tw: suicide mention, depression, pills/depression medication, discussion of trauma/psychology

summary: After the Winchesters' living conditions grossly fail to live up to the standards of Mackland Ames, he and Caleb head back to New York City with the boys.

word count: 2,670

Caleb's nose wrinkled as he took in the Winchester's living conditions afresh. He noticed the cigarette on the door, and his frown deepened.

"What are you doing in a smoking room?"

"Cheaper," Sam said like it was obvious, trying the knob and finding it unlocked from Dean and Mac's arrival a few minutes before their own.

The older man couldn't help but gag a little as he followed the teenager inside, and couldn't find it in him to close the door behind him and deprive them of whatever fresh air they could get. Cigarettes hadn't been the only thing smoked in the cramped little space. He'd be hard-pressed to find an area on the carpet or the comforters that wasn't stained. A box of disinfectant wipes next to the sink was probably the only reason the hard surfaces were anything but covered in grime.

He would've found the look on Mac's face funny if he wasn't so disgusted himself.

Dean was tiredly packing their things into their duffles while the doctor paced and shook his head in utter disbelief.

This was bad even for the Winchesters.

"Take it we're relocating?" Sam asked, utterly unsurprised.

"Told him it was fine," his brother replied in a voice that said he would've fought harder if he wasn't too tired to exist.

The younger boy scoffed a little. "Yeah, and I'm sure that worked so well."

Dean didn't answer, and he didn't look Sam in the face as he handed him his duffle. "You have your school stuff?"

Sam nodded with a glance at the backpack on his back, and his brother returned the gesture before making a final check of the bathroom and the space under the beds, then looking at Mac exhaustedly.

"We really don't need to go…"

"Yes," the doctor replied firmly. "You really do."

The boy exhaled heavily, but didn't argue further, picking up his own bag and brushing past Caleb and out the open door. Caleb wasted no time in following him, but waited for his father just outside as the boys loaded their things into the Impala.

"We taking them back to the city?"

Mac nodded. "I already left a message telling John."

"He's gonna lose his mind. I'm not even supposed to be talking to Dean right now." His tone made it clear what he thought of those orders, but his point remained.

"I know," his father sighed. "But we'll deal with that as we have to."

It was Caleb's turn to nod slightly.

"What did you tell Sam?" the doctor asked after a pause.

"Not full details, especially about before today," his son said tiredly. "But I told him the truth with the understanding he was not to tell John or let Dean know he knew. I just… didn't know how else to get through to him."

"I trust your decision."

Caleb nodded his appreciation. He wasn't sure if he did, but he had to admit it had seemed to work… at least for the short term.

He hesitated for a long moment before saying softly, "They wrote him a prescription."

"Antidepressant?"

"Amitriptyline?"

The doctor nodded. "Yes, that's a common one."

Caleb bit his lip, blinking back a hard rush of tears. "What do you think?" he asked, his voice choked and barely audible.

"I think I believe in the power of medicine," his father replied simply. "But I also believe in professional help, which I know they recommended as well."

"Dad…"

"I know how you feel, Son," Mac cut him off gently. "And I know why you feel that way. But I also know it's helped a lot of people when it's done right."

"He's never gonna go for that anyway," Caleb countered. "And I won't force him."

"You think he'll take medication?"

"I don't know."

Mac accepted that with a small movement of his head. He was quiet for a moment before saying, "Take Dean and pick it up. Just to have it… it doesn't mean he has to use it. Me and Sam will start on our way home."

"Yeah." He swallowed hard. "Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. Thanks, Dad." He dug his keys from his pocket and held them out to the older man. "Be nice."

Mac smiled a little. "To Sam or the car?"

"The car. I don't care if you're mean to Sam."

"I'll do my best," the older man chucked, then turned and headed for the waiting Jeep.

"Runt, you're with the Scholar," Caleb called to where the Winchesters were leaning against the Impala, watching them. "Deuce, you're with me."

Dean didn't look at him as he in turn handed over the Impala's keys and made his way over to the passenger side. The older hunter ducked into the driver's seat and adjusted it and the mirror while Dean slowly climbed in and buckled.

"You ready to kiss this dump goodbye?"

"Dad's gonna lose it."

Caleb sighed. "Yeah. But you know what? He'll be mad at me and my dad, not you. That'll be a nice change."

"It'll be my fault," Dean replied with a small shake of his head. "It always is."

The older man bit down on the inside of his cheek, but he couldn't argue with that logic. Instead, he reached out and squeezed the boy's shoulder briefly. "It's gonna be okay, Deuce."

All he was answered with was a small nod that said the exact opposite and a head turned to stare out the window.

Exhaling once more, Caleb nevertheless didn't press the issue, instead starting the car and backing out of the parking space. Only when they turned out of the lot in the opposite direction as the Jeep in front of them did Dean look his way again, though his eyes dropped after a split second of contact.

"Where are we going? The highway's that way."

"Pit stop," Caleb replied, conjuring up a quick smile for the younger man.

Dean was far from satisfied. "Where?"

He swallowed hard. "Walgreens."

"For what?" Anger and hurt had instantly embodied every part of his friend's tone. "The psych meds they wanna put me on? I'm not crazy, Caleb! I… I don't need… I don't need to take some pills and just be happy!"

"I know, Deuce."

"I thought you said you wouldn't force me to do this stuff!" Dean continued with moisture biting at the back of his voice. "I'm not some thirteen-year-old girl who… who needs help! I don't need help!"

"I know, Deuce."

A single tear fought its way down the young man's face. "I expected this from Mac, but not you, Reaves! I thought… I thought you would…" He squeezed his eyes shut, fists balling at his sides in utter, helpless frustration and pain.

Caleb waited until he was sure the boy didn't have something else to say, then took a deep breath. "I'm not gonna make you do anything, Dean. If you don't wanna take them, you don't have to take them. I don't think you're crazy. And I don't think you need help. I think you need help. The kind everyone needs, the kind that comes from family. I'm just gonna pick up the prescription so you have it if you decide you wanna give it a shot."

"But that shrink said I was depressed!" Dean snapped. "I'm not depressed, Damien!"

The older man's brow knit a little as he glanced at the seat beside him. "No?"

"No!" Fresh hurt washed over his face. "You think I am?"

Caleb bit his lip, choosing his words carefully. "I think… I think you think dying's better than living, Deuce. I think I've been there, and I was nothing if not depressed when I was."

"But you were a kid!"

"Well…" He faltered. "Yeah. Yeah, I was. But lots of adults get depressed. It's not… it's not something you can control, Kiddo. Not something you should be ashamed of."

"But…" Those green eyes squeezed shut once more. When his voice came out again, it was utterly soft. "It's not just in my head. Please don't tell me it's all just in my head."

Caleb braked for a red light as he felt heartbroken guilt throb through him with the realization of why the word offended the boy so much.

"Deuce," he said gently. "That's not what that means, Man. I would never try to… to write this all back to you and say… say it's all about your issues and your head. I wouldn't. You should know that."

"But…" Dean swallowed hard. "I just…"

But he didn't go on, so Caleb did after a long moment. "Look, Kid. Depression isn't… isn't us just waking up one morning, having our brains break, and deciding we hate our lives for no reason. Sure, sometimes people with pretty good lives struggle with it, but that's not… no one's saying that's what's happening here. Alright?"

Dean stared at the floor and didn't say anything.

"I was depressed because I saw my parents die, Dean," he went on plainly. "Because I had these powers that made me see other people die, so then people thought I did it, or I was crazy. Because my life freakin' sucked. And then later, I was with Mac, and it didn't anymore, but I still had all of that to deal with every day and every night, so I was depressed all over again. Would you say that was all in my head?"

"No, but…"

"Kid," he cut him off before he could argue, "you're depressed because your dad's made you believe your only worth is tied up in protecting and looking after your little brother, and now your little brother won't stop telling you he doesn't need you. Because you watched your mom die. Because you're twenty years old and you've got the life and… and weight on your shoulders of a forty-year-old mother and father and soldier all rolled into one. Because your life sucks, Dude."

"So how are pills supposed to fix any of that?" Dean asked, his voice utterly small.

"They're not," Caleb sighed. "I wish it was that easy. They just… kinda trick your brain, I guess. Tell it everything's not so bad. Convince it that it doesn't need to tell you to pick up a gun."

"Oh." The word sounded like the epiphany of giving up.

"And like I said," the older man pressed as he pulled into the Pharmacy drive-through line. "You don't have to take them. I just wanna give you some options. Okay?"

The boy swallowed hard, blinking back more moisture, but offered up a tiny nod.

He didn't say a thing through the entire process, but a silent wish to disappear and stop existing came through to Caleb loud and clear.

As they pulled away, he started to fiddle with the radio, a pointed attempt to avoid further conversation.

Caleb allowed him to do so for nearly an hour. But as the station they'd been listening to lost signal and Dean started to find another one, he reached over and turned it off instead.

The boy opened his mouth to argue, but he held up a hand with a small smile. "House rules."

Dean rolled his eyes and looked away. "Then pick something."

Not for the first time that day, Caleb was transported back to another day of fake IDs and Uncle Caleb to the rescue because John couldn't be bothered to be around. Back then, he'd still held the oldest Winchester at a certain superhero status, always trying to give him the benefit of the doubt.

How the illusion that he really was doing his best had died.

He pulled himself out of the memory, exhaling heavily. "You gonna talk to me about what happened with the shrink?"

"Nothing happened, Reava," Dean snapped without looking at him. "Stop projecting your trauma onto me."

Caleb bit his lip and pushed away the sting of the words. It was a game as old as Dean Winchester, and he knew better than to let what he said to protect himself hurt him.

"I'm not trying to… project my trauma," he sighed. "But you looked like you'd been hit by a bus when I walked in. You still do."

"I just don't like people trying to get into my head."

"Trust me, Kiddo, I know," he said with a weak laugh. "And I get it… they're draining. Even the decent ones. But something's bugging you about something to do with that."

"Speaking of getting in my head," Dean mumbled in clear annoyance.

"Just tell me what happened."

"Nothing happened," the boy repeated, but with less hostility. "He was… nice, I guess."

"So what's eating you?"

The younger man chewed on his lip for a long moment. Then, finally, "I told him too much."

"Yeah?"

"Not like… about the hunting… but just about… growing up. I didn't want to. It just kinda… came out."

Caleb nodded slowly. "It'd been a long day, Kid. That's perfectly understandable. And you're never gonna see him again… if that makes you feel any better."

Dean didn't answer. That wasn't it.

"So what'd you tell him?" he pressed after a moment. "About taking care of Sammy?"

"Yeah."

"And your dad not being around?"

"Yeah."

He was starting to understand. "I imagine he had some things to say about that."

"Yeah."

Caleb hesitated, once again carefully considering what he was going to say. "You know, Deuce, there's a reason you guys always had to be so careful with adults growing up."

"Yeah, but I… I thought that they just didn't get it."

"They don't. I'm not saying the way you grew up wasn't screwed up, but there's a level of it no one's ever going to understand, Deuce."

"I know."

The psychic allowed silence to stretch between them, trying to read the kid but finding only muddy pain and barely-sustained walls.

"How screwed up am I, Damien?"

The question was barely audible and unbearably small.

And suddenly, everything made sense. The guy had heard an extremely-shaken Dean's half-conscious recount of his childhood trauma and responded with a list of diagnoses that just sounded to Dean's John-conditioned brain like screw up, girl, failure, freak.

"Listen, Kid," he said gently. "I was so… screwed up… that they locked me up. When I was twelve. I know a thing or two about some guy with a degree listening to you talk for thirty minutes and then deciding he knows everything about you. But you know what? They don't."

He felt Dean's gaze finally lift to his face.

"He might've had a lot of fancy words for what you've been through and what's wrong with you now but I say screw all of that," he continued, his grip tightening on the steering wheel. "You've been through hell, and it hurts. That's it. There's nothing wrong with you, and nothing you've been through is gonna define who you are for the rest of your life. I said it once and I'll say it again. You're in a rough spot right now, but you are the best person I know, Deuce. And I do not see that changing."

"But is… is anything gonna change?" Dean asked quietly. "I mean, is it… is it gonna feel like this forever?"

It took everything in Caleb not to pull the car over then and there and hug the kid in the seat beside him. He settled for one hand, squeezing his shoulder tightly. "Absolutely not. It's gonna get better, Deuce. That's a promise."

Dean swallowed hard, his chin dropping once more. "If I stick around that long."

Caleb squeezed harder as his chest throbbed. "When. When you stick around that long. Cuz I'm gonna hold on for you when you can't. You hear me?"

Dean didn't answer, but he released him after a moment, running his hand over his hair before finally returning it to the steering wheel.

It was clear the younger man was out of chick-flick energy, so he flicked the radio back on and focused on not breaking down.