Title: John, The Silent
Characters: John, with mentions of Mary, Sam, Dean, Jo, Ellen, and Pastor Jim.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything or anyone affiliated with Supernatural.
Author's Note: This is set before Sam goes to college, but probably around that same year.
Summary: Turns out John has a heart and this may be what's in it.
...
There are a few things that John Winchester loves that he has never shared with anyone. It would be too... shall we say... too much of a let down?
John doesn't share much, talk much, dwell much. For someone to find out some of the things that enter the man's mind, well... it would tell one that there is no doubt that the man has a heart.
He guesses that the first thing that he would consider to bring him the most joy is the fact that at least one of his boys looks like their mother and at least one of his boys looks like himself. Dean with his worldly good looks like Mary, light eyes, light hair, perfect winner's smile to win over any of whom he wished. Mary flashed that smile to get her way too often. The boy would be happy to learn that he could see her smile if he were to give one to the mirror.
Then there's Sam, the boy inherited his most prized features, his dimples and curly hair. There isn't much John hasn't been able to accomplish with his dimpled smile. For when Mary and he would argue, she'd flash her radiant sunny smile in efforts to rile him further, but all John did was flash his arrogant dimpled grin. Sometimes no one won the arguments, and sometimes, just sometimes one would be so taken with the other that one would surrender... willingly.
Other things that John thinks about being the most heartwarming, if he actually thought of the word heartwarming, would be Ellen and Jo, the baddest female hunters imaginable. Ellen is as mean as nails, with her ice cold glares and fist on hip stances, and he isn't too keen on admitting that the woman has a way of making him twitch with something akin to nervousness or fear. There is nothing like an angry female with motherly instincts. Makes him miss Mary that much more.
And Jo, the kid reminds him of his late friend, her dad, with her sharp nose and thin lanky form. He used to call her dad, Beanpole. He calls Jo, String-bean. She always greets him with a hug and rolls her eyes at the nickname. The girl has eyes for her eldest, Dean, but what John sees is someone who would be a perfect fit for his youngest. Sam and her, if they were to ever turn each other's way, would resemble Mary and himself at that age. Blonde alongside brown, green alongside hazel, and short alongside extremely tall. Just like he and Mary.
Other things that make John feel... just feel at peace he guesses he would say would be his friend Pastor Jim's church, and really just Pastor Jim's presence does it. He and Mary used to go to church together. Oddly enough, John was the one that got her into going. He was raised in church, not that he took most of it seriously. But when he joined the Marines he learned to pray for real. Mary's parents just scoffed, telling her that no amount of preachers could keep the demons at bay, that they were the only ones that knew how; which John didn't understand what they were speaking about until after Mary's death. However, Mary being the woman that wasn't raised in church, but that loved John Winchester with everything she had, told her parents that they didn't know everything, and that John isn't crazy to believe how he does. She'd always bring up the fact that Christians may not be demon hunters, but at least they have enough sense to know that demons exist and they do what they can by praying. Then she'd finish her rant with a glare that told the parents that the discussion was over. So yes, when John barrels through town for one hunting reason or another, he always makes a stop to see his friend, Pastor Jim.
Down in the deep, John holds onto memories, memories that keep Mary alive, that keep his sons babies. It took John years before he could stop sleeping with a pillow sideways beside him after Mary died, and he doesn't think that it ever helped much, it was just a small comfort, of the woman that he can still feel, still hear laughing when he would trip over his long legs and big feet. He can still smell her when he remembers certain memories. He can still taste her kisses. He won't go into the memories much. He sees that his boys lap up every bit of the memories he spills like each one quenches a thirst that nothing else can quench. And when he does... when he does let a past memory slip between his lips, he momentarily slips back into brighter times and enjoys himself.
As for the memories that keep his boys babies... it's simple really. Those certain memories are a combination of years worth of curly haired dimpled cheeks, chubby arms reaching for him asking to be picked up and carried when John felt like the weight of the world was too much without Mary and that he needed to be carried himself, and always making sure to leave Dean Peanut Eminems in his duffel bag every other day to assure the boy that Daddy still wants the boy to feel some form of happiness, even if Mary's death had stolen all of his own smiles for a long time.
Throughout the years John fought monsters, yes, but he also fought the commons... colds, viruses, two cases of pneumonia, and one bad case of when the both of his boys had the Chicken Pox. If John were asked, he might share with you that fighting everyday things in life could prove to be a lot scarier than the supernatural itself. Some of those fevers were high enough that they landed the boys in a tub of ice water. And well, the Chicken Pox, the boys were kind enough to share with him as well, seeing as how he had never had them before. But really, and truthfully, the man remembers how utterly dependent his little boys were on him, to make them all better again each time life shook them, to make everything okay. Glassy little eyes with red fevered cheeks, made something happen in John. It made the marine in him forget to cry for Mary to save him from having to do it all by himself, and to step up and be the hero in his boy's lives.
He looks at the strong young men his sons have become and sometimes sees the same little boys they were when they smile mischievously, or when they're looking at him with large curious eyes as if he has all of the answers that will save the day.
Maybe the next feeling is a little prideful and selfish, but it's the fact that his boys make him feel like a hero. The Marine in him trained them to be soldiers, and they trust him with their lives. It's a lot to swallow but his boys are as competent and strong as they come. To have two such strong individuals look up to him makes him feel like he's on top of the world. That kind of responsibility scares him a little. He always prays to God for strength and tells his late Mary that he really hopes that she won't shine any supernatural wrath down on him if he somehow manages to screw their boys up or get them irreversibly hurt from the hunting.
Even if the responsibility of it all seems to swallow him whole sometimes, he watches his boys fight like the capable young soldiers that they are and he thinks that he did something right, something good, something worth feeling proud about.
The last feeling that tops it all, is when he's injured. Not because he's a masochist, not because he's an adrenaline junkie, but because each time he's torn a cartilage, or thrown a shoulder out of socket, or is cut too deep for band-aids, his boys take what he's taught them with all of the times that he's doctored them up, and they return the favor.
When John needs a bullet dug out of a shoulder or a thigh he doesn't know whether to laugh or tear them a new one for playing rock/paper/scissors to figure out which one will take the job. Sam stitches him up so precisely that he hardly scars. And Dean, well Dean of course throws a seamstress joke in there somewhere, questioning Sam's manhood, but the younger of the two knows not to take it seriously, no matter how much he curses his big brother back.
Dean knows the art of surprise as he always manages to get his dad's focus on something right before ramming a knee or shoulder back into socket. The boy walks away each time mumbling under his breath an apology for how it must hurt his old man.
Somewhere along the way, his boys became more than just his babies when they began to grow up, they became men. Yet there will always be a part of the man that sees them as little terrors that gave him enough strength to keep going after his Mary died with their unconditional love and absolute dependency.
Somehow along the way his boys became not just men, but good men, that save people. It took him a while to admit to himself that he raised his boys half Marine, but mostly hunter. He knew that Mary wouldn't approve, but the men his boys have become are some of the finest, strongest people he's ever had the pleasure to know. When there is care to be given when he's injured, the boys know how to give it by heart. His boys take it upon themselves to take care of him without even being asked, and that isn't something he taught them through rigorous training to become the hunters that they are. It's something they picked up along the way from all of the times when John took care of them. And that's not really even the extent of it. The boys don't do it because they have to, not because they are hunters, but because they actually care for their old man.
When it all comes down to it, as far as feelings go, or whatever mumbo-mumbo, that's got to be his favorite.
End.