Clearing out the drafts folder part one
Title: There’s Never Enough Time
Summary: Jess has three hours before Sam comes home from that stupid roadtrip with his brother
Word count: 1,700
Rated: pg (Language)
Notes: Set S1, during the pilot
Warnings: Implied cannon character death
Genre: Het, angsty in context
Characters: Jess, mentions of Sam and Dean
A/N:Title from the eponymous Postal Service song
Disclaimer: Supernatural and it's characters belongs to WB/The CW, I own nothing and make no money.
Jess has three hours left.
Sam’s cutting it pretty close, with an 8 o’clock interview, but nobody asked her. He texted he’d be in at midnight, and midnight it’ll be. Sam’s predictable like that: If he makes you a promise, he means it, just the kind of person he is. Then again, the kind of person she thought he was wouldn’t have left her for two long days of radio silence. That hadn’t been fun. When he drove off with Dean, she assumed they’d be back sooner, or at least that he’d call.
But she’s happy he’s talking to his family now, when before he couldn’t even stand to talk about them. There’s no point being a bitch about getting left in the lurch. Jess decides she’ll bake Sam’s favorite cookies, the ones with double the chocolate chips. Maybe tidy the apartment- Sam was supposed to help with that, but leaving the mess for two full days feels petty. At least it’ll distract her from worrying about how well she really knows her boyfriend. Or about what sort of trouble Sam is getting up to on a days-long roadtrip with someone like Dean. Jess makes a face. The infamous brother hadn’t been quite what she expected. Not that she knows what, exactly, that was.
They’d dated almost a year before he told her about Dean, after all. It was maybe five months after she’d given up asking about his past, and even then he hadn’t meant to tell her. Giddy from watching some horror film, Sam had blurted out “Dean would fucking love this,” and then looked mortified when she’d asked him who that was. “My brother,” he’d muttered. She’d just said, “Oh,” like it didn’t matter that he’d kept having a sibling from her on top of everything else.
She knows Dean through a handful of anecdotes, dropped casually into conversation as if Sam’s family lived just one state over and called every Thursday. The stories don’t make up a whole person, or even a coherent caricature: in this one, Dean’s a jerk who lords his status as daddy’s favorite over Sam, here Dean’s teaching Sam the best way to pace yourself distance running. Dean’s mocking his kid brother mercilessly for liking magic tricks, Dean’s trying to initiate a Bon Jovi sing-along. Dean’s giving him the last bowl of Lucky Charms because it’s his favorite, Dean’s not calling because Dad said not to, and in the end Dean always picks Dad.
Jess sets the eggs and butter out on the small counter, and begins to dig through the over-stuffed cupboard for the chocolate chips she is bought last week. Hopefully, Sam didn’t make a snack of them before he left. His sweet tooth is probably the only reason he likes her admittedly mediocre baking. The way he closes his eyes when he’s eating, as if he’s never had a home-cooked meal before, is the only things that inspires her to keep a good kitchen. She idly wonders if her boyfriend’s brother is a chocoholic too. One more question to add to a very long list: The mystery of the Winchesters could drive a girl crazy.
Before she understood that was off limits, she’d ask about his family. Sam would give a few vague sentences about his single-minded father’s impossible demand for obedience, then change the subject. “It’s not like they’re going to visit,” he used to say, when she pressed him. Of course there were hints, the things that slipped out: too much knowledge about picking locks, loading shotguns, and how much blood you could lose before you needed a hospital. She’d asked at once point if his family was the mob and she’d been only half joking. “No,” he’d said with some heat. “They do a lot of good in the world.” That was the really crazy part: Sam didn’t even hate the family he had disowned, or been disowned by. Jess doesn’t care how messed up the truth is; she wants to know everything about Sam, good and bad.
But she was still waiting for Sam to trust her with the real story when Dean showed up. After all that time with no communication except two phone calls bracketing a week of Sam distant and panicky, there was suddenly Dean. Dean who broke into their apartment, Dean who looked at her as if she was just a replaceable pair of tits, Dean who wanted her out of the room the second he was done leering at her and made Sam agree. The way they looked at each other like she wasn’t there. Jess mashed the egg yolks pensively into the batter with a fork.
Sam always said his family didn’t matter because that was all in the past, but he’d been wrong and Jess had always known. And sure enough, here his past was, whisking him away as if the last four years meant absolutely nothing. Barely taking time to explain, Sam had disappeared into the night. She was left with no explanation or information, just the sneaking suspicion that she didn’t know the first thing about who Sam Winchester really was.
Determining that the chocolate chips were evenly distributed, Jess locates their two cookie sheets and scoops the dough out in half-inch blobs. She slides the first batches into the oven and set the timer for 30 minutes. There’s just over two hours to go. The cookies will probably be cool when the Winchesters arrive, but there ought to be enough to go around. Not that she actually knows who she’s expecting to feed. Maybe it’ll be just Sam, or possibly Dean is going to stop by for more than a few minutes this time. For all Jess knows, she’ll be entertaining Sam’s mysterious father in a couple hours. Not an ideal meet-the-parents situation.
Sam met hers properly, a nice restaurant with an hour of freaking out beforehand. Jess kept insisting it would be fine, but he’d been so worried about how he looked. Jess doesn’t buy into the idea of soul mates, but Sam almost makes her a believer; he’s everything she could imagine needing. She wants to think Sam is serious about a future together, too, but a voice whispers, look at how he left his family and tell me he doesn’t have it in him to abandon you, too. Blood ties brought them back, but what do you have? He won’t even tell you what ‘the family business’ is. And now the road trip, now Dean looking at Sam like she’s not even there and Sam looking right back and asking her to leave.
Maybe Dean’s dismissal hurts because there’s a little bit of truth to it.
But all that could come later; right now the oven timer demands her attention. She takes out the first cookies and puts in the second sheet, and while they bake she starts to clean up the disaster area left in the wake of two 6’ men tussling in a small apartment. First thing to fix is the table they knocked over first, and then the detritus all around it. Jess is picking up a handful of Sam’s papers when a small note in an unfamiliar, elegant hand slips out. It’s the stationary from a local jewelers, and on it are three prices listed beside the words princess-cut solitaire, platinum radiant, and Marquise diamond. Rings. Jess stares for a good minute, stomach doing flip-flops, before her brain can catch up with her adrenaline-filled body.
“Jessica Winchester, “ she says with a flourish. It sounds pretty good. “Jess Winchester.” She was not the kind of girl that fantasized about her wedding, more the kind of girl who gripes about the patriarchal institution that has girls change their names like property. But at the same time, marrying Sam…you don’t buy a ring for an exchangeable pair of tits. When he came back with his brother, and maybe his father, she would get introduced and included properly. And soon after that he would ask her and she’d be a part of his family and learning about their business and picking names for kids. Mary, she thought, brushing her hand over her flat stomach. Mary after his mother if it was a girl.
The second and last batch of cookies came out, and they smelled divine if she said so herself. Sam was going to be back in forty-five minutes to give a second opinion. Jess wondered if she’d spoiled any fancy plans by finding out before he asked. Knowing Sam, it would have been sweet and serious, probably at the restaurant where they’d had their first date, or the park where they’d met. He’d have stammered through the question like he thought she might say no, even though any sane person would be able to tell she was just barely containing herself from screaming in the affirmative. She could picture it perfectly, and she couldn’t stop herself from giggling like a little girl. Jess arranged the cookies on a plate and left a note in case he came back while she was in the shower. She wanted to write “I do!” but made herself stop. Instead, she wrote “Missed you! Love you!” and went to the bathroom.
She was testing the stream of water when she heard a noise in the apartment. “Sam?” she called. They were early-- Dean must speed, another fact to add to the pile. There’s no way she can pretend she doesn’t know about the ring; she never could lie to Sam. He’ll know something’s different in an instant, just by how giddy she is. The thought makes her start grinning like an idiot again. If Dean and their dad are with him, she’ll treat everyone to a late-night dinner to celebrate. She can get to know Dean, and see how Sam acts with his brother, find out why he idolizes him. See what about their father inspires so much respect and resentment. In time, she can get to know everything about Sam, his family, their mysterious business. She has her whole life in front of her to live with the man she loves.
“Sam!” she calls as she swung open the door. “I’ve been waiting for you, baby.”
But of course, it isn’t Sam.
Summary: Jess has three hours before Sam comes home from that stupid roadtrip with his brother
Word count: 1,700
Rated: pg (Language)
Notes: Set S1, during the pilot
Warnings: Implied cannon character death
Genre: Het, angsty in context
Characters: Jess, mentions of Sam and Dean
A/N:Title from the eponymous Postal Service song
Disclaimer: Supernatural and it's characters belongs to WB/The CW, I own nothing and make no money.
Jess has three hours left.
Sam’s cutting it pretty close, with an 8 o’clock interview, but nobody asked her. He texted he’d be in at midnight, and midnight it’ll be. Sam’s predictable like that: If he makes you a promise, he means it, just the kind of person he is. Then again, the kind of person she thought he was wouldn’t have left her for two long days of radio silence. That hadn’t been fun. When he drove off with Dean, she assumed they’d be back sooner, or at least that he’d call.
But she’s happy he’s talking to his family now, when before he couldn’t even stand to talk about them. There’s no point being a bitch about getting left in the lurch. Jess decides she’ll bake Sam’s favorite cookies, the ones with double the chocolate chips. Maybe tidy the apartment- Sam was supposed to help with that, but leaving the mess for two full days feels petty. At least it’ll distract her from worrying about how well she really knows her boyfriend. Or about what sort of trouble Sam is getting up to on a days-long roadtrip with someone like Dean. Jess makes a face. The infamous brother hadn’t been quite what she expected. Not that she knows what, exactly, that was.
They’d dated almost a year before he told her about Dean, after all. It was maybe five months after she’d given up asking about his past, and even then he hadn’t meant to tell her. Giddy from watching some horror film, Sam had blurted out “Dean would fucking love this,” and then looked mortified when she’d asked him who that was. “My brother,” he’d muttered. She’d just said, “Oh,” like it didn’t matter that he’d kept having a sibling from her on top of everything else.
She knows Dean through a handful of anecdotes, dropped casually into conversation as if Sam’s family lived just one state over and called every Thursday. The stories don’t make up a whole person, or even a coherent caricature: in this one, Dean’s a jerk who lords his status as daddy’s favorite over Sam, here Dean’s teaching Sam the best way to pace yourself distance running. Dean’s mocking his kid brother mercilessly for liking magic tricks, Dean’s trying to initiate a Bon Jovi sing-along. Dean’s giving him the last bowl of Lucky Charms because it’s his favorite, Dean’s not calling because Dad said not to, and in the end Dean always picks Dad.
Jess sets the eggs and butter out on the small counter, and begins to dig through the over-stuffed cupboard for the chocolate chips she is bought last week. Hopefully, Sam didn’t make a snack of them before he left. His sweet tooth is probably the only reason he likes her admittedly mediocre baking. The way he closes his eyes when he’s eating, as if he’s never had a home-cooked meal before, is the only things that inspires her to keep a good kitchen. She idly wonders if her boyfriend’s brother is a chocoholic too. One more question to add to a very long list: The mystery of the Winchesters could drive a girl crazy.
Before she understood that was off limits, she’d ask about his family. Sam would give a few vague sentences about his single-minded father’s impossible demand for obedience, then change the subject. “It’s not like they’re going to visit,” he used to say, when she pressed him. Of course there were hints, the things that slipped out: too much knowledge about picking locks, loading shotguns, and how much blood you could lose before you needed a hospital. She’d asked at once point if his family was the mob and she’d been only half joking. “No,” he’d said with some heat. “They do a lot of good in the world.” That was the really crazy part: Sam didn’t even hate the family he had disowned, or been disowned by. Jess doesn’t care how messed up the truth is; she wants to know everything about Sam, good and bad.
But she was still waiting for Sam to trust her with the real story when Dean showed up. After all that time with no communication except two phone calls bracketing a week of Sam distant and panicky, there was suddenly Dean. Dean who broke into their apartment, Dean who looked at her as if she was just a replaceable pair of tits, Dean who wanted her out of the room the second he was done leering at her and made Sam agree. The way they looked at each other like she wasn’t there. Jess mashed the egg yolks pensively into the batter with a fork.
Sam always said his family didn’t matter because that was all in the past, but he’d been wrong and Jess had always known. And sure enough, here his past was, whisking him away as if the last four years meant absolutely nothing. Barely taking time to explain, Sam had disappeared into the night. She was left with no explanation or information, just the sneaking suspicion that she didn’t know the first thing about who Sam Winchester really was.
Determining that the chocolate chips were evenly distributed, Jess locates their two cookie sheets and scoops the dough out in half-inch blobs. She slides the first batches into the oven and set the timer for 30 minutes. There’s just over two hours to go. The cookies will probably be cool when the Winchesters arrive, but there ought to be enough to go around. Not that she actually knows who she’s expecting to feed. Maybe it’ll be just Sam, or possibly Dean is going to stop by for more than a few minutes this time. For all Jess knows, she’ll be entertaining Sam’s mysterious father in a couple hours. Not an ideal meet-the-parents situation.
Sam met hers properly, a nice restaurant with an hour of freaking out beforehand. Jess kept insisting it would be fine, but he’d been so worried about how he looked. Jess doesn’t buy into the idea of soul mates, but Sam almost makes her a believer; he’s everything she could imagine needing. She wants to think Sam is serious about a future together, too, but a voice whispers, look at how he left his family and tell me he doesn’t have it in him to abandon you, too. Blood ties brought them back, but what do you have? He won’t even tell you what ‘the family business’ is. And now the road trip, now Dean looking at Sam like she’s not even there and Sam looking right back and asking her to leave.
Maybe Dean’s dismissal hurts because there’s a little bit of truth to it.
But all that could come later; right now the oven timer demands her attention. She takes out the first cookies and puts in the second sheet, and while they bake she starts to clean up the disaster area left in the wake of two 6’ men tussling in a small apartment. First thing to fix is the table they knocked over first, and then the detritus all around it. Jess is picking up a handful of Sam’s papers when a small note in an unfamiliar, elegant hand slips out. It’s the stationary from a local jewelers, and on it are three prices listed beside the words princess-cut solitaire, platinum radiant, and Marquise diamond. Rings. Jess stares for a good minute, stomach doing flip-flops, before her brain can catch up with her adrenaline-filled body.
“Jessica Winchester, “ she says with a flourish. It sounds pretty good. “Jess Winchester.” She was not the kind of girl that fantasized about her wedding, more the kind of girl who gripes about the patriarchal institution that has girls change their names like property. But at the same time, marrying Sam…you don’t buy a ring for an exchangeable pair of tits. When he came back with his brother, and maybe his father, she would get introduced and included properly. And soon after that he would ask her and she’d be a part of his family and learning about their business and picking names for kids. Mary, she thought, brushing her hand over her flat stomach. Mary after his mother if it was a girl.
The second and last batch of cookies came out, and they smelled divine if she said so herself. Sam was going to be back in forty-five minutes to give a second opinion. Jess wondered if she’d spoiled any fancy plans by finding out before he asked. Knowing Sam, it would have been sweet and serious, probably at the restaurant where they’d had their first date, or the park where they’d met. He’d have stammered through the question like he thought she might say no, even though any sane person would be able to tell she was just barely containing herself from screaming in the affirmative. She could picture it perfectly, and she couldn’t stop herself from giggling like a little girl. Jess arranged the cookies on a plate and left a note in case he came back while she was in the shower. She wanted to write “I do!” but made herself stop. Instead, she wrote “Missed you! Love you!” and went to the bathroom.
She was testing the stream of water when she heard a noise in the apartment. “Sam?” she called. They were early-- Dean must speed, another fact to add to the pile. There’s no way she can pretend she doesn’t know about the ring; she never could lie to Sam. He’ll know something’s different in an instant, just by how giddy she is. The thought makes her start grinning like an idiot again. If Dean and their dad are with him, she’ll treat everyone to a late-night dinner to celebrate. She can get to know Dean, and see how Sam acts with his brother, find out why he idolizes him. See what about their father inspires so much respect and resentment. In time, she can get to know everything about Sam, his family, their mysterious business. She has her whole life in front of her to live with the man she loves.
“Sam!” she calls as she swung open the door. “I’ve been waiting for you, baby.”
But of course, it isn’t Sam.