SPN WIPs
So, these are all the WIPs and snippets I have for Supernatural in all their unedited, unrevised, fragmented glory! Warnings appear at the top of each WIP, along with filenames (so you can clearly see my unique creativity even extends to filenames. I don't think anyone can ever come up with a more orginal filename than "Sam_dean story 125." Schyeah.)
Also, for those who want to read, a bunch of ellipses denotes gaps in the same work. **s mean purposeful and intended transitions in time. lots of +s mean end of that file.
filename: tifaching_prompt.rtf
"Dean."
He turns, Sam's face softly lit, lap of stale water hitting the edge of their ride. Sam's face is soft, all honeyed tan and vulnerable, and he can't. His hand finds the soft curve of bone, fingers edged by a long, loose hint of curling hair - Sam's jaw, sharp and thin under skin, cupped in his hand.
The squeak and pull of their boat is hypnotic, and he watches Sam breathe in the not-dark, staring at him, Dean, like he's a savior, a good thing, "hey, Sammy," he manages, voice gone and thick.
He leans in, heart pounding, hands sweating, and for a minute he thinks this is what it feels like to be crazy, to die. Then he feels the flare of heat against his lips before he's kissing his brother, coaxing Sam's mouth open, taking warm, wet heat and devouring everything he can get.
He wants, he wants, and his other hand drifts around, flicks the damn pink and purple unicorn out of the way, hard enough that Sam sighs a protest (and Dean remembers amber lights, shrieks and sweetielovehappy in the background, a hand of darts and hitting dead center first time, pointing high and hearing Sam laugh, seeing Sam hold out his arms, wrapping tight and easy around the gently matted material handed to him, like he was never going to let go. Sam, meeting him eye to eye -and when did he get so tall - eyes light and happy, dancing, leaning in and brushing a kiss over his cheek, thanks, baby, just what I wanted, and dancing away again, off to the fun house and forced screams), and maybe Dean doesn't knock it into the water like he was going to, just away, enough to find the hem of Sam's worn teeshirt, enough to reach skin and the jump-shift of muscle underneath.
God, god, and he's not sure if he thinks it or he says it or Sam says it, not aware of anything but pressure against him, pulling his brother closer, almost forcing Sam into his lap, and Sam's mouth, sweet with the fake tang of soda, hands at his neck, in the short hairs at the crown of his head.
They pull away to breathe, gasp and hot/cold air sliding down their throats, blocking sounds and anything else that isn't Sam, isn't Dean, isn't desirewantneed that burns in his veins. Sam's leaning his forehead against Dean's, inhale and exhale and inhale, and there are sudden edges of light creeping toward them, the hint of day not quite done. Dean looks at his brother, eyes close and undeniable, waiting for fear or anger or uncertainty.
The ride skirts the edge of done, Sam smiles, and Dean falls in love.
lonetread_prompt
Jess says, "God, Sam, yes. Yes," and she's nodding, eyes shiny and wet looking, looking at Sam like everything was going to be okay.
And Sam says, "Sammy. I'm Sammy."
"I don't understand how anyone could want to hurt you."
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Notes: lonetread's prompt - this one, I can't say where I was going with. Gotta say, first two lines go together, but the last one, I think, was just a stray sentence that I liked and stuck there for the time being until I could use it. Maybe.
Also, tifaching's prompt seems finished? But it since it was with the others I just copied the whole thing. Sorry.
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filename: spn_s2 reimagined.rtf
warnings: major character death, violence, angst
"you burn my body," sam grits out, "this ends here."
**
It starts with Sam actually killing John.
"Do it, Sam. I can't hold him for long - "
"Sam, don't you do it. Don't you do it."
"Sam!"
Things are bright little snapshots. The blast of the Colt, the smell of gunpowder. John's body falling limp to the floor. Dean's mindless screams. Each one is a picture, laid out slow and clear in front of him until he actually turns to look over at Dean, and the confusion, the horror, makes everything jump into fast-forward.
"Sam, no - " and Dean's up and rushing him, knocking Sam and the Colt to the ground, but it's too late, Dad's already there before them, eyes shut - Sam can see it when his own head hits the floor, black/yellow flashes of pain before it clears and he turns his head to see their dad laid out on the floor - blood pooling, threading through creaks and bumps, wending its way in thick red rivulets..
Sam's face is numb from the fall, waves of tingling shivers running all through him, over and over, fading into the background when Dean's fist crashes down into him.
**
Sam whispers, when Dean's dragging him out, loading him into the Impala. Snatches of things, stupid shit, and Dean doesn't listen. Except when he's flipping the seat back, Sam's swollen, crusted eyes open as much as they can. Stare in Dean's general area, and Dean can tell Sam's not tracking all that well.
"He was going to kill you."
Direct, muffled by swollen lips and blood leaking in the back of Sam's throat.
Dean doesn't say anything right away, just gets in, cranks the car, tries not to feel like his insides are burning, twisting, like something's really fuckin wrong.
It's only later, when the Impala's whining down the road, and Sam's passed out again, hoarse half pants letting Dean know his brother hasn't croaked, when he says anything. "That doesn't make it right."
Dean spends two days with Sam's blood on his hands. Red smears on his knuckles, sunk into his fingernails. He's dirty, dust and sweaty funk; Sam's not much better, with the added tang of gunpowder, sharp and biting whenever Dean drifts too close.
"Sam," he says, but his brother won't look over at him. His bruises are still fresh, startling, and Dean's watched Sam's split lip crack open and bleed over and over, even though Sam isn't talking.
He spends hours staring at Sam. Not much else to do, holed up in some backwater cabin, one of the fuckin hundreds Bobby seems to have stashed across the country, just for times like these.
He snorts. Sam jumps. Who has times like these, anyway?
Day one passes like that, stomaches growling on and off, Dean's throat aching a red hot line to his guts (mashed and mushed, but Dean doesn't want to think why, doesn't want to think after).
The second day passes much the same, Dean staring, Sam not, until the sun sliding past cracked, bare windows, turns things washed out and gray, makes Dean see flashes of bright color that don't exist.
It always starts the same, always him, always "Sam." Ends the same, too, the back of his brother's head, sweat and oil making the dark strands almost black and completely flat.
The something burning in Dean's gut, though, is a cold burning heat, now, a hollow throb, and maybe he's bleeding out inside his body, maybe it's that, and not hunger or thirst making him light-headed and lazy, but he thinks if Sam looks - just looks then.
Then.
He's sick of it, suddenly, anger thick and cloying, molding dirt and blood crusted
hands into fists, ragged, chewed nails dipping and digging into the skin of his palm. Sudden.
Fuck you, he thinks, laser beaming straight at the back of Sam's shaggy, father-killing -
"What'd they call it," he croaks, willing his brother to look at him, goddamn see, "what you did. Huh, Sam? Big fancy words - " dig, dig, dig. Fuckin need something here. "What - "
"Patricide," Sam whispers, "patricide, and you know that." Sam's up, fragile against the heavy air and manic, scuttling around the dingy gray room, bruises weird shadows across his face, darker gray than the light pallor of him.
Dean thinks maybe he should've kept going, spread his baby brother's blood and skin like pulp across his hands, until Dean was covered in it, until Sam (tearing at cupboards, fling cans and boxes in his search for fuckin something) really did stop moving, until he stopped breathing.
Maybe it would've been the better thing to do.
**
There's a bird in Sam's chest that swoops and dives every time he hears Dean shift. It's cracking itself against his ribs, he thinks, a bloody, thick lump at the pit of his stomach.
His face hurts, his chest throbs with his breathing, two thick points of pain from the weight of Dean's knees pressing him down back at the warehouse, holding him still, as if he even thought to move.
Dean's voice is acid, bitter and rough, and Sam mumbles back, flashes of grief and anger and the sharp crack of the Colt ringing in his ears. Dean's white face twisting, mouth screaming, still not at ease, still in pain after all this time, and he thinks inside, inside, Christ.
He knows Dean's watching him rampage around the cabin. This is a hunter's cabin, and Sam knows he'll find what he needs. It's about the only thing he's sure of.
When he finds what he's been looking for, he pauses, debates cleaning himself up first. The cabin doesn't have running water, but the battered jug of stale water hiding in a stipped down cupboard is filled, it's thin, moldable plastic bulging with it's contents, overflow leaking out of the spigot when he jostles it.
... ... ... ...
Sam's heart drops, and he stumbles to a halt, sweat gathering cold and slick along his skin as he looks around. Down.
A mud-covered field. "Oh, god."
He hears his name shouted, still distant and blurred by it, and he knows what's coming, and he yells, "Dean -" because he has to say it. No, Dean. Stop. Don't. But there's a shadow over his shoulder - Jake, Jake, he knows it's Jake - and he turns to face it and in that split second he sees it, blinding, painful flash of painheatblood and when he's bracing just for the next vision, he sees -
- darkness.
"Sammy!"
He thinks, I changed everything else, why not this part? But it's too late. A split second, not even a complete turn to face Jake, and he feels it, rip/tear and a gush of heat that has him staggering, while footsteps gain and fade, gain and fade. When he falls to his knees Dean's there, and Sam works through the pain, the lethargy, and looks. Dean's face is almost inhuman, just horror and fear and grief so strong they're almost alive, writhing in the creases and the corners.
"Sammy, Sammy," and there are Dean's hands, and Dean's arms, and it takes every effort not to sink down, not to tip forward.
It takes all his strength to turn in the tight grip his brother has on him, to yell, "Bobby!" when he sees feet run past them. "Bobby," and he can feel Dean stiffen, knows that if he looked he'd see the hurt bleeding all over Dean's face.
"Son, son," Bobby's kneeling, too, slightly winded. There are tears in his eyes, and Sam loses focus, becomes hypnotized by them, until Dean shakes at him.
"It's Meg," Sam gasps, "it's Meg, and she'll be in Wyoming, at the Devil's Gate Colt was protecting. Jake. Jake -"
"It's alright, son, you rest now," and Sam thinks no, no no. You have to hear this, you have to, but Bobby's up, moving away and everything's too far away and too difficult, his tongue thick, garbling everything he's trying to say, but he still turns back, feels one of Dean's hands pressing into the small of his back, sending ripples of fire through his gut.
"Dean," and it's weak, low. Sam can feel Dean's breath when he leans in close. Sweat and leather and something just Dean. "Dean. You burn my body." He hears and feels the hitch, the muffled sob, feels the shakes that spread throughout Dean's body. It's not surprising that Dean's grip tightens, hardens, hurts where he's latched onto Sam. Dean's shaking apart, and Sam can't escape it, can't escape the words that spill out of Dean's mouth - lies and denial and everything that says Dean can't do this. "This ends here." And it's done, Sam's done it, everything he could, and it's a mix of grief and warmth, cresting in waves over him. I did it, he thinks muzzily, and then: please, Dean, let me go.
Things are fuzzy, faded; Sam knows that he's scared, but it's vague and slipping away with everything else, and as he closes his eyes he hears his brother scream.
_________________
Notes (not mindblowing or anything, aha) on where this was going: I love multi-POV fics, when they're done right. This was my attempt, which I think would've worked, had it not slinked its way to terminal WIP-land.
Notes I had in the body of the fic:
- every time sam sees cold oak, a rush of s3-5 happens, and as sam reworks things, those kaleidoscopic rushes shorten, until - right when he's standing in the middle of the muddy field - he flashes on Jake and the knife and pain and there's only blackness after.
- ava and meg - reason all the special kids get dragged to cold oak. meg wants revenge for azazel, ava is half-crazy from azazel's training (since going back to peoria).
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filename: take what you can carry_john_bobby.rtf
warnings: graphic domestic violence, fiddly-diddly fanon, and my own powers of make-believe, even in the face of canon
Bobby says, "you're an idiot," when John pulls up. It's almost dark, and Bobby's house isn't much more than a dimly lit smear against the shadows.
"Bobby." If he was standing in front of anyone but who he's actually in front of, the tone would be enough. Tired and angry and promising pain, but Bobby just scoffs and doesn't move.
"You're a jackass, John, and that ain't no surprise." Bobby's just another elongated shadow in front of the screen door and the low light coming out from behind him. "Come on in, I guess, since I know you ain't leavin til you soak my shirt in all your manly tears."
It's a heartwarming tale of two men, John thinks with an internal eye roll, against adversity.
These are the facts about John: he was christened John Eric Winchester. He was born April 22, 1954. His blood type is AB. He has been a Marine, a mechanic and a nomad. He was widowed in 1983 and was left with two little boys. Seven years later, another son came along. He was a veteran.
A nice, tidy package for the world to deal with.
The facts include: he was a hunter. Spirits, remnants, demons, and everything in between. He raised two boys into the life, and another he let escape that fate. He learned that destiny was real and luck was capricious.
Those are more messy, though, and anyone walking down the straight wouldn't bother to ever learn them, steering clear of the dark man with a bad attitude.
His sons called him a hero. Others called him a criminal.
That's another thing he'd learned: everything's relative.
John knew from the time that Sam was born that he was different. More stubborn, more aware, more independent.
The thing that Dean can't remember is that he hated Sam for the first six months of Sam's life. Every picture John and Mary had of Dean holding Sam was the result of a bribe.
Dean, hold your brother and you can have pie for dessert tonight. Dean, after this we'll toss the football around. Dean, if you want to go to the park...
He'd tried to hide it from Mary, John knows that. Every time his mom had been in the room, Dean was all smiles, even though he'd never touched the baby. But Dean's always hated lying, and even back then he hadn't been able to do it for long. Dean had told Mary that Sam stank and was loud and annoying and pulled his hair. The squinty-faced bundle that Mary carted around was Dean's number one enemy, and John sometimes thinks the only reason Dean ever grew to accept Sam was because Dean loved John too much to give him hell after Mary's death. God knows John was expecting WWIII or armageddon, but Dean only ever shrugged and smiled and held on so hard to Sammy's baby blankets (that smelled like heat and fire and death, for weeks and weeks, no matter what John did), when John was too bleary-eyed and hung over to see to anyone, let alone a preschooler and a little baby.
It was only when Sam started getting bigger, pressed into Dean's side so thoroughly that John would sometimes forget that SamnDean wasn't just one person, that in fact he had two sons and not a hybrid with massive dimples and an attitude problem, that John realized the problem was actually worse than Dean's hatred. Sam was Dean's obsession, now, so totally and completely that John could practically hear Mary's warm, husky voice say, "well, hon, what'd you expect?" And, then, because she was as contrary as they come, "you know, some think that excessive love is actually repressed hate. So, maybe things aren't as different as you think."
Psychobabble, John called it. He'd gotten familiar with it after the Marines, all the reorientation back into a healthy societal role and on and on until he was blue in the face, and dying just to blurt, "so you mean I can't kill the next civvie that cuts me in the line?" just to see the shrink's face pale splotch and twist into a grimace. Mary spouted it because she loved making him turn bright red, loved seeing him speechless and twitchy.
John could see it, though. Where everything could go to hell real quick, where Sam breaking Dean's heart could be the end of...something, something important. John would hate to see it and he spent most of his time trying to get Dean out, whether training and simple hunt-related things or with other kids his age. Getting in trouble, ripping up whatever town they were in at the time. Something, so his boys could be two separate people again.
It worked until John turned his back for an hour, a minute. Christ, a second. Dean went out, met people. Dean learned and excelled at everything John put in front of him, and just when John was sure that Dean understood, finally realized everything he could be or could have, he'd spy them out and they were clicked back into place, SamnDean.
He wanted to tell them, "you'll regret it." Wanted to warn them, like he could see their future rolled out right before him, the long years of too much and not enough and betrayal. All there, for him to see, and he wanted to say it'll never work and you'll be stuck paying forever. He wanted to say, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done this.
But Sam was stubborn and angry and lost and Dean couldn't see anything besides his little brother, the kid who wanted desperately to fit in somewhere, and never really could.
Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, Sam was devouring books and homework. Acing tests and signing up for the debate team. John knew Sam would be the one to leave. Knew it in his bones that the newly raised hackles weren't just hormones and teenage drama.
Knew by Dean's franticness, his almost panicked training and work, that he knew it, too, and couldn't figure out a way to make Sam stay.
Bobby relents, moving to the side, so John has a clear view of the porch and, beyond that, the beginning of the little hallway in Bobby's house. Crossing the yard and climbing the steps almost feels like punishment, the weight of Bobby's eyes on him heavy. He wants to shrink and hide, because Bobby's judged him before, all stern looks and quiet sneering, found him failing in ways that John couldn't disagree with.
This time's no different, and the feeling isn't lessened when he slips past Bobby, but is stopped with a calloused, hot hand on his arm. "Where's Dean?" Because even now, it's not unusual for Sam to bitch and moan until John drops him, leaves him in the current rental, when a case dictates, means hours in the car and hundreds of miles piled on the odometer.
John shrugs him off but doesn't move. That's Bobby's house ahead of him, dusty and stuffy. "Heading to California."
"John - "
"With Sam."
It's like the air between them clears, thunderheads rolling out and leaving calm space behind. "Oh."
What was strange when Mary was pregnant with Dean was that the beginning was blurry in John's mind. He couldn't remember how and when Mary actually told him. It seemed like they were moving into their house, sickeningly infatuated with each other when they weren't raring to kill each other, and then she was bent over the toilet, and John was there, nodding like he knew everything about the situation and saying, "morning sickness," like Mary didn't have a clue.
They fought about that particular personality quirk a lot. It's always the same or almost, at least. John remembered it most, though, because Mary's belly was big under one of John's old shirts, big with her belly button poking out ("like cooking a Thanksgiving turkey," Mary would say, and pat her belly, smiling like everything was a secret. "Almost done.").
"This," she said, voice that mix of vicious and dark that had taken John by surprise the first few times he heard it. It's a voice that knew how to hurt, and John learned, a few times flayed alive by her tongue, and he knew just what was coming. "This is why I didn't like you back in high school, John. You're a condescending bastard, but you know what? What are you? A washed up ex-Marine? A car repairman?" Mary's eyes always snapped, everything was always so alive, even her hate. "So quit acting like you're the king of the mountain. You're just like the rest of us lowly humans."
The words stay crisp in his mind, then and years later, although he won't remember when they burrowed deep into his skull. He was too busy practically sprinting for the door. He'd grown up seeing his father put his hands on his mother. He'd heard the screams and saw the bruises and the fear and the blood. That's why he joined the Corps, when he felt the beginnings of a useless, frazzled anger, when daydreams suddenly seemed a bit too real, too violent. It calmed him down, the training, the war, the bloodshed. And now that he's back?
Better just to leave.
John almost likes how Bobby's house stays as cramped and dirty as the first time he saw it. Things change because of time, because of circumstance or the end result of stagnation.
Bobby changes. But Bobby's house doesn't. There are always the same books scattered about, the same bags and herbs and oils spread out from whatever supernatural experiment Bobby's obsessed with now. Same amount of dishes in the sink, same must and leather smell hanging around, sometimes mixed with incense or something sharper, more bitter, depending on the hour or the day.
He stands in the foyer, breathing in, even and deep. It's almost perfect, almost enough to bring a smile to his face, even though it feels like his face is fit to split from grief and rage, and not anything else.
"You're an idjit," Bobby's rants all start the same.
They usually end the same, too. The only variables that switch it up are the two that aren't here. Bobby'd scoffed when he first heard about John dragging his kids to hell and back, back when John was still green. Had studied and ranted and kept his distance for a long while when he finally met the Winchesters.
Somewhere along the way, he became worse than a mama bear with her cubs about John's boys.
Sometimes John appreciates it. Most times he hates it.
This was what he remembered most clearly about his mom and dad:
His father, sitting on his mom's pregnant belly on the kitchen floor. Blood was
smeared along the lower part of the refrigerator. His father's hands were wrapped high around his mom's neck, not choking but using the grip as leverage to bash her head into the floor, the leading edge of the bottom of the fridge. His mom's hands were spotted deep brown, dried circles along her fingers and wrists where they gripped at John's dad.
His mom healed in the weeks following, staying at the hospital for days before coming back home. He watched his mom's swollen belly shrink back into shape, and remembered idly that he never got his promised brother or sister.
He was six.
John's skin feels tight. It's felt that way ever since Sam and Dean came to him - always a united front when it mattered, and that thought alone shouldn't sink John's stomach like it does - packet gripped tight in Sam's hands. He tells himself he couldn't stop it, he shouldn't even want to.
"The kid's allowed," he mumbles, stopping dead in the middle of Bobby's house. He feels the almost collision in the way Bobby stumbles behind him, cusses up a storm before straightening.
"The hell you mutterin over there?"
He looks back. Bobby's face is dark, glowering. It's the same face he's known for
years. Bobby changes, but Bobby doesn't seem to age. Not at this point.
"Christo," he says, just as low as before, but Bobby cottons on, sharp wave of his hand chopping through the air, dismissing him.
John smirks. It always pays to be sure.
John was ten when his parents bought their first home. It was small, wood floors, tons of windows, a yard and a little garden filled with colorful flowers and sweet smelling bushes. The house was an off-white color with red shudders, and John remembered always looking for that stain of color against the dullness. That was it, that was home.
He loved it, and he thought it was haunted.
Things would move or disappear. Sometimes when his parents fought (hard smack of skin on skin; the scrap and thud of a body hitting furniture; the screams and the footsteps that never went anywhere, never got away), he'd hide somewhere. Sometimes, sometimes it'd be harder to get out of those places, when the tables had been righted, the glass swept up, his mom locked in the bathroom with powders and ointments. When it was over and he'd turn the brass knob, dark in places where the finish rubbed off (too many hands, he'd think, and wonder who, if anyone crouched where he did, if maybe the dip in the very back of the coat closet was from another body sitting and waiting for everything to go quiet), it wouldn't turn or it'd be stuck or there would be weight pressed against the door.
His mom would say, "it's an old house, baby." The words would be pressed, hot, into his hair, her hands braced on his sloping shoulders. "Things settle."
That was always her answer, "it's the way it settled." Or, "just age, John." Or, "don't worry."
He never told his dad.
"Ha ha, you jackass," Bobby growls. His hand is hard on John's shoulder. Leading him, John thinks. But Bobby seems as clueless as him. Just one of those nights. "You want a beer?"
"Yeah," John says, and leans against the counter as Bobby rummages around in the fridge. There's the familiar trucker's cap and flannel over shirt. The side glimpse of beard and hint of dark eyes.
"What?" Bobby's head's cocked when he pushes the two bottles on the counter, his turn to hunt for the damn opener.
Maybe it's because tonight feels like an end to something. His boys off, Sam for good, maybe, Dean for however long Sam can con him into staying. But he feels pushed out there, off track and lost.
"Nothing," he says and Bobby snorts.
He's known what kind of father he was since Sam's first birthday. A storebought cake, a present. No candles, nothing else. If John's honest (or drunk, sometimes it seems one can't go without the other, most days) he'd been in the middle of trying to get to the boys to Pastor Jim's so he could get to a wendigo hunt and he hadn't really cared. Hadn't really even remembered until Dean's tiny face (so narrow, so skinny. Even back then he'd been hollowed out, honed, to be everything he thought he had to be) swam in front of his sleep-starved blurry eyes at the ass crack of dawn.
"Sammy turns one today, Daddy," he'd said, solemn and intent. The world ending and the world beginning with that one sentence.
For Dean it had.
Maybe the one good thing he'd done that day was sit up, grunt an affirmative and stumble around the hotel room looking for pants and a shirt. He'd never been able to imagine what would have happened had he ignored Dean or waved him away or dismissed him.
He loaded them up a few hours later, headed to the nearest Wal-Mart to browse the slightly stale left over cakes and pick up a toy. He'd covered everything, per Dean's orders, with his jacket while Sammy slumped against his shoulder, sound asleep.
______________
Notes: for some bigbang or other. Endgame was John/Bobby ... I just couldn't do it. It wanted to stay gen, which was fine, but I lost interest in it soon after, lols. MOST. SHALLOW.
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filename: possible norahy prompt.rtf
warnings: bit of sexist language
"You really are a girl, aren't you," he mutters, and leans nearer to run his hand quickly across Sam's bare thigh, feels the prickle of coarse hair and pulls back. Sam yelps, and Dean says, "makin sure you haven't started shavin your legs yet, Samantha." When Sam glares, Dean adds, "apparently, we've still got time."
"You know," and Sam's voice is snotty little brother, all disdain and anger, "in most states, Dean, fondling your brother's thigh could be misconstrued as, you know, something illegal ."
Sam's still glaring, eyes fox sharp and liquid, waiting for Dean's comeback, some snark that'll put this whole thing on an even keel (anger, irritation, distance). Dean blinks, lets his eyes travel down his brother's body before coming back to rest on Sam's face. He hears something that almost, almost, sounds like a gasp, and Dean smirks.
... ... ... ... ...
"I just sometimes miss being brothers," Sam says.
Dean wants to snap you do? but he manages, "we still are, Sam."
Sam huffs, gets up, moving restlessly, fidgeting. "No. I mean, yeah, okay, we are. But we're...this," Sam waves a hand between them, where Dean's sprawled, naked, except for a thin sheet over his lap and to himself, boxers on and nothing else, so Dean gets the point. "First, now. Like, no matter what, this is the answer."
Dean scratches at his forehead, head ducked down. Don't look, don't look. "And?" He tries not to make it sulky or stubborn, but Sam spins, face panicky.
His words are calm, though. "It's not enough, all the time. You know?" He collapses back on the bed, apparently all his energy gone leaving with his pronouncement. "I'm sorry, I -"
"Sam."
"I'm not really used to this, yet. I guess. Maybe I didn't think I'd get to be used to it." When Sam's arm stop flailing it falls back to his thigh with a slap. "I don't know."
"You thought...what? It'd be love 'em and leave 'em with you and - and me? Like I could do that?" It's fucked up, but Dean almost says, we're family, Sam. Like that's good, healthy, in this conversation. He chokes the words back, leaves the spoken ones hanging there, sharp and bitter.
"I don't know," Sam stares straight ahead at the line of accordion doors marking off the wall-length closet. They have their own fuckin sides, for chrissakes. "I said I don't know."
___________
Notes: maybe angsty domestic fic? Again? Sounds about right ...
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filename: norahy prompt (again! look how I managed to not finish two fics for you, norahy! I know you feel special, now!)
The world doesn't shatter, it doesn't break, and it doesn't end. They're sitting at a rickety table, scent of stale grease in the air, remnants of breakfast scattered between them. Dean rubs both his hands over his face, travels an arc through his hair to the back of his head before lifting his eyes to Sam's. His shoulders are hunched, and for some reason that gets to Sam's stomach. It's like the broken curve of leather is an omen, an end of something that even angels and demons couldn't destroy.
Dean says, "there's somethin I've been meaning to talk to you about," and the words are quiet, close up Sam's throat like they were his own. It's unfortunate, really, since his throat spasms around the partially swallowed gulp of coffee, making him choke and cough, spraying stale dregs across the table, drops staining the back of Dean's hand.
Sam watches Dean frown, slow through tacky fear and an aching throat. Dean leans over to smear the drops on the sleeve of Sam's shirt, but Sam can't move, the press of his brother's knuckles is rough and sharp through the cheap material.
"Yeah," he manages, but it burns his mouth, comes out weak and reedy, and Dean pushes back into his chair again, opens his mouth and begins talking real estate.
**
Dean's new dream is flipping houses. Too many episodes of Flip that House at 4 o'clock in the morning, too many hours of saying it's enough; we've done enough, of wiping his blood off his body, rinsing Sam's off his hands, and Dean's sure. Lead paint and faulty wiring seem like the perfect set up.
He sees Sam's heart break over his face, he sees the shattered pieces of guilt and greed and happiness. There sharp enough to cut, to stab the air around them, closed off and quiet in the Impala
___________________
Notes: fragments of domestic fic, I think, that was supposed to be all happy? Seeing as norahy is always on me to write fluff, or at least not hopeless, helpless angsty man!pain, ahaha.
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filename: ohsam h_c meme
warnings: forced humor! dime can't write funny. this is where she finds that out!
"Straight, Sam, straight!" Dean's jerking, bad leg braced as well as he can, left hand clutching the Impala's door, the other bending fingers in the dash.
"Straight," Sam's slurring, but it's the best he's been since getting to the car, into it, behind the fucking wheel, and Dean wouldn't have done it, shouldn't have done it, but his leg's screaming agony, and he couldn't get two miles down the road with his right leg shuffled off to the side, trying to drive with his left.
And Sam. Sam had fallen from a second story window, safe, safe, until his head had cracked against a little Welcome to Our HOME sign in the front yard. Then there'd been blacking out, puking, and sounds that maybe should have been the English language but weren't quite close enough for Dean's piece of mind.
Fuck, he thinks, fuck fuck "FUCK!" And he feels the car swerve back, hears the heavy sound of the wheels finding and gripping pavement again.
Dean breathes a sigh of relief, feels like if he can just scream loud enough, get his leg to stay still, they might just be able to make it the twenty miles to the ER.
Then Sam leans over, eyes dilating wildly and voice harsh from acid going the wrong way, and says, "shh, don't wake the cheese."
"Je - " and Sam's glaring harder, now, and maybe Dean's a little out of it, a little fuzzy, because it takes him a minute to realize if Sam's busy staring a hole into Dean's head, that means he's not fuckin watching the road.
_____________________
Notes: yep. told you. (also, actual prompt this was trying to be a response to is lost to time).
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filename: death story.
warnings: really? okay. happy. ending. ahahahahahaha
He's dying. His chest rises and falls, easy and rhythmic, fingers spread wide and even across his heart, beat beat beat, counting every moment.
It's not obvious, Sam knows that. It's not tears and anger, fighting. It's just a gasp, even and low at night, when no one's awake, when no one can tell. It's the start of sentence he can't recall, something cut off, in heat and smoke.
He knows all the ways he's died, can recount them all, and sometimes when Dean grins, says Sammy, Sammy, Sammy-boy, when he reaches out and his fingers brush against the ends of Sam's hair (like he meant to aim higher, cheek or temple, actual skin. Something real), sometimes when he dips his head and walks to the bar and slides onto the stool ... sometimes then Sam wants to blurt them out, spew them out like some twisted, fucked up origin story, and this is how Sam Winchester came to be. This is how Sam Winchester came to die.
Dean knows. Has to imagine it. Sam might be dangerous, but he's not stupid, and he knows how his brother (lips against scratched knee, stop crying, I've got you, little kid voice whispering shame, shame, SHAME on you. You're the one in back of all this ...) thinks even now.
He's dying, neurons firing and frying, myelin sheathes eroding, all the basic ... Samness ... crumbling every time he blinks and laughs and thinks.
**
Death got it wrong. That's the thing; Death was wrong from the very beginning.
Death lied, Dean, he thinks, sitting across from his brother, from the knocking knees, from the rasp of jeans and eyes that are all for him. You don't know, you don't, but Death lied.
Death was ... kind.
**
Dean says it like it's easy. Sam keeps seeing two small bodies huddled together, leaning and merging in the back seat. Keeps feeling Dean's heavy stillness next to him, every breath saying remember, remember, and Sam does.
When they find the boys, Dean's goddamnit slips out of him, rumbling and angry
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
"I don't know what I'm doing."
"Good thing I do then, huh?" And Sam thinks, yes, yes, but when Dean presses closer it's only to pull Sam more firmly into him, manuevering so that Sam's head rests in the crook of Dean's neck, and Dean can wrap his arms around him, tight tight tight, one hand buried in Sam's hair, cupping the back of his neck.
I'm dying, Dean.
Shh, sleep. Everything's alright.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
When the world inside your body kills you, she says, I will weep.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
I'm not insane, he thinks, blood and cocklebur in his hand, blood on his face, blood like tears down his cheek. I'm not insane because this is really happening.
What else, he thinks hysterically, what else would a crazy person say.
____________________________
Notes: lots of gaps here, and sentences thrown in just because I like them? And maybe wanted to work them into the plot, had I ever written enough to figure out what the plot was beyond. "wall bad. sam crazy. angst. DEATH."
++++++++++++++++
filename: bb_2011
warnings canon character death.
Summer
Beaver, OK, 1965
She's not a stranger. Ten years ago they were five and he was holding her mud-slick hand on the bank of the Beaver River, her stained and worn dress wet and tripping her around chubby little girl legs.
Except the last time they'd talked, they were ten, and it was some fight, winter cold settling in, killing everything down to brown and stems. She'd walked away, blond hair pulled back and simple, and he'd just lost his best friend.
They're fifteen, now, and Karen's wearing some yellow and black dress that should look foolish as all get out, but instead bares legs past the knee, and she's standing there, looking at him, blonde hair poofed and curled out on the ends.
"Karen! Karen!" It's some other girl, and Bobby gets the sense of brown hair or red, but Karen doesn't turn, standing still on the side of the sidewalk, downtown stroll in the evening interrupted by a ghost from her past, but stares at him a minute longer.
He opens his mouth, can't help but smell the tang of river air, the screech of a day by the water. He's not quick enough, and he sees small shoulders curl inward, head bow (bright yellow plastic band almost hidden by the hair around it), before Karen turns, makes her way down the side walk to the group of kids waiting beyond the next intersection.
He loses that first chance, but he knows his daddy'd have his hide (and his mama, with that frown and that sigh, would be bringing up the rear) if he didn't at least try to make amends when he had the chance. And they would find out, he knows that. Karen'd mention it to her mama who'd mention it to his mama who'd say something to his father. And then they'd start in, like they had more stakes in the friendship than Karen or he did. She's a nice girl, his mama would say (had said before), and she was so sweet on you when you were babies. Maybe it's time ...
And, well, maybe it is time. The broad, worn steps leading up to the front porch are familiar. The filigreed screen door is the same, too, and the blonde haired girl standing behind it in flared pants and a bright shirt sure is the prettiest thing Bobby's ever seen.
"Hi, Bobby," Karen says, and the words lilt up, follow her body as it bounces a little.
"Hi."
He fumbles it, spit choked and sweating. He drags his eyes away, down to the steps as he goes up one then two, wood groaning under his weight. When he's that much closer, he says, "you - you looked nice yesterday." He stops, words hanging in the thick air, and Karen looks a little confused, a little hurt. "But you look nice now," he blurts out. His hands are sweating and he rubs them on the rough material. He's seen the styles other boys wear, heading into Montgomery Ward for the latest, and he feels stupid, all plain colors and patched holes. "I mean, you always did look nice."
"Oh, right. Thanks." The words are weak, but she steps out, toward the railing.
"You're pretty," he says helplessly, and she laughs, short blonde hair whispering over her shoulders as her head tips back. And he feels like the butt of a bad joke, suddenly, starting to regret coming over here. "It's not that funny."
"Oh, Bobby." The words are hiccuped, and Karen's wiping tears from her cheeks, pink and flushed, mouth grinning easily. "Calm down, I'm not laughin at you."
Bobby scoffs and makes to turn away, but a hand on his arm stops him. Karen's leaning around a column, chest pressed against it in an effort to reach him and stay put at the same time. "No, really, I'm not." She holds up her hand, palm toward him, "I swear."
"Yeah?" He asks.
She nods, smile back on and eyes soft, "yeah."
He grins back, feeling it crack through sweat tracks from the walk from his family's farm to hers, and he slumps onto the steps he was about to storm off of. He watches her come around, a long pale arm trailing the width of the column she'd been leaning against, fingers outstretched until the last moment, and then falling to her sides as she walks to the other side of him, slipping in beside him .
She's pressed close, shoulder to shoulder, thin thigh against the outside of his. He thinks maybe he could put an arm around her and she wouldn't mind, but he doesn't, just leaves them dangling between his knees.
Her skin's soft under the slip she's wearing. His hands feel dirty and callused against her, and he almost wants to get up, scrub away until all the signs of his work are gone, skin pink and fresh like some city boy, the type of guy he's seen Karen smile and laugh with.
Spring
Near Sioux Falls, SD, 1978
It's the bottle tastes good now, only thing that keeps him going. It's only been two months and the house is already dirty, dusty, everything that living smack dab in the middle of a salvage yard'll do. Bobby thinks maybe he should be up in arms against it, fight to keep it all away the way Karen did. Every day she was cleaning up a mess wasn't hers, smiling and humming and kissing him in the morning, before he'd brushed his teeth, even.
It don't do right, a man should be loved that way.
The whiskey burns, or would do, maybe, if his throat wasn't numb by now. The women have all been by, dropping off casseroles and offering their time on Saturday, their weekly condolences. It's better, Bobby thinks, has to be better than every day, every god damn hour of every day, like it was the first month, seems like.
He doesn't tell them about the tupperware containers in the freezer, marked all careful and proud in Karen's cursive. Meals laid out to last weeks, if he wanted, if he could bear to look and touch long enough to reheat them. He doesn't tell them that, doesn't say anything but thank you and miss and see ya'll next week.
They'll stop coming, eventually. Already he's getting weird looks more often than not. Bouiffanted hair all disapproving and sly about the bottles of liquor cluttering tables and counters, stale clothes and wild beard
... ... ... ... ... ... ...
"This ain't gonna help Jo, you know," he says. Ellen's striding step for step with him, and damn, but he's never seen a woman so prideful just by walking. "She's gonna end up hooked on huntin - it takin the two people she loves most away from her."
Ellen stalls and Bobby does, too, up ahead and turning back to face her blacked out form. They're silent, only Ellen's harsh breath clear between them, and the low song of crickets behind it. "I'm not dying."
He snorts, idjit. "But you ain't there, either."
"She's twelve, Bobby, she don't need me around every second of every day. Besides, she's looked after."
"She's twelve, and she just lost her daddy," Bobby says, "do you have a right to runnin away?"
He sees the tears in the dark. They make her eyes shine something fierce. "Don't you - " and she's coming towards him, shotgun pointed down and finger on the guard. Her other hand's up, sharp and pointed, ready to poke him square in the chest. "Don't you dare lecture me, Bobby Singer. I know what your little town thinks of you."
He wants to flinch, but her acid isn't anything new. He knew day one what her temper was like, fast and deep, written all over her face. "It's the truth, Ellen, and that's fine. But I don't have a kid. Not then and not now. I had allowances you don't get." He doesn't apologize for it - she doesn't need it, doesn't want it, he knows that.
"So I - I should be like John, huh, is that what you're saying? Some good-for-nothing, sonuvabitch draggin a kid around?" Bobby's starting to think it's not gonna be ending with a poke in the chest, but that shotgun coming up and whacking him in the head.
"Ellen," he says, and it's a warning. Not stop, not don't you dare, because those don't work with hunters. It's remember where we are; dead weight's not what you need right now.
She jerks back from leaning in, jaw up and tight as her short nod.
_______________
Notes: bigbang again? All about Bobby, because ILU BOBBY. But really, having to research for a fic? phhhhhhhhhhhhhhhbt. no, thanks, man.
Hokay. I think that's all of them! Enjoy, I guess? TREASURE ALL THE WORK I DIDN'T DO.
Also, for those who want to read, a bunch of ellipses denotes gaps in the same work. **s mean purposeful and intended transitions in time. lots of +s mean end of that file.
filename: tifaching_prompt.rtf
"Dean."
He turns, Sam's face softly lit, lap of stale water hitting the edge of their ride. Sam's face is soft, all honeyed tan and vulnerable, and he can't. His hand finds the soft curve of bone, fingers edged by a long, loose hint of curling hair - Sam's jaw, sharp and thin under skin, cupped in his hand.
The squeak and pull of their boat is hypnotic, and he watches Sam breathe in the not-dark, staring at him, Dean, like he's a savior, a good thing, "hey, Sammy," he manages, voice gone and thick.
He leans in, heart pounding, hands sweating, and for a minute he thinks this is what it feels like to be crazy, to die. Then he feels the flare of heat against his lips before he's kissing his brother, coaxing Sam's mouth open, taking warm, wet heat and devouring everything he can get.
He wants, he wants, and his other hand drifts around, flicks the damn pink and purple unicorn out of the way, hard enough that Sam sighs a protest (and Dean remembers amber lights, shrieks and sweetielovehappy in the background, a hand of darts and hitting dead center first time, pointing high and hearing Sam laugh, seeing Sam hold out his arms, wrapping tight and easy around the gently matted material handed to him, like he was never going to let go. Sam, meeting him eye to eye -and when did he get so tall - eyes light and happy, dancing, leaning in and brushing a kiss over his cheek, thanks, baby, just what I wanted, and dancing away again, off to the fun house and forced screams), and maybe Dean doesn't knock it into the water like he was going to, just away, enough to find the hem of Sam's worn teeshirt, enough to reach skin and the jump-shift of muscle underneath.
God, god, and he's not sure if he thinks it or he says it or Sam says it, not aware of anything but pressure against him, pulling his brother closer, almost forcing Sam into his lap, and Sam's mouth, sweet with the fake tang of soda, hands at his neck, in the short hairs at the crown of his head.
They pull away to breathe, gasp and hot/cold air sliding down their throats, blocking sounds and anything else that isn't Sam, isn't Dean, isn't desirewantneed that burns in his veins. Sam's leaning his forehead against Dean's, inhale and exhale and inhale, and there are sudden edges of light creeping toward them, the hint of day not quite done. Dean looks at his brother, eyes close and undeniable, waiting for fear or anger or uncertainty.
The ride skirts the edge of done, Sam smiles, and Dean falls in love.
lonetread_prompt
Jess says, "God, Sam, yes. Yes," and she's nodding, eyes shiny and wet looking, looking at Sam like everything was going to be okay.
And Sam says, "Sammy. I'm Sammy."
"I don't understand how anyone could want to hurt you."
_____________
Notes: lonetread's prompt - this one, I can't say where I was going with. Gotta say, first two lines go together, but the last one, I think, was just a stray sentence that I liked and stuck there for the time being until I could use it. Maybe.
Also, tifaching's prompt seems finished? But it since it was with the others I just copied the whole thing. Sorry.
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filename: spn_s2 reimagined.rtf
warnings: major character death, violence, angst
"you burn my body," sam grits out, "this ends here."
**
It starts with Sam actually killing John.
"Do it, Sam. I can't hold him for long - "
"Sam, don't you do it. Don't you do it."
"Sam!"
Things are bright little snapshots. The blast of the Colt, the smell of gunpowder. John's body falling limp to the floor. Dean's mindless screams. Each one is a picture, laid out slow and clear in front of him until he actually turns to look over at Dean, and the confusion, the horror, makes everything jump into fast-forward.
"Sam, no - " and Dean's up and rushing him, knocking Sam and the Colt to the ground, but it's too late, Dad's already there before them, eyes shut - Sam can see it when his own head hits the floor, black/yellow flashes of pain before it clears and he turns his head to see their dad laid out on the floor - blood pooling, threading through creaks and bumps, wending its way in thick red rivulets..
Sam's face is numb from the fall, waves of tingling shivers running all through him, over and over, fading into the background when Dean's fist crashes down into him.
**
Sam whispers, when Dean's dragging him out, loading him into the Impala. Snatches of things, stupid shit, and Dean doesn't listen. Except when he's flipping the seat back, Sam's swollen, crusted eyes open as much as they can. Stare in Dean's general area, and Dean can tell Sam's not tracking all that well.
"He was going to kill you."
Direct, muffled by swollen lips and blood leaking in the back of Sam's throat.
Dean doesn't say anything right away, just gets in, cranks the car, tries not to feel like his insides are burning, twisting, like something's really fuckin wrong.
It's only later, when the Impala's whining down the road, and Sam's passed out again, hoarse half pants letting Dean know his brother hasn't croaked, when he says anything. "That doesn't make it right."
Dean spends two days with Sam's blood on his hands. Red smears on his knuckles, sunk into his fingernails. He's dirty, dust and sweaty funk; Sam's not much better, with the added tang of gunpowder, sharp and biting whenever Dean drifts too close.
"Sam," he says, but his brother won't look over at him. His bruises are still fresh, startling, and Dean's watched Sam's split lip crack open and bleed over and over, even though Sam isn't talking.
He spends hours staring at Sam. Not much else to do, holed up in some backwater cabin, one of the fuckin hundreds Bobby seems to have stashed across the country, just for times like these.
He snorts. Sam jumps. Who has times like these, anyway?
Day one passes like that, stomaches growling on and off, Dean's throat aching a red hot line to his guts (mashed and mushed, but Dean doesn't want to think why, doesn't want to think after).
The second day passes much the same, Dean staring, Sam not, until the sun sliding past cracked, bare windows, turns things washed out and gray, makes Dean see flashes of bright color that don't exist.
It always starts the same, always him, always "Sam." Ends the same, too, the back of his brother's head, sweat and oil making the dark strands almost black and completely flat.
The something burning in Dean's gut, though, is a cold burning heat, now, a hollow throb, and maybe he's bleeding out inside his body, maybe it's that, and not hunger or thirst making him light-headed and lazy, but he thinks if Sam looks - just looks then.
Then.
He's sick of it, suddenly, anger thick and cloying, molding dirt and blood crusted
hands into fists, ragged, chewed nails dipping and digging into the skin of his palm. Sudden.
Fuck you, he thinks, laser beaming straight at the back of Sam's shaggy, father-killing -
"What'd they call it," he croaks, willing his brother to look at him, goddamn see, "what you did. Huh, Sam? Big fancy words - " dig, dig, dig. Fuckin need something here. "What - "
"Patricide," Sam whispers, "patricide, and you know that." Sam's up, fragile against the heavy air and manic, scuttling around the dingy gray room, bruises weird shadows across his face, darker gray than the light pallor of him.
Dean thinks maybe he should've kept going, spread his baby brother's blood and skin like pulp across his hands, until Dean was covered in it, until Sam (tearing at cupboards, fling cans and boxes in his search for fuckin something) really did stop moving, until he stopped breathing.
Maybe it would've been the better thing to do.
**
There's a bird in Sam's chest that swoops and dives every time he hears Dean shift. It's cracking itself against his ribs, he thinks, a bloody, thick lump at the pit of his stomach.
His face hurts, his chest throbs with his breathing, two thick points of pain from the weight of Dean's knees pressing him down back at the warehouse, holding him still, as if he even thought to move.
Dean's voice is acid, bitter and rough, and Sam mumbles back, flashes of grief and anger and the sharp crack of the Colt ringing in his ears. Dean's white face twisting, mouth screaming, still not at ease, still in pain after all this time, and he thinks inside, inside, Christ.
He knows Dean's watching him rampage around the cabin. This is a hunter's cabin, and Sam knows he'll find what he needs. It's about the only thing he's sure of.
When he finds what he's been looking for, he pauses, debates cleaning himself up first. The cabin doesn't have running water, but the battered jug of stale water hiding in a stipped down cupboard is filled, it's thin, moldable plastic bulging with it's contents, overflow leaking out of the spigot when he jostles it.
... ... ... ...
Sam's heart drops, and he stumbles to a halt, sweat gathering cold and slick along his skin as he looks around. Down.
A mud-covered field. "Oh, god."
He hears his name shouted, still distant and blurred by it, and he knows what's coming, and he yells, "Dean -" because he has to say it. No, Dean. Stop. Don't. But there's a shadow over his shoulder - Jake, Jake, he knows it's Jake - and he turns to face it and in that split second he sees it, blinding, painful flash of painheatblood and when he's bracing just for the next vision, he sees -
- darkness.
"Sammy!"
He thinks, I changed everything else, why not this part? But it's too late. A split second, not even a complete turn to face Jake, and he feels it, rip/tear and a gush of heat that has him staggering, while footsteps gain and fade, gain and fade. When he falls to his knees Dean's there, and Sam works through the pain, the lethargy, and looks. Dean's face is almost inhuman, just horror and fear and grief so strong they're almost alive, writhing in the creases and the corners.
"Sammy, Sammy," and there are Dean's hands, and Dean's arms, and it takes every effort not to sink down, not to tip forward.
It takes all his strength to turn in the tight grip his brother has on him, to yell, "Bobby!" when he sees feet run past them. "Bobby," and he can feel Dean stiffen, knows that if he looked he'd see the hurt bleeding all over Dean's face.
"Son, son," Bobby's kneeling, too, slightly winded. There are tears in his eyes, and Sam loses focus, becomes hypnotized by them, until Dean shakes at him.
"It's Meg," Sam gasps, "it's Meg, and she'll be in Wyoming, at the Devil's Gate Colt was protecting. Jake. Jake -"
"It's alright, son, you rest now," and Sam thinks no, no no. You have to hear this, you have to, but Bobby's up, moving away and everything's too far away and too difficult, his tongue thick, garbling everything he's trying to say, but he still turns back, feels one of Dean's hands pressing into the small of his back, sending ripples of fire through his gut.
"Dean," and it's weak, low. Sam can feel Dean's breath when he leans in close. Sweat and leather and something just Dean. "Dean. You burn my body." He hears and feels the hitch, the muffled sob, feels the shakes that spread throughout Dean's body. It's not surprising that Dean's grip tightens, hardens, hurts where he's latched onto Sam. Dean's shaking apart, and Sam can't escape it, can't escape the words that spill out of Dean's mouth - lies and denial and everything that says Dean can't do this. "This ends here." And it's done, Sam's done it, everything he could, and it's a mix of grief and warmth, cresting in waves over him. I did it, he thinks muzzily, and then: please, Dean, let me go.
Things are fuzzy, faded; Sam knows that he's scared, but it's vague and slipping away with everything else, and as he closes his eyes he hears his brother scream.
_________________
Notes (not mindblowing or anything, aha) on where this was going: I love multi-POV fics, when they're done right. This was my attempt, which I think would've worked, had it not slinked its way to terminal WIP-land.
Notes I had in the body of the fic:
- every time sam sees cold oak, a rush of s3-5 happens, and as sam reworks things, those kaleidoscopic rushes shorten, until - right when he's standing in the middle of the muddy field - he flashes on Jake and the knife and pain and there's only blackness after.
- ava and meg - reason all the special kids get dragged to cold oak. meg wants revenge for azazel, ava is half-crazy from azazel's training (since going back to peoria).
+++++++++++++++++++
filename: take what you can carry_john_bobby.rtf
warnings: graphic domestic violence, fiddly-diddly fanon, and my own powers of make-believe, even in the face of canon
Bobby says, "you're an idiot," when John pulls up. It's almost dark, and Bobby's house isn't much more than a dimly lit smear against the shadows.
"Bobby." If he was standing in front of anyone but who he's actually in front of, the tone would be enough. Tired and angry and promising pain, but Bobby just scoffs and doesn't move.
"You're a jackass, John, and that ain't no surprise." Bobby's just another elongated shadow in front of the screen door and the low light coming out from behind him. "Come on in, I guess, since I know you ain't leavin til you soak my shirt in all your manly tears."
It's a heartwarming tale of two men, John thinks with an internal eye roll, against adversity.
These are the facts about John: he was christened John Eric Winchester. He was born April 22, 1954. His blood type is AB. He has been a Marine, a mechanic and a nomad. He was widowed in 1983 and was left with two little boys. Seven years later, another son came along. He was a veteran.
A nice, tidy package for the world to deal with.
The facts include: he was a hunter. Spirits, remnants, demons, and everything in between. He raised two boys into the life, and another he let escape that fate. He learned that destiny was real and luck was capricious.
Those are more messy, though, and anyone walking down the straight wouldn't bother to ever learn them, steering clear of the dark man with a bad attitude.
His sons called him a hero. Others called him a criminal.
That's another thing he'd learned: everything's relative.
John knew from the time that Sam was born that he was different. More stubborn, more aware, more independent.
The thing that Dean can't remember is that he hated Sam for the first six months of Sam's life. Every picture John and Mary had of Dean holding Sam was the result of a bribe.
Dean, hold your brother and you can have pie for dessert tonight. Dean, after this we'll toss the football around. Dean, if you want to go to the park...
He'd tried to hide it from Mary, John knows that. Every time his mom had been in the room, Dean was all smiles, even though he'd never touched the baby. But Dean's always hated lying, and even back then he hadn't been able to do it for long. Dean had told Mary that Sam stank and was loud and annoying and pulled his hair. The squinty-faced bundle that Mary carted around was Dean's number one enemy, and John sometimes thinks the only reason Dean ever grew to accept Sam was because Dean loved John too much to give him hell after Mary's death. God knows John was expecting WWIII or armageddon, but Dean only ever shrugged and smiled and held on so hard to Sammy's baby blankets (that smelled like heat and fire and death, for weeks and weeks, no matter what John did), when John was too bleary-eyed and hung over to see to anyone, let alone a preschooler and a little baby.
It was only when Sam started getting bigger, pressed into Dean's side so thoroughly that John would sometimes forget that SamnDean wasn't just one person, that in fact he had two sons and not a hybrid with massive dimples and an attitude problem, that John realized the problem was actually worse than Dean's hatred. Sam was Dean's obsession, now, so totally and completely that John could practically hear Mary's warm, husky voice say, "well, hon, what'd you expect?" And, then, because she was as contrary as they come, "you know, some think that excessive love is actually repressed hate. So, maybe things aren't as different as you think."
Psychobabble, John called it. He'd gotten familiar with it after the Marines, all the reorientation back into a healthy societal role and on and on until he was blue in the face, and dying just to blurt, "so you mean I can't kill the next civvie that cuts me in the line?" just to see the shrink's face pale splotch and twist into a grimace. Mary spouted it because she loved making him turn bright red, loved seeing him speechless and twitchy.
John could see it, though. Where everything could go to hell real quick, where Sam breaking Dean's heart could be the end of...something, something important. John would hate to see it and he spent most of his time trying to get Dean out, whether training and simple hunt-related things or with other kids his age. Getting in trouble, ripping up whatever town they were in at the time. Something, so his boys could be two separate people again.
It worked until John turned his back for an hour, a minute. Christ, a second. Dean went out, met people. Dean learned and excelled at everything John put in front of him, and just when John was sure that Dean understood, finally realized everything he could be or could have, he'd spy them out and they were clicked back into place, SamnDean.
He wanted to tell them, "you'll regret it." Wanted to warn them, like he could see their future rolled out right before him, the long years of too much and not enough and betrayal. All there, for him to see, and he wanted to say it'll never work and you'll be stuck paying forever. He wanted to say, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done this.
But Sam was stubborn and angry and lost and Dean couldn't see anything besides his little brother, the kid who wanted desperately to fit in somewhere, and never really could.
Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, Sam was devouring books and homework. Acing tests and signing up for the debate team. John knew Sam would be the one to leave. Knew it in his bones that the newly raised hackles weren't just hormones and teenage drama.
Knew by Dean's franticness, his almost panicked training and work, that he knew it, too, and couldn't figure out a way to make Sam stay.
Bobby relents, moving to the side, so John has a clear view of the porch and, beyond that, the beginning of the little hallway in Bobby's house. Crossing the yard and climbing the steps almost feels like punishment, the weight of Bobby's eyes on him heavy. He wants to shrink and hide, because Bobby's judged him before, all stern looks and quiet sneering, found him failing in ways that John couldn't disagree with.
This time's no different, and the feeling isn't lessened when he slips past Bobby, but is stopped with a calloused, hot hand on his arm. "Where's Dean?" Because even now, it's not unusual for Sam to bitch and moan until John drops him, leaves him in the current rental, when a case dictates, means hours in the car and hundreds of miles piled on the odometer.
John shrugs him off but doesn't move. That's Bobby's house ahead of him, dusty and stuffy. "Heading to California."
"John - "
"With Sam."
It's like the air between them clears, thunderheads rolling out and leaving calm space behind. "Oh."
What was strange when Mary was pregnant with Dean was that the beginning was blurry in John's mind. He couldn't remember how and when Mary actually told him. It seemed like they were moving into their house, sickeningly infatuated with each other when they weren't raring to kill each other, and then she was bent over the toilet, and John was there, nodding like he knew everything about the situation and saying, "morning sickness," like Mary didn't have a clue.
They fought about that particular personality quirk a lot. It's always the same or almost, at least. John remembered it most, though, because Mary's belly was big under one of John's old shirts, big with her belly button poking out ("like cooking a Thanksgiving turkey," Mary would say, and pat her belly, smiling like everything was a secret. "Almost done.").
"This," she said, voice that mix of vicious and dark that had taken John by surprise the first few times he heard it. It's a voice that knew how to hurt, and John learned, a few times flayed alive by her tongue, and he knew just what was coming. "This is why I didn't like you back in high school, John. You're a condescending bastard, but you know what? What are you? A washed up ex-Marine? A car repairman?" Mary's eyes always snapped, everything was always so alive, even her hate. "So quit acting like you're the king of the mountain. You're just like the rest of us lowly humans."
The words stay crisp in his mind, then and years later, although he won't remember when they burrowed deep into his skull. He was too busy practically sprinting for the door. He'd grown up seeing his father put his hands on his mother. He'd heard the screams and saw the bruises and the fear and the blood. That's why he joined the Corps, when he felt the beginnings of a useless, frazzled anger, when daydreams suddenly seemed a bit too real, too violent. It calmed him down, the training, the war, the bloodshed. And now that he's back?
Better just to leave.
John almost likes how Bobby's house stays as cramped and dirty as the first time he saw it. Things change because of time, because of circumstance or the end result of stagnation.
Bobby changes. But Bobby's house doesn't. There are always the same books scattered about, the same bags and herbs and oils spread out from whatever supernatural experiment Bobby's obsessed with now. Same amount of dishes in the sink, same must and leather smell hanging around, sometimes mixed with incense or something sharper, more bitter, depending on the hour or the day.
He stands in the foyer, breathing in, even and deep. It's almost perfect, almost enough to bring a smile to his face, even though it feels like his face is fit to split from grief and rage, and not anything else.
"You're an idjit," Bobby's rants all start the same.
They usually end the same, too. The only variables that switch it up are the two that aren't here. Bobby'd scoffed when he first heard about John dragging his kids to hell and back, back when John was still green. Had studied and ranted and kept his distance for a long while when he finally met the Winchesters.
Somewhere along the way, he became worse than a mama bear with her cubs about John's boys.
Sometimes John appreciates it. Most times he hates it.
This was what he remembered most clearly about his mom and dad:
His father, sitting on his mom's pregnant belly on the kitchen floor. Blood was
smeared along the lower part of the refrigerator. His father's hands were wrapped high around his mom's neck, not choking but using the grip as leverage to bash her head into the floor, the leading edge of the bottom of the fridge. His mom's hands were spotted deep brown, dried circles along her fingers and wrists where they gripped at John's dad.
His mom healed in the weeks following, staying at the hospital for days before coming back home. He watched his mom's swollen belly shrink back into shape, and remembered idly that he never got his promised brother or sister.
He was six.
John's skin feels tight. It's felt that way ever since Sam and Dean came to him - always a united front when it mattered, and that thought alone shouldn't sink John's stomach like it does - packet gripped tight in Sam's hands. He tells himself he couldn't stop it, he shouldn't even want to.
"The kid's allowed," he mumbles, stopping dead in the middle of Bobby's house. He feels the almost collision in the way Bobby stumbles behind him, cusses up a storm before straightening.
"The hell you mutterin over there?"
He looks back. Bobby's face is dark, glowering. It's the same face he's known for
years. Bobby changes, but Bobby doesn't seem to age. Not at this point.
"Christo," he says, just as low as before, but Bobby cottons on, sharp wave of his hand chopping through the air, dismissing him.
John smirks. It always pays to be sure.
John was ten when his parents bought their first home. It was small, wood floors, tons of windows, a yard and a little garden filled with colorful flowers and sweet smelling bushes. The house was an off-white color with red shudders, and John remembered always looking for that stain of color against the dullness. That was it, that was home.
He loved it, and he thought it was haunted.
Things would move or disappear. Sometimes when his parents fought (hard smack of skin on skin; the scrap and thud of a body hitting furniture; the screams and the footsteps that never went anywhere, never got away), he'd hide somewhere. Sometimes, sometimes it'd be harder to get out of those places, when the tables had been righted, the glass swept up, his mom locked in the bathroom with powders and ointments. When it was over and he'd turn the brass knob, dark in places where the finish rubbed off (too many hands, he'd think, and wonder who, if anyone crouched where he did, if maybe the dip in the very back of the coat closet was from another body sitting and waiting for everything to go quiet), it wouldn't turn or it'd be stuck or there would be weight pressed against the door.
His mom would say, "it's an old house, baby." The words would be pressed, hot, into his hair, her hands braced on his sloping shoulders. "Things settle."
That was always her answer, "it's the way it settled." Or, "just age, John." Or, "don't worry."
He never told his dad.
"Ha ha, you jackass," Bobby growls. His hand is hard on John's shoulder. Leading him, John thinks. But Bobby seems as clueless as him. Just one of those nights. "You want a beer?"
"Yeah," John says, and leans against the counter as Bobby rummages around in the fridge. There's the familiar trucker's cap and flannel over shirt. The side glimpse of beard and hint of dark eyes.
"What?" Bobby's head's cocked when he pushes the two bottles on the counter, his turn to hunt for the damn opener.
Maybe it's because tonight feels like an end to something. His boys off, Sam for good, maybe, Dean for however long Sam can con him into staying. But he feels pushed out there, off track and lost.
"Nothing," he says and Bobby snorts.
He's known what kind of father he was since Sam's first birthday. A storebought cake, a present. No candles, nothing else. If John's honest (or drunk, sometimes it seems one can't go without the other, most days) he'd been in the middle of trying to get to the boys to Pastor Jim's so he could get to a wendigo hunt and he hadn't really cared. Hadn't really even remembered until Dean's tiny face (so narrow, so skinny. Even back then he'd been hollowed out, honed, to be everything he thought he had to be) swam in front of his sleep-starved blurry eyes at the ass crack of dawn.
"Sammy turns one today, Daddy," he'd said, solemn and intent. The world ending and the world beginning with that one sentence.
For Dean it had.
Maybe the one good thing he'd done that day was sit up, grunt an affirmative and stumble around the hotel room looking for pants and a shirt. He'd never been able to imagine what would have happened had he ignored Dean or waved him away or dismissed him.
He loaded them up a few hours later, headed to the nearest Wal-Mart to browse the slightly stale left over cakes and pick up a toy. He'd covered everything, per Dean's orders, with his jacket while Sammy slumped against his shoulder, sound asleep.
______________
Notes: for some bigbang or other. Endgame was John/Bobby ... I just couldn't do it. It wanted to stay gen, which was fine, but I lost interest in it soon after, lols. MOST. SHALLOW.
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filename: possible norahy prompt.rtf
warnings: bit of sexist language
"You really are a girl, aren't you," he mutters, and leans nearer to run his hand quickly across Sam's bare thigh, feels the prickle of coarse hair and pulls back. Sam yelps, and Dean says, "makin sure you haven't started shavin your legs yet, Samantha." When Sam glares, Dean adds, "apparently, we've still got time."
"You know," and Sam's voice is snotty little brother, all disdain and anger, "in most states, Dean, fondling your brother's thigh could be misconstrued as, you know, something illegal ."
Sam's still glaring, eyes fox sharp and liquid, waiting for Dean's comeback, some snark that'll put this whole thing on an even keel (anger, irritation, distance). Dean blinks, lets his eyes travel down his brother's body before coming back to rest on Sam's face. He hears something that almost, almost, sounds like a gasp, and Dean smirks.
... ... ... ... ...
"I just sometimes miss being brothers," Sam says.
Dean wants to snap you do? but he manages, "we still are, Sam."
Sam huffs, gets up, moving restlessly, fidgeting. "No. I mean, yeah, okay, we are. But we're...this," Sam waves a hand between them, where Dean's sprawled, naked, except for a thin sheet over his lap and to himself, boxers on and nothing else, so Dean gets the point. "First, now. Like, no matter what, this is the answer."
Dean scratches at his forehead, head ducked down. Don't look, don't look. "And?" He tries not to make it sulky or stubborn, but Sam spins, face panicky.
His words are calm, though. "It's not enough, all the time. You know?" He collapses back on the bed, apparently all his energy gone leaving with his pronouncement. "I'm sorry, I -"
"Sam."
"I'm not really used to this, yet. I guess. Maybe I didn't think I'd get to be used to it." When Sam's arm stop flailing it falls back to his thigh with a slap. "I don't know."
"You thought...what? It'd be love 'em and leave 'em with you and - and me? Like I could do that?" It's fucked up, but Dean almost says, we're family, Sam. Like that's good, healthy, in this conversation. He chokes the words back, leaves the spoken ones hanging there, sharp and bitter.
"I don't know," Sam stares straight ahead at the line of accordion doors marking off the wall-length closet. They have their own fuckin sides, for chrissakes. "I said I don't know."
___________
Notes: maybe angsty domestic fic? Again? Sounds about right ...
++++++++++++++++++++++++
filename: norahy prompt (again! look how I managed to not finish two fics for you, norahy! I know you feel special, now!)
The world doesn't shatter, it doesn't break, and it doesn't end. They're sitting at a rickety table, scent of stale grease in the air, remnants of breakfast scattered between them. Dean rubs both his hands over his face, travels an arc through his hair to the back of his head before lifting his eyes to Sam's. His shoulders are hunched, and for some reason that gets to Sam's stomach. It's like the broken curve of leather is an omen, an end of something that even angels and demons couldn't destroy.
Dean says, "there's somethin I've been meaning to talk to you about," and the words are quiet, close up Sam's throat like they were his own. It's unfortunate, really, since his throat spasms around the partially swallowed gulp of coffee, making him choke and cough, spraying stale dregs across the table, drops staining the back of Dean's hand.
Sam watches Dean frown, slow through tacky fear and an aching throat. Dean leans over to smear the drops on the sleeve of Sam's shirt, but Sam can't move, the press of his brother's knuckles is rough and sharp through the cheap material.
"Yeah," he manages, but it burns his mouth, comes out weak and reedy, and Dean pushes back into his chair again, opens his mouth and begins talking real estate.
**
Dean's new dream is flipping houses. Too many episodes of Flip that House at 4 o'clock in the morning, too many hours of saying it's enough; we've done enough, of wiping his blood off his body, rinsing Sam's off his hands, and Dean's sure. Lead paint and faulty wiring seem like the perfect set up.
He sees Sam's heart break over his face, he sees the shattered pieces of guilt and greed and happiness. There sharp enough to cut, to stab the air around them, closed off and quiet in the Impala
___________________
Notes: fragments of domestic fic, I think, that was supposed to be all happy? Seeing as norahy is always on me to write fluff, or at least not hopeless, helpless angsty man!pain, ahaha.
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filename: ohsam h_c meme
warnings: forced humor! dime can't write funny. this is where she finds that out!
"Straight, Sam, straight!" Dean's jerking, bad leg braced as well as he can, left hand clutching the Impala's door, the other bending fingers in the dash.
"Straight," Sam's slurring, but it's the best he's been since getting to the car, into it, behind the fucking wheel, and Dean wouldn't have done it, shouldn't have done it, but his leg's screaming agony, and he couldn't get two miles down the road with his right leg shuffled off to the side, trying to drive with his left.
And Sam. Sam had fallen from a second story window, safe, safe, until his head had cracked against a little Welcome to Our HOME sign in the front yard. Then there'd been blacking out, puking, and sounds that maybe should have been the English language but weren't quite close enough for Dean's piece of mind.
Fuck, he thinks, fuck fuck "FUCK!" And he feels the car swerve back, hears the heavy sound of the wheels finding and gripping pavement again.
Dean breathes a sigh of relief, feels like if he can just scream loud enough, get his leg to stay still, they might just be able to make it the twenty miles to the ER.
Then Sam leans over, eyes dilating wildly and voice harsh from acid going the wrong way, and says, "shh, don't wake the cheese."
"Je - " and Sam's glaring harder, now, and maybe Dean's a little out of it, a little fuzzy, because it takes him a minute to realize if Sam's busy staring a hole into Dean's head, that means he's not fuckin watching the road.
_____________________
Notes: yep. told you. (also, actual prompt this was trying to be a response to is lost to time).
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filename: death story.
warnings: really? okay. happy. ending. ahahahahahaha
He's dying. His chest rises and falls, easy and rhythmic, fingers spread wide and even across his heart, beat beat beat, counting every moment.
It's not obvious, Sam knows that. It's not tears and anger, fighting. It's just a gasp, even and low at night, when no one's awake, when no one can tell. It's the start of sentence he can't recall, something cut off, in heat and smoke.
He knows all the ways he's died, can recount them all, and sometimes when Dean grins, says Sammy, Sammy, Sammy-boy, when he reaches out and his fingers brush against the ends of Sam's hair (like he meant to aim higher, cheek or temple, actual skin. Something real), sometimes when he dips his head and walks to the bar and slides onto the stool ... sometimes then Sam wants to blurt them out, spew them out like some twisted, fucked up origin story, and this is how Sam Winchester came to be. This is how Sam Winchester came to die.
Dean knows. Has to imagine it. Sam might be dangerous, but he's not stupid, and he knows how his brother (lips against scratched knee, stop crying, I've got you, little kid voice whispering shame, shame, SHAME on you. You're the one in back of all this ...) thinks even now.
He's dying, neurons firing and frying, myelin sheathes eroding, all the basic ... Samness ... crumbling every time he blinks and laughs and thinks.
**
Death got it wrong. That's the thing; Death was wrong from the very beginning.
Death lied, Dean, he thinks, sitting across from his brother, from the knocking knees, from the rasp of jeans and eyes that are all for him. You don't know, you don't, but Death lied.
Death was ... kind.
**
Dean says it like it's easy. Sam keeps seeing two small bodies huddled together, leaning and merging in the back seat. Keeps feeling Dean's heavy stillness next to him, every breath saying remember, remember, and Sam does.
When they find the boys, Dean's goddamnit slips out of him, rumbling and angry
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
"I don't know what I'm doing."
"Good thing I do then, huh?" And Sam thinks, yes, yes, but when Dean presses closer it's only to pull Sam more firmly into him, manuevering so that Sam's head rests in the crook of Dean's neck, and Dean can wrap his arms around him, tight tight tight, one hand buried in Sam's hair, cupping the back of his neck.
I'm dying, Dean.
Shh, sleep. Everything's alright.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
When the world inside your body kills you, she says, I will weep.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
I'm not insane, he thinks, blood and cocklebur in his hand, blood on his face, blood like tears down his cheek. I'm not insane because this is really happening.
What else, he thinks hysterically, what else would a crazy person say.
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Notes: lots of gaps here, and sentences thrown in just because I like them? And maybe wanted to work them into the plot, had I ever written enough to figure out what the plot was beyond. "wall bad. sam crazy. angst. DEATH."
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filename: bb_2011
warnings canon character death.
Summer
Beaver, OK, 1965
She's not a stranger. Ten years ago they were five and he was holding her mud-slick hand on the bank of the Beaver River, her stained and worn dress wet and tripping her around chubby little girl legs.
Except the last time they'd talked, they were ten, and it was some fight, winter cold settling in, killing everything down to brown and stems. She'd walked away, blond hair pulled back and simple, and he'd just lost his best friend.
They're fifteen, now, and Karen's wearing some yellow and black dress that should look foolish as all get out, but instead bares legs past the knee, and she's standing there, looking at him, blonde hair poofed and curled out on the ends.
"Karen! Karen!" It's some other girl, and Bobby gets the sense of brown hair or red, but Karen doesn't turn, standing still on the side of the sidewalk, downtown stroll in the evening interrupted by a ghost from her past, but stares at him a minute longer.
He opens his mouth, can't help but smell the tang of river air, the screech of a day by the water. He's not quick enough, and he sees small shoulders curl inward, head bow (bright yellow plastic band almost hidden by the hair around it), before Karen turns, makes her way down the side walk to the group of kids waiting beyond the next intersection.
He loses that first chance, but he knows his daddy'd have his hide (and his mama, with that frown and that sigh, would be bringing up the rear) if he didn't at least try to make amends when he had the chance. And they would find out, he knows that. Karen'd mention it to her mama who'd mention it to his mama who'd say something to his father. And then they'd start in, like they had more stakes in the friendship than Karen or he did. She's a nice girl, his mama would say (had said before), and she was so sweet on you when you were babies. Maybe it's time ...
And, well, maybe it is time. The broad, worn steps leading up to the front porch are familiar. The filigreed screen door is the same, too, and the blonde haired girl standing behind it in flared pants and a bright shirt sure is the prettiest thing Bobby's ever seen.
"Hi, Bobby," Karen says, and the words lilt up, follow her body as it bounces a little.
"Hi."
He fumbles it, spit choked and sweating. He drags his eyes away, down to the steps as he goes up one then two, wood groaning under his weight. When he's that much closer, he says, "you - you looked nice yesterday." He stops, words hanging in the thick air, and Karen looks a little confused, a little hurt. "But you look nice now," he blurts out. His hands are sweating and he rubs them on the rough material. He's seen the styles other boys wear, heading into Montgomery Ward for the latest, and he feels stupid, all plain colors and patched holes. "I mean, you always did look nice."
"Oh, right. Thanks." The words are weak, but she steps out, toward the railing.
"You're pretty," he says helplessly, and she laughs, short blonde hair whispering over her shoulders as her head tips back. And he feels like the butt of a bad joke, suddenly, starting to regret coming over here. "It's not that funny."
"Oh, Bobby." The words are hiccuped, and Karen's wiping tears from her cheeks, pink and flushed, mouth grinning easily. "Calm down, I'm not laughin at you."
Bobby scoffs and makes to turn away, but a hand on his arm stops him. Karen's leaning around a column, chest pressed against it in an effort to reach him and stay put at the same time. "No, really, I'm not." She holds up her hand, palm toward him, "I swear."
"Yeah?" He asks.
She nods, smile back on and eyes soft, "yeah."
He grins back, feeling it crack through sweat tracks from the walk from his family's farm to hers, and he slumps onto the steps he was about to storm off of. He watches her come around, a long pale arm trailing the width of the column she'd been leaning against, fingers outstretched until the last moment, and then falling to her sides as she walks to the other side of him, slipping in beside him .
She's pressed close, shoulder to shoulder, thin thigh against the outside of his. He thinks maybe he could put an arm around her and she wouldn't mind, but he doesn't, just leaves them dangling between his knees.
Her skin's soft under the slip she's wearing. His hands feel dirty and callused against her, and he almost wants to get up, scrub away until all the signs of his work are gone, skin pink and fresh like some city boy, the type of guy he's seen Karen smile and laugh with.
Spring
Near Sioux Falls, SD, 1978
It's the bottle tastes good now, only thing that keeps him going. It's only been two months and the house is already dirty, dusty, everything that living smack dab in the middle of a salvage yard'll do. Bobby thinks maybe he should be up in arms against it, fight to keep it all away the way Karen did. Every day she was cleaning up a mess wasn't hers, smiling and humming and kissing him in the morning, before he'd brushed his teeth, even.
It don't do right, a man should be loved that way.
The whiskey burns, or would do, maybe, if his throat wasn't numb by now. The women have all been by, dropping off casseroles and offering their time on Saturday, their weekly condolences. It's better, Bobby thinks, has to be better than every day, every god damn hour of every day, like it was the first month, seems like.
He doesn't tell them about the tupperware containers in the freezer, marked all careful and proud in Karen's cursive. Meals laid out to last weeks, if he wanted, if he could bear to look and touch long enough to reheat them. He doesn't tell them that, doesn't say anything but thank you and miss and see ya'll next week.
They'll stop coming, eventually. Already he's getting weird looks more often than not. Bouiffanted hair all disapproving and sly about the bottles of liquor cluttering tables and counters, stale clothes and wild beard
... ... ... ... ... ... ...
"This ain't gonna help Jo, you know," he says. Ellen's striding step for step with him, and damn, but he's never seen a woman so prideful just by walking. "She's gonna end up hooked on huntin - it takin the two people she loves most away from her."
Ellen stalls and Bobby does, too, up ahead and turning back to face her blacked out form. They're silent, only Ellen's harsh breath clear between them, and the low song of crickets behind it. "I'm not dying."
He snorts, idjit. "But you ain't there, either."
"She's twelve, Bobby, she don't need me around every second of every day. Besides, she's looked after."
"She's twelve, and she just lost her daddy," Bobby says, "do you have a right to runnin away?"
He sees the tears in the dark. They make her eyes shine something fierce. "Don't you - " and she's coming towards him, shotgun pointed down and finger on the guard. Her other hand's up, sharp and pointed, ready to poke him square in the chest. "Don't you dare lecture me, Bobby Singer. I know what your little town thinks of you."
He wants to flinch, but her acid isn't anything new. He knew day one what her temper was like, fast and deep, written all over her face. "It's the truth, Ellen, and that's fine. But I don't have a kid. Not then and not now. I had allowances you don't get." He doesn't apologize for it - she doesn't need it, doesn't want it, he knows that.
"So I - I should be like John, huh, is that what you're saying? Some good-for-nothing, sonuvabitch draggin a kid around?" Bobby's starting to think it's not gonna be ending with a poke in the chest, but that shotgun coming up and whacking him in the head.
"Ellen," he says, and it's a warning. Not stop, not don't you dare, because those don't work with hunters. It's remember where we are; dead weight's not what you need right now.
She jerks back from leaning in, jaw up and tight as her short nod.
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Notes: bigbang again? All about Bobby, because ILU BOBBY. But really, having to research for a fic? phhhhhhhhhhhhhhhbt. no, thanks, man.
Hokay. I think that's all of them! Enjoy, I guess? TREASURE ALL THE WORK I DIDN'T DO.