Chapter 35
Dean wakes up, taking a huge gulp for air.
"You're okay, bro?..." Sam asks, sitting next to him.
"Yeah…"
"That was a long trip… What happened?..."
"Later…Where's Bobby?"
"At the hospital with Eli…" At that moment, his phone rings. "Must be him… Hello?... Yeah, he's back… Oh, good… We're on our way…" He cuts the call. "Eli is awake too… I don't know how you did it, but you got to her…"
"I'm kinda irresistible!..." Dean jokes.
.
The next day, Eli may leave the hospital despite the confusion the doctor still has over her case.
They go back to the Motel to recuperate their duffels. "Guys, can you please give Eli and I a moment... I think it's time I have a conversation with her about all this..." Bobby gently asks the brothers.
"Oh Yeah... Sure... We'll wait for you at the Dinner at the corner..." Sam answers.
"Thank you…" The old man mouths. "Pumpkin... We need to talk about your mother..." He continues before closing the door.
"You're sure it's safe we leave them alone in there?" Dean a little bit worried.
"Come on… It's father and daughter we're talking about here… What, you wanna stay with your ear glued to the door, in case of?"
"No… You're right… Maybe not…" The elder smiling at a person passing by in the hallway, looking dagger at them.
.
"I promise Dean I'd listen to your version of the story… So, go ahead…" Eli sitting on the edge of the bed, arms crossed and looking away from her father.
"This boy really got to you, didn't he?..." Bobby smirks, grabbing a seat to sit in front of her.
"Absolutely not!… But, his argumentation had some sense in it… So…" She unconvincingly answers.
"His argumentation… Right… Okay, Eli… Here it goes…" He intertwines his fingers and places his hands in front of his mouth, in a sort of concentration position, before starting to talk. "When you were born, your Mom couldn't stay a foot away from you… She was carrying you around everywhere… Singing for you all day long… You were both so adorable together…" He gently smiles at the memory. "And then suddenly, something changed in her… She became irascible… She disappeared for hours, leaving you in your buggy in the middle of the garden, unattended… She stopped taking care of you… Of her too… Even the house was a mess… So, I brought her to the doctor… He said she might suffer from Baby Blues and he gave her some antidepressant pills… That she didn't take of course… And it got even worse… She started to be violent…With me, with you… The Sheriff came home once, because she was accused of burglary by one of the store-man in town… It was totally not Karen anymore… To avoid jail time, I promised the judge to take her to a shrink… Schizophrenia, he said… And she was immediately committed in a mental institution… But, she escaped five days later and came home after a week and a half like nothing happened… Then, the night of your ten months, some strange noises coming from your bedroom woke me up… I heard your Mom's and another man's talking a language I couldn't understand… When I opened the door…" He stops and sighs heavily. "There was a guy towering above your crib, one of his fingers in your mouth… He turned to face me and there I saw his Yellow-eyes… I thought first it was because of the reflection of the night light… But, he pushed me away and slammed the door just with a gesture of his hand… I tried to open it again… I pushed, hammered, yelled… It was locked…"
"With Sam, a fire started right after that... And his Mom died in it… Why was it different for us?..." Eli questions.
Her father lifts a hand to ask her to wait the rest of the story. "Suddenly, the door opened by itself again and your mom was holding you in her arms… The man had vanished… She was smiling at me… Telling me that everything would be all right now… I was totally confused and scared… I didn't understand what was happening to our family… In the morning, I took you to the doctor… I needed to know if that man did something to you… But, he didn't find anything strange… You were a perfectly healthy ten months old baby… No traces of bruises or marks… You even smiled at the doctor, wanting to grab his stethoscope to play with…" Bobby giggles. "But, nothing that would answer my distress… I was totally confused… So before riding back home, I made a detour to our church to talk to father Peter… I explained him everything that happened… And he was the first one to talk about Demon's possession and Hunters trying to get rid of the once wandering around on earth… He advised me to contact a friend of his, a specialist in that kind of matter… I thought it would be a 'he' but it was a 'she' that knocked on our door the next morning… Pamela Barnes, a very powerful psychic by the way… She wanted to make a hypnosis session with Karen to make sure it was a possession case… During the process, your mother had suddenly a short moment of lucidity where she explained she felt like somebody else was in her, another woman making her doing things…That she was trying to fight it, but failed… That the man I saw with the Yellow-eyes was a Demon… And that entity in her was his formal wife… And that she was scared for us… You and me… But then suddenly the tone of her voice changed and that Demon woman started to speak… She was about to run away with you to rejoin her husband… Pamela wanted me to tie up your mother on the chair while she took a book from her pocket and told me she needed chalk to draw some cabalistic signs on the floor… But we weren't fast enough; the Demon in your mom took a letter-opener on the desk and stabbed herself with it… She explained that since the body was now damaged, Karen would die soon after the exorcism… I asked Pamela to stop the session and wake Karen up from the hypnosis… I couldn't believe what I was hearing… I needed time to process all what was happened in our lives since the past six weeks… Despite her protests, I send Pamela away and try to discuss with your mother… Again, she promised me that everything would go fine and that I had nothing to worry about…" He stops talking, a sudden sob choking him.
Eli goes for her father's duffel and takes the little Whisky flask out of it. She opens it, drinks a sip and hands it to him. "Thanks, Pumpkin…"
Before going back on the bed, she gently squeezes her father's shoulder, finally showing him some support and understanding.
Bobby clears his throat and continues to narrate that painful moment in their lives. "Two days later, I called back Pamela… I really needed answers to the zillions questions that were turning in my head… I needed to know what could be done… I wanted to save your mother… Pamela came home, accompanied with a man… A hunter… He explained me the basis of what that special job meant… What exactly was a Demon… And how to handle one, at least the low-graded ones… I was a lousy believer and only red Bible when I was a kid… So, imagine suddenly facing the facts that Heaven and Hell, Demons and others evil creatures really exist…" He takes another sip of Whiskey. "The next day, in the middle of the night, I caught your mother trying to sneak out the house with you in her arms… I tried to stop her and to take you away from her… We started to fight… It quickly turned ugly… I succeeded to push her back in our bedroom spreading Holy Water to her and locked the door with a salt line… She hammered on that damned door for hours… I just went up there to give her food and drink, still with that bottle of Holy Water as a weapon… I noticed that the stab wound in her belly got septic… At that moment, I knew I wouldn't be able to save her anymore… I drank till I found the courage to go up there, with the exorcism text in one hand, a bottle of Holy Water in the other and a long knife in my belt… I traced a Devil's trap in front of the bedroom door, put a mat over it and made a breach in the salt line before opening it… I backed up in the corridor, waiting for her to come out… Of course she was stopped by the trap and I started to read the Latin text out loud… She was screaming like an animal… It was awful… Really awful… The Demon finally came out of her in a form of a black smoke we all know by now… And it disappeared through the open window… Your mom felt on the floor, still breathing… I took her in my arm and she…" Bobby sobs again. Eli kneels before him, taking his hands in hers. "She begged me to stop her suffering… I took the knife… And stabbed in her heart… I cremated her in all due respect…" He places his hands around Eli's face. "The guilt weight on me since… She was the love of my life, Pumpkin… And you are all what I have left now… So, that makes you the most precious thing I own… That's why I tried to protect you since you're a kid… Letting you be a hunter… Asking John to train you… And let Dean and Sam taking over… I wanted to be sure you would survive the day I wouldn't be around anymore…"
"You knew for the Demon blood in me?..." Eli asks.
"Yes, I only completely understood it later when John told me about Sam… That's the reason I wanted you all to stay together… And I hope you will stay close, Sam and you, when Dean will… You know…"
"Dad, I'm so sorry… I was so angry with you… Why were you hiding all of this from me?... I would have understood, you know…"
"I know, Pumpkin… That was a terrible mistake I made…"
Father and daughter, both go up and hug each other tight.
.