Sinister and Sensibility (Supernatural x Gilmore Girls Crossover)

Chapter 9

The car was bathed mostly in darkness as the sun sank behind the trees and quaint houses and shops in town. Swaths of orange light splashed across the boy's faces and clothes as Rory watched them in the rearview mirror. Sam's gaze flicked in her direction as a rectangle of fading light slid past his eyes like a reverse superhero mask.

Rory felt her stomach twist into knots, worry eating away at her insides. She felt nauseous, and Dean's driving didn't seem to help, but something about his demeanor let her know that she'd be in serious trouble if she threw up in his car, so she clamped a shaky hand over her mouth and focused on the rumbling engine and Sam as he flipped through a small journal. The thin beam from the flashlight allowed her to catch glimpses of the strange symbols and messy handwriting that covered the lined pages. Sam caught her staring at him, his mouth pulling up into a sad half-smile, a silent apology.

She didn't understand how she'd ended up there. She went into the bookstore that afternoon to relax and replenish her reading material for when she returned to her new life on the road. Her trip home was supposed to be stress-free as she caught up with her mom and Lane and watched Christmas movies. Yet, there she was, trapped in a much darker version of The Ghostbusters.

Sam had seemed so stable, at least in the hour or so that she'd known him. He had a solid career she was sure he had worked hard for. He was obviously smart and well-read. He had been kind and patient with her. And when she talked, she could tell he truly cared about what she was saying; a rare quality nowadays. Come to find out, he believed he was some kind of psychic who saw ghosts. And what frightened her more than that and the fact that his brother completely believed him, was how her mom had somehow been dragged into the evergrowing absurdity.

Everything had happened so fast, like being swept up in a whirlwind as they ushered her into the large muscle car, that wouldn't surprise her if it was currently harboring a dead body in the trunk, and took off in the direction of her house once she explained the fastest route to get there. As much as Rory didn't want to believe Sam and Dean's poltergeist theory, she couldn't chance her mom's life, and if they were wrong, she'd at least gotten a free ride out of it; albeit a rather unsafe one.

Her curiosity eventually got the better of her however, as she shyly leaned forward and lightly tapped Sam on the shoulder. He shifted, trying to face her the best he could on the bench seat. "What exactly is a poltergeist?"

The only information regarding the supernatural entity Rory had to go on was the series of Speilberg films of the same name that her mom had talked her into watching with her one Halloween when she was thirteen. The evening ended with them huddled under blankets and her mom throwing the remote at any sudden noises, both of them screaming when a couple of trick-or-treaters rang the doorbell a little after midnight, a tad late for the typical window for handing out candy.

The naive side of her was afraid to know, to squander that streak of optimism and idea that the world was mostly good, the part of her that always told her Stars Hollow was the safest place on Earth. But the more sensible side of her wanted to be as prepared as possible. Or maybe it was the slightest jolt of excitement at the idea of getting a peek at the darker side of the world she thought she knew.

"Poltergeists are unquiet spirits. They're typically created from extreme acts of violence," Sam said. 

"They're huge attention seekers. They start out just causing problems, like carving the word 'murderer' into the wall." Dean said, studying Rory in the rearview mirror. "They're basically the Kardashians of the spirit world." Rory forced a small smile at Dean's attempt to lighten the mood.

"But they can quickly turn dangerous," Sam added as he closed the leather journal and slid it into the backpack at his feet.

Dean swerved around the familiar turn that let Rory know they had made it onto Maple Street. She stared out her window as her neighbors' houses and mailboxes sailed by, the people inside safely sitting down to dinner in their homes, completely oblivious to her world crashing down around her.