MoonlitePrincez314: Hey, yeah...Alyson just seemed - to me - to be someone who would have faith. And yeah...I think I've got her reaction to Castiel already figured out. LOL.
Supernatural-Stalker: Love the name. LOL. Just thought I should tell you I was thinking of 'Days of Our Lives' too. I was actually gonna put that in there as the one they were watching, but then I said 'nah!'. Maybe I should have? Anyway, glad you're hooked and thanks for reviewing.
Born Under a Bad Sign
Part One
A day later, Sam turned up missing. Again. And this time it wasn't like last time. Sam hadn't been arguing with Dean, and he'd been generally happy. As far as Sam goes, anyway.
Sam had been at the motel - in a separate room - and then when Dean and I had gotten up the next morning…no Sam.
At first, we thought maybe he'd gone out for breakfast or something equally as innocent, but then when half a day had gone by with no word we began to worry. We'd tried calling, but…no answer. Only voicemail.
And this time even I was freaking out. I had been the voice of reason when Sam had left last time, but this time Sam had had no reason to leave, and it made me wonder if something had happened to him. He wasn't here, but most of his stuff was, which was weird and it meant that either something had happened and he'd to leave quickly, or he just hadn't wanted us to worry about him too early so he'd left his stuff to make us think he was coming back.
"Did he say anything to you?" Dean asked as we got into the car.
"No," I said. "But we checked his room, and it didn't look like anything had been there…or anyone."
The first thing we'd done was call Bobby to see if he'd heard from Sam. He hadn't, of course. Our luck just wasn't that good. Never had been, probably never would be.
Then we'd called Ellen, telling her to be on the lookout. She'd said she'd call Jo, and tell Ash. But she hadn't heard from Sam, and she made a comment about us not keeping a good enough eye on him, and hadn't we been here in this situation recently?
I'd wanted to tell her that was ironic seeing as to how she probably didn't even know where Jo was. But I didn't because I'm a nice person, and I had better things to worry about.
"I don't know why he left…or even if he left on his own," I said, which wouldn't put Dean's mind at rest, but it was the truth. "But we'll find him. I promise."
------------- -
About an hour later, I called my dad. In all honesty, I'd sorta - but not really - forgotten about him. It wasn't like I'd totally forgotten completely. It's just Sam had been on my mind instead.
It wasn't that I thought Sam would contact Jack, anyway. It was more a precaution than anything else. It was just to tell him to keep an ear and eye out, and let us know if he found anything out.
"Have you tried hacking into his cell phone's GPS?" I asked Dean, knowing he hadn't because I'd been with him the whole time. "Can we even do that?"
"I can…or…better yet, we can get Ash to do it. He could probably do it without even calling the phone company."
"Do you want me to make the call?"
"Please."
So I called Ash at the Roadhouse.
"Dr. Badass here," he answered.
"Hey, Ash. I need a favor."
"Name it, and I'll see if I can do."
"Hack into the GPS on Sam's phone, see if you can find where he is."
"Yeah, okay. Stay on the line. It'll take a few minutes."
"Will do."
So…a few minutes later… "Ash said that he's in New York." I was kinda confused by that.
"New York? Where in New York?" Dean asked.
"Um, upstate, he said. New Paltz, or something like that."
"New Paltz?" Dean looked like something had clicked in his mind. "That's where that chick lives."
"Um…be more specific?"
"Sarah something. The girl that Sam liked."
Oh…yeah. I'd forgotten about that. Not that he'd liked her, of course, but everything else - like where exactly she had lived. And something about this was weird anyway.
"Why would he go there now?" I questioned, and Dean shrugged. "I mean, without telling us? Why would he do that?"
"I don't know, okay," Dean snapped.
"Don't yell at me," I snapped back. "It's not my fault that he's gone…again." And I knew that adding the 'again' to the end of that sentence wasn't helping matters any - as a matter of fact, it was probably only adding insult to injury, or salt to the wound or whatever - but I knew if I didn't say something now, Dean's attitude would only progress. And it really wasn't my fault for Sam being gone, so I wasn't gonna let him take his anger out on me.
------------- -
Ash had kept us updated and, apparently, Sam was pretty stable because the GPS was in the same place - New York. Ash had even narrowed it down to a café near the art gallery where Sarah Blake had worked.
And then we'd asked Ash to get the number for the gallery, and Sarah's home phone number just in case.
Now that we knew where we were going, now that we had a goal we could focus on, Dean seemed calmer for some reason. It was like the real irritability Dean had been feeling was more because he hadn't had a place to start than anything else.
I tried calling Sam again - it had to have been the seventh time in the last hour alone - but got his voicemail again.
"Um, okay, either you're ignoring me or you don't have your phone on you -" which was ridiculous since he was supposed to be in a café "- but when you get this - along with my other messages - call me. Or Dean. Or at least text us if you don't feel like talking, let us know you're safe."
I shut my phone and sighed. "When we find him, we're really gonna have to remind him that communication is a good thing."
I let my mind wander as I turned my gaze to the window. The scenery outside was mostly snow and ice-covered trees. And, yes, it was beautiful, and normally I would stop and appreciate it, but today it just clashed horribly with my mood. I mean, the sun was shining down, glistening off the pure white snow, but I felt as if it should be cloudy and storming. The sky should have been dark to match my mood.
"So, uh, we should be there in about four hours," Dean said, making it a point to not be snappy. "Maybe we should call Sarah and give her a heads up?"
"Yeah, sure," I said. "Should I, or do you want to?"
"You can do it."
So about five rings later, I got an answer at the gallery where she'd worked. I didn't know whether it was an employee or Sarah's father, but it was a guy who answered.
He went through the whole spiel about how they were the finest aft gallery in the state, and whether I was interested in buying or selling.
"No," I said politely, "actually, I was wondering if Sarah Blake was in."
"May I inquire as to who's calling?"
"Um, she may not remember me, but we met about seven or eight months ago. My name's Alyson. Uh, tell her I'm a friend of Sam's."
"One moment, please."
Exactly a minute later a girl said, "Hello?"
"Sarah?"
"Yes. Hi." She still sounded as friendly as she had been.
"Hey, um, I'm just gonna cut to the chase. Have you seen Sam?"
"No," she said, confused. "He's not with you guys?"
So she did remember who we were. Granted, it would be hard to forget someone who introduced you to the supernatural world.
"No, he's not. We hacked into the GPS on his cell phone, and it says he's in New York, near where you are, but he -"
"Where?" Sarah interrupted. "I can go find him."
"Um…some café. A cyber café, I think."
"There's a few of those around here, but I can check them all."
"Yeah, okay. He's not answering his phone, either, so…if you find him tell him to call, okay?"
"Yeah." A nervous silence fell between us, and then she said, "do you think he's okay?"
I glanced over at Dean, who was focusing on the road, and then answered. "I don't know, Sarah. I hope so."
She sighed, and we said our goodbyes.
"She's gonna look for him. If he's there, she'll find him."
"Good," Dean said firmly. "Then I can ask him why he left, and them maybe beat him half to death for not tellin' us where he was goin' and not answerin' his phone."
I scoffed. "You know you won't do that."
"Yeah, you're right."
------------- -
One thing I noticed as we were heading toward New York was that Dean didn't have the music as loud as he normally did while Sam was with us.
I didn't really understand it, and I didn't need to. It was just an observation I'd made.
"So he really didn't say anything to you? About leaving?"
"Dean," I said, turning in the seat to look at him, "if I knew anything, I would've told you."
"I know, I know," he conceded, "it's just…it seems like I'm always chasing after the kid, and honestly, I don't mind finding him because he's my brother, but every time he leaves it's…"
"Harder? And it reminds you of the first time he left?"
"Yeah." He sounded like he was glad that he hadn't had to say it himself. "Exactly."
"That's normal." I was silent for maybe five seconds and then I said, "Uh, Dean, listen, I may be overstepping my bounds here, but…when Sam left it wasn't about you, I don't think. Sam's just…I don't know how to say this nicely, but…maybe selfish…or spoiled?"
Dean kinda looked like he was getting angry, and honestly, I got it because Sam was his baby brother, and nobody can badmouth Dean Winchester's brother, but…
"And before you yell at me, let me explain. What I mean is, Sam's gonna do what Sam wants to do when he wants to do it."
"That's not fair," Dean protested firmly.
"Yes, it is. I'm not saying he's not a good person. He's second only to you, in my book, but he's…used to getting his way most of the time. I mean, he loves you, and he would do anything for you. But…he's spoiled, as I said."
"Still not fair. You weren't there when we were growing up."
"No, but I'm willing to bet you did everything you could to make him happy. I'm also willing to bet that you went out of your way to make sure he had almost everything he wanted."
Dean didn't answer, which was as good an answer as any.
"You never had that, Dean." I hadn't actually set out to dredge up old memories, it was just where the conversation had naturally gone. "And you had to give up everything to take care of him." When John wouldn't or couldn't.
"We were talking about him leaving, what does this have to do with that?"
"I'm getting there." And so I was. "As I said, when he left the first time - when I was with you - it was about him, not you. I mean, even when he went off to college it wasn't about you. He wanted to be normal. Then, he left you to go find answers about himself."
"Do you actually have a point to all this?" Okay, so I was hitting a nerve apparently, because he was becoming defensive again.
"My point is that you shouldn't take it personally when he leaves because it's not about you. He doesn't do it to hurt you, or to spite you. I mean, I'm not saying it hurts any less, but he's not doing it because he knows it hurts. He usually does it for himself."
A moment passed and then Dean said, "you should've been a shrink." It was said in a playful way so I assumed he wasn't mad at what I'd said about Sam.
I was glad he wasn't angry and that he didn't get offended when I stated my opinion. I wasn't one who usually kept my thoughts to myself unless I didn't know or trust the person I was talking to.
------------- -
In New York, we met up with Sarah. Her hair was shorter than it had been the last time we'd seen her, but other than that she looked the same. She seemed genuinely worried, so I assumed she hadn't found Sam. Also…he wasn't with her; that was another clue.
She was at the gallery, which had closed for the day. After looking for and failing to find Sam, Sarah had come back here to wait for us.
"Hey, I found this," was the first thing Sarah said when we found her.
She handed us a cell phone; it was Sam's. "It was in one of the café's I checked. Um, I know the owner, Eddie, and he said that Sam - or someone who looked like the guy I described - had been there for a couple of hours this morning. And seeing as to how that phone was there…it was probably him."
"Yeah," Dean replied. "Did you find it, or…?"
"Oh, no," Sarah replied. "Eddie kept it, he thought maybe Sam would come back for it."
"Do you think we could talk to Eddie?"
Sarah nodded. "Sure. It's just, we'll have to go to his house."
"Can you leave now?" I asked. "And come with us?"
She smiled. "You think I'd let you do this without me?"
So we piled into the car and Sarah began directing us towards her friend's house. The evening traffic - it was around five - was horrible, and it seemed like it was gonna take a while.
"Can you guys think of another reason why he'd be here?" Sarah asked. "Because he hasn't been in touch with me at all."
"I don't know," Dean said, shrugging. "I mean, as far as I know, you're the only person who he knows from around here."
"Hm."
Things were quiet again until Sarah told us to turn left. And then… "How've you guys been…before now."
"Well, we're alive," Dean said. "And that's about all I can say."
"And we haven't come across anymore haunted paintings, so the art world is safe as far as we know," I added.
"What have you come across?" she asked.
Dean shook his head. "Trust me, you don't wanna know."
"Okay," she drew it out, making it sound longer than just two syllables.
Dean was probably right about her not wanting to know. Sarah knew about ghosts already, but she didn't need to know about the demons and vampires and all the other stuff we'd come across.
------------- -
When we got to Eddie's place - it was a penthouse, doorman and all - Sarah led us to his door, and as we were walking Sarah started talking.
"Okay, so he doesn't know Sam and I were attracted to each other, so…don't say anything, okay?"
"He your boyfriend or somethin'?" Dean asked, ever so eloquently.
"Um, yeah," Sarah admitted. "Sam made it clear we could never be together, so…"
"You couldn't wait to see if he'd change his mind," I said, filling in the last of her sentence.
"Exactly," she said.
At the door, Sarah didn't knock, she just pulled out a key and opened the door herself.
"Eddie?" she called out.
"Yeah, I'm in here," a sorta deep voice called out. And then a guy - a shirtless guy - came out of one of the rooms and walked into where we were. "Oh," he said, eyeing me and Dean. "I didn't know you were bringing anybody."
He didn't seem mad, just surprised.
Anyway, he was very well-built; his body was built sorta like Dean's, and his chest led down to jeans - black - and some high-dollar shoes.
I made it a point to look at the floor, because I didn't know this guy, so it was a little embarrassing to be seeing him half naked.
"Um…I'm gonna go throw a shirt on."
And so I looked up at his retreating back.
"Sorry about that," Sarah said, and she really did sound apologetic. "I should've called and warned him. He's probably embarrassed…even though he has nothing to be ashamed of," she ended mischievously, and began walking off in the direction Eddie had just gone.
I noticed - now that I was looking around and not at the floor - that the place we were in was on the top floor, and there was a big window in the living room overlooking the city outside. It was almost dark so all the lights showed themselves beautifully.
The place was furnished fashionably with black leather chairs, and a sofa was against the far wall. On the opposite wall were two shelves. One was full of books, the other held pictures.
"I wonder if she sleeps here every night," Dean said.
"I don't know, and don't you dare ask. That's not your business." I turned to him and whispered, "do you think it's okay to look?"
He shrugged, but moved forward anyway. He didn't care that it was someone else's home. Social decorum wasn't his strong suit, but I wouldn't have it any other way. It was part of his charm.
"Yes, you can," Eddie said, coming into the room, and he must have Superman hearing because he hadn't even been in the room when I'd been whispering. Or maybe I had whispered louder than I thought I had.
Eddie didn't look like an Eddie to me. Eddie seemed too informal because he was wearing what looked like a business shirt. It was blue and white striped. He looked more like a CEO of a company than a café owner.
Actually, he reminded me of the Green Arrow from Smallville. Blond hair, chiseled features, bright smile, handsome, with a weird sense of kindness in his features, and maybe a little playfulness.
"So, you guys are looking for someone?"
"Yeah, uh, my brother," Dean said. "That cell phone you found belongs to him."
"Mm. Do you think he's okay?" Eddie asked, genuinely concerned.
Sarah came out behind him. "They don't know. They were sorta hoping maybe you talked to him or noticed anything strange."
"Well, I don't know him - Sam? - but he didn't seem strange. He seemed really calm. He didn't talk to anybody except to order coffee."
Dean seemed crestfallen. "A'right, well, we should go look for him at the motels around here, see if he's in any of them."
I sighed. "Do you need me for that? I mean, you know more about the types of places he'd stay in by himself than I do. And I've been cooped up all day in the car." I looked back at Sarah and Eddie. "If it's okay, I'd like to stay here for a while."
Eddie shrugged. "Sure. Sarah told me she hadn't seen you for a while. Ya'll could probably use the time to catch up."
"Do you care?" I asked, turning to Dean.
"No. You can stay here. It's up to you," he said. And okay, his words said it was up to me, but his tone was saying that he needed me, and would I please come with him? Who was I to say no to that?
------------- -
Dean and I checked every motel and tried every name Sam usually used when him and Dean were apart. We got nothing for our efforts.
"Okay, he had to have been here," I said, "or we wouldn't have found his phone. But why would he leave it?"
We had just gotten back into the car after searching the last motel around here. It was a little after nine and it was dark aside from the lights from the surrounding buildings.
"I dunno, maybe he was just leading us in the wrong direction. Ya know, messing with us."
"No, he wouldn't do that," I said quickly, knowing it to be true. "Something must've made him do this."
"Yeah." Dean sighed in frustration. "Do you feel like sleeping in the car tonight?"
I shrugged. "Not really, but if you wanna leave tonight I can."
"Nah, it's okay. Sarah's boyfriend - what's his name - said we could stay there. So we'll sleep a few hours and then go."
------------- -
Sleeping proved to be harder to put into practice than it normally was for me. Usually with me it's two minutes getting comfortable and then I'm fast asleep. But not this time. And it wasn't because I was in a different bed - we hardly ever slept in the same bed for more than three or four nights -, it's was because Sam wasn't here and I was sure something bad had happened to him.
I made a great show of pretending I was sure Sam was fine and that we'd find him and everything would be fine, but that wasn't the case here at all.
I sighed, and an arm wrapped around my midsection and pulled me close. Dean's chest was to my back, and I could feel the warmth seeping from him into me.
"You should be asleep," he said softly, though he sounded as if he'd been awake this whole time too.
His hand moved from my stomach, traveled up the length of my arm to my neck, where he moved the hair away that was covering it. His lips latched onto the place where my neck met my shoulder, and his tongue played over it a couple times.
I sighed softly as a shiver went through me when his teeth grazed over the spot.
"Dean," I whispered, turning to face him. "We can't do anything here. We barely know the guy who lives here."
Dean grinned half-heartedly. "Hey, I was just kissing my girlfriend. It's not my fault that your mind leaped forward."
I smiled slightly and put my head on his shoulder. Then my smile fell. "This isn't gonna be easy," I said, moving closer to his side. "It's probably gonna take a while."
"Yeah, I know. It's gonna be like lookin' for my dad all over again."
"Only I think we'll find Sam a little faster than you did your dad. You know everything about Sam, just use that."
"Yeah, well -" he broke off as his phone started ringing - well, vibrating. He reached for it, and turned the lamp on before picking his cell up.
I closed my eyes against the light as it filled the room, and I shifted with Dean as he sat up and looked at the screen on his phone.
"Hm." He flipped his cell phone open. "Hello?"
I waited patiently for Dean to put it on speakerphone. But he didn't.
"Are you sure it was him?" Dean asked whoever he was talking to. "He asked you not to call me?"
Okay, so…someone had obviously seen Sam, and Sam had known we'd be looking for him and had told the person not to tell Dean.
"Okay, I'll be there tomorrow." And he hung up. "That was -" he looked at me and broke off.
"That was what?"
"A, uh, an old friend of mine. Said she saw Sam."
"Yeah, okay. Where?"
"Missouri. She said he trashed his motel room and left town."
"Oh." Trashing motel rooms? Who did Sam think he was, a rock star?
------------- -
We told Eddie and Sarah that we were sorry we couldn't stay and that we'd call when Sam was found. Well, actually, I told them that. Dean was in a hurry to get out the door. When I got to the door, however, Eddie pulled me off to the side. I was confused at first, but then he started talking.
"I haven't told anyone that you guys are here, but I saw Dean on the news."
I blinked a few times in surprise, and swallowed nervously. "And?"
"And I'm not going to tell anyone -you guys know Sarah and she wouldn't be friends with you if you guys were dangerous - but there's something I have to know."
Oh, God. Eddie was going to ask why we'd been in the bank, I was sure of it. And what was I supposed to tell him? The truth? That we hunted monsters, things he'd only heard of in movies, and other things he'd probably never heard of at all?
"Sam's the guy, isn't he?" Eddie asked.
"What?" That had caught me by surprise and totally messed up my train of thought.
"The guy. Sarah's always held something back from me, and I always wondered who it belonged to. It's him, right?"
"Oh, um -" I looked down at the floor, "- wow."
"I've made you uncomfortable," he said apologetically.
"You really have," I retorted. "But, uh…she told me not to say anything about it. She said you didn't know. Apparently that was a miscalculation, huh?"
"Apparently," he agreed.
"Look, Sam and Sarah only knew each other a couple days, but yeah, they were attracted to each other. She went through something life-changing with him. And that's pretty much all I can say. If you wanna know more you'll have to ask Sarah."
"Thank you," he replied sincerely.
"Yeah, don't mention it. And tell Sarah I really am sorry that I couldn't stay longer. It would've been nice to catch up with her."
------------- -
Dean and I were in the car headed towards Missouri. I wasn't sure exactly where. Dean had said something about the town, but I was hanging between the sleeping and waking state, so I'd missed it.
"Hey, uh, I need to talk to you," Dean said softly, and I forced myself to pay attention. "This, uh, this girl we're goin' to see. Her name's Cassie."
"Okay." I shrugged, not understanding the connection to the name, but the tone in Dean's voice said it was important. "Um…I'm guessing there's a back-story here?"
"Yeah, you could say that. I went out with her for a while a couple years back. I haven't see her since last year."
"Oh. Is this the one you told the truth to?"
"Yeah." Dean sounded like this was awkward for him. "I just thought you oughta know, so you wouldn't just randomly find out when we got there."
"Yeah, that might have caused a problem," I replied. "So, why would Sam go there?"
"I dunno. Maybe he's feeling nostalgic." I knew Dean was just joking, so I didn't say anything. "No, it seems like he's sending us on a wild goose chase. The only reason we're even goin' is 'cause I want to check out the motel room he was in."
"How're we gonna do that?"
"Easily, as long as they haven't cleaned it up yet and rented it out. Cassie's a journalist for the local paper. She could get in for pictures of somethin'."
"Oh, that's…nifty."
"You're okay with this, right?" he asked. "Because we don't have to go. Sam's not even there anymore."
"No, you know Sam was there…so there might be a clue as to where he went next. It doesn't matter who told you he was there, but we have to go check." I looked over at Dean. "Are you okay with going?"
"Yeah," he said, although he seemed unsure. "Yeah. Ya know, we ended things the last time we were together. It's cool."
I didn't say anything because we'd sorta talked about this before. He'd said once that he'd never been as open with anyone as he was with me, and I believed him. And I knew he cared about me. But I also know seeing someone you used to go out with could dredge up old feelings you thought were gone.
I guess we'd have to wait and see.
------------- -
"Hey, we're here."
That was the first thing I heard when I woke up. Actually, it's what had woken me up.
"What?" I asked groggily. And, ow, my neck was stiff. I'd fallen asleep against the window.
"Cape Girardeau, Missouri. We're here."
"Oh. How long was I asleep?"
"About eight hours."
"Really?" That would explain the crick I had in my neck.
I looked at where we were - in a motel parking lot - and yawned. There were woods behind the motel and on the opposite side of the road I assumed we'd just come from.
"This the place Sam was in? The place he trashed?"
"Yup."
"Did you check the room?"
"Nope, we just got here, and, uh, I called Cassie to see if she could get us in. We'll do things the legal way for once."
I laughed a little at that. "That'd be a welcome change. So she's gonna meet us here?"
"Yeah, is that okay?"
"Yeah," I said firmly. "And we've already talked about this. Is this about me or you? Are you okay?"
"I never thought I'd see her again," he said softly. "So can I tell you after?"
"Oh, um…okay." That hurt a little. "Yeah."
"It's nothing bad," he said quickly. "And I know that…you're the one I wanna be with. You're the one I am with, and that's not gonna change. But I don't know how I feel about seeing her again."
I didn't really know what to say to that, but the little speech had reassured me a little in a weird way.
I reached for his hand, and the fact that he let me hold it was good enough for me.
------------- -
Cassie arrived about ten minutes later. She parked right beside us, and then when she got out of the car I saw that she was - maybe - half-white, half-black. She was slim, and she looked about twenty-five-ish.
Dean and I got out of the car. The three of us stood there for about ten seconds of silence - not awkward, just silent. Dean was the first to speak.
"Hey, Cassie, uh -" he grabbed my hand "- this is Alyson. She's my girlfriend."
"Really?" She seemed politely curious. "How's that working out for you."
"Good," Dean and I said in unison.
"Good? Good." She eyed our joined hands and seemed maybe a little amused. "I don't remember you being much of a hand holder."
Dean shrugged. "People change, I guess."
"Obviously," she said dryly. She looked at me. "Well, it's nice to meet you."
"Likewise," I replied. "So, um, the room?"
"Right," Cassie said, and then she began walking. "It's this way."
So we followed her - our hands still together, which I think was for Dean's benefit as much as it was for mine - to one of the rooms. This was one of those motels where the rooms led outside to the parking lot so we didn't even have to go inside to talk to the manager. We probably should have, but we didn't.
"This is the same motel we stayed in when we were here the last time," Dean said. "When'd you see him, anyway?"
Cassie answered as we went through the door. "Yesterday."
And wow…the place really was trashed. The bed sheets were in a sorry state all over the floor, the pillows looked like they were barely hanging together, and one of them actually had feathers coming out of it.
The two lamps that were in the room were broken and, really, the only reason I could tell they'd been lamps in the first place was the bottom where the cord began.
"I wasn't sure it was him at first," Cassie confessed. "So I followed him here. He seemed okay, and we talked."
"'Bout what?" Dean asked.
"Not much. Just what's been going on since you'd been here last. But he made it clear he didn't really want you to know he'd been here. And to be honest, I wasn't going to tell you. Until this happened."
"Did he do this while you were with him?" I asked.
"No, after I left. I'd gone to work and the call came in from the police station telling me that someone had trashed a room here. I didn't even think it would be this one, but…"
"You checked it out and he was already gone?" Dean asked.
"Yeah, that about -"
"Hey, what're you doin' here?"
I gasped at the unexpected voice and turned around. A middle-aged white man with a scraggly beard stood in the open doorway. He had a bruise on the left side of his face above his eye.
"I work for the paper," Cassie said. "I'm working on a story about what happened."
"The guy was nuts," the older guy said. "There's your story."
"Did he do that to you?" I gestured to his bruise.
"Yeah, he did. On his way out. I got a few complaints about noise - things hittin' the wall and such - and I came out to tell him to quiet down. He popped me one and left."
Dean and I glanced at each other and I could tell we were thinking the same thing: Sam wouldn't do this. Something was very wrong.
------------- -
For two days we stayed in Missouri even though there was no need to. Dean was driving himself crazy with worry, and I mean, I got it, because Sam was gone. We didn't know where he was, or why he'd left.
Dean had barely slept and it was starting to affect his coordination. I was seriously considering slipping something into his drink to make him sleep, but Dean would probably hate me for it.
Cassie and I had gotten along pretty well, and if she was still caught up with Dean she didn't show it. That was a good thing because if she'd seemed interested then it would've made things awkward. And Dean would've been caught in the middle…not a comfortable place to be.
Anyway, it was the third morning in Missouri that Dean woke me up by jostling the bed.
"Hey, get up," he said softly, but urgently. "Sam called."
And if you ever wanna wake someone up quickly, telling them you've heard from someone who's missing will get the job done. Definitely. It's very effective.
"Is he okay? Where is he?"
"Twin Lakes, Iowa," Dean said. "And I don't know if he's okay."
I got up from the bed. I'd slept in my clothes just in case. I'd learned the other night that anything could come up when you least expect it, so best to be prepared.
But at least it was daylight this time.
------------- -
When we got out to the car I asked for the keys and Dean replied with a very intelligent, "what?"
"The keys," I repeated. "Dean, you didn't sleep very well, I can tell. And I won't thank you for wrecking while I'm in the car with you."
It was true that he didn't look well-rested. He had dark circles around his eyes, and his movements were sluggish and sporadic.
"Hey, I'm an excellent driver."
I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, whatever, Rain Man. Give me the keys."
"You have a terrible sense of direction," he complained.
"Yeah, I do. However, I also have the common sense to follow the signs." I sighed semi-impatiently. "Dean, what if he's in trouble? You're not gonna be able to help him if you're falling over from exhaustion. Right?"
So, yeah, Dean gave me the keys, and he got in the passenger side - even if it was reluctantly.
Ten minutes into the drive, it became obvious that Dean had no intention of sleeping, so the point of me driving seemed void now.
"So, if you talked to him how do you not know if he's okay?"
"Well, he's okay enough to talk," Dean said. "It's just he seemed really panicked and out of it."
"Why?"
"I don't know. But he was…freaking out. He was scared."
"Did he say why he left?"
"No. I just told him not to move, and we'd be there as soon as we could."
"Oh."
Well, I just hoped Sam had a good reason for keeping us on edge for four-and-a-half days, because if he didn't I was gonna smack him. After I hugged him and told him how glad I was he was okay.
------------- -
Three hours later, we arrived in Twin Lakes, and now I didn't know where to go. Dean hadn't told me where Sam was, here.
And Dean had eventually drifted off to sleep, and now I was loathe to wake him, but I needed to know where to go.
"Dean?" Nothing. "Dean?" And again nothing.
When I came to a stop sign, I - well - stopped. I looked over at Dean and saw that at least he was in a comfortable position so he wouldn't have a crick in his neck like I had the other day.
I reached over and shook him a little. "Hey, you've gotta tell me where to go."
It took a few more pokes and prods to get Dean to wake up fully, which made me feel even worse for having to be the one to do it.
Dean didn't know exactly where to go, either, he just knew the name of the motel. So we went from there.
We ended up at a motel in the middle of town, which was a good place for it. It was the prettiest part of the small town.
Inside, Dean and I went straight for where Sam had said he was. On the way, I came to a complete stop and looked around. I was having one of my feelings.
"Dean, wait." Dean looked back at me, questioning. "I - uh…something's here."
"Something?" He had a 'like what' tone to his voice.
"I don't know what." I could never tell what kind of 'something' was around, I could just sense when the non-human weird things were around.
So we began to hurry, the feeling getting stronger as we neared the room number Sam had given Dean over the phone.
When we got to the door, Dean knocked. "Sam? It's me."
No one opened the door, but that didn't matter because it wasn't locked. And thanks to my spider-sense tingling, I was prepared to find the worst inside the room - like Sam dead with a demon standing above him.
But we didn't.
Sam was on the bed sitting up and not moving, but he wasn't dead, so that was a plus. But he did seem out of it, like Dean had said he'd sounded.
"Sam?" I said, closing the door and moving forward. There was blood on his hands and shirt.
Dean moved from the door to squat in front of Sam. "What happened?"
"I tried to wash it off," Sam muttered. "I don't think it's mine."
"Whose is it?"
"I don't know." Sam looked up at me and then back at Dean. "I don't remember anything."
And that would've been funny except for the fact that, ya know, it really wasn't.
"Did you hit your head?" I asked, which was stupid because he didn't remember anything.
"I don't know - I…My head doesn't hurt right now."
Dean stood up straight and sighed. I looked around the room, but nothing seemed weird about it even though I still felt the chills. So that meant either there was something invisible here, or that Sam was the one making my weirdar go off.
But that just wasn't possible because Sam wasn't acting weird. Or, ya know, evil.
"Are you here alone?" I asked.
"Yeah, why?" Sam looked at me with sad, lost eyes. He was freaked out, so…nothing was wrong with him except that he was freaked out.
"Oh, uh-" Dean caught my gaze and his eyes said 'no'. "Nothing."
I went toward the bathroom just to see if I could feel something other than what I already was, but nothing.
"Hey, uh, I'm gonna go to the front desk, see if they saw anything," Dean said, coming in the bathroom behind me. "Watch him?"
"Yeah, sure," I said.
After Dean left, I went out and sat beside Sam, and I tried to move his hair from his eyes but he flinched away from me.
"What's the matter?"
"I don't remember anything," he said. "I could've hurt somebody."
"Sam, no…you just -" I broke off because I didn't know what to say because I didn't know what he'd done while he was away. "Do you remember goin' to New York?"
Sam shook his head. "Why would I go there?"
"Sarah, maybe? You left your phone in a café near where she works."
"Oh. No, I don't remember. I didn't even notice my phone was gone until I called Dean."
"Hm. Dean has your phone," I said softly. "He'll give it to you when he gets back." I sighed heavily. "And, uh…what about Missouri? You ran into Cassie and trashed the room you were stayin' in."
"I'm sorry. I-I don't remember that, either."
"It's okay. Not your fault. What do you remember?" I wasn't prodding; I was gently nudging. "The last thing."
"Uh, Maryland…I couldn't sleep so I went out for a drink." He shrugged half-heartedly. "That's it."
"Oh. Okay." That was not surprising, but it was disappointing.
"I don't know what's happening to me." He sounded close to the breaking point, and I didn't know what to do or say to make him feel better.
So I waited for Dean to come back. When he did, the only thing he said was that Sam had checked in here two days ago, the room had been quiet, and nobody had noticed anything unusual.
Dean had gotten Sam's stuff out of the car and now Sam was in the bathroom, changing.
"I don't understand," I said, hopefully quietly enough that Sam couldn't hear. "He had blood on his clothing and it wasn't his. I wonder what happened to him."
"I don't know. But he's okay, and-and that's what matters. Everything else we can deal with."
I laughed a little, but there was no humor in it. "He feels funny, Dean. And he has four days he can't account for, and then the blood. Don't forget the blood."
"Alyson," he said. His tone was saying for me to shut up, please, and he wouldn't forget the blood. How could he?
"What do you mean I feel funny?"
Sam had obviously been listening, and that wasn't good.
"Sam -" Dean began, but Sam cut him off.
"No. What does that mean?" His eyes were on me.
"Sam, you're giving me the chills," I said bluntly. "And not the good kind."
"What does that mean?" Sam asked frantically. "Am I - am I evil? I mean, is this what Dad warned you about?"
That last part had been directed at Dean, and Dean seemed to be…sincerely uncomfortable…about answering that question.
"Look, we don't know what happened," Dean said. "We've just gotta treat this like any other job. What's the last thing you remember?"
His answer was the same as it had been when I'd asked. Only this time he added, "next thing I knew, I was sitting here - bloody. Felt like I'd been asleep for a month."
"Okay. Retrace your steps," Dean said, sitting down on the other bed - there were two, and Dean was sitting on the one Sam hadn't been on. "The manager said you left yesterday afternoon and never saw you come back."
And, the obvious way he got in was…the window, which had even more blood on it. It had the vague shape of a handprint.
"What the hell have you been doing?" I asked, even though I knew Sam couldn't answer.
"Don't I wish I had the answer to that question?" Sam said.
Well, if he did that would've simpled things up so much. But our lives were hardly ever that easy.
Anyway, let me know what you guys think, like always. Oh, and I was totally going to update yesterday, but my stupid computer was on the fritz and it didn't want to let me get online, so I had to wait.