Going from dead asleep to fully awake in the span of a heartbeat was disconcerting, or it would have been if Skye hadn't been used to it. A useful survival skill, sure, but man, just once she'd like to wake up all slow and lazy like in the movies, sprawled out in a big, warm bed with sunlight streaming in through the curtains… a boyishly charming grin and bright green eyes next to her… Oh, fuck no. She was not going there.
Well she was certainly awake now. And at least the sunlight part was there, searing right through her eyeballs and into her brain. Shielding her face, she shied away from what promised to be a disgustingly nice morning and slowly leveraged herself into a sitting position.
"Morning, Sleeping Beauty. Sleep well?" Turning to look over the seat at Skye, Sam stopped rifling through the box in his lap that she knew held Dean's entire cassette collection, some of which she was pretty sure were older than she was. At least Dean was nowhere to be seen. Thank God for small favors.
"Not bad, all things considered, thanks for asking." Stretching the kinks out, she got up slowly, taking in the area around the car. She'd figured out they were at a gas station before she ever opened her eyes, the smell of gasoline and the sound of the cars around them being kind of a dead giveaway. Looks like Dean was keeping up his habit of finding the absolute cheapest, crappiest, most run-down no-name gas stations he possibly could. Grand. Speaking of… "Dean inside?"
"Yup. Bathroom, food, and fuel. You need any of those, grab them now before he gets back."
"Right. Great. Good advice."
God, what she'd give for a hot shower, or hell, even a cold one. Of course, that just didn't seem to be in the cards this morning. Or yesterday morning, and she knew tomorrow wasn't looking good either. She probably smelled worse than the decrepit excuse for a bathroom she was currently standing in.
With a sigh, Skye splashed water on her face, doing what she could to look like she hadn't spent the last week living out of a plastic bag.
Dean had refused to even stop at a motel for a night, insisting that the car and the showers that could occasionally be found in truck stop bathrooms were 'good enough'. 'Suck it up and deal' had also been a typical response, and she was just about ready to shove the next moldy shower head she came across straight up his ass.
Stomach rumbling, she winced. When was the last time she'd eaten something that wasn't from a fast-food drive-thru or a gas station? Exactly how many days had it been since Dean Winchester fumbled his way into her life? Today was what, November first? And they'd met on the twenty-fifth of October. ...Jesus, it seemed like so much longer than that.
Alright, quit stalling, Skye. Time to face reality…
...whatever that meant.
When she made her way back out to the car, she found Dean pumping gas, two yellow plastic bags sitting on the trunk next to him. Sam was still sitting in the passenger side seat with the box of tapes in his lap, though by now he'd opened the door and stretched his long legs outside.
"So, how did you pay for that stuff?" Inclining his head toward the plastic bags on the trunk and the pump sticking out the tailend of the car, Sam looked like he already knew the answer, an assumption that proved true the very next time he opened his mouth, "You and Dad still running credit card scams?"
Now that was something Skye hadn't considered. Killing monsters probably didn't pay too well. Or at all. Well, it's not like she hadn't ever done similar to keep herself fed, though that didn't stop the pang of guilt she felt when she thought about exactly how many fast-food burgers 'Dean' had paid for over the last few days. Whoever the cards really belonged to could totally spare a few items off the dollar menu, right? Right. At least, that's what she was going to tell herself to keep from feeling too bad about it.
"Yeah well, huntin' ain't exactly a pro-ball career. Besides, all we do is apply. They send us the cards."
With the clunk of metal on metal, Dean hung up the nozzle after filling the tank. Screwing the gas cap back in before walking back around to the driver's side door, he paused just long enough to shove one bag into Skye's arms before popping his door open, "Got you some food."
"...thanks?" She didn't know whether he was ignoring her or just hadn't heard her, not that it made any difference, the end result was the same. Rolling her eyes, she climbed back into the car, shutting the door as Sam and Dean did the same, settling back in for the rest of the drive.
Pulling the bag over from where she'd set it next to her, she couldn't help but be curious about what Dean could have picked out for her. Up to now, he'd simply tossed her a card or some cash and told her to get whatever. Let's see… Protein bars, a packet of peanuts, a package of cupcakes, some Juicy Fruit, a bag of beef jerky and a couple of bottles of flavored water. All things she'd grabbed at some point or another over the last week.
Huh. She hadn't thought he'd paid that much attention. Or, you know, cared.
Shifting, Sam leaned back against the door, setting the cardboard box down on the seat next to him. Pulling one knee up, he laid an arm on the back of the seat, a position that was quickly becoming the norm. Glancing from Skye to Dean and back again, he rolled his eyes. Apparently neither of them felt the need to break the silence. Well fine, if they didn't want to talk, he would. Clearing his throat, he caught Dean's attention, picking up the thread of the conversation they'd started at the gas station, "So, what names did you write on the application this time?"
"What? Oh, umm…Burt Aframian and his son, Hector." Lost in whatever thoughts were spinning around in his thick skull, Dean took a minute to figure out what Sam was talking about, blinking blankly over at him as he had to dredge up the information from some corner of his brain that wasn't preoccupied with the girl in the backseat. Not that Sam could be sure that's what was on his brother's mind, but let's call it an educated guess. "Scored two cards out of the deal."
"Sounds about right." These two weren't even going to make a tiny bit of effort, were they? They really wanted to sit in tense silence for the rest of the ride. Yeah, no. Maybe if they could actually hold a conversation without sniping at each other every four seconds, they'd stop wanting to kill each other and go ahead and move on to other things. If they wouldn't talk, he would.
Reaching down into the box, Sam snagged a cassette off the top of the unorganized pile. Holding it up between two fingers, he tapped it against the edge of the box, smirking at Dean, "I swear, man, you have got to update your cassette tape collection."
"What? Why?" Sounding genuinely offended, Dean glanced over at Sam, looking like he just couldn't fathom what anyone could possibly have against his precious classic rock.
"Because they're cassette tapes, Grandpa." Snorting derisively, Skye crossed her arms, rolling her eyes so hard they should have popped out and rattled around the floorboards, "What is this, the eighties? You're like half a step away from an eight-track-"
"I am not old-"
"-I mean, there's a little thing called compact discs, you know? And even MP3 players that can connect with your radio. Technology is amazing, Winchester-"
"-and just because you're still in high school, little girl-"
"I graduated two years ago, asshat, which is more than I bet you can say-"
"-does not make me old."
"I mean, she's got a point, dude." Oh, this conversation was going so well. And here he'd thought perhaps music would be a safe topic, but apparently not. Still, the girl wasn't wrong. Holding up one tape after another, Sam let each one drop back into the box after reading off the label, "Black Sabbath? Motorhead? Metallica? It's the greatest hits of mullet rock."
Laughter drifted up from the backseat, soft and bubbling. Even Sam had to admit it was cute and apparently Dean thought the same, if the smile he was trying to hide was anything to go by. Clearing his throat and wiping that stupid grin off his face, Dean reached into the cardboard box on Sam's lap and rummaged around for a minute, glancing at a tape or two before picking one out and shoving it in the cassette player, "Well, house rules, Sammy. Driver picks the music and shotgun shuts his cake-hole."
"...I met a devil woman, she took my heart away. She said I had it comin', but I wanted it that way…"
Yeah, because that wasn't an interesting choice in music at all. And unfortunately for Dean, he hadn't turned it up loud enough to drown out the mouthy brunette in the backseat, "Isn't it pie-hole? I've always heard it as pie-hole, so shouldn't it be 'shotgun shuts his' or her because let's not be sexist, 'pie-hole'."
"Fine. How about shotgun and backseat shut their collective fuckin' pie-holes. Happy?"
"Not even remotely."
Okay, so, that worked so wonderfully well. Did they turn everything into a fight? Jesus H Christ, this was going to be a long couple of days. Fine, if everyone else was going to get snippy, Sam might as well join in. Shoving the cardboard box back down into the floorboard, he turned around to slouch down in his seat with his knees jammed against the dash, "It's Sam, okay? 'Sammy' is a chubby twelve-year-old."
There was a wordless sound of agreement from behind him as he watched Dean adjust the rearview mirror for the twentieth time. Sam had never seen him fidget so much and he couldn't quite figure out if Dean kept adjusting the mirror so he could see Skye, or so he couldn't. Did he even notice he was doing it?
"Sorry, can't hear you." Reaching over, Dean turned the volume on the radio up, the lyrics drowning out his own words and even the constant rumble of the V8 engine, "Music's too loud!"
"...You ain't seen nothin' yet...B-b-b-baby, you just ain't seen n-n-nothin' yet…"
