Bobby gets in from his latest hunt — a werewolf on the loose out in Ohio — at half past dead o'clock and collapses on his sofa, intent on sleeping off the exhaustion and the pain he still has in his shoulder. As has been the case with so many things involving John Winchester before tonight, this does not go as planned. John storms into Sioux Falls without so much as a call to announce his intended presence, and goes unnoticed until a rustling in the kitchen shakes Bobby to his senses. He doesn't wonder over what could make it through his locks and his protective measures — he just grabs the shotgun off the floor.
Rounding in through the door, he cocks his weapon and points it at the dark figure rifling through his fridge. Before he can even snap a Hands up!, John raises them and straightens up, that goddamn inscrutable, lopsided smile on his face. "Hey, Bobby," he says as though it's nothing.
Bobby lowers the gun and disengages it; with the threat removed, John lowers his hand. "Let me guess," he sighs. "You were hunting something that infected you with an allergy to calling people?"
John shakes his head, and the smile widens. "Just thought I'd drop in, you know."
Bobby nods — only because he has holy water in the beer. He shoves John out of the way of the fridge and pulls two bottles out; evidence that this is John: he pulls the face that says, 'Are you fucking serious? Give me some of your better stuff, cheapskate' — but Bobby doesn't take the edge off his stance until John gets the whole bottle down. The Look he gets asks if that was really necessary; Bobby looks over both shoulders and, seeing nothing to dissuade him, wraps his arms around John's shoulders. They fall into a kiss like second nature, mouths crashing into each other as though it's not been six weeks since the last time they saw each other, and at least two since the last time John called. His embrace is warm, but there's some desperation underneath the strength.
Wrinkling his nose, Bobby pulls back and looks around. Something's not right here. "...Where are the boys?" he asks, looking John up and down.
All he says in response is, "Dean's with Pastor Jim tonight. They're looking into something." On which note, John reignites the kiss — and it's not that Bobby objects to it, to John's tongue in his mouth or the way that John drags his teeth along Bobby's lower lip — but some secrets are best when actually fucking kept.
With a grunt, Bobby shoves John off of him. He grimaces at having to do so, and wipes his mouth off on the sleeve of his red checked flannel. "And what about Sam?" he huffs.
John shrugs; turning away, he heads right for the cabinet where Bobby keeps the best of his liquor collection. Out comes the whiskey, the newest bottle because John knows better than to take the older stuff, which Bobby is specifically aging for some undetermined point in his life when he really cannot stand the Winchesters anymore and needs to drink until he forgets it all. Twisting off the bottle's cap in a fluid motion, John just explains: "Sam's not going to be a problem."
As though nothing else needs to be said, he stalks toward the sitting room and helps himself to the sofa. Although he doesn't plan to use it, Bobby cocks the shotgun and aims it at John's chest. "What's that supposed to mean?" he demands, and advances toward John slowly, like he would toward a demon or a rabid dog. John shrugs, and chugs the whiskey from the bottle; the burn doesn't seem to bother him, but then, he has that Look — his patented Look of doing something stupid, or in this case, of drinking just to get drunk. "John!" Bobby snaps, and holds his tongue until, placid and even-faced, John looks up. "Just what the Hell is that supposed to mean?" John shrugs, and asks what Bobby means. "What do you think I mean, genius? What's that 'Sam's not going to be a problem' business?"
"He's gone, Bobby," John says without adornment. "Sam's gone."
The shotgun quivers in Bobby's hands as he disengages it once again and lowers it to the ground; the effect of the news feels like submersion underwater. As he stares down at the other man, Bobby's jaw goes slack — he tries to form so many different questions — what happened to Sam, who was he with, did he try to go off alone, was it demons, something else, how the fuck did John let something happen to his boy, and why the Hell is Dean with Pastor Jim, why is he hunting at all, if his brother's dead — but all Bobby gets is a fishy opening and closing of his mouth. He looks John over once again. Then twice. Then for the third time, and still nothing about John's posture that explains anything. Finally he manages a weak, shaky, "...what?"
John shrugs, slouches into the sofa, and throws back another shot. "What do you mean what?" He sighs like some fucking teenager, as though giving this explanation is some horrid imposition on him. "He's up and gone, Bobby. G-O-N-E, gone, and he's never coming back—"
"Yeah, I heard that! What I'm asking you is... for God's sake, John: what. happened. to. Sam? When? What's Dean doing hunting now? Did you have him salted and burnt yet?"
"Salted and burn... what?" John sighed. "Jesus, you jump right into assuming the worst, don't you? ...Sam's not dead, smart-ass. He's in California. Or driving there, anyway." Still slack-jawed and furrowing his brow to go along with it, Bobby repeats that: California... and asks after what Sam thinks he's doing all the way out there, and alone, at that. All John says is, "Going to college." The game of repeating things continues as Bobby parrots: College? "Yeah, Bobby, fucking college. ...Some group of teachers all got together and pushed him into Stanford. They let him in, he got a full ride, and he's run away to go be normal."
"What — and you just fucking let him?"
"Of course I didn't just fucking let him!" John bellows like some of the worst creatures that Bobby's ever had to fend off. He throws back the whiskey like it's water and with a growl, he continues: "I tried to fucking tell him, Bobby — it's dangerous for him to be alone. They're planning something for him, Bobby — I don't know what, and I don't know how much is going on with it, but he needs to be with me, or his brother, at least, but... He yelled at both of us before he left. At Dean. Because we're smothering him — can you believe that?"
As John tells the story, Bobby falls onto the sofa next to him. In part, he wants to reach for John in some gesture of comfort — but John, he remembers, is not his sons; both of them carry part of him in them, but John, their patriarch, can handle his own emotions, when he decides to acknowledge their existence. Instead, Bobby takes the whiskey, and helps himself to some of it. "But you tried to get him to stay, didn't you?"
"Right up until the end I did," John admits, his voice quieting for the first time tonight. "But then he started blaming Dean... I told him to stay gone if he walked out that door. And he did." John pauses, grimaces, and under the scrutiny of his glare, Bobby takes another shot. "Fuck — God, don't look at me like that. What was I supposed to tell him? 'Have fun at college, Sammy, but make sure to keep up on your hand-to-hand and your guns just in case what killed your mother goes after you too' — like that'd make him listen."
For a moment, they just look at each other — but Bobby breaks the silence when he cuffs John on the back of the head. "Well anything would've been better than letting him go!" he snaps.
"Sammy's got no interest in being part of this family, Bobby!"
"Oh, like you always made it easy on him," Bobby points out, going at the whiskey in the same way that John did. Setting the bottle on the end table, atop one of his old books of lore, and yanks John around by the collar of his jacket; this, he rips off, and John's shirt follows it onto the sofa; the kiss, this time, is not desperate or looking to comfort his John — every motion against John's mouth, every bite on his lip, every yank to keep him from backing off bubbles up with rage, frustration — without needing to ask his questions, he demands: what were you thinking, why did you do it, what's Sam going to do on his own, why the Hell did you come here — and Bobby needs no answers for them. Shoving John back into the sofa, Bobby huffs, "You stupid son of a bitch."
John's jeans come off easily — almost too easily — and Bobby handles his own too; taking John's legs around his hips, Bobby only waits for John to nod before he shoves in his cock. His thrusts start fast and fevered, angry, grunting, rutting — but they slow when John's face doesn't screw up right, the scrunching way it does when he's getting close. Bobby stares at John, furrows his brow; the pause gives John enough time to snake one arm around Bobby's shoulders and the other hand up into his hair; he pulls Bobby down and, for a moment, tries to start a sentence, tries to tell Bobby exactly what he feels tonight and why he came, beyond the obvious need for booze, and sex, and some time away from Dean.
Instead, he sighs; he holds Bobby close and mutters, "Go harder." And Bobby obliges without a second thought.