He let out a sigh of disgust. Yes, I know his sighs by heart. When you live your entire life in someone’s shadow you pick up every little quirk they have. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I’ll have to get back to you on that one. The reason for this particular sigh of disgust was my generally good sense of direction suddenly gone bad.

“I can’t believe we’re friggin’ lost! Sam, you told me you knew were the hell you were going, dammit!”

I nervously fidgeted in my seat. “Try making a left at the next stop sign.”

“Okay…I’ll…try making another left.” He said this under his breath, just enough so I could hear the sarcastic tone of his voice.

At this point, I wanted to do one of two things…

One: Take my flashlight I was using to read the stupid map, and smack him across the head with it.

Two: Just open up the car door and get the hell out of dodge…. Well technically it’s a Chevy Impala, but you get the idea.

Dean sighed once more, this time it was one of impatience. It was a drawn out one followed by his hand going up to his face and slowly pulling at his cheeks. Once he placed his hand back on the steering wheel, almost smacking it as he did, he said “And what the hell were you thinking anyway?”

Here it comes. This is the real reason he’s pissed ladies and gentlemen. It doesn’t have to do with me misreading a stupid map at all. That’s how my brother works. Misplaced aggression…he should teach a class on it, if he knew what it meant.

“Telling them we’d take this case after all the crap they put us through! My God…I would have told them to stick it so far up their…”

“We owe them Dean!”

“We don’t owe them anything! They owe us!”

“That’s not how I see it.” I said shaking my head at him as he let out his third sigh, this time one of annoyance. When he’s annoyed he puff’s out his cheeks and then slowly let’s out a whistle as they deflate.

“How do you see it then? Please explain it to me because from what I remember, they only care about themselves and bail on us whenever they have the chance.”

I pointed to the stop sign as I tried to collect my thoughts, “Don’t forget to make a left…”

The tires screeched as my brother abruptly turned just in time, “What are they calling themselves now?  I know they’re not the Ghostfacers anymore.”

I closed my eyes and tried to remember the name I saw in the email they sent me, pleading for our help and telling us things would be different this time around. “I believe they are the Ghoul Patrol now.”

“Well, that’s just beautiful…what dicks.”

I couldn’t help but laugh, “Yeah, they are but they need our help Dean. I owe them.”

“How?”

“They helped me out while you were in hell.”

He let out another sigh; this one was clearly of amusement. It was more like a small grunt followed by a laugh of disbelief. “How the hell did they help you?”

I had never intended to share this story with anyone, let alone Dean. This was something I had planned on going to my grave with. Can you imagine being so desperate for help that the only people you can think to call or even trust or those idiots? But right after Dean died, I felt like I couldn’t trust anyone, especially the other hunters. As much as I wanted to call Bobby for help, I couldn’t bring myself to do that either. It was too soon.

“I’m waiting…” He said impatiently.

“I was being haunted…” Now it was my turn to speak in a whisper.

He looked over at me, “You were what now?”

“You heard me. I was being followed by a ghost. I couldn’t shake her.”

“A chick ghost?”

I nodded, “Right after you did your…you know… thing…”

“By my thing, you mean being ripped apart by hell hounds and dragged down to hell?”

“Yeah.”

“Oookay….and?”

“And I needed help getting her to leave…they happened to be in town at the time and they actually came to look us up. While they were here, strange things started happening and I used that as an opportunity to get rid of her. They actually helped me find her body and burn her bones.”

“Sammy, I’m disappointed in you! You can do that crap yourself. You’ve done it plenty of times.”

“I had no energy Dean…I was lucky I could even drag myself out of bed.”

Then came a sigh of understanding…

“It was hard after you left Dean…I could barely keep it together. They helped and were even really sympathetic and cool about things.”

“Fine…so what do they need us to do?”

He let out another sigh, this one of acceptance.

“They think their Gila monster is possessed.”

He closed his eyes and slowly hit his head on the steering wheel.  “Well, looking on the bright side, we might not actually ever get there…dead end.” He said pointing to the fence blocking the rest of the road.

“Guess we shouldn’t have made that left.” I felt the need to say, once again consulting the map.

“You think?” He rolled his eyes at me and let out yet another sigh. We’d made it through the whole rotation and disgust was once again up at home plate. As he turned the car around he looked at me, “What am I going to do with you?”

I smiled at him, “Well, you could kill me but then you’d probably go and do something stupid like sell your soul to the crossroads demon…so how about you just give me this one and know I’ll owe you for the next one.”

He smiled and let out a small laugh, “It’s a deal.”

We drove back to the main road and made a right this time.