Disclaimer: All things Supernatural belong to Kripke not me (Rinse & Repeat)

A/N: Unbeta'd so all niggles, wtf's and humdingers are mine, all mine. Inspired by challenge #11 at foundficspn. Mad props to kimonkey7 and rinkle for adhoc de-Aussification and pickups. Thanks guys :-)

'Jesus, Mike – what does she think I am? A fucking idiot?'

John threw the note back on the table in front of him, shaking his head.

'Katie's only tryin' to help, John. And she's right. You gotta fly this one straight tomorrow, get your shit straightened out pronto, buddy. Or you're gonna lose those boys.'

'Hey, keep your voice down,' John growled around the lip of his beer, glanced towards the hallway and the bedroom where the boys were sleeping. Dean didn't need to hear any of this.

Mike leant forward across the kitchen table, his eyebrows almost meeting in consternation.

'You think that kid hasn't already figured out what's going on? You need to wake up and take a look around you, John. You got a four year old kid in there doin' a better job of pickin' up the slack than you are.'

He stood up angrily, swept a hand towards the counter.

'Kid's making scrambled eggs and toast on a kitchen bench he can't see the top of. Sam starts cryin' the other night, by the time Katie gets in there Dean's outta bed and rockin' the crib like a fuckin' thirty-five year old little man. You think this is what she would have wanted for him? For you?'

John gave him a look that could have stripped paint. 'Shut the fuck up, Mike.'

Mike recognized the line, stepped back from it and shook his head. He looped his fingers around the tops of the empties in front of his friend. He pointed the bottles at John as he removed him from the table.

'And this? This isn't helping. You know that, right?'

You see, that's where you're wrong, Mike. This? This is the ONLY thing that's helping. This right here is the only blunt thing I'm rubbing up against. Everything else? Got fuckin' razors on it.

'I got it under control.'

Mike gave him a long stare. He didn't know if John meant the drinking, or the rest of this mess. But it didn't really matter. He was wrong. Either way.

'No, you don't. If you had it under control you'd be opening the garage tomorrow. I'm serious John, that better be your last tonight. You walk in there tomorrow smelling like a brewery and they'll yank those boys faster'n you can say ward of the state.'

'Why don't you cut me some slack here, Mike.'

John leant back in his chair and gave him a flat stare. Tapped the bottom of the half drunk bottle on the table top. Mike sensed an explosion of some kind imminent and he suddenly didn't care. Maybe John needed to explode. Get angry. Do something.

'Slack? No. Last month was slack. I cut you slack last month. You know what you got this month? You got two boys. And they need you clear headed. She'd go to town on your ass if she could see you right now.'

Mike threw the bottles in the recycling beside the fridge and they crashed louder than he intended. John was up out of his chair at the same time, fist thumping the table and for a split second Mike thought they were going to have at it, right there in the kitchen. Fuck. Guy's an ex-Marine. I'm a dead man. But then Sam started howling down the hallway and the hothead Marine was gone. It was Mary's husband lifting his palms to the ceiling, rolling his eyes.

'Great. Wake 'em up, Mike. Nice.'

John's feet felt heavy against the hallway carpet, and not just from the beer. Everything had a new weight now. Up until this week, things had felt…light. Not easy light. But weightless, as though everything was flying up and around, pinging in his skull and buzzing painfully like a fluorescent light on its last legs. For a few weeks, there'd been all that stuff to deal with. Enough mundane distractions to keep the air going in and coming out, without having to make it happen. Funeral arrangements. Bills. Insurance. Bank accounts and mortgages and who knew it took so much paperwork to extract someone from a life? But no-one needed any signatures anymore. No-one was thrusting anything under his nose to sign, or telling him which queue he needed to be standing in.

And that was the real kicker. For two months he'd been crossing a minefield, listening for a click beneath his boot - hell, Winchester, let's be honest - kinda hoping for that click beneath his boot. But now he was past that first field, and the rest of his life was yawning before him like so much unwanted space. The bulb had blown. He was stumbling in the shadows now, listening to the world settle and creak and moan, readjusting itself without her in it.

And yeah, he was angry. Not exactly at her – but yes, at her.

I will be your witness. That's what she'd said. All blonde hair and shimmering eyes and lip gloss and all that taffeta. Christ, he'd lost it over the taffeta. And she'd been so mad at him that he thought he was going to crack a fucking rib laughing.

We shall keep together what share of trouble and sorrow our lives may lay upon us.

And then it wasn't anger but tears rising at the back of his throat, behind his eyes. He blinked them away, swallowed it down. It wasn't that she didn't deserve those tears. 'Cause hell - I'll cry me a fuckin' RIVER right through this city if it'll change a damn thing. But this feeling? It was so damn useless.

Dean had climbed into the crib. John watched him from the doorway, hunkered down beside his brother, one arm curled around him. Between Sam's soulful keening, he could hear Dean's quiet Shhhhhhhh. And then those tears were clawing their way back up his throat - useless or not - and he was drunk and stupid and he didn't trust himself to speak for a while.

'Hey, kiddo.'

Dean sat up sleepily, rubbed his eyes as John gathered Sam up in his arms.

'I got him, Tiger. Back to bed.' He monkey gripped Dean's forearm with his free hand and pulled him up out of the crib, swung him out over the floorboards back onto his own bed in one fluid motion and step. Dean scooted obediently underneath his covers as John paced the room and rocked his brother.

'What time is it?' Dean asked.

'It's late, Kiddo.'

'Is it time to look at the car yet?'

'What?'

'Are you going to look at the car now?'

Oh. That's right. He'd lied.

The car magazine had been a perfect foil.

They were sitting at a café table outside the shopping complex down the road from the garage. Dean had been chasing the straw of his milkshake around the lip of the glass for an eternity, and John was pretty sure the way he was holding it meant the whole lot was gonna end up in his lap any second. But he didn't stop him. You couldn't wrap them up in cotton wool. Kids had to learn.

The two women at the next table were watching him with unabashed and flirtatious interest. He must have looked like fucking Father of the Year, sitting there with Sam in the stroller and Dean sticking his straw up his nose every two seconds. He rolled his wedding band around his finger beneath the tabletop and didn't return their wide and inviting smiles.

'My wife's dead,' he wanted to call out to them. Betcha that'd wipe the Fuck Me right outta those eyes.

'So Auntie Kate's gonna take care of you boys for a bit on Friday morning,' he said to Dean, fighting the urge to reach across the table and liberate the straw from his son's nostril.

'Why?'

'Oh, I gotta go see a guy about something.'

'Whaddya hafta see him about?'

The question was innocent enough and John raised his eyebrows, stared blankly at the magazine in front of him. Fuckin' kid wanted to know everything. And yeah, it was good that he'd finally started opening that trap of his again. But Sweet Jesus - mind your own business kid, you know?

'Impalas,' he barked, staring at the picture of the Chevy on page twelve of the classifieds.

'What's an Impala?'

For fuck's sake. He spun the magazine round, pushed it towards Dean's inquiring face, those eyes that nearly two months on were still broadcasting the same message twenty four hours a day: I don't get this. He'd had a look about him since the night of the fire, like a dog that had been clipped hard up the side of the head. He was wary of things now. Everything. And sometimes John found he couldn't look at him for too long because he didn't have an answer for that. He didn't have any promises to make the kid. People go away. Helluva lesson to have smacked into you. Four years old.

'That. Right there.' He jabbed the photo with his thumb. 'That's an Impala, kid.'

Dean's eyes widened. 'Are we getting an Impala?'

'Maybe, son. Maybe. That's why I gotta go talk to this guy. You like it?'

'Yessir.'

'So you guys are gonna hang with Auntie Kate and I'm gonna go see about this car. No promises, though Dean. If she doesn't run right, you gotta walk away. Even the pretty ones.' He winked at the boy. 'I'm gonna tell ya that again in a few years only we're not gonna be talking about cars.'

Dean didn't get why his Dad thought that was funny, but he mirrored the upturn of his father's lips innocently, the edges of his mouth hovering between a smile and uncertainty. It was enough to make John's heart hitch and he rubbed his chest absently with the side of his thumb. That feeling behind his ribs, it wasn't a surprise anymore. He was almost getting used to the permanency of it.

The only thing that varied was the degree.

They sat there while Dean finished his milkshake. John watched the straw nearly poke his eye out three times before he turned his attention to Sam so he wouldn't intervene. He stared at his sleeping son and thought: They got their whole lives not to know her. All three of them were trapped there, somewhere between her and death.

It seemed like such an awful way to spend the rest of a life.

Mike wasn't done with him yet. He started in again when John came back into the kitchen, Sam finally asleep.

'And what happened to you this afternoon?'

'What?' John hooked his beer off the table, avoided Mike's stare.

'The garage?' Mike raised his eyebrows. 'Your job? Ringing any bells, pal?'

'Something came up.'

'Something came up? Something's coming up alright – our loan repayments. You can't just close the place down in the middle of the day, John. You're killin' us here.'

Mike chewed on his barely contained frustration. 'Please tell me you didn't go see that spook again.'

'Hey, I said something came up.' John wheeled on him, snarling. 'I don't ask you for a fuckin' affidavit every time you take a piss. Back off, Mike.'

Mike leant against the kitchen bench, hands on his hips. He sighed.

'Look, I'm goin' to bed. Katie's gonna be home in an hour. I suggest you hit the hay by the time she gets in. She catches you drinking tonight….Man, I don't know what she'll do. Right now she's still on your side. That could change.'

John stood in the middle of the kitchen for a long time after Mike had disappeared down the other end of the house. He sculled the last of his beer and threw the empty down into the recycling. Then he raked his fingers down his face and opened the fridge door.

He leant there, staring at the remaining bottles on the top shelf. She catches you drinking tonight… John left the bottles untouched, shut the fridge door and wandered into the living room. He punched the TV remote on the coffee table, brought to life some black & white late night movie he wasn't going to pay any attention to. Then he crossed to the cabinet on the far wall and opened it, took out a glass and the bottle of whiskey from the top shelf.

Fuck you, Kate.

It was still dark when John slipped into the boys room. Dean was awake before he squatted beside the bed. There had been a time not so long ago the kid could have slept through a nuclear explosion. But not anymore.

'Dad?' he enquired too loudly and John shushed him.

'Up and at 'em, kiddo,' he whispered, holding up a jacket for Dean to slip into.

The boy frowned sleepily as he poked his arms into the sleeves and turned so his dad could do up the zip.

'Do I hafta get dressed?'

'Nope. Jacket's fine. Keep your voice down, kiddo. You don't wanna wake Sammy, do ya?'

'No.'

'Good kid.'

'Why's the sun gone?'

'Sun's not up yet, Tiger. We're gettin' the jump on her.'

The idea seemed to delight Dean. His eyes shone in the moonlight.

'Why?'

His voice was so full of childish excitement and wonder that John smiled - actually smiled - for the first time in he didn't know how long. There was nothing forced about it, nothing feigned. It felt good, and wrong, and guilty. It felt like betrayal. But it was a smile, and Dean was looking at him like a trip that got the jump on the sun might just be about the greatest thing that had ever happened to him.

Maybe the kid already had a bit of the gypsy in him.

'You wanna go look at that Impala, right?'

Dean's mouth opened a little. He looked around the darkened room as if the car might be there somewhere, waiting to be discovered. For a second John regretted the words. The kid looked like he was about to start squealing. If he started squealing, no-one was going anywhere.

'Dean, you gotta be real quiet. I promised Uncle Mike and Auntie Kate we wouldn't wake 'em up this morning. So we're gonna be reeeeal quiet, like little mice. Okay? You remember that time when I hid in the closet near the stairs and you were looking everywhere and you couldn't find me?'

Dean nodded.

'Well, that's because all those times I wanted to say something, I kept my mouth shut and I stayed real quiet.'

Dean nodded again and John saw that he understood. He was staring intently at him, and those eyes had thirty years on the four under his belt. A kid shouldn't know how to be that quiet. A kid shouldn't be able to be.

He lifted Sam out of the crib, did a couple of laps around the room until he was satisfied he wasn't going to wake on the way out of the house.

At the front door, he stooped and picked up the duffel bag from the floor. He shouldered it carefully, bent again and handed Dean his little backpack. He felt a sharp flare of pride as his son shrugged it on – his face a firework of questions, eyes finally full of something other than loss and confusion. And he was holding it all in there, like a padlocked box.

His father had asked him to be quiet. Dean Winchester was going to implode before he let a word pass his lips.

John turned the bolt as if defusing a bomb, lifted the door as he swung it open to silence the creak he knew was waiting to betray them. And then they were out into the crisp sharpness of the early morning air.

He led the way, Sam in one arm, Dean's hand in his. They passed Mike's beat up, old, brown sedan, then John's blue pickup. He kept going down the driveway, out onto the street and headed left down the deserted sidewalk towards the park.

The rental was waiting where he'd left it. It'd been pretty painless, really. Missouri had organized the fake IDs and given him the contacts. Two guys, a James and a Caleb. Phone numbers, addresses and the promise of a roof over their heads, for as long as they needed it. John was surprised, actually – the lies dripped off his tongue like honey on the phone to the rental company, to the clerk behind the counter when he'd caught the bus out to pick it up two towns over. You'd think, all those years in the service, all that duty and obligation drilled into him, this'd be harder. But it wasn't. This morning's deception? It felt like the first right thing he'd done since the start of November.

But before any of that, he'd called the guy from the magazine. The guy with the Impala. Lying to Mike, Kate, the courts and the rental company? That was one thing.

Dean? A whole other board game. He wasn't rolling those dice loaded.

John found the keys in his pocket, along with the note Kate had left him on the kitchen table. He checked the booster and the baby seat, got the kids settled. Dean wasn't happy about sitting in a Disco Barbie booster seat. He could see it from the pinch of his features as he clipped the seatbelt in. But it was all they'd had at the store and John didn't have time to hunt around.

He started her up, looked down at the note where he had tossed it on the centre console.

GET TO COURT EARLY – AT LEAST ½ HOUR BEFORE 8:30. Dress nicely. Speak clearly. Look directly at the judge. DO NOT VOLUNTEER ANY INFORMATION.

Do not volunteer any information. I'm not setting foot in any court. Some fuckwit judge ain't gonna tell me he's yanking my drivers license over a DUI.

And I'm not losing these boys. Period.

Do not volunteer any information. Thanks for the advice, Kate. I know what killed my wife. I know now. And I can't unknow it.

He rubbed his hands together in the frigid air. He caught Dean's eye in the rear view mirror, twisted to look at him.

'You ready, kiddo?'

Sam started crying, a sleepy grizzle. Dean reached out, an automated response, and thumped the side of the baby seat rhythmically. His brother settled. John shook his head, a little awed.

'You got your brother all worked out, haven't ya?'

Dean craned to see into the front, stared open mouthed and wide eyed down the street, fist still knocking a steady beat against Sam's seat.

'Yep,' he said absently. 'Will the Impala play tapes?'

John pulled out from the curb, and felt his world drop away from him. The car sailing over the edge of an abyss.

'You mean like a stereo?'

Dean's head bobbed yes in the rear view mirror.

'I'll betcha it does, kiddo. I'll betcha it does.'

Thanks for reading :-) Pdragon76