Dean leaned against the wall as he watched the Doctor try to be a normal houseguest. He was absolutely terrible at it and clearly had no idea what passed for small talk in small town America, but once he had seen the project Ben was working on for school, his whole demeanor had changed, and he'd start to extol the virtues of learning about new places.
And Dean had to laugh, because judging by Ben's expression, all the Doctor had managed to convince him of was that Dean had found a friend to try to help him get into his ecology project so he could pull his grade up.
And hey, that was a nice side effect, sure. But mostly, Dean was entertained watching the Doctor, because he remembered the last time the Doctor had tried to help with homework—and Dean had ended up meeting some lizard people.
He was so caught up in watching the Doctor and Ben that he almost didn't see Lisa. But even after all this time had passed in his "normal" life, he hadn't let go of his paranoia, so almost no one could sneak up on him these days.
He was, however, much better at stopping himself from startling when someone grabbed him without warning. This was a small town, and he'd done enough favors for people by fixing their cars or their yards that people were starting to get familiar with him, starting to clap him on the back or jostle him when they talked to someone. And that was good; that meant he was starting to fit in. Starting to be normal.
It shouldn't have been this hard to be normal, though, right? There was something wrong with him that had was having this hard of a time.
"Who is he?" Lisa asked, both eyebrows raised pointedly.
"Not a hunter," Dean said in an undertone, though he saw the Doctor pause and look over his shoulder and wondered if the guy had heard him. He'd always had an uncanny knack for knowing things he shouldn't, and he did have some kind of telepathic … something.
"Okay," Lisa said. "But who is he?"
"Hard to explain," Dean said, and when she playfully hit him with the back of her hand, he held both hands up. "No, really. He's… a time traveler, believe it or not."
"After some of the stuff you've told me? Yeah, I believe it."
Dean chuckled at that and pulled her over to kiss her cheek. "Just trust me on this," he said. "You can trust him. I've known him since I was a kid."
Lisa frowned at him for a moment longer, then sighed and kissed him in return. "Okay," she said. "Just tell me he isn't here for a reason."
"That part, I can't tell you. Usually, when he shows up, something's going on."
"Of course."
Dean shrugged easily. "Didn't seem like he knew why he was here, either, so—"
"So should I cancel that dinner reservation with the new neighbors?" Lisa asked. "They've been asking what side dishes they should bring tomorrow, but if we have unexpected guests…"
"You know… that might be just the excuse we need," Dean said, nodding along.
That was the biggest part of living a "normal" life that genuinely stymied Dean: the weird politics for something as simple as getting together for dinner. There were all sorts of unwritten rules about hosting and inviting and all that, and while Dean would never admit it, he knew he didn't actually know the norms. He was used to breezing into an area, not at all changing himself, charming whoever he needed to, and then leaving.
But he'd promised Sammy he'd try, so he'd ended up agreeing to have dinner with the new neighbors.
But they were giving off weird vibes. It was the same couple who had come to dinner a few nights back, and they had moved right into their hosts' house—and Dean and Lisa hadn't even known they were going to move. They said that it had been a dinner to sign some closing papers, but still. Something was off about the whole thing.
And they lived next door, and Dean was determined not to lose another family.
But he also didn't want to see patterns where there were none. And he didn't want to scare anyone. And he definitely didn't want to raise a kid into paranoia and too much responsibility.
So, yeah, putting off the dinner was probably a good thing, right?
Dean frowned as he watched the Doctor talking with Ben. He had never known the Doctor to not have adventure in his wake. And with these weird neighbors suddenly around, that couldn't possibly be a coincidence, right?
But he and the Doctor could look into it without involving Lisa and Ben. That was probably the better move.
Dean was already nodding, agreeing with his decision before he vocalized it. "Hey, Doc, I was actually hoping to get your opinion on something," he called out—and tried not to laugh too hard at the look of pure gratitude Ben shot him for rescuing him from an overly-interested stranger.
The Doctor straightened up, still smiling, and pulled his coat down. "I should have known," he said. "Always something with the Winchesters, isn't there?"
"Yeah." Dean knew he didn't mean anything by it, but … well, eventually, one day, maybe he'd be able to think of himself as whole instead of only one half of a whole. But that hadn't happened yet, and he wasn't sure when it would.
The Doctor interrupted Dean's train of thought with a wide, sweeping gesture. "Well? What's the problem? Zygons? Sonatarans?"
"You made half those up," Ben said, though he was grinning, and Dean recognized that light. He wanted to help.
That light scared Dean more than he cared to admit.
"What?" The Doctor laughed and turned to Dean. "You mean you haven't even told him about the Silurians?"
"Yeah, you haven't even told me about the Silurians?" Ben said, grinning crookedly.
Dean laughed and shook his head, gesturing for the Doctor to join him somewhere Ben wasn't doing his homework, and the Doctor, still laughing, came with him, his hands in his deep pockets.
The Doctor waited until they were out of Ben's earshot before, grinning obnoxiously, he looked toward Dean with both eyebrows raised. "Gotta love that instinct in there—that one that says they'll run into danger no matter what you do."
"Yeah, yeah, I know I have no room to talk. If you start saying something parental like 'you were the same way at his age', I'll kick you out," Dean grumbled good-naturedly.
"Then I won't say that," the Doctor said—but paired with his grin, that was somehow worse.
Dean lifted one eyebrow in the Doctor's direction, but when that only resulted in a wider grin, he laughed, shook his head, and got down to brass tacks. "Okay, so, these new neighbors showed up one day for a dinner party, and the next thing anyone knows, they own the house, and no one's heard from the neighbors," Dean said, sitting down with the Doctor in the living room so they could brainstorm.