Supernatural gen fic, PG-13
Title: Our Childhood Wars
Characters: Claire Novak
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Remember the little girl Lilith possessed in No Rest for the Wicked? She's seventeen now, and has just met Claire Novak.
Word count: 5800
Disclaimer: I am not Kripke. I claim nothing.
Notes: The little girl was never named, so I've christened her Alice.
Claire first meets Alice Fremont as a paper figure, cut from school files and third-hand accounts. By the time she gets to Indiana, Alice hasn’t lived there in seven years; no one at the Bloomington Elementary School remembers her. There’s a record noting a “minor disturbance” that took place when Alice was ten, but when Claire asks the principal about it, she shrugs her shoulders, says that was before her time.
Claire is years behind in a search she shouldn’t be pursuing anyway.
She talks to a former neighbor who knows nothing about the incident, but does recall where the Fremonts moved. Dayton, Ohio, is only three hours away - Claire can make it there in less, if she wants to.
The neighbor, a middle aged woman, has been frowning ever since Claire spoke the Fremonts’ name, and when Claire rises from the flowered couch, she reaches her hand out as if to stop her. Quickly, though, she retracts her hand.
“Is there something else, Mrs. Bradbury?” Claire asks. Hopes.
“They were - different.” Mrs. Bradbury shakes her head, her hands fisted in her lap. She looks down at the floor for a long moment before she raises her head and in an even voice says, “I think something happened when they were up at his father’s place, Ms. Whittemore. Up in New Harmony.”
Claire knows what happened in New Harmony, but she gently pushes Mrs. Bradbury to elaborate.
“It was long time ago - 2008, I think.” That’s all she’ll say, so Claire thanks her and leaves.
Outside, the afternoon sun has been swallowed up by rainclouds. It’s not raining yet, but a sudden bolt of lightning and accompanying clap of thunder startle her. When she was younger and scared of thunderstorms, her father told her that thunder was just the sound of the angels bowling. A common story, told by many parents to many children.
By the time a second bolt of lightning splits the sky, Claire is in her car, driving out of Bloomington. She is only thinking of Alice. Not him, not them.
* * *
Alice can keep a secret. Her friends always confide in her - Molly’s parents are getting divorced, Camille doesn’t want to turn into her mother, Lillian slept with Mark. They tell her their secrets over the phone, in text messages, in notes passed during study hall.
She never tells them her secrets. She doesn’t tell them why her family moved to Illinois in the middle of the school year, or why the taste of cake makes her sick. She doesn’t tell them about her nightmares - a mutilated cat, her grandfather with his neck snapped, a man standing over her with a knife. She doesn’t tell them about sitting in the basement with her parents, her father’s hands pressed over her ears so that she couldn’t hear the man upstairs screaming - her mother crying - the silence that followed.
She’s still waiting for that silence to break.
* * *
It’s around six when Claire enters Dayton, too late to see the Fremonts, even if she had their address. It will be easy enough to track them down - she should find a cheap motel and then get started.
Claire has had more difficult days, but she’s suddenly drained. She can’t remember if she ate anything today, can’t remember the last time she could sleep without taking pills. It’s just that she’s been pushing herself too hard; she’s been chasing the truth across the country for months. Of course she’s tired.
This is the lie she tells herself to silence the one truth she doesn’t want to know. Until now, she’s only dealt with the dead and the missing - hunters, demons, angels. No one has gotten hurt yet.
What if - ? She cancels the thought before it can complete itself. Finds a motel, gets started.
* * *
That night there is blood down the front of her dress. The cat, again. Alice wakes from the dream with none of the horror she would’ve once felt. She’s not growing numb, but resistant. She will dream the terror of her childhood, but she will not feel it.
And yet, she has to clamp her hand over her mouth to hold back the scream. She’s done so well; she’s kept the same scream inside for so long, and only let it out once. Small, desperate sounds claw their way out between her fingers, sounds that a trapped animal makes - but she holds back the scream.
When she’s sure it’s over, she moves her hand away, breathing harshly through her mouth. The clock reads two fifteen - there are hours yet until morning.
* * *
Usually when Claire flashes her - well, Jane Whittemore’s - badge, people are more willing to cooperate. Mrs. Freemont is not. She keeps the door partially closed and doesn’t let go of the handle.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I think you’re mistaken.”
“Your husband didn’t have family in New Harmony?” Claire can only see a section of the foyer; she can’t spot any signs that a teenage girl lives in this house. Not that she plans to speak with Alice.
Mrs. Fremont notices her looking and steps outside, pulling the door closed behind her. “His father lived there, but his death was an accident. I don’t know about anyone else who died there.”
Claire lets a moment pass before she speaks. “I see,” she says and draws a card with her name and number from her pocket. “Well, if you think of anything…”
She hears a car pull up in front of the house and glances back. The passenger door opens, and a girl climbs out from the car. She’s blonde, looks about seventeen. She sees Claire and hesitates before she begins to walk up to the house.
Mrs. Fremont snatches the card from Claire’s hand. “I’d like you to leave now.”
“Of course,” Claire says. And then she waits just long enough for Alice to come within earshot. “Anything you remember about New Harmony would be helpful. Have a good evening, Mrs. Fremont.”
She walks past Alice, who is frozen in the walkway. She can’t quite bring herself to look at her.
* * *
They have spaghetti that night. Alice’s mother doesn’t tell her father about the woman who came to the house, but later she hears the quiet exchange of their voices coming from their bedroom and guesses at the topic. She doesn’t bother listening in; nothing they say ever makes sense to her.
Their voices stop around eleven. She waits another hour, though, just to be safe. She then descends the stairs, skipping the last one, which squeaks. She’s certain that her parents will hear her opening the garbage can to shift through the trash, certain that they’ll come rushing down the stairs to stop her from pulling the small, crumpled card out.
But no one stops her. One corner of the card is stained with spaghetti sauce, but the name and number are legible once she smoothes out the card. Detective Jane Whittemore. Alice wishes she could call right now, but she can wait. She’ll wait; it’s only one more night.
* * *
There is no reason to expect a call from Alice. Her mother probably tore up the card, or hid it - and even if Alice got to the card, even if she calls, Claire doesn’t know what to say.
Yet she keeps checking her phone to confirm that it has good service and that it’s charged. At first she tries to concentrate on her research. If she can find a lead on Robert Singer, she can leave Dayton without feeling she’s missed an opportunity. Because Singer’s the one she’s really after. He’s the sole living link to the Winchesters; he witnessed the war most of the world never realized was being fought.
She has no leads on Singer, and it’s unlikely that Dayton will help her in her search. So Claire sits in her motel room, reviewing the precious scraps of information she has, trying to make connections.
Within an hour the words on the papers begin to lose meaning. If there is a connection to be found, she’s not going to find it now, when she keeps listening for her cellphone to go off. Claire puts the papers away and rises from the bed. Maybe a walk will calm her mind.
As she’s closing the door the cellphone rings.
She knocks over the lamp trying to get to the phone and answers it on the second ring. She shouldn’t hope, can’t dare to hope -
From the other end, a girl’s halting voice asks, “Is this Detective Whittemore?”
“Yes,” Claire says. She struggles to keep her voice calm and neutral. “Who is this?”
There’s a short pause. “Alice Fremont. You came to my house yesterday.”
Before Claire can process this, Alice takes an audible breath and says, “You said something about New Harmony. I was just - I wanted to know if…” She makes a sound of frustration. “Why are you looking into New Harmony, detective?”
Her directness surprises Claire. “I’ve been investigating some unexplained deaths in that area.” She keeps her answer vague; she wants Alice to lead this conversation.
“Recent deaths?”
“Miss Fremont,” Claire says, “is there something you know? Something you want to share with me?”
Alice doesn’t answer.
“If you know something - ”
“I think I do,” Alice says. “I think… Could we meet?”
Claire takes a breath, forces herself to say it. “Yes.”
They arrange a meeting at a café in town later that day. After Claire hangs up, she realizes she’s been holding on to the edge of the small table so tightly that her hand is aching. She lets go with some difficulty and begins to change into her suit.
* * *
It’s a short drive into town. Alice arrives much too early, but she’s still disappointed when she scans the room and doesn’t see Detective Whittemore. She orders a cup of coffee even though she hates it, and for half an hour she sits, forcing the bitter liquid down her throat so that she’ll have something to distract her.
The door to the café opens, and Alice looks up, not really expecting to see her. A blonde woman enters and almost immediately turns her eyes on Alice. Alice can’t help it; she stands up so abruptly her chair nearly tips backwards.
Detective Whittemore walks over to her, and God, why did Alice choose this place? There are too many people; their voices are too loud, and they’re plugging up her ears. She won’t even be able to hear the detective.
“Miss Fremont?” Detective Whittemore’s voice is pitched just above a murmur, but it sounds so clearly it’s as if she’s speaking into Alice’s ear. She offers her hand - for a moment, Alice is too stunned to know what to do with it.
“Uh,” she says, finally taking Detective Whittemore’s hand. “Hi.” It’s all she can think to say.
The detective smiles. “It’s okay, Miss Fremont. I’m not here to interrogate you; I just want to listen to what you have to say.” She sits, and Alice automatically follows.
“You don’t have to call me that,” Alice says. “Miss Fremont, I mean - it sort of makes me feel like I’m in the principal’s office.”
“Fair enough.” Detective Whittemore takes a small notepad and pen out of her purse and looks up at Alice. “Do you mind if I take some notes?”
Alice thinks she could say no and it’d be all right with Detective Whittemore, but she says yes.
“Tell me about New Harmony.”
Alice wants to. She’s been waiting to tell someone about the blood and the screaming and the years of silence - but she realizes that this moment, still, is not the right moment. Detective Whittemore wouldn’t understand. So Alice tells her what she will understand.
“My grandfather lived in New Harmony,” she begins. “We used to go there sometimes, on the weekends. But I guess you already knew that.”
The detective nods. “Go on, Alice.”
“One weekend, we were visiting him, and something happened.” She tries to continue, but her breath catches in her throat. Detective Whittemore waits patiently for her to find her voice. “I was six. It was spring.” She remembers the pretty flowers, all in bloom. Her breaths are coming quickly now; she’s starting to feel dizzy. “I can’t remember exactly what happened. It was like I was asleep and then awake, and even when I was awake, I couldn’t…” Control my body, she wants to say, but that would sound crazy. “It was like I wasn’t really there. Does that make any sense?”
Alice has kept her gaze on a point just to the right of Detective Whittemore, but now she catches her eye. And it’s like she’s staring into a too bright light - there is something so profound in the detective’s eyes that Alice is nearly blinded. Her eyes speak. They say, I know.
How? How can she know when Alice has never told anyone and doesn’t herself understand? Before Alice can ask the question, the light switches off. Detective Whittemore jots something down. “It does.”
Alice stares at her for a long moment, thrown. She might have imagined what she saw - Detective Whittemore’s expression is as it was before, mild and pleasant. Alice reaches for her coffee cup and takes a sip before she can remember that the coffee’s cold by now.
It’s awful, but it refocuses her attention. She swallows, grimacing slightly, and says, “I know my grandfather died. I don’t know how, but I remember - ” She remembers his eyes gone wide and blank, his head at a funny angle. “I’m not sure what I remember,” she finishes, cautiously.
Detective Whittemore doesn’t speak at first. She leans forward and looks intently into Alice’s eyes. Alice can’t decide if she wants to lean in or sit farther back in her chair. She’s afraid to look away. “Did you ever hear about the other people who died there, at the same time?”
She does. She once found a brief article that mentioned New Harmony mourning its losses, but she never found out anything more. She tells the detective this.
“Most of them - ” But she presses her lips together before the rest of the sentence can escape her mouth. “Do you remember anyone unusual? Two men, maybe, who you’d never seen before?”
The man who stood over her with a knife. He would have killed her, if the other man hadn’t stopped him.
She’s not in the little girl anymore.
“Alice?”
She doesn’t realize that she’s squeezed her eyes shut until Detective Whittemore touches her arm and they fly open.
“Are you all right?”
Alice can’t speak, so she nods.
“I’m sorry,” Detective Whittemore says. “This is obviously difficult for you. I shouldn’t be asking all these questions at once.” She stands. “Do you want me to take you home?”
Alice can’t understand what’s happening - that’s it? It’s over? “Wait,” she says, “there’s more I could tell you.”
“I have time. You can tell me later.” The detective studies her, frowning. “Really, if you want a ride - ”
“No,” Alice quickly says. She took her father’s car; she has to get it back.
“All right.” Detective Whittemore walks her to the door, watching her as if she’s afraid that Alice will collapse.
But Alice reaches her car and remains upright; her hands don’t even tremble as she opens the door. Detective Whittemore, satisfied, starts to walk away.
“Detective!” Alice calls. The detective turns back. “You were going to say something about the people who died in New Harmony.”
Detective Whittemore hesitates. “Nearly all of them were found on the street where your grandfather lived.”
And then she is gone.
* * *
“How did they die?”
Alice doesn’t give her a chance to say hello after she picks up her cellphone. Claire’s first thought is of Sam and Dean, but Alice can’t be talking about them. “Who?”
“The people from New Harmony.” Alice pauses. “And my grandfather, if you know.”
This isn’t how Claire wants to have this conversation. She wants to see Alice - needs to see how she reacts, so that she’ll know when to stop pushing. “I think it would be better if we met again.”
But Alice can’t meet. She mentions her parents and trails off; Claire reluctantly accepts this.
She pulls out her notes on New Harmony, though she doesn’t need them. “A few were stabbed,” she says, turning to a page where she’s scribbled demon killing knife? From? next to the names of the dead. “Some apparently died of natural causes.”
Michael Kumin. Claire moves her fingers over the name, considering.
“Apparently? So you don’t know for sure?”
“The reports I have are old,” Claire says. She turns the page over - Kumin can wait. “There isn’t much I do know for certain.”
“Yeah,” Alice says, “I know the feeling.”
Claire lets the silence go uninterrupted, afraid that if she speaks, she’ll speak as herself and not as Jane Whittemore. Does Alice know that feeling of utter helplessness, the one that Claire can’t rid herself of, no matter how many strands of the truth she gathers together? Does she know that feeling that something is wrong, something is wrong and no one else seems to notice?
“Shit,” Alice mutters. “I have to go.”
“Go?” Claire echoes. Perhaps Alice is punishing her for her sudden departure yesterday.
“I can call you back, right? That would be okay?”
Claire nods before she realizes that Alice can’t see her. “Yeah.”
And it’s better this way, she thinks as she puts down the phone. Now she has time to collect herself, to forget about those feelings that no one but Alice would understand.
* * *
It becomes a routine. Detective Whittemore never calls Alice, but each time Alice calls her, she can tell that the detective has been awaiting the call.
At first, Alice can’t call while her parents are in the house. She calls while they’re out, or borrows the car and drives somewhere she can be alone. After a few calls, though, they stop naming New Harmony. It’s simply “there” - they both know what they’re referring to. She feels safe enough to stay in her own room, the door closed and locked.
Alice can’t pinpoint when things begin to change. In an early call, she asks if the police ever had any suspects; later, as she lies on her bed, she asks why Detective Whittemore took this case. It’s personal, direct - and Alice doesn’t know why she asked it.
“This is my job,” the detective says. A week ago, Alice might not have caught the change in her voice. Even now, she can’t quite describe that change, but she knows what it signals.
“Liar,” she says, without thinking.
She regrets it immediately and expects Detective Whittemore to hang up. For a moment, when there is no response, Alice assumes she has hung up.
“You’re right,” the detective says. Her voice is a little unsteady - Alice has never heard her like this. She sits up, listening very carefully. “I’m not just here because it’s my job. I want - ” Alice can’t move for fear she’ll make a sound and miss something. “I want to find out the truth. There are things…” Detective Whittemore stops, and if she doesn’t go on, Alice won’t be able to bear it. “Things I don’t understand. Things I need to figure out.”
That’s the first and only time Detective Whittemore ends the conversation. She sounds hoarse when she says goodbye, as if she’s been screaming. She might have been crying.
The sound of her voice keeps Alice up that night. She tries to apologize the next time she calls, but Detective Whittemore talks over her, something else she’s never done before.
Their conversation is short and dissatisfying, so the next time Alice calls, she begins with a question she knows will cause problems.
“What are you hiding?”
“I don’t understand,” Detective Whittemore says.
Alice is quiet for a moment. She thinks about how the detective’s eyes looked in the café, the way her voice sounded over the phone. “You do,” she says. It’s not an accusation; it’s the truth.
“Any information I’ve withheld is information I’m not permitted to share.”
Alice considers calling her a liar again, but she doesn’t think it’ll work again.
“And Alice?” Though Detective Whittemore’s voice has lost its clinical tone, she is still in control. “I could ask the same thing of you.”
Alice’s heartbeat quickens. She knows she should take this as a warning to not ask dangerous questions. But she also knows that they have gone too far already - now the only questions left to ask are the most dangerous ones.
* * *
“There was a survivor.” This is the first thing Claire says when she calls Alice. She’s been preparing herself to say it, but now that the words are out she cringes. There is no turning back from this.
She anticipated the long silence that follows, as well as the anger that colors Alice’s voice when she speaks. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
Claire ignores her and continues with her prepared statement. “Michael Kumin. I talked to him a few weeks ago. He told me - ” She presses her fingernails into her palm. Say it. “He told me that something entered his body that night. It took control of him. I think the same thing happened to the others who died in New Harmony.”
She waits for Alice to ask what possessed him, or perhaps to say, in a quavering voice, that it happened to her too.
But Alice’s voice is steady. “You knew,” she says, sounding almost pensive. “From the start, you knew.”
Her aberration catches Claire off-guard. “I…”
“Who are you?”
Detective Jane Whittemore. It’s the best name to give, but Claire could just as easily say Julie Taylor, Adrienne Keating, Sarah Harmer. How could Alice know she was lying?
She would know.
“I’m not even sure you’re real,” Alice says. “And I know how that sounds, but how can you be real? How can you, when you looked at me like…” She stops. “God. Just - just tell me that you’re real.”
“Claire.” The name explodes from her, and the aftershocks make her chest hurt. “Claire Novak.”
“Where are you, Claire?”
She tells her. Fifteen minutes later, Alice is standing in her motel room.
* * *
Detective Whittemore - no, Alice corrects herself, Claire - looks younger. She’s not dressed in a suit but in jeans and a t-shirt, and Alice realizes that she’s only a few years older than herself. She takes a step closer; Claire steps back. Her eyes are wide and startled.
“Wait,” she says. “Wait.”
But Alice has to satisfy her childish need to know that Claire is real - she has to touch her. The tips of her fingers touch Claire’s cheek. Claire closes her eyes, and then moves her own hand to cover Alice’s.
“Real,” Alice whispers.
She doesn’t know how long they stand there, but after some time her hand falls away and she sits in the only chair in the room. “She told me her name was Lilith,” she says, knowing that Claire understands what she’s talking about. “She said she wanted to play.”
Claire remains standing. “Lilith was a demon.”
It’s almost too absurd. Alice was raised vaguely Christian, going to church only on holidays; she’s never given much thought to demons. But she believes Claire. “Was?”
“Lilith was killed,” Claire says, sitting on the bed. “I’m still working out how.”
Alice takes some small comfort from this. “Why did she choose me?”
She can tell by the way Claire is looking at her that she doesn’t know, or that there is no reason. She doesn’t want to hear that, so before Claire can answer, she launches into the series of questions she been waiting to ask. Who were those two men? What really killed those people? Claire tells her what she knows, and then asks her own question.
“What happened when you were ten, Alice?”
At first Alice doesn’t know what she’s talking about. “We moved,” she says.
“Why?”
“Because I screamed.” During the middle of math class - she remembers numbers written on the board. She couldn’t copy them into her notebook. It was like a nightmare; everything she wrote turned into something ugly and frightening. She remembers standing up on her chair - Alice, what are you doing? Alice? And then she screamed.
She’s not sure what she said aloud and what she thought, but Claire doesn’t ask her to explain.
They both fall silent. Claire looks out the window; Alice stares at her, knowing that she feels her gaze. “There’s a reason you came here,” Alice says, and still Claire does not turn toward her. “You wanted the truth. Claire, did you - ” She falters. “Did you need me? To find the truth?”
Claire finally turns to her, but she cannot keep her eyes on Alice. “You have to understand,” she says. “I’ve been trying to figure it out for so long. And there was no one…” Claire presses her fingers to her lips, her eyes closed.
Alice wants to grab hold of her, wants to shake the words out of her. She wants to say, Yes Claire I understand. But she can’t be sure that she does until Claire can tell her the truth.
“I was twelve,” Claire says, and then slowly opens her eyes. “I was twelve when my father went crazy. My mother tried to hide it from me, but I knew something was happening to him. Later I found out that he was hearing a voice - but I didn’t know that until after he left. He was gone for a long time. Almost a year.”
She’s not forcing the words out - they flow, in fact, with surprising ease - and yet, Claire sits like a compressed coil. Tense, and ready to spring. “I watched him leave. I was standing on the porch and he looked at me and said that he wasn’t my father.” Claire shakes her head. “He wasn’t. I couldn’t explain how I knew it, I didn’t know what he really was, not then - but I knew it wasn’t him.
“And then he came back, and this time it was him.” For a moment, Claire just sits and breathes. “I thought that maybe everything was going to be okay again. Until our neighbors attacked us.” Her fingers flutter over her throat. It’s a strange gesture, but Alice doesn’t ask. “They were possessed by demons. Two men came and got us away from them.”
“Sam and Dean?” The sound of Alice’s voice seems out of place.
Claire nods. “They were going to take my dad with them, and my mother and I were going somewhere safe. But it turned out that my mother was possessed, and they had to come back. Before they got back, though, I heard a voice.” So far, she hasn’t looked Alice in the eye, but she does now. “There other beings that possess humans, Alice, not just demons. The voice told me he was an angel. Castiel.” She pauses, possibly to give the Alice the opportunity to ask about angels, or to express disbelief. Alice says nothing.
“He could help me, but he needed to use my body. I said yes.” She stops again, and this time, it feels wrong. It feels like Claire is shutting her out. “My mother ended up okay, and I ended up okay. I never saw my father again. This - ” She waves her hand, unable to find the word. “Whatever it is I’m doing, it started off as a search for him. But there was too much I didn’t understand. I had to find the beginning. Mostly I’ve learned about the Winchesters.”
“Tell me,” Alice says. She can’t bear to let Claire stop speaking. More than anything, for reasons she can’t understand, she needs to hear Claire’s voice.
Claire tells her about Sam and Dean, about the demon with yellow eyes and the burning women. Alice goes dizzy with information - hunters’ names, crossroad contracts, demon’s blood, and a gun that can kill anything. It’s too much, but every time Claire pauses, Alice begs her to go on.
Claire ends with her plan to drive to South Dakota, where Robert Singer once lived. “I probably won’t find much, but it could be a start.” Her voice is rough from speaking for so long. “You should go home now, Alice.”
Alice’s curfew passed hours ago. By now, her parents have discovered that she left her cellphone in her room and that none of her friends know where she is. She rises from the chair, her body stiff, and walks to the door. If she opens her mouth, she’ll say something ridiculous - I want to stay here, or maybe something worse. So she doesn’t say a word, not even goodbye. Especially not goodbye.
Her parents are furious with her. They were worried sick about her; for all they knew, she could’ve been dead. Alice isn’t sorry.
She’s already planning.
* * *
Claire doesn’t take any pills that night. She lies awake for several hours, and then, as dawn begins to break, gets out of bed. She’s learned to keep all of her things in one place, so it’s easy to pack her bag.
She almost gets away with it. Her bag is in the backseat, and she’s sliding into the driver’s seat when she sees Alice standing a few feet from her car.
Her hand tightens around her keys. If she just drove away -
Claire gets out of the car and lets Alice come to her. “What are you doing here?” The question comes out as an accusation.
“I tried to call you,” Alice says. Her eyes are dark with resentment. “You didn’t answer.”
Claire shut off her cellphone this morning, in anticipation of such a call.
“You were going to leave without telling me.” Alice looks away briefly. “I feel like I’m getting dumped,” she mutters, and then turns her unforgiving gaze again on Claire.
“I’m sorry, Alice,” Claire says, but the apology sounds empty. She tries again. “I am sorry that I came here and brought you into this.”
Alice takes a step closer to her and says in a low voice, “What do you mean?”
Claire plots out her words carefully. “You asked me last night if I needed you to find the truth,” she says. It’s only one more word. One word, and the whole truth will be out.
Alice waits for her answer.
“No.” The word leaves a bitter aftertaste in her mouth. “I never needed to talk to you, or even your parents. I knew what happened.”
Claire expects Alice to get angry. She thinks she might yell or throw something, though Alice carries nothing with her. “But you did talk to me,” Alice says, and once again she’s refusing to obey Claire’s expectations.
“It was a mistake.” Claire realizes, from the hurt in Alice’s eyes, that she’s said the wrong thing. “Alice, you should hate me,” she says, in desperation. “I came here to make you relive your worst memories.”
Alice looks at her like she pities her. “You don’t get it,” she says. “I used to think I was crazy. Sometimes I thought I did those things that I dreamed of. Hate you?” She forces out a short, painful laugh. “How can you want to take this from me, Claire?”
Claire can’t answer her, and she doesn’t try to.
“I want to come with you,” Alice says. She obviously means to sound confident, but her eagerness makes her sound childish. “I - I have some money. It was for college, but it’s my money.”
This startles Claire, but it also gives her the opportunity to reclaim control. “You need to go home, Alice,” she says, gently.
“I can’t.”
“You have to.” Claire watches Alice blink away the tears she’s trying to hide. She feels sick. “This isn’t a good life, believe me.”
Alice raises her head. Her face is a little blotchy; a wet trail follows the curve of her right cheek. “You - ” But she doesn’t finish her sentence. She turns away, and after several moments, she begins to walk to her car. She never looks back at Claire.
The engine starts.
There is still time.
Alice drives away, and Claire stays where she is. She stands there for a long time, until she can remember how to move her legs, how to lift her arm and grasp the door handle. Each movement requires conscious effort.
For nearly ten hours, she drives and feels nothing. Claire’s been scooped hollow, anesthetized, and left to recover. It’s only as the sunlight begins to fail that she becomes sensible of her wounds.
She could make it to South Dakota that night. But she stops in a small town along the way and gets a room. The sleeping pills taste strangely sweet tonight; soon, Claire can’t keep her eyes open.
In the morning, she will know what to do. Her mind will be clear, and she will know what to do then.
* * *
Lillian drops her off at the bus station. She’s formulated a Romeo-and-Juliet theory regarding Alice’s departure - Lillian has always been a terrible romantic. “You know you’re crazy, right?” she says as they stand in front of the station.
“Yeah,” Alice says. She didn’t leave a note for her parents, and she’s starting to regret that decision.
“God, Alice.” Lillian throws her arms around Alice and squeezes the breath from her lungs. “Take care yourself. And don’t forget to call me.” She steps back, smiling in a bemused way. “You could run away to New York. Paris. Anywhere! What’s waiting for you in South Dakota?”
“I don’t know,” she says, truthfully.
They say goodbye. Lillian crushes her in one last hug and then drives away. Alice picks up her bag and heads inside.
From this point on, nothing is certain. What she will do when she gets to South Dakota, whether she will find Claire, what Claire will do if she finds her - she doesn’t know. Alice could develop a better plan of action while she sits on the bus, but instead she stares out the window. In the blur of trees and buildings passing, the world she has known falls away. She is alone in a world with no rules and no destiny.
On a whim, she pulls a small, stained card from her bag. This is the only map she has brought with her. Alice’s fingers touch the raised letters of Claire’s false name.
She holds the card in her hand until it’s time to change buses. By then, it’s dark outside, and when she looks out the window, she can only see her own face.
Characters: Claire Novak
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Remember the little girl Lilith possessed in No Rest for the Wicked? She's seventeen now, and has just met Claire Novak.
Word count: 5800
Disclaimer: I am not Kripke. I claim nothing.
Notes: The little girl was never named, so I've christened her Alice.
Claire first meets Alice Fremont as a paper figure, cut from school files and third-hand accounts. By the time she gets to Indiana, Alice hasn’t lived there in seven years; no one at the Bloomington Elementary School remembers her. There’s a record noting a “minor disturbance” that took place when Alice was ten, but when Claire asks the principal about it, she shrugs her shoulders, says that was before her time.
Claire is years behind in a search she shouldn’t be pursuing anyway.
She talks to a former neighbor who knows nothing about the incident, but does recall where the Fremonts moved. Dayton, Ohio, is only three hours away - Claire can make it there in less, if she wants to.
The neighbor, a middle aged woman, has been frowning ever since Claire spoke the Fremonts’ name, and when Claire rises from the flowered couch, she reaches her hand out as if to stop her. Quickly, though, she retracts her hand.
“Is there something else, Mrs. Bradbury?” Claire asks. Hopes.
“They were - different.” Mrs. Bradbury shakes her head, her hands fisted in her lap. She looks down at the floor for a long moment before she raises her head and in an even voice says, “I think something happened when they were up at his father’s place, Ms. Whittemore. Up in New Harmony.”
Claire knows what happened in New Harmony, but she gently pushes Mrs. Bradbury to elaborate.
“It was long time ago - 2008, I think.” That’s all she’ll say, so Claire thanks her and leaves.
Outside, the afternoon sun has been swallowed up by rainclouds. It’s not raining yet, but a sudden bolt of lightning and accompanying clap of thunder startle her. When she was younger and scared of thunderstorms, her father told her that thunder was just the sound of the angels bowling. A common story, told by many parents to many children.
By the time a second bolt of lightning splits the sky, Claire is in her car, driving out of Bloomington. She is only thinking of Alice. Not him, not them.
* * *
Alice can keep a secret. Her friends always confide in her - Molly’s parents are getting divorced, Camille doesn’t want to turn into her mother, Lillian slept with Mark. They tell her their secrets over the phone, in text messages, in notes passed during study hall.
She never tells them her secrets. She doesn’t tell them why her family moved to Illinois in the middle of the school year, or why the taste of cake makes her sick. She doesn’t tell them about her nightmares - a mutilated cat, her grandfather with his neck snapped, a man standing over her with a knife. She doesn’t tell them about sitting in the basement with her parents, her father’s hands pressed over her ears so that she couldn’t hear the man upstairs screaming - her mother crying - the silence that followed.
She’s still waiting for that silence to break.
* * *
It’s around six when Claire enters Dayton, too late to see the Fremonts, even if she had their address. It will be easy enough to track them down - she should find a cheap motel and then get started.
Claire has had more difficult days, but she’s suddenly drained. She can’t remember if she ate anything today, can’t remember the last time she could sleep without taking pills. It’s just that she’s been pushing herself too hard; she’s been chasing the truth across the country for months. Of course she’s tired.
This is the lie she tells herself to silence the one truth she doesn’t want to know. Until now, she’s only dealt with the dead and the missing - hunters, demons, angels. No one has gotten hurt yet.
What if - ? She cancels the thought before it can complete itself. Finds a motel, gets started.
* * *
That night there is blood down the front of her dress. The cat, again. Alice wakes from the dream with none of the horror she would’ve once felt. She’s not growing numb, but resistant. She will dream the terror of her childhood, but she will not feel it.
And yet, she has to clamp her hand over her mouth to hold back the scream. She’s done so well; she’s kept the same scream inside for so long, and only let it out once. Small, desperate sounds claw their way out between her fingers, sounds that a trapped animal makes - but she holds back the scream.
When she’s sure it’s over, she moves her hand away, breathing harshly through her mouth. The clock reads two fifteen - there are hours yet until morning.
* * *
Usually when Claire flashes her - well, Jane Whittemore’s - badge, people are more willing to cooperate. Mrs. Freemont is not. She keeps the door partially closed and doesn’t let go of the handle.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I think you’re mistaken.”
“Your husband didn’t have family in New Harmony?” Claire can only see a section of the foyer; she can’t spot any signs that a teenage girl lives in this house. Not that she plans to speak with Alice.
Mrs. Fremont notices her looking and steps outside, pulling the door closed behind her. “His father lived there, but his death was an accident. I don’t know about anyone else who died there.”
Claire lets a moment pass before she speaks. “I see,” she says and draws a card with her name and number from her pocket. “Well, if you think of anything…”
She hears a car pull up in front of the house and glances back. The passenger door opens, and a girl climbs out from the car. She’s blonde, looks about seventeen. She sees Claire and hesitates before she begins to walk up to the house.
Mrs. Fremont snatches the card from Claire’s hand. “I’d like you to leave now.”
“Of course,” Claire says. And then she waits just long enough for Alice to come within earshot. “Anything you remember about New Harmony would be helpful. Have a good evening, Mrs. Fremont.”
She walks past Alice, who is frozen in the walkway. She can’t quite bring herself to look at her.
* * *
They have spaghetti that night. Alice’s mother doesn’t tell her father about the woman who came to the house, but later she hears the quiet exchange of their voices coming from their bedroom and guesses at the topic. She doesn’t bother listening in; nothing they say ever makes sense to her.
Their voices stop around eleven. She waits another hour, though, just to be safe. She then descends the stairs, skipping the last one, which squeaks. She’s certain that her parents will hear her opening the garbage can to shift through the trash, certain that they’ll come rushing down the stairs to stop her from pulling the small, crumpled card out.
But no one stops her. One corner of the card is stained with spaghetti sauce, but the name and number are legible once she smoothes out the card. Detective Jane Whittemore. Alice wishes she could call right now, but she can wait. She’ll wait; it’s only one more night.
* * *
There is no reason to expect a call from Alice. Her mother probably tore up the card, or hid it - and even if Alice got to the card, even if she calls, Claire doesn’t know what to say.
Yet she keeps checking her phone to confirm that it has good service and that it’s charged. At first she tries to concentrate on her research. If she can find a lead on Robert Singer, she can leave Dayton without feeling she’s missed an opportunity. Because Singer’s the one she’s really after. He’s the sole living link to the Winchesters; he witnessed the war most of the world never realized was being fought.
She has no leads on Singer, and it’s unlikely that Dayton will help her in her search. So Claire sits in her motel room, reviewing the precious scraps of information she has, trying to make connections.
Within an hour the words on the papers begin to lose meaning. If there is a connection to be found, she’s not going to find it now, when she keeps listening for her cellphone to go off. Claire puts the papers away and rises from the bed. Maybe a walk will calm her mind.
As she’s closing the door the cellphone rings.
She knocks over the lamp trying to get to the phone and answers it on the second ring. She shouldn’t hope, can’t dare to hope -
From the other end, a girl’s halting voice asks, “Is this Detective Whittemore?”
“Yes,” Claire says. She struggles to keep her voice calm and neutral. “Who is this?”
There’s a short pause. “Alice Fremont. You came to my house yesterday.”
Before Claire can process this, Alice takes an audible breath and says, “You said something about New Harmony. I was just - I wanted to know if…” She makes a sound of frustration. “Why are you looking into New Harmony, detective?”
Her directness surprises Claire. “I’ve been investigating some unexplained deaths in that area.” She keeps her answer vague; she wants Alice to lead this conversation.
“Recent deaths?”
“Miss Fremont,” Claire says, “is there something you know? Something you want to share with me?”
Alice doesn’t answer.
“If you know something - ”
“I think I do,” Alice says. “I think… Could we meet?”
Claire takes a breath, forces herself to say it. “Yes.”
They arrange a meeting at a café in town later that day. After Claire hangs up, she realizes she’s been holding on to the edge of the small table so tightly that her hand is aching. She lets go with some difficulty and begins to change into her suit.
* * *
It’s a short drive into town. Alice arrives much too early, but she’s still disappointed when she scans the room and doesn’t see Detective Whittemore. She orders a cup of coffee even though she hates it, and for half an hour she sits, forcing the bitter liquid down her throat so that she’ll have something to distract her.
The door to the café opens, and Alice looks up, not really expecting to see her. A blonde woman enters and almost immediately turns her eyes on Alice. Alice can’t help it; she stands up so abruptly her chair nearly tips backwards.
Detective Whittemore walks over to her, and God, why did Alice choose this place? There are too many people; their voices are too loud, and they’re plugging up her ears. She won’t even be able to hear the detective.
“Miss Fremont?” Detective Whittemore’s voice is pitched just above a murmur, but it sounds so clearly it’s as if she’s speaking into Alice’s ear. She offers her hand - for a moment, Alice is too stunned to know what to do with it.
“Uh,” she says, finally taking Detective Whittemore’s hand. “Hi.” It’s all she can think to say.
The detective smiles. “It’s okay, Miss Fremont. I’m not here to interrogate you; I just want to listen to what you have to say.” She sits, and Alice automatically follows.
“You don’t have to call me that,” Alice says. “Miss Fremont, I mean - it sort of makes me feel like I’m in the principal’s office.”
“Fair enough.” Detective Whittemore takes a small notepad and pen out of her purse and looks up at Alice. “Do you mind if I take some notes?”
Alice thinks she could say no and it’d be all right with Detective Whittemore, but she says yes.
“Tell me about New Harmony.”
Alice wants to. She’s been waiting to tell someone about the blood and the screaming and the years of silence - but she realizes that this moment, still, is not the right moment. Detective Whittemore wouldn’t understand. So Alice tells her what she will understand.
“My grandfather lived in New Harmony,” she begins. “We used to go there sometimes, on the weekends. But I guess you already knew that.”
The detective nods. “Go on, Alice.”
“One weekend, we were visiting him, and something happened.” She tries to continue, but her breath catches in her throat. Detective Whittemore waits patiently for her to find her voice. “I was six. It was spring.” She remembers the pretty flowers, all in bloom. Her breaths are coming quickly now; she’s starting to feel dizzy. “I can’t remember exactly what happened. It was like I was asleep and then awake, and even when I was awake, I couldn’t…” Control my body, she wants to say, but that would sound crazy. “It was like I wasn’t really there. Does that make any sense?”
Alice has kept her gaze on a point just to the right of Detective Whittemore, but now she catches her eye. And it’s like she’s staring into a too bright light - there is something so profound in the detective’s eyes that Alice is nearly blinded. Her eyes speak. They say, I know.
How? How can she know when Alice has never told anyone and doesn’t herself understand? Before Alice can ask the question, the light switches off. Detective Whittemore jots something down. “It does.”
Alice stares at her for a long moment, thrown. She might have imagined what she saw - Detective Whittemore’s expression is as it was before, mild and pleasant. Alice reaches for her coffee cup and takes a sip before she can remember that the coffee’s cold by now.
It’s awful, but it refocuses her attention. She swallows, grimacing slightly, and says, “I know my grandfather died. I don’t know how, but I remember - ” She remembers his eyes gone wide and blank, his head at a funny angle. “I’m not sure what I remember,” she finishes, cautiously.
Detective Whittemore doesn’t speak at first. She leans forward and looks intently into Alice’s eyes. Alice can’t decide if she wants to lean in or sit farther back in her chair. She’s afraid to look away. “Did you ever hear about the other people who died there, at the same time?”
She does. She once found a brief article that mentioned New Harmony mourning its losses, but she never found out anything more. She tells the detective this.
“Most of them - ” But she presses her lips together before the rest of the sentence can escape her mouth. “Do you remember anyone unusual? Two men, maybe, who you’d never seen before?”
The man who stood over her with a knife. He would have killed her, if the other man hadn’t stopped him.
She’s not in the little girl anymore.
“Alice?”
She doesn’t realize that she’s squeezed her eyes shut until Detective Whittemore touches her arm and they fly open.
“Are you all right?”
Alice can’t speak, so she nods.
“I’m sorry,” Detective Whittemore says. “This is obviously difficult for you. I shouldn’t be asking all these questions at once.” She stands. “Do you want me to take you home?”
Alice can’t understand what’s happening - that’s it? It’s over? “Wait,” she says, “there’s more I could tell you.”
“I have time. You can tell me later.” The detective studies her, frowning. “Really, if you want a ride - ”
“No,” Alice quickly says. She took her father’s car; she has to get it back.
“All right.” Detective Whittemore walks her to the door, watching her as if she’s afraid that Alice will collapse.
But Alice reaches her car and remains upright; her hands don’t even tremble as she opens the door. Detective Whittemore, satisfied, starts to walk away.
“Detective!” Alice calls. The detective turns back. “You were going to say something about the people who died in New Harmony.”
Detective Whittemore hesitates. “Nearly all of them were found on the street where your grandfather lived.”
And then she is gone.
* * *
“How did they die?”
Alice doesn’t give her a chance to say hello after she picks up her cellphone. Claire’s first thought is of Sam and Dean, but Alice can’t be talking about them. “Who?”
“The people from New Harmony.” Alice pauses. “And my grandfather, if you know.”
This isn’t how Claire wants to have this conversation. She wants to see Alice - needs to see how she reacts, so that she’ll know when to stop pushing. “I think it would be better if we met again.”
But Alice can’t meet. She mentions her parents and trails off; Claire reluctantly accepts this.
She pulls out her notes on New Harmony, though she doesn’t need them. “A few were stabbed,” she says, turning to a page where she’s scribbled demon killing knife? From? next to the names of the dead. “Some apparently died of natural causes.”
Michael Kumin. Claire moves her fingers over the name, considering.
“Apparently? So you don’t know for sure?”
“The reports I have are old,” Claire says. She turns the page over - Kumin can wait. “There isn’t much I do know for certain.”
“Yeah,” Alice says, “I know the feeling.”
Claire lets the silence go uninterrupted, afraid that if she speaks, she’ll speak as herself and not as Jane Whittemore. Does Alice know that feeling of utter helplessness, the one that Claire can’t rid herself of, no matter how many strands of the truth she gathers together? Does she know that feeling that something is wrong, something is wrong and no one else seems to notice?
“Shit,” Alice mutters. “I have to go.”
“Go?” Claire echoes. Perhaps Alice is punishing her for her sudden departure yesterday.
“I can call you back, right? That would be okay?”
Claire nods before she realizes that Alice can’t see her. “Yeah.”
And it’s better this way, she thinks as she puts down the phone. Now she has time to collect herself, to forget about those feelings that no one but Alice would understand.
* * *
It becomes a routine. Detective Whittemore never calls Alice, but each time Alice calls her, she can tell that the detective has been awaiting the call.
At first, Alice can’t call while her parents are in the house. She calls while they’re out, or borrows the car and drives somewhere she can be alone. After a few calls, though, they stop naming New Harmony. It’s simply “there” - they both know what they’re referring to. She feels safe enough to stay in her own room, the door closed and locked.
Alice can’t pinpoint when things begin to change. In an early call, she asks if the police ever had any suspects; later, as she lies on her bed, she asks why Detective Whittemore took this case. It’s personal, direct - and Alice doesn’t know why she asked it.
“This is my job,” the detective says. A week ago, Alice might not have caught the change in her voice. Even now, she can’t quite describe that change, but she knows what it signals.
“Liar,” she says, without thinking.
She regrets it immediately and expects Detective Whittemore to hang up. For a moment, when there is no response, Alice assumes she has hung up.
“You’re right,” the detective says. Her voice is a little unsteady - Alice has never heard her like this. She sits up, listening very carefully. “I’m not just here because it’s my job. I want - ” Alice can’t move for fear she’ll make a sound and miss something. “I want to find out the truth. There are things…” Detective Whittemore stops, and if she doesn’t go on, Alice won’t be able to bear it. “Things I don’t understand. Things I need to figure out.”
That’s the first and only time Detective Whittemore ends the conversation. She sounds hoarse when she says goodbye, as if she’s been screaming. She might have been crying.
The sound of her voice keeps Alice up that night. She tries to apologize the next time she calls, but Detective Whittemore talks over her, something else she’s never done before.
Their conversation is short and dissatisfying, so the next time Alice calls, she begins with a question she knows will cause problems.
“What are you hiding?”
“I don’t understand,” Detective Whittemore says.
Alice is quiet for a moment. She thinks about how the detective’s eyes looked in the café, the way her voice sounded over the phone. “You do,” she says. It’s not an accusation; it’s the truth.
“Any information I’ve withheld is information I’m not permitted to share.”
Alice considers calling her a liar again, but she doesn’t think it’ll work again.
“And Alice?” Though Detective Whittemore’s voice has lost its clinical tone, she is still in control. “I could ask the same thing of you.”
Alice’s heartbeat quickens. She knows she should take this as a warning to not ask dangerous questions. But she also knows that they have gone too far already - now the only questions left to ask are the most dangerous ones.
* * *
“There was a survivor.” This is the first thing Claire says when she calls Alice. She’s been preparing herself to say it, but now that the words are out she cringes. There is no turning back from this.
She anticipated the long silence that follows, as well as the anger that colors Alice’s voice when she speaks. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
Claire ignores her and continues with her prepared statement. “Michael Kumin. I talked to him a few weeks ago. He told me - ” She presses her fingernails into her palm. Say it. “He told me that something entered his body that night. It took control of him. I think the same thing happened to the others who died in New Harmony.”
She waits for Alice to ask what possessed him, or perhaps to say, in a quavering voice, that it happened to her too.
But Alice’s voice is steady. “You knew,” she says, sounding almost pensive. “From the start, you knew.”
Her aberration catches Claire off-guard. “I…”
“Who are you?”
Detective Jane Whittemore. It’s the best name to give, but Claire could just as easily say Julie Taylor, Adrienne Keating, Sarah Harmer. How could Alice know she was lying?
She would know.
“I’m not even sure you’re real,” Alice says. “And I know how that sounds, but how can you be real? How can you, when you looked at me like…” She stops. “God. Just - just tell me that you’re real.”
“Claire.” The name explodes from her, and the aftershocks make her chest hurt. “Claire Novak.”
“Where are you, Claire?”
She tells her. Fifteen minutes later, Alice is standing in her motel room.
* * *
Detective Whittemore - no, Alice corrects herself, Claire - looks younger. She’s not dressed in a suit but in jeans and a t-shirt, and Alice realizes that she’s only a few years older than herself. She takes a step closer; Claire steps back. Her eyes are wide and startled.
“Wait,” she says. “Wait.”
But Alice has to satisfy her childish need to know that Claire is real - she has to touch her. The tips of her fingers touch Claire’s cheek. Claire closes her eyes, and then moves her own hand to cover Alice’s.
“Real,” Alice whispers.
She doesn’t know how long they stand there, but after some time her hand falls away and she sits in the only chair in the room. “She told me her name was Lilith,” she says, knowing that Claire understands what she’s talking about. “She said she wanted to play.”
Claire remains standing. “Lilith was a demon.”
It’s almost too absurd. Alice was raised vaguely Christian, going to church only on holidays; she’s never given much thought to demons. But she believes Claire. “Was?”
“Lilith was killed,” Claire says, sitting on the bed. “I’m still working out how.”
Alice takes some small comfort from this. “Why did she choose me?”
She can tell by the way Claire is looking at her that she doesn’t know, or that there is no reason. She doesn’t want to hear that, so before Claire can answer, she launches into the series of questions she been waiting to ask. Who were those two men? What really killed those people? Claire tells her what she knows, and then asks her own question.
“What happened when you were ten, Alice?”
At first Alice doesn’t know what she’s talking about. “We moved,” she says.
“Why?”
“Because I screamed.” During the middle of math class - she remembers numbers written on the board. She couldn’t copy them into her notebook. It was like a nightmare; everything she wrote turned into something ugly and frightening. She remembers standing up on her chair - Alice, what are you doing? Alice? And then she screamed.
She’s not sure what she said aloud and what she thought, but Claire doesn’t ask her to explain.
They both fall silent. Claire looks out the window; Alice stares at her, knowing that she feels her gaze. “There’s a reason you came here,” Alice says, and still Claire does not turn toward her. “You wanted the truth. Claire, did you - ” She falters. “Did you need me? To find the truth?”
Claire finally turns to her, but she cannot keep her eyes on Alice. “You have to understand,” she says. “I’ve been trying to figure it out for so long. And there was no one…” Claire presses her fingers to her lips, her eyes closed.
Alice wants to grab hold of her, wants to shake the words out of her. She wants to say, Yes Claire I understand. But she can’t be sure that she does until Claire can tell her the truth.
“I was twelve,” Claire says, and then slowly opens her eyes. “I was twelve when my father went crazy. My mother tried to hide it from me, but I knew something was happening to him. Later I found out that he was hearing a voice - but I didn’t know that until after he left. He was gone for a long time. Almost a year.”
She’s not forcing the words out - they flow, in fact, with surprising ease - and yet, Claire sits like a compressed coil. Tense, and ready to spring. “I watched him leave. I was standing on the porch and he looked at me and said that he wasn’t my father.” Claire shakes her head. “He wasn’t. I couldn’t explain how I knew it, I didn’t know what he really was, not then - but I knew it wasn’t him.
“And then he came back, and this time it was him.” For a moment, Claire just sits and breathes. “I thought that maybe everything was going to be okay again. Until our neighbors attacked us.” Her fingers flutter over her throat. It’s a strange gesture, but Alice doesn’t ask. “They were possessed by demons. Two men came and got us away from them.”
“Sam and Dean?” The sound of Alice’s voice seems out of place.
Claire nods. “They were going to take my dad with them, and my mother and I were going somewhere safe. But it turned out that my mother was possessed, and they had to come back. Before they got back, though, I heard a voice.” So far, she hasn’t looked Alice in the eye, but she does now. “There other beings that possess humans, Alice, not just demons. The voice told me he was an angel. Castiel.” She pauses, possibly to give the Alice the opportunity to ask about angels, or to express disbelief. Alice says nothing.
“He could help me, but he needed to use my body. I said yes.” She stops again, and this time, it feels wrong. It feels like Claire is shutting her out. “My mother ended up okay, and I ended up okay. I never saw my father again. This - ” She waves her hand, unable to find the word. “Whatever it is I’m doing, it started off as a search for him. But there was too much I didn’t understand. I had to find the beginning. Mostly I’ve learned about the Winchesters.”
“Tell me,” Alice says. She can’t bear to let Claire stop speaking. More than anything, for reasons she can’t understand, she needs to hear Claire’s voice.
Claire tells her about Sam and Dean, about the demon with yellow eyes and the burning women. Alice goes dizzy with information - hunters’ names, crossroad contracts, demon’s blood, and a gun that can kill anything. It’s too much, but every time Claire pauses, Alice begs her to go on.
Claire ends with her plan to drive to South Dakota, where Robert Singer once lived. “I probably won’t find much, but it could be a start.” Her voice is rough from speaking for so long. “You should go home now, Alice.”
Alice’s curfew passed hours ago. By now, her parents have discovered that she left her cellphone in her room and that none of her friends know where she is. She rises from the chair, her body stiff, and walks to the door. If she opens her mouth, she’ll say something ridiculous - I want to stay here, or maybe something worse. So she doesn’t say a word, not even goodbye. Especially not goodbye.
Her parents are furious with her. They were worried sick about her; for all they knew, she could’ve been dead. Alice isn’t sorry.
She’s already planning.
* * *
Claire doesn’t take any pills that night. She lies awake for several hours, and then, as dawn begins to break, gets out of bed. She’s learned to keep all of her things in one place, so it’s easy to pack her bag.
She almost gets away with it. Her bag is in the backseat, and she’s sliding into the driver’s seat when she sees Alice standing a few feet from her car.
Her hand tightens around her keys. If she just drove away -
Claire gets out of the car and lets Alice come to her. “What are you doing here?” The question comes out as an accusation.
“I tried to call you,” Alice says. Her eyes are dark with resentment. “You didn’t answer.”
Claire shut off her cellphone this morning, in anticipation of such a call.
“You were going to leave without telling me.” Alice looks away briefly. “I feel like I’m getting dumped,” she mutters, and then turns her unforgiving gaze again on Claire.
“I’m sorry, Alice,” Claire says, but the apology sounds empty. She tries again. “I am sorry that I came here and brought you into this.”
Alice takes a step closer to her and says in a low voice, “What do you mean?”
Claire plots out her words carefully. “You asked me last night if I needed you to find the truth,” she says. It’s only one more word. One word, and the whole truth will be out.
Alice waits for her answer.
“No.” The word leaves a bitter aftertaste in her mouth. “I never needed to talk to you, or even your parents. I knew what happened.”
Claire expects Alice to get angry. She thinks she might yell or throw something, though Alice carries nothing with her. “But you did talk to me,” Alice says, and once again she’s refusing to obey Claire’s expectations.
“It was a mistake.” Claire realizes, from the hurt in Alice’s eyes, that she’s said the wrong thing. “Alice, you should hate me,” she says, in desperation. “I came here to make you relive your worst memories.”
Alice looks at her like she pities her. “You don’t get it,” she says. “I used to think I was crazy. Sometimes I thought I did those things that I dreamed of. Hate you?” She forces out a short, painful laugh. “How can you want to take this from me, Claire?”
Claire can’t answer her, and she doesn’t try to.
“I want to come with you,” Alice says. She obviously means to sound confident, but her eagerness makes her sound childish. “I - I have some money. It was for college, but it’s my money.”
This startles Claire, but it also gives her the opportunity to reclaim control. “You need to go home, Alice,” she says, gently.
“I can’t.”
“You have to.” Claire watches Alice blink away the tears she’s trying to hide. She feels sick. “This isn’t a good life, believe me.”
Alice raises her head. Her face is a little blotchy; a wet trail follows the curve of her right cheek. “You - ” But she doesn’t finish her sentence. She turns away, and after several moments, she begins to walk to her car. She never looks back at Claire.
The engine starts.
There is still time.
Alice drives away, and Claire stays where she is. She stands there for a long time, until she can remember how to move her legs, how to lift her arm and grasp the door handle. Each movement requires conscious effort.
For nearly ten hours, she drives and feels nothing. Claire’s been scooped hollow, anesthetized, and left to recover. It’s only as the sunlight begins to fail that she becomes sensible of her wounds.
She could make it to South Dakota that night. But she stops in a small town along the way and gets a room. The sleeping pills taste strangely sweet tonight; soon, Claire can’t keep her eyes open.
In the morning, she will know what to do. Her mind will be clear, and she will know what to do then.
* * *
Lillian drops her off at the bus station. She’s formulated a Romeo-and-Juliet theory regarding Alice’s departure - Lillian has always been a terrible romantic. “You know you’re crazy, right?” she says as they stand in front of the station.
“Yeah,” Alice says. She didn’t leave a note for her parents, and she’s starting to regret that decision.
“God, Alice.” Lillian throws her arms around Alice and squeezes the breath from her lungs. “Take care yourself. And don’t forget to call me.” She steps back, smiling in a bemused way. “You could run away to New York. Paris. Anywhere! What’s waiting for you in South Dakota?”
“I don’t know,” she says, truthfully.
They say goodbye. Lillian crushes her in one last hug and then drives away. Alice picks up her bag and heads inside.
From this point on, nothing is certain. What she will do when she gets to South Dakota, whether she will find Claire, what Claire will do if she finds her - she doesn’t know. Alice could develop a better plan of action while she sits on the bus, but instead she stares out the window. In the blur of trees and buildings passing, the world she has known falls away. She is alone in a world with no rules and no destiny.
On a whim, she pulls a small, stained card from her bag. This is the only map she has brought with her. Alice’s fingers touch the raised letters of Claire’s false name.
She holds the card in her hand until it’s time to change buses. By then, it’s dark outside, and when she looks out the window, she can only see her own face.