memento vivere - supernatural & criminal minds

chapter 11

Chapter 11
Things We Leave Behind

Jude spent the ride back to Stanford in silence and the boys let her. Such a cataclysmic return to hunting had left her shaken, unsteady. She’d expected a simple burning of bones with a Winchester reunion at the end of it and a road trip back to Quantico, the two sides of her life neatly wedged in separate corners of her mind. But they hadn’t found John, and the over-the-counter pain medication she’d taken was just beginning to wear off, letting the ache creep back into her bones. Most of her bruises and cuts were easily hidden, but she didn’t know how she’d explain the visible ones to her team. She hated the thought of having to lie again.

She was barely aware of the car rolling to a stop and Sam getting out. He hugged her briefly as she moved from the backseat to the passenger, but she almost didn’t feel it. Her glazed eyes stared straight ahead when he pulled away, looking at his chest instead of his face. The five singed holes in his shirt were still there, a souvenir of Constance’s torture. Sam frowned down at her in the dim light of the streetlamp above them, painting shadows around the cuts on her face and neck from when she’d been tossed from the car. 

Dean watched her in the same worried way as she slid into the passenger seat, like she was a broken porcelain doll held together with tape. He didn’t ask her what he wanted to, which was if she’d travel to Colorado with him in Sam’s stead - that was where John’s coordinates led to. If this was the state she was in after one hunt, he was afraid to put her through another.

He continued to respect her vow of silence, but took advantage of the empty road ahead every so often to glance over at her. She seemed to be physically closing in on herself, tucking her legs closer to her chest each time he turned to look. Her face was pressed against her kneecaps to hide the tears streaking her cheeks. She had no reason to be crying, she tried to tell herself, but this didn’t stop the tears from flowing. Constance hadn’t plunged her ghostly hands into Jude’s chest, but she’d still managed to tear it open.

The car swerved and her legs slid from the seat, tipping her forward. Dean’s arm flew out like a seatbelt and he completed the U-turn one-handed, apologizing profusely as he did so. “What the hell are you doing?” Jude managed through her panic, forgetting to wipe the streaks of tears from her face. Later, she would think that Dean hadn’t noticed them anyway. She was wrong.

“Bad feeling,” was all he said, pressing his foot harder on the gas. They screeched back into the lot at Stanford. Dean’s bad feeling had been right. The doors to the Impala were flung open and the car left running as they sprinted for Sam’s building. Jude called 911 on the way up the stairs, her voice shaky and inaudible, but there would be a dozen more calls like hers. 

Fire plumed from the windows of Sam’s apartment, leaping from floor to floor. Smoke already hung heavy in the night. Jude thought of the last college campus she’d been on that was plagued by fire. She thought of Charon, the ferryman of the dead. He would not take Sam tonight.

Dean kicked down Sam’s door. The apartment was ringed in fire, the ceiling caving in. Sam was flat on his bed, his smoke-ragged screams cutting through the crackle of the flames. His brother rushed forward to pull him to his feet but he resisted, flailing his limbs like a frightened child. He grabbed for the doorframe, trying to hold on. Jude followed his eyes to the ceiling as she frantically helped Dean loosen Sam’s grip.

The remnants of a white nightgown burned above them, eaten away by the unforgiving flames. Thick blood pooled from a deep gash in the stomach of the ruined nightgown’s wearer. Her blonde hair was singed and matted, her lips and eyes wide with fear as the flames crept across her skin. Sam bellowed her name as his brother and friend dragged him down the stairs, away from the charred remains of his lover.

***

It was Sam’s turn to fall silent. He sat in the passenger side with his hands in his lap pretending not to hear the hushed conversation Dean and Jude were having behind the car. All he could see in the rearview mirror was Dean massaging his temples and Jude gesturing wildly, hardly letting him get a word in.

“One hunt, Dean. That was the deal,” Jude hissed.

“It was,” Dean fired back, “but things change, Jude.” He waved an arm in the direction of the apartments, where two firetrucks and a swarm of students had gathered. “Sam can’t stay here, not after this. Dad said we were all in danger, possibly from the thing that killed our mom, and this is exactly how she…” His anger seemed to dampen and his arm dropped. Jude felt herself shrink with him and reached out to put her hands on his shoulders. This was the second time Dean had rescued his younger brother in this way. Sam didn’t even know that his brother had carried him from their burning home in Kansas, but Jude did. “Sam and I have to follow our dad’s trail, and that means going to Colorado. We have to find him, Judy.”

“I know,” she sighed. “I know.” If one hunt became two, and two became three, she’d be tumbling back into a life of hunting before she could stop to catch herself. Colorado was on the way to Virginia, meaning that the boys would have to double back after they dropped her home and waste time that could be used to find their father. 

Just one more hunt, she promised herself again. She prayed to a God she no longer believed in that this time it would be the truth. That prayer went unanswered. She’d known it would.

***

“How are you holding up?”

Jude forced a dry laugh at Spencer’s question, raking her fingers through her hair. “Not great.” She leaned her head back against the thick trunk of an oak tree, letting the hush of the graveyard wrap around her like a burial shroud. Dean leaned against the repaired Impala a few feet away. Both of them had opted to give Sam his space.

They had stayed in California for a week longer than they’d planned to on account of Jess’s funeral. Sam stood before her gravestone now, a bouquet of flowers in his hand and a weight on his heart that Jude couldn’t imagine. The small bag of his un-scorched belongings now joined Jude’s in the trunk. That evening, they would begin the drive to Blackwater Ridge.

“How much longer do you think you’ll be staying? Not that I’m trying to rush you, it’s just-”

“I miss you too, Spencer,” Jude smiled into the phone. “There’s just a few more loose ends we need to tie up.” Not a complete lie. “It shouldn’t take more than a week.” She hoped.

“Okay. If you need anything, call me.” Jude heard a muffled female voice shouting as if from across the room. “Or Garcia.” A chorus of staticky voices filtered through the speaker. “Or Elle or JJ or Morgan.”

“I will,” she promised. “Update Hotch for me, okay?” With two quiet goodbyes, they ended the call. Jude joined Dean by the Impala and he passed her a styrofoam cup of coffee. She took a sip and pursed her lips. “Did you put whiskey in this?”

“You looked like you needed it,” he shrugged. She noticed that his eyes didn’t leave Sam, a speck of a black suit among the headstones and willows. This was why she’d been able to rouse herself so quickly, to pull herself out of the stupor she’d been trapped in during the ride back to Stanford. After what happened to Jess, Sam needed Dean to lean on. With John gone for most of their childhood and Mary gone from the beginning, he’d always needed Dean to lean on. Until Jude came into their lives, Dean had been standing on his own.

He used to joke when they were kids, calling her the sister he never wanted, but they both knew he needed her. They both knew that Jude could easily book a flight home and be in Quantico by the end of the day. But she wouldn’t. The door to this haunted part of her life had been opened, and she wouldn’t be able to close it again. The Winchesters were standing in the way.

She decided she’d let them.