#maybe even a child from Grenada if I could

[the-winds-of-destiny-xxx]

.

[thetrgger]

One of my teachers, a really cool and interesting guy, once said that, if you had an idea, and someone else did that, then it was never yours. An idea is yours if you think it and go as far as you can with making it real. That is when it is your idea. And I don't know how to make games, especially not on the level I think this idea deserves to be made on, but I do have the idea, and I've thought on how to theoretically make it, though I am sure that counts for little. Anyways, here it is: A horror game based on the idea of superposition, where something can be in multiple states until measured. In this case, it is the (what I'll refer to as) monster that is in superposition, in multiple locations at once, perhaps in different forms as well. I never liked the overused horror monster that could only kill when not looked at, so I turned it on its head. Now we have a monster, created by the classic human meddling with space-time, that you must absolutely not look at it. Measure it with thine eyes, and it will be there, and it will see you as you see it, and boy does it want you dead. You'll have to go through the tight halls of a wrecked Research Centre™ as well as disturbingly large rooms, and in a place as ruined as this, you best watch your step, or meet your end at something as boring as sharp debris, falls or inconveniently positioned equipment.

What was the reason for all this science mumbo jumbo that lead to this creature? Why, the search for immortality of course. If you could exist in multiple states at one time, it would not matter if you died once, you have more states to live in that are perfectly fine. Except whoever greenlit this project probably didn't consider the consequences of using death-row inmates as test subjects, and skipping any animals. The result was a "human", born a big ol' murderer, that had their atoms flung around a tad too much and now they resemble that of a blended squirrel without the fur and double the terror. And this stuff was in prototype phase, so each and every state of the poor buddy is gonna be uniquely screwed up. Maybe they have about fifty six eyes too many and they really don't appreciate not having any eyelids... That or the pain of being a flesh creature with too many views of one ugly idiot staring at them. Maybe they're blinder than the genetical defect of a child between a mole and a bat with the hearing of Mr. Krabs when the cash register goes off, and god are your footsteps loud and annoying (but, you know, also the immeasurable pain of being a creature like that.) I think you get the idea. Don't worry, they won't stay put even if they want to though, being a "living" creature in superposition is not your average Tuesday (the canonical day this would take place) and their states just kinda float around when not observed. Maybe the freaky, breathing blob of skin is on the 4th floor one moment, but the other, it is two feet to your left.

Oh, but of course, you want to GET OUT of the terrifying and dangerous ruin, yeah, I forgot about that tidbit. How do you do that? Well, this wasn't your run of the mill Bachelors students doing a group project, the Government™ was all over this and made sure it was the number one top secret. Only people who knew worked in the place itself, or at least resided there, and they did not fancy any easy access, so you gotta go against some big ol' doors, buddy.

Now gimme a second to decide where this takes place geographically. Okay, did some wheel spinning, picked a country from every continent plus one from the entire world, and the mix of all these is gonna be what this country is gonna be like: Europe, Estonia; Asia, Armenia; Africa, Tunisia; North America, Grenada; South America, Bolivia; Oceania, Nauru and all countries, Netherlands. Okay, so let's say they have the language of Estonia, architecture of Armenia, food of Tunisia, people of Grenada, geography and nature and terrain and stuff of Bolivia, history of Nauru and general influences on all parts from Netherlands. Credit to random wheel jr.

Oh and there's also Martin. Martin is just chilling. The whole superposition thing worked perfectly on him, he wasn't even supposed to be on death row, got framed by accident (he doesn't mind.) He just exists all over the world. Maybe you see Martin, he says hello, asks how your day is, that stuff. Come back the next day and he isn't there, but don't worry, one of him will float back around to you one day. He just chills, nothing much. No pain, no anger, no nothing. Just a cool guy. Scared of the water, but otherwise unperturbed, just carries on existing.

[zzapzzaptasers-a]

 A BIG OL’ HEADCANON POST

Nobody asked about Darcy and @dointhedirtywork​ but I was thinking about it a lot yesterday while working because all I do when I work is think about relationships between characters and like Darcy openly (or atleast jokingly) calling Nick ‘dad’ might be confusing, so here’s an info dump regarding that

Darcy had a dad who was pretty much her favorite person in the world? She was definitely a daddy’s girl. He was an AP biology teacher at their local highschool and a favorite one at that, with a forgiving but firm syllabus. He’d been former Army, having participated in the US invasion of Grenada (Operation Urgent Fury) and I would like to go into more detail about how the aftermath morphed his opinions on military and military force and international interference by the US government but that gets a little too political for this blog SO suffice to say, it upset him emotionally on a level that propelled him into pacifism and he left after his initial four years, opting out of a further obligation. Darcy inherited his passion for pacifism and hatred for guns and the taser she uses in Thor 1 (which this blog is named after) was gifted to her by him when she left for college. His name is Ben Lewis (I named him before I came out as trans and took the name for myself -- displaying the fact it’s been an important name to me for years and years) and his family was Jewish immigrants, although he had broken from the orthodox traditions his brother practived (more of this can be read about on @datureae, Darcy’s cousin Salome) and legally changed his last name from Cohn to a more common but less traditionally Jewish “Lewis” when he joined the Army at age 20. He meets Beth Cohen (age 20) almost immediately after he leaves the Army (at age 24) during a friend-group weekend-outting to DC. They are married by the following year and Darcy is born 3 years later in 1990. Ben and Beth are both enamored with their only child but Ben perhaps moreso -- maybe because it almost seems natural for a well-adjusted father to dote on his daughter. He is the one she goes to for bedtime stories, for kisses and bandaids to scrapes and cuts, for advice in all things. He is also the one who drives Darcy to her Culver University tour in 2007, where they personally witness the second documented appearance of the Hulk. Nothing is the same afterwards -- something is wrong. Darcy spends one year at a local college before transferring to Culver (the incident with the Hulk having shaken her) and Ben knows something happened at the local university to upset Darcy deeply, but does not push when she refuses to answer. During this sophomore year/the first year at Culver, Ben Lewis is diagnosed with prostate cancer. After six months of treatment, he makes a dramatic turn for the best and Darcy returns to school, hopeful. Just as unexpectedly, something goes wrong. Darcy is on her way back from school on a wednesday, speeding down the highway to get back to her dad in the hospital, when he passes. Darcy is traumatized and somewhat remains so (no thanks in part due to reliving the scene of his death with CJ’s Nyarlathotep.)

Considering SHIELD-- in MOST verses, Darcy wants nothing to do with it. She has a natural disinclination for anything resembling the military or war-glorification and after the dump in CA; TWS, she remains even more staunchly so (how does an intelligence agency get secretly infiltrated by nazis for seventy years???) In some verses (typically in an MCU or MCU adjacent verse), Darcy is either seeking employment at SHIELD or already employed in an intern-y paper-pushing office capacity. This results in a strange compromise between her dislike of SHIELD and her need to stay connected to SHIELD’s world, as after the incident with Thor, mundane life is...mundane. Darcy already knows too much, so it makes sense that she would be employed in a non-important, non-combat role-- however, this becomes a source of bitterness for Darcy, who has skills that could be developed into something more valuable (a bitterness picked up by @doctorxdoom in the Latverian Intern verse) In 616 and the CJ verse (confusing because everything is CJ verse and yet nothing is), Darcy continuously seeks employment with SHIELD despite @dointhedirtywork personally rejecting her often (at one point, threatening her playfully)

Somewhere alone the way, Nick looked at this pacifist nerd with daddy issues who sometimes leaned into illegal activity and couldn’t fry an egg if her life depended on it but also somehow managed to taze Thor and get involved with a bunch of entities way out of her league and went “This hot mess is my child now” despite the fact the story with his own blood children had not gone particularly well. Darcy was lowkey resentful of someone trying to do her dad’s work when she’d had a perfectly fine dad, thanks, but was won over eventually and is now fond of him despite the fact she is everything she hates and also that her dad would probably hate. Sometimes life just be like that.

[okimargarvez]

HURT - 7

Prompt: Luke’s dark thought, destiny, contrasted love. Warnings: sexual content, dark thoughts. Characters: Penelope Garcia, Luke Alvez, BAU team, others. Pairing: Garvez. Multichapter (22).

MY OTHER GARVEZ STORIES

Chapter 1-  Chapter 2-  Chapter 3    Chapter 4   Chapter 5   Chapter 6

HURT -  Chapter 7

How can she fell for it again? How could she have believed for the umpteenth time that an attractive man like Luke (or like Battle) could feel something serious for her? And it’s useless to cry on herself, no matter how much she has consumed every handkerchief in her house. As bad as the chest hurts, for being too shaken by the sobs. But she will overcome it. She will manage it. The worst thing will be to have to work together again. Well. What was false, it will now be in truth. In other words, if she had made others believe she couldn’t bear him because he had replaced Derek, while in reality she was in love with him, from this moment on she would have been seriously professional and detached with him. She wouldn’t allow him to approach her. Any demon had taken hold of him while he was telling her those horrible things. That he was in the throes of a sort of nightmare. She didn’t care. She wasn’t able to stand next to a person with similar problems. She had almost come to love him, but it doesn’t matter. She would do everything to see him happy; but it doesn’t even matter.

Nothing matters anymore.

 As if they were tearing him. Pulled from one side to the other. A medieval torture. An atrocious, unbearable pain. No tears flow down his cheeks. Not a groan. It stays all inside of him. And that's why it hurts even more. The ghosts are now of a different type than usual, to which he was sadly accustomed.

The ghosts, or rather the apparition, has delicate hands with glazed fingers of the colors of the rainbow, her touch is cool and refrigerant. Her blond hair, slightly wavy, tickled his shoulders. The rough tongue runs his skin from the side upwards, until it meets his mouth. She sucks his soul greedily. And her voice cries, whispers, alternately, together, always the same thing.

I really loved you, Luke. Why did you do this to me?

The woman's face is so infinitely sad, is that of a child.

But maybe it's better this way. The pain will diminish. It will leave him. It must be confident. Otherwise he will die. How is it said? What doesn’t kill you, make you stronger.

At this moment, however, there is no room for useless disquisitions. Only for continuous twists. With the knowledge that in a few hours he will see her again.

 There isn’t the slightest chance that she chooses to take the elevator. Better stairs. Unfortunately, the same thing happens like during the summer holidays: everyone thinks they are the only ones who have had the brilliant idea of ​​starting a timetable because there will be no one, as a result the streets are always clogged and you spend hours lined up. This is what passes through Penelope's head at the exact moment when she looks up from the last step and sees Luke come up from the opposite side, he too on the stairs. He notice her, but doesn’t say anything, just like her. He stops, so that she can pass first. When she has entered, he goes to her desk. There is no trace of the blonde. She will be hidden in her bunker. And it's better this way.

He looks at the bracelet on his wrist, caresses it, trying to calm down. Until they call for a new case, he will have to continue studying Peter Lewis, Mr. Scratch. It's been a long time, now a few months, but they haven’t made any kind of progress.

A message arrives. It's Emily. Five minutes in the meeting room. Update.

He decides to start before, still unable to get blood out of a stone, with those papers in his hands. When he reaches the room, he hears Garcia's animated voice and that of Spencer. There are also Prentiss and JJ. After a second Rossi appears behind him. Except from Tara, they are all there.

-Hey, is there a case?- he asks, unable to look at her. -What’s Tara’s brother’s picture doing up?- nobody says anything. JJ and Spencer are fake stupid. Then she explodes.

-Come on, the new guy? He knows? How come I was the last one to know?- he can’t stop himself from giggling, seeing her behaves in such way.

-It was an experiment. She wanted to time how long you could keep a private conversation private. And you made it 12 hours.- Spencer explains. The heart of Penelope breaks into further fragments. Only pride prevents her from crying.

Then he does a horrible thing. Shameful. -Damn, I had you down for six! - he exclaims, doing or rather believing to look as the nice guy.

-Oh, you know what? You guys, I thought you were my friends, but you suck! You all suck!- she glances disgusted at her colleagues and disappears, not before adding -Especially you, new guy, but you always suck! Newbie!- and the others don’t understand what she refers to. They think it's just another release to Garcia, but it's not like that. And she knows perfectly that Luke will understand what her target was aimed at.

 He can’t ignore it. So, he follows her, not caring what their colleagues can think of. He increases the pace and intercepts her a second before she can open the door of her cave.

-Penelope!- she turns to him with a click. The face deformed by anger. Shiny eyes.

-What do you want?- she shouts to him. She puts her arms in a defensive position.

-What did you mean with that "you always suck"?- despite some tears have escaped her control, she smiles maliciously.

-Do you think you're the only one who can pretend?- she asks. Then she sees people passing out of the corner of her eye, then she drags him inside and closes the door. -I've never feel anything special when I was with you.- her voice is firm, firm. -In all cases nothing comparable to what made me feel Derek.- is the final stab, the decisive blow, the point of the KO.

Have they been together in that sense?

She sees him remain stunned, unable to ask anything, to open his mouth. Then she smiles to reinforce the deception, asking Savannah for forgiveness her in her head. Meanwhile, inside, she is dying. Because even after he has hurt her so deeply, she feels the instinct to cling to him and the temptation to forget. But fortunately, she doesn’t. She stays with her arms folded, waiting for him to find the strength to leave. And then she will immerse herself in the research that was about to begin. She will not cry. She will not allow it. Although the pain is even more acute, because not only him, made fun of her, but her team, her family. It was just a joke, but at that moment she was too vulnerable. She would give her life for each of them.

Luke feels his legs as heavy as lead. A voice in his head shouts to tell her the truth, to apologize. To explain why he said something like that. But it would mean having to confess everything, all his past. The whole Cullen case, starting from the mistake of undercover his best friend Phil Grenada, whose wife was the sixth month of pregnancy. But there were other agents available, much more experienced and prepared than him. But Luke had succumbed to his friend's requests: he couldn’t resist between the paperwork and spend the evenings deciding the type of diapers, the name, the color of the room... He should have been stronger, harder: he was the boss on that occasion and his decision was the only one that mattered. It was his fault. It's all his fault. Only his fault. And that had been the first of his mistakes. How could he send a man with his wife ready to give birth on such a mission? How could he have believed he wouldn’t try to contact her, contradicting the whole protocol?

How could he tell Penelope the thoughts that tormented him, the ghosts that came to visit him every day? The voices he heard? She would have obliged him to undergo a psychiatric examination. And no news would have emerged. He was already there, at his session. There had been no improvement, no deterioration. From the outside, he didn’t look crazy in the grip of visions. Nobody would have thought it. But she upset him. She puts him in total turmoil. Whenever he was with her, he felt like he was on the brink of an abyss. Or at a crossroads. Every single time could be wonderful, he could be able to live the best and show her the love she deserved, but the opposite could also happen. What he had did was just what he feared and promised not to do: hurt her.

Not just wounded. He had practically destroyed her, and he manages to see it, even though she wanted to show herself firm and severe. He reduced her to shatter. And this means that she loves him or rather, at this point, she loved him, really; that the voice he had heard in his head corresponds to reality.

-Agent Alvez, could you give me the pleasure of leaving my office, allowing me to do some more useful activities, and maybe you too could do something fruitful?- the question, the professional tone that at the beginning had made him laugh so much and entertained, which had attracted him like a magnet to her. And now it sounds deeply bitter. And yet his feet refuse to move.

This time, however, he must do the right thing. He will do it. The right thing for her.

 Finally, when she is left alone, Penelope allows herself to relax her muscles and release tension. She had been about to ask him. Ask questions whose answers probably she wouldn’t have liked. But in the end, if he wanted to share something with her, he would not have done it before? Why should she persist in doing the good fairy, the godmother of all, the shoulder to cry, the friend listener and dispenser of advice, the Jiminy Cricket?

Why did she have to dig into the mud? Was it worthwhile to get treated in horrible ways, worse than a high-class prostitute? Sex between them had always been fantastic: both when he was hungry, and tender and attentive; whether he was sweet or curt; both when she had felt his girlfriend, or as his concubine. But sex couldn’t be enough. It would never have been enough for her. And what he had had from her, apart from sex, was a bit too little. The only time he had seemed about to reveal something to her, to explain what he had felt when JJ and he had been in that fire, he had run away as soon as he realized what he had done. In addition, his jealousy flattered her, but he also frightened her: twice, after seeing her talk to another man, he had behaved strangely, performing a kind of ritual as if to validate the fact that she belonged to him. He had also forced her to say it, although he had apologized later...

And another time he burst into tears, flooding her hair and blankets...

[the-record-newspaper]

The disappearance of Sherry Hart (Part III)

Sherry Hart standing by her 1977 For Grenada 

By LARRY J. GRIFFIN

Special Reporter for The Record

 Betty Lyall knew how important 6-year-old April was to her daughter, Sherry Hart, and that she would never stay away from her for very long.

“Sherry was a mother who loved her daughter,” Ms. Lyall emphasized in a March, 1996 nationally televised interview.

“She thought more of April than anybody or anything.” Irma Pugh, Sherry’s friend, agreed. “She really never talked much about what she wanted to do in life; her thoughts were all wrapped up in April.”  

So, when Monday morning, Jan. 16, 1984, dawned and Sherry still had not returned home,  Ms. Lyall began to suspect that something was wrong — very wrong.  

“I was always told that my grandparents knew that something bad had happened because my Mama would never leave me for that long a time,” recalled Sherry’s daughter, April Billings.  

However, Ms. Billings concedes that her initial 6-year-old thoughts were of abandonment.  “I just figured that she didn’t love me anymore and didn’t want the responsibility of a 6-year-old daughter.”  

But April’s grandparents, the Lyalls, were fearful that something nefarious had occurred — particularly after their daughter’s 1977 red and white Ford Granada was discovered — on that same day—where she ostensibly left it the evening before.

 Accounts differ as to the actual location of Sherry’s parked automobile and even the person who discovered it. “Rumor had it that the car was parked downtown West Jefferson at the Wilco Service Station—now Speedway—near First National Bank,” Irma Pugh recalled.  April Billings averred that she had been told her mother’s Ford was parked in the lot outside of Sky City discount store—near the present location of Ingles Supermarket.  Still another account places the car in a parking lot of a grocery store in West Jefferson.

There are at least two conflicting stories crediting different people with the discovery.  One account credits a cadre of “investigators;” others maintain that it was her father—Joe Lyall—who found it.  That is the way April Billings remembered the story.  “I was told that it was my Papa Joe who found Mama’s car parked in the Sky City parking lot.” Irrespective of the location and the discoverer, Sherry’s abandoned car likely reinforced the Lyalls’ unfathomable fear that their daughter was somehow a victim of foul play.  

On January 17, 1984, the Lyalls filed a “missing person’s report” with local law enforcement.  A comprehensive search began for Sherry Elaine Lyall Hart, white female, just 24-years-of-age.

 Days turned into weeks, and weeks quickly became months with no substantive leads.  As despair began to mount so did the number of rumors.  “One that I kept hearing was that Mama had run-off to Florida with a lover,” April recalled in a recent interview.  “I don’t know who started that rumor; I don’t think anyone does.” Sherry’s Aunt and Uncle Calloway were of course aware of that specific rumor but could not identify its origin either.

Ms. Billings was in the middle of her first-grade year at West Jefferson Elementary School when her mother disappeared. Recently, she described how difficult the remaining 4½ months of the school term were.  “I struggled for the rest of the year.  I don’t remember much about it; only that right after my Mama went missing, I would come to school and find little gifts from various people on my desk.  I don’t recall anyone really saying anything to me about my Mama’s being gone; but, I do remember the small presents.”  

For six-year-old April, the struggle was all too real; she was understandably distracted.  “I ended up having to repeat my first-grade year.”  Resilient and determined, she completed her elementary education and graduated from Beaver Creek High School, 19-years after her mother’s senior year there.

Near Christmas in 1984, Ashe County Sheriff’s Office was investigating a local “breaking and entering” in which a safe was stolen.  Deputies had received a tip that the safe had been thrown off a cliff near the Jumpingoff Rock on the Blue Ridge Parkway at the Ashe/Wilkes County lines.  On Monday December 10, 1984, deputies descended a steep incline to search for the safe near Jumpingoff Rock, located about a half-mile from the Parkway pull-off known as the “Jumpingoff Rock Parking Area.” While combing the terrain, they happened upon a grizzly, yet unmistakable trove of decaying matter comingled with weathered, deteriorating clothing.

 “My grandparents always found it difficult to speak of my Mama’s disappearance.  They seldom spoke of it; and when they did, you could tell that it was painful for them,” April Billings recently reflected.  “And they rarely talked to me about any of it, maybe because I was so little.”

But April was seven-years-old and home from school on the day that TV news reports announced that human remains had been discovered at Jumpingoff Rock in Ashe County.  “When they started talking about it on the TV news, my grandparents immediately pulled me away from the television and the room.  They were trying to protect me, I guess.”  

Ashe County deputies hoisted the container of recovered human remains up the precipitous incline and loaded it into an emergency vehicle for transport to the Chapel Hill office of the State Chief Medical Examiner (ME).  An autopsy was performed, though a cause of death could not be conclusively substantiated at that juncture.  However, through the utilization of old X-rays, the ME concluded that the recovered remains were—in fact—those of Sherry Elaine Lyall Hart.  

For the Lyalls, the unimaginable fears, about which they infrequently spoke, were being transmogrified into a living nightmare before their eyes.  Eleven months after she drove away on a mid-January Sunday evening, their first child and only daughter was officially pronounced dead on Monday, December 10, 1984 at 1:05 PM.    

“I don’t remember much about my Mama’s funeral,” April explained, while gazing off in the distance, as if in search of some poignant memory.  “I just remember the casket, and on top of it was a picture—a framed picture of her.”

 It was on a Friday, December 14th—eleven days before Christmas, 1984—that Sherry Hart’s casket was conveyed to the Hardin Family Cemetery, atop a slight hill, overlooking the Beaver Creek Community in which she lived out her life.  Her tombstone stands just to the left of the gated entrance, where she reposes—“In Loving Memory”—amongst her antecedents whose deaths predate her own untimely demise.  

 Daughter April acknowledged visiting her Mother’s gravesite periodically—especially around her birthday and on Mother’s Day. But it is an agonizing experience for her, knowing that her Mother was too-soon-laid-to-rest there.  “I find it hard to look at her grave because I know she’s there, and I want her here with me again, and with my kids—her grandchildren. I do tell them things about her, you know, and show them pictures.”  

However, Ms. Billings, who was so young when her Mother was killed, admitted to having very few lucid memories.  Then, with a smile, she suddenly reminisced:

I do remember one thing, though.  Mama used to bring me home Charms Blow Pops—you know the suckers with the gum in the middle.  Well, all I wanted was the gum; so, I would put a Blow Pop in a glass of water until the candy dissolved.  That way, I only had the chewing the gum left.

And just for a fleeting moment—in her imprecise memory—her “Mama” was alive and with her once again.

[50shadesofsubtextao3]

October 1, 1938

Sam and Dean were trying to slip out the front door when Dean heard his father’s voice behind them. “Where are you going, boys?”

“Just outside to get a little air,” Dean said.

“Before you’ve done the dishes?”

Dean cracked his face into a smart-aleck grin. “Well, you see Dad, I was thinking that maybe it’d be a good idea to go with Sammy on his run today. I gotta be prepared if Hitler decides to take over America after he finishes Europe.”

His father sighed and Dean admired the strength it took to keep himself from rolling his eyes. There was just enough truth, and fear, behind the statement to keep John from laughing outright. Last month, Jewish ghettos in Germany were attacked by Nazis and homes, synagogues, and businesses were ransacked and set on fire.

“You’ll go out when I say you can go out. And you can go out after you wash the dishes and clean the kitchen.”

Sam looked ready to put on his puppy dog eyes, but Dean grabbed his arm, “Yes, sir!” he mock saluted and pulled his brother into the kitchen.

When the door closed behind them, Sam began to protest. “You didn’t even put up a fight, Dean. It’s Saturday! We were gonna go see that Clark Gable movie at the Grenada. Besides, this mess is all Dad’s anyway. Look—” Sam swept his arm in the direction of the empty beer and liquor bottles on the counter, “—all of these are his—”

“A couple of those are mine,” Dean cut him off. “Some things just aren't worth arguing about. He’ll still let us go out. If you’d help me clean instead of complaining, we’d go faster. Hell, he might even let us take the car.”  

Sam was only fifteen, and Dean knew, or at least hoped, that he would grow out of his resentment against their father. It wasn’t like John was father of the year or anything, but he had never recovered after their mom’s death and Dean always gave him the benefit of the doubt. Plus, Dean suspected there were some deeper, unspoken issues from his service in the Great War. He knew Sam hated when Dean went along with John, but it wasn’t going to hurt anyone to give him what he wanted every once in a while, just to make life easier.

Just like Dean promised, it didn’t take long to clean with them both helping, and John did let them take the car. She was still new, and Dean adored her. She was a black, 6-cylinder 1937 Chevrolet Master Town Sedan, and Dean treated her like his child.

They still left in plenty of time make it to the Granada. Dean even had time to pick up Lisa at her house. Sam opened his mouth to protest when Dean turned the car onto her street, but one look from his big brother made him snap his jaw closed.

He turned off the car outside the brick house and told Sam to jump in the back while he went to get her. He walked to the front door and knocked twice before Lisa’s father opened the door. He put on his biggest smile, the one he used to sweet talk people. “Mr. Braeden, I was hoping to take Lisa to the theater today.”

Benjamin Braeden eyed him. He’d always thought Dean was trouble but hadn’t forbidden Lisa from seeing him. “Just the two of you?”

“No sir,” he pointed to the car where Sam waved from the backseat, “my brother is with me.” He may have thought Dean was trouble, but he thought Sam hung the moon. Everyone did. They both smiled at Sam and he relented.

“Alright, son. Let me get her for you,” he pointed a finger at Dean, “but I want her home by 9. No excuses.”

“Thank you, sir.” Dean smiled as Mr. Braeden retreated into the house. Dean whistled to himself as he waited, and after a minute, Lisa stepped out of the house with her jacket slung over her shoulders and her dark hair curled down her back. Dean resisted kissing her while her father could be watching and led her to the passenger side of the car, opening and closing the door for her. As they pulled away, she scooted closer to him, their legs brushing against each other.

“Hi Lisa,” Sam piped from the back.

She turned and smiled at Sam as her hand found its way to Dean’s thigh, out of Sam’s view. “Hey Sam, how are your classes this semester?”

They went to the same high school, but Lisa was a senior and Sam was only a sophomore. It was a small school, but they didn’t have any friends in common and only caught up when they were around Dean. “I barely have time to read a book for fun anymore. Everything I read is for homework.”

“Such a twit, Sammy,” Dean laughed.

Lisa play-slapped his arm. “Be nice to him. Just because you were a scrub though school doesn’t mean everyone else should be.” She turned back to Sam. “Don’t pay him no mind, kiddo. He tells me all the time how proud he is of you.” Sam smiled and looked back out the window to watch the businesses on Mass Street pass them by.

Lisa’s hand had ridden all the way up Dean’s thigh by the time they pulled in front of the theater. Dean grabbed it and pulled her out through the driver’s side door while Sam jumped over the front seat and slid out the passenger side. Dean bought them all tickets and they sat in the back of the theater. By the time Clark Gable followed Myrna Loy to South America, Dean and Lisa were too busy to pay attention to the movie, and by the time the lights turned back on, they had forgotten there was a movie playing at all.

Sam was able to drag them out with the promise of food, and they walked the few blocks up to Round Corner Pharmacy for sandwiches. Lisa had her chair pulled close to Dean while they ate, but once his food and soda were placed in front of him, all other thoughts disappeared.

Dean held Lisa’s hand as they walked back to the car and twirled her in circles. Sam rolled his eyes when Dean twirled her to his chest to kiss her, then spun her out before their lips made contact.

Sam climbed into the back seat while Lisa sat close to Dean again. She made sure to have a leg on each side of the gear shift so every time Dean switched gears, he had to reach between her legs. She slid back to the passenger side when they reached her house, and Dean again went around to open the door for her. They held hands as they walked to the front door, but Dean resisted kissing her goodnight in fear of what her father might say.

The drive back to their house was quiet, and Dean turned on the radio to Fred Astaire singing “The Way You Look Tonight.” Dean sang with the chorus.

Sam let the song finish before speaking up. “Are you in love with Lisa, Dean?”

Dean stopped singing and flashed a look over to his brother. “What?”

“Are you in love with her?”

“Where is this coming from kiddo?”

“She’s graduating in the spring. Do you think you’re going to marry her? Settle down with her?”

Dean paused for a minute before joking, “You trying to get rid of me, Sammy?” Sam didn’t laugh and Dean sighed, “I don’t know. She’s great, you know, but I’ve never, ever told her that I love her. And I don’t think I’m ready to settle down. It isn’t all about feelings and emotions Sam.”

“Yeah, I know. But it isn’t all about sex either. You aren’t leading her on, are you? Are you sure you know what you want?”

Dean had to catch his thoughts. “I mean, I like working at the garage, even if working for Dad isn’t ideal.” He paused and considered whether to tell Sam before he continued, voice softer. “I’ve been thinking about joining the service. The Marine Corps, like Dad.”

Sam’s eyes went huge. “Are you kidding me! You are so ready to be just like Dad that you’d join the service? What happens if we start fighting Hitler? You’d get yourself killed if another war broke out.”

“FDR doesn’t want to go to war. I know Hitler is angling toward Poland, but England and France won’t let him take it.”

Sam rolled his eyes. They both heard so much about what was happening overseas that it was pointless to argue about it, so he changed his tactic. “So, what happens to Lisa if you join up? Would you make her wait for you if you aren’t even sure how you feel?”

Dean sighed. “Why are we even talking about this. It’s none of your business what I do with my life.”

“I just care about you. And I’m worried that you’ll be stuck in Lawrence working at the garage forever. You’re smart Dean, you could be doing more.”

“Marines would get me out of Lawrence,” he said. “And the garage is a good job. We’re lucky Dad managed to stay open through the depression, that it’s even there to work at.”

Sam looked down, guilt playing on his face. “I know Dean, but just think about it.”

Dean cut the engine and looked at his brother. “I know you worry about me, but it’s my job to look out for you, not the other way around, okay?”

Sam sighed resigned. “Yeah, I get it. I’m here to talk when you want.”

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