SUMMARY: The Winchesters have to pack up and leave when the boys get into trouble at school. Implied parental spanking; if you don't like it, don't read it. Same AU as 'The Adventures of Alyson Winchester'.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hello Dear Readers! If this is your first time reading one of my fanfics, please check out my profile for more stories with Alyson Winchester. The main story is called 'The Adventures of Alyson Winchester', and there is now a sequel called 'Winchester Interrupted: The Further Adventures of Alyson Winchester'. There are also several one-shots about Aly at different ages. I hope you enjoy them- please leave me a review and let me know what you like!
Aly: 4 years old, Sam: 12 years old, Dean: 16 years old
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Aly knew when he came to pick her up from preschool that Daddy was angry. He didn't say it, but she could tell by the way he held himself. He didn't smile when he walked into the room, he barely looked at Miss Kelly, her teacher, as he signed her out, and he had that little line in between his eyebrows that he got when he was upset. He leaned down and took her backpack out of her hand, and she took his other hand.
"Let's go, Alyson," he said in clipped tones.
He buckled her into her car seat silently, and then started the car.
"Where we goin', Daddy?" she asked, when she noticed that they had not turned towards home.
"We have to go pick your brothers up from school," Daddy said in the same clipped voice.
"Oh," Aly said. She wondered why; normally when they got home, both brothers would be there, and she would run to Dean first and he would pick her up and tickle her, and then Sam would hug her and say, "Hey, Alybug."
Her Daddy parked the car at the curb of the big brick building- she had gone into the school with them when Daddy was taking something called 'paperwork' in, when they had first moved here a couple of months ago. Everything had seemed so big, and the kids were so tall and grown-up looking. She couldn't imagine ever being old enough to go to a school like this.
Daddy reached in and unbuckled her car seat, and then took her out and swung her up onto his hip. She wrapped her little arm around his bicep, feeling the tense set of his shoulders as he walked quickly to the door. He pressed a button on the wall.
"Yes?" Came a tinny voice from a speaker.
"I'm here to pick up my sons," Her Daddy said. There was a buzzing sound and Daddy opened the door. He walked into the front office and went up to the counter. A plump woman with long gray hair and glasses sat behind the counter, in front of a computer.
"John Winchester, here for Sam and Dean Winchester," Daddy told the woman, and his voice was a little deeper. It got deeper, the angrier he got.
"I'll let Mr. Crocker know," she said, and picked up a phone. "Have a seat."
Daddy walked over to where there were a couple of chairs in a row and set Aly down on the floor.
"Sit," he said to her, pointing to a chair, and she did so. He sat next to her. She tucked her hands under her legs and swung her feet, looking around the bright office. There were wooden plaques and photographs of people smiling and a couple of flags all hung on the walls.
The phone on the desk rang, and the woman answered it, said, "All right," and then hung up. She looked over at them. "Mr. Crocker will see you now." she said.
Her Daddy stood up, and then it seemed like he remembered she was there. He turned back to her.
"Stay right there," he said to her.
"Yes, Daddy," She said obediently. She didn't know what had happened, or what was wrong, but she knew that Daddy was angry about something, and when he got this way, it was best to behave and be on your best behavior. Because if you were naughty or didn't do what he told you, right away, or even told him no, his voice would get loud and his brown eyes would get darker and he would yell, or worst of all, he would swat your bottom. Her brothers had gotten spankings before, which was lots of swats all at once. She had only gotten a couple of swats here and there, and she tried hard to be good. She didn't like it when Daddy was angry and yelled, and she didn't like it most of all when he spanked her, because it hurt her bottom and her heart and made her feel like a bad girl.
Daddy turned and walked around the desk and disappeared down a hallway. Aly kept swinging her legs and looking around.
The woman behind the desk caught her eye. "Little girl, would you like a piece of candy?" She pushed a ceramic bowl forward that had brightly colored wrapped pieces of candy in it.
Aly wanted one, but she knew she had to ask Daddy first. You always had to ask Daddy first before you did anything, and sometimes he had to check something to make sure if was safe. It was very important that they were safe, Daddy had told her more than once.
"No fank you," she said, glancing at the woman. "I gotta ask my Daddy."
It seemed like she had to wait there forever. She was bored, and she wanted to get down and run around, but Daddy had told her to sit, and so she had to stay in the chair. If Daddy came out and saw that she wasn't in the chair he might get angry with her and scold her, or even smack her butt, and she didn't want that.
She stared at the floor and tried to count the lines on the linoleum, but she could only count to 12. Her big brother Sam was working with her and he had showed her how to count higher but she couldn't remember what the numbers were. Something -teen.
She sighed heavily and looked around again. The lady behind the desk turned off her computer and leaned down, then pushed her chair back and stood up. She put a purse and a tote bag over her shoulders and walked around the desk.
"Have a good day," she said as she walked out of the building, and then Aly was alone. She felt scared for a moment. Where was Daddy? Where were her brothers? Was anyone else at the school? What if they had forgotten her and left her there, and she was by herself forever?
She thought about getting off of the chair and trying to find her Daddy, but she was too scared to. There were lots of doors down the hallway her Daddy had walked down, what if she opened the wrong one?
She was almost starting to cry with worry when she heard a door opening, and then voices.
"Thank you, sir," Daddy's deep voice said. She heard footsteps, then a door opening, and another voice said something. She heard Daddy say something too, it sounded like, "Let's go," and then there were more footsteps coming up the hall.
She looked up, and her brothers were walking next to each other. They both looked down at the floor, and didn't meet her eyes. Sam had a black eye and a bruise on his other cheek and his lip was swollen. Dean had a bruise on his cheek and blood in the corner of his mouth. Daddy had a hand on the back of each of their necks.
Normally when Aly saw her brothers, she would crow, "Sam! Dean!" happily, and throw herself at them, but she could feel by the tension in the air around them that it would not be a good idea to do that right now.
When they walked around the desk, her Daddy snapped his fingers at her and said, "Alyson, let's go," and his voice was that deeper pitch. His face was now angry, the line between his eyes was deeper and his brows were down, in a frown, and his jaw was set. Aly slid off of the chair and hurried to his side, reaching for his hand. Her little legs had to walk fast to keep up with his long strides.
When they got to the car, Dean reached in the back and buckled her into the car seat. She saw that his knuckles were bruised and bloody, and he looked at her and gave her a brief smile, and tapped her nose. Then he walked around and got into the front passenger side of the car.
The drive to their house was silent. Dean got her out of the back, and Sam took her backpack as well as his own, and they followed their father inside.
"Sit," Daddy gestured to the sofa, and both boys set their backpacks down on the floor and went to sit on the sofa.
"Explain yourselves," he said, and his voice was deeper now.
"Dad, they won't leave Sammy alone," Dean said. "I can't let them hurt hi-"
"Dean, how many times do I have to tell you, don't bring attention to us!" Daddy's voice was loud and annoyed. Aly stood absolutely still. Daddy sighed heavily and pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes for a moment. He opened them and pointed at Dean. "You had to go after the police chief's son? You broke his arm!"
"He's a bully, Dad," Sam said in a small voice. "He beats on a lot of kids, and nobody will do anything."
"Well, because of this—altercation, we're going to have to leave. I can't have the chief of police breathing down my neck for the rest of the time that we're here, and I don't want you boys on the school's radar either. And the Vice Principal said something about a possible lawsuit!" Daddy turned to her- when he had said they would have to leave, she had made a small sound in the back of her throat.
"Alyson, go to your room," he said sternly.
"Yes, Daddy," she said automatically, and left. She didn't understand what was happening, just that her brothers had done something bad, and they were going to have to pack up and move again, and it had something to do with school, and the police. Daddy always said they had to "keep their heads down" when they went places, and "stay under the radar" and she didn't quite understand what those things meant. Dean explained to her that it meant they had to be on their best behavior in school and all the time, because if you were bad, people noticed you, and getting noticed could be a bad thing, but he didn't tell her why.
She went down the hall and into her room, closing her door quietly. Daddy didn't like doors slamming, and he would yell and swat after a door had been slammed, especially if he was angry or grumpy. She walked over and climbed onto her bed, and sat there.
Daddy began talking, and as he talked, his voice got deeper and louder. Aly heard Dean respond, and then Daddy talked again, and then Dean, and then Daddy even louder. Then Sam said something, and Daddy yelled. He kept yelling for a few minutes, and Sam tried to say something in a louder voice, but Daddy kept yelling.
Then she heard footsteps, and Daddy's voice saying, "Wait in my room," and the door to her brother's room opening and closing. She heard Daddy's deep rumble, and then the repetitive smacking sound that meant that one of her brothers was getting a spanking. She crawled to the head of her bed and laid down, putting the pillow over her head to block out the noise as much as possible. She hated hearing when her brothers got punished, it seemed like such a scary thing, and Sam usually cried at the end. Sometimes he yelled during, too, but not this time.
She heard the door open and close and then her Daddy's footsteps went further away as he went to his room to deal with Dean. He made Dean wait in his room or the living room for his punishment. She could hear Sam's low sobbing from the room next door, and wondered if she was allowed to leave her room yet. Sometimes Daddy would come and tell her she could, other times it seemed like he forgot about her, until he called them for dinner.
She heard footsteps coming back down the hallway, and they didn't stop at her door, they went straight to the living room. She was too nervous to leave her room and ask, though, she didn't want to risk having Daddy yell at or spank her. She didn't know if he would but why run the risk of that happening?
In a few minutes, her door opened, and Dean walked in, carrying her duffle bag.
"Hey, short stuff," he said, and his voice cracked. She looked at him- his face was blotchy red and his eyes were wet, which meant he'd been crying. She got off of the bed and ran to him and hugged his legs. He leaned down and patted her back.
"C'mon, we've got to get you packed up," he told her. She let go of him and he walked over to the dresser and opened the drawers, and started to take her clothes out and pack them in the duffle bag,
"Why we gotta pack?" she asked.
"Uh, we have to leave," Dean told her.
"But why, De?" she asked again.
Dean sighed. "Because we just do. Some people that live here...aren't very nice, and me and Sammy got into some trouble. So we've gotta go now. C'mon, get your toys together."
"But what about my school? An', an' my pwojecks?" Aly was very proud of the art projects that she did at school every week, and she loved bringing them home to show to her Daddy and her brothers.
"There'll be projects at the next school you go to, I'm sure," Dean said.
"But I wike dis school!" she protested. "I wike my teachers an' ev'yfing!"
"Well, we've gotta go," Dean said. "That's just the way it is."
"Don't wanna go," Aly's lower lip poked out in a pout.
"Alyson!" Daddy's voice said from the doorway. "Leave your brother alone and let him pack. Do you have all of your library books?"
"Yes, Daddy," she said. "Nex' to da sofa on da table."
"All right," Daddy stepped into the room and handed her a canvas tote bag. "Get your toys packed up. And change into your pajamas, we're going to be driving through the night. I'm going to run the books over to the library and I'll be back in a few."
"Yes, Daddy," Alyson said, and Dean chimed in, "Yes, sir."
By the time her Daddy came back, Dean was in the boy's room, packing his clothes. Aly had followed him in and was sitting on Sam's bed while Sam knelt on the floor next to the small bookshelf and packed his books. Sam's chest hitched every once in a while, and he wouldn't look at either his sister or his brother. His mouth was in a tight line and his eyes were wet too.
Daddy came to the door. "Alyson, I told you to leave your brothers alone so they could pack," he said in a hard voice. Aly started to slide off of the bed, but Sam turned and looked at Daddy and said, "She's not bothering us, just let her be."
Daddy put his hand on his waist, at his belt, and said, "Do you want to go another round with me, boy?" and glared at Sam.
"Uh- no, sir," Sam said, lowering his gaze.
Daddy snapped his fingers and pointed at the floor in front of him. "Alyson, with me," he said, and she slid off of the bed and followed him out to the kitchen. He had her hold a plastic bag open while he put food from the refrigerator in it, and he packed some other things in a small cooler.
"All right, let's get you changed," he said, standing up. She followed him back to her room, and he got out her flannel pajamas. Daddy sat down on her bed and she stood in front of him as he pulled her dress off. She held on to his arm for balance as she stepped into her pajama pants, and stood quietly as he buttoned up the top. Usually when Sam or Dean buttoned her, they tickled her tummy, but Daddy didn't. He picked up her discarded clothes and stuffed them into the duffle, then zipped it closed after glancing around the room once. He nodded, and said, "Let's go."
Sam buckled Aly into her car seat and settled into the back seat next to her. He held up a book to her- "Grimm's Illustrated Fairy Tales", and placed it between them, to read to her later. Dean and Daddy got into the front, and Daddy started the car. He looked over at Dean and said, "Son, I am proud of you for defending your brother. I just wish the police hadn't had to get involved..." he shook his head ruefully and put the car in gear.
Once again, the Winchesters were on the road, leaving the small town they had called home for a while, and moving on to the next one.
