"You're ridiculous, Dean, you know that? I mean, can we take one job without you hooking up with some chick? Just one?" Sam complained the second they were out of Kara's earshot.
"Aw, come on, Sammy, now where would be the fun in that?" Dean replied.
The two got into the car, and Dean started the engine. He had to wait for a rather slow-walking elderly man to cross the street.
"Come on, old man," Dean muttered. The man glanced at him slightly as he opened the door to Kara's bookstore.
"Uh, Dean, I think he heard you," Sam said.
"Nu-uh, impossible. He's just some creepy old guy…Then again, I was a little loud," Dean replied as he pulled away. He did a U-turn and followed Kara's direction to a small restaurant on a corner.
"The Corner," Sam informed Dean, as if he couldn't read.
"Hey, wouldn't it be awesome to work here?" Dean asked rhetorically. "Then, you could say, 'Hey, I work The Corner', and be completely serious." Dean laughed at his own joke as Sam rolled his eyes.
The two walked in, and just about every pair of eyes was on them. Not that there were many people there; one teenage waitress, one older waitress—probably a single mother— two little old ladies, and a small family of four—mom, dad, school-aged brother and toddler sister.
Dean and Sam walked up to the bar counter and sat down. "Two beers," Dean ordered from the older waitress. He smiled at her, and she smiled politely back, writing down their order.
"Anything else?" she asked routinely.
"Uh, a hotdog, some fries, and…a piece of that apple pie. Oh, and some of those onion rings, too," Dean finished, glancing over the mini-menu in front of him. "You, Sammy?"
"Nah, I'm not that hungry. Besides, Dean, you usually order enough for everybody," Sam replied.
The waitress walked away, Dean's eyes watching her until she was out of sight.
Sam caught this and sighed. "You know what, Dean? You really are utterly ridiculous. I hope we're never up against some hot red-head who also happens to be a demon trying to kill you. Cuz, then we'd be screwed."
"Hey, I never mix business with pleasure," Dean defended himself. "I'm surprised that you'd even think that."
Sam shook his head, and the waitress reappeared, the two beers in hand.
"Here you go," she said as she placed them on the counter. "And your food will be done in just a few minutes." With that, she was off to get the check for the happy little family.
"So, what do you think we're up against?" Sam asked Dean, reminding him of the real reason they were in Little Oak.
"Well, I don't know yet. But something'll come up, I can feel it."
"Oh, you can feel it, huh?"
"Hey, you're not the only one around here who's allowed to be psychic."
"Are you saying that you're psychic?"
"Well, no, I was just saying, you know, that it is possible for people to have hunches. You can't be all that special, Sammy."
"Whatever. This just better not be another big waste of time."
"What do you mean another?" Dean asked defensively, turning to his brother.
"You remember Johnsburg. You went on and on about how there was something supernatural with the people there, so we stayed there for almost two weeks. And the only thing wrong with those people was their overly inflated egos," Sam said, making Dean shift slightly.
"Hey, there was some freaky, 'children of the corn' type stuff going down there."
Sam raised his eyebrows, and Dean looked away. "Well, kind of."
"Mmhm. Exactly."
"Well, hey, that Kara chick is kind of suspicious, what about her?" Dean asked as if he just had a sudden epiphany.
"You mean because she didn't immediately jump into your bed? You know, Dean, not every girl is going to like you."
Dean looked as if he'd, well, seen a ghost. "What are you talking about, man?"
Sam laughed, as Dean muttered, "Maybe she's a lesbian."
"Dean! And you complain that those Johnsburg people have overly inflated egos?"
"Whatever, Sam, just shut up," Dean said, taking a large sip of his beer. "Bitch."
"Jerk," Sam replied. Just then, the waitress appeared once more, this time carrying Dean's food.
Dean immediately shoved half of his hotdog in his mouth. Sam just watched him, eyebrows raised, as Dean slowly chewed and swallowed the bite, as if it was the best thing he'd ever eaten. A minute had passed by the time he had finally finished it.
Sam opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off by the loud and familiar sound of sirens. Dean and Sam spun around to see a police car and ambulance speed passed The Corner.
"They're going to Kara's bookstore!" One of the old ladies exclaimed.
"Come on, Dean, let's go," Sam urged. Dean shot his food a sorrowful look before running out the door with Sam. The jumped into the Impala and were at Kara's store in less than a minute.
Sure enough, the squad car was there, one cop questioning Kara, who looked surprisingly calm, the other looking around the bookstore, where a small mess was left. The old man that had walked in when Dean and Sam had left was being carried out in a stretcher and was placed into the ambulance.
"Doesn't look very supernatural to me. I don't know Dean, Little Oak just might be another Johnsburg."
"No," Dean argued, shaking his head. "We've just got to do a little investigating. I'll talk to Kara; you talk to some of the townspeople. Find out whatever you can about that old man."
A moment after Dean and Sam left, old Charles Arnoldson walked in, which was a surprise to Kara. Charles was 84 years old, and had just had a stroke a few weeks earlier. He lived alone in a house a couple of blocks from there and doesn't own a car.
"Mr. Arnoldson, what a surprise. That's an awful long walk for a couple of books," Kara greeted him politely.
"Oh, I'm not here for any silly old books," he replied. "I've got something better in mind."
"What do you mean?" Kara asked. Charles was acting very strange. He hated leaving his house for anything, unless it was extremely important.
"Do you want to read something new?" she asked, leading him away from the desk and towards the aisles of books. She stopped in front of one particular aisle. It was filled with books like the ones Sam had just bought, and the aisle was marked by a large, oval mirror. "You usually read books about mysteries and 1920's detectives. How about something more challenging. Like…Cristo?"
As soon as she said Christ's name in Latin, her eyes strayed to the mirror. Just as she feared, Charles' eyes completely filled with black and the man started to wheeze. She grabbed the book, which really was titled Cristo, and turned around smiling.
It seemed that the demon hadn't realized its cover was blown just yet, so Kara quickly improvised, forming a plan as she went. "I think that this one is perfect for you, I'll just ring up at the front."
She turned around and went back to the register, ringing up his book. "I really think you'll like Cristo, Mr. Arnoldson, it's such a great book."
At the second mentioning of Christ's name, the man began to wheeze even more.
"Oh, Mr. Arnoldson, are you alright? It sounds like you're having trouble breathing. Here, drink a nice big gulp of this, and you'll be all better again," she said, pulling a water bottle out from behind the register. She twisted off the lid and handed it to Charles.
Charles took it and did just as Kara had instructed, and…he began to scream. Kara immediately slid over the counter, kicking the demon as she did so. He fell to the ground, gasping for air. "Holy water's a bitch, isn't it?" she asked, teeth gritted.
Knowing his secret was out, the demon got up and stood up tall, instead of hunched over, like Mr. Arnoldson normally walks in his old age.
"Ah, Kara, how wonderful it is to finally meet you," he said, his voice deep and throaty, far from Charles' softer voice.
"Too bad I can't say the same about you," Kara replied.
The demon laughed. "With everything they told me about you, Kara Laketon, they didn't mention that you were funny," he said, as if this was some play date.
"Well, it seems that you have the disadvantage, because no one's told me a single thing about you."
The demon laughed again. "Even in the face of danger, you can still come up with a witty remark.
Kara shrugged, "Well, I try. Now, it's been lovely, but it's time for you to go now."
"Sorry, but I just can't do that."
Kara sighed, "You damn demons just can't make anything easy, can you?"
The demon smiled, "Nope." He lunged toward her, and Kara sidestepped just in time. The two fought, Kara doing whatever she can not to hurt the old man's body.
They continued fighting, and Kara knew that she would either have to come up with a brilliant plan, or really hurt Charles. Fortunately, she saw the water bottle filled with holy water, and it still had plenty of water in it. She picked it up, and emptied the rest of it on the demon's head.
As the demon screamed in agony, Kara snatched up the book Cristo, flipped it open to a book-marked page and began reading. What she read out loud would sound like gibberish to the average human being, but to Kara, they were words that have saved her life dozens of times. And for the demon, they were words of pure, unbearable torture. It was a real exorcism, written entirely in Latin.
By the time the pain from the holy water had gone away, Kara was halfway done with the exorcism, which was much more painful.
Unfortunately for Kara, she wasn't far enough into the incantation for it to paralyze the demon, and so he left Charles' body.
The real Charles Arnoldson slumped to the ground. Kara dropped the book and was immediately at his side. "Mr. Anderson? Mr. Anderson, can you hear me?"
"K-K-Kara? My-my chest!" he cried out, painfully clutching his heart.
"Oh God," Kara muttered. The possession affected his body so much because of his condition and had given him a heart attack. Kara whipped out her cell phone and dialed 9-1-1. She told them that she was at Wrinkled Pages and that Charles Arnoldson had just had a heart attack. About three minutes after she had hung up, one of the four squad cars and an ambulance were there.
"Oh, Frank, thank God," she said as one of the officers came over to talk to her.
"Hello, Kara. What happened?" Frank flipped open a notebook, ready to take down her statement. Kara wanted to laugh at how serious he was being.
"Charles came in for a couple of books. He wasn't looking too well, so I offered him a bottle of water. But when he went to drink it, he tossed it in the air, and started clutching his chest. He was complaining about pain and fell to the ground. So, I called you guys," Kara told the officer a revised version of the recent events.
Frank turned and looked into the bookstore. A couple of books had fallen off of shelves and some papers from the register were strewn around. Dammit, I should've cleaned up more, Kara thought to herself, knowing that it would have made things easier if she had.
"How did the store get into such a mess?" he asked.
"Oh, I was cleaning and going through things when Charles came in. I didn't get a chance to finish what I was doing before everything had happened," she said, hoping the life was good enough for Frank to believe.
Frank scribbled God knows what on his pad of paper, eyeing Kara suspiciously. "I know that look, Frank," Kara informed him. "You don't believe me?"
"It's not that, Kara, it's just, that, well, everything seems so…suspicious. I mean, there are signs of a struggle, and you had both motive and opportunity," Frank replied slowly.
"Wait, motive?" Kara asked, honestly having no clue as to what Frank meant.
"In high school, Charles was always giving you a hard time, blaming you for his wife's passing." The minute Frank said the words, Kara could tell that he wished he could take them back. However, she was too angry to ignore it.
Years ago, when Kara was a freshman in high school, things began to grow intense. She had just learned the truth, about all of the abnormal things in the world. This was when she first became a hunter, working along side with her uncle, Marcus Laketon. The two were admittedly a great team; Marcus knew so much and was so intelligent, Kara had picked up on every little tidbit she could.
Kara was raking the leaves for the Arnoldsons when she got a call from her uncle. He was telling her all about a hunt not too far from Little Oak, and that he had wanted her to check it out. Nothing fancy, just see if his information was correct. He was currently on his way back from finishing a job in Hartford, and would be home early the next morning.
As soon as Kara was finished with the leaves, she hopped on her bike (she was only fifteen and didn't yet have a driver's license), and was at the job site in an hour.
Unfortunately, when Kara was checking out Marcus' information, all of which turned out to be correct, the poltergeist attacked Kara. Even worse, Charles' wife Edith had followed Kara (Marcus hadn't taught her how to know if you're being followed since she didn't start Driver's Ed for a few more weeks). While Kara was fighting off the angry spirit, Edith came in to save her. However, Edith was old and frail, and the spirit was majorly pissed off.
By the time Marcus made it, Kara had managed to put the ghost to rest. Unfortunately, Edith was at rest as well.
Charles never knew exactly what had happened, but he knew that it had been all Kara's fault. Of course, Marcus saw it as Edith's own fault for not only following Kara when she should've stayed home, but trying to fight a poltergeist with no prior training whatsoever.
After this, Kara never trained harder in her life. She spent every free moment she had learning about her trade, which is probably why she outlived her beloved uncle.
"Come on, Frank, you can't honestly believe that I would want to hurt Charles. Although we had our differences, he was just getting past all that. Why would I cause an old man to have a heart attack when he was starting to forgive me?" Frank couldn't come up with an answer.
"You're right, Kara, it was silly of me to even think it. I'm sorry," he apologized. He looked back down at his notepad and continued, "That's all we're gonna need, Kara, thanks." As he walked away, he tore off the sheet with her statement, crinkled it up, and tossed it into a public trash can. Kara fought the smile that was trying to show itself.
"Hm, looks like you dodged a bullet there, huh?" a voice behind Kara asked. She spun around to face the stranger Dean.
"Don't you have someplace to be? A family or a job?" she asked, trying to change the topic.
"Why do you think we're here?"