Chapter 4 - nosy rabbit, angry bigfoot

My nose woke up first.

The smell was wonderful. Warm and juicy. My mouth watered. I made noises as I imagined myself eating. Then I realized I wasn't really eating anything.

I opened my eyes.

I lay on my back, stretched out with my paws up in the air. I blinked a little. Then I remembered. This was all wrong. I didn't mean to oversleep. I meant to leave as soon as it got light outside.

I turned my head so I could look out the window by the front door. It was light outside, all right. The sun was out. It was morning already.

Dean stood over me. I didn't like that but he had a plate in each hand. The plates were piled high with food. I sniffed the air. My stomach growled so hard my belly hurt.

"Hey, Hershey."

"Uh...hi."

"You ready to eat?"

I nodded.

"Okay. We've got bacon and eggs. All you can eat. And pie for later. Apple pie. I didn't make it but it's still pretty damn good. Scoot over, dude."

I sat up and Dean put the plate down on the couch beside me. Then he sat down too.

My tail wagged back and forth. I couldn't stop it, but I didn't feel right about this. Eating, out here in the open? Was he going to take it away from me? Make fun of me while I ate? I lowered my head and sniffed at the food. I didn't eat. Dean didn't notice at first.

He had a fork in his right hand and he shoveled the bacon and eggs into his mouth. I had my head down and my eyes up as I stared at him. He put the fork down just long enough to pick up the remote and aim it at the tv. The morning news came on. Then he picked up the fork again and started eating again.

I still hadn't eaten. Finally he stopped and looked at me. "Something wrong?"

'No."

"Did you want sausage instead? I've got pork sausage if you want."

"No. This...this is fine." My tongue darted out and I licked at the scrambled eggs. They melted in my mouth. Oh, the taste made my front legs tremble. It was good!

Dean watched me for a few more seconds and then his attention was divided again between his plate and the tv.

I didn't come up for air until the bacon and eggs were all gone. The next thing I knew I'd licked the plate all nice and shiny.

Dean grinned at me. His plate was clean too. "Want some more?"

My tail thumped once. My stomach grumbled. MORE!

"Yes, please."

"Okay." Dean stood up with his plate in his hand. He scooped mine up. "Be right back."

He disappeared into the kitchen. He was gone a little longer than I expected. I laid back down on the couch. On the tv humans sat around talking about boring stuff. I didn't pay that much attention.

The smells that came out of the kitchen were different. I lifted my nose into the air and sniffed long and hard. The scents were sweeter. Heavier.

Dean came back. The food on our plates was different. The pancakes were stacked high and smothered in maple syrup and butter. I saw a large pile of pork sausage on the plate too.

I sat up and Dean put my plate down beside me. "Here you go."

I stared bug-eyed at the plate. All this food? For me? The last time I had this much food two days in a row I was home with my mom. Pickings had been pretty slim since then.

Dean sat down again. "Eat up, dude. We're not sweating the cholesterol around here."

I didn't know what cholesterol was and I didn't care. I dug in.

Later on we had apple pie. It was good.

Two hours later we watched a movie that was in black and white. It was about a big lizard who roared and breathed fire. He came out of the ocean and stomped around on land. Humans screamed and yelled as they ran away from him.

"Who is that?"

Dean smirked. "That's Godzilla. He's the King of the Monsters."

"He is?'

"Yep. This your first time, huh?"

I nodded and stared at the big screen. Godzilla didn't seem afraid or angry, but he liked to smash buildings and set things on fire. This was different from anything I'd ever seen. I stared at the screen. My body relaxed. I didn't think about me or anything bad that happened to me.

Dean turned to me with a smile. "You wanna go for a walk after this?"

"No." I laid my ears back. My body went completely stiff. All I could think of was If I go back out there they'll find me. They'll hurt me for running away.

"Oh. Okay. How about a ride in the car? We could go to the beach."

My insides felt jittery, like drops of water on a red hot iron. "I don't wanna" I heard myself say.

Dean's smile faded a little. I hated to see that but I didn't care. He leaned forward with both elbows on his knees, then tapped the fingertips of his hands together. "How about Petsmart?"

I'd never heard of this Petsmart place before. The feeling I got from Dean when he talked about it was good. No pain or fear. I lifted my head, pricked my ears up a little. "What's that?"

"You'll love it. Big place full of dog toys and treats. You can walk around inside. A lot of pets go there. Cats, birds, guinea pigs. Hamsters. Not that you're a pet though. We'd have to get you a leash as a cover..."

Suddenly I wasn't interested in the movie. I didn't get up, but I turned my head away from it. I stared at the far wall instead. I wanted to go hide behind the couch.

I flinched as a bad memory rose up inside me.

"Stupid mutt! Now you're going to get it!"

That day the others hit me in my face with a metal choke chain. They hit me so hard I had raised stripes across my muzzle. I was sore for a week.

The memory went away but the bad feeling inside me didn't.

I cringed. My ears went down.

Dean's eyes widened as he leaned back against the couch. I'd done it again. I'd broadcasted the bad stuff inside my head. I couldn't help it. I didn't want him to see that.

"Hershey," Dean said slowly. "Dude. I know somebody out there hurt you. You didn't do anything wrong. You didn't deserve any of that. And nobody's going to hurt you while I'm around. I don't know how I can make you believe that."

I didn't say anything. I didn't say anything because he was right. No matter how kind he was to me, I didn't believe him. I couldn't.

But I did wonder why I stayed if I felt that way.

Dean frowned, and at first I thought he was frowning at me. I didn't realize what was really going on at first. He scowled again as he turned in the direction of the front door. "Sonofabitch," Dean muttered. "What the hell does he want?"

There was a knock on the door.

I didn't react as Dean stood up and walked over to the door. By the time I realized I should hide it was too late. I don't know why I thought I should hide. I just did.

Dean opened the door. "Yeah, Thompkins. What can I do you out of today?"

The man on the other side was older, softer. He wasn't as tall as Dean. He didn't have a lot of hair on the top of his head, only the sides, around his ears. He'd combed a couple of the longer hairs over the bare skin on his head. That looked funny. I mean odd. He reminded me of a rabbit. He had pale pink skin and his nose twitched. He wore a pair of round glasses that made his eyes look really large. When the door swung open he stared past Dean into the living room. He saw me.

I froze. It was too late to jump down and hide behind the couch. The rabbit man blinked. His mouth dropped open.

I knew he was seeing me as I really am, a huge black German Shepherd with blue eyes. I didn't want him to see me. The way he looked at me hurt my skin. I had to do something, so I Changed. Dean had his back to me.

The rabbit-I mean, the human kept right on staring. "Um..."

"Well?"

"That's a...that's a really weird...I mean nice little Yorkie you've got, Winchester."

"Yorkie?" Dean sounded puzzled. He turned around and saw me. His eyes widened. He saw my trueform and the Yorkie illusion at the same time.

Dean stared at me and then he said slowly "Uh...yeah. Yeah he is." He turned back to look at the rabbit man. "His name's Angus."

"Angus?"

"Yep. I named him after Angus Young." The rabbit stared at Dean. He didn't know what any of that meant. "The lead singer of Metallica?"

"Oh. Never heard of him."

"That figures," Dean told him. "What do you want?"

"You have two dogs over here?"

Dean's voice took on an edge. "I might. And since when is that any of your damn business?"

Rabbit man kept staring at me. He didn't seem to hear that Dean cursed at him. That was when I realized that I cast the illusion all wrong. Maybe it was because I was scared and nervous. The rabbit man might be one of those humans who could see me no matter what. He kept staring and I knew that he saw my German Shepherd trueform and the Yorkie illusion at the same time, one inside the other.

"That's odd," the rabbit murmured.

"Hey, Thompkins?" Dean waved his hand in front of the man's face. He was enjoying this. "I'm over here, dude."

He finally looked at Dean. His nose twitched like he was smelling something bad. I got it then. He thought he was better than Dean. The rabbit man didn't like him. He pretended but he didn't, not really.

I didn't like the rabbit man. I raised my head and growled, low and deep in my throat.

He blinked. "Did he...did he just growl at me?"

"He might have. He's feisty like that. Go on."

"Well, uh, I was up in my bedroom last night and I thought I saw a big black dog in your backyard."

Dean didn't like the rabbit any more than I did. His smile was more like he was baring his teeth. "Oh. You did, did you?"

"I did. Uh...Edna didn't allow the last tenants to keep pets. That's why they moved out. So, ummm...you might have a problem."

I lifted my head, stared at him and yawned. Really, really wide. I usually do that when I feel nervous and I was nervous, but I knew the rabbit man wouldn't know that. All he would see was the big black dog and the little Yorkie.

And lots and lots of teeth.

It worked. He jerked back.

Dean rumbled laughter. "Yeah that would be a problem. Except that I bought the place from Edna six months ago."

The rabbit's eyes grew wide as saucers. "You-you did?"

"Yeah. I did. So whatever goes on here is my business, not yours." Dean jerked his right thumb at me. "He's not going anywhere. Anything else?"

"Well..no."

"Nice talking to you." Dean closed the door in the man's face. I heard the rabbit man call out through the door "Well, uh, you too!" His footsteps faded as he walked away.

The Yorkie illusion fell away from me. I was glad to let it go.

Dean rolled his eyes and grumbled to himself as he walked back to the couch and sat down. "Yeah yeah, whatever. I bet he was hanging out the second story window with a pair of night vision binoculars."

He turned and looked me up and down. "Nice trick with the Yorkie thing."

I felt weird, like I was exposed somehow.

"No worries. That's Virgil Thompkins. The neighborhood snoop. He's also the reason the last family moved out. When I moved in the first thing I did was put that privacy fence up. He's probably calling Edna right now to see if I really do own this house." Dean laughed. "I wish I could be a fly on the wall for that conversation. She doesn't like him."

"She doesn't?"

"You just met him and you didn't like him either. Nobody does. She'll probably cuss him out for calling her in the first place."

"He saw me last night." My ears drooped.

Dean shook his head. "You didn't do anything wrong, Hershey. He saw you. So what? You live here. That sonofabitch doesn't."

My ears pricked when he said that. I felt warm inside. The good kind of warm, not the bad.

That Godzilla sure did make a lot of movies.

Dean told me that this was a "tv marathon." I don't know what that is but I liked it. Some of the movies were in black and white. Some of them were in color. I liked the one with the big ape too. Humans running around screaming, big explosions, a lot of roaring and smashing stuff up. What's not to like?

I felt good. Safe. So I moved closer and put my head on Dean's knee. I didn't know if he was going to jerk away from me or tell me to get the hell off him.

He didn't. After a couple of minutes his hand came up and skritched me underneath my right ear. Long and slow. My tail wagged and my right hind leg thumped. I couldn't help it. I grinned from ear to ear.

We sat there watching the lizard and the big monkey and then wouldn't you just know it? I had to pee. Damn.

I put it off for as long as I could. Then I scrambled off the couch and headed for the back door.

After I finished in the back yard I sat there staring at the pool. Sunlight made the water move and sparkle. Wind blew through the trees and the grass.

I felt something, but I didn't know what it was. Not at first. Then I knew.

I was at peace.

I didn't want to go anywhere. I wasn't sure if the bad stuff was still inside my head, but I didn't want to stop feeling this way.

I lifted my head and scented the air. This house was home. It felt like home. I wanted to live here. With Dean.

I turned around and went back inside.

I heard voices as I padded through the kitchen.

"I just thought I'd come by, you know? Check up on you. See how you're doing."

I didn't know that voice.

I stopped and cocked my head to one side. I started walking again when I heard Dean's voice.

"Dude, good to see you. Sit down! Let me get you a beer."

Dean is here. It's okay, I told myself. As long as he's here it'll be okay.

I stopped in the doorway of the living room and it wasn't okay. Not anymore.

Dean stood by the front door. The man next to him was very tall. Taller and a little younger than Dean. He had shaggy brown hair. I smelled the family connection between them.

Dean smiled at me. "Hershey, this is my brother. Sam."

I cleared my throat. "Hello."

Sam's mouth firmed into a thin hard line. He stared at me. Anger rolled off him in waves. "Dean, what is this? Where'd this thing come from?" I knew that look. He saw my trueform.

Dean looked confused. "Thing? What are you talking about?|"

I glanced down at Sam's hands. They were balled up into fists. He wanted to hit me.

He hated me. Hated the sight of me.

So I hated him back.

I couldn't help myself. My hackles rose up around my neck as I crouched down. I growled, showed him my teeth.

Hurt him, the bad stuff inside my head whispered. Hurt him before he hurts you first.

Coming Up: Dean and Sam have a brotherly heart to heart talk. No chick flick moments, please. Hershey has a relapse. He makes a fateful decision after Dean offers some sage life advice: "Don't get mad or stay sad. Get even."

TBC this week