FIB, Chapter 2

A young woman walked behind the bar and into the kitchen, while carrying a tub filled with empty beer bottles, mugs, plates and various other objects. She found her way to the sink and set the tub down on the counter before she grabbed a case of beer and worked her way out to the bar. After she opened the doors, she caught a glimpse of a man from her past. This was normal for her, considering she was still grieving from his death.

She pushed the thought aside and handed the case of beer over to the head bar-tender, Jerry.

"Hey, Xandy, you got some customers over at table twelve." He informed her as he grabbed the case of beer.

"Looks like your regulars," a woman named Julie said as she prepared a drink for a customer. "Might as well get the burgers started," she said as she walked into the back to set the order.

Jerry and Julie both owned the bar called J&J. They were brother and sister, both somewhere in their thirties with Julie being the youngest at thirty-two. She had shoulder length brown hair that barely touched her shoulders. Whenever she pulled it back into a ponytail (which was every night she worked) a few strands of her hair hung in her face.

Jerry on the other hand was always trying to impress the female customers and the occasional male customer, for a big tip. He would show up his skills at serving the drinks, either by flipping the bottle in the air or pouring the drink without looking at the glass.

The young woman, who went by the name of Xandy, looked over at table twelve.

"Thanks for the heads up, Jerry."

She walked over to the table and pulled out a pen and pad from the black apron around her waist. As they told her what they wanted, she wrote it down on the pad of paper. As she was writing, she caught another glimpse of the same guy through the crowded bar. But when she looked up again, he wasn't there.

"I'll be right back with your two beers. The burgers will be out shortly."

Xandy made her way back to the bar, bobbing and weaving through crowds of people. Once again, she saw the same guy from her past. She had seen him at the bar before, but not this many times. "Great. Now I'm seeing things," she mumbled to herself as she walked behind the bar. Not paying attention to the crowd of people, the woman walked over to the cooler to get a few beers.

"Excuse me, miss?" a man asked, trying to get her attention.

The young woman was too distracted by her thoughts, that she didn't hear the man call her. When she knelt down to get the beer, she finally heard Julie call her name. She snapped back to reality and stood up holding two beers in her hands.

"What is it Julie?"

"You got a customer," she said, nodding behind her.

She turned around and set the one beer bottle on the table then looked up. When she saw the man's face she jumped in shock, dropping the bottle to floor. After the glass shattered, the bar went silent for a minute and some of the men cheered and howled.

The man who wanted her to wait on him was, sure enough, the man from her past. The man that she thought had died started to laugh a little. "Oh come on. Don't tell me that you're still scared of me?"

As she started backing away, she bumped into Jerry. "Xandy, don't worry about the mess, I'll have Phil clean it up. PHIL! Broken glass!" Jerry yelled over to the other end of the bar.

"Xandy? Since when do you go by that name?" The man asked still finding the situation amusing. "If I didn't know any better, I'd think that you were trying to hide from someone."

She quickly backed away and ran into the kitchen.

"Hey! Xandy, where are you going?" Julie asked worried about her. It wasn't like her to just run out on them. They all knew about the things that she had gone through, so Julie let her off the hook.

Throwing off her apron, the young waitress ran to the back door and headed for the woods.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Sterling, Illinois

A young man came into the main office of the Baker Motel. He was tall and had dark hair that hung in his face; his clothes were worn in and raggedy.

“Hi, can I help you?” the female receptionist asked with a bright smile. She couldn’t help but notice how attractive he was compared to the other losers that walked through that door.

“Yes, actually, I lost my cell phone. I think I left in my room that I recently stayed in.”

“Oh, sure,” she said as she knelt down to open up a cabinet, pulling out a small bin. She fished through the various items and found a cell phone. “Is this it? You can use this phone to check the number,” she suggested, pushing the office phone in front of him.

“Thank you.” He dialed the number and grinned when the phone in her hand started to ring. “Perfect.”

“Will that be all?” She widened her smile and leaned forward, pulling the phone back.

He looked out to his car parked out front in the empty parking lot, then looked her up and down. “Actually... No. My friends and I”—he motioned to two more vehicles that pulled up next his—“haven’t had a decent meal in a few days.”

“And you’d liked me to recommend the nearest restaurant,” she guessed.

“Not quite,” he smirked as her smile faded away.

Before the girl could react, he was already holding her down.

After him and his friends were all done, he walked up to a woman with long brown hair wearing torn jeans and a tight, black t-shirt.

“Did you find the cell, Matt?” she asked with her arms folded as she leaned against her car.

Matt noticed the annoyed look on her face. “Oh, come on. You know you enjoyed your little snack. And, yes, I did find it.” He waved the phone in front of him.

The woman sighed, “She better be worth this chase or else.”

“Or else what?” Matt challenged her. “Come on, Kate. You need to get over his death and have some fun.”

“You didn’t know him! Luther was my life and they took him away from me! I want revenge,” Kate snapped at him and snatched the cell phone out of his hands. “How is this…?” She trailed off when she smelled something familiar. Holding the phone up to her nose, she took a sniff. “They were with her. Their scent is faint,” she noted to herself.

Matt watched in confusion as she started searching the phone for something. “What are you doing?”

She ignored him and grinned when she found what she was looking for. “She does know them. Maybe this little chase of yours can be useful after all, Matty,” she said as she stared at Sam Winchester’s cell phone number.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Xandy ran through the woods, towards the river that ran past her backyard. If what she thought was happening was happening, then she needed help and fast. But what was she going to do? The only other person she could talk to about this didn’t want to talk to her anymore. So, she was all alone with a killer on her trail.

Behind her, she heard loud thuds of footsteps chasing after her.

“This can’t be happening,” she panted.

She held her arms up, breaking any branch that got in her way or pushing them aside. Her feet snapped twig after twig under her sneakers. Once she reached the wide river that was illuminated by the moon, she started running faster. Her path would now be mostly clear, except for the occasional branch or log.

Her dark path was suddenly enlightened by two faint beams of light, bouncing around her.

“Over there!” she heard a man yell.

Hearing snapping twigs, branches and crunching leaves behind her, she quickened her pace. She risked the chance and glanced behind her, only to be blinded by their lights. When she turned around, her foot got caught on root, tripping her.

She held back a scream, not wanting to draw further attention toward herself. On her way down, she caught herself on her hands and pushed off the ground, stumbling a little bit.

A few minutes later she saw the bridge up ahead and sprinted forward. She finally made her way to the twenty foot long, concrete bridge. As she ran across, she could hear the rushing sound of the water flowing underneath her. She could smell the fresh water off of the wind that ran along the current.

Once she was across, she knew she was getting closer to her destination.

Up ahead she could see the clearing of her backyard, where she knew she would be safe. Unfortunately, she was still being followed, but she kept her steady pace.

She ran across her yard and up to her back door. Her fists were banging on the door, as she kept looking at the two shadows that were drawing closer and closer.

“Kyle!” she yelled through the door. When the door finally opened, she pushed past her husband, who was holding their daughter.

Kyle was about to close the door and go after her until he heard somebody call his name.

“What the hell?” Kyle couldn’t believe his eyes. Seeing them sent a fury of anger run through him, but he had to put his daughter down first. After he placed her in her playpen, he stormed over to the door, where he saw Sam and Dean Winchester walking towards him.

“Leave!”

“What?” Dean asked in disbelief.

“You heard what I said!” He yelled, balling his fists in rage. “I don’t know what you guys are trying to do, but I won’t let you do that to her again!”

Sam and Dean looked at each other confused.

"Whoa, Kyle, take it easy. What's going on?" Sam said.

"Are you kidding me?!" Kyle saw Sam and Dean look at each other clueless and said, "Alex thinks you're dead!"

Dean’s heart skipped a beat as his color left his face. Ever since he came back, he had forgotten about Alex until he stumbled upon a photo of Hana. But then Dean started to wonder who told her or how she found out.

Dean turned towards Sam and asked, “Did you tell her?”

Sam hesitated, glancing at Kyle, who now had his arms folded across his chest. “No.”

"No?! It never occurred to you that it would have been a good idea to tell her this?!"

"I was too busy trying to save you!" Sam explained.

Dean looked back from Sam to Kyle. "So, she thinks I've been dead for the past five months?" he asked furiously.

“Yeah,” Kyle answered a little less angry. Something in Dean’s tone made Kyle wonder if Sam told him anything that happened.

"Well she knows I'm alive now. Can I at least talk to—" Dean was cut off by Kyle.

"No. I don’t think that’s a good idea."

"What do you mean?" Sam asked worriedly.

Kyle sighed and glanced towards the hallway. "All through May Alex was hoping to get a call from you guys, letting her know that everything was okay. After May and no phone calls, she went into a serious depression. She would wake up in pain, crying from nightmare after nightmare all throughout the night. The days weren’t much better for her either. It got so bad that she even wanted to leave me and Hana, because she was afraid of losing us too. That's when we decided to take her to a therapist."

"We?" Sam asked curiously.

"Everyone: Brad, my grandma, Cody, and a few of her friends from work. We all told her it would be for the best and that we were all there for her. About a month ago she finally started to smile again and made a lot of progress. Now you're here and I’m afraid she'll go back to square one." Kyle explained.

Dean took in what Kyle had said. He couldn’t believe it. Alex suffered because of him. She thought she lost another member of her family for good. On his last day he didn’t even think of how much it would affect Alex. She wasn’t this depressed after her step-dad was murdered by Danny, so why did she act this way now? What made him so special that his death caused such an impact on her life?

"So, could you please, just, leave? I'll call you tomorrow and let you know how she's doing."

With that, Kyle walked back inside his house, leaving Sam and Dean in the backyard.

Sam looked at his brother and sighed. "Dean..."

"Not now, Sam." Dean walked back into the woods and glanced at the house, wondering more about those lost four months.