Harmless Things (Jean Hobbs AU)

Part twenty-seven

Of course he was lying when he said Jack needed help, it was most likely the other way round. I had a long hot steaming shower, the kind of ones that when you inhale you feel like you're drowning but your lungs cleanse in the process and make you feel grateful for the colder air outside.

I padded back to our bedroom after but when I saw the door was shut and I could hear muffled laughter from beyond it, I went back to the bathroom, cringing when I whenever I stepped on a wet footprint I had previously left behind. Before I sat down on the edge of the bath I opened the small window, watching the translucent fog escape, shivering in my towel when the cool breeze brushed against my skin.

I guess maybe that brought us back to where we were now. The hospital visits were same old, same old but I didn't really dread them anymore. If I ever told anyone, I know they would think that it was awful that I hated to coming to see my own sister, but maybe if they listened to my side of the story they would understand why, even if it was just a little. 

Coming to hospital was painful. Seeing the changes in Scarlett everyday was terrifying since Death kept her in his sight. When she was first admitted, he would occasionally walk past the room and no one would really notice. But after we got the full diagnosis of cancer he hovered outside the door and then after we discovered it was terminal he stepped in, but still kept out the way, but I could see he was moving closer and closer each day. 

I could swear I've seen an outline of him or something, but I know it sounds like I'm crazy so I just keep my mouth shut like I always do. Sometimes Dean stares in the direction of where I can see him and I wonder if he can sense something too, but I don't question him. After all, what are the chances?

I was scared that the end of Scarlett's life was near, but I wasn't scared for her. That might not make sense, but Death seemed friendly enough and I knew he wouldn't hurt her or take her when she wasn't ready. Only when Scarlett was at peace with the world and had finished whatever her set task was would be when she would meet him and carry onto the next life or heaven or wherever else she could look over us. I would never know where she would follow him, but I knew she would be safe.

I felt weirdly content with that, that someone was waiting for her on the other side and she would be out of here and would no longer have to suffer or be crammed in these four walls, having to spend nights alone. At the same time it felt like she had already gone, she was skin and bones now and seemed hollow, but I suspected that barely any fragments of soul were still here.

I would prefer that she would move straight on instead of having to look down on the family she left behind so she wouldn't have to see us grieve over her. I did not want her to feel guilty over something that was not her fault, since the end was inevitable and it was something we would all have to go through. 

Seeing Dean happy stimulated a tiny bit of life back into her, but I think it did in all of us. He was the strongest bond in our family and without him we would break apart and lose touch. Jack was like a protective layer that wrapped around Dean and secured him in place, being able to take the pressure when need be so Dean wouldn't crumble beneath it all. 

But still, the visits were exhausting. Even just looking at Scarlett wore me out since she was the definition of tired. She could barely move as it was with since her right side wasn't responsive anymore, but now even the slightest bit of movement took a lot of strenuous effort. Her head lolled to the side now, leaving me with questions about the tumour that I would never ask, such as: 'does it make your head feel heavy?' 'Can you feel it?' and 'does it hurt?' 

I guess all the questions were pretty ridiculous, especially the last one since she was put on morphine a lot. From what I had overheard, the tumour had just been growing and growing and growing to the point now where it was partly in the centre of the brain and had invaded and engulfed so much that Scarlett wouldn't survive an operation for reduction. 

The change was so sudden it made me sick and dizzy, and now the black space we saw in the first MRI scan seemed tiny compared to what I was imagining. I didn't tell anyone what I knew, after all I wasn't supposed to know in the first place and Scarlett wanted to know as little as possible. I think the way she saw it was that she had this thing in her head and she was dying. That's all she knew, she didn't want to know all the details since she was terrified already anyway. 

I think that's how Dean was trying to protect me too, by not telling me all the gruesome facts so I wouldn't worry. It frustrated me at first, having all those secrets between us, but I could see now he only wanted the best and to make it as least frightening so it wouldn't spin around in my head 24/7 like it did in his.

It made me realise that even though he was only two years older than I was, Dean was a lot more emotionally strong than I had originally thought now that I had vague idea of how much he was keeping from me. Instead of trying to coax out all the information so he wouldn't keep it all bottled up, I only hoped Jack helped him carry the weight of the world.