This second chapter is set a few days after the first, exactly how many is up for you to decide.
Disclaimer- I do not own the boys, Supernatural, The CW, or anything else that I'm forgetting to mention. All I own are the typos. ;) Have fun reading!
Dean isn't a nosy person, he really isn't. If someone sets their phone down next to him and walks off, he's not gonna go racing through what's on it. He just never had that kinda curiosity, though maybe the rudeness if he ever wanted to, but he didn't want to.
So why the hell is he standing at the tail end of the Impala, trunk open, seconds away from looking through stuff that isn't his?
He isn't even on this Earth anymore, and you're the closest relative, so that automatically makes it your stuff, his brain tells him. But that doesn't sit right with him. Stuff that isn't yours originally can only become yours if someone's died and left you their things, right? That doesn't make it his stuff then. Because the owner of these things is not dead, has been dead before, but did not die recently in order to make them no longer his.
He knows he's not dead, he would feel it deep in his soul if his little brother was, he's just in a place where no longer living people go. Makes sense.
If someone would argue that he is dead, he would retort with "Oh really? Show me some proof," for the simple fact that there is none. There's no body, the giant gaping hole in the cemetery made sure of that. No way of putting it down on paper, in writing, stone cold that he's now the last Winchester left standing.
So he's going with the idea, no, the fact, that this stuff isn't his. But he wants to look through it anyways. Why, he isn't really sure. He thought he wanted absolutely nothing to do with this car and all its many contents ever again, but here he is. Like a damn siren, beckoning him to what's inside.
It's not like there's even anything grand inside the trunk anyways, except that they belong to him so they mean everything to Dean.
There are two sets of duffel bags, one his and one Dean's, his sporty little red book bag, a bag of salt in the back half open, and underneath in the hidden compartment a wide variety of everything a hunter needs.
He isn't here for the guns, or knives, or crucifixes, or holy water down below; he's here for the stuff on top. The stuff any cop who would ever pull them over would see when they popped the trunk. The day to day stuff they carried with them, their closest belongings, the things they plopped onto their respective motel beds, their life. All crammed into two duffel bags and a book bag.
Not really crammed, actually, but more like taken space in. It's not as if they had a lot to take, they always packed light. And that's sad, isn't it? It should be sad. It's probably sad. But Dean's brain is too fuzzy with scotch and grief to get teary eyed over some bags in a trunk.
He's not even entirely sure how he got here. Not but five minutes ago, he was camped out on the living room couch. He catches the irony in that; as if there's any kind of living going on in this room.
The television was spitting out its usual noise, what specifically he couldn't tell you, him nursing a beer as his peripherals kept the image of his empty glass previously filled with scotch. The house was empty, Lisa at work and Ben at school.
He felt an overwhelming drag inside his chest, and he turned his head to settle on the window with its curtains pulled back, seeing the garage through the glass. That's the last thing he remembers.
Now he's here.
Dean doesn't know what he's looking for; just that he has to look. So he then decides to grab the duffel bag. His duffel bag. Though the two are identical, he doesn't even have to open it to know it's his brother's.
It's all zipped up, fluffed with some air inside so that it looks it's natural cylinder shape, all its contents tucked away inside. Whereas his duffel is smashed flat, half the zippers undone and the ones that are closed caught on some fabric of clothing.
Yeah, the one he's grabbed is definitely Sa- his baby brother's. He pulls it up to the outer edge of the trunk and starts unzipping the top and biggest flap.
It hits him. Hard.
He hadn't thought about it, but now it's crashing through him and threatening to break down whatever bits and pieces of himself he managed to drink together in an alcoholic daze.
His smell. The best concoction he's smelt in probably his whole life, all coming out of a ratty duffel bag that still ain't even his. At first it's one big thing, but as he keeps inhaling it he's able to pick out its constituent parts; light raspberry from that damn chap stick, faint peppermint from those Tic Tacs he picked up at a gas station near Milwaukee, some actually old Old Spice, gunpowder, and finally just the overpowering smell of Sam.
And if that doesn't make him drop dead with agony on the spot, Dean doesn't know what will. He feels like his heart's pounding right out of his damned chest but frozen solid all at the same time. He said it. The one word he'd been trying not to say for over a month now. It's the one word that could be used to describe Dean and it all make sense. Like if you had to look up Dean Winchester in the dictionary all it would say is See Sam Winchester.
He's been fighting to not say it this whole time, and now not only has he broken that promise to himself but also to not touch anything inside the Impala in one fell swoop. Dean knew that if he spoke, or even thought of his brother's name in completion, that it would tear him apart. Because there is no more SamandDean, DeanandSam. Because there is no more Sam, making there no more Dean either.
But what is left is the stuff he's left behind. The people he's left behind, he thinks. And it's all in front of him, staring right back in his face. Every time he hears his mind echo the chant of him finally thinking his brother's name he breaks inside, so much that he thinks any minute it'll leave a pile of Dean shards on the garage concrete.
But right before he breaks completely, he gets another whiff of Sam and it immediately glues him back together. Until he realizes he's just thought his brother's name again, leaving him breaking, again. It's all one vicious cycle that doesn't seem to end, so he gulps in some air and avoids the tears forming on the edges of his vision, and reaches out to grab something inside the duffel while he's being broken and glued.
His hand settles on a plaid flannel shirt, in variations of blue. It feels soft, but rough in that flannel kind of way. He grinds the fabric between his fingers, can practically feel the body heat pouring off of it like it would if he had touched it when Sam was wearing it. He makes some god-awful noise that's a mix between a gurgle, a throaty chuckle, and a sob, remembering how much of a furnace Sam was, even in the depths of winter.
He moves on, past a few pairs of denim, until he reaches the bottom of the bag to find the backside of a Polaroid. He laces it between is fingers and flips it over, gasping at what he sees.
It's a picture of Sam and him, the one that was taken of them at that diner when they had the rabbits foot and first got tangled with Bella. He barely glances at himself, noting the face-splitting grin and twinkle in his eyes, dragging his attention towards the pout and overall massive bitch-face his brother slapped on right when the crowd said "Say cheese."
It's so natural for them, yet so comical, he doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. But he's pretty sure he signed off on having any kinda control over his emotions the second he walked into the garage, so he does neither.
No matter all the confetti, the streamers, the much-too-large check, or the smiles. Out of that entire picture, the only thing that could give him any kind of joy is the one thing that doesn't have any in the picture.
Well, it's not like he's experiencing any kind of joy in reality either, his damned brain reminds him. And that thought rips out all the glue in between his shards, leaving them crashing to the ground and breaking into a trillion pieces like glass. The reality that his baby brother is suffering eternal torture right this very moment and he's doing nothing about it.
He throws the picture back inside the duffel and pushes the whole thing back into the trunk, slamming the lid closed.
Dean storms out of the garage, suddenly in thirst for another glass of scotch that's waiting for him in the house, and if he hears the slight sound of glass crunching under his boots as he goes, he doesn't let on.
I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter, and expect the next chapter very soon again! Make sure to leave a Review, Favorite, and Follow as I will be adding more.
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