Title from Tracy Chapman song Fast Car, which heavily inspired this fic. Set in the early spring of 1995, Dean is 16 and Sam is 11
Don't go around in bare feet.
That's the first thing Dad tells them when the growl of the engine subsides into the ticks and pings of cooling metal pipes. The apartment isn't much to look at. It can't be seen from the parking lot at all. Past the dumpsters behind the rusty gate, there's a walkway and beyond that, stairs. Sixteen and sixteen is thirty-two up to 314.
"That's a long way!" Sam exclaims, peering between untied laces and scuffed up tips to see the concrete sidewalk below.
"That's a long way to drag a body," Dean thinks. But doesn't say because Dad's already thought of it.
OoOoOoO
As far as first days go, this one is unremarkable. The bus ride is nice enough and the other kids are nice enough and the teachers are nice enough. Even lunch isn't half bad, although Dean only eats half the week so maybe he's just lucky and catches the cafeteria on the good days.
Science then math then English. Mrs. So and So, Mr. What's His Name, and Ms. Who Cares. Dean alternates his attention between his pencil and the lawnmower pushed in circles by the groundskeeper he'll probably never meet before the duffles are packed and the sun reflects off the bumper.
OoOoOoO
Sam's happy to be out of the motel. Dean's happy this place doesn't smell like cat urine.
There's only a single bedroom, single bed. A couch of course, complete with obligatory saggy depressions and springs like random reminders not to get too comfortable. They don't bring the sleeping bags in.
The moderately sized tub is being put to good use while Dad pulls Dean aside. Doesn't have to go through the whole drill. Ten years and Dean's pretty sure he's got it better memorized than his own father does. Here, a stack of weathered twenties in his palm. Feels heavier than the keys dropped in his other.
OoOoOoO
She's attractive. Dean notices. Of course. She's not going to end up on television or on a runway or in a magazine or anything but she catches his eye and never returns his gaze. He doesn't do anything the first day. Or the next or the next or the next. Gives it a solid two weeks before he approaches her.
OoOoOoO
"Library!" says Sam.
"You are such a nerd. How about Tower Records?" Dean counters.
Hands on hips, classic pose. "We don't even have a player."
"That's not the point," Dean wants to say but doesn't. Thinks it instead because it wouldn't matter if he did.
He parks crooked on purpose, takes up nearly three spaces. Sam's got hands on hips again.
"You're taking up all the spaces."
Dean cuffs the back of his head. "Right. Because this is such a popular joint, people would kill for a prime spot close to the door."
Sam ducks away from him and trots up the steps and through the glass door. Dean lingers, hesitates, watches the passing traffic because if the paint gets so much as a scratch, his dad will take it out of his hide.
OoOoOoO
He's not really sure how it's supposed to go, so he does it like he does everything else. Leaps without looking and hopes for the best. He sets his lunch tray beside hers since it's Tuesday and he's actually getting lunch today. Swings his legs over the bench and waits. She's writing, pen flying over the scrap of paper torn from her notebook, the fringe jagged from being pulled in a hurry. She flips it occasionally, numbers and figures and sums on the back, all those words on the front.
It's a grocery list. They meet over a grocery list.
OoOoOoO
His stomach is vaguely ill. No imminent encore of yesterday's food though. It's really more of a 'chance of rain over the weekend' kind of feeling.
Lucky Charms still hasn't fallen from Sam's good graces. Dean upends the box, lets the dried misshapen marshmallows enjoy their status while they have it. The list of things Sam used to love and doesn't anymore gets longer every day. He stretches while Sam eats.
"You know," bits of magically delicious cereal wobble on Sam's spoon when he wags it at him, "you could have the bed tonight."
Dean cuffs the back of his head. "Right. Because you'd go to sleep instead of staying up all night watching TV."
Sam ducks away from him, shovels the last of his breakfast into his mouth and dumps the dishes in the sink. A few more twists of his spine bring the aches to a manageable level. Dean grabs the paper sack that holds Sam's lunch and subtracts sixteen from sixteen to get to the walkway, then past the dumpsters and beyond that, the parking lot. He slides a hand across her fender when he passes, the bus squealing its approach from down the street.
OoOoOoO
It's sort of like looking in a mirror. She's the oldest. Has a little sibling to take care of. An absent father. Her word, not Dean's.
There's nothing official or deeper in their interactions than simply being in the other's company. He sits next to her at her lonely table, sometimes with lunch and sometimes not. It had taken him a while to realize that, of all the things she judges him for, that isn't one of them.
Sometimes, during class, he hears her stomach grumbling too.
OoOoOoO
Sam's a warm lump under the blanket when Dean rouses him with gentle shakes, like a sailboat's back and forth on favorable waters.
They've both got socks, since there's no going around in bare feet, so it's a simple thing to slip on shoes and be out the door and under the sky and then atop the leather seats and out of the city. Music loud and windows down, the chill of the night against their heated skin.
OoOoOoO
He doesn't see her outside of school.
Until the day he gets in line at the local grocers and she's there. A buggy of peanut butter and canned pasta nearly identical to his. She's got coupons, hands them over with the weathered twenties. Without being asked to, she waits for him at the door. Lets out an appreciative whistle when her eyes find the black beauty in a crowd of Fords and Toyotas.
Dean's proud and a tingle chases up and down his spine when he imagines showing her just how fast a real car can drive.
OoOoOoO
Time slips by, folds over itself, origami shapes repeating. The telephone rings and it's hard to hear above Sam's shrieks of delighted pain. Normally, Sam doesn't get released from beneath Dean's knee until he hollers uncle, but the phone stops then starts anew. Signal given. Signal received. Dean takes the call.
OoOoOoO
Some kind of class project or presentation or party and her little sister is in Sam's class so they both have to stay. They ditch the rows of folding chairs for the mist dampened bleachers. She swings her legs and he jogs his knee and they don't talk all that much. They don't have to.
Her usual ride can't make the later time. She told him that, confided her worries on Monday. That's why he drove on Friday.
OoOoOoO
The hunt's done but Dad won't be coming back yet. That's one of the drawbacks to hitching a ride in someone else's car. You don't leave until they say it's time to go.
Sam swallows the lemon sour news and makes the appropriate face. Dean counts pieces of bread and nickels and days on the calendar.
OoOoOoO
He's not sure what he was expecting but it's probably somewhere between reality and someplace much nicer. She holds her head up high, holds her sister's smaller hand in hers. But there's embarrassment there. It's sort of like looking in a mirror.
She turns the key and shoves her body against it to get the door to open. The smell hits Dean as he crosses the threshold waiting for his eyes to adjust. They don't. The gloom doesn't fade.
There's a body on the couch. It startles Dean and he tugs Sam behind him, instinctive and habitual and useless. It's just her dad, she explains whisper-toned and herding her sister to the bedroom with a newspaper and a peeled crayon. The body on the couch snores and Dean supposes he expected absent to mean something a little different.
OoOoOoO
Because Sam is Sam and eleven and doesn't like to listen, Sam takes his shoes off and socks too. And Dean's too busy concocting a meal out of rice and ranch dressing packets to notice until there's a sound he hates and a smear of red along the dusty baseboards.
"This is why Dad told us not to go barefoot," Dean probably shouldn't say it but he does and Sam glares, tears wobbling on the edge of his eyelid while the tweezers poke and prod and pull.
After the bedroom door slams, Dean feels himself slip down that list and he's pretty sure Lucky Charms is higher than him now. There's nothing he can do about that now so he clears away Sam's blood with a paper towel and holds the shard to the light for inspection. Green glass, still retains the stink of fermented yeast. There's only one brand of beer sold in this town. Dean's seen the bottles. On the cooler shelves at the grocers, littering the highway, scattered around the sleeping body of an absent father.
OoOoOoO
She avoids him at school the following week. Dean doesn't do anything about it. It's kind of like looking in a mirror.
OoOoOoO
That indistinct discomfort in his stomach is now making its formal Broadway debut. He spends half the night on the edge of the couch, hand hovering above the telephone. The other half he spends upending his stomach, hoping he's being quiet enough for Sam to sleep through.
Dad doesn't even have to come back right away. All he has to do is call. Call and let Dean know what the hell he's supposed to do next.
OoOoOoO
A lunch tray set next to him isn't really an apology. Or maybe it is. It's kind of like looking in a mirror.
He picks up right where they left off. As if the silence never happened.
OoOoOoO
Thank heavens for libraries, Dean decides.
"Yo, Sam. Your book's due." The spine of the mentioned book taps the closed bedroom door.
"You know where the library is, don't you?" Muffled but no less moody.
"Yeah." It feels like strapping on a blindfold while stepping onto a construction site.
"You know how to drive, don't you?"
"Of course." Lots of sharp, dangerous objects to stumble onto.
"So go without me." It's almost funny hearing Sam's adolescent voice copying Dad's authoritative tone.
Bang, bang. "Uh uh. This is your book. You have to return it."
Now comes the time when Dean holds his breath. The door opens.
OoOoOoO
She's not at the library but the post office is close enough that they cross paths again. Dean's leaning against the hood because it's just too nice outside not to. She parks her little sister on the library steps, in plain view and practically within arm's reach, and gives her a green lollipop. Then she circles Dean's car, eyes envious and wondering and sort of lit up with a peculiar kind of dream. Her thin hands wander, smoothing over black chrome on panels, the cool silver of door handles. Dance across the roof, glide off the trunk.
Her gaze strays to where Sam bounds outside, three more books to replace the one returned, careful not to step on her sister's fingers. The breeze catches her sigh.
"Do you ever think about leaving?"
OoOoOoO
Salt scatters when Dad throws the door open. Dean bolts upright, reaching for the shotgun under the couch. Dad holds up a hand, waits until the gun's back in its spot and Dean's reaching for the blanket pooled around his waist.
The kitchen chair scrapes as its pulled back. Creaks when a weight settles in it. The sound of muttering and pen scratching across paper isn't as intrusive as one might think. Dean's used to it by now. He closes his eyes and gets the best sleep he's had in three months.
OoOoOoO
The bell rings and she isn't there. Lunch comes and goes and she still isn't there. Dean lingers, hesitates, watches the passing students for a familiar face. The last bell for his class on his last day. His heart sinks, which he feels dumb about. So he doesn't get to say goodbye. Big deal. It's not like they were going to kiss or anything. He doesn't feel that way about her. It's more like mutual respect. It's kind of like looking in a mirror.
He's given up on the idea, is in the middle of picking Sam up when he sees her. She's got a uniform on. The local grocers. He tries to call out to her, but her arm is around her sister and they're rounding the corner and they're gone and he never gets to say goodbye.
"Are you going to stand there all day?" Sam is suddenly at his elbow.
Dean cuffs the back of his head. "Right. Because I want to be the one that makes us late and gets Dad pissed at us."
Sam ducks away from him, sprints down the sidewalk. Dean looks in the other direction, the other corner.
Do you ever think about leaving?