The Chlorhexidine, pinkish red, swirls down the tub drain and mixes with his blood, becomes pure red, leaves behind the sting of disinfection. John doesn't wince, might've if he'd been alone in his cleaning, but Chalendra is there somehow managing to look authoritative and dignified while sitting on the toilet, lid down, of course. She's holding the sizable box of one of his first aid kits in her lap. She waits with gauze in hand, watches him with a nearly professional concern, like a nurse would, a nurse with defined deltoids. It'd been too cold in the woods for her tank top, not that he'd complain, but he figures it's probably more comfortable temperature-wise for her now here in the hotel room. It's actually too warm; he's removed his flannel and not just to keep the blood off it. Sometimes wounds make you cold, sometimes they make you hot, depending on where and how deep it is and how much food and rest you've been getting.

It's not as bad as he'd thought it might be, no stitches, and he'd rather have a scratch than a bite any day.

Chalendra passes him the gauze, timing perfect. He dabs at the leaking fluids before reaching out for the antibacterial ointment and then it's time for the gauze that he will tape the wound up with. She's ready again. "You're good at this."

"Handing you supplies?" she asks, her head quirks to the side.

John chuckles. "Took Dean a while to learn when to hand me what. Wasn't his fault. He'd just get scared to see me bleeding." She smiles at him. "Of course, he was a little man then."

"What was Dean like as a child?" she asks.

He doesn't feel that the question is just out of politeness but that she actually wants to know. Giving free rein for a parent to reminisce about children is a dangerous offering. It's not often that John is given the chance and it warms him to take it. "I could tell right away that Dean was gonna be a good man, even when he was little. He cares so much about others, always wants to make sure that they're safe. He wasn't all that nervous energy so many kids are. He could sit there and focus on something, like when I taught him how to clean a gun. He never got bored and started futzing with the TV. He'd just do the job because he knew it was important. He's good at setting his priorities."

All the while that John talks, he makes sure the bandages are dry, tightens them down. Assured that they're secure, he looks up at Chalendra, embarrassed as he realizes how heartfelt he'd been while distracted with the task.

"And when he isn't hunting? What does he like to do?" she asks.

John exhales. "Ah, the same things that any twenty year-old wants to do. You know, women, cars, that sort of thing." She looks almost disappointed, so he adds, "He likes to eat."

She nods, enthusiastic. "Eating is enjoyable; I can understand that interest."

He laughs. "Well, I think I should probably get some pants on." He's comfortable enough in his boxer briefs, a small wonder for having just met the woman, but he'd like to at least put forth some effort for propriety's sake.

Chalendra closes the first aid kit. "Don't feel the need to dress for my sake. I am comfortable with the male form and don't feel threatened by your exposed legs."

It's such a strange thing to say and such a strange way to say it that again, as he had so many times already this evening, John finds himself charmed by her. He can't help but to laugh again though he feels self-consciously girlish laughing at everything she says. "Glad you're not scared off by my hairy ankles."

She studies him for a second and then jokes, "I've faced my share of sasquatches."

Together, John trying desperately not to laugh again, they make their way to the bed closest to the bathroom. He does wince when he sets down harder on the bed than he meant to and his knee is forced into a straight position. It's going to be a lot tenderer in the morning. For now it's pulsing a bit but the pain is completely manageable. He pulls some of the stiff white-cased pillows behind his back and props himself up. It's easier to have this hurt leg bent so he moves that off the bed but keeps his other straight on it. It looks a little awkward and, considering how he's still in his underwear, a bit skeezy. He trades one of the pillows, back comfort for crotch covering, and if he looks as silly as a teen hiding an erection with a textbook, at least Chalendra doesn't mention it.

The room is decorated in different shades of browns and greens, probably to best emulate the forest outside it. Chalendra's green tank top matches well, like camouflage. As all hotel rooms, the TV is set up as the main focal point. It's strange considering how little attention he usually ends up paying attention to the electronic hypnotist these days; Dean is far more likely to watch it. John prefers books, likes imagining himself as one of the characters if it's a fiction book, and if it's a non-fiction, losing himself in the wealth of information that he can pull from it. He occasionally entertains the thought of writing something himself, but talks himself out of it, makes himself feel silly for thinking it.

Not wanting to be rude, but not as eager as she, he asks, "So, what is Sam like?" It hurts to say the name, makes the void in his heart ache. It doesn't help that his Sam would be about the same age as Chalendra's now, is, if he's still alive somewhere, the hope that keeps John going, that keeps him searching and fighting, adding more and more miles to his truck's odometer and more scars to his flesh.

She sits next to him on the bed, far enough away that the movement won't jostle John's leg or maybe so she isn't pressed up to the strange guy in his underwear. "Before or after adolescence?" she asks after a loud put out sigh.

"Ah," he says as though he has any idea. Dean was such a good teenager, not that he'd admit that to Dean himself, that John had never fully understood the big deal that parents made of the dreaded adolescence. "Before."

Her eyes sparkle as she speaks and he notices that like her shirt, her eyes match the room, its browns. John isn't sure why he felt so immediately comfortable with this woman. It's almost like the old cliché, feels like he's met her before. It isn't like him to wax romantic, but as he's fairly sure she isn't telepathic, it doesn't do any harm to admire her voice's cadence, her commanding presence.

"Sam brought home animals: dogs, toads, raccoons, until he realized that he couldn't keep them when we moved, that he would always have to part with them. He just had so much love in his heart for everything. We discovered the world together… that's how it felt. Like I could know the Earth and its inhabitants through this one small soul, look at it from his eyes. He would draw everything he saw and he was only bad for the first few years, then the pictures started to look like the things he was copying like he was pushing past the Theory of Forms." John has no idea what she means but listens attentively. "He drew me often because he loved me."

"I'm sure he still does."

Chalendra jerks as though she had forgotten that he was there, which might be the case. "Oh, yes. The books assure me that he does love me but he is dealing with the fluctuations of hormones that will complete his growth cycle." Again, strangely explained, and John is staring at her, knows it but can't help it. If he'd had any experience with aliens in his supernatural missions, he'd suspect that she is one.

"So, now, what is he like now?"

Her face changes and so does her posture, hands wringing in worry. "He's angry all the time. Hates hunting, acts as though he hates me, sleeps any time that he can get away with it. He doesn't bring home animals and if he draws, he doesn't show them to me. He used to chatter incessantly, now it's one word answers. I miss hearing his ideas of the universe."

John feels sad for her and yet grateful that he hasn't had to go through that with Dean. Dean's always been so solid, so eager to help his father find Mary's killer and, hopefully, his kidnapped baby brother. He never felt like Dean hated him, not even during their worst arguments, a rare but inevitable occurrence when living in such close quarters with someone.

"I'm sorry," he says, reaching out a hand to touch hers.

She looks down at the gesture curiously. That's all he sees in the way she looks at the hand, like she doesn't know what it is and why it's there. Then she looks up at him and smiles. "I appreciate your empathy. I am glad to have met you both."

He wonders then if he should be trying to kiss her, wonders if he has time to try. "Think the boys have defected?" he asks.

Chalendra laughs. It brightens the room.

"They have been gone awhile," says John, defending what he worries she's seeing as over-protectiveness. "I know Sam had to walk back to your car, but still… They'd better not be joyriding."

Her voice is unworried, confident. "They are safe together. I hope you are right and that they are taking this opportunity to get to know each other."

John would be pissed if Dean was goofing off with the teenager instead of checking in at the hotel like he was supposed to. Or at least, he would be somewhat pissed, but there is still that thought flicking at the back of his mind wondering if it's a bad idea for a guy in his underwear to try and kiss a woman he's known for an hour, a woman that could leave him more injured than the waheela had.

"Son of a bitch!" cries Dean. "It bit me!"

Dean is too fucking cute wrestling with the scared, angry fluff that is trapped in the bag of his jacket. Petulant: a word that Chal often uses to describe Sam, seems to fit Dean's current mood. For all he knows, that's how Dean usually is, not that he has a lot to go on, since they only just met. Sam hopes that the other hunter isn't judging him based on how he's acted tonight. In the short hour or so that he's known Dean, Sam has cried in front of him, twice, once nearly sliming the poor guy's jacket, and begged like a little kid for Dean to spare a puppy's life, after, of course, having killed the puppy's mom himself with a silver blade across the throat. God, what an impression he must have made on him!

The jacket, fine brown leather, wriggles constantly and Dean tries to examine his hand in the night. It's not as dark here in town, but it's not exactly bright either. Apparently he isn't too badly hurt since he puts his hand back to work at keeping the waheela in the coat. Sam would have been very surprised if he was, since the critter is just a baby.

"Just be glad waheela aren't venomous," teases Sam. He can't help his cheery mood, the relief that he felt when Dean acquiesced had lifted so much of the burden of guilt, the soul-crushing realization of what he'd done, that he's felt since they found the waheela cub that he wants to wrap his arms around Dean (again) and set off babbling words of gratitude. Instead, he's trying to pull off the smooth Fonz-like coolness that Dean wears, but the remaining puffiness of his eyes and profuse nasal drip are insurmountable impediments.

Dean doesn't spare a glare for Sam's joke, merely snaps, "Shut up and point me to the damn shed."

Sam leads them across the small yard. Their Michigan house is quaint, a word often used by realtors and landlords to replace "tiny," but it's true enough. Despite how Sam feels about the state of Michigan, its weather in particular, he doesn't have any complaints about the house which has felt homier to him than any of the places that he and Chal have stayed at in recent memory. Its roof is pointy like those little churches that spring up in small towns and it has plenty of windows which they both like since neither is particularly private, hunter lifestyle excepted. He isn't overly concerned about the mailman catching him eating cereal in his underwear and Chal loves watching the birds, or even the occasional daredevil squirrel, plucking seeds from the bird feeder. Sam suspects that Chal would be fine if the house didn't have walls at all, just something to prop up the roof. She doesn't get cold like he does, doesn't feel small and helpless, like a kitten abandoned in an alley, when the snow piles high on the lawn.

He hears Dean grumbling behind him. "It better not have peed on anything."

Sam opens the small metal gate, providing an "after you" gesture to the other hunter. The floodlight kicks on as soon as he does and both of them are blinded, Dean cursing. Sam recovers faster, knowing his way around, not that there is much to know since it's not so much a backyard as it is a rural alley, the back of the house where the trash truck maneuvers every Tuesday morning. He turns the combination lock, 28-36-15, and unhooks it from the metal loop. The puppy is still fighting, scared little whimpers coming from the jacket as Sam steps inside the shed. It's a 10x12 galvanized steel shed. They always have a shed; sometimes they take it apart and rebuild it at the new place, but usually they just buy a new one, the effort worth more than the cost, plus there is always some oxidization on the bottom where rain and snow have started to taint it, and Chal hates signs of aging on things. Sam would suspect that she is projecting her own insecurities, but Chal looks as young and vibrant as when he was a kid.

Sam pulls the chain for the naked light bulb. Lawnmower, flower pots, boxes – empty and full, tools, the normal shed inventory clutters up the left side of the shed bursting over to the right side a bit as well. Spell components, weapons, ammunition, crosses of every faith, sealed ancient boxes, lemonade pitchers decorated with yellow lemons and filled with holy water, and sharply honed wooden stakes fill the right side, Sam's normal shed inventory. A red devil's trap, chunky with paint from being freshened up time and again and a line of salt serve as the shed's welcome mat.

Sam self-consciously looks at Dean, can see approval in his eyes. Sam relaxes. "We'll have to put up some of the herbs, make sure it doesn't eat any, but it should be fine here."

"What makes you think your mom won't notice Cujo in here?" Dean juts a chin, hands too full to use them for the gesture, at the metaphysical inventory. "Isn't she gonna put some stuff back after the hunt?"

"The equipment she uses the most she keeps in her room, so she doesn't have to come out to the shed for it. I doubt she grabbed anything special just for a waheela."

It isn't that mentioning the waheela reminds Sam of the bundle in Dean's arms because there is no forgetting it, not with the noise it's making, but it does provide a good segue to worrying about the snagged creature. He'd cut his tongue out rather than say it to Dean, but the broken-hearted scared sounds of the puppy are killing him. His arms ache to hold the baby monster until it calms, to use his over-sized callused hands to stroke its fur until it stops shaking. He uses one of those hands now to shut the shed door behind Dean, trapping the scent of musty metal, earth, and aging herbs in and leaving out any sensory clues about the world outside the safe-feeling chamber.

"You want me to just set it down?" Dean looks uncertain. "Don't you have a cage or something?"

Sam doesn't share Dean's reluctance. He's so eager to get the puppy set up in its new home, as temporary as Sam's, to let the poor orphan know that it is safe.

Rather than respond verbally, Sam reaches for the jacket, unravels the top. The puppy's whimper turns to the least menacing growl the world has known. The waheela is white somewhere underneath the dirt, almost like a husky but its snout is wide and ursine, ends in a smudge of a nose. Its ears are round, not pointed. Its eyes are nuggets of rose quartz flecked with hematite. Its teeth, which the waheela displays in abundance, are small but sharp, carnivore's canines and incisors. One day the waheela will be threatening, scary even, but today is not that day.

Sam shushes it, coos at it in pointless gibberish and baby talk as he reaches for it.

Softly, so as to not spook it, Dean warns, "Dude, I wouldn't. Cujo's got some damn sharp teeth."

Sam must be doing something right because, while not calm in the least, the puppy has ceased growling. Rather than let Dean see him get nipped, almost but not quite worth the opportunity to feel the soft fur, Sam waits as Dean sets the jacket with its adorable terrified contents down on the floor of the shed.

The puppy shoots out, a furry white cannonball, its nails scratching a cacophony on the metal floor, diving into a hole in the clutter on the more mundane side of the shed. Something, a wood plank, Sam guesses from the sound, clatters to the floor.

Sam smiles at Dean. "I don't think it likes your jacket."

A quirk tugs the corner of Dean's mouth upwards. "In that case, Cujo is definitely not female." He retrieves his jacket, pushes his nose to the leather, pulls back with a grimace. "Well, no pee at least." With how scared the puppy was, the jacket got off lucky. "Still smells like ass."

"I doubt that's from the dog," snarks Sam.

"You've got a smart mouth on you, don't you Sasquatch?" Dean's words could be cutting, but they aren't, sharpness dulled by a levity of voice and a camaraderie of spirit. He's playing back. It only confirms what Sam had already realized seconds after they met; he likes Dean.

They look to the area of the shed that now contains a small monster. Sam slaps Dean's arm lightly. "Come on, we should get back to the hotel. It needs a chance to adjust anyway."

"You think I'm worried about how the damn thing feels?"

Sam locks up the shed behind them. He doesn't know if Dean cares about the waheela, but he'd cared enough about Sam's feelings to leave it alive. As a fellow hunter, he gets how big of a deal the gesture is, cherishes its warmth. Dean leads the way back to their vehicles; it is not the last time that Sam will follow him.

Chalendra's fall from Heaven was less like a plummeting aircraft and more like a confused autumn leaf buffeted by strong winds. Her grace had become weaker and weaker as her identification with God's favored creations grew stronger. She can't look back and think, "Ah, that is when I became human" partially because she doesn't know and partially because she doesn't think she has yet, not fully, though that may be faith rather than fact. Nearly sixteen years she's spent as Sam's guardian, the last seven she's been, angelically speaking, powerless. Sam was nine when he caught chicken pox. He lay in bed burning with fever, covered with rubbery itchy nipple-like bumps, and she had pressed her hand to his damp forehead and completely failed to heal him. It was one of the worst days of her divinely long life. She'd felt vulnerable when she lost her power of conjuration, unable to summon even a single blanket for Sam to cope better with winter, she'd been frustrated when she'd lost her ability to read human thoughts and emotions, and she'd been heart-broken when she'd lost her ability to fly, but nothing had affected her as much as not being able to stop the disease from ravaging Sam, her charge, the reason for her earthly existence; it had been the blackest day.

She's a hybrid now, too often surprised and delighted by things like nesting birds and telephones, and too slow to empathize to be considered human, yet she can't answer prayers or travel to the outer reaches of the universe, exploring its wonders like a tourist lost in the Louvre. She has adapted to her life on the small blue planet, but it still isn't home.

So when Sam's father, the kind, troubled human to whom Sam owes half of his very existence presses his lips to hers, she berates herself for not having learned this core aspect of humanity, worries that he will feel her inexperience. She's embarrassed at her duality and she pushes her hands against him, moving him away, even as a terrifically pleasurable knot curls in her belly and shivers down her spine. She wants to keep the sharp bristles of his chin hair against her own smooth chin, wants to join their lips and tongues and saliva, but this is John Winchester, a figure as iconic to Chalendra as Jesus and she doesn't want to screw everything up, his opportunity to know his lost son, because she has failed to prepare.

John apologizes, mistaking the intent behind her refusal. "I'm so sorry," he says, his hand comes up to rub at his stubble, a nervous tic. He leans his upper torso back unaware that her head is screaming for him to stay. He looks so young when embarrassed, like Sam's brother but with more grey. "I think I misread something there. I… I'm an idiot. Sorry, Chalendra."

She loves her name on his lips and the soft vulnerability in his eyes. Before she is aware of the impulse, she recovers the physical distance. Her body lunges towards him, both fists digging into the mattress to support her weight as she leans into him, presses her chapped lips to his. It's an awkward position and when he raises his hands into her hair, cups just under her ear, it's the best position ever.

He opens their lips, he has control of such things now, and his tongue brushes hers. It's like lightning. She duplicates the movement, hopes that this time she will be a fast learner. His thumbs are still pressed into the skin by her ear. She feels like a disembodied head floating above for the sole purpose of being in physical contact with John. Kissing is delightful, much better than bird watching. Eagerly she moves her tongue over tongue and over teeth, bravely over a lip, and his eyes open, watching her. He pulls back a bit and she worries that she's done something wrong. His eyes and his lips smile. "Guess I didn't misread?" he asks.

She isn't sure exactly of what he's asking, probably could think better if the pulse in her head wasn't beating "more" to a maddening pace. Unable to answer the unknown question, she gently commands. "Please kiss me more."

He does.

Dean's got Warrant blasting on Baby's speakers and he's following Granny Driver Sam. It's so late that it's nearly early now. Despite the smell of beast dog all over his jacket (shoved in the back trunk for now), he's feeling pretty good. He somehow managed to smuggle the dog to Sam's, where his dad will never go, and as long as they both keep their mouths shut about the events of the night, he just might be able to keep his dad from knowing that he broke one of the cardinal rules of hunting.

Sam pulls up next to John's Sierra Grande. Dean, paranoid that his dad might catch a whiff of waheela in his trunk, parks a bit farther away but not suspiciously so. Sam gets out first and as Dean approaches him, he's all nervous smiles, and Dean worries that he's gonna blow their cover. He leans in close to Sam and says, "If he asks why we're late, I wanted to get some fast food, but it turned out the place that we went to wasn't open 24 hours like you thought, get it?" Dad might be a bit pissed at him for not checking back in immediately, but food is about as decent an excuse for tardiness as he can get.

He waits for Sam to nod before pulling out the plastic key card. The room is number 207, Dean feels proud to remember. Nothing tricky, but it's too easy to get mixed up with yesterday's motel room number.

"Think we should knock first?" he asks Sam with an eyebrow waggle.

Sam doesn't think it's funny and he pulls a whiny bitch face that makes Dean feel triumphant.

Dean puts the card in the slot and opens the door. When he enters the hotel room, he sees his father on the bed, a pillow over his crotch, and Chalendra standing next to the TV, her face pink and her mouth kiss-red. He thought what he'd said to Sam was a joke. He'd been able to tell that his dad was grooving on the Mom Ackles vibe but he didn't know his dad would make his move so fast. It's impressive. "Hey Kids," he says. "We're back."

"It's about time," snaps John. Then, realizing how that sounds, like he wasn't enjoying his lady friend's company, he coughs and adds, "I mean, we did just finish a hunt. You should always report back first before doing any joyriding."

Dean wants to scoff at the word "joyriding." It seems that his dad is more interesting in joyriding than Dean or Sam. Chalendra hasn't looked up at the two of them, her guilty eyes studying the brown carpet. Dean doubts she took offense to John's words because he doesn't think she's hearing a word anyone's saying. "Yeah well, Sammy and I tried to get some grub in this town. Harder than you'd think at this time of night." He looks back at Sam for confirmation. Sam, though, is staring at Chalendra, eyes impressively wide for how far down his eyebrows are. It looks like his eyelashes have little toupees. They are making this situation way more awkward than it needs to be, he thinks. "How's the knee?"

Dad, recovering quicker than Sam and Chalendra, shrugs. "I'll live. Just a scratch, though those damn things have some long claws." When the room remains silent after a few seconds he adds, "Think it tried to leave a tattoo on my bone."

"Anchor tattoo?" Dean asks. He finally moves into the room, sets down his duffel bags, hunting and clothing, on a tiny table that guests are expected to eat breakfast on. He'd rather eat in bed. Hell, he'd rather do most things in bed.

He notices that Sam hasn't shut the door, hasn't even come fully into the room.

"I don't think waheelas do much sailing." His dad says trying to lighten the mood, fails.

Dean smacks Sam's arm pulling the boy out of his shock-induced stupor. "Sam here took one out without a scratch. Guess he must be a better hunter than you ,eh old man?"

Sam's head moves between Dean and his dad, trying to catch up with the conversation now that Dean has physically forced his attention on it. "I've had a good teacher," he says breathlessly, as though he's been running. His eyes squint, suspicious and incredulous, as he looks at his "teacher."

Chalendra apparently decides then to own up to her actions. She straightens, raises her eyes, smiles at Sam. "Thank you, Sam. You've been a good student."

Dean doesn't go in for all this happy loving family crap and, luckily, it ain't his family, so he says, "Well, I'm gonna shower. Anyone need to pee first?" No one shouts anything, so he grabs the duffel with his clothes in it, pushes Sam into the room all the way so that he can close the damn hotel room door, and locks himself away in the too white bathroom far from the messed up Brady Bunch episode outside.

He's not disgusting like he so often is after a hunt and it's nice to not have a single wound to wash or bandage. He gets a lather going on his body until he looks like Santa's beard and he sings the Warrant song from the car, softly at first and then louder as he loses himself in the pleasure of soap and hot water and a waiting bed. This isn't the first time he's felt giddy about impending bedtime. Bed rocks.

Emerging from the bathroom, t-shirt clinging to the wet spots on his chest, Dean expects to find Sam and Chalendra hugging or yelling or talking about the birds and the bees. Instead, the room is quiet and empty save for his father sitting at the small table looking in his journal with pen in hand. It's a comforting sight, something that Dean likens to other guys seeing their dads reading the Sunday paper. His dad's face is focused. It was such a basic, open-shut case that Dean wonders what he's even had to write about the situation. Cases like these are Winchester weekends.

Dean sets his duffel on the bed farthest from the bathroom, the bed that dad hadn't been making out in. He can smell her, he thinks, a slight feminine aroma, but his own soap smell is so strong that he could just be imagining it, or worse, smelling himself. An elf of mischief sneaks into his mind and he lets it out his mouth because, hell, this is a rare opportunity. "Sam's mom seems nice."

John doesn't look up. "Shut up."