Ten days later.
South Dakota, Sioux Falls. At Bobby Singer's.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
She was staring at a quite big gilded clock with a sort of black statue of a man leaned against it, for almost three minutes now. The little hand of the clock was almost hypnotizing as she stood there, waiting for that angel to show up.
"This is an exact replica of the clock we can find in one of the many rooms of the palace of Versailles," the familiar and annoying voice said making Kate turn around as she faced the angel who had been invading her dreams every night for a long time now, much for her displeasure than anything else. "It was delivered to the great rooms of Earl of Artois in-"
"In 1773, I kinda did a presentation about it so I know," she cut him off and he grinned as he gave her a little bow with the head. He looked at her as she stared at him with a stern face.
"Don't tell me you're still not over it?" He asked her sighing.
"Over what? The fact that you almost got Bobby, Rufus and I dead by letting the shower run so the water could go through the floor and erase the devil's trap and get the demon out? Or maybe the fact that you skipped telling me that there is an actual spell to send me back to my dimension?" She asked bitterly. Zachariah let out a long sigh as he threw his head back.
"I've already told you why we did all of this," he groaned in annoyance before he looked at her. "We needed to convince Bobby that you can take care of a demon. Otherwise, he would never let you get on the road with the Winchesters and you will never be able to fulfil the mission we gave you," he walked towards her. "And, as for the spell, we were simply waiting for the right time to tell you."
"Sure," she scoffed. He shook his head and walked around her, towards a large fancy white and red chair.
"I'm so disappointed that you would think I am not telling you the truth," he said sitting down.
"I'm sorry I have so many reasons to doubt," she replied spinning around.
"You should not doubt. God wouldn't want you to doubt Him," he told her.
"I'm not doubting Him," she said in a softer voice.
"Are you sure? You've got to understand that I am celestial entity with very great powers. It's easy for me to know when your faith is fading away," he told her as he put an arm on the back of the chair, his eyes glued to her face.
"I… I just still don't understand… I don't understand why God is letting all of those things happening," she admitted.
"I thought we made it clear last week?" He stood up in a quick movement and walked towards her. "If God had given a world without any kind of hate, despair, sorrow, pain and all this negativity, to the humans, they wouldn't need a Heaven to go to when they die. It's a tricky way to keep them faithful. By living in a crappy world, they are even more motivated to believe there's a better after life."
"Some don't believe in an afterlife… Or even in God," she told him.
"Their bad," he shrugged laughing.
"Does that mean they'll go to Hell too?" She asked him and he frowned in confusion. "Do atheist go to Hell? Even if they've been good their whole life?"
"No one is good their whole life. And everyone is good their whole life," he replied and she frowned as he turned his attention to the clock. "It's all bureaucrat things. You don't need to know that. What you need, is to focus on the Winchester brothers," he looked at her. "You're gonna have a good time with them, very soon."
"They're on a hunt and Bobby-"
"Bobby is going to let you go there, because they're going to need you," he cut her off.
"What do you mean?" She asked before he smirked and vanished in thin air. Only the sound of the clock remained until a ringing sound started to get louder and louder in the room. She turned around, her eyebrows frowned as she wondered from where it came from.
Kate opened her eyes to have her gaze land on the ceiling. Laying on her back, a blanket covering only half of her body. RIIIING. She turned her head to the little table she used as a nightstand and grabbed her cellphone that was ringing, as she felt like something was missing from her. It had been like that for weeks now. Everytime, she woke up, she would feel like she had forgotten something important, like something was truly missing from her.
"Yeah?" She answered the call without even seeing who was calling her.
"Hey! You are fluent in French, right?" A male voice asked her. She wasn't completely awake to recognize the voice, nor to really understand what they were saying to her.
"What? Who's that?" She asked.
"It's me, Sam."
"Oh," she said as she rubbed her face. "How are you doing? You haven't called yesterday-"
"I was kinda busy," he replied before he coughed. "So you're fluent in French, right?"
"Yeah I am but-" She started only to be cut off by him.
"Look, Dean is completely against this idea, but hum I called Bobby and he said it was okay with him. So, could you come to Fairfax in Indiana first thing tomorrow morning?"
"What for?"
"We kinda need you to play a French teacher in a school."
"What?" She asked sitting up.
"Look, I'll send you by mail the case we're working on, okay?" He told her.
"I suppose I don't have a choice," she said in almost a pouty voice.
"Bobby said he'll have someone to drive you here and to help you pack all you'll need," he told her ignoring her comment. "I'll call you later-"
"Wait, I don't have a mail! How are you gonna send me everything I need to know by mail if I don't have a mail?" She told him before he hung up.
"Right, then hum… Just create one and text it to me," he told her.
"Alright," she replied. "You're okay, Sam you sound a bit-" She frowned when a beeping sound started against her ear. She looked at her phone and rose her eyebrows. "Sure, just hang up while I'm talking." She sighed as she flopped back in her bed, her phone still between her hands which were on her stomach. Suddenly, it vibrated in between her fingers. She brought it up and opened the text she just received.
Sam Winchester: Sorry, Dean was just 3 feet from me… See you at 7am. I'll send you the exact location by mail… Can't wait to see you.
Kate smiled and closed her eyes, thinking she could sleep a bit more, too comfortable to leave that bed. Suddenly, she opened her eyes and looked at the message again and then checked the time.
"Damn!" She sat up. "I've got only seven hours to get there!"
Of course, the person Bobby had made responsible for driving Kate to Indiana, was Matthew. The moment Kate had realized they only had seven hours ahead of them to get to Indiana, while she was sure it needed a trip of ten hours to get there, she had run downstairs. He always slept on the couch even though there were two empty rooms with beds upstairs. She had rushed him into helping her pack her stuff and in less than forty minutes, they were on the road. She had called Bobby who had gone to help another hunter on a delicate case, and had told him that she and Matt were heading to Sam and Dean. He had explained to her the brothers' case briefly and he had warned her to listen to Sam and Dean, and to be very careful. Later on the road, she had pulled out the sort of monsters encyclopaedia she was writing. She had added a few things Matt had told her before grabbing another book that was in her bag and taking a few notes from it too. Matt hadn't been as talkative as he had been the whole time he had stayed at Bobby's until he had decided to check if she had been studying her monsters that well.
"And what kills a shapeshifter?"
"A silver bullet or silver blade to the heart," she replied. "Just like werewolves!"
"Excellent!" Matt told her and she smiled as she looked at him. "Although, you should have just said silver blade to the heart since we both know you can't shoot."
"I can shoot!" She replied almost childishly.
"Pulling the trigger and fire anywhere, isn't shooting," he told her. "Shooting is hitting the target with the bullet."
"That's just details," she said under her breath.
"Details that can save your life," he told her and she turned her head to look at him staring at her intensively.
"Watching the road might save our lives too," she told him and he smirked before turning his head back to the road. "How long until we get there?"
"Hum," he said before glancing at his watch around his wrist. "Two hours. What time did he ask you to meet them at the motel?"
"Seven am," she replied as she brought her hand up and looked at her watch. "We're gonna be late, if we get there in two hours," she said as she saw it was now 5:32am.
"You're supposed to go have an interview in that Truman high school at 8, right?"
"Nope," she said as she bent down and grabbed her black bag and put it on her lap. She opened it and rummaged around before getting out a file with all the papers she had printed from Sam's mail. "Actually, he's already got me the job. All I have to do is pass by the principal's office to announce my arrival, and then I can just go and teach… Yay." She finished sarcastically.
"You don't like teaching?"
"Teaching? I've got no problems. It's the students, I'm not crazy about," she told him as she browsed through the papers she had already read twice earlier. A girl named April had drowned another girl in the toilet in one of the Truman high school bathrooms.
"Why not?" He asked her with a light chuckle. "They're just kids."
"Exactly. They're kids and kids can be cruel," she told him and he glanced at her.
"Not all of them."
"Most of them, yes," she said, her eyes still glued to the papers in her hands.
"This must the only time since I met you, that I'm convinced you're related to Bobby Singer," he told her chuckling. She looked up at him, her eyebrows rose before she let out a light laugh.
"I'm sure, you will get along with everybody, miss Singer," the rather old principal said as Kate walked by his side in the full of students hallway. Some of them would glance at Kate and even point at her before whispering between each other.
"If you say so," she replied as he gave her a gentle smile. Before leaving, Matt had made her wear one of the outfits he had bought her in the first shop they found on the road. A light blue button-up, a black pencil skirt that reached just above her knees, a pair of black high heel ankle, and sheer thighs highs. She had taken off the parka coat she had put on and was carrying it in her arms, as she had her black bag hanging on one of her shoulders. She had left her duffle bag at the reception, giving as a fake excuse that it was things she had to bring at her new apartment at the end of the day. As for her hair, she had no idea what hairstyle would make her look legit, so she decided to let them untied, and brought the upper part on the back with a hair clip. It made her hair look less wild and that was all that mattered.
"Here we are," the principal said as he pushed the door opened. They walked in and he coughed. "Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your full intention?" The few teachers that were in the room, talking, drinking coffee or even checking their bags, turned their heads towards the rather old man in a brown suit. "I see not everyone is here, but still. May I introduce you the substitute for Mrs Patricia Owens, Miss Kaitlin Singer."
"Just Kate will be fine," she said as she looked at the few men and women in the room. They nodded at her before the bell rang announcing the start of the day of work.
"Alright, I think it's time for your first class at Truman High," the principal told her with a smile.
"Yes, I'm heading ahead in a second," she replied nodding as he left and some teachers started to leave as well. Kate turned to one of the two coat racks that wasn't completely covered with many coats, jackets and scarfs. She put her coat on it but it dropped. As she started to bend down to take it, someone else did. "Thank you."
"You're welcome," Kate looked at the man who gave her gentle smile. He was quite charming and a sincere gentleness irradiating from him. He put her coat up on the coat rack and pulled his hand out. "I'm Chad Wyatt, the English teacher."
"Nice to meet you," she said shaking his hand "I'm Kate Singer, obviously."
"Have you visited the place yet?" He asked her.
"Hum, no. Not really. I kinda came here late. I don't even know where is the classroom I'm supposed to go to," she admitted which made him chuckle lightly.
"I suppose it's the same as Mrs Owens? 226?" She nodded at him. "Then, it's right across mine. I'll walk you there."
"Thanks," she replied as she followed him out the staffroom. The hallways were already empty meaning that all of the students were all in their classroom. "I'm sorry I'm making you late for your class."
"It's alright. The students will actually be happy to lose a few minutes," he told her as they kept walking. He glanced at her. "You look very young."
"Maybe that's because I am young," she replied jokingly. "I'm 25 years old."
"First job in teaching?" He asked her.
"Sort of," she replied.
"It might sound completely untrue, but you're gonna like it. Kids nowadays can be difficult, but if you listen to them properly, you'll see they're not that bad," he said with a smile before he stopped "This classroom is yours," he pointed at a door in which she could see agitated teenagers talking loudly and moving all around. "This one is mine," he pointed to the one at the opposite. "If you need anything…"
"Thank you," she replied. He nodded before walking to his classroom. She turned around and looked at the door leading to the classroom where she was supposed to teach, took a deep breath and walked in.
"Good morning everybody," she said as she closed the door behind her and put off her back bag to put it on the desk. The students turned to look at her as they started to take their seats in silence. "As you certainly know, I am the substitute for your French teacher, Mrs Owens. And my name is," she said as she turned around and grabbed a piece of chalk and wrote her name on the board. "Miss Ander- Singer!" She said erasing her real last name she had started to write and replacing it with the other. "Miss Singer, that's it," she said turning around with a nervous smile. "What would be really cool, is if you could write your first names on a paper and put it on your table so I can put a name on everyone's face." The students started to write their name and do as told. They didn't look enthusiast at all and took their whole time to write their names down. "Can anyone tell me what you were doing before Mrs Owens had to leave?"
Kate scanned the whole class to find only students looking at her as if they had just woken up and hadn't realized they weren't in their beds anymore. However, she noted a few boys' eyes traveling up and down her body. She rose her eyebrows and shook her head as she crossed her arms over her chest. Suddenly, a hand raised shyly on the back. Kate smiled at the young girl as she waved at her.
"We were studying the French revolution."
"Alright," Kate nodded as she looked down at the girl's name. Julie. "So I presume she made you study Les Misérables?" Julie shook her head.
"She spent her whole time just rambling her lesson, Miss," a teenage boy up front said and Kate looked down at her with raised eyebrows.
"That's too bad. Les Misérables is a very good story and it gives you a very good sum up image of what happened during the French Revolution," Kate said as she noticed a shelf near the windows with a few DVD boxes. She walked to it, and started looking through the collection there. "Does anyone know who wrote it?" She glanced at the class to see everyone shrugging except from the little Julie on the back. She could see that the girl knew but didn't want to pull the attention on her. "Julie? Wanna take a guess?"
"Hum, Victor Hugo?"
"Good guess," Kate smiled at her as she turned her attention back to the shelf. "Oh here!" She said as she took a DVD and showed it to the students. "Well, it's a not so old version movie of the book. Maybe, we could watch a bit, what do you say?"
"Yeah!" Everybody exclaimed, happy to watch a movie instead of studying. Kate chuckled.
"You'll still have to do an assignment about it for tomorrow," she told them and they groaned. "It would be in French of course. And, hum, well let's say it would have to be a double sided-page. But for now, you're gonna watch it," she looked down at the DVD in her hands. "Does anyone know how we can play it with that machine?" She asked pointing at the overhead projector. Two students rose their hands. "Okay, go ahead, settle everything while you three over there you pull the curtains." She told them as she handed them the DVD, grabbed her bag and walked to the back of the class.
A few minutes later, the movie was on, and all of the students were completely focused on the movie. Kate pulled out her cellphone she had put in her bag and bit down on her bottom lip as she noticed the many missed calls, and texts. All from Sam. The last one saying that Bobby had told him she had reached the Truman High, and asking her where she was. She sent him a text to tell him she was teaching in a classroom, and will meet him right when the class was over in a couple of hours.
"N'oubliez pas de faire votre devoir pour demain ! Et on regardera la fin du film au début du cours !" Kate said loudly as the students gathered their things and started to walk out. She checked her planning and saw that she had exactly an hour before her next class in the same room. She stood up quickly and rushed the last students to leave the room. "Come on, you've been in here for an hour. Don't you wanna leave this room as fast as possible?" She told them and they gave her strange gazes as they all got out. She closed the door and looked around before glancing at her phone in her hand. "Where the hell is he?" She mumbled as she looked up and tried to look through the students as they made their way to their next class. She tapped her thumb rhythmically on her phone as she looked at her left and right.
"You're waiting for someone, Miss Singer?" Mr Wyatt asked as he walked towards her.
"Hum, no," she lied and he arched an eyebrow.
"You're sure?"
"Yeah," she replied. "I'm just waiting for the bell to ring so I can have the whole hallways completely empty and I can visit the place peacefully, you know?" She smiled nervously.
"Well, I'm actually hoping this break will last longer because I have another class just after and it's with my most complicated students," he replied chuckling. "How was your first class here?"
"Good. Good, very good," she told him nodding her head when suddenly the bell rang.
"I suppose the Gods are on your side," he told her jokingly as he looked up while the bell was ringing.
"Looks like," she said smiling.
"See you later," he told her and she nodded frantically as he left to his classroom.
The hallway emptied very quickly and soon she was the only one standing there. She turned her head to the right when she heard some noise. She couldn't help the large smile that grew on her lips as her eyes fell on a tall man wearing a khaki janitor suit. She made quick steps towards him and he made big steps towards her too. He smiled back at her as they approached each aother.
"Has anyone told you that khaki brings out your eyes?" She asked him in a teasing tone making him chuckle. She leaned up and put her arms around his neck as he leaned down. She hugged him tightly and he let out a breath. He smiled against her hair before she pulled away but still kept her arms around his neck while his were around her waist. She looked up at him with a sincere grin. "It's so good to see you, Sammy."
"It's good to see you too, Katie," he said smiling, his cheeks a bit red. Kate pulled her arms away and stepped back making him let go of her too. "I gotta say the teacher style looks good on you."
"Thanks," she replied with a light smirk. "So, was it your idea or Bobby to give me his last name?"
"Actually, it was the only name I could think of when I made your file," he admitted before motioning her to walk with him.
"I'm surprised they had been lenient enough to let me get through without an ID though," she said as they started walking down the hallway.
"Oh right!" He exclaimed as he looked down at her. "Remind me to create your fake ID with your picture and stuff later," she gave him a simple nod. "Which motel are you staying at?"
"None," she replied as they turned left and walked down the staircase. "I didn't have time to find myself a motel to leave my duffle bag there, so I just put it at the reception."
"Good. You'll bunk with us, then."
"Same room?"
"Preferably. It will be easier to make sure you're safe. But you can have your own room if you rather, of course," he told her before grimacing as he remembered what he was supposed to tell her and his brother.
"What?"
"I forgot to tell you… I spent a couple of hours going through the whole school and there's no sulphur which means-"
"No demon!" She cut him off enthusiastically. He stopped and looked at her with rose eyebrows. "Because sulphur means demon," she told him with a smile that showed him how proud of knowing that, she was.
"Yeah," he nodded slowly as an amused smile grew on his lips. He pushed a door as they walked in another empty hallway.
"But, wait that also means there's no case," she said with frowned eyebrows.
"Exactly," he nodded his head.
"Does that mean I had to make a long trip for nothing?"
"Sorry," he told her with a little smile. She sighed and waved her hand.
"Oh nevermind! It gave me the opportunity to see you after so long," she said making him smile. "And now I can finally leave this terrible place."
"We still gotta tell Dean, and then we can leave."
"Today, you will have the honor of playing one of the greatest games ever invented. A game of skill, agility, cunning. A game with one simple rule... dodge," Dean said to the few students standing in line in front of him as he walked. He was dressed in a white shirt and tight red shorts, and had a red headband on his head. The outfit was ridiculous and he knew it, but he loved the whistle and how it gave him full power. He threw a ball with force into a student stomach and regretted immediately when the student groaned in pain. "Sorry."
"Uh, Substitute Coach Roth..." A student said.
"Yes?" He replied with a strong rough voice as he walked towards the boy.
"Ms. Boudreaux never let us play dodge ball."
"Well, Ms. B's in Massachusetts getting married, so we're playing," he replied as he kept holding in between his fingers the whistle that hung around his neck.
"She says it's dangerous," the student said and Dean decided to ignore it as he blew his whistle.
"Take a lap!"
"But-" The student said and Dean kept blowing the whistle which made the student run quickly. Dean looked in the back to see Sam walking in followed by a brown-head that he wasn't expecting at all. He threw the bag of balls to the class.
"Go nuts," he told them before making his way towards the two.
Dean couldn't stop his eyes from traveling up and down Kate's figure. His eyes then focused on her natural red lips that popped out from her soft white face. Dean was pretty sure she hadn't even any make up on her except from that thin black line on her eyelids. There was no denying, his memory hadn't given her justice at all. He used to remember her as an ordinary brunette with brown eyes and an extraordinary ability to make him feel better; but now he realized that she was really very pretty and it wasn't just the fact that she was dressed in such pretty clothes that hung at the right places. He couldn't help the little smile that appeared on his face as the sight of her sent a wave of softness and serenity that he had been waiting for ever since that night.
"Having fun?" Sam asked as Kate bit on her bottom lip very hard while she looked at Dean's outfit.
"The whistle makes me their god," he replied as he glanced at his brother before he looked at Kate. "So how are you doing, substitute Singer?" He asked her seductively making Sam roll his eyes. She shook with laughter as she tried not to burst out laughing.
"Those… Shorts… Oh my God…" She managed to let out in between breaths as she held her stomach. Dean glared at her.
"Nice shorts, indeed," Sam told him which made Dean look up at him with a glare too while Kate shook even more with laughter.
"And I was gonna say it's good to see you, Kaitlin," Dean sighed as he looked at her. She pressed her lips together and took a deep breath through her nostrils. Dean and Sam stared at her.
"It's good to see you too," she said as her lips started to curve into a smile and she suddenly bursted out laughing. "I'm so-sorry!" She turned around and took a deep breath before spinning around to face them with a stoic expression.
"You're done?" He asked her. She gave a nod, her lips pressed together as he turned his head towards Sam. "So, found anything?"
"I've been over the entire school twice. No sulfur," Sam replied.
"No sulfur, no demon. No demon, no case," Dean reasoned and Kate turned to Sam pointing at herself silently. He nodded with a little smile.
"But, I don't know, Dean. Maybe I was wrong," Sam replied as he turned his attention back to his brother.
"Well, it happens to the best of us. I say we hit the road, huh? But after lunch - it's sloppy-joe day," Dean said with a grin.
"Ohh!" One of the students shouted, Kate and Sam looked at the boy, and grimaced as he ran holding his nose.
"Good hustle, Colby! Walk it off," Dean shouted at the boy.
"Maybe one of us should walk him to the nurse's office?" Kate said looking back and forth at Dean and Sam. "Though, I have no idea where it is."
"I'll go," Sam said before quickly running after the boy. Kate turned her head back to Dean to find him staring at her.
"What?" She asked him.
"You look different," he told her and she rose her eyebrows.
"Do I?"
"Yeah."
"I suppose it's because we haven't seen each other for a month or so," she replied.
"Yeah," he just said and she stared at him before she glanced at the students behind him.
"I better go and let you play god with your whistle," she said with a smile as she turned around. He looked at her as she walked towards the door. He couldn't help but check her out a little bit. Damn that pencil skirt fitted her so well.
"Has anyone told you the teacher style looks really good on you?" Dean said making her turn around with a smile.
"Actually, yes," she told him and he smirked at her before he turned around ready to go back to his students when she made him spin around by calling him. "Hey Dean!"
"Yeah?"
"I missed you," she told him in a voice as soft as the smile that was on her face. He stared into her brown eyes not knowing what to say. She turned around and walked away, leaving him to stare at the door, a bit taken aback by what had just happened, but mostly puzzled and wistful.
"Mr Wyatt!" Kate said as she rushed to the tall man who was talking with two students. He looked at her as she approached him.
"If you need to talk, Lindsay or even you Marie, you know where to find me," he said to the girls who nodded before leaving. Kate looked at them before looking up at the man. "Miss Singer. I assume you learned the bad news seeing your expression?"
"Yes, Mr Opkins told me a student put another student's hand in a spinning Cuisinart," she told him shaking her head. "That's just horrible."
"Yeah," Mr Wyatt said and Kate could see the hurt on his face. "There's a reunion all the teachers are supposed to go, even the substitutes. We better go, now." Kate nodded at him and followed him. "It must be hard for you to start in a school in which two tragedies happened in such a short time."
"Yeah," she said thoughtfully before looking up at him. "I heard about the girl who was drowned by another. Did you know them?"
"April was a student of mine, yes," he replied. "She was a very good student with so much potential… She was a bit reserved and well, you know, high school can be really tough for reserved kids," she glanced at him as they arrived near the classroom where the reunion was supposed to take place. "But, I would have never thought she would go as far as killing someone… I suppose it was all the accumulation of too much pressure and maybe some background problems."
"I suppose we all have our own demons," Kate said in a little voice as she reminisced her high school years. Years of trying to fit in, years of enduring stupid bullies, years of struggling with an anxiety that had made her more and more reserved. Years of praying it would all end and she would get as far away from that place as possible.
"I've heard that her mother has been trying to give the full keep to her father for years now, but her father doesn't wanna get her either so he completely moved out of town," a tall skinny blonde said as she leaned against the sink.
"No way!" Another blonde with a pitchy voice exclaimed as she put on her pink lip-gloss, her eyes glued to the mirror.
"No doubt they all want to leave her, she's a real freak!" A brunette adjusting her cleavage said next to them.
"Did you see her yesterday at the gym class? She went all crazy and pretended to be sick so she could go to the nurse. I heard she did because she's scared of being around people." The brunette said.
"Oh yeah! I heard about that phobia last week! I can't remember what it's called though…" The skinny blonde replied.
"The Kate-phobia," the blonde applying her lip-gloss said making them all laugh.
"Maybe it would make a better nickname than Fatty Katie," the brunette said.
"Oh no… I like Fatty Katie, it's just as pathetic as her," the blonde said when suddenly the bell rang. "Oh shit! Let's go, I don't want Mrs Patterson to give me another detention because I'm late!"
In a toilet cabinet, the teenage Kate was standing on the toilet, tears streaming down her face as she tried to stay as quiet as possible. When the bell finished ringing and she was sure no one was left in the bathroom, she sat down on the toilet and breathed heavily through her sobs.
"How's the nonviolence assembly going?" Sam asked as Dean and Kate made their way towards him in the deserted hallway.
"Apparently, shoving a kid's arm into a Cuisinart is not a 'healthy display of anger.' So, the kid had ectoplasm leaking out his ear," Dean replied.
"Which only comes from a seriously pissed-off spirit, right?" Kate said making the brothers nod at her.
"It means that it's got to be ghost possession," Sam said.
"Yeah, but that's pretty rare," Dean told them.
"Yeah, but it happens. I mean, they get angry enough, they can take control of a person's body," Sam explained.
"Does that mean we've got an actual ghost in here?" Kate asked with wide eyes. "Like Casper is here wandering around?"
"Wandering around and killing people," Dean said as he looked at her. "I suppose Casper rebelled."
"Yeah, but there's no EMF," Sam said as he looked back and forth at them. "Maybe we could find out who it is, at least. You know, check and see if somebody died bloody around here or something."
"Way ahead of you. I had to break into the principal's office to get this-" Dean started.
"So that's why you were late to the reunion?" Kate cut him off.
"Yeah," he replied before looking up at his brother with a smirk. "FYI, three of the cheerleaders are legal. Guess which ones."
"No," Sam and Kate said in sync as they gave Dean a stern look. He gave a slight pout before he unfolded a paper that he took from his pocket.
"So, there was only one death on campus. It was a suicide back in '98," Dean told them as Kate looked away and crossed her arms over her chest. "Some kid named Barry Cook. What?" Kate looked up at Sam as he sighed.
"I knew him. How did he die?"
"He slit his wrists in the first-floor girls' bathroom," Dean replied.
"That's where-" Sam started.
"Right where the chick got swirleyed to death, exactly," Dean finished for him. "So, what? This ghost is possessing nerds?"
"And using them to go after bullies, yeah," Sam said before he noticed Kate's expression was distant. "You're okay, Katie?" She looked up at him and nodded, but her face remained a bit distant.
"Well, does that sound like Barry's M.O.?" Dean asked his brother.
"Barry had a hard time," Sam replied softly before looking at Kate again and frowning his eyebrows as he realized something bothered her. "Katie-" He started.
"I better go back to the reunion or they'll think the two substitutes are banging," she told them quickly before turning around and walking away.
"That's weird," Sam whispered as the two brothers watched her go.
"Yeah, who says banging nowadays?" Dean said frowning his eyebrows as he looked at his little brother. Sam looked at him and sighed.
"That's not what I meant," Sam told him as Kate had turned in a hallway and was completely out of sight. "Besides you used that expression three days ago."
Dean parked his car across the graveyard and turned around in his front seat to look at Kate sitting on the backseat.
"You're sure you don't want us to drop you off at the motel while we take care of this?" He asked her as he looked at her with concern. He wasn't very fond of the idea of Kate having to watch them burn and salt a corpse. He hadn't been very willing for her to even join them on that case but Sam had convinced him that having Kate would make them cover more territory, and Bobby had accepted saying it would be good for her to get out of his house. He had warned Dean not to let her face any danger, though. She was there to help them find what was there, to research more and to wait for them as they solved the case.
"Yeah," she told him as she looked at him before glancing at the rearview mirror to meet Sam's gaze there. "I want to come."
"Alright," Dean sighed. "Let's go, then." He walked out of the car and walked to the hood. Kate and Sam approached him as he pulled out two shovels and pickaxe. Sam grabbed a bag as Kate took a shovel from Dean. He looked at her and didn't say a word as he handed her a flashlight. They finished taking all that they needed and started walking to the graveyard. Kate switched on her flashlight and so did Sam.
"So, Kaitlin," Dean started as they walked in the graveyard towards Barry's grave that Sam had found the exact location earlier. "What have you been doing at Bobby's all that time?"
"Bobby hasn't told you anything?" She asked him.
"Not really," he replied as Sam was ahead of them listening to them while showing the way. "He just said you helped him with some research once in a while."
"Yeah, well there's that and other stuff," she replied and he glanced at her.
"Other stuff?" He asked her.
"Yeah," she said shrugging and he looked up and down at the young woman in her dark green almost khaki parka coat covering her from shoulders to her mid-thighs. He couldn't help linger a bit on her legs, they seemed even longer with her high heels and he liked that.
"Did you find answers for your ticket back home?" Dean asked her as his gaze went back up to her face.
"No, not really," she replied as Sam stopped walking and looked down at a grave. "Barry's grave?" He nodded at her.
She approached him and put her hand gently on his forearm, squeezing it gently as she looked up at him, hoping he will feel the comfort she wanted to give him with this simple gesture. He looked down at her and gave her a little smile. Dean stared at them for a moment, the easiness between them was more than obvious, but he didn't really want to keep on seeing that right now.
"We should get started before Casper decides to show up," he said making them both nod as they stepped back.
"Dean, let me just go get you that bottle of water," Kate said as she looked down at Sam and Dean who were almost done digging. The hole was pretty big and it had taken some time to make it. Of course, they both forbad her to help her the slightest and she had called them macho men who thought she wasn't strong enough. Sam explained her that she wasn't even dressed to climb down in the hole and dig in the dirt, and that Bobby would kick their ass if he found out they made her do the dirty work.
"I'm okay," Dean replied as he kept digging.
"You've been complaining that you're thirsty for the last fifteen minutes, Dean," she told him as she stood right above the hole, her hands in her pockets. "Come on, I can walk to the car and get you water!"
"You don't go anywhere. You just stay under our watch," he replied pointing at her as she rolled her eyes. Right then, Sam pushed his shovel down only to find out that they had reached the coffin. He bent down and Dean looked at him. "We're done digging?"
"Yeah," Sam said as he pushed away a bit of the dirt and stepped back to pull open the upper part of the coffin. He turned his head and looked at Kate. "Katie, you can still look away if you want."
"No, I'm okay," she replied as she licked her lips before biting them together while Dean climbed out of the hole. Kate took a step back as he stood next to her. He looked at her and asked her if she was sure as he wiped the sweat away from his face. She nodded, her eyes glued to the coffin.
"Alright," Sam said as he opened the coffin and Kate's eyes widen a bit at what she saw. Sam sighed as he looked down at what was left of one of his rare childhood friends.
"You're alright, Kaitlin?" Dean asked as he watched her face. She turned her head to look at him and was a bit surprised to see that he was actually very close to her. She looked up at his face which she could see very well under the moonlight. And, for a second she was entirely mesmerized by the traits of his whole face, and the way his green eyes sparkled.
"You've got some… Dirt," She said pointing at his forehead. He brought his hand up wiping the left side of it. "Here," she told him as she pulled out a tissue from her pockets, and brought her hand up to wipe it away gently. He looked at her eyes as they focused on what she was doing before her gaze met his as she pulled her hand away. "You're good." He nodded, and turned his attention back to his little brother.
After they had salted and burned the corpse, they were driving back to the motel. Kate was as quiet as Sam, and Dean thought it was normal since it was the first time she saw the process of salt and burn. However, he couldn't help feel a bit concerned by his little brother sitting on the seat next to his.
"You all right?" He asked him and Kate turned her head towards the two brothers.
"Barry was my friend. I just burned his bones," Sam replied and Kate felt bad when she heard Sam's voice filled with sadness.
"Well, he's at peace now, Sam," Dean told him trying to make him feel better.
"I mean, if Dad had let us stay just a little while longer, maybe I could have helped the kid, you know?"
"You read the coroner's report same as me," Dean replied. "Barry was on every anxiety drug and antidepressant known to man. School was hell for that kid. His parents had split up. He just wanted out. It was tragic, but it's not your fault… To tell you the truth, I'm glad we got out of that town. I hated that school."" Dean told Sam as Kate leaned against the window and closed her eyes while other memories came back in her mind.
"Oh look at that!"
"Ashley, give it back to me," the teenage brown-head said as she pulled her hand out.
"Are you ordering me, Fatty-Katie?" The blonde said as she held a little black box in her hand, while the other was on her hips. "Anyways!" She exclaimed as she quickly stood on one of the chairs in the lunchroom. Everybody looked up at her. "Listen up everybody!"
"Ashley…" The teenage version of Kate started as the slim blonde just ignored her.
"Did anyone know that Fatty-Katie took drugs? Not any drugs! Antidepressant drugs!" Everyone's eyes turned to look at Kate. Ashley looked down at Kate. "You're such a freak that you need drugs to make you feel normal? How pathetic that is! I understand now why you've got no friends, you fat freak!" Some students started to laugh and Kate closed her eyes as she tried to calm herself down. She had only started taking those drugs a few days ago, hoping it would help her manage her anxiety, and she had forgotten to leave them at her house. Suddenly, as the laughs around her seemed to get louder, Kate felt a wave of anger go through her.
"Give it back to me right now, Ashley," Kate told her with a strong voice as she looked up at the girl with a glare.
"What? You're gonna make a panic attack or something like that, right now?" The blonde said laughing. Kate felt her heart beating harder against her chest as she heard the sound of her heartbeats in her ears. All of sudden, Kate threw herself at Ashley making the girl fall down, yelping. Ashley's friends didn't lose time to grab Kate apart. Three of them kicked her again and again on the floor as everybody else just watched. She grabbed a girl's ankle and pulled at it, making her fall before she sent a kick up on another girl as the third one just pulled at Kate's hair. Ashley looked at Kate with hatred as the young brown-head managed to hit the girl pulling at her hair. Suddenly, two teachers approached them.
"Stop it, right now!" A rather old-man said as they separated the girls. "I want you five in the principal's office, now!"
Once they parked in the motel parking, the three of them got out of the car walking towards the rooms door when Dean stopped abruptly. He looked at Kate before he left saying he was coming back in a few minutes. Kate followed Sam to their room in silence and once they were in, she noticed how very little the room was and how it looked even dirtier than the previous one she had stayed in with them. She noticed the lack of a couch and realized she would certainly have to share a bed with one of them.
"Katie, can I ask you a question?" Sam said making her spin around to face him.
"Shoot," she replied.
"Why did you sound so relieved to leave this place?" He asked her.
"What?"
"You know, when I told you earlier there might not have any case here, you said you said something like you could finally leave this terrible place," he told her.
"Oh, yeah," she said nodding her head as he kept staring at her. "I just don't have really good memories of high school, you know?" He felt like she was avoiding telling him more.
"Wanna talk about it?" He asked her gently and she looked at him hesitantly. Suddenly the door opened and Dean walked in, throwing something at her. She caught it easily and looked down to find it was a key.
"Got your own room this time," he told her as he shrugged his jacked off. "Thought it'd give you more privacy."
"Thanks," she just said as she walked towards the door with Sam's gaze following her. Dean grabbed his duffle bag and followed her. She stopped at the door and looked at him with a questioning expression.
"I'm just gonna help you secure the room with salt," he told her.
"Just give me the salt, I'll do it on my own," she told him as she pulled her hand out. "I'm sure I'm capable of drawing salt lines at every exits."
The next day, Kate had joined the boys in the parking lot with her duffle bag and her back bag pretty early. She had put on a dark denim pants, the same pair of boots than the previous day, and a white long-sleeved tee-shirt and of course the parka coat on it. Kate had asked them if they could have lunch before leaving and the brothers had accepted, feeling very hungry themselves since all they had for dinner the night before was some triangle sandwiches. Later, Sam had asked Dean to drive them to the high school before leaving town. Dean had said it was better to leave immediately without saying any goodbyes but Sam had insisted telling him he needed to see a teacher who used to be his teacher back when they were young.
"Really? We came back here so you could talk to a teacher?" Dean asked him.
"He's a good guy," Sam replied.
"Which teacher you wanna see, Sam?" Kate asked from the backseat.
"Mr Wyatt, my former English teacher," he told her as he glanced at her through the rearview mirror.
"Oh, yeah. He's a really great guy," Kate said nodding her head. Dean looked at her through the rearview mirror.
"Is that the guy who kept whispering to you during the nonviolence reunion?" He asked her.
"He talked to me just twice during the reunion, and it was to explain to me a few things," she replied rolling her eyes. "But, yeah that's him."
"He was a very good teacher, and one of the few that showed true concern to his students," Sam explained.
"Well, whatever," Dean said. "Go have your Robin Williams "O captain! My captain!" moment. Just make it quick."
"I'm going too," Kate said and Dean looked in the rearview mirror again. "I wanna tell him goodbye." She said in almost a whisper as she kept touching the toy soldier stuck in the rear door ashtray that Sam had told her, he had stuck there when he was kid.
Sam and Kate were walking down the deserted hallway in silence, both of them deep in thought. Sam ran his hand though his hair as Kate looked up at him and remembered the few things he had told her about his childhood. How crappy it was because of their father's way to raise them.
"Excuse me, can you tell me how to find room 305?" A young girl asked making Sam and Kate turn around.
"Sure," Sam replied with a polite smile. "Hum... head down the hall, take your first right, and it's the third door on the left."
"Thanks, Sam," she said making Kate and Sam look at the girl with big eyes. The girl took out knife from her pocket and threw herself at Sam as she tried to stab him with it.
"You got tall, Winchester," the girl said before kicking Sam in the face making him fall to the ground. Kate went in between them, preventing the girl from reaching Sam. "Get out of the way."
"I don't think so," Kate replied and the girl kicked Kate in the stomach before grabbing her arms and throwing her away. Kate landed on the lockers a few feet away, groaning in pain. She saw the woman approaching Sam who quickly grabbed her and put his palm on her mouth. Kate tried to stand up as she stared at the girl who started to shake violently. Suddenly, Kate witnessed something even more astonishing. It seemed like the ghost was ripped from the girl's body and it flew out the door. The girl collapsed and Sam sat down holding her. He looked up at Kate who was holding her stomach in slight pain.
"You're alright?" He asked her and she nodded as she stared at him breathing heavily.
"How did you do that?" She asked him.
"Salt," he told her as he showed her his hand in which there was still a bit of salt. She glanced at the girl and then at Sam.
"No wonder you went to Stanford, you're a real smart," she told him making him let out a light snicker.
Sam and Kate were in the back of a school bus with an EMF meter while Dean was up front, searching for some clue of the ghost. They had figured out that all the students who had been possessed by the ghost, were taking the same bus to go to school. So here they were, going through the whole bus.
"Definitely not clean," Sam said.
"Here, ghosty, ghosty, ghosty! Come out, come out, wherever you are!" Dean said making Kate look at him.
"You're really think it will get him out of his hiding place?" Kate told him.
"You never know," he replied shrugging as she shook her head with a little amused smile.
"Man, I don't get it. No one ever died on this bus, and it's not like there's a body hidden in here," Sam said as he looked at his brother with a confused expression.
"Yeah, but doesn't a flap of skin or a hair can tie the ghost to this place?" Kate asked.
"Actually yeah! I mean, hell, a hangnail could be tying the ghost to this place. We just gotta find it," Dean replied as Kate decided to join Dean who was looking through some papers at the front of the bus.
"Got a new driving permit. Issued two weeks ago," he said glancing at the brunette as she stood next to him, trying to look at the papers in his hands.
"Just before the first attack," Sam said as Dean stared at Kate's hair. He hadn't noticed that her dark brown hair had lighter strands. He liked it.
"Yeah," Kate said as she leaned more and read what was written. "Name of the bus driver is Dirk McGregor Sr., 39… 39 North Central Avenue."
"McGregor?" Sam asked making Kate turn her head at him which made Dean turn his attention to his brother as well.
"Yeah. Why?" She asked him.
"I knew his son," Sam replied.
"Did you know everybody at this school?" Dean asked, when all of sudden someone tapped on the bus door. They all turned to see a middle-aged man. "Hum hello coach!"
"Hello," the man replied to Dean as he looked at Kate and then at Sam in the back of the bus. "Everything's okay here?"
"Yeah, yeah," Dean nodded his head. "We were just trying to find some hum necklace! A student lost a necklace here so we're looking for it!"
"Alright," the man replied not seeming really convinced as Sam, Dean and Kate gave him fake grin. "Anyway, Miss Singer, may I have a little chat with you?"
"Sure," she said as she took a few steps before seeing the EMF meter in her hands and shoving it to Dean before walking out of the bus while the brothers looked at each other and shrugged.
"So, you were friends with Dirk?" Mr Mcgregor said as Sam, Dean and Kate were standing in his living room.
"Yes, sir, in high school," Sam replied.
"I don't recall Dirk having many friends at Truman. Here, sit. Sit down." Dean sat down on the little couch and Kate sat down next to him, before Sam joined them. She moved closer to Dean, trying to give as much room as possible for the giant Sam. Dean looked at her as she glanced at him murmuring a sorry.
"When did, uh - when did Dirk pass?" Dean asked as he turned his attention back to the man sitting across from them.
"He was 18."
"What happened to him?" Sam asked in a gentle tone.
"Well, there was, first, drinking, then drugs, and then too many drugs. And then he just slipped through my fingers. It was my fault. I should have seen it coming, you know? Dirk, he, uh - he had his troubles," Mr Mcgregor told them.
"What kind of troubles?" Dean asked.
"School was never easy for Dirk. We didn't have much money, and, well, you know, kids - they can be cruel. They picked on him," Mr Mcgregor replied and Kate frowned a bit remembering Sam telling her that Dirk was picking on people, not the other way around.
"They picked on him?" She asked hesitantly.
"They called him poor and dirty and stupid. They even had a nickname for him," Mr Mcgregor said as he tried to recall the name. "Dirk the jerk. And after what happened to his mother, he…"
"His mother?" Sam asked confused.
"Yeah, Jane, my wife. She died when Dirk was thirteen. Cancer," Mr Mcgregor replied and the three of them felt a bit for the old man. However, Sam was the one who reacted worse, guilt rising in him. The more Mr Mcgregor talked, the more Sam felt shitty. He had no idea what Dirk was going through back then. "I was working three jobs, so it fell to Dirk to take care of her. And he was a great kid. He made sure Jane got her medicine. He helped her, cleaned up after her. But, you know, you - you watch somebody die slow, waste away to nothing... it does things to a person. Horrible things."
"We didn't know about his mother… I'm truly sorry," Kate told the old man with a soft gaze. He nodded at her with a gentle yet sad smile.
"He - he wouldn't talk about her, not even to me," he shook his head. "Lot of anger in that boy." Kate looked down, nodding her head slowly.
"I'm sorry," Sam said to the man and Kate glanced at him, as his whole face showed real regrets.
"Well, we'd really like to pay our respects, Mr. McGregor," Dean said. "Um, you mind telling us where Dirk is buried?"
"Oh, he wasn't. I had him cremated."
"All of him?" Kate asked surprised. If she had done well when studying the supernatural creatures of that universe, a ghost completely burned could never come back except if some part of him, even the tiniest, was still intact.
"Well, I kept a lock of his hair,"Mr McGregor replied as he looked at her.
"Oh, that's - that's nice. Where do you keep that?" Dean asked.
"On my bus, in my Bible," the man replied a bit confused.
"You just destroyed your whole future, Kate! This is a mark on your high school file that will close every single doors ahead of you! And, can you imagine what I will have to say to Mrs Thompson? How do I tell my boss that I'm sorry my daughter attacked your daughter? Huh?"
"She started it, mom!"
"I don't care who started it! You could have just suck it up and walk away!"
"Don't you see it mom? I've been sucking it up for years now! I've let them all make fun of me, humiliate me and I never complained once to anyone!" She shouted back at her mother as they stood in her high school hallway.
"I've made you take karate classes so you could take off all kind of stress out there! If I knew you would take it all on those girls, I wouldn't have paid so much!" Her mother shouted ignoring what she had just told her. Kate shook her head and turned around ready to walk away. "Don't you dare turn your back on me, young lady! We still gotta talk about how you managed to get those drugs! Come back here, right now!"
Kate kept walking away, she pushed a door and made her outside the building. She turned left, knowing her mother would go to the right where the parking lot was. She kept walking and stopped in track when she heard the nickname she hated so much.
"Fatty Katie," Kate turned around to see the four girls she had fought with during lunchtime. "I heard you received a sanction of three days off school. Well, we," Ashley said as she opened her arms motioning to her friends. "We had the same. But, you know what my mother said too? No going out for a whole month and I can say goodbye to my new car I've been dying to have." Kate just stared at her as they started to walk towards her. "You know what that means?"
"You're gonna have to take the bus to school like most of us?" Kate replied sarcastically. Ashley snorted.
"That means," she said as they stopped walking. "I'm gonna make your last years here a real Hell."
Tired, Kate yawned for the second time, as she was sitting next to the middle-aged coach by her side, in the school bus. It was already dark outside since night had fallen a few hours ago and she had just returned from a high school basketball match. She had wanted to stay with the brothers tonight but Dean had been categorical. She would not go to Truman High with them as they would take Dirk's lock of hair and burn it just in case the ghost would show up again. He had told her to just go back to her motel room and wait for their return but she had told him that she couldn't anyway because the coach who had caught the three of them in the bus had asked her if she could assist the basketball match. He had told her that at least half of the students in the basketball team were taking her French classes. He had told her it would be great for her to show them she was interested in their activities. Not really knowing how to say no to someone so insisting, Kate had unwillingly accepted. So, here she was listening to that man going over and over again about all the previous matches his team won in the noisy bus full of rather excited students.
"Where would we be without Eddie, huh?" He told her chuckling and she nodded at him with a plastered smile. "Thanks for subbing tonight, Eddie!"
"My pleasure, Coach," Kate heard Eddie reply as she looked outside through the window. Suddenly, she noticed that the bus was kind of going really fast. She frowned and looked up at the back of Eddie's seat.
"Hum, Eddie, you want to ease up on the pedal, there?" She told him as the coach next to her agreed.
"Yeah, we're not in a rush, you know?" He said laughing.
"I got it all under control," Eddie replied as Kate stood up from her seat, worried a little bit.
All of sudden, the bus swerved and she gripped on the seats as the bus came to a violent stop.
"What the hell was that?" A student shouted. Kate looked around at everybody.
"Everyone alright?" She asked loudly only to have a few scoffs and some comments along 'yeah, almost dead!' and other things that just made it clear they were all okay.
The brunette turned her head to the driver as he opened the bus door and stepped out of the bus.
"What the hell?" The coach said as he looked at Kate who stared at the students on the left side of the bus, staring through their windows. When suddenly they heard the sound of a gunload which made her slightly jump and blink while the students screamed. She looked at the coach and motioned him to move so she could pass. He took his whole time to move and impatient, Kate started to push him away, right when Dean entered the bus.
"Dean!" She said as his eyes fell on her.
"What are you doing here?"
"I told you I had a match to go to," she told him.
"You didn't say you'd be in this bus!"
"There was a last-minute change," she replied as she walked to him.
"All right, everybody stay where you are," he said to everyone before looking at Kate. "Except you Miss Singer, of course."
"Aren't you the P.E. Teacher?" Someone said in the bus.
"Not really. I'm like "21 Jump Street." The bus driver sells pot," Dean replied as he glanced at Kate by his side. "And Miss Singer is my sexy colleague, yeah." Kate rose her eyebrows at the way he introduced her, and stared at him. He looked at her and gave her a little smile along with a shrug of his shoulders. She shook her head as he turned around and bent down.
"So, the lock of hair is on this bus?" She asked him in a whisper. He nodded and she quickly joined him in the research of the Bible containing that hair lock. Kate found the Bible, she opened it and started to shake it in order to make the lock of hair drop but there was absolutely nothing. Dean looked at her before going to the bus door.
"It's not here!" He shouted to Sam.
"Where is it?" Sam snarled as he pointed a gun at Eddie who was possessed by Dirk.
"Nowhere you'll ever find it," he replied making Sam push the shotgun against him.
"Where is it?!" Sam shouted at him.
"Sam Winchester. Still a bully. You, you jocks... you popular kids... you always thought you were better than everybody else. And to you, I was just Dirk the jerk, right? Now you evil sons of bitches are gonna get what's coming to you," Dirk said as Kate was now standing next to Dean outside the bus.
"I'm not evil, Dirk. I'm not. And neither were you. Trust me. I've seen real evil. We were scared and miserable, and we took it out on each other - us and everybody else," Sam told him. "That's high school. But you suffer through that, and it gets better. I'm just sorry you didn't get a chance to see that... you or Barry." Kate felt as if those words were said to her. She stared at Sam and realized how true his words were.
"Nothing is gonna get better for me. Not ever," Dirk replied before he suddenly broke out of the rope. Sam fired salt at him which made the whole bus scream again. What was certainly the spirit of Dirk, just flew back to the bus before entering inside a student that was on the bus. The possessed student walked out pushing Kate and Dean out of his way as he marched towards Sam and attacked him from behind. When he started beating Sam up, Kate grabbed the shotgun on the ground and tried to focus on the student before firing at his shoulder and missing him completely.
"Dean! Kate! Find the hair!" Sam shouted as Kate dropped the gun on the ground, and started looking through the pocket of the unconscious Eddie, for the lock of hair. Dean pulled Eddie's shoe off as she kept looking through his pants pockets.
Dean found the lock of hair, showing it to Kate who turned her head to Sam as Dean took out his lighter, and set it on fire. Dirk screamed as he flew out of the student body. Dean leaned his back against the bus as he stared at the brunette who was looking at his brother. Suddenly, the student fell on Sam who called out from under the student.
"Little help?" Kate chuckled as she looked at him, Dean glanced at Sam and made a funny face.
"He's giving you the full cowgirl," he said making Kate glance at him, laughing fully as she met his eyes. When she turned her attention back to Sam, still laughing at him, Dean couldn't help the soft smile that formed on his lips while staring at her.
Knock, knock.
Mr Wyatt looked up from the papers he was grading at his desk in his classroom. Kate stood at the doorway, wearing a simple pair of denim pants, a beige long-sleeve tee-shirt and her flat converse shoes. She had put her hair up in a ponytail, only a few strands falling around her face.
"Miss Singer. Please come on in," he told her with a smile as he put his pen down and took his glasses off. She slowly walked in as he stood up from his chair.
"I'm here to say goodbye," she said softly.
"Oh yeah, I heard Mrs Owens is coming back from her sickness leave, and you are actually a cop under cover looking for some sort of drug traffic in this high school," he told her as she realized the lie the Winchesters had given for the people in the bus had already reached everyone's ears pretty quickly. "That's a shame, you would have made a really good teacher," she gave him an attempted smile.
"I just wanted to say… I wish I had a teacher like you back when I was in High School," she told him as she looked into his eyes.
"Thank you, I'm touched," he said with a kind smile. He scanned her face for a few seconds. "Was it that hard? Your high school experience?" She was taken aback as she stared at him.
"Pretty much," she just said nodding her head.
"But, I guess it all turned out better after then? You obviously became an intelligent young woman who overcame all of that."
"I suppose I… I suffered through that and it got better," she replied remembering what Sam had said the previous night to Dirk.
"It's what I try to make my students understand," he told her as he nodded. "It's hard to see a light at the end of the tunnel, but there really is a light. Whether it's in school or in life in genral. Sometimes, we're just the ones looking on the wrong way or even keeping our eyes closed. But once we change that, we can get out of there. We just need to put ourselves out a bit more everyday until we reach that light at the end of the tunnel," he said gently and she looked at him with tears forming in her eyes before she noticed him glance at the doorway. Sam was standing there.
"I better go," she replied avoiding Sam's gaze as she looked at Mr Wyatt. "Thank you again. I wish you the best."
"Back at you." He gave her a gentle smile as she walked to the doorway passing Sam whose eyes were glued to her. Once she stepped in the hallway, she met Dean there. He was staring at her in a way that was clear for her. He had heard her conversation with Mr. Wyatt just as his little brother.
"I thought you were gonna wait in the car," she said as she walked down the hallway, followed by him.
"Sammy wanted to see his teacher," he told her as she kept walking. "Kaitlin, wait!"
"I don't wanna talk about anything, Dean," she replied.
"Kaitlin, I heard you and I-"
"Dean, drop it!" She said turning around to look at him. "You had absolutely no right to listen to my private conversation with Mr. Wyatt!"
"Oh and you had every right to listen to my private conversation with my brother!" He said as loudly as her, referring to when he confessed about Hell to his brother more than a month ago.
"Because I acted as a fucking snoop doesn't give you the right to do the same," she told him as she stared at him with anger.
"You know what? Let's pretend none of this happened," he told her as he made an invisible line with his hands before walking ahead of her towards the exit door.
Dean grabbed his bottle of cheap but strong whiskey on the floor as he was sitting on his bed. Sam had fallen asleep on the bed right next to his, almost an hour ago. Dean glanced at him before he stared at the bottle in his hands as he unscrewed it in the darkness of the room. He brought it to his lips and stopped as he remembered the brown-head who had taken it from him that night. He put it down as he let out a long exhale and stood up from his bed, rubbing a hand down his face. He couldn't stop seeing her face as she shouted at him in the hallway this afternoon. Her eyes were filled with tears and she hadn't wanted anyone to talk to neither him nor his brother when they were in the Impala. Sensing the tension in the air and knowing why it was there, Sam had suggested they would stay one last night at the same motel before hitting the road the next morning. It wasn't a bad idea, because truthfully Dean wasn't sure he could drive hours in a car with a tension as thick as the one that appeared this afternoon.
The dirty-blond man walked to the end of his bed, took his boots and put them on before leaving the room. He was hit by the coldness quickly as he stood there in a simple white tee-shirt and a pair of jogging pants. He walked to his left, passing three rooms and stopped. He looked at the door of her room. He assumed she was asleep by now, but still, he knocked on her door. Lightly enough so if she was truly asleep she wouldn't open the door. He waited for a few seconds, and then shook his head as he started to walk away, realizing how stupid his idea was. The sound of the door unlocking and opening made him stop and spin around.
Her snow white face surrounded by a wild curly mess of her hair, appeared in front of his eyes. He glanced down noticing that she was wearing a simple grey tank top and a pair of shorts that seemed familiar. When his green eyes met her brown eyes, he was sure she hadn't slept at all.
"You shouldn't open without asking who's at the door," was the only thing he found to tell her as she stood in the doorway.
"I saw you in the peerhole," she replied and he nodded. "What are you doing here, Dean?"
"I…," he started but frowned as he realized he had veritably no idea what he wanted to tell her. "I just…" Kate pushed the door open and motioned to him to come on in. He let out a sigh as he walked in. She closed and locked the door before turning around to find him staring at his feet in the middle of the room. "Kaitlin, I wanted to apologize for earlier…" She stared at him. "I should be the first one to understand when someone doesn't wanna open up about some stuff," he looked up and immediately met her eyes. "I just really wanted to help…"
"I know the feeling," she replied in a little voice as she gave him a little smirk. He let out a light chuckle, nodding his head as he glanced at her bed. Two books were open on the nightstand, and what seemed to be a journal was there too.
"Couldn't sleep either?" He said nodding his head at the nightstand.
"Not really," she admitted and he looked down at the shorts she was wearing. He frowned as he realized why they looked so familiar.
"Those shorts are mine, right?"
"Hum, yeah," she replied as she looked down at the shorts. "They're pretty comfortable... Dean, I…" He looked up at her face as she stopped. She took a deep breath and looked up at the ceiling before looking right back in his eyes. "I've had a pretty hard time in high school," she said as he looked at her attentively. "And I'm aware that it's far less hard than what you had to go through your whole life, but…"
"Hey," Dean whispered as he approached her slowly. "You don't have to talk if you don't want to…" He looked down at her as she looked up at him. "I just wanted you to know that… You're not alone, Kaitlin."
"Will you…" She started before she bit her lips together and shook her head.
"What?"
"No, nothing," she said shaking her head again.
"Kaitlin, tell me," he told her as he fixed her face.
"Will you stay with me?" She breathed out "Until I fall asleep?"
"Sure," he told her as he walked to the little chair in the closest corner of the room and Kate stared at him confused. He sat down and bit on her bottom lip.
"I meant… If you could sleep with me?"
"Sleep… You want to sleep-" He stuttered as he stared at her surprised. Kate realized he had misunderstood her.
"No! No, no, no. I mean sleeping sleeping. The calm and innocent version of sleeping."
"Oh, yeah. I got it," he nodded as he stood up nodding his head.
"Alright," Kate said awkwardly as she stared at him before she turned around and walked to her bed. She pulled the blankets down and slid in. Dean stared at her and took a deep breath as he walked towards her. He pulled his feet out of his boots and glanced at her as he saw her closing the books and the notebook put on the nightstand. He rearranged the second pillow that was next to hers, patted a few times before he felt her stare at him. He slowly slid under the blankets and laid on his back. Kate laid on her back, her head turned to watch him as his whole body was rigid while he was staring up at the ceiling. "You know, Dean, if you don't feel comfortable-"
"What?" He cut her off before giving an obviously fake scoff. "I'm good-I'm fine. Very comfortable, yeah."
"You don't really give me that impression," she told him before sitting up. "Look, this was a real bad idea. I have no idea how I even dared asking you to stay in my bed until I fall asleep," she shook her head.
"No, no," Dean said as he sat up. "It's just that I'm not used to all those kind of things… I got it that you wanted me to hold you in my arms like you did with me that night," he said and she looked at him. "But I-I've never really done this kinda things, you know? I mean the first and last time I ever spent a whole night holding a woman in my arms with no sexy actions was with you…"
"What about you don't hold me in your arms?" She suggested and he frowned. "You could just be here until I fall asleep."
Sam opened his eyes and rolled around in his bed, only to find the other bed empty. He frowned and realized that Dean had certainly gone out to find a bar or some girl to hook up with. He yawned and stretched in his bed before he grabbed his cellphone and realized he had only been sleeping for three hours. He rubbed his eyes and was going to put his cellphone back on the nightstand before he changed his mind. He scrolled through the names, and stared at hers. He wanted to call her because he was used to talk to her when Dean wasn't around. He knew it was stupid since she was staying just a few rooms away, but he wouldn't dare going to her room at this time of the night. He wanted to hear her voice and he needed to know what was wrong with her. He needed to know what made her have that kind of conversation with Mr. Wyatt. He was very concerned about what might have happened to her in her past that she hadn't told him. He took a deep breath and phoned her. If she wanted to talk, she would answer the call, otherwise he'll just see her tomorrow morning.
One ring. Two. Three. Four. It went to the automatic voicemail making him sigh as he put his phone down and looked up at the ceiling remembering how he had Ruby to kill the demon who had seen her soul back at Bobby's weeks ago. He sat up and took his phone as he dialed another number.
"My dear little Sammy, you missed me?"
"Ruby, can you meet me in twenty minutes?" He said before he gulped. "I need it."
"For you, I'll make it to your place in ten minutes," he could hear the smirk through the phone before he hung up.
"Okay, so favourite dessert then?" Kate asked Dean as they were laid to their sides so they could face each other in her bed. They left a good space between them making it impossible for them to even brush the other. It made things immediately less uncomfortable. And then, Kate had started asking questions him that had absolutely nothing to do with his hunting job. They had been talking and getting to know each other more, for more than two hours now.
"Pie," he replied with a smirk.
"What about chocolate charlotte?" She told him and he frowned his eyebrows.
"What the fuck is that thing? Anyways, nothing's better than pie."
"It's true that pie is pretty delicious," she whispered. "But chocolate charlotte is not bad either."
"You know what? When we get back to Bobby's, you should bake me a pie and a chocolate charlotte, and I'll be the judge of that," he told her as she let out a yawn while giggling.
"I can't do that. I'm a bad cook," she told him as she brought her hand up to rub her eyelids while Dean stared at her face.
"I imagined you as the perfect housewife who could cook," he told her smirking as she looked at him putting her hand under her pillow.
"I'm far from it," she replied with a little smile. "Oh and favourite colour? You never said."
"Well, I don't…" he started before he stopped himself as he looked into her light brown eyes that seemed to twinkle with the simple light coming from the moonlight through the curtains. She had beautiful brown eyes, there was no possible denying of that. "Brown."
"Brown?"
"Brown."
"No one's favourite colour is brown," she replied while she felt her eyelids getting heavier and heavier as she blinked many times in a couple of seconds.
"You're falling asleep?" He asked her in a whisper as she softly nodded. "Then go to sleep, Kaitlin." She rolled over, giving her back to him and closed her eyes.
"Why do you keep calling me Kaitlin?" She asked him in a whisper after a moment of silence.
"Because I like it," he replied in a gentle whisper as he inched closer to her, tenderly reaching around her waist with one of his hand. Almost completely asleep, she snuggled against him as he held her in his arms. Slowly she fell asleep, as he held her safely in his arms.
"Goodnight, Kaitlin."
Author's note :
A huge and sincere thank you to all of you dear readers who take a little of their time to leave me a review. You need to know that you are the ones who truly keep me writing everytime I've got some free time! And whenever, I feel uninspired I just go back to read your reviews, and they really give me the strength to overcome the moments my muse just leave me alone. So yeah, really thank you. Your reviews are much more appreciated than you can imagine!
As promised, you've got this new chapter sooner than usual since I feel like I gave you a very crappy chapter last time… I truly hope that you've enjoyed this new chapter and that my spelling mistakes, typos and all those stuff I do, are not that many in here because I didn't have time to check everything out…
Anyways, tell me what you thought of this chapter and please let me know if you want to see something in particular. By the way, dear Imou, I added your brilliant idea to use Matt to make Dean jealous a bit ;)
Please leave a review !
Have a very nice week and take care of yourself,
A.