Chapter Text
The mixture of sounds; screams, Maureen's voice, everything else, fade away, and his body falls in a heap, landing in the bathroom.
His father - John-David - is clambering up, eyes wide, complements flowing to Alice who is visibly shaking from the effort of summoning them back from Hell.
The screams had been overwhelming, pressing in on his senses, constantly burning into his mind, forcing him to enter fight-or-flight mode.
Back in the cold, blue themed bathroom. It feels like he has gone from one extreme to the opposite, and his mind is struggling to keep up.
He looks over at his sister, who is blushing, and pushing back at her father, clearly embarrassed but pleased at his words.
He kisses her forehead, before hurrying downstairs to greet his wife with joy, leaving an ashy trail behind him.
Jimmy is also covered in ash, and its bitter taste rings in his mouth. He asks his sister whether he should clean himself or not, and she returns that he probably should.
He is slightly unwilling to clean himself; he does not want all the evidence of his adventure to be gone so soon (at least the evidence other than his father's apparent alive-ness), but he acquiesces to her suggestion, slowly turning the shower on, and then admitting to himself that the feeling of warm water is nice and soothing after all the events of Hell.
It had been... A lot. And even that was an understatement. From the constant and unrelenting screams, and the endless heat, it had been a sensory hell on it's own, and that was before the risk of the mission and the fact that his father's spirit was at stake came into play.
It feels deeply strange to be back in the normality of the Bluebell hotel.
Jimmy closes his eyes in bliss, as the warm water runs over his face, before reaching for the shampoo. When his body is clean, and his hair cleaner, he can hear the sounds of the chairs scraping downstairs in the dining hall.
The hotel Bluebell has hosted his family for a long time, for they are not the owners, they simply rent out a few rooms.
Jimmy pulls on the clothes his sister left out for him, before sleepily making his was down to the kitchen.
His father is eating a bowl of soup as he enters, and Alice is sitting next to him, writing in her purple notebook. She looks up and calls out a greeting. She seems to be less tired now, and he spots a half-empty cup of coffee beside her.
I'm happy to be back, he replies quietly, before his mother embraces him, her arms strong and safe. She whispers soothingly into his hair, before sitting him down to make sure his food isn't stolen by Alice.
The affection is nice, but he cannot help but feel worried; as though there are going to be problems coming from this breaking of the rules of life and death.
The light outside the windows dims, and soon the only light (aside from the indoor ones) comes from the fairy lights hanging in the orchard.
Jimmy licks his lips, a desire to complement his dinner the thought on his mind, but befoe he can, the weight of tiredness hits him hard, and he slips forward, head thudding onto the table, a soft snore slipping from his mouth.
Alice comments on how sweet he looks, before she slinks from the kitchen to read or do more demon related things in the privacy of her room.
John-David gently picks his son's sleeping form up, carrying him back up the stairs before tucking him into bed.
When the heavy duvet covers press on Jimmy's body, he sleepily mumbles that he's glad John-David is back. In reply, John-David hugs his son, before gently tucking him in and slipping out of the room.
Jimmy is left in the cool silence. It is a small habit from his time in Hell, but Jimmy is half awake - not obviously so, but his ears, still ringing slightly, are open, still expecting danger any second, but the only sound that fills the air is the soft ticking and tocking of his bedside clock.
He lets out a long sigh, settling more comfortably into his bed, before letting sleep take him to the land of dreams and memories.
It is later on, when he is half awake and not sure what the time is, when he realises that the grandfather clock was not chiming at dinner time.