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“What are you doing out here?”
She didn’t look up. She was sitting there on the side of the old bridge, her feet dangling off, hanging over the river that was going by below dangerously fast.
She knew it was Dean talking, she knew it from his familiar voice of course, though she had already known before he had spoken. She had heard his heavy step coming up to her from behind, the gravel crunching under his boots.
“Nothing,” she muttered quietly, her eyes absentmindedly following the movement of the river. “Just thinking”
“Thinking,” Dean’s deep voice repeated. She felt a breeze on her left side, and yet, he was sitting down right next to her with a grunt.
“That sounded like something hurt,” she commented, still without taking her eyes off the water.
“That might be,” he said, “Because my knees did hurt”
“Mh,” she made, now with a slight smirk on her face, but still not looking at him. “Old man”
She felt his fist jokingly boxing her shoulder alongside one of his deep laughs, and that made her let out a little chuckle as well.
She now could see his legs dangling off the bridge right next to her own, his legs in dark blue jeans, with his old, brown boots on his feet. Just Dean, she thought, like he always was.
“Thinking ‘bout what?” Dean’s voice now came through, the water rushing in the background.
“Stuff,” she gave a quiet reply.
“Stuff,” he repeated. Nothing more. Nothing from her, either.
“You know,” he then added, and she could feel the railing’s crossbar moving as he rested his arms on it, “I might not be an expert on … stuff …, but if you need someone to talk … I can keep a secret”
She hesitated. For just a moment she hesitated, her eyes still following the river, then she turned to him, looking at him for the first time in this conversation.
“If you …” she started, then stopped. Thought. Dean’s eyes were on her, waiting patiently. “If you were … you know, feeling things,” she then started again. “You know, like, things you’ve never felt before. And it’s … You’ve thought about the possibility of feeling that before, but it’s so different from what you imagined, and it’s also different from what people told you, and …” She paused. “If you’re feeling something,” she then concluded, “but you don’t know what you’re feeling … what do you do?”
“Mh,” he made. His head was now resting on his arms, his eyes still on her. He had been carefully listening to every word, with a soft expression on his face. “Are we talking feelings for another person?”
All of a sudden, she turned her face, avoided his eyes again. Just hoped that he couldn’t see the red she felt crawling over her cheeks.
“Maybe,” she gave a mumbled response.
“I think …” she heard his voice speak calmly, no sign of amusement or mocking, “I think that you don’t necessarily have to know what exactly it is you’re feeling. I think that sometimes, maybe it’s enough to know if someone makes you feel good. That’s enough for the start. I think that if someone makes you feel good, you could start with spending more time with that person, and then you just know. Having them around, I think after a while you know if you want them as a friend, or more”
“Mh,” she hummed. “That’s not as bad of advice as I expected”
A chuckle from him. “Hey, I can be quite insightful, from time to time”
“Right,” she smirked. Then, after a moment: “What if it’s not the kind of person that society tells you to like?”
For just a second, there was nothing from Dean. Then, his silence was broken with a little sigh. It sounded sad, even though she couldn’t confirm by his expression. She wouldn’t look at him, still not.
“Don’t give a shit about society,” he said. “It’s your life, so make yourself happy”
She let that sink in for a moment. Turned back to look at him again.
“Did you?” she asked.
He only looked back into her eyes in silence, for a second, two. Another sigh, and he turned his eyes away.
“I wish I would’ve,” he muttered. Without another look at her, he moved back, stood up.
“Dean-“ She started, but he interrupted.
Now standing on the bridge, looking down on her, he said “Just text her”
Her brain stopped working for a moment there, and that must have been visible, because Dean showed a little smirk, despite his still sad eyes.
“I mean, I may be old, but I’m not blind. I could see this smile-thing you and Kaia had going. So, you know, just text her. It’s gonna be fine”
She couldn’t answer, not in words. All she brought out was a sincere smile.
He gave a smile back, for just a second. Then he turned to walk away, the gravel crunching under his boots again.
After a couple of steps, the scrunching stopped.
“Claire?” She heard his voice.
“Yeah?”
“Don’t wait too long,” he said. “Don’t make the same mistakes I did. You’re gonna regret it”