Warnings: Swearing, language, bullying, mentions of bullying, physical violence, mention of minor character death, mention of inherent suicide

Chapter 10: Unsaid things

1994

A new year, a new school.

Most of kids Sam's age would probably have liked the possibility to reinvent themselves in a place where no one would know them. A new opportunity to become the star of the school, with teachers who wouldn't have labeled them for years, comrades who wouldn't have seen them grow. Sam, however, hated to change of schools at the mercy of his father's assignments. He wasn't very good to make friends and never stayed in one place long enough to have real ones. There was no reason for anything to... He looked up at the pediment of the main building to remember the name of his new middle school. Truman High.

Fantastic, he would spend the next few months of his life to explain to people that if the high school football team was called the "Bombers" it was because President Truman had bombed Japan half a century ago. Dean would find it very funny and the rest of the world would find it stupid.

He sighed and crossed the threshold, looking down, the protective hand of his brother on his shoulder. He pushed it away of a sharp movement and pulled his schedule from the pocket of his jeans. The clothing had belonged to someone before belonging to Dean and then passed down to him. He didn't pay much attention to it, but he had already attended enough schools to know that the popular kids would throw a look at his outfit where only the shoes were new and would turn away from him as if he didn't exist. That didn't bother him, it was on a first selection between the people he would talk to in the coming months and the others. Either way he wouldn't remember these people. He wouldn't remember the kid who was a head taller than he and who hit him voluntarily in the hallway as he hurried to his first literature class.

"You could apologize!" The other shouted in his back. Sam turned and weighed him up. He was very good to this exercise and it put people quite uncomfortable to be sized up by a skinny kid whose stray locks fell before his eyes. The other was tall and seemed beefy but Sam had a soldier as a father, he was well placed to know that those who appear beefy aren't the most impressive. He judged the kid unworthy of interest and turned away, shrugging, ignoring the insult that echoed in his back. He was used to be the new one tested and knew a pseudo-tough guy when he saw. They didn't scare him.

However, they scared Barry. Throughout this first day, Barry was the only kid who spoke to him for anything other than asking him to move out of the way. He was even smaller and less impressive than Sam which was a feat in itself. And he was the official punching bag of Dirk McGregor who, Sam soon learned, was the pseudo-tough guy from the corridor.

"Why don't you just say no?" He asked a few weeks later seeing Barry hastily finish Dirk's homework before classes start.

"You're crazy? He'd reduce me to a pulp!"

"Nah." Sam said. "That kind of guy you simply stand up to them once and they leave you alone."

"Maybe. After reducing me to a pulp." Barry said by putting the end point to the copy. "Doesn't look like my handwriting too much?" He asked, handing the paper to Sam. This one shook his head, sighing.

As everywhere, nobody was lashing out at Sam Winchester. Maybe because he had a cool and awesome big brother who made no secret that he would tear the eyes of anyone who would look bad at him. Maybe because he gave the impression of being able to take care himself about his assailant's eyes. Or maybe because no one worthy enough of interest to martyr him.

Barry, however, was one of those children who drag their pain with them, unable to hide them and he exposed himself to the world as a potential victim.

This lasted for a time and gradually Dirk grew bolder and lashed out at Sam. The kid was indifferent to his attacks, he was just trying to stay away from problems. Mainly because he didn't want to risk the remonstrances of his father and also to avoid yet another expulsion to Dean, who asked him daily why he didn't defend himself.

"Damn Sammy, you could beat the hell out of him with your hands tied in your back!"

"I know, but we don't solve anything with violence, let me handle it." The younger replied, his head on his homework. He knew that Dean was forcing himself to not intervene.

"Why didn't you fight back Sam?"

Once, Sam sighed. It was at the end of the first term. He had turned on his chair. "Because I want to be normal for once. Don't be the new one who has a knife in his pocket and knows how to use it, don't be the one designated as "Sam Winchester, you know, the guy whose father is a killer!" "

"Dad is not a killer!"

"He's a marines. Normal kids think he's a killer, and they think I'm a monster." The kid protested.

"You aren't a monster Sam!"

"Then let me prove it this time."

Dean had nodded and had not raised the issue anymore. But despite his efforts, Sam wasn't the kind of kid who managed to integrate. Maybe something in the line of his jaw or in his eyes that Dirk was not observant enough to identify. May be his way of always stand straight. He didn't integrated. And Barry didn't defend himself against Dirk until the day when things went too far.

Dirk wanted to fight and Sam knew he wouldn't do it in the school premises, he had already tried and teachers had intervened. He waited until the end of classes, in the crush of students hurrying to the bus he lashed out at Barry. When Sam arrived, his friend was on the ground, bloody nose, feeling around the dirty asphalt of the parking lot looking for his glasses which had been projected a few steps away.

The whole crowd's indifference was probably what got Sam furious the most. They were a good dozen to observe the unequal fight, laughing at Barry. He didn't find even one to take his friend's defense. And he was also furious against Barry who was curlling up in a ball on the ground, moaning. Why could he not defend himself for once? Only once and everything would be over!

Dirk gave him a challenging look that Sam ignored despite the anger that made him clench his fists and bite his lips. He helped his friend to his feet and handed him his glasses.

"Get to the bus." He said. Barry gave him a somewhat worried look. He knew Sam now. He was the only one to had taken interest in him beyond the weapon he was hiding in his bag and his cool brother. He was the only of the school to have glimpsed John through the windows of the Impala ("Your father is scary." "That's because of his work."). He was the only one to consider Sam as a human being and that's probably why he knew immediately that things were going to turn badly. His look said to his friend to be careful but Sam didn't look at him. He went away to the bus and saw Sam hesitate half a second, looking Dirk up and down before turning away from him to go away. Dirk shoved him.

It was a classic way to start a fight that he had already used on Sam, but had failed to make him fly off the handle. But this time, by mistake or by calculation, Dirk had exactly the right words to get him a fit of rage. Sam had scratched his hands on the bitumen and was focusing on the minor burn to not listen to the insults and jeers that were showering down on him.

"What's the matter lose-chester? You scared?"

Just the burn, breathe, do not let himself lose his temper. He clenched his fists.

"Let's see what you got, freak!"

Breathe. Violence wouldn't solve anything. But he could already see himself hitting him, knew where he would aim first, taking advantage of his small size and his apparent superiority in combat.

"Come on, monster, come on!"

The word struck Sam stronger than a blow, he almost felt the lash of the whip to have failed, to be once again the school freak. Anger overwhelmed him like a wave and before having thought about it he was on his feet and had pushed Dirk too. The other looked at him, surprised to see him defend himself. He tried to hit him in the face but Sam dodged, leaned forward and struck him right in the stomach. He hadn't even put all his strength in the blow but Dirk bent over and took a few steps backward. Sam had to admit that the kid was tenacious and stupid because he didn't give up the fight. He tried to hit him again and earned Sam's knee into the chest for any reward. Then his fists on his face, again and again. Sam wasn't fighting anymore to save or avenge Barry, nor even to prevent future attacks from Dirk. He was doing it only by pleasure, for the simple satisfaction of seeing that brat Dirk bite the dust. A kick behind the knees to make him fall and again a blow under the chin to knock him down and put him KO.

He leaned over him, satisfied and looked him in the eyes.

"You're not tough, Dirk. You're just a jerk. Dirk the jerk."

He didn't even know why he felt the need to belittle the other boy like that. It felt just good after months of biting his tongue to never reply anything. He walked away, leaving behind him Dirk still lying on the ground in the middle of the circle of his former admirers who were now laughing and chaunting in unison "Dirk the jerk, Dirk the jerk".

Madison smiled. "He got what he deserved." She said. "Apparently it was high time that someone put him in his place."

Sam shook his head. He had sat with his elbows on knees, feet flat on the floor, hands clasped between his legs spread apart and was looking at the carpet through the curtain of his long hair.

"They all continued to call him Dirk the jerk all the rest of the year. I discovered long after that he lived a hell at home. Her mother had died of cancer the year before, it was probably why no teacher reprimanded hm for his behavior."

"That's not an excuse. Lots of people suffer losses and don't become bastards for all that."

"He died the year of his twelfth grade."

Madison raised her eyebrows. "Of what?"

"Of me I guess. Once I had broken his image... things have never been the same for Dirk anymore. He had become the school's whipping boy he couldn't bear it. He began to drink, take drugs, and eventually got run over by a bus one night." He clenched his hands hard against each other to stop them of shaking. "I became exactly what I thought I was fighting against. People were cheering me in the corridors the next week, and no one lashed out at Barry that year. They all turned against Dirk. But the following year, my father was assigned in another state and I moved to another school. Another tough guy took the place of Dirk in Barry's life, and others I guess. Two years after I received a death announcement sent by his mother."

He had a lump in his throat, he could still see the little black cardboard and the white typing on it.

"Because whatever you do Mads, whatever the number of assholes that you take out there will always be some to take their place. And I didn't know that. I'd thought... I was just a kid and I thought I was doing what was right. I just became exactly what I hated. I wanted to do justice and I became the torturer. I caused the death of a child to save another who's dead anyway."

Madison said nothing and he felt compelled to fill the silence.

"Well, that's it." He said, parting his hands. "You know about all of me now."

The silence was heavy, it seemed to weigh on Sam a little more each minute. "Say something!" He begged, raising his eyes to her. She just shook her head. She had sat cross-legged and hadn't unclenched her hands from around her beer for a good half hour. "Say something."

"What do you want me to tell Sam?"

"Anything."

She put her bottle on the floor thoughtfully and looked at him for a moment before making a decision. She rose as swiftly as her slight inebriation allowed her and put a hand on his shoulder. "I need more alcohol." She stated, squeezing slightly.

"That's all you can say?" He was feeling... confused, almost betrayed. He had just confided her the most important thing in his life and she wanted more alcohol. He wondered what was wrong with that girl. What was wrong with him.

"Tomorrow I'll say something. Tonight, you and I are only good at getting drunk." She said, stretching to the phone to order more bottles to the room service.

"You often get drunk when people confide to you?" He asked with a dark tone. She was perched on the back of the couch near his shoulder and he had to raise his head to look at her. She hung up the phone, biting her lips.

"Tomorrow." She said. "Let me time to digest, I'll have the appropriate response tomorrow."

"And what's the appropriate response?" He gnashed. He wanted to leave, to act as if none of this had happened, as if she wasn't leaning towards him with an expression he couldn't name.

"Tomorrow." She said. She paid the bottles when they came to bring them and this time they used the glasses. The tequila lacked lemon and salt, the vodka, ice, but at the end of the bottles, Madison was drunk enough to not think about what she had just heard. Too drunk probably because everything seemed to float miles away from her. She didn't even have the feeling to actually touch anything and she was moving as if in cotton. Fuelled by alcohol, Sam had relaxed. Maybe was she in condition to tell him something, or to have now the appropriate response she was defering to the day after. She was certain that the words coming out of her mouth were not exactly those she was thinking so she decided not to say anything.

"Tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow." She promised.

She was vaguely aware that he was leaving and woke up with a stiff neck and a sticky mouth.

##

Dorothy deeply admired the complicity of the members of Free Will among them and the way they had to invite just about anyone in their little world.

Kevin, Charlie and she had moved to a box in a coffee shop, surrounded by bags of their impromptu shopping. The bassist and cellist had sat cross-legged next to one another while both looked over the same board, arguing about whether it was really a federal crime to put cream in coffee. Dorothy smiled and gave her own board to the waiter saying to herself that it was rare for them, accustomed to fast food, to have a waiter. She let her mind wander, heard here and there a few words of conversation, watching people until the two others have finally chosen and tha their drinks were brought to them.

"When will you see her?" Charlie asked to Kevin, soaking her lips into her cup.

"Next week, we'll be in Illinois, I invited her to the concert."

Charlie smiled, raising her cup. "You finally understood what's the point of being rockstar, I'm proud of you!"

Kevin smiled, methodically reducing a muffin into little crumbs on his napkin. "It's not like that." He said softly. The coffee shop noises created an almost warm atmosphere around them while gray clouds were darkening the sky they saw out the window. "It's just that..."

"That?" Dorothy asked, leaning over the table. The old leather of her jacket slowly creaked while Kevin looked down at the cup he clutched in his hands.

"We all thought that Castiel was going to die. It doesn't make you realize that life is very short in fact?"

Charlie chuckled. "You had a sudden revelation?"

"Cause you hadn't?" The young man defended himself. "You two have become much more... obvious since this incident."

The two women exchanged an embarrassed glance.

"Because we're discrete doesn't mean we're not attached." Charlie said mid-voice, taking a sip of her coffee. "Do you have any idea of how screwed we'd be if people knew for us? Or even worse, for Dean and Cas?"

Kevin shrugged. "You're paranoid. No one cares who you sleep with and I'm sure it could even advertize us."

Dorothy smiled at the young man's naivety. "Charlie may not interest a lot of people..."

"Hey!" The bassist cut her short, reaching out to hit her on the shoulder over the table. "But it only concerns us. Also you're wrong, nobody cares until people find a reason to take offense."

It wasn't something easy to explain and neither Charlie nor she actually had the words for it. It was just the pervasive sense that whatever they share, all would be ruined at the slightest intrusion into their private lives.

Charlie and Kevin had engaged in a lively debate about the way people judged the stars without knowing them and Dorothy lost the thread of the conversation while watching bassist. She was wearing glasses with heavy black plastic frames, her red hair in a ponytail from which escaped wisps and a plaid shirt, which for once didn't seem out of the closet of one of the Winchester. There was something very endearing in Charlie, in her way of talking by gesticulating, in the way she had to wink to the barista at the other end of the room and in her laughter.

"Hey, you're participating?" Said the young woman, turning to her. Dorothy hid her confusion behind her drink, blinking.

"Weren't we talking about Kevin's great revelation before you digressed?"

Charlie turned her attention to the young man who had started to grope one of his gauges.

"So, tell us."

"There's nothing to tell. She was glad to hear from me and I invited her to the concert, that's all."

"And what are you gonna do?"

"I don't know!" He sighed in exasperation. "You'd find it easy to see someone you've known forever and come looking guileless, arms open like: "Hey look it's the new me!" "

Charlie shrugged. "Yes." She simply said. "I almost went back to work after the first tour you know. Show them that they had been wrong to fire me."

Dorothy chuckled. "It's sure that the loss of your skills would have been the first thing they'd have thought seeing you."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Charlie replied without laughing, finishing her drink. Kevin beholded her with a smile. Besides her shirt she was wearing jeans torn at the knees which must have go out of fashion at the death of Kurt Cobain and her red boots that she refused to remove now anyway. Her black polish was peeling and she was wearing enough leather bracelets to cover half of her two forearms. Her bangs falling into her eyes hiding her makeup that had suffered from the heat of the afternoon. They were all fully aware of what their appearances inspired to the others. Even in this cafe with a rather young clientele, Kevin saw out of the corner of his eye the fold of the mouth of some customers who expressed a broad category of emotions, from disgust to disappointment. On tour nobody watched them like that, they melted into the mass of spectators and piercied, tattooed and weirdly dressed roadies. But once the doors of the halls or tourbus passed, reality hit them again.

The absence of tattoos and piercings of Dorothy helped her to go unnoticed, option that neither Charlie nor Kevin had. They had chosen it and Kevin knew he could always remove his piercings. But he didn't want to, the metal implants had become a part of him that went with the keyboard, the concerts and the new life that the Winchester had offered him one day after hearing him play in the street.

He just wondered what Channing would think about it. Probably nothing good, and the mere idea that his friend could look at him like had just did the middle-aged lady leaning on the counter was clutching his stomach.

##

"Dotty? What will happen next?"

"Next what?"

They were both lying on the bed in their hotel room trying to find a program to watch on TV. Charlie thought that tomorrow she would probably have more energy but for now she was only able to close her eyes for the night. Dorothy's warm body against hers was comfortable and truth be told she didn't really care about the answer to her question.

She had half asked to fill the semi silence of the room.

"After the tour." She said lazily, putting an arm around her lover to draw her against herself.

"Each will resume her life." Dorothy answered by turning the TV off. Charlie sighed contentedly before the meaning of the words strikes her completely. She looked up, frowning.

"What do you mean?"

Dorothy shrugged. "I'll find another job, the demand for drivers isn't lacking, and you'll resume your normal life."

"Without you." Charlie said, sitting in bed.

"Of course without me." Dorothy seemed puzzled. "Charlie what's wrong?" he asked, putting her hand on the shoulder of the bassist. The woman resisted the urge to push her back with a sharp movement.

"It's just that I thought that... After one year..." She had a lump in the throat and at the same time wanted to scream very loud that it wasn't fair. That Dorothy had no right to be as serene and detached by announcing that it seemed perfectly normal to her that they leave each other at the end of the tour. As if they had been one for the other only a convenience on the road.

"We had come to an agreement from the beginning Charlie!"

Charlie nodded. Of course they had reached an agreement. A year ago. When Charlie wasn't attached yet, when she honestly thought she'd be able to not become attached, and when Dean had made fun of her about it.

"You're about as able to not getting attached than Sam is to let go of something!"

"That's not true!"

He was right apparently, because she souldn't have felt as miserable. It didn't mean anything. They had never promised anything to each other but now Charlie deeply regretted having left their agreement grow between them to become a kind of impenetrable wall. She let Dorothy draw her against herself and lay her back between the pillows before kissing her. Charlie felt like crying, clinging to the neck of the blouse of her partner. She was starting to count down their kisses, as well as their caresses.

One more kiss, one less on the list of those that remained to them.

A caress and another one.

Dorothy had regretted her words to the second she had seen the pained expression on Charlie's face. It had done her something strange in the region of the heart to see her like that, like a sort of instinct screaming her that something was wrong and she had to rectify it immediately. She silenced her inner voice by hugging Charlie against her. She would respect the agreement they had signed months earlier because it was the kind of respect that one shows to the people they cherish. And she would do it without complaining even though she saw scrolling the miles getting them closer to California without pleasure. She wouldn't like the sun, since she wouldn't see it set Charlie's hair ablaze anymore. And the road would be dull without her on the passenger seat. But she had lived worse, would probably live worse than indulge in having feelings for someone who would eventually resume her life without her.

That was what she had signed for the first time she had kissed the girl and she was fully aware of it. So it didn't matter that she had a heavy heart at the thought that soon she would no longer hear the sighs of bassist, nor the sound of her voice in the morning.

It didn't matter that she wouldn't be able to spend whole nights, her horny hand in hers or the approaching end of their conversations in the front of the tourbus. She knew what she had signed for.

##

Even after all these years, waking up with Castiel remained one of the best moments of the day. Dean slowly opened his eyes, expecting the daylight but sometimes he could see nothing but the sheets covering the chest of his companion. No matter in what position he fell asleep, or if Castiel wasn't yet in bed at this moment, Dean woke up systematically one arm around the accountant. That morning he was sweating under the blankets but made no move to push them knowing that this would wake the young man up. He just listened to his breathing and the beating of his heart mixing with the street noise that was slowly waking. Sometimes when he was exhausted or half asleep, he found himself as this morning to marvel at the slightest detail. The skin texture of his lover, the folds sheets of which he could hardly hear the crumpling when he was moving. And he began to write in his head, crossing out each sentence bit by bit, a song of which he only had the title. Miracle.

Castiel awoke while he was mentally stumbling on a chorus trying to fall back asleep.

"Hey." The young man croaked.

"Hey. Sleep well?"

"Not enough."

"Go back to sleep."

"No."

Dean laughed, he mentally ran a journal of the speed at which Castiel managed to place "no" in conversation. He regularly broke his record. Sometimes it was even his first word of the day.

"You're thinking so loud that I heard you in my dream." Castiel said, pulling himself out of his embrace to roll on his side and look at him. Dean smiled.

"And what was I saying in your dream?"

Castiel turned in a creasing of sheets to take his face in both hands, eyelids half closed on his eyes still clouded with sleep.

"More, more..." He whispered right up against his lips while their legs tangled under the blanket. Dean laughed clutching him against himself.

Even after years, it was his favorite moment of the day.