Fic: But I've become what I can't be
Written for the 2016 spn_j2_bigbang
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester
Length: About 21K words
Rating: R for language and show-level violence
A season 2 casefic that takes place immediately after "Playthings." Still reeling from John's revelation that Dean might have to kill his brother, the Winchesters find themselves in Nashville. They're investigating a case in which people are being brutally murdered by their loved ones, which cuts just a little too close to home, considering that Sam is trying to get Dean to accept that he might have to kill his own loved one.
My first casefic! \o/ Huge shoutout to my lovely artist, Stargazingchola. Please visit her art post and show her some love (note that the art is spoilery, so please read the fic before you visit her art post.)
Many, many thanks to my wonderful betas, Celtic_forest and Gingersnap1224.
Also available on AO3
The title and chapter titles are from the One Republic song Stop and Stare.
[ 1. This town is colder now, I think it's sick of us ]
Nashville is cold. Damp, windy, chill-you-to-the-bone cold. And Dean seems to consider it a personal affront; maybe even a failing on Sam's part. He clutches his coat to his chest (over-dramatically, Sam muses) as they leave the motel office. "Dammit," he growls, "you said Tennessee would be warmer than Connecticut. It's fucking freezing." Sam ignores him, because really? The weather is an issue? The temperature matters that much? On a scale ranging from "surprisingly unpleasant" to "more fucked up than you could possibly imagine," Tennessee is colder than I thought it would be is pretty far below My father's last words were instructing my brother that he might need to kill me. Sam really couldn't care less about the weather right now.
He stops to stare across the parking lot at the massive church on the other side of the highway. "That's all one church?" Dean asks, stopping next to him. "Cause it just looks like a big church connected to an even bigger church."
"The smaller building - or, I guess, the less big building - was the original church," Sam says, reading what he printed from the church's website. The stiff, cold wind threatens to snatch the paper from his hand. "In 1990, they were, quote, blessed by the Lord with the resources to build a new sanctuary. That's the bigger part. They just gutted the old church and use it for offices and classrooms and stuff now."
"Blessed," Dean mutters, blinking up at the massive, ornately-carved edifice. "Because they're crazy enough to believe there's a God up there just throwing money down on them." He retrieves his duffel from the back seat of the Impala and heads for their room. "And you think the church is the connection? I mean, that's a big church. Gotta be a thousand or so members. Maybe two of them getting murdered isn't as weird as you think."
It isn't Dean's first protest against this being an actual case, and Sam doesn't understand why he doesn't get it. It's like he refuses to get it. "Two of them murdered by loved ones who say they don't remember doing it." He grabs his own bag and falls in behind Dean. "That's the weird part."
"Yeah. Murderers saying they don't remember murdering anybody," Dean laughs. "Weird." He opens the door and flicks on the light, revealing their typical shabby room, and Sam sighs. Connecticut sucked for a lot of reasons, but the inn was a pleasant departure from their routine.
Dean punches a couple of buttons on the heater and it rattles noisily into service. He stands in front of it, adjusting the vents and testing the airflow, then tosses his bag on the bed that he's calculated will get the most warm air. He turns and grins at Sam. "I call dibs on the spare blanket, Mr. Tennessee-Will-Be-Nice-This-Time-Of-Year." Sam doesn't rise to the bait, and Dean turns back to his bag. "How's your hand doing?"
The sudden change of topic makes Sam smile. Leave it to Dean to snag the warmest bed, and then immediately feel guilty enough to start mother-henning over Sam's broken hand. "Still here," he says, holding it up for inspection. "See?"
"You sure it's okay? We didn't cut the cast off too soon?"
"Dean, I keep telling you, it's fine. The damn thing had to come off either way after it got so wet, and I was really tired of it. I'm glad it's gone."
"Yeah, I guess it would interfere with your... activities." Dean raises his eyebrows suggestively.
"Oh, shut up," Sam groans. "It interfered with writing and typing, and you know that."
"Sure. I guess you use your left hand for other things."
Sam takes in the lecherous grin and the fake cheer and wants to say stop it, please, stop it. Stop hiding and deflecting and sidestepping and just fucking talk to me about it. Tell me what you think. Tell me what Dad said to you, and why he didn't say anything to me. Tell me fucking ANYTHING. But he doesn't say any of that. He knows it won't do any good. Instead, he sits heavily on the other bed and yawns, which gives Dean's mother-hen instinct another nudge.
"You didn't sleep last night."
"Sure I did," Sam lies. Well, it's not entirely a lie. He did sleep some. Because you can't have nightmares if you don't fall asleep.
"Yeah, I wouldn't know. Not like I was right there in the car with you or anything."
"Look. You know I don't sleep all that well in the car sometimes. It's not a big deal."
"Whatever." Dean turns and rummages through his duffel for a change of clothes. "Are we Feds or reporters today?"
That was suspiciously easy, and Sam doesn't trust it. Dean's not usually brushed off so quickly. "Feds. I don't think the church staff will want to talk very openly to reporters about their members being murdered."
"It does put a damper on their whole blessed by the Lord story," Dean mutters. He inspects his dress shirt. "I hope this place has an iron."
Yeah, so much for being blessed. Sam goes over his notes again. Two people, members of Bethel Pentecostal Church, murdered in the last month. Murdered by family members, people who loved them, who claim to have no memory of the act. Belinda Montrose, her throat cut by a husband who, according to everyone who knew them, cherished and adored her. Paul Kramer, whose by all accounts devoted mother bashed his head in with a hammer. There's got to be a case here. And if not, if Dean's right, then, dammit. He'll find another one. Because he needs to think about something other than himself. He needs to not think about what's wrong with him, what Dad knew, what Dad feared, what Dad told Dean. He needs to not think about the others like him - Ava, Andy, Scott, Max, Ansem - and the death and destruction trailing behind them. He really, really needs to not think about that.
[ 2. It's time to make our move, I'm shaking off the rust ]
Having freshly ironed the front and cuffs of his white dress shirt (and no, Sam, it doesn't matter, it's not like he's going to take his jacket off anyway, it's fucking freezing out there), Dean leans on the door and flashes an annoyed look at his brother, who's still trying to coax his hair into some semblance of an FBI-approved style. "Dude," he grumbles. "It's as manly as it's gonna get. Let's get a move on." Sam rolls his eyes and shrugs on his overcoat.
A pedestrian bridge spans the interstate between the hotel and the church, floating high in the dreary gray morning sky. It's even colder up here, and Dean shoves his hands deep into the pockets of his overcoat as he watches the traffic below. All those clueless people, heading toward jobs and friends and homes and families, not knowing how easily it could all be ripped away by pure random evil. He never really understood Sam's craving to be one of them. Why would you want to be ignorant about the true nature of the world, when you could be out there saving people? But now he remembers Dad's last words, remembers the promise Sam drunkenly extracted from him in Connecticut, remembers waiting for his brother to succumb to a demonic virus in Oregon, and maybe Sam had a point. Maybe it's better not to know there really is something under your bed. Especially when there's nothing you can do about it anyway.
And right now, more than ever before, there's nothing he can do about it.
The older part of the church is filled with dark wood, subdued lighting, plush carpets, and art cloying enough to cause a toothache - benevolent saints and angels with open arms, beaming down on them from puffy white clouds. Dean knows none of these entities are actually watching over him, no matter what Mom thought.
Pastor James Clark greets them under the vaulted ceiling of the lobby and escorts them back to his office. Like everything else about his church, Clark's office is large and comfortable. Sam gratefully accepts his offer of coffee, which is not a surprise considering how often he woke gasping and stuttering out of a nightmare last night, and the only real mystery is why he thinks Dean doesn't notice. Dean starts to decline, but changes his mind when he sees Clark uses actual ceramic mugs, not styrofoam cups.
The Winchesters sink into a pair of low-slung armchairs in front of the neatly-arranged desk, and Sam begins the interview. Dean wraps his hands around his mug, soaking up the warmth, and doesn't pay much attention to whatever backstory his brother has come up with to justify their presence. The whole damn job is Sam's baby, and he's gonna let him handle this part of it. And it's nice to have him back, to deal with this part of the job. John's people skills always left Dean on edge, waiting to undo the damage. It's a mutinous thought, but there it is. He appreciates being able to sit back and let Sam handle the touchy-feely, dealing-with-civilians shit when he's not in the mood, and if there's one thing he knows about Sam, it's that he's very good at the touchy-feeling, dealing-with-civilians shit. He sits quietly, Agent Rhodes to Sam's Agent Osbourne, and listens to him drone about patterns of killings and statistical anomalies and routine investigation and probably nothing and dotting all the Is, crossing all the Ts, and it's not until he gets a look of sympathy from Pastor Clark that he realizes Sam has pitched this investigation as the most lowly, boring kind of grunt work possible. Which is annoying, since he could have made them rock stars, X-Files types who get sent to handle the most puzzling and fascinating cases. On the other hand, rock stars get remembered, and grunt workers don't, and this job is easier when you're not particularly memorable, and see, that's why Sam needed to come back. That's why this works better with Sam on board.
"What can you tell us about Darius and Belinda Montrose?" Sam asks.
Pastor Clark smiles fondly. "Good, good people. Active in the church, active in the community, raised two wonderful children. It's really awful, what happened. I suppose I understand, in a way, that Darius wanted to end her suffering. I pray for that poor man every day."
Wait, what? "End her suffering?" Dean asks. Sam flashes him a dirty look. Okay, so he didn't study before the quiz. Whatever.
"Her cancer," Sam says, with a pinched look. He turns back to Clark. "And you were with them right before she was killed."
"Yes. I said some healing prayers over her that morning. And she wanted to talk about her service. Belinda was a good woman and full of faith, but... sometimes the Lord heals you, and sometimes He calls you to be somewhere else." Okay, Dean would like to sit this man down and explain to him that there is no God who sends a demon to take your mother and your father and your brother's girlfriend someplace else. And if there was, that's a God no one should worship. A God that anyone with sense would refuse to believe in. He bites his lip and lets Sam continue.
"Was there any connection you're aware of between the Montrose and Kramer families? Other than attending this church?"
Clark tips back in his chair and looks thoughtfully toward the ceiling. "Nothing I can think of. Both Paul and Belinda sang in the choir at one point, but Belinda was in the main church choir and Paul used to be in the youth choir, and those are completely separate. They didn't even come to the same service. The Montroses were regulars at the 8:00 service, and the Kramers were, well... rather sporadic attendees at the 10:30 service. In fact, Cheryl Kramer stopped attending a couple of years ago. She just brought Paul for some of the teen activities. I saw her the day before... " Clark pauses uncomfortably, and Dean wonders how the guy's going to figure out a graceful way to say before she violently murdered her teenage son. "The day before Paul passed," he finally continues. "But before that, I hadn't seen her in months."
Sam's ears have pricked up. "You saw her the day before Paul was killed? What was her state of mind? What was she doing?"
The pastor shakes his head. "I'm afraid I can't say. I didn't talk to her. She wasn't even in the church. I just saw her in the parking lot, waiting for Paul."
Sam pauses long enough that it looks like they're done, but it turns out he's simply trying to stifle a huge yawn. "Excuse me, Pastor," he says. "Lot of research last night."
Clark smiles and peers at Sam curiously. "Are you okay, son?" Dean does the same, and honestly, he really doesn't look all that good - he's a little pale, with dark circles under his eyes. And Dean knows it's got nothing to do with sleeping in the damn car. Sam's nightmares, which had mostly subsided in the months since Jess died, are ramping up again. Which really isn't surprising, considering.
"I'm fine, thanks," Sam says. "Could we look at the sanctuary before we go?" Dean shoots his brother a look.You do realize I know you just want to get your church geek on, right? Sam pretends not to get it, and as Dean sighs quietly, they follow Clark out of the office.
A short connecting hall leads into the new sanctuary. The hall is lined with a dozen or so portraits hung on the wall, each with a polished brass plaque. Sam stops to observe a cluster at the end of the hall. "Important people?"
"Important to our church's history," Clark explains. "This is Gwendolyn Gilchrist." He gestures to a portrait of a sharp-faced young woman who looks like she's in her twenties, or possibly early thirties. Judging from the hair and clothing, the portrait itself is from the 1970s. "Miss Gwen, everyone called her. She was the church's choir director for almost forty years. Lovely lady; died just a few months ago." He turns to a more modern photo of a round-faced older man. "Pastor Walter Hartsell. I came on board when he retired, and I'll join him on this wall some day. Wally still attends services here, but I don't think he approves of my sermons." He chuckles gently and turns to the oldest photo, a faded black and white portrait of a young man with thick wavy hair and kind eyes. "And this is Pastor John Fleming, our founder. He started Bethel as a small country church in 1930 and helped make it what it is today."
A pair of wooden doors opens into the larger sanctuary. It's impossibly huge. Fairly new construction, but designed to look old. Rows of dark polished pews are divided by three aisles, converging on a stage (okay, Dean knows it's not actually called a stage, but that's what it feels like to him) that houses a large pulpit, a raised area with microphones and a drum set, and a huge wooden communion table in the center, waist high and easily seven feet across. Both the communion table and the pulpit are intricately carved, covered in flourishes and trimmed with corbels. The massive stained glass windows are muted against the cold gray sky, but Dean can imagine them bursting with color on a sunny Sunday morning.
"Nice place," he muses.
"Thank you." Clark puts his hands in his pockets and comfortably surveys his domain. "We've definitely been blessed."
Must be nice, to feel blessed. Of course, it's all a lie. Pastor Clark has been lucky, or skilled, but not blessed. But still, it must be a comforting feeling, to believe there's someone up there on your side, someone watching over you. Dean wouldn't know; all of his comfort comes from things he can see. His weapons. His car. His brother.
Sam is slowly spinning, head tipped back, taking it all in. His interest runs to truly old things, not new things trying to look old, so there's no telling what it is about this church that's grabbed his attention. "Have you noticed anything unusual lately?" he asks, taking a couple of steps down the aisle. "Odd smells? Strange noises? Cold spots?" He looks back at Dean and lifts his eyebrows, then glances at Dean's pocket. EMF meter. Which is... in his duffle, back at the motel. Shit.
"All of Tennessee's a cold spot right now, son," Pastor Clark laughs, clapping a hand on Sam's shoulder. Sam laughs and pivots just enough to turn Clark away from Dean, who is supposed to be doing a little surreptitious EMF reading right now. "But no, I haven't noticed anything unusual. Why? How would that be related?"
"Oh, you know," he shrugs. "Patterns." He smiles apologetically. Sorry to bother you with our boring insignificant research, good sir. Please be sure to forget I asked.
"No, sorry, I can't really say I've noticed anything."
"All right then. Thanks for your help." Sam takes a step toward the door, then turns to Pastor Clark again. "Oh, hey, how many people does your sanctuary hold?" He continues walking slowly toward the door, causing Clark to follow him, which would be awesome if Dean were behind them reading his EMF meter. But he's not. He catches up with them as Sam hands Clark a card. "Please give us a call if you think of anything."
Clark cheerfully shakes their hands. "I will. Good luck, boys. Thanks for your service." That should make Dean feel a little guilty, but it really doesn't. Even if the man doesn't know what their actual service is, damn straight they deserve to be thanked for it. Then the pastor claps a hand on Sam's shoulder again and quietly adds "I'll have you in my prayers, son." Sam gives him a little smile that looks convincingly sincere, and Dean feels his hackles raise a little bit as Clark turns around and heads back into the connecting hall. Like this man's prayers to a non-existent God are going to help anyone.
He braces himself for the cold as Sam nudges the massive carved door open. Once outside, Sam stops on the concrete steps and turns to look back at the church. "You get anything?" he asks.
"I, uh." Dammit. "I left the EMF meter at the motel."
"What?" Sam whirls around to gape at him. "Seriously?"
"I forgot it, Sam. People forget things."
Sam throws up his hands in frustration. "Yeah, people forget things. And people ignore things. And people blow off things. So which one of those are you doing?"
"Dammit, Sam, I am not blowing this off. I just forgot, all right? It happens. And what was that all about, with Clark having you in his prayers?"
"Don't change the subject."
"Subject number one is finished. I forgot the EMF meter. End of story. New subject: Why is that guy praying for you?"
"Fuck if I know. He saw me yawning. He could tell I was tired. I don't know. Maybe I just look like a guy who needs to be prayed for. Why does it matter?" Sam looks away and sighs heavily. Probably counting to ten. Or doing some relaxation mantra or whatever weird shit he picked up in California. "Okay. Let's go get the EMF meter and then talk to Mr. Montrose."
[ 3. I've got my heart set on anywhere but here ]
"All right, Sam, explain to me again why we're doing this," Dean says as he steers the Impala down the Montrose's street. It's neat and quiet, lined with magnolias and dogwoods. The kind of street where people think they're safe from any kind of evil, supernatural or not. "Cause so far, it just sounds like a guy who offed his wife."
"Darius Montrose," Sam reads from his notes. The notes Dean would have already read, if he wasn't being such a dick about this case. "His wife Belinda was suffering from metastatic cancer and was given a few more months to live. They came home from a meeting with Pastor Clark, where they were literally planning her funeral. Here. This is their house, on the right."
"And healing prayers," says Dean, as he parks on the street in front of a large, elegant brick house. "Don't forget good ol' Pastor Clark was sending up those healing prayers for her. And you."
Sam ignores the comment - he's had enough of this bullshit about the prayers. The more people praying for him, the better, and he doesn't care if Dean has a problem with it. "They get home, she lays down for a nap, and he cuts her throat. And doesn't remember doing it." They climb out of the Impala and head up a nicely landscaped walkway.
"So, like I said, a guy who offed his wife. And he's out on the street because...?"
Sam suppresses the urge to wrap his coat tightly around him. Dean was right; Tennessee is a lot colder than it ought to be, but he's not going to give him the satisfaction of admitting it. He waves at their genteel surroundings. "Fine upstanding member of the community, not considered a flight risk, general consensus is that it was a mercy killing. Boom, he's out on bail."
"Mercy killing. Because she was dying of cancer. So how is a mercy killing our business?"
They step onto the broad front porch. "Because I don't think it's a mercy killing," Sam sighs. Because when you want to put someone you love out of their misery, you don't cut their throat. And yes, he's thought about exactly how you would put someone you love out of their misery. He's considered the pros and cons of a bullet to the brain versus a pillow over their unconscious face. He thinks Dean would probably be horrified to know how often he thinks about the logistics of a merciful death.
He presses the burnished brass doorbell, putting on his Fed face when the door opens. "Mr. Montrose? I'm Agent Osbourne and this is Agent Rhodes. Thank you for agreeing to see us on such short notice."
Darius Montrose is the saddest-looking man Sam has ever seen, with big chocolate-brown eyes that droop like a Bassett hound's. He doesn't speak, but opens the door wider and motions them inside. He leads them into a glassed-in sunroom, cheerful even on this dreary day, with bright-cushioned wicker furniture and flowering plants. Framed photos show the Montrose family in happier times: weddings, graduations, vacations. One photo shows four people in evening wear - Darius, Belinda, a man who looks so much like a younger version of Darius that he must be their son, and a pretty young blonde woman who looks very familiar. Sam can't place her, but he recognizes her from somewhere.
"This was Binny's favorite room in the house," Montrose says, settling into a chair. Sam and Dean take the wicker sofa across from him. "She wanted to be in here when she passed."
"Is this where..." Sam nudges Dean's foot before he can finish his question, but Montrose shakes his head.
"No. Upstairs, in our bedroom." He sighs and looks around him. "If that's why you're here, you can go on up. I don't go in there any more."
"Right now we just want to ask you some questions, and try to find out what happened," Sam says. "I know this is difficult, but if you can tell us everything you remember, it would be very helpful. I know you've talked to the police, but we'd like to hear it directly from you, in your own words. What do you remember about that day? Was there anything unusual, even something that you didn't think could be related?"
Montrose settles back into his chair. "Like I said, we went to the church to talk to Pastor Clark about Binny's... Binny wanted to plan her service. She said she wanted to take that off me. She was the one who was dying, but she was always more worried about me." He pushes aside his glasses to wipe his eyes. "And then we came home and she went upstairs for a nap..." His voice trails off.
"And so that's when...?" asks Dean. Sam nudges his foot again. For Christ's sake, Dean, stop pushing the poor guy.
"Maybe you should go check out the bedroom now, Agent Rhodes," Sam says, putting a hand on his jacket pocket. Dean pats his own pocket, where Sam made damn sure he stashed his EMF meter, and nods.
"Yeah, I'll go do that." Dean stands and moves toward the stairs. "Don't worry, Mr. Montrose. You don't need to be there."
Montrose nods without looking at Dean or the stairs to his bedroom. "Go on ahead. It's the last door on the right." He rests a hand morosely on his cheek and turns to stare at the photos of his former life. "I don't know," he says slowly. "I don't know. It was like I was having a nightmare. When I woke up I was holding the knife, and there was so much blood, and she was dying. I remember calling 911, but I don't remember anything before that. I didn't remember doing it. I still don't remember."
Sam wishes he could say something. Anything. We'll catch the monster who did this. Except, as far as you know, it was you. I know how you feel. The woman I loved died because of me, too. And it's never going to be okay. Yeah, that's helpful. It wasn't your fault. But nothing will ever convince this man that his wife's death wasn't his fault. Sam knows that better than anyone.
Dean shakes his head briefly when he steps back into the room. No EMF, then. It's no surprise - whatever tore the Montrose family apart, it doesn't seem to be limited to their house.
"Mr. Montrose," Sam asks, "Has anything like this happened to you before? The memory loss?"
"Never. I've never had anything like this." He looks at Sam imploringly. "My lawyer and my doctor say I must have had some kind of retrograde amnesia. Something caused by the emotional trauma. They say I did it to end her pain. That must be it, don't you think?"
(Is this how it's going to be when it comes for me? Will it slip in unchecked, unnoticed until it's too late? Will I know it's coming? Will I be able to fight it?
Will I even want to fight it?)
"I'm sure it is. I'm sure it was something like that."
///
"What did you think?" Sam asks, trailing Dean back to the Impala.
"I'm still not seeing it," Dean mutters over his shoulder. "And even if this is our kind of thing - "
Sam's patience for Dean's doubt, stretched the point of breaking, finally snaps. He stops and grabs his brother's arm. "Dean. If there's even the slightest chance this is something we can stop, we have to stop it." Because people who can't stop themselves have to be stopped by someone else.
Dean stares at him with a squint of concern. "You all right?"
(I'm a hand grenade, and I'm scared that someone already pulled the pin.)
"I'm fine. I just. We really need to do this."
"Okay." Dean's concerned look doesn't quite go away, but now it's got an added dollop of confusion. "Okay, Sam."
Following him down the brick-paved walkway, Sam thinks about being so out of control, doing something so irrevocable, and the shiver that rolls down his spine has nothing to do with Tennessee's unseasonably cold weather.
[ 4. I'm staring down myself, counting up the years ]
The Nashville police station is the kind Dean likes. Too casual to be steeped in ironclad procedures and protocols, but big enough that they can bluff their way into getting copies of the victims' files - and a little quality time with one of the killers - just by vaguely mentioning permission from higher-ups, without anyone saying "You mean Fred? He didn't tell me anything about you guys." A flash of a fake ID, some of Sam's best legal mumbo jumbo, and they're on their way.
"And why, exactly, are the Feds interested in a couple of local murders?" asks the officer escorting them to the interrogation room.
Dean raises an eyebrow at Sam. Your case, you answer him. "Yes, Agent Osbourne. Explain to the officer why the Feds are interested in a couple of local murders that don't seem to have a connection."
Sam closes his eyes and adopts an expression that Dean knows well - the if I were looking at you, this guy could tell I'm planning to strangle you in your sleep look. "Well, Agent Rhodes, as I was explaining in the car, these two killings may seem unrelated but they have some things in common with other murders around the country. We're just seeing if there's a pattern that might tie them together." He smiles brilliantly at the police officer. "Thank you for the case files. I'm sorry if it feels like we're wasting your time, but it's our job to sniff out these things. And if it turns out not to be our kind of thing, we'll be on our way. I assume that's not a problem."
Officer Whatshisface - Dean's already forgotten his name - glances at Dean and then looks away uncomfortably, like a kid watching his parents try to argue without sounding like they're arguing. Subtle move there, little brother. The guy obviously knows who Sam's mini-lecture was really meant for. "Not a problem at all," he replies. "Just curious." He unlocks the door to the interrogation room and quickly locks it behind them.
Cheryl Kramer is a small, faded-looking woman with glasses, mousy hair, and a thin, tired face. Her nails are bitten down to the quick, and she keeps her eyes focused on her hands, picking at her scabbed cuticles. "I don't understand why you're here," she says quietly. "I already told the police everything. How many more people do I have to talk to?"
Sam is in full-on empathetic mode, only stopping short of holding her hand, and Dean won't be surprised if that's the next step. "Mrs. Kramer," Sam says kindly, "We're not the local police. We're the FBI. Are you sure you told them everything? Could there be something you didn't want to tell them? Maybe you didn't think they'd believe you?"
But the puppy dog eyes won't work on someone who refuses to look at them. Cheryl drops her gaze even further, staring at her lap. "I'm not hiding anything," she says in a low monotone voice.
"No, no, I'm not saying you're hiding something," Sam says. "But sometimes people see or hear things that they don't want to talk about, because they don't think the authorities will believe them. I just want you to know that we're not like that. So if there's anything you were afraid to say earlier, you can tell us. We're here to listen."
Nothing. Cheryl sighs deeply but doesn't look up from her lap. Sam catches Dean's eye and mouths drugs? It doesn't seem likely that a woman in the county lockup would be allowed sedatives, but it would explain her trancelike behavior, and God knows she'd probably need them. Dean would need them. Dean would need to be strapped to the bed, drugged to the gills, stripped of his belt and shoelaces, and on a 24/7 suicide watch if he were in her shoes. And yeah, he has been thinking about that a lot. Can't stop thinking about it.
"Mrs. Kramer," he says sharply. If she's in a drugged haze, he wants to cut through it. "I know you've given a statement to the police, but we're the FBI, and we'd like to hear it directly from you. Can you tell me what you remember about the incident?"
"The incident?" She jerks her head up. "The incident? You mean, me murdering my son? Is that what we're calling it? An incident?"
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Kramer. I know this is difficult."
The room reverberates with a loud smack as she stands up and slaps the table with both hands. "No, you don't know! You don't know a goddamn thing! Difficult? You have no idea how much I loved my boy! I never gave up even when he got sick and his father left us, and then I wake up one day and I'm standing over my Paul with blood all over my hands and blood all over his face, and you call it difficult?" She crumples back into her chair, drained, and now she's looking Dean in the eye and won't let go. "I loved him so much, and I killed him. Can you even imagine?"
Dean feels his heart slowly stutter to a stop because he can, he does, he imagines, no matter how hard he tries not to. He pictures his hands stained red with Sam's blood and he wonders if he could do it and if he could ever forgive himself if he did, and if Sam would forgive him if he didn't, and now here's Cheryl Kramer, sitting here in this interrogation room like the ghost of fucking Christmas future, showing him what it's going to feel like. He feels Sam staring at him but he can't figure out how to get started again; he's momentarily forgotten how to give a shit about the deaths of people he doesn't know, and suddenly Sam is speaking.
"You woke up? What do you mean, you woke up?"
"God! I told you, I don't want to go through this again! I just kind of woke up, like I was sleepwalking or something, there was blood everywhere and I woke up. Please, don't make me do this again." She's fading again. She slumps back into her chair and stares at her hands, at her bloody, torn cuticles.
Sam's voice softens. "No, of course, Mrs. Kramer. We're almost done." He looks down at his notes. "Can you tell me about Paul's activities in the church?"
"Just teen stuff," she sighs. "The youth group. He used to be very involved. But things got... complicated."
"So he wasn't in the choir?"
"Not for a couple of years. Like I said, things got complicated. With his illness."
"Yes." Sam nods knowingly, the little bullshit artist. "His illness. His..." He pauses and flips through his notes, as if he's already got Paul Kramer's medical history written down somewhere.
"His schizophrenia." She looks away and wipes her eyes. "Can we stop now?"
Sam gives her a sad, sympathetic smile. "I'm so sorry to have to ask you these questions, but there's just one more thing I need to know. Do you remember anything unusual leading up to... what happened? Do you remember hearing voices, or feeling cold spots, or smelling anything unusual, like rotten eggs?"
"Oh, you think since Paul was schizophrenic, I must be crazy too? Or I was having a stroke? I wish to God I was. I wish I had some excuse. But I don't remember anything. All I remember is the blood and waking up and seeing my Paul... and I don't know why. I don't know why." She stops staring at her hands and looks up at Sam. "Are we done?"
"Of course, Mrs. Kramer," Sam says. "We're very sorry for your loss." He scoops up the case files and raps on the door to get Officer Whatshisface's attention. "If you think of anything later that you'd like to tell us, please let one of the staff here know." But Cheryl Kramer is staring at her hands, lost in her own world again.
Dean feels a little lost too, as he wordlessly follows Sam out of the building.
///
Onward to chapter 2