Brothers and Strangers
By EB
©2009
Part Three
There will come soft rain and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum-trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire.
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly.
And Spring herself when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone.
(Sara Teasdale, "There will come Soft Rain")
21.
He feels, sometimes, that he has lived here all his life.
Outside his room lies the east garden, his mother's garden. It's not the formal garden at the front of the house; that's maintained by a silent group of dark-skinned men Dean hasn't yet met. No, this garden is – was – his mother's, small and overgrown. As far as Dean can see, no one touches it now, not even the gardeners.
It's a manageable size. It isn't like the rest of this place, huge and echoing, too large for such a small group of people. He likes to think of a woman tending that little garden.
Grace. His mother's name was Grace.
He squints into the sun and stares out at the weedy patch of green, listening to footsteps outside his door, the soft tap of knuckles. Marisol, shy and as out of place as he, strangely, is not: "Señor Fleming, breakfast."
"Thanks," he calls, staring out the window. "Be right there."
The closets are filled with clothes he didn't buy. "Gotta have something decent to wear," Gabriel said, not quite making a face at Dean's torn jeans and flannel. "Don't you get it? You're my brother. I thought you were dead. Rafe – Dean, there's nothing I wouldn't get for you. Nothing on the goddamn planet."
"My name is Raphael," he whispers against the glass.
He's never had a room like this. Not even his first bedroom, all his, familiar and warm and safe. He's never seen a room like this outside of movies. This bedroom is huge, more like a whole apartment: sleeping area, gigantic bed that would easily sleep him and Sammy both, and maybe a cute chick besides; a fireplace and a sitting area, ornate couch and two heavy chairs, a table with a vase of fresh flowers, replaced daily by some invisible servant.
"Fucking fairy tale," he says under his breath, and feels gooseflesh prickling his arms.
His stomach rumbles, and he goes to the bigger of his two closets. Not his style, nowhere near, but he's finding out that rich people really do dress differently, act differently, think differently, and he's rich now, too, isn't he? One side of the closet is all shirts: cotton and silk, and more cotton so expensive it feels like silk. Blue and cream and white and gray, like a freaking banker, and a rack of ties, gleaming in orderly rows. Suits, pants, jackets, coats. He could wear a different set of clothes every day for two months and still have never taken the tags off half this stuff. Socks and damn silk boxers, but not so many shoes.
"We'll get you fitted next week in the city," Gabriel had said, that funny little disapproving wrinkle between his eyes while he took in Dean's good solid work boots. "Good shoes. You'll wonder how you ever did without them, I promise."
The idea of shoes made for his own feet is so alien, he can't even contemplate it.
He yanks down a shirt at random, a pair of pants that don't seem like they're part of a suit or something, and puts them on. A belt like butter in his hands, probably cost more for that little length of leather than anything his dad owned in his life.
Not his dad. The guy who'd played his dad. His father is dead. His father's name was Michael.
He looks at himself in the mirror and sees a pale, scared-looking stranger. Frowning, he takes a deep breath and stares until he can see himself again, and goes to the door.
His bedroom is in the east wing, the newest section of this huge house. Mansion, maybe, or castle. Big enough to be. Cut down a couple of whole forests for all this wood, dark and glossy. Ari's told him this is really just guest quarters, overflow; the rest of the family lives in the west section, a ten-minute hike down stairs and up again. "But we'll have Mother's old room redecorated for you," she said, with a brilliant dimpled smile that was nothing at all like Sam's. "It's one of the best views in the house. You'll love it."
The banister feels warm under his hand, alive. He takes the stairs slowly, watching the portrait as he goes by. Some ancestor, great-great-grand-something or other. Old dude, looking fat and way too pleased with himself.
When he was a kid, Sammy always used to ask about family, about grandparents and where were theirs, and did they have any aunts and uncles, huh, Dean, where do they live, what do they do? Why don't we ever see them?
He remembers having no idea what to tell him. Hell, he didn't know the answers. Dad never got around to caring and sharing on the subject, surprise. All our grandparents are dead, dude, and Dad was an only child. Mom, I dunno, maybe she was too. The only family that mattered was them, the three of them.
Sammy stopped asking after a while. Maybe he figured out Dean was pulling it all out of his ass, or maybe he just didn't care anymore.
Got enough family to make even you happy, Sam, Dean thinks. Except it isn't yours. It's mine.
They're all in the smallest dining room. Not enough for Flemings to have a formal dining area; they have three, and that's if you don't count the parts of the house no one uses anymore. Dean has never even thought of having a house so large you shut up a bunch of it because there's no need for all that space. One day he'll open it up, see what's there. Maybe someday when what's open now is actually familiar.
"Dee!" Michael flings down his spoon and jumps off his chair, grinning while he runs to him, grabs onto his legs with both arms.
"Hey, Mikey." Dean bends down and lifts him in his arms. "Morning, kiddo."
Ari's sitting in the chair next to Michael's, looking sleepy and still well put-together. "Morning, Dean." She, unlike Gabriel, doesn't struggle with his name.
Breakfast, he has learned, is a family affair. Gabriel's long gone into the city, but Ari and Helen are always around, Michael and the baby. The women of his family -- sister and sister-in-law -- have made him thoroughly welcome, no less so than Gabriel, and nobody appears to care that he doesn't know which piece of silverware is used when, or that he sits in his chair like he expects it to blow up beneath him at any moment.
He pours himself some cereal and thinks, This is my life now. This is my sister I never knew I had, and her name is Ariel, and I have an older brother – older, not younger and his name is Gabriel and he's married to Helen and they have two kids, which makes me an uncle. Our dad seems like he was an okay guy, except the whole naming us after angels thing, which – whatever.
My name is Dean. But my name isn't Dean.
The bowl of cereal blurs, and he blinks and digs in his spoon.
"What time do you want to leave?" Ari asks, laying her napkin daintily by her plate. She eats eggs but no toast, drinks milk and ignores the coffee. If she weren't family Dean would think she was possibly from another planet. A planet of skinny, gorgeous women who can't possibly be related to him.
He frowns, and she adds, "Gabriel said something about bringing you into the city. Shoes."
"Uh. Anytime, I guess." He wiggles his toes inside his boots.
She nods and says, "Give me an hour?"
"Okay."
Ari smiles. Her eyes are very green. "I'll take you to lunch. I know a place."
He bets she knows lots of places. "Cool."
After breakfast, Ari leaves to dress, and Mikey stands by Dean's chair. His expression is both pleading and imperious, like a pint-sized king brand-new to his reign. "Wanna show you something, Unca Dee."
Dean lifts an eyebrow and finishes his coffee. "You do, huh?"
"C'mon!" Michael's hand wraps around his own, tugging. "Let's go!"
It's a sunny, cheerful morning, and it's hard not to be charmed by that, by Michael's enthusiasm as he steers Dean outside, down the wide stone steps behind the house. Two silent gardeners watch them go, Mikey giggling and leading the way past the manicured gardens, down the gravel path to a stand of thickly planted evergreens.
"See?" Mikey gazes up at him earnestly.
Dean frowns, hunkering down next to him. "I see a bunch of trees. What is this?"
"Mom says I'm not supposed to go in there, but it's 'cause there's nobody to go with me, 'cause she won't and Aunt Ari doesn't have time, see? But now I can 'cause you're here!"
Dean reaches out to snag Mikey's hand, but he dances out of the way. "In where?" Dean asks, and Michael ducks behind a shrub.
"The maze!" Mikey calls, and gives a high, clear laugh.
"Great," Dean mutters, standing up. "Just what I always wanted."
It's both similar to evergreen mazes he's seen in movies, and not much like them at all. For one thing, he can see over the top, just barely. Thinks, Sam would see even more, and shakes his head once, sharply. It's big, the maze, maybe an acre, and beautifully pruned, well cared-for.
It is, he thinks as he starts walking after his nephew, a maze for children. For someone Mikey's size it really is hard to navigate. Dean peers forward over the neat line at the top of the greenery, sees the shrubs to the left wriggling, and smiles.
He rounds a corner, upping his speed a little, and sees a face in the shrubs. A little startled noise squeaks from his throat. He skids a little in the grass, but it isn't Michael. Isn't anyone, just a – mask, maybe, plaster, but so lifelike it sends a superstitious shudder down his spine. Hanging there in the maze, he thinks, what? To freak people out?
"Dude," he whispers shakily, "you fugly."
"Unca Dee!"
It's farther away than it should be, and he looks away from the mask, cranes his head over the shrubs and sees another waving patch of green. "Where are you, kiddo?" he calls, breaking into a jog.
There's no reply, and Dean barely glances at the next mask, or the one after it, somebody's bizarre idea of decoration maybe. No wonder Helen and Ari wouldn't come out here; they aren't tall enough to see over the hedges.
Two more masks and he can see the maze ahead opening up, turns a corner to see a pretty miniature garden, Mikey standing at the center. His face is flushed with triumph.
"I beat you!" he says, and laughs joyously.
"Yeah, you did," Dean says. He's breathless, although it wasn't more than a short jog.
The clearing has been recently spruced up, it looks like, the clean smell of cut branches and evergreens, and the garden has no weeds, the flowering plants immature and not all flowering yet. He can name some of the plants without thinking: rue, yarrow, gentian. Herbs, this is mostly an herb garden, but there are other plants he's never seen before. He's met a few herbalists in his time, more than a few, but he isn't one himself, only knows enough to recognize the big shots, and these are foreign to his eye.
Michael touches the statue at the center, and revulsion boils up in Dean's throat, instinctive and unwavering. Don't, don't touch it, it's WRONG.
"Hey," he says sharply. Michael's head whips around, blue eyes wide. "Come back over here."
He can't explain it, doesn't try, while Michael trots over to him. "What's wrong?"
"N- Nothing."
It's just a goddamn statue, but looking at it hurts, twinges deep in his belly. Just some old dude, but those carved eyes are too real, gazing at him with cool superiority, gauging, assessing. He wears old-fashioned clothing, another movie shoutout, something British and boring, but Dean can't shake the feeling of wrongness. He wants his EMF reader suddenly, fiercely. Bet that nice cane has something sharp hidden inside, he thinks. Dude knows something I don't. Something –
"Dean?"
He flinches, turns in the direction of Ari's shout. "Better go back," he says, putting a shaking hand on Michael's shoulder.
"It's cool, though, isn't it?" Mikey gazes up at him, teeth shining white. "That's my great-great-great-great-great grandfather." He ticks it off on his fingers.
"It is, huh? That's a lot of greats." Dean turns his head slowly, lifts his eyes to glance again at the statue. His throat is very dry. "Looks like a real nice guy," he whispers, and ducks away.
When they emerge again from the maze Ari's standing on the steps by the house, hands on her hips. Her expression is impossible to read, formal. Patrician. "Michael showed you the maze," she says.
"Yeah." Dean looks down at his nephew, sees his smile gone, expression worried at his blue eyes dart between aunt and uncle. "Making sure I know where everything is, aren't you, buddy?"
Mikey nods and gives Dean's hand a squeeze before darting inside the house.
"It's a big place," Ari says evenly. Her expression hasn't changed, head tilted a little to one side, watching him. "I'm not sure I've seen all of it, and I've lived here all my life."
"That statue," Dean says, and has to swallow. His throat is very dry. Adrenaline makes his fingertips tingle. "Michael says that's an ancestor."
"Ezekiel Fleming. He bought this land in 1787, all two thousand acres. Started building the house the same year."
So that's the freaking patriarch. His great-whatever-many grandfather. His head has started to ache. Doesn't look like Zeke approves of the ol' prodigal grandson.
Ariel's cool hand closes over his own. Her smile is slow and brief, a twitch at the corners of her mouth. "I hate the maze," she tells him, eyes flickering past him and then back. "It's fucking creepy."
He coughs a startled laugh and nods. "Yeah. Mikey, though – he's – he thought it was cool."
"He would, wouldn't he?"
"What do you mean?"
She smiles again, tucks her arm through his and lifts her chin in the direction of the house. "Come on. We need to get going or we'll be incredibly late."
Long ago, in a land pretty damn far away, John Winchester would have liked Fleming, Connecticut. Nice town, by all indications relatively nice people – wasn't much not to like, he thinks.
Now, after Dean with the imposters calling themselves his family, he's just about ready to buy some C4 and blow up the whole town, starting with the damn perfect gazebo in the town park.
Or maybe just that monstrosity of a mansion. Maybe that's all it would take.
He glances over at Sam. "Need to get moving."
Sam looks tired, worn like someone recovering from a serious illness. His limp is mostly gone; this is something else, something John's gut tells him is this place, this family Dean's been sucked into. Or maybe it's not the Flemings at all. Maybe this – gift of Sam's, curse, whatever – maybe this is all theirs.
"To where?" Sam asks. The circles beneath his eyes look painted on, stark. "We need a plan, Dad. Not just fly off half-cocked."
It's on the tip of his tongue to snap something about plans be damned, they need to get Dean BACK. But he can't do it, not to his son's exhausted, too-old face. He shrugs instead. "Got one handy? I'm all ears."
He sees Sam nod with no surprise at all. "Talk to people in town, see what we can find out."
"Thought you said we had to hurry."
Sam shakes his head, reaches up to rub one eye. "He knows we're here. Gabriel, he saw us. I think if we tried to go back to the house now –"
"What?" John barks.
"I don't think we'd be able to again," Sam says slowly. "I don't think it would let us."
"All right, then –"
"We don't know what his plans are, and we need to know. Why he's so happy, why –" Sam shakes his head, and looks away. After a silent moment he says, "Why did he want Dean back? Why is it so important to him?"
"Family," John says gruffly. "Isn't that enough?"
Sam snorts a single hard laugh. "Not even close." His eyes are beseeching. "He wants Dean for something. I think -- I think once we know what that is, then we'll know everything. Everything we need."
John makes himself nod. "Got any theories?"
"Not yet. Dean's biological father asked me if he'd done the right thing. He took Dean away, right? So he was protecting him from something."
John swallows and glances at the window of their room. He's tough, it shouldn't hurt to hear Sam talk about Michael Fleming like he's real, like he's Dean's father, HE is Dean's father. His belly feels cold, his hands twitch with the need to do something, anything, it doesn't matter what as long as his son – HIS son – comes back to them.
"So let's investigate," he says, sharper than he means. "Come on, shake a leg."
He avoids Sam's ancient, tired eyes while he walks over to the tiny pristine bathroom. Shower and shave, that's all he needs. Get his head back on straight.
A month from now they'll all be laughing about this. All three of them.
He turns on the shower with a hard twist of his wrist.
There's no chain bookstore in Fleming, Connecticut, just as there are no Walgreens, no K-Marts, no Wal-Marts, no McDonald's. The bookstore is locally owned and operated, and Sam walks inside feeling that warm little sense of familiarity he always feels in such places. Books, smelling dusty and spicy and welcoming; low counters, chairs that look sat in, comfortable, beckoning.
It's a fantastic bookstore, and he wishes absently that he could really just browse, just enjoy it. But this isn't a pleasure trip, and he glances around, gives a smile to the elderly man standing next to the cashier's counter.
"Morning," the man says with a nod. "Looking for anything in particular?"
"History," Sam says, opening his hands outward. "Local history, county, that kind of thing. There's no library, or – Well, I didn't see one."
"Was, once. Burned down fifteen or sixteen years ago." The man shakes his head, looks sternly disapproving. "Tragedy."
Sam frowns. "Was anyone hurt?"
"No, no, nobody hurt, just. All those books."
"Yeah. That's -- So do you have anything?"
"Over here."
The man leads him down a dim aisle, reaching out occasionally to touch the dark spine of a book, run a finger over a leather cover. "What brings you to Fleming?" he asks, coming to a halt by the last shelf.
Sam smiles. "Architecture. I'm a student at Stanford, and I was thinking of doing my senior thesis on the Fleming house. Sam Archer." He sticks out his hand, and waits until the man shakes it. His grip is cool and hard.
"Jack Boone," the man says. "This is my store, guess you could tell."
Sam nods.
"Fleming House, eh? How'd you hear about it?"
"I didn't, as such. I was in the area last year, and I saw it. Part of it, I guess. I got curious, couldn't find much on it, but I thought I'd come back out, see if I could get a tour or something. It's an amazing house."
There is cool study in Jack Boone's eyes, not welcoming, but not forbidding; only assessment. "Yep, that it is. Won't find much, though. What there was, burned up in the library fire." He taps a couple of books on a lower shelf. "These here, bit of history of the town, the Flemings. They're private people, mind their own business, but you'll find a bit."
"What I saw of the house – It looked huge."
"Yep."
Boone says nothing else. The books are twenty years out of date, sketching out nothing he hasn't already read elsewhere, but he picks one with a bit of town history, gives a nod as if he's satisfied. "So the Flemings -- They own the town, too?"
It takes Boone a moment to reply, walking with new briskness back to the cashier's counter. "Some of it, yep. Not all."
"Seems like a nice place. Well-to-do."
"Suppose so." A neutral, unreadable look. "That's twenty-four fifty. Cash?"
Sam nods and digs out his wallet. "Say, do you think there's any way I could get a closer look at the house? Maybe find some photos, blueprints? It's for my thesis," he adds with a hopeful look.
His money disappears into the register, the book into a plain brown-paper bag. "Don't guess I know of anything like that," Boone says evenly. "Like I said, we're private people."
First the Flemings, now the whole town, Sam thinks grimly. All right, then. "Well, thank you anyway."
His hand is on the old-fashioned doorknob when Boone says, "Could be one person to tell you a bit about the house."
Sam turns. "Yeah?"
"Woman used to run the library. Anna Stockton." The expression on the man's face has changed; discomfort, reluctant interest. "Retired now, of course. But if anybody'd know about the house, most likely be her."
"Awesome." Sam grins. "Thanks." His smile fades at Boone's lingering uncertainty. "What is it?"
"Mind a word of advice?"
"Go on."
"You don't -- People, they don't just go up the house." Boone looks away, mouth pinched. "It just isn't done. I were you? I'd find another subject for a thesis. Be a lot easier, and a lot –"
Sam frowns. "A lot what?"
"Never mind. Have a nice morning now."
Sam nods slowly, and goes. Outside he squints in the sunshine, the useless book clenched beneath one arm. It just isn't done. Well, probably not.
But he's equally sure that Boone was going to say, "safer."
Cont. in ch. 22