Ghosts of Christmas

Chapter 2

A trip to the hospital brings up bad memories and some unexpected Christmas spirits.

Thanks to everyone who wrote a review for this story, you're all really nice. I might try writing under the influence of strong flue medication again, it seems to work. There's only one more chapter, which should be up soon, so hopefully people will still be feeling Christmassy. Again let me know what you think.

Disclaimer: Don't own them, just play with them.

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Sam was still staring at Andy, when Margaret came around the corner looking for the little boy.

"There you are Andy, you know you're not supposed to go wandering about after lights out." She glanced up at Sam a concerned look on her face. "Honey you don't look so good. How are you feeling?"

Sam blinked a couple of times before answering. "I'm fine, really. I was just looking for the restroom."

She didn't look convinced but let it drop, giving him directions back up the corridor.

Sam nodded and left, he really needed to talk to Dean.

Back at their room though, he changed his mind. He just couldn't bring himself to wake his brother not when he looked so peaceful, he couldn't remember the last time Dean had got a descent nights sleep but he new it was before their father had died. The spirit hadn't seemed malicious surely it could wait till morning.

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Sam woke to a callused hand being pressed against his forehead. "Man, your burning up."

Sam just grunted, trying to bury himself deeper under the covers, he was freezing.

"What you doing Sam, trying to cook in your own juices?" Asked Dean as he tried to untangle the mass of bedding that claimed to be his brother, only to get his hand slapped away for his efforts. "Fine but I'm telling the doctor when she comes round."

Sam managed to force his eyes open enough to give his brother a look of complete loathing but didn't answer, quickly falling back to sleep.

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When Sam next woke it was to Dr. March peering into his face. This time he sat up as hitting her too probably wasn't an option.

If the doctor had looked harassed yesterday, today she looked positively haggard but she still managed to give him a slight smile. "Morning sunshine, let's have a look at you shall we."

Sam submitted to the exam with as good a grace as he could manage, which wasn't saying much, his head was killing him and couldn't stop shivering. Next to him his brother looked pale but decidedly chipper. It was annoying.

"I wouldn't worry too much it looks like it's just a really bad cold." She said addressing Dean as Sam seemed to be entirely disinterested. "I'll get him some pills to help with the fever, but apart from that I'd just suggest a long hot shower to try and move some of that phlegm." She rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "I'll give him a vitamin shot as well, he seems a bit anaemic and it can't hurt."

Dean grinned at the thought of his brother getting stabbed, he hated needles. Unfortunately the doctor noticed his glee. "Forget it boy'O you're getting one too. I've seen your blood work and judging by the results I'm not sure you'd recognise a vegetable if it bit you."

Sam let out a short barking laugh, which quickly degenerated into a hacking cough.

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A couple of hours later he was finally on his way to feeling human again, the doctor had been right about the shower. The only problem was now he couldn't stop his nose running.

He had filled Dean in on what he had seen and what he suspected. They had both agreed to keep an eye on the boys and some further research, if it really wasn't their parent haunting the hospital the last thing they wanted to do was traumatise the children further by digging up their parents.

In truth though Sam had no doubts, their deaths had been sudden and violent, and in the end what parent could rest easily not knowing the fate of their children. Still it didn't mean they were a threat, their own mother had hung around for decades without doing anyone any harm, although for their sakes he hoped the moved on soon. The idea of his mother trapped alone in their old house still gave him nightmares.

Heading back to Dean he was a little perturbed to find a short bald man in a white coat blocking his way an annoyed expression on his face. This couldn't be good.

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In the cold light of dawn Dr. Williams was having second thoughts about his decision to ignore Marchs insubordination. Who new what kind of trouble these men were in and letting them interact so closely with the children was bound to open them up to public scrutiny. Yes better to nip it in the bud now before things got too complicated.

Spotting one of the objects of his ire coming down the corridor he moved to block his path. "You, young man I have some questions for you?"

Sam stopped and faced the man giving him a slightly confused but polite look, as if to say 'Who sir, me sir?'."

"Can you explain to me how you came to be in my hospital with no insurance and no means to pay for your treatment?" This man definitely wasn't friendly.

Sam opened his mouth to speak deciding to go with the all American college boy approach.

"I'm taking a year out to go road tripping with my brother, before continuing with my studies." Sam shrugged and looked down at his feet as if embarrassed. "I'm afraid things got a little bit away from us."

"Where did you go?" The man way clearly suspicious.

"Stanford, sir." Sam smiled politely. "Pre-law."

The mans eyes widened slightly at the mention of the prestigious university.

"My brother Edward went there. Does Judge Grant still teach?"

Sam sensing he was being tested, shook his head. "Sorry, I've never heard of him, he must have been before my time." Or never existed he thought silently.

Sam paused as something occurred to him "Edward Williams the eighth circuit judge who over throw Whitman vs. Grand Forks city council. Professor Lee still goes on about it, he said it was one of the ballsiest rulings" He wisely left out the part about the Prof. having thought he was stupid for having made it. "he had ever seen, he said he couldn't credit one of his students with having made it."

The man visibly preened under the reflected glory before continuing in a slightly more kindly manner.

"Don't you have any family who could help you?"

"No sir, there's just me and Dean."

That gave the man pause, but it didn't last long. "Um well, just see that you don't take advantage of our kindness, I'm responsible for our budget and we have to spend it wisely, don't you know."

"Yes, sir." Pompous little idiot.

"Well you had better get back to your ward, before Dr. March does her rounds."

"I will do. Thank you again Doctor."

With that the over confident little doctor headed on his way, leaving a relieved and slightly annoyed Sam in his wake.

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Dean lent up against the wall of the childrens ward, watching Nathan and Gary tussle for the TV remote when a small gasp of fear drew his attention to youngish man and woman who had just entered the ward. The woman immediately moved forward with every intention of descending upon the scene like an avenging angle, but the man stopped her at the last minute pulling her tight to his chest.

Oblivious to it all the boys fought on, but their mock fight soon erupted into a fit of giggles when the remote, momentarily forgotten in the heat of battle was picked up by Andy who actually decided to use it to turn on the TV rather than as convenient trophy. Laughing the two older boys flopped down on either side of the small child, their fun had. Now clearly content to concede victory and hence control of the remote, for the time being at least.

"Mr. and Mrs. Barns good to see you, as you can see Gary is doing much better today. You should be able to take him home soon." Dr. March had just appeared at the couples side and was smiling at the three boys.

Garys head shot up at the sound of his name, his eyes instantly finding his parents. Dean was shocked by the look on the boys face and by the sound of the twin gasps from his parents so were they, he looked disappointed. Getting up he walked slowly back to his bed and climbed in looking nothing like the energetic little boy who had been tumbling around the floor minutes before.

"Oh God, what have we done." Dean felt like a voyeur as he watched understanding, raw and painful, flood into the womans eyes as she realised that in trying to protect her son, she had taken away everything that made him a child.

"It's not too late honey, we've still got time." The man whispered into his wifes hair, clearly he at least had guessed some of this before.

Holding his wifes hand he walked over and sat on his sons' bed only to have the boy duck his head clearly a little worried about his parents response to his horse play. "It's O.K son we're not angry. How about you take us over and introduce us to your friends."

Feeling uncomfortable Dean pushed off the wall to head back to his room, wanting to give the little family some privacy.

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Dean returned to his room and was more than a little surprised to find Dr. March sitting on his bed, facing away from the door. Hearing him enter, she got up and blew her nose noisily before turning around. She had clearly been crying.

"Are you alright?"

"No." He took her arm and led her back to the bed. Sometimes strangers were easier to talk to than friends.

"It's Mark, my husband he's gone missing."

"When?" Wasn't her husband in Iraq?

"Three days ago, he and some of his friends had asked permission to go out to a hospital a hundred miles south of Basra which had been badly damaged in resent fighting to try and get the electricity up and running again." She explained. "They got there easily enough, but they stopped checking in on the second day and no ones heard from them since."

She let out an angry sob. "He's an electrician for Gods sake, things like this are not supposed to happen to him."

But Dean new that wasn't true, his Dad had told him enough in the past to know, that guys like Dr. Marchs husband were often the first in and the last out, either setting up forward bases and getting captured enemy assets like airport operational or staying behind to see that any equipment which had to be abandoned was useless to the enemy. He suspected that the good Doctor new this as well, but just didn't want to see it right now, so he kept silent and just listened.

"Nobody will tell me anything, to be honest I don't think they have a clue what is going on. Mark could be dead and I wouldn't know." She was looking straight at Dean now. "How to I cope with that, with the not knowing?"

"Well you have to always look on the bright side of life?" Dean shrugged uncomfortably, not quite knowing how to handle the situation. He generally didn't consider himself the type of person people blurted things like this out to, preferring to keep to his policy of 'No chick-flick moments' whenever possible, but right now he seemed to be stuck in an endless stream of them. The food poisoning must be affecting his brain. Although Sam would probably claim it was Christmas spirit, he'd always been way too fond of this holiday.

The Doctor looked at him as if trying to decide if that way the best or the most insensitive thing anyone could have said under the circumstances, but just as Dean was beginning to worry that he might have said something terribly wrong, she burst out laughing.

"Oh God, I wish Mark was here. He'd just love you, that's exactly the kind of idiotic thing he'd say." She smiled at Dean fondly before turning thoughtful. "Although 'The life of Brian' is probably a good one for the Middle East at the moment with all that conflicting religious and political views being thrown around, they're both really just strange comedies." She said sadly before getting up to leave, but before she could Dean stopped her.

"Look my Dad was a marine and he was one tough bastard to kill, I'm sure your husband will do everything he can to get back to you. You just have to trust him."

"Your right." She smiled "Thanks Dean, you're a good listener." Dean raised an eyebrow, he didn't think anyone had called him that before, this day was just getting stranger and stranger.

"Oh and Dean my names Kate." She gave him a slightly embaressed smile, as she turned to walk out the door. "I only usually blub to people I'm on a first name basis with."

Looking up he was surprised to see Sam standing in the doorway looking pensive.

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Sam hadn't meant to eavesdrop on the Doctor and his brothers conversation but he had and he didn't like the feelings it had stirred up in him. It was like he just didn't know Dean anymore. He new he had missed things when he went away to collage but between the way his brother had interacted with the kids last night, then the Doctor now and the constant references to British comedy, he was beginning to wonder if he had ever known him at all.

Stepping tentatively into the room he cleared his throat determined to make amends for his lack of knowledge. "Dean since when do you like British comedy?"

Dean blinked, his mouth dropping open slightly, clearly this was a question he never expected to be asked.

"I mean is this something new or have you always like it?"

Responding to the pleading look in his brothers voice, he answered even if he still didn't have a clue why the kid was asking.

"No it's a pretty resent thing."

Sam continued to look at him expectantly so he continued, trying to figure out what his brother wanted to hear.

"It was a couple of month after you left for Stanford, Dad wasn't taking it very well and things got kind of rough between us for a while. Anyway we got sloppy and ended up stuck up a mountain in Wyoming with no gear and some totally freaked out backpackers, when a pack of Hell hounds attacked." Dean paused looking at his hands uncomfortable.

"Things got bad and we had to walk out, it was miserable, it just wouldn't stop raining. I was walking with one of the girls a Brit, she had been pretty badly cut up in the attack but we were all injured to some degree, so she had to walk. I remember we'd just got to the top of what we thought was the last hill, only to find it wasn't. We were all about ready to give up and she starts singing this song 'Always look on the bright side of life' and she doesn't stop till we make it to town. She just wouldn't give up and wouldn't let the rest of us either." Dean gave Sam a wry look.

Oh she sung other ones 'Every sperm is sacred' was particularly good, but that was that one that really stuck in my mind." Dean suddenly smiled at Sam as if he actually remembered it fondly.

"Once we got out of hospital, she gave me a bunch of Monty Python DVDs. After that when Dad got to much I'd watch them on the laptop and pretend to be doing research, I must have watched the 'Life of Brian' over a dozen times. I've liked that kind of stuff ever since. The Brits have a thoroughly weird outlook on things and it kind of fits the lifestyle."

Sam looked at his brother sadly, he had never really thought about how his leaving would affect his Dad and Dean, he'd always just figured they'd carried on as before hunting and hustling with barely a thought to the loss of their inconvenient third wheel.

He paused. No that wasn't entirely true, he new Dean would miss him and worry, he just chose to ignore it because it was easier to go on if he pretended the spilt in his family was what they all wanted but the truth was nobody had even thought to ask Dean what he wanted.

"Dean I….." Sams voice trailed off, how do you apologies to someone who's loved and protected you your entire life for walking away?

"Forget it kid, you didn't do anything wrong. You wanted a better life, that's nothing to be ashamed of." Dean fixed him with a hard stare, willing him to understand. "Dad and I patched things up soon enough. We made a pretty good team the two of us."

Sam could hear the loss in his brothers voice when he spoke of their Dad, he felt it too. He had lost so much time with both of them, because of nothing more than stubborn pride and now with their Dad at least he would never get the chance to make amends.

"Dean did Dad ever talk about me……………….you know after I was gone." Sam grimaced slightly at how inarticulate he had suddenly be come.

Dean gave him a sympathetic smile, understanding. "Yeah kid he did." He shifted so his elbows came to rest on his knees once more feeling uncomfortable, this day really was turning into one giant chick-flick moment, but he continued anyway because Sam needed it and he could never deny his brother anything, at least not for long. "He loved you Sam, never stopped. He was just scared, that if you left the family he wouldn't be able to protect you…. and because it was you and Dad we're talking about it all came out as an angry shouting match. " Dean smiled fondly. "You two were never the best at communicating. Too much alike I guess."

Sam smiled, it was funny how being compared to his Dad was no longer something to be complained about, it was just a shame their understanding had come to late.

Both of them sat in silence for a couple of minutes, before they were interrupted by Nathan and Gary tumbling through the door. "Dad says you've got to come and play cards because we're killing him." Garys words were practically tumbling over each other in his excitement.

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This Christmas Eves was turning into one of the best Sam had ever spent, it was also one of the most surreal. Carol and Ben Barnes turned out to be a complete riot, more than happy to get involved in any games Dean and the children could come up with, even if Carol did have occasional reversions to over protective mother mode, but the best thing about the afternoon was Dean.

Ever since their Dad had died Dean had been on edge, his mood fluctuating from sullen to down right scary but today it was as if somebody had lifted a giant weight from his shoulders, he laughed, goofed around and smiled more than Sam could remember seeing him do in years. Sure he still looked like death warmed up and tired easily (not that Sam was any better he still felt like his brains were dribbling out of his nose), but it didn't seem to get him down, not even Nurse Ellens 'juice therapy' was capable of doing that.

Ellen, Margarets daytime counterpart had taken an instant shine to Dean and had taken to dosing him with large quantities of organic vegetable juice whenever she thought he looked tired or peaky, which was pretty much all the time. He was beginning to think she had overheard Dr. Marchs comment about him not knowing a vegetable if it bit him and was trying to give him a years supply in one go. Still it wouldn't have been too bad if she had stuck to carrot juice, it was actually quite sweet but the beet juice with extract of citrus seed and Oregon grape was disgusting and everybody had drawn the line at pure garlic juice.

Of course it didn't help Deans case for being let off this onerous treatment that the children insisted on trying every single one of the concoctions, even after seeing the faces he invariable pulled upon first tasting them and took too daring each other to take larger and larger gulps of the vile concoctions. Then to top it all off, when Dean had turned to Carol for help she had just smiled sweetly and pointed out that she really couldn't object as the juices were both organic and sugar free, a comment which caused Gary to squirt beet juice out of his nose.

However the highlight of the afternoon at least from Sams point of view had to be when Susies parents came to collect her. Devastated at being separated from Dean, she tearily presented him with a picture of a violently pink horse and much to his brothers consternation insisted on a hug.An uncomfortable experience for Dean as it took place under the wary eye of the childs father who looked like he bench pressed pick-up trucks for fun. Fortunately, her mother seemed to be finding her daughters first crush as funny as hell and even gave Deans arm a sympathetic pat on the way out the door.

Things were just beginning to calm down for the night when a woman in a dark suite walked in looking like thunder.

"Oh Shhhhhhhhhhh……oot" Amended Kate glancing at the now giggling children as she got up to greet the woman. "Back in a mo."

Kate immediately tried to steer the woman into the wards tiny office, she wouldn't have any of it and soon the two women were engaged in a quiet but heated debate. All the humour in the room evaporated, as the temperature in the room began to drop both literally and figuratively. Sam gave Dean a slight nod to acknowledge the temperature drop when he looked in his direction before turning his attention back to the two women, while Dean concentrated on calming the kids. He was disturbed to see the dark suited women gesture violently in his direction. The last thing he and Dean wanted to do was cause Kate any trouble.

Dean exchanged worried looks with Carol and Ben; all three children were getting agitated, Nathan moving to Carols side to be closer to his brother who nestled wide eye in her lap, while Gary took shelter under his Fathers protective arm.

Suddenly the lights began to flickered, a spoon rattled against one of the plates, as the room began to shake. Dean and Sam were on their feet in an instant scanning the room threats, in the distance the EMF detector Sam had left on in their room began to scream.

A light bulb exploding overhead brought the womens argument to an abrupt halt when Kate rushed back to help, as the Barnes began to drag the children into the doorway, clearly thinking they were experiencing an earthquake.