SPN gen fic - Five Postcards Dean didn't send
I was going through my supernatural fic folder tonight - trying to force the muse to work on some of my half-written stories, when I came across a fic I wrote about 15 months ago. It was for a fanzine that never happened. I've written a number of little scenes that provide the background for this fic, but I've never actually posted the fic itself.
It's AU, in that it was written before In My Time of Dying premiered, but I kind of like that it's AU. And because it fits with the Kerouac.
TITLE: Five Postcards Dean didn't send
RATING: PG13 (gen)
CHARACTERS: Sam, Dean, Bobby; mentions of John
DISCLAIMER: Kripke and CW own Supernatural, Kerouac owns On the Road. I don’t even own the postcards.
NOTES: 2400 words. Sam POV. Set post Devil’s Trap - slightly AU. Quotes from Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’. Many thanks to missyjack, natfudge and Alistra for beta work.
“Somewhere along the line I knew there'd be girls, visions, everything; somewhere along the line the pearl would be handed to me.”
Bobby won’t let him see the Impala. It’s not like he’s going to feel guilty or anything, the truck would have hit them even if he had been concentrating on the road and not arguing with Dad while simultaneously freaking about Dean bleeding out in the back seat.
But Bobby’s got the garage locked up tight, says he’ll kick Sam’s ass if he tries busting in. Sam’s pretty sure Bobby won’t, not while he’s still in plaster, but then he remembers that summer he and Dean used the junkyard as an agility course, and Dean had snapped the aerial off Bobby’s truck as he jumped from the roof, spraining his ankle in the process. The combined wrath of Bobby Singer and John Winchester had been, frankly, a terrifying sight to behold.
So Sam gives in, and sits next to the pot-bellied stove, a tin mug of day-old coffee in his hands, Pace’s head nuzzled in his lap. He pets her soft, floppy puppy ears with his good hand, and cradles the coffee awkwardly against the cast. Bobby’s added something extra to the coffee, and it’s strong and bitter and wonderful. He drains the mug, feeling a warmth spread through the aches in his bones that the hospital drugs never quite managed to reach.
“Found this in the trunk.”
Bobby tosses a bag at his feet, it lands with a muffled thump, the contents shifting as it hits the floor. Pace’s claws skitter on worn wood as she tries to jump into Sam’s lap. Sam almost overbalances, but finally settles the lanky pup across his knees. Sam scratches behind her ear, then along her belly, and she stretches loosely under his ministrations.
“Damn lapdog,” Bobby grumbles, pretending he hadn’t been settled in that exact same position when Sam arrived.
Sam grins, and leans down to sift through the bag beside him. It’s Dean’s. Some clean clothes, though not that many - laundry hadn’t exactly been a priority since they’d last visited with Bobby - his wash kit, his favorite knife and a few books.
The books are mostly research texts that Dean’s swiped from libraries over the years, but there are some actual novels there. Sam doesn’t think he’s seen Dean crack a book since high school, or at least he hasn’t since they’ve been on the road together
They’d fallen into an easy pattern in their downtime. Sam would research or read, books and online, but Dean was happiest when he was cleaning guns, sharpening knives, working out. They’d sit, sometimes in easy conversation, sometimes in comfortable, companionable silence, and the very thought of it makes Sam’s chest hurt. A wave of something that he can only describe as homesickness swells in him, like someone took him apart and put him back together, but they left out a piece of the jigsaw.
He pulls a book from the bag. Kerouac’s On the Road. He can’t help the grin that spreads across his face. He remembers reading it one of the summers they’d moved around a lot, and had taken to quoting random passages out to Dad and Dean, insisting that they both needed to read it. Dad had just sighed resignedly and mumbled something about preaching to the choir. Sam had even started calling Dean the Holy Goof, but Dean had stubbornly refused to take offence. Or read the book
Sam opens it, flipping through a few pages. Stops when he comes to a marker. It’s a postcard, “Greetings from the White Mountains” emblazoned across the bottom, “Old Man of the Mountain” at the top, an artist’s watercolor of the famous New Hampshire rock formation in a stylized oval frame.
Sam lifts it, flips it over to see who’s been sending his brother postcards.
Hey, Sam.
His heart stutters when he sees his name curled in Dean’s loose lazy script. Pace whimpers in his lap, kneads at his thighs a little, trying to get comfortable.
Thought you’d like this, geek boy. Swear to god I had nothing to do with the collapse. Natural erosion, that’s what they said.
So, we’re following this lead, on the Kancamagus highway, and try saying that after six beers. Dad picked up the trail after some kids went missing on their way home from a party. Turns out there was an accident in the fifties, couple on their way home from prom. The girl - Sam - got killed. Guy came to, found she was dead, and committed suicide. Couldn’t live without his Sam.
So, your basic salt and burn, I guess. Except for the whole restless spirit causing a landslide. Seriously, no one suspected a thing.
Dad almost bust a vein yelling, though. Good times, Sammy-boy.
The card is stamped; his address in Palo Alto written down the side. No date, but he remembers the rock formation falling away three years ago maybe. Jesus, only Dean would turn a simple salt and burn into a natural disaster. He grins and breathes around the ache in his chest, and slips the card back into the book.
He flips a few pages further, finds a second card. This time it’s from Salem, one of those dumb old style cartoon witch ones - The Witch of Salem, circa 1692 - complete with broomstick, cat and a howling moon. He’s almost afraid to turn it over.
Sam,
Passing through, and just so you know, witches aren’t all like they say in the story books. Dad was supposed to meet with a contact here, but he got a call about a poltergeist in PA, so I hooked up with her instead.
She was Wiccan, and hot. Redhead, into peace, love, nature and life affirmation, and let’s just say we affirmed life a lot that night. Five times, I think. So, anyway - turns out this isn’t the town with the floating kid vampires, but Sammy, remember you wouldn’t watch Starsky and Hutch for months after we saw it. Or open the blinds.
So, nothing much to hunt here, think all the real ghosts are kinda ashamed to hang around this tourist trap. Meeting up with Dad in a couple of days, this gig in PA, so I’ll keep you posted. Ha.
Dean.
Sam remembers. Huddled under the plaid throw they dragged from motel to motel, popcorn so sweet it made his teeth sing, and watching the TV between his fingers. He’d barely slept that night, kept asking Dean if he was sure there was no such thing as vampires. Dean had finally stomped off to the kitchen and found an out of date pack of garlic seasoning which he spread next to the salt lines along the window. There, dumbass, happy now? Dad had freaked when he got in next morning, and Dean got yelled at for compromising the salt lines, but Sam had slept sound, knowing he was protected.
He pages through the book till he comes to the next marker. It’s a postcard from one of those roadside diners; the ones that have those giant figures outside, as if having a thirty-foot-tall fiberglass statue of a cowboy is somehow supposed to be a testimony to the sheer awesomeness of the food.
This particular giant is dressed all in white, a ten thousand gallon hat perched on his head, a black bow tie under his squared jaw, a quarter tonne burger balanced on his huge palm. Sam turns the card over.
Dude,
I’ve found the only Sam in the world taller than you, my freak of nature little brother.
There’s a little black arrow drawn to the printed info notes above Dean’s scrawl: “Cowboy Sam towers over the Cadet Restaurant in Kittanning, PA.” He can feel Dean’s laughter; he can see Dean sitting in the diner, hunched over with barely restrained hysteria as he scribbled this card. There’s a tiny splodge of something in the top right corner that might be relish. Or maybe blood.
Met up with Dad for that poltergeist gig. Spielberg has a lot to answer for. Guy had unhooked his cable. You ever spend three nights in a house with no TV? With only Dad for company? I think the poltergeist might just have offed itself out of boredom. Anyway, we cleaned house, and were headed out of town when we passed good old Cowboy Sam here. Had to stop for a burger and you know, to laugh our asses off.
Sam remembers. They’d been sparring as usual, and Sam was pissed off about having to do training, as usual, and Dad was criticizing his moves, as usual, and Dean was dancing about like he was Ali, as usual. Sam drew his fist back, aiming for, but not actually looking at Dean’s shoulder, and somehow - he’s still not sure how - his fist cracked along the edge of Dean’s jaw.
He realized in that moment that he’d grown a couple of inches. And Dean hadn’t. Course, Dean kicked his ass even harder than usual, but Sam had just lain on the ground, wheezing with uncontrollable laughter and calling Dean ‘little bro’ every three or four seconds. Even Dad had laughed.
He flips another couple of chapters, and the next card makes him wonder if Dean might possibly have been the victim of demonic possession when he chose it. The title reads Still Life. It’s not unpleasant; he likes the contrast of the black and white flower head in diagonal opposition to the colored version, but a quilting pattern? Dean must have been temporarily insane, that’s the only explanation. He flips it over.
Yeah, I know, the card, right? Relax, Samantha, I haven’t been possessed by the spirit of Martha Stewart. We’re working this case in Athens, haunted heirloom quilts. Seriously, you should see the hand-stitching on those things. Wish I could get my stitches that small.
Dad wants to research so we’re staying a couple of weeks at least. So I’m down at Ohio State, fake interviewing, and get totally busted by this hot little journalism major. She’s pretty cool, though. She took me to this Dairy Barn quilt museum - it was research, Sammy. I told her I had an enormous dork for a brother and she picked out this card.
And just so you know, all that crap about going to college to study? Dude, you’re so there for the chicks and booze.
Dean.
Sam remembers. Cassie. Dean told her. He reads the card again, looking for the signs, the giveaway, the moment when his big brother lost his mind and decided to break rule number one in the Winchester Handbook of Things That Must Never Be Done. Out of all the rules that Dad laid down, it was the only one Sam didn’t break.
He remembers asking Dean’s advice about girls, all the pearls of wisdom Dean handed down through the years, never really wondering who Dean learned it from. Dean said it, so it must be true. Sam wonders now if Dad knew about Cassie. He must have figured something was up, if Dean saw her more than a couple of times. He wonders if they talked about her, if Dean wanted to tell Dad about her, but he couldn’t, because Dad would expect him to be focused on the job.
Sam leafs through the pages, finds one more postcard tucked into the book. This time it’s slipped in picture-side down, the stamp and address facing up, Dean’s message demanding to be read.
Sam,
Things didn’t work out so great in Athens.
It’s the simplicity of it that breaks Sam. Dean had loved her, trusted her, committed treason for her, and she’d thrown it back in his face.
Got a little banged up when we went after the ghost with the quilting fetish. It took that old ‘cross your heart, hope to die, stick a needle in your eye’ thing kinda literally. Must have been off my game, Dad had to haul my ass out of there. Don’t know what he thought was going on, but he didn’t even yell at me.
So, he figured it might be good for us to split up for a while, let me work a few gigs on my own. Cover more ground. I’m headed for Stepp cemetery near Bloomington, lot of weird shit going down there. Dad’s going back east.
Kinda miss the company. You’re staying safe, right? Keep the salt lines straight, geek boy.
Dean.
Sam turns the card over. It’s one of those old-fashioned painted black and white photos at the top, with a printed message underneath:
Postal Card Telegram from Holton, Ind.
I can’t get away. Have a pressing engagement that will probably keep me for some time. Don’t worry!
Sam remembers. He hadn’t worried. He’d gone off to Stanford and left them. Left Dean. And in all that time, he’d never worried about him, never doubted for a moment that his big brother would be okay. Dean was always okay. Sam hadn’t even bothered to find out.
The door opens behind him, and Bobby comes back in, wiping his hands on an oily rag. “Enjoying your book?”
Sam slips the card back between the pages, smoothes his palm over the yellowing paper, like it’s Braille, like he can feel his brother through the print. “It’s Dean’s.”
Bobby pours a mug of coffee for himself, and adds the something extra from a hip flask, settles in the chair opposite. “How’s he doing?”
Sam drops his hand, lets Pace nuzzle into his palm. “He’s okay.”
“Charming the panties off those nurses, I reckon.” Bobby grins encouragingly.
“I guess.” Sam tries to return the smile. The nurses love Dean, coddling him, calling him honey and sweetheart and they don’t seem concerned that Dean is quiet and polite and wants to sleep a lot. They just tell Sam it’ll take time.
Dad didn’t understand that. He pushed Dean, like always, to wake up, but Sam thinks this time it was guilt and not impatience that motivated his father. Dean did as he was told, like always, but Sam knows he wasn’t ready. Isn’t ready.
That’s okay, though. Sam closes the book, and puts it back into Dean’s bag. Bobby says the Impala will be ready for them when they need it. And there will always be stuff to hunt, not like that’s going to change any time soon. Sam can wait. He isn’t leaving Dean this time.
For now, Sam has the visions, and Dean’s got the girls, and that’s more than enough to keep them on the road together.
It's AU, in that it was written before In My Time of Dying premiered, but I kind of like that it's AU. And because it fits with the Kerouac.
TITLE: Five Postcards Dean didn't send
RATING: PG13 (gen)
CHARACTERS: Sam, Dean, Bobby; mentions of John
DISCLAIMER: Kripke and CW own Supernatural, Kerouac owns On the Road. I don’t even own the postcards.
NOTES: 2400 words. Sam POV. Set post Devil’s Trap - slightly AU. Quotes from Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’. Many thanks to missyjack, natfudge and Alistra for beta work.
“Somewhere along the line I knew there'd be girls, visions, everything; somewhere along the line the pearl would be handed to me.”
Bobby won’t let him see the Impala. It’s not like he’s going to feel guilty or anything, the truck would have hit them even if he had been concentrating on the road and not arguing with Dad while simultaneously freaking about Dean bleeding out in the back seat.
But Bobby’s got the garage locked up tight, says he’ll kick Sam’s ass if he tries busting in. Sam’s pretty sure Bobby won’t, not while he’s still in plaster, but then he remembers that summer he and Dean used the junkyard as an agility course, and Dean had snapped the aerial off Bobby’s truck as he jumped from the roof, spraining his ankle in the process. The combined wrath of Bobby Singer and John Winchester had been, frankly, a terrifying sight to behold.
So Sam gives in, and sits next to the pot-bellied stove, a tin mug of day-old coffee in his hands, Pace’s head nuzzled in his lap. He pets her soft, floppy puppy ears with his good hand, and cradles the coffee awkwardly against the cast. Bobby’s added something extra to the coffee, and it’s strong and bitter and wonderful. He drains the mug, feeling a warmth spread through the aches in his bones that the hospital drugs never quite managed to reach.
“Found this in the trunk.”
Bobby tosses a bag at his feet, it lands with a muffled thump, the contents shifting as it hits the floor. Pace’s claws skitter on worn wood as she tries to jump into Sam’s lap. Sam almost overbalances, but finally settles the lanky pup across his knees. Sam scratches behind her ear, then along her belly, and she stretches loosely under his ministrations.
“Damn lapdog,” Bobby grumbles, pretending he hadn’t been settled in that exact same position when Sam arrived.
Sam grins, and leans down to sift through the bag beside him. It’s Dean’s. Some clean clothes, though not that many - laundry hadn’t exactly been a priority since they’d last visited with Bobby - his wash kit, his favorite knife and a few books.
The books are mostly research texts that Dean’s swiped from libraries over the years, but there are some actual novels there. Sam doesn’t think he’s seen Dean crack a book since high school, or at least he hasn’t since they’ve been on the road together
They’d fallen into an easy pattern in their downtime. Sam would research or read, books and online, but Dean was happiest when he was cleaning guns, sharpening knives, working out. They’d sit, sometimes in easy conversation, sometimes in comfortable, companionable silence, and the very thought of it makes Sam’s chest hurt. A wave of something that he can only describe as homesickness swells in him, like someone took him apart and put him back together, but they left out a piece of the jigsaw.
He pulls a book from the bag. Kerouac’s On the Road. He can’t help the grin that spreads across his face. He remembers reading it one of the summers they’d moved around a lot, and had taken to quoting random passages out to Dad and Dean, insisting that they both needed to read it. Dad had just sighed resignedly and mumbled something about preaching to the choir. Sam had even started calling Dean the Holy Goof, but Dean had stubbornly refused to take offence. Or read the book
Sam opens it, flipping through a few pages. Stops when he comes to a marker. It’s a postcard, “Greetings from the White Mountains” emblazoned across the bottom, “Old Man of the Mountain” at the top, an artist’s watercolor of the famous New Hampshire rock formation in a stylized oval frame.
Sam lifts it, flips it over to see who’s been sending his brother postcards.
Hey, Sam.
His heart stutters when he sees his name curled in Dean’s loose lazy script. Pace whimpers in his lap, kneads at his thighs a little, trying to get comfortable.
Thought you’d like this, geek boy. Swear to god I had nothing to do with the collapse. Natural erosion, that’s what they said.
So, we’re following this lead, on the Kancamagus highway, and try saying that after six beers. Dad picked up the trail after some kids went missing on their way home from a party. Turns out there was an accident in the fifties, couple on their way home from prom. The girl - Sam - got killed. Guy came to, found she was dead, and committed suicide. Couldn’t live without his Sam.
So, your basic salt and burn, I guess. Except for the whole restless spirit causing a landslide. Seriously, no one suspected a thing.
Dad almost bust a vein yelling, though. Good times, Sammy-boy.
The card is stamped; his address in Palo Alto written down the side. No date, but he remembers the rock formation falling away three years ago maybe. Jesus, only Dean would turn a simple salt and burn into a natural disaster. He grins and breathes around the ache in his chest, and slips the card back into the book.
He flips a few pages further, finds a second card. This time it’s from Salem, one of those dumb old style cartoon witch ones - The Witch of Salem, circa 1692 - complete with broomstick, cat and a howling moon. He’s almost afraid to turn it over.
Sam,
Passing through, and just so you know, witches aren’t all like they say in the story books. Dad was supposed to meet with a contact here, but he got a call about a poltergeist in PA, so I hooked up with her instead.
She was Wiccan, and hot. Redhead, into peace, love, nature and life affirmation, and let’s just say we affirmed life a lot that night. Five times, I think. So, anyway - turns out this isn’t the town with the floating kid vampires, but Sammy, remember you wouldn’t watch Starsky and Hutch for months after we saw it. Or open the blinds.
So, nothing much to hunt here, think all the real ghosts are kinda ashamed to hang around this tourist trap. Meeting up with Dad in a couple of days, this gig in PA, so I’ll keep you posted. Ha.
Dean.
Sam remembers. Huddled under the plaid throw they dragged from motel to motel, popcorn so sweet it made his teeth sing, and watching the TV between his fingers. He’d barely slept that night, kept asking Dean if he was sure there was no such thing as vampires. Dean had finally stomped off to the kitchen and found an out of date pack of garlic seasoning which he spread next to the salt lines along the window. There, dumbass, happy now? Dad had freaked when he got in next morning, and Dean got yelled at for compromising the salt lines, but Sam had slept sound, knowing he was protected.
He pages through the book till he comes to the next marker. It’s a postcard from one of those roadside diners; the ones that have those giant figures outside, as if having a thirty-foot-tall fiberglass statue of a cowboy is somehow supposed to be a testimony to the sheer awesomeness of the food.
This particular giant is dressed all in white, a ten thousand gallon hat perched on his head, a black bow tie under his squared jaw, a quarter tonne burger balanced on his huge palm. Sam turns the card over.
Dude,
I’ve found the only Sam in the world taller than you, my freak of nature little brother.
There’s a little black arrow drawn to the printed info notes above Dean’s scrawl: “Cowboy Sam towers over the Cadet Restaurant in Kittanning, PA.” He can feel Dean’s laughter; he can see Dean sitting in the diner, hunched over with barely restrained hysteria as he scribbled this card. There’s a tiny splodge of something in the top right corner that might be relish. Or maybe blood.
Met up with Dad for that poltergeist gig. Spielberg has a lot to answer for. Guy had unhooked his cable. You ever spend three nights in a house with no TV? With only Dad for company? I think the poltergeist might just have offed itself out of boredom. Anyway, we cleaned house, and were headed out of town when we passed good old Cowboy Sam here. Had to stop for a burger and you know, to laugh our asses off.
Sam remembers. They’d been sparring as usual, and Sam was pissed off about having to do training, as usual, and Dad was criticizing his moves, as usual, and Dean was dancing about like he was Ali, as usual. Sam drew his fist back, aiming for, but not actually looking at Dean’s shoulder, and somehow - he’s still not sure how - his fist cracked along the edge of Dean’s jaw.
He realized in that moment that he’d grown a couple of inches. And Dean hadn’t. Course, Dean kicked his ass even harder than usual, but Sam had just lain on the ground, wheezing with uncontrollable laughter and calling Dean ‘little bro’ every three or four seconds. Even Dad had laughed.
He flips another couple of chapters, and the next card makes him wonder if Dean might possibly have been the victim of demonic possession when he chose it. The title reads Still Life. It’s not unpleasant; he likes the contrast of the black and white flower head in diagonal opposition to the colored version, but a quilting pattern? Dean must have been temporarily insane, that’s the only explanation. He flips it over.
Yeah, I know, the card, right? Relax, Samantha, I haven’t been possessed by the spirit of Martha Stewart. We’re working this case in Athens, haunted heirloom quilts. Seriously, you should see the hand-stitching on those things. Wish I could get my stitches that small.
Dad wants to research so we’re staying a couple of weeks at least. So I’m down at Ohio State, fake interviewing, and get totally busted by this hot little journalism major. She’s pretty cool, though. She took me to this Dairy Barn quilt museum - it was research, Sammy. I told her I had an enormous dork for a brother and she picked out this card.
And just so you know, all that crap about going to college to study? Dude, you’re so there for the chicks and booze.
Dean.
Sam remembers. Cassie. Dean told her. He reads the card again, looking for the signs, the giveaway, the moment when his big brother lost his mind and decided to break rule number one in the Winchester Handbook of Things That Must Never Be Done. Out of all the rules that Dad laid down, it was the only one Sam didn’t break.
He remembers asking Dean’s advice about girls, all the pearls of wisdom Dean handed down through the years, never really wondering who Dean learned it from. Dean said it, so it must be true. Sam wonders now if Dad knew about Cassie. He must have figured something was up, if Dean saw her more than a couple of times. He wonders if they talked about her, if Dean wanted to tell Dad about her, but he couldn’t, because Dad would expect him to be focused on the job.
Sam leafs through the pages, finds one more postcard tucked into the book. This time it’s slipped in picture-side down, the stamp and address facing up, Dean’s message demanding to be read.
Sam,
Things didn’t work out so great in Athens.
It’s the simplicity of it that breaks Sam. Dean had loved her, trusted her, committed treason for her, and she’d thrown it back in his face.
Got a little banged up when we went after the ghost with the quilting fetish. It took that old ‘cross your heart, hope to die, stick a needle in your eye’ thing kinda literally. Must have been off my game, Dad had to haul my ass out of there. Don’t know what he thought was going on, but he didn’t even yell at me.
So, he figured it might be good for us to split up for a while, let me work a few gigs on my own. Cover more ground. I’m headed for Stepp cemetery near Bloomington, lot of weird shit going down there. Dad’s going back east.
Kinda miss the company. You’re staying safe, right? Keep the salt lines straight, geek boy.
Dean.
Sam turns the card over. It’s one of those old-fashioned painted black and white photos at the top, with a printed message underneath:
Postal Card Telegram from Holton, Ind.
I can’t get away. Have a pressing engagement that will probably keep me for some time. Don’t worry!
Sam remembers. He hadn’t worried. He’d gone off to Stanford and left them. Left Dean. And in all that time, he’d never worried about him, never doubted for a moment that his big brother would be okay. Dean was always okay. Sam hadn’t even bothered to find out.
The door opens behind him, and Bobby comes back in, wiping his hands on an oily rag. “Enjoying your book?”
Sam slips the card back between the pages, smoothes his palm over the yellowing paper, like it’s Braille, like he can feel his brother through the print. “It’s Dean’s.”
Bobby pours a mug of coffee for himself, and adds the something extra from a hip flask, settles in the chair opposite. “How’s he doing?”
Sam drops his hand, lets Pace nuzzle into his palm. “He’s okay.”
“Charming the panties off those nurses, I reckon.” Bobby grins encouragingly.
“I guess.” Sam tries to return the smile. The nurses love Dean, coddling him, calling him honey and sweetheart and they don’t seem concerned that Dean is quiet and polite and wants to sleep a lot. They just tell Sam it’ll take time.
Dad didn’t understand that. He pushed Dean, like always, to wake up, but Sam thinks this time it was guilt and not impatience that motivated his father. Dean did as he was told, like always, but Sam knows he wasn’t ready. Isn’t ready.
That’s okay, though. Sam closes the book, and puts it back into Dean’s bag. Bobby says the Impala will be ready for them when they need it. And there will always be stuff to hunt, not like that’s going to change any time soon. Sam can wait. He isn’t leaving Dean this time.
For now, Sam has the visions, and Dean’s got the girls, and that’s more than enough to keep them on the road together.