Red - Chapter Two/Fresh Meat
Summary: Something evil is killing treeplanters in the forests of the Pacific Northwest, possibly the same predator that Dean narrowly escaped years before. How Grimm will things get before the brothers figure it out?
Rating: Gen, PG-13 due to swearing, blood-letting, logging accidents and malevolent sexual undercurrents. WIP, will be 10 chapters. Horror/drama.
Don’t touch the monkey: Hey, Eric, you’re really busy with the new season and all. Just move along. I promise I won’t hurt any of them…much.
A Short Word from BigPink on the Beta Process: Now that I’ve discovered the iChat video function on my new laptop, I yak to Lemmypie incessantly, much to our families’ consternation. We talk about all sorts of things, but one great thing has been fleshing out this story. She’s great with the ideas, and with teasing even more nonsense from my dysfunctional brain. The ever-vigilant jmm0001 bats clean-up, making sure that in my excitement I haven’t forgotten that Dean’s not wearing any pants or that Sam’s wandered off without paying the bill.
Read Chapter One/Deep Blue
Read
--
Aberdeen, WA, present day
She wasn’t an office worker, she was a treeplanter. Sam saw that plainly and right away.
Technically, she was in an office and she appeared to be working behind the counter, but she was no more a secretary than Sam was a Mexican wrestler.
She ducked under the counter in a quest for Sam’s requested forms, annoyed maybe; it was near six o’clock by the time they made Aberdeen, must be close to quitting time. A thick braid of sleek red hair fell over her shoulder like a bright animal, ferret-like, as though it would have a name and eat from her hand. Sam remembered Jess once saying hair that color must come from a bottle, because nothing in nature was like it except maybe the inside of a ripe papaya. This girl didn’t look like she’d put any kind of chemical anywhere near herself, so unless it was…what was that stuff called - right, henna - then it had to be natural.
She had the easy grace of a yoga instructor, but powerful, built like fighting dog, all muscle and bone. Her high-bridged nose reminded Sam of a Greek statue, the kind he’d studied in that useless art history course he’d taken. Calypso, a caryatid, winged Nike; something like that. The statue’s serenity was somewhat marred by the sloe dance under sharp red brows.
Maybe she sensed his attention, and maybe she didn’t. She stopped fiddling with her braid and slapped the forms down in front of him. Her smile was incremental but encouraging.
“Fill it out down to here,” and she pointed to a big blank box that said ‘for office use only’, which basically was the place some supervisor would write down whether or not Sam came across as a walking talking moron. She licked her lips, maybe slightly intrigued by Sam, maybe not. “Today is your lucky day,” she said like she wasn’t sure it was the thing to bring up.
“How so?” Sam asked automatically, fishing for a pen from his bulging knapsack, taking so long the girl leaned over the counter and poked him on the back with the tip of the ballpoint she held in her hand.
“Here,” she said, giving him the pen. It had the company logo on it, a hand with a stylized tree. “Just that we’re down a few planters, and today’s the break and we were about to close up for the day, go back to the bush short-handed. Your timing is…” and Sam stood up, tried to put ‘eager’ back into his arsenal. “Great.”
“Um,” and Sam flashed the battered card the Grateful Dead roadie had given Dean in the Walla Walla diner. “This guy. Said I should stop by?”
The girl took the card, brought it close to her Grecian nose. “Tommy? Tall blond guy, little hair here,” and she gestured to her chin.
“Onion farm, Walla Walla,” Sam supplied, starting to fill out the form, but got stuck on the first line, which was where he was supposed to write his name.
“That’s him,” she agreed. Her mouth was wide, filled with Chiclet teeth. Sam smiled back, liking her cautious dark voice and her quiet amusement. Young and serious.
“Ruby,” and she nodded, glancing obviously down at his form.
“Sam,” and that’s what he wrote on the line.
“If Tommy gave you the card, he must have thought you could handle it,” she said, but she wasn’t watching him anymore, she was tidying some papers onto the shelf behind her, ignoring a ringing phone. As he looked up, she came out from behind the counter, crossed the waiting area filled with cardboard boxes and a dead potted plant to rummage in a box of map pins under the bulletin board.
“He actually gave my brother the card,” Sam admitted, watching as she stuck a red-headed pin into a topographical map on the wall. It joined others bristling in a cluster. He had no idea what region he was looking at. What he was looking at.
Ruby turned, brows raised. “You’ve never been planting before?”
Sam shook his head. Dean always warned him about telling the truth, but he obviously hadn’t been born with the same instincts Sam had. Another bright smile and Ruby shook her head.
“That’s okay. You done much sports, marathons, any hard labor?”
Sam thought about telling the truth again. Meet her partway, maybe.
“Ran a lot in school. Varsity track. Distance.” The kind of hard labor he and Dean had been doing the last year was probably best left unsaid.
“Okay, when you go in to talk to the boss? Mention the track. Marathons,” and she shook her head, going back to the board and jabbing a pin in. “The boss likes marathon runners.”
He nodded. “Should I talk about the ecology courses I took?”
“Fuck no.” Shook her head emphatically. “Not a word. When he asks you why you’re doing this, tell him it’s the money. When he comes back to the question - and he will - tell him it’s for the money. Tell him you need enough to put you through next semester. Tell him that you were a competitive asshole when you were running distance. Do not,” and she stopped for emphasis, turning away from the board, “tell him you’re saving the planet or love nature or want to make art about the wilderness.”
“Even if it’s true?” he grinned, still working on the form. I could tell him that I’m hunting down whatever wolf’s picking off your crew workers. That was the truth, but it also brought him back to Dean’s anxiety, his reluctance to show fear, the long drive here with Dean dodging and weaving like a pro receiver running toward the end zone. Something evil, and Dean alone, out of his element, eighteen years old. Not knowing what he’d been facing, maybe, and unwilling to admit it now. More than that, though, because Sam could have sworn that Dean was scared, and that was rare, was a perfectly good indicator of how bad this ‘wolf’ was going to be.
Smarten up, pay attention.
He felt Ruby’s eyes on him as he walked across the crammed outer office into the supervisor’s dingy room, where he was grilled for half an hour on his motivation, his experience, and his general health. In the end, Sam assumed they were pretty desperate, because the supervisor rose, shook Sam’s hand - Sam winced at how thick the calluses were on the hard palm - and told him to come back bright and early the next morning, when a truck would pick them up and take them to the camp; they’d set up and be on the block by ten, get in most of a day.
Then the supervisor told Sam he’d be making seventeen cents a tree, because the terrain was pretty steep, no beach plant this, and that daily camp fees were twenty-two dollars a day, which included three squares and shower rights. He had his gear, right? Tent, bags, shovels and calk boots, Sam told him. Leather gloves, gaiters, bama socks, silviculture liners. Now just showing off.
Duct tape?
Ah, no, not that. The supervisor grinned and stood up. “See you tomorrow. Five o’clock in the morning, or you find your own ride up.”
Ruby was still there. Waiting, Sam thought. She met Sam’s stare, smirked. “Gotcha on the duct tape, didn’t he?”
Sam ducked his head, but he was grinning. It was exciting in some ways, in spite of or maybe because of the danger: Dean had been trying not to laugh as they’d picked up gear in Seattle, seeing Sam’s continuous expression of disbelief - why do I need spiked boots, Dean? How much rainwear can a body wear at one time? - but now the idea of being outside and just pushing himself didn’t sound so bad. Hell, just mention the words ‘marathon’ and ‘competition’ and he felt like going there now. There was even the added incentive of being able to make a shitload of money in very little time.
And if there was an evil wolf spirit involved, especially if it meant protecting treeplanters like Ruby? Well, how awful could it be?
“Hey,” Ruby said, picking up Sam’s huge backpack and handing it to him, “the hardware store’s just down the block. You could pick up the tape there and we could grab something to eat at Minerva’s.”
“Minerva’s?” Oh, Sam knew what kind of dinner he was going to have tonight. Tempeh burger, sweet potato fries, and some sort of soy beverage. “Let me phone my brother, see if he’s had any luck.” He caught the edge of disappointment in Ruby’s down-turned mouth. “He’s supposed to meet me for dinner.”
--
Quasilit Valley WA, 1997
Dean thought about sleeping and dying. He thought about both a lot. Sleeping a little bit more, maybe. Given two minutes, he’d just lie down, right there, between a nurse log and a tree that was taller and older than any European cathedral, lie down in fifteen different kinds of moss and just sleep. That led invariably to thoughts of death, because these trees were coming down. Instead, he watched as the plume of bright sawdust kicked back from Goodenuff Dave’s chainsaw like he’d hit an artery.
He’d never been so sore in his life and the weight of this chainsaw was going to fucking kill him. A spasm crossed his shoulders and he grimaced, but he made sure the ear protectors were in place under his hardhat, hefted the Husqvarna - a medium weight one with only a forty-inch bar, they’d laughed at that, too - and followed Dave up the self-made steps they’d made in the tree trunk. Dave cut another window square for the next spring board, the one that would get them well up on the root swell, to where the Doug fir’s shaft rose a hundred feet - shit, more - without a single branch until you hit one fifty. Dean had already seen one guy at the top of one of these suckers, standing there two hundred feet up even after topping it. That topped tree was now the spar, anchoring the cable that ran down the mountainside; cut logs were dragged along by the cable, crashing through underbrush down to the roadside where they could be bucked.
What a lot of fucking work for a single tree, Dean thought, but then did the math. Board feet. How many tens of thousands of dollars was this single tree worth? Completely staggering. Mr. Janzen would have been proud of his ability to come up with the sum so quickly, except that Mr. Janzen had failed him last semester, hated his guts, and would never see him again.
The rain sheeted down, and Dean could see his breath for all that it was May. Dave had loaned him a couple of down vests, some extra socks. Loaned him the Kevlar pants held up by the requisite red suspenders, along with the field vest, the heavy belt containing a first aid kit, air horn, chainsaw parts, extra compression bandages. What a lot of shit to haul around. They stayed in a cheap motel during the nights, and at least Dean could usually wash out the socks before he fell unconscious into bed. His feet were what bothered him the most. They soaked in a brine of sweat and wool and rainwater almost all the time.
Goodenuff’s uncle had loaned him the saw, had done it with a reluctant grin. Said that Dean could take his pick of the jobs, which one he wanted to be trained for. High riggers, maybe, Dave had joked, pointing up through the rain to the top of the spar. Fuck, that guy two hundred feet up standing on a fucking swaying post? No fucking way. Better be a faller then, Goodenuff’s uncle had suggested. They make the most, once they’re good at it.
The reason for that, Dean discovered, was that fallers were most likely dead if they were bad at it. “When you’re a faller, death always comes from above,” Uncle Goodenuff had said, handing Dean the chainsaw. “This isn’t a job you want to bullshit your way into, son.”
Dean had spent most of the last week furtively glancing up every five seconds or so, rain hitting him in the face like an insult, watching the treetops dance and spin, trying to figure out which way the tree was going to fall. Every shimmy of the saw made the branches move; every change in wind direction and speed mattered. He watched carefully for widow-makers, the dead branches that fell loose when the tree started to go. They came down like thunderbolts, some the size of small trees, would spear you right through if they hit you. He felt like a gopher on a hawk-covered plain.
That much weight falling that fast didn’t allow for mistakes.
He had bruises in places he didn’t think he could get bruises; he had cuts from bushwhacking through the slash with the chainsaw, and two days ago he’d been so hungover that he’d had to go puke in the bushes.
The other guys had laughed; they’d been the ones to get him drunk the night before. Goodenuff was exempt; his uncle owned the crew and the equipment and the contract. Dean, on the other hand, was fair game, was green as they came.
It’s work, he kept telling himself.
It’s money, he told himself when one of the experienced fallers filled his boot with urine during the lunch break while Dean aired out his feet.
Two hundred bucks a day to start, he whispered under his breath with every wild swipe of underbrush that drew blood as he moved through a light-filled spot created by a fallen tree, nature busy filling in the vacuum.
Started to feel good about what he was doing by the fifth day, when Dave directed him to go up the springboards first. Dean figured out what way he wanted the Douglas fir to go, sliced the Humboldt undercut from the trunk, hammered wedges into his cut to force something that weighed more than a house to fall exactly where it wouldn’t kill any of the assholes working with him. He worked it out in advance, hoping for wind and lean and luck to converge in the right combination; Uncle Goodenuff said he had good tree sense and that unteachable ability of ‘finding time’ when things were moving fast - to assess, plan, react.
Food on the table, this when the foreman sewed up the cut on Dean’s upper arm when he hadn’t been nimble enough to avoid a chip of wood flung from the saw. Shit, he hadn’t even seen it, let alone felt it.
Chocolate milk, stupid comic books, new running shoes, Kilcannon’s fucking rent, dozens of brown plastic prescription pill bottles with John Winchester’s name typed on the labels, the crinkle of the paper bag as the pharmacist wraps them up.
God help me, he thought the first time he caught sight of Ludovic in the cookhouse tent, his heart pretty much stopped cold, everything slowing - time, blood, burgeoning pride. God help me, was his only thought and it did him no good at all.
--
Aberdeen WA, present day
As predicted, Minerva’s had four different types of soy milk, a multitude of salad greens Sam had never heard of, not even having lived in California for as long as he had, and ice cream made with tofu, gravy made with miso. Wheatgrass smoothies. That’s what he ordered, waiting for Dean to find the place. Hard to miss, but Dean would probably stand outside for ten minutes working out whether it was a restaurant or a medieval apothecary.
The dried flowers and a dreamcatcher the size of a truck tire hanging in the window were the giveaways. Dogbowl outside for customers’ canine friends.
His non-canine friend didn’t look at the menu board before she ordered a non-wheat, non dairy pizza, and then unfolded a map onto the table.
“So, the cut block they’re currently logging is here,” and she pointed to one side of valley, slightly difficult to make out from the undulating lines and numbers and varying degrees of green-ness. The topographical map mostly concerned elevation -- which averaged over 2200 feet above sea level, so hell, up there. “The crew is selectively logging a second growth forest, but the Western Wild Association’s taken pictures of some spotted owls in the area.”
Sam shook his head, took a sip of the smoothie, felt healthier right then, sitting there, than he had in a long time. “Why would that matter?”
Ruby’s look told Sam that he really ought not to ask such inane questions. “Well, they’re protected for starters. Usually only nest in old growth, and there’s a stand at the southwest quadrant of the watershed. If the owls are nesting in the valley, the logging operation will get shut down. That’s why the WWA’s protestors set up camp at the entrance of north shore access road.” Her finger traced a dotted line; the legend identified dotted lines as ‘logging access only’. Sam presumed that meant ‘rough as all hell’. “We’re replanting the south slope, the block here,” and tapped a large gray-shaded square.
“It’s pretty high up,” Sam said.
“Pretty steep,” she conceded, nodding. The lines were packed together on the map; elevation escalating quickly. “You’ll have a mixed bag: spruce, Lodgepole pine, Douglas fir. We don’t stack ‘em in the bag, so don’t even try it. Against company policy. You’ll have to cut the tags at the cache…”
She went on, but Sam’s attention wandered off, not only because he had no idea what she was talking about, but because Dean was standing just behind her, elbows leaned against the back of the long bench she sat on. He was listening intently, but his mouth twitched in amusement around that mouthful of canary feathers. Dean met Sam’s stare, and Ruby stopped, turned around.
“Have you got to the spotted owls yet?” he asked, coming around the bank and pulling up a chair. “What the hell is that?” and pointed to the thick green drink Sam held. “Don’t,” when Sam opened his mouth to explain.
Dean leaned back in his chair; the restaurant wasn’t busy, only a couple of tables were occupied. Several customers scanned the bookshelves in the corner near the vitamin supply shop. A multi-purpose kind of place; the front cash also had fresh baked goods and amethyst crystals for sale.
“Hey,” Dean called to a young guy only differentiated from the rest of the clientele by a red apron. “Can I get a menu?”
The guy gestured to the chalkboard above the bookshelves.
Sam thought he heard Dean moan. The waiter came over, wiped his hands against his thighs. “Something to drink?”
“Beer?” Dean replied, but his question was small and hopeless.
“Sure,” the waiter said, perking up. “We got wheat beer, another that’s made with pine needles, it’s, um, yeah, it’s different, and an organic pale ale that’s really hoppy. You know,” and he smacked his lips, which might have meant tart, or bitter, or something. “And hard cider.”
Dean was still again, but not the cat-sees-bird-in-bush quiet, more the maybe-aliens-will-abduct-me-if-I’m-lucky silence. His sigh, when it came, was resigned. “I’ll have the wheat one. What’s a tempeh burger? Is that with mushrooms and bacon or something?”
“Uh, Dean,” Sam interceded. “You wouldn’t like it.”
“Well, I’m not getting tofu nuggets with miso gravy.”
“The salmon burger’s good,” Ruby said, moving the map, but Dean stopped her, held the map in place. It changed the mood a little, that quick movement.
Ruby stared at him, and Dean stared back. He wanted to see the map.
“Salmon burger it is,” Dean agreed, but without a smile, still staring at Ruby for one more second than was strictly necessary.
Sam blinked. As far as he knew, the only kind of fish Dean liked came from a can. Maybe he didn’t know salmon was a kind of fish, though that would be a monumental lapse, even for Dean.
“Salad, or sweet potato fries?” The pen hovered over the pad.
Dean’s face screwed up as though the waiter had just asked him if he wanted a side of cold monkey shit.
“Lots of fiber in the sweet potato,” the waiter continued, like that was an incentive.
“What? Do I look like I’m going to knit a sweater? What the hell do I want fiber for?”
Ruby opened her mouth, about to tell him the many and manifold benefits of a high-fiber diet, but if Dean heard the word ‘regular’ come from those lips, Sam was pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to break up the fight.
Sam realized that this meal was going to be all about him interceding. “He’ll take the fries. Same for me,” and prayed the waiter would just beat a hasty retreat and not offer them the miso gravy option.
“Dean, this is Ruby,” but Dean’s attention was now entirely on the map. With a jolt, it occurred to Sam that Dean knew how to read this kind of map, that the lines and numbers spoke to Dean. More than that; he’d been here before, and what were just gradations of color and scale to Sam were far more than that for Dean; it was known territory, perhaps a landscape of horror. Dean hadn’t specified what Ludovic had done, had only said the planters - all young women - had never been found.
“This is my brother Dean. He logged this area, about ten years ago.”
Ruby’s mouth twitched, but Dean was still looking at the map. She pointed with a nail-less finger. In fact, her hands were scratched up, reddened, sore looking in places. “Probably there, right?” and Dean glanced up at her, nodded curtly. Ruby continued. “Replanted your bomb crater my first season out.”
Fighting words.
For whatever reason, Dean wasn’t in the mood for a knock-down drag-out. He seemed to be pretending she wasn’t there, or that she was a particularly dull talking animal.
“You been with them all season?” Dean asked after a long moment.
Ruby lounged against the benchback, arms crossed, one eyebrow raised. “This is my third season with them. Pay’s fair, good crew.” Her voice roughened and it drew both Sam and Dean’s attention.
“Tommy said that there’d been some trouble.” Sam pitched his voice to soft.
Ruby shrugged. “Melissa and Hilary, not a month ago. Barely started out. Left everything, their tents, and bags. Cloud rolled in, lost sight of them. Never found shit. Both from out of state. They’ll show up.” If that was supposed to set them at ease, it wasn’t working. Luckily, Sam wasn’t expecting things to go smoothly up there. They were, after all, looking for whatever had taken the girls, not trying to avoid it.
Her stare slipped to the side, drifted back down to the map. “There,” and indicated a ridge that ran between two streams, that traced the top of a mountain down the side of the slope right down to the river that cut the valley into north and south. “That’s the back end of the block, where it meets the old growth patch that’s still left. The timber scout’s been up there, trying to figure out how to best build the road in. Maybe log it next year if the WWA doesn’t get the valley protected.”
Dean made a noise somewhere between a snort and sigh. “The WWA,” he said dismissively. He grinned at Sam, “See? It’s always about those little fucking owls.”
“It’s not just about the owls,” Ruby said, heat coming into the husky voice. Oh, time to intercede again and they hadn’t even gotten their beers yet. “It’s about the whole watershed.”
“How’d you make out?” Sam asked Dean quickly, praying that the pint glasses on the waiter’s tray were theirs.
Dean took the glass from the tray, eyed it suspiciously before taking a long gulp. It must have tasted beer-like, because he drank half of it before replying. “Well, Dave bought out his uncle five years ago. He’s still working the license in Quasilit,” and he turned to Ruby, “which you can do indefinitely if you do it right. If someone doesn’t put you out of business.”
Ruby’s mouth was pressed shut, firmly as a granny’s purse.
Sam edged his chair forward, just in case he had to jump in between them. “So, are you going to go up?”
Dean’s grin had returned, though it seemed tenuous. He’s humoring me. “Yeah, Dave’s a good guy, remembered me. I don’t have to be at the camp until dinnertime tomorrow, though, so I’m sleeping in,” and shrugged at Sam. “I’d give you a ride, but you’d miss a day on the block and you don’t want to be doing that.”
Thanks a lot asshole, Sam thought. “What’s Dave’s set up?”
Dean leaned forward, smiled, and it was entirely for Ruby. “Gotta crew camp this time, no motel. We take the north shore access road; the Impala rides low, so Dave’s gonna come down with a company truck, pick me up. Once we’ve run the WWA’s blockade, I’m going to cut down some trees. I’ll be across the valley from you. I cut; you plant. Your trees are, what? Fifteen cents apiece? More or less. My trees? A little bit more than that.”
“Except if your brother’s any good, he’ll make more than you in a day.” Aw, jeez, Ruby, Sam thought, take it down a notch. Might as well be prodding a grizzly with a ski pole.
But Dean just smiled slow, that defense Sam recognized completely. “Oh, my brother’s plenty good, sweetheart.”
And Sam knew, right then, that he wouldn’t get a serious conversation out of Dean tonight, that his brother was going to tease him relentlessly about this granola-chomping, Echinacea-popping, spotted-owl loving hippie chick and all the fun Sam was going to have in the planters’ tent city in the mountains. While Dean skulked about with a chainsaw in what Sam knew to be the most statistically lethal profession in the country, if you didn’t count demon hunting. Or demon hunting while logging. What kind of outrageous odds adequately described that risk?
“When will I see you?” Sam asked, suddenly anxious for all he had the satellite phone tucked away in his backpack.
“After tonight? You’re up six, down one?” and Dean looked to Ruby for confirmation. She nodded; it seemed to be the usual pattern. “I’ll see you on the off day, meet you at the motel here in town.”
Stay in touch, Dean’s eyes clearly said, slid to Ruby, raised his eyebrows and drained his beer and Sam had no idea if that meant, stay clear of this wingnut, or go for it, or you’re on your own with this one.
--
Seattle WA, 1992
She timed it, because sometimes it was important to measure your humanity in such increments: four minutes, thirty-five seconds. Under five minutes and that plate was practically licked clean. Tanya sure as hell hoped he wouldn’t make himself sick, eating that fast. He was the sort of kid who wouldn’t want to call attention to that, she was sure, so she didn’t hover, didn’t stick around that end of the counter.
Maybe that would be enough to keep him on this side of the line, for tonight anyway. A full stomach. Maybe that’s all it took. He pushed the last fry into his mouth, barely stopping to wash it down with the glass of chocolate milk she’d brought, surreptitiously pocketed the little containers of mayonnaise and ketchup that had come with the burger. Throw extra into the ‘to go’ bag, Tanya instructed herself. Maybe one of the chocolate milk cartons. Who was he feeding? His mother - she might be some junkie, unable to feed herself. Or a sibling. Maybe that.
He didn’t even push away the plate, just stared at it when he was done, wishing it full again. Don’t be sick, she muttered under her breath, told herself it was because she didn’t want to be the one to clean it up, but it was so much more than that, too much more, so she couldn’t think about it at all.
She left him alone for awhile, mostly because the table of rentboys were calling her over, wanting more Cokes, and she finally had to say no to that, but then Anthony came back, eyes bleak, then shining to laughter as one of the other boys - Lamont, maybe, the kid who looked half-Chinese - said that Anthony had money now, why didn’t he get them something to eat? Tanya took their order for two plates of fries as Anthony headed for the bathrooms at the back.
“You done?” Tanya asked the kid at the counter after she’d slapping the order on the pass-through for Julio. Done? Shit, what else was he going to eat, the cutlery?
“Yeah,” the kid said. “Thanks, that was great.”
“That’s Julio for you,” but his glance was sliding around again, and she noticed how one hand gripped the edge of the counter. “You want the to go order now?”
He swallowed. “I can’t…you know…”
“Fuck it, the food we throw away here. Like I said, I’ll put it on my staff meal tab. No worries.” He wouldn’t refuse, not when he’d taken the first meal. He wanted to, raised his chin a little, met Tanya’s stare. Difficult to read right now, masking.
Take it. Oh please just take it and go.
He nodded, and the hand that had been holding on to the counter’s edge relaxed a little, finally fell on his lap. “Yeah. Is there…you know…anything that needs…”
Oh yeah, the boss would just love that, some underage kid doing my job.
“Nope, you stay put. I need to start a new bag of milk in the serving fridge. You can help me by finishing off what’s left in the old bag.” So he had another glass of milk, 2% this time, was just bringing it up to his mouth when Anthony came back out, nudged the kid in the back as he passed.
The kid didn’t spill the milk, but he turned, carefully set the glass down on the counter. Was halfway to a stand before Tanya grabbed the two plates of fries from the pass-through and hurried over to Anthony. “For god’s sake, Anthony, take this thing, watch it, it’s hot,” and shoved one of the plates at him. Anthony, six inches taller than the counter kid, backed away slowly, pivoted, and took one of the plates.
“Just checking out the fresh meat,” he said, meant it to carry. Tanya didn’t have to be looking at him to know what color the kid’s face had probably gone to. The bell, the bell, Julio, did you have to go out and kill a fucking cow to get the…
DING, and she eyed Anthony and his friends sternly. Goddamnit, when was she supposed to go out and get drunk? She wasn’t a social worker or a camp counselor or a den mother and she was all of these things. All for $3.80 an hour, plus tips.
“To go!” Julio shouted, and Tanya pushed Anthony gently on the shoulder.
“Mind yourself,” she hissed with a smile. Anthony wasn’t listening.
The door opened to the night, the bell above jangling and Pavlovian reflex kicked in: Tanya turned, smiled, nodded to the new customer.
He was at least six foot three, rangy, like the Marlboro Man. Lean, all bone and sinew, silky dark blond hair spangled with rain, a walk like a wild animal. No hesitation, no return of the smile. Pad, pad, pad, right up to the kid at the counter. Was this the car owner, come to continue the beating?
But no, the Marlboro Man sat beside the kid, didn’t even look at him, then glanced over at Tanya. And right then, he reminded her of a sound, not an animal or a celebrity. A sound that she’d heard once in that Ginsberg poem - he was a howl. All of that in those pitiless slivers of iceblue eyes. Remember that face, in case you need to get a sketch artist to draw it. He pointed to the coffeepot on the machine behind the counter.
The cup rattled in the saucer as Tanya poured. She set it down, watched the kid to see what he would do. Was this his dad, maybe, here to haul him off the street? For once she hoped not.
Then, it became something worse, because the howl given form smiled at the kid in that way and the rent boys started poking each other across the table, throwing dirty looks to the counter.
And Tanya knew this was how it started.
“Hey,” she said sharply, and the kid looked to her, and he was begging her without knowing he was doing it, just had it in his eyes, and she could help, could save maybe just one. Get him the fuck out of here. “Hey, here’s your order. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
He was up like a shot, heading for the door and she stopped him, called him over to the cash machine, opened it, took out twenty bucks, knew she had enough to cover it, say goodbye to the underground club tonight, but she’d wake up with a clear conscience. “Here’s your change. Go right home, all right?”
She kept her voice low, but there was a shake in it, and he shook his head to the money. “I’ll be okay,” he said, and that just made her want to cry.
Along the counter, the lean blond man looked on with more than interest. With avarice. That’s a ten dollar word she’d learned at Evergreen College. Don’t make a scene with the money, girl. She put the bill back into the tray, slammed it shut. “Just go, I’ll make sure he doesn’t follow you.”
Because he was going to: Tanya could tell, and the kid could tell. This guy wanted to eat him whole. She shivered, understanding that.
The kid nodded, grabbed the warm paper bag without saying anything else, and fled.
Tanya picked up the coffeepot like a weapon, walked down the aisle, held it out with a wide smile. “Free refills,” she said, coming towards the man.
“You know that boy?” the man asked, a slender smile creeping across his face, a crack in thin ice.
Tanya shook her head. “Never seen him before.”
And the rentboys started to make noise behind her and she glanced over to see Lamont stand - pushed from the bench, actually, his turn. He sauntered over, adjusted his belt. “Mister, buy me a coffee?” he asked, leaning one hand on the counter.
“Sure, kid,” the man said, and Lamont sat, but the man kept his eyes on the door.
--
The burger was cold by the time he got to the rough grass beside the tracks, even though he’d run most of the way. He’d gone the long route, just to make one last pass by the motel. Just in case, he told himself. Just in case. ‘Cause this has to end soon, one way or another.
You’ll keep this up as long as it takes, Winchester.
Skidded to a halt by the line of old garages behind the ancient clapboard houses. Near the track, this part of town; either drug dealers or whores or seniors too old to move. The old Chinese lady who lived in the house on the end kept all kinds of weird shit in her garage, but she never came out to look.
Dean eased open the door, breath sawing in and out, the burger sitting in his stomach like a cannonball. He was shaky, and he marked that up to being out of shape, but it was nothing like that and he knew it. That was the first real meal he’d had in days.
He probably shouldn’t have run all the way. But. But, and he couldn’t think about why he’d run flat out like a demon was chasing him, because that would mean thinking about a whole lot of other things too, including something that felt like a demon but was only a choice not taken tonight. Maybe that was a different kind of demon.
The bag wasn’t warm anymore, but that wouldn’t matter, he didn’t think, trying to see into the old wooden garage, windows screened with dirt and mold, everything smelling of cat piss and garbage and wet. Turned to close the door when he heard a sudden noise behind him and realized he hadn’t made the knock and -
A two-by-four caught him on the shoulder, made him drop the bag, twanging a warm rush of pain down his arm and fuckfuckfuck Sammy you pick now to go all Rambo on my ass.
Dean grabbed the piece of wood as a small dark figure tried to get it up again, twisted it out of the way with a curse, still breathing like an asthmatic in a dog kennel.
“Jesus, Sam,” he said and the figure in front of him stopped dead.
“Shit,” the young voice came.
“Language,” Dean warned, rubbing his shoulder, trying to spot where the bag had landed in the pitch darkness. Snatched it, a wave of dizziness hitting him mercilessly as he tried to stand. He crouched for a minute, let it pass. “I got you some food.”
Sam hunkered down beside him, too close, but Dean allowed it. Maybe wanted it right now. There was an old Oldsmobile parked in the garage, no engine, up on blocks, tires gone. But bench seats front and back. Home for the last two weeks. The front seat was Dean’s bedroom; the back, Sam’s room, where he slept and did his homework. Neither liked what they shared the found space with: a family of raccoons, several rats.
There was worse, Dean reminded himself. They didn’t have any light, and couldn’t afford to call attention to themselves for such a luxury even if they’d had the money for candles or a flashlight. Dean had the one gun Dad had left them, but John Winchester hadn’t thought of a flashlight. Or a telephone. Or food. He had left them at the motel, which had had all those things.
“A burger?” Sam breathed, plunging his hand into the bag. “Oh man. Chocolate milk?” Like Dean had mugged Santa and returned with his sack. Dean’s breath was still coming weird and he swallowed with difficulty. Shit, all it took was chocolate milk. Who knew?
“You can eat it like a normal human being, you know,” Dean whispered - this place was all about whispers - and stood slowly, pulling Sam up with him. Sam was already taking huge bites of the burger, barely chewing. “Slow it down, okay? Jesus, it’s like watching a fucking golden lab at a picnic.”
But Sam grinned. Dean could tell because one streetlight had kicked on, as it did from time to time, and a little sliver of light managed to squeeze through the broken window on the east side of the garage. Slight kid, all dark eyes and hair and pale skin. Grin like a searchlight over Hollywood.
“You go by the motel?” Sam demanded, finding the fries. He asked that all the time, fretting. He sat down on a broken wooden chair, set the bag on an upturned oil drum. “Did the manager spot you? Was the car back?” It wasn’t the real question. It wasn’t the question that both of them asked themselves over and over like a broken fucking record.
Wherethefuckisdad?Wherethefuckisdad?
Dean shook his head. What, like that wouldn’t have been the first thing out my mouth? “Nah.” Nodded his head, knew he had to keep it up, this relentless front. “It’ll be okay. Any day now.”
“Where’d ya get the food from?” Sam asked, clearing the fries with an almost mechanical precision. He popped open the chocolate milk carton last, always one for delaying gratification. Gulped it down slowly, but never took it from his lips. Wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, beaming. He didn’t care about the answer, Dean realized, so he said nothing.
For a long while, they sat in silence, then Dean reminded Sam he had school in the morning, that he needed to look ‘normal’ and he should get some sleep. They had plenty of blankets stolen from the motel, and soap, and even a dozen rolls of toilet paper. Towels, another oil drum outside full of freezing rainwater. Enough to get by.
“You okay?” Sam asked, taking off his grubby jean jacket and changing into a long-sleeved jersey shirt that he called his pajamas. The streetlight blinked off, and the garage was plunged into darkness again.
That was good, Dean reckoned, because Sam was getting to be an expert at reading him. “I’m fine,” he said, voice rock steady. “We’ll be fine. He’ll be back soon.”
--
Go to Chapter 3
a/n: Okay, you want the good news or the bad news? Okay, good news…I’m going to Scotland on Tuesday for a friend’s wedding! Doesn’t that sound like fun? A whole week, drinking Scotch, visiting my Gran, who’s turning 100, drinking Scotch, helping my cousin shoe some horses, drinking Scotch, watching my fiddler cousin play in a pub…and I’m not even bringing my laptop so that pesky clients won’t be able to bug me!
Uh, I’m presuming that by now you’ve figured out what the bad news is.
But I’m already working on chapter 3, the whole thing’s outlined, don’t worry, it’s coming. But it’ll be longer than my usual week between chapters, that’s all. Have faith. And I’ll be picking up messages as I go, but I might be drunk when I do it, so don’t be surprised if my responses or posts are a little…squiffy.
--
Rating: Gen, PG-13 due to swearing, blood-letting, logging accidents and malevolent sexual undercurrents. WIP, will be 10 chapters. Horror/drama.
Don’t touch the monkey: Hey, Eric, you’re really busy with the new season and all. Just move along. I promise I won’t hurt any of them…much.
A Short Word from BigPink on the Beta Process: Now that I’ve discovered the iChat video function on my new laptop, I yak to Lemmypie incessantly, much to our families’ consternation. We talk about all sorts of things, but one great thing has been fleshing out this story. She’s great with the ideas, and with teasing even more nonsense from my dysfunctional brain. The ever-vigilant jmm0001 bats clean-up, making sure that in my excitement I haven’t forgotten that Dean’s not wearing any pants or that Sam’s wandered off without paying the bill.
Read Chapter One/Deep Blue
Read
--
Aberdeen, WA, present day
She wasn’t an office worker, she was a treeplanter. Sam saw that plainly and right away.
Technically, she was in an office and she appeared to be working behind the counter, but she was no more a secretary than Sam was a Mexican wrestler.
She ducked under the counter in a quest for Sam’s requested forms, annoyed maybe; it was near six o’clock by the time they made Aberdeen, must be close to quitting time. A thick braid of sleek red hair fell over her shoulder like a bright animal, ferret-like, as though it would have a name and eat from her hand. Sam remembered Jess once saying hair that color must come from a bottle, because nothing in nature was like it except maybe the inside of a ripe papaya. This girl didn’t look like she’d put any kind of chemical anywhere near herself, so unless it was…what was that stuff called - right, henna - then it had to be natural.
She had the easy grace of a yoga instructor, but powerful, built like fighting dog, all muscle and bone. Her high-bridged nose reminded Sam of a Greek statue, the kind he’d studied in that useless art history course he’d taken. Calypso, a caryatid, winged Nike; something like that. The statue’s serenity was somewhat marred by the sloe dance under sharp red brows.
Maybe she sensed his attention, and maybe she didn’t. She stopped fiddling with her braid and slapped the forms down in front of him. Her smile was incremental but encouraging.
“Fill it out down to here,” and she pointed to a big blank box that said ‘for office use only’, which basically was the place some supervisor would write down whether or not Sam came across as a walking talking moron. She licked her lips, maybe slightly intrigued by Sam, maybe not. “Today is your lucky day,” she said like she wasn’t sure it was the thing to bring up.
“How so?” Sam asked automatically, fishing for a pen from his bulging knapsack, taking so long the girl leaned over the counter and poked him on the back with the tip of the ballpoint she held in her hand.
“Here,” she said, giving him the pen. It had the company logo on it, a hand with a stylized tree. “Just that we’re down a few planters, and today’s the break and we were about to close up for the day, go back to the bush short-handed. Your timing is…” and Sam stood up, tried to put ‘eager’ back into his arsenal. “Great.”
“Um,” and Sam flashed the battered card the Grateful Dead roadie had given Dean in the Walla Walla diner. “This guy. Said I should stop by?”
The girl took the card, brought it close to her Grecian nose. “Tommy? Tall blond guy, little hair here,” and she gestured to her chin.
“Onion farm, Walla Walla,” Sam supplied, starting to fill out the form, but got stuck on the first line, which was where he was supposed to write his name.
“That’s him,” she agreed. Her mouth was wide, filled with Chiclet teeth. Sam smiled back, liking her cautious dark voice and her quiet amusement. Young and serious.
“Ruby,” and she nodded, glancing obviously down at his form.
“Sam,” and that’s what he wrote on the line.
“If Tommy gave you the card, he must have thought you could handle it,” she said, but she wasn’t watching him anymore, she was tidying some papers onto the shelf behind her, ignoring a ringing phone. As he looked up, she came out from behind the counter, crossed the waiting area filled with cardboard boxes and a dead potted plant to rummage in a box of map pins under the bulletin board.
“He actually gave my brother the card,” Sam admitted, watching as she stuck a red-headed pin into a topographical map on the wall. It joined others bristling in a cluster. He had no idea what region he was looking at. What he was looking at.
Ruby turned, brows raised. “You’ve never been planting before?”
Sam shook his head. Dean always warned him about telling the truth, but he obviously hadn’t been born with the same instincts Sam had. Another bright smile and Ruby shook her head.
“That’s okay. You done much sports, marathons, any hard labor?”
Sam thought about telling the truth again. Meet her partway, maybe.
“Ran a lot in school. Varsity track. Distance.” The kind of hard labor he and Dean had been doing the last year was probably best left unsaid.
“Okay, when you go in to talk to the boss? Mention the track. Marathons,” and she shook her head, going back to the board and jabbing a pin in. “The boss likes marathon runners.”
He nodded. “Should I talk about the ecology courses I took?”
“Fuck no.” Shook her head emphatically. “Not a word. When he asks you why you’re doing this, tell him it’s the money. When he comes back to the question - and he will - tell him it’s for the money. Tell him you need enough to put you through next semester. Tell him that you were a competitive asshole when you were running distance. Do not,” and she stopped for emphasis, turning away from the board, “tell him you’re saving the planet or love nature or want to make art about the wilderness.”
“Even if it’s true?” he grinned, still working on the form. I could tell him that I’m hunting down whatever wolf’s picking off your crew workers. That was the truth, but it also brought him back to Dean’s anxiety, his reluctance to show fear, the long drive here with Dean dodging and weaving like a pro receiver running toward the end zone. Something evil, and Dean alone, out of his element, eighteen years old. Not knowing what he’d been facing, maybe, and unwilling to admit it now. More than that, though, because Sam could have sworn that Dean was scared, and that was rare, was a perfectly good indicator of how bad this ‘wolf’ was going to be.
Smarten up, pay attention.
He felt Ruby’s eyes on him as he walked across the crammed outer office into the supervisor’s dingy room, where he was grilled for half an hour on his motivation, his experience, and his general health. In the end, Sam assumed they were pretty desperate, because the supervisor rose, shook Sam’s hand - Sam winced at how thick the calluses were on the hard palm - and told him to come back bright and early the next morning, when a truck would pick them up and take them to the camp; they’d set up and be on the block by ten, get in most of a day.
Then the supervisor told Sam he’d be making seventeen cents a tree, because the terrain was pretty steep, no beach plant this, and that daily camp fees were twenty-two dollars a day, which included three squares and shower rights. He had his gear, right? Tent, bags, shovels and calk boots, Sam told him. Leather gloves, gaiters, bama socks, silviculture liners. Now just showing off.
Duct tape?
Ah, no, not that. The supervisor grinned and stood up. “See you tomorrow. Five o’clock in the morning, or you find your own ride up.”
Ruby was still there. Waiting, Sam thought. She met Sam’s stare, smirked. “Gotcha on the duct tape, didn’t he?”
Sam ducked his head, but he was grinning. It was exciting in some ways, in spite of or maybe because of the danger: Dean had been trying not to laugh as they’d picked up gear in Seattle, seeing Sam’s continuous expression of disbelief - why do I need spiked boots, Dean? How much rainwear can a body wear at one time? - but now the idea of being outside and just pushing himself didn’t sound so bad. Hell, just mention the words ‘marathon’ and ‘competition’ and he felt like going there now. There was even the added incentive of being able to make a shitload of money in very little time.
And if there was an evil wolf spirit involved, especially if it meant protecting treeplanters like Ruby? Well, how awful could it be?
“Hey,” Ruby said, picking up Sam’s huge backpack and handing it to him, “the hardware store’s just down the block. You could pick up the tape there and we could grab something to eat at Minerva’s.”
“Minerva’s?” Oh, Sam knew what kind of dinner he was going to have tonight. Tempeh burger, sweet potato fries, and some sort of soy beverage. “Let me phone my brother, see if he’s had any luck.” He caught the edge of disappointment in Ruby’s down-turned mouth. “He’s supposed to meet me for dinner.”
--
Quasilit Valley WA, 1997
Dean thought about sleeping and dying. He thought about both a lot. Sleeping a little bit more, maybe. Given two minutes, he’d just lie down, right there, between a nurse log and a tree that was taller and older than any European cathedral, lie down in fifteen different kinds of moss and just sleep. That led invariably to thoughts of death, because these trees were coming down. Instead, he watched as the plume of bright sawdust kicked back from Goodenuff Dave’s chainsaw like he’d hit an artery.
He’d never been so sore in his life and the weight of this chainsaw was going to fucking kill him. A spasm crossed his shoulders and he grimaced, but he made sure the ear protectors were in place under his hardhat, hefted the Husqvarna - a medium weight one with only a forty-inch bar, they’d laughed at that, too - and followed Dave up the self-made steps they’d made in the tree trunk. Dave cut another window square for the next spring board, the one that would get them well up on the root swell, to where the Doug fir’s shaft rose a hundred feet - shit, more - without a single branch until you hit one fifty. Dean had already seen one guy at the top of one of these suckers, standing there two hundred feet up even after topping it. That topped tree was now the spar, anchoring the cable that ran down the mountainside; cut logs were dragged along by the cable, crashing through underbrush down to the roadside where they could be bucked.
What a lot of fucking work for a single tree, Dean thought, but then did the math. Board feet. How many tens of thousands of dollars was this single tree worth? Completely staggering. Mr. Janzen would have been proud of his ability to come up with the sum so quickly, except that Mr. Janzen had failed him last semester, hated his guts, and would never see him again.
The rain sheeted down, and Dean could see his breath for all that it was May. Dave had loaned him a couple of down vests, some extra socks. Loaned him the Kevlar pants held up by the requisite red suspenders, along with the field vest, the heavy belt containing a first aid kit, air horn, chainsaw parts, extra compression bandages. What a lot of shit to haul around. They stayed in a cheap motel during the nights, and at least Dean could usually wash out the socks before he fell unconscious into bed. His feet were what bothered him the most. They soaked in a brine of sweat and wool and rainwater almost all the time.
Goodenuff’s uncle had loaned him the saw, had done it with a reluctant grin. Said that Dean could take his pick of the jobs, which one he wanted to be trained for. High riggers, maybe, Dave had joked, pointing up through the rain to the top of the spar. Fuck, that guy two hundred feet up standing on a fucking swaying post? No fucking way. Better be a faller then, Goodenuff’s uncle had suggested. They make the most, once they’re good at it.
The reason for that, Dean discovered, was that fallers were most likely dead if they were bad at it. “When you’re a faller, death always comes from above,” Uncle Goodenuff had said, handing Dean the chainsaw. “This isn’t a job you want to bullshit your way into, son.”
Dean had spent most of the last week furtively glancing up every five seconds or so, rain hitting him in the face like an insult, watching the treetops dance and spin, trying to figure out which way the tree was going to fall. Every shimmy of the saw made the branches move; every change in wind direction and speed mattered. He watched carefully for widow-makers, the dead branches that fell loose when the tree started to go. They came down like thunderbolts, some the size of small trees, would spear you right through if they hit you. He felt like a gopher on a hawk-covered plain.
That much weight falling that fast didn’t allow for mistakes.
He had bruises in places he didn’t think he could get bruises; he had cuts from bushwhacking through the slash with the chainsaw, and two days ago he’d been so hungover that he’d had to go puke in the bushes.
The other guys had laughed; they’d been the ones to get him drunk the night before. Goodenuff was exempt; his uncle owned the crew and the equipment and the contract. Dean, on the other hand, was fair game, was green as they came.
It’s work, he kept telling himself.
It’s money, he told himself when one of the experienced fallers filled his boot with urine during the lunch break while Dean aired out his feet.
Two hundred bucks a day to start, he whispered under his breath with every wild swipe of underbrush that drew blood as he moved through a light-filled spot created by a fallen tree, nature busy filling in the vacuum.
Started to feel good about what he was doing by the fifth day, when Dave directed him to go up the springboards first. Dean figured out what way he wanted the Douglas fir to go, sliced the Humboldt undercut from the trunk, hammered wedges into his cut to force something that weighed more than a house to fall exactly where it wouldn’t kill any of the assholes working with him. He worked it out in advance, hoping for wind and lean and luck to converge in the right combination; Uncle Goodenuff said he had good tree sense and that unteachable ability of ‘finding time’ when things were moving fast - to assess, plan, react.
Food on the table, this when the foreman sewed up the cut on Dean’s upper arm when he hadn’t been nimble enough to avoid a chip of wood flung from the saw. Shit, he hadn’t even seen it, let alone felt it.
Chocolate milk, stupid comic books, new running shoes, Kilcannon’s fucking rent, dozens of brown plastic prescription pill bottles with John Winchester’s name typed on the labels, the crinkle of the paper bag as the pharmacist wraps them up.
God help me, he thought the first time he caught sight of Ludovic in the cookhouse tent, his heart pretty much stopped cold, everything slowing - time, blood, burgeoning pride. God help me, was his only thought and it did him no good at all.
--
Aberdeen WA, present day
As predicted, Minerva’s had four different types of soy milk, a multitude of salad greens Sam had never heard of, not even having lived in California for as long as he had, and ice cream made with tofu, gravy made with miso. Wheatgrass smoothies. That’s what he ordered, waiting for Dean to find the place. Hard to miss, but Dean would probably stand outside for ten minutes working out whether it was a restaurant or a medieval apothecary.
The dried flowers and a dreamcatcher the size of a truck tire hanging in the window were the giveaways. Dogbowl outside for customers’ canine friends.
His non-canine friend didn’t look at the menu board before she ordered a non-wheat, non dairy pizza, and then unfolded a map onto the table.
“So, the cut block they’re currently logging is here,” and she pointed to one side of valley, slightly difficult to make out from the undulating lines and numbers and varying degrees of green-ness. The topographical map mostly concerned elevation -- which averaged over 2200 feet above sea level, so hell, up there. “The crew is selectively logging a second growth forest, but the Western Wild Association’s taken pictures of some spotted owls in the area.”
Sam shook his head, took a sip of the smoothie, felt healthier right then, sitting there, than he had in a long time. “Why would that matter?”
Ruby’s look told Sam that he really ought not to ask such inane questions. “Well, they’re protected for starters. Usually only nest in old growth, and there’s a stand at the southwest quadrant of the watershed. If the owls are nesting in the valley, the logging operation will get shut down. That’s why the WWA’s protestors set up camp at the entrance of north shore access road.” Her finger traced a dotted line; the legend identified dotted lines as ‘logging access only’. Sam presumed that meant ‘rough as all hell’. “We’re replanting the south slope, the block here,” and tapped a large gray-shaded square.
“It’s pretty high up,” Sam said.
“Pretty steep,” she conceded, nodding. The lines were packed together on the map; elevation escalating quickly. “You’ll have a mixed bag: spruce, Lodgepole pine, Douglas fir. We don’t stack ‘em in the bag, so don’t even try it. Against company policy. You’ll have to cut the tags at the cache…”
She went on, but Sam’s attention wandered off, not only because he had no idea what she was talking about, but because Dean was standing just behind her, elbows leaned against the back of the long bench she sat on. He was listening intently, but his mouth twitched in amusement around that mouthful of canary feathers. Dean met Sam’s stare, and Ruby stopped, turned around.
“Have you got to the spotted owls yet?” he asked, coming around the bank and pulling up a chair. “What the hell is that?” and pointed to the thick green drink Sam held. “Don’t,” when Sam opened his mouth to explain.
Dean leaned back in his chair; the restaurant wasn’t busy, only a couple of tables were occupied. Several customers scanned the bookshelves in the corner near the vitamin supply shop. A multi-purpose kind of place; the front cash also had fresh baked goods and amethyst crystals for sale.
“Hey,” Dean called to a young guy only differentiated from the rest of the clientele by a red apron. “Can I get a menu?”
The guy gestured to the chalkboard above the bookshelves.
Sam thought he heard Dean moan. The waiter came over, wiped his hands against his thighs. “Something to drink?”
“Beer?” Dean replied, but his question was small and hopeless.
“Sure,” the waiter said, perking up. “We got wheat beer, another that’s made with pine needles, it’s, um, yeah, it’s different, and an organic pale ale that’s really hoppy. You know,” and he smacked his lips, which might have meant tart, or bitter, or something. “And hard cider.”
Dean was still again, but not the cat-sees-bird-in-bush quiet, more the maybe-aliens-will-abduct-me-if-I’m-lucky silence. His sigh, when it came, was resigned. “I’ll have the wheat one. What’s a tempeh burger? Is that with mushrooms and bacon or something?”
“Uh, Dean,” Sam interceded. “You wouldn’t like it.”
“Well, I’m not getting tofu nuggets with miso gravy.”
“The salmon burger’s good,” Ruby said, moving the map, but Dean stopped her, held the map in place. It changed the mood a little, that quick movement.
Ruby stared at him, and Dean stared back. He wanted to see the map.
“Salmon burger it is,” Dean agreed, but without a smile, still staring at Ruby for one more second than was strictly necessary.
Sam blinked. As far as he knew, the only kind of fish Dean liked came from a can. Maybe he didn’t know salmon was a kind of fish, though that would be a monumental lapse, even for Dean.
“Salad, or sweet potato fries?” The pen hovered over the pad.
Dean’s face screwed up as though the waiter had just asked him if he wanted a side of cold monkey shit.
“Lots of fiber in the sweet potato,” the waiter continued, like that was an incentive.
“What? Do I look like I’m going to knit a sweater? What the hell do I want fiber for?”
Ruby opened her mouth, about to tell him the many and manifold benefits of a high-fiber diet, but if Dean heard the word ‘regular’ come from those lips, Sam was pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to break up the fight.
Sam realized that this meal was going to be all about him interceding. “He’ll take the fries. Same for me,” and prayed the waiter would just beat a hasty retreat and not offer them the miso gravy option.
“Dean, this is Ruby,” but Dean’s attention was now entirely on the map. With a jolt, it occurred to Sam that Dean knew how to read this kind of map, that the lines and numbers spoke to Dean. More than that; he’d been here before, and what were just gradations of color and scale to Sam were far more than that for Dean; it was known territory, perhaps a landscape of horror. Dean hadn’t specified what Ludovic had done, had only said the planters - all young women - had never been found.
“This is my brother Dean. He logged this area, about ten years ago.”
Ruby’s mouth twitched, but Dean was still looking at the map. She pointed with a nail-less finger. In fact, her hands were scratched up, reddened, sore looking in places. “Probably there, right?” and Dean glanced up at her, nodded curtly. Ruby continued. “Replanted your bomb crater my first season out.”
Fighting words.
For whatever reason, Dean wasn’t in the mood for a knock-down drag-out. He seemed to be pretending she wasn’t there, or that she was a particularly dull talking animal.
“You been with them all season?” Dean asked after a long moment.
Ruby lounged against the benchback, arms crossed, one eyebrow raised. “This is my third season with them. Pay’s fair, good crew.” Her voice roughened and it drew both Sam and Dean’s attention.
“Tommy said that there’d been some trouble.” Sam pitched his voice to soft.
Ruby shrugged. “Melissa and Hilary, not a month ago. Barely started out. Left everything, their tents, and bags. Cloud rolled in, lost sight of them. Never found shit. Both from out of state. They’ll show up.” If that was supposed to set them at ease, it wasn’t working. Luckily, Sam wasn’t expecting things to go smoothly up there. They were, after all, looking for whatever had taken the girls, not trying to avoid it.
Her stare slipped to the side, drifted back down to the map. “There,” and indicated a ridge that ran between two streams, that traced the top of a mountain down the side of the slope right down to the river that cut the valley into north and south. “That’s the back end of the block, where it meets the old growth patch that’s still left. The timber scout’s been up there, trying to figure out how to best build the road in. Maybe log it next year if the WWA doesn’t get the valley protected.”
Dean made a noise somewhere between a snort and sigh. “The WWA,” he said dismissively. He grinned at Sam, “See? It’s always about those little fucking owls.”
“It’s not just about the owls,” Ruby said, heat coming into the husky voice. Oh, time to intercede again and they hadn’t even gotten their beers yet. “It’s about the whole watershed.”
“How’d you make out?” Sam asked Dean quickly, praying that the pint glasses on the waiter’s tray were theirs.
Dean took the glass from the tray, eyed it suspiciously before taking a long gulp. It must have tasted beer-like, because he drank half of it before replying. “Well, Dave bought out his uncle five years ago. He’s still working the license in Quasilit,” and he turned to Ruby, “which you can do indefinitely if you do it right. If someone doesn’t put you out of business.”
Ruby’s mouth was pressed shut, firmly as a granny’s purse.
Sam edged his chair forward, just in case he had to jump in between them. “So, are you going to go up?”
Dean’s grin had returned, though it seemed tenuous. He’s humoring me. “Yeah, Dave’s a good guy, remembered me. I don’t have to be at the camp until dinnertime tomorrow, though, so I’m sleeping in,” and shrugged at Sam. “I’d give you a ride, but you’d miss a day on the block and you don’t want to be doing that.”
Thanks a lot asshole, Sam thought. “What’s Dave’s set up?”
Dean leaned forward, smiled, and it was entirely for Ruby. “Gotta crew camp this time, no motel. We take the north shore access road; the Impala rides low, so Dave’s gonna come down with a company truck, pick me up. Once we’ve run the WWA’s blockade, I’m going to cut down some trees. I’ll be across the valley from you. I cut; you plant. Your trees are, what? Fifteen cents apiece? More or less. My trees? A little bit more than that.”
“Except if your brother’s any good, he’ll make more than you in a day.” Aw, jeez, Ruby, Sam thought, take it down a notch. Might as well be prodding a grizzly with a ski pole.
But Dean just smiled slow, that defense Sam recognized completely. “Oh, my brother’s plenty good, sweetheart.”
And Sam knew, right then, that he wouldn’t get a serious conversation out of Dean tonight, that his brother was going to tease him relentlessly about this granola-chomping, Echinacea-popping, spotted-owl loving hippie chick and all the fun Sam was going to have in the planters’ tent city in the mountains. While Dean skulked about with a chainsaw in what Sam knew to be the most statistically lethal profession in the country, if you didn’t count demon hunting. Or demon hunting while logging. What kind of outrageous odds adequately described that risk?
“When will I see you?” Sam asked, suddenly anxious for all he had the satellite phone tucked away in his backpack.
“After tonight? You’re up six, down one?” and Dean looked to Ruby for confirmation. She nodded; it seemed to be the usual pattern. “I’ll see you on the off day, meet you at the motel here in town.”
Stay in touch, Dean’s eyes clearly said, slid to Ruby, raised his eyebrows and drained his beer and Sam had no idea if that meant, stay clear of this wingnut, or go for it, or you’re on your own with this one.
--
Seattle WA, 1992
She timed it, because sometimes it was important to measure your humanity in such increments: four minutes, thirty-five seconds. Under five minutes and that plate was practically licked clean. Tanya sure as hell hoped he wouldn’t make himself sick, eating that fast. He was the sort of kid who wouldn’t want to call attention to that, she was sure, so she didn’t hover, didn’t stick around that end of the counter.
Maybe that would be enough to keep him on this side of the line, for tonight anyway. A full stomach. Maybe that’s all it took. He pushed the last fry into his mouth, barely stopping to wash it down with the glass of chocolate milk she’d brought, surreptitiously pocketed the little containers of mayonnaise and ketchup that had come with the burger. Throw extra into the ‘to go’ bag, Tanya instructed herself. Maybe one of the chocolate milk cartons. Who was he feeding? His mother - she might be some junkie, unable to feed herself. Or a sibling. Maybe that.
He didn’t even push away the plate, just stared at it when he was done, wishing it full again. Don’t be sick, she muttered under her breath, told herself it was because she didn’t want to be the one to clean it up, but it was so much more than that, too much more, so she couldn’t think about it at all.
She left him alone for awhile, mostly because the table of rentboys were calling her over, wanting more Cokes, and she finally had to say no to that, but then Anthony came back, eyes bleak, then shining to laughter as one of the other boys - Lamont, maybe, the kid who looked half-Chinese - said that Anthony had money now, why didn’t he get them something to eat? Tanya took their order for two plates of fries as Anthony headed for the bathrooms at the back.
“You done?” Tanya asked the kid at the counter after she’d slapping the order on the pass-through for Julio. Done? Shit, what else was he going to eat, the cutlery?
“Yeah,” the kid said. “Thanks, that was great.”
“That’s Julio for you,” but his glance was sliding around again, and she noticed how one hand gripped the edge of the counter. “You want the to go order now?”
He swallowed. “I can’t…you know…”
“Fuck it, the food we throw away here. Like I said, I’ll put it on my staff meal tab. No worries.” He wouldn’t refuse, not when he’d taken the first meal. He wanted to, raised his chin a little, met Tanya’s stare. Difficult to read right now, masking.
Take it. Oh please just take it and go.
He nodded, and the hand that had been holding on to the counter’s edge relaxed a little, finally fell on his lap. “Yeah. Is there…you know…anything that needs…”
Oh yeah, the boss would just love that, some underage kid doing my job.
“Nope, you stay put. I need to start a new bag of milk in the serving fridge. You can help me by finishing off what’s left in the old bag.” So he had another glass of milk, 2% this time, was just bringing it up to his mouth when Anthony came back out, nudged the kid in the back as he passed.
The kid didn’t spill the milk, but he turned, carefully set the glass down on the counter. Was halfway to a stand before Tanya grabbed the two plates of fries from the pass-through and hurried over to Anthony. “For god’s sake, Anthony, take this thing, watch it, it’s hot,” and shoved one of the plates at him. Anthony, six inches taller than the counter kid, backed away slowly, pivoted, and took one of the plates.
“Just checking out the fresh meat,” he said, meant it to carry. Tanya didn’t have to be looking at him to know what color the kid’s face had probably gone to. The bell, the bell, Julio, did you have to go out and kill a fucking cow to get the…
DING, and she eyed Anthony and his friends sternly. Goddamnit, when was she supposed to go out and get drunk? She wasn’t a social worker or a camp counselor or a den mother and she was all of these things. All for $3.80 an hour, plus tips.
“To go!” Julio shouted, and Tanya pushed Anthony gently on the shoulder.
“Mind yourself,” she hissed with a smile. Anthony wasn’t listening.
The door opened to the night, the bell above jangling and Pavlovian reflex kicked in: Tanya turned, smiled, nodded to the new customer.
He was at least six foot three, rangy, like the Marlboro Man. Lean, all bone and sinew, silky dark blond hair spangled with rain, a walk like a wild animal. No hesitation, no return of the smile. Pad, pad, pad, right up to the kid at the counter. Was this the car owner, come to continue the beating?
But no, the Marlboro Man sat beside the kid, didn’t even look at him, then glanced over at Tanya. And right then, he reminded her of a sound, not an animal or a celebrity. A sound that she’d heard once in that Ginsberg poem - he was a howl. All of that in those pitiless slivers of iceblue eyes. Remember that face, in case you need to get a sketch artist to draw it. He pointed to the coffeepot on the machine behind the counter.
The cup rattled in the saucer as Tanya poured. She set it down, watched the kid to see what he would do. Was this his dad, maybe, here to haul him off the street? For once she hoped not.
Then, it became something worse, because the howl given form smiled at the kid in that way and the rent boys started poking each other across the table, throwing dirty looks to the counter.
And Tanya knew this was how it started.
“Hey,” she said sharply, and the kid looked to her, and he was begging her without knowing he was doing it, just had it in his eyes, and she could help, could save maybe just one. Get him the fuck out of here. “Hey, here’s your order. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
He was up like a shot, heading for the door and she stopped him, called him over to the cash machine, opened it, took out twenty bucks, knew she had enough to cover it, say goodbye to the underground club tonight, but she’d wake up with a clear conscience. “Here’s your change. Go right home, all right?”
She kept her voice low, but there was a shake in it, and he shook his head to the money. “I’ll be okay,” he said, and that just made her want to cry.
Along the counter, the lean blond man looked on with more than interest. With avarice. That’s a ten dollar word she’d learned at Evergreen College. Don’t make a scene with the money, girl. She put the bill back into the tray, slammed it shut. “Just go, I’ll make sure he doesn’t follow you.”
Because he was going to: Tanya could tell, and the kid could tell. This guy wanted to eat him whole. She shivered, understanding that.
The kid nodded, grabbed the warm paper bag without saying anything else, and fled.
Tanya picked up the coffeepot like a weapon, walked down the aisle, held it out with a wide smile. “Free refills,” she said, coming towards the man.
“You know that boy?” the man asked, a slender smile creeping across his face, a crack in thin ice.
Tanya shook her head. “Never seen him before.”
And the rentboys started to make noise behind her and she glanced over to see Lamont stand - pushed from the bench, actually, his turn. He sauntered over, adjusted his belt. “Mister, buy me a coffee?” he asked, leaning one hand on the counter.
“Sure, kid,” the man said, and Lamont sat, but the man kept his eyes on the door.
--
The burger was cold by the time he got to the rough grass beside the tracks, even though he’d run most of the way. He’d gone the long route, just to make one last pass by the motel. Just in case, he told himself. Just in case. ‘Cause this has to end soon, one way or another.
You’ll keep this up as long as it takes, Winchester.
Skidded to a halt by the line of old garages behind the ancient clapboard houses. Near the track, this part of town; either drug dealers or whores or seniors too old to move. The old Chinese lady who lived in the house on the end kept all kinds of weird shit in her garage, but she never came out to look.
Dean eased open the door, breath sawing in and out, the burger sitting in his stomach like a cannonball. He was shaky, and he marked that up to being out of shape, but it was nothing like that and he knew it. That was the first real meal he’d had in days.
He probably shouldn’t have run all the way. But. But, and he couldn’t think about why he’d run flat out like a demon was chasing him, because that would mean thinking about a whole lot of other things too, including something that felt like a demon but was only a choice not taken tonight. Maybe that was a different kind of demon.
The bag wasn’t warm anymore, but that wouldn’t matter, he didn’t think, trying to see into the old wooden garage, windows screened with dirt and mold, everything smelling of cat piss and garbage and wet. Turned to close the door when he heard a sudden noise behind him and realized he hadn’t made the knock and -
A two-by-four caught him on the shoulder, made him drop the bag, twanging a warm rush of pain down his arm and fuckfuckfuck Sammy you pick now to go all Rambo on my ass.
Dean grabbed the piece of wood as a small dark figure tried to get it up again, twisted it out of the way with a curse, still breathing like an asthmatic in a dog kennel.
“Jesus, Sam,” he said and the figure in front of him stopped dead.
“Shit,” the young voice came.
“Language,” Dean warned, rubbing his shoulder, trying to spot where the bag had landed in the pitch darkness. Snatched it, a wave of dizziness hitting him mercilessly as he tried to stand. He crouched for a minute, let it pass. “I got you some food.”
Sam hunkered down beside him, too close, but Dean allowed it. Maybe wanted it right now. There was an old Oldsmobile parked in the garage, no engine, up on blocks, tires gone. But bench seats front and back. Home for the last two weeks. The front seat was Dean’s bedroom; the back, Sam’s room, where he slept and did his homework. Neither liked what they shared the found space with: a family of raccoons, several rats.
There was worse, Dean reminded himself. They didn’t have any light, and couldn’t afford to call attention to themselves for such a luxury even if they’d had the money for candles or a flashlight. Dean had the one gun Dad had left them, but John Winchester hadn’t thought of a flashlight. Or a telephone. Or food. He had left them at the motel, which had had all those things.
“A burger?” Sam breathed, plunging his hand into the bag. “Oh man. Chocolate milk?” Like Dean had mugged Santa and returned with his sack. Dean’s breath was still coming weird and he swallowed with difficulty. Shit, all it took was chocolate milk. Who knew?
“You can eat it like a normal human being, you know,” Dean whispered - this place was all about whispers - and stood slowly, pulling Sam up with him. Sam was already taking huge bites of the burger, barely chewing. “Slow it down, okay? Jesus, it’s like watching a fucking golden lab at a picnic.”
But Sam grinned. Dean could tell because one streetlight had kicked on, as it did from time to time, and a little sliver of light managed to squeeze through the broken window on the east side of the garage. Slight kid, all dark eyes and hair and pale skin. Grin like a searchlight over Hollywood.
“You go by the motel?” Sam demanded, finding the fries. He asked that all the time, fretting. He sat down on a broken wooden chair, set the bag on an upturned oil drum. “Did the manager spot you? Was the car back?” It wasn’t the real question. It wasn’t the question that both of them asked themselves over and over like a broken fucking record.
Wherethefuckisdad?Wherethefuckisdad?
Dean shook his head. What, like that wouldn’t have been the first thing out my mouth? “Nah.” Nodded his head, knew he had to keep it up, this relentless front. “It’ll be okay. Any day now.”
“Where’d ya get the food from?” Sam asked, clearing the fries with an almost mechanical precision. He popped open the chocolate milk carton last, always one for delaying gratification. Gulped it down slowly, but never took it from his lips. Wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, beaming. He didn’t care about the answer, Dean realized, so he said nothing.
For a long while, they sat in silence, then Dean reminded Sam he had school in the morning, that he needed to look ‘normal’ and he should get some sleep. They had plenty of blankets stolen from the motel, and soap, and even a dozen rolls of toilet paper. Towels, another oil drum outside full of freezing rainwater. Enough to get by.
“You okay?” Sam asked, taking off his grubby jean jacket and changing into a long-sleeved jersey shirt that he called his pajamas. The streetlight blinked off, and the garage was plunged into darkness again.
That was good, Dean reckoned, because Sam was getting to be an expert at reading him. “I’m fine,” he said, voice rock steady. “We’ll be fine. He’ll be back soon.”
--
Go to Chapter 3
a/n: Okay, you want the good news or the bad news? Okay, good news…I’m going to Scotland on Tuesday for a friend’s wedding! Doesn’t that sound like fun? A whole week, drinking Scotch, visiting my Gran, who’s turning 100, drinking Scotch, helping my cousin shoe some horses, drinking Scotch, watching my fiddler cousin play in a pub…and I’m not even bringing my laptop so that pesky clients won’t be able to bug me!
Uh, I’m presuming that by now you’ve figured out what the bad news is.
But I’m already working on chapter 3, the whole thing’s outlined, don’t worry, it’s coming. But it’ll be longer than my usual week between chapters, that’s all. Have faith. And I’ll be picking up messages as I go, but I might be drunk when I do it, so don’t be surprised if my responses or posts are a little…squiffy.
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