Chapter two - Don't cry over spilled milk.
Jen approached the kitchen with a gloomy expression. It seemed that the emotion between Bobby and her sister was seriously taking its toll on her. Maybe a hot cup of coffee was the best thing for her, when she considered the cirumstances. She was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she didn't even hear the muffled speech from on the other side of the kitchen door. Jen walked right into the kitchen and straight towards the fridge. The speech stopped completely.
"You one of Bobby's friends?" A gruff voice questioned causing Jen to jump out of her thoughts and spin in the direction of the kitchen table.
Two men were sat at the table, staring at her intently. Both of the men had suspicious expressions on their faces, as if they thought she was some sort of evil creature or something, and both were studying her. She felt quite uncomfortable if she was being honest with herself. She couldn't help but surpress a smirk though; They were both what she and Nat would call 'smoking hot'. Jen had a feeling that Natalie would be impressed, that was if she wasn't killed by Bobby before she could see the two men.
"Yep, I'm Jenny Johnson. And you are?" Jen began, still slightly gloomy. Her spirits had slightly lifted up since she got into the house but knowing that Bobby and Natalie were still angry with each other she couldn't help but feel that emotion too.
"I'm Sam, and this is my brother Dean." The man with the shaggy hair introduced the two of them, with a warm smile on his face.
Jenny smiled back. It was truly satisfying for her to be able to smile and be filled up with warmth and happiness. One good thing about everything that was happening to her was that she could quickly know what people were truly like just by feeling what they are feeling. She turned back towards the fridge and opened it, then scanned it for some milk. When she couldn't find any she spun back around and smiled at both of the two men in turn. "Well, Sam, Dean, you must be the ones who know their way around Bobby's kitchen."
Natalie didn't know what was worse; The fact that Bobby still hadn't said a word since Jen had left them or that her neck was starting to get sore from craning it so that she was looking right down at the floor. She didn't dare say a word until Bobby spoke but waiting for him to start the conversation was getting really frustrating. Natalie expected a huge lecture about how she shouldn't have hung up half way through such a cell phone call with him but what she got instead was a big surprise.
"I just can't believe how goddamned bitter you have gotten." Bobby muttered sadly causing Natalie to shoot her head up. She stared back at him and noticed that he didn't look angry. He looked disappointed and upset. She raised her eyebrow, clearly not expecting such a turn in their conversation. Bobby's eyes narrowed in annoyance. "You're not the same Natalie that I have watched grown up since she was a little baby! You were never, ever this rude to me Natalie! Sure, you were a dynamic character but you've never hated me before."
Natalie's heart sunk. She didn't hate Bobby at all, she could never hate Bobby. But it was complicated. "Bobby, I don't hate you."
"But you dislike me."
"No. Look, it's a long story."
Bobby shook his head. "One which you failed to fill me in on!" His face grew a little bit softer. "I know that when your dad died it took a lot out of you but you can't just hold it all in Natalie. It's just not healthy!"
As soon as her father was mentioned, Natalie started to shut down any sign of emotion on her face. "This isn't about dad Bobby. It's not why we're here."
"And you never used to leave me hanging with news of how you and Jenny were doing in the middle of a flippin' phone conversation!" Bobby had completely ignored Natalie's last statement as he was too hell bent on trying to talk some sense into her. He had so much that he had wanted to say for a long time and now it was all coming out. "You used to keep me informed all the time. Now I get an occasional phone conversation with very little information-"
"I'm here to talk to you a-"
"About everything that is happening with you girls. I made a promise to myself and to your father that I would look after you both and make sure that you were safe and happy. How can I do that if your so goddamned determined to shut me out of your lives? I mean-"
"BOBBY, SHUT UP FOR ONE SECOND!" Natalie exclaimed, very loudly and firmly. Her tone was so strong and commanding that Bobby did shut up, mainly because he was surprised in the way that she had spoken to him. "I can't have this conversation with you. Right now, the most important thing is finding out what is wrong with Jen. I'm not going to stand here debating about the past with you when we need to be dealing with her situation! Our whole 'family bond' thing that you want to try and fix isn't a priority Bobby and that's the end of it."
Even Natalie was surprised with herself when she had finished speaking. Her voice was so full of raw emotion that it hurt her throat to speak for too long. Tears ran freely down her cheeks and she didn't even try to wipe them away in a bid to show that she was strong minded. Instead, she looked Bobby straight in the eye. "Please, can we just fix her?" She practically pleaded.
Bobby could only nod. If Natalie was getting so worked up about Jen's situation then Bobby knew that it was much worse than he had suspected. Natalie could always fix almost all of Jen's problems without fail. So it was obvious that this one was too much for even her to handle on her own. "Okay, we'll fix her." He replied softly, his voice quivering slightly with emotion. "But first you've got to tell me what has happened."
"So, how do you know Bobby then?" Dean questioned curiously as Jen joined both him and his brother at the kitchen table, with a cup of coffee in her hands. Bobby hadn't really told them much as they had only arrived an hour or so before Jen had. All he said was that two other people were coming to the house soon, and he seemed very worried about something. He hadn't actually managed to pull himself away from his phone for that hour but was only being directed straight to voice mail each time. Dean hadn't ever seen Bobby as het up and concerned as he was in that hour before. So, naturally, he was curious as to who Jen was. "I mean, I would be highly surprised if you were Bobby's dirty little secret and you were here to offer some services." He joked, flashing a wink in Jen's direction.
The pure thought of the implications of Dean's joke sent a disgusted shudder down Jen's spine. She was so surprised by it that she very nearly almost choked on the gulp of coffee that was in her mouth.
"Dean!" Sam hissed, disapprovingly, as he watched Jen cough the coffee back up her throat.
"What?" Dean questioned, obliviously. When he realised what Sam was so annoyed about he scoffed. "Oh please, it was only a joke."
"A sick joke." Sam corrected indignantly.
When Jen had gotten breath back into her throat, she glanced over to Dean and raised her eyebrow. "Sorry, but that was disgusting! Bobby's like family to me." She went to take another sip of her coffee but another shudder stopped her. "Ew, ew, ew."
Dean thought about it for a few moments, biting his bottom lip in consideration. "Okay, so maybe it was quite a sick joke... but it was funny."
Before the conversation could progress Bobby and Natalie walked into the kitchen, with Natalie contientiously a few paces behind Bobby.
"Looks like you've shown Jen around the kitchen." Bobby started, looking between the cup of coffee in Jen's hands and the Winchesters. "This is her older sister Natalie. Natalie, this is Sam and Dean Winchester."
Natalie looked between both of the Winchesters and offered them a small smile, even though socialising with new people wasn't exactly something that she wanted to do at that moment in time. "It's nice to meet you."
Jen glanced between the two of them a few times as if she was trying to guess what had happened outside. Her sister looked really upset, but not as upset as Jen had expected. Jen had expected Bobby to be angry too but instead he looked even more upset than Natalie did. The feeling swept over Jen like the plague and hit her with such an impact that she clutched at her chest as if her heart was breaking in to two pieces. Whilst going to clutch her chest, she had completely forgotten about the cup of coffee that had been in her hand. As soon as she let go of the cup, it toppled down on to the edge of the table and smashed into pieces. The hot liquid exploded from the broken pieces and spread out into all different directions. Sam and Dean both sprung up from the table in surprise but Jen didn't even notice. Hot coffee fell on to her lap and she still didn't react, she couldn't. Jen could feel the hot liquid seep through her clothes, and it stung but she was too upset to even move.
"Shit! Jen!" Natalie exclaimed as she rushed towards her sister and pulled her off of her chair. Jen still seemed to be clutching on to her heart but Natalie didn't notice that. She gripped on to her sister's shoulders and shook her. "What the hell were you thinking?"
Jen's attention suddenly got pulled away from her thoughts and emotions as she stared at her sister, her eyes over flown with tears. "What?"
Natalie looked between Jen's hands, which still firmly clutched at the left side of her chest, and her face which looked distraught. "Shit, shit, shit." She repeated over and over. It was happening again.
Jenny let out a pained howl as her legs suddenly buckled. This caught Natalie off guard and Jenny fell straight to the floor. She rolled around in complete agony. Natalie instantly dropped to the floor and cradled her sister. This only caused Jenny's howls to become more loud.
"What the hell is happening?" Bobby demanded frantically as he approached both of the Johnson sisters. He had watched in utter amazement but once the feeling had worn out, he took action. When he reached Jen and Natalie, he looked towards Jen. But, before he could speak, Natalie cut him off.
"Bobby, we both need to get as far away from her as possible."
Bobby raised his eyebrow. "Natalie, what the hell are you playing at? Look at your sister!" Bobby stayed focused on Jenny and thought that what Natalie was telling him to do was absurd. "Jenny," He also kneeled down beside them both and tried to take one of Jenny's hands. His body staggered backwards when Natalie pushed him away.
Natalie scoffed. "Bobby, she can't hear you!" She glanced over to the Winchesters who were both stood just a few steps away from the scene. Both of them had concerned looks on their faces, but were too astonished by what they were seeing. "They need to stay with her Bobby."
"What?" Dean questioned, eyebrow raised. If he was being honest, he was panicking about the situation.
"Exactly my thoughts!" Bobby exclaimed. "Natalie, she needs us here. She knows us."
Natalie moved away from her sister and frowned. "What are you not getting about what I've said? Bobby, we need to get as far away from Jenny as possible. We are hurting her! Sam and Dean need to stay here with her and keep on eye on her until she has calmed down. I don't like this any more than you do but we need to leave or she will seriously hurt herself."
Bobby hesitantly got up from the floor but didn't move from his spot in the kitchen. He glanced at Jen and watched as her body convulsed and as she weeped sadly. He couldn't just leave her.
"Bobby, we'll look after her." Sam began, causing Dean to look in his direction. The youngest Winchester kept his eye on Jen. He didn't know why but what was happening to her didn't panic him as much as the others. It was as if it was familiar to him, in an odd sense that even he couldn't describe. "Just do what Natalie says."
"Thank you." Natalie smiled softly in Sam's direction before clutching Bobby's arm and pulling him in the direction of the kitchen door. "I'll explain it all to you when we've gotten away from her. Please just trust me on this Bobby."
Bobby didn't say another word. He simply allowed Natalie to pull him out of the room as he was shocked at what he had seen. He thought that Natalie's plan sounded crazy but he also decided that she knew more about Jen's condition than he did. He had to trust her on it, for Jen's sake. Natalie stole one last glance of her younger sister and tried her best to hold in all of her emotions as she rushed Bobby straight through the hallway and out of the house.
"Where are we going?" Bobby questioned when he had found his voice again.
"To the back of the junk yard. It's close enough to make sure that nothing else happens but it's also far enough away so that we don't hurt her."
Sam and Dean stayed true to their word; they stayed in the kitchen and kept an eye on Jen. Dean was, needless to say, completely shocked by what was happening. He hated seeing anyone in this amount of pain, let alone a woman, so he started to clean up the kitchen table in a bid to keep himself preoccupied. "She was acting completely normal before it happened." Dean shook his head as he said this.
His younger brother frowned as he pushed a hand through his hair. Instead of keeping one eye on Jen, he kept both of them on her. "D'you think this is supernatural?"
"Definitely."
Suddenly Jen's body stopped moving and her cries halted. Dean and Sam stopped their conversation and glanced at each other warily before turning their attention back to Jen. She was almost too still.
Sam got up from his chair and walked towards her. He bent down beside Jen and pulled one of her hands from her chest and checked her pulse, sighing in relief when he could feel that she was still alive. When his fingers connected with her wrist, he felt a small rush of sadness pass through him. This caused Sam to immediately let go of her wrist as his eyes widened.
"Is she okay?" Dean questioned, standing a few steps away from his brother and Jen.
"I don't know Dean." Sam muttered in a concentrated manner as he stayed focused on the woman in front of him. He sighed in relief when her eyes twitched ever so slightly. "Jennifer?"
Her eyelids suddenly opened widely and she looked around at her surroundings as if she was confused to where she was. When she saw Sam, she jumped right up into a sitting position and backed away from him slightly.
"Hey, it's okay. You're at Bobby's." Sam tried to reassure her.
The sorrow and emptiness in Jen's stomach seemed to disappear completely as soon as she had woken up. Her emotions were all over the place and mixed up though, so she was finding it difficult to stay calm. "Where's Natalie?" She questioned abruptly as her eyes scanned the room. "And Bobby?"
Dean cleared his throat. "Your sister said that they had to leave the room to stop you from getting hurt? She asked us to stay in here and keep an eye on you."
Jen bit her bottom lip as she remembered why she was getting so worked up; Bobby and Natalie. They were so upset that their emotions radiated off of them and straight into her. But that had never happened before. It took a lot more for her to fall to the ground and be overwhelmed by an emotion. She shook herself away from her thoughts and shakily turned her attention to Dean. "Oh." She knew that her sister would feel guilty and she hated herself for causing that. Jen hated herself for having to depend on Natalie all the time, it wasn't fair on her older sister. "Thank you." She added as she forced a smile on to her face.
Dean shrugged. "It's okay. I'll just go and find Bobby and your sister and fill them in." He glanced over to Sam. "I'll be right back."
Sam nodded and watched as his brother left the room and then turned to Jen. "Are you okay?" He asked thoughtfully.
"My legs sting..." Jen admitted truthfully. Her legs really did sting and they were sore.
"Oh yeah! You dropped your cup in all of the commotion and the coffee spilt over your lap. You'll need to get that sorted in a minute."
"It's such a waste of good coffee!" Jen joked, though it was clear that she was more annoyed about what had happened to her.
Sam wanted to ask her about what he felt when he touched her wrist but he didn't know how to word his question. He didn't want to come across as nosey or intruding but it was really bothering him. When he touched her wrist, the sadness that he felt was sudden and almost overwhelming. It was like they had connected for that brief second.
"What the hell is going on in there?" Bobby questioned as soon as he and Natalie reached the back of the junk yard.
Natalie sighed, folding her arms against her chest. "You're going to think this is crazy..."
Bobby raised his eyebrow in response. "I am surrounded by a world of craziness Natalie. But what I am concerned about at this moment in time is why the hell Jennifer is rolling around in agony on my kitchen floor! I want a full explanation Natalie."
"It started just after she turned twenty two..." Natalie began, causing Bobby's eyes to widen slightly.
"Carry on." He pressed in a tight voice. It was all sounding too similar to something else.
"She started to grow more aware of everybody else's emotions... once, we went into a bar full of students celebrating a twenty first birthday. Well, you know twenty one year olds... they were all really, really drunk and hazy. Jen didn't even have a sip of alcohol and she started feeling hazy too, heck, she even got up on to the karaoke stage and sung a song! You know how shy Jen is... that just isn't her. Anyway, she looked and acted so drunk. It was really scary. So I took her out of the bar when she had gone too far and when we had left she almost immediately went back to normal." Natalie paused for breath but Bobby stayed silent, absorbed in the retelling of the events. "Jen started to be able to read everyone around her. She knew which people were avoidable and which ones were God's gift to men. I tried my best to deny any of it was happening because she's my baby sister and I just couldn't accept that something could be different about her... But then it came to our most recent hunt and it was all so emotional for her that she wanted to go to the funeral of one of the victims. Bobby, there were crowds of people, crowds of people who were so distraught. The emotions hit her like a ton of bricks and she passed out. She passed out for four days. I took her to the hospital straight away and they said she was in a coma... a frickin' coma and that it was doubtful that it was possible that she wouldn't wake up!"
Natalie cleared her throat of the raw emotion that was building up in it. "I thought she was going to die Bobby. It was a frickin' miracle that she woke up. Bobby, we think she's empathetic and whatever this is, is getting stronger and stronger every single day."
Bobby fiddled with his hat. "And that's when you decided to come to me?"
"I didn't know what else to do."
Bobby sighed and shook his head in disbelief. "Your mom died in a house fire, didn't she?"
Jen nodded. "What has this got to do with our mom's death?"
"It's got everything to do with it!" Bobby exclaimed, frustrated. He had seen what Sam had to go through and he knew of a few other special children but he couldn't believe that it was happening to Jen too. "I think I know what it is but we need to speak to the Winchesters and fill them in."
Hi, thank you for the support and feedback. I really appreciate it! Here is another chapter! I forgot to tell you that this story is set in season 2. Read and review. :)
