Family is Where the Heart is
Chapter 49
It was midmorning around nine o'clock. The roadhouse was deserted again of hunters. Sarah sat at the coffee table on the floor with her chin pressed to it as she stared at a glass of water, trying to focus on it. She remembered how she was able to send the demon flying across the room. If only she could get control of her powers, they may have a better fighting chance the next time. Sarah scrunched her forehead, thinking of her grandfather dying, figuring the same thing would work like it did the night before with the Colt.
As Sarah continued, Ash walked by, noticing her staring at a glass of water. "What the…"
"Ash!" Ellen called from the bar.
"It's okay," Sarah assured, "my dad cusses, too. I already know every word."
Ellen returned to preparing for the day.
Ash shook his head and walked away as Sarah continued staring at the glass. Come on! She thought as she tried to move it. After five minutes, Sarah thought of her grandfather, father, and uncle all killed by the hands of the demons not really thinking of the consequences. The glass started to shake as rings rippled on the surface of the water. Once she saw the demon laugh as her family laid there, not moving, bloody and beaten up, the glass flew across the room, crashing against the far wall into a dozen pieces.
Sarah shot up to her feet in shock and turned to Ellen, "Sorry, Miss Ellen! I didn't think it would do that."
"What was it you were trying to do?" she asked, grabbing a broom and dust pan and walked over to where the glass had broken.
Sarah hesitated, not sure how to explain it. "Uh. Um. Well, you see…Nothing. I'll clean it up, Miss Ellen." She walked over and took the broom and dust pan from her, squatting down to start sweeping, being careful not to cut herself.
Ellen watched her clean up the mess and then walk over to one of the arm chairs, sitting down. Sarah just sat there, staring off into space. Ellen wished she knew what was going on inside that head of hers, but figured it was something to do with her grandfather.
"You sure you don't want to talk?" she urged Sarah.
"Yeah, I'm sure," Sarah replied.
Ellen let out a long breath before returning to her work.
The following morning, Sam called the roadhouse this time, asking about the homicidal clown they were hunting. Ellen took a guess and said it was a Rakshasa, a race of ancient Hindu creatures. She explained how a Rakshasa appears in human form and feeds on human flesh. They can also make themselves invisible and cannot enter a home without being invited first. Rakshasas live in squalors, sleeping on a bed of dead insect, feeding every twenty to thirty years. Only way to kill a Rakashasa is with a dagger made of pure brass.
Sam thanked Ellen and was about to end the conversation when she interrupted him. "Sam, I'm worried about Sarah. She doesn't seem to be taking your father's death quite well," she explained.
"You mean keeping it held in?" he asked. ""Yeah, Dean's doing it, too. None of them are talking about it, won't let me help or anything."
"That's not what I mean." Ellen told Sam about the first night and the day before. Only Ellen didn't see what Sarah did with the glass and assumed she had thrown it. "Jo has tried to talk to her. I've tried. No one can get through to her and I'm worried it's gonna destroy her from the inside out. Sarah doesn't seem to want to run around and be a kid."
"Actually, as long as I've known her the past year, she isn't the kid who runs around and acts like a normal kid but I understand what you're saying and you're right. Sarah isn't the out-of-control kid who throws or punches things. Something's up and I know Sarah knows something," Sam explained, walking a way's away behind his brother.
"How do you figure?" she asked.
"Sarah was the last to see my dad alive. She says she doesn't know but I think she does."
"Of course, someone that young seeing their grandfather die. We'd all be scarred too. The question is what did she see?"
Sam shook his head, "I have no idea. Look, I doubt she'll talk to any of us, but maybe if I can talk to Dean, maybe the two of them can share and care with each other. I mean, they are dealing with the same feelings, basically, and Sarah is closest to him."
"If Dean won't talk to you, what makes you think he'll open up to a child? Even if it's his own."
"Because I've seen how Dean is with his daughter. It's like Sarah has the ability to make him all soft and cuddly. Dean was never like that, he's the tough, macho guy not a teddy bear," he explained.
"Fatherhood can do that to a person, sometimes," Ellen shrugged before she happened to look over to see Sarah coming from the bedrooms, rubbing the sleep from her eye and still in her pajamas. "Sarah's up, Sam. Want to talk to her?"
"Yeah, put her on," he replied.
Ellen held the phone up telling Sarah it was her uncle. Sarah walked around the bar and took the phone.
"Hey Uncle Sam, did you kill the psycho clown yet?" she asked into the phone.
"Not yet, we had to call Ellen to see what it was we were up against," he told her and explained what Ellen had said.
"I hate clowns," she stated.
Sam had to smile at that. "So do I, Peanut. They scare ya, huh?"
"Scare me? What idiot is scared of clowns? I'm talking about how dumb it is to put paint your face and wear shoes ten times your size just to get a laugh from children. Get a job, pal."
"Thanks for that, Peanut," he told her, shaking his head.
Sarah realized her uncle must have had a fear of clowns. "Oh crap. Sorry, Uncle Sammy. I didn't mean to call you an idiot. Did you see It, too?"
"See what?" he asked.
"The movie," she said.
"What movie?"
Sarah let out an annoyed breath. "It."
It finally clicked in what Sarah meant. "Oh, you mean, Stephen King's It. No, I didn't see it. No, it was just something your dad did when we were kids."
"What'd he do? Hide in the closet and jump out at you while wearing a clown suit?" she asked.
"No," Sam answered before changing the subject away from clowns. "So, how are you feeling, Peanut? How's your arm doing? Are you remembering to ice it before bed?"
"Yes, but it still kind of hurts."
"Hey, could have been worse," Sam shrugged. "Your dad or me would have had to do it ourselves and that would have hurt a lot more. With as much chocolate milk you drink, it'll be healed in no time."
"I hope so," she said.
Sam could tell she was still upset over John's death by the tone of her voice and him bringing up any part of the accident did not help any. "Peanut, can you please talk to someone? I don't care who as long as you let it out. You know you can come to me about anything." He could hear his niece moan to herself. "I'm just worried about you. This isn't like you."
"I'm okay, Uncle Sam. Really," she told him in a frustrated tone. "Why can't everyone just leave it alone? I don't want to talk!" With that, Sarah dropped the phone, letting it dangle from the cord and ran back to the room she had been staying in, slamming the door shut. She then threw herself onto the bed and buried herself into her music, using headphones. She didn't come out for the rest of the day. Ellen and Jo both tried talking to her but Sarah was just too closed up. There was only one person who could get in there and he was closed up himself.
Sam talked to Dean about what Ellen had told him about Sarah. Dean brushed it off as what he had told Sarah. If he backed off and let Sarah come to him when she was good and ready, she'll eventually talk to him. It worked before and it'll work again. So Sam called Ellen back to let her know.
Once the Rakshasa was finally killed, Sam and Dean headed back to the roadhouse, getting there the following morning where Sarah ran out from her room into her father's open arms. Dean and Sarah shared an extra-long hug. The boys celebrated their victory over a couple of beers until Jo walked up, leaning on the bar beside Dean. She eyed Sam in a way that told him to leave.
Sam looked back, wondering why she was staring at him until it finally dawned on him what she wanted. "Oh, uh…um. Sarah, you said you were going to teach me that card game of yours, why don't you show me now?" he suggested.
"Now? But you and Dad just got back. I missed you guys," Sarah told her uncle.
Now it was Sam's turn to pass Jo's look to his niece.
It took a minute before Sarah took the hint that the adults wanted to talk alone. "Right. Let me go get my cards." She jumped down and hurried back to the room to grab them.
Once Sam and Sarah were gone, Jo spoke, "Cute kid you got there."
"Yup, sure is," Dean stared at his beer in his hands.
"So," she changed the subject.
"So," he repeated, looking up at her.
"Am I gonna see you again?"
"Do you want to?" he asked.
Jo thought on that before she replied, "I wouldn't hate it."
Dean stared at his beer, "Hm. Can I be honest with you?" He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Ellen was eavesdropping on their conversation. Understanding as a parent himself, he knew where she was coming from and would probably eavesdrop on his own daughter's conversations with boys. That and Dean just wasn't feeling up to it. He did not feel in the mood. "See, normally, I'd be hitting on you so fast it would make your head spin. But, uh, these days…I don't know."
"Wrong place…" Jo asked and smiled over at her mother's back. "…Wrong time?"
Yeah," he said, quietly in almost a whisper.
"It's okay, I get it."
Ash came out at that point with his computer and John's research. "Where have you guys been? Been waiting for you," he told Sam and Dean.
Sam was sitting over at one of the tables with Sarah, with her cards spread out between them on the table, "We were working a job, Ash. Clowns?"
Ash looked at him, "Clowns? What the…"
"Got something for us, Ash?" Dean asked, interrupting him.
Sam stood up and hurried back over to the bar as Sarah quickly gathered up her cards again and joined the adults, too. "Find the demon?" Sam asked, sitting down on the same stool he was sitting on before.
"It's nowhere around," Ash explained. "At least, nowhere I can find. But if this fugly bastard raises its head, I'll know."
Sarah walked up at that point and stopped dead in her tracks. She wasn't sure if she should tell them the demon had been there, three nights ago. Would it even make a difference if they knew it?
"I mean, any of those signs or omens appear anywhere in the world my rig will go off. Like a fire alarm," she heard Ash continue. So shouldn't he have noticed anything that other night? The demon was right there inside the roadhouse. Could it be Sarah had just imagined the whole thing?
Dean had tried to check it out himself on Ash's computer but quickly pulled his hand back as he got a death glare.
Sam scoffed, "Ash, where did you learn to do all this?"
"MIT. Before I got bounced for fighting," he replied.
Sarah was hanging her arm over her father's right leg. "I tried to pester him two days ago. Learn some new things, nope. Guy locked himself up in his room."
"This little punk threatened me," Ash nodded towards the little girl.
"I wouldn't have had to but you decided to call me, shorty," Sarah glared back at him.
Dean reached down and popped his daughter on her backside. "I am really not in the mood right now, Sarah Lynn. So knock it off. The next time, I hear you threatening someone and they're not killing you, you will be over my knee before you can blink," he warned her.
Sarah was rubbing her backside where it hurt, "Yes, sir."
"So," Sam changed the subject quickly. "MIT, huh."
"It's a school in Boston," Ash explained.
"Okay," said Dean, looking over at Ash, "give us a call as soon as you know something?"
"Si, Si, compadre," he replied.
Dean smiled and took one last swig of his beer before standing up. "You all packed and ready to go, baby girl?" he asked, looking down at his daughter.
Sarah hurried down the hall to the bedroom and quickly threw everything inside her duffel bag, before returning to where her father and uncle were standing by the door.
"Peanut, what do you tell Ellen, Jo, and Ash for letting you stay with them?" Sam told his niece.
Sarah set her duffel bag down and ran over to hug Ellen and Jo, thanking them. With Ash, the two of them exchanged handshakes, with Sarah trying to squeeze his hand. Ash squeezed back though, showing no mercy. She glared back at him as she walked back towards her father and uncle, shaking her hand. She walked backwards, pointing two fingers at her eyes then at him.
When Sarah was close enough, Dean cupped his hand around her head and pushed her along, out the door.
Inside the van as Dean started the engine, Sarah admitted, "I like them. Especially Miss Ellen. Hey Dad, I think Miss Jo likes you. Maybe you should date."
He rolled his eyes. "Great, my own kid is trying to hook me up." Dean looked back over his shoulder to back out. "Like I told Jo, not really into dating, right now."
Sarah grinned for the first time in a couple of weeks, "You're afraid of Miss Ellen, aren't you?"
Dean looked up at his daughter, through the rear-view mirror, "What? That's crazy, Sarah. I am not afraid of Ellen. I can take her, any time. Any day." There was a sudden knock on his window, making Dean yelp out in surprise.
It was Ellen, holding up Sarah's monkey. "I think Sarah left this behind," she said as Dean manually rolled down the window and took the monkey from her, tossing it over his shoulder.
Sarah caught it. "Thank you, Miss Ellen," she told her.
Ellen smiled back at the little girl, "You're welcome, Sarah."
When Ellen headed back inside the roadhouse, Dean rolled the window back up.
"Not afraid?" Sarah smirked at her father again. "Dad, you sounded like a girl."
"I did not and that was a yelp of surprise, not fear," he argued back.
She nodded, still smirking, "Sure, Dad. Sure."
Dean drove back to Bobby's place where he and Sarah continued working on the Impala. He continued to teach Sarah what to do, letting her help when it was something she could do. Conversations were still the same, nothing but cars. Sarah was learning pretty fast on what Dean was teaching her.
The two of them were working on putting new wheels on when Sam walked up, "You were right."
Sarah looked back at where her uncle was standing at the back of the car. "Right about what?" she asked.
"Not you, Peanut," he told her, quietly. "I mean your dad."
Dean finished tightening the bolt and stood up. "About what?" he asked, walking to the other side. Sarah followed after him.
"About me and Dad," said Sam. "I'm sorry the last time I was with him, I tried to pick a fight."
"No you're not," Sarah said without realizing it.
"Sarah, please. This is between your dad and me. You know nothing about what we are talking about," he told her.
"Really, because it seems like ever since that day when I talked to Grandpa over the phone, all I've seen and heard is you hating him. You wanted to find him but yet you bickered with or about him. Yeah, I fought with him, too and got mad but I wasn't intending too. So no, you're not sorry. Why are you even out here?"
Sam shook his head at his niece. "You want to argue with me on this then fine. Why are you even upset over this? You barely even knew our father. You met him, what a month ago for maybe five minutes. Then we spend a week together. Your dad and I, we've known him our whole lives."
Dean stepped in, "That's enough, Sam," he said. "It doesn't matter how long Sarah knew Dad for. The matter is, he was her grandfather and that what counts."
"The only reason Dad was her favorite grandfather is because Dad never punished her like her other one," Sam argued.
That heated Sarah up. "You don't even know the reason why Grandpa was my favorite, so shut up!" she snapped at him. "You don't know what it's like growing up with my other family."
"Don't tell me to shut up, Sarah," Sam scolded her. "I will wash your mouth out with soap."
Sarah glared at him.
"That's enough, both of you," Dean ended it before it got ugly. "Even with Dad gone, I still have to referee? Just cut it out. All right?"
Sam looked away, off to the side, his hands on his sides. "You may not see it, Sarah," he said, looking at his niece again, "But I do love him. And I am sorry for being angry with him all the time. It hurts to think that our dad died thinking that I hate him." His voice was cracking as he spoke. He looked at his brother, "You're right, Dean. What I'm doing right now, it's too little, too late." Sam switched back to Sarah, "I miss him just as much as you do, if not more. And I feel guilty as hell," inhaling and exhaling fast.
Sarah looked at the ground, feeling guilty for saying that to her uncle. They were all hurting. All three of them. It did hurt like hell having John gone from them, especially after spending a year searching for him. Plus, it wasn't Sarah's fault she didn't get to know her grandfather more, and Sam was sorry for always picking a fight with his father.
She looked up at her uncle and suddenly dashed over to him as Sam kneeled in the dirt. Uncle and niece shared a hug, together for a long time. "I'm sorry, Uncle Sam. I didn't mean any of it. I…"
"I know, Peanut," he replied, holding her in his arms, tightly. "I didn't mean any of it either. We both had no right to say those things." After they finally let go, Sam stood back up and looked over at his brother, who had been watching the two of them, not saying anything. "I know I'm not all right, Dean. Sarah knows it, too. And neither are you." There was a short pause before he told them he'll let the two of them get back to work and walked away.
Sarah watched her uncle head back inside the house before closing her eyes at the ground. Whoever said life was easier than death, did not know what they were talking about. Having to move on after losing a loved one, it hurt and Sarah wasn't sure if she could take any more pain. Shortly after, her thoughts were interrupted by glass shattering behind her. Sarah turned around in time to see her father with a crowbar in his hands, smashing into the trunk.
Sarah watched as her hero fall apart before her very eyes until he eventually stopped, leaning forward on his arms. She hurried over to him and hugged his legs.
Dean looked down, almost forgetting that his daughter had been standing there. "Sorry you had to see that, baby girl," he apologized.
"It's okay, Dad," she looked up at him. "I did the same thing with my fist and a pillow the first night at the roadhouse." She looked down at the dirt, "I think I scared them."
Dean stood up and lifted his daughter up onto the trunk, away from the hole he had just put into it and sat down next to her, hanging his feet off the back bumper they haven't changed yet. He leaned forward, his forearms on his knees, switching from the dirt to ahead of him, a few times. "I, um…baby girl, I seem to always forget just how much alike we are."
"I thought Uncle Sam and I were alike?" she said, picking at a loose thread on her polyester athletic shorts.
"No," he shook his head and looked back at her. "Truth is, I think you're more like me than you are Sam or your grandfather."
Sarah looked up at her father, squinting from the bright sunlight.
Dean looked away. "Sarah, you're pretty much my clone," he told her, looking at her again. "It's like looking in a mirror, sometimes. I already heard about your outbursts. I shouldn't have left you behind. I should have put my foot down. I should have been there for you."
"But Dad, all I did was punch a pillow," she shrugged. "I would have done it even with you there. You did."
He looked down again, a whole lot of stuff on his mind. "You know how you look up to me…a lot, baby girl?"
"Yeah," Sarah replied.
"How you try to be just like me and always feel the need to defend me?"
"What about it, Dad?" she asked, leaning on her elbows that dug into her legs.
Dean looked around the salvage yard with just his eyes. "You…you got that from me, too. Since as long as I could remember, I worshiped my dad. I listened to the same music, did everything he did. It wasn't just because of that night with letting that shtriga get away. I wanted to make him proud by obeying every order, being the perfect son. Until the day he died, not once did my own dad tell me he was proud of me."
"So that's how you knew the demon was possessing him?"
Dean nodded, looking at the dirt. "You know that leather jacket of mine, you like?" he looked back at Sarah.
She nodded.
"It was Dad's first."
Sarah's eyes widened in surprise. "Really?"
"Yup," he finally smiled. "I remember I wanted it since the day I first saw him wear it."
"Can I have it, one day, Dad?" she asked.
Dean sat up, straight to put his arm around her, "The day I die the jacket is yours."
Sarah looked at the dirt, that time. "I don't want to think about when that day comes," she told him, sadly.
Dean hugged her to him in one arm and kissed the top of her head.
"Did Grandpa really put more attention on Uncle Sam than he did you?" Sarah asked, thinking about that day when they ran into the demon.
"We were both looking out for Sam. It didn't mean he didn't love me any less," Dean assured her.
A tear appeared. Sarah quickly wiped it away. "I'm sick of crying, Dad but I can't stop. Every time I think about Grandpa, it makes my eyes all watery. How do you keep from crying? Is there a secret to it?"
"There's nothing wrong with crying, baby girl. Trust me when I say, you're a lot stronger than me if you can cry. It helps to get all that grief out of your system. Me, I'm a guy. I have to mask it. I can't just cry, I have to keep it together for you and Sam."
"But maybe you'll feel better then, Dad. You said it yourself just now, it makes you stronger. I won't tell anyone if that's what you're afraid of. I just don't want you to become depressed like Mom did. Mom wasn't a very happy person her last two years and it affected everyone else around her and herself. She never cried either…" She thought for a couple seconds, looking up at the sky. "That I know of."
Dean was looking at the ground again.
"We can cry together, if you want," she kept trying. "I'll keep doing it just for you. Grandpa's gone…" Sarah choked on some more tears, letting them fall, wiping her nose on her bare arm. "Uncle Sam was right I didn't know Grandpa for that long. That's what hurts the most about all this. For a whole year, I hear all about him and I'm hoping and praying every single day that we would find him that same day, or the next. That day, he called, I'm glad I answered your phone. If you or Uncle Sam had done it, I never would have gotten the chance. He would have hung up once he was finished giving those names." Sarah's eyes and nose ran as she continued to cry. "It's unfair I only got a short amount of time with him."
Dean rubbed her upper, left arm above the part of the sling as Sarah held her head against him. "I know, baby girl. I wish you could have had more time with him, too."
"Do you think Grandpa really did adore me?" she asked.
"I don't know," he shrugged. "Maybe." Dean looked away. He could feel his face growing hot and his eyes gloss over. He tried to stifle it but his nose was starting to run and tried to sniff, quietly so Sarah wouldn't hear. Either it wasn't that quiet or she just had good hearing because she looked up.
Sarah pulled her arm that was between them and wrapped it across her father's back, rubbing it like he'd done for her. "It's okay, Dad. Really. Let it out."
Dean looked down at his daughter and stared into her eyes. It got to where he couldn't hold it any longer and broke down. Father and daughter sat there on the trunk of the car and cried, holding each other for God knows how long before Sarah was able to speak again and started singing the song again. In fact, when she finished, both of them sang it together. Dean didn't care how lame it was. All he cared about was that moment, holding his little girl in his arms.
