lamplight

Note: Hey, Beauties <3


I'm back again, maybe it's time to officially declare that I'm ready to return to my posting schedule of weekly updates :) What would y'all think of that?


Thanks to all my lovely readers for the votes and comments. You guys truly make my day with every kind word. I appreciate you so so much!


A while ago (and I mean so long ago that I can't even find the message, which means I can't actually drop the person's username) I received a request that I continue the storyline from Glass Lives-- So this story is set between Pain is Pain is Pain and This Side Up, which are the two most recent installments in that particular storyline. Whoever you are, I hope you like this, and I'm so sorry it took me like half a year.


As in Pain is Pain is Pain, Anna is fifteen.




lamplight


"Hey," Anna said softly, stepping into the soft glow of lamplight. Her mismatched socks barely made a sound against the cool floor of the library, but the room was so quiet otherwise that even that soft brush of fabric seemed to echo. "Can I tell you something?" Her voice seemed too loud despite its smallness, and Anna shrunk in on herself a bit more.


Both boys were sitting at the table in front of her, and neither of them seemed to have noticed her before she'd spoken. "Hey, Rugrat. What are you even doin' up right now?" Dean asked, setting aside a heavy tome and straightening in his chair. "Can't sleep?"


Anna shrugged. Her stomach was fluttering with anxiety such that she almost felt light-headed. "No," she admitted quietly. She stepped a little closer so that she was right behind Sam's chair, and she put a hand on his shoulder, longing for touch without really knowing why. Maybe it was the little circle of light the lamp on the table was creating. Maybe she just wanted to press herself inside of it, turn her back completely on the darkness, secure the outline around herself and her family. Maybe the light just looked safe.


Her face was illuminated by the lamplight, and she had to squint against it. She'd had the lights off in her room, and the hallways of the bunker had almost no light to offer either. It had been so dark before that even this small glow was enough to nearly blind her.


"Sit down," Sam invited softly, reaching up to squeeze her hand once.


Anna did, sliding quietly into the chair beside Sam. She glanced up at Dean, who was looking right at her with a slightly worried look about him. She flicked her eyes back down to the table and struggled to remember the last time he'd so much as glanced her way without looking worried. It had been a while. It had been over a month, at least, because it had been before she knew about her mother.


"What did you want to tell us?" Sam prodded.


Anna looked up again, blinking rapidly as the light poked at the whites of her eyes. She twisted her fingers around each other, tensing her hands nervously. "It's probably gonna make you mad," she said, her heart beginning to beat a little faster. "Cause it was... it was really stupid."


She felt the familiar helplessness of the last few weeks re-entering her chest. It made her want to cry, exactly the way it always did. But she was getting used to that feeling, and she was getting better at shoving it down. It was scary, but it was helpful.


"Okay, well, spit it out," Dean said, a hint of urgency making its way into his voice. He didn't sound angry, though. He still sounded gentle, like he was speaking to a skittish pony.


Anna looked right at him, looked at the worry lines around his eyes, and she struggled to remember the last time he'd spoken to her in a different voice, a harder one, an angry one. "I summoned Crowley," she whispered.


The room went dead silent. It was so quiet that Anna swore she could hear the light of the lamp. But it didn't feel quite so safe now. It felt dimmer, weaker. It felt like it was about to lose the battle and surrender its outline to the darkness.


"That day," she continued nervously. She was still wringing her hands, and despite her best efforts, she was just too restless to stop. She moved them underneath the table instead, rested them in her lap and kept twisting and tensing them. "That day you came home and I was sitting on the floor... I made devils trap out of cereal, and I summoned Crowley. I thought he could help me find Abaddon. But he wouldn't. I mean, he brought to Hell, he-"


"He brought you where?" Dean shouted all of a sudden.


"Dean," Sam said softly, though the control in his own voice was thread-bare.


"I'm gonna kill 'im," Dean grumbled under his breath.


Sam held a hand out and made a stern face at their brother. Anna had to tear her eyes away when he looked back down to her, though. "What else, Anna?" he asked. It was surprising how well he was able to maintain his gentle demeanor. He had to be angry too, just like Dean was.


"I asked him to," she said, peeking nervously at Dean through a fringe of wispy curls that hung in her face. "He left that first time, but then he came back the next day, and he said he had a job for me. But he was just... he was just patronizing me," she said with a measure of bitterness, but it was diluted with hopelessness. Everything she said and did was diluted that way. "He said he had this demon, and he needed answers. But he didn't need me, not really. He was just... I think he felt bad-"


"Crowley doesn't feel bad for people, Anna," Dean snapped. "Son of a bitch was using you. I can't believe you-"


"Dean," Sam said again. "Is that it?" he asked.


Anna was able to hold his gaze this time as she nodded. "I told him to bring me back, and he did. Nothing happened."


"Nothing-?!" Sam cut himself off this time, and Anna watched as he glanced to Dean and then back at her. He took a slow, deep breath. "Anna-" He looked so conflicted, partly frustrated, partly pissed, partly discouraged. Anna couldn't even pick out half the emotions dancing through his face. "Why would you... Why would you do that?" he finally asked.


Anna shrugged one shoulder. "I couldn't... I couldn't sit and do nothing." She felt so tired all of a sudden, her whole body heavy. She wished she'd never come out, wished she'd never stepped into the lamplight. She wished she'd stayed in her room with the lights off, listening to sad music and letting a tear out every once in a while. "She killed my mom," she said so softly it was just barely above a whisper. She blinked, trying to get her thoughts together again. She could feel her eyes getting damp, and it was distracting, because she was getting good at avoiding that.


"Anna, we're gonna find her," Dean said seriously.


Anna turned her eye down, staring at her fingers gone pale and still in her lap. It was dark under the table, and the sight was welcoming. It put her eyes at ease, so much so that they didn't feel wet anymore. She blinked a couple times, sniffled once. It wasn't that she didn't believe Dean. It wasn't that at all. It was just that his promises weren't making things better. They weren't making her feel less empty. They weren't giving her that same spark of hope that they used to.


"We should've talked about this before," Dean said, his voice almost hoarse with how low it was. "But, kid... you're lookin' in the wrong places."


Anna couldn't help her body's reaction. Her head popped up, her eyes fluttering open and shut as the light poked at them again. "You mean... what you said before?" she asked, confused. "About not being the same?"


She looked over at Sam, realizing that he was probably a bit lost. But he didn't look confused, and Anna had to wonder if Dean had given him the sparknotes version of their conversation under the stars.


"I can't do it," she said suddenly, surprising even herself as she closed her eyes for a moment.


In her mind, the stars reappeared, making promises that couldn't be kept... promises that things could look pretty again after being blown to smithereens. She remembered Dean's flannel under her cheek, his voice in her ear, saying nobody expected her to look just like before. But the appearance wasn't what she cared about now.


She opened her eyes again, lashes wet. She saw Dean's green eyes, tight and worried again. He didn't even look angry, though he had just a second ago. She wondered about the power she had over him that she could dignite his anger so quickly and yet douse it just as fast.


"What can't you do?" Sam asked.


She didn't turn to look at him. For some reason, Dean's eyes seemed a brighter light even than the lamp, and Sam's voice was even brighter. They were all so gentle, so safe, their backs turned completely on the darkness.


"I can't be like this," she whimpered. Tears spilled over her cheeks, and she grunted in frustration, wiping furiously at her face with her fingers until it was mostly dry again. "This is exactly what I mean," she said angrily. "I can't think straight, and I'm either scared or mad all the time. I can't talk without crying. I feel like everything's different. I just want it to go back to how it was. I want to be me again."


"Honey, you are you."


Anna looked at Sam, feeling miserably small. She curled her hands into fists beneath the table, let them take their strength from the darkness hidden in her lap.


"No, I'm not," she argued sadly.


She shook her head slowly, and her fists unfurled. There was no strength to be had in the darkness. She felt weak for having attempted to find it there.


"Anna," Dean called carefully. She turned to look at him. "This is the hard part," he said, clenching his jaw as soon as the words were all the way out. It was a rare sight, the tightness in his face. It looked like he was trying not to cry. "I know it hurts like hell right now, alright? But you're not done yet. It's gonna get better."


He sniffed, and the sound broke Anna's heart right down the middle. It made her face crumple, made her eyes well anew. Why was she so damn good at twisting Dean's emotions into a knot? She wished for his sake that she were someone else's problem.


She looked at Sam. "I'm sorry," she whispered.


"Hey," he said, shaking his head. He had a strange effect going on compared with Dean. There were tears visibly gathering in his eyes, and yet his face wasn't so tight. He was thinking too hard, and he was hurting. But he was keeping control, at least for now. "I told you, you have nothing to apologize for," he reminded her. "Dean's right. This, right now? This is the worst part. Grief changes you, kiddo. And for a while it feels like it's just killing you. But you're gonna be okay. You just... you gotta let us help you."


"I'm trying," Anna said. "I just don't know how."


"This," Sam said, giving her a small, stiff smile and a short nod. "This is how. You're having a hard time, and you came out here, and you asked us for help," he said, sounding both like he felt encouraged and like he wanted to encourage her. "That's progress."


Progress, Anna thought, the word feeling just a little off. She'd maybe taken a baby step. But she still felt like crap. She still felt scared, angry, sad. She still didn't feel like herself.


She turned her head so she could see Dean's face again. He seemed to have regained his own composure while she was speaking to Sam. That was progress. Her? She was still fracturing. But that was exactly the point. She was fracturing, but she was doing it where they could see.


This was the hard part. But the trick to getting through it was to sit in the light of the little lamp on the table with her hands curled into her brothers'. The trick was low voices, tear-damp faces, and three backs turned on the darkness.


La Fin

Comment