Title: Sharing Drinks
Characters/Pairings: Various
Author's Notes: Unrelated short stories chronicling moments over shared drinks.
Disclaimer: I obviously don't own "Supernatural." If I did I'd make sure the writers didn't make Season 7 such a mess.
Summary: Sometimes the best drink you have isn't about what you have, it's about the memory it carries with it.
About this chapter: No slash; just Dean pondering life on the road with a mostly absent father. (Rated K+)
1. Black Coffee
John Winchester doesn't stick around for long anymore. Just stopping in Bobby's or the church or whatever motel they're holed up at long enough to catch a few hours of sleep and down enough caffeine to get him through the job he's working. Dean's only seen him in glimpses — a shadow showing from under the bathroom door as he brushes his teeth, an elbow as he turns a corner, the back of his coat as he slips out a door. It's been a little more than a month since they've actually had a conversation beyond the usual orders: Watch out for Sammy, stay out of trouble, lock the doors.
It's been longer since Sam has seen their father; though, Sam doesn't seem to mind. Six years old is too young to even care when there are trees to climb and hidden places to discover and other kid stuff to occupy his time. So Dean doesn't blame him when Sam sleeps on instead of waking with a gasp at the sound the front door slamming. He glances at the clock on the bedside table. It's barely five in the morning. Rubbing sleep from his eyes, Dean throws back the sheets and scrambles out of bed and down the hall. His surroundings are still a bit blurry as he tries to fight past his exhaustion and fully wake up. Almost falling down the stairs, he rushes into the kitchen, smelling burnt toast and coffee.
"Dad!" he says expectantly.
The kitchen is empty, and his heart sinks. The only evidence that John was even there is the plate left on the table with a few stray crumbs on it and a chipped mug sitting next to it. There's a note this time, scrawled hastily on a scrap of paper on the table. Dean doesn't bother. He knows what it says: Be back in a few days. Same as always. The same lie.
His body suddenly feeling too heavy, Dean collapses into one of the chairs at the table and drops his face into his palms.
"Damn it," he whispers. And then, louder, because he's 10 and doesn't feel like obeying his father's no-cursing rule, "Damn it!"
He chastises himself almost immediately for losing his temper and strains to hear whether Sam was woken up. There's no creak of bed springs or shuffling footsteps, so Dean breathes out a sigh and grabs the plate and mug still on the table. He rises slowly to his feet and goes over to the sink, laying the plate on the stack of dirty dishes slowly piling up in a dirtier sink. He's about the put the mug in when he notices a few mouthfuls of tar-black coffee still sloshing around at the bottom. He's already broken one rule today by swearing, so he decides that a bit of coffee can't hurt. He swigs the leftover coffee in one gulp and grimaces as that burnt-bitter, earthy taste coats his mouth.
He misses his father, but he doesn't cry. He does, however, drink coffee every morning at dawn for a week and three days until John finally comes home, too exhausted to talk and too broken up by whatever he'd seen and done to look Sam and Dean in the eye. So, Dean dumps some instant coffee in a mug of hot water for John. And, when he hands him the coffee, holds on tight to that brief flicker of a smile on his father's face.