Long Winter

Chapter-5

Third person POV

"Hey. come on we are going" said an overly energetic boy with black curls. "Hmm, coming" was the response he got from his overly serious friends.

"How many more shops do we need to visit" said another guy following his two friend.

"No idea, I think until he gets every thing" was the only respond he got while the black head boy moved towards his other destination.

The three men with bags in each hand followed their extremely happy friend. "I don't understand how we got into following him, especially today" said the guy with green eyes with an annoyed face.

 "You know how he gets if we did not follow him, especially today" was the respond he got from his friend who was busy looking around.

The three men went into another store with each of them sighing. "Hey Dean try this on." said the boy with curly hair passing his friend a royal blue shirt. 

"Oh come on Ian, how many more cloths are you going to buy for us. These are enough" said the guy with green eyes indicating towards the bags kept aside. 

"Yes Ian. I agree with Alex. This amount of shopping is enough for collage. Can we please stop now" said River following in lead with his friends.

"Come on Dean say something. You don't think this is enough right" said a pouting Ian trying to convince his friend to stand on his side. 

"I think they are right Ian the cloths are enough. Lets go and eat something now" said Dean in his usual calm tone. "Ok. If you say so" "YES, Finally. Lets go eat" shouted Alex picking up the bags ready to rush to the closest food store.

"You all go forward while I pay the bill. " said dean while his friends were picking up the bags they had previously discarded on the floor. 

Saying this he went to the counter to pay the bill for the cloths bought. After he was done collecting the cloths he went on to look for his friends.

As he was ready to call his friends for their location he saw the girl he saw earlier in the grocery store. Unlike her self then she seemed rather stiff as if she had witnessed an accident. He saw her cover her ears and end on her knees with her eyes closed. Without thinking much Dean rushed towards the girl whose smile had made his day.

When he was finally in front of her, Dean slowly got close to her cautious enough to not scare her. Being a psychology major came in handy to him as he saw the girl having a panic attack. Slowly removing her hand from her ears dean spoke slowly. "Its going to be ok, breath. Its ok breath." although he continued trying to reassure her, she was still scared and the attack continued.

 Seeing their was no improvement Dean tried another method to calm her "listen to my voice and count with me" without waiting for a respond from the girl Dean stated to count and slowly the girl too started counting with him. 

By the time they finished counting till Ten the girl was breathing normally.

 She slowly got up copied by Dean "Thank you" she said with her head down and dashed in the opposite direction leaving Dean standing with his eyes in the direction she left.

Dean was back brought to his senses by his ringing phone. Still stunned he picked up Alex's call "Hmm" 

"What 'Hmm' where are you. Come quick we are on the second floor. We are in-front of the ice cream parlor. " without waiting for a respond from the other end the call was cut.

Dean took five minutes to reach the place described by Alex on call and was greeted by his friend resting inside the parlor eating their respective ice crams.

"Look who finally got hear" said Alex as he saw Dean walk towards them. 

"Sorry. Something came up" said Dean taking his seat beside River. River passed him the ice cram and the subway they just bought.

"So are you all exited to finally go back to collage" said Ian taking a scoop of ice cram "Obviously. Now that we are in our senior year" said Alex finishing his ice cream.

All through the conversation Dean was absent minded remembering what he just encountered. "Dean. Dean hey you ok" said River and when Dean finally looked up he saw all his three friends giving him weird looks. 

"Yeah. I was just...thinking something. Nothing to worry about" he said trying to sound as normal as he could.

Alex and River knew something was wrong but did not continue pressurizing him. Ian just gave Dean a look expecting an explanation but when Dean signed him that they will talk later he left him alone. 

The conversation resumed and dean stated looking out side the window where he saw two people standing with subway packets in their hand. 'Siblings' he thought seeing their interaction.

Looking around he once again saw the girl and unintentionally stood up. She was smiling as she approached the pare of siblings. They seemed to have a conversation and she was smiling through out but the smile was not as radiant as he saw in the grocery store. It looked empty. He continued observing the siblings until they left.

It was only then he realized that he was standing looking back he saw his friends staring at him. Knowing he has been caught a silly smile made its way onto his lips. 

"Before any of you say anything let me speak" said Dean knowing he did not have any way out.

'Looks like the day is going to be long' sighing he began to explain from the very beginning when he saw this girl for the first time in their collage just before the vacations began and later in the grocery store early this morning. Leaving out their interaction on the third floor.