A/N: So, I loved Bobby in this episode. The thoughts are so clear on his face but I wanted to explore what seeing Dean back from the dead meant to him. Writing this was kind of a stream of consiousness deal (it scares me, the things that lurk in my head...)
Spoilers for 4x01, and by extension the end of S3.
Disclaimer: Again? Seriously? *sigh* Not mine. Title and lyrics from You Got a Killer Scene There, Man, by Queens of The Stone Age.
~~CTS~~
Over the last few months, I've had more than a few hangovers. Kid called it right when he hefted the whiskey bottle from my desk, joked about 'Parents out of town?' It didn't hide the understanding in his eyes, and damn if I hadn't missed that. I've never seen someone so guarded, so locked down who can't hide a thing behind his eyes from the people who know him.
There's a lot I don't remember, since July thing's've been mostly blurry, hazy. It takes a heck of a lot to take the edge off, so that bottle on the desk wasn't even the latest.
So yeah, there've been a few mornings lately when being sober is about as unappealing as jumping buck naked into a Wendigo's lair in the middle of winter. Hair of the dog, turns out you can make that into a motto for life.
But since New Harmony, there've been a few moments when sobriety just kinda snuck up on me, welcome as clap in a whore-house.
Walking downstairs one morning to find the couch empty, the blankets Sam was burrowed into the night before folded neat and tidy at one end. Kid didn't even leave a note.
Waking up on the side of the road, out of gas and lost as heck, no clue, no memory of anything since sitting at my desk with a new bottle and the satisfying crackle of the seal breaking.
I walked to a gas station and the kid behind the counter musta thought I was nuts when I asked him where we were. Heck, I thought I was nuts when he told me.
Halfway to freakin' Pontiac.
That was about three weeks ago and I ain't touched a drop since. 'Til now, that's been about the fifth hardest thing I've ever done, comes in right behind burying my wife, helping the boys build that damn pyre, walking back to the middle of that damned empty street in Cold Oak.
Last thing on the list is sitting on my couch.
Burying that kid topped it. Felt like I was burying my own damn heart in that coffin.
But since I hugged him tight as I could twenty minutes ago, sniffed sweat and dirt and tears, for the first time in months, the last thing I've wanted was a drink.
He doesn't look at me when I come back into the front room carrying a bowl of hot water and the smallest first aid kit I got. He's got his face buried in about the sixth glass of water so far but who's counting? He sounds almost like Dean again, instead of a chain-smoking, pneumonic blue's singer.
Sitting next to him I can smell my soap, but underneath it's still a raw, earthy smell. It's one I know, one most hunters know though it normally comes with the stink of decay.
Probably a good thing it doesn't this time. I don't think I could've taken him walking through my door smelling like a corpse.
He's staring into the empty glass like it holds the secrets of the universe, like it could tell him how the heck he's sitting on my couch at all. He doesn't seem to notice me sitting next to him, jumps a mile when I grab his left hand.
"Jesus, Bobby."
"Sorry."
Good thing the glass was empty. He reaches out with his right hand, refills it with the last of the pitcher on the table and takes a long, noisy slurp.
Kid's table manners ain't improved any.
I've got no doubt he'd get a laugh out of that, the Winchester sense of humour has always bordered on the bizarrely macabre, Dean's particularly, so I mutter it aloud and sure enough he chuckles.
Still doesn't sound quite right, but it's close enough for government business.
I throw a couple stitches into the still oozing slash in his arm; glad I keep my knives wicked sharp. Clean edges are easier to sew.
It's not until I take a look at his hands and see the bruises and scrapes on his knuckles that it hits me and I'm fully, completely and utterly sober for the first time in four damn months.
"Bobby?"
My turn to jump like a startled kitten.
"You okay man?"
I nod, lying through my teeth as I stare at his wounded hands. I woke up in a pine box.
"Dammit, ya idjit."
It's out before I can stop it but he doesn't answer, doesn't huff out a familiar laugh, just flinches and sucks in a breath as I start to work ointment into the worst of the cuts.
I've been in some bad places. Heck, I was almost buried alive once, longest minute of my life 'til Bill salted the ghost and dug me out.
I remember I was a hellhounds' chew toy, then lights out. Then I come to six feet under...
He mumbles something when I release his hands, relaxing sideways into my couch. Kid looks exhausted, like he's hollow, running on nothing but fumes.
After waking up from the dead and digging himself out of his own grave, most people would be on the floor already. Winchester stubborn can be useful sometimes.
"Get some rest."
He winces at that, shoves himself upright and I wonder at the reaction even as I know exactly what he's about to say to me.
"No. Sam."
A half hour later he's half-asleep in the passenger seat, staring blankly out the windshield and I wonder what he's watching.
It doesn't look like fun.
Kid looks pretty damn good for four months underground, which just means that he's pale as a vampire and his hands are shaking like a junkie coming off a week-long high.
"Dean. Sleep."
He looks sideways at me, like it hurts to meet my eyes and shakes his head slowly. With ghosts like that in his gaze, I guess I wouldn't want to sleep either.
I nod at the radio and he jumps on the offer, shoving the first tape he can find into the deck.
"What's the difference, we all gonna die. You gonna do something killer? C'mon give it a try."
He shuts it off as fast as he started it and we finish the ride in silence but the damn song plays in my head. Over and over as I park the car, lead the way up the narrow, dark stairs to the second floor of the hotel and damn if that ain't screwed six ways 'til Sunday, kid hasn't let me go first since he was eight.
Moment he sets eyes on his brother, it's like nothing changed.
He's the first one of us to say anything, first one through the door, first one slammed up against a wall and the first one to crack a bad joke.
The skinned knuckles are a like a bad memory as he looks at me over his brother's shoulder and smiles at me like he's dying all over again, like Sam's the only thing keeping him upright.
Like he's the only thing that's solid. That's real.
