CHAPTER EIGHT
On the road
John's taken over driving for a while, give Dean's eyes a rest. He knows how the lines and lights start to blur after the first twelve hours.
There's no job, but John doesn't figure he actually needs to verbalize that for Dean to realize it's the truth. The truth hasn't much figured into their plans in the past, and he didn't expect Dean to do much more than be in the car when he was told to, and that's exactly what happened. Dean's never really been full of surprises.
There can be no question that John has pushed his boys, tested them to see what they're made of. Sam can go blow for blow, verbally, while Dean will shut it down. Very rarely has he ever risen to the occasion. John's never truly yelled at Dean the way he's yelled at Sam, but never needed to, to get the same result. Dean doesn't need to be scolded, he learns his lessons from the silent disappointment.
They were different as boys and are growing even more individually distinctive as they become men, but that kind of logical reasoning had never given the desired justification to Sam's tirades, so instead he'd always blamed John for any and everything Dean had ever said or done that Sam didn't agree with or approve of. Leaving school was just his current favorite example, and one that was topical as the academic year wound down.
According to Sam, it was John's fault when Dean started screwing around with random girls, because they never saw an example of a healthy, functioning relationship. John's fault when Dean got busted for smoking at sixteen, fighting at eighteen, drinking at nineteen, because he set horrible examples for them during their most impressionable years.
Dean's senior year, coming down the homestretch, John got caught up in an exorcism, his first real experience with a demon, and under the worst possible circumstances. A six-year-old girl with strawberry blonde curls and the sweetest blue eyes before the demon took hold, and he threw himself into the job, desperate not to lose such a young soul to another nasty something that goes bump in the night. He'd been on a bit of a hot streak, considered himself a formidable match for any nasty son of bitch that happened to make the mistake of crossing his, path despite the fact he'd never yet had a demon do such a thing. Didn't have much information at all regarding the species, and made a couple of phone calls, looked up an exorcism rite some acquaintance claimed would work, and took on the thing alone.
He was wrong, horribly wrong and horribly ill-prepared, and it was three weeks before the boys tracked him down, handcuffed to a hospital bed and comatose in what might as well have been a full-body cast. Concussion, broken back, fractured femur, and four cracked ribs. Demons are rare, and the exorcism rite wasn't properly researched, and the whole ordeal left him barely whole and drugged to the clouds but the only suspect in the poor girl's apparent murder.
Dean was eighteen and some change when he dropped out, more than old enough to make his own decisions, and spent six months working two full-time warehouse jobs to take care of his father, to pay for medication and frequent checkups and months of physical therapy, not to mention keeping food on the table for Sam. And that self-righteous snot of a kid was never once truly concerned about John's health. Never gave a flying fuck for his father's wellbeing, only of Dean's education, the now lack thereof, probably giddy at the thought of having something else he could accuse of being John's fault.
When it comes to Dean finishing high school, in the sense of attending a graduation, and not just the GED it took him another eighteen months to find the time to finish, well, it's the one instance Sam threw these accusations around that John actually agreed with him. But that's a pain and a disappointment that he keeps to himself in his heart. This was never the life he'd envisioned for his boys when he was a young father full of hope for a bright future who had started college funds and baseball card collections. But it's the hand they've been dealt, and his priorities have shifted as that imagined future itself has, and now all that matters is keeping them both safe. Alive.
Sam never understood, never cared to try. They weren't being protected in his eyes, they were being sheltered, held captive, not allowed to have a real full life.
Samuel's a smart kid; strange, but smart, and destined to be a different sort of man than his father or brother. John's much more at peace with that thought than he's been given credit for. He's proud of his son for his independence, just not the way he seems to be unburdened by any thought as to what family should mean. The fight in Sam is an expression of that natural independence, a different kind of strength than Dean or even John, himself, possess. His desire to keep Sam at arm's length had been a purely fear-driven response. A crippling panic that he won't be able to protect his boys when it counts.
John's only hope is that Sam is happy with his decision and safe, and that in the very least Dean recognizes this is simply an uncomfortable stage of life that will pass soon enough. He can't undo what's happened and can't say anything to make it right. He isn't angry at Sam for his reasons, only his methods. How could he possibly be mad at the kid for running away from his problems because what the hell has HE been doing for the last eighteen years?
Dean is and always has been John's Jiminey Cricket, his conscience. The voice of reason he thought he'd lost when he lost Mary.
Sam doesn't get it, never did, because he doesn't remember. It's difficult to swear to a life of vengeance for the murder of someone of whom you have no memory. Even a parent. She's just an idea to Sam, a story. He's never understood, and John prays every night that he never will, not in this way.
Dean remains sullen and silent on the bench seat next to him, just along for the ride, and in more ways than he thinks he knows. His elbow propped against the door in what has to be a very uncomfortable manner, chin in hand as he stares out of the window. They're passing nondescript fields and have been for hours, so John figures anything must be better than facing him.
John works his jaw, digs a dusty olive branch out of the aching corner of his heart and reaches over to pop the glove box. "Wanna listen to some Zeppelin?"
Dean flinches away as John roots for the tape. "Sammy doesn't like Zeppelin."
John draws his hand back and slams the compartment shut with enough force, he nearly steers the Impala off of the asphalt. "Damn it, Dean, Sammy's not here, is he?"
Dean frowns, and the look in his eyes could be accusatory or simply contemplative. Damn kid's gotten so grown up lately it's difficult to tell what he's really thinking. "Yeah, I know." He shifts on the seat, and the leather squeaks beneath his jeans as he settles his gaze once more out the window.
John readjusts his grip around the steering wheel and nods. "We'll stop soon." They go then next two hundred miles in silence.
The day before
Abilene, Texas
The bedroom door flies open, the slam of the knob into the wall waking Dean. He snaps upright from where he'd finally fallen asleep sometime during this second night of his ultimately futile vigil, slumped exhausted and uncomfortable against the cheap headboard. The guilt of giving up on Sam hits him immediately, a hollow pit in his gut echoing with the pounding of his own heart. A knot in his neck screams for attention and he kneads it, blinking, and tries clearing the dense cobwebs left by only a couple hours' of tense, restless sleep. He remembers deciding there was no way he was going to allow himself to fall asleep, no way he COULD, not without knowing Sammy was home and okay. Sammy, who's not answering his phone and hasn't even had the decency to let his family know whether or not he's still alive.
"Let's go."
"What time is it?" Dean asks before the heaviness in his father's voice or the implications of his words sink in. He grinds a knuckle into his eye. After the spots dissipate he throws a glance at the window. It's not even light yet, not really.
John's eyes are bright but determined. He's come to a decision, doesn't take long to bark at Dean, "Time to go." Short and sweet and oh-so-Dad.
Dean fumbles for his watch, discarded on the bedside table, and squints. Five-thirty. Early enough for Dad to mean it. He rolls back, mouth open and ready to argue but he isn't given the chance. The doorway is empty.
Dean's heart skips and he stumbles off of the bed, banging out into the hallway after his father. "Dad."
John ignores him, going to work cramming anything in the house worth taking into a pair of beat-up duffels open on the kitchen table. The table is little more than a piece of lawn furniture, the thin aluminum legs shaking as he adds more weight to the bags.
Dean sees only the essentials: weapons and clothes already emptied from closets, still on hangers, non-perishable food items from the cabinets and bottled water from the refrigerator. It looks like they're holding a goddamned food drive in the middle of the kitchen. All of the items are easy to transport, and the alcohol that's been such a prominent fixture these past two long days is nowhere to be seen. "Dad, wait." He feels like an idiot but he owes to his brother to ask, "We going after Sam?"
"No, we're not..." The inside of the trash can clinks ominously as John drags it across the dirty linoleum with a chuckle; evidence of the whereabouts of the MIA liquor and how his father has spent these two long nights. "I got a call." He doesn't look up, barely acknowledges Dean is in the room, just deposits the overstuffed can against the back door and returns to his packing. "We've got a job waiting."
Dean swallows, not sure he believes him, but that's never been a factor before. "Where?"
John doesn't stop stuffing the bags, his movements almost mechanical in their deliberation. "Since when does it matter where? A job is a job and we're leaving, now."
John Winchester is not a patient man, and there's no question Sam's time is up. Even while part of Dean can't actually believe they've stuck around town this long, he can't help translating his father's real intent or the subtext here: We're getting as far away from your brother as possible. Sam's given up on family and now his family is giving up on him.
Dean's heart pounds, guilty and desperate and maybe even scared. "Dad, he could still come back."
John slams his hands onto the unsteady tabletop, sending the bags and his coffee mug to the stained linoleum with a crash.
Dean jumps back as jagged shards of the mug and liquid bullets of scalding coffee explode outward on impact. His head is spinning but he has the presence of mind to be impressed it was actually coffee in the mug.
"He's not," John says evenly, still refusing to look at Dean, "coming back." There's a startling finality to his words. Maybe this is no longer Sam's decision to make. Maybe John's taken it out of his hands completely.
Dean stands straight and tall, angrier at that single thought than he is for such an unwarranted outburst. Angry that John won't look him in the eye and knowing everything this means. That he's not being given a fair chance to make a case for Sam. That there's no argument here. That anything he dares say is wasted breath because they're leaving, now, and that's the way it is because that's the way he says it is. Angry still with Sam for putting them here. Angry with himself for letting Sam out the door in the first place, for having so many opportunities to keep things from getting this far and for not speaking up every possible chance he got. So he stands by and says nothing, fuming without being sure just exactly at whom he's so mutely furious.
John raises his eyes and his right twitches slightly, the smallest possible acknowledgement of an overreaction, of his displaced anger, but he'll never breathe a word of apology and never take it back. That's not the Winchester way. "Pack up your things, Dean."
There's a lot of instinctual, inherited fight in Dean and there always has been, buried deep and tucked away beneath years of training, of loyalty and respect and "yes, sir" and "right away" and "how high?" But not now, or he's likely to be left behind, too. Left behind or beaned in the head and stuffed into the trunk to be taken along like luggage, which is what they should have done with Sammy in the first place.
He nods and backs slowly onto the carpeted hallway, wary of placing his bare feet around the blue porcelain pieces of John's mug, careful not to leave anything of himself behind in this awful place. He goes back to the bedroom he shares – shared – with Sam and with muscles tense, with every instinct screaming to snap something in half, but he takes care not to slam the door and give either of them the satisfaction. He tugs on his boots and begins the task of violently stuffing clothing and belongings into his bag without any thought of doing so neatly. It doesn't fit right, as repacked items rarely do, and he yanks roughly on the zipper, daring the damned thing to break, frustration mounting.
It's not as though this is remotely the first time Sammy's ever done this, but it's the first time Dad told him not to come back, regardless if he meant it only in the heat of the moment. The first time Dad doesn't expect him to come back. Maybe doesn't want him to, even.
This was different from the starting gun and they all knew it. Sam had a packed bag hidden in the closet, threw in a few extra digs he knew he wouldn't have to apologize for later, and told Dean to stay the hell out of it. And also for the first time, Dean stupidly obliged, hung back and chewed his lip and seethed but did it all without intervening, believing like a doe-eyed child this was something the two stubborn asses could eventually work out.
Dean's trying to stay positive but the reality of the situation hangs heavily in the air. Sam knows the rules and this is a violation of them all. With his silence, Sam's told them to go fuck themselves.
Dean glances at Sam's side of the room, at the things he's deemed unworthy and left behind. The things reminiscent of an entire LIFE he's deemed unworthy. A few t-shirts he grew out of over the summer when he made like a weed, a couple of old notebooks from school, his baseball cards, his mitt, all of the cheap, tacky tchotchkes he's picked up in gas stations and visitors centers on their many trips back and forth across the country, collecting since he was a kid. That one hurts.
Damn it, Sammy. Through sheer force of will, Dean manages to make room for all of it, until the old seams are stretched to their limits. By the time he finishes packing up in the room the small house is empty and feels it. John is arranging his own bags like bulky canvas puzzle pieces in the trunk of the Impala.
He looks up and meets Dean's eyes over the top of the car. There's something hard to define there in his father's expression. At least this isn't as easy as he's pretending it is. "You have everything?"
Dean nods curtly, pulling the door shut as he steps outside, putting the kibosh on what was "home" for the lengthiest duration since the Winchesters became a nomadic clan. Home in Abilene for nine long months, for scheming, secretive Sammy, so he could get the grades and the diploma he wanted, and secure the means to disappear from them into some kind of fairytale life. Putting the kibosh on the childish notion they could ever survive as a real family. The rent is paid through the end of the month; it will be at least a week before anyone discovers they're gone. Just the way they like it.
John shuts the trunk. "Okay. Let's roll."
His father is acting so nonchalant about what's happening here, Dean wants to throw something at his head. But it's a nice tactic. Has to be a tactic, because John's a planner, a plotter, not nearly as impulsive as people think, and it's working, because this almost feels like a dream, detached and somehow not really happening.
John walks slowly around to meet Dean on the passenger side, staring at the car keys in his hand as Dean slings his overstuffed bags into the backseat. As Dean straightens, he holds them out. "Here. You take first shift."
Dean wants to take a page from Sammy's book and stubbornly stand his ground. There's enough guilt over letting the kid out the door, over not speaking up more, he feels he owes his brother that much. He moves slowly to take the keys, knowing that if he accepts them he's telling his father they're okay here. No hard feelings for the temper earlier, no blame for what's transpired. Knowing that as he accepts them, he's turning his back on Sam. None of which he wants to be true.
But Sam's not the one standing here making any kind of offering, Dad is. John knows all of Dean's weaknesses, and he gives in embarrassingly easy. For this, for putting Dean in this predicament, for not being here for this moment, the little shithead deserves it.
Dean convinces himself of this long enough to feel less like a cheap hooker as he slides behind the wheel.
First shift, nothing. John lets him drive the entire day. Dean's too tired to remember to be angry until he thinks of something funny and glances in the rearview mirror to tell Sammy and Sammy isn't there. Sammy's always been there. A chill washes over him, settling in his bones, and he knows it won't go away anytime soon.
Two nights earlier
This was a long time coming. Not entirely unsurprising, yet all the same somehow still catching Dean completely off guard. It had seemed a question of when, not if, and he's spent the past few awful, tense weeks steeling himself for this very moment, just in case, just to be prepared but never for a second wanting to believe it would actually come to this. Every day's been harder than the one before, every fight worse than the last.
It's later in the day; dusk, just. Neither sunny nor dark in the small house but that achy, inky gray in-between. The end of this one awful day and the beginning of many more. The end of something, definitely. The television is still on, muted sounds and lights filling the otherwise silent house. Godzilla on, black and white and grainy and to think they'd actually been sharing an afternoon of comfortable, companionable quiet before the shouting started. All of it for show, because Sammy knew exactly what was going to happen. He lit the fuse and stepped away and waited to see the light show.
Dad is immediately and sloppily pouring three fingers of a strong whiskey into a glass, the alcohol splashing over the rim as he tips the bottle. He stares out of the back window with the freshly opened bottle on the counter next to him, a tacky ring of amber liquor glistening around the base. A hulking statue, silent and stoic. He's been careful not to make eye contact with Dean, hiding whatever he may be feeling about what has just transpired, assuming he feels anything at all. Anger, for sure. Disappointment. Maybe guilt. Hopefully guilt.
Sam is gone, and this isn't the all-too-familiar taking-a-walk-around-the-block-to-cool-my-head kind of gone, this is a packed-bag-in-the-closet-bus-ticket-in-my-pocket-leaving-nothing-but-the-bed-sheets-GONE and Dean is experiencing a kind of violent crash of conflicting emotions he's never before felt directed at either his father or brother, too hard to pick out exactly what he thinks about this turn of events, himself. His own stomach-wrenching mash of anger and guilt, at least. But he's certainly not in any position to express a coherent thought if he can form one.
The curtains rustle as a warm breeze blows through the house, disturbing loose papers and unleashing a greater sense of apprehension. Dean moves slowly across the room and carefully shuts the front door, left wide open in the haste of a furious, desperate, and uneasy escape. Unsure of what else to do, he stays there by the door, and stares at the back of his father's head, waiting to see the awful confirmation of what he already knows in his gut.
Sam's not coming back. Not on his own.
"Go get him." His father's voice is sudden, thick, and gravelly.
"What?" The wind playing with Dean's ears, clearly. That was a door John shut long before Dean shut this one.
But John whirls, sloshing more liquor over the rim of his glass, whiskey glistening on his knuckles as it drips to the floor. The anger has given way to an unanticipated flash of fear. "Go get your brother. Drag his ass back here if you have to."
The first order his father's ever given Dean that causes him to hesitate, just long enough.
A month earlier
John's woken in stages by the shrill ringing of the landline, surfacing with small steps from under the warm, thick blanket of the pill and whiskey cocktail he's gone to bed with. Consciousness stokes the fire in his shoulder, and he levels up on an elbow to the painful tug of the freshly sewn stitches in his skin. Most of the line had been done neatly and carefully, if not a bit too slowly for John's liking. He can't really fault the kid for not wanting to tip off his old man to just how much he'd been drinking but John always knows. The last five or so are ragged and uneven, done without a shred of patience and put in himself from an odd angle and without the benefit of a mirror.
He doesn't need this shit right now, whatever this particular brand of shit may be. He's in desperate need of a quiet, dark room and a full eight hours but it doesn't seem like either of the boys is in any hurry to answer the phone. He gropes for it blindly with little more intention than to silence the ring, not particularly caring to find out who is on the other end, though he has a few theories, given the hour.
John flips the receiver to fall next to his face and clears his throat noisily. "Jim, if this is you, you've gotta give me the benefit of a good night's sleep before you send me on another damn wild goose chase."
"John? John Winchester?"
"Yeah?" he mumbles, not really awake, the phone's cord coiled around his wrist like a garden snake. It's a man's voice, deep but not Murphy's, not bringing to mind any familiar face. "Who the hell's this?"
"Well, I'm certainly no man of God, John, and I have no intention of sending you out after wild geese."
The curious specifics of the response, the knowledge of Murphy, have John's sleep-dusted, groggy mind clearing quickly, instincts setting him on edge as he brings himself back up on his elbow. "Go on," he grits.
"Let's just say I'm a friend of a friend. A friend who wishes to remain anonymous, seeing as how he gave me your number."
"S'not a bad idea." John pulls himself fully upright with a barely suppressed groan, untangles himself from the cord and reaches to the side, knocking down a long-empty pint of Svedka to clatter to the floor. He drags the chain of the lamp on the bedside table, bringing his small bedroom to muted light. "What the hell is it you're wantin' with me at three in the morning, friend?" He straightens, swings his legs over the edge of the bed. Even alone in the room, he fights the instinctual urge of his exhausted body to fold in on itself and take pressure off of his injured arm.
"Calm down, killer. Just have a tip for you."
"I don't think I'm gonna be taking tips from nameless strangers callin' me in the middle of the damn night." Regardless of his words, the voice is tripping all sorts of bells and whistles in John's head, and he cradles the receiver against his good shoulder to reach under the mattress for his journal. The book is never farther from his person than it is right now, usually hidden from the curious, prying eyes of his sons. His fingertips flip pages until he comes to a fresh one, hastily documents the date and time, followed by a scribbled series of "Phone call – Murphy? – ?"
"Oh, I think you will listen to me, John. If you want to save your son, that is."
John stiffens, but he's too smart to give anything away, swallows his reflexive inquiry and lets loose the next one in the queue. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"All these long years hunting, chasing these wild geese of yours, and I've sought you out to let you know what you've been after. Or, perhaps more importantly, what's been after you and yours."
John exhales violently but doesn't respond. His fingers tighten around the receiver.
"It's been almost two decades now, you've been grasping at straws, coming up empty, hunting this thing. And I know what it is."
John channels twenty years of frustration into his next words. "Oh, yeah? And what's that?"
"A demon."
The hairs on the back of John's neck rise. "Y'sound pretty sure of yourself."
"I am."
"How the hell would you know? And what does this have to do with my sons?"
"You'll find out. Sooner than you think."
"Who the hell is this?"
"Dad!"
John drops the phone, throws the journal aside and jumps to his feet as Dean rushes into the room, looking disheveled and rumpled with wide, panicked eyes. "Dean, what is it?"
"Sam's gone."
His young son's disappearances in the middle of the night have become such a common occurrence that John jumps immediately to anger before fear even has the chance to dance across his mind. He has to shake Dean roughly to get him to calm down enough to let him think.
Sam seems to have forgotten the one rule that came with the cell phone he'd been handed: answer the damned thing when it rings. Dean is gulping coffee by the pot and pressing redial like his life depends on it while John runs through every contact in every phone he's got, but no one's heard from the kid. They're still making calls from their small command post at the kitchen table when the little shit comes strolling back in like he owns the damn place.
Went to the library, he all but yells at John when confronted by his father. "Finals," he spits, as though it should have been a given. He continues in a tone laced with a heart-breaking concentration of venom that he's going to take his academic homestretch seriously, no matter what John has to say. He's not going to phone it in and eventually give up the way Dean did, to follow Dad like the brainwashed soldier he always wished Sam was, too. Says it with fire despite the fact they all know that's not the way it happened.
Dean, in the room but barely, in the conversation but rarely, reels back like he's been physically hit, visibly struck by his brother's words. In any case, this one's not meant to be a dig at him. It's never really a dig at him, just Sammy's most needlessly vicious way of getting to John through any means available. Throwing everything in his considerable verbal arsenal at his father like very wordy fragmenting grenades. Dean is an always present, incredibly convenient peripheral target. The only reason they're even still in town for the sake of these damn finals is at Dean's urging, but Sam still heaves word bombs at his brother in an attempt to put a dent in John's armor.
He feels fists form at his sides and slams them to the tabletop, causing both of his boys to jump. "I thought we'd decided the last time you pulled this shit was going to be the last time you pulled this shit."
"Guess it didn't stick," Sam huffs, hefts the strap of his bag over his shoulder.
This steaming heap of horseshit coming only hours on the heels of the threatening and cryptic call he'd taken in the middle of the night allows John's anger to get the better of him, and he tells Sam, "I've HAD it, do you hear me?" He flattens his palms on the table. "I have had it with the lies and the sneaking out and the blatant disrespect."
Sam rolls his eyes, moves to walk away and John stops him. "This is not how your father, not how your family, is to be treated. The next time you pull a stunt like this, your brother and I may not be here when you decide to come back."
Sam crosses his arms. "Is that supposed to scare me straight or something?"
Or something. "I'm just telling you the way things are. We won't continue to indulge you in these childish antics, Samuel."
Dean shrinks back, respectfully not wanting to exacerbate an already fragile situation. He's had a rough time being hauled into the middle of this, ages of it at this point, but he's been careful not to take a definitive stance on either side of the line, bouncing back and forth like a tennis ball for years, loyal to a fault, to both of them. He's always known what's best, though, and recognizes in the look John throws him now that means sticking together as a family.
He gapes at his little brother, lifts a shoulder. Any previously expressed fight has gone out of him, and all he has left in his arsenal is reason. "Sammy – "
"Forget it." Sam stomps down the hall, or attempts as much.
The stranger's warning still fresh and stinging in his mind and suddenly afraid of what happens next, John stops him, grabs him desperately and rougher than intended by the upper arm.
With the help of the muscle he's been gaining at John's own urging, Sam shakes him off too easily and takes advantage of his latest growth spurt. He draws himself to his full height, nostrils flaring in his father's face. Dean is a tangible presence on his peripheral, there to intervene if it comes to it.
John finds himself unable to say what is needed, unable to express the rush of paranoia and fear, of losing what's left of his family, his need to know his children are SAFE. "I'm losing my patience for this, Samuel," he growls, not forcefully, but not without meaning it.
"Right back at you," Sam dares in a disrespectful, spiteful hiss, leaning in.
John feels the fist reforming from his right hand, instincts responding as though there's a threat nearby instead of his mouthy young son looking for this exact reaction.
"Stop it, both of you!" Dean rushes in at that moment, plants a hand on each of their chests and gives John a shove so rough his teeth clack together. "Damn it!"
Already tensed and ready to spring, the hand comes out on reflex, catches Dean just behind the ear as he positions himself between them. A glancing blow, enough to startle but not to hurt him. The motion sends a fiery rip of heat through John's ravaged shoulder, and he lets the limb hand limply, fingers tingling. Dean blinks and Sam advances like he was released from a slingshot.
Dean reaches out, grabs his brother by the sleeve and yanks him backwards. "It was an accident, Sam."
"Is this what we do now?" Sam asks heatedly, but stumbles into an awkward stop. He snorts and glares at John. "God, I can't wait to get out of here," he mutters.
John's plate is already overfilled at the moment, and he lets the aside go without comment. In any case, he's already given his orders; that's a conversation that's already been had, a decision that's already been made. He rubs his face, gathers himself. After a breath he uses his left hand to point at each son in turn, stopping on Sam. "Neither of you is to raise your voice like this again."
"Yes, sir," Dean says quickly.
"You got it," Sam spits.
"And at the risk of repeating something you've already been told, Samuel, you are not to leave this house again without my permission. I…I can't guarantee your safety if you do." It doesn't quite come out the way he'd intended, but it does the job all the same.
For a flash, a blink, there's a stunned look in Sam's eyes before his face hardens. It's almost like this inadvertent threat, this plea will be the one to force him to cool his jets.
Almost.
Sam spins on his heel and retreats to their bedroom at the end of the hall. The door slams just loudly enough to communicate his frustration without bringing John in after him. A perfect mix he'd perfected at too-young an age.
It's before noon but John lifts an overturned glass from where it had been drying on the counter, grabs the bottle still on the table from last night and pours a splash of whiskey, gulps it quickly. The liquor is warm and thick as it burns a trail down his throat, draws his attention from the renewed pain in his shoulder. Dean stands by, as though awaiting an order.
"Go cool him down," John obliges, extending a finger from the glass to point down the hall.
"Yes, sir."
"Dean." He wants to apologize, needs to chew on the words a moment before swallowing them with another gulp of warm whiskey. This one goes down much smoother. "Cool him down."
"Yeah."
It takes more than another glassful to sand down the rough edges of his pain and conscience, for John to convince himself he's done the right thing by keeping this to himself.
The previous night
Dad finds out, as was inevitable, in a worst-case scenario kind of way. In a loosey-goosey, half-shot bottle of whiskey at the ready on the table, two tablets of Oxy down the hatch to deaden the agony of the shredded upper arm Dean's still trying to stitch up as Sam's waving the goddamn letter in his face like Charlie Bucket's golden ticket kind of way.
"Get that fucking thing out of his face," Dean hisses through clenched teeth, lying if he says he's not still riding a bit of a buzz himself, but finding that the shortest route to stone-cold sober is a mess of Dad's blood on his hands and clothes and streaked across his face. He can't believe he's been stupid enough to think this was all water under the bridge, that Sam wasn't going to start this shit back up and do it at the worst possible moment, and the last thing he needs is Sam throwing a self-important tantrum like the maraschino cherry on top of this shit sundae. He makes a clumsy one-handed lunge for the letter.
His fingertips brush and leave a crimson smear on crisp cardstock as Sam, shitting rainbows, dances out of his reach. "He needs to know."
"He doesn't need to know right the fuck now, numb nuts." Dean is balancing precariously, and not particularly well, on mental and emotional overload, trying to keep as much of his father's blood inside the man's body as he can without giving away the farm that he's drunk as a fucking skunk.
John is the last person on Earth to tolerate being talked about like he isn't in the room when he's sitting right the fuck between them. He swings around sloppily, Dean literally connected by a thread and staggering from his chair to turn with him, and attempts to level a lethal stare at Sam. In his currently doped condition, it doesn't quite have the intended effect. "What do I needta know?"
"Nothing," Dean grits with a glare that does better to hit the mark. Not now. He knew this was coming at some point, but not now. Knock this shit off, Sammy, and do it now.
Almost too predictably, Sam doesn't get the message. "I know I should have said something before, but I got into a bunch of schools, Dad. All of them that I…I'm going to Stanford, and this just came today." Sam holds out the thick ivory paper. "Already accepted pre-Law."
John stares a long moment, redirects and swings surprisingly and surprisingly steadily to Dean. "You knew about this?"
Without a hint of a slur. Goddamnit. Dean's jaw drops nearly to the table, and he's suddenly completely sober. "He just told me this afternoon, Dad, I – "
Sam's so distracted when John shoots to his feet that Dean's lie goes unnoticed, the least of anyone's concerns at the moment. His chair falls backwards and the curved needle is jerked from Dean's hand, hangs swinging from the dark thread looped through Dad's arm.
John's eyes are clear, his voice strong and steady as he orders, "I don't care what you've done, or what that paper says. I thought we'd put this issue to rest months ago. You are not leaving this family."
"Come on, Dad, It's not like I'm LEAVING. I'm just going to college. People do it all the time." The kid's so damn excited, really thinks this is the conversation that's going to tip the scales in his direction, and this is the most rational tone he's taken with their father in months. Maybe years. "If you're worried about the money, don't, because everything's taken care of. I got a scholarship, full ride."
Dean shoots a glare at Sam and tugs gently on John's arm. "Dad, I need to finish – "
John throws him off, sending another spray of blood to spot the tabletop and any exposed skin of Dean's that isn't already resembling some gory Jackson Pollack painting. "You're not going anywhere without my permission, and I'm not giving you that."
Sam actually looks shocked, like there was no anticipating this response. "But, Dad – "
"No, Samuel. The answer is no. I don't want to hear about this again." He stalks down the hall towards his room, needle and thread still swinging from his half-closed wound. If Dean knows his father at all, he means to finish the patch job himself.
Sam's chest heaves, red blotches of anger spotting his cheeks and neck.
Dean considers the bottle of whiskey on the table. No sense letting it go to waste. "Sammy…"
"Don't. Just…don't."
Two months earlier
Dad's getting that restless, listless look again, like it's about time to be moving on, regardless of what he's told Dean or promised Sam, regardless of being smack dab in the middle of the school year. This is a promise he's been breaking since they were kids, and Sam can't actually think they'll still be here come May. He's too smart for that, and he won't let them forget it.
They have a tiff – nothing memorable in the words, just the frequency of these fights they're having and the tones they take with each other. Like they're not even family. Dad packs up the car for a job, enough clothes for a week, enough weapons for an army, and Sam's gone in the morning when Dean wakes.
This isn't nearly the first time Sam bolts after a heated argument with Dad. It isn't nearly the first time he storms out of the house with a weekend's worth of his meager possessions crammed into his backpack, vowing with gusto and an impressive strings of expletives never to return.
Dean remembers the nightmare in Flagstaff last year, and the dominos are all lined up in the same horrible formation, waiting for the fall. There wasn't a fight but there didn't need to be for it to be one of the worst stretches of time Dean can remember. In the same childish, chicken-shit fashion, Sam had waited until Dad took off for a job to sneak out in the middle of the night. Dad was gone almost two weeks, thought it was only half that, and near-about tore Dean a new asshole when he got home and Sammy wasn't there. Only with words, with tone and intention; never raised a hand. Never had to.
Dean paced the long hall of the apartment then like he's pacing in the house now, eaten up from the inside by guilt, anger, worry, and fear. He blows up Sam's voicemail, shouting, threatening, pleading. This mighta been funny the first six times, but dammit, Sam, it's not funny now! Get your ass back before Dad gets home, or I swear to God... We'll work this out. I promise. Sammy, please.
He's only gone two nights, two long sleepless nights that Dean spends productively as possible, because something has changed in the way Sam chooses his words in these fights he picks with Dad. Like there're options now when before he was just blowing hot steam for the sheer enjoyment of it.
Sam slinks back before lunchtime, strutting like a peacock because he knows Dad's not home, and maybe because he thinks Dean isn't either. Otherwise it'd be tail between the legs, because he's still enough a part of this family to know who's in charge and knows it ain't him, and Dean's well-caffeinated and waiting for him, comes off the bed as soon as the bedroom door opens.
He leads with his forearm laid horizontal like a crossbar, connects with Sam's chest and pushes with just enough force that his brother backs into the wall with an expression landing somewhere between surprise and fear, dropping his overstuffed bag to the carpet. Sam's been the taller of the two for a while now but he's been spending too much time reading recently, and Dean keeps him pinned in place almost too easily.
Sam blinks away whatever fear may have been in his expression. "There something I can do for you?"
Dean gives him a little shove for that one, fists the front of his shirt hard enough to stretch and ruin it. "There sure as shit is, smartass. I thought we'd had this talk after the bull you pulled in Flagstaff, man. And just in case what you were aimin' for was me being on Dad's shit list again, I didn't tell him you took off this time."
Sam doesn't respond, sure doesn't make a move to apologize or explain himself, just fidgets against the wall without just yet attempting to dislodge his brother, looks around his head at the mess Dean's spent the better part of two days making of the room, the contents of his bureau drawers scattered across both bedspreads. Dean knows it's not the balled-up socks or boxer shorts that brings his brother's eyebrows together, that causes him to clench his jaw and breathe steam like a bull, it's what he found underneath: thick letters on good stationary with official stamps and seals and letterheads. A dozen of them. That brings him bucking up from the wall. "You going through my things now?"
Dean's grip on Sam's shirtfront tightens as he presses his brother into the plaster, not necessarily wanting to hurt him, just needing him to know how pissed he is. He's a big brother, and that still has to count for something. For anything. "Why do you have things to hide?"
Sam snorts. "Come off it, Dean. You've hidden stuff from Dad before."
"You think we're dealing from the same deck because I stashed a coupla one-hitters under my mattress a few years ago?" Dean gives Sam one last shove to punctuate his anger, maybe wanting this one to hurt. His brother's shoulder blades smack dully against the drywall. "And if I'm remembering right, you're the snitch that ratted me out." He releases Sam, steps away. "And you weren't just hiding this from Dad. You were hiding it from me." For weeks. Months. Fuck, Sammy. "Were you going to tell me?"
Sam doesn't seem to have been moved by any of this. "I knew what you'd say."
"Yeah, what's that?"
Sam tugs at the hem of his shirt, puffs himself up to his maximum capacity of pompous ass. "Whatever Dad wanted you to."
The only reason we're even still HERE is because of me, dumbass, because I stood up for you. "That's not fair, Sam." Forgetting for a moment that Sam doesn't care about fair, Sam only cares about right.
"Then prove me wrong. I'm going to college, Dean. I got accepted everywhere I applied. Scholarship offers, early admission. This is happening."
"Like hell it is." Dean sinks onto the edge of his bed, his fading rush of anger leaving a gaping hole for the exhaustion to creep through. He looks down at the array of paperwork covering the bedspread. "And what the hell's this address on these letters?"
"I got a PO Box at the post office."
"You got a…don't you have to be eighteen to…" Dean's head snaps up so fast Sam actually takes a step back. "You went out and got a fake ID, which I would be completely on board with under any other circumstance, by the way, and then got your own PO Box? Just to hide this from Dad and me?"
Sam smiles, proud of himself, the little fucker. "Admit it, you're a little impressed. Besides, I didn't really hide anything. I told you both I was applying to schools."
Again, Dean had been hoping the kid was just blowing hot steam when he'd told them that. They hadn't heard a peep about it since. But that's how Sammy plays. This is how Sammy plays. "This isn't applications, Sam. This is a welcoming packet, and housing information, and how the fuck to live with your potluck roommate. This is…" This is a plan. "You accepted something, man, and how many times did you have to forge Dad's signature on this shit?"
"You've signed his name a hundred times."
Dean quirks an eyebrow, weighs the options with his hands. "Again, you're failing to see the GAPING CANYON of a difference between THIS, and a bad report card."
"I thought you'd be proud."
"I don't need a piece of paper to tell me how smart you are, Sammy. And you shouldn't, either." Dean rubs his hands roughly over his face. "Jesus, Sam. Fuck, what do you see happening here?"
"Dad's going to understand."
"Dad's not – Sam, did you not take anything away from the first fifteen times you pitched this shit to the old man?" Dean shakes his head. "We've gotta get rid of this stuff. He shouldn't find out you did this."
"He's sure as shit gonna find out when I go."
"You CAN'T go, Sammy. What part of that don't you get? We have an obligation – "
"What, to DAD? He's the parent here, Dean. He has an obligation to us. If he wants to act like a good father for once, he'll support me."
Dean ALMOST clocks him for that remark. Comes up off of the bed and feels the fist forming, catches himself and loosens his fingers with a couple of deep breaths, but he can't keep Sam from seeing it.
Sam gets a rise out of it, smirks and folds his arms across his chest. Dares Dean to hit him, knows he can get him there if he really tries. "I'm going." A low, steady declaration.
"No, you're not." Not with anything near the force Dean wants behind the words.
"It's Stanford, Dean."
"That's nice. Really, it's awesome." Or so he can assume, from this display of passion. Dean couldn't honestly give a rat's ass.
"Do you have any idea how happy I would be if you actually thought that? This is all I've ever wanted. Ivy league, full ride, done deal."
Dean keeps a healthy distance across the room, doesn't trust himself to straighten or approach his brother. He doesn't honestly trust Sam, either. If Sammy wants to play ball, they'll play, but it's all over if they start swinging at each other now. In the moment, he forgets that they already have. "That's a great dream to have, Sammy, really, but we need to take a quick pit stop in a little place I like to call reality." He knows his job is to make Sam see reason, get him to understand that his place is with his family, but it's already obvious this is a futile effort. He wants Sam to be happy, but he wants him to be here more. He needs him to be.
Sam rolls his eyes. "We have very different ideas of what reality is."
Dean takes a big step forward before catching himself and pausing. "Sam, your life is already full of crazy shit other people can't even dream about. Every day, we see things that…if you don't get how cool that is, then I guess I don't know what else to tell you. Just…" He rolls his neck. "Just sit on this for now, please? For me?" It's the only thing he has left in his arsenal that has even a chance in hell of working, and he can't keep it from sounding as desperate as he feels.
Sam stares, doesn't blink for a very long time before tightly nodding his concession. "I gotta go to school," he says, averting his eyes. "I already missed first and second period."
And that's when Dean, the only possible line of defense remaining between Sam and California, is cut off.
It's not fair to say he willingly lets it happen, but he doesn't nearly put up the fight he'd like to believe he did.
One month earlier
The pangs of guilt John struggles with from whatever lingering traces of naïve, hopeful young father didn't give up entirely the day he found out Dean dropped out of school are growing weaker and weaker as he navigates this rough road with Sam. It was so easy with Dean, probably so easy it should have been cause enough to stop and wonder why. Sam is a horse of a different color. He can't keep his boy calm, can't keep him complacent, and Dean is becoming less and less helpful backup by the day, one foot obviously itching to step out of John's camp but not yet entirely on his brother's side, walking that fine line like he's finessing a high wire. Dean's the card that brings down the house, and he seems to be the only one that doesn't know it. Something's going to give and it's going to be sooner rather than later. The boat's been rocking for a while now, and the smallest shift in the breeze could upend them all into the drink.
It's time to be moving on now. There's something in the air or the water here, someone at that school overstepping their bounds and encouraging the flights of fancy Sam's been having for years, helping him turn them into full-fledged plans. He's gaining confidence along with years, inches and pounds, getting mouthy in new and cocksure ways that John can't find answers for, in ways he's exhausted himself trying. He's too much like his daddy, and John's never been particularly adept at dealing with himself.
He finds a job in Illinois, a tip from Caleb that wouldn't usually be enough to necessitate such an immediate move for the three of them, and takes it without hesitation. Calls the boys into the living room just as the streetlights are coming on, already has his own bags packed and stacked in the corner and Sam's jaw drops when he sees them.
"You've gotta be shitting me, Dad." A disrespect so commonplace these days he doesn't even get popped in the mouth for it anymore.
Dean hangs back a few steps to let the cards play out, those feet of his placed delicately on either side of that line, obviously not looking to be blamed or in any way held accountable by either party later. There might even be a girl in town, because his downcast eyes let John know he's clearly not thrilled to be moving on but will go along with whatever his father says is best, just like always. There'll be a girl in the next town, too. Plenty of them. Dean never stays down or bored for too long.
John quirks an unamused eyebrow at Sam. "Excuse me?"
"I've got, like, four months of school left. I have college applications out. You can't do this."
The eye roll at the mention of college is a reflex, and as he's making the motion John can hardly believe it himself. There was once a day this was exactly what he wanted for his boys. More than just wanted, what he planned for. "I can, and I am. You can finish the year in Peoria, or get your GED like your brother did." He wants to leave it there, doesn't owe Sam any more than that, but something keeps the words pouring out. "And as for these notions of college…well, I figure if it's that important to you, you can find some community college and transfer classes as we move." It's the first time John's pitched this thought, the first time he's offered a compromise to Sam, and he does it so softly that Sam blinks dumbly for a moment without speaking, before rejecting the idea altogether with a harsh bark of laughter that bounces around the room like a ricocheting bullet that manages to strike them all.
A ball of fire roils in John's gut. "There something funny?"
"Community college, Dad? Really? You don't get it at all."
I get that I want you safe. I get that I want you and your brother to look out for each other. Exactly what part of that makes me so goddamned awful? Never able to say what it is he wants to, John instead snaps, "Is there nothing that's good enough for you, kid? Do you get that your family is what should be important to you? I don't care what you think is out there you need to be doing instead, but you will stay with this family."
Sam shakes his head. "You're such a, a tyrant. This is what's important to me. You don't understand."
"Your brother understood. I never had to put up with any of this bullshit from him. He never wanted to go off somewhere, especially not for something like college." He didn't have to add all of that, and it's not fair to Dean, especially when he has so deliberately stayed on the edge of this conversation. And here John just grabs him with a mouthful of words of which he's not entirely positive of the accuracy and yanks him into the fray. From across the room, Dean's eyes dart to his father but he remains quiet. Sam only has one play now, and it's such an obvious one John could probably be accused of wanting the fight.
"You wouldn't know if he did. He's too loyal a toy soldier to ever contradict you. You just wind him up and tell him what to say, or point him at what to kill. You've trained him to be just what you want. Compliant." Unaware of the irony of his words and the situation they're in, the trap John set that he just tiptoed into, Sam shoots a sneer his brother's way, dipping a lure in the water and seeing if Dean will bite. "Dickless."
John wishes he would bite, just once. Maybe that's why he's laying these stepping stones. Maybe that's why he turns to Dean and says, very nearly dares, "You just gonna stand there and let him talk about you like that?"
Dean works his jaw and his eyes narrow. He studies the pair of them like he's preparing to diffuse a bomb. Finally, he jerks his chin towards the front door. "Sammy, go take a walk."
"No." Sam stomps a juvenile foot that rattles the front window in its frame. "I'm not doing this again. I'm not leaving school just because this son of a – "
Dean crosses the distance between them in a blink, is on his brother like a lightning strike before he can finish the thought. He has the collar of Sam's polo fisted in his left hand and the fingers of his right are making dents in the meat of his upper arm as he hauls his younger, though taller, brother to the front door. They're just a hair shy of evenly matched these days, though Dean won't ever admit to it, and when he shifts his weight, relinquishes just enough of his hold to wrench the door open Sam whirls to the right and takes a blind swing at him, a sloppy closed left fist that lands with a smack just above Dean's eyebrow. He stumbles into the opening door and slams it closed again, nearly taking it right off the hinges.
Dean's grip falls away as Sam steps back, glancing at his hand like it threw the punch of its own accord. He does have the presence of mind to look to his father for a reaction, of which John is slow in forming. "Dean – "
Before John can shout or speak or reprimand, Dean springs up from one knee like a snapped rubber band, tackles Sam around the middle and they go to the carpet in a clumsy roll and flurry of fists. A couple connect, with the meaty twacks of badly dubbed action flicks.
Oh, holy hell. His boys have tussled before, sure, ground each other's faces into dirty carpet and practiced arm locks and left marks they've shown off to their father like hard-won Boy Scout patches, but this isn't disciplined, or even fun and games. It's ego and it's force and it's the first time John witnesses Dean display the quick temper it's already been so frequently made evident he passed on to Sam. There's always been an inherent aggression within Dean that manifests in calculated bursts of necessary violence; the hearty whoop after decapitating a monster, or brandishing abraded knuckles won in a fight, be it a bully in the school yard or a dick in a bar in a bad part of town. John's never seen Dean direct that physical hostility at his little brother before, but maybe it's been there inside of him this whole time, and this is simply the first time Dean can't reign it in.
A part of him wants to stand back and let them go, let them get this out of their systems and then deal with the repercussions of acting aggressively in response to every flare of irritation, but that would be admitting a loss of control over the immediate situation, and he's not necessarily feeling like being a hypocrite today. But whether he acknowledges the loss of control or not, it's happened.
John steps in to get it back, never having thought he'd be pulling the two of them off of each other when it's more than pride being attacked. He wiggles a boot into the middle of the fray, plants it on the carpet and yanks the boys apart by the shirt collars. They're all breathing heavily. "You two just about through acting like temperamental children?"
"Yes, sir," Dean responds, like someone pushed a button, before he's even caught his breath.
"Yeah." Sam jerks away, trails a fingertip across his lip, wincing when he makes contact with the split skin there. He studies the smear of blood and crabs back from John a few paces before shoving up to his feet, and he stomps down the hall without another word.
Dean ducks under the hand John offers him and rises quickly under his own power, embarrassed, cheeks flushing. John surveys the damage; a welt the size of a nickel – or a knuckle – is rising over his eyebrow, an angry red discoloration blossoming from the edges around his temple, and another contusion is coming to color under the opposite eye.
"Gonna have quite a pair of shiners in the morning," John comments coolly, in a manner meant to both inquire about Dean's condition and reprimand him for the childish manner in which he just indulged his brother.
"Yes, sir."
A pang of guilt sucker punches John in the heart. "So what do you think?"
"Huh?" Dean forgets his manners for just a moment, or it could be a concussion. He's got a hard head but it wouldn't be the first time, and there's no harm in checking.
John sinks into the armchair and motions for Dean to sit, as well. His son obliges stiffly, perches on the edge of the couch with a wince. "What do you think about this school issue?" he elaborates, trying to get Dean to look directly at him, to judge the reactiveness of his pupils. Boy gets his stubbornness as well as his temper from his daddy, and John has to reach out and grab him by the chin to still his evading fidgeting.
Dean swallows, fingers twitching at his side like he's fighting the urge to probe the swollen parts of his face. He levels his gaze at John. "I think we should let him finish."
We. John's been throwing softballs at him and Dean finally underhanded one right back. If you're gonna yank me into this like it's two on one, Dad, then I get an equal vote. He'd never say it with his mouth, but boy, he's shouting it with his eyes. His mother's eyes, and John was sure as hell never able to tell her 'no.'
John releases Dean's face, stands and goes to the kitchen. "What about this college idea of his?" he asks, getting his son a cold compress for his eye and a colder beer for his pride.
"He'll get over it." Dean doesn't sound so sure, but it's the answer John was hoping to hear. More than hoping – expecting. It stops him in his tracks, drops a weight of guilt in his gut like a brick.
Dean speaks up every now and then, when it's important and he knows he might be the only damn thing holding this family together, but maybe Sam's right.
Maybe John just winds Dean up and points him where he wants the kid to go.
He wonders, however briefly, if knowing this will be enough to cause him to stop and think before it happens again, before he tells Dean exactly how high to jump without even giving the kid a chance to ask.
Deep down, he knows that it won't.
The End. Or is it the beginning?
If you've made it here, I thank you for your patience, and for taking this on. This story wasn't any easier to write than it was to read - if that's any consolation! In any case, I accomplished all of the goals I set for myself when I sat down to start this story, and I've felt challenged as a writer, and I feel like I've grown as a writer, and I hope to continue to crank out some enjoyable and challenging pieces. Thanks to all for the support!
My soundtrack for this story was "Stop and Stare" by OneRepublic (what gave me the original idea), "Demons" by Imagine Dragons, "Down in the Valley" by The Head and the Heart, and "Maybe" by the Sick Puppies.