~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chapter 7 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"So. You're saying there was a monster in my yard last night?" Lisa says. They're sitting around the kitchen table, eggs and toast and orange juice laid out like normality. Her tone makes it sound like she's talking to a toddler who's told some elaborate lie. Was it really the Boogeyman who stole all the cookies from Mommy's bin? Are you sure about that?
"I know how it sounds," Dean says. He's barely touched his eggs.
Lisa purses her lips. "Do you?" she asks between bites of toast. It's as if she's using the food as a buffer- the only thing that's keeping her from screaming her next words. "You show up here after all this time dragging the ghost of my kid behind you, and now you're saying something might be after me? Again? Where the hell does it end?"
"It ends when we kill whatever this is," Dean replies evenly. His lip twitches, as if already anticipating the demise of a monster he doesn't yet know the name of. Sam stays quiet, watching for more of these hidden expressions he's probably missed over the years. It's weird, like he's looking at his brother from the outside in for the first time in his life. Like Dean's a stranger he has to examine and read like a mark.
Lisa throws her hands up, letting them land lightly on the table. "This is insane."
"I know," Dean shrugs. "But you need to be prepared. I need to do it right this time."
Lisa chews on the inside of her cheek, looking at Dean. "Okay," she says after a moment of silence. "So what now? I mean what's the next step here?"
Dean raises his eyebrows, somewhat baffled. Lisa catches the expression and rolls her eyes.
"Look, I kind of remember how this goes. You're the expert, right? Sooner you kill the monster, sooner you can leave. So I'm trusting you, even though I really, really shouldn't."
"Dean's the best there is, Mom," Ben cuts in, tone matter of fact. "He'll keep you safe."
Dean shoots Ben a look that screams not helping, then grimaces apologetically in Lisa's direction.
Sam speaks up finally, when the next silence stretches too long. "Next step is to do what we always do: we figure out what we're up against. Find out why it's after you. And then we figure out how to kill it."
"And how long will all of that take?" Lisa asks, already knowing she'll hate the answer.
"No way to know," Sam replies, not bothering to sugarcoat.
"Great." Lisa rolls her tongue along her teeth and stands up from the table, reaching for Sam and Dean's plates, raising her eyebrows at Dean's untouched breakfast. He lets her take it away. She brings both plates to the sink, talking over her shoulder. "And I'm assuming you'll need to stay close by in the meantime? At all times?"
Sam downs the rest of his orange juice and meets her at the sink, handing the empty glass off to her. "That would make things a lot easier, yes. Plus that would mean…"
"More time with Ben," Lisa nods, not needing Sam to finish the thought. "Guess I'm cashing in on all those unused vacation days."
Dean hasn't moved from his spot at the kitchen table. He's got his fingers wrapped around his full glass of orange juice, peering straight through it like he's trying to pick out and name each individual strand of Vitamin C nestled in the pulp. Sam lingers for an extra second on his brother's expression before he grabs for the dishrag next to the sink and starts drying the dishes Lisa's already placed on the drying rack.
"We can follow you to work if that's easier," Sam suggests. "We're not trying to ruin your life here. Just trying to save it."
Lisa shakes her head, handing Sam a clean plate. "No. After this is over, whatever this is, we'll have to figure out...Ben will have to leave. So before that happens, I'd like to just be with him." She turns around to find Ben, who's also still sitting at the table, carefully observing Dean. Dean studiously continues to ignore everyone in the room, lost in his little glass world. "How's that sound, sweetie?"
Ben looks over at his mom, and he smiles. Bright and happy and almost alive. He nods, head bobbing with real enthusiasm.
"Okay, so that part's settled," says Lisa, passing Sam the last dish in the sink. She waits patiently while he dries the fork and puts it back on the drying rack. "So for everything else," she continues once he's focused his attention on her once again. "What do you guys need?"
"Honestly?" Sam says, spinning so that he's facing Dean and Ben again, leaning on the counter. "Time." A pause. "And preferably your Wi-Fi password."
Lisa busts out a short, surprised laugh, and then seems to catch herself. Still, she's smirking when she nods her understanding. Sam misses the expression. He's too busy watching Dean's. The way he had immediately unfrozen at the sound of her laugh, lip twitching again, different than the animalistic calculation of before. This time, it's like there's nothing he'd rather do than join in on that laughter. Instead, he finally takes his first sip of orange juice before Lisa can catch sight of what was probably the beginnings of a smile.
Sam glances up from his laptop for the first time in what seems like hours. For some stupid reason, the best spot in the house for Wi-Fi is in the middle of the stairs, so that's where Sam' s been perched, shoulders hunched and fingers dancing over keys. Every once in awhile he can catch small glimpses of Dean through the narrow windows next to the front door, pacing the porch with his Purgatory blade swinging at his side. He'd insisted on keeping watch in case the monster or whatever it might be came back, though Sam knows it's more of an excuse than anything else. An excuse to keep his distance from Lisa and Ben...maybe even from Sam. Regardless, Sam has other things to focus on at the moment.
It's taken him forever to even guess at what he might be looking for, and even now, the picture is just barely beginning to form. He leans back from the screen, stretching out his back and letting out a low groan when he feels his spine pop. He glances out over the railing to where Ben and Lisa are sitting, watching TV. He's about to get back to work when he catches sight of the look in Lisa's eyes. Ben is focused on whatever's happening on screen (Sam recognizes the movie and smiles. Knows it has to be one that Dean showed them. Probably bought the DVD for them and everything). But Lisa's attention is focused solely on her son. She's staring at him like she knows she's dreaming, but she doesn't want it to end.
"Mom," Ben says, drawing out the 'o.'
"Hmm?" Lisa mumbles, still staring.
"Please stop looking at me like that." He sounds just the right amount of impatient, but Sam can hear the sadness leaking into his voice, too. He wonders if Ben is already thinking about goodbye.
Lisa clears her throat, blinks herself out of her daze. "Oh. Sorry." She smiles guiltily at him. "You hungry?"
Ben rolls his eyes and snorts, turning back to the TV. Two men sit in a diner. The image is fuzzy, picture in black and white.
"And then I'd quit, Rico," says the taller man on the left. "I'd go back to dancing, like I used to before I met you." Sam leans into the banister, suddenly as transfixed by the old movie as Ben is pretending to be. "I don't know" the man continues. His name is Joe, Sam remembers. "I ain't made for this sort of thing."
Sam's swallows hard, shifting back to look at his laptop again.
"Right. Yeah," says Lisa over Joe's next words. "Stupid question." She turns back to the screen. Hesitates for a moment, but doesn't look away from the two men on screen. "Ben?"
"Yeah?" Ben sighs.
Lisa clears her throat. "Nothing. I'm just….I'm really...I just missed you."
Ben smiles, turning to give his mom his full attention. "I missed you too, Mom. I wanted to break through the veil so bad, it was killing me. I'm sorry I didn't find you sooner."
Sam flinches at the poor choice of words. He's also getting the distinct feeling they've forgotten he's within hearing distance and briefly considers making a quiet escape. But he also doesn't want to break the moment by drawing attention to himself. Too many words between him and Dean have remained forever unspoken due to an ill-timed phone call or a nasty speed bump or, hell, even an Angel of the Lord popping in at the wrong time. He can tell the Braedens are building up to something, and he doesn't want to be the inhibitor that staunches the blast. Volcanoes were made to erupt, after all. He stays put and fails to ignore the conversation.
"Don't apologize for that," Lisa says, shaking her head. Onscreen, Rico has walked in on a poker game.
Ben nods easily. "Okay."
"You could apologize for running out on me, though," Lisa says suddenly. "That's an apology I would take."
They're really looking at each other now, the movie completely forgotten. "Mom…" Ben starts.
"You never should have left," Lisa says, as if the conviction in the words could somehow rewrite history. The sorrow in her tone holds Sam captive, and he can't focus on his research anymore. His fingers stop moving over the keys.
Ben looks like he's about to cry. "I know," he says.
Sam knows this conversation. He's been right in the middle of it on countless occasions. It was the You Can't Sneak Off Like That fight after Sam ran away to Flagstaff. One with Dad, one with Dean, though Dean's was mostly just holding onto him and not letting go and shaking so hard Sam thought he might fall apart right there. It was Stanford, too. It was hitchhiking in Chicago and Ruby and demon blood and falling into Lucifer's Cage. His brother begging, asking, wondering. Why didn't Sam stay?
Sam's had a million second chances, and he's done the same thing every time. He wonders why someone keeps doling those chances out, perhaps thinking he'll finally make the right decision. Crazy to think how many roads they've walked, how often the pavement is about to drop out from under them and suddenly there's more of it, another long mile to walk beside a brother who is somehow still breathing.
He wishes Ben and Lisa could get another chance, too. That that same someone would flip the script around and let them stay together and alive. He wonders why he and Dean are so special, why they're the ones who hold onto such a cursed and wretched and beautiful gift.
It's then that Dean walks back into the house, closing the door slowly and quietly behind him, as if he's somehow sensed the importance of the conversation happening between mother and son. More likely, he'd learned from his time in Monsterland that making noise would get him killed, and the habit is hard to break. He catches Sam's eye from where he still sits in the middle of the stairs, then cuts a quick look over to the TV.
"You gotta get me out of this, Rico," Joe begs from the screen, tall black hat tilted to the side. "You gotta. Don't you see? I'm working steady now! Can't a guy ever say he's through?"
Dean's eyes crinkle a little when he, too, recognizes the movie, but the smile stops short when he sees Ben and Lisa sitting on the couch facing each other, both with tears in their eyes. They are still talking, but the words are low and mumbled now, drowned out by Rico, his gang, and a reluctant Joe planning out their next heist. Dean shoots a questioning look in Sam's direction, who shrugs. Let them talk it out, his expression says. Dean narrows his eyes, then gestures with the hand that still holds his blade for Sam to follow after him into the guest room.
Sam gets up as quietly as he can, bringing the laptop with him and following after his brother. Dean is standing awkwardly in the center of the room, arms swinging at his sides, weight shifting from one foot to the other.
"Whattya got?" he asks once Sam's closed the door behind him. "Anything poppin' out at you?"
"I think I might have something, yeah," Sam says. "But it's really, really thin."
"Okay, so shoot," Dean encourages.
"It's really not much."
"Look, Lisa's in danger here. 'Not much' is still one step closer to something." Dean's right hand twitches and the blade jumps, just a little bit. Sam does his best not to jump, too.
"Looks like crossroad deals," Sam starts, dropping his laptop softly onto the bed. "A lot of them, going back a little over a decade. People making it big, dying ugly ten years later."
Dean rolls his eyes and starts pacing the small space, shoving Sam's duffle bag closer to the bed with his shoe to make a clear path. "That's fascinating, Sam, but it's not exactly helpful. Crossroads demons don't stalk people outside their homes, and Lisa's not searching them out in the first place."
Sam locks his jaw for a moment and considers the implications of his next words. He watches Dean pace for another moment, boots treading lightly over the carpet. Sam clears his throat. "You sure about that?" he asks, and watches Dean freeze.
"What?" Dean looks like someone just threw his favorite firearm into the river.
"She lost her kid, Dean," Sam explains, cautiously. "And they'd been getting vague memories of you. Of the life and how things are in our world. Maybe she figured out how crossroads work. She's not stupid."
Dean's empty hand curls into a fist, but he drops the Purgatory blade onto the mattress with a decisive thump. Sam's ashamed of how much safer that makes him feel. "Damn right she's not stupid," Dean growls, voice getting louder with each word. "Which means she would never...I mean she wouldn't. She wouldn't do that."
"You did," Sam answers calmly.
Dean's forehead scrunches. "That's not…that's different," he insists.
"How?"
"H...Sam. Come on," Dean growls. "You're missing something. You gotta dig deeper."
"So we will, Dean. We'll go into town, start asking some questions." Sam pulls his laptop open, types in the password, and spins it against the mattress so that it's facing Dean. "Here. This is what I know so far. I say we head out in ten, see what we can find."
Dean stares down at the screen, but it's obvious he's not registering the list of names and stories Sam has pulled up. Sam rubs a hand down along his jaw and sighs again. His tone is softer now.
"Dean?" he waits until Dean is looking at him. "I'm not saying anything yet, okay? You know her better than I do. But we can't ignore this. And right now it's all I can find that's even slightly our kind of thing. So let's go see how all the pieces fit together, okay?"
Dean catches his tongue between his teeth and nods. He picks up the laptop and starts skimming as he makes his way to the door.
"I'm gonna change. Meet you in a few," he says, closing the door behind him on the way out. It barely makes a sound, and Sam finds himself wishing, for the first time in his life, that his brother could be just a little bit louder. Because sometimes it feels like he'll turn around and Dean will have vanished. Will have melted back into a place Sam could never hope to find, could never pull him back from. Sam turns, glancing down at Dean's blade where it still sits on the mattress. He shivers a little.
Sometimes he wonders if he ever really got Dean back at all.
NOTE: The movie being 'played' here is a 1931 film called Little Caesar. If you've seen it, I'm impressed with you (or, more likely, your parents, who no doubt sat you down to watch it, same as my father did for me =)).
