𝐁𝐎𝐑𝐍 𝐓𝐎 𝐃𝐈𝐄 - 𝘥. 𝘸𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘩𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳

05.

ミ★ chapter five:
memory lane

ENTERING THE TOWN MORGUE, Magnolia and the two brothers prepared to see the corpse of Steven Shoemaker. They had read about his death in the paper, prompting them to check it out.

"Go ask," Dean said, nudging Magnolia's side.

She frowned. "Why should I ask? Why don't you?"

"Because you're a girl," Dean said. "He'll do anything you say."

"I'm not a people person. You go." Magnolia argued, repressing the urge to roll her eyes. She shoved Dean forward. Nearly losing his balance, the eldest Winchester cursed under his breath. He managed to stop himself from ramming into the table.

"Hey." an assistant said, looking up from the book on his desk.

"Hey. We're the med students." Dean introduced as normal as possible, gesturing toward him and the two other hunters.

Having not been made away of those plans, the man furrowed his brows. "Sorry?"

"Oh, uh, Dr. Fligavitch didn't tell you?" Dean said, slightly stuttering when he tried to pronounce the doctor's name. It was without a doubt wrong upon glancing at the assistant's face. "We talked to him on the phone. We're from Ohio State. He's supposed to show us the Shoemaker corpse. It's for our paper."

"Well, I'm sorry. He's at lunch." the man said, his eyes lingering on Magnolia a little too long. She shot him a disgusted look. Yep. Not a people person.

"Oh, well, you know, it doesn't matter. You don't mind showing us the body, do you?" Dean asked.

"Sorry, I can't. The doc will be back in an hour. You can wait for him if you want."

"An hour." Dean winced. "We got to be heading back to Columbus. Look, this paper's worth half our grade, so if you don't mind helping us out —"

With a deadpan expression, the assistant stated, "Look, man — no." He made eye contact with Magnolia. "Unless you're offering something in return?"

Magnolia fought a gag. Anger flaring, Dean chuckled humorlessly. At that moment, he knew how easy it would be to knock out the man and check out the corpse himself. Going to pull out her gun, Magnolia reached into her waistband. While she did that, Dean muttered under his breath, "I'm gonna hit him in his face, I swear."

To prevent Magnolia and Dean from resorting to violence, Sam grabbed her arm to stop her from drawing her weapon and offered a couple hundred bills to the assistant. On board with the plan, the man smiled. "Follow me." As he went to snatch the bills from Sam's hand, Sam drew his hand back.

"You don't say another word to her, understand?" Sam questioned, making a new term to their deal. Swallowing down his pride, the man nodded, wanting the money. Bitterly, Sam delivered his promise, handing over the bills. The man stood from his rolling chair and wandered toward a different room.

Sam was about to follow before Dean grabbed his jacket and pivoted his younger brother to face him. "We earned that money."

"You guys won it in a poker game."

"Yeah!" Dean and Magnolia said. To them, it was still hard-earned cash. Part of him still wanted to smash the man's face against his desk, violent images flickering through his mind.

"We could've kept our money if you just let me pull out my gun," Magnolia remarked.

"I would rather not have the cops on our backs. Next time though." Sam assured as Magnolia grumbled something about how her hard work playing a card game was for nothing.