Sam arrived at our house midday on Christmas eve and he was due to stay until Boxing day. I wasn't sure how I felt about it. Last Christmas we'd had all to ourselves, and this year we had Jo whom Sam hadn't even come to meet yet though she was nearly three months old already. And seriously, what was this man doing during the holidays? Surely nobody hired 'personal investigators' during the week between Christmas and New Years? I said as much to Dean, asking if Sam spent the holidays with his girl or something. He said no. Then I got a bit grumbly about how Sam couldn't put family first for once, knowing how much it would mean to Dean if he actually stayed a while longer, but Dean came down firmly on Sam's side and refused to discuss it at all after that.
But turn up he did. In that car which might as well be single-handedly responsible for global warming (I'm not allowed to say that out loud in my own house, but I can think it, okay?).
Sam was gaunt and twitchy, clearly on edge, but he smiled brightly at his brother and politely at me, and looked at me for permission before taking Jo from Dean's arms. I actually had to try pretty hard not to let my reluctance at him taking her show. I mean, this man was clearly unstable, and led a violent life and… stuff.
I needn't have worried. His entire demeanour changed when he was holding her. He almost relaxed the way I had seen him do when he was alone with Dean. Not quite, but almost.
…
Sam and Dean took a drive after lunch and didn't return until we should have already left the house. Even then they remained in the car, Sam's head buried in his hands and Dean's brow furrowed and turned towards his brother, lips moving and hands clenched on the steering wheel. When he caught the movement of me opening the door from the corner of his eye, they both got out of the car, pasted on smiles, and pretended like nothing had happened.
Christmas eve dinner was at my parents'. Sam said he should stay behind, that he was fine. Dean said he'd stay with him. I told Dean he was coming or so help me God. Dean reluctantly agreed, but Sam insisted on staying. My Mother and Lily threw a fit that Sam was alone in the house on Christmas eve, and Lily went back to our house and came back dragging a shell-shocked Sam who was still pleading his case for spending the evening alone when Lily unceremoniously pushed him down on a chair at the dining-room table. Ah, the joys of living in the same neighbourhood as your family. And ah, the joys of having a sister entirely unable to read the atmosphere in a room.
Because the atmosphere grew decidedly more tense with the addition of a near-stranger who was definitely not one for contributing much to the conversation. But, it lightened up after a while. Dean coaxed Sam into drinking some eggnog. And then some more, and suddenly Sam turned into a rather pleasant and much more socially adjusted human being than Dean. I was actually very surprised. But, all good things must come to an end.
"So Sam," Lily started as we were sitting by the Christmas tree after dinner. "Last year Dean told us you guys don't really have any Christmas traditions, but that can't be true right?"
"Uh well… Dean usually made sure we had some kind of tree or… something," the brothers looked at each other like they were sharing an inside joke, "but, not really, no."
"But, like, turkey and stuff, you had that, right?"
"Uhm…" both Sam and Dean looked more uncomfortable by the minute. "We weren't really… very skilled cooks. My college girlfriend made a mean Christmas dinner though," Sam smiled nostalgically.
Lily looked a little put out at this information; apparently learning about Sam's romantic involvements was not to her taste.
"She baked these amazing sugar cookies pretty much every day through the whole of December," Sam's eyes were locked on the tree but he was seeing something nobody else could.
"If you get the recipe from her we can make some tomorrow," my mother offered indulgently. Something about Sam made both her and Lily want to mother him to death. Me… not so much. I just wanted Dean to tell me what the hell was going on with his messed up family.
"No, that's fine," Sam snapped out of his reverie and smiled politely. "It's just a nice memory."
"I insist. We have to keep the traditions we can right? I'm sure she won't mind giving you the recipe."
I made the connection with the story I had overheard at the bar just a second too late. Just a half-second before Sam said;
"I'm afraid that wouldn't work. She passed away."
"Oh, I'm so sorry!"
"It's okay, it was a long time ago," Sam looked back at the tree.
"Where did you go to college?" Mark asked after a pause, in an effort to change tracks.
"Hmm?" Sam looked up again, startled at the interruption to his thought process.
"Stanford," Dean replied in his stead. "Pre-law. Got a full ride."
It was obvious he was proud of his brother.
"Wow!" Lily was mesmerised again. As if this man could get anymore perfect in her eyes…
"Where did you go to law-school?"
"Oh, I didn't. I dropped out before I finished at Stanford."
If anybody had been paying attention to Dean they would have seen that they were treading into dangerous territory. Sam had apparently had a little too much eggnog.
"Why?"
"Because Jess died and Dad went missing and the…" Sam looked up when Dean punched him in the arm, "…stuff," he finished lamely, rubbing at the sore spot but not looking irritated at being interrupted.
…
I left Sam and Dean downstairs with Jo that evening figuring that if they were going to be up late they could simultaneously change the occasional diaper. Of course, my joy at peaceful sleep only lasted a few hours until I woke up with the insatiable need to check on my baby. Damn motherhood and its stupid sleep-defying instincts!
From the doorway to the living room I saw Dean asleep on the couch, and Sam pacing back and forth with a mildly unhappy but very sleepy baby. He clearly adored his niece and it made me warm up a little towards him. I also took the opportunity to listen in to his nightly musings:
"So Jo. How're you doing? You're a really nice baby, aren't you? Nice and quiet. If you grow up to be anything like the Jo you're named after you're gonna be a real spitfire. Keep your parents busy, huh? The other Jo sure did. Saved your dad's life once, right before she died. She didn't listen to her mom. You have to do that though, okay? Listen to your parents! Your mom, she's really nice and your dad… he's the best dad ever. I would know, you know, he was my dad too when I was little. He's gonna teach you all the important things in life like walking and reading and field-stripping a gun in under two minutes. So you be good for him, yeah, and take care of him when I'm not here anymore. 'Cause I have to go soon you see, but that's alright, as long as you keep an eye on your dad for me, okay?"
Sam stopped walking and looked at my little girl whose innocent baby eyes were attentive and serious in her face. Then she yawned wide and Sam smiled adoringly as he laid her back against his shoulder and continued his pacing, picking up his train of thought.
"And no hunting for you, young lady, you hear me? That's important. Maybe I should write that down for Dean so he doesn't forget, hm? Part of my will or something," Sam mused in all seriousness.
Of all the times I had eavesdropped on this man, this was by far the most disconcerting. I hadn't even been aware there was a sentimental reason Dean had nicknamed our baby Jo, which made me a bit uneasy. I also wasn't sure whether or not I ought to bring up Sam's morbid death-talk either with himself or Dean, but somehow I doubted it would phase either of them.
Sam left after breakfast the following morning instead of staying as planned, and the jealousy churning in my gut only allowed me thirty minutes before I broached the subject of the previous night with my husband.
"Why do you call Josephine Jo?"
"Huh?"
"Why Jo and not Josie or… something else?"
"Why not?" Dean seemed surprised. I wasn't really one to bring up random topics of discussion most of the time, and I suppose my tone was a bit conflict-seeking.
"It's just, I overheard Sam talking when he was getting the baby to sleep last night, I think you'd fallen asleep on the couch already, and he was talking about a Jo who was apparently a spitfire and saved your life right before she died, and never listened to her mother."
"Were you eavesdropping?" Dean rarely got angry, but there was something dark in his tone now. If only he knew…
"Yes," I admitted. "Who was she? An ex?"
"What? No!" he seemed honest. "She wished," he added with a small smile. Then he sighed and looked me square in the eye. "She was a friend. She and her mother they… were good people. Almost like family to us and they… they both died to save us. Jo… she was younger than Sam, only 24, and so full of life, so rebellious. She didn't deserve that. It was my fault. Mine and Sam's."
"How so?"
"Look Em, I… can't tell you that, it's part of the past, it's not important." Always so evasive. My anger flared up again.
"That's bullshit Dean, and you know it! I put up with a lot of weird things from you with no explanation. Those sigils you draw under the carpets? The weapons in the garage you think I don't know about? That time I came back from a business trip and there was salt pretty much everywhere? Not to speak of the time your brother shows up on our doorstep bleeding out, with an arsenal in the trunk of the car! I never ask. But all this is clearly very very important!"
"Emily, please!" Dean looked beyond exhausted as he sank into a chair at the kitchen table. "It's not that I don't trust you with this stuff, it's that I don't want you to know because I want to protect you."
"From what? Does it have to do with what Sam said to Jo about her not being allowed to hunt, whatever that means? I'm assuming he wasn't talking about deer. Is that what you were doing before? The reason Sam seems to think he's going to die soon?"
"I am not letting him die!" Dean said, determination leaking back into his features. "We'll figure something out," he continued, mostly to himself.
"Is he sick?" I felt obliged to ask. Not that I wasn't concerned, it's just that this whole situation was way more than I could deal with.
"No. No, he isn't. Em, if you need to know I'll tell you. And you probably will need to know I just… I wish you didn't, you know? So can we leave it? Just for another little while? Please?"
Jo… no Josephine, or Josie, or something else - I wasn't going to call my daughter after some heroically self-sacrificing friend of my husband's whom he hadn't deemed me worthy to know about - chose that moment to start crying and I left the kitchen, wondering for the first time if making Dean a permanent fixture in my life had been a good idea after all.
