Losing Lives / Book Six / The Life Series / Supernatural

Out With the Old

I had parked my car near a walkway along a river, dressed against the cold, pacing around the snowy ground, on the phone. "So, Dick's funding an archaeological dig? Well, unless Dick's actually digging himself, I'm not sure I know what to do with that, Frank. Or the factory in Saudi Arabia, or the fishery in Jakarta. None of this is helping, Frank."

"Explain how Western to Southeast Asia is too wide a net. You know, I could be in Tromso right now. Zero leviathan activity in Tromso."

"Why the hell would you want to go to Norway?"

"Oh, you know where Tromso is. That's encouraging." I rolled my eyes, resisting to reply. "I want to go there so I'm not a freaking target for leviathan, you moron." I closed my eyes. "By the way, they opened another Biggerson in Butte."

"Yeah, well, we're not in Montana."

"So, where are you?"

"We're in Oregon."

"No, I got nothing in Oregon."

"Wisconsin, Frank."

"What about it?"

"The coordinates. My dad's coordinates."

"Bobby... Oh! Right. Yeah, no. I got nothing. I got no activity."

"Well, work on it."

"Hey. When did you become the boss of me? You don't like what I'm doing, you can stick it right up your Montana."

"All right, all right, all right. Take it easy, Frank."

"Oh, and another thing."

I heard a dial tone.

"Frank? Hello? Fra—" Sam and Dean walked closer, carrying coffee. Sam had a newspaper. I hung up, turning to face them. "He's a crazy son of a bitch."

"Frank?" Dean asked.

"You know, having a cranky total paranoid as your go-to guy, that's—it's..." I trailed off. "I don't know what it is." I looked at Sam. "What are you going for, like, the Guinness record of of caffeine consumption? That's, like, your fifth this morning."

"Yeah, well, every time I close my eyes, Lucifer is yelling into my head," Sam told us. "It's like I let him in once, now I can't get rid of him."

"You know he's not actually..." Dean trailed off.

"Yeah," Sam answered. "Yeah, no, I know. Uh, try telling that to the volume control inside my brain."

"Well, did you try the hand thing?" Dean asked.

"Yeah," Sam answered. "Anyway, long as I'm awake, check it out." He showed us the newspaper. "They're saying drugs, but read between the lines. Sounds like she danced her own feet off. Might be our kind of thing."

"Dancers," I told them. "They are toe shoes full of crazy."

"And you would know this how?" Dean asked. I hesitated, looking away. "Ness?"

I pressed my lips together, looking at Dean and Sam. "My mom used to have me in... dance... before she got possessed."

"You--" Dean started.

Dean and Sam started to laugh in amusement.

"It was a long time ago," I told them in innocent defense. "I stopped after she died." Dean and Sam were still chuckling. I pushed Dean in the chest lightly. "Stop laughing."

Dean and Sam stopped.

Sam sighed. "Oh, God. I'm sorry. It's just--I can't even picture it."

I looked away.