Summary: Lisa and Bobby talk. "Was he happy?" He's an old man. Sometimes he can't help the things that come out of his mouth. Tag to 6.01 "Exile on Main St."
On Idiots and Why We Love Them
Damn Winchesters, Bobby thinks as he closes his front door behind the brothers. Always leaving me with babysitting duty.
"Mom?" he hears from the staircase. It's the kid, Ben. "Don't worry, Mom. He'll be back."
Bobby knows Dean's girl—Lisa's her name—is still sitting on the stairs where Dean had left her. He knew it was one of the hardest things the boy's ever had to do, leave this woman and the kid he'd come to think of as his own.
There's no way to get to the kitchen (where he's got a pot of coffee going) from where he's standing without passing within sight of the stairs.
So he stays put and tries not to listen in on the private conversation taking place right around the corner. Well, maybe he does eavesdrop, but it is his house. Man's got a right to listen in on conversations held in his own house. He feels a tad bit sneaky about it though, seeing how he doesn't know these people all that well. But it's his house.
These people, they're Dean's, and Dean is family, so that makes letting them stay alright. It's not everyone Bobby opens his house to. Just idjit Winchesters, it seems like.
Lisa sniffs. She's a civilian, after all. And her boyfriend did just dump her and her son at no notice with an old geezer in a junkyard full of rusty relics and a house with more spells cast on it than a toad's got warts. "Ben, baby," she says, "I-I don't think he's coming back. He said goodbye. I'm sorry, baby."
"He'll be back," Ben says firmly. Looks like Dean's rubbed off on the kid, or maybe that way of taking care of people Dean, and it looks like this kid, have is just innate in the two of them.
Bobby can't see them but he thinks they're both probably sitting on the stairs, the boy maybe leaning up against his mom (he's not too old to be ashamed of loving his mother), and she with her arm wrapped securely around him.
"Remember when he first came? When he saved us?" the kid goes on. "You said he wouldn't be back. 'Cause he had a job he had to do. But he did. And he'll be back this time. You just see. He'll be back." The boy's got hero worship. Bad. Just like his daddy. Step-daddy. Whatever he is.
His mom sighs and clears her throat. "Well," she says brightly, "are you unpacked?"
Ben heaves what had to be a Sam-sized groan. "Mooooommmmmm," he whines, "can't we do that later?"
Bobby gets the feeling Lisa's still a little shaken up because she relents. "Alright. Let's go thank Mr. Singer properly for letting us stay in his house." Their clothes rustle as they get to their feet and brush off the dust of the old house.
Bobby takes that as his cue to walk around that darn corner he's been standing behind for the last couple of minutes. "You can call me Bobby," he tells her. "None of that Mr. Singer nonsense with family." He looks down at the boy. "The boys used to call me Uncle Bobby when they were younger," he says uncertainly, rubbing the hair under his cap. "You could call me that. Or Bobby. Whichever you like."
Brown eyes examine him carefully. Apparently, Bobby passes the kid's test, wrinkled shirt and all, because he says, "I've never had an uncle before. I mean," he stammers, "before Uncle, uh, Sam."
From the way Lisa tenses up, it's fairly obvious that Ben's never brought up the subject of Sam as his uncle, or maybe it's because of the implication that the kid sees Dean as his dad. Bobby could tell the kid that if it's the latter, the feeling's mutual, but somehow, he doesn't think that'll go over too well at this point. Lisa's a mother, and she wouldn't appreciate anyone butting in and telling her son what the doofus that just left her was thinking.
"I got coffee on, and sodapop in the fridge," he says, just to break the tension. "You guys eat yet?"
"I'm starving!" Ben announces.
Bobby wonders if Lisa had been telling Dean the truth when she said the kid wasn't his because this old man is seriously beginning to doubt her word on that. "Got pie for dessert," he says to test his theory out.
The kid's eyes get as big as saucers and he promptly begins to salivate. That settles it. Kid's a Winchester.
Lisa offers to help around the kitchen but Bobby won't let her. They're guests, and he's got some of the manners Karen had drilled into him left. Bobby takes a look at the girl's trim figure and decides that frying dinner's out of the question.
Dinner goes by swimmingly after Bobby digs out a series of old dusty anecdotes about the Winchester boys and the shenanigans they'd gotten themselves into over the years. He keeps the supernatural bits out of it, but there's plenty of good humiliating stuff left even then. Ben is kept laughing out loud throughout the meal, but Bobby catches Lisa looking pensive, as if wondering about this side of her man that she'd never gotten to see in the year he'd lived with them.
Ben's sent to bed after pie and milk, grumbling about how he hadn't even gotten to explore the 'epic' house.
"Brush your teeth," his mother tells him firmly.
Even though Bobby had said he'd do the washing up, Lisa picks up the worn dishtowel without a word and starts wiping the clean plates. And Bobby can't help it, he really can't.
"Was he happy?"
He's an old man. Sometimes he can't help the things that come out of his mouth. Senile, that's right, he's getting senile in his old age.
The look the woman gives him is enough. Happy enough, but Dean would have been happier if he'd known his brother was alive. She'd been the one there for him when he'd woken up screaming from nightmares, she'd been the one to pry the empty glasses from fingers clenched tight even in drunken sleep, she'd been the one to mother the broken man back into something resembling the person he'd been before.
"Should I have told him?" he finds himself asking.
He really can't help himself. It's a question he's asked himself every damn morning, if this was the day he'd pick up the phone and tell Dean Winchester that his brother was alive and well. He always found an excuse not to call though. But every night, he'd lie awake wondering if he was doing the right thing.
"He's a grown man," is all she says. She picks at a speck of food left on the plate she's holding. "I think he would have been able to make his own decisions if he'd known. I don't know if he would have stayed with me, or," her voice hitches a little, "left, but he would have done whatever he thought was the right thing. He's like that," she says with a sniff. "Considerate, even when he was grieving so much. He was always so sorry that he'd woken me up, or that he'd passed out somewhere Ben or I could trip over him."
That makes Bobby smile, though it hurts somewhere deep in his chest and in his stomach. "That's Dean for ya. That's Dean."
"I tried to help him, but it was so hard to get him to accept it." The dishes sit forgotten now. Neither of them feels much like cleaning up.
"Looks like he finally did though. Got you and that kid to thank for it." Bobby stares at the soapsuds on his hands. A bubble on his wrinkly-wet thumb pops.
"You too," Lisa says. "I know he called you at all hours of the night, just to talk. He was always calmer afterwards."
Was that so? Bobby'd hoped, but he hadn't known if talking to an old man who was a painful reminder of the sorely missed little brother and an abhorrent past life had done Dean much good. Bobby swallows past the painful lump in his throat, and all he can do is nod.
"Do you think," Lisa starts, but hesitates.
"If I know the boy, he'll be back," Bobby says with more confidence than he has. This girl's good for Dean. She's done her best to mend him, and he's getting there, slowly but surely. "He loves you, both of you," he adds softly, hoping she won't mind an old man butting into her business. "He doesn't love easy, but he loves hard."
Wet brown eyes meet his. "I know," Lisa says, "but he loves his brother too."
And that was the crux of the problem. Bobby nods. "That he does. I still say he'll be back. Just you watch."
Lisa takes up the dishcloth again. "I hope so, for Ben's sake. He looks up to him so much. He's never had a dad before, and Dean, he's so wonderful with him."
Her face just about shines sunbeams when she says that, so that Bobby can't help but tease, "I bet that's not the only reason you want him to stick around."
It's only after Lisa flushes bright red that Bobby realizes, "Oh Lordy, not like that. I meant, aw, never mind," he blusters out and plunges his hands into the sudsy water again. Not what he meant.
And it's a credit to Dean to find a girl that's just like him, really, because she after she recovers, she says, in a matter of fact manner, "Well, he's great in the sack too," and that's that. Lisa giggles, albeit a little hysterically, and Bobby turns as red as a tomato, shaking his head and muttering things under his breath.
The rest of the night is uneventful. Bobby contemplates staying up to see if the boys'll call, but then again, when have they ever called unless they wanted something? So he goes up to bed and tosses and turns wondering who Dean would choose.
The morning brings no phone call, but there's a knock on the door right before noon.
Bobby opens it and feels a flood of relief.
"That's a great girl you got, Dean," he tells him.
Dean smirks. "You don't have to tell me that, Bobby. I know."
That just gets Bobby's goat because he's trying to tell the boy something important here. "She's an idiot for putting up with you," he adds just out of spite.
"Well you're an idiot for putting up with almost thirty years of Winchesters. Don't you ever learn, old man?" Dean snarks back and passes by Bobby to get to his girl.
A minute later, a frustrated shout of, "I don't care about the house, Dean," can be heard from the sitting room, and Bobby shakes his head. Doesn't the boy ever learn?