Chapter Four

A/N: Finals are over! *pumps fist* This chapter was giving me issues that couldn't be hammered out in the small minutes of time I was sneaking in between studying & class. But I've been stuck playing with it for two weeks, and I've rewritten it nearly a dozen times, so I'm just going to run with this version (which bothers me the least). Feedback would be especially appreciated this go around.
A/N 2: Apparently, I can't do simple math. For Dawn to be 21 when she meets the Winchesters, the year needs to be bumped up to 2012. Since realizing this mistake, I've sat down and written out this awesome color-coded sixty year calendar that I can flip through to make sure I'm not making a mess of my own timeline. (I think I was confusing it with the Dark Angel timeline, because DA is starting to eet mai brainz. Jensen, stop seducing me into new fandoms.) For the record, in June 2012, Dawn is 21, Buffy is 49, Dean is 26, Sam is 22, and John is 55.


◊◊◊


July 1984. Lawrence, Kansas.

Buffy turned as she heard the name 'Mary' being called across the garage. She was getting better at responding to a name that wasn't hers, and she wasn't ashamed to admit that it was mostly because she liked the way John said it. His voice was a smokey drawl and she loved listening to him talk about his hometown, telling her about all the time he'd spent in Furguson's growing up, or the crazy things he'd done as a kid. But when he said her name... the smokey curl of his tone set up shop in the pit of her stomach, making her wish for dreams she had given up long ago.

"Mary, right?" a male voice asked again, and Buffy shook off her thoughts to smile at the man that had made to stand in front of her.

"Mary Campbell," she affirmed. "Guilty as charged."

"Mike Guenther, I'm the co-owner of this garage," he introduced himself. "I hear you're new in town?"

"Just passing through," Buffy replied, firmly ignoring the clench in her stomach - she wasn't going to acknowledge that at all, no-siree.

"Oh?" Mike looked slightly startled, but he gamely continued. "Well, I wanted to introduce myself to the woman who caught John's interest."

Her head tilted to the side without her permission. "Really?"

Mike smiled warmly at her, "In the nine months that he's been back in Lawrence, I haven't seen him take an interest in anybody, so I'm a bit curious about the woman who caught his attention. You must be something special, Miss Campbell."

She couldn't help the pinking of her cheeks. It was flattery, pure and simple, but it left a nice feeling that she couldn't deny. "I'm not really anyone special," she demurred, willing her blush to go down. "Just working my way across the US. I've always wanted to hit all fifty states, but I never had the time before now."

A bit of understanding entered Mike's eyes, and Buffy wondered what had put it there. It wasn't like she had said anything particularly illuminating.

"Well, it's a pleasure to meet you, all the same. My wife, Kate, is probably wondering where I am, so John's further in, if you want to–"

Mike's voice was relegated to background noise as Buffy caught sight of John sliding out from underneath a car. He was a bit sweaty, parts of his white tank damp and clinging to a healthy set of muscles. Motor oil had been flecked across his clothes, and a smear of grease streaked across his cheek and under his eye. But the light in his eyes was more boyish than she'd seen before, a man who really loved what he was doing, and she found herself falling just a little bit more.

She was walking towards him without really realizing it, watching as he tossed a rag towards a man he was talking with, a very comfortable conversation carried between them. She stepped up into his space and saw his eyes go confused, but pleased at her presence. Her arms wrapped around his neck of their own accord and she pulled him down into a strong kiss that he responded fervently to.

He smelled of motor oil and exhaust, but there was a hint of pine and something wild underneath it. It was a scent she could get used to. Buffy let his tongue slide into her mouth, opened up for him and let him try to drag her soul up into the light of day where she could get hurt again. She found herself not minding, wondering if John could be more than worth it.

Buffy managed to regain control of herself and gently disengaged herself from the kiss, lips tingling and a smile spreading across her face that she just couldn't help.

"Hi," John greeted her, his voice warm with affection.

"Hi," she murmured back, curling into his arms and resting her head against his chest.

A loud wolf-whistle echoed in the garage as the other hands cheered and laughed at the public display of affection from their boss. Buffy felt a red hot blush erupt across her face and inched closer to John even as his chest rumbled with his chuckles, but she didn't regret it. Not one bit.


◊◊◊


June 2012. Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin.

After a few quick chats with various nurses and patients lingering in the hallways, Sam managed to track down the general direction in which the woman had been heading. The time he'd spent scouring the hospital earlier in the week was definitely coming in handy now, since he was pretty sure that she was headed towards the cafeteria, and not towards the exits. As strange as that was –since she had sounded pretty firm in wanting the place sued and that meant contacting lawyers– he was just going to cross his fingers and hope that his luck continued to hold out.

His fingers tightened briefly around the unopened bottle of holy water he had taken with him from the room. He was really hoping that this was just some sort of bizarre mix-up. If this woman turned out to be a demon, they were in much bigger trouble than he wanted to be. Not to mention that an exorcism in a crowded hospital with plenty of bodies to jump into was not his idea of fun. He'd been brushing up on his Latin since the demon they'd found on that plane... but he wasn't sure he could whip out an exorcism by memory yet. Especially without Dean there to keep it's attention off of him while he went on chanting.

A scowl was not the best expression to meet her with, so Sam evened his face into something younger, a worried and faintly curious look. With a steadying breath, he stepped through the open arches that led into the cafeteria, his eyes roving across the room in search of the woman. He found her sitting in a corner, her legs swung up underneath her on the chair and carefully savoring a large bowl of red jello. The sound of his steps had to be swallowed by the noise of the room, but she looked up at him with a wary expression before he even managed to reach the table.

"What do you want?" Her voice sounded tired and a bit weary. If she was a demon, she was also the best damn actor he'd ever met. Far better than Meg had been.

"I'd like to apologize," Sam murmured, even as he pulled out a chair to sit in, not wanting to tower over her like a threat. "I don't know where the blood from my father came from for this test, but all the same, we didn't mean to bring up bad memories."

"So, what, you're apologizing for something you didn't do?" Snorting, she flicked her hair back with a toss of her head and a little wave of her fingers, smokey blue eyes giving him a once over with a faint derision that had him tensing. "This isn't even your problem, unless you're trying to scam me along with your dad."

"He's family," Sam replied. "Even if we don't get along all the time, he's family, and that makes it my problem."

Her eyes softened a little bit –he just barely caught it– and he wondered if her family ran with the same rules. An aunt and uncle that were so close to her mother that they could decide with a clear conscience to refuse an abortion that might be the line between life and death? It sounded like something straight from Oprah, but they had to have an insanely close rapport to allow them to make decisions like that.

"I really don't know why someone would want to identify my dad as your father," he continued. "He's not that great of a dad, really, but he wouldn't go beating up on other women, either. And we weren't the ones calling for the test. It's kind of an accident that we're up in the area anyways. We're from Lawrence."

For the first time, she looked a bit startled. "Kansas?" she asked, confusion coloring her tone.

He hadn't meant to let that slip, but she had lost a little bit more of her defensive posturing, so he counted it as a partial win. It was dumb to hand out information about their real lives; why hadn't he said Maine or something? Probably because while they hadn't really lived there for years, but Lawrence was the only place he could legitimately call home with a bit of warmth in his tone. The stories Dean had told him as a kid still held a bit of magic in them, made him wonder what life would have been like there. Palo Alto, for all his hopes and dreams had been, wasn't a safe haven for him anymore. "Yeah," he said softly, lost in his memories. Sam shook his head to dislodge the melancholy thoughts, and continued. "We came up here to visit friends; got caught up here because of a hunting accident. We should have been on the road a week ago."

"And you're still here, why?" But her question was less anger and more curiosity, now, apparently the truths he'd been blurting out like a kid who couldn't keep a secret were calming her down. She really didn't seem like a demon, but he knew from experience how Meg had seemed like a perfectly normal girl.

"Can't take dad out of the hospital yet," he admitted, wondering again where in the hell this sharing was coming from. "If we did, it'd be against medical advisement. He's not doing so well."

She brought her hands together and clasped them on the table, leaning in just a tad. "Do you know anyone who would get something out of me being John Winchester's daughter? Money, fame, something like that?"

"No?" Sam hazarded, thrown off by the non sequitur. "Why do you ask?"

"You have no idea who I am, do you?" her tone was suddenly warmer, eyes amused.

"Should I?"

A tiny smile curled the edge of her lips. "I suppose it's not that important. My name is Dawn Summers, I think we got off on the wrong foot." She unlocked her hands and her fingers fluttered a little bit before she extended her hand over to his.

Sam blinked, but took her hand a bit bemusedly, being careful not to crush her smaller palm. She had delicate hands, painted nails that were shorter than Jess' had ever been, and faint calluses that hinted she was used to working. But mostly, he was just confused at where her anger had gone, and knew that while he was still off balance, he had to be extra careful in regulating his strength. He had bruised Jess a lot when he was still learning that most people weren't as strong as his brother. Jess had passed it off as him getting too tall and too large faster than he managed to figure it out on his own, which was a part of it, since he had shot up a foot and a half between seventeen and eighteen, and still managed to grow some more after that. But the real reason was that Dean had never been hurt by him; no bruises, no black eyes from their wrestling and training. He hadn't realized he was almost too strong until he was dumped in with normal people.

Dawn disengaged her hand from his and returned to the last few bits of her jello with a flair that faintly reminded him of Dean. If Dean had been as obsessed with jello as he was with pie. "I'm not going to sue you, or your father," she announced after she had swallowed her last bite. "I probably shouldn't trust you, but for some reason," a tiny curl lifted the side of her mouth, "I do."

Sam abruptly realized she was starting to end the conversation, and he hadn't gotten her to drink the holy water yet. He couldn't let her leave without finding if she was a demon or not. "I'm glad," he managed to get out past the slight panic in his throat.

She stood, swinging her purse over her shoulder and picking up the small tray with her empty dishes. "I would say it's been nice, but it hasn't, really. You seem like an okay guy, though. It would have been nice to meet you under different circumstances."

"Hey, do you want a bottle of water?" Sam blurted, wincing inwardly at his blundering. "It's just, I got this from one of the vending machines, but I'm not really thirsty anymore." He held out the bottle of holy water and hoped against hope.

"It's not drugged, is it?" Dawn asked wryly, taking the bottle from his hand. He watched her inspect the cap and shake the bottle before running her hands along the plastic. She laughed a little bit, "God, if this knocks me out I deserve it."

"I wouldn't drug–" Sam finally got out, surprised at the direction of her thoughts. But still, he watched intently as she twisted off the cap and swallowed some of the water. No steaming, no burning, no nothing. Looks like she wasn't a demon. The relief sparked deep in his chest. He really didn't want to do an exorcism by himself.

"Thanks for the water," she gestured. "Hopefully we don't run into each other again, Mr. Winchester."

"Let me walk you out to your car," Sam added spontaneously. She had been in the hospital for three days, and she looked healthy, but for some bizarre reason he wanted her safe. Maybe because of the way she had reacted to the news, like someone had tried to claim to be her father before, not knowing what he was stepping into.

Dawn looked at him strangely, but nodded her head slowly at his quirked smile and slightly hunched shoulders. "Alright. Thank you."

He slid from the chair and let her lead them out of the cafeteria and down the hall into the lobby. The silence between them was neither strained nor particularly comfortable, but simply the lack of conversation. It was a peculiar feeling, but he pushed it away. He was glad the silence wasn't strained, and even more glad that it wasn't comfortable. Dawn might not have been a demon, but she could still be a possible threat. And he hated the fact that he was starting to act more and more like Dean and dad, treating everything as a potential danger.

They were a yard or two from the automatic glass doors when a blonde whirlwind rushed in, zeroing in on Dawn. Before Sam could even move to cover her, the loud, "Dawnie!" and bewildered, "Mom?" stopped him in his tracks.

Dawn was embraced tightly by a shorter, well-dressed woman who clutched at her tightly, clothes wrinkling in the strong hug.

"I–Mom?" Dawn repeated, her voice surprised. "I thought you were still in London?"

"Are you okay?" The woman ignored Dawn's question to take a small step back and run her hands across Dawn's face and down her arms, as if checking for wounds. In fact, it reminded him strongly of how John used to check both him and Dean after a hunt. "Willow got a hit that your medical files had been accessed, and you weren't supposed to be–"

"Mom, mom, I'm good, I'm okay, alright?" Dawn said placatingly. "Okay, so some moron knocked me out for a couple of days, but hey, just another day in the life of a Scooby, right? This is no where near as bad what happened when I was younger."

"I know," came the strained reply, as if she was struggling to calm herself down. "I know, but the hospital was trying to access files they shouldn't have unless you were in need of an organ transplant or something, and then there was a hit on my file trying to find out who your father was–"

"Yeah about that," Dawn said slowly, her eyes regaining some of the fire Sam had seen back in the hospital room. "I've got a really interesting story to tell you when we get on a conference call with Uncle Angel."

"Angel?"

"I'm going to need some cutthroat lawyers."

"Dawnie, what–? You know what, tell me later. I need to calm down first. Next time you leave your poor beleaguered mom a message about how you were in the hospital for a couple of days, please, please, don't just tell me, 'not dead yet'."

Sam couldn't help himself. He snorted, drawing the attention of the two women quite firmly onto him.

"Dawnie?" the woman asked questioningly.

"Oh, mom, this is, uh, you know, I never caught your first name," Dawn replied, flashing him a tight smile.

"Sam Winchester," he found himself replying, holding out a hand even as the blonde took a step around Dawn to look him more firmly in the eyes. His heart practically leapt into his throat. He hadn't gotten a clear picture of her as she had been checking over Dawn, but he was getting a perfect view now. This woman looked like—

"Buffy Summers," she replied charmingly, taking his hand in a firm shake.

—his mother.