Andi may be free from the clutches of the yellow-eyed demon, but that doesn't mean her future is in the clear. Johns gone. The colt's gone. Her relationship with Dean is up in smoke, and the parting gift Azazel left her with makes hunting him a hard...
"You won't see me fall apart, Cause I've got an elastic heart."
Elastic Heart by Written By Wolves
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This was stupid. Beyond stupid. If anyone knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of one Dean's grudges, it was Sam. Yet here I was, beer in hand, desperately trying to find a place among the darkness for his reassuring words.
He doesn't hate you.
He doesn't hate you.
He doesn't hate you.
I wanted so badly to believe that was the case. I wanted to believe that he was ignoring me and pushing me away because he needed to handle his grief alone. Or, that he was keeping his distance because he knew he was the kind of guy that lashed out at all the wrong people when he was sorting out his emotions. Not because he thought I had something to do with what happened to his father, and not because he didn't trust in us enough to believe that I would tell him the truth if he would just ask me.
We had been tiptoeing around this conversation for weeks. He hasn't so much as spoken a word to anyone about what happened at the hospital, and I couldn't help but shake the feeling it was because of me. Because of the deal he knew I made. The deal he surely thought I made good on.
It was exactly why I needed to leave.
But if I was going to do that, I needed to know for certain that it was because that's what he wanted. Not because that feeling of being unwanted here was something I somehow managed to convince myself was real.
I had to talk to him, and he needed to talk to me. Whether he liked it or not, it was the only way the two of us were going to get past this.
If that's even what he wanted.
I'd be lying if I said the thought of losing Dean didn't scare me. I thought I would have been okay. He was alive. That was all that was supposed to matter, but everything was different now. It was a new world and my choices no longer affected whether or not Dean survived.
And he would survive.
Even if he survived alone.
It was the only thing that cushioned the heart-wrenching blow when I approached him. He was bent over the hood of the busted-up Impala and practically flinched when he realized I was standing there. His shoulders tightened. His jaw clenched. I was no expert in body language, but I was certain the way he was white-knuckling his wrench meant that he was agitated with my presence, and I was more than certain that it had nothing to do with wanting to grieve in silence.
But I had to do this, if not for myself, then for Sam. I promised him one last shot and regardless of how painful it was to be on the wrong side of Dean's cold shoulder, I would do it.
