Video Killed the Radio Star, a supernatural fanfic

Video Killed (the Radio Star)

AN: As I've mentioned several times, not only can I not write anything happy in this genre, I also don't own Supernatural. The title is the Buggles' song and I have no ownership of it or them. I hope this piece isn't too depressing – it's Sam again, I guess I'm branching out.

Sometimes he doesn't even chose a channel, just let's it run; adverts, soaps, documentaries, the news. The all seem to blur into one now, so much so that he doesn't even notice when it turns to static and howls at him. It reminds him of the past, but not quite enough for it to hurt.

When Sam was younger he grew out of these scenarios, two beds, a coffee machine, and a television set, so small you had to strain to see it and your eyes burnt after half an hour. There was even one room where the set was so old you had to turn it upside down and let it warm up for a few hours before the screen was bigger than a chopstick. He went to Stanford to get away from these rooms, from spaghetti hoops and The Thundercats, from the situations that Dean somehow revelled in, thrived. He couldn't grow like that, he'd tell himself. Now he wishes he'd spent every minute since and when blurring his corneas to Steve McQueen and crap comedies. He still can't believe neither of them needed glasses.

Dean had tasted a different life, one he could barely remember but, still, it must have hurt. Sam had never known the difference; known that NZBC News was no substitute for a kiss good night and that the Happy Days picture perfect endings couldn't match up to a decent bed time story. Then again, Hawaii 5-O never quite saved the day like John Winchester.

Although Sam was quite the striker on the pitch, he could never watch sport on television short of the Christmas game; and that was only because Dad nearly always made it home for that. Sam can't even take that anymore because it reminds him of how crap Dean was at sport. Ironic really, Dean could run until he was dead, until Sammy was safe, until evil was gone. He could vault anything, haul himself over gates, hit pretty much anything with a single rod; God, he had good aim, but toss him a football and he was worse than an amateur. He made little league cringe. He'd have been good at swimming if he'd bring himself to wear shorts; he'd held his breath for a minute an a half (nearer two, though he'd never admit it) when Sam had sunk beneath the surface in Maine – the water wasn't half freezing too.

Sam remembers arguing over channels with Dean. Full House versus Best Rock Anthems of All Time. Yet whenever Dad appeared he'd clam up and become submissive, go with the flow, beg them to watch what they wanted. He could be so bloody belligerent when he wanted to be, but he never, never, argued with Dad. Sam could butt heads with his father 'til the cows came home, and show brick walls a hard time when the stormed out or was sent to cool off. When John was on the scene Dean looked like a small child, a scolded puppy, and that was bad enough but most of all he looked like someone you'd lose in a parade line. Dean was a soldier, and Sam couldn't remember whether it was Dad who made him that way or if Dean just couldn't function in the world unless he was. Even when he died he held his head and gave his orders. He did as he was told until the bitter end.

Dean had always preferred the radio to the television anyway, if it couldn't deafen the cattle they passed on the road it wasn't worth playing. Sam used to wonder if he was trying to block something out. Now, when he plays Dean's tapes over and over and over again on full volume, headphones jammed in his ears, he's trying to keep something in. They'd both developed reasonable vocal chords, now he thinks about it; Dean would have relished the rock star lifestyle; right up until playtime was over. But Sam knows now, playtime was never over, playtime was never there to begin with. Did he fool around just to prove to Sam that they could?

The television's playing noise again, maybe this is that best channel for Dean now, and Sam can't bring himself to turn it off. Even when he leaves, goes out and hunts; a lone wolf beneath a hollow moon, the set's still there playing. Sam thinks; if he can't keep Dean, he can at least keep the light on for him.

Fin.