wants to "head on down to the crack gallery." Great, now I'm going to be singing that song for days.

Jake won't let David get on the freeway because that's how Jake's dad died; we're meant to think that this explains why Jake always puts his seat belt on, despite his otherwise reckless behavior.

We hear a farting noise; Jake thinks it was David, but David explains it was the body. Jake apparently didn't notice the body before now. He puts the gun to David's head and tells him to stop the van, and then pulls the body out of the van and throws it down on the ground. David is appalled, of course, and it is truly horrifying to see. As they get back into the van, David tries to quickly use his cell phone, but doesn't quite have enough time.

Jake tells David to stop at a market, or maybe it's some sort of truck stop. He makes David get in the back of the van and ties him up with some rope. While Jake is inside, David manages to wiggle out of the ropes, so when Jake comes back, David hits him with the door of the van and runs.

I'm describing this in a very boring way because I'm traumatized.

David sort of hides behind a truck — is that the best you can do? Climb up under the truck or something! But he just sort of skitters around from truck to truck, in a panic, and then crouches down to see a police car pull up to the market. Just as he begins to have hope, his cell phone rings, and Jake is on him in a heartbeat.

If I've learned anything from this episode, it's that I'm right to hate hot tubs and cell phones.

Also, I don't think this is really living up to Six Feet Under standards; it's almost sensationalist, and is telling me how to feel even more than Spielberg does, which is saying a lot. Usually this show tends more toward the subtle side of things.

We do get a little moment of reflection, though, when David asks Jake how he can do this, and how he could be so disrespectful about the corpse; he wonders how Jake can be so "completely disconnected from another human being."

Jake: "Jesus, David. What fuckin' difference does it make? Let's just get high and have some fun."

And maybe that's the reason "Bush just lies and nobody cares": it's easier to just get high and have some fun. Or else it really is all a dream, like Michael Moore wondered, and we'll wake up to find out Nate's actually dead, Gore won the election, the twin towers are still dominating the NYC skyline, and nobody's ever heard the acronym WMD.

Um, sorry.

They go to MacArthur Park, but instead of a cake out in the rain, they find crack dealers. Jake makes David smoke some crack, and David has another hallucinatey moment where he imagines driving really fast while Jake blows him; but in reality he and Jake are slumped in the van. They wake up when the guy who sold them the crack smashes the windshield and starts wailing on the van.

They drive off and act silly. David tries to negotiate his release, but Jake still isn't listening. Suddenly David's guts clench, and in the next scene he's taking a dump in an alley while Jake says "there's definitely some downsides to crack."

Jake says he'll let David go if he just takes him to Long Beach. I don't think I can take it. ('Cause it took so long to bake it.)

Suddenly they see a dog. Jake says it's his dog and they need to catch it. This is all too trippy and horrifying. David helps him catch the dog, but — surprise, surprise — it's not actually Jake's dog, so Jake freaks out, takes David's wallet and kicks the shit out of him. Then he pours gasoline on David and asks him to choose between the gun and a match.

David's expressions are excruciating. I never feel like covering my eyes during horror movies, but I do find this incredibly hard to watch. Jake makes David suck the gun; then he tells him to close his eyes, and David starts to watch the scenes flash: he sees his dad; the gay man who got killed at the ATM; Keith; Lisa's body. And then he hears the tires screech as Jake leaves with the van.

We see David shuffle down a road, looking like hell, and when a cop car pulls up and puts on its siren, it's the most beautiful thing in the world.

I'm still asking why, but I no longer feel manipulated: I just feel moved, and very, very glad that it's over. The credits roll in silence.

NEXT WEEK ON SIX FEET UNDER: David doesn't want to talk about what happened and can't breathe; Ruth screams about George's little secrets; Nate asks Diane Delano for a job; Joe and Brenda look at houses; Edie finally says "c'mere" to Claire. (I take back what I said about wanting to go back a few years: let's go forward exactly one week instead.)

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