The Reporter -Part Two
Dean didn’t say much that night to Sam he just showered and went to bed. Sam thought he was upset because he actually felt something for Vangie so he was trying to do the right thing at least that’s what Sam hoped. The next morning Dean informed him that Vangie was meeting them for breakfast and more than likely accompanying them to the next town where they needed to investigate.
“Damn it Dean don’t I get a say in things anymore I know you like her but….”
“Did I say I liked her Sammy, I love her,” Dean said not meeting Sam eyes as he walked out to the car without looking back.
“You coming or not?” he asked.
Sam shook his head as he locked the hotel room door to get in the car.
“Love Dean, I assume those are residual feelings?”
“What the hell does that matter? They haven’t changed but I don’t know if I’ll tell her.”
“How many times have you been in love? Okay, I know the answer is none so I will say that telling her will get you what you want. You know, laid,” Sam said.
Dean didn’t say anything.
“Maybe that isn’t what I want with her.”
“Right.”
“Whatever man, you think you are the only one with feelings in this car? Maybe I have learned some things from all your chick flicky-ness.”
“Okay, that is so not a word and I doubt if you have learned anything,” Sam mumbled.
“What college boy because I’m stupid, insensitive, conniving and a regular bad seed?”
Sam didn’t want to argue but he didn’t want Dean to feel that he looked down on him either.
“Hey man I’m sorry if you say you’re in love than I’m happy for you if it makes you happy, okay, she’s hot you could do worse.”
They drove the rest of the way in silence.
Sam noticed at breakfast Dean wasn’t his cocky self. Sam excused himself before they walked back out to the car mostly to give them time alone but he said he was going to the john.
Dean walked Vangie to her car.
“Why are you so quiet this morning and don’t lie to me,” she said as she put her arms around him.
Dean smiled.
“Just thinking…”
“Okay, will you expand on that for me?” she asked.
He looked in her eyes something he felt he could do all day. But what if what he was feeling was just physical attraction. He didn’t want to be wrong about this; he didn’t want to hurt her. Loving him would be hard enough if they even got that far.
“Dean?” she said as she watched him totally “daze out” on her.
“What?” he finally said before Sam walked up behind him to say he was ready.
“Why don’t you ride with me,” she said before getting in her car.
Dean nodded at Sam as he got into Vangie’s Jeep.
“I just have a lot on my mind I wasn’t ignoring you,” he said as he cleared his throat.
“That’s okay there is just so much I want to say but it isn’t coming easy,” she said as she looked straight ahead at the road.
“No rush we have a long drive,” he said knowing they couldn’t talk about things around Sam.
“Yea, you’re right.”
Sam followed her back to her apartment so she could get some things together to go with them and leave her truck.
Dean went into to help her so Sam figured he would have time for a nap; he shook his head as Dean followed her in. Once inside she packed fairly fast since she had already begun the night before. Dean stood in her closet looking at her dresses while she rummaged under her bed looking for her other sneaker.
“Hey can you take this dress?” he asked as he looked at the peach halter top sundress in his hand.
She smiled, “Sure if you think I’ll need it.”
She rolled it up in and put it in the bag as he laughed.
“I’m taking a portable iron it’ll be fine.”
He looked so uncomfortable she felt sorry for him it was so unlike him. She put the bags on the floor and took his hand to sit on the bed.
“Dean tell me whatever is bothering you, I won’t bite you I promise this time,” she smiled.
He put his arms around her and kissed her. He had been more intimate with her despite not having sex than with anyone else in his life. Why don’t I just stop hunting and take this chance I’ve been handed?
“Okay if you want talk I will, Dean, I fell in love with you. It just happened and I thought about you often, I don’t even know what to think of it myself. I mean we were casual, right? Then I felt so guilty after Aaron died but part of me just wanted you which made things worse.” she said.
He didn’t think this was the time despite her declaration. He still had his arms around her when the tears began to flow.
“I know for certain I was in love with you when I got married and still am now,” she said with her head down.
Wonderful he had ruined her marriage the little time she had with her husband.
He looked in her eyes with sadness on his face.
“I’m certainly not blaming you please understand that; I’m just telling you the truth,” she said wiping her eyes.
He almost gave in, maybe this was the moment and he was about to miss it. On the other hand he wanted his words to mean something not just be a response to hers. Maybe Sam was rubbing off on him.
“We should go,” he said but she stopped him from going to the door.
“Just tell me you aren’t angry.”
“I’m not angry but I’m sorry about the way things happened. I’m sure you did your best to make Aaron feel loved in the time you had together. How could I be angry when a beautiful woman just told me she loves me?” he said with a smile as he squeezed her hand and they headed to the car.
Sam was surprised to see them come out so soon. He was going to owe Dean an apology if he was behaving himself. They drove almost a hundred miles which was about half way before they stopped for the night. Dean and Vangie had talked the first fifty or so miles non-stop about their previous adventures together.
{Flashback}
Dean had met Vangie before Dad went missing. She had showed up at a crime scene all dressed in black: black jacket, black Metallica t-shirt, black jeans and black boots, something Dean would never forget, she was petite and build just right. All that black just brought out the green in her eyes. He was already in the house looking around when she found him upstairs with the monitor. She just stood there like it was her house as she watched him. She had scared the daylights out of him since he thought he was alone.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
When he turned around to answer the question he was surprised to see a smile on her face but also pleasantly surprised to see such a beautiful young lady.
“Checking for spirits,” he had stuttered.
He knew right away that she was someone he could trust, it was something about her demeanor, to keep his secret so he showed her the monitor and how it worked. He allowed her to keep checking with him and eventually decided there was nothing there. Afterward they went to a local hang out to eat. After they sat down he asked why she believed what he had told her.
“I know John because when I was younger he came here after my father was killed.”
Dean’s mouth dropped open.
“You know my dad?”
“He told me all about you and Sam over the time that he was here. I hoped that if something else happened that one of you would show up, I thought about calling him when this happened but here you are,” she said with a grin.
{End Flashback}
Then Vangie had fallen asleep in the backseat she had made into her bed with pillow included. Vangie could sleep anywhere the reason they had slept in their clothes the night before he left before was because the room was so horrible they were afraid to take them off. Considering her situation it was definitely more appropriate than allowing their desires to take them in the wrong direction. Every now and then Dean would glance at her in the mirror. Sam kept his eyes on the road just in case.
“Why didn’t you tell me she knew dad?” Sam whispered to keep from waking her.
“My mind has been a bit occupied, Sammy,” he said quietly as Vangie started to move around a bit.
Sam could only imagine Dean’s idea of love until now has only been lust. Sam tried to think positive thoughts: if Dean was really in love would this change him at all, he wondered.
She stretched and yawned as she opened her eyes and sat up.
“Where are we?” she asked leaning up between the seats to look at Dean.
“Almost there,” Dean said with a smile.
“So you knew my father?” Sam asked curious to hear the story.
“We’ll talk about that later,” Dean said as he looked at Sam.
“No, its okay I can talk about it,” she interrupted.
Dean knew the story and thought it was a bad idea for her to go into details but she went ahead despite his suggestion. Her father had been camping with her uncle when he was attacked by what they thought was a wolf. Later the state of the body showed it had been something more than a regular wolf. John figured out it had to be a werewolf. The authorities never did find her uncle, which John revealed to her later with trepidation that the uncle was the werewolf he knew because he had had to kill him.
“Wow, I’m sorry, I had no idea,” Sam said sorry now for having asked.
“No, it’s really okay I loved my father but things happen. He and I had a great relationship but he taught me that you have to live day to day,” she said.
“For tomorrow isn’t promised,” Sam quoted.
“Just a little light bible reading?” Dean asked.
“At least you know where the quote is from,” Sam laughed.
“Oh that hurts, you know the Gideon’s put bibles in every hotel room we have ever stayed in,” Dean teased.
Vangie laughed at the two of them.
They picked a fairly nice hotel for the night one with an actual room and sleeping space for three. Dean pulled out the sofa bed though he offered it to Sam he chose the rollout bed betting Dean would end up in the room before long. Vangie stayed up to read for a while half hoping Dean would come in to at least talk to her. She hoped he wasn’t skittish because she had told him she loved him; she knew guys tended to be that way at times. Maybe she should have waited to tell him. All she knew was she had wanted him to know because it had been so long and she had never stopped loving him. She eventually fell asleep feeling uncertain but satisfied she had done what she felt was best for her. She knew from spending time with Dean before his cockiness stemmed from his way of living; inside he was a little lost boy who was never properly loved.
When Sam woke up and saw Dean still asleep on the sofa he was more than a little surprised. He thought maybe he just wanted it to appear he had been there all night, that’s probably it. A few minutes later Vangie came out of the room dressed in jeans and a tank top, she wondered if anyone was ready to use the shower in the room.
“You look nice, Yea, I’ll go ahead,” Sam said as he passed by her to go to the room.
Dean opened one eye to look up as she kissed him on the cheek.
“Hey sleeping beauty, I was hoping last night you would come in to talk to me,” she teased.
Sam almost ran into the door when he heard that, Dean really slept on the sofa all night, oh he must be in love.
“Good morning, I’m sorry I was really tired,” he said covering his mouth.
She laughed, “ here let me test your breath come here.”
He did and she smiled instead of turning away.
“Smells like mint.”
“Good, come over here and give me a proper hug,” he said as she sat beside him on the makeshift bed and he held her in his arms.
Once they were in the car and on the road again Vangie made some calls using her work contact. She was a reporter for the area paper in Des Moines, IA, the Des Moines Register but they were headed to Sioux City on the other side of the state to look into the suicides.
“Okay so far we are good Lance said nothing has happened there yet. He knows I’m working on this story but not that I’m with professionals,” she said smiling at Dean in the mirror.
“Yea we’re the pros just like the Orkin men,” Dean said as Sam laughed.
“You spot ‘em we swat ‘em,” Sam added.
Vangie loved the analogy but she remembered something Dean had told her about him being hurt.
{Flashback}
At the restaurant on the second nigh they at together they talked about their jobs.
“The kind of hunting Dad and I do can be rewarding but we have been hurt a few times too. It’s a pain being at a hospital and not having visitors it can be so boring and down right depressing,” he said biting into his pizza.
Vangie thought that was a sad way to live life even if you were helping people.
“So sometimes you and your Dad split up obviously because he isn’t with you now?”
“Yea, we do it both ways. We were raised to be fairly self sufficient early in life.”
Vangie thought Dean was an awfully sweet person despite his hard outer core, she believed it was something about the way he didn’t think before he spoke that made him appealing. It was more revealing then he realized.
“How about your mom?”
“She is still alive but she moved when she realized I wasn’t going to be smothered by her. I didn’t mean to be unreasonable but she believes in lets be safe and stay around the house to knit or sew no dangerous living like being a reporter who will go out to get the story,” Vangie said irritated as she wiped her mouth.
Dean smiled, “ No porcelain doll, huh?”
“Not me, I’m more go into the trenches to get the scoop up close,” she said.
Despite all her I’m a big girl speeches he had still walked her to the truck and made sure she drove off before he got in the Impala.
{End Flashback}
Vangie liked Sam she though he was a good compliment for Dean’s sharp edges. She could see the two of them traveling the country like super heroes fighting evil. She wondered if Dean would ever consider living any other way. If he could survive any other way. She reached for her cell phone as it rang. It was the mother of the teen they were trying to save. She looked at Dean in the mirror.
“Yes, I’m with the Register we are almost to your home. It’s very important that Monica be there to talk with us,” she said.
Dean watched her nodding then Sam had to remind him he was driving.
“Okay see you then,” Vangie said hanging up the phone.
Monica was still at school but the mom was going to pick her up and meet them at home in about an hour.
“There wasn’t any time patterns, right?” Dean asked Sam.
“None that I noticed.”
“Good maybe that isn’t significant, “ he said as the past the Sioux City city limits sign.
TBC
