Ooh, look at this. I got my act into gear and am posting another chapter! Woo hoo!
"Do you need to answer that, Winchester?" Hotch asked when Jessa's phone rang.
"No, sir." She rejected the call. Jessa felt a little bad about it, it was the fifth time Dean had called in the last thirty minutes, and he never called this many times—he knew Jessa would assume the worst.
Almost five minutes later when he called again.
"Answer it." Hotch ordered.
"It's only Dean." Instead, Jessa guiltily turned it off. She would call him back when she was less busy.
Jessa tossed her pizza crust into the empty box and leant back in her seat and flicked her phone on.
"Something more interesting than this case, Winchester?" Hotch glared at her.
Jessa glanced at her phone—she'd had it turned off for three days now, and there were several messages from Dean, Ellen, and even Bobby. Something was wrong.
"No, sir." She shut it off again.
It was another sleepless twenty-four hours before the case was done, and Jessa had felt uneasy the whole time. She shuffled toward her truck and hoisted herself in to the driver's seat. Exhausted, she laid her head against the wheel and closed her eyes.
A knock on the window startled her awake—after she had fallen asleep for god knows how long—and she looked up to see Morgan standing there with a satisfied smirk on his face.
"What do you want?" She asked, rolling down the window.
"Are you okay?" He asked.
"I'm exhausted, Derek." She told him, not bothering with pretenses, "I have been ignoring calls from my brothers for days, and I have no energy to call them back even though I know something is wrong, and I know that makes me an awful person but I can't bring myself to call them back—not until I get some sleep."
"Hey, hey." Morgan placed his hands on her shoulders in an attempt to calm her down, "You aren't an awful person, you just need to take care of yourself first. You need to go home and get some rest."
Jessa sighed and nodded, he was right.
"But you're in no shape to drive." He took the keys from her hand, "Scoot over."
Jessa was far too drained to argue, so she obliged, allowing Derek to drive the truck—something she didn't ever do.
They drove in silence, and after about five minutes of static Derek twisted the dial on the radio until something decipherable played. Jessa laid her head against the window and let the music relax her.
"What is this?" She asked tiredly after a few minutes.
"I have no idea." Morgan laughed, "I don't like it."
"It's nice." Jessa told him, closing her eyes.
The music lulled her to sleep, and next thing she knew Derek was shaking her awake.
"There're people here to see you." He whispered.
Jessa looked out the window to see the Impala sitting on the curb. She was instantly overcome by guilt.
"You have to go in, Bright Eyes." He told her gently, reading her mind.
"I can't deal with this right now, Derek. I can't."
"You're going to have to." He climbed out and ran around to her side to open the passenger door, "I'll come with you."
When Jessa reached the front door she— unsurprisingly— found it open. She tossed her things on to the end table in the foyer and walked straight into the kitchen and grabbed herself a beer. Nicks ran eagerly up to her and she rubbed the dog's head. She ignored Dean and Sam, who were sitting at the table sharing a pizza, until she had the bottle open and had taken a long sip.
"Hey." Dean said when she finally looked at them, "Where were you?"
"Dean, I really don't have the energy for this." She sighed, pressing the palm of her hand against her forehead to try and fight off the oncoming headache.
"I called, J." He nearly yelled, "We needed you, and you weren't there."
"Dean—"
"No, Jessamine, listen to me." Dean stood now, "Do you know what we were doing without you? Do you know what happened to us while you were ignoring my calls? We killed the demon! Yeah, we ended this without you!"
"Dean!" Sam's voice cut through Dean's tirade. He gestured to the doorway where Derek stood with a look of confusion on his face.
"Shit." Dean cursed.
"Derek, can you give us a moment?" Jessa said to him.
"Did you say 'killed'?" He looked at Dean.
"Uh—" Dean fumbled for an explanation.
"You also said 'demon'." Morgan continued. "You said 'we killed the demon'."
"Derek, can you please just walk away!" Jessa yelled now, "Go home. I'll call you tomorrow."
"Fine." He held up his hands and backed away. It was a couple of moments before they heard the truck fire up.
"Jesus, Dean!"
"What's going on? Why is he here?" Dean demanded, "You guys back on now?" His tone was accusing, and his eyes shone with anger.
"Back on? No, Dean! He drove me home because I am exhausted!" She really enunciated the last three words. "I have barely slept in over three days and I have nothing left to argue with you so can we please sit down and talk about this?"
"Fine!" He threw his hands in the air and sat back down on his seat.
"You killed the demon?" She started, her voice at a reasonable level.
Dean nodded, but didn't say anything.
"What happened?"
Sam and Dean shared a look, then Sam looked at her, "Bobby tracked some omens to Wyoming. Serious omens, Jessa, something big was going down there. We went, and the demon was planning something. There was a fight, Dean managed to shoot the demon with the Colt."
"With help." Dean muttered.
"Help?"
"There was a Hellgate that got opened, an—"
"A HELLGATE?"
"Yeah, anyway, so the h—"
"Like an actual Hellgate? A door to Hell?"
"Yes, Jessa, an actual gate to Hell. Let me finish please?"
"Sorry, go on."
"Thank you. Anyway, so the Hellgate opened and Dad climbed out."
"Dad?"
"Yeah." There was a small smile on Dean's face when he said it.
"Dad climbed all the way out of Hell?" She sank down into a chair. "Well, I guess if anyone is stubborn enough to do it, it's Dad."
"That's what I said." Sam laughed.
"So he crawled out of Hell?"
"Yeah," Dean laughed and snatched the beer from her hands and took a sip, "I'd be dead without him."
Jessa felt her eyes fill with tears, and she thought about what Missouri said about John having people looking out for them. He may have been a sub-par father at times, but there was no denying the lengths he would go to for his kids.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there." She whispered, looking down at her hands.
"We wanted you to be there, Jessa." Sam said, reaching out and squeezing her hand, "We're sorry you weren't."
"No, that's on me." Jessa squeezed his hand back, "I'm glad you both ended it. Well, the three of you. Like a family—just how it should be."
"Without you." Dean whispered.
"Dean, we all know that I have been an absent member of this family since I was seventeen." She gave him a reassuring smile, "Now that it's over, what's the plan? Are you going back to school?"
Sam shook his head, "Jessa, a lot of bad shit got out of that Hellgate when it opened. That's on us, we've got to stop it."
"So, you're never planning on going back to school?"
"We caused this mess, we've got to clean it up."
"Sammy, you said you were going to find the thing that killed Mom—killed Jess—then you were going back. You were at Stanford! On a full ride, I might add. You were set."
"I can't do that anymore, Jessa." He defended his decision, "Saving people, hunting things, it's what we were meant to do."
Jessa sighed, "I'm glad you're both okay, I am, but I'm so tired. I need some sleep. I've got tomorrow off—we'll talk about it then." She stood up and walked to the stairs, her whole body aching with exhaustion. "Feed Nicks." She added before disappearing.
Jessa woke up when Nicks leapt up on to her, her paws digging into Jessa's side.
She peeked open an eye to look at the curious pup, and Nicks let out a whine and dropped her face to her paws.
Jessa groaned. She had the day off, and she wanted nothing more than to sleep in a little while but she had been so busy lately that her poor dog hadn't had the exercise she needed. Nicks had already taken that out on several pairs of Jessa's shoes, as well as a couch cushion.
"Yeah, alright." She moaned, rubbing Nicks behind the ears. "Just let me get dressed." Clearly not understanding, Nicks didn't move until Jessa rolled her off her stomach.
Once she was changed, the playful dog nipped at her heels as Jessa did her best to step over her and down the stairs to get the leash. When she got downstairs, she noticed a note on the counter from her brothers: Caught a case, call you later. It said in Sam's slanted handwriting.
It took longer than necessary for Jessa to clip the leash to the collar—as the dog was overexcited— but once she did Nicks all but pulled her put the front door.
As soon as they got through the front gate Jessa broke into a run, loving how, even after a few kilometres, there was no twinge in her leg. After all these months she was back to a hundred percent. She didn't stop running until they reached the park, where Jessa sat down on the lush grass and began tossing Nicks a tennis ball.
When she first got the pup, Nicks didn't understand the concept of 'fetch', but after a little training she got it, now it was one of her favourites. The German Shepherd's tail wagged from side as she brought the ball back to Jessa for what felt like the thousandth time and dropped it into Jessa's lap.
"Good girl." She cooed, patting her head before throwing the ball again.
After another thirty minutes of fetch, Nicks grew disinterested and ran off to play with another pup.
"Nicks!" Jessa whistled for her dog. Nicks ignored her and continued to play with the small terrier. Jessa jogged up to the young woman walking the dog and apologized profusely as she clipped the leash back onto Nicks' collar.
"Oh, don't worry about it." The woman gushed in a perfect southern drawl, "Chi-Chi loves other dogs."
Jessa stared down at the fluffy white thing, equipped with a bedazzled pink collar. The dog was certainly friendly enough, but its owner was far too chipper. "Sorry, again." Jessa said, tugging on Nicks leash. She tried not to judge the stranger, but she was making it hard. Her jogging clothes were all coordinated—black and pink from her shoes to her water bottle—and she wore the bubbly smile of someone who was never fazed by anything.
"I'm Sami, by the way." She extended her hand to Jessa, completely oblivious to the fact she was trying to get away.
"Funny, that's my brother's name." Jessa smiled politely, "Jessa."
"What's this one's name?" She asked in that fake voice everyone uses toward babies, as she leant down to pet Nicks. "She is just the sweetest."
"Uh, yeah," Jessa said awkwardly as Nicks began to growl at the woman, "This is Nicks."
"What a sweet name!"
"Uh, thanks."
Sami stood up straight and began addressing Jessa, "I'm new in town." She grinned, flashing perfect white teeth, "Fresh off the bus from Texas."
"Wow, how are you liking it?" Jessa really didn't know what she was supposed to be doing with the information.
"Oh, it's great." Sami answered, "I've been here for about a month now. I opened up a little boutique downtown, and finally moved out of the hotel. It's all been great."
"Uh, good to hear. I'd better run." Jessa tugged on Nicks' leash and began backing away, eager to get away from the over enthusiastic stranger.
"Oh, well it's lovely to meet you, Jessa. I hope to see you around!"
Jessa nodded and turned on her heel and began jogging back towards the road.
She slowed to a walk when she saw her truck parked in the drive, and took her time unclipping the leash from Nicks when she stepped through the gate so she didn't have to face Morgan.
"Hey." She finally said, unable to put it off any longer.
"Hey." Derek smiled, "I just brought your truck back."
"I noticed. Thanks."
"Anyway, I've got a cab on its way."
"Don't do that! I'll drive you."
"Don't worry about it, Jessa."
She sighed, "Listen, I'm sorry about snapping at you last night. I was a little out of it."
"It's forgotten." He stood up from the porch step as a cab pulled up at the curb. "I'll see you tomorrow." He gave her a kiss on the forehead and left.
