Season 7 Crazy Town; Ep 17

[weirddreams]

It didn't take a lot of math to deduce that the last time he had any sort of date, roadside or otherwise, with Ruby had been over eight months ago. Castiel was at fault for a lot of that, but Sam had himself to blame for letting Lucifer in too. The last fourty eight hours reality had been hard to distinguish. Ruby helped keep him present though. He wanted to do something in return for her which is why through out the day he stole repurposed things no one was using anymore from around the hospital.

When he was ready, he asked Ruby if she could get pizza from the outside world (please and thank you) and laid things out to surprise her when she got back. It wasn't much. He lit a candle that had been thrown away after a service, straghtend up flowers no longer for the purpose of a funneral and a cup of butterscotch pudding and another of orange jello that was never opened. Just because he was hospitalized for his sleep issues, it didn't mean romance had to die.

Then he waited for Ruby to bring the main course.

Comments

[peaceonearth]

And on those bad days, she'll help remind him. Sam would do the same thing for her if she were in his shoes. "Puppy, that's what I'm here for. My plan was to lock you up in a room with me and take care of you myself, but apparently, psychiatric medicine has come a long way and Dean thinks you'll do better here with medicine." She leans across Sam and across the bed to snag her bag with one hand then dumps it out onto the bed. There are books, a pot of the cream in question, bandages, tape, knitting needles, and a couple of skeins of yarn. At least tonight she can stay until just before the shift change when she'll sneak out in the early hours of the morning.

She opens the pot of ointment and gently smooths it on his hand. "I am the instruction book," she teases him as she starts to wind the bandage around Sam's hand.

[weirddreams]

Where did he ever meet a girl like her again? He's well aware he'd be lost without her company. He chuckles, but tiredly, at the statement. "Right now it doesn't seem so bad to have the best of both worlds. I slept a few hours before this with the help of psychiatric medicine and now you're here." He promised to keep her updated as best he could and this is it. His eyes explore the contents on the bed as his better hand pushes things to different sides to sort them into sections: reading material, first aid, knitting, and other. Once he's done, his other hand rests on the bed, palm facing upwards. The spot where she had already slept next to him was still open to her. The night was theirs and theirs alone.

Surprisingly, the ointment doesn't sting as it goes over his wound and he flexes his hand, carefully, after she finishes with the bandage. "I'm going to need every bit of guidance you got."

[peaceonearth]

Outside the gates of Hell. "I'm glad you got some sleep," she tells him. She knows he struggles with it right now. "You can get some more later." She figures the knitting might help keep his hand busy so he doesn't hurt himself again.

She's good at her job and not everything has to hurt. "Lucky you, I've been doing this for oh...a few hundred years. Eat more first," she encourages him. "I'll show you how to get started afterward."

[weirddreams]

A restaurant would have been a much better place for their first meeting. Anyone would when Luci-vision belts out Elvis' greatest hits and moves in the wee hours of the morning. "Can I convince you to sleep over?" No one would need to find out if they do it right. Breaking the smaller rules doesn't bother him as much as it used to.

"Thank you." He says softly, lingering on her for a few moments longer before complying with more bites. He'd been more hungry than he let on and when he finished he downed four pieces. He looked at her with expectancy. "So, how do we start?" He realizes how that sounds as he's saying it, and throat clears. "Knitting."

[peaceonearth]

Almost anywhere would have been a better place for their first meeting. However, outside the gates of Hell was fitting for them. She smiles softly at his question and reaches out to smooth his hair back from his forehead. "Already convinced." That's good. While Ruby encourages Sam's strong moral character, breaking the small rules isn't going to hurt anyone and sometimes, like now, it benefits people.

She watches him eat, picking at her own piece of pizza. Once he's done, she clears away the pizza, putting it on the dresser top, then settles in beside him. She hands him two knitting needles, taking up her own and gets both of them set up with a roll of yarn. "Okay. Take the end of the yarn and wrap it around your right needle like this," she shows him slowly and patiently a couple of times so he can get it.

[weirddreams]

Half of his half stays swept and half of it falls back in front of his forehead. He retains his fond stare on her. "I'll let you pick the time to come back." He doesn't want to admit it but he can't recall the time as it was right then. Why spoil their time together with reality?

The second he feels her rest on him, Sam angles his arms over her so she's close and can see his hands and what he's doing. He inhales, indiscreetly, to take in the scent of her hair then exhales. First, he tries to hold the knitting needles out more as his hands take a lot of space. He works like this while slowly and awkwardly working with her instructions. He starts off for the most part well enough but with looser craftsmanship of the knots. "Either you make this look easy or I need bigger needles." properly.

[peaceonearth]

"I'll just stay. Tomorrow I'll sneak out before the shift change, change clothes and be back after you eat breakfast," she suggests. As far as Ruby is concerned, there's nothing more important than spending time with him now. Cas and Dean are researching how to help Sam.

He can sniff her as obviously as he wants; she won't judge. She works on her own knitting slowly, keeping pace with him so that he can watch what she's doing and mirror it. She laughs softly at his comment. "I've been doing this off and on for hundreds of years; I should hope I make it look easy. You don't need bigger needles. That would make your spacing between stitches bigger and looser. You're doing fine. I wasn't very good when I started, but I liked the monotony and rhythm involved. I think you will too. Focus on those, not the results."

[weirddreams]

He puts down the needles briefly to rub one hand up and down her arm as a reminder she's real. "I'd like that. I'll miss you either way. You could even use the shower here. It's... down the hall." He's certain he hadn't dreamed that. Just which direction it falls in is a bit muggy.

When he picks up the needles again, he follows her movements without any real skill. His lips tug downward mildly, not because she's wrong about him needing the practice but because a part of him always desires to do things well. He knows she's only trying to encourage him and shrugs it off as best he can. His hands feel awkward with the exercise. "Yeah. What made you want to start? Were you still human then?" Her life before becoming a demon interested him. He recalled the time when he told her she didn't have to force herself to remember her life and that he only asked to get to know her better. The same applies now. There is never any expectation for her to answer.

[peaceonearth]

"You think if I tell them I'm a demon, they'd admit me and let us be roommates?" she asks, entirely serious. If she thought it was a possibility, she'd do it in a heartbeat. She notices that he doesn't give clear directions to the shower; she'll find it herself in the morning and his being foggy on the shower's location isn't that troubling. After all, she knows he's having problems with things like that already.

She watches him out of the corner of her eye while her needles click and dip, making the knitting look easy. It's good he's still got that desire to do well even if that's the point of this activity. She shakes her head a little. "It was still pretty new when I was human. Embroidery was what I got stuck with as a human. I--I possessed a widow sometime in the..." Her eyes narrow and her brow furrows as she tries to remember the period "18th century I think. It was just getting popular. She was a witch, and she went to a knitting circle a few times a week. I figured out that it helped me calm down and focus. It helped me feel...more human, I guess and unlike embroidery, I liked knitting. Instead of some useless pretty thing, I ended up with something cozy, useful and pretty."

[weirddreams]

"I'm glad you're talking to me before you make that decision. No, I don't think you should," he tells her, following a moment to deliberate. For her sake, he wouldn't want her to put herself through any of the controls she'd be at the mercy of to the hospital. He agreed to remain in this situation, in fact he insisted he had to, when Dean offered to bust him out. He couldn't be a burden on either of them because his delusions led him there in the first place.

Knitting is the perfect distraction from his tired mind. He has something to focus on and if he can at least finish his...thing half decently, he intends to hand it to Ruby for her use. He's almost entirely gotten over how Ruby's lived and taken over other people before and listens only to what she learned from that experience with his best smile under his tired infliction. "Yeah. The fact you can make clothing sounds useful as much as it does cozy. You'd look cute head to toe in wool clothing." It's what comes to mind first. Sorry.