Title: Of Closets and Life Lessons
Rating: PG
Spoilers: N/A
Characters: Samuel, John, and Dean Winchester
The first time Sam startled awake, he couldn't figure out why.
Hazel eyes wide in a smooth, childish face, he tensed to the sound of a tree limb scraping slowly against the grimy window pane – the only source of light in the room. The quiet, muffled snoring of his older brother Dean filtered erratically through the paper-thin wall of the ramshackle house the Winchester family was squatting in for the night, rising and falling in a way that told Sam his brother was not sleeping well.
He wondered if the same thing that had woken him was messing with his brother's sleep, too. Which reminded him, brought him back to the present with a sharp intake of breath, a quick glance around the room – what was it that woke him up in the first place?
Softly he slipped out of bed (if you could call the cot spread out on the dusty, rotted wood floor a bed) and walked around the room, nerves keyed up and arms wrapped around the bulk of Dean's too-big sweatshirt – it was early October, and the place was so broken down and old it didn't even have a gas lamp. His breath fogged the air by his lips in cold, slow spirals, and by two trips around the little area he temporarily called his own, he decided it must have been the tree branch on the window after all. He crawled back under the threadbare comforter (Dean insisted he take it, Dean always insisted on stuff like that even though Dean hates the cold and Sam loves it) and quickly fell asleep.
The second time Sam startled awake, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye.
Sam's breath caught in his throat, and his eyes grew to the size of sand dollars as they tracked the shuffling, eerie creak of the closet door opening. This time last Christmas he would have dismissed it completely, 'cause everyone knows closet monsters don't exist.
Except they do exist. His Dad hunted them and his older brother hunted them and one day he knew, he knew he'd have to hunt them, too. But he stood, frozen with fear and eyes painfully peeled for further movement in the shadow of the closet beyond the door. He knew one day he'd have to fight those monsters, that he'd have to be brave and strong like his Dad and brother and not be a little kid afraid of the dark, but right now…right now he WAS that little kid afraid of the dark; and it was dark in that closet, and he was, very, very much afraid.
He thought he saw something surge out at him from the closet and he couldn't help it – he yelped and bolted for the door, flinging it open and scrambling into the living room where he knew his Dad was still up, cleaning his guns (he didn't have to hide them from Sam anymore, Sam was a big boy and knew what he did now). Dad looked up in alarm as Sam burst in, panting and frantic, and the man was already halfway across the room, shotgun cocked and at the ready before Sam stumbled into him, clutching at his legs.
"Daddaddadthere'ssomethinginmyclosetdadthere'!"
John Winchester staggered under the weight of his youngest son barreling into him, and with a moment's difficulty he parsed out what Sam was trying to tell him. When he did, he was torn between amusement and exasperation: he knew for a fact there was nothing in Sam's closet (he had checked it himself before allowing the boys anywhere near the place) but…this might prove a good opportunity. Dean had already blown the secret to Sam, and John couldn't pretend to him any longer that monsters weren't real. Maybe it was time he started doing something, to show Sam how to look after himself.
After several seconds' deliberation he untangled himself from his son, beckoning him over to where John had left the rest of his gear in a state of disassembly. He picked up the .45 ACP, a small, reliable handgun that he'd used himself on a hunt once or twice. He checked to make sure the barrel was clear before turning to Sam and showing him how to switch the safety on and off, and how to load the pistol.
"Here," he said gruffly, flipping the safety on and turning it so the handle faced Sam. Sam looked at it with trepidation, deflating somewhat.
"What? Wait, you don't…you don't want me to go…?" Sam stared at his father in mounting horror, already recoiling from the gun held out to him. "No! No I don't – I don't hunt things Dad, I don't know how to kill a monster!"
John rubbed his hand over his face, holding the gun persistently under Sam's nose. "Then it's about time you learned. You need to know how to protect yourself. I can't guarantee Dean or I will always be there, son. You're old enough now to have your own gun."
Sam swallowed hard, trying not to say what he really wanted to (Dad you'll always be here and Dean will too you won't leave me right?) and, hand shaking violently, reached out to grasp the cold hilt of the gun. It felt dead and frozen in his hands, like an icy snake that would rear up and bite him if he moved too suddenly.
John put his hand over his son's, stilling its trembling. "Now, come on. I'm going to teach you how to shoot a monster."
They shuffled back towards Sam's room, John waving Dean back to bed as he emerged, half-asleep and bleary-eyed in the gloom from the room next to Sam's. Without a moment's hesitation Dean obeyed, ducking back behind his door: when John told his boys to do something, they did it.
They halted before the half-opened door to Sam's little cubby, Sam's shaking beginning anew. John put one steadying hand on his son's shoulder and pushed the door open all the way with his other, allowing the dim light from the living room to spill fully across the threshold.
There was nothing to be seen, but, as John will teach his sons again and again, that doesn't mean something isn't there. John walked Sam through the basics of clearing a room (left, right, ceiling, corners) and they padded inside, Sam trying to mimic his father's soft, cat-footed walk and managing a decent imitation.
John walked clear over to the closet, sidling up beside it and giving Sam a stern look; clearly, he wanted Sam to take point. Whimpering a bit in the back of his throat, Sam steeled himself (he didn't want to look like a sissy when fighting his first monster, Dean would never let him live it down) and inched closer, flinching a little as John flicked on the flashlight he held in his hand (Sam hadn't noticed the flashlight, he wonders where Dad pulled that from?) and scanned the inside of the closet with it.
Again, there was apparently nothing to be seen. Sam, feeling a hair more confident, fully entered the confining little spot, grinning a bit despite himself when he heard his dad murmur approval – he'd remembered to clear the corners, he might be a natural! – but froze when a quiet scuffling sound came from somewhere above his head. He'd forgotten to clear the ceiling.
The shriek Sam let out when something small and furry landed on his head had Dean jolting out of bed next door, stumbling so badly in his haste to reach his little brother that he smacked face-first into the doorframe and gave himself a bloody lip. Sam reared out of the closet violently, falling on his behind; the gun lay forgotten where he'd dropped it in shock. John stood above him, holding something that hissed and spat, something alive that from where Sam could see (he didn't have a good vantage point from the floor) was covered in fur and writhing.
By the time Dean managed to enter Sam's room, holding a hand to his bleeding mouth, Sam had calmed down enough to get a proper look at what thrashed in his dad's arms. John watched his youngest son, looking like he was struggling to maintain a straight face despite the bedraggled cat that fought furiously to escape his grasp. He let his grip loosen and the cat took off like a shot, an exclamation echoing through the room as the creature nearly upended Dean in its haste to get out the door. Silence reigned.
Sam sniffled. His bottom and hands hurt from where he hit the floor, the dust the cat had stirred up in its attack was bothering his nose and he felt both defeated and humiliated. A cat! How was he supposed to be a hunter if he got scared of a cat?
He didn't have to see Dean's face to know he was gearing up for a circus of baby-bro taunts, but to his surprise a soft hand corded through his hair as he was pulled to his feet and into a hug.
"You did good, son. Not bad." John whispered in Sam's ear, and Sam could have cried from hearing that, because Dad didn't say stuff like that a whole lot. John put him to bed once Sam's snuffling had subsided, kicking his brother out of the room with the threat "if you don't get some sleep you won't be wakin' in time tomorrow and you're not getting any breakfast!"
Sam smiled into the comforter as Dad left, carrying the pistol that had, for a brief time, been Sam's. He was pretty sure Dad had just said those things to make him feel better; and hunting was scary and he wasn't ready yet to hunt monsters like his brother or his Dad…but maybe he could ask Dad to start teaching him, tomorrow. Really teach him. 'Cause he didn't always want to be the little kid afraid of the dark, who can't even handle a mean old cat. He didn't always want to be the one hiding behind his Dad or his big brother, being protected. Sam drifted off to sleep, fantasizing about the day when he would be the one protecting everyone instead.