Pieces Of Me {Sam Winchester}

Collateral Damage

One Week Later

Josie swallowed. Her reflection in the mirror across from her swallowed too.

"Ready?" Myles asked, poking his head into the bathroom.

Josie took a deep breath, watching as her reflection's chest rose and fell, in perfect sync with hers.

She smoothed down the fabric of her black dress, suddenly bothered by even the slightest wrinkle. She needed little things to focus on, to fix, to perfect. She needed pointless things to obsess over. She needed to keep herself sane.

"No," she finally answered.

•••

The funeral has been lovely, Josie was sure. But frankly she hadn't paid much attention. She'd just stared at the lovely polished wooden casket, and thought about how it was empty. Jess...Jess hadn't been recovered from the ruins of the apartment.

And they lowered it in the ground, and Josie thought, What a waste of a coffin.

Then there were flowers. So many flowers. So many different bouquets, and arrangements. Josie and Myles had brought their own, to lay down atop the empty casket before they buried it, but it quickly drowned and disappeared beneath the layers upon layers of flora.

Who are the flowers even for? There's no one to receive them. They'll just be buried, then they'll suffocate and wither and eventually decompose and merge with the soil. Who are the flowers for?

Josie pondered this as she and Myles walked back home.

And she pondered, and thought, and wondered, and considered. She did anything she could possibly do with her vacant mind to avoid thinking about Jess.

•••

When they got back to the apartment, Josie sat down on the couch and turned on the TV.

Myles pursed his lips.

"Josie," he started, "baby...I'm worried about you. That was the first time you've gone out all week. You just sit and you sleep and you only eat when I remind you. I haven't seen you eat in four days."

Josie frowned, but didn't look at him. Had it been four days? Was she hungry?

"Hadn't noticed," she replied.

She tried to focus on the television screen. If she stared hard enough, and had her glasses on, she could see the little red, green, and blue bars that formed every frame and picture that showed up on the screen.

Myles sighed. He walked into the kitchen and opened the fridge.

"We don't even have any food," he murmured. "I'm going to go grocery shopping. Then I'll get home, and I'll make you a big meal, and we'll sit down and eat together," he said. "Okay?"

"Okay," Josie responded. But it wasn't okay; she didn't know what she'd agreed to. It had been something. She hadn't been paying attention.

She managed to stay focused long enough to hear the apartment door slam shut. Then, before long, she was closing her eyes and drifting off.

•••

When Josie opened her eyes again, it was dark.

Waking up in the dark was always disorienting, no matter what time you went to sleep. But it took Josie longer than usual to take in her surroundings, to remember where she was, and to remind herself how she got there.

Once her brain was awake, and she adjusted her glasses, she stepped off the couch and went to turn the TV off. Then she went in the kitchen.

There were two place settings at the table. Myles had obviously done his best to make the meals of chicken nuggets, Kraft macaroni and cheese, canned corn, and Swiss Rolls seem as gourmet as possible. Despite herself, Josie smiled a little.

A wave of hunger passed over her. Myles must've been right, she hadn't eaten in a while. She started to sit down and start eating, but realized that Myles had made this meal for the both of them--it wasn't right to eat it without him.

But where was he?

"I'll call him," Josie decided out loud.

But her cell wasn't in her pocket.

"Landline," she muttered.

She grabbed the home phone off its dock and dialed Myles's number. But as her line rang, she heard music playing--trumpet music. She recognized it immediately. It was the recording from Myles's first place trumpet ensemble's first radio feature. It had been his ringtone since junior year.

Josie followed the ringing through the house and into their bedroom.

"Myles!" she called. She glanced around the bedroom, and spotted his cell phone on his nightstand. But Myles was nowhere to be found.

"Weird," Josie murmured to herself. "Myles!" she called again.

She walked over to pick up the phone as her own end went to voicemail.

That was when she saw it.

Three drops of blood on the sheets of the bed.

All at once, Josie's heart rate sped up, a lump formed in her throat, and her eyes darted to the ceiling.

And there was Myles.

Just like Jess, he was pinned against it, a bloody gash in his stomach dripping with crimson. His mouth was open in an expression of horror. His eyes--they were terrified.

"Myles!" Josie screamed.

But it was too late. Just like with Jess, an inferno of scarlet fire bloomed behind Myles. It engulfed him in seconds, but before it could get to Josie, she moved.

Maybe it was instinct. Maybe it was a reflex. Maybe an invisible force shoved her. Whatever it was, Josie didn't consciously make the decision to hurl herself out the window. All of a sudden, her feet were moving, and then her shoulder slammed into the glass of the bedroom window, and then she was falling. Two stories passed instantaneously. And then she hit the ground, her fall hardly cushioned by a cluster of rose bushes.

But as Josie scrambled to her feet, she wasn't even aware of the rips in her clothes or the deep scratches covering her skin, warm blood running down her arms and legs. She wasn't even aware of the salty tears running down her cheeks, or the way they stung when they slipped into the cuts on her cheeks.

Before she could register any sort of pain she may or not have been aware, Josie took off running.