Keeping her word, she left her cell on the whole time she drove, occasionally saying Dean's name to see if he'd come to yet. Erin half wondered, half dreaded what she'd find in the cabin.
Erin drove the length of the lake twice, the first time missing the overgrown driveway, then directed her small car down the path, the vehicle jostling roughly. "Dean, I'm almost there," she said loudly, glancing down to the phone on the seat beside her. The small numbers kept growing, signifying how long she'd been on with him. 72 minutes and 3 seconds… 6 seconds…
The cabin came into view after a slight bend in the road, the large Impala seated nearby. As the trees cleared, her focus shifted to the lake. She'd come to Lake Masota a few times as a kid but hadn't ventured to the area for many, many years. It was just as she'd remembered. A few ducks squabbled nearby as they slipped into the water gracefully from the small shoreline. The house was only a stone's throw from the water's edge; an ideal spot, really. As she stepped out of her car and locked the door behind her, she thought of how beautiful it would be when the sun rose over the water and far off tree lined horizon.
Lake Masota was known for its beauty, with a forest surrounding almost every angle of the sixty mile long lake. Few cottages had been set up around it due to conservation and a ban on fishing but the cabin that stood here had probably been built long before the ban. Sighing, she turned away from the water and headed for the aged building.
Stepping onto the porch, she looked down, eyes widening. Drops of blood acted as a trail from the Impala to the front door, which lay open. Swallowing quickly, she walked in. "Dean?" Erin pushed the door open further, her gaze immediately landing on the body that was roughly seated on the floor against the couch. She rushed to him, dropping to her knees and taking in the visible damage. A wide gash lined the left side of his neck and blood covered the two shirts he wore beneath a leather jacket.
It wasn't the same jacket she remembered him in the last time they'd spoken, she thought absently.
"Hey, Dean?" A hand moved to the other side of his neck, feeling for a pulse. It was there; thin but there. Inhaling quickly, Erin noted the bag half slung over his shoulder and gently pulled it away, checking what he'd brought with him. Three rolls of white bandage lay inside along with some salve and a few changes of clothes. She almost smiled when she realized that was almost all he owned.
He looked different yet still the exact same. He'd aged, not so much in years but in character, she noticed. Lines of worry wrinkled his forehead even when he was unconscious and bags under his eyes made her assume he hadn't had a good night's sleep in years. And the innocence that she remembered seeing in him - well, maybe not innocence, but an intentional desire to hope, was gone. But still, he was Dean, and that hadn't changed.
Erin placed her hand on his right shoulder and gave him a slight shake, testing to see just how out cold he was. After a few more shakes with no result, she knew he wouldn't be waking up anytime soon and decided the best thing she could do for him was stop the bleeding, but to do that she would have to get his jacket off and get him on the couch rather than beside it.
Trying to be as careful as possible, and being very conscious of the blood that had yet to dry over the wound, she worked on removing Dean's right arm from his jacket. It took a moment of slow angling and quick glances to his face to make sure he wasn't in pain before his arm slipped out of the tight sleeve. She scolded herself for immediately taking note of how the plaid fabric clung to the toned muscles beneath. The young man she remembered seeing last had been quick to flaunt the slowly growing biceps that wrapped his arms.
They now suited him. Well.
Shaking her head, she shifted to his left and cautiously pulled the jacket by its collar from behind him. When he groaned, she stopped. "Dean?" she whispered again, unsure if he was waking or his body simply reacted to an unseen pain. When he made no reaction, she continued, trying to ignore his shallow breaths, knowing that leaving the coat on would do more harm than good. His left arm slipped out of the sleeve with ease and she tossed the jacket aside, the smell of alcohol and mild sweat wafting in the air as it moved.
She stared at him for a long moment, unsure of how to move him. He had at least 80 pounds on her and she wasn't overly strong by any means. Determining that waking him might be a good idea, for his sake and hers, she placed a hand on his chest and said, "Dean, come on, you've gotta wake up. I can't do this without your help and I need to move you so please… please wake up?" She continued talking and shaking him until he stirred, his head jerking up slightly and his eyes squeezing tightly shut against the afternoon sun that streamed in the nearest window.
Erin moved to block the sun and waited for him to focus on her when his eyes fluttered open. Slowly, and painfully, he lifted his head with a wince and caught her gaze. A flicker of recognition quickly veiled by discomfort. He shifted, his left arm limp at his side, and he groaned.
"Dean, can you hear me?" He didn't nod but she knew he could. "I'm gonna move you onto the couch, okay? I just need you to help me and then you won't have to move for the rest of the day." His eyes met hers quickly before he closed them and nodded once.
Lifting her knees from the ground but still crouching beside him, Erin slipped a hand around Dean's back and hefted his right arm over her shoulder. She grimaced at his obviously unwanted reaction when she tried to stand. He closed his mouth tightly in an attempt to hide any more groans but when she helped him up, his legs bearing some of his weight when they finally straightened, a jumble of curse words fell out.
"Sorry," she breathed, doing her best to make him lean on her but his stubbornness wouldn't allow that. Not to mention his height advantage over her. They moved to the couch quickly and he fell onto it with a grunt, careful to keep his left side safe as he landed against the back with his right shoulder. Erin turned to the bag and retrieved the bandages and salve.
His eyes were open but still seemed fuzzy. "Do you remember me, Dean?" she asked, hoping her tone sounded less interested than she was. They had met when he and Sam came to the Lake Masota area for a hunt five years back. She remembered him coming up to her in the bar with a small notepad and pad, his suit fitting in all the right places. She doubted he was a real FBI agent from the moment she looked him up and down, and he did the same to her, but she played along and answered his questions.
When his last question was for her phone number - and not for business purpose - she'd given a wide smile and did as he'd asked. He called her once and she talked him down from a one night stand to a proper dinner and though he was obviously thinking about other things through most of the date, he had been good company.
But then a demon and long talk later -
"Erin, right?" he asked, his speech slurred.
She glanced at him as she sat on the edge of the small coffee table that sat before the couch. "I'm surprised you remember." Unwinding some of the bandage, she watched him try to think past the blood loss to a witty comeback. Obviously finding none, he gave a one sided shrug, accompanied by an equally lopsided smile.
"Hard to forget."
Erin assumed that they would have plenty of time to talk in the coming hours so she set her curiosity aside. "Can you take off your shirt?"
One brow rise and his smile widened, though weakly. "First time in five years… and you're already -"
"Can it, tough guy. I need to clean it," she motioned to the bite "and your collars aren't gonna help anything. Besides I think you've got more to worry about then just that."
He hesitated, but only to calculate how much pain the movements would cause, then sat forward and began removing the long sleeved shirt. Air hissed between his teeth as he sucked in a breath when the fabric made contact with the open wound. Erin didn't help, knowing she wouldn't be of any help, and instead focused on finding towels in his bag.
Dean jerked his right arm out of the sleeve when his left was loose and dropped the shirt on the floor, his face flushed. He started to lean back but immediately sat forward again. "What happened to your back?" she asked, setting two barely folded towels on a pile.
He looked at her with a small smile. She found it amazing how even though he was still half asleep and no doubt dizzy from the blood loss, he still managed to look flirtatious. "The thing I burned believed in eye for an eye."
"The thing." Erin had seen first hand the things the Winchesters hunted but she hadn't heard or seen anything like it for five years. Now, talking about monsters as if they were real felt strange to her again.
Dean seemed to have stopped paying attention as his eyes drifted out the window and his right hand held tightly to the left arm that was obviously causing him pain.
"I'm guessing you don't have any soap in your car, right?"
His gaze snapped back to her. "What?"
"Soap? It's ideal for cleaning a wound." His eyes half closed in a slow roll. "But I guess you knew that."
"I don't have any soap. Just use alcohol." His voice was rough from not swallowing and judging by how slowly he was breathing, she guessed that he was trying to avoid moving his neck at any cost.
"Where's alcohol?" He motioned to the bag. Leaning down, she moved the clothes out of the way and saw a small flask on the bottom. Lifting it, she gave it a shake and glanced back at him. "Do you have any more alcohol?"
He smiled warily. "Supply run was tomorrow."
"Ah." There wasn't very much liquid left in the bottle but it would be enough to clean the wound - not enough for him to drink to dull the pain though. "Well," she sat next to him, careful not to move the cushion beneath them too much. "I know we didn't exactly part on good terms and I don't think this is gonna make you like me any more, so, I'm sorry."
"Just do it," he said through gritted teeth with a threadbare smile.
She sensed that they would talk about their past more later so she decided to distract him with other questions. "So, where's Sam?" Flask in hand, she uncorked it and let the droplets fall directly onto the open wound. He reacted with another hissing sound, eyes clamped shut, and body tense. She tried to work quickly, wiping away the excess and pressing a white cloth onto the area. Seeing the sweat forming on his forehead and his pained expression, she whispered another apology.
He began to reply but instead bit his bottom lip firmly, head tilting to the side to expose more of his neck to her but stiffening again from the shot of pain. "Sam… he's hunting somewhere else," he said between shallow breaths.
"Why?" She quickly got the picture that he wasn't interested in talking and just wanted her to hurry. Doing so, she added a few more drops and cringed when he cursed under his breath. "Just a few more seconds," she said absently, pressing the towel to the gash once more. Dabbing gently, she set the towel on the couch beside her and looked at his neck. The liquid had cleaned up some of the blood around it and she bit the inside of her cheek when she saw new blood slowly taking its place.
"What?" he asked, eyes closed, but knowing by her silence that something was wrong.
Erin sighed. "I'm gonna have to stitch it." He didn't react. "But you knew that already, didn't you?"
"It ain't rocket science. There's some thread and needles in the side pocket." He swallowed hard, expression a constant show of his pain.
She leaned down and retrieved them. The packet was similar to what she remembered seeing in her grandmother's yarn basket. "Taking up sewing, Dean?" she asked with a smile, taking some comfort in his quiet chuckle. Erin wasn't familiar with sewing a man but she had sewn some clothes as a teenager with her grandmother. She hoped it wasn't too different.
Knowing that prolonging it for her own sake was also prolonging his relief so she inhaled deeply, making her uneasiness a little too obvious. She caught his smile. "What?" she asked, hating herself for being so distracted by the smile.
"First time?"
Had the question come from anyone else, it wouldn't have unsettled her. But somehow the phrase, and the meaning she knew he was setting behind it, made her blush a little. Thankful to be seated at his side and not in front, she hoped he wouldn't notice. "Shut up."
He chuckled again.
"Now this'll probably hurt like hell so just -"
"Erin, this isn't my first time. Go on." His right hand made a waving motion for her to continue - and quickly.
He had no fear, she quickly came to realize. At least not that he showed. She was about to stick a needle into his skin and thread it through him several times, and he looked almost relaxed, except for his obvious discomfort. "Always the hero, huh?"
Dean sucked in a quick breath when her needle made the first entrance. "Yeah… somethin' like that."
She worked as fast as she could, thinking of how she'd been taught to sew and implementing the rusty knowledge, and also doing her best to ignore the fact that she was sewing a human and not fabric. It took nearly ten minutes for her to close the wound, with a few breaks to remind Dean to breathe. He didn't make any noise through the procedure but he did hold his breath almost every time the needle re-entered him.
"Alright, done," she said, surveying her work. It wasn't pretty but it would hold. "How's the arm?" She looked at his left arm, the one he still held tightly against him.
He glanced down stiffly. "Gettin' better. It was numb for a good while there but I can feel it now." His fingers stretched out and he winced.
"Give it time. Doesn't have to heal right away." She stood from the couch and gathered the needle and thread, towels, and flask. Placing them on the table, she exchanged them for the bandages and quickly unrolled the white material over the wound a few times. Taping it in place, she stepped back. "Alright, I think you're good."
Dean looked up at her and he opened his mouth, as if to speak, then closed it again and instead smiled. "Thanks."
Erin smiled in return, apprehensively. Even with the flush of pain in his face and the wrinkles in his brow, Dean Winchester was gorgeous. She had noticed it immediately upon their first meeting and she fought to keep from noticing it now.
"So." She turned away, packing his belongings back into his bag. "Why'd you call me?"
He sighed from behind her. "I saw your name in my phone and I called it."
She looked over her shoulder and saw him looking at her. "My number was still in your phone? After five years?"
"Yeah."
"Isn't that kinda weird?" She pushed down the flattery she felt from his honesty. "I mean you never called me except for that one time. Why'd you leave it in?"
His right shoulder lifted in a slow shrug and he looked out the window again. Erin finished putting the items back in Dean's bag and straightened, aware that that part of the conversation was over. "Alright well…" he looked back to her. "I'm gonna need to change that dressing in 12 hours."
"I know."
She glanced at her watch. "So that'll be 4 in the morning. I'm gonna set an alarm on my phone." As she pulled her call out of her jeans pocket, she looked up and saw him watching her intently. "What?"
He smiled. "Nothing." At her impatient stare, he added, "It's just that you actually came here and you're staying."
"Surprised?" she asked, knowing that she'dd been equally surprised to find herself actually getting in her car and driving to him after 5 years of silence.
"A little."
"Good." Erin's smile matched his. She walked to the front door, turned back, and said, "I'm gonna go get us something to eat. There's a burger joint about ten minutes from here. I'm gonna assume that your taste hasn't changed?" Dean seemed a little taken aback by her knowledge. "I'll take that as a yes. Be back in about half an hour - don't do anything stupid."
As she walked out the door, pulling it closed behind her, she released the real smile she'd been hiding for a while. There was something about this guy, something she couldn't put her finger on, that made her want to smile every time he looked at her. And she hated him for it because she just really wanted to hold a grudge.