A/N: I got the idea for this from "Swap Meat" when Sam stole the toast off the mother's plate.
Really, the toast should've clued me in.
Dad had come back from his trip out to Reno and some supposed ghost in the 'Bowling Hall of Fame' that turned out to be nothing. We shared a couple shots of whiskey while Dad asked what had gone on in his absence and I told him about some likely hunts I'd found. Then I turned in while Dad stayed up with a book and the TV remote.
Sam does that, 'multitasking' he'd call it. He can read a book, watch TV, and carry on a conversation all at the same time. Drives me crazy. I thought maybe I should call the kid. We hadn't talked in a week…eight days, but who was counting? It was his turn to call but he was in his second semester of college and things were no doubt busy. I fell asleep thinking maybe tomorrow I'd call him.
The next morning Dad and I had breakfast at the diner attached to the motel. I got the Trucker's Special and Dad had pancakes and I thought that sometimes it was scary how alike Dad and Sam really are. They both like pancakes. Of course, Dad always has the full stack with lots of butter and syrup, while Sam, health-geek that he is, always gets the short stack, no butter, and actually pours his syrup on the side to dip his forkful of pancake into.
Drives me crazy.
"You are listening to me, aren't you?" Dad asked.
"What? Yeah. Sure. The lake is leaking."
Dad gave me The Look and clarified, "My brakes are squeaking. You wanna follow me to the car parts place, or should I meet up with you someplace after?"
That was usually Sam's cue to choose the library or bookstore or laptop. Sure there were a lot of places I could go instead of shadowing Dad at the car place, but – what was the point of going to any of those places alone?
"Nah, I'll come with. I'll see if they have anything for my baby…"
"Great."
Sammy never worked on the car, but he'd sit nearby whenever I did, reading some book or another, doing his homework, handing me tools when I asked for them. Depending on what he was reading or what he'd learned or what had snagged his interest most recently, he'd lean across the fender and watch me work and regale me with little known facts and really weird trivia.
F'rinstance, did you know that kangaroos can't walk backwards? That might be useful – if we ever went to Australia. Apparently non-dairy creamer is flammable, which actually might be useful sometime or another in our line of work. A really handy tip was that most alcoholic beverages contain all 13 minerals necessary to sustain human life. See, that's why I drink, for the nutrition. Oh, and Americans drink over a billion pounds of coffee every year and around five million bottles of soda - we sure do our part. My personal favorite though was the startling bit of info that a whale's penis is called a dork. I haven't decided yet if the word should now be considered a compliment instead of an insult.
One thing was for sure - my life had become much quieter since Sammy went away to college.
Drives me crazy.
Some movement across the table brought my mind back to the diner and breakfast. Dad had snagged the piece of toast from my plate. Gee whiz. Somebody slip him a happy pill or something? Toast-snatching was Sammy's forté. It had been since he was in single digits, and especially since mind-boggling growth spurts turned him on most occasions into a bottomless pit. He never asked 'can I have that?' or even 'you gonna eat that?' Just – snatch and grab, from my plate or Dad's, sometimes both. I didn't mind because a well-fed Sam was more than likely a non-grumpy Sam. Dad didn't mind because – so I surmised – if Sam was at ease enough with Dad to take liberties, underneath it all they were still good.
I really needed to call Sam.
When we pulled into the parking lot of the car parts store, I told Dad I'd be there in a minute. We were in the same time zone and I knew Sam's schedule, so as soon as Dad was inside the store, I hit speed dial.
"Hey, Dea –" Sam's greeting was punctuated by a loud thud right in my ear and a few choice words from a distance. Guess somebody dropped his phone.
"Sam? You okay there?"
"Hey, sorry. Didn't mean to drop you." He came back on the line. "Hold on a second, I need to sit down."
"Sam – you okay? You sound out of breath. Where're you running to?"
"Nowhere. Just – thanks, I've got it. Thanks." That got said to somebody on his side of the phone. "I just have my hands full is all, trying to get back to my dorm. What's up?"
"You haven't called. I'm just checking that you're OK."
"It wasn't my turn to call."
"It was soooo your turn to call."
"Was not."
"Was too. Remember? You got mad because your phone rang in the library, like I was supposed to know you went there forty-five minutes early."
There was a pause.
"Oh. Yeah." He finally admitted. "I've been – busy. I forgot."
"Good busy I hope."
There was another pause. One that I didn't like.
"SAM?"
"I twisted my ankle. It's nothing. Really. Just – it's nothing."
"How bad?"
"Not bad."
"HOW bad?"
Another pause.
Drives me crazy.
"Bad. I guess. They put an orthotic on me, not just an ace bandage. I'm on crutches." He snickered then. "You should see it. My foot is turning more colors than Dad's face did that time the motel kid asked him if he had an AARP card."
Good thing Dad wasn't around or he'd be wondering what I was laughing so hard at.
"Guess the marble hallways in those ivory towers can be dangerous." I said, when I stopped laughing. "So, what do you need?"
"What?"
"I'm coming out there, what do you need?"
He didn't say, 'nothing, I'm fine', he didn't rattle off a list of fussy necessities. No, for an answer, I got another pause.
"You know what, never mind." I said. "When I get there, I'll tell you what you need. I'm not even twelve hours away, I'll be there before midnight.
"Okay. Thanks. I'll see you then, then. Thanks."
Poor kid had to be really suffering to be repeating himself like that. Maybe his university health insurance didn't cover the really good drugs.
"Go back to your room, Sammy, rest your foot. I'm already packed up so I'll hit the road as soon as I let Dad know I'm going." I expected the pause I got that time; I always got one whenever I mentioned Dad. I just kept talking. "Don't worry about falling asleep, I can let myself in."
"I know." He answered, with more than a little experience. "All right. I'll see you then. Thanks, Dean."
We hung up and I headed into the store and nearly ran into Dad who was on his way out already. We turned and headed back to the car and truck.
"I have to go out and check Sammy. He wrecked his ankle, I'm gonna make sure he didn't permanently destroy it."
"How bad is it?"
"He said it was bad, so you know it's very bad." I never got the pauses from Dad when I was talking about Sam that I got from Sam when I was talking about Dad, but I still knew better than to ask if he wanted to come with me. "I'll take him out some good painkillers. See what else he might need."
"Here, I've got some back here." Dad opened his driver's door to reach behind the seat and bring out a paper bag. "There's Vicodin in there. Some foam rubber too, in case he needs the handgrips on his crutches padded."
Well, not only was the medicine oddly convenient – who the hell ever said anything to Dad about crutches?
It hit me all at once – the multitasking, the pancakes, the toast-snatching. Dad had been deliberately making me think of Sam so that I'd call him.
He knew.
"You knew." I accused him. "Stanford's only a few hours past Reno. You were out there. You knew Sam was hurt."
Dad looked embarrassed and that's something I was definitely not used to.
"I drive out whenever I can, make sure he's okay."
"Why the hell didn't you give it to him yourself?" I gestured to the bag.
"He wouldn't want to see me. Not after the last thing I said to him." He offered me the bag again. "Better it comes from you."
Idiots. My father and my brother are both stubborn idiots.
"Next time, will you just tell me I should call Sam, rather than making me play 'Clue'?"
Dad nodded.
"All right. I will. I promise."
"Good." I took the bag and headed for the car, but Dad called me back.
"Hey – just – don't tell Sam, OK?"
I growled and stomped to my car.
Idiots. Stubborn Winchester idiots.
Drives. Me. Crazy.
The End.