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stusbunker · 15 days

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Spotless: Furia

Chapter Twenty Three

Featuring: Dean Winchester/Reader, Dean/Bela

Other characters: Isaac/Tamara,

Word Count: 1780

Warnings, etc: Mutual pining, the thing is they hurt each other a lot, most of the time without meaning to.

A/N: We pick up right where we left off. Trouble tries to get ready to go out on tour, Dean sets off alarms.

Series Masterlist

It wasn’t fair, you were not being fair. But that didn’t change that sick feeling crawling up your throat. Face burning, you looked at Dean who was pointedly not looking at you. You counted the deep breaths he took, his nostrils flared less the longer you sat in suffocating silence.

You should have said something.

You had no idea how to take it back. It wasn’t even what you said, it was how you said it, so derisively.

You wanted to disappear.

The traffic on the freeway only seemed to get worse the longer you sat. It had been a good day, even with Dean’s snippiness over the Rolling Stone article. Why did you have to open your big mouth?!

You bit the inside of your cheek, you were not going to cry. You knew how guys felt about girls crying, it’s a cop out, or a pathetic ‘get out of jail free’ card. Despite knowing girls usually cried out of frustration rather than actual sadness. You didn’t want to come off as pandering or fucking weak.

“Look—- I don’t want to make you do something you’re uncomfortable with. But, we’ve all seen how well the press and the fans have responded to you two. Is this something I need to put the brakes on? Because I need to know before we start touring.”

Dean huffed. “It’s fine—- it’s not about Bela, okay? It was just an honest question.”

You waited because it felt like he had more to say. You owed it to him to let him say his piece.

He let out a self deprecating chuckle. “You really think it’s just because I’m a horndog, I’d want out?”

“Dean— I didn’t mean it like that, I—”

“No, you did. You were very clear. I just gotta know, Y/N, is there no other reason you can think of for me to want out than some easy lay?”

He wasn’t even pretending to keep his eyes on the road anymore. His jaw was tight and his eyes were dark and glossy and every hope you’d ever had fluttered in your stomach.

You were supposed to say something back.

But you had already said too much.

You couldn’t lose him over something as avoidable as a misunderstanding.

“I’m sorry— I shouldn’t have—”

“Don’t— nu-uh, that’s not what I asked. I don’t want your apology, here, okay? Just—- tell me there’s something else that could get me out of this without being the bad guy.”

It hurt to look at him.

But God was it even harder to look away.

“I can talk to Crowley— work out a timeline if you want?”

Dean shook his head, looked to the ceiling of the impala, and exhaled deeply. “No—- we’re good. But if you ever think of an answer. I want to hear you say it.”

You looked down at your lap, your phone case biting into your palm where you squeezed it.

“I don’t know what you’re fishing for, Dean. I’m sorry. I know you said not to apologize, but I feel like I can’t help but put my foot in my mouth tonight.”

“It’s okay, Trouble. No hard feelings. Promise.”

You looked up to make sure he wasn’t still pissed.

“Seriously?”

Dean’s mouth twitched with a ghost of a smile. “Seriously.”

It wasn’t until you were safe and distracted with drinks and everyone else at Elizabeth’s that you realized Dean had called you by your real name. You couldn’t remember the last time that had happened.

No one really talks about the non-glamourous tasks required before going on tour. Especially not the ones that have nothing to do with the music and everything to do with leaving your home for months on end. Your personal to-do list always fell by the wayside when it came to the band, but you were running out of time on it now. In less than 48 hours, the opening act would take the stage.

And three days after that you would officially be on the road, for nearly six months straight.

You shoved a quart of half-eaten fried rice into a garbage bag and moved onto the vegetable drawer. Cleaning out the fridge didn’t take very long, but going through your pantry was a nightmare. When did you even buy half of this shit?! The cans would last, but a lot of the boxed stuff was already halfway to expiring so you set them aside to drop off somewhere over the next couple of days.

Then you wiped everything down.

By the time the kitchen surfaces were done, you were sweaty and gross. But you had too much momentum to stop there. You swept and mopped the floor. You took a breath and pushed on. Later that evening while taking out the trash, your neighbor, Isaac, waved at you over the half-fence.

“Getting ready to get back on the road then?” His accent was pleasant as ever.

You sighed and blew a stray strand of hair out of your eyes. “Getting there. I never understand how much I need to clean with it just being me. But here I am, like usual.”

He poked at some meat on the grill as he made conversation. “Tam said we’re due over tomorrow to go over things before you leave?”

You nodded your head. ��Yeah, anytime after you both get home from work is fine, I’ll just be forcing myself to actually pack at that point. I really appreciate you guys looking over the place.”

“It’s nothing really. Plus you more than compensate us for it, love.”

“I know, but still.” You looked down at your dust streaked tshirt and ratty sweats and decided you had been out in the world long enough looking like that. “Alright, I better get back inside. See you tomorrow, Isaac.”

“TTFN!”

You smiled to yourself as you stepped back inside through the side door. You were so lucky to have good neighbors, especially with the way your job worked. Dean had told you all about Tamara and Isaac before you moved in, making sure you knew everything from the seriousness of not asking about kids to the humor of not insulting classic Doctor Who.

When Dean remembered, he’d still meet Isaac at one of the few English style pubs for a football match every now and again.

And they didn’t seem to mind housesitting for you whenever you needed.

The smell of the dry rub from Isaac’s grill haunted you as you went back into your clean, yet emptied out kitchen. It just meant another night of delivery was in your future.

You woke up grumpy from an incessant buzzing coming from your phone. The first notification was from Twitter and you opened it without checking anything else.

Ugh, okay, fine. Dean dropped Bela off late last night. You weren’t too worried about it. So you tried to go back to sleep. But a nagging feeling in the back of your mind kept prodding the possibilities into your thoughts.

Before jumping to any conclusions, you got out of bed and started a pot of coffee.

There had been a lot of little things you had to ignore in the day-to-day of being the band’s publicist, and even more you had to try and bury as their friend. Cas’ penchant for banging journalists was one of the ongoing thorns in your side. And of course all of Lee and Pamela’s on-again-off-again nonsense came up more than was even happening. But Dean knew how to leave a hook up. He also knew when he was being tailed.

This entire headline smelled fishy.

You bit your lip and opened your contacts. It was still too early for a business call, especially since you knew he was out until after bar close, but you couldn’t wait any longer for answers.

The phone rang in your ear and you silently begged your coffee pot to brew faster. Dean answered just before it would have sent you to his voicemail.

“I’m up— where’s the fire?” Dean mumbled into the microphone.

Without any preamble, you started in on the questions. “Have you seen the latest? People are up in arms over you squealing out of Bela’s driveway this morning. What happened?”

“Uh, hold on,” Dean must have moved the phone or covered the mouthpiece because you could hear his voice rumbling, but couldn’t make out a single thing he said. Then came a bunch of muted background noises and a door opening and closing. “Okay, wanna run that past me again? Slower and without the accusatory tone— it’s not even fucking nine am, Trouble.”

Your suspicions continued to rise. “Where are you?”

“In a hallway.”

Not ‘the’ hallway, not ‘my’ hallway, an unspecified singular hallway.

“Dean—”

“Look. The paps were fucking vultures last night, I caught one of them trying to lowjack Baby. So, I ditched her, and Sam got her back home safe. I circled back after I knew they’d scattered and I stayed put. There’s nothing to worry about. Just people trying to make me look bad for being too smart for their slimy ways.”

Your brain hissed like a television left between channels, not a signal coming or going in either direction.

“You’re at Bela’s.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yep.”

Your business brain rebooted, slowly.

“Trouble?”

You called him, you should have said something already. “Okay, so, uh, I guess just make sure to leave publicly. Or go out for breakfast or something. Just don’t leave it how they’re spinning it.”

Dean huffed. “Makes sense. Anything else?”

“Tomorrow is the morning show interview, you said you’d pick me up? Is that still gonna happen or should I just get an Uber? I’ll just call an Uber.”

“I mean, yeah, gotta be home to drag Sam with anyway. So you don’t gotta. We’ll be there with bells on right at five.”

“Okay, thanks.”

“I should go—”

“Right, of course. Bye.”

“Talk to you later.”

You hung up and your coffee pot finally whistled, signaling it had completed brewing.

You moved through your morning routine in a fog. Even when Bela posted a gorgeous fruit plate between matching mimosas sometime before noon, you only gave it a heart and moved on to folding your next load of laundry. Once you let yourself look at what was happening, you gave into the anger. You screamed into an old hoodie until you were hoarse.

Dean was actually sleeping with Bela.

Your two best friends were fucking.

The same best friends you had set up to help make your job easier.

What the fuck was your life?

And how the hell were you supposed to pretend any of this was okay?!

Tagging:

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