One Little Tear

Soundtrack:
The Pretty Reckless – Kill Me
Eddie Cochran – Summertime Blues
Garbage – I'm Only Happy When it Rains
Haim – A Little of Your Love

A/N: Thank you to everyone who followed, favourited and reviewed! Much appreciated!

Lacey opened a portal and stepped back into the cabin to the sound of knocking. She took a deep breath, re-orienting herself. She walked a little unsteadily towards the front door, her nerves a little on edge, wondering who the hell it could be. She never got visitors up here, in the middle of nowhere. Ready to go into attack mode at the drop of a hat, she unlocked the door and opened it. Sam was standing on the door step, his brow furrowed as he waited for her.
"Sam?" Lacey looked back at him, confused. "What are you doing here?"
"It's nice to see you too, Lacey." Sam gave her a crooked smile. "Can I come in?" Lacey nodded and took a step back, letting him inside the cabin.
"I wasn't expecting you. After the last time we spoke… well, we didn't exactly leave it on good terms." Lacey reminded him, leaning back against the kitchen counter.
"I know, I just… I needed some time to myself, to figure out what I want to do next." Lacey raised an eyebrow, waiting.
"Actually that's why I'm here. I sort of met someone." Sam looked up at her expectantly.
"Ok…" Lacey said, waiting for him to continue.
"We've been together a couple of months now and I'd really like you to meet her."
"What? Why?" Lacey asked, frowning.
"Well, you're kind of the only family I have right now…" Sam started but Lacey interrupted, walking up to him as she spoke.
"Family? Really, Sam? Cause I thought family meant nobody got left behind or some other crap. You left us behind. You left me to search for him, by myself. Then you have the audacity to come here and the first question out of your mouth isn't, how's the search going?" Lacey glared at him, her hands balled into fists by her side.
"You're right, Lacey, I should have asked. How is the search going?" Sam asked, giving her the puppy dog eye look he always used to use. Lacey pursed her lips for a moment before answering.
"Not so good. But I'm not giving up."
"Of course." Sam nodded. There was silence for a moment, before Sam spoke again. "So, the reason I came was to ask if you would come and meet her, Amelia, and stay with us for a couple of days." Lacey stared at him.
"Why?"
"Because I've told her all about you and she wants to meet you. And I've missed you, it's been too long." Sam explained. Lacey sighed.
"It's really that important to you?"
"Of course." Sam looked at her, surprised.
"Fine. I'll come. I better get changed and pack a bag." Lacey rolled her eyes and headed into the bedroom at the back of the cabin. Sam sat on the sofa and waited for her. She reappeared a short while later, having changed into a white strappy top, black leggings, a denim jacket hoodie and trainers, a duffle bag slung over her shoulder.
"Ok, let's do this." She said, slightly begrudgingly. The two of them headed out the door and Lacey locked it behind them. When she turned around she forgot to breathe for a moment.
"Hey, Baby." She said softly, running her hand down the side of the car as she walked toward the front passenger door. Sam smirked at her across the roof of the car.
"What?" Lacey asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
"Nothing." Sam shook his head, smiling, and the two of them got in the car.
"So, where are we going?" Lacey asked.
"Kermit, Texas." Sam told her.
"And how long is that going to take?"
"Uh, about a day." Lacey rolled her eyes.
"Ever heard of teleporting?" Lacey asked, sarcastically.
"You can teleport the car?" Sam asked.
"Hmmm, lets find out." Lacey reached out and put her hand on the dashboard, closing her eyes in concentration. Sam looked around wildly.
"Are you sure this is a good…."
"Shhhh!" Lacey wrinkled up her face and concentrated. Seconds later they disappeared from outside the cabin and reappeared in an empty suburban street.
"Wow." Sam looked around, impressed.
"Yeah, not too shabby. I wasn't sure it was going to work."
"You weren't sure…" Sam stared at her.
"Are we going?" Lacey asked, interrupting him.
"Yeah… Yeah…let's go." Sam said, turning the engine on.

They drove a few miles down the road before Sam pulled into a driveway. Lacey got out, looking up at the house in the fading light. There was a light on in one of the front windows. Lacey took a deep breath and followed Sam up the front steps. He unlocked the front door and held it open for her. As she stepped inside, Lacey caught movement out of the corner of her eye and turned to her right. A small, pale woman with wild black hair was walking towards her.
"You must be Lacey. Sam has told me so much about you." She smiled at Lacey.
"Oh, he has?" Lacey turned to Sam, a smirk pulling at her lips.
"Of course." Sam gave her a look.
"And what has he told you?" Lacey realised her tone sounded hostile but she didn't really care. Amelia looked unsure as she answered the question.
"That you're like a sister to him. That you and Dean used to be…. Before he passed." She trailed off. Lacey took a deep breath, trying to slow her pounding heart and control her anger.
"Right. Well, it's been a long day, I'm kind of tired. Sam, mind showing me where I'm sleeping?" She asked, her tone clipped.
"Sure, right this way." Sam ushered her towards the stairs. When they reached the top he showed her into a small room on the left. As soon as they were inside, Lacey turned towards him, her eyes blazing with anger.
"You told her Dean is dead?! Why would you do that?! He's not dead!" She growled at him. Sam looked down at his hands and sighed before taking a seat on the edge of the bed.
"We don't know that he isn't, Lacey."
"Wow." Lacey stared at him. "Way to keep upbeat. I can't believe you've given up on him." She said, biting back tears.
"Lace, it's been 10 months. I haven't given up on him but we have to face facts, it's not looking good. I had to tell Amelia something, and telling her he was dead was easier than explaining the truth. She doesn't know anything about our world, about what we do. And I'd like to keep it that way, so if you could keep the power usage to a minimum, I would appreciate that." Lacey stared at him for a moment in silence.
"Who are you?" She shook her head. "Never mind. Don't answer that. Look, it really has been a long day so, I need some sleep." Sam looked down at his feet before nodding.
"I'll see you in the morning." He said as he crossed to the door and shut it behind him. Lacey flopped down on the bed. It was hard to be around Sam when he was like this. Part of her didn't know why she had come. She shook her head, she knew exactly why she had come. As much as she was enjoying her little astral projections back in time, she knew it wasn't the real world. She was literally living in the past, keeping his memory alive. Coming here was her way of proving to herself she could deal with the here and now, if she had to she could live without Dean. She lay back on the bed, closing her eyes. She wasn't giving up, no matter what Sam did or said, she wasn't giving up yet.

The next morning Lacey woke up to the muffled sound of people moving around downstairs. She sat up, blinking, as last night came flooding back and she remembered where she was. She got to her feet and grabbed some clothes from her bag and changed before getting cleaned up in the small bathroom attached to her bedroom. She opened the bedroom door and glanced out into the empty hallway. She padded down the stairs and into the living room she had seen last night.
"Morning." Sam said, nodding at her from the dining room table, where he was reading the paper.
"Hey." Lacey said as she joined him at the table.
"How did you sleep?" Sam asked as he folded up the paper.
"Fine, thanks." Amelia emerged from the kitchen carrying a plate of pancakes.
"Help yourself to pancakes." Amelia said, putting the plate down and taking a seat.
"Thanks." Lacey speared a couple of pancakes with her fork and dumped them on her plate.
"So, we were thinking of heading over to the craft fair at the botanical gardens in the next town over. Would you like to join us?" Lacey raised an eyebrow at Sam, who gave her a look.
"Uh, sure, yeah, why not." Lacey shrugged as she took a bite of pancake.
"Great." Amelia smiled and went to get the coffee pot from the kitchen. There was the sound of padding feet and a dog appeared beside the table. Lacey raised an eyebrow in surprise.
"You have a dog." She noted, reaching her hand out and letting the dog sniff it.
"Yeah, that's Riot." Sam told her as he ruffled the dogs fur.
"So… a craft fair?" Lacey asked, glaring at Sam.
"Have you ever been to one?" Sam asked.
"No. I can't say that I have." Lacey shoved the last of the pancakes into her mouth.
"Well, why don't you give it a try." Sam suggested as Lacey got to her feet. "Just keep an open mind."
"Fine." Lacey shrugged heading for the door, muttering to herself. "If Dean could see me now."

A short while later the four of them were pulling off the highway and Baby was trundling down the road towards the Botanical Gardens. Riot was sat on the back seat with Lacey, enjoying the attention he was getting. They pulled off the highway a short while later and into the parking lot of the botanical gardens. Lacey clipped the leash to Riot before getting out. She handed the leash to Sam as they headed towards the entrance. Once Sam had got them tickets they began to walk down the pathways leading to the greenhouses. There were stalls lining the path selling clothes, house decorations, jewellery and other handmade items. Lacey trailed behind them as Amelia chatted happily to Sam, pointing out things she liked. Lacey stopped to look at some jewellery. She turned around to find Amelia standing beside her.
"That's pretty." She nodded at the necklace Lacey had been looking at.
"Yeah, it's nice." Lacey shrugged. "Where's Sam?" She asked, looking around.
"He's gone to get us all ice creams." Amelia told her as they continued down the row. "Wanna wait for him here?" Amelia suggested, nodding at a nearby bench.
"Sure." Lacey shrugged. The two of them sat down, Lacey looking around uncomfortably.
"I just wanted to say, I understand some of what you're going through and if you ever need to talk, I'm happy to listen." Amelia told her. Lacey slowly turned her gaze on her.
"What I'm going through?" She asked, her tone edging on disbelief.
"I lost my husband, he died in Afghanistan." Amelia explained. Lacey got to her feet abruptly, the bench scraping backwards along the ground with the force of her movement. Amelia looked a little surprised at this.
"Why are you telling me this?"
"I… I just wanted you to know I understand what you're going through, with Dean dying…" Lacey gritted her teeth, doing her best not to start throwing things.
"We are not doing this." She told her, before striding away.

Lacey wandered through the gardens, not really paying attention to where she was going. Why had she come here? She knew the answer to that. Sam wanted her to play happy families and she'd agreed, because she still wanted them to be that, a family. Maybe she was just setting herself up for a fall. Sam seemed to care more about how Amelia saw this situation than what he was putting her through. Having to pretend Dean was dead was really doing a number on her head. Of course there was a chance that was true, but up until then she had been ignoring that possibility, trying to stay positive. She shook her head as her mind began to reel. What if she really did never see Dean again? Sam had stopped hunting, what was she going to do with her life? She stopped walking and closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. Panicking was not going to help or change anything.
"Hey, you ok?" She felt a hand on her shoulder and span around to find Sam standing beside her, holding two ice creams.
"Amelia said you were upset."
"Upset? Upset?! Of course I'm upset Sam! She keeps constantly talking about Dean being dead, which he's not!" Lacey glared at him. "Do you have any idea what it's like to pretend that the person you care about most is dead just to appease some stranger?" Sam looked down at his feet.
"Lacey we don't know what's happened to him, I just thought it was easier to tell her he died."
"Easier for you. Maybe, this isn't about you though, Sam." She told him witheringly. "I'm ready to go whenever you are. I'll wait by the car." She told him before stalking off.

They drove back to the house in silence and as soon as they arrived Lacey headed up to the guest room and hadn't emerged since. Sam had tried to coax her out for dinner but she'd refused.
Lacey lay back on the bed, trying to gather her thoughts. Maybe she'd been a little harsh on Sam, but damn it, she was sick of pretending. It was one thing to pretend to be someone else for a case, but to actually have to fake your way through a relationship. She shook her head, she couldn't do that. Her phone began to vibrate on the night stand and she reached out to pick it up. She frowned, realising it was Damon.
"Hey, what's up?" She asked, answering it. Her expression dropped as she listened to what he had to say.
"I'll be there soon." She told him before hanging up. She jumped to her feet and began rummaging in her bag for something more appropriate to wear. She pulled on the darkest clothes she could find before throwing everything into her bag and zipping it up. She hurried down the stair and stopped in the doorway of the living room. Sam and Amelia, who were sitting on the sofa watching TV, looked up, a little startled at her sudden appearance.
"I have to go, one of my friends is having an emergency." She told them before opening the front door and stepping outside and shutting it behind her. The door didn't stay shut long as Sam rushed out after her, as she made her way down the driveway.
"Lace! Wait!" He called out. Lacey sighed and turned around.
"I really need to go, Sam."
"So that's it, you're just going to bail?" Lacey's grip tightened on her bag.
"Bail? You're one to talk about bailing. Isn't that exactly what you've done to me and Dean?" She accused. Sam closed his eyes before shaking his head.
"I'm sorry. You're right. Why don't you come back inside and we can talk."
"I told you, I have somewhere to be." She told him.
"That was for real?" Sam frowned.
"You don't believe me?" Lacey raised an eyebrow. "Fine. I'll prove it to you." Lacey grabbed hold of his arm, dropped her bag on the floor beside Baby and opened a portal, pulling Sam through.
"What the…" Sam stared around in shock as the came out the other side on an empty street. The portal closed behind them.
"Where are we?" Sam asked, looking around in the cold grey light of early morning.
"Mystic Falls." Lacey told him as she strolled across the street and into the cemetery.
"And where's that?" Sam asked, following behind her.
"It's another dimension. Same as ours just slightly different." Lacey told him. "I'm going to warn you, I have friends here, and some of them are vampires. Not the kind of vampires we have in our world. More like the Anne Rice kind, although don't ever tell Damon I made that comparison." She smirked.
"Wait." Sam said as she was about to start walking again. "So you want me to walk in there and ignore these vampires?" Lacey sighed.
"Sam, you're a great hunter, but even you would struggle to handle these guys. Like I said they're not the kind you're used to. Plus they're my friends. They don't go around killing people for no reason… most of the time." Lacey shrugged. "So just for a little while, pretend you don't hate vampires." Lacey headed off into the cemetery and Sam stared after her, open mouthed, for a moment before following her. They walked deeper into the cemetery until they were walking through trees and the graves thinned out to just the odd mausoleum. They soon found a small crowd of people standing outside one of the mausoleums. Noticing their arrival Damon stepped forward to greet them.
"Hey. You made it." He said as Lacey gave him a hug.
"Of course. Sam this is Damon, Damon, Sam." Lacey made with the introductions. "Should I go see him?" She asked.
"Yeah, go ahead." Damon's expression turned stony. "He's just chilling in what will be his final resting place." Lacey squeezed Damon's arm and gave him a small, reassuring smile before heading into the mausoleum.
"So, you're the boyfriends brother." Damon noted, his eyes fixed on the building in front of them.
"Yeah. And you're a vampire." Sam guessed. Damon chuckled.
"Hope that's not a deal breaker for you, cos we've got three vampires, a witch, a doppelganger and a vampire-werewolf hybrid in the house tonight." Damon smirked for a moment, but his grin quickly faded.
"Seriously though, I've seen a lot more of Lacey in the last few months and as much as I enjoy her company, that only happens when somethings wrong at home. So, as someone who's best friend is dying in that crypt, take my advice, fix it. Help her fix it, don't let her give up. Whatever it takes." Sam frowned a little but nodded.
"She doesn't give up, does she." Damon chuckled again.
"She wouldn't be Lacey if she did." Almost as if she'd been listening, Lacey came out of the mausoleum, wiping her eyes. She walked over to some of the other people and began to hug them, offering her condolences.
"You'll take care of him, won't you?" Lacey asked as she finished her rounds and came to stand beside them again.
"I've got him covered." Damon assured her, holding up a bottle of whiskey. Lacey smiled and shook her head.
"Damon, you're incorrigible, never change." She gave him one last hug. "Call me again if you need anything. I better get this one home, it's past his bed time." She joked.
"It was nice to meet you, ever so briefly, Sam." Damon nodded at Sam before strolling into the crypt. The two of them began to walk back towards the cemetery gates.
"What was happening in that mausoleum?" Sam asked. Lacey let out a breath.
"Short version. Alaric, who's a friend of mine and a big part of everyone's lives back there, he was turned into a vampire. In this universe if you don't feed within a certain amount of time of the transition, you die. Alaric decided he didn't want to transition for personal reasons, so everyone's there to say goodbye to him." Lacey told him, looking down at her feet, trying to stop the small tremble from entering her voice.
"I'm sorry." Sam told her sincerely.
"Thanks. Bet you feel bad about doubting why I had to leave now." Lacey joked.
"Yeah, about that…." Sam looked a little sheepish.
"Hang on, let's get this over with first." Lacey said as she opened up a portal. The two of them stepped through and were back on Sam's driveway. The portal closed behind them.
"I'm sorry for doubting you. Hell, I'm sorry for dragging you out here." Sam said, running his hand through his hair. "You were right, it was more for my benefit than yours."
"When do you want it?" Lacey asked.
"Want what?" Sam asked, looking confused.
"The I told you so dance." Lacey smirked at him. Sam let out an amused chuckle.
"You got me there."
"I accept your apology, Sam. But I really do think I should go. I'm going to keep looking for him, I'm not giving up. I need to be out there doing something, even if it's not much."
"I get that." Sam nodded.
"I guess I'll see you around then." Lacey said, as she picked up her bag from where she'd left it in the driveway.
"Yeah, don't be a stranger." Lacey gave Sam a small smile and a wave before teleporting out. Sam looked around at the darkness, before walking back into the house.