Story Summary: After her husband, Sam, is brutally murdered, Jessica struggles with just getting out of bed in the morning. When a mysterious stranger knocks on her door, he makes her question everything she knew about her husband, but he also gives her hope that maybe Sam didn't leave her all alone in the world after all.
It's been one week since Dean's little brother was mourned and burned. It's been two since his body was found in a dirty, garbage filled alley torn apart and missing his heart. It's been ten years since Dean had spoken to Sam face to face and fourteen years since Sam had renounced hunting, their father, and everything associated with either one; including Dean.
Dean had felt like his heart had been ripped out when he'd scanned through the Californian obituaries from a motel room in Oklahoma and found Sam Winchester's name big and bold and dead. Winchester, along with three others, was tragically killed by a wild animal attack in the middle of downtown.
Three days, a thousand miles, and thirty-six hours of no sleep later Dean was standing in a nondenominational funeral home listening to bland meaningless prayers, bland meaningless eulogies, and bland meaningless grief from people that hadn't grown up with and practically raised Sam from the night their mother had died.
He was almost completely numb with sleep deprivation, exhaustion, and that gaping pit of grief that he was studiously ignoring until he could kill the thing that killed his brother.
It was so hard though. So hard to nurture that pit of burning rage and need for vengeance when it felt like his heart had been ripped out of his chest, too. He still wore the brass bull's head charm around his neck and it was burning a hole in his sternum. He felt empty inside.
The only thing distracting him from giving up on holding it together was watching Sam's widow. Her cheeks were dry of tears, her makeup was undisturbed, her hair was sensible, and her dress was wrinkle free; her mask was perfect. If Dean hadn't known what utter despair felt like he wouldn't have been able to see the hopelessness in her eyes. But he did see. He saw through her façade and for a fleeting moment he was grateful.
Sam had been loved. Her gray-blue eyes were a reflection of Dean's own grief. It made the lingering ache of Sam's decades long desertion a little bit more bearable. He'd found the normal life he'd so craved and it was a fleeting comfort to Dean.
When the service was over, Dean lingered on the fringes still watching Sam's widow. She was beautiful and Dean allowed himself to feel proud of his little brother's choice of wife. When she turned and their eyes met, when they made a tenuous connection across a sea of sorrow, Dean silently vowed to look after her. Besides killing the thing that killed Sam, Dean owed it to his little brother to look after the thing he loved most in the world:
Jessica Moore Winchester.
An FBI badge and a cheap suit got Dean a conversation with the investigating detective on Sam's case and a copy of the autopsy report. The ME was thorough and competent and the photos were informative. Dean threw up three times after reading it.
He knew what had killed his brother and he knew how to kill it and he knew he had over a week before he could get a shot at it. The full moon wasn't for nine more days and Dean had that much time to waste. He spent it stalking Sam's wife. Sam's widow.
Jessica Moore- Jessica Winchester was a beautiful woman. Even with a palled grieving complection and red tear stained eyes. Stationed across the street, Dean watched a steady stream of friends and family traipse in and out of her house. Not a single sympathetic look or word seemed to comfort her any. Dean could sympathize.
Bobby had called him once a day presumable for an update on the case. Dean knew it was to make sure he hadn't eaten his own gun yet. He didn't intend to. At least not until the thing that killed his brother was dead.
Dean hadn't made up his mind on whether or not he'd bite the bullet after that. He had nine days to decide so he wasn't going to think too hard on it yet.
Jessica Winchester was home every day. Dean assumed she'd taken time off work so he had ample time to just observe her. Three days straight sitting in the Impala without sleep to be exact. She wandered her house drinking coffee, eating sympathy leftovers, and trying and failing to find things to do to occupy her time. To take her mind off the fact that the man she'd loved was nothing, but ash sitting in an urn on her mantel.
Dean had watched her take the tasteful dead person vase out of its tasteful box and slide it on the mantel above the fireplace right between their wedding photo and a selfie from their vacation in Peru. It seemed like an overly morbid and masochistic tradition to keep the dust of your dead in your living room, but then again Dean had never understood people much less people that lived in the 'burbs.
He sat in his car for three days watching her be miserable, as miserable as he was. She got up every morning dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, put her blond wavy hair in a messy ponytail, and drank fresh brewed coffee like it was water.
He sat in his car for three day watching her be miserable. He hadn't changed his clothes or taken a shower or eaten anything more substantial than convenience store sandwich and crappy convenience store coffee.
On the morning of the fourth day, Dean watched Jessica get up, get dressed, put her hair up without brushing it and drink her first of many cup of coffee. Then he started the car for the first time since he'd parked there and drove back to his motel.
Two hours later he parked back in front of his brother's house showered and dressed in a cheap suit with his hair combed to the side.
Dean watched the house, watched through the kitchen window as Jessica washed the minimal amount of dishes she'd accrued in the last three days with a sad unsmiling face. After twenty minutes of procrastinating, he finally convinced himself to get out of the car.
He paused one last time before he was able to cross the street. He allowed himself a moment to smooth down his tie, to pat at the pocket in his jacket where his fake badge was sitting, to run a shaking hand over his hair. The last time he'd been this close to Jessica Moore –Winchester- was from across the quad at Stanford ten years ago.
He hadn't wanted to talk to her then either.
Before he knew it he was crossing the street and walking up the steps to her front door feeling like his heart was pounding, a continuous throb of pain echoing in his chest. Dean took a deep breath slapped his FBI face on and forced himself to act like this was just another interview; necessary for the hunt and completely meaningless to him personally.
What a fucking lie. Then again Dean's always been good at lying to himself.
The doorbell was glowing and warm under his thumb and the chime rang pleasantly through the house. The dichotomy of happy bells in a house that mourns was not lost on him.
There was a long moment where Dean listened almost reluctantly to the sound of the water in the kitchen being shut off and the muffled clink of a porcelain being set down on a hard surface. The sound of Jessica's soft footsteps over a hardwood floor was gentle and oddly soothing in comparison. Dean took another deep steadying breath in the quick moment before the door opened and felt some of his inner turmoil quiet.
The sound of the tumblers on the deadbolt unlocking sent a flutter of approval through him. It wouldn't be very much protection in the scheme of things, but he could appreciate the vigilance just the same.
When the door swung inward and Jessica was revealed, Dean observed that she looked worse up close. Her skin was almost sickly pale, gray, her blood shot eyes looked gritty and dry. Her blond hair was darkened with grease. Her t-shirt was wet across her belly from leaning against the sink and stained with a small splotch of yellow over one breast, probably mustard halfheartedly wiped away, the remnants left to dry stiff on the cotton.
Her jeans here the kind of baggy and soft you only got from wearing them for days, a new hole had been torn in the right knee and was already frying from being worried with twitchy fingers. Dean distantly noticed that she wasn't even wearing a bra, but unlike every other time he'd seen a good looking woman free-boobing it, he didn't feel even a hint of arousal.
She was a picture of despair, reflecting exactly how he felt. A split second of looking her up and down, Dean noted that the only brightness about her was the bright red of her painted toenails. Even then they looked a little ragged the paint chipped and dulled.
While he'd been taking in all of her newly widowed glory, she'd been taking in all his costumed glory.
Jessica looked at the man standing on her welcome mat. His suit was off the rack, his tie knot was uneven, his hair was haphazardly gelled down, and he'd missed a spot on his jaw shaving. He was handsome and built and held himself straight, shoulders back and feet hips wide apart. His lips were full, his face was chiseled and his eyes were bright green.
She recognized him immediately. He'd been standing on the fringes of her husband's funeral with such a look of grief on his face that it was like looking in a mirror.
Jessica met his equally assessing gaze and asked, "Can I help you?"
It was like watching the flip of a switch. His stance shifted, his expression set, and her mind suddenly reminded her of the marathon of CSI: Miami she'd spent the last seven hours staring at blankly.
"Mrs. Winchester, I'm Agent Lugosi with the FBI. I would like to ask you a few questions about your late husband's death." He pulled a leather fold from his inner jacket pocket and flashed her a picture ID. Jessica knew next to nothing about spotting a fake ID from a real one, but it seemed legit enough and she really wasn't in the mood to care more than that.
Regardless of her ennui, however, she knew Sam would have kicked her ass if she didn't at least put up the façade.
"What is this about, Agent?" she asked. "My husband was killed by a wild animal. I didn't think the FBI would be concerned with rabid wild life."
His express didn't waver for even a second as he answered. "We generally wouldn't be, ma'am, but one of the victim's family members demanded an investigation and we are obligated to follow up on all requests such as this."
It sounded plausible enough and he was sincere enough while delivering his rote response that Jessica didn't really see a reason to protest. If this just happened to be the only time in three days that she'd actually been able to focus on anything clearly, well she thought she deserved a break from the exhausting haze of just going through the motions.
She stepped back into her foyer and held the door open wider. "Come in, Agent."
The heavy sound of his footsteps on her wood floor broke up the stale silence that had been pervading her home. He moved further into the house and Jessica kept her eyes on him as she closed and locked the door.
Agent Lugosi looked around her entranceway as she imagined he would look around a crime scene. His keen green eyes seemed to take in every detail, but they lingered on the bits of personality scattered around. The catch all table pressed flush to the wall covered with her cluttered keychain, loose change, receipts, a messy pile of mail, and ignored sympathy cards. He studied the pictures hanging on the wall like they were mysterious foreign objects. Although, her and Sam's smiling faces in front of the Trevi Fountain, the Grand Canyon, and Buckingham Palace, seemed to wipe any hint of expression from his face.
"Would you like some coffee? I have a fresh pot in the kitchen," she offered. Her curiosity momentarily satisfied and whet at the same time.
"Thanks." He nodded and turned to follow her off to the side into her newly scrubbed kitchen. All she'd had to do besides tune out well-wishers and watch terrible tv was clean. She hated cleaning.
Jessica moved to the cabinets to the left of her sink above the coffee maker and waved halfheartedly at the kitchen table. "Please, sit."
Agent Lugosi ran his gaze over her kitchen with the same attention to detail as he had the entryway. Jessica busied herself with pulling down two of the mugs Sam seemed to collect like baseball cards on every trip they'd taken; one from Australia and one from Italy. She glanced at him over her shoulder as she pulled the sugar and powdered hazelnut creamer from their coffee accessory cabinet. Like in his previous examination the bits of personality caught his eye, but this time his gaze seemed to get stuck on a few specific things.
A frown wrinkled her brow when she realized he was staring at the blue glass eye hanging over the kitchen doorway.
"We bought that in Cypress on our cruise of the Mediterranean," she told him as she set his filled coffee mug in front of him and lined up the sugar, creamer, and two spoons in the middle of the table between them. She sat down across from him and grabbed the creamer. "The stall owner said it was supposed to protect against the evil eye."
Something flashed through his eyes and the corner of his mouth twitched. "I hear they're pretty effective."
Jessica was surprised to find herself mirroring his dry expression. "Well, we haven't had a problem so far, so I guess it works."
There was a pause in their idle conversation while they both doctored their coffees. Well, she said they; Agent Lugosi just waited patiently while she added sugar to her light colored coffee and stirred it sufficiently. Apparently he liked his black.
She looked up from her satisfactory concoction and met his gaze. "You said you had questions about my husband's death."
"Yes." He cleared his throat, his mug clinking when the ring his right ring finger taped against the ceramic. "I'm sorry to have to disturb you, but the bureau likes a thorough investigation."
Suddenly, Jessica felt her patience waning. Her curiosity was fading and the urge to get back to her numb haze of grief was reasserting itself.
"Just ask your questions, Agent." She drummed her fingers impatiently against her own mug. "I have things I need to get back to."
They both knew she was lying, but he obliged her anyway.
"Was your husband acting in anyway abnormal in the days before his death?" he began. "Did he mention anything out of the ordinary that you can remember?"
"No. Sam was in the middle of case and it was normal for him to stay later at the office," she responded, taking a sip of her coffee to cover up the unwanted quiver of her lips. At least her voice remained steady. "As far as I could tell everything was normal."
He nodded and moved on. "Had either of you been aware of the previous deaths the month before? Did you hear about them on the news or read about them in the newspaper?"
That, at least, she could answer. "I don't pay attention to the news, but Sam read the paper every morning. I would assume that he would have read about them."
Agent Lugosi didn't seem happy with that response. His brow wrinkled in a frown and his lips thinned, but he smoothed his expressed pretty quickly. If Jessica hadn't been so interested in observing him and the real reason he was sitting in her kitchen interrupting her mourning, she wouldn't have noticed the crack in his mask of professionalism.
He took a breath and asked, "Could you tell me why you had your husband cremated? Was there a specific reason or was it just a preference?"
Jessica scowled, her back stiffening. "I don't see how that's relevant, Agent Lugosi."
"I apologize, Mrs. Winchester, but I have to conduct a thorough investigation," he returned, the response rehearsed and the placating apology insincere.
She decided she was done with this farce and wanted him gone. She wanted to go back to her numbness and her self-absorbed grief. But the look in his eyes was hard and unrelenting and it was obvious that he wasn't going to leave until she answered him. This question was important, the ones before were just for appearance sake, but this one meant something.
Jessica did and didn't want to find out why.
"It was in his will. Sam specified that his body was to be covered in salt and then cremated," she told him scowling angrily. "Does that answer your question, Agent?"
Agent Lugosi's expression was complicated and unreadable before he struggled to wipe his expression clean again. He didn't do as good a job as before and Jessica was confused when she realized that some previously unnoticed tension had drained from his shoulders. The air of stiff professionalism and determined emotional distance around him had thinned and Jessica was reluctantly curious again.
"Yes, that answers my question." He stood from his seat leaving his untouched coffee on the table still placed exactly where Jessica had set it. "Thank you for your time and once again I apologize for disturbing you."
He was halfway to the front door before Jessica could get out of her seat to follow him. He didn't seem to want to wait for her to see him out, like he couldn't spare a minute for politeness' sake, like he couldn't get out fast enough.
Jessica made it into the foyer just as Agent Lugosi closed his hand around the doorknob.
"Agent Lugosi?" She was confused by his reaction and couldn't stop herself from calling to him.
He paused with his back still turned, his fist visibly tightened around the knob. There was a long moment of stillness between them then he slowly glanced over his shoulder at her.
Jessica's throat tightened painfully at the look in his eyes. It was the same look she'd seen at the funeral. His green eyes reflected such grief and pain that Jessica felt like she was looking in a mirror. It was a perfect copy of the despair inside her.
"I am truly sorry for your loss," he murmured lowly then was out the door and down the front steps before she could move again.
She went to watch him through the front window as an aching in her heart started up again. He stalked down her front walk as fast he could without actually running and crossed the street in long strides. He didn't stop until he could wrap a hand around the door handle of a classic beast of a car. It was shining jet black in the sunlight even under a layer of dirt. It was familiar.
It'd been parked outside her house for the last three days and she'd noticed it.
His shoulders slumped and he ran a jerky hand through his hair then he yanked the door open slid into the driver's seat, slammed it closed, and the engine stared with a deep rumbling growl. Jessica didn't look away from the window until Agent Lugosi had disappeared around the corner.
The police report said they found a silver switch blade engraved with SW at the scene. The blood on the blade tested positive for animal DNA, some species of canine. Dean took little comfort in the knowledge that Sam had fought back. Fourteen years rusty armed only with a silver pig sticker, Sam didn't stand much of a chance.
Dean had given that knife to Sam on his seventeenth birthday. He'd almost gotten his head bashed in trying to hustle enough cash pool to pay extra for the engraved initials. If he'd thought about it too hard, Dean would have admitted that he'd assumed the knife had been discarded along with every other vestige of Sam's old life.
Knowing that Sam had kept at least that reminder of Dean didn't do anything, but add a layer of nostalgia to his grief.
It's been nine days since Sam had been burned, his ashes consigned to a fancy pot on his wife's mantel, and Dean was crouched on a roof in downtown with a view of most of the neighborhood. He was armed with silver bullets, silver knives, and a burning need for vengeance. His binoculars were military surplus night vision, and he had the patience of a saint. He would sit there in the dark of night as long as it took to find the thing that killed his brother.
Fortunately for him, he didn't have to wait long.
Three hours after sun down the full moon was high and Dean almost didn't need the night vision. A short howl -could have been a dog, could have been a coyote, could have been a wolf- echoed off the brick buildings along the street. A block away in a dark alley behind a restaurant trashcans were knocked over and a dumpster was slammed into -could have been a cat or rat or raccoon. Probably was a werewolf.
Dean had been hunting almost since before he could read. It was second nature to ghost soundlessly down the fire escape and melt into the darkness as he moved toward his target.
His pearl handled colt was held steady in his hands, his eyes and ears were alert for movement. He didn't want it to get the jump on him, he didn't want it to get away, he didn't want it to bite him. He wanted that fucker dead and there was no way he was going to see the sunrise without its body cooling on the ground at his feet.
There was more clattering, some scuffling along asphalt and concrete, a low growl that shouldn't be able to come out of a human throat. Well, it wasn't human anymore.
Dean took a step around the corner into the alley and his boot heel crunched a piece of glass. The sound seemed to echo off the walls and all sounds of the night just stopped. Even the skittering of roaches had silenced.
A rookie mistake, Dean cursed himself. His emotions were too high, this job was too personal and he let it cloud his training. The werewolf knew he was coming now and shit was about to get real.
He got an aborted growl as a warning before the werewolf dropped down on him from somewhere above. His mind blanked and his instincts took over. Absorbing the impact he rolled with the forced and came up in a crouch gun still steady in his hand. The wolf rolled too and Dean had the blink of an eye to pull the trigger twice then it was on him again.
It had once been a man. Middle aged, just starting to bald, average height, average paunch, average coloring. Now its eyes were yellow and reflected light like an animals, it had claws, and fur sprouted across its brow and cheek bones. Its teeth were pointed sharp fangs and it dripped saliva like a rabid dog.
It slammed into him like a linebacker and Dean used its momentum to flip it. Twisting in the air like a cat the werewolf landed in an awkward crouch, its humanoid limbs not designed to move like that. It gave an angry bark and charged again. Dean had to drop his gun and unsheathe one of his knives. His colt was more of a detriment in close quarters like this and he needed this fucker dead more than he need its teeth at his throat.
The fight was brutal. The werewolf wasn't new. It had been around for a while, hard to say how long, but long enough that the man inside him knew what he was, long enough to learn a modicum of control as an animal. Dean held a detached sort of sympathy for the poor shmucks that didn't know what they were, but the assholes that knew and began to revel in the kill made his blood boil.
Dean let out a grunt when its claws caught him across the belly, but he pushed the pain down. Grabbing onto its arm he pulled the monster into his knife. The werewolf howled as the silver punctured its side and burned its skin. It scrambled away from him, confused that it wasn't healing from this injury.
Yeah, it had been around a while, but not long enough to know its own weaknesses. And that was a weakness in itself.
Taking advantage of the werewolf's momentary retreat, Dean lunged toward his discarded gun sliding painfully on his belly along loose asphalt and broken glass. His hand wrapped around the pearl grip and he flipped onto his back in a breath. The wolf had rallied and tensed to spring, but Dean sighted and pulled the trigger first. Double tap to the heart.
It dropped to the ground with a dull thud and the night fell silent.
Dean's blood was rushing in his ears, his heart was pounding, and he allowed himself a moment to catch his breath. But only a moment.
The pain from his injuries was numbed by adrenaline and he was able to get to his feet smoothly. In two long steps he was standing over the body of the monster that had torn apart his brother. He aimed his gun and double tapped it in the head.
Jessica allowed herself one more day of paralyzing grief then she decided to get back to her life. She took a shower, she put on fresh clothes, and she threw out all the sympathy food cluttering her fridge. She called in to the medical practice where she worked as a nurse and got back on the roster for work.
The next day she was dressed in her light pink Hello Kitty scrubs and walking into work. The office manager put her on light duty, manning the front desk, organizing patient files, but Jessica wasn't going to complain. Truthfully even though she was ready to restart her life, she wasn't sure she could summon the patience to see patients yet.
Her first day back had been monotonous, uneventful, and surprisingly grueling. She picked up takeout on the way home, ate it in front of three episodes of Bones then took a shower and collapsed into bed in one of Sam's soft worn Stanford t-shirts. The next morning she got up with her alarm, dressed in baby blue Candyland scrubs and went to work. She got takeout on the way home, ate it in front of four episodes of How It's Made, took a shower and went to bed.
On the third day of the rest of her life, she ordered pizza, changed out of her tie-dye scrubs, and dug through the catchall hall closet until she found the tattered water stained cardboard box Sam had carted from apartment to apartment to house. She dragged it into the living room, tipped the pizza boy generously, and stared at the box through dinner and two episodes of Rehab Addict.
After an hour and a half of failing to distract herself, Jessica figured she'd procrastinated enough and put her leftovers up. She diligently ignored the fact that she'd ordered enough pizza for two people plus Sam's hollow leg and didn't cry as she shoved two pie plates worth of pizza into the fridge.
The flower printed living room area rug -a compromise for Sam's massive flat screen tv- was the only barrier between Jessica's butt and the cold wood floor. Sam's cardboard box loomed ominously before her. Her hands shook as she lifted the lid and set it aside with exaggerated gentleness.
She didn't know what she'd been expecting as she peered into the box, but a closed shoe box, a pile of random trinkets, and a collection of knives hadn't been it. It was safest, she decided, to start with the trinkets, because there's something universal in secondary uses for old shoe boxes and she wasn't ready to look at pictures of Sam's life before her, yet.
Pulling out the shoe box and putting it the side she delicately began pawing through the things at the bottom of the box. Jessica thought maybe she should have started with the pictures after all. She was at an utter loss as to how to interpret what she was looking at.
She pulled out a battered authentic handmade dreamcatcher and a leather pouch with an arcane symbol stitched on the front with dirt and dried plants and quartzes stones inside. Setting those aside she found an expensive zippo lighter with a pentagram carved into the side. Flicking it open she was surprised to find that it still had fuel enough to light a flame.
She discovered a thin leather bracelet, a stack of blank postcards from around the country, a bus ticket from Colorado to Palo Alto, and his Stanford acceptance letter.
It was all piled up on the box lid and only the shoebox and the knives were left. She gathered up the knives still leaving the shoebox for last.
Perhaps the most confusing and worrying and just plain shocking was the sheer assortment of knives. Butterfly knives, pocket knives, switch blades, a bowie knife, some kind of curved serrated blade the likes of which she'd never seen before, and a collection of custom made knives wrapped up in a leather pouch.
Unraveling the pouch, Jessica barely registered that her hands had started shaking again and her breath was coming faster with her growing incomprehension. She didn't know much about heavy metals, but she was pretty sure some of the knives in the pouch were sterling silver, some were solid iron, a couple were copper, and some were just regular stainless steel.
Why? She tried to breathe around the hitch in her throat. Why did Sam have all this stuff? Why was there a new age voodoo looking pouch with rocks and dirt in Sam's box? Why was there a lighter with a satanic symbol messily carved on the side? Why were there enough knives to make a slasher film just tossed into a mundane cardboard box?
Why hadn't she known about any of this?
Jessica curled forward and pressed her forehead hard into her knees. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried not to cry.
She had loved Sam since their fifth date when he wrinkled his nose at her pistachio flavored ice cream. She had lived with him for eleven years and been married for eight. She had given him her entire heart, shared all of her secrets, had looked forward to spending the rest of her life with him and Sam had kept a box of crazy stuff from his past hidden behind their Christmas ornaments and cleaning supplies.
Her heart was suddenly aching with something other than grief. It tasted a little like betrayal, but she violently shoved it away before the bitterness could linger on her tongue. Maybe she didn't really have the right to feel betrayed, because she'd known Sam was estranged from his family and after the first couple of times of trying to ask him about it she'd given up. Sam had been great at deflection and downright stonewalling. He hadn't wanted to talk about it and she hadn't pushed enough to wear him down.
Now she was wondering if the reason why Sam hadn't wanted to talk about his family was because they'd been in a cult, or had worshiped demons, or, hell, been traveling gypsy criminals or something.
Okay, she told herself taking a deep shuddering breath trying to calm down. There was no use jumping to conclusions. All this stuff could be something or it could be nothing. Sam wasn't around to ask, so she was going to have to either keep digging or shove it all back in the box and back in the closet and forget about it.
Sitting up she dropped the knives on top of the other stuff from the box and dragged the shoebox out and into the light.
She didn't dilly dally this time and just yanked the lid off to look inside.
Pictures. Jessica stared down at them and felt a quick rush of relief. There were just pictures inside.
Surprisingly her hands were rock steady as she slid the first one out of the stack. It was battered, the corners were bent and fraying, and it was familiar. Sam used to have this picture in a cheap frame propped up on their bookshelf in their Stanford apartment. She hadn't even noticed it had disappeared until she was staring at it again in the soft light of her living room.
A beautiful blond woman and a handsome dark haired man were standing in front of a two story house wrapped in each other's arms and smiling at the camera. Jessica could see the love between them and knew who they were before she turned the photo over to read the names.
Mary + John '78
Sam's parents.
She set it gently aside and looked at the next one. Mary was heavily pregnant sitting in a rocking chair and glowing with happiness. Mary + Baby '79
Mary tired in a hospital bed, John sitting next to her and a baby wrapped in a blue blanket between them. John, Mary + Baby Dean 1-24-1979. A chubby toothless baby staring wide eyed at the camera, Dean 3 mths. A blond diapered toddler screeching gleefully and running around a grassy yard, Dean '81. John + Dean '80 First Birthday. Dean '83 First Day of Preschool. Mary, Dean + Baby '83.
"Sam," Jessica whispered and stared enraptured at the photo. Mary was reclined on a hideous late '70s couch with four year old Dean pressing his ear to her large round belly. It was beautiful and Jessica pressed a hand to her mouth to keep a sob inside. She swallowed thickly when she was sure she wasn't going to break down crying and set that photo aside apart from the rest. She wasn't ready to cover it up just yet.
The next one was predictably another photo of a tired joyful Mary in a hospital bed sandwiched between a curious four year old Dean and a proud John. A baby in a blue blanket held securely in her arms. John, Mary, Dean + Baby Sam 5-2-1983.
This time she didn't bother trying to stop the sob that escaped her sadly smiling lips, or the lone tear that slipped down her cheek. She allowed herself a long bittersweet moment to admire how pink and wrinkly Sam had been. She swallowed down anymore sobs and hurriedly wiped away her tear.
She put that photo with the other one, separate from the rest.
After that there was a large stretch of time between the next photo. Years were skipped and Jessica could only guess Mary's untimely death made picture taking low priority in John's mind. Then Sam was out of his toddler years and Dean was on his way to being a preteen. They were both shirtless and grinning, sun kissed and dripping wet standing on a dirt yard with a backdrop of an unkempt two story with a large paint peeling wood porch, and dust caked windows. Jessica turned the picture over to read the caption written in the shaky messy handwriting of a child.
Dean + Sam Bobby's House '88.
The rest of the pictures after that were sporadic. Sometimes there would be years in-between and almost none of them showed John.
Dean + Sam Pastor Jim's. Dean + Sam Caleb's. Dean + Sam Maine. Dean + Sam Texas. Dean + Sam Second Largest Ball of Twine.
Maybe a handful of pictures of John were scattered here and there. The rest were Dean and Sam, sometimes by themselves, sometimes with other grown men smiling next to them. They all looked rough and hard, like men that worked, and fought, and earned their scars and muscles the hard way. Even the pastor gave off the impression of harsh living.
As she watched Dean and Sam grow older she watched them both fill out more than normal boys their age should. She would know, she was a nurse and worked with boys of all shapes and sizes. Dean and Sam both had more muscle mass even than some of the dedicated athletes she'd done physicals on.
Both boys seemed to harden in more ways than one as they got older, Dean more so than Sam. While Sam had chubby cheeks and a measure of baby fat, Dean at the same age had lean muscle and sharp features. Jessica was positive that if he had come through her exam room she would have discovered that he had an almost unhealthy lack of fat on his body and borderline malnutrition.
Dean looked neglected and Sam looked healthy. It didn't take a genius to guess why that was. After all, big brothers were supposed to take care of their little brothers.
A surge of anger at John Winchester welled up inside her and Jessica had to force it down to concentrate on the task at hand. Discovering her husband's past.
She looked through every single picture. She watched the brothers grow up, read the captions in steadily improving handwriting until it finally settled on a sharp jagged script that was unmistakably masculine. She knew Dean was the one that had painstakingly labeled each photo because Sam's handwriting, while sharp, was more controlled and precise.
The last picture at the bottom of the stack was of two almost grown men leaning against a classic black beast of a car.
A younger, skinnier Sam was easily recognizable. His clothes were not. Faded jeans, plaid over shirt, scuffed boots. His hair was still long to his chin and unruly. He was grinning that happy grin that she loved so much.
Next to him, just as recognizable was Agent Lugosi, the man from the funeral, Dean Winchester.
He was younger, the dichotomy between his twenty something youth and his present haggard features made his figure in the photo look painfully young. Even inches shorter than Sam he was still a tall man. With broad shoulders, lean muscle, lightly tanned skin, a smattering of freckles across his sharp straight nose, and sun bleached hair he was handsome. He wore a battered leather jacket, broken in jeans, scuffed biker boots, and a mischievous smirk. His bright green eyes gleamed happily as he had an arm thrown around the younger Sam's shoulders pulling him tight against his side.
Jessica looked at the picture in her hands and didn't really know how she was supposed to react. Sam looked so happy. He was obviously loved dearly by his brother. His father may have been largely absent, his lack of presence in the photos evidence enough, but what little he did appear it was obvious he did love his sons. Not, perhaps, as unreservedly as Dean seemed to love Sam, but still loved them just the same.
Their life after their mother died was harsh, she could tell, none of the photos were taken in the same place consecutively. The evolution of their growing bodies hinted at a disturbingly violent life. John, too, had aged roughly with every picture. Jessica could see why Sam would want to get away from this life, whatever life it had been, but she couldn't see how he would want to become totally estranged from his family.
Then again she didn't have all the facts. She didn't know the story, Sam's story. Sam hadn't trusted her enough to tell it.
That thought burned in the back of her throat and she quickly turned her mind to the other mystery she'd discovered.
Dean Winchester. Agent Lugosi. The man at the funeral.
He'd appeared after his brother had died. He stayed on the fringes of the mourners. He'd staked out her house for three days then posed as an FBI agent and asked her very uncomfortable questions. Jessica didn't know what he wanted. She didn't really know who he was.
Sam had run away from his family, he had a box of occult adjacent knick-knacks, and he suddenly had more secrets than Jessica thought she could stomach. Sam had never talked about his family and now she had an estranged brother-in-law practically stalking her.
She looked around at all the confusing clues to Sam's life before her and a disturbing thought fluttered through her mind. The pictures she found told a story of a rough at least partially violent childhood. It was obvious the boys had been dealing with danger from a young age. Though Sam seemed to have been spared some of it, Dean had been frequently photographed with a black eye, a busted lip, a line of stitches barely visible crawling up his bicep under his t-shirt.
Sam may not have been violent, but she was willing to bet that Dean had. Even in the photos he seemed to be shadowed with a glint of danger and the possibility of violence.
Jessica thought back to her interactions with him. She thought back to seeing him with empty grief filled eyes from across the funeral parlor. She thought back to seeing him appear on her doorstep dressed in a cheap suit with a fake smile.
He'd dressed in leather and jeans and boots, and she'd thought he didn't fit in with the people milling around in more ways than just dress. He stood in her entranceway and looked around at the evidence of his brother's life and didn't seem to really comprehend it. His eyes had been darkened with experience, his face weathered with a hard life, his knuckles crooked from badly healed breaks, his hands scarred and callused.
She'd known he wasn't really an FBI agent. That much she could put together since he was the only thing in those days after she put her husband to rest that really stood out from the haze of grief. But she hadn't been paying enough attention.
Looking at the photo of a young Sam and his too old for his age brother, Jessica felt a shiver rush up her spine. Was Dean simply here to mourn his brother? Had he just wanted to satisfy his morbid curiosity of Sam's life without him? Would she ever see him again or had he gotten what he'd come for?
Jessica didn't know and as she looked around at the arcane symbols, the knives, the photos of a life she'd known absolutely nothing about, she realized that she was tired. She was tired of her grief, tired of trying to start her life over again, and tired of all the questions and doubts about the man she loved.
She dumped the things back in the box not caring about the haphazard disorganization. She shoved the lid back on, hiding Sam's secrets from her blurring vision, and almost violently shoved the box back into the closet.
It was almost two in the morning and she was tired.
TBC…