"Paris Hilton?"
"Yes. Paris Hilton."
Amelia sat down on her Uncle's Bobby's desk, dangling her legs off over the edge. "Sam," she started. "Sam, we don't talk enough, you know that?" she said. "Your calls are always a delight."
"I'm not sure if almost being eaten by a pagan god can be described as a 'delight'," the younger Winchester replied.
"Dean got beat up by Paris Hilton," she reminded.
He paused, then sounded incredibly amused. "Yeah, he did," he replied. "It was fantastic."
She leant back in the chair, a thoughtful look on her face that Sam couldn't see. She went to school with the man who ran the print store down near the Highstreet. She had a couple of calls to make. She was seeing a cardboard cut out and a rather startled Winchester in her future. Perhaps he could make her a banner.
"I'm already seeing plans with this," she told him as she stared up at the ceiling. She frowned slightly to herself; maybe she should give it a lick of paint. It'd had been a while since she'd done that. "Don't let him know I know."
"He's already told me we're not telling anyone," he replied.
"So you rang me at the first opportunity. I get it, it's a good move," she agreed. "Was it really Paris Hilton, though?"
Bobby came into the study from the side archway, looking slightly confused at her look of delight. "What's going on?" he asked her.
She moved the phone away from her mouth. "Dean got beat up by Paris Hilton," she explained.
"Seriously?" he asked. She shrugged.
"It was a pagan god wearing her face. Still counts," she replied, almost as if she had expected him to shoot her down. She then looked at the old clock on the wall. It was getting close to 3pm. "You two coming back here soon?"
"I think you're the next stop," Sam replied. "What have you got planned?"
She smiled to herself. "Oh, you'll see," she said vaguely. "But if I need your help, I'll let you know. I gotta go. I'm expecting a call in a minute. Take care Winchester."
"You too, Miller." She quickly hung up before jumping off the desk.
"She's all yours, Uncle Bobby. Got anything juicy to research?"
"It's all fascinating," he replied, completely deadpan. She leant down and placed a kiss on his cheek. She still saw his wheelchair on the ground when she closed her eyes at night and she was, on occasion, hit with the devastation that she had felt when she'd first seen it. She was just so happy that he was alive, and as grumpy and slightly drunk as ever. There was a childish part of her that was determined to make him live forever, but for now she settled with just making sure he had a nice house to live in. He wasn't going anywhere and with the Winchester boys back together they actually might stand a chance at stopping the Apocalypse.
It was a small chance, granted, but a chance none the less and she was holding onto that with the type of optimism that was rarely seen in the Hunter business. Some might of called her naïve. She liked to think she was just being proactive.
Her phone starting ringing and Bobby watched her smile widen even more. "Gotta take this," she said, answering before he could reply. "Hi Cas."
Bobby's eyes narrowed as she answered the phone. The last time he remembered her smiling like that when the phone rang and it wasn't one of the two Winchester brothers was for that snotnosed brat, Daryl, who she'd taken a fancy to when she was in ninth grade. Those angels had already taken advantage of her since this whole mess of the end of the world had started, and even though Castiel seemed to be on their side, he didn't really trust any of them with her.
"Hello Amy," Cas greeted. "I'm calling again to check in."
Amelia couldn't get over how awkward he was on the phone. He really didn't trust the device, it was like a child imitating their parents on a business call. "I can see that, Cas," she replied. "You don't have to keep saying it every time you call."
"I don't?"
"No," she confirmed. She left the study but only moved to the stairs, sitting down on the same one she had always sat down on. Not too close to being downstairs, but close enough that she could keep an eye on anything that was going on. "I asked you to check in. I know why you're calling."
"Okay," he replied. There was another pause. Their phone calls were always filled with awkward pauses.
"Any leads on the Colt?" she asked him, prompting him back into a conversation. Turned out that his skills still weren't strong enough to carry the conversation.
"There has been word of the gun being seen in the Middle East," he explained. "However, I have also heard that it might be in Europe."
"Where are you heading first?" she asked, turning to lean against the wall.
"Europe," he replied. Another pause. "Are you well?"
She blinked, surprised. The last few weeks had been Cas calling, letting her know he was calling, telling her where he was, then hanging up again. He'd not asked about her. Not because he was rude, she knew that. It was just because he wasn't quite used to interacting like… well, like a human. Common curtesy wasn't something that came naturally to angels.
It made her smile even more. "I'm good," she said. "I mean, I keep seeing…" She glanced into the study but her Uncle Bobby was already buried in a book. She still hadn't told him what she'd seen, and she really didn't want him to know. He had enough to concern himself with. "I keep seeing dead people when I go to sleep, and Dean still hasn't come to pick me up, but everything is much better."
"And your Godfather?" he asked, surprising her even more. "Are you still concerned?"
"No, no, we're good," she replied. "Thanks for asking, Cas."
"I think I'm starting to understand this telephone device," he explained, sounding almost proud. She shook her head, completely amused by him.
"I think you are," she humoured, because she'd heard his voicemail message. That was not a man who understood the technology he was using.
"I'm going to hang up, now," he told her after yet another pause.
"If you want to really get a hang of this calling people business, you should know you don't say that you're going to hang up either."
"What do you say, then?"
"Um, well." Good question. She shrugged to herself. "I guess something like 'I'll talk to you later', or 'Thanks, bye', depending on the context of the call."
"Which would be more appropriate now?"
Honestly, she was sure children picked this up easier. Then again, most children grow up around people and observe social cues. How else was he supposed to learn if he didn't ask?
"Probably… 'I'll call you again in three days'," she explained patiently.
"Alright." Pause. "I'll call you in three days, Amy."
"Talk to you later, Cas."
He hung up first but she didn't move, instead staring into the kitchen, not really paying attention to what she was looking at. He always called at 3pm on the dot, never a moment late. He was taking her command rather seriously, but he never felt put out by it. She really appreciated it. Knowing he was still alive and well whilst galivanting across the planet was rather reassuring.
What wasn't, however, was Dean's avoidance of coming to pick her up. She knew that the two brothers were going to need some time to get back into the groove of being on the road with each other again, but she had expected the Impala to have pulled into the drive days ago. Instead they were out fighting Pagan Gods wearing Paris Hilton's face without her.
Sam and Dean were just as much part of her family as Bobby was, but it was moments like this that reminded her that she wasn't as much a part of theirs. It was hard not to feel a little rejected even if she understood. It was a conflicting feeling. If she'd told Cas about it, he'd tell her it was just another example of human emotions being 'confusing'.
He wasn't wrong.
One of the phones on the wall starting ringing, startling her out of her thoughts. She stood up off the stair and quickly skipped down.
"I've got it!" she told Bobby before he could even call her name. "Hello, you've reached Agent Maloney's office, how can I help today?"
~0~0~0~
"So they're saying that some wolf came in, scratched her brains out, and just left her lying on the couch like she was sleeping?"
"That's what they're saying," Dean replied. "We're on our way now. Can you have a look, see if anything else batshit's been going down?"
Amelia walked over to her laptop, which was perched on the dining table in the kitchen. "On it. I'll have a look and update you when you get here."
"Oh, er, we've… we've already passed you," he stuttered out. She sat up straighter in the chair, sighing in annoyance.
"Dean, you said you'd pick me up weeks ago," she accused. "What the hell?"
"I know, I know. I'm sure we'll come back around," he dismissed. "Keep me posted, Miller."
"No, we're talking about this…" she trailed off at the sound of the click on the other end. She pulled her phone away from her ear; he hung up on her?!
She wasn't sure if she was angry at him dismissing her, or hurt that he was leaving her behind, but she was going with angry. Angry would work. She could thrive for days on angry.
She slammed the lid of her laptop down. She wasn't going to let him keep avoiding her. "Uncle Bobby?!" she called.
"Yeah?"
"Have you got a working car?"
She was already packing up her laptop when he came into the kitchen. He looked a bit bewildered. "What for?" he asked.
"There's something going down in Nebraska. A girl's had her head scratched open. I'm going to check it out."
"Really?" he asked, a little confused. He still wasn't too happy about her being a hunter, he didn't think he would ever be happy about that, but since she'd come back from the dead he'd stopped arguing with her about it. There just seemed to be bigger things to worry about. "I thought you were all set on fighting this damned apocalypse? Now you're wanting to work a normal job?"
"I do. I am," she replied in reverse order. "Dean called it in. If he thinks for—" she opened the fridge to grab herself something to snack on, "-for one more moment he can avoid me he's got a rude awakening and a hard slap coming his way. Do you have a car?"
"Well, I've got… I've got a '97 Ford out back. Not sure the state of the engine but she seems to run pretty smooth," he replied. She nodded. She really only needed it for the drive there. If it got back, then great, but she'd get into the Impala even if she had to follow it around America.
"Great. I'll be back in a sec."
"Princess," Bobby started as she headed to the stairs. She paused, turning around. "Do you think this is the best idea? You've got back from whatever messed up fantasy that dickless winged nutjob sent you and Dean on…"
"That was weeks ago, Uncle Bobby," Amelia protested. She'd only told him the basics; Zachariah had sent them to some version of the apocalypse to scare Dean into saying yes. She didn't tell him what she'd seen – that he was dead, that she was a demon, any of it – because it wasn't going to happen.
"You don't just get over that in a couple of weeks, kid."
"Dean saw it too and he's out hunting with no trouble," she retorted. "Look, if he wants to break up the band, then…" well, it wasn't fine, "… then whatever. I'll deal with that. But he's avoiding me and I'm sick of him just trying to palm me off with 'oh, sorry Amy, maybe next time'. I'm going to go see him, find out what the hell is going on, and hopefully gank something for my trouble."
She turned, storming up the stairs to her bedroom. She just wanted to see Dean again. She saw Bobby's wheelchair overturned when she slept, but it wasn't the only memory of the future that she couldn't get out of her head. She saw herself with black eyes, cackling manically. She saw Dean on the floor, his neck snapping underneath his brother's foot. She saw Cas, half stoned and desperate to not lose her. It swirled in her head and made everything else around her, everything real, a little harder to focus on.
She picked up her duffle bag, chucking it over her shoulder before she heading downstairs when Bobby was waiting for her with a set of keys. He wasn't going to stop her, as much as he wanted to. She would just find a way to go with or without his blessing.
She was going to see Dean, alive and kicking, and no one was going to stop her.
~0~0~0~
