Chapter 18
The halls of Hogwarts were still empty of students as the brothers made their way to the second floor bathroom. A cursory look around suggested everyone was still in the Great Hall eating breakfast. They entered the bathroom to find Myrtle sitting atop the sinks quietly moping.
She turned toward the sound of them entering and gasped dramatically as if it had been her birthday and had been presented with a ten tiered cake.
"Oh! It's you!" she said as she giggled. "Hi Sam." she added with a wiggle of her fingers.
"Hi, Myrtle." answered Sam. "How are you today?"
"Whhhhooooooo are you?" she said, ignoring Sam's question, She was staring at Dean the way a child stares at desert plate before they've had their dinner.
"Now who's the Loverboy?" Sam said through his teeth.
"Shyadap." Dean whispered back. He took a few steps forward and introduced himself. "Hi, I'm Dean, Sam's brother."
"Come in boys!" she said with the hint of a little too much anticipation behind it.
Sam hitched the bag a little higher on his shoulder and they both entered the wash area of the bathroom. Their footsteps echoed of the cold, damp walls which were chipping and peeling in places. If it weren't for the fact there was a boy-crazy ghost in front of them, it may have been somewhat creepy.
Myrtle giggled to herself as she watched Sam and Dean approached her. She bit her lip, her eyes darting up and down. Dean felt oddly exposed and felt the urge to cover certain parts of his body even though he was fully clothed. The ghostly teen seemed to pick up on that fact and winked at him, making him subconsciously move the the picnic basket in front of himself.
Sam put down his bag and grabbed the picnic basket out of Dean's hand forcing him to fold his hands there instead. Sam just laughed as he put the basket next to the bag.
"I've been thinking of you all day, Sam." Myrtle said with a titter. "I thought you had forgotten all about me."
"Of course not!" Sam said. "I made you a promise, remember?"
"How could I forget?" she sighed and erupted into fits of giggles. "You told me you had a brother, but you never told me how . . . handsome he was." Again her attention we focused on Dean who gulped hard.
"So . . ." Dean said quickly, trying to change the subject. He bent over and reached into the bag and pulled out the iron fire poker. "How do we want to do this?"
Sam's eyes widened. "Dean!"
"What?" he said defensively.
"Don't be rude. She does have feelings, you know. Don't just start swinging as soon as you walk in the door." Sam urged.
"What's the difference?"
"WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE!" Myrtle howled.
She rushed toward Dean, making his feet flee backward so quickly his back was up against the wall within the blink of an eye. He dropped the poker onto the tile floor making a loud CLANG! Now floating face to face, Myrtle was huffing in a state of anger most fierce.
"The difference is that one is having polite conversation with a person you've just met, and the other is like walking into a room and punching the first person you see in the nose!" To demonstrate her point, she thrust her fist right through Dean's head causing him to squeamishly cry out. He instantly felt foolish because it obviously did nothing to him.
Myrtle burst out crying and took off into the air. She retreated into her stall and with a loud sploosh a fair amount of water sloshed onto the floor. They could still hear her muffled sobs coming from the stall several moments later.
Sam looked at Dean with disbelief. "Look what you did!"
"What did I do?"
"You hurt her feelings, Dean! She isn't like the ghosts back home, okay? She was just a poor little girl who was teased mercilessly by bullies in life. Even as a ghost she gets bullied now and again. She's . . . sensitive, alright?"
"I swear I didn't mean it like that, okay? There was a ghost girl staring at my junk, and I got nervous, alright?"
"Fair enough, but you need to go apologize to her." Sam said pointing toward the stall.
"Seriously?" Dean squeaked.
"We need her, Dean! This may be our only chance to see if this stuff works and it quite literally just went down the drain."
"Come on man!" Dean protested.
"Go!" Sam said resolutely and pointed toward the stall again.
"Gaaaahhhh!" grumbled Dean as he reluctantly walked over to the stall muttering something about not believing he had to apologize to a toilet. He approached the stall door, his feet lightly splashing in the new puddle on the floor. One last time he looked over his shoulder at Sam hopefully.
Sam pulled a serious face at him and mouthed the words "Say you're sorry." and continued to point.
Dean pouted.
"NOW." Sam mouthed.
Dean grunted and turned back toward the stall door. He cleared his throat. "Hey, Myrtle?" he said and knocked three times with his knuckle.
"Goooooooooo aaaawwwwaaaayyy!" came her muffled voice from under the water.
Dean turned around to leave but was met with Sam still pointing with that serious face on. So he turned right back around again just as quick.
"Myrtle, look." he started. "I'm sorry. I . . . I just get nervous sometimes and I do stupid stuff without thinking. You're absolutely right. It was rude of me to just . . . get down to brass tacks with hardly a word spoken between us. It was impolite and . . . and I'm sorry."
Dean waited for a response. When none came he went on. "I'm sorry, Myrtle. Okay? Come on outta there won't you? I promise I really am a nice person."
There finally came a splosh from the inside of the cubicle. A fresh wave of water lapped at Dean's shoes as he heard her soft sniffles behind the door. He sighed.
"You okay?" he asked, this time actually caring.
"No." she answered wearily. "I'm dead."
"I mean are you okay with me?" Again he waited for an answer. "I really am sorry, Myrtle."
Her ghostly face appeared through the door. "Alright," she sniffed, "I believe you." She floated through the door and back toward Sam.
"Thank you, Myrtle." Sam said. "He didn't mean it. And we surely can't do this without your help."
She turned her head and looked at the iron poker lying on the floor where Dean had dropped it. Sam followed her gaze and moved to retrieve it off the ground. As he picked it up, she glided up beside him.
"Will it hurt?" she asked.
Sam looked at her. "If it works, it ought to make you dissipate. You'll reconstitute in a few seconds. To be honest, I don't think it will hurt, but then again nobody really knows."
Myrtle moaned sadly. "Let's get it over with then. Before I change my mind." she said. "But you remember your promise to me Sam Winchester!"
"Hey," he said seriously. "I made a promise and I intend to keep it." he said and he took a few steps back. He shouldered the poker like a baseball bat. "You tell me when you are ready, okay?"
Dean watched this exchange between his brother and the dead girl. He was being so kind to her. Just as if she was flesh and blood.. She had been at one point been a real person, and aside from the fact that she could fly, and apparently hide in the plumbing, she was pretty normal.
Dean watched as she prepared herself. Myrtle took what looked like a couple of deep breaths, which he thought was kind of pointless, but perhaps a force of habit.
Myrtle looked at Sam after a few moments. She saw the look in Sam's eyes was not one of passiveness, but of deep regret. He did not like it anymore than she did. She nodded finally and she tensed up.
"I'm sorry for this, Myrtle." Sam said and he swung the iron poker at her.
She squealed as it passed through her, her eyes closed tightly shut, her shoulders up by her ears.
The iron ran right through her center mass, pure and true with a tremendous whoosh of wind behind his swing.
Sam paused, his facial expression shifted between shock, relief, and disappointment almost instantly. It had had absolutely no effect.
Myrtle opened one eye and half squinted behind her specs to see what had happened. The look on Sam's face had said it all.
"It didn't work, did it?" she asked.
Sam lowered the poker. "No. Not even a ripple."
Dean slowly walked over to the two of them. "There was always a chance it wasn't going to work."
"I know." Sam said dejectedly. "I thought I was onto something though."
Dean hated seeing his brother like this. He had watched Sam spend hours and hours pouring over his books doing research trying to find at least one part of monster lore that matched their own. If this didn't work, it wasn't for a lack of trying.
"It's okay, Sam." Dean said. "Myrtle, thank you for letting us try . . ."
"No, something has got to work!" Sam said and he reached into the bag and grabbed the bag of salt.
"Don't worry about it, Sammy. We'll find something else." Dean said as Sam struggled with cord tying the bag. "Sam?"
Sam ignored him and proceeded to open the bag and pour a line of salt around himself and Dean. "Okay, Myrtle." he said when he was finished. "Try to cross the salt-line."
She nodded and moved forward through the air. Sam held his breath and hoped that she wouldn't be able to cross it.
She glided toward them, crossed the line and passed right between. She turned to Sam once she passed the other side and shrugged. She looked genuinely sorry that it didn't work.
"I don't understand." he said. He grabbed a hand full of salt from the bottom of the bag and tossed it lazily at Myrtle. The white grains flew right through her and came to rest on the floor without so much as a sizzle.
Sam hung his head and Dean touched his shoulder.
"It's okay, Sammy." he comforted him. "We'll find something else to do here."
They had said their goodbyes and packed their things. Sam promised to return next week to visit and they left the second floor bathroom as slyly as they could, given that the students and staff were now around and about. They spent the rest of the afternoon into the evening in their rooms where they had eaten the packed lunches they were given which, even cold, was absolutely delicious.
Sam sat for a long time at the desk thumbing through more books and scribbling notes on pieces of parchment. Dean passed out on the bed for a while and when he awoke it was dinner time.
"You coming?" he asked Sam.
"No. You go on ahead. I'm not very hungry." he said.
"I'll bring you up a plate. Take a nap man, you look awful."
"Yeah. That sounds like a good idea." Sam admitted.
"Alright. I'll see you later." Dean said as he closed the door.
Sam tossed the book he was reading from aside and rubbed his eyes. They stung. He climbed into the bed and before he knew it he was out cold.
There he was, standing in the Quidditch Pitch, a broom in his hand. He felt the sunshine on his skin and took a deep breath of clean Scottish air and smiled. A cool but pleasant breeze kicked up and blew through his hair. He mounted the broom and away he went into the sky as the theme to The Neverending Story began to play. He was flying around the Hogwarts grounds, just checking things out. He flew to the tallest towers, encircled the owlery, and even swept under the bridge at full speed. Twice. He skimmed the Black Lake, making ripples on its surface. The music in his head was playing full blast as he mimicked Sebastian on the back of Falkor and threw his fist into the air screaming, "YEAH!"
He was on his fifth or sixth circle of the castle when dark clouds covered the sun and it began to drizzle. He shivered a bit as the temperature dropped. When the wind picked up enough to make his broom start flying a bit off course, Sam thought it was a good idea to look for a place to land. He headed back toward the Quidditch Pitch and lightning streaked the sky above. The rain was coming down in great heavy droplets that stung his face as he raced through the air.
He rounded a tower and saw it floating there. A Dementor. It reached out for him and he pulled up on the broom handle hard. He slid off the back end of the broom and began to fall. He plummeted end over end toward the ground.
Sam awoke with a start to find the candles had all burned down, and the smoldering embers in the fireplace were casting eerie shadows over everything in the room. Including the figure at the end of his bed.