"God, Bobby, do you own a functioning umbrella?" Sam grunted in frustration as he sifted through the closet, which housed the largest collection of broken umbrellas that he had ever seen.

"Been meaning to throw those out… One of the blue ones ought to be all right..."

"Sam, don't do something stupid," Dean groaned in exasperation.

"Like what?" the younger brother shot back, "Like provoking Lory to…to do God know's what that was back there?"

"Like going after her- after that- after she specifically told you to leave her alone."

"Oh," he said with a bitter smile, "so now you care about Lory's wishes."

"Your life, more so," Dean scowled stubbornly, folding his arms across his chest.

"Lory wouldn't hurt me," Sam nodded matter-of-factly, "and she wouldn't have hurt you if you would have just left her alone. It's pouring out there, and I'm going to find her."

"I'm going with you," Bobby nodded, feeling the pangs of guilt.

Pamela emerged from the living room, her leather jacket donned and zipped.

"Not without me. I might be able to sense her. Don't worry, no probing needed."

"Dean, you stay here in case she comes back," Sam instructed, his tone dismissing any objections that may arise.

Dean held them back with a reluctant nod, his only comfort being the unlikelihood of her returning on her own.

"Fuck the umbrellas," sighed Sam finally, slamming the closet door, "Let's go."

Dean watched them file out, standing glued to his spot for a long moment. He thought about how close he came to dying just minutes ago. He wondered what caused Lory to grant him mercy just within seconds of him losing consciousness. Love? And finally, he questioned, in the event that she had not, where would he have ended up this time? The thought jarred him, causing him to sift frantically through his mind- through his recollection. Was there any reason why he didn't deserve to return to hell?

"Dean?"

Though soft and tender, the female voice that came from behind him caused Dean to jump and make a slight choking noise. Slowly, he turned, bringing his eyes to rove the girl's frame, which dripped from head to toe onto Bobby's area rug. Eyes wide, jaw clenched, he studied her for a long time. All of the malice seemed to have left her body, but still, his hands shook.

"I won't… I won't hurt you…" she half-whispered.

Flatly, not daring remove his eyes, Dean stated, "Everyone's out looking for you."

"I know. I waited for them to leave…" Watching his brows contort she added quickly, "I don't want to hurt you. I want to talk to you. "

He blinked.

"… I've got something ugly inside me, something that's very hard to control, but you have to understand, Dean, it doesn't define me. I am a good person. My situation and Sam's are very similar, except, instead of being tagged by a demon, they've got their hooks in me upstairs. But trust me, that doesn't make it any better."

"Whatever you think you need to explain to me, you don't," Dean assured her, but the only thing on his mind was the fact that was about five feet from the door.

"I do!" she cried desperately, extending her hand to him.

His thighs tugging on his heavy legs, Dean pleaded, but in his calmest and firmest voice, "Lory… Let me go…"

"Not until you listen to me, Dean," she replied in the same tone.

"Well, if you insist…" he smirked irritably.

"I haven't been completely honest with you guys…" she began.

"Really? I never would have guessed."

"What happened back there… It never would have happened if you hadn't sent Pamela into me. These powers, this, the ability to hold you down like this- it had been buried for well over two years. I locked it up because something terrible happened. These powers- they were not meant to be controlled. They were meant to kick in when I need them- like 'fight or flight', if you put the 'fight' on steroids…"

"The wind chimes? At the Fishers…" Dean inquired, his calmness surprising and reassuring to them both.

She smiled a little, "You're supposed to be the dumb one… Yeah, occasionally, when I got really angry I would have a little power fart, but nothing like this. My powers were pretty much dormant, like a volcano- giving off the occasional little puff of smoke, but generally harmless. Have you ever heard of the Volta experiment?"

"I think Sam listens to them…Why?"

She snickered a bit, "No, not Mars Volta. A long time ago, there was this scientist named Volta. He was like the father of electricity. Hence, the volt. He conducted an experiment where he took a dead frog's leg and electrified the nerves, causing the muscles to spasm and jump."

He frowned a little.

"That's interesting...?"

"That's what happened with me and Pamela tonight. Those powers were pretty much dead, like a detached limb. But her energy jumpstarted mine. Now, they're back. That's precisely why I didn't want her to go snooping."

"So, why didn't you just say something?"

She sighed, pausing for a long moment, examining the rug before bringing her softened eyes to meet his.

"From the moment we met, you distrusted me. All I've wanted to do since then was to change that. How would you have reacted if I told you all this before? Really."

"I wouldn't have trusted you," Dean replied, shrugging as if it were the only answer in the world.

"Exactly!"

"But lying to me and Sam all this time only makes me trust you even less," he confessed blatantly, shaking his head.

Slowly, carefully, she swayed over to him, just a thin layer of air separating them. Her eyes traversed the nine inches or so that divided their heights. Not looking back down at her was a thought that hadn't crossed Dean's mind. Their eyes were locked like the horns of two butting rams- a competition of sorts to see who could last the longest. Dean's cold stare was no match for the love in her eyes. He blinked rapidly twice.

"Dean Winchester, I would never hurt you."

Though a small part of him believed her, the bitter defiance in him would not let him go without replying "What do you call what just happened upstairs?"

"That wasn't me!" she pleaded softly, "Those things I said, what I did- when that happens to me, the powers take over and Lory just sits there watching…The same Lory would rather die than hurt you…" Her words formed a whisper.

At this point, Dean had forced himself to take a vast interest in the rug, which he could see over her shoulder. However, no interest could be vast enough to block out her words, or the way she said them, or the way he could feel her looking at him…Studying him…Admiring him. Her hand, cool and damp, brushed the burning roughness of his cheek. He pulled away, yet the feeling still tingled on his face.

"Don't."

"I know you wish I was pretty…" she said softly, lowering her eyes and watching his strong chest rise and fall, "I do, too."

"What does that have to do with anything? Why should I care what you look like?" he asked coldly.

"You wouldn't hate me…" she said pitifully, blinking away the sting in her eyes.

Dean was not in the mood to feed into her. It had been too long of a night for him to continue the conversation by telling her he didn't hate her. And there was no way in hell that he was going to indulge her fixation with him by telling her that she was pretty- or at least had her pretty qualities. He refused to tell her that her curves redeemed her weight, and that her lips were attractively shaped when she used them for smiling instead of speaking. Or the slight difference her rain-soaked white t-shirt made in his disdain for her. It had been far too long a night for that, and he wasn't going to make it any longer.

"Lory, let me go."

"Dean, I only held you for about two seconds," she smirked, quickly looking up at him in amusement before turning on her heel and walking toward the bright light of the kitchen.

And as he watched her, still gluing himself to his spot, he silently vowed never to admit any of those things to her…And never again to himself.

0000000000000000000000000000

"We've looked everywhere for her," Sam grunted in utter disdain as he dripped through the door, past his brother, "Bobby's dropping Pamela off. When he get's back we're going back out-"

"Relax, dude, she's here," Dean shrugged nonchalantly,"Came in right after you left."

He neglected to tell his brother that it happened deliberately.

"Oh, so you just let us search out there for an hour and a half? Thanks."

"I was going to call you, but Lory Shanghaied me into having a little heart-to-heart with her."

Sam raised his eyebrows.

"You didn't say anything offensive to her, did you?"

The older of the men scoffed, "Yeah, right, after what just happened? You're the smart one but I'm not stupid."

"Well, what did she say?" urged Sam, like a teenager hungry for gossip.

"A lot of things. She's asleep upstairs right now, so let's try to keep it down," he said in a hushed tone, moving closer to his brother and beginning to talk with his hands again. "This just proves what I've been saying about letting her go."

"Dean, we can't-"

"Hear me out, Sammy-"

"But this is your fault, not hers!" he whisper-yelled.

"Don't you think I know that? And don't you think I feel bad about it? But does that make her any less dangerous?"

Sam reasoned, "All you have to do is stop pushing her and she'll be fine. She doesn't want to hurt you! Loves you-"

"Yeah yeah yeah, Whatever. She didn't love me very much when she no-hands choke-slammed me upstairs."

"Uhm, because you slapped her? Which I still can't believe you did. I understand that it got intense up there, but she's a good girl, Dean, and you can't just be like 'Hey, God, I know you have this plan for us and all, but fuck you.' You'll get chucked right back downstairs."

"And what if she starts PMSing and sends me there? She just told me herself that she can't control her powers. And about how they got so out of control, she had to pretty much shut them down until they got flabby."

"Yeah, well what happened with her mom-"

"Her mom? What happened with her mom?"

Sam had betrayed her trust twice in one night, a new record.

"I'm not supposed to tell you this..." he began tentatively, "And knowing that I did could send her into a meltdown, thanks to you."

Clapping an encouraging hand on his shoulder, Dean, pleaded, "Come on, man, I won't say anything."

He took a large gulp of air before beginning, "Lory's mom was a bit of a religious zealot. When she found out Lory had powers, she went all 'get in the prayer closet' on her. She tried to having her prayed over, exorcised- and then she started trying to beat the 'evil' out of her."

Dean felt a slight wretching in his stomach. Sam could see it, but still he continued. His brother needed to hear this.

"It was like a gateway for her to start hating her. She rode her about everything- from her grades to her weight, and finally, she said something that made her snap. Lory made her fall down the stairs and put her in a wheelchair. Her mom told the police that she physically pushed her- because who would believe her, right? And then Lory told them what really happened, so they committed her. That's how she ended up at the Darcy Home."

Amidst all he was taking in and feeling- sympathy for Lory, guilt- he found the easiest emotion for him to accept at that point was anger. He tilted his head and stared at his brother accusatorily.

"You knew about all this- her powers, everything, and you waited until after the fact to tell me? You're just as guilty as I am! You could have prevented this!"

"I wasn't about to out her in front of you and everybody else- because then you would have gone on and used her secret as an excuse to have Pamela pick her mind, anyway."

"No, no, no, "Dean defended, "I'm not cruel. And more importantly, I'm not an idiot. I wouldn't have done anything that dangerous and you know it."

Sam shook his head in slight condescent.

"You really have no idea what it's like, do you?"

"What?" his brother asked thickly.

"To be a freak."

Dean was taken aback, and his face did not make it a secret.

Sam continued, waxing emotion and disgust, "I see the way you look at me- your own brother- sometimes. I don't know what goes on in your head about me and my powers exactly, but I'm sure I'm better off not knowing."

"Sam, I-"

"No, Dean. Don't deny it. You've touched me with a ten foot pole just because I can exorcise demons with my mind. How would you have treated Lory when you found out she actually hurt someone? I'm willing to bet you wouldn't hear one word about how hard it is... Because to people like you, once you're different, you're no longer human. You're not allowed to make mistakes."

"Whoa, whoa- hold up," Dean interrupted, squinching his brows, "What do you mean 'people like me'?"

Sam shook his wild and dripping head again. and smiled ruefully.

"Normal people, Dean."