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goodnightmoonTitle: The Spirit House
Author: Logan![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
humming_along
Pairing: Mention of John/Mary and Sam/Dean OC POV
Rating: PG-13 for mention of weecest
warnings: none
Spoilers: Up to season 1, Ep 9 "Home"
Summary: House loved her family very much. She'd loved them all, of course, but this family was special to her.
Disclaimer: Nope, still not mine. Damn you, Kripke.
Notes: I wouldn't have even written this if it weren't formarciaelena, beta extraordinaire and the most beautiful girl in the world.
[...]One of the most universally held beliefs about anthropomorphic spirits is the concept of a "House" (denoted by capitalization of the letter h). This belief revolves around the idea that some human dwellings develop a soul or spirit of their own, once the dwelling has been charged with the right type of emotional energy from its occupants. The conception of a child, a personal spiritual awakening, or the deep desire to create a homestead from the dwelling is said to provide this energy, and explains why not all dwellings have such spirits. Mobile homes, apartments, motels and other dwellings meant for more temporary habitation usually do not possess them. This belief may be the origin of the phrase "A house is not a home", meaning that not just any dwelling embodies the concept of "home" until it has been charged with the appropriate energy for it to have such a spirit of its own.
-- Murdock, Robert M. "The House with a Soul and Other Anthropomorphic Spirit Folklore of the American Midwest." Hearth and Home (1974): p.81-84
House loved her family very much. She'd loved them all, of course, but this family was special to her. Perhaps because John and Mary had been so young when they came to her; Dean had been a tiny little toothless thing in a yellow sleeper, not quite four months old. House was so happy to have a baby under her roof again that the furnace hummed with pleasure, keeping Dean's nursery toasty warm when he kicked off the blankets at night.
Yes, House loved John and Mary Winchester. She could tell by the care John put into cleaning her chimney and by the protective symbols Mary scattered about the house; salt on the doorways, blue bottles in the windowsills, sage tossed in the fireplace. John kept her pipes in pristine condition despite their age and Mary made her garden bloom with Angelica and Hyssop, Feverfew and Lovage. In return, House did what she could to keep them safe and happy as well; she coaxed a little more propane from the tank during their lean first winter within her walls. She made the closet door stick firmly when Mary wanted to retrieve her winter boots, unaware that a brown recluse had made its home in the left one.
As the years passed, House spent much of her energy on little Dean. Tow-headed and full of mischief, that boy was, and her floors were a little less shiny and a squirrel found its way into her attic while she was occupied moving rugs to catch him as he tumbled, bracing the banister for Dean to slide down. Oh, but he did keep her and Mary busy! It didn't matter; she loved him so much that she couldn't bring herself to mind. She hummed contentedly as he slept each night, warm and safe in her lath and plaster arms. Perhaps one day it would be his children bathing in her tub and climbing her trees. She loved her family, and they loved her.
House was thrilled at first when Dean moved to the bedroom down the hall and John painted the nursery yellow. She kept the screws from rolling away as he struggled to assemble the crib (it had vexed her for years that her floorboards had warped), and convinced the plaster that it was a terrible time to crack when Mary tapped in nails to hang new pictures on the walls.
But something troubled Mary during her pregnancy, and House didn't know what it was. She did all she could to take care of Mary as her belly grew. She sternly told the spiders that she would tolerate no cobwebs in her corners, called the water in the the ancient tank such scandalous names that it was steaming hot when Mary wanted a bath. She talked to the paint, which talked to the crayons, and Dean never did figure out why those darned Crayolas didn't work when he wanted to draw a spaceship on his bedroom wall. She put the toilet seat down when John left it up and shut the icebox door behind Dean a dozen times a day.
House felt sure that all would be well again after Mary and John brought little Sammy home. What a darling baby he was! And how Dean loved his new baby brother. House made sure the floor didn't creak when Dean crept from his bed at night to peer at his sleeping brother. She moved the light switch in the hall just enough that Mary's tired hand always found it as she made her late night journeys to Sam's room. Yes, Sam was the perfect addition to their little family. House's flower beds were verdant with color that spring, and she even cajoled that stubborn pear tree in the backyard to hold onto those hard green little fruits until they were ripe and sugar sweet, much to Dean's delight.
But something had changed, and House could not make it right. During the daylight hours all was as it should be; Dean's little legs pumped furiously as he rode his Big Wheel up and down her driveway, and Mary basked in her big picture window as she nursed and sang to baby Sam. John came home tired but satisfied just in time for supper every evening, and if Mary was a little distracted with the baby and the roast was starting to dry, House spoke to the oven who was happy to oblige and turn the temperature down. Yet late at night, Mary tossed and turned, and House felt helpless. She soothed Mary to the best of her ability, keeping the wooden floors warm and encouraging the lavender sachets under the mattress to give off a little more scent to ease Mary's dreams. But nothing worked. Mary woke more and more often, gasping and shaking in the night.
It was the second week of October and Sammy was teething when the crows came. "It's coming!" They cried, circling her eaves, beating their coal-black wings against her windows. "Death is coming!" they screamed, defecating on her porch. House spoke to the soil, which spoke to the tree roots, and confirmed the dire warnings of the crows. Something unspeakable was coming. House was not afraid of Death; she was an old house, and people had died under her roof before. Death was only another beginning. But this, whatever darkness was approaching, wished great harm to her family, and she simply could not allow that to happen. She would have to let go of her dear Mary and strong, kind John and their babies.
House was on a mission to drive her beloved family away. She started the campaign by backing up the septic tank, then nearly concussing John by shortening the bottom step as he left for work one early morning. She made the windows rattle and the pipes clang. But John, ever loyal to her, was ready to defend his home. He attacked each new problem with hammer and wrench, annoyed but resolute. Mary called him her hero and kissed him so tenderly that House was all the more determined to send them away, to keep them safe. She flickered the lights at all hours, burned everything that Mary cooked, and bowed a branch on the big Elm tree so that it made a teeth-clenching-headache-inducing sound as it scraped across their bedroom window at night.
It was all to no avail. The days ticked by and the moths came, then the toads. Death, they warned. Death under your roof, blood on your walls, your studs burned to cinders. House grew desperate, and each afternoon as the shadows slid down her walls she thought of new torments for her loved ones. The smell of something rotting in the living room, slamming doors that were shut tight, turning the volume up on the television (how terrible she felt when Dean was chastised for that).
John and Mary stayed, and House wept. Dean asked Mary if they were having an earthquake. Mary kissed him and told him it was just an old house, it was normal for things to break and the house to shake as it settled.
It was the second of November, and House was busy guiding a stream of ants into the kitchen when the darkness came. It wore the body of a man but there was nothing alive or human about it. House gathered all of her energies, determined to shake her family loose, crumble herself to her foundation if she must, anything to keep him away. But it was too late. As he walked up the sidewalk she felt her energy deplete, drain from her studs and ceiling; even the deep roots of the trees under the basement shrank back. He stepped over her threshold, past the runes Mary had drawn on her walls before putting up the wallpaper, and claimed what was not his to take. House could barely flicker the lights in warning as he approached the nursery.
When he threw Mary against her ceiling she tried to hold her gently, to whisper to her to be calm, to be still and John would save them. But Mary was too afraid to hear.
House did what she could, blessed little that it was. The pain of the fire blistering her plaster and charring her wood was incredible, and it took all that she had, all the force and courage she could draw from the soil and the trees, to keep the windows from breaking and feeding more oxygen to the fire, to guide Dean out with baby Sam in his arms, and all the while to whisper to Mary, to hold the gate open for her and tell her to go through, that there was nothing to be afraid of and House would care for her family as if it were her own. She murmured to Mary that Dean and Sam were safely outside, that it was all right to let go, that many had walked through this gate and what awaited was beautiful and right. Her strength wavered as her walls crumbled, her roof collapsed, and finally she surrendered, let the fire eat at her and focused all of her will on holding that gate open for Mary. She pushed and tugged and opened it as wide as she could, so wide that she heard a voice coming from the other side.
"It's all right, Mary, Daddy's here. Come to me, sweetheart, let me take you home."
"My babies, my boys, John, oh, Daddy..." She cried.
Samuel Campbell held out his hand. "They'll be all right. You can watch over them. Just come with me, sweetheart. It's time to go."
Mary was gone, and House was alone with the pain, crackingpeelingburningblistering, and she dove deep into the basement, into the soil beneath it, and slept to blot out her sorrow.
House could sleep for decades, centuries if she had to, but her respite was short-lived. It wasn't long before Missouri Moseley woke her.
"You got a job to do, you hear?" Missouri said softly, stroking the bubbled paint in her living room. "You stay with those boys and watch out for them. They need you. It ain't over, I can tell you that. This is only the beginning of their journey, God bless all three of 'em."
And so House woke, but things were very different now. She no longer fit in her skin, her limbs charred, incinerated. She was ash and soot, cinder and charcoal. Gutted and blackened. Was she still House, if she was no longer house-shaped? She wondered. There were rules she had to follow. John had taken Sam and Dean to live with friends who had their own House, and House could not intrude on the space inhabited by Another. She made herself small and stayed in the storm cellar with the roots and Earth for company. She was lonely and sad. She missed Mary, she missed John and Dean and Sam. She missed her walls, her warm pine floors, she missed rain on her roof and bread baking in her kitchen. She was still House, because it was the only name she knew, but she was no longer Home.
It took four years after Mary's death for House to realize she would never be Home again. She took many shapes and wore many skins as she followed John and the boys; a trailer in Duluth, an apartment in Cheyenne, and the wonderful House in Sioux Falls that warmly invited her to share the room her boys slept in whenever they visited. But none of them fit right; they were not her walls, her brick and mortar and plaster. They were sheet rock and vinyl siding and she did not belong. She fit poorly at best, and found that the walls did not respond the way her own had; Dean woke in the night to the sound of a drunken neighbor shouting, the backfire of a muffler. Sam was kept awake by a neon sign flashing through the broken blinds on the window. Within her own walls, she could have dampened the sound, moved a tree branch to block the light (and any blinds hung on her windows would never, ever have been broken!) She could have done many things to aid her family in her own skin, but she was an intruder in these dwellings, and they stubbornly ignored her.
The hardest part for her was the time she spent tucked into the trunk of the Impala. Steel and metal were not meant to be a House or a Home. The Car had its own magic. It tolerated her presence, but had no need of her. She grew weak and tired from the many hours she spent in the dark; the constant rumble of the engine lulled her into a deep sleep that left her confused and listless. She began to lose track of her boys. Sometimes they would spend weeks or even months somewhere and she would sleep and sleep, tucked under the eaves or in the garage, any place that seemed inviting enough, and it would take her just as long to track them down again, waiting for messages from the birds and ladybugs, the roots and the bees as to which direction they had headed.
But there were moments of joy amid all the difficulty, and she treasured each and every one. Hours and hours that Dean and Sam spent curled in bed together reading comic books and laughing, or rare evenings when John was her John again, Mary's John, kind and warm as he played cards with the boys, teaching them poker and gin rummy over bowls of popcorn and sodas. The boys grew strong and tall and handsome, and if they continued to share a bed long past the age when John found it acceptable, House would work her hardest to make sure they had some warning of John's arrival; a squeaking screen door, a window that rattled when he pulled into the drive. Her boys deserved whatever comfort they could take from one another, and if House suspected that John would not understand, she would do her part to make sure he simply didn't know.
It wasn't perfect. Far from it. She dreamt of strong solid walls and a level foundation, of beadboard and crown molding. Cabinets that shut properly and plumbing made of warm, bright copper instead of dull, mute plastic. But they made do. Sam and Dean stole what moments of happiness they could find, and although House could do so little now to assist them, she hoped they felt her presence, her love for them, and that it was enough.
Sam had just gotten his driver's license when they moved into the house in Decorah. A house! It was small and had not been loved in a very long time, but it had no House of its own, and she stretched and shimmied with joy as she unfurled along the walls, the ceiling, sank joyously into the floors and claimed it as her own. She was happy again, and it was a golden spring and summer. Sam went to school and Dean worked at a garage and they both worked as busboys at night. What John did, and where he went for weeks at a time, she could not say. But her boys came home tired each night and finally, finally she had room to wiggle and move.
She spent hours conversing with the walls and floors, the rusty radiators and the leaking pipes. She explained how dear her boys were, how much they needed a little comfort, and after a time each part of her new body was happy to comply. Admittedly, the fence went a little too far when the man from the electric company came to shut the power off. Something had needed doing, that much was certain, but making that rusty nail stick out and catch the man's calf wouldn't have been her first suggestion. After that they worked long and hard on their communication skills and kept the dwelling as comfortable for Dean and Sam as possible. The light bulbs glowed brightly while Sam studied into the night and the shingles were stalwart against the weather when House knew that Dean couldn't afford to replace them. There was that incident in the shower, but the tiles could hardly be blamed for that. They held up valiantly, but Sam and Dean weren't little boys anymore, they were big and strong and their combined weight and all that soap... well, House thought it best not to think of it again. They were nearly adults, and loved one another very much, and after a gentle reprimand the tiles assured her they would do their best to not let it happen again.
Things were as close to normal as they would ever get with Mary gone, until that day in late August. John banged her door carelessly as he rushed inside and yelled for Sam and Dean to grab only what they could carry and get in the car, they were leaving in half an hour and would not return. House sighed and began to gather herself together, saying goodbye to the pipes, the radiators, the oak paneling and the bay window. She watched as John took a bag of herbs and salt from his pocket and began to trace out a symbol on the floor. She was used to these symbols, meant to protect or conceal, invoke or repel. She was a House, and they weren't governed by the same laws. Until this time. John took out a book and began to chant, Latin she thought it was, but as he chanted he anointed his forehead with some sort of oil, then did the same to Sam and Dean, and House felt her perception shift sideways, slide off into...
And then she slept. When she woke, she was alone.
Neither the birds nor the trees, not the soil or the grass, the wind or the rain could find her boys. Whatever spell John had performed had hidden them so well and thoroughly that she could not find them. Her sadness turned to despair, her despair to such loneliness that she curled up among the roots of a pecan tree, pulled the soil up snug around her and forgot that she was House, that she was needed, that her boys were alone without her. She existed only to dream of the pitter patter of little feet on her gleaming pine floors, sunlight streaming through her windows to glow in Mary's hair, and the smell of sulfur as House burned to nothing.
She slept for weeks, months, years. The seasons changed and the world turned; and House slept through it all. She could have slept forever, perhaps, but something dark began to trouble her dreams. Yellow eyes and the coppery tinge of blood, and her sweet little Sam crying out, "No, Jess, no!", snarled in his own dark dreams, far far away.
House rolled and stretched, roused from her long sleep and found that the little cottage was gone, the pecan tree was gone. How many years had she slumbered under this ugly strip mall? The Walgreens was cold and silent, the static buzz of its own fluorescent lights the only thing it could hear. Starbucks was no better. It gleamed and shone and seemed warm and inviting, but under its thin skin it was the same as the others; veneer and particle board. Lifeless.
But these were not her concerns. She cast out to the wind, the birds, the butterflies and the grasshoppers, and grew cold and afraid as they replied. Hurry hurry hurry, the veil has been lifted, the darkness has come for your boys. Now Now Now chirped the crickets. The starlings twittered nervously as they brought her the scent, showed her the way. She flung herself at them, as far and fast as she could, and ached at what she felt as she drew near. Oh John, what's happened to you? She cried. And Dean, Mary's beautiful little boy, so sad and weighted beyond his years. Sammy. Mary's baby. Sweet baby Sam, dreaming of fire and blood and death.
She went as fast as the wind could take her, rode the silvery trails of moonlight to where Dean stood outside his brother's door, hand poised to knock, unable to drive away and leave his baby brother again, but she was too late. She'd slept too long, almost forgotten how to be a House. She was weak. She could only cling tenaciously to the ceiling and whisper to Jessica the same words she had whispered to golden, darling Mary. Don't be afraid. This is not the end. But she herself was afraid, trembling as she held on with all her might, letting the fire peel and excoriate the skin she'd only just slipped into, this dwelling that smelled of Sam, of promises not yet made and others not meant to be kept.
She vowed never to leave her boys again.
Many things had changed while she slumbered. Her boys were tired and wary. Dean was guarded and full of false bravado, and Sam's grief hung about him like a shroud. They no longer slept curled around one another, each keeping the other safe. And oh, how House tried. But when she worked all day and late into the night to convince the frame of Dean's hotel room bed to collapse, Dean slept on the floor instead of in Sam's arms. They were together but millions of miles apart, and House would not tolerate that. They needed one another, even if they could no longer admit it. She would keep trying. She could be patient. She would show Mary's sons that they belonged together.
She followed them to Colorado, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania. Ohio and Indiana. They left her alone in cynical, unwelcoming motel rooms for days at a time, but she didn't mind. They needed her, of this she was certain. She muffled the sound of an illicit tryst in the next room, refused to let the lock budge when a would-be thief tried to force his way inside. Little things. Small comforts. They were all she had to offer, but she would give all she had to her boys. She would not forget her responsibilities again.
Her boys often returned to her bruised and bloody, tired and filthy. If the pipes clanged and yelped as they gave forth limitless gallons of hot water for their showers, well, it's not her fault that the stubborn old water heater needed a good kick to get with the program. She knew Dean wondered why the antiseptic and gauze were always at the very top of his duffle bag when he needed them, but she'd never tell. She evicted the bed bugs, fluffed the pillows, and charged the laptop and cell phones when the boys forgot. They kept her terribly busy, but she didn't mind. To the contrary, she felt strong and purposeful again, as she hadn't in many years. Not since Lawrence. Not Since Mary and John.
House wept when she thought of John. He was lost to her. Houses were very powerful, though it was a subtle power. But there were barriers, insurmountable ones. Houses could be uninvited. Not only from their dwellings, but from their families. John had uninvited House. Not with words, but with the walls he'd built around his heart with too much magic and far, far too much alcohol. Too much anger and self loathing. House missed him, she missed his smile and his warm eyes and steady, diligent hands. She hoped one day he would let her near him again. But for now, she would see to the safety of his children, as Mary would have wanted.
She traveled with them to Missouri, curled in the back of the Impala, and read their books as the road unfolded endlessly beneath them. If this was their life, these words and symbols, runes and incantations, it would be hers as well. She would be ready when the Darkness came again. It would not touch her boys.
It was in Missouri that they found one another again, all hands and mouths and breathless joy, and House made the sheets as soft as silk, kept the bed frame from arguing that it was not strong enough for the weight of two grown men, and drew the curtains when the early morning sun would interrupt their respite. And if they mistook her happy humming for the sound of the heater, there was no reason for them to do otherwise.
House was content, until Sam began to dream of her.
It had never once occurred to her that her dwelling would be rebuilt, that she could have returned. She'd promised Mary she would stay with their family, and that was simply the end of it. But Sam dreamed of her now, her walls strong and solid, her roof whole and invincible. But her skin, her beautiful pine floors and picture window and her sunny kitchen housed something wrong, something angry and mean. This she could not tolerate. She nudged at Sam, gently and lovingly, but firmly insistent, until the morning that he announced to Dean that they must return to Kansas.
She was nervous and excited as the car put miles and miles behind it, drawing them closer to Lawrence. Would she fit in this skin, still? Had she learned enough from the boys' books and talk to repel whatever was infecting her skin and bones? She trembled with emotion as they turned onto the street, so much so that Dean wondered at the vibration and made a mental note to check the spark plugs in the car.
The family living in her dwelling was warm and good. The mother, Jenny, was tired, lonely and sad, missing the life she'd had before. But she loved her children fiercely, and House knew that she would be fine. This dwelling, these walls, her lovely body, had been built to house strong mothers. She unwound slowly along the walls, mapping the new shape and textures; there were granite countertops and porcelain sinks and strong new windows. She greeted each and every one. As exciting as the newness was, she thrilled as she encountered familiar spaces and slid sinuously along them. She unfurled between the studs, behind the walls, along the baseboards and flowed happily, slowly, into the attic, savoring every moment. House. Home. Oh, how she had missed it.
But all was not well. The Wrong Thing, the Angry Thing, was festering in the basement, picking at her floor joists like a million termites, skittering along like hungry rats. It didn't even know what it wanted. She poked it and it snapped viciously at her. She had not been there in a very long time, had not talked to these walls, these floors, in decades, and they were afraid of the Angry Thing. They quivered in fear when she whispered to them that they could fight back, they could repel this nasty invader.
Finally she turned to the one place she was truly afraid to go. Sammy's nursery. The place where Mary had died. She crept cautiously under the door, along the walls. Something had been there. Something that smelled of burning paint and ash and... no. It couldn't be. House sighed. Mary would not walk these rooms again, would not rock her baby to sleep under this window. House stroked the walls lovingly. I've done my very best, Mary, she murmured. They're strong and good and I hope it's been enough.
She worked hard. She burrowed between the floorboards, soaked into the insulation, whispered and promised and cajoled, but the walls quivered and the wiring shrank in horror as the Angry Thing attacked the workman in the kitchen. House could not stop it. It took all her strength to convince the phone line, nearly mute with terror, to call an ambulance for the poor man. She held him as he waited for help to arrive, softened the linoleum to lend comfort, taught the kitchen towel how to wind itself tightly around his arm to slow the loss of blood.
It took the last of her energy to keep his blood from seeping into the subfloor. She was exhausted, depleted. It had been too long since she had done the proper work of a House. She didn't know if she had the strength to drive the Angry Thing away. Angry herself, sad and tired, she sought solace in the nursery. The room Mary had loved so much. It was a little girl's room now, a bright sanctuary for the girl named Sari to play and dream and study, lovingly put together by her mother. Yet there was a longing in the air, in the walls. A wistfulness, and the faint smell of smoke, and it niggled at House's senses, the persistent thought that if she could only remember.... She spent the night inching along under the floorboards, determined to find the answer, pausing often to check on Jenny and her family.
It was nearly noon the next day when she found the gate, hidden behind the girl's winter clothes in the nursery closet. She was ashamed she had not sensed it the first time she entered the room. It was not entirely open, small and wavering uncertainly, but there. A thinning between the worlds. Between Here and What Comes Next. Something, someone, was trying to come through. The last time House had seen the gate... she sighed, remembering.
And then she knew.
Mary! she cried joyously, spinning happily through the house, along the walls, which pulsed with her excitement as she searched for her friend. But the only response was the muffled whimper of the boy Richie, scared and cold in the dark. House raced down the stairs and there it was. The Angry Thing. Black as nothingness, feral and brutal. The amusement it felt as it leaned against the icebox door, trapping the boy inside, oozed from it like smelly hot tar. It grinned at her, all shark teeth and hyena laughter. Mocking and cavalier.
She had had enough. House slammed into the Angry Thing as hard as she could, but it was so much stronger than her. It was like being caught in a funnel cloud of wasps, stinging and hot and she wanted to shrink away, to hide with the wires and the insulation, to get as far away from it as she could. But Richie. Small and scared and trapped, sealed up with not enough air to last more than a few minutes.
She held on tight, let the Angry Thing try to shake her off like a horse swats at a fly, kicked and flailed against it, but all she could do was make the icebox shake, knock over the milk as a warning to that dear child's mother, bang her fists against the Angry Thing until the light fixtures shook and the windows vibrated. It laughed at her, flicked her away as if she were nothing more than a nuisance, and dove down into the basement, smug and satisfied. She collapsed to the floor, sinking in deep, and nearly sobbed with relief when Jenny cried out Richie's name and flung open the icebox door.
House could do no more. It was too strong, and if Mary was there, House could not find her. She slunk away, curled up tight in the cabinet under the bathroom sink and wept, a steady drip drip drip from the faucet.
It was Missouri Moseley who found her.
"You're going to hide now, when Jenny and her babies need help?" Missouri tsked softly, turning the sink handle hard enough that House jumped. "Now you come out here and remember your part," she scolded. "Sam and Dean are big grown boys, even if they don't act like it, but these little children here need you. And I don't just mean this poltergeist. They need a Home," Missouri said kindly. "Sam and Dean can make their own way. It's time for you to go back to doing what you do best." She stroked the wall gently before turning off the light.
House heard Sam and Dean downstairs, moving about, leaving with a list of herbs to gather. She heard the Impala rumble away, and sighed. Her boys. Mary's boys. How could she leave them? It didn't matter how good and right it felt to wind her way through her walls again, to fit in her skin, to hear the sounds of small children. She'd made a promise to Mary.
Mary. She had to find Mary. Somehow she knew that everything would make sense once she did. She pleaded with the pipes. Whispered to the walls. One by one they agreed, lent her their strength, their energy, and in return she made promises, pledges. She would teach them to truly be a Home. To talk to the plants and roots and earth, to talk to one another, so they could love and nurture their family as she had Dean and Sam, John and Mary. She grew stronger as each one joined her. The bricks in the chimney, the banister, the shutters all pledged their aid. She felt more resolute as the trees outside her windows shook to signal their readiness, as the birds gathered under her eaves, along her gutters, squawking encouragement.
As Sam and Dean moved through the house with Missouri, she knew they were under attack. But this time, she could not help. She needed all of her strength for what she must do. They were grown, tall and strong, and they would manage without her, just this once.
She caught a glimpse of them in the nursery together. Dean leaned against her window sill, his breath fogging up the glass, and Sam came up behind him, wound his arm around his brother and held him close.
"You okay, being back here?" Sam asked softly.
Dean leaned into his touch. "You were a beautiful baby," he said softly, stroking the sill. House shuddered with pleasure at his touch. The sconces in the hall burned brighter, suffused with the emotion pouring from Dean. "Even if there hadn't been a fire, if mom... I'd still have wanted..."
Sam turned Dean in his arms and kissed him, leaned his forehead against his brother's. "I know," he whispered. "I love you too. Now let's get this done before it gets dark," he murmured, kissed Dean again and turned away to hack another hole in her walls. She allowed it, just this once.
She could not use their books and spells, their herbs and magic. But she did not need it. She had her own. She was Home. It was all she needed to be. She gathered an army of nails and screws, rivets and beams and shingles. The marigolds in the garden stood at attention, brave and ready.
Finally, she too was ready. This was her house. Jenny's Home. She would open that gate, and let through whatever waited on the other side, and hope it meant to help her send that damnable thing in her basement straight to Hell.
It was dark out, and Jenny and her children were in bed, trying to shake off the events of the day and find their way to sleep. Sam and Dean sat in the Impala outside, keeping watch on the house and the family inside. Her boys. Such fine men they had become.
She went first to Richie, small and sweet, curled on his side in his little bed. His cheeks were flushed with sleep, his lashes twitching as he dreamed. She leaned close to him, whispered sweet nothings to assure his dreams were carefree, and tucked his bear under his arm. She'd missed having a little one to love. Being near him filled her with tenderness and strengthened her resolve all at once.
She went to Jenny next, stroked her forehead, smoothed out the blankets rumpled from her tossing and turning. As she sang softly to her she felt It stirring, heard it smack its ugly lips and rouse from slumber, ready to play. She had to hurry.
She spared a moment to cast a tender look at Sari as she entered the nursery. Not unlike her Dean, this one was. Her father distant, her brother needing her so, her life turned upside down. House could not help but love her.
She steeled herself. She could wait no longer. It was coming up the stairs, towards Jenny's room. She flung open the closet door, ready to throw herself at that gate and demand assistance from What Came Next. But there was Mary, pushing desperately at the gate. The veil was wrapped tightly around her, a living second skin of fire and sorrow, holding her back. She was shrouded in her own death, the fire twisting and coiling around her, refusing to give, to let her through. She tried to scream but could only whisper. "Sam, Sam!" a flicker of sound as she beat furiously at the veil. Sari began to scream.
House grabbed Mary, pulled as hard as she could, tearing at the veil with the strength of her sharp nails, the determination of her foundation, the strength of her bricks and walls. The fire was hot and wild but it did not burn. It was made only of Mary's grief, and House plucked the clinging strands from her beloved friend as if they were nothing but cobwebs. It was difficult work only because Mary would not hold still. Mary reached for Sam as he entered the room with Richie in his arms, the longing she felt its own bright flame, but he couldn't see her. He grabbed Sari from her bed and ran with them both.
"It's going to kill them all, we have to stop it!" Mary shouted to House once the last remnants were torn free. House took only an instant to look at Mary, aflame now with starlight, with her love for her babies, her anger at the thing that dared invade her house. She was glorious, and House loved her so, could not contain her joy as she wrapped herself around her friend and told Mary to hang on. House shouted for the floor to make way for her, and together they dove through the floor as the Angry Thing latched onto Sam, dragging him back into the house, its laughter reverberating through her halls.
It had Sam by the throat, pinned against her cabinets. Mary flickered and burned in her arms. How DARE it touch their babies! Mary's fury was terrible and just, and It recoiled when she approached, loosening its grasp. House heard Dean shouting, and commanded the door, gravely offended by the hatchet in Dean's hands, to let him through. They would repair the damage later, she assured it.
Dean ran into the kitchen, calling Sam's name, and raised his gun at the fiery figure of his mother.
"No, don't, don't!" Sam pleaded, his eyes filling with tears.
"What, why?" Dean asked, confused.
"Because I know who it is. I can see her now."
Mary's happiness, her pure joy, cooled the flames of her sorrow, her anger. She stood before her boys bathed in radiant silver light, smiling beatifically.
"Mom?" Dean whispered, nearly forgetting the gun he held as he slowly lowered it.
"Dean," Mary murmured, his name laden with such pride and love, such longing that House ached at the sound. Dean's lower lip trembled and House saw into his heart, four years old again, his mother the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
Mary walked towards Sam, and the air was so thick with feeling, pregnant with all that Mary had never been able to say to her babe. "Sam," she said, so softly, so tenderly that the whole house held its breath, waiting to hear what she would say next. "I'm sorry."
Confusion and longing creased Sam's face as tears ran down his cheeks. "For what?" he whispered. But Mary could not reply. It was behind her, the Angry Thing, looming and black, hoping to catch her at her most vulnerable.
Mary turned to face it, and House knew what she must do. She coiled herself around her friend, brought the strength of the walls and floors and roof with her, building a fortress around Mary and her babies, burning brightly with determination. Mary looked up at it, looked into its snake pit eyes and commanded with her own voice, the voice of the roots and trees and earth, the stars and sky.
"You get out of my House," the moon in her voice, the sun. Every mother who ever loved a child in her voice. "And let go of my son."
The house trembled and shook. Another gate opened, this one onto a black nothingness, and one moment the Angry Thing was there, and the next it was gone, sucked into the darkness. Not just absent, but Gone. As if it had never existed.
House had no time to wonder what had become of it. In the next instant she was in the closet of the nursery, poised before the gate. It was open wide now, shimmering softly, invitingly. House touched it, and gasped as the golden glimmer of it suffused her, ran down her... legs.
Human legs. She gasped and pressed human hands to a human chest.
Mary's soft glow entered the closet, smiling tenderly at her, and House understood.
"My friend," Mary murmured, reaching to touch her, to enfold her in her warm embrace. "Thank you."
House shook with emotion. "You're welcome," she whispered, hugging Mary tight. "You won't be back, will you?"
Mary shook her head. "No. It's time. And time for you as well, dear one," She said softly, stroking House's cheek. "You've raised our boys. They're men now, and they have each other. They have to make the rest of their journey on their own."
"But I promised!" House protested, clouds gathering over her roof as tears filled her eyes.
Mary's smile was so gentle and soothing as she spoke. "You've kept your promise. It's time to make new ones. To Jenny and Sari and Richie. Don't be afraid," she murmured. She kissed House on the cheek, then slipped through the gate. It closed behind her, leaving only the faint smell of honeysuckle behind.
The human glamour faded, and House was just House again. She slipped into her own skin, between the walls, into the attic, deep into the basement, reclaiming it. This was her house. She had done all she could for Dean and Sam, loved them with a mother's heart and followed them to places she was never meant to go. But she was still a House. It was what she did best. It was what she would always be. She was meant to be a Home, but she wasn't that to Sam and Dean any longer. If she had learned anything on her journeys with them, it was that Home could exist without a house, a dwelling. Home was comfort and shelter, love and devotion. A safe haven.
Sam and Dean had found their own Home in each other.
House dried her tears, took a deep breath, and turned her attention to the busted windows and broken front door. To Jenny, Sari and Richie. Her family. They needed her to make this house their Home. There was so much to do! There was glass everywhere, splintered wood and heaven help her, holes in her sheetrock. It was time to go to work.
End
Author: Logan
humming_alongPairing: Mention of John/Mary and Sam/Dean OC POV
Rating: PG-13 for mention of weecest
warnings: none
Spoilers: Up to season 1, Ep 9 "Home"
Summary: House loved her family very much. She'd loved them all, of course, but this family was special to her.
Disclaimer: Nope, still not mine. Damn you, Kripke.
Notes: I wouldn't have even written this if it weren't for
marciaelena, beta extraordinaire and the most beautiful girl in the world.[...]One of the most universally held beliefs about anthropomorphic spirits is the concept of a "House" (denoted by capitalization of the letter h). This belief revolves around the idea that some human dwellings develop a soul or spirit of their own, once the dwelling has been charged with the right type of emotional energy from its occupants. The conception of a child, a personal spiritual awakening, or the deep desire to create a homestead from the dwelling is said to provide this energy, and explains why not all dwellings have such spirits. Mobile homes, apartments, motels and other dwellings meant for more temporary habitation usually do not possess them. This belief may be the origin of the phrase "A house is not a home", meaning that not just any dwelling embodies the concept of "home" until it has been charged with the appropriate energy for it to have such a spirit of its own.
-- Murdock, Robert M. "The House with a Soul and Other Anthropomorphic Spirit Folklore of the American Midwest." Hearth and Home (1974): p.81-84
House loved her family very much. She'd loved them all, of course, but this family was special to her. Perhaps because John and Mary had been so young when they came to her; Dean had been a tiny little toothless thing in a yellow sleeper, not quite four months old. House was so happy to have a baby under her roof again that the furnace hummed with pleasure, keeping Dean's nursery toasty warm when he kicked off the blankets at night.
Yes, House loved John and Mary Winchester. She could tell by the care John put into cleaning her chimney and by the protective symbols Mary scattered about the house; salt on the doorways, blue bottles in the windowsills, sage tossed in the fireplace. John kept her pipes in pristine condition despite their age and Mary made her garden bloom with Angelica and Hyssop, Feverfew and Lovage. In return, House did what she could to keep them safe and happy as well; she coaxed a little more propane from the tank during their lean first winter within her walls. She made the closet door stick firmly when Mary wanted to retrieve her winter boots, unaware that a brown recluse had made its home in the left one.
As the years passed, House spent much of her energy on little Dean. Tow-headed and full of mischief, that boy was, and her floors were a little less shiny and a squirrel found its way into her attic while she was occupied moving rugs to catch him as he tumbled, bracing the banister for Dean to slide down. Oh, but he did keep her and Mary busy! It didn't matter; she loved him so much that she couldn't bring herself to mind. She hummed contentedly as he slept each night, warm and safe in her lath and plaster arms. Perhaps one day it would be his children bathing in her tub and climbing her trees. She loved her family, and they loved her.
House was thrilled at first when Dean moved to the bedroom down the hall and John painted the nursery yellow. She kept the screws from rolling away as he struggled to assemble the crib (it had vexed her for years that her floorboards had warped), and convinced the plaster that it was a terrible time to crack when Mary tapped in nails to hang new pictures on the walls.
But something troubled Mary during her pregnancy, and House didn't know what it was. She did all she could to take care of Mary as her belly grew. She sternly told the spiders that she would tolerate no cobwebs in her corners, called the water in the the ancient tank such scandalous names that it was steaming hot when Mary wanted a bath. She talked to the paint, which talked to the crayons, and Dean never did figure out why those darned Crayolas didn't work when he wanted to draw a spaceship on his bedroom wall. She put the toilet seat down when John left it up and shut the icebox door behind Dean a dozen times a day.
House felt sure that all would be well again after Mary and John brought little Sammy home. What a darling baby he was! And how Dean loved his new baby brother. House made sure the floor didn't creak when Dean crept from his bed at night to peer at his sleeping brother. She moved the light switch in the hall just enough that Mary's tired hand always found it as she made her late night journeys to Sam's room. Yes, Sam was the perfect addition to their little family. House's flower beds were verdant with color that spring, and she even cajoled that stubborn pear tree in the backyard to hold onto those hard green little fruits until they were ripe and sugar sweet, much to Dean's delight.
But something had changed, and House could not make it right. During the daylight hours all was as it should be; Dean's little legs pumped furiously as he rode his Big Wheel up and down her driveway, and Mary basked in her big picture window as she nursed and sang to baby Sam. John came home tired but satisfied just in time for supper every evening, and if Mary was a little distracted with the baby and the roast was starting to dry, House spoke to the oven who was happy to oblige and turn the temperature down. Yet late at night, Mary tossed and turned, and House felt helpless. She soothed Mary to the best of her ability, keeping the wooden floors warm and encouraging the lavender sachets under the mattress to give off a little more scent to ease Mary's dreams. But nothing worked. Mary woke more and more often, gasping and shaking in the night.
It was the second week of October and Sammy was teething when the crows came. "It's coming!" They cried, circling her eaves, beating their coal-black wings against her windows. "Death is coming!" they screamed, defecating on her porch. House spoke to the soil, which spoke to the tree roots, and confirmed the dire warnings of the crows. Something unspeakable was coming. House was not afraid of Death; she was an old house, and people had died under her roof before. Death was only another beginning. But this, whatever darkness was approaching, wished great harm to her family, and she simply could not allow that to happen. She would have to let go of her dear Mary and strong, kind John and their babies.
House was on a mission to drive her beloved family away. She started the campaign by backing up the septic tank, then nearly concussing John by shortening the bottom step as he left for work one early morning. She made the windows rattle and the pipes clang. But John, ever loyal to her, was ready to defend his home. He attacked each new problem with hammer and wrench, annoyed but resolute. Mary called him her hero and kissed him so tenderly that House was all the more determined to send them away, to keep them safe. She flickered the lights at all hours, burned everything that Mary cooked, and bowed a branch on the big Elm tree so that it made a teeth-clenching-headache-inducing sound as it scraped across their bedroom window at night.
It was all to no avail. The days ticked by and the moths came, then the toads. Death, they warned. Death under your roof, blood on your walls, your studs burned to cinders. House grew desperate, and each afternoon as the shadows slid down her walls she thought of new torments for her loved ones. The smell of something rotting in the living room, slamming doors that were shut tight, turning the volume up on the television (how terrible she felt when Dean was chastised for that).
John and Mary stayed, and House wept. Dean asked Mary if they were having an earthquake. Mary kissed him and told him it was just an old house, it was normal for things to break and the house to shake as it settled.
It was the second of November, and House was busy guiding a stream of ants into the kitchen when the darkness came. It wore the body of a man but there was nothing alive or human about it. House gathered all of her energies, determined to shake her family loose, crumble herself to her foundation if she must, anything to keep him away. But it was too late. As he walked up the sidewalk she felt her energy deplete, drain from her studs and ceiling; even the deep roots of the trees under the basement shrank back. He stepped over her threshold, past the runes Mary had drawn on her walls before putting up the wallpaper, and claimed what was not his to take. House could barely flicker the lights in warning as he approached the nursery.
When he threw Mary against her ceiling she tried to hold her gently, to whisper to her to be calm, to be still and John would save them. But Mary was too afraid to hear.
House did what she could, blessed little that it was. The pain of the fire blistering her plaster and charring her wood was incredible, and it took all that she had, all the force and courage she could draw from the soil and the trees, to keep the windows from breaking and feeding more oxygen to the fire, to guide Dean out with baby Sam in his arms, and all the while to whisper to Mary, to hold the gate open for her and tell her to go through, that there was nothing to be afraid of and House would care for her family as if it were her own. She murmured to Mary that Dean and Sam were safely outside, that it was all right to let go, that many had walked through this gate and what awaited was beautiful and right. Her strength wavered as her walls crumbled, her roof collapsed, and finally she surrendered, let the fire eat at her and focused all of her will on holding that gate open for Mary. She pushed and tugged and opened it as wide as she could, so wide that she heard a voice coming from the other side.
"It's all right, Mary, Daddy's here. Come to me, sweetheart, let me take you home."
"My babies, my boys, John, oh, Daddy..." She cried.
Samuel Campbell held out his hand. "They'll be all right. You can watch over them. Just come with me, sweetheart. It's time to go."
Mary was gone, and House was alone with the pain, crackingpeelingburningblistering, and she dove deep into the basement, into the soil beneath it, and slept to blot out her sorrow.
House could sleep for decades, centuries if she had to, but her respite was short-lived. It wasn't long before Missouri Moseley woke her.
"You got a job to do, you hear?" Missouri said softly, stroking the bubbled paint in her living room. "You stay with those boys and watch out for them. They need you. It ain't over, I can tell you that. This is only the beginning of their journey, God bless all three of 'em."
And so House woke, but things were very different now. She no longer fit in her skin, her limbs charred, incinerated. She was ash and soot, cinder and charcoal. Gutted and blackened. Was she still House, if she was no longer house-shaped? She wondered. There were rules she had to follow. John had taken Sam and Dean to live with friends who had their own House, and House could not intrude on the space inhabited by Another. She made herself small and stayed in the storm cellar with the roots and Earth for company. She was lonely and sad. She missed Mary, she missed John and Dean and Sam. She missed her walls, her warm pine floors, she missed rain on her roof and bread baking in her kitchen. She was still House, because it was the only name she knew, but she was no longer Home.
It took four years after Mary's death for House to realize she would never be Home again. She took many shapes and wore many skins as she followed John and the boys; a trailer in Duluth, an apartment in Cheyenne, and the wonderful House in Sioux Falls that warmly invited her to share the room her boys slept in whenever they visited. But none of them fit right; they were not her walls, her brick and mortar and plaster. They were sheet rock and vinyl siding and she did not belong. She fit poorly at best, and found that the walls did not respond the way her own had; Dean woke in the night to the sound of a drunken neighbor shouting, the backfire of a muffler. Sam was kept awake by a neon sign flashing through the broken blinds on the window. Within her own walls, she could have dampened the sound, moved a tree branch to block the light (and any blinds hung on her windows would never, ever have been broken!) She could have done many things to aid her family in her own skin, but she was an intruder in these dwellings, and they stubbornly ignored her.
The hardest part for her was the time she spent tucked into the trunk of the Impala. Steel and metal were not meant to be a House or a Home. The Car had its own magic. It tolerated her presence, but had no need of her. She grew weak and tired from the many hours she spent in the dark; the constant rumble of the engine lulled her into a deep sleep that left her confused and listless. She began to lose track of her boys. Sometimes they would spend weeks or even months somewhere and she would sleep and sleep, tucked under the eaves or in the garage, any place that seemed inviting enough, and it would take her just as long to track them down again, waiting for messages from the birds and ladybugs, the roots and the bees as to which direction they had headed.
But there were moments of joy amid all the difficulty, and she treasured each and every one. Hours and hours that Dean and Sam spent curled in bed together reading comic books and laughing, or rare evenings when John was her John again, Mary's John, kind and warm as he played cards with the boys, teaching them poker and gin rummy over bowls of popcorn and sodas. The boys grew strong and tall and handsome, and if they continued to share a bed long past the age when John found it acceptable, House would work her hardest to make sure they had some warning of John's arrival; a squeaking screen door, a window that rattled when he pulled into the drive. Her boys deserved whatever comfort they could take from one another, and if House suspected that John would not understand, she would do her part to make sure he simply didn't know.
It wasn't perfect. Far from it. She dreamt of strong solid walls and a level foundation, of beadboard and crown molding. Cabinets that shut properly and plumbing made of warm, bright copper instead of dull, mute plastic. But they made do. Sam and Dean stole what moments of happiness they could find, and although House could do so little now to assist them, she hoped they felt her presence, her love for them, and that it was enough.
Sam had just gotten his driver's license when they moved into the house in Decorah. A house! It was small and had not been loved in a very long time, but it had no House of its own, and she stretched and shimmied with joy as she unfurled along the walls, the ceiling, sank joyously into the floors and claimed it as her own. She was happy again, and it was a golden spring and summer. Sam went to school and Dean worked at a garage and they both worked as busboys at night. What John did, and where he went for weeks at a time, she could not say. But her boys came home tired each night and finally, finally she had room to wiggle and move.
She spent hours conversing with the walls and floors, the rusty radiators and the leaking pipes. She explained how dear her boys were, how much they needed a little comfort, and after a time each part of her new body was happy to comply. Admittedly, the fence went a little too far when the man from the electric company came to shut the power off. Something had needed doing, that much was certain, but making that rusty nail stick out and catch the man's calf wouldn't have been her first suggestion. After that they worked long and hard on their communication skills and kept the dwelling as comfortable for Dean and Sam as possible. The light bulbs glowed brightly while Sam studied into the night and the shingles were stalwart against the weather when House knew that Dean couldn't afford to replace them. There was that incident in the shower, but the tiles could hardly be blamed for that. They held up valiantly, but Sam and Dean weren't little boys anymore, they were big and strong and their combined weight and all that soap... well, House thought it best not to think of it again. They were nearly adults, and loved one another very much, and after a gentle reprimand the tiles assured her they would do their best to not let it happen again.
Things were as close to normal as they would ever get with Mary gone, until that day in late August. John banged her door carelessly as he rushed inside and yelled for Sam and Dean to grab only what they could carry and get in the car, they were leaving in half an hour and would not return. House sighed and began to gather herself together, saying goodbye to the pipes, the radiators, the oak paneling and the bay window. She watched as John took a bag of herbs and salt from his pocket and began to trace out a symbol on the floor. She was used to these symbols, meant to protect or conceal, invoke or repel. She was a House, and they weren't governed by the same laws. Until this time. John took out a book and began to chant, Latin she thought it was, but as he chanted he anointed his forehead with some sort of oil, then did the same to Sam and Dean, and House felt her perception shift sideways, slide off into...
And then she slept. When she woke, she was alone.
Neither the birds nor the trees, not the soil or the grass, the wind or the rain could find her boys. Whatever spell John had performed had hidden them so well and thoroughly that she could not find them. Her sadness turned to despair, her despair to such loneliness that she curled up among the roots of a pecan tree, pulled the soil up snug around her and forgot that she was House, that she was needed, that her boys were alone without her. She existed only to dream of the pitter patter of little feet on her gleaming pine floors, sunlight streaming through her windows to glow in Mary's hair, and the smell of sulfur as House burned to nothing.
She slept for weeks, months, years. The seasons changed and the world turned; and House slept through it all. She could have slept forever, perhaps, but something dark began to trouble her dreams. Yellow eyes and the coppery tinge of blood, and her sweet little Sam crying out, "No, Jess, no!", snarled in his own dark dreams, far far away.
House rolled and stretched, roused from her long sleep and found that the little cottage was gone, the pecan tree was gone. How many years had she slumbered under this ugly strip mall? The Walgreens was cold and silent, the static buzz of its own fluorescent lights the only thing it could hear. Starbucks was no better. It gleamed and shone and seemed warm and inviting, but under its thin skin it was the same as the others; veneer and particle board. Lifeless.
But these were not her concerns. She cast out to the wind, the birds, the butterflies and the grasshoppers, and grew cold and afraid as they replied. Hurry hurry hurry, the veil has been lifted, the darkness has come for your boys. Now Now Now chirped the crickets. The starlings twittered nervously as they brought her the scent, showed her the way. She flung herself at them, as far and fast as she could, and ached at what she felt as she drew near. Oh John, what's happened to you? She cried. And Dean, Mary's beautiful little boy, so sad and weighted beyond his years. Sammy. Mary's baby. Sweet baby Sam, dreaming of fire and blood and death.
She went as fast as the wind could take her, rode the silvery trails of moonlight to where Dean stood outside his brother's door, hand poised to knock, unable to drive away and leave his baby brother again, but she was too late. She'd slept too long, almost forgotten how to be a House. She was weak. She could only cling tenaciously to the ceiling and whisper to Jessica the same words she had whispered to golden, darling Mary. Don't be afraid. This is not the end. But she herself was afraid, trembling as she held on with all her might, letting the fire peel and excoriate the skin she'd only just slipped into, this dwelling that smelled of Sam, of promises not yet made and others not meant to be kept.
She vowed never to leave her boys again.
Many things had changed while she slumbered. Her boys were tired and wary. Dean was guarded and full of false bravado, and Sam's grief hung about him like a shroud. They no longer slept curled around one another, each keeping the other safe. And oh, how House tried. But when she worked all day and late into the night to convince the frame of Dean's hotel room bed to collapse, Dean slept on the floor instead of in Sam's arms. They were together but millions of miles apart, and House would not tolerate that. They needed one another, even if they could no longer admit it. She would keep trying. She could be patient. She would show Mary's sons that they belonged together.
She followed them to Colorado, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania. Ohio and Indiana. They left her alone in cynical, unwelcoming motel rooms for days at a time, but she didn't mind. They needed her, of this she was certain. She muffled the sound of an illicit tryst in the next room, refused to let the lock budge when a would-be thief tried to force his way inside. Little things. Small comforts. They were all she had to offer, but she would give all she had to her boys. She would not forget her responsibilities again.
Her boys often returned to her bruised and bloody, tired and filthy. If the pipes clanged and yelped as they gave forth limitless gallons of hot water for their showers, well, it's not her fault that the stubborn old water heater needed a good kick to get with the program. She knew Dean wondered why the antiseptic and gauze were always at the very top of his duffle bag when he needed them, but she'd never tell. She evicted the bed bugs, fluffed the pillows, and charged the laptop and cell phones when the boys forgot. They kept her terribly busy, but she didn't mind. To the contrary, she felt strong and purposeful again, as she hadn't in many years. Not since Lawrence. Not Since Mary and John.
House wept when she thought of John. He was lost to her. Houses were very powerful, though it was a subtle power. But there were barriers, insurmountable ones. Houses could be uninvited. Not only from their dwellings, but from their families. John had uninvited House. Not with words, but with the walls he'd built around his heart with too much magic and far, far too much alcohol. Too much anger and self loathing. House missed him, she missed his smile and his warm eyes and steady, diligent hands. She hoped one day he would let her near him again. But for now, she would see to the safety of his children, as Mary would have wanted.
She traveled with them to Missouri, curled in the back of the Impala, and read their books as the road unfolded endlessly beneath them. If this was their life, these words and symbols, runes and incantations, it would be hers as well. She would be ready when the Darkness came again. It would not touch her boys.
It was in Missouri that they found one another again, all hands and mouths and breathless joy, and House made the sheets as soft as silk, kept the bed frame from arguing that it was not strong enough for the weight of two grown men, and drew the curtains when the early morning sun would interrupt their respite. And if they mistook her happy humming for the sound of the heater, there was no reason for them to do otherwise.
House was content, until Sam began to dream of her.
It had never once occurred to her that her dwelling would be rebuilt, that she could have returned. She'd promised Mary she would stay with their family, and that was simply the end of it. But Sam dreamed of her now, her walls strong and solid, her roof whole and invincible. But her skin, her beautiful pine floors and picture window and her sunny kitchen housed something wrong, something angry and mean. This she could not tolerate. She nudged at Sam, gently and lovingly, but firmly insistent, until the morning that he announced to Dean that they must return to Kansas.
She was nervous and excited as the car put miles and miles behind it, drawing them closer to Lawrence. Would she fit in this skin, still? Had she learned enough from the boys' books and talk to repel whatever was infecting her skin and bones? She trembled with emotion as they turned onto the street, so much so that Dean wondered at the vibration and made a mental note to check the spark plugs in the car.
The family living in her dwelling was warm and good. The mother, Jenny, was tired, lonely and sad, missing the life she'd had before. But she loved her children fiercely, and House knew that she would be fine. This dwelling, these walls, her lovely body, had been built to house strong mothers. She unwound slowly along the walls, mapping the new shape and textures; there were granite countertops and porcelain sinks and strong new windows. She greeted each and every one. As exciting as the newness was, she thrilled as she encountered familiar spaces and slid sinuously along them. She unfurled between the studs, behind the walls, along the baseboards and flowed happily, slowly, into the attic, savoring every moment. House. Home. Oh, how she had missed it.
But all was not well. The Wrong Thing, the Angry Thing, was festering in the basement, picking at her floor joists like a million termites, skittering along like hungry rats. It didn't even know what it wanted. She poked it and it snapped viciously at her. She had not been there in a very long time, had not talked to these walls, these floors, in decades, and they were afraid of the Angry Thing. They quivered in fear when she whispered to them that they could fight back, they could repel this nasty invader.
Finally she turned to the one place she was truly afraid to go. Sammy's nursery. The place where Mary had died. She crept cautiously under the door, along the walls. Something had been there. Something that smelled of burning paint and ash and... no. It couldn't be. House sighed. Mary would not walk these rooms again, would not rock her baby to sleep under this window. House stroked the walls lovingly. I've done my very best, Mary, she murmured. They're strong and good and I hope it's been enough.
She worked hard. She burrowed between the floorboards, soaked into the insulation, whispered and promised and cajoled, but the walls quivered and the wiring shrank in horror as the Angry Thing attacked the workman in the kitchen. House could not stop it. It took all her strength to convince the phone line, nearly mute with terror, to call an ambulance for the poor man. She held him as he waited for help to arrive, softened the linoleum to lend comfort, taught the kitchen towel how to wind itself tightly around his arm to slow the loss of blood.
It took the last of her energy to keep his blood from seeping into the subfloor. She was exhausted, depleted. It had been too long since she had done the proper work of a House. She didn't know if she had the strength to drive the Angry Thing away. Angry herself, sad and tired, she sought solace in the nursery. The room Mary had loved so much. It was a little girl's room now, a bright sanctuary for the girl named Sari to play and dream and study, lovingly put together by her mother. Yet there was a longing in the air, in the walls. A wistfulness, and the faint smell of smoke, and it niggled at House's senses, the persistent thought that if she could only remember.... She spent the night inching along under the floorboards, determined to find the answer, pausing often to check on Jenny and her family.
It was nearly noon the next day when she found the gate, hidden behind the girl's winter clothes in the nursery closet. She was ashamed she had not sensed it the first time she entered the room. It was not entirely open, small and wavering uncertainly, but there. A thinning between the worlds. Between Here and What Comes Next. Something, someone, was trying to come through. The last time House had seen the gate... she sighed, remembering.
And then she knew.
Mary! she cried joyously, spinning happily through the house, along the walls, which pulsed with her excitement as she searched for her friend. But the only response was the muffled whimper of the boy Richie, scared and cold in the dark. House raced down the stairs and there it was. The Angry Thing. Black as nothingness, feral and brutal. The amusement it felt as it leaned against the icebox door, trapping the boy inside, oozed from it like smelly hot tar. It grinned at her, all shark teeth and hyena laughter. Mocking and cavalier.
She had had enough. House slammed into the Angry Thing as hard as she could, but it was so much stronger than her. It was like being caught in a funnel cloud of wasps, stinging and hot and she wanted to shrink away, to hide with the wires and the insulation, to get as far away from it as she could. But Richie. Small and scared and trapped, sealed up with not enough air to last more than a few minutes.
She held on tight, let the Angry Thing try to shake her off like a horse swats at a fly, kicked and flailed against it, but all she could do was make the icebox shake, knock over the milk as a warning to that dear child's mother, bang her fists against the Angry Thing until the light fixtures shook and the windows vibrated. It laughed at her, flicked her away as if she were nothing more than a nuisance, and dove down into the basement, smug and satisfied. She collapsed to the floor, sinking in deep, and nearly sobbed with relief when Jenny cried out Richie's name and flung open the icebox door.
House could do no more. It was too strong, and if Mary was there, House could not find her. She slunk away, curled up tight in the cabinet under the bathroom sink and wept, a steady drip drip drip from the faucet.
It was Missouri Moseley who found her.
"You're going to hide now, when Jenny and her babies need help?" Missouri tsked softly, turning the sink handle hard enough that House jumped. "Now you come out here and remember your part," she scolded. "Sam and Dean are big grown boys, even if they don't act like it, but these little children here need you. And I don't just mean this poltergeist. They need a Home," Missouri said kindly. "Sam and Dean can make their own way. It's time for you to go back to doing what you do best." She stroked the wall gently before turning off the light.
House heard Sam and Dean downstairs, moving about, leaving with a list of herbs to gather. She heard the Impala rumble away, and sighed. Her boys. Mary's boys. How could she leave them? It didn't matter how good and right it felt to wind her way through her walls again, to fit in her skin, to hear the sounds of small children. She'd made a promise to Mary.
Mary. She had to find Mary. Somehow she knew that everything would make sense once she did. She pleaded with the pipes. Whispered to the walls. One by one they agreed, lent her their strength, their energy, and in return she made promises, pledges. She would teach them to truly be a Home. To talk to the plants and roots and earth, to talk to one another, so they could love and nurture their family as she had Dean and Sam, John and Mary. She grew stronger as each one joined her. The bricks in the chimney, the banister, the shutters all pledged their aid. She felt more resolute as the trees outside her windows shook to signal their readiness, as the birds gathered under her eaves, along her gutters, squawking encouragement.
As Sam and Dean moved through the house with Missouri, she knew they were under attack. But this time, she could not help. She needed all of her strength for what she must do. They were grown, tall and strong, and they would manage without her, just this once.
She caught a glimpse of them in the nursery together. Dean leaned against her window sill, his breath fogging up the glass, and Sam came up behind him, wound his arm around his brother and held him close.
"You okay, being back here?" Sam asked softly.
Dean leaned into his touch. "You were a beautiful baby," he said softly, stroking the sill. House shuddered with pleasure at his touch. The sconces in the hall burned brighter, suffused with the emotion pouring from Dean. "Even if there hadn't been a fire, if mom... I'd still have wanted..."
Sam turned Dean in his arms and kissed him, leaned his forehead against his brother's. "I know," he whispered. "I love you too. Now let's get this done before it gets dark," he murmured, kissed Dean again and turned away to hack another hole in her walls. She allowed it, just this once.
She could not use their books and spells, their herbs and magic. But she did not need it. She had her own. She was Home. It was all she needed to be. She gathered an army of nails and screws, rivets and beams and shingles. The marigolds in the garden stood at attention, brave and ready.
Finally, she too was ready. This was her house. Jenny's Home. She would open that gate, and let through whatever waited on the other side, and hope it meant to help her send that damnable thing in her basement straight to Hell.
It was dark out, and Jenny and her children were in bed, trying to shake off the events of the day and find their way to sleep. Sam and Dean sat in the Impala outside, keeping watch on the house and the family inside. Her boys. Such fine men they had become.
She went first to Richie, small and sweet, curled on his side in his little bed. His cheeks were flushed with sleep, his lashes twitching as he dreamed. She leaned close to him, whispered sweet nothings to assure his dreams were carefree, and tucked his bear under his arm. She'd missed having a little one to love. Being near him filled her with tenderness and strengthened her resolve all at once.
She went to Jenny next, stroked her forehead, smoothed out the blankets rumpled from her tossing and turning. As she sang softly to her she felt It stirring, heard it smack its ugly lips and rouse from slumber, ready to play. She had to hurry.
She spared a moment to cast a tender look at Sari as she entered the nursery. Not unlike her Dean, this one was. Her father distant, her brother needing her so, her life turned upside down. House could not help but love her.
She steeled herself. She could wait no longer. It was coming up the stairs, towards Jenny's room. She flung open the closet door, ready to throw herself at that gate and demand assistance from What Came Next. But there was Mary, pushing desperately at the gate. The veil was wrapped tightly around her, a living second skin of fire and sorrow, holding her back. She was shrouded in her own death, the fire twisting and coiling around her, refusing to give, to let her through. She tried to scream but could only whisper. "Sam, Sam!" a flicker of sound as she beat furiously at the veil. Sari began to scream.
House grabbed Mary, pulled as hard as she could, tearing at the veil with the strength of her sharp nails, the determination of her foundation, the strength of her bricks and walls. The fire was hot and wild but it did not burn. It was made only of Mary's grief, and House plucked the clinging strands from her beloved friend as if they were nothing but cobwebs. It was difficult work only because Mary would not hold still. Mary reached for Sam as he entered the room with Richie in his arms, the longing she felt its own bright flame, but he couldn't see her. He grabbed Sari from her bed and ran with them both.
"It's going to kill them all, we have to stop it!" Mary shouted to House once the last remnants were torn free. House took only an instant to look at Mary, aflame now with starlight, with her love for her babies, her anger at the thing that dared invade her house. She was glorious, and House loved her so, could not contain her joy as she wrapped herself around her friend and told Mary to hang on. House shouted for the floor to make way for her, and together they dove through the floor as the Angry Thing latched onto Sam, dragging him back into the house, its laughter reverberating through her halls.
It had Sam by the throat, pinned against her cabinets. Mary flickered and burned in her arms. How DARE it touch their babies! Mary's fury was terrible and just, and It recoiled when she approached, loosening its grasp. House heard Dean shouting, and commanded the door, gravely offended by the hatchet in Dean's hands, to let him through. They would repair the damage later, she assured it.
Dean ran into the kitchen, calling Sam's name, and raised his gun at the fiery figure of his mother.
"No, don't, don't!" Sam pleaded, his eyes filling with tears.
"What, why?" Dean asked, confused.
"Because I know who it is. I can see her now."
Mary's happiness, her pure joy, cooled the flames of her sorrow, her anger. She stood before her boys bathed in radiant silver light, smiling beatifically.
"Mom?" Dean whispered, nearly forgetting the gun he held as he slowly lowered it.
"Dean," Mary murmured, his name laden with such pride and love, such longing that House ached at the sound. Dean's lower lip trembled and House saw into his heart, four years old again, his mother the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
Mary walked towards Sam, and the air was so thick with feeling, pregnant with all that Mary had never been able to say to her babe. "Sam," she said, so softly, so tenderly that the whole house held its breath, waiting to hear what she would say next. "I'm sorry."
Confusion and longing creased Sam's face as tears ran down his cheeks. "For what?" he whispered. But Mary could not reply. It was behind her, the Angry Thing, looming and black, hoping to catch her at her most vulnerable.
Mary turned to face it, and House knew what she must do. She coiled herself around her friend, brought the strength of the walls and floors and roof with her, building a fortress around Mary and her babies, burning brightly with determination. Mary looked up at it, looked into its snake pit eyes and commanded with her own voice, the voice of the roots and trees and earth, the stars and sky.
"You get out of my House," the moon in her voice, the sun. Every mother who ever loved a child in her voice. "And let go of my son."
The house trembled and shook. Another gate opened, this one onto a black nothingness, and one moment the Angry Thing was there, and the next it was gone, sucked into the darkness. Not just absent, but Gone. As if it had never existed.
House had no time to wonder what had become of it. In the next instant she was in the closet of the nursery, poised before the gate. It was open wide now, shimmering softly, invitingly. House touched it, and gasped as the golden glimmer of it suffused her, ran down her... legs.
Human legs. She gasped and pressed human hands to a human chest.
Mary's soft glow entered the closet, smiling tenderly at her, and House understood.
"My friend," Mary murmured, reaching to touch her, to enfold her in her warm embrace. "Thank you."
House shook with emotion. "You're welcome," she whispered, hugging Mary tight. "You won't be back, will you?"
Mary shook her head. "No. It's time. And time for you as well, dear one," She said softly, stroking House's cheek. "You've raised our boys. They're men now, and they have each other. They have to make the rest of their journey on their own."
"But I promised!" House protested, clouds gathering over her roof as tears filled her eyes.
Mary's smile was so gentle and soothing as she spoke. "You've kept your promise. It's time to make new ones. To Jenny and Sari and Richie. Don't be afraid," she murmured. She kissed House on the cheek, then slipped through the gate. It closed behind her, leaving only the faint smell of honeysuckle behind.
The human glamour faded, and House was just House again. She slipped into her own skin, between the walls, into the attic, deep into the basement, reclaiming it. This was her house. She had done all she could for Dean and Sam, loved them with a mother's heart and followed them to places she was never meant to go. But she was still a House. It was what she did best. It was what she would always be. She was meant to be a Home, but she wasn't that to Sam and Dean any longer. If she had learned anything on her journeys with them, it was that Home could exist without a house, a dwelling. Home was comfort and shelter, love and devotion. A safe haven.
Sam and Dean had found their own Home in each other.
House dried her tears, took a deep breath, and turned her attention to the busted windows and broken front door. To Jenny, Sari and Richie. Her family. They needed her to make this house their Home. There was so much to do! There was glass everywhere, splintered wood and heaven help her, holes in her sheetrock. It was time to go to work.
End
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(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 02:35 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 02:59 am (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2009-09-15 03:00 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 02:49 am (UTC)I really did enjoy this story. It can be really hard to anthropomorphize an inanimate object and keep up the suspension of disbelief. You did a really great job of keeping the spell cast over the reader, sustaining the magic through to the end. I really enjoyed it, thank you!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 06:14 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 03:24 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 05:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 06:14 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 04:57 am (UTC)*sigh*
Great story!
<3
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 05:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 05:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 06:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2009-09-15 12:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 08:56 am (UTC)The concept is so believable, because it makes so much sense to me! You just know when your house is a Home and not just a place where you live.
Love how she went on the road with them, how she lost them and how she found them again. And it seems to me that she's really connected to Sammy and the love that the whole family shared when he came to them.
Absolutely beautiful!
Thanks for sharing and for opening the comments so that we can tell you how amazing this is!
♥
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 12:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 09:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 12:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 10:07 am (UTC)You've captured everyting in the characterization and description and subtlety, and it is so poignant but infused with so much hope, it is truly a privilege to read. I hope you realize how amzaing this is!! Thank you so much for sharing!! :D
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 12:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 02:53 pm (UTC)*curses the heavens* I NEED MORE TIME!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 01:20 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-15 10:01 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 01:20 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 02:24 am (UTC)Thank you!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 03:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2009-09-16 03:31 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 03:55 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 08:04 am (UTC)I think Layne quoted this as well in her comment. It perfectly sums up your lovely story. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-16 07:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2009-10-14 05:54 pm (UTC)