Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters or story lines
Summary: "You are my Dad in every way that counts Dean." One shot in my I'm Scared Verse. Season 2x02.
SPN SPN SPN
This was it.
The last remaining Winchesters stood gathered around the pyre of wood that Dean had painstakingly built to send their Father into the afterlife, whatever that might hold for the man. It was dark by now, they had to wait until sundown so the smoke wouldn't alert anyone.
Dean brought out his Zippo and flicked it open watching the flame dance in front of his eyes. The smell of gas was already permeating the air around the siblings as it leached off the bundled body balanced on the wood in front of them.
"Dean," Sam started as he stood to his brother's right with a swollen eye and bruises from their accident and laid a gently hand on his brother's tense shoulder, "I think it's time."
Dean didn't answer, Dean hasn't been talking a lot lately not since Dad died. He nodded but still didn't make a move to throw the lighter on the bundle, the body, still in a daze.
"Come on Dean," Dani, the youngest of the Winchesters, coaxed as she stepped from Dean's left, "just get it over with it's like a band aid."
That got a reaction from the eldest as he spun around with fire in his eyes, "How dare you! How dare you talk about our father like that, as if he is nothing more than trash?"
Defiance burned in her eyes as Dani stepped forward, "You know what I think I'll just go wait inside."
Spinning around on the gravel Danielle Winchester started back towards Bobby's house. She was still in rough shape after the accident that had almost claimed all of their lives, right arm in a sling and the left side of her face a mess of bruises and stiches.
She was no longer the little girl that followed her brothers around like a lost puppy, she was fourteen years old and starting to find herself in this crazy world. She still shared her brother's awesome taste in music (as was evident with her AC/DC shirt) and she still wore those ratty old combat boots her brother bought her what felt like lifetimes but was only a couple of years ago.
"He was your father too!" Dean yelled at his sister's back as she started to disappear back into the shadows.
Sam was helpless in his own grief to do anything but watch as his siblings dueled it out. Knowing that Dean would never be able to light the body Sam pulled his own lighter from his pocket and threw it onto the pyre igniting it.
Dean saw the fire as it burst to life alongside him, but first he had to deal with his sister who striding forward in a slight limp, "How could you? How could you disrespect that man who raised you, who was your father!"
"He wasn't my father Dean!" Danielle screamed back striding forward with her shaggy, blonde hair a mess around her swollen face.
"While unless you suddenly popped into existence, yes he was your father and now he's dead. Pay him some respect." Dean yelled back and was about to continue when he heard a soft laugh and shake of her small head, "What the hell is so funny?"
"You really don't get it do you?" Dani asked as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Get what?" She could tell Dean was getting angrier by the minute.
"You are more of a dad to me then that man ever was," she answered nodding to the flaming pyre just a couple of feet away.
"I don't-" Dean answered all fire lost in his fight.
"God you can be so slow sometimes," Dani laughed, it was a bitter laugh as if everything was wrong in the world, "You have done more for me in my life then that man," she answered pointing to the pyre again, "has ever dreamed of doing for me. Sure he donated his sperm but that's it."
It was quiet as all the Winchesters took in what was being said. It was Sam that spoke up first, "Dani why don't you think about what you are saying here? I know we are all a litt-"
"Damn it Sam I know what I'm talking about!" She screamed as she limped towards her brothers, "Dean you were the one I took my first steps towards, my first word, hell you even held my hand on the first day of school!"
"You were always there when I was sick or hurt. You drove half way across the country to come and rescue me when Dad was kidnapped, you stayed by my side after the car accident then and you didn't ditch me the first chance you got after I was kidnapped and tortured."
She watched as her brothers both flinched at the recalled memory, "You bought me ice cream after my first break up, took me to the store to buy my first bra. Dad, John, never did any of that for me. I was the liability in the family, the one who couldn't be trusted because I was a girl. You were the one that taught me how to shoot a gun and hand to hand when I was little. You taught me Latin before I could even read English."
She could see her brother's eyes getting a little misty or maybe that was her own, "Or remember that one time you drove for a day straight so that you stayed out all night with me when I wanted to go and see that stupid Nicholas Spark's movie marathon at the local cinema in Nebraska? Did you know when I asked Dad if I could go he just laughed at me, said I needed to get back to my Latin homework?" She brought her head back as if she could push the tears back in.
Bringing her head back down she faced her brother and stepped closer, "Dean you are my Dad in every way that counts. That man," she used her free arm to point at the slowly dying fire, "is just someone that paid the bills and gave me life. Nothing more and nothing less."
Dean couldn't help it when he brought his sister into a bone crushing hug squeezing her into his chest, "Dani I-"
"The only good thing that came from him was that he saved you Dean, he saved you." Dani whispered just loud enough for her brother to hear, "because if he wouldn't have I would have."
Silence filled that cold South Dakota night, three children that were alone in the world now with the burning remains of their father just a mere couple of feet away.
The eldest holding the youngest as a father would hold a child after a heartbreak and the middle was watching in peace. Maybe this is what they all needed, maybe now things could go to the way they were supposed to.
Little did they know this was only the beginning.
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