Stranger in Love, part 1/5
MASTER || PROLOGUE || PART 1 || PART 2 || PART 3 || PART 4 || PART 5 || EPILOGUE
PART 1
Dean pushed at a heavy door that appeared to be long unaccustomed to reaching its destination. The movement sent loads of dust into the air, so he was breathing in thick clouds as he stepped across the threshold. The floor creaked beneath his feet. Looking around, he found himself inside an old, abandoned building in the middle of nowhere, Montana. Pretty much the usual gig - as typical as the job could be - except maybe for the very house. Dean couldn’t help but immediately like it. Even more so now that he’d got inside.
The place was spacious and cool, whether because of its solid walls or ghost activity. According to the locals, the last owners had left town a few days after they’d moved in. Since then, the house had attracted many people, from squatters to kids with a misguided sense of adventure, but probably none of them stayed in for more than one night. So yeah, Dean definitely could relate to the spirit of this place.
The EMF meter was humming continuously as if Dean himself didn’t feel a distinct presence of something in there, which wouldn't be nearly as disturbing had he not already burnt the bones. He was clueless as to whatever else could be keeping the ghost attached, and turning the huge house inside out looking for it didn’t seem all that exciting. Nevertheless this was precisely what Dean was going to do, just because he couldn’t bring himself to burn the place down.
He turned off the EMF and lit up a flashlight. Getting to know the house, checking the walls for recesses and wood flooring for hiding places, he didn’t pay much attention to the doors creaking, squeaks and groans among all the other noises. Not until a distinct rustle floated in a freezing wave of air brushing his arm from behind. Immediately, Dean reached for his gun lying on a cabinet, just where he'd put it down to get a better look behind an antique piece of furniture.
He turned around and saw a smudgy figure right in front of him so he fired the gun on instinct, showing some impressive, adrenaline boosted reflexes. The shape melted into thin air. Pretty blurred to begin with though it had been, there was no mistaking as to whose ghost had just appeared. As the local papers from twelve years back informed him and the closest townsfolk seemed to confirm, Jeremy Barrow had died in this very house in an accident, but under vague circumstances. That, combined with his post-mortem gigs, seriously hinted of murder. He'd died pierced by a ceiling beam which, having seen the spirit, Dean now could agree, went through him in an odd angle. Twice.
Not that any of it mattered. The ghost was still in the house and so was Dean. Probably the artifact that kept the ghost insistent on keeping Dean company was there as well. So the real question right now was whether there was also any iron.
None that he could think of, except for one dilapidated umbrella in the hall. Somebody who had broken into the house must have left it there. The framework of the common umbrella was made of steel, which wasn't ideal, but consisted mostly of iron and Dean had already proven it useful on more than one occasion. So that should do. After one of the longest moments in his life to date, Dean got to the umbrella, grabbed it in a firm grip and aimed its spit in whatever direction he heard even the barest swish coming from.
Soon enough, the ghost reappeared, only to vanish again when stabbed by Dean, but there was no way such a hopeless defense could last. Dean wouldn’t last. When this time for a change he actually did have something to look forward to. This very day. Sam had recently called Dean and asked if they could hit the road together during the summer break. His little brother had finally found it in himself to break the silence and by now he probably reached this ridiculously smallish town, Pryor, where they were supposed to meet once Dean got the job done. Sam would be there, sitting in the diner just a few miles away, expecting his brother who would never show up.
This would be a trace of Dean’s thoughts if he hadn’t been concentrated solely on getting outside. He ran for all he was worth and in no time he’d nearly made it to the door, but the ghost reappeared in the way and threw Dean hard against the wall. Curling up on the floor, he thought idly that he should have burnt the house down right when he’d gotten there. Soon enough, he saw the ghost coming at him and, while he tried to stab it, the thing showed up by his right side without any warning. It was sheer luck that when Dean tried and pressed the button on the shabby handle, it worked and put up the umbrella, steel wires spreading rapidly to reach the spirit beside him. It spluttered in the air but just when Dean got back to his feet, it shoved him through the hall back to the living room. The umbrella got lost somewhere in the process. Dean was lying down, sore back on the dirty floor but he barely got a chance to look up and catch a glimpse of the ghost crouching over him. Because suddenly, the thing was gone. Not melted away, not spluttered not even burnt in the air, just one moment there it was and then it wasn’t. Although Dean allowed himself a small relieved sigh, he never let his guard down. He knew better than that. Things don’t tend to become dematerialized. Material or not, they just don’t. Therefore, Dean found the sudden peace heavy and disturbing. He briefly thought of it as some horror flick in which, typically, just when the danger passed, the fatal strike was about to happen. As random contemplations went, this wasn't the most comforting, especially since Dean's sore muscles did not seem to be quite ready to pull him upright yet.
He glanced behind him quickly and this time found a very different figure crowding over him. Much taller one, better yet, firm and solid. More than anything, sincerely welcome. By the time his gaze caught up with Sam’s face, Dean was smiling unwittingly. It wasn't until much later that he noticed there was a smoldering, lacy rag crumpled on the floor at his brother’s feet.
“Sam.” His voice was shaking. “Good to see you, man.”
Sam snorted knowingly, reached out a hand and hauled his brother up. “Glad I showed up.”
“Did you-“ Dean was still a bit confused, beat-up and altogether not well. Stumbling, he walked up to the stairs in the living room and sat on the second step where Sam joined him. Dean shook his head incredulously. “How did you make it disappear like that?” Because really, that was odd. If the rag had been the thing keeping the ghost, burning it would’ve caused setting the phantom up in flames. Dean never let his eyes off of his attacker so he knew for a fact this was not the way it had gone down.
Sam chuckled and raised a brow when met his eyes with Dean’s. “A good magician never reveals his secrets,” he said.
Then he winked, amused with his brother’s confusion and looked ahead with the most peaceful, content smile Dean had seen in way too long.
“So. Exactly how much of that failure did you catch?” Dean asked nonchalantly. He knew how his embarrassment tended to show most when he most tried to hide it.
“I got there just in time to see you firing an umbrella. I would hated to have missed that,” said Sam.
They sat in silence for a while. Somehow Dean figured that, if anyone, it should be his brother doing the talking. Yet, apparently, Sam didn’t feel like it; he would only smile now and then when he thought Dean wasn’t paying attention. And it was all fine, it really was.
Dean didn’t feel like moving. Ever again. His whole aching body insisted on sticking to this resolution. When Sam stood up with a sigh, dusting himself off, Dean barely spared him a dubious glance.
“We probably should head to the motel,” Sam said when his brother didn’t so much as move an inch.
“I don’t know about that,” Dean drawled. “Are we sure you got rid of the spirit right and proper?”
Truthfully, Dean realized he couldn’t tell which answer he’d prefer to hear at the moment.
“Yeah, pretty sure,” Sam said. “I guess we could always make a round with EMF-”
“Yeah, you do that, Sammy,” Dean seized on the idea. He propped on his elbows a step higher.
“Uh-huh.” Sam sized him up with a considering look. “Dean, the motel is less than two miles from here. Come on, I could drive.”
“Yeah, and I could nag at my brother, but we’ve yet to switch personalities,” Dean yawned and looked up at Sam who was smirking, no doubt sharing with himself yet another one of his inside jokes. Freak.
Eventually, Sam walked up the stairs, lingering when he passed Dean, whose gaze followed Sam around, as it apparently did sometimes on its own. When he came back, he was holding the equipment in one hand and a small package in the other.
“All right then, I’ll make the tour.” He sighed and handed the pack to Dean, who found a cherry pie inside along with a beaker of hot chocolate. Dean regarded the goodies in his grasp dubiously, then looked up at Sam.
“Who are you and what have you done with my brother?” he sized Sam up with a level gaze.
Sam was standing deadpan until Dean laughed heartily when the sweet waft hit his nostrils.
“Scratch that!” he grinned, delighted. “Who are you and where have you been my whole life?”
Later that day, Dean sprawled on his bed, full and fresh from the shower. It was only then that things started sinking in. Slowly, gradually. His body, bruised and swollen, relaxed at last to the point of letting him feel the exhaustion. The clean sheets he was wrapped in felt like delicate compress over his entire wounded body. Dean reached for an open beer on a cabinet by the bed. Sip by sip, cold liquid massaged his insides and all the sensations combined made his eyes water. He felt strangely serene, letting in just two things, his own body doing away with the tension and a strong sense of his brother’s presence.
Sam was there and that itself was too much to consciously process for Dean the state he was in, so his attention switched to mindlessly following what he knew by heart. Weight and pace of his brother's footsteps, quiet breathing interrupted with occasional sighs, chair legs scraping against the floor, followed by brief series of clacking on a keyboard. Barely perceptible scent of peach shampoo mixed with overall vaporous freshness. As it turned out, all this held a power of lulling Dean to sleep in no time.
“How do you want your coffee?” a perky blonde asked, ballpoint in her hand tapping against notepad. She directed a brisk smile at Dean which felt totally at ease.
Sam and Dean had come down for breakfast to the diner on the first floor of the motel; not like there were any more to choose from in a small town like Pryor. Looking up at the waitress though, Dean didn't really feel like complaining; this was a good place to be for now.
“Why, hello there-” Dean's flirtatious grin faded when he saw a plaque with a name on the girl's breast. “Tom.”
At the other side of the table Sam smirked not even looking up from the newspaper he was briefly going through.
“I'm Candy,” the girl chuckled. “We're required to wear the plaques with names, it's all in the statute,” she pointed with her ballpoint to some boards hung on the wall near the kitchen entrance, “which is sort of the commandments around here. It is, however, surprisingly vague in the matter of who's to wear what name exactly. My plaque got lost and Tom's shift starts when mine ends so... ours is a perfect relationship!” she beamed.
Dean smiled back eagerly. “But strictly professional,” he inquired.
“I don't know, Dean,” Sam teased. “She did take his name.”
Candy shook her head, amused, but other than that didn't bother to comment. “What can I get you guys?” she asked when her gaze returned to the notepad.
“I'll have scrambled eggs with-” Sam started, but Candy raised her hands vividly in protest.
“You need to order coffee first,” she returned to her notepad like this was all self-explanatory.
“Excuse me?” Sam asked, bemused.
“It's the first subclause of the statue,” she shrugged.
“Come on, Sam, try not to rebel for once and have a coffee instead,” Dean said. “I'll have mine black,” he flashed yet another smile at the waitress.
“Well, I don't want coffee,” Sam said.
“Oh, here we go,”
“Guys?” Candy raised her hands. “I say fine, we'll try it your way. Let me take your orders and maybe my mom won’t notice,” she said. “But keep low!” she aimed the ballpoint at Sam's chest like lightning and raised her eyebrow pointedly, “if mom finds out, we'll all live to regret this.”
Once Candy was gone, Sam and Dean looked around the place more carefully. Miles and miles of shelves filled with trophies were stretched out along the walls displaying golden seeds and golden cups - shining proudly as if demanding common recognition and admiration. In between, there were numerous showcases framing diplomas for the best served cafe corretto in state and also one presentable poster of Sugarcubes. Only after careful assessment of the diner did Dean notice the music seeping from speakers,
All I do is pour black coffee...
The brothers' looks had locked at once before scattering again helplessly.
When the dishes arrived, Dean raised his eyebrows with his eyes fixed on Sam, and picked up a cup to leisurely sip his beverage.
After breakfast they took a long walk. Sam hadn't found anything even remotely suspicious in his share of the press and neither had Dean. Truth be told, Dean wasn't exactly set on finding a new hunt just yet, and from the look of it, he didn't believe Sam would pinpoint the supernatural in any newspaper unless it had placed an advertisement. Their second day back together and they already shared this kind of unspoken agreement effortlessly, Dean realized.
“You really do like this house,” Sam said and it was only then that Dean caught up with the fact that they'd been walking the road up to the building they'd worked yesterday.
“Yeah,” he smiled. “I guess I do.”
And this had been true from the very beginning. Of course, a subsequent brief period of nearly getting killed there had allayed a bit his affection but after Sam’s arriving on scene, the house regained the initial favors, as far as Dean was concerned.
As they arrived, Dean inspected the remains of the lacy rag Sam had burnt the day before.
“So seriously, what happened here?”
Sam only snorted.
“What are you, five?” Dean asked incredulously.
Answered with silence, Dean let out a sigh and headed up the stairs where his brother must have checked in before they'd met the other day. Sam seemed to have appeared in the living room out of nowhere then, which was some clue to begin with, but first and foremost, he'd also snatched the delicious pie from upstairs afterward.
There was nothing besides the attic on the upper floor, a spacious room that had been made into a store for renovation equipment judging by some remaining paint canisters and a ladder that still remained in place. Sam followed Dean upstairs, though he seemed more interested in the view from a large window on a slanting wall than his brother's ongoing investigation. Dean noticed a grimy pink paint covering the walls around them and at once recalled the lacy, distinctively girly fabric which Sam had set on fire right in front of him. But not before coming downstairs to the living room, apparently from this very attic. Once again, Dean looked around the room carefully. Clearly it must have been lived in, if quite a while ago.
“There was another ghost,” Dean said. “Of a little girl.”
It was an educated guess that Dean would be willing to bet on now. The rag, however lacy and most likely derived from what used to be a pink room, technically still might have been some sort of a souvenir important enough for Jeremy Barrow that it would bound his ghost. However, the phantom would have caught up in flame along with the fabric if this had been the case. Most likely, a person whom the artifact had once belonged to turned into another ghost within this house at some point, one that was somehow related to Jeremy Barrow. If their phantom had been the one to have gone in flames, it wouldn't necessarily show since the ghost itself hadn't manifested at the time. Dean had yet to figure out the connection between the two.
Sam stood with his palms propped on the windowsill. Briefly he touched the pane and then jerked his hands away rapidly muttering something about it being heated to hell. He checked the battened frames as if trying to decide whether having some air let in this way was a good idea.
“Sure thing,” Dean decided. “Those make for some nasty spirits.”
“Piece of trash!”
“'S what I was saying.”
The window was open all right, but Sam couldn't seem to determine what to do with the knob left in his hand.
Meanwhile, Dean proceeded to search the room. Sam kept playing enigmatic, which was getting more annoying than it was ridiculous and someone had to make sure that this hunt was over and done with. It would be plain irresponsibility to trust Dean's little brother completely with the job he'd just taken on after a years-long break - and apparently managed to get done before Dean could even piece it together, but that was beside the point, really.
He went through some of the old, dusty boxes piling on the shelves. There was no telling what he was even looking for, but he dived right into the mess, shoving aside all kinds of stuff on his way.
“I'm- pretty sure I haven't left any more pie in there, Dean.”
Clouds of dust were floating around, ever thicker. Dean narrowed his eyes at Sam in what could have passed as the intimidating manner if it hadn't ended up with rapid sneezing. Then he brushed off some of the dirt from his hands, giving the search a rest for now.
“All right,” he said “so how did you know about the girl?”
“I did my research,” Sam shrugged. Having uncovered some huge canister by the window from behind a foil, he took a sit there and put down the knob on the sill eventually.
“Oh- You did?” Dean pulled a face. “Why did you?'
“You told me to meet with you after you'd solved a case,” Sam stated what he clearly considered an obvious explanation.
“So?”
“So I looked into it. Pryor is not exactly a metropolis; it wasn't hard to find what you were after.”
Dean shook his head, still looking expectant. Sam did likewise.
“I'm just saying,” Dean said, scanning the room for any remotely dust-free surfaces and failing. “Two years ago you wouldn't have done that.”
“You're not wrong.”
There were other questions that begged to follow, but Dean shrugged them off for now. He went back to searching for clues. Case-related clues, he reminded himself.
“So what did you find?” he asked looking through the pictures he'd found in one of the boxes. Absent-mindedly, he still noticed there was something disturbing about them.
“Pretty interesting things about the house owners actually, once I put the freeholds together.”
“Yeah?” Dean turned some photograph in his fingers. “Like what?”
“Nothing evil,” Sam said. “Just illegal.”
“Wow.”
“What?”
“Pretty interesting things?” Dean sized his brother up. “How do you turn into a law geek within two years?”
Sam rolled his eyes. Dean didn't really pay attention. It was clear from what the pictures he'd found revealed that they had been taken recently. Last-couple-of-years recently. Which, considering the place, was rather odd, still, someone might have hidden them there. The boxes though, they were not that easy to explain. Dean ran his finger along the cover and frowned; must have taken long years to collect this amount of dust.
“What is it?” Sam asked.
“I don't know yet,” Dean said, detached. He shook his head. “Probably nothing. So, no trace of the girly ghost in the deeds."
“No, but there was a family in the early fifties that sold the house right after they'd bought it. Turned out, their daughter had died in the meantime.”
“You find out how she died?”
“Girl's name was Fiona Marble. I asked around. Her death had been quite an incident in town, one that many people have kept in their memory,” Sam said. “The girl killed herself.”
“Killed herself?” Dean cut in. “That's not exactly a vengeful spirit material.”
“Depends on what had been done to her to drive her to it,” Sam said bitterly. “Anyway, her mother had left after that and the house was sold.”
Dean put another cardboard box away for now. He checked on the trinkets splayed out on a shelf where they had been twining all over the packets he picked out. Everything he found was more or less equally scattered and long unmoved.
He picked up a faded toupee and a handful of hair-pins ornamented with ponies. Looking gingerly at all these distinctively mismatched artifacts, Dean considered them in regards to what Sam was telling him about Fiona's less than peaceful death and nodded to himself.
Dean broke the silence. “Ok, so I think it's safe to say that the house had been changing hands on a regular basis since then. Looks like this room became a dumping ground.”
Hands full of awkward, hairy stuff, he took a couple of steps towards his brother in order to seal Sam's hairdoom. The floor creaked and Dean stopped on a dime. Fresh memory of the pierced ghost came rushing to him as he considered the rotten boards beneath his feet.
“She hanged herself, didn't she?” The ridiculous hairdresser's equipment in Dean's hands was lowered with an odd, too-careful steadiness. “She hanged herself on one of those beams.”
Sam nodded. “She also did it poorly. The wood she'd picked for this had been rotten and it had fallen apart before her spinal cord ultimately did. She was dying for hours nailed down to the floor by those beam, barely able to move.”
Dean squeezed his eyes shut. He didn't ask how old the girl was. He never asked for her name; it was Sam who supplied it.
Automatically, Dean walked back to the shelves where he put away the toupee and hair-pins. He cleared his throat.
“Right, so she turns into a vicious poltergeist juggling with the timbers,” he said. “I guess that lessens the mystery of Jeremy Barrow's mysterious death.”
“Agreed.”
“Was he in any way connected to her death?”
“No, apparently it was only the other way around,” Sam answered. “I don't believe he even knew her. This was random, Dean, many of her previous attacks had been. Just,” he shrugged. “This one turned out lethal.”
“Enter a new ghost, Jeremy Barrow.” Dean said incredulously.
Dirty floors or not, he sat down, a box of slides in his lap. He was determined to solve the mystery of all these strangely recent pictures in ancient packages. Might as well figure out something that did make sense before they leave.
“Seriously man,” he continued, “You saying ghosts are having ghosts now?”
“I know,” Sam said, his lips quirked upwards slightly, “Like that ever suspends eviction,” he raised his voice, warning the space around.
It was refreshing to go through the case this way. Not necessarily with all due respect. As fulfilling as it had been working with Dad, it would never come this naturally. It used to be all Dad, not at all Dean.
Dad.
“Sam,” Dean tried and failed to cut in Sam's tirade, something about lacy rags and pink dresses 'cause, yeah, Sam. “Dude, shut up for a second.” Dean raised his voice slightly and Sam regarded him with a curious look but without so much as another word he walked up. “Have a look at this,” Dean stretched out his arm to where a pale beam of light was coming from the window. He was holding a single slide in between his thumb and forefinger.
Sam and Dean were both looking at the picture of their father.
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MASTER