She came out of the bathroom, hair wet and dripping down her back before freezing in mid step as she knew that I was there. I took advantage of the pause to look her over and only partially satisfied that I found nothing to note in the observation. Short, skinny, covered with scars and an anti possession tattoo that was pressed intimately into her lower back. I had seen more memories then I could place of Sam and then Dean tracing it and allowing it it's designation of an intimate place.
"Can I help you?"
She didn't turn to look at me as she asked, not allowing me the curtsey and something harsh pounding in my head with the recognition that Dick did the same and what it meant when either of them did it: That I wasn't worth the concern and that they wouldn't even allow me the illusion that I did.
"I brought your dress."
I nodded at it hanging over the chair though she still didn't look and stretched my legs more comfortably over the arms of my own. Claiming it as my own and that even if it wasn't I wasn't allowing her enough respect to think that she could claim it herself. She was the prisoner here and I was the one enforcing that.
"And ...?"
She finally turned to look at me, pulling her bra over her damp arms and not at all fazed by her state of undress as she altered it. It could have been that she suspected everything she had I had already seen but I knew better that she lacked certain patience for body and that if others were going to see it then it wasn't her business to allow them control from that. The detail answered the question for me with memories to back up the claim and I felt torn on discomfort that I knew her so well that her personality was editing out my own.
"You think you have it all figured out, don't you?"
I knew she didn't. She never did. She worked with what she had and she manipulated it for survival. Not hers. Almost never hers. Dean, Sam, Castiel, Bobby ... anyone else's life before hers and then hers – if it was a necessity – coming after. But I was angry and anger made you say things you didn't always mean and I let myself into that definition and the assurance of the position I held that was clearly over hers.
"Have what figured out?"
She tossed her shirt back and forth between her hands and I took note of the shallow scar on her chest from the bullet that had killed her. The bullet Dick had shot and she had somehow been brought back from. Even she didn't know how. Heaven and then darkness and then buried six feet under. Not exactly six feet. But that was the expression and it slid easily on the tongue.
"Dick."
The name clicked coldly on my lips as I tasted it and the confliction that came with. The anger, the hatred, the love and the desire for it returned that was torn between my own memories and others and of a time when he loved me for no other reason than that he simply did and then stopped just as easily.
"You think you got him wrapped around your finger and that you can break it just as easily?"
I stood now to gain that height advantage though coming closer remembering it made no difference. Short as she was we were the same height, the same unfortunate detail a reminder in the back of my thoughts with the taunts and teasing she had received for the short coming – pun: noun; the humorous use of a word or phrase so as to emphasise or suggest its different meaning or applications – and how easily she had brushed it off.
"Now for whatever reason Dick likes you. And for the moment that keeps you safe."
The words were cold with that bitter taste returned. Regret? Jealousy? That he cared for this insignificant excuse for a human but had forgotten how to for the sister that had been by his side for countless millennia. The taste was dry and I swallowed it down with the unfamiliar workings of my throat muscles and the pained smile I tried to force.
"But he'll stop. Eventually he always stops ..."
I couldn't remember when or why ... that just one day I was no longer adored shadow and instead what followed him around like a weight outlining every move he made. That he wanted me to forget – to lose myself in other bodies in other people just so I could forget the fragments of myself as he tore what was left as easily as if it was his practiced skill.
"And when he does there is a whole line of Leviathan waiting to rip you piece from piece."
I had heard them. Shared in the fantasy and the confusion of the human in front of me and what made her so special. The efforts she had made to save the world and the failure we had had in bringing her and her loved ones down. The three boys and the old man – Bobby – who I saw in printed color with the warmth of emotion that were too close to individual name but never seemed to fit under just one.
"And I'm first in line."
A smile. A cold one. I learned from the best and I felt it just as coldly in my chest and wondered if it had done the same to him. The harshness of the tone, the dead look in the eyes that swallowed down what made humans so easy to read. Emotion, feeling, a hope, a question that they couldn't conceal and that I had trouble portraying myself. It was subtle. I wasn't subtle.
"Have fun tonight."
A colder smile, a colder pressure as I nodded at the dress again and turned on my heel to leave. The pressure faded and grew icy as I noted she hadn't moved when I'd spoken that her expression hadn't changed to betray fear or warning or that she'd even heard or acknowledged what I said. All humans feared me. They knew it when they saw me and they were paralyzed by it to even ask why. But she didn't. She didn't fear me. She wasn't scared, she wasn't angry, she didn't care ... I shut the door behind me with a hard pull of the metal and the handle of it crunching in my fist. She didn't care enough to be swayed by my threat and somehow that was more hollow then if she had hated me.
