The hotel is situated right on the beach in the city on Corpus Christi Bay, so the Winchesters leave the car where it is and trudge through the sand toward where Dean thinks he was when he saw the kite flyers. Dean doesn't mean to be confused, but all he can remember is the beach, dunes, some houses down a little ways from the park. Unfortunately, there's a lot of beach front in this city, and a surprising number of parks along it.
"Local legend says the U.S.S. Lexington in haunted, Dean. Do you think we should check it out as long as we're here? There are houses along Ocean Drive that are supposedly haunted, too, and an abandoned theater." Sam is trying to strike up a conversation with his brother. (His little, older-young brother, he thinks.)
Dean is too lost in his own thoughts to be paying much attention, and his non-responsive "um-hum" just serves to point that out even more. Dean is searching the shoreline looking for the wrought iron fence and trying to remember exactly where he was in relation to their current position. After another half-mile, Dean sinks to the ground. Sam sits beside him. "What's wrong, Dean?" Sam moves closer to his brother so their arms are touching.
"How can I forget where this happened already, Sam? There's got to be something wrong to make it so hard to find." Dean pulls his knees up to his chest and rests his cheek on his knees, looking at his brother. "We may have to go back where we were staying and let me try to retrace my steps from there."
"You sure it isn't down just a little further?" Sam asks his brother, who looks so woebegone that he reaches to pull him in for a hug.
"Get off me, Sammy. No chick-flick stuff. "Dean is trying to push his bigger brother away, but failing miserably. Sam starts laughing and the next thing he knows, he has a highly-indignant wildcat of a little brother who has him in a headlock.
"Stop, frikkin' trying to humor me and manhandle me, Sam. This whole situation is not funny," Dean is yelling. Sam responds by standing up, wrapping the smaller body in his arms and walking into the water. He wades out a little until it's deep enough that he knows his brother won't get hurt and throws him in the bay.
Dean comes up sputtering and shivering. The temperature might be 74 degrees on this last day of January, but the water is more than ten degrees cooler. Sam watches him unrepentantly, though. For one thing, his shoes are soaked and his pants are wet above his knees, too. And Dean shouldn't pick fights he can't win. Speaking of fighting, his brother has his fists clenched and a determined look in his eyes as he comes out of the water. Sam decides that unless he wants to end up in a brawl with his brother, which would look really bad right now with him being ten inches taller, he better take defensive measures. He takes off running back toward the hotel with his shoes swishing water.
Once they get back to the room, Sam tells Dean to get a hot shower to warm up and takes a minute to change his clothes while Dean is doing that. He goes into Dean's duffel and grabs out clean briefs and flannel pants for his brother, opening the bathroom door to drag out the wet things and leave the dry. Then he starts getting a load of laundry together figuring he shouldn't have listened to Dean and gotten him more clothes to begin with. He looks up when his brother comes out of the bathroom and gasps.
Dean's thin back and chest bear scars that Sam doesn't remember. They are big and vivid, claw marks on his back and down his side, dwarfing the tattoo and handprint. Sam wonders how he will ever explain this to a pediatrician. Dean sees Sam staring and grabs a shirt, one from his older days, but he slips it on, averting his eyes from his brother's as if he thinks if he doesn't see Sam staring, his privacy's intact.
Darting a look at his brother, Dean snaps "What?"
"I don't remember the scars." Sam tells him gently. "Can you refresh my memory, please?" Sam's thinking back, straining to think of his brother at this age. He would have been nine. He thinks of some times he stayed with Pastor Jim or Bobby about this age, after he knew what the family business was but before he did anything except help research.
"Yeah, well, guess you better hope that I get my old body back soon, 'cause otherwise someone's gonna think I'm an abused kid." Dean says turning away from Sam before seeing the look that crosses his face, the look that says Sam would say that too. "I let a Wendigo get too close on a hunt with dad. That's the side. The back was a werewolf. I got sleepy when I was supposed to be watching. Got some broken bones too… poltergeist, vengeful spirit, and some damned witch." Dean's listing these things nonchalantly. "It's a wonder dad ever made a decent hunter of me."
Sam is breathing sharply, trying hard to hide how upset he is, and realizing that he can't change any of it twenty years later. He's swearing to himself that his brother will not get hurt again if he has any say in it. Forcing his voice to sound calm, Sam tells Dean they need to come up with a cover story just in case. Together they decide to say the scars are from a car accident, the same one that killed their dad. Sam decides he'll deal with any broken bone issues when he has to.
Dean chuckles. "What will we tell anyone about the tattoo? Or the handprint?"
"We could say the tattoo is some kind of religious thing. Look'em in the eye and say it's an anti-demon possession mark. Blame mythical dad for being a religious nut," Sam suggests as he finishes getting the laundry together.
Dean agrees with that idea, and has a suggestion for the handprint. "If it comes up, let's just say it's a birthmark," he grins. "We can say religious nut parents said it's a mark from the angels."
Sam laughs. "I thought that was the freckles."
As he's heading out, Sam tells Dean he'll be back with clean clothes and dinner as soon as he can. "Pick up burgers, Sam, and beer," calls Dean as Sam heads out, ignoring his brother's stern glance.
The next couple hours Dean spends using Google maps checking every inch of the Corpus Christi Bay shoreline looking for a familiar landmark. He's also pouring over descriptions of local libraries and lore, searching for places that might have arcane literature about fairies. And, because he was listening, he looks up the local ghost stories, figuring maybe he and his brother would take care of these while they are waiting around here to resolve the bigger issue.