Part 7
Fifty-three. Fifty-three. Dean's feet beat out the time. He felt more like himself. He hated the glasses but they were needed. He punched the air. Fifty-three. Again. Fifty-three. He slowed his jog as he reached the corner. Just another block to the market. He had the last of his money in his pocket. Bobby had shelled out for another month of rent. Ellen had kicked in for meds. Sam refused anything but a couple of days once he realized Dean still refused to budge. He had given Dean a 'borrowed' MP3 player full of Zeppelin, Metallica, Boston and Ozzy in all his incarnations. He had bitched plenty about the cost of Metallica but Dean didn't care. The present said everything it needed to.
Bright pink was Sam's idea of a joke but the tunes sometimes drowned out the internal timer that sometimes drove Dean nuts. Fifty-three. Fifty-three. Foreplay's bass could rival the countdown for the pounding in Dean's feet. Guitars taking the sting out of the numbers. Dean sang under his breath as he raided the refrigerator for his selections. Yanking his hood forward, he continued on through the store. His mind turning over lyrics and playlists and ways to make some cash in the next couple of days. A hustle would buy him a couple of weeks worth of groceries. He was getting stronger. By next week he could sell himself as a handyman. Maybe a mechanic. Shit, where'd the tunes go?
"You dropped this."
Dean turned to find the last person he'd expected to see, holding his bright pink pod-person or whatever it was. He found the end of his headphones dangling.
Carmen stepped forward and plugged it back in for him. She glanced at the screen and scrolled down. "You know… there was music made after 1979."
"That's a matter of opinion," he replied with a small smile. He took the player back, more than appalled that the pink was even brighter than he remembered.
"Pink your favorite color?" she teased.
"My brother is a clown." Dean turned to walk away but she looked like she was going to say something. "Sorry about being a prick."
"No, uh… you had a really, really bad month." She offered him a smile and lifted a hand but dropped it back to her side. "I… gotta… go."
Dean took a deep breath, readjusted his hood and made for the counter. He let a little old lady cut in front of him so he wouldn't be taunted by having Carmen in front of him in line. He turned up the volume and tried not to think as he walked the distance back to his hovel. A block away from his turn off, he could see a car with its hood up. He didn't want to check it out but he had to think ahead. Ingratiate himself to some hard-up driver and maybe word of mouth gets him enough jobs to keep him in grub for fifty-three days.
The car was empty but a purse sat on the passenger seat. The hood was up and still warm. Frowning, Dean scanned the dark for the driver. He grabbed the keys and locked the doors before moving around to drop the hood. That's when he saw the alley across the way. Something bounced off some ray of light that he couldn't see but he recognized that glint. A knife. His hand slid to the back of his jeans where his gun wasn't… Damn.
"Motherfucker!" Came the shout. "Bitch!" A scream.
Dean put himself in motion; he had a knife in his… dammit! How the hell did he leave the house unarmed? Tossing his bags to the ground, he charged ahead. Instinct, more than sight, sent a guy crashing into the wall, head first. He felt a burn in his side but ignored it in lieu of knocking the knife from the other guy's hand. Arms and legs in motion, Dean knocked him down but not out. "Run!" He shouted to the girl on the ground. Shoving the butt of his hand into the guy's sternum, Dean sent him reeling into his buddy.
He turned, grabbed the girl by her shoulders and set them both in motion. Away from the light of the main street, deeper into the alley. Her sobs were the only indication that she was keeping up. And damn! He couldn't see shit! His night vision was shot and his glasses were fogging up. He tripped over a garbage can but small hands gripped his arms to help him back up. They burst out of the alley and into a residential neighborhood. After a block, he saw the street sign that said they were in his territory. Gripping her hand, they sprinted down an alley, then darted down a short block and came up behind his little apartment. She stumbled up the stairs but Dean took that opportunity to get the door unlocked and open. Once they were both inside, he peered out the window. His heart pounded out fifty-three over and over. Eyes on the street, he reached back and gripped his shotgun. He didn't have real buckshot for it but no one had to know that. Pumping it, he lifted the window and slid the barrel through. Then he saw them, running and searching the darkness for their quarry. The shot was loud in the apartment. The sound outside sent the predators scurrying any which way but after them.
Dean watched for a long moment after they'd run off. Then he turned to the girl he'd just saved. She had her hands over her face, shaking. Making sure that his hood was on securely, he set the shotgun down and crossed to grip her elbows. "I think they're gone."
"Are you sure, Dean?" She wiped at her face and stared at him with wide eyes. "Are they really?"
Carmen. Shit. Dean turned away and fixed his eyes on the street outside the window. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure."
"Oh my God." She sobbed into her hands.
Then it hit him. Those guys had left her purse. He whirled around. "Are you okay? Did they… ?" She shook her head but gripped her bruised wrists. He knelt with her as she slid to the floor and lightly rubbed the abused skin. "These will fade." Lightly, he felt her arms, shoulders and neck. "Doesn't look like they roughed you up too badly."
"Since when are you a field medic?"
"Sweetheart, I know more about field medicine than some veterans." He lifted her chin to examine the bruise on her jaw line. "Your legs?"
"Fine, I think."
"Knees or ankles?" He asked gently.
"Knees."
Brushing away the torn folds of her skirt, he found a cut on her knee and a bruise on the opposite thigh. Hopping away, he got the first aid kit from his makeshift nightstand. He had plenty of Neosporin and bandages. He set those next to her before running to grab a clean rag to wet down. Carefully, he washed the blood away. "I don't have alcohol. Sorry."
"I'm surprised… you have everything else in here." She glanced at him from where she'd been picking through his kit.
"I forget sometimes… so I just stopped keeping it." Dean tugged at his hood to make sure it was staying in place. "You hurting? I have some regular Tylenol or the good stuff… I think Ellen left her bourbon if you want that instead."
"The Tylenol is fine." She nodded and watched as he twisted away to pick up the bloody washrag and trash from the gauze he'd taped to her thigh. That's when she saw the bloody tear in his hoodie. "You're hurt!"
"What?" Dean frowned and looked himself over. Then he remembered. "It's just a slice… it'll heal."
"Sit," she commanded and found her strength once again. This she could do. "Take off the shirts."
"It's fine."
"God!" she screamed at him. "You saved my life and patched me up. Let me return the favor." She gathered the kit and rifled for everything she'd need. She turned and grabbed his hood and he gripped her hands hard. "Hey! You get an infection in that cut… and the burns will get infected, too. Your immune system is already on overload with that."
Cursing under his breath, Dean did as told and took off his hoodie and his shirt. The shirt peeled off the cut, which was shallow but needed a cleaning. Leaning his upper body on the table, he pulled his arms up and out of the way. Fifty-three. Fifty-three. The towel wiped away blood. She quickly put one stitch in the middle of the cut, then treated with some ointment before taping gauze over it. "Bitch, I didn't put a stitch in you."
"I didn't need one." She ignored the insult as she gathered her mess to toss away. She eyed the bottles on the counter before tossing one his way. She found the bourbon herself. She poured herself a glass and swallowed it down. She poured another and offered it to her savior. "I won't tell the doc, I swear."
Dean managed a grin but only downed half the shot, knowing that mixing the meds wouldn't be a gangbuster idea once his heart stopped. He slid the glass back to her. She downed it without further encouragement. "You can take what you need from the closet and the dresser. Bathroom is through there. I don't think going out there tonight is a good idea."
"Okay." She nodded and poured herself a third shot. "I'm not a lush… I…"
Dean rose from his seat and got the clothes himself. He put them in her hands and pushed her into the bathroom. "There are towels in the cabinet. Take your time."
Dean made sure all the windows were closed and locked. Then he made sure they all had salt. He reloaded his shotgun and set it by the bed. He settled into a fresh undershirt and hoodie before settling down with his thoughts. He must have fallen asleep because he found himself smiling up at Carmen who wore just a short robe and he knew if he yanked that sash…
"Dean?" She shook him lightly, clothed in one of his shirts and one of his hoodies. "Hey Dean… maybe you should lie down and sleep."
"Naw." His throat felt like sandpaper. "You take the bed. I'll… stay up." He pried open his eyes and forced himself to his feet. Two glasses of water later, he turned to find she'd taken a blanket off the bed and curled up in one of the chairs at the table. His clothes made her look tinier than she was. "You okay?"
"I'm fine. I'm not the one who got stabbed." She huddled deeper into the chair. "I couldn't sleep now if I tried."
"Adrenaline will fade and then you'll crash."
"Why do you have a shotgun, anyway?"
"Don't like being unarmed."
"Because of your accident?"
Dean couldn't hold back the snort. "Sweetheart, some things happen to a person long before you meet them." He moved around the little kitchen and brewed up a pot of coffee. "I was raised on shotguns."
"Oh? Is that why you knew all those fancy moves in the alley?"
"My dad was a Marine. After my mom… well, he… raised us to defend ourselves."
"Martial arts and target-shooting."
"Among other things."
"How long have you lived here?" Her eyes flicked from window to table to the other side of the room.
"Since the day I pissed you off." Dean poured them both a cup before the maker had finished its cycling.
"If you're not from here… why stay here?" He shrugged. She sipped the coffee slowly. It was much stronger than she was used to. "Okay. Fine. Why do you carry a picture of me in your wallet? Obviously you had it before you ever met me."
Dean thought about his answer long and hard before he gave it. Normally he wouldn't talk so much but he'd been alone for longer than he'd like. It was good to have company. "It was a dream."
"What was?"
"Sam and I were… on a hunting trip. I knocked myself on the head. I had a dream. It felt real. So vivid. There were a lot of things about that dream that I loved and a few things… I hated." He took a deep breath. "My mom was alive. My mother… and I grew up in one place. Sam got to live the life he should have… and me… I was still a screw up but I had a good life. A steady job… a girlfriend and a place I called home."
"You couldn't have any of that while you're awake?"
"Not so much. I kind of… I hated that it was a dream and just a dream. When I woke up, I… wasn't really myself. The dream bugged me because I recognized the girlfriend but I couldn't place from where. I was telling Sam about it while I was flipping through a magazine…" Dean lifted his eyes to see her but her eyes were fixed on her coffee cup. "Maybe I'd flipped through it a day or two before my concussion but… I didn't want to let the dream go." He took a breath. "Sam thought it was my spank rag, too but… it wasn't about that."
"I'm sorry that I overreacted." She whispered and lifted her eyes to his, slowly. "So, can I ask? I mean… about why you… can't have a life like what…" His eyes shifted away. "What happened to your mom?"
"She was killed when I was little." He shrugged and had to laugh at his next phrasing. "My dad came a little unhinged. We started moving around a lot. He drank too much… if I spent a whole semester somewhere, it was damn rare."
"I'm sure my life is downright mundane next to yours." Carmen sipped her coffee slowly.
"I really hope it is." Dean got up and found creamer in the cabinet. Sam's creamer. "Here."
"Was it that obvious?" She blushed and uncapped the bottle. She stirred it with her finger and then eyed the bottle when she licked the coffee off her finger. "Hazelnut?"
"My brother. Such a wuss." Dean laughed to himself. "Ellen just shook her head at him when she realized why it was even in the cabinet."
"Ellen is a… fierce woman."
"Yeah." Dean smiled to himself. "Ellen."
"You seem a little taken with her."
Dean shrugged. "She's just one of those ladies… Ladies. I just called Ellen a lady. She'd laugh at that." He inhaled half his coffee. "I haven't actually known her that long but…"
"Well, whether she's known you long or not, she loves you." Carmen sipped her coffee. "She scared the shit out of me the last time you were in the hospital."
"Ellen?" Dean's forehead creased in thought.
"Sounded like a threat. She wanted me to stay away from you. I think she actually called me the mother of all bitches… and coming from her… I think that must be pretty bad."
"Yeah… Ellen would know the true meaning of bitch." He had to smile. It seemed like something Ellen would do and never tell him about. "We're like family. Ellen's family. My family… just… we know that the family is more important than everything else. I'm glad I'm on her good side… after Jo…" He trailed off and remembered being the one to tell Ellen that her daughter was dead. "I kind of figured it would break her but Ellen's got backbone enough for the world."
"Who's Jo?"
"Her daughter." Dean cleared his throat. "Passed away six months ago. 24 years old. Ellen's world shattered but you'd never know it unless you knew her and I'm still not sure I'm on the list of the qualified."
"Been a rough year for you, I guess."
"Rough couple of decades." He cleared his throat again. "Okay. I did my time. You do yours. Why were you even in a magazine if you're a nurse in Bumfuck, Nebraska?"
"We're in Bumfuck, Kansas," she corrected. "I ran away a few years ago. Too much small town bullshit. Not enough reasons to put up with it. I had my nursing under my belt but school loans were killing me. Met a guy at a bar. Said I could be a model…" She shook her head. "I did one shoot and got paid handsomely for it. I had lined up two more and thought I could do that for a while. See the world. The photographer on the second shoot…" Carmen tipped the bourbon bottle into her coffee and took a long sip. "Made me realize how naïve I was and just how small a town I'd come from… and how much I had lucked out up to that point. I took my money and ran home."
"At least you had a home to run to."
"Yeah and got an earful from my mother and my father and we waited until the damn pictures stopped circulating. So… seeing that ad in your wallet just…"
"We all have triggers."
"After tonight, I'll have a few more." She got up to refill her cup and turned to get his as well. He blinked at her rapidly, and then he lightly tugged on the left side of his hood. "I know you said that you moved around a lot but what is it that you do for a living."
"Not anything that I can do anymore. Some of my resources are gone."
"Like?"
"My eye is shot. For what I do… bad eyesight is bad." He pointed to his left shoulder. "This whole side is still stiff. If I had been in top condition, I could have murdered those guys in the alley. Sure as hell wouldn't have had to run off. We could have taken your car and been done with it."
"You didn't answer my question."
"Let's just say that if you thought you were naïve for not thinking sexual favors were expected of models… then my world is a whole world over your head. No one normal gives my world a single thought, forget a second thought." Dean gulped his coffee. "I freelance investigations. No one usually asks for my help but they end up needing it. I dispose of problems."
"You're not a garbage man for the mafia, are you?"
"I wish."
She nodded and sipped her coffee in silence for a long moment. "So, you what? Move to an area and look for what? Problems that you specialize in and what? Just solve it for free?"
"I read a lot of newspapers. I'm trained to see patterns and clues where say… the cops aren't. Hell, even the FBI doesn't see these things. Maybe they don't want to. I stop them from continuing."
"So what brought you to Lawrence?"
"Lawrence?" Dean paled and he could feel a panic attack coming on but forced himself to breathe. "I didn't even ask. I just…"
"Woke up here?"
"Yeah. We started out in Stull… we were… working and things didn't go right. We took it as far as we could and we got the job done but… it didn't really work out."
"Because you got hurt."
"It happens… just never been hurt this way before." He took his cup to the window and stared out over his neighborhood. He had avoided newspapers because he didn't want to tempt himself. He kept his head down when he was out and about. "Lawrence, Kansas."
"You okay?"
"I was born here. If we're on Cedar, then… shit… my childhood home is about two miles from here. Missouri knows I'm here. She'll give me hell when she finds out what I've done."
"Missouri Mosley?" Carmen frowned at him. "She passed away three months ago."
"How do you know Missouri?" Dean turned to face her.
"It was on the news. I didn't even know we had people in town that played at being psychic. The way she died…" Carmen shuddered suddenly. "And… I was in the burn unit when she came in."
"Burn unit?" His heart clenched up and he couldn't stop the tears. "They got her, too." He turned and punched the wall. "God, I should've come and… I should have been here. Three months ago… three months ago, I was…"
"You think someone did that to her?" She set her cup aside and took his from him. "It was a gas leak. She didn't know. All it took was for her to walk in and flip on a light."
"But she would have known."
"She wasn't really psychic, Dean."
"You didn't know her." He all but roared in her face. "Missouri…" He fought for memories that he knew he didn't have. Long forgotten before he'd known they were there to be forgotten. "She… helped my dad after my mom died. Helped him with me and Sammy and… she helped us when dad was missing and… shit… Missouri." Dean sank onto his bed and dropped his head between his knees. "She would have known…. Unless…"
"Unless what?"
"They only made it look like a gas leak."
"You think someone murdered her? She was a con but I doubt anyone in this town would murder over some wrong advice."
Dean snorted. "Missouri was the only person in the psychic business that I knew was not a con. As for this town… two guys tonight almost killed us both and their original intent was to rape you. You tell me what you know about Lawrence."
Carmen stayed silent. Dean had yelled at her before. Had exerted himself right in front of her but she had never seen his face turn red in anger. With his burned face, he almost looked like he was wearing a mask. "Okay. Maybe you're right. I didn't know her and I'm naïve enough to think my home town is safe. Happy?"
He only shook his head and averted his eyes. "If I told you what I think really happened… you'd have Dr. Gilbert on the phone first thing and you'd both have me locked up. I'm not spending my last fifty-two days in a psych ward."
"Fifty-two days?" She sat on the edge of the bed and dared to touch his knee. "What's fifty-two days got to do with anything?"
"Nothing. Forget I said anything." Dean shook his head. "I've had a bad life and a really suck out loud couple of years."
"Okay." She nodded. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you upset." She slid to sit next to him on his right side. "You were born here? Maybe we went to school together for a little while."
Dean shook his head. "I was four when my mom died. We left Lawrence after Christmas that year. We didn't come back until I was 26. I only stayed a week."
"What your uncle said… about you… not talking when you were five…"
"Remembered, huh. Damn," he tried to joke. "I hadn't been talking since it happened. I don't even really remember running off that time… except that maybe Sammy had an earache or something."
"You don't remember running off but you remember your baby brother had an earache?" She smiled at him. "Aw, you're a good big brother."
"I am an awesome big brother," he corrected her but the smile faded from his mouth because he was a shitty big brother. He sold his soul for his baby brother but he had let Sam find out. Had cursed his brother to know that… He shook his head and tried to focus on Carmen's slow smile. Sometime in the night, they had come to a truce. It killed him because it was easy to talk to her. Maybe because he had gotten used to it in his dreams. Maybe because she was really nice once he stopped abusing her verbally. "Do you have a brother… or a sister?"
"Two sisters. Both younger. They're both married and have kids and I'm the spinster older sister who isn't doing such a good job with her life."
"You're what? 26?"
"28, but I appreciate the attempt at flattery." She punched him lightly on the arm. "I don't feel old but my parents just… shake their heads at me… like I messed up."
"What do your sisters do?"
"They take care of the kids. Nani married a roofer. Isela is married to the son of the lady who owns that cheesy Mexican-knock off restaurant." She rolled her eyes.
"You're a nurse. You saw a bit of the world. What did they do before they got married and had kids?"
"Dropped out of college the second they found out they were pregnant is what they did." She snorted. "It's really my mom who's on my case. My dad…"
"Had a difference experience?"
"Yeah." She looked at him with a half smile and glittering brown eyes. "He went to college. He didn't finish but he went. His mother had done the same. I'm the first to finish. I don't know about her husband… if there ever really was one."
"Single mom?"
"I think so. Dad won't talk about his dad."
"Grandpa Porter never been in the picture?"
"Not that I ever could remember." She frowned suddenly but dismissed it and sighed. "What time is it?"
"Late." He could stare at her all night. It was probably his last chance. "You should get some sleep."
"What about you?"
"I don't sleep so much anymore."
"More panic attacks?"
"Not a single one since the night before I got jumped."
"God, you are so…" She cupped the scarred side of his face and pressed her lips against his. "Thank you, Dean."
He kept stock still until long after she'd pulled her hand away and stretched out beside him. Until long after her breathing had evened out. It wasn't fair but then… it never had been for Dean Winchester.
TBC
