A/N: So I had a lovely vacation, made even better by you guys and your feedback. Thank youuu, lovelies! :)
This chapter... I'll let it speak for itself. My regular readers shouldn't be too surprised. :p This is also where the possible trigger I spoke about in the beginning will feature. Please tread carefully.
Seven: The Winner
"Hey, Mitch."
Sam scratched at his nose as he sat on the couch, holding his phone to his ear. Mitch was one of their hunter colleagues, who had promised to try and find someone to take Holly. And if he was calling again, it meant only one thing.
"Hey, Sam," Mitch replied. "I got some news for you."
Sam knew what it was. He pressed his lips together. He needn't think about it so much, he realised. The call could just be about the Leviathans, or Dick Roman. "Yeah?" he asked Mitch after a moment. "Good or bad?"
"Good. I found someone who's ready to adopt your kid."
"Really?" Sam asked the other hunter, raising his eyebrows.
"Yeah. Nice family too. Friends of my buddy. They already have one kid, but are ready to adopt the second one. The dad's a kindergarten teacher, the mom's a surgeon. Got a big house and all that. They don't hunt but they know about the stuff that goes bump in the night, so your little girl will always be protected."
Sam processed the information. This sounded really good. He glanced at Holly who was playing in the sitting area, making noises as she made her dolls fly about in the playpen. Sam thought of her life in a clean, big home with a surgeon mom and a teacher dad. She'd love it. But…
He sighed. "Mitch, listen…" he said, wondering how to explain to the other man that he didn't want to give Holly up. After making Bobby's hunter friends look around for a family for Holly, after all this hard work, Sam felt guilty for what he was about to say. Holly would stay. He and Dean had reached this understanding a few days ago. They had missed her too much when they'd left her behind on their hunt. She helped both of them, and they would manage their hunts even with her—without making her a hunter.
"We're keeping Holly," said Sam, finally getting to what he'd wanted to tell Mitch all along.
Mitch didn't reply for a whole minute. Then he let out a breath, the crackle of which reminded Sam of rustling leaves in a dry wind. "Yeah, I get ya, Winchester," said Mitch.
Sam paused, licking his lips. "You — you do?"
"Yeah, I do."
"You're not pissed?"
"I'm not," Mitch replied, "but some of the other hunters might be — after looking for so long and all. But I'll tell 'em." He hesitated. "Take care of your little one." The next moment, the line was disconnected and Sam put the phone back on the couch, blinking at it. That had gone surprisingly well.
He was glad, though, that Mitch had listened. Holly was Sam's little miracle, and even if Mitch hadn't agreed, Sam would have had his way, but this was much better. As he thought about this, Sam couldn't help the grin that formed on his lips. Holly, his daughter, was going to be with him. Forever.
~o~
Sam and Dean soon discovered that Winchester luck only lasted so long. A couple of weeks after the conversation with Mitch, just a few weeks after Dean had agreed to keeping Holly, calamity hit again. And it started with Lucifer reappearing in Sam's hallucinations.
Lucifer had been completely absent recently. Sam did not miss the annoying, terrible voice in his head and the devil in the corner of his vision. Sam did not miss staying up nights because he couldn't sleep. He had Holly to help him with one of the biggest fuck yous that life (or Cas), had handed him. Holly was the tangible, real part of Sam that grounded him from the hallucinations. He didn't need anything else when he had Holly and it was like he was normal again — or at least who he was before the wall broke. But this was an improvement, and he'd take this over anything else.
Then came the day when Holly ceased to be enough. Sam would always remember it as the worst in his life, one that set off a chain of events that he couldn't forgive himself for.
The day began uneventfully. Dean was in the shower and had told Sam not to disturb him for the next hour. So while Dean cleansed himself, Sam stood at the stove, stirring chicken soup. He was on lunch duty today and he wanted to make sure he did it properly.
Sam was putting some bread in the toaster when Holly called out to him from the playpen. Sam put the soup to simmer and went to the sitting room to pick up his child.
Holly grinned at him when he had scooped her up into his arms. He took her to the couch and sat her on his lap as she explained her toys to him in gibberish. Holly was content to stay in his lap, and she played happily while he watched her and the chicken soup simultaneously. Just when Sam was about to set Holly back in her playpen, Dean's phone rang from the coffee table.
Sam squinted at the ID. It was Sheriff Mills. He picked the phone up in his hand, swiping across the screen to accept the call, when Holly snatched the phone from him and put it to her own ear.
"WO!" she said enthusiastically, as Sam covered her hand with his, trying to take the phone back.
"Give that to me, baby," he said.
"Uuuungh!" Holly grumbled, twisting away from his grip as she spoke again. "'Olly!" she announced, in a loud voice. Sam stopped trying to reach for the phone and Holly sat still, listening to the voice on the other side. Sam chuckled, watching Holly's dimples appear as her eyes widened in enthusiasm. He could hear the Sheriff's muffled voice, but he didn't know what she was saying.
"Deaaa?" Holly enquired, looking up at Sam, her eyes sparkling. "Deaaa gushhhhh," she replied, 'gush' being her word for a shower or a bath. "Pee Fammy?" she asked again.
Sam wasn't sure what she meant by 'pee' but he hoped that Holly just meant to ask if Jody wanted to speak to him. And he had guessed right, for in a moment, Holly took the phone off her ear and held it out to him. "FAMMY!" she hollered, as though he was five miles away.
"Jeez, I'm right here," Sam told her mildly, taking the phone from her. He picked Holly up and put her in the playpen, before heading back to the kitchen with the phone held between his shoulder and ear. "Hey, Sheriff," he said.
"Who was that?" Jody enquired.
"Just…" Sam paused, and then smiled. "Nothing. Just someone."
"How old is she?"
"Just over nineteen months," said Sam, flashing an adoring smile at Holly, who waved at him from her playpen. He waved back at her and blew her a kiss. Gosh, was he turning into a ball of mush. But Holly had done that to both him and Dean. She had managed to wrap them around her little finger. It was amazing.
"Wow," Jody replied, bewildered. "Kids are becomin' all tech savvy these days. Makes me think of our humbly simple childhoods, if you ask me."
Sam chuckled at the memory of his army men and his Legos and all the times that he and Dean chased each other about or played hide-and-seek. "Yeah," he said, "to be honest, though, I had no idea she knew how to speak in a phone."
"They just tend to imitate people around them," said Jody. She paused. "So you and Dean on babysitting duty or something?"
"Babysitting – yeah," said Sam. "Kinda."
"For how long?"
"A while. We'll be babysitting her for a while."
Jody cleared her throat, evidently on the verge of saying something, when a voice spoke from behind Sam. "It's a big babysitting gig, Jody," said Dean and Sam turned around to see his brother emerge from the bathroom with a towel around his waist. Dean headed straight for the kitchen, and Sam laid the phone on the counter top, switching it to the speaker.
"What do you mean?" asked Jody.
Sam looked at Dean, who shrugged as he towelled his wet, unruly hair. Sam cleared his throat. "She… well, Holly's my daughter."
There was silence. Then all of a sudden: "Your – your what?" the sheriff sputtered.
"I had a couple of one-night stands two years ago—"
"A couple of one-night stands?" Dean snorted. "Try half the women in America. He had more than just a couple of those, Sheriff," Dean explained, adjusting his towel. "And he didn't use condoms in a few."
"And you're just keeping the kid?" Jody asked them.
"Well, yeah," Dean replied, shrugging, "we are." He licked his lip. "What's the matter? Why did you call?"
"I… I just wanted to check on you boys," Jody replied hesitantly, as though she hadn't wanted to change the subject. Sam could understand why. "Y'know," Jody continued, "since Bobby… I wanted to know how you're getting on."
Dean swallowed and stole a glance at Holly. A wistful smile appeared on his face as he did so. "We're okay, considering. Still trying to see what we can do to kill that Dick, all puns intended, but yeah, we're good."
"You find out what the Leviathans are up to?"
"A whole lot of strange stuff, but we don't really know," said Dean. "We can't connect the dots here — we're looking for more info. What about you? You got any news?"
"Apart from more people being eaten every day?" Jody huffed, "No."
There was brief silence. "So," Jody began, breaking it, "what's it like, taking care of a kid?"
"A lot like managing a bunch of firecrackers," Dean chuckled. "I'm practically living with two Sams, Sheriff, and one's a bitch. At least the other one is cute." He ignored Sam's exasperated glare.
There was more silence from the other side and Sam's heart sank when he realised that the sheriff had lost her own son for a second time just a few years ago. He cleared his throat. "So… how are things on your side?"
"Not bad," said Jody. "I'll drop in and meet you boys sometime," she promised. "I need to see who this mini-Sam is."
Dean laughed openly, something he'd been doing a lot lately. Sam noticed a lot of positive changes in their lives since they'd taken Holly in and this was one of those. Sam was glad that he'd been stubborn about not giving Holly up for adoption.
And, he thought, as Dean finished the rest of the conversation with Jody, that if it came to giving up hunting after they'd found a way to get rid of Leviathans, Sam would gladly do it. Probably, so would Dean. But even if Dean wanted to stay on, Sam wouldn't, and he would make sure that his daughter got at least a part of the normal life that he'd never had.
Once Jody had hung up, Sam finished the soup and he, Dean and Holly had a pleasant lunch together. Dean was more jovial, less brooding, and he pulled Sam's leg in front of Holly. Uncle and niece had a good time laughing and amusing themselves at Sam's expense (well, Holly probably didn't understand half the jokes — she only got excited and giggly because of the way Dean was laughing). Holly still accepted her vegetables only from Dean and she was fussy about them, so the jokes were Dean's way to get Holly to eat. He multitasked well and fed Holly while feeding himself at the same time.
Sam had to admit that Dean had a knack of getting Holly to eat even what she didn't like. Most of her food landed inside her mouth instead of her bib and she was getting less and less picky about what she ate. Also, Dean had managed to wean Holly off the night bottle, to replace it with the sippy cup. It had taken some tantrums to get there, but it was worth it, because Sam was pretty sure that the bottle was bad after a certain age.
Holly never ceased to ask about her mother, though it wasn't as frequent as before. She'd ask, and then get upset about it sometimes. She still thought that Allison would come back to get her. but Holly had adjusted to Sam and Dean, and Sam knew that she'd forget about Allison in due time. It was a saddening thought, though, that Holly wouldn't get to remember what it was like when her mother was alive.
After lunch, Dean had to head out for supply shopping and Sam decided to let Holly play for an hour before he put her down for her nap. He sat on the couch in the sitting room and spread a small blanket for Holly on the floor where she could sit and play. She hated being in the playpen or in the crib all the time so Sam and Dean generally let her play around the cabin when one of them could monitor her.
Sam had crossed his arms and was watching Holly, who sat on the floor with her legs stretched out in front of her. She was playing with a large beach ball and her bunny, making cooing noises while she patted the ball with the flat of her palm. Lucifer had settled into the corner of Sam's vision, and he was smirking, while humming to himself. Sam ignored him.
The ball rolled away after a while and Holly got up to get it. Sam watched her pad away on little feet, to the corner of the room, and shut his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, though, there were two Hollys walking towards him, holding two balls. He swallowed. Shit.
"Uh… baby?" he enquired slowly, but both Hollys looked up at him and giggled as they toddled over to him. Sam ran a hand through his hair and thought. Okay. He had to stay calm. He needed to stay calm. He could handle this. He knew how to handle this.
"Fammy!" Holly called out — Sam was hoping she was the real one anyway — and her footsteps quickened into an unsteady run as she reached him, and climbed onto the couch and onto his lap. The other Holly sat down on the blanket and hugged the ball to herself.
"Fammy!" the Holly on his lap said, and he swallowed.
"Hey. What happened?"
"Deaaaaa?" she asked him.
"He's at the supermarket. He'll—" Sam took a deep breath. Please come back fast, Dean.
"FAMMY!" Holly called out again, displaying a lovely dimple.
"Yeah, Holly—"
"FAMMY!" she said, giving him a grin as her eyes sparkled. "Fammy, Fammy, Fammy, Fammy—" Sam shut his eyes, "FAMMY!" When he opened them, Lucifer was straddling him, with a pleased grin on his face.
Fammy, he jeered, flashing his teeth, and Sam clenched his jaw.
"No," Sam whispered. "You're not—"
Faaaammyyyy, Lucifer said again with a terrible caress in his voice, and Sam tangled his fingers in his hair, turning away, muttering to himself.
"You're not real. You're not real. You're not real… Oh, God…" said Sam, his breaths coming in large, shaky gasps. "Oh God, oh God…" he repeated, fingers tightening as they grasped his hair and Sam pulled at them till he felt a few strands get detached from their roots, sharp pain blossoming on his scalp.
Fammy?
Sam took in a sharp inhale. "Go away. Please. Not my daughter."
Fammy!
"Go," Sam choked, covering his eyes with a hand. When he'd look again, it would be okay. It would be okay.
When he opened his eyes Lucifer was still there and he gave Sam a shit-eating grin as he fisted Sam's lapels. Sam turned to the real Holly who was looking at him from the mat, bewildered and scared. What did this whole thing look like to her? Something crazy, obviously.
Tears began to gather in Holly's eyes, as they started to widen. She was visibly frightened. Sam puffed out a breath. "It's okay," he whispered. "It's going to be okay. You just – you play with your ball, okay?"
Holly obviously knew that it was not okay, because she shook her head, her eyes beginning to water. "Fammy?" she enquired in a small voice.
"I'm all right," he said. "I won't hurt you. No one will hurt you. Don't be scared." Sam shut his eyes again. If he didn't do anything, if he stayed like this, nothing would happen and eventually, Dean would come back and help him put a stop to this. Until then, he just needed to hang on.
Such a bunch of lies, said Lucifer's voice in his ears. You're telling your daughter it's okay, when it's clearly not. You're telling yourself you'll get better, when you really won't.
"P-P-Please…" Sam begged, to Lucifer, to anyone who was listening, to his own mind, to the God who had never cared. His throat constricted painfully and he swallowed. "Please."
There was silence. Pin-drop, thick, uncomfortable, terrifying silence. Sam coaxed his body to relax, and tried to breathe. In. Out. In. Out. In. Out. In—
FAMMY!
Sam acted purely on reflex. Startled by the voice, he suddenly stretched out his arms and pushed at Lucifer — surprised when Lucifer's weight gave away easily. Almost immediately, Sam heard a thump and a scream, which didn't belong to Lucifer and —
Goosebumps made themselves evident all over his body. Oh, God, oh no, nononono…
Panicked, Sam opened his eyes to see Holly on the ground, lying spread-eagled on the blanket, her face crumpling as she bawled loudly, screaming and beating her legs against the floor.
Sam's stomach lurched. He had pushed the real Holly, thinking it was Lucifer.
~o~
When Dean entered the cabin with bags of groceries, he saw Sam curled up on the couch, cradling Holly to himself. Soft sobs issued from Holly's small form as Sam kept murmuring a litany of 'I'm sorry'. When he looked up and saw Dean, though, all resolve seemed to break and he clenched his jaw as his eyes looked pleading.
"What happened?" Dean asked, his heart rate starting to quicken as he dropped the grocery bags and approached them.
Sam gently held Holly out to Dean. "Take her," he said in a shaky, panicked voice.
Dean obeyed him quietly and Holly wrapped her arms and legs around Dean as he rubbed her back and sat down on the couch, next to Sam. "What is it, Sammy?"
"I – I—" Sam pressed his lips together and shook his head. "Don't leave her alone with me, okay? Just take her with you — or I'll run errands the next time."
"What?"
"Lucifer," Sam replied. "I – I, Dean… shit," he whispered, putting his elbows on his knees and hiding his face in his palms. "I fucked it up," he said.
"What did you do?" Dean asked him, hoping that Holly wouldn't pick up on the profanity. Currently, though, she was shaking against him as he rubbed her back. Something had scared her for sure and looking at how Sam was reacting, Dean was scared too.
"I pushed her, Dean," Sam said in a muffled voice, which broke mid-sentence. "I… shit," he repeated, sniffing slightly and looking up at Dean with misery written all over his face. "She was on my lap and I thought it was Lucifer and I pushed her. She fell from the couch."
"What?" Dean immediately began to detach Holly from himself. "When did you start seeing Lucifer again? And did you check—"
"I checked her for injuries," said Sam when Dean tested Holly's pulse while she squirmed. "I checked her pupils," Sam continued, "and looked for bruises, tenderness… she seems fine. But…" He licked his lips and buried his face in his hands again. "I messed up. Just like you said I would."
Dean let Holly cling on to him again and looked back at Sam. "Is she talking?"
"Yeah," Sam replied. "Like usual. She cried a lot too. She's just scared now, though. Of me, probably."
"Hey, no, Sam, it—"
"Don't call it an 'accident,'" said Sam. "Because I should have told you." He snorted ruefully. "Sam Winchester, the child abuser. Just what I need."
"You didn't abuse her," Dean replied calmly. "And you — you weren't in your right mind, man. The fucking Devil was haunting you, for God's sake."
"Yeah, but the CPS will take her away if they know," said Sam. "You know that, right? My mental health is all the more reason I shouldn't be raising her. And anyway, what I have done, whether I intended it or not, is a form of abuse. Don't defend me."
"Hey, I'm not defending you — or saying anything, but look, she isn't hurt," Dean replied. "It was an accident. Like you said, you didn't mean any of it. We'll just be more careful from now on, all right? I won't let it happen again."
"I'm still a child abuser," said Sam, defeated.
"No, you're not," Dean insisted. "You didn't hurt her out of spite, or because you wanted to. And I'll help you, okay? Until we fix you. I'll punch you out of your hallucinations, if that's what I have to do."
Sam looked supremely miserable and didn't even respond to Dean's joke. Dean knew this was because his brother genuinely thought he deserved to be punched in the face if he hallucinated again.
Pushing his hair back with his hands, Sam stood up. "I need a beer," he said. "Want one?"
"Sure," Dean replied, as he began to rock Holly. "I'll just get her to sleep first."
"Yeah, okay."
"And Sammy—" said Dean, as his brother began to walk away, "you're a lot better than Dad, okay? I know you'd never hurt Holly on purpose. We'll find a way to fix you up now, so we don't have to worry about Satan messing with you anymore."
"Yeah," Sam snorted ruefully, "if there's a way to fix this. And we can't go on with me like this, Dean. Not forever." He clenched his jaw and blinked a couple of times. Then he walked away to get his beer, while Dean worked to get Holly to sleep, hoping that there was really some way to fix Sam — to get rid of those hallucinations because Sam was right: there was no way they could go on like this for much longer.
~o~
By evening, Holly seemed off. Sam wasn't sure what was going on with her, but he couldn't shake the feeling that something was about to go very wrong.
Holly was okay now. She wasn't crying, and she didn't seem scared of Sam, but she was grumpy and a little drowsy. Sam tested her pupils again and they seemed okay and Holly didn't look like she was hurting anywhere, so he stopped worrying just a little. Every time he remembered how he had flung Holly, though, his stomach churned, and he hated himself some more.
He didn't deserve Holly. He should have told Mitch that he was ready to give her up.
Sam, Dean and Holly sat down for dinner a while later and Dean swirled around the tomato soup in Holly's little bowl before spooning some, blowing it, and bringing it to Holly's mouth. She shook her head and refused to accept it.
"Be a good girl, munchkin," said Dean softly. "Here," he said, holding the spoon out further.
Holly looked up at him and tears welled in her eyes, as one slid down her cheek. "Jo-jo."
"You just napped a while ago, kiddo," Dean said to her, thumbing the wetness away with his free hand. "Are you not feeling okay? What is it?"
Holly's lips trembled. "D-Deaaaa," she said weakly, sniffling, as more tears fell.
Dean flashed Sam a look of worry as he put the spoon back in the bowl. "Holly," he said calmly, "does it hurt?"
Holly nodded, and Sam's heart skipped a beat. So she wasn't okay, after all. Sam had really hurt her.
Aw, Sam, your sob story is touching, said Lucifer, suddenly appearing in the corner of the room. Sam took a sharp breath, feeling, for the first time, that he'd deserved everything he'd got in Hell.
Lucifer grinned. That's right. You're a filthy child abuser.
"Where does it hurt?" Dean asked Holly in the meantime. The fact that Holly wasn't crying hysterically, like the time in during the bath or after her shots was scaring Sam even more. Dean seemed to feel the same way. He started to untie Holly's bib. "I think we should take her to the hospital, Sam." He turned to Holly. "Where does it hurt, munchkin?"
And Sam's heart leapt into his throat when Holly's hand went up to her head. However, before either Sam or Dean could react to that, her eyes rolled up and she plunged forward, face first. "FUCK!" Dean yelled as he caught her with his palm to her forehead, before she hit the table. He pulled Holly out of her highchair in one go, held her to himself, threw away her bib, and started to rush to the door. "Sam, get the car keys!"
Sam pulled himself up and bolted after Dean, grabbing the keys and going to the Impala, where Dean stood, holding Holly in his arms. He patted her cheek. "Hey, wake up, munchkin."
She didn't respond. Sam unlocked the driver's seat, got in and Dean slid into the back. The moment they had settled, Sam started to drive, accelerating the car as he pulled out into the street.
"Hey, hey, Holly?" he could hear Dean say from behind. "Hey," Dean said again. "Sam, she's waking up," he reported. "Her pulse, though…"
Sam heard a whimper and pressed his foot down on the accelerator. "You're okay," Dean was saying at the back. "You're— shit—" there was a choking noise, accompanied by wet gurgling.
"What's happening?" Sam asked, barely able to breathe.
"She threw up," Dean replied. "Just drive faster, will you?" he said to Sam, as he started to soothe Holly in a low voice. "It's okay, munchkin, happens to everyone, you'll be okay, just sit for a while…"
When they pulled over outside the ER, Sam was about to have a meltdown. Lucifer was there again, following Dean as he leapt out of the car before Sam had stopped it completely. Sam put the car into park and followed his brother, watching, as Dean laid Holly in a gurney while they were surrounded by medical staff. Sam noticed that Holly was unconscious again.
"She took a fall this afternoon," Dean was saying to a nurse while she placed the mask of a resuscitator bag to Holly's face and started to pump. "She was okay, and suddenly her head was hurting… and she passed out." Dean sounded like he was on the verge of hysterics even as he said it.
"Okay, sir," the nurse replied, "we'll take it from here." Her colleague drew out her pager. Sam and Dean followed Holly's stretcher to a cubicle in the ER and Sam noticed, when Holly was attached to a monitor that her heart rate was low and her blood pressure was high.
"She vomited?" the nurse asked Dean, seeing the stains on his clothes, while the other tried to determine Holly's status.
Dean seemed to notice the stains for the first time. "Yeah," he said, "yeah… what—?"
"I've paged the paediatrician," the nurse replied. "You'll have your answers soon." Just as she said that, the curtains were ripped back and an elderly man entered with a frown in his face. He hurried to Holly's bedside, his expression serious.
"What have we got here?" he asked the nurse.
"Signs of raised ICP," the second nurse replied. "She's about twenty months old."
"GCS?"
"Seven."
Sam had heard these words enough in his life, the most prominent experience being after Dean's injury from the accident that they'd had with the semi. ICP was intracranial pressure. GCS was the Glasgow Coma Scale, a scale doctors used to determine extent of brain injury. And as far as Sam knew, seven wasn't a good number.
The paediatrician — Dr Robins, as his nametag read, pursed his lips. He looked at Dean. "What happened?"
Dean repeated the chain of events to the doctor — of Holly falling down, and her symptoms; and the doctor seemed to have drawn a conclusion by the end of it. He shone a penlight into Holly's pupils, and spoke. "It sounds like some sort of an intracranial haemorrhage," he said honestly. "The symptoms indicate an epidural haematoma, meaning she has haemorrhaged into her dura mater — a layer of her meninges. We'll get a CT done to be sure, but she'll need immediate surgery once we confirm."
"Do whatever you have to," Sam said, finding his voice for the first time. "I'm her father," he told the doctor. "I'll consent to her surgery."
"Okay," said the doctor, picking up the pad that the nurse handed to him and writing in it. "Take her for the CT," he told the nurse. "Send me the results immediately. And alert the neurosurgeon on call; the child will need to be prepped quickly."
The nurse nodded and as the doctor started to walk away, Dean called out to him. "Hey, doc?"
Dr Robins turned around. Dean hesitated. "Will she. . . will she be okay?"
He licked his lip. "Mr—"
"Winchester," said Dean, who gave his real name by mistake but didn't seem to care. "I'm her uncle."
"Look, Mr Winchester," said Robins, "Your niece has suffered what we classify as a severe brain injury. If it is a haematoma, the surgery is quite simple, and her kind of injury has maximum prognosis too, but, with her age, the risks are greater and… I'm sorry, but I'll advise you not to get your hopes up."
Dean nodded once and Sam saw tears in his eyes for the first time since Bobby's death.
A/N: Yes, that changed quickly, and I'm horrible. Reviews? ;)
Review responses:
annburgum: Haha, you read SSaB, which even knocks me on my ass when I try and write it (it's why the last chapter is taking so long). This is much better than that. :p Thanks. :D
purplepandas: Haha, awww, I like that rule. Thank you for reading! :*
