Destiel AU - After John Winchester is killed in a freak car accident when Dean is 19, the boys lives take an entirely different turn than they could have. Sammy gets to finish school properly without having to learn to fire a gun before he can properly work the TV remote, Bobby gets to see the two of them grow up in a relatively normal life, and Dean - well. Dean gets to experience first hand the utter mundanity that comes with average small town life. That is, until a man with eyes like an angel rudely decides to walk into his life and throw most of what Dean Winchester thinks he knows about life straight out of the window.
Would love it if you could review after reading :) first ever time writing for Supernatural
Chapter 1
Well I was born in a small town, and I live in a small town, Prob'ly die in a small town - John Mellencamp, 'Small Town'
There are certain places in the world which lend themselves easily to opportunity. Airports, train stations, even the odd neon-lit highway in the middle of the night. The kind of places which ooze both nostalgia and promise for the future at the same time, where human feelings are bursting out of every corner. People are inspired, at peace, made to believe that anything is possible at that moment if they want it to be.
Jericho was not that sort of place.
Sandwiched right in the middle of Memphis and the back-end of nowhere, it took Dean Winchester less than a year of working at the solitary gas station to grow tired of people asking him how he could stand living all on his own out in the middle of nowhere. It was less than two years before he stopped trying to explain to them that there was actually a town there. And, he thought, on stifling summer days like these where they'd be lucky to see more than five cars in a day on the road outside, let alone see them stop, well - it's none of their freaking business anyway. He lay back against the wall behind the counter, eyes closed against the sunlight filtering harshly through the cheap curtains. The flickering neon light above the door was beginning to give him a headache. Making a mental note to fix it as soon as he could call in a favour from the guy who owned the hardware store, Dean swung his legs up onto the counter and settled back, wondering whether or not to call Sam - but no, he had that final today didn't he? Or was that tomorrow? The radio tucked underneath the register continued to crackle, the occasional snatch of some godawful country singer floating out through the static.
Suddenly the phone began it's shrill ring, hanging on the opposite wall much too far away for Dean's liking. He waited a few seconds, half hoping whoever it was would give up and go, then groaned and stood up, eyes narrowed against the afternoon light.
'What?'
'Jesus boy, you greet all your paying customers like that? People want customer service, not their heads bitten off'
'Last I saw Bobby, my paying customers don't want anything more than the right change and a drink from a cooler that actually works. I thought it might be you."
Bobby chuckled down the crackly line. "Well who else is it gonna be? I was wonderin' if you heard from Sam since Monday. Damn boy never tells me anything but I know he had that important quiz thing or whatever it was today."
Ah, so it was today. "Why don't you ask him yourself? Ain't your slave…" he muttered sullenly, staring longingly at the sad, empty chair on the other side of the shop.
"I'll take it that's a no then. You'll give me a call later when you've spoken to him?"
"Yeah." Dean sighed, watching a bluebottle crawl across the counter and wishing Bobby would hurry up and get to the point. "C'mon now, we both know that isn't why you really called. Just get to it."
The line stood silent for a few seconds before Bobby replied. "Just wanted to make sure you were okay kid. Six years might be a long time to you, feels like yesterday to an old man like me. Your Dad and I had our differences but that doesn't mean I don't still miss him."
"I'm fine."
"Like hell you are. Just don't you sit around working on that damn car all night, that's all I'm saying."
Dean snorted. "It's just another day, Bobby. I've said it before, the guy was hardly around when he was alive, it's not exactly breaking my heart now that he's not home with dinner cooking when I close up shop."
Another pause. "I gotta go, I got an engine that needs rebuilding" Bobby finally answered, sounding tired. "You'll talk to Sam?"
"I already said I would"
"Alright then. Don't do anything stupider than usual, idjit."
Dean hung up the phone and leant back against the window sill to his right. He stared at the clock hanging over the doorway to the back room for a few seconds, watching it ticking away the seconds towards the 3 o' clock marker. Yep. Three hours earlier than the closing time posted on the door was certainly as good a time as ever to close up.
Steve's Place was as full as ever of all the downbeat regulars who seemed to find themselves there every afternoon without fail, never quite remembering how they got there in the first place. Dean flung his coat down over a bar stool, raising a hand at the older man behind the bar, who nodded back and began making his drink. The unintentionally vintage jukebox played on happily in the corner, the up-beat music lending the already dismal room an air which was downright depressing. The bartender came over holding a double scotch, handing it to Dean with a smile and waving away the hand reaching for his wallet.
"I still owe you for fixing the Ford last week. Me and Tracy would have been done for if you hadn't gotten us out of here in time for her sister's wedding. That deserves a couple more whiskeys at least" he grinned, wandering back down to the other side of the bar.
As the afternoon dragged on and the stifling June heat became slightly more bearable, Dean began to relax a little. The jukebox dragged on, the three old men in the corner argued viciously over who had won an illegal boxing match some 40 years previous, and Steve's wife Tracy sidled up to him as usual, making crude jokes and going through enough white wine spritzers to knock out a bull. It really was just another day. Eventually, peeling away from Tracy and nodding goodbye to Steve, Dean made his way out of the bar and down the tiny high street to the apartment.
A good half bottle of whiskey and two hours spent fiddling with his dad's old beat-up Chevy later, and Dean wondered, as he often did, whether Bobby had some sort of psychic ability that only worked on him. Wiping down his hands with a rag, he stood up and made his way into the empty flat, vaguely thinking about the phone call he'd had with a very animated Sam after closing up the filling station. Their conversations were practically scripted by this point - Sam yapping on about his classes or how his new landlord was being a dick again, or how he was still trying to decide on whether he should apply to Harvard next year or somewhere closer. Dean listened, said a couple of things about the shop or how the car was getting on, and reminded his brother to call Bobby more often. They agreed to call again soon, then hung up. No mention of the anniversary date, or of their Dad at all.
The refrigerator hummed quietly in the background, and Dean stood in the kitchen, at a loss with himself for a few seconds. The apartment stood empty and silent, the two bedrooms mocking him quietly. The calendar on the fridge caught his eye as he replaced the bottle of whiskey on a shelf, and he sighed. The ever present clock loudly ticked on, and on, and on.