Dean slowly pries his eyes open when he hears muffled music playing and lifts his head to look around the room he's been asleep in. Lizzy's bedroom comes into focus and he drops his head back onto the pillow, relaxing with a smile at the comforting sight. He must have dozed off after they finished properly greeting each other and he thinks it was nice of her to let him rest. In the past three or so days he's only caught a few short hours of sleep. He's highly deprived and knowing Lizzy she knew that just by looking at him.
Stretching out under the soft, billowy, non-motel-quality covers and inhaling deeply, something wonderful smelling fills his nose. Then he hears movement in the kitchen. Chopping maybe, he thinks. Holy shit… she's cooking. He's going to eat real food for once, not something wrapped in paper or deep fried to death. Wow, if this is how regular people live, he could easily get used to being a regular person.
Standing up and searching for his clothes, Dean gets dressed and realizes he needs to get his things out of the car. And get into a shower asap. That's another thing he hasn't done in a little while and it's a good thing Lizzy didn't notice. Or maybe she just didn't care.
He heads out of the comforting room and walks down the hallway, pausing in the kitchen doorway to watch her at work. She's standing at one of the counter, dicing tomatoes and singing along to 'Wild Fire Woman' playing on her IPod dock. She's swaying her hips with the music, something she always does when she hears a song she loves. Lizzy could never stand still when music was playing. She only has on her light blue panties she'd been wearing before and a simple white wife-beater tank. Her hair is up in a messy ponytail, long bangs sweeping over her right eye, and she's smiling as she works. She looked so damn good that Dean briefly thinks he's ready for round two.
"It's alive!" Lizzy jokes as she spies him in the doorway, pulling his gaze off of her body and onto her eyes. Dean holds his hands up and shakes them with joking surprise before taking the few steps needed to stand behind her. He wraps his arms around her waist and drops an innocent kiss onto the side of her neck.
"Thanks for letting me sleep."
"Sure seemed like you needed it," she laughs. "I don't even think you totally finished before you passed out."
"You wore me out," Dean jests, though there was some truth to the statement.
"Yeah, that or you haven't slept in days."
"Eh, we'll call it both. What're you making?"
"A dinner that has fresh ingredients and is, gasp, healthy!" she exclaims happily.
"Uh," he complains, but not seriously. "Vile word."
"Dude, you have to start eating healthier one of these days or you're gonna have a heart attack at the age of thirty-five!" She smiles at her own scolding. Who was she kidding? While on the road she eats the same kind of crappy food that he does. "And come to find out, I totally don't suck at cooking so healthy or not, it'll still taste good."
"I'll be the judge of that," he comments while reaching out, stealing a sliced piece of green bell pepper and popping it into his mouth before returning his arm to her waist.
"And if you know what's good for you, you'll say you like it no matter what," she giggles. "You know, having a home base and being able to do normal things like cook a freakin' meal now and then, I have to say, it's been nice."
"It's good to see that you're giving it an honest try," Dean tells her. "It's all I wanted for you."
"Why thank you, but I'm only trying it on a part-time basis," she reminds. "I can't leave hunting when I seem to be so tangled up in it, and I still fucking love it if I'm being honest, but I like having a stationary, not-on-wheels home again. And I am super close to being a certified ass kicker. Can't give up on that now!" After keeping up on her fight training at a local self-defense center once she was on her own, her teacher suggested that she train to become a self-defense instructor with her already considerable skills. Lizzy loved the idea and soon enough she was studying to do so with the goal of teaching other women how to be independent and strong enough to take on anything that came their way. It's become something she wholeheartedly believes in.
"No way," Dean jests, though he knows she's excited about becoming an instructor. She's talked about it nonstop since starting and he clearly sees how much she loves it.
"Oh, my classes are from nine to eleven tomorrow morning, by the way," she remembers to tell him. "So, I'll be gone for a few hours. You'll probably sleep through that though. Won't even know I'm gone."
"Most likely," he smiles, looking forward to a solid night of real, uninterrupted sleep.
"I do want you to come by the center at some point though. The facility is great and honestly… I want to spar with you," she says with a mischievous grin as she drops her work and turns around to face him, one eyebrow cocked while leaning back on the counter.
"You want to fight me?" Dean asks with surprise while placing his hands on the edge of the counter at either side of her.
"Absolutely," she says with sly undertones. It'd been something she's thought about many times and knows she can handle. "I want to kick your ass."
"You couldn't kick my ass," Dean confidently proclaims. Lizzy makes a surprised face and snakes her arms around his neck.
"You sound so sure of that," she says back while licking her lips with the challenge.
"Because I am sure. You could never take me," he returns, leaning in closer to her. Somehow he finds the idea of fighting Lizzy less wrong and more arousing than he probably should.
"Oh, I can take you," she responds in a serious tone. "I can take all of you."
"You could never handle all of me," Dean says with his lips brushing hers, the double meaning not lost on him.
"That's it," she backs away with sudden need to prove him wrong. "It's on, Hot Shot. You are going down!
"You just name the day and time, sweetheart," Dean smirks, eyes level with hers. "I will wreck you."
"Ha, can't wait to see you try," Lizzy simply responds, knowing he's in for one hell of a battle and he just doesn't know it yet. She'll make him eat his ego for this one. She lands a quick kiss on his lips. "But honestly, I think I found my other calling. Kicking monster ass and teaching women how to kick male ass. Pretty fucking cool if you ask me."
"And it seems to make you really happy," Dean tells her. He's noticed the change over the past month. She's doing much better and he couldn't be more excited for that. "And I'm a little jealous. This new life you have is better than anything I've got going." Dean says it sadly. He envies that she's been able to live at least semi-normally.
"I think that someday you'll figure it all out," Lizzy tells him. "You'll see. And I'll be right here waiting for you when you can get away. We'll quit together… or do the part-time thing together. Whatever works."
Dean leans down and kisses her, his way of thanking her for her never-ending support and unlikely optimism.
"So," Lizzy interrupts, "You've had it pretty rough lately."
"Yeah," Dean agrees.
"You gonna fill me in?" Lizzy looks up at him, concern in her face.
"Tomorrow," he says and kisses her forehead sweetly. "Tonight I relax and pretend that life is easy. We'll talk about reality tomorrow."
"As much as I'm dying to know everything, that's fine with me. You got yourself a free night."
"Thank you. Now, I'm gonna run to the car and get my stuff. Then I seriously need a shower," he explains while kissing her quickly one more time and letting go. He jokingly lifts his arm, takes a whiff, and makes a disgusted face.
Lizzy laughs in return while getting back to chopping tomatoes. "Yeah, well monster guts aren't supposed to make you smell like roses."
Dean smiles. "Um, you remember where my jacket is?"
"On the floor downstairs where you left it," she winks to him while getting back on task and chopping more vegetables. "Also, I told some people we'd go to my bar tonight, grab some drinks."
"Oh yeah?" Dean asks, a little saddened that he'll have to leave the apartment. He exhausted and really just wants to hang out the two of them. Whoa, did he really just have that thought? This may be the first time he's not wanted to go to a bar.
"Yeah. There are some people I want you to meet, old friends and whatnot," Lizzy tells him with a grin, excited for him to meet the few people she still has in her life. "Plus, drinks are on me!"
"Well, when you put it that way," Dean smiles. Obviously this is important to her so he'll suck it up and go without complaints.
"Then we can come back here and you can sleep for fifteen hours straight!"
"Yes! Now that is a plan!" Dean says while making his way down the stairs. He grabs his jacket off the hardwood floor and heads out the door to his car. Opening the trunk, he takes out an empty duffel and fills it with the big canister of salt, his sawed-off, silver knives, rosary beads, chalk, and anything else they might need to secure the apartment. Castiel's warning definitely landed and he's ready to do what he can to keep them both safe while here.
Next he takes out his bag of clothes and personal items from the back seat and his phone from the front seat. He sees he has a voicemail from Sam so he slings the bags over his shoulder while holding the phone to his ear to listen and begins walking back around the house.
Hey Dean. So Castiel just dropped by… flew by, as I'm sure you probably assumed he would after leaving you. Hope he didn't interrupt too badly, ha. Just wanted to make sure…
Dean freezes when he senses something and it puts him on high alert. He stands still in the walkway while having the eerie feeling he's way too familiar with and keeps listening to the message while searching the side yard around him.
…you guys are being cautious and everything. Castiel seemed really concerned, so take that for what it's worth. If anything happens call us right away. Have fun and try to get some sleep, huh?
He closes the phone and pushes it into his back pocket. It feels like someone is watching him and he's unsettled by it. Something moves by a tree behind him and he jerks around quickly, turning just in time to see a squirrel run up a tree trunk. He shakes his head, the feeling suddenly gone but still unsettled by the whole thing. Must be the lack of sleep, he thinks to himself before continuing on his way inside. He always grows more and more paranoid as he gets more and more tired.
As soon as he closes the front door, he drops down to the floor and takes out the salt, pouring a thick line across the doorway before checking under the area rug to make sure a devil's trap is under it. As he expected, Lizzy had one already there. Even if he thinks he's overreacting to nothing, it's always better to be safe than sorry. Every good hunter knows that.
"Whoa," Sam says loudly from the table in the kitchen, his laptop open in front of him. Looking for anything that will clue them in on what's it is that Castiel warned them about, he quickly shoots a look over to Bobby who is in the study with his nose in a book after coming across some interesting information. "You check the weather forecast for out east yet?"
"No but judgin' by your reaction to it, I'm guessing it ain't good," Bobby assumes while looking up from his desk.
"Not at all," Sam explains with concern written on his face. "There's a huge blizzard heading their way."
"In the middle of October?" Bobby questions, standing and swiftly walking over to Sam in order to take a look for himself.
"Yeah. A nor'easter they call it. Supposed to hit tomorrow around noon and go for almost twenty-four hours straight. Holy crap!" Sam says while pointing to a statistic. "They're calling for at least three feet, but it could be up to five in some parts."
"Odd," Bobby comments. "Isn't it really early for a massive snow storm to hit that part of the east coast?"
"That's what all the meteorologists are saying," Sam confirms as he clicks play on a local news channel's weather forecast video. Bobby leans down and watches over Sam's shoulder as a slightly goofy looking man in a suit stands in front of a map of southern New England and speaks with sheer glee.
"Winter's coming early my friends!" he smiles into the camera. "So pull out the shovels and snow blowers and get your winter coats out of the attic. We're looking at a doozie!"
"Could he be any happier?" Sam wonders aloud with the ridiculous enthusiasm the overly tan man exudes.
"These guys thrive on this shit," Bobby grumbles before they listen once more.
"Expect the snow to start around noon out in Rhode Island and parts of Connecticut and by two o'clock in Boston. Flurries at first will soon turn to white outs as the snow will be falling fast and furious! By noon Sunday we will be looking at an easy three feet, up to five in some parts."
He begins excitedly talking about breaking snowfall records for the month of October, but one detail catches the hunters' attention. "…is that meteorologists have not seen a snow storm form so rapidly since the monstrous Blizzard of '78. You baby boomers remember that one! Well, get ready to possibly relive it! Stock up now and get comfy!"
Sam pauses the video and looks to Bobby with concern. "A freak storm that just popped up outta nowhere."
"Yup." Bobby knows what Sam is thinking because he's thinking it too.
"What are the chances that this has nothing to do with Castiel's visit?"
"Ah, I'd say slim to fuckin' none," Bobby responds while standing back up.
"And get this; Lizzy's hometown had severe electrical storms last night and into early morning," Sam tacks on. "Several buildings got struck, some burning down to the ground."
"Well, balls," Bobby complains. "We're lookin' at omens. Big ones."
"That's what I thought," Sam says while reaching once again into his back pocket for his phone to call Dean and give him the heads up. "Something is definitely going down."
"Better share the news with dumb and dumber then," Bobby comments while walking back towards his desk to keep reading. "Maybe this time they'll answer."