Hi all, hope you're continuing to enjoy the story!
I have never been to Palo Alto, so my description is based on internet images. Apologies for any inaccuracies!
Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural, nor any canon characters therein, and I am making no profit from this piece of fiction.
Chapter 4 – Amongst Butterflies
They arrived in Palo Alto late in the evening, as the sun set about it's downward journey to the horizon, painting watercolour streaks of palest pink across the sky that were being slowly overtaken by darkening blues and purples. It might have been called pretty, if Dean Winchester noticed that kind of thing.
Which he didn't.
They crawled through the city, traffic surprisingly heavy for the time of day, giving Dean plenty of time to survey his surroundings. He'd never given much thought to the place when he'd been there in the past with his father, and then to pick up Sam.
If he had to use one word to describe this place it would be leafy. It was lush with trees and vegetation, and in the spring air the scents from baskets of flowers hanging along the walls of the almost Mediterranean-style buildings wafted in through the Impala's open windows.
He wanted to hate it. Really he did. But it was actually kind of pleasant.
The last time he'd been here it had been more autumnal, and many of the trees had shed their loads, looking barren and stark as their branches struck out in all directions, reaching out like bony fingers. He hadn't paid much attention at first though, his only thought being to get in, get Sammy and then get out again.
Then the demon had murdered Jessica.
He'd spent a week there following barely-there leads, for little else but to reassure Sam that they were doing something to catch her killer. He didn't remember much, he'd been so worried about his brother, so consumed with fury at what had been done to him.
Sam had kept him at arm's length for most of that week, checking in with him every so often to see if he had found anything, but otherwise ignoring him. On some level he'd known that Sam needed space, that he had more to deal with than he could even comprehend, but he'd still felt left out. He'd wanted to be at the funeral with Sam, for no other reason than to just be there. But Sam had put his foot down, told him he could handle it, and Dean hadn't felt that he had the right to challenge him.
Especially since he was grappling with his own guilt over what had happened.
If he'd just left Sam alone...
The streets of Palo Alto were crowded with preppy students clumped together outside bourgeois bars and restaurants – the kind Dean normally avoided like the plague - happily casting off the day's study like a cumbersome jacket, and Dean found himself picturing Sam in the crowd with those people. It felt wrong.
The innocuousness of it all disturbed him slightly and he reached forward to turn on the radio, needing to assert his presence somehow, the urge to throw a rock into a still pool too much to resist.
Sam however, immediately swatted his hand away, giving him a look that promised death if he tried to put on his music.
"Sammy this is all a little too Dawson's Creek for my likin'. These guys wouldn't know a decent guitar riff if it poked 'em in the eye" On some level Dean knew he was making a play to distract his brother from the obvious pain he was feeling on being back in this town – if Sam's pained features and hunched form were anything to go by - but he also felt oddly out of place here, and was loathe to admit that he needed his music around him like a safety blanket.
Sam sent him a cold glare. That's it Sammy, Dean thought. If Sam was pissed at him, then maybe he wouldn't be so internally focused. The elder hunter would happily play punching-bag if it meant that his brother would stop beating himself up.
"Dean, if you turn that thing on I will permanently disown you!" Sam growled, uncurling slightly to shoot his brother another threatening scowl.
Wouldn't be the first time, Dean muttered to himself, but reached forward and flicked the radio on anyway, tossing Sam a cheeky grin.
CCR's Run Through the Jungle jolted through the car with a crash that caused several people in the vicinity of the car to turn and stare disdainfully at the Impala and her occupants. Sam's hand darted forward in an attempt to turn it off again, but this time it was Dean whose hand was hovering protectively over the radio.
"Not my fault these people have piss poor taste in music Sammy!"
Dean chuckled as Sam cringed and immediately tried to hide himself by sinking lower in his seat, hampered in his efforts by his ridiculously long legs.
"I'm gonna kill you" Sam groaned as he avoided the snooty glares of the people strolling past.
"Yeah I'm sure you are" Dean knew that his unconcerned tone would irritate his brother even more, and was rewarded with a muttered "friggin' jerk!" from somewhere in the vicinity of Sam's now hidden face.
He smirked and jauntily began tapping his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat, winking at any good looking women who happened to glance in his direction.
They eventually located a suitable motel not far from the Stanford campus, Dean wincing at the cost as he checked them in – everything seemed so damn expensive in this State. The cost notwithstanding, the motel definitely met their usual criteria.
It wasn't as chronically depressing as the one they'd taken refuge in back in Sandwich, but it was certainly making an admirable effort. The murky, claret coloured carpet was scattered with splodges of age-darkened stains that Dean didn't even want to think about, and the vomit coloured wallpaper made Dean feel slightly nauseous, especially coupled with the tan coloured bed covers and curtains.
"Well they've got both orifices covered" Dean quipped as he disdainfully surveyed the room, wrinkling his nose at the vomit-like smell he wasn't quite sure he was imagining.
"What?" Sam quirked a brow as he looked up from where he'd been rifling through his bag.
"Never mind"
"Want to take the first shower?" Sam offered, pulling out his cell phone. "I'm going to give Jenna a call; let her know we're here"
Dean did. One of the few aspects he hated about life on the road was not always being able to wash up properly. The gritty feeling of having been in the same clothes for over twenty-four hours always grated against his skin, and he couldn't wait to feel the soothing fingers of the hot water massaging his tired and aching body.
When he'd finished, he dragged a towel across his head, forcing his short hair into messy tufts. He pulled on fresh clothes, relishing the feeling of clean cotton and denim against his just-dried skin. The rejuvenating effect of the shower made him feel slightly better about the prospect of meeting Sam's friend. Not one mention of it would ever pass his lips, but he was feeling a little nervous.
He could tell Rebecca hadn't liked him, even without the shapeshifter using his form to torture her, and it had bothered him. Normally he shrugged people's opinions off like they were annoying flies to be swatted, but somehow this was different. These were Sam's peers, his little brother respected them, looked for their acceptance.
And if they didn't like him then their views might rub off on Sam.
He opened the bathroom door and bravely padded across the carpet on bare feet, giving Sam a questioning glance as he passed by.
"We're going to meet her in about half an hour over at Pedro's" At Dean's blank look he added. "It's a bar"
"Right" They hadn't been in Palo Alto more than an hour and already Sam was starting to patronise him. Terrific.
Pedro's wasn't exactly what Dean would have called a bar.
Bars were supposed to be dimly lit, wood-panelled rooms shrouded in wisps of cigarette-smoke, with tables coated in the sticky residue of spilled beer and pool tables huddled secretively in the corner. They were supposed to be filled with men weathered by the passage of time and the harshness of life, and by women in low-cut tops and high hem-lines on the prowl for passing-through prey.
"Sam this isn't a bar, it's like somethin' out of Sex and the City" Dean complained as they arrived outside.
The place hadn't been far from where they were staying, and despite Dean insisting that he wanted to drive, Sam had refused point-blank and laid down the law. They were walking.
Dean hated walking. Dean hated girly 'bars'.
This was going to be a long night.
"You're really going to admit that you've watched that show?" Sam snorted in disbelief, turning a sceptical face towards his brother.
"The clue's in the title, Sammy!" Dean leered, his lips curved into a satisfied smirk.
Sam just shook his head.
Dean's smile faded as soon as Sam looked away. Looking at this place, imagining Sam spending time here, thinking about the life he'd led here, it was making him feel uneasy in a way he couldn't quite define. It was as alien to him as if someone had plucked him from the Earth like a ripe strawberry and plopped him down again to rot on Mars.
He had no frame of reference for this, no footholds to help him negotiate what was likely to be a slippery slope.
Dean followed his brother through the entrance, dismayed to note that it was exactly how he'd pictured it. In the soft blue lighting emanating from the back-lit shelves behind the harsh, unforgiving line of the bar, Dean could see lots of cube-like tables arranged in grid-lock pattern along the straight rectangular room. There were lots of silvers, and light blues, and lilacs, with long delicate-looking lamps hanging down from a ceiling stripped bare to reveal criss-crossing steel beams.
There was some sort of horrendous song bobbing along in the background, barely audible over the sound of conversation and clinking glasses. Dean thought he could detect a whining voice singing about a girl with a broken smile, and tried not to gag at the triteness of it.
The people sitting symmetrically around the tables looked as fresh-faced and untouched by the world as if they had emerged as butterflies after being raised in a protective chrysalis. They were all blonde highlights and pastel coloured shirts. Dean didn't think he could have told any of them apart if his life depended on it.
Sam however, was already waving enthusiastically at a girl who had risen up from her cube almost as soon as they had walked through the door. Dean followed as his brother weaved across the room to reach her, his loping walk reminding Dean of a documentary he'd seen about giraffes on the Discovery Channel.
As they approached the table, Dean could see instantly that there were others there. The group had pushed a few of the cubic tables together so as to have enough room for everyone. He immediately recognised Rebecca Warren, though her hair was considerably shorter now, and a man who looked very much like her brother Zach. There were four others present, a girl with a heart-shaped face framed by raven hair that had been sculpted into a sleek bob, a blonde man with a scruffy surfer-type look, a fresh-faced girl with freckles and sandy corkscrew curls, and an African-American man with a military-style crew cut.
In short, the kind of well-groomed people Dean disliked on first sight.
There was something too wholesome about them, too pristine. These people didn't have the hard edge he had, they'd never seen the horrors life could bring, the things that hid in the shadows.
"Sam!" Jenna reached them first, throwing herself into Sam's arms and clinging to him as if he'd just pulled her from a burning building. "Thank god!"
Dean didn't get a good look at her until she had pulled back from his brother. She had thick auburn hair that dropped poker-straight from her dainty head, and a fringe so long Dean felt certain she ought to be covered in bruises from all the furniture she had to have been tripping over. Blue eyes were tearing up as she gazed up at Sam, lingering on his still-healing cheek, and she certainly did have a long way to look. The younger Winchester utterly dwarfed her petite frame.
Sam stepped back from her and gestured to Dean. "Jenna, this is my brother Dean"
Jenna's eyes raked over him with barely veiled curiosity, and Dean didn't need to be a mind-reader to know exactly what she thought of him: dangerous. He nodded at her and flashed a brief smile, receiving a plastic one in return before she returned her attention to Sam.
"I know you weren't expecting a crowd Sam, but everyone wanted to see you" At Jenna's cue, the group at the table rose to their feet and swarmed towards the younger Winchester.
Dean stepped back to allow them room, not wanting to intrude on their reunion. He caught Rebecca's eye and nodded in recognition, then he suddenly found his hand being grasped in a firm handshake, and glanced up to see Zach Warren standing before him.
"So you're Dean Winchester" he began, smiling warmly. "Great to see you up and around, last I heard you were lying in a cemetery back in St. Louis"
Dean found himself laughing jovially, liking this man despite himself. "Yeah, you might say reports of my death have been a little...exaggerated!"
In the background he was vaguely aware of Sam pointing him out to the others, but he blithely ignored their scrutiny.
"Good to finally meet you!" Zach was continuing, his expression open and guileless. "You guys really saved my bacon, and I feel kind of bad that you ended up taking the fall"
"Don't mention it" Dean brushed off the thanks, uncomfortable with gratitude. "It pretty much comes with the job description"
"Well I got a second chance at life thanks to you. Least I can do is buy you a drink, what'll you have?"
Dean blinked, somehow touched at the genuineness of the offer. "Uh...I'll take a beer thanks"
As Zach departed, the elder Winchester felt a tug on his arm and he was pulled across to stand in front of the others, as if being unveiled as some tawdry game show prize.
"Dean, this is Kate Winters" Sam nervously gestured to the raven-haired catwalk model, who gave a haughty smile in response. "And this is Riley O'Connor" The surfer-dude – as Dean had taken to referring to him in his mind – gave his hand a laid-back shake as he displayed a rack of perfect white teeth.
Sam continued, indicating the freckle-faced girl, who gave him a shy wave which Dean found himself returning awkwardly – since when did he do that stuff? "This is Elena Martin, and..."
The other man stepped forward into Dean's personal space and grasped his hand, giving it a forceful shake. "I'm Luis Jackson" Dean flashed him a closed-mouth smile but refused to step backwards. The two stood eye-to-eye for a brief moment before Luis moved away, Dean smirking at the other man's perceived submission.
He glanced over to the remainder of the group, Kate was eyeing him like a cat stalking its prey. Normally he'd have lapped up the attention, but she was just making him feel uncomfortable. "So we finally get to meet you Dean. You've been something of a mystery figure for a while. Although, after what Jenna told me I can see why"
"Oh really?" Dean plastered the most fake smile he could muster, in the hope that it would fill in the cracks that had suddenly started to appear in his façade. Mystery figure?
"Well I have got an image to maintain" He swallowed the sour taste her insinuation had elicited. He'd known Sam had wanted to keep their family business a secret, but he found himself wondering exactly what Sam had told his friends about him.
Sam seemed to notice his discomfiture. "Uh, yeah, well it's not the kind of thing you can just, you know, blurt out"
"I'll say" Surfer-dude agreed, giving Sam a searching look, as if trying to figure out how these two versions of Sam could possibly fit together: the college boy and the ghost-hunter.
"Yeah Sam, you sly dog! No wonder you were always so secretive about your life before you came here" Luis cut in, shooting a glance at Dean, who frowned back.
"I still can't believe it" Elena laughed, with a slightly hysterical edge. She was irritating him already. This was going to be a long night – and hadn't he said that already?
Ugh.
Sam opened his mouth to respond, but was saved from continuing this line of discussion by the arrival of Zach, who'd brought a drink for him too, evidently having known exactly what to get. Dean eyed the electric blue liquid in Sam's spindly glass and sent him a scathing look.
"Really Sam?" He raised his eyebrows at his brother, who merely shrugged unapologetically back at him.
"Sam used to drink this all the time back in the day" Zach explained, handing Dean a mercifully cool bottle of beer.
"Sam used to drink?" Dean quipped, to the accompanying laughter of Zach, Luis and Surfer-dude, and his brother's reddening face. He was satisfied that his effort had covered up any trace of the bitterness he'd felt at finding out that there was much he didn't know about Sam that these strangers apparently did. It was one more notch in the life Sam had carved out for himself.
Sam said nothing in response, and everyone took this as their cue to sit down.
When everyone was settled around the table, Sam turned to Rebecca. "So how come you and Zach ended up back here?"
The blonde looked over at her brother, and briefly flicked her eyes towards Dean. "Well, after...everything that happened in St. Louis, Zach decided to come back here with me when I restarted at school"
"I lost my job. I might have been cleared of...everything" He stumbled slightly, the memory clearly still raw in his mind. "But the damage was already done. I couldn't stay there, so I decided to get a job back here"
Dean felt the eyes of the table fall upon him as the siblings recounted their story. It was blatantly obvious that they all knew the details of what had happened, and he was beginning to feel like the new attraction at the local zoo. It shouldn't have bothered him, but somehow he thought they were all imagining him torturing Rebecca. The girl herself could still hardly look at him, not that he blamed her; it would be his face she would see in her nightmares.
"I still can't get my head around this stuff. I don't know whether to be afraid of what's out there or to worry about your mental state" Jenna piped up, her voice slightly shrill with her heightened emotion. "But I can't explain what happened to Jake"
"How do you think you guys can help?" Luis queried, looking from Sam to Dean, and back to Sam again. "I thought it was supposed to be – and I can't believe I'm saying this – but you guys hunt ghosts, right? How can this be a ghost?"
"Well hang on!" Zach cut in. "The thing that killed Em and framed me wasn't a ghost. It was a...what did you call it again?"
"A shapeshifter" Sam supplied, and Dean could tell that his brother was more than a little uncomfortable discussing it. The elder hunter wondered whether Sam had expected so many people to be in on the Winchester family secret.
He'd guess not.
Kate snorted at Sam's words. Finding herself on the receiving end of several glares she relented. "Sorry, it just sounds so Sci-Fi Channel. I mean, I know you guys lived it, but it's just ridiculous. This stuff can't be real"
"Believe it, sweetheart" Dean blurted before he could stop himself; the girl was starting to piss him off.
Sam punched his thigh under the table in warning.
"Ow!"
"Look, we don't just hunt ghosts. There are lots of other...monsters out there, evil things. This could be something else, we don't know what yet. So Jenna, if you feel up to it, could you tell us more about what happened to Jake?" Sam was in gentle mode now. Dean had seen him draw victims and witnesses under his spell a thousand times, and was more than a little envious of his abilities. Of course, for Sam it was as natural as breathing.
Jenna had been mostly quiet up until now, staring morosely into whatever multi-coloured cocktail she was drinking, swirling it around absently with her straw. She nodded at Sam's question, scrunching her face briefly as if trying to straighten her thoughts.
"Jake he was...god he was so full of life. You know he was a political science major? But he was so passionate about people. We had a rally on campus a few days ago, a protest against human rights abusers, and Jake organised the whole thing. He wanted to go into politics so he could stand up for the vulnerable, the disenfranchised"
Disenfranchised, Dean mimicked in his head in a silly child's voice, then cringed internally at his own immaturity.
"I remember he seemed like a great guy" Sam agreed soothingly. "I know this must be so hard for you"
"He was my best friend Sam. To lose Jess...and now Jake..."
Sam's face fell at the mention of his late girlfriend, and Dean felt his heart constrict at the sight.
"When did you last see him?" The elder Winchester took over while Sam composed himself, glancing periodically at his little brother to check that he was okay.
Jenna closed her eyes as she forced the memory to the forefront of her mind. "Uh, after the rally, so that would have been...four nights ago, I guess. It had all gone really well so a group of us had gone out to celebrate. We were out for a few hours but Jake was feeling tired so he went home early. He never made it. He just disappeared"
"What did the police say?" Kate asked, a frown creating a delicate crease in the middle of her flawless forehead.
"Oh they didn't want to know at first, thought he was playing a prank or that he'd needed a break from studying and had just taken off somewhere. I left his description with them anyway, just in case...and then when they found his body, they called me" Jenna's voice began to waver at the memory, her eyes going glassy as if she was reliving the moment there and then.
"And that was yesterday morning?" Dean clarified, trying to keep her focussed. He'd always found it difficult to deal with crying women; could only flail around helplessly while someone else – usually Sam - stepped in and took the reins from his incapable hands.
She nodded, looking as if she didn't trust her voice to hold the weight of her words.
"Have there been any other...victims?" Dean coaxed gently, his gaze boring an intense hole into hers, trying to create some kind of tangible link between them.
Jenna sniffed sharply, as if the rapid intake of air would disperse the emotional fog in her mind. "Two other students were...murdered...in the last couple of weeks. A guy and a girl I think, I don't remember their names. The police aren't giving out details, but they think it's some kind of...satanic cult or something"
"You said they pulled Jake out of the river...?" Sam cut in, having managed to close the door on his own anguish for the time being.
Dean shot him a questioning look. You okay? Receiving Sam's slight nod in return, he returned his gaze to Jenna.
She nodded again, and then continued with a voice as shaky as a newborn foal standing for the first time. "His body...god, it was...it was all...bloated...and disfigured. And that horrible...thing on his chest, like someone had taken a carving knife...and his face. He looked so scared" The dam had broken and the tears were rolling freely now, weaving disjointed tracks blackened by mascara down her pale cheeks.
Sam immediately moved closer to her and draped an arm across her shoulders, drawing her to him and holding her as she sobbed.
The remainder of the crowd shifted awkwardly and tried not to make eye contact with each other. Jenna's distress was palpable, and Dean wondered if, like himself, the others were trying not to imagine the grotesque picture she had painted. Not that he wouldn't see the real thing anyway when he and Sam got to the morgue, but sometimes fantasy was worse than reality.
Sam's gaze was searching out his brother's, and Dean met it reluctantly. The younger Winchester gave a small grimace, which might have seemed callous, but Dean knew his brother's intentions were entirely the opposite. In that unwritten language they both seemed to instinctively understand – that had seen them through countless dangers and near-death experiences - Sam was calling a halt to the interview. They'd get no more out of her just then, and Sam clearly didn't want to get any more out of her just then.
The poor girl looked as if she could barely comprehend what she'd been through, and she clearly hadn't assimilated it. She'd need time.
Dean understood that. He nodded at Sam in agreement and acknowledged his brother's grateful smile.
Their silent conversation took barely a second, but the others at the table were staring at them with unbridled curiosity, clearly having no idea what had just transpired. Dean almost smiled in possessive pride; he sometimes took for granted how in sync he and Sam were. It was easy to forget how one look, one gesture, one expression could convey so much. It was the almost telepathic connection that came from having spent so long observing and reacting to someone else's behaviour, from having repeatedly put your life in that person's hands and have them put theirs in yours.
But more than that, it came from knowing someone better than you knew yourself. Something a few years at Stanford hadn't been able to change, and he had to remember that.
He watched as Sam began to stroke Jenna's shoulder with a gentle, soothing motion, as if calming a frightened animal. It was the kind of attention that would have had Dean calling him a girl and telling him to man-up, but deep down in that hidden place he'd sooner die than reveal, he secretly envied it. Since his mother had been so savagely ripped from his four year old self, no one had ever treated him like that. He'd never allowed anyone to treat him like that.
"Jenna, I think you should go home and get some rest" Sam murmured softly, glancing around at his friends, looking for an ally.
"Yeah, honey, I'll drive you" Elena leaned forward to squeeze Jenna's limp hand.
Sam had tried many times to care for him, but Dean couldn't and wouldn't let himself go. He needed to be strong. Looking after Sam was his job. It had been since he was that four year old boy on that fateful night, when the small bundle of his baby brother had been frantically shoved into his arms by his distraught father. John Winchester had given him a lifelong contract to sign in that moment, and he was forever bound by it. Willingly.
He'd die before he'd break it.
Apart from hunting, protecting Sam was all he knew how to do...well, other than sex (and he thought he was pretty good at that). Having Sam return the favour seemed wrong on some fundamental level that Dean couldn't fully articulate.
Dean could remember only too well the sickeningly humiliating feeling of bone-deep weakness he'd felt after the electrocution, the unbearable knowledge that he couldn't have fought off a stiff breeze, the agonising realisation that he needed his kid brother to help him up out of a chair. It had traumatised him for a long time after Roy LeGrange had 'healed' him in that tent in Nebraska, and Sam hadn't been able to let him out of his sight for weeks afterwards. It had grated on him.
He didn't know how to be looked after.
Suddenly he felt the weight of several pairs of eyes on him and glanced up from his introspection to find that everyone was looking at him expectantly. Jenna and Elena had apparently already departed.
"Huh?" He grunted stupidly.
He caught Luis sending Kate a smug smirk and his eyes narrowed.
"I was just saying Dean, Sam never talked about what you guys did before he went to college. Bet you've got a few stories to tell!" Zach's smile seemed to banish the spectre of tension like a well timed rocksalt blast, and Dean couldn't help but wonder if the guy was genuinely oblivious to the undercurrents swirling around them or just a damn good actor.
Nevertheless, he was prepared to accept a lifeline when it was offered. And the chance to mortify Sam in front of his friends was too good to pass up, especially when his little brother was shooting desperate, pleading looks at him.
Dean ignored him, took a long swig of beer and then set it down on the cube with a decisive thunk and an almost predatory smile. "Oh, I've got more than a few!"
"And Sammy had a fear of cats for years after that one!" The elder Winchester teased animatedly, his amused smirk acting as the conductor to the symphony of good-natured laughter generated by the others.
Dean had warmed considerably to this subject, Sam noted ruefully, feeling the heat from his blushing cheeks. The idea of his friends and family comparing notes over him was so unbelievably normal however, that Sam couldn't really bring himself to be mad at his brother for relaying some of his most excruciatingly embarrassing moments, especially since his friends seemed to have the good grace to not be freaked out by them.
So many scenarios had played through his mind on the walk to Pedro's about how badly this could have turned out. He'd fretted that his friends would think he was some sort of lunatic, that they'd be angry at him for all of his lies, that they'd be hostile and judgemental.
Instead, they'd been practically tripping over themselves to greet him. Had told him how much they'd missed him, how glad they were to see him. He'd felt their warmth flow through him like a steaming cup of coffee on a frigid morning.
They'd accepted him. As he truly was. And it was so gratifying.
No more lies. No more masks.
He hadn't expected to slip back into Stanford life like a comfortable pair of slippers. Sitting around the table at the bar he and his friends had once haunted like the spirits he and Dean banished almost made Sam feel like he had never been away, that all the months he'd spent with his brother had never happened.
"Man, that explains so much!" Riley snickered, his perfect teeth glinting in the bluish light as he smiled. "Remember that time Sam totally freaked out when Jess let that Wallace lady's cat into their apartment? Oh man, you squealed at some frequency only dogs could hear!"
Sam found himself laughing at the memory, though painful spikes of loss at the mention of his late girlfriend were digging into his soul like spurs. "Yeah, that was so I could call some dogs to chase the friggin' thing away!"
Being here with his friends was like a soothing balm. He'd been completely unprepared for the searing agony he'd felt while Dean had guided the Impala through the streets he'd once known like the back of his hand. Every brick, every pane of glass, every tree branch felt as if it had absorbed Jessica's image - her essence - only to project it outwards again like some twisted hologram when he passed by. It had been so unbearable that he'd been on the verge of breaking down and begging his brother to turn the car around and get them the hell out of there, but then Dean had started his 'embarrassing older brother' routine and snapped him out of it. Dean always seemed to know what to do.
Dean, who was at this moment roaring with laughter at his expense.
He couldn't quite wrap his head around his brother's presence in this world. It seemed wrong somehow, given how hard he'd tried to make this life his own, how hard he'd tried to block out his family. Yet Dean was occupying this space like it was the most natural thing in the world, and Sam found himself almost resenting it, like his brother had broken through the last bastion of control he had kept for himself.
But Dean was trying. He really was making an effort, and Sam had to acknowledge that, especially given the fact that the older man had made no secret of his distaste for Sam's college life and all that it had entailed.
"That old lady was crazy anyway" Luis piped up, giving Sam a sly glance. "Though I think I remember her having a bit of a soft spot for you Sam!"
"Yeah, Jess definitely had some competition there!" Rebecca joined in, eyes bright with amusement.
"It's the puppy-dog eyes, gets them every time" Zach punched Sam lightly on the arm. It was such a Dean gesture that the younger Winchester nearly stamped on his brother's foot in retaliation.
Instead he just shook his head with mock weariness, a small smile giving away his nostalgia. He remembered the older woman only too well, and her somewhat disconcerting crush on him. He'd lost count of the number of times there been a tap-tap-tap on the door, usually when he and Jess were about to spend 'quality time' together. Once he'd opened the door shirtless and the poor dear had nearly had a fit.
There was always some job she'd needed help with, something that required a 'tall young man', or a 'strong young man', or a 'smart young man'. He'd helped her every time even though he'd known it was usually an excuse for her to squeeze his bicep or slap his ass. It was hard-wired within him to help the damsel in distress – however old and randy she happened to be.
He glanced at Dean, hoping to catch his eye and share the joke with him, but he was jolted back to earth at the suddenly subdued expression on his brother's face. Dean sat staring intently at his empty beer bottle as if it had unimaginable wisdom to impart, fingers worrying at the label, peeling it from the glass.
He frowned, wondering at the change in his brother's demeanour.
"Exactly!" Luis nodded enthusiastically, waving his arms madly to emphasise his point. "Like Professor Lang! All those 'extra tuition' sessions you kept having with her? We were starting to wonder Sam!"
Sam rolled his eyes at his friend's exaggeration. "Man, it was so not like that! She was lonely, and she liked talking about sociological norms in polycentric societies. I got so much background for my assignment"
"Yeah, Sam, that's why you got an 'A'. Because you learned from her!" Riley winked, and high-fived Luis.
Sam guffawed heartily, feeling every muscle relax as his body sagged back against his chair. He'd forgotten what it was like to really laugh like this, to hold nothing back. Briefly he felt Dean's eyes on him, but when he looked up his brother's gaze had re-attached itself to the beer bottle.
"Yeah, well, better that than pulling all-nighters like you. Did you even get any sleep in Freshman year?" Sam retorted.
"Well it wasn't exactly high on my list of priorities Sam! I lost count of how many parties I tried to get you to go to, but no dice. Guess I kind of understand now, I mean, the life you led before coming here. Must have seemed like such a luxury to have some quiet time" Riley continued, sobering slightly as he considered his friend.
Sam, as ever attuned to his brother's movements, immediately noticed Dean going rigid at Riley's thoughtless comment. A little worried that Dean would end up saying something they'd both regret, he scanned his brother's features. Disconcertingly, the elder Winchester's face remained impassive, his eyes – normally the litmus test for Dean's emotions – blank and sterile. Nevertheless, Sam knew he had his brother's full and undivided attention as he waited with bated breath for his answer.
"Uh, yeah" He replied hesitantly, agreeing but not wanting to parade it in front of Dean. "I guess"
There was an uncomfortable silence as the rest of the table contemplated this, their eyes shifting from Sam to Dean as if watching an epic tennis match.
Zach, as ever, dived in to diffuse the awkwardness. He'd always been the peacemaker of their group, seeming to possess some innate ability to restore equilibrium from chaos. "Dean, you've been sitting with an empty for ages, want another?"
Dean blinked and cleared his throat, seeming to waken from his reverie. "Uh no, thanks, we should probably get going. I'm pretty beat, and we should get an early start"
Sam raised his eyebrows questioningly at his brother. Dean wanting to turn in early? That was...unusual to say the least. Admittedly, he remembered with a guilty squirm, his brother had driven all the way from Illinois - at Sam's request - with no sleep. Still, it was a little unexpected.
He remembered Dean's earlier subdued behaviour and wondered if he should worry. "You okay?" He asked quietly.
Dean shot him a strange look, brimming with some emotion Sam couldn't define but that made his throat tighten painfully. "Yeah, just tired. You comin'?"
Torn, Sam looked back at his friends, feeling their almost intoxicating pull. He was feeling relaxed and lethargic from alcohol and laughter, and the promise of exchanging more stories was more than he could resist. He really didn't want to leave. Dean would be okay. He'd go back to the motel and he'd sleep off whatever melancholy mood he'd found himself in.
"Uh, no" He replied, glancing back to his brother as Dean got to his feet. "I'm going to stay for a bit"
"Cool!" Luis grinned as the others expressed similar sentiments.
A brief flicker of something like desolation crossed Dean's face so quickly Sam was sure he'd imagined it. "Right" The elder hunter replied, nodding absently before giving one of his closed-mouth smiles. "Just make sure you don't drink too much Sammy, I know how well you handle your liquor, and I ain't cleanin' up after you!"
Sam merely snorted in response, knowing Dean was covering something up, but realising he'd have to let it go for now. "Catch you later" He called after Dean had tossed back a general goodbye to the rest of their group. Dean raised a hand in acknowledgement as he walked from the table, and soon his retreating form was swallowed by the mass of bodies by the door.
Heaving a huge sigh, Sam realised he was actually relieved that Dean had left. He could never turn off his little brother radar when Dean was around him, leaving him always hyper-aware of what his brother might have been thinking and feeling. As relaxed as he had felt, there was a small part of him that had been monitoring Dean, sensing his discomfort. As had been the case for many years, their moods often bled onto one another, like an infectious contagion surging past an immune system weakened by all the time they'd spent together.
But this time Sam wasn't prepared to let Dean's mood impinge upon his. He needed this. After all those months of withdrawal, of craziness and pain, he craved a hit of normality. He knew the high would be brief and that the come down would be paralysing, knew ultimately that the job he had to do would forever be a barrier to enjoying moments like this until it was done. Nonetheless, he wanted to savour it while it lasted, until the madness encroached once more.
He squashed the tendril of guilt that escaped his tight emotional hold as he thought about his brother returning to the motel, tired and alone, on a hunt he was only sceptically enduring because Sam had dragged him there.
Dean could handle himself.
The problem was, Dean could handle himself in almost every way apart from his emotions. He didn't handle them, he merely locked them in a box somewhere in his mind and wrapped them several times over in chains. He rarely unlocked them even when Sam pestered and wheedled and unleashed the infamous puppy-dog eyes.
Sam was coming to understand that his brother was much more complex than he'd ever thought before. Going from the child-like hero worship of his younger years to the rebellious resentment of his adolescence he felt like he had unfairly pigeon-holed his brother with an inept simplicity he was only just beginning to recognise.
With a flash of sickening regret he remembered wielding the - thankfully unloaded - gun at Dean during that dreadful asylum hunt, after tauntingly telling his brother that he didn't have a mind of his own, that he was pathetic. The words may have been coated in a residual layer of truth from teenage years spent begrudging the fact that Dean would blindly follow their father's instructions, would always take his father's side; but he'd been wrong that time. He really hadn't meant them.
He remembered the feeling of irrationally uncontrollable fury as he'd pulled the trigger on his own brother, an experience that had terrified him for weeks afterwards; his dreams haunted by the resigned expression on Dean's face as he'd uttered those words: you really hate me that much?
No, of course he didn't hate him. Could never hate him.
The problem was that he was beginning to feel more and more that he and Dean were on separate pages. Then there was still the anger at his brother that he'd been quietly stoking for days, making sure the flame didn't sputter and die. Anger kept him going, kept him strong; it was his armour.
But for now he just wanted to luxuriate in his happy memories, to be reminded that the life he loved was still waiting for him.
"Is Dean okay?" Rebecca asked tentatively, cutting through his ruminations. "He seems different to how he was in St. Louis"
Sam looked at her sharply, wondering if she'd noticed something he hadn't.
"He's fine. It's been a tough few months is all" He answered vaguely, thinking of Chicago, Nebraska, Indiana...the many places they'd been and the different forms of hell they'd endured.
"He's...not what I expected" Kate spoke up. Sam frowned at her, she'd been silent so long he'd almost forgotten she was there.
"Yeah, I remember you said once that you guys weren't exactly the Bradys" Luis agreed, with a regretful smile. "I get that"
"Are you happy doing what you're doing Sam?" Riley was looking at him intensely.
Sam was touched that his friends still seemed to care so much about him, but he felt himself begin to bristle at what they were implying about his brother.
"No, I'm not happy" he admitted. "But Dean...he means well. We have our moments, but...you know...he's my brother. He's helping me deal right now" Sam's tone was laden with a finality that he hoped would dissuade his friends from continuing their line of questioning. He didn't want to talk about his family, or about hunting. He just wanted to pretend he was back at college, living the life that had turned from reality into fantasy.
Taking a large gulp of air he gathered the strength to pull himself together and then huffed out a breath. "So...haven't heard from Brady in a while. How's he doing?"
Dean sighed as he opened the door to the empty motel room, the slight buzz he'd felt from the beer had long since worn off and he wanted nothing more than to collapse onto his bed and sleep for a week. But the sight of Sam's empty bed seemed to poke straight through the hole in his heart, the one that had been torn asunder the night Sam had left for college, and which had taken all of those months together to slowly draw closed; the one that had started to gradually re-open all evening as he'd listened to the stories from his younger brother's time at Stanford.
The tales painted for him the picture of the life his brother had led without him; the happy life Sam had lived without his family. More than that, Dean had been watching his brother closely in that moment, hadn't seen him laugh like that in a long time, years in fact. He saw clearly the life his brother wanted, the reason he'd chosen it over his family, the reason he'd choose it again once the demon was gone.
And he'd realised, really realised, that Sam would leave him again. That he'd end up alone.
Dean sighed again, knowing he was in for another sleepless night.
Come on, what the hell is wrong with you? He chastised himself in a voice which sounded uncannily like his father's. He was on a case, there wasn't time for moping around in self-pity like a moody teenager. He wasn't about to start wearing black and sitting around writing poetry to a Radiohead soundtrack.
If he couldn't sleep then he'd get a head start on the hunt. Besides, the sooner he could establish that this wasn't one of their kind of gigs the sooner he and Sam could get the hell away from this place.
Grumbling to himself about having to do all the work on a case that Sam had insisted they do, he cast aside his jacket and plopped down in front of the laptop. "Geekboy's not the only one who can do research" he muttered to himself out loud, as he booted the computer up.
He rubbed tired eyes as the light generated by the computer screen seemed to jab at his brain painfully. Knowing from experience that the laptop would take a while to load he decided to make himself a cup of coffee to blow away the cobwebs clogging up his mind.
He had time to splash water on his face, brew his coffee and take several tentative sips of the scalding liquid before the internet search screen had finally loaded. A quick glance through the local news sites yielded the bare bones of the skeleton of information he was trying to flesh out.
The first victim was apparently an eighteen year old female freshman named Annabeth Carlson, last seen at a campus party approximately two weeks ago. No one remembered seeing her leave. She'd been found naked in an alleyway in Downtown North Palo Alto around thirty-one hours later when a delivery van driver had stumbled across her body in the early morning. Described as a model student and principled citizen, the news article reported that she was a vociferous campaigner for sexual abstinence, and had apparently founded a campus chastity club.
Dean shook his head in disbelief, unable to comprehend why anyone would want to do something like that. Clearly only people who'd never lost their virginity were capable of being abstinent – if they knew what they were missing then they'd never be so holier than thou. The elder Winchester smirked as he thought he could probably teach these girls a thing or two, given half the chance. But really, he preferred more experienced women.
Pulling his mind from the proverbial gutter and back to the picture of the undeniably pretty and angelic face of blonde, blue-eyed Annabeth Carlson, Dean forced himself to remember that this was a young girl who had been brutally murdered. He felt his hands curl into fists. Their kind of gig or not, this was one sick sonofabitch.
Taking another sip of coffee, he moved onto the second victim, a nineteen year old sophomore called Gerry McCafferty. Details were more sketchy surrounding his disappearance. The news article implied he was something of a loner, who didn't participate much in campus activities and didn't seem to have many friends. The last time he'd been seen was in class. Like Annabeth before him, he'd been found within forty-eight hours of going missing – this time in a dumpster behind a diner in East Palo Alto.
He continued with a cursory search of other local websites, but there was no new information. The police were evidently keeping a tight leash on what the media was being told. He'd get nothing else on that tonight.
Moving on from that line of thought he decided to do a general search of any mysterious deaths on campus, but aside from a few exam-related suicides, there was nothing to suggest the presence of a vengeful spirit. Neither did he find any evidence of previous patterns in the area, or indeed anything that remotely connected with the murders.
Not the most encouraging start, but at least the number of reasons why this wasn't one of their cases was starting to accrue.
Shutting down the laptop with a decisive click he pondered the next step. He and Sam would definitely need to visit the morgue to see Jake's body. Seeing the symbol had to be their top priority. They were effectively blind until they had that.
Talking to the victims' friends was also something he wanted to do. His mind flicked through their usual cover stories as if he was holding his stack of fake ID's in front of his eyes. Police and FBI were risky. Palo Alto was no backwater town and Dean didn't want to draw too much attention to them, especially given the somewhat inconvenient fact that he was now a deceased wanted serial killer. He grimaced at the thought.
Maybe they could pass as campus counsellors to interview the victims' friends, but he was pretty sure they'd need FBI covers to get into the morgue. He could spin some story about there having been other similar murders across the country, blah, blah, blah. All they needed to do was get in, see the symbol, and get out.
Simple.
He glanced at his watch. It was now approaching two in the morning, and his eyes were so tired that they were starting to blur, every blink feeling like he was lifting a ton worth of eyelid. He really ought to go to bed.
Sending Sam's empty bed another forlorn look he fumbled with his clothing before crawling onto his bed. He reached up to slide his knife under his pillow before slumping forward and sending the world packing as sleep finally claimed him.
This ended up being much longer than I expected...anyway, please review...just so I know you'd like me to keep going!