Dean jolts awake, sitting up slowly as he gazes blearily around the room. It was still dark, though some sunlight shone weakly but persistently between the blinds, and fell across the maroon bedspread covering his body. He yawns widely, reaching over blindly to grab his phone off the wooden bedside table. He clicks a button.
37 missed calls from her. 56 missed texts. A couple calls from Sam, too.
Dean closes his eyes, allowing a spike of pain to shoot through him for only a moment before he tosses away the blankets and swings his legs over the side of the mattress. He rakes a finger through the mess of his hair.
He should go back. Or at the very least, answer his phone. For all they know, he could be dead.
Well, for all she knew, anyway. After Sam had come back to spend the day with Jane, he had headed out again, this time to hunt the thing with Bobby. Dean would've gone, but as Bobby said, it was "more talking, less shootin'," and therefore more of Sam's kind of case. He'd gone, leaving Jane alone at the bunker.
Dean had been gone since that night. Only a few days, but enough to drive Jane nuts, apparently. He didn't read the texts or listen to the voicemails, but he had a feeling he'd be going back to the bunker some time that day.
While he'd been gone, he'd hunted.
There'd been a vampire case nearby, and he'd gone after it with everything he had, pouring his anger and his hurt into hunting down the son of a bitch and killing it with a brutality that frightened even him.
It was the mark, he reasons. Which it was. Partially.
But it was also the hurt. Logically, he had no right to be upset. She was dating Sam, and therefore she could do whatever she wanted with him.
Except that that night, all he had running through his head was her words, her promises. And that's what he had planned on falling asleep too, which might've sufficed, had he not instead be driven out of the bunker entirely by the sound of...
Dean shakes his head, his fingers clenching around his phone. He feels a sudden urge to throw it, destroy it, but he resists, instead clambering roughly to his feet and changing out of his clothes, tossing them into the duffel bag and pulling on jeans and a t-shirt. Then he grabs his keys out of the pocket of his jacket, lugs the bag over his shoulder, and slams the motel door behind him.
Dean yanks the passenger door open and tosses the duffel onto the seat before circling around the Impala and climbing in.
And off he goes.
He drives for a few hours, making no stops along the way. His cell phone rings a few times, and chirps a few more, signaling that Jane was no doubt texting him again, but he doesn't check them. For a moment, he wonders why she's contacting him so incessantly. Did she know why he left? Or when? Did she care that he was gone? Would she be angry at him?
Probably. Dean knows that Jane doesn't have much of a temper, but once you tick her off, she doesn't just reprimand you-no, she shouts herself hoarse. He sighs at the thought, feeling drained. He didn't know how much more of this he could take. He loved her. He loved her with every goddamn fiber of his being. He loved how messy her hair was in the morning, how she cut her toast into four triangles, how she went around straightening everything in the bunker. He loved to make her laugh, to make her eyes light up, to make her blush. He never, ever didn't want to be around her.
But she was Sam's. And it was driving him nuts. And God, it hurt. It hurt that he wasn't the one that woke up to her every morning. That he wasn't the one that greeted her with a hug and a kiss on the cheek. That he didn't fall asleep with her every night in his arms.
It hurt so fucking bad.
But he pushed through. He pushed through, because that's just what he did. That's what he'd always done. And it sucked. It sucked a lot. But he did it. He pushed harder every damn day, because that's what he was supposed to do, as a friend and as a brother.
He pushed.
Dean reaches the bunker within a few hours, pulling into the garage smoothly. As he climbs out of the car and walks towards the door, he braces himself for her anger.
Smart decision, too. The second he slams the door, she's sprinting into the hallway, sliding unsteadily across the wooden floors, her phone in her hand and her eyes alight and furious.
"Hey," he says casually, too damn hurt and miserable to even bother trying to apologize. He was so close to snapping.
"Where the hell have you been?" Her voice is deadly quiet.
Dean crosses to the kitchen, pulling open the fridge and lazily popping the cap off a beer, taking a long drink before answering. "On a hunt."
"You went on a hunt by yourself?!" she shouts, her eyes widening in anger. "You could've been killed, Dean! You didn't answer a goddamn text or phone call for the past 4 days and I thought you were dead!"
"Well, surprise. I'm not," Dean snaps.
Fuming, she clenches her hands into fists. "How hard is it to pick up the fucking phone, and let me know what the hell is going on?!"
"I was busy, sweetheart. A hunt ain't exactly sunshine and roses."
"Don't give me that shit, Dean. It would've taken you two goddamn minutes to let me know you were okay." Her eyes fill with tears. "Did you enjoy that? Did you enjoy driving me crazy with worry?"
Dean sighs heavily. He stares at her for a long minute. "I needed some time, Jane. Alright?"
"Some time?" she repeats in disbelief. "I'm fine with you needing time, Dean, but you didn't need to vanish off the face of the Earth to get some!"
"Well, maybe I wanted to!" Dean suddenly yells back. "You're not my friggin' babysitter, Jane. I can do whatever the hell I want."
"You're right, Dean. I'm your best friend. And you know damn well that if it had been me that had suddenly up and left, you would've freaked out, too. And you would've been pissed."
"So what?"
"What do you mean, 'so what'?" she shouts.
Dean takes a step towards her and leans in slightly. "I mean, so what?"
Her eyes flash with fury and she takes a step forward, too. "Fuck this, Dean," she shouts. "You're so..."
"So what?" he says again, this time asking a question.
She doesn't say anything.
"No, go on, sweetheart. Tell me," Dean baits.
"Hypocritical!" she yells. "You're a damn hypocrite, Dean, and it drives me nuts!"
Dean stumbles backward suddenly, his eyes widening at her words. He squeezes his eyes shut.
