long live the ladies

Charlie didn’t know what to wear. Most of her clothing was scattered between Dean’s house in Malibu and the hellicarrier. She settled on a fitted T-shirt with the “Not all that is gold” poem from Lord of the Rings on it, some jeans, and a dark blue hoodie. She put on a little bit of makeup, it was a date after all, and slipped on her converses. She looked at her watch, she still had fifteen minutes.

Ruby won't follow her inside, which Meg is okay with. "You can just stand out here and try not to piss yourself if you see her coming back." She shuts the door behind her once inside, looking around the Martha Stewart-like home. She wants to barf at how nicely organized and decorated the house is. She should have guessed it'd be this way based on how nice the house is on the outside. She'd just always assumed the woman was part garden gnome or something. The first thing she does is go for the bedroom, which is empty and bland unlike the rest of her home. She finds it weird and unsettling. She pokes around some of the drawers, finding mostly magazines and some severely outdated clothing. The closet gives her much more of the same thing, noticing boxes filled with outdated issues of this and of that. Meg can admit she wasn't expecting her to be such an avid collector. Ruby's looking inside the home and all she can see when she looks through the back window is a blackbird sitting inside a cage - except the door to the cage is opened up? She finds that weird, but she can't really judge this woman seeing as how she didn't stop Meg, yet again, from doing something completely insane. Meg, on the other hand, has gone into the basement, tugging on a chain to turn on the crappy light. "With all the awful décor she has going on, you'd think she could afford some better lighting," she huffs, almost chuckling to herself. The basement has more boxes, except for the center of the room. She walks over, kneeling down and running her hand over the chalkline, rubbing her index finger and thumb together, "No fucking way. Ruby's going to shit her pants." Ruby's getting colder as the sun finishes setting and she's wondering how much longer Meg is going to be. She doesn't know if she can take this. She turns around, opening the door gingerly, whispering Meg's name into the darkness of the stranger's home. Her eyes start to adjust to the darkness, only to notice that bird is gone. She makes a face at the cage, starting to close the door behind her. The last thing she wants to do is be the reason that this woman lost her poor bird. Just as the door clicks behind her, a woman suddenly appears in front of her, "I believe you're in the wrong house," she says, her voice dark. Ruby barely has time to process what's being said as she's shoved out the door, yelping. She tries to yell that her friend is still in there, but the woman shuts the door, both the screen door and the main door. Ruby's flat on her butt, staring at the door. Oh no. Meg stands up straight when she hears the scuffle come from above her. She quickly goes over to the basement light and tugs the chain (breaking it) to turn it off. She backs up, nearly knocking over a box, listening to the footsteps above her as they move toward the basement. She ducks down and hides under a table, making sure that the skirt of it covers her. Her hand covers her mouth when she hears the creak of the woman's feet on the steps, moving down toward her. Maybe Ruby was right, just this once. What if this woman doesn't care about the law and instead wants to murder her? Oh yeah, that's a fantastic thought for her to have. Wait, then what happened to Ruby? She doesn't have time to focus on the thought, closing her eyes and holding her breath as she listens carefully to each footstep taken into the basement. Meg's eyes pry themselves open when the light turns on. She looks down at the chain she's holding in her hand, confused, then tries to focus her eyes through the skirt of the table, not having much luck in doing so. A shadow looms in front of the table and it causes her to almost retract from where she's kneeling, taking in a sudden but quiet breath. "If you're going to break into my home, you could have at least have the decency to steal something." Meg's heart nearly drops when the woman speaks, feeling faint. She doesn't have it in her to respond right away, swallowing hard, reminding herself mentally how to breathe. There's an exhausted sigh, "Please come out from under my table, I only have a number of hours to tend to this matter. and spending them pretending I don't know where you are just sounds unnecessary." There's a moment of silence, hesitation even, before Meg crawls out from underneath the table, brushing some of the dust off of her pants. She looks at the woman before, the woman who never changes in appearance, the woman she's been watching since she was a kid. She extends her hand toward Meg, "You're the girl across the street who watches me, yes?" Meg has never wanted to die before, but in this moment, she does, "My name is Hannah, and what might my curious stalker's name be?"There's more silence, more hesitation, before Meg takes Hannah's hand in her own, shaking it, "Meg. Name's Meg." Hannah smiles, "That's a great name, Meg. Now, how about some tea before I kick you out of my house. We can discuss me not calling the police on you." Everything that happens that night seems like a blur, right up to her being guided out through the back door, where Ruby comes rushing up to her, "Oh my god, are you okay? I thought you were dead! I was going to call the cops!" There's enough reassurance in Meg's voice to make sure that Ruby doesn't do that. She goes home across the street that night, looking back at the house, still not satisfied. Ruby kept mentioning some weird, creepy bird which Meg had never noticed. Hannah's the one watching Meg this time, looking at her discretely through the curtains. She doesn't know how well this will subdue the girl's curiosity, but she hopes it will hold for now. Meg makes it her mission to figure out what's going on with Hannah. She finds herself finding every excuse in the book to go over there, to the point of stealing her mail and going over, claiming that it was delivered to her parents home on accident. Hannah knows exactly what's going on, and she finds it almost amusing. No one has ever been this curious about her or cared about her. Maybe she shouldn't be entertaining it the way she is, but she does. One night, when she notices that Meg is watching from her second story bedroom window as usual, she blows some dust through the air of her window, lighting up her room. Meg's eyes go wide, immediately grabbing her phone and calling Ruby - who's tired when she answers the phone. "You're not going to believe the shit I'm seeing right now. It's like she just popped open a can of fireflies in her damn living room!" It's only about a month later when Meg realizes, after all these years, she's only ever seen Hannah at night. During the day, the only thing that she can ever see when she looks through the window is Hannah's bird, but at night, it's just Hannah. The whole thing is confusing and leads her on a quest of many ridiculous Google searches. Now, with the aid of her ridiculous Google searches, she was pretty sure that the woman living across the street and calling herself Hannah, was a shapeshifter. Which had to be insane. No matter how many times she tried explaining to Ruby why she thought the woman was this thing, Ruby called her nuts and then she'd beg her to drop the subject - which Meg couldn't do. That would be crazy. Frustrated with all the secrets, with the weird dreams involving Hannah, with the damn fireflies late at night, Meg goes over to her house. She's pounding on the door until Hannah answers, looking at Meg curiously, "Can I help you?"  Barely through the sentence, Meg forces her way inside, going right into the living room and pointing at the cage, "Where's the bird?" Hannah looks taken back, but she knew this day would inevitably come. She shuts the door, following Meg into the living room. "Hannah! Tell me where the bird is?!" Hannah's quiet, keeping her eyes on the cage as she goes and sits down on her couch. Her hands rest on her lap, looking uneasy, "If I tell you my story, if I tell you any of it's details, I'll have to leave." Meg's sitting on her bed, staring at her desk, her head spinning. Her hands are clasped together, wondering if it was worth it to learn the truth. She looks at her window, her arms crossing over her chest. It's raining out, storming even. She finds it ironic given her state of mind. She wonders though, how much of Hannah's story was true? A woman from decades upon decades upon decades ago being cursed? A witch being doomed to a life during the day as a flightless bird, then a woman during the night? She couldn't believe it. Except, the thing that made it so believable, was knowing that Hannah had given up her mortal life and chosen a cursed one to spare her brother; Castiel. He had been sick, and he was desperate. So desperate, in fact, that he chose to act with his gut instead of his head. He stole from someone in their village that no man, woman, or child would ever dream about stealing from. He was to be killed for trying to cure himself, and instead, Hannah let the blame fall upon herself. Hannah’s packing up her belongings, the necessities. She pulled the money from her walls, lining her suitcases. She would do what she always did and relocate, using help from the coven in order to do so. She had let herself grown attached to Meg, and that was a mistake. The poor girl had gone running out of her home, not believing her, yelling that she should have just admitted the bird flew away. Hannah has been alone for so many years that she forgot what it was like to have someone so invested in her. Having outlived her family, her bloodline forsaken, knowing she couldn't bare children of her own? It was nice to have some attention, even if it wasn't in the most healthy of ways. Her body turns toward her bedroom door when she hears the bell ringing. She looks at the time. It's late, she doesn't have much time before daybreak comes. Meg's standing in the rain, her back to the door. She doesn't know what she's doing, or what she's going to say, but she's definitely sure she should have brought an umbrella or at least worn a jacket - she can only imagine what Ruby would be saying right now. She hears the door creak open and she's reminded, briefly, of the way she felt when she heard Hannah coming down those basement steps. She turns around, looking at her. She's cold, and she's shivering, but she focuses on her. "Don't leave. Not yet." Hannah looks surprised, but she doesn't make an effort to move, "I want to see it happen. I want to see you change. It's the only way I'll believe this, believe what you've told me." Hannah considers Meg's request, watching her, before looking down at her feet, "On one condition." She didn't even wear shoes. Meg nods, waiting, "I want you to at least let me give you something dry to wear." Meg's sitting on Hannah's couch, wearing some oversized sweater and a pair of sweatpants that must be from the seventies. They're patterned quite hideously. She's pulling at the sleeves, making sure her hands are covered, looking over at Hannah when she comes into the room, sitting down on the chair adjacent to the couch. Nothing is said between them, causing the silence to become unbearable for Meg. "So, is this going to be like The Swan Princess and I'm going to watch you turn into a bird in some huge beam of light?" which sounds absurd, because Meg would have noticed something like that over all the years she's spent watching this woman. Hannah almost laughs, extremely amused, "I wish it was as fancy as that, and beautiful, but it's really not anything as overtly ridiculous as that." The silence continues until Meg watches the sun touch Hannah's skin. Half of her expects to see a Twilight effect come into play and watch her glitter away and then suddenly become a bird. Instead, she watches as Hannah's skin almost melts away into nothing. Their eyes never leave one another's, Meg watching as Hannah just disappears. Her clothing flattens against the couch, minus a small patch where something small seems to be moving. She stands, going over and moving the small bit of clothing aside, revealing the blackbird that Ruby often talked about seeing that first night. Meg chuckles, almost crying. Hannah turned into a fucking bird. The bird - Hannah - hops onto Meg's outstretched hand. She stands upright, watching the bird standing on the palm of her hand, and heads toward the bedroom. "I know you can't talk back to me, seeing that you're a bird and everything," her words seem to trail off as she goes into the bedroom, sitting down on the edge of Hannah's bed. She lowers her hand, letting Hannah hop off her hand and settle next to her, "I just wanted to say I'm sorry. For everything." Meg feels terrible, careful as she lies down on Hannah's bed, feeling the bird come around to sit in front of her. Their eyes meet and she expects to feel confused and uncomfortable, but she feels at ease. She's almost crying again, thinking about what Hannah went through. "So, you can do like... spells and shit? I still don't know how to respond to all of this." Meg falls asleep like that, the bird [Hannah] nestled into the pillows beside her. She dreams, something more pleasant compared to the invasive feelings she's had of late. There's a smile on her face when she wakes up, feeling so relaxed, until she notices the empty space next to her. She sits up, looking around, seeing nothing. She notices the suitcases that had been in Hannah's room are gone and gets out of bed, searching the entirety of the house. When she's finally accepted that Hannah has left, she calls Ruby crying. She doesn't even know why she's crying so much, but she is. It doesn't take long for Ruby to get there, hesitantly letting herself in, not comfortable being there when her only memory of the place is the night she broke in with Meg. She finds Meg on the floor in the living room, curled up against the wall, so she joins her. Meg never talks about what happened, about the night she spent with a woman who turned into a bird. She never explains to Ruby why she got into art and was so focused on aviary. She doesn't explain why she bird watches, or why she used her inheritance from her parents sudden death to buy the house across the street and sell the one she grew up in. The only thing she does tell Ruby, is that one time she met the most beautiful person in the world. A kind person, someone who was stuck in an immortal life in a mortal world, and even though she knew that none of what she did made sense to other people, she took the punishment that was placed upon her. Ruby still doesn't understand it, not even to this day. But she swears that she recognizes the woman she sees Meg with about twenty years later.

   The music played on.  Outside, the snow continued to fall.  And inside, in the warmth and comfort of each other, the girls said a quiet thank you to whatever God, watching out for wayward girls like them, had allowed them to find each other.