III. The Haunting of Stanford Hall ♱

Max had elected to drag the boys to the Art & Architecture department's library, with its warm orange and yellow hues inviting them in at the large, brown door. The light poured in from the windows, spanning from floor to the tall ceiling like angels appearing. The rising and falling of the sun was a daily show for Max, an unrelenting cycle that cast shadows across the scratchy slate carpet. It was the main place they could find anything occult, if they needed to, and the art students spent most of their time in practical settings rather than studying paint strokes, so finding two empty rectangular tables that they pushed together with a groan and a shhh wasn't quite the task they made it out to be.

The book shelves towered over them, a testament to the infinite pursuit of knowledge. The dedication to housing the future generations, even though the likes of Max and Sam, the ones with multitudes beyond their studies. More to put on their job applications than any other student there, if they could: talented with firearms, ghosts, and demons. Runs towards the danger. Great in a house fire. The research lining the walls were intimidating, at minimum. Housing a grand total of twelve thousand books, mostly relating to artists and architecture, but stacked and lost somewhere far and between lay the stories of their lives. The ghouls, the witchcraft, and the Latin. The cultures and folklore.

"The library? How original."

Dean was always grumbling about something, it seemed. Like he had a perpetual stone in his shoe that he just couldn't shake. Nothing was movie-like enough. Sam was used to the Stanford libraries, but Max suspected Dean had never stepped foot in one outside of hunting.

"What's wrong, Dean? First time?" she smirked.

Sam rolled his eyes behind them, falling back to let them lead as they spoke. "Would that make you happy?"

She'd stopped by her place to grab her research — not without complaint from Dean, who kept badgering her about seeing her apartment and, likely, rifling through her underwear drawer (literally and figuratively) — rushing in and out in case Jess came home early.

Pulling the crumpled newspapers from the bottom of her handbag and dumping it on the table, Max drew their attention to her case.

She'd come across it by ear, hearing about a girl named Cindy that dropped dead in Jordan Hall. She sat not three rows in front of Max in class, always eager and overzealous. The first to raise her hand, correct or not. The last one to leave on a Friday afternoon.

She wasn't the drug-abusing type. Not beyond a shit ton of Adderall which, truthfully, Max couldn't blame her for.

She leaned forwards on her elbows. "Okay, so. There's been four deaths in two weeks, all the same, all ruled an OD."

Placing a hand on one of the obits, messily cut out from its flimsy counterpart, and looking around to make sure no one was listening, Dean shrugged, "So it might not be a spirit, just some new, raving drug."

"Yeah, you'd think," said Sam. "What's making you think spirit?"

"'Cause it's strange. Not like any OD I've ever seen."

"And you've seen plenty, I'm sure," came the eldest Winchester's voice.

The ink was starting to stain his fingers black, and he wiped them on his jeans annoyed.

Max sighed, reaching for the manila folder in her bag—the police file she'd printed off this morning whilst Jess was still sleeping. Crime scene photos, coroner's reports, witness statements. Not one mentioned any party, any opportunity for spiking. Not one was a stoner, or had a friend that knew they were on drugs (though, of course, it's likely their friends wouldn't fess up to the police. Which is exactly why they'd have to find out for themselves, posing as concerned class mates).

She threw the file in front of him.

"Take a look," she shrugged, letting them have at it. "Jaws clamped shut, muscle palpitations, fists clenched, asphyxiation, foaming at the mouth. But hey, if it's just an OD—" she raised her hands in false defeat, leaning back.

Sam reached for the crime scene photos first, passing them to his brother when he was done, who occupied himself with the capital lettering in the boxes of the coroner's report. They grimaced at the photos, trying to maintain some air of indifference, but god were they gross.

The drug they claimed had been overdosed on hadn't been identified. In fact, there were no traces of any narcotic known to man or modern medicine that they could find. No haunting string of chemicals.

Almost like they hadn't taken any drugs, at all.

"Alright, it's more than an OD," Sam, ever the wise one, conceded.

"But... spirit?"

Max held up a finger, making her way over to the computers to print off an article and leaving the boys behind.

Dean immediately turned to his brother, trying to keep his voice low. "Dude."

Sam stared back at him, dumbly. "Dude?"

"What are you doing?"

"What am I doing? What are you doing?"

Dean leaned towards him, elbow on the table as he turned his full body to face Sam. "We should be out there looking for Dad, not... following around with some chick. No matter how hot she is."

Sam rolled his eyes.

"We don't even know that Dad's in trouble—"

"—he's been gone for two weeks, Sam—"

"—And he's been gone for longer before!"

Dean paused, at that.

"Christmas. Easter. Middle of summer. My high school graduation. He's disappeared for months before, Dean. Why are you so worried now?"

"Look, I know you and Dad had your differences—"

"Differences? He told me not to come back!"

"—but you need to trust me on this, alright? We should be out there, looking for him. Not messing around with some chick on a hunch."

"Because you thinking Dad is missing isn't just a hunch?"

"Better than some crappy ODs!"

Sam sighed in resignation.

Dean was stubborn, he always had been. The main thing he got from his father, besides a strong jaw and iron right hook. Unrelenting in his prowess. He'd pursue things he knew he couldn't have, people he couldn't get, just for the challenge, undeterred by rejection or dead ends. But it also made him a pain in the ass. He made a wrong decision and stuck by it just for pride.

It seemed like he was weighed down, bricks tied to his feet, inhaling water with every breath, and yet he refused to kick his feet. Refused to reach the pocket knife in his boot and relinquish himself from the pull. To reach the surface and fight for air.

He didn't care that his pessimism or stubbornness would kill him one day. Just that it made him feel like he was right.

Sam debated for a moment, staring Dean dead in the eyes. "We help Max solve this, and if Dad's still not back by then... we'll go after him, alright?"

Dean looked like it was Christmas by the time Max made her way back over, breaking his state with the paper she printed.

An article from the Bulletin—the newspaper for the university—headline bold as ever. The Haunting of Stanford Hall. A picture of the Museum was below, four large pillars in place. Dean almost felt small just looking at it, placing his blue pen between his lips.

Fucking spoilt college kids. He'd probably never step foot in there without some sort of background check and some cash in hand. Something more than his scuffed boots and ragged clothes.

Saving people didn't exactly pay all that well.

Max smirked as he let out a low whistle, sitting in her seat opposite him.

"A month ago, janitor over at the old Museum building was locking up. He said that as he went to leave, he heard screaming in the basement. Multiple people banging against the walls. But when he opened the door, like an idiot..."

"There was nothing there?" Dean asked, more like he was sure. It's just the way these things went.

Max shook her head gently. "I don't think it's a coincidence that somethings in the basement and all of a sudden students are dropping dead."

The way she talked—the cadence of her voice, smooth and enthralling—it seemed like she was sat around a campfire, sharing ghost stories like a kid. Not that she ever was one. The minute her dad placed that Beretta in her palm, fresh from school and knee socks shifting. Her pleated skirt swaying with the recoil, shoulder taut with the pressure of her father standing over her like an angel. Or the Devil, she wasn't quite sure. His advocate, at least.

Long gone was the code of ethics he swore by, hand over heart. The oath he took. All he had was his prodigy; the wunderkid so easy to mould.

"So, we gonna check it out or what?" she asked.

Sam nodded, albeit reluctantly. Not that he was hesitant to help Max in any way—he'd help her if she was in the middle of the ocean drowning—no. He was hesitant to jump back behind the wheel, tempted to dig his heels into the ground like a petulant child.

He hadn't done this in years. He dreamt about it every night, hunting down the thing that claimed his mothers life, but he never quite thought he would be here. Walking right back into the life.

"We'll stop by tonight when it's dark. Visit the witnesses first?"

Max sighed, snatching Dean's blue pen from his grasp. He smiled sarcastically. "Guess I'm cancelling dinner."

"So, who died, exactly?" Asked Sam.

Sifting through the photos, Max worked on putting a timeline together.

"Cindy was first, the middle of the night," she said. "She was found by her roommate the next morning. Then, it was this Josh guy—"

"Hey, he worked the pretzel cart, right?"

"You have a pretzel cart?" Dean muttered under her breath, slight wonder in hie voice.

"—yeah, think so. Anyway, after a long night of dishing out twisted pastries, apparently he went home and just couldn't help but end it all."

"As so many cart-sellers do," nodded Dean, sarcastically. Max shot him a bemused look.

"Then was that engineering kid, Robert, and the mathlete, Louise."

"That's two deaths a week?"

Max looked at Dean across the wooden table. He'd run his hands through his hair so much it was unruly, and he'd all but ripped of his leather jacket whilst her and Sam were discussing the case, not offering much but a quip.

He just looked back at her, like he expected her to gawk. His eyebrows furrowed, although Max was sure that staring wasn't new. She'd stared at him shamelessly before, she'd seen everything there was to see, but for some reason she couldn't tear her eyes away from him.

That's exactly what he wanted, of course, which just made her even more embarrassed about her reddening cheeks.

Max cleared her throat. Sam frowned.

"Yeah, odd right?"

"All in the middle of the night?" He asked, to which the girl hummed. "If there is a spirit, why act now?"

Dean sighed. "Think someone did something stupid? Triggered whatever it is, made it angry enough to start acting out?"

"Maybe," Sam leaned back in his chair, tapping his fingers on the arm. "Let's find out."

They all stood at the same time, Dean pausing to pick up some of the papers—the newspaper cut outs, the new printed article—and pass them to Max, pausing and staring until she took them from his awaiting palm.

Sam murmured something under his breath. "I'm gonna head back," he pointed over his shoulder, "look into the witnesses a bit more. Get our, uh, characters ready and all that."

Max didn't think much of it. Sam's always in his head, always planning possibilities A-Z, thinking about work or dreaming about Jess. He would probably drop by her lecture when it ended.

"Meet at your place?" she asked. He just nodded, half expecting Dean to follow, but he stayed.

Sam shot a wave their way as he left.

Stuffing the papers in her bag, she murmured a thanks as she took them from the other brother, and threw it over her shoulder. A book on Rembrandt was mixed up with the files, red-inked annotations and neon post-its running wild.

She could feel his eyes on her, burning like sin. Green and bewitching.

"What?"

He startled, "nothin', nothin'. Just... never seen you like this."

"Like what?" Max almost scoffed.

"All in your element, like this. At college," he said, waving his arm around as they started to walk, "the library. Half expected to see you... I dunno—"

"—kicking ass in the middle of campus?"

Dean laughed. "Yeah."

"Hate to break it to you, Dean, but I'm a student now. I have these things called," she clicked her fingers in mock-thought, "responsibilities."

"Nah," he smirked. "You're just rusty and won't admit it."

Max smiled in his direction, brown hair swaying back over her shoulders as she opened the door and turned back to him. He immediately took the weight of the door from her hands, holding it open until she'd completely passed through and followed.

"You think I'm out of the game?"

"Aren't you?"

She hummed in contemplation. "If you call missing my exams to take out spirits then, yeah, sure, I'm out." They continued down the corridor, consumed by oak. "So... tell me you're still driving that gorgeous piece of crap?"

Dean was almost offended. He'd never let Baby out of his sight.

Max had adored the Impala, not used to a classic with so much life in it. Bobby had always left his rusted up, falling apart and wrecked. Even hotwired, the damn things wouldn't start.

Dean remembered he'd pulled up to the curb and been leaning against the door when Max came out of her apartment building, running her fingertips gently across the roof of the car in silent admiration.

"This...belongs to you?" she'd asked, disbelieving. "What, you steal it or something?"

Dean's lips twisted into a wry smirk. "We're not all thieves like you, Molisanti."

"Please," she scoffed. Nobody was a thief like her. She stole almost as easily as she hunted, when she needed to. "Just didn't think you would see the beauty in a classic, is all."

"And what's that supposed to mean?" he asked defensively. The car was his pride and joy—it was his.

Bobby lingered by the sidewalk as he exited the building, staying completely out of it.

Max's lips tugged up at the corners as she ran her hand along the roof once more and opened the passenger side door. Sinking into the seat, she spoke, "it means I think you're shallow and arrogant." Dean frowned, unmoving. "So, Bandit, you gonna get in or what?"

"Does that make you Carrie or Cledus?"

Max paused, thinking, twirling her hair around her finger as she opened the passenger door. "Which one is prettier?"

Dean looked back at her now, hair shorter, cleaner. Outfit more or less the same—low rise jeans and a belt, fitted short sleeve grey shirt, lighter tones trailing a pattern, leather jacket in her arms—but seemed more tailored to her now. They fit her better. Her makeup was cleaner and she looked alive. More than some paranoid, hollowed out shell planting trip wires in her doorway and sleeping in the living room chair, revolver in hand.

Still as bitchy as ever, though.

But he just shrugged off his daze, slowing his pace and smirking at her. "Why? You wanna go for a ride?"

"Always."

She paused in the doorway leading to the car park, holding the door open as she turned to him, hopeful smile on her face. The light bled in from behind her.
"Can I drive?"

Dean looked at her dumbly, swinging the ring of the keychain around his finger once. She could've sworn one of the brown, woven bracelets she'd left behind in their motel was tied around it.

"Can you drive? Can you drive? You don't even have a license!"

He gently nudged her forwards, through the door, forcing her to walk with a hand splayed across her back.

"Yes, I do." Max was almost offended, turning to look at him as he continued to force her forwards.

Almost.

The Winchester just stared at her. "It's fake."

"I can drive," she told him, wrapping a hand around her bag strap and contemplating. She'd been raised by Bobby in a junkyard, for God's sake, she knew how to drive. "Forwards."

"Just shut up and get in."

"Yes, sir," she mocked a salute, disappearing into the passenger seat.

Dean rolled his eyes.

♱

The joyride in the Impala had unveiled more than ten minutes in the library, for Max. Dean obviously didn't want to take the case, he wanted to keep searching for his dad. Which would be reasonable, if John wasn't... well, John. A hunter. Neglectful. Downright piece of shit—not that anyone else she knew saw him that way. And Dean hadn't changed all that much since Max had last seen him; still listening to Zeppelin and Metallica, wearing that damned leather jacket, driving recklessly but taking care of Baby like she was his pride and joy. Still playing soldier even when John wasn't around.

"You really think there's something more to, uh, these straightforward ODs?"

"What part of lockjaw and asphyxiation screams straightforward to you?"

Dean tapped his fingers on the steering wheel, clenching his jaw. He wasn't frustrated, more... restless.

"I agreed it might be a spirit, didn't I?"

"Yeah, unenthusiastically," Max rolled her eyes. "Seriously, what's up with you? You've dived in deeper for less."

The windows were down and the breeze brought a cold chill that rustled Dean's hair. Max looked over at him, hair moving in tandem, elbow on the door as they moved.

"I just think Sam and I... we should be looking for my dad. You could deal with this. You've handled worse."

Max's thin brows furrowed. "You realise you're not your dads lapdog, anymore, right? You're twenty-six, Dean, you're not gonna get grounded."

Dean sat in silence for a while, the raises of the winds song taunting.

"You've changed," he told her.

"Yeah, right."

Outwardly, sure, Max had changed. Her hair was longer and neat, no longer frazzled by the blunt scissors in a motel bathroom mirror, but cut gently by her friend in the middle of the night—nobody has ever done this for me, Max had told Jess, eyes glimmering in the light of her living room as her friend took to gently trimming away, cutting off the dead ends Max had only known to be splattered with blood. Not even your mom? Jess had asked. Her mother was nowhere to be found. Her father died a gruesome death (aren't Molisanti's supposed to? It's destiny) and her mother had dumped her at Bobby's place and run like hell.

Bobby had tried to cut her hair for her when she was younger, but the uneven pigtails had left her sobbing in the yard. She'd learned to love it, at least he had tried, but it was just a reminder that she would never be like the girls she had known in school. She wouldn't spend her days shopping and at the spa, getting blowouts and manicures. She chipped her nails on the daily. She'd have a blunt pocket knife and a pseudo-father that had no clue what he was doing, no matter how many parenting books he read.

Dean didn't know she still slept with her butterfly knife under her bed. That it cut her when she slept. That she woke with bloody palms and scars all over.

Nor did he know about her spiral-induced insomnia, the nightmares where she woke screaming and sweating, the visions of her father sat in the rocking chair on their porch—missing an eye, pouring darkness—haunting her nightly.

Outwardly, Max was just the average college student, if not a little jaded. Bordering on pessimistic, a non-believer. Just another face in the lecture hall, overwhelmed balancing "work" with studies, if not set apart by the tattoo on her back and the scars dancing along her arms.

"I'm serious," he shot her a glance, careful to keep his eyes on the road. Dean didn't know anything about her, anymore. "You're calmer, relaxed."

"Well, I kinda gotta be on my best behaviour around here."

"Yeah?" he questioned, thoughtful. "Thought you didn't even want to go to college, anyway. Said the only life was a hunter's life, or somethin'."

Last time he had seen her, Max was the epitome of hunter. Huntress, if you will. Consumed only by the dark nights and the grooves of her crossbow, waving Bobby off when he even suggested studying. I'm not made for that, she'd whispered to him in the back of the Impala, Dean and John riding up front. That's not the life I'm supposed to have. It's not the life my dad had.

You're nothing like your father, Bobby had attempted to whisper back. You don't have to be.

But she did. 'Cause that's what she was good at. And some twisted part of her believed she'd never deserve the average life; how could she, when it was her duty to protect? She couldn't walk down the aisle one day, knowing people were dying whilst her (minimal) friends and family were tearing up at how pretty she looked.

It was one last argument with Bobby that even pushed her into college. She'd stolen a car and driven herself there, sent him a picture of her dorm and hardly spoken to him since. A message, here and there. A how are you and a let me know you're alive.  She missed him, but this is what he wanted for her. To be removed from the life. She wasnt sure he realised until later that safety meant cutting ties with her.

It didn't make her like the monotony of college life any more.

The only thing Max had going for her was memorising the Latin of old works — it was surprisingly helpful — and Jess. The only friend she could actually maintain.

Not that she was really looking for other friends. More people to put in harms way.

Max hummed, looking at her reflection in the door mirror, returning to Dean's thought.

"Yeah," she scoffed. "Bobby wanted me to have a life outside of hunting. Said I wasn't made for it."

"That's going great for you, isn't it?" Dean quipped. "Running around like Buffy?"

"Yeah, except my librarian is a piece of shit."

He really was; Max was sick of the stereotype that librarians were all sweet stuff. Guy was a prick.

They fell into a comfortable silence for a while, music winding its way out of the radio and around the car, vibrating the leather seats. Dean took a left, steering with one hand. Such a guy.

"So, uh," he cleared his throat. "Any boys on the horizon?"

Max considered him as he averted his gaze, almost guilty. Almost as if he knew that he ruined all other men for her, that one night in some crappy motel, a haze of beer, dance, and the thrilling high of a hunt. A montage of blinding lights, tongues and teeth.

It was a distant memory, but sometimes Dean still felt her lips on his neck, teeth grazing over his pulse. Sometimes, he looked at the waitress he was flirting with and saw Maxine on her name tag instead.

Almost as if he was thinking about how he all but fell at her feet, praising the very ground she walked on, after she had pulled him up from his seat at the bar and forced him to let loose. Let go of everything dark and complex. How she had grabbed him by the wrist and his arm had fallen over her front as they made their way to the dance floor. How he had left purple handprints on her hips, and how she had left her mark all over his biceps.

Dean was a womaniser by nature. The consequence of a life on the road, Max supposed. It was easier for him to chase after barmaids and dancers, random women that knew him as Matt or Jason, oblivious to the Colt in his duffel bag, than confront the fact that he would likely never settle. He'd never get that white-picket fence, charmed life. It was easier than confronting the fact he saw her everywhere, in everyone. The way a woman's hips swayed, the way the breeze took to her hair.

The way he remembered the motel light, no matter how dingy, made her smile look as angelic as anything could get in a world full of demons.

It was easier than knowing Max had ruined all other women for him, too.

"Why, you jealous?" she resorted to her default smirk, rather than indulging in the daydream she knew was lying ahead.

"Just... wondering if I should be on the lookout for a jealous Edward Scissorhands before he scratches up my beautiful car," he deflected.

Max hummed. "No, no boys."

"Good," he responded quickly—too quickly, like it was a knee-jerk reaction. Like he'd mulled it over a thousand times before. Max shot him a look, and he averted his gaze once more, shrugging. "Just cause, you know, you'd eat the sorry bastard alive."

"Oh, Dean, you say such nice things," she said, sarcastically.

The truth was, Dean wasn't jealous, exactly, but the idea of some college boy that had no idea what he was doing, pawing all over Max and her low rise jeans, her scar-littered arms and back, her tattoos, knocked him sick. To his core. Almost vengeful, actually. 'Cause he knew that she deserved better than some fumbling geek that didn't know what to do with his hands. One that had never touched a woman before, let alone a pistol. One that would hide behind her when something jumped out of the closet one dark night instead of reaching for his AK-47.

Some guy that wouldn't be able to protect her, when the time came. Not that she'd accept the help, anyway; he'd put his arm in front of her to stop her from hitting the dash one time, and she had responded by punching him in the arm. Hard.

She deserved more than someone that was just out to fuck. Someone that shared their experiences, their reflexes, their allure to the dark.

But he wasn't lying when he said she'd eat them alive.

Max was something you kneel at the altar for, something you pray to. It was like she knew something you didn't, but desperately needed to. Teetering on the edge of madness, she was alluring in an almost animalistic, unpredictable sort of way; the same way the apple called to Eve, the way a high calls to an addict.

The same way sin draws you in; she was the promise of a rush, the dark voice that promised it would be good, it would be heavenly, no matter how wrong it seemed. No matter how much you would have to repent, to beg the Father for forgiveness, Max's charm—her wit dripping with enchantment—was effortless, and all-consuming.

When they'd kissed, Dean felt like he was on fire. A blinding, searing pocket of light engulfed him, ecstasy almost as much as it was her.

"You ever think about it?" he asked. Catching her frown, he explained, "relationships. Settling down."

She had. Briefly, and then pushed it aside.

She saw Sam and Jess, how irrevocably in love they were, a golden thread wrapped around them and pulled tight. She saw how happy they were; Sam could barely contain himself around Jess, still as nervous and obsessed with her as he was the first time he saw her in his Law class. As jittery as he was the first time they spoke.

She was jealous, sometimes, of how Jess could reveal everything to Sam without consequence. Without a dirty little secret that would scare any sane person away.

She also saw how it was going to end, if Dean succeeded and pulling his brother back into the business. Messy, fiery, tragic; no two people so in love could ever part on good terms. Sam and Jess would be left with a gaping hole in their hearts, a yearning like a malignant tumour in the brain, they would never be okay, again.

"Yeah, I think about it. Sometimes. Think about how unattainable it's gonna be for us." By us, she meant as hunters, but if the man took it to mean them personally, hey. That's up to him. "You?"

Dean looked her in the eyes, then.

The sight was intense, and Max felt like he could read the braille on her bones. Like he was reading the cards she held close to her chest.

The reminder of their night together hung in the air, warping around them the same way fog wrapped around the cathedral spires as they passed by, a blur.

"Yeah," he told her earnestly. "Sometimes."

"Hm."

Max was reeling as she hid a small smile behind her hand, looking out of the window.

"Hm?"

"Yeah. Good to know."

Note: unedited