Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. Also this is my first SPN fanfic, so be kind with any criticism you may have.
AU Where Dean grows up an only child. Hope you enjoy.
The first night Dean was alone...
A faint scream is what first stirs him from his sleep. What truly wakes him up is the smell of smoke. Dean rises off the bed and makes his way to his bedroom door. Carefully he reaches forward, extending his hand to turn the knob. The metal feels cool to the touch and the door opens just as always. He looks to the left, towards his baby brother Sammy's nursery, and sees the bright dancing light. Smoke is pooling out from the open doorway - that's where the fire is. Hands grab his shoulders and turn him around.
"Dean, are you all right?" his Dad asks urgently. Silently Dean nods at him. John looks his oldest boy over quick just to be sure and then turns towards the horror behind him. "Mary!" he yells as he rushes forward into the burning nursery, leaving Dean standing alone in the hallway.
His father rushes back out of the room, coughing even though his face is shielded by his shirt. Bending on one knee in front of Dean, he hands him Sam, who seems impossibly small wrapped in a soft, blue fleece blanket. "Take Sam and get outside!" His father yells as he stands back up. He looks at him, at both of them - his boys, and yells again as he turns back towards the nursery.
"Now Dean!"
Dean shakes his head to clear it and grabs tightly onto his baby brother. He heads down the hallway, through the downstairs and out into the cold, crisp, fresh October air. Despite everything going on - the light from the fire, the thickness of the smoke - Sam is oddly quiet. Even as the sirens start approaching and people start filing out of their houses to watch the events unfolding, he only stirs a little in Dean's arms and soon stops moving altogether. Dean looks down at the baby brother he's only had for six months and gently holds him as the life flees from his tiny body.
This was the last night of peace Dean knew for several years, and the last night that John Winchester spent sober after the loss of his wife and infant son.
The first night Dean had to steal...
Pain filled his stomach as a loud rumble sounded in his ears. He hasn't eaten in days and he can already tell that he's lost weight because his pants are starting to become loose on him.
Summer vacation out of school is always hard on Dean because he has no guarantee that there's going to be a meal during the day. Dean is now nine years old; still a child but already grown-up and self sufficient in many ways. Except for one - providing himself with food.
He steps out of the house into the warm summer air. John is passed out on the couch in his normal alcohol induced sleep, beyond oblivious to the actions of his son. Oblivious most of the time that he even still has a son. It's been five years since the loss of Mary and Sam Winchester and neither remaining man has shown any signs of being over it.
Dean walks aimlessly, trying to keep his mind off the grumbling and growling his stomach makes as it protests the lack of sustenance its been receiving. Most of the time during the summer, neighbors offer Dean a little bit of food here and there, but not this year.
This year Dean is on his own because John lost his job at the garage and they were forced to move out of the ramshackle apartment they had managed to keep in Lawrence. And so, Dean wanders the streets, the grumbling and pain in his stomach the motivation he needs to keep moving so that he might be able to get his mind off his lack of food.
Dean stops as a mouthwatering smell overwhelms him. He turns towards the source of the smell: a small bakery, the window display showing an assortment of rolls and pastries. Slowly he makes his way towards the door, wiping the drool from his chin with the back of his hand.
The bell on the door jingles gently as he pushes the door open a little ways, peeking his head into the bakery. A woman steps out from behind the counter and gives him an appraising look. "Anything I can help you with?" she asks in a friendly voice.
"Just looking for now. Thank you." Dean answers in reply. He looks around the room for several minutes, going back and forth between the fresh baked rolls of sourdough bread and the small packages of peanut butter oatmeal cookies. Soon the woman walks into the back and Dean glances around nervously at the empty shop before seizing his chance.
He grabs two loaves of bread, tucking them under his arm and several bags of cookies, thrusting them quickly into the seemingly extra-large pockets of his slightly over-large jeans. He yanks open the door and bolts out, the bell clanging loudly this time, fading off into the distance as he runs back towards his home, victory meal clutched to him tightly.
The first time Dean got caught stealing...
"Shit." The word is out of Dean's mouth before he even realizes what's happening. Sirens wail loudly outside the convenient store that Dean was attempting to rob. He glances down quickly at the paltry $54.38 that the cashier threw into a plastic bag for him and bolts out the door.
"Freeze! Police!" the cop yells as he jumps out of his car that is effectively blocking Dean's path, pointing his gun at the young man. Dean knows it's futile to resist and so stops, dropping the grocery bag and his own gun onto the ground and raising his hands over his head.
In all his seventeen years on this Earth he's never had to deal with cops before and is taken aback the forcefulness this one seems to have with him. Dean is quickly frisked for any other weapons by Cop #1 while his partner heads into the store to talk with the cashier. After being handcuffed he is escorted to the back of the cruiser to sit and wait while Cops #1 and #2 finish talking with the cashier.
Dean sits in the back patiently waiting as several minutes pass and both walk back out to the car where he is subsequently driven to the police station and booked. Since John is at home passed out drunk as always there is no one that can make bail to get Dean out until his sentencing.
At the hearing several days later the judge asks his plea, to which he replies, "Guilty." knowing full well he has no chance of getting out of it.
"Do you have any last words before your sentence is handed to you Mr. Winchester?" the judge asks him calmly. He sees before him a young man, under the legal age, who has just had his first run in with the law.
"Actually yes, Your Honor." Dean replies. "I should have stuck to cards." He smiles warmly at the judge who merely looks indifferent at the boy and shakes his head.
"Since this is your first offence, Mr. Winchester, I hereby sentence you to six months in juvenile detention. It should be a full year, so do not make me regret the shortened sentence." the judge tells him forcefully.
"Oh of course not, Your Honor." Dean replies drying, his smile now completely gone.
The first day Dean met Cas...
Dean taps the man on the shoulder with just enough force to get his attention. "Hey, excuse me, but can you help me find 1499 Highland Boulevard?" He has a job interview, his first real one in years, and he's gotten himself completely turned around somehow.
The man turns and looks into Dean's bright green eyes with blindingly blue ones of his own. Dean is momentarily taken aback at the brilliance of them. "Yes, that's actually where I'm headed now. I'm Cas." he says, holding out his hand for Dean to shake. His voice comes out deep and gravelly - it is a very remarkable and unique voice, putting it completely at odds with his appearance.
The man has short brown hair and relatively average features if you were to exclude his eyes.
He takes the proffered hand and shakes warmly. "I'm Dean." he answers back. "Do you work there, or are you heading in for the janitorial job too?"
"Oh no, I already work there. I'm one of the counselors. It's right this way." Cas tells him as he points up the street. Both men start walking in said direction and easy conversation flows between them. Dean finds the man quite like able and hopes he gets this job so that he can see him more often.
Ten minutes later they're at the entrance to the building. Cas bids him farewell and wishes him luck during his interview. He points to where Dean needs to check in before heading off into the building, presumably to his office.
Dean walks up to the counter. There is a pretty young blonde woman sitting behind it holding a phone to her ear. After a moment she finishes up her call and lowers the phone back into the cradle. She smiles warmly up at Dean and asks, "Welcome to Arbor Reed Counseling Center, how may I help you?"
"Uh, yes, my name is Dean Winchester and I'm here about the ad I saw in the paper for an opening as a janitor. I called the other day and was told to come in for an interview." He smiles at the woman - she is really gorgeous - and she nods back at Dean.
"Yes, Mr. Jacoby is expecting you. If you'll just sign in here while I go get you a visitors pass." She slides a slim notebook and a pen across the counter for Dean to sign and walks through a door a few feet away. Within minutes she's back and hands Dean a small visitors sticker badge with his name written across it. "If you'll just walk through those doors right there, His office will be the first door on your left." she says pointing off to one side of the reception room. "I'll give Mr. Jacoby a call and let him know you're on your way to see him."
Dean smiles politely back at her and says, "Thank you."
He follows her instructions and knocks on the first door on his left after going through the double doors she'd pointed out to him. Twenty minutes later, he exists out through those same double doors, a small smile spreading across his face. He got the job.
Sure it's not exactly glamorous, and it's not quite as well paying as hustling cards probably would be, but it's an honest living and he'll make do somehow. A familiar figure walks out from behind a different set of doors and Dean walks over towards his new friend. "Hey Cas!"
Cas turns to the man he met only a half hour earlier and smiles brightly. "Hi Dean. So, how did your interview go?"
"I got the job! I can start tomorrow." Dean tells him happily.
Cas continues to smile and tells him, "Congratulations. I have things to do at the moment, but I guess I'll see you around."
Dean certainly hopes so.
The first time Dean realized he was finally truly happy with his life...
"Dean, what's wrong?" Cas asks him.
Dean continues to smile like he has been for the last fifteen minutes. "Nothing baby. Just happy that's all."
After that first day meeting Cas the two of them became good friends, which eventually, after a slightly stupid drunken night revealed that they both wanted more from each other, did indeed become more.
"About what?" Cas asks again, curious. He'd always been curious about Dean - his past, his family, his entire life. At first Dean had been reluctant to share but Cas eventually wore him down and Cas gladly told him everything and anything Dean had wanted to know about himself.
"You saying yes." Dean leans forward and kisses Cas chastely on the lips. "It made me realize just how happy I truly am with my life right now. I mean, when I was a kid, I never would have thought that I'd be successfully living on my own, holding a job I love helping kids that are going through exactly what I went through, and being in love with the most wonderful person on the planet."
"You got all that from me agreeing to move in with you?" Cas asks him, a giggle filling the spaces of his words.
"Absolutely." Dean says with conviction and he smiles even wider at the man he loves.
"Well that's very good to know then." Cas smirks at him.
Dean looks at him closely. "What is it?"
"Well, if we're going to move in together, I was thinking that maybe we should get a puppy..." Cas tells him sincerely.
"No." Dean tells him flat out.
"Not even if we call him Sam?" Cas wonders aloud. He looks gently up at Dean's face as his eyes glaze for a moment and he is lost in a deep, dark memory of a night that is nearly twenty-five years earlier.
Dean's voice is low and quiet when he awakens out of his reverie but he sounds happy. "Ok we can get a puppy. But only if we call it Sam."
Cas smiles at Dean, love and reverence showing clearly in his eyes.
This would be the chance for Dean to properly care for one of the two little boys that had been lost that night, the ones who had never gotten to know the joys of life: He would be able to take care of Sam.
And who, you may ask, would properly care for the other lost, lonely little boy that had been left on his own that night, twenty-five years ago - the product of a devastating fire and a neglectful father?
The answer is simple. Dean's guardian angel would be there with him the rest of their lives, because Dean would always have Cas.