Hitting Reset
"Can you do it?" Sam asked Castiel. "Can you pick and choose memories?" And then he realized the angel would likely not understand without further information. "Pick and choose among certain memories, I mean. Like a surgeon going in and cutting out the cancer cells, but leaving healthy cells behind."
For one of the few times in his life, it was Sam who'd called on Castiel. Doing so, and expecting Cas to show up, had always been a little dicey, until Dean, with a typical sharp command so reminiscent of their ex-Marine father, once instructed the angel that he'd better answer Sam's prayers no matter what. Though on good terms, Sam and Cas had never shared the same bond that the angel did with Dean. But once Sam had told Cas over the phone that Dean was a demon, they had forged a deeper bond: Save Dean at all costs.
And they had. Together. Dean was wholly human again.
But he wasn't fully himself.
Dean had crashed around 1 a.m. Sam remained awake, browsing sites on his computer. Two hours and too much caffeine later, his brain not yet ready to call it quits, Sam finally retreated to Room 7B, where they had cured Dean, in order to be completely private. And then, in the midst of an iron devil's trap, he'd summoned the angel to the place where, a few months before, the blood-cure had given them back Dean.
But it was a different Dean.
"He's always carried the guilt," Sam said, leaning against a wall with arms crossed. "I didn't realize how much, when I was a kid. Then I finally grew up and saw it. It took a long time for me to understand how much he deflected from me, how much he took on himself so I could be a kid longer, to keep the pressure off me. He was four, Cas. He never had a childhood after the night Azazel came to the nursury and killed Mom, fed me on his blood. I don't fault Dad for what he did—after all, I committed, too, when Jess was killed the same way, and I was a hunter prior to Stanford—but hindsight is 20/20."
Cas stared at him with his usual penetrating gaze. "A hind is a female deer. But I don't understand this measurement, or how a deer applies to Dean."
Though unintended, it lightened the moment. Sam's smile flickered. "In this case it means we can look behind us . . . look at the past. With perfect vision."
"Do you mean you think your younger lives were perfect?"
It was always interesting talking with Cas. The angel was a supreme literalist, and while he was much better at understanding pop culture references now, there were still gaps in his understanding of human terms and feelings.
"That's what the saying means, " Sam explained, "and no, our lives weren't perfect. But they were different. And before Abaddon, before the Mark of Cain and the First Blade, before Metatron and Dean turning demon, he was different."
"All of those things would change a man, yes."
Sam drew in a breath. "I want my brother back, Cas."
"You have him back, Sam."
"No. I want the guy who laughs like crazy when I'm covered in seltzer water and glitter. The one who gets excited when handed a giant slinky. Who thinks Clint Eastwood movies are the best in the world - with or without monkeys - and loves Chuck Norris. The guy who feels anime is an art form. Who, without notes, can cite the entire pre-battle speech from Braveheart. Who gets excited over fireworks, and Legos, and cheeseburgers and cheerleaders. The one who pranks me even when I hate it. I want that guy back, Cas. Can you do that? You've scrubbed memories before—you did with Lisa and Ben. But that's not what I mean. Can you pick and choose? Can you go into his head and find the worst of his memories from the last year, remove those, but leave him everything else?"
Cas, as was usual, appeared focused but nonetheless uncomprehending. "Is it not said that a man is the sum of his memories?"
"Sum of his parts, actually—but yeah. A man's a sum of his memories, too." Sam shrugged. "All of us - all humans, that is - carry the good and the bad. But Dean carries so much bad. Or father used the bad to drive himself to destroy the demon who killed our mother . . . but Dean doesn't use it. He just has it. And it's all tangled up in his soul, Cas."
Castiel gazed at him. "I suppose I can spray you with seltzer water and glitter."
Sam grinned. "Uh, no . . . that's not what I meant—"
The angel interrupted. "You mean figuratively."
Sam nodded. "Yes. Figuratively."
"Was this the experience you had with evil clowns?"
"All clowns are evil," Sam replied instantly, then realized that a literalist angel might get the wrong impression. "Okay, that's not true. There are good clowns, and funny clowns, and clowns who make kids laugh—"
"But you were not among the laughing children."
"No. Clowns always scared the crap out of me."
"Like airplanes frighten Dean."
The memory of an exchange popped into Sam's head.
Dean: "Planes crash."
Sam: "And apparently clowns kill."
He smiled at the recollection. "That's who I want back, Cas. I don't want him changed. I just want him . . . refreshed. He'll still carry the guilt, because that's just who he is. But can't you make it a little easier?"
Cas appeared to be consulting some inner compass. "You want me to tiptoe through the tulips."
The reference came from so far out of left field that all Sam could do was stare at the angel with his mouth hanging open. Cas was quoting Tiny Tim? Finally he said, "Well . . . yeah. Tiptoe through the tulips—his memories - and pick a few. Not many. Just the worst ones."
"You are asking me to change your brother at a fundamental level."
Sam's gaze was steady. "You did it for me, when you took on my memories of hell. Can't you do the same for Dean?"
And that was both the crux of the matter, and a weapon. Sam had known he would wield it if necessary. Now he'd just done so. Once he'd thought such a thing as scrubbing memories was terrible, as when Dean asked Cas to do it with Lisa and Ben. But now . . . well . . . this was his brother. He'd do anything. So would Cas, who had done more for Dean than for any human on earth. Possibly more than for any angel in heaven. And still would.
He saw the acknowledgment in Castiel's eyes.
"Tiptoe through the tulips, Cas. Just pull a few of the worst. The ones that poison the field. "
# # # #
Dean awoke belly-down, twisted in sheet and blanket, face mooshed into the pillow. For a moment he remained that way, breathing in the scent of freshly-washed pillowcase. Oddly, it triggered a memory of Kansas, of Lawrence, of the house before it burned, and Mom doing the laundry.
He smiled, inhaling deeply, then shifted over onto his back. For the first time in months he'd slept well, felt refreshed. Felt like the young man he yet was, instead of one old beyond his years. One whose memories always brought regrets, remorse, a wish for other answers.
But this morning, everything seemed bearable. Not gone. Just—better.
He had a bed of his own, and a room of his own, and a roof over his head that was rent- and mortgage-free, and a brother free of Lucifer. A brother free of the same kind of obsession that had driven their father to find the Yellow-Eyed Demon, except that Sam's obsession was to find Dean, and cure him.
Mission accomplished.
He shifted again, untangled feet from sheets, saw with surprise it was almost 10 a.m. Scratched briefly at his stubbled jaw. Maybe time for a shave. Shower, definitely. He sat up, pushed back the bedding, heard a sliding clatter next to his body. Frowning, he discovered a couple of boxes on his bed, now tumbled by his movements.
Dean blinked at them. A box of Legos -? An old model kit for a '67 Chevy Impala -? Plus a gift booklet for free meals at Biggerson's—which no longer served the Turducken Slammer - and a card.
Dean dug out the tucked-in flap of the card, slid it free of the envelope. It was a rude cartoon, and Sam's scribble directed him to the desk.
He scrambled out of bed and took the two long strides to the desk. There he discovered one of the old record players they'd unearthed from storage, and an album. Not a CD, not an old 8-track or cassette tape, but far more ancient than that.
"Duuuude," Dean breathed with reverence, "vinyl!"
With great care and respect, he slit open the plastic with a thumbnail, pulled the shining black plate-sized record out of its cardboard and paper sleeves. Grinning in delight, he placed the album on the turntable, twisted the knob to On, watched the slow revolution begin.
Still grinning, he lifted the arm off its rest, shifted it toward the record, lowered it so the needle kissed the first groove.
Ah, that faint hiss. The promise of greatness to come.
"My baby brother friggin' RULES!"
# # # #
Sam was in the kitchen peeling potatoes, planning to break some eggs, make country hash browns, fry up some bacon, and even serve pie for breakfast. As the unmistakable opening chords, the heavy driving bass line of Deep Purple's classic metal song, broke the peace of the morning, he grinned.
Cas said, puzzled, "Is that not the ringtone he has on his phone?"
"Yup. But I found a record—an actual, 100%, real record album - in a thrift store, and I've been saving it for today. It's a classic, Cas."
"Why have it on an album, if he has it on his phone?"
"Trust me, for him it's better this way."
Dean, in his bedroom, cranked up the volume so loud that Cas squinted in something akin to pain as it echoed through the hallways.
We all came out to Montreux
On the Lake Geneva shoreline
Sam grinned at the angel. "I'm telling you, it's just better this way."
"Why?"
"Because it's Dean."
The angel contemplated that, came up empty. "I don't understand how loud music constitutes a human."
A final potato left to peel. "Look at it this way, Cas—it's one of the good tulips. Thanks for leaving it."
Smoooooooke on the waaaaaaterrrr
A fire in the sky-y.
"And right about now he's playing air guitar and doing head snaps."
Cas was utterly baffled. "Why would he do such things?"
But Sam didn't answer that. To the room at large, grinning, he simply said, "Happy Birthday, Dean."
~ end ~
A/N: Thanks to Nova42, with whom I discussed a way for post-demon Dean to regain some of the joy and boyishness of earlier seasons.
And clowns have always scared the crap out of me, too.