~11~ Harvelle's Memory

We drove for a ways north of town and transferred onto a dirt road. Sammi followed the little map and directions on her phone, leading us right where we needed to go. We turned off the road and down a short drive that opened up onto a cluttered lot. Sadly, it seemed Harvelle's really had burned down. There was what looked to be a shell of an RV to the right and next to it, to the left, the rambling remains of the Roadhouse. There appeared to be most of two adjoining walls still standing in the front left corner and part of a wall on the right, next to the parked RV. Weeds were growing up, in spots, through what was left of the floor.

I stopped the car and we just sat in silence, staring. Nobody had anything to say. I experienced shock that the place was real and then a sickening lump in the pit of my stomach that it really had burnt down. I hoped the deaths in the fire were just a manufacture of Carver's imagination. I looked around the car and saw the evidence of similar thoughts on the faces of my friends. I cracked open my door, taking a last look at them. We all looked at each other, maybe building our courage to venture out, from one another. I stepped out and the others followed.

Sammi pulled out her camera and went to town, documenting our visit. We all just wandered in our different thoughts and directions. Cat bent down and picked up a scorched light bulb at the front of what was left of the building. She looked up. My eyes followed. There was a small portion of what used to be the Roadhouse sign, hanging on the remaining bit of front wall. Cat looked down again at the light bulb and then pocketed it.

I ventured into the remains along with El and Charlie. I stopped just past the threshold and closed my eyes. I tried to envision what the place would have looked like, thinking of the many descriptions given in the books. I could almost hear the jukebox playing "Can't Fight This Feeling" by REO Speedwagon. I picture some old hunter playing a video game in the corner, trying to beat Jo's score. Ash and some stranger are playing pool off to the left. Ellen, behind the bar, pouring beers for rough and tumble hunters and road weary folks who somehow have stumbled upon the Roadhouse. Jo brings out a basket of fries for a guy in a booth to the right. I open my eyes and can almost see Sam and Dean sitting on bar stools at the bar in front of me.

I'm shaken from my thoughts as Sammi shakes my shoulder. "I said, are you okay?"

"Huh? Yeah. Yeah. I was just picturing the place as it used to be. Well, trying to at least. So sad."

She gives my shoulder a squeeze and nods her head. She heads into the roadhouse's remains and takes a few more pictures.

I look around, thinking it seemed so much smaller than I thought it would be. I shift some debris around with my foot and a glint catches my eye. I bend down and pick up a bottle cap. I go to wipe the black soot off of it and stop short. No. I decide a proper remembrance of Harvelle's should keep the soot of the fire intact. I pick up several bottle caps as I wander around the building.

"Fuck yeah! I don't fucking believe it!" El exclaims with more excitement than the situation seemed to require. We look over and she's gone back near the back left of the building and was digging around in the remains.

"What don't you believe?" Cat asks, walking over.

El stands up and holds a board above her head in triumph. The left side of the sign is burned away and across it's front we could read 'ADASS' and in the bottom right corner was an 'IS:' It was Ash's office door sign which, according to the books, originally read "Dr. BADASS IS:" and it had a smaller sign that hung from it with an IN and an OUT on it. The smaller sign was gone, probably burned in the fire.

"Cool souvenir." Charlie said, smiling. But as we all looked at it, our smiles faded and were replaced with sadness.

"So...Ash was real." Sammi said. "Or, at least, someone whom Ash was based on."

El looked back down at the sign in her hands. She took a hand and gently ran it across the surface of the sign. She looked reminiscent of a mother holding the belongings of a lost child and my chest tightened at the sadness of the scene. I turned away, maybe too quickly, and continued wandering the building.

Sammi, over to the left, bent down and dug around a bit, coming up with the torched remains of what looked like the cue ball from the pool table. She held it out at arm's length and snapped a picture of it. She set the ball back down in the rubble with loving care and stood there, studying it. She then picked it back up and carried it with her.

We were all pulled from our thoughts by a loud crack and a stream of cursing. I turned and, back in the area that would have been behind the bar, Charlie stood awkwardly, spinning her arms.

"Fuck me, that hurts!" she exclaimed.

"Are you okay?"

"What happened?"

We all rushed over as best we could through the debris to find that her foot had broken down through the floorboards. A piece of the remaining flooring was jabbing into her calf, preventing her from easily extracting her foot. El grabbed her around the back, supporting her and keeping her from falling over. I bent down and grabbed the broken piece that was poking into her and pulled back on it. Cat grabbed a hold with me and, with a resounding crack, we broke it off, falling back onto our butts. Charlie pulled her foot out and El helped her to the floor. Sammi pulled a small first aid kit from her bottomless purse/suitcase. I poured some of my bottled water over her calf and Sammi worked at cleaning it up.

"It's only a scrape. Nothing needing stitches." Sammi said as she cleaned the wound with an iodine pad and applied a large gauze pad, taping it into place.

"Thanks, Sammi." Charlie said with a slight hiss to her breath.

"Oh my God. Guys, look at this!"

We turned to find Cat hovering over the hole left behind from Charlie's foot. Charlie scooted across the dirty floor toward the hole and the rest of us crowded in. "What? I can't see anything." El said, tilting her head trying to see into the hole.

"Hold up." Sammi said, digging into her purse again. She pulled out a small flashlight.

"Seriously?" I asked incredulously.

"What? I believe in being prepared." She answered, flicking it on.

"I guess so!" I laughed and leaned in to see what her flashlight would reveal.

The hole was actually a hidden compartment under the floorboards. Cat reached in and started pulling things out. A canister, about the size of a can of grated parmesan cheese, that read Morton's Salt through the rust spots; a metal canteen that sloshed when she shook it; and a dented metal box about the size of a shoe box. El took the canteen, cracked it open, and took a small sniff. She frowned and shook her head. She tipped it up and poured some of the contents into her palm. It appeared to be just water.

"Holy water, I'd bet." Cat said, almost reverentially.

El chuckled. "Why would you say that?" Cat reached over and stuck a finger into the opening and, after some digging, pulled it out with what appeared to be a rosary hooked on it. "Okay, then." El responded.

"Salt and holy water. I wonder what's in the box?" Sammi quietly said.

"What's in the box?!" I yelled, making everyone jump. They all give me disgusted looks. "Sorry." I sheepishly say. "It's one of my favorite quotes..."

Cat hands the box to me. "You wanna know so bad..."

I look at it. Charlie did a number on it when she went through the floor. There was a large dent in the top. There was a locked latch on the front that had come loose from the damage. I carried the box out to the parking lot and found a rock. I hit the latch a few times and the lid came open. Everyone gathered around. Inside the box was a bundle of cash, a gun, and a small framed photo. The photo was a night time picture of a man. He was sitting on a log and holding a beer out to the camera in a mock toast, grinning ear to ear. His face was dirty and there may have been a smudge of blood at his hairline. In the bottom corner of the photo were some words written in silver ink. "To Ellen. Miss you Love you – Bill"

"Well this is all just creepy as fuck." El finally said.

"Yeah. I'm beginning to freak out a little." I answer.

"My God." Sammi whispers. "Ellen was real. Bill, her dead husband I have to assume, was real."

El holds out her sign. "Maybe Ash was too."

"So, we have a real diner in Florida, with waitress named Doris and a guy who really went missing at The Mystery Spot." Cat says.

"Sammy's apartment." Charlie says in a hushed tone.

"Well..." I say. "We don't really know if a Sam ever lived there guys..."

"Okay. I'll give you that." Charlie said. "But what about the creepy gate thing at the Freeland Cemetery? You can't say that wasn't creepy as all fuck."

"Okay. I will admit to that." I offered.

"Um...and we have a car with real weapons and fake ID's in the trunk." El added.

"And a probable serial killer psychopath, that just happens to be named Dean, on our tails." Sammi ends it.

We all just stand there. Cat does one of those shakes you do when you get a chill up your spine. I take all the contents of the secret hole and put them into the weapon's cache in the trunk of the car. I pull out our picnic supplies and cooler. "Okay. Enough with the creepy, guys...who's hungry?" El shakes her head as if coming out of a dream.

"Yeah. I could eat." Charlie says with a smile.

"You could always eat. I swear to God, you're a bottomless pit!" El says, grinning.

The creep factor ratchets down to bearable levels as we focus on our picnic dinner. We spread out a blanket in the grass off to the side of the lot and eat. It's beginning to get dark as we finish up and clean our mess. Fireflies are starting to blink in the trees and meadow behind the Roadhouse. Sammi and Cat are whispering to each other and then go off, wandering around the parking lot. Later, they call us over to the front of the Roadhouse. They had built a little tower of stones in memorial.

"To the Harvelle's." Sammi says.

"May they rest in peace." Cat adds. We all stand there in respectful silence. "Okay enough emo crap." Cat says suddenly. "Let's check out some stars."

We had chosen tonight for our star watching because it was so wide open out here with hardly a light to be seen, messing up the view. Sam and Dean were known to stop the car, at times, and just look at the stars. Not sure if it was just a recoup time for them or what. A chance for them to draw back and out of the crazy that made up their day to day lives, maybe. But we intended on following Winchester tradition.

We all chose a spot on the car. El and Sammi on the hood and Charlie, Cat, and myself on the trunk. We lay there for what seemed like hours, just gazing at the amazing expanse of stars in the heavens above, each lost in her own thoughts. It was eventually broken up when El broke out in a rousing rendition of 'Kumbaya' to which our groans quickly drowned her out. We tiredly headed back to the hotel and a good night's sleep. For some. I had nightmares of burning buildings.