Hatching Out of Rocks: Spring Fic Exchange for the_green_bird
Recipient: the_green_bird
Author: evelyncarver
Artist: soserendipity
Title: Hatching Out of Rocks
Summary: Sam’s always wanted a pet. Dad always said no and Dean agreed with him, until now.
Characters/Pairings: Sam, Dean, Bobby, John
Rating: G
Wordcount: 2730
Art Masterpost HERE
A/N: soseredipity’s art is amazing, made an awesome icon to go with the story too! And I got lots of help about embedding and posting there too. Thanks to colliding_skies for the quick beta.
It was hard to say what Sam liked the most about Uncle Bobby’s house: the cool books, the dog, the backyard he was allowed to play in, the dog, not having to share a bed with his brother, the dog or maybe it was just the dog.
“Uncle Bobby!” Sam sprang from the back seat of the Impala as soon as the car slowed to a stop. His short legs carried him across the yard and he pounded on the front door with his tiny seven year-old fists.
"Sorry Sammy." Bobby patted him on the head. "I haven't got Perry anymore."
Sam nodded, tears welling up in his eyes as he bit his bottom lip.
"Sammy, Sammy." Dean pulled his little brother close. "He was old remember? He liked to lay in the sun
and sleep. He didn't play with you. Bobby's got a new dog now."
"Really?" Sam scrubbed his arm across his face, smearing the tears and looked up at Bobby hopefully. "Do you have a puppy Uncle Bobby?"
"Yep." Bobby pointed to a box in the corner. "Be nice to him Sammy. He's real little and until he gets big, we have to be careful. He's not trained yet, be gentle." He cautioned the boy, "No pulling his tail or his ears."
Sam nodded and raced over to the cardboard box as soon as Dean let him go. "Hey puppy." He whispered, lowering a hand into the box and running his fingertips along the silky fur of the dog.
"Thanks again Bobby." John clapped the man on the back. "I'll be back in a couple of weeks." He looked at Dean. "Look after your brother, don't let him get into trouble."
Dean nodded, "Bye Dad."
John slipped out the front door while Sam was occupied with the puppy. Bobby knew why he did it, avoiding a scene, making things easier on himself, but it was painful, it was mean to just disappear on the kid.
"Does the puppy have a name?" Sam asked at dinner, eating the noodles that Dean had made for him.
Bobby shrugged. "Dog?”
"You can't do that!" Sam's voice rose high and shrill. "Everyone needs a name. We read about it in school."
"Why don't you think of some names for the puppy?" Dean suggested, they had only been there for a couple
of hours and Uncle Bobby already looked tired. "You can present them to us tomorrow at supper."
Sam nodded eagerly and slid down from his chair."I'm going to get started."
The weeks they spent at Bobby's that summer were magical. Between the puppy growing bold and strong enough to venture out from it's box, to getting to swim in the river and Dean finally learning how to drive, it was good. Sam stopped mentioning Dad two days after he left and the entire household was unprepared for his return.
"Bobby? Boys?" John Winchester walked in through the open door and set his duffel bag down. "Anybody home?"
"John." Bobby heard the voice and came in off the back porch. "How'd it go?"
John shook his head. "There were some tough spots." He stared at the back door. "How are my boys?"
"They had a good summer." Bobby opened the fridge and tossed John a beer. "Where you headed next? It's almost time for school."
"I know." John cracked the beer. "I've been handling them for a lot longer than you have Bobby. They're my boys. They're fine."
"Sure." Bobby pointed out the bathroom. "Feel free to take a shower and wash your clothes before you see them. You look like hell."
The elder Winchester took his advice and by the next morning everyone was packed and ready to go. All the laundry done, books traded out for ones that Sam hadn't read and Dean was loading the car.
"Let's hit the road." John beckoned, climbing into the Impala.
"Bye Uncle Bobby." Sam gave his adoptive father a quick hug. "Bye Rumsfield." He knelt next to the puppy that had almost tripled in size in the past seven weeks.
The puppy barked and leaned into the gentle pet of Sam's hand and when Sam headed towards the car, it followed him, trotting along at his heels.
"I want a puppy." Sam said, climbing into the backseat of the Impala. "Dogs are really nice Dad."
"No dogs." Dad backed out of Uncle Bobby's driveway and pulled onto the road.
"Dogs are helpful." Sam insisted. "They guard you and keep you safe. And if you train them, they can track stuff too. It would be a special dog and it could sleep with me and I would take it for walks and feed it and everything."
"No dogs Sam. No dogs in the car, no dogs in a motel. No dogs." Dad said, as if that was the end of it all.
Dean had to deal with the same fight over and over again for the next three months. Sam wanted a dog and Dad said no. Sam didn't seem to understand that when Dad said no, he had his mind made up and that was that. There would be no Winchester puppy, Winchester cat and even Sam's pet fish idea was turned down.
"Unless I can eat it, we're not carting a fish around." Dad said before dropping them off at school.
Dean was late that day.
"Did you change your mind?" Sam asked when they got in the car that afternoon.
"No. You need to stop asking for a pet Sam. It's not going to happen." Dad drove them home, the silence in the car fraught with anger and Sam's pouting.
Dean hid out in the bathroom for an hour, trying to put his plan together. Dad kicked him out to take a shower just before he finished.
"Dean, do something." Sam laid on their bed and kicked his feet in the air. "I'm bored."
"And I'm busy. Don't you have homework? Or a book to read?"
Sam sighed loudly and pulled a paperback out of his duffel bag. "When are we going back to Uncle Bobby's? I've finished all the books I borrowed."
"I don't know." Dean answered distractedly, concentrating on his special project. "Don't ask Dad." He added a moment later.
"Whhhhy?" Sam moaned, opening his book.
"Honestly Sam, just shut up and leave me alone!" Dean turned his back and hunched over his paper again. Sam would like this, but if he didn't stop complaining, Dean was never going to finish it.
He didn't get his side project done as quickly as he wanted to. First there was detention for being late to school and then Dad came home bloody and Dean had to do the laundry and get groceries and then they had to move, because the thing that made Dad bloody turned up on the riverbank and it looked human.
"But I'm tired." Sam protested when Dean came to put him in the car. Everything else was loaded and ready to go. There was a fresh thermos of coffee in the front and a blanket in the backseat for a tired brother.
"Here. Just be quiet if you're not going to sleep." Dean shoved the surprise in his brother's face and took his place in the front seat. Sure, it wasn't the magical time he'd imagined to give Sam the project, but if it made him stop complaining, it was worth it.
"What's this?" Sam asked, his voice a little more awake and a little less whiny.
"Can't you read dumbass?" Dean asked, pulling a map out of the glove box.
"Dean." Dad warned and he sounded tired.
"Sorry." Dean said, not really sorry. He did something nice and all Sam did was complain. He worked a million times harder than his brother and did he ever get any thanks?
The car ride was long and bumpy and Dad kept almost falling asleep. But Sam didn't talk again until they stopped and Dean shook him awake to walk to their new motel room.
"Thanks." Sam murmured, clinging to his older brother. "I’m going to call him Draggy."
Dean was too tired to care so he nodded and carried Sam inside.
Sam carried the rock around for the next eight months, following the instructions Dean wrote out carefully until he told Dad about it and it got thrown off the bridge a few miles up the road. He cried and Dean got in trouble for playing with things that shouldn’t be joked about.
“I’m back!” Sam crashed through the door of the bunker, his arms laden with food and supplies. So maybe this didn’t feel like home to him, it was wonderful to have a base. His stuff was here and it wasn’t mixed up with Dean’s and there was a fridge and a stove, it was good enough.
The bunker was quiet and he didn’t see Dean as he made his way down to the kitchen. There was still water in the coffee pot, and the smell of damp coffee grounds hung in the air.
“Dean!” Sam called again, opening the fridge and pulling out a rotten head of broccoli. As nice as it was to have a base, sometimes they were gone for a little longer than originally planned.
He’d finished cleaning up the kitchen and was starting to cook supper when the door crashed open again.
“Dean?” Sam headed out towards the main staircase. It wasn’t that he was worried. Dean could do whatever he wanted, but usually he said something or left a note.
“You’re home?” Dean asked, stopping in the open doorway.
“Yeah. You want supper?” Sam asked, heading back towards the kitchen.
“Sure.” Dean called out and Sam heard the door slam shut from the kitchen a couple of minutes later. It was a little odd, but he wasn’t getting into that now. Trust, he trusted Dean and his brother probably wasn’t going anything that would kill the both of them.
It didn’t take him long to make a passable meal. Having a stove and counter space was still a novelty after so many years on the road and Sam knew that his cooking wasn’t all that great but it was a sight better than Dean’s microwaving and boiling abilities.
“Dean! Dinner!” Sam yelled down the hall, pulling down plates and cups from one of the cupboards. The Men of Letters had left their bunker well stocked. He didn’t really need to get groceries, there were enough sixty year old MREs to feed a small army for months.
“Hey.” Dean came in, his hands behind his back.
Sam put the pot of rice on the table. He didn’t bother with serving bowls if he was going to be stuck doing the dishes. “What’s going on?” His mind ran with ideas of gross things that Dean might have found in some of the storerooms they just hadn’t had time to explore yet.
Dean’s face reddened slightly. “Just here.” He pushed a bundle of fur into Sam’s hands and sat down at the table, shovelling rice and chicken onto his plate, leaving a wide path around the vegetables.
Sam looked down at the scrap of fur. It was soft and a dirty white grey sort of colour. It shifted and looked up at him with chocolate brown eyes. “Merow.”
“Dean.” Sam sat down, pulling the kitten closer into his chest. “You got me a kitten?”
Dean shrugged, his mouth to full to answer. Jerk probably planned it that way.
“Merow.” The kitten made it’s little noise again and reached a tiny paw out towards the buttons on Sam’s
shirt, claws extending.
“Hello.” Sam said, cradling it carefully in his arms. There was a lot of fur going on here, but his fingers felt bones under the soft pelt. “Are you hungry?” He held the kitten carefully in one arm while he put together a plate of the chicken, thankful he’d left it plain.
“Wait, Dean, can kittens have pieces of chicken? What am I supposed to feed it?”
Dean’s plate was mostly empty now. “I got some kitten chow and a litter box. This wasn’t a spur of the moment decision.”
“Really?” Sam asked, giving the kitten a little piece of chicken anyways. “Funny, because I don’t remember you ever mentioning getting a kitten to me before.”
“I always meant to get you a puppy.” Dean muttered before meeting Sam’s eyes. “Remember that summer we stayed with Bobby? Right after he got Rumsfield? I sort of wanted a dog too. I tried to convince Dad to get one but he wouldn’t budge.”
“You still think about that?” Sam asked as the kitten moved from chewing on the chicken to nuzzling and licking his chicken coated fingers.
“Course I do. I wanted you to be happy.” Dean waved a hand. “I thought a kitten was a better choice though. Doesn’t have to be taken outside and it can stay on it’s own for a couple of days when we have to check something out.”
“Right.” Sam wiped his chicken hand off on his pants. “Where’d you get it? Does it have a name?”
“The Humane Society had a special.” Dean shrugged. “It’s yours Sam. Already got all it’s shots, flea treatment and they did that spay thing too.”
Sam nodded and flipped the furry kitten over. “Did you mean they neutered it?” There was no shaved patch on the kitten’s belly, but two lines of dark stitches stood out on the little sacks near its tail.
“Whatever. There’s some kitten stuff in my room. Go look at it if you can’t until supper’s done” Dean grabbed the pot of rice. “Can I finish this?”
“Yeah.” Sam took his kitten to Dean’s room. There were papers, he could read those later. Other things, litter box, bag of food, not exciting but important. Ah, there were some fun things, a feather attached to a piece of string, one of those little grey cloth mice.
“Here kitten.” Sam dangled the feather in front of the little cat’s nose and smiled when it reached it’s paws out to bat at it.
Sam put the kitten into the cat bed that Dean had brought home.
“Good night.” He whispered, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Dean hadn’t overheard him talking to his new pet as if it was human.
When Sam woke up the next morning, the kitten was on his pillow, pressed up against his neck. He turned slowly, trying not to disturb it and stroked it gently with a single finger until the gentle purrs gained volume and the kitten was loudly proclaiming his happiness.
“What did you name it?” Dean asked, frying bacon while Sam poured kitten chow out into a bowl.
“He’s a he, not an it.” Sam retorted and set the bowl down on the floor.
“Didn’t name him yet.” Dean concluded and dumped the bacon and a rather impressive amount of grease out of the pan and onto plates.
“I did too name him.” Sam accepted a plate of bacon and pressed some paper towel down onto it, there was no reason to eat all that extra grease.
“Really?” Dean challenged, “What’s his name?”
“Rocky.” Sam stuffed bacon in his mouth. “Since I never had a pet rock.”
“Yeah you did. I made it myself.” Dean protested. “That was a nice rock too. Took me a while to find it.”
“And you told me it was a monster egg. You gave me a whole paper with rules to follow to make sure that it hatched and didn’t eat me!”
“You were bugging me! And I said it was a dragon egg, not a monster egg.” Dean protested. “Besides, Dad didn’t get that angry. Once he realised it was just a rock.”
“You could have told him that before he threw it off that bridge.”
“Nothing’s going to happen to this Rocky.” Dean assured him, a definite edge of humour in his voice. “He’ll be okay Sam, I promise.” Dean reached across the table to pat Sam’s hand reassuringly.
“Seriously?” Sam got up and Dean burst into laughter.
“Of course.” Dean mumbled through his laughter. “And if we ever need to hunt a mouse, we’ll know who to call.”
Sam snorted and picked up Rocky from next to his empty bowl. “Don’t listen to him. You’re a fearsome hunter.”
“Merow.”
