Caleb woke to the smells of breakfast. Claire was downstairs nursing a cup of coffee. She stared out the window. "I meant to ask last night if I could crash here for a while… but you were in a state…"
He shrugged. "How long?"
"I don't know."
"Yeah. Of course." He nodded and helped himself to a waffle and hashbrowns. "Keep cooking like this and you can stay forever."
She stared into her cup for a long moment. "Those were her parents? Laina?"
"Alanna. Yesterday was her birthday." He sank into his chair with a fork. "I think it's the last one I'll spend with them. Let's talk about something else."
So Claire talked about her son. For hours. Until she ran out of things to say. Caleb listened to her soft voice, just a bit raspy. To her enthusiasm. To her longing. Watched her small smiles as she recalled the kooky way his hair stood on end since he was born or the way he always had to tell her he loved her eye to eye. His eyes were green like hers but his hair was a bit darker, probably like his father. She talked about his love of soccer and how he often slept in his uniform. How he loved to tell everyone that his mother was in the Airforce and how he was going to join when he got older. It was later. When the rain was pouring down and they were sitting on the porch just letting it cage them into the house. Caleb looked at her. "So… you saw John."
Her eyebrows furrowed before she looked at him, wondering how he knew. "We got rid of some witches together."
"How did that work out?"
"Fine. Nothing's changed really. Maybe I really let go this time." She nodded to her car. "Dean and Bobby fixed up my car. Said to give him a call if it starts falling apart. He's such a good guy."
Caleb nodded to the change in subject. "You ready to put the trunk in?"
"Are you?"
"When the rain stops."
"After…" Claire stared at her bare toes. "After we put in the trunk and get me finally organized… will you come with me to Kansas?"
"What's in Kansas?"
"What's left of my family." She shrugged at him. "I tried to go back a couple of times. Once, even with some support, but I… I couldn't make myself get all the way there."
"Okay." He owed her that much.
They spent the next few days in companionable silence. She joined his routine of reading, cleaning and eating. She asked questions, he answered what he could. Sometimes they discussed some aspects of hunting and he watched her try to find her own way rather than rely on the Winchester law as she had in the past couple of years. They built out the trunk of her car and when it was done she reached for him. He almost pulled back. Her face was so close to his. She didn't quite let him kiss her. Her hands held his ribs and he was just too afraid to pull her to him. She led him around by his dick until they were out of the barn and in the half-light of the yard. That's when he knew that she would be the death of him. He would follow her around with these half-kisses for the rest of his life, grateful that he got a graze of skin, a taste of breath. She pulled him with her to their knees and finally let him kiss her. She pulled at his clothes and moved hers around and there in the middle of the yard, halfway between the house and the barn, half in the light and half in the dark, Caleb forgot that he hated the dark.
How could he hate the dark when he was sinking into Claire under the stars? When her eyes were just slits and her mouth released his name in such tantalizing breaths. No underwear to get in the way. Buttons easily pulled open. Skin so soft. Her hands pulling at him, pulling his shoulders toward her, shoving his shirt up, sliding down and taking his pants with them, grabbing his ass when she needed more. Grass in her hair as she held him against her, catching her breath. Caleb breathed in the scent of her skin, easing away but not far. Not far at all because they went again.
Then again on the porch. The kitchen. The living room. The stairs. By the time they hit his bed, they were too tired to fuck again. In the morning, Caleb woke and he absolutely did not want to get out of bed or else find out he'd just had the best dream ever. She was asleep beside him, her arm thrown across his chest. When she woke, she gave him a smile before cuddling in close, her lips running over this skin of his arm. "How long have you been up?"
"Little while."
"We should go out for breakfast."
"Might be lunch time."
"Then we should do that."
"I don't know if I can stand up."
She laughed and kissed his mouth. "Me either but I'm starving." She kissed his chin, then his neck. "Meet you in the shower."
"Shower." He nodded and watched her scoot away. Watched all the parts that bounced as she got the shower ready. When she had a good steam going, he joined her, still not sure it wasn't all just a dream. Against the wall in his shower, her eyes told him that it was all real but he still wasn't sure.
He watched her get dressed, her long blonde hair dripping on everything as she got a too-big dress over some sort of silky number that might have been a hair too small around the hips. No panties. She caught him staring. "I've never worn them."
"Hottest thing you could ever say about underwear."
They took her car into town. She pulled him around by his hand. They had lunch at a Cuban place that he hadn't known existed. He'd had no clue about the allure of pork and pickles. Then he took her for ice cream at a place he'd known since he was a kid. They were in line for the sweet stuff when he realized she was all over him. That she was there with him and claiming him in front of God and everyone and he hadn't done that with someone in the daylight in over ten years. Made his hand grip her waist tight, hold her closer than he should. They took their ice cream down the street to window shop like real people.
Caleb stared down at her and she tried to step back but he didn't let her. "Caleb?"
"When did this happen?"
"I don't understand."
"Trust me. I can't believe I'm questioning this right now but…" He swallowed down a lump. "You hate me."
"I don't. I don't think I ever did."
"What are we doing right now?"
"I don't know. I've never done this… like this… before." Her big green eyes were so wet, he wished he'd just kept going with it. "Do you want to stop?"
"God, no. I've never hit the high numbers like this before. You're single-handedly raising my stats."
She laughed and cut it off with a little punch to his ribs. "I've never had a good guy like you… look at me the way you look at me."
"Hey…"
"You are a good guy, Caleb. I think you forgot while being a bad boy…"
"What about you?"
"I've always been me." She lowered her eyes to her melting ice cream. "Do I come on too strong?"
"I think I need that." He kissed her, initiated a moment for the first time. "You going to stay with me?"
"You going to come with me to Kansas?"
"Yes."
"Caleb." The voice came from somewhere. Caleb's world spun as he tried to identify the voice. His eyes found Adrian and his family walking toward them. His instinct was to push her away but he wanted to hide behind her. "So, this is the girl, Mom was talking about."
"Adrian Chase, Claire Reid." Caleb made the introductions and loosened his grip on her. Claire was her charming self and made small talk until Adrian's children tugged him away to more interesting places.
Claire nibbled at her ice cream and led Caleb around the square while his brain whirred. He absentmindedly had a lick at his ice cream every couple of steps. She sat him on a bench and sat next to him. "You embarrassed of me?"
"No." He shook his head. "I just… it was a bad night at their place. I don't know… I meant not to see anyone again. It was gonna be the last time… I don't really come to town like this."
Ice cream gone and the breeze rustling her dress, Claire kissed his mouth and laid her mouth to his ear while she told him about all the things she was going to do to him when he got her back to the house. That calmed him somehow. He knew exactly what to do. She made him drive her car and she kept touching him and whispering in his ear. They didn't make out of the car for the first round. Claire kissed him big, gasping in deep breaths full of his smell. She didn't move to get off him or out of the car. Her dress hung open, her slip bunched around her waist, the bodice wet from his mouth. She stared at him, lids half-mast over his blue eyes. Blue like the sky outside. Thin eyebrows furrowed, she smoothed them out with her thumbs. It transformed his face from scowl to relaxed. She kissed his bottom lip, his top lip just vanished no matter what he did. But she liked it. She tried not to remember that John had a similar thing going on.
Caleb's face was so… different. So… good. Skin stretched across bone and when he opened his eyes, she just wanted to dive into them. She licked her lips and her mouth was so dry. "I'm sorry I was such a bitch when we met."
"Well… I… am not sorry for being a pig."
"No?" She laughed.
"No."
She touched his cheekbones and kissed his freckles, slid a hand over the top of his head. It pointed a bit. She both loved and was frightened of it. She didn't know why. She shifted and let him slip out of her body. "Take me to bed."
Caleb watched her climb out, she didn't bother to fix her slip. He got himself tucked in to follow her. The neighbors weren't really that close but close enough. Daylight kitchen table sex. Beautiful. She sat on the couch, in just her dress, hanging open, eating pineapple out of a can and Caleb panicked a bit.
He watched her from the doorway. She was flipping through a book on incantations, eating pineapple, not caring if she was dripping juice on her tits. And he was hard again. He plopped down on the other side of the couch. "Where in the world did you get that dress? It's like… nine sizes too big."
"Bobby."
"Does he cross dress?"
"It was his wife's. She was… sturdy."
"Sturdy?" Caleb asked.
"She was thick. Solid. Yes, the dress is too big." She finished and pretended to huff and cover herself with the folds of thin fabric. "It's really comfortable though. It was one of the first pieces of clothing I acquired after… the Pixies. I'm fond of it."
"Do you have any clothes that are yours?"
"No, but I've been making do. I get some stuff when I have some funds left over."
"I don't mind. I personally wouldn't mind if you turned my house into a nudist colony."
She set the book aside, her can on the floor. She opened the dress and let him look his fill. "I think that if I did that… we'd die of starvation and exhaustion."
"You might be right." He nodded as he crawled over to her.
"You're not tired of me, yet?"
"Oh God, no." He shook his head before dipping his head to kiss her thighs.
"I thought you were a one-night kind of man."
"Usually, I am." He admitted. "But… I keep thinking that if I stop… If I get complacent for a second… then you'll leave… and I'll kick myself forever."
"Then don't stop. Never stop." She shut her eyes as his mouth closed over her clit. His name was a litany, a mantra, that just slid off her lips over and over.
Later, showered and fed and dozing in bed, Claire was tired. Fully. She laid out on her own pillow but her arm draped over his chest, her hand stroking the stubble on his chin. Caleb rolled closer, arm under his pillow. "When do you want to go?"
"Tomorrow."