Tick. Tick. Tick.
In 's waiting room the only thing that could be heard was the continual and comforting tick, tick, tick of the clock on the beige wall. It was the only thing I could rely on to be on when ever I arrived and as always it never let me down. It was my only companion in the waiting room while everyone else was either just waking up or on their commute. The receptionists had yet to arrive and even in the lobby the security gaurd had left his night shift. There was a comfort in this lonliness, the familiar feeling of it all, but mostly it was sad. The sick distrubed feeling in my body made my thoughts turn sour but I had to ask myself why? Why was I always so early? To every appointment, to any place I went? Why was I always the first one? It was like my body wouldn't allow me to have interactions with people. It was like my sickness wanted me alone, forever and all the time.
My sickness.
I tried not to think about it but with my pack on my lap, the keys in my hand, and the lights all shut off it was all I could think about. That and the nightmares that felt so real when I dreamed them and still so frightening after. I know what Dr. Walcott would say about the dreams. I haven't been taking my medicine and I haven't seen Dean in over two months. Both must be a factor. But were they?
There goes my mind again; drifing off to places I never wanted it to go. I shut my eyes and leaned my head against the back of the chair. I had been feeling so exhausted and sleep was so little. I wanted to sleep, I wanted to dream but there wasn't any comfort in that anymore. But there was comfort in memories...especially where I had left off.
It was the familiar sound of shouting that had woken me up from my black sleep. My body responded first by tensing up but slowly my mind noticed and recognized the voices. They belong to my rescuers, Dean and the other man. But what could they be fighting about?
"We have to finish this Dean," it was the older man. I opened my eyes slightly, the lights were to bright for me to open them all the way, and saw them standing before each other as if to square off in a fight .
"I'm not letting you go back to that thing by yourself. I can hel-"
"Dean," there was something in the older man's voice that made the fight final. With his name and that tone it was like there was no way he could be countered. It was like he already won. But still he continued, " I'm going to go back and finish this. And you're going to stay here and take care of that girl. Am I understood?"
Dean's head, so fragile and angry, hung slightly as if to bow in submission as he spat out,"Yes sir."
The man turned around, walking to the door and opening it all in one motion. I had been expecting a slam but weakly, without even turning around, he added, "I'll ask Bobby to help, if that'll make you feel better."
The man didn't wait for an answer. He shut the door behind himself while Dean locked the door. His actions were slow and sluggish as if the adrenaline from the fight was leaking out of him with each quiet step. He took a seat on the bed, the other bed, and it was then that I noticed we were in a cheap motel room. Lanza 86 I thought it must have been because of the bright decorations and all the yellow. My aunt had known the woman who ran it...before she was dead like I should have been. But Dean saved me and there he was, sitting on the bed in deep thought. He was so handsome and from that small altercation he seemed so...destroyed...he seemed so...watching me!
"How long you been awake?" It was the first thing he said directly to me that wasn't a pick up line. I wondered why he wasn't angry that I had spied on his private conversation. I wondered why of all the things he could have asked he asked the simple question. A question that just need an answer.
So I did, "From 'We have to finish this Dean.'"
"So you figured I'm Dean?" he asked and I wondered how he could express so much and so little with each one of his facial expressions.
"Yeah, the other guy's been screaming it all day," I said as I slowly, very slowly lifted myself up into a sitting position.
There was a chuckle, a brief one like an exhale of air, that I registered before he continued, "That's my dad. But you can call him, John. You're Lorrine Damsel."
"Call me Lori," I snapped weakly; I hated the name Lorrine. It was only used in the worst of times like when my aunt was trying to convince me to try a new drug or when I was getting pulled out of school or when we were moving. 'It's for the best' always followed but nothing good ever came out of that name. I tried to push myself up to stand but it was like my arms weren't listening to me and they wouldn't move. My strength had gone down into the danger zone. I looked up at Dean quickly and added, "I need something to eat."
As if on que two Snickers bars landed in my lap but I felt to weak to grab them. I grabbed and I held and I tried to lift and pull off the wrapper but everything was blurry again and I felt like I was going to pass out but then Dean snatched the bars from me and opened them as if they were nothing. I didn't say thank you, I didn't want him to think I needed his help. Instead I ate the bars like I hadn't eaten anything in ages while I listened to him work up the courage to ask, "What's wrong with you?"
"Nothing's wrong with me. I'm fine. I'm just sick," I explained, regretting instantly the attitude I gave him but what ever. I didn't need another person telling there was something wrong with me.
"What do you have?" he corrected. I could feel his eyes on me but I couldn't lift mine up to confirm. Instead I focused on his dirty boots and chewing and swallowing and deciding how I would answer a question everyone's been asking. What do I have? I heard a soft chuckle and looked up angrily in time to see Dean smile as he cautioned, "Slow down, you're gonna lose a finger. I got more here."
I didn't bother hiding the anger that leaked out of my eyes but I did hide the blush. Why are cute guys such jerks? He knows he's cute and he knows what he does to girls like me, why does he have to keep doing it? I answered his question with my mouthful to prove a point, "No one knows...My aunt's dead right? And my uncle too? That guy killed them. Why did he kill them? Where's the police?"
"Are you sure you're ready for this?"
Ready for what? I thought back to the way my aunt looked on the ground, drowning in blood, and the man that was screaming and disappearing and reappearing as John shot at him. Was I ready for this? I thought there was only one way to find out. I nodded.
"That wasn't a guy back there. That was a ghost. His name was Steven Meyer and he died ten years ago. He was battling some kind of...sickness and no one knew what it was. He died before they realized it was cancer and since then he's been at large," he didn't say these things as if it were nothing. As he spoke his eyes were on mine, pouring into mine, as if to give me his strength as if he knew this was crazy and he knew no normal person could handle this without a little help...especially someone like me.
"At large?" the words came out like a whisper.
"Haunting Dr. Walcott and killing all of his patients," he explained.
My doctor. He's been my doctor for four years. Is that why the waiting rooms have been getting emptier and emptier with each visit? I looked away as I thought about him, "Dr. Walcott?"
"He was his doctor too."
That poor old man with that poor tortured smile and that old look on his face getting older and older. Poor doctor. It can't be true. I snapped my head up a little too fast and all the information was hitting me at once and all I could think to ask was, "Who are you guys?"
"You know those things that go 'bump' in the middle of the night?" he asked, casting his gaze to the side to look at something or remember an event.
"Yeah," I answered, closing my eyes briefly to let the episode of nautiousness pass but there was a stiffness in the air that suddenly forced my eyes open and onto his that were digging deep inside of me again and forcing me to get lost in his reply.
"Well let's just say we're the guys that bump back, hard."
A shiver rolled down my spine as the full weight of his words slammed down into me and I knew then with Dean in front of me that these were the good guys. I was in the right place for once. These guys knew how to save people and they had already saved me. I swallowed the vomit I felt creeping up my stomach and said softly, "Thank you."
"For what?" he asked, his whole appearance shifting to match his complete shock.
"For saving me," I answered, letting him know with my tone that it was ridiculous that he should have to ask why.
A deep and menacing smirk formed on his lips that created the most perfect boomerang of a smile I had ever seen and with a wink he grinned, "All in a day's work."
I rolled my eyes openly at his reply which somehow filled the air with a loud and pompous laugh. I couldn't help but to allow myself to laugh a little too, something I hadn't done in years. I looked back at him, feeling instantly better as the Snickers kicked in and inquired, "How long have you been doing this?"
"My whole life," he shot out quickly, leaning back onto his elbows as he got comfortable on the parallel bed.
"Whole life?" I repeated, finding it insane that he's been going after ghost and saving 'Damsels' in distress for such a long time.
"Yeah...ever since I was little. Something snuck into our house one night, started a fire, and killed my mother and we've been huntin' the thing ever since," his voice changed as he told the story into a darkness that reminded me of his father but that's not what I focused on. I focused on the rattling that seemed to make all my bones creek and rock and grab them all at once.
I felt my tears push out of me and fill into my eyes as my face began to tingle and my nose began to hurt and I asked, keeping my face away from his sight, "Did it start in the nursery?"
He shot up from the bed and into a sitting a position so fast it would have given me a headache if I had followed it. His voice got darker and scarier as my insides did, "How did you know?"
My eyes jumped from place to place, from the lights to the ground and briefly to his face, to stop the tears from spilling as I answered through my clenched jaw, "My mother died the same way. "
"Good morning, Ms. Damsel. Tamara informs me that you were an hour early again," Dr. Walcott Jr. greeted as I walked through the door.
My eyes narrowed in confusion as I hopped onto the bed with the slippery paper. Why was he here? "Yeah, I'm sorry," I apologized tentatively before asking, "Where's Dr. Walcott?"
He sighed with a little frown, "Sick again this morning. He asked me to take care of all his patients today. And don't apologize. You know you can come when ever you'd like. That's why the old man gave you the key. My only concern is...did you eat your breakfast today?"
How did they always know? Dr. Walcott Jr. was only a few years older than me but it was as if him and his dad were the same person. They knew the same information, the stuff about John and Dean, as well as everything I'm most likely to do. They knew me better than I knew myself. I shook my head as he got the light thing to shine in my ears and my throat, "No. But I'll get some right after this."
"Good girl. Now has anything been troubling you?" he asked, moving the light from side to side and up and down and then putting a top on it so he could look into my ears.
"I've been having these...strange nightmares," I said tentatively, opening my mouth when it was time for him to check my throat.
"Nightmares?" he repeated. "About your aunt and uncle again?"
He took out the arm band thing that checked my blood pressure and wrapped it around my shoulder as I answered,"No...about Dean. Tell your Dad he said 'hi?'"
"Will do. Now, tell me. When's the last time you've seen Dean?" He asked, listening to what ever the stupid test tells him.
"Two months,"I answered half-heartidly.
"You're not taking your medicine, are you?" he asked, taking off the band as he wrote down all his finding in his chart.
I looked up at him so suddenly I gave myself a headache and he began to laugh.
"Don't look so shocked. A side-effect of the medicine is increased drowsiness and dreamless sleep. You look exhausted and you're taking about nightmares. I'm a doctor, I can put these things together. As for the nightmares...you haven't seen him in two months. It's probably just a case of the lonelies. You know what he's facing out there, trying to keep us simple folk safe. My best advice is to take the medicine! You look horrible and weak! Swollow the pills and eat something! My dad didn't give them to you for his health, they're for yours. Do you unerstand" He shouted, shaking my shoulders to emphasis the point and making me laugh at how ridiculous he looked and sounded.
"Fine, fine, fine!" I yelled in the same tone, allowing him to release me at once. "I'll take it when I get home."
He sat down on his seat and took out his little prescription bad, "Don't go blowing smoke up my ass, Lori, really do it. And here, add this. It'll help you with the nightmares and your appetite."
He pulled the paper out of the pad and handed it over to me as I hopped off the bed, "I WILL. It was good seeing you, Doc. Thanks for everything."
"No problem," he sighed, following me to the door and with a smile he added, "Oh yeah, and call me Nick, for Christ-sakes, you're embarresing me over here."
I nodded my head as I waved weakly, "Alright, Nick."
"Alright," he waved back.
And then I was gone.