[h3] Dean Winchester [/h3] 

Dean listened to Esme stammer, her awkward guilt causing his heart to hurt.  He felt as if he had caused all of this with his stupidity and his inability to let people go, once he opened up to them.  He squeezed her knee tightly when she started to talk about his death, and simply shook his head.  Even though she broke the sentence off herself, he felt the need to almost give her permission to not talk about it, yet.

“Well you’re here.  And…”, when she stepped off the hood of the car, he stared at her intently, pulling his hand back to his hip and shook his head at her words, “There’s not going to be anything that is bad enough to push you out of here, alright?  I want to know that you’re safe, and…I’ll keep things not strained, if it will make you stay.  I know you want to.”

He leaned in close to her ear and whispered, “And I know that you want to figure out where we should stand.  So, just give me a chance to help.”

He didn’t want to say the last words to her, where either of the other girls could hear him.  He knew Mika wouldn’t take things well, if she overheard them.  Like clockwork, as he was thinking about her reaction she chimed in about the riding situation, looking at Esme.

“We could take the Impala, but that might just make things worse…”, he whispered to her, turning to Mika and Nat, “Let’s go.  I need a drink, what about you girls?”

He stepped up to Mika, placing a careful hand on the small of her back and kissing her temple, trying to form a sort of truce before they got to where they were going.  He held his hand up high, “I’m riding shotgun!”

—-

As they arrived at the bar, after the silent ride, Dean quickly got out of the front seat, and stepped around to open Mika’s door, holding a hand out to her.  Rusty’s looked ultra busy tonight, but it also looked like the perfect place for limited talking, and limited communication in general.  He fully planned to go inside, make a few hundred dollars in pool, and get drunk enough to forget this night had ever happened, resurrected or not.


[h3] Annabeth [/h3]

Anna smirked, relieved to see Sam acting more like the sweet Sam she hadn’t really met for long.  She rubbed both her wrists with a small hiss of pain, and turned toward the bowl, “Im thinking I might need help getting the blood out of my hair, to be honest.  I’m drenched…I felt it in the cold outside.”

She pulled her shirt over her head and tossed it heavily on the ground, the blood sticky and causing it to ‘slap’ on the concrete.  Her shirt had soaked through so badly that her skin was lightly tinted in a faint pink color.  She then shoved her jeans down, and onto the floor, stepping out of them with her hands out.

“Sam…you’re not some pervert.  You’re just helping me…besides…”, she held her hands out in front of her, with her teeth chattering  at the detox chills and showed him her shaky hands, “I don’t have the best control over my body, at the moment.”