Fic: Dating Strategy
Title: Dating Strategy
Genre: Crack/Humor
Summary: Dean has a spotty track record when it comes to the opposite sex.
Author’s Note: Set mid-season 1 of Supernatural. Written for spn_reversebang
Spoilers/Warnings: none
His brother was an idiot when it came to girls.
That wasn’t exactly a new realization for Sam; he’d picked up on that little fact when he was eleven and they’d had to skip town in the middle of the night when Dean had put half the starting lineup of the latest school’s football team in the hospital. It wouldn’t have been such a big deal if his father hadn’t been out of town on a hunting trip and thus completely unavailable when the sheriff called to report Dean’s exploits. This alerted Social Services to the fact that an eleven year old and a fifteen year old had been left on their own in a ratty, run-down apartment and instigated an almost panicked flight from Milford, Ohio to Pastor Jim’s place in Blue Earth. And the entire incident had happened because Dean had worked his way through half of the cheerleading squad in the month that they’d been in town.
This latest piece of stupidity somehow went above and beyond the normal, however, and Sam was currently contemplating locking Dean up in a monastery somewhere. On a deserted island. In the Arctic.
“It’s not that bad, Sammy,” Dean said. “And she’ll figure out how to undo it eventually. Just relax a little.”
“You’re two inches tall, Dean,” Sam ground out. He couldn’t turn and glare at his brother, who was currently perched on his shoulder, but he knew his brother had to hear the anger in his voice. “The only reason I can even hear you is because you’re right next to my ear.”
“It’s not that bad,” his brother repeated. Sam felt the tiny boots press against his shoulder through the thin cotton of his T-shirt as Dean paced. “I’m still human, still have all my fingers. Hell, she even shrunk my clothes so I don’t have to snatch something off of an old G.I. Joe. Jasmine will figure out how to change me back eventually. She’s still kind of young for a fairy.”
“Am I supposed to carry you around in my pocket until then?”
Dean snorted. “You try and I’ll kill you in your sleep. Get me down from here.”
Sam reached up his hand, palm up, and his brother climbed onto it. “I’d like to see you try it, Tiny.”
There was a shrug of small, leather-shrouded shoulders once he was safely on the table. “Your throat’s as vulnerable as anyone else when you sleep.”
“Big talk for someone who could sleep in the glove compartment.”
There was a tinkling, cheerful sound, and the fairy was beside his brother. The bright red halo of fluffy hair bobbed about merrily in the gentle breeze that her presence stirred up. She leaned in and whispered something in Dean’s ear, and his expression turned gleeful. “Really?” he drawled out, the sound thin and high to Sam’s ears but still audible. “You know, Sammy here is a pretty deep sleeper. Do you think-,”
“No,” Sam interrupted. “Whatever you’re thinking of doing, just . . .no. So help me, Dean, if you make this any more complicated than it already is I’m taking pictures and posting them on the internet.” He was planning on taking a couple of pictures anyway, when he thought he could get away with it, but there was no need to tell his brother that. Little brothers needed blackmail material sometimes.
Dean rolled his eyes and turned back to Jasmine. “Sorry, sweetheart, my brother here is a real killjoy. Any luck on getting me turned back to normal?”
Her golden brown eyes filled with tears, and she shook her head. “Oh, hey, it’ll be ok,” his brother said hastily. “Don’t cry. You’ll figure something out.” He opened up his arms and the tiny fairy literally flew into them, her translucent wings fluttering in distress.
“I’m sorry,” the fairy wailed. Her voice was still surprising to Sam, who was expecting something high-pitched and bell-like and instead heard the husky, warm tones of a torch singer. “I just wanted a friend. I didn’t mean to hurt you, Dean.”
“I know, baby, I know. But Sam needs me. We have to find a way to turn me back to normal.” One itty-bitty hand rubbed at the spot between the fairy’s shoulder blades, moving back and forth from where the delicate wings erupted. “I need you to keep looking, Jasmine.” Sam saw his brother’s face through one gossamer wing as he rolled his eyes. “Did they tell you anything helpful at all?”
“No,” the fairy hiccupped, shaking her head. “The other fairies just said that if I used my magic, I was the only one who would be able to undo it. When I told them I don’t know how, they laughed at me!” She broke out in fresh sobs and clung even tighter to Dean’s tiny form.
Dean made a face that Sam associated with his ‘I can’t believe I’m putting up with this shit’ sigh, though the noise itself went unheard. “It’s all right, kiddo, we’ll figure it out. You can go back once they’ve calmed down-,”
“I can’t go back,” she cried out, pushing him away abruptly. “They were mean to me.”
Sam stifled a laugh at the indignant tone. Dean would carry through his threat if he caught Sam laughing at him right now. “They’re probably sorry already. Isn’t there anyone you can go to who will answer your questions? Someone who’s nice to you?” Because in all fairness, laughing at her question was typical fairy behavior. Jasmine was a rarity; most of the fae tended to be pretty vicious, petty and mean-spirited while she was honestly distressed over the predicament her little fit of magic set up. He doubted she got that way without outside influence. “Who taught you to how to use your magic in the first place?”
Her amber eyes brightened. “Oh! Oh! I could go find Reka!” And with that her tears were gone and she was flitting for the door, still accompanied by a tinkling sound.
Sam sighed and dropped into one of the battered chairs. He jostled the table a little, making Dean struggle for balance. “Easy, Sam,” he growled, walking across the scarred surface and sitting down cross-legged next to the empty coffee mug.
It was unbearably cute, and Sam couldn’t help but grin when he saw it. The small motel coffee mug completely dwarfed his older brother, and he kind of wanted to take pictures. Without getting caught, of course, since his brother was right and he would have to sleep eventually.
Some hint of what he was thinking must have crossed his face, because Dean’s expression turned dark and grim. “I will shove a live cricket in your ear,” his brother promised, the threat coming through loud and clear despite the high-pitched, tinny voice. And Sam had little doubt that Dean would do exactly that if he provoked him, patiently wrangling the creature and waiting for exactly the right moment to strike, so he cleared his throat and changed the subject, dropping down into the chair so he could hear his brother more clearly.
“Want to grab some food? That place down the street probably makes great burgers.” That should distract him. The logistics of getting his brother a burger, fries, and a beer would be at least a momentary challenge.
Dean shrugged, the movement harder to recognize on the much smaller frame. “I could eat.”
“There’s a surprise,” Sam muttered. Some things would never change about his brother. “I’ll go out and grab something. You stay put until I get back.”
His brother looked aggrieved. “Sam, where the hell am I going to go? Jumping off this table would probably kill me.”
Sam shrugged. “I’ve learned never to underestimate you. Any requests?”
“Cheeseburger. Fries. And can you leave something out on the table so I have something to do?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Leave the paper out or something. I’m bored out of my freaking skull here.”
Sam knew that a bored Dean was also a creative Dean, so in the interest of his eyebrows and sleeping without fear for the next several days he unfolded the newspaper on the table. Comparable size being what it was, that should keep him occupied for the time it would take to run to the tavern across the street.
Dean raised his eyebrows in the patented Dean Winchester ‘I can’t believe we’re related’ gesture. “What, no porn?”
“You touch my computer and I’ll send pictures of this to every person you know.” He looked straight at the miniature form of his brother. “I mean it, Dean. Some things I can’t unsee.”
“Yeah, speaking of that, we need to set something up so I can take care of business,” Dean said matter-of-factly as he stood at the top of the obits. “Unless you want me to use your pillow or something.”
“Dude, gross! You’re such a jerk.” He rummaged around in the bathroom for a moment before emerging with the top to a travel-sized tube of toothpaste. “Here. Enjoy. I’ll be back in ten.”
“Leave the phone where I can reach it in case something comes up.”
Sam paused at the threshold of the room, his jacket half-on as he stared at his brother. “Dean, can you even use the phone?”
“I can step on the buttons. Leave it out on the table. Humor me.”
He did as his brother requested. “I better not find out you called a 900 number while I was out.”
“Please. Those girls call me for a good time.”
Sam rolled his eyes and headed out the door.
***
He waited until his brother was gone before using his makeshift toilet. Life at two inches tall was hard enough without the tiny dick jokes he was sure Sam would bust out. He had no intention of opening himself up for any more mocking than necessary in this particular situation.
That done, he settled in to read the obits. It was a weird angle, standing on top of the newspaper and looking down to read it, and it started to hurt his neck fairly quickly. He tried to compensate by standing back further, which helped a little, but reading went by with an agonizing slowness as he walked down the column of words. It didn’t help that the obits in this particular edition were frighteningly dull, with none of the keywords that he usually searched for like ‘mysterious death’ or ‘authorities baffled.’ It was mostly older people and cancer or natural causes, which was both depressing and annoying.
Sam showed up before he needed to turn the page, which was good. It meant his brother could take over the job of distracting him from the latest problem. God knew the boring details of this town wouldn’t be up to the challenge, and he needed the distraction more than he would have thought.
Every second that Jasmine was out of his sightline he began to worry that she wouldn’t come back. The fae were notoriously mercurial, prone to mood swings and memory lapses and incredibly odd uses of magic that were often cruel and used to amuse themselves at the expense of others, and while Jasmine might be the nicest, most benevolent one he’d ever met she still had all the flightiness of her kin.
“Go ahead and sit down,” Sam said, setting a greasy paper sack on the table. The smell of the cheeseburger inside was almost overwhelming. Dean sat down with his back against the coffee mug while his brother opened up a beer and carefully wiped off the lid. He pinched off a little cheese and meat, a piece of bread, and a tiny portion of a French fry, placed them on the bottle cap, and set the makeshift platter down in front of Dean. “Bon appétit.”
Dean eyed the food. Despite his brother’s attempt to break off very small portions, the amounts when presented to him were daunting. He probably wouldn’t be able to finish them, just like he wouldn’t be able to drink the waste-basket-sized beer Sam had poured into another toothpaste cap (with an admonishment to not mix it up with his makeshift toilet, whatever, Sam). He shrugged and dug in. What the hell, you only live once.
Sam sat down at the table next to him, hovering a little like he wanted to talk. “Do you think we should go to Bobby’s?”
Dean paused in his eating, swallowing the bite in his mouth and looking at his brother with the kind of patience you typically only see exhibited toward a particularly dim laborador retriever that didn’t realize it had just dug up every single one of your perennials. “I think you know the answer to that one, Sammy. Besides, if we relocate we’ll lose Jasmine for sure.” The little fairy was already easily confused when it came to local travel. The idea that people could move from wherever she last saw them was apparently a continuously novel one.
“Yeah, OK.” Sam ducked his head a little, looking oddly embarrassed. That was the problem when your face was comparatively the size of a movie screen. Every single little emotion stood out like neon. “It’s just . . .he might know something that could help.”
“We can handle it, Sammy.” Dean didn’t want anyone seeing him like this. It would be hard enough to live down with Sam, but Bobby had a memory like an elephant and a long enough list of embarrassing stories about him without adding this to the collection. He tried to emphasize a belief that he didn’t really feel when he added, “Jasmine will figure everything out soon enough.”
***
Sam was trying not to worry, but his brother was so cute and tiny and vulnerable that it was difficult to stop. It would be so easy to crush him right now, to break fragile bones and squeeze the breath out of him. He would feel so much better if someone else could help him keep an eye on his brother, because he had a feeling that Dean was currently calculating all the different ways he could get into trouble the instant he was left alone. The five minutes he was across the street getting dinner were some of the longest of his life, knowing that Dean was all alone and that anything could happen to him while Sam was gone.
It was just so easy to miss his brother’s presence right now. Dean was asleep, using the other bed’s pillow as a massive sleeping surface, a soft square of flannel cut from a bloodstained and torn shirt keeping him warm, and he couldn’t hear his brother’s breathing or the soft snores Sam was sure were present. He knew his brother was there, but knowing about it and being able to tell in the dark motel room were two very different things.
After the wreck and the hospital and the reaper and Dad’s death, which was looking more and more like the end result of some sort of deal, Dean had been angry and too quiet, his brother pulling away and into his skin. Sam had gotten used to interpreting nonverbal Dean, listening to his breathing at night and using it to as an anchor when he had trouble sleeping.
Sam tossed and turned for about an hour before giving up, snatching his own pillow, and moving onto the other bed. He was careful in his movements as he settled down onto the mattress. Dean would never let him live this down if Sam jostled his brother awake because he couldn’t sleep.
With his head on a pillow six inches or so from Dean’s, Sam could just make out the faint sound of his brother’s even breathing. He felt himself relax, synch up, and drifted off to the familiar sound.
There was a marked lack of mocking in the morning when Sam woke up to find his brother’s tiny form perched on the edge of the nightstand, watching him with surprisingly unveiled attention. Dean merely grinned when Sam blinked awake and demanded coffee and pancakes.
They were halfway through breakfast when they heard the tinkling sound that heralded Jasmine’s imminent arrival. When she lighted on the table, there was another fairy with her, roughly the same height and crowned with a head of improbable dark purple hair, though this one’s hair hung down to her waist in long curls and somehow managed to completely avoid becoming tangled up in her wings.
She looked like she was about the same age as Jasmine, but Sam knew that apparent age meant nothing when it came to the fae. Hopefully, this was the friend that Jasmine had mentioned earlier, and she was here to help.
The new arrivals circled Dean, the unknown fairy flying slowly around him rather than waste time walking. “Yes, I see what you mean,” the other fairy murmured, her voice high and sweet. Like Jasmine’s, it carried throughout the room despite her small stature. “However did you manage to do this?”
“It was an accident,” Jasmine said, her husky voice almost petulant. “I just wanted him to be my friend.”
Her friend made a tsking sound. “Accidents are always the hardest to undo. This is exactly why you should have been practicing control like I asked you.”
“I promise I’ll practice if you help me undo it,” Jasmine pleaded. “I’ll practice every day until you tell me I can stop. I feel so bad about doing this to him when you told me not to hurt anyone.”
“It’s all right, sweetheart. We can change him back.” The purple-haired fairy passed a hand through the mop of bright red hair on Jasmine’s head in an oddly human gesture of affection before turning to address Dean. “Jasmine is my . . .I guess you could say apprentice. I’ve been training her to use her magic.”
“And you are?” Sam asked.
“Call me Reka.” She smiled and turned to Jasmine. “Are you ready to get started, my dear?”
***
“Okay, this is kind of bad,” Dean admitted. The iridescent dragonfly wings that sprouted from his shoulder blades fluttered uneasily as he paced across the nightstand.
Jasmine had taken one look at the result of her efforts and burst into tears before streaking away in a ball of light. Her companion offered an apologetic smile before heading off after her.
Sam reached out a hesitant finger toward the wings, watching as Dean ducked away. “Do they hurt?” He remembered the high-pitched scream he’d heard when his brother had doubled over at the beginning of the transformation.
“No. Keep your hands to yourself, Sasquatch,” Dean growled as he continued his pacing.
Sam crouched down and got a better look. The wings weren’t the only new change in his appearance. He was still only about two inches tall, but Jasmine’s increasingly frustrated attempts to turn him back to his usual six feet had backfired spectacularly, leaving him looking even less like his normal self.
Sam was confident enough to admit that his brother was a good-looking guy. He remembered being in middle school and overhearing cheerleaders waxing eloquent about Dean’s green eyes, and once when Dean had been in the hospital Sam had interrupted a gaggle of giggling nurses gossiping about how gorgeous the patient in room 423 was.
This new version of Dean who was doing his best to wear a path in the varnish of the nightstand was still recognizable as Dean, just . . . prettier. His eyes were jewel-bright, his skin milk-pale, and his features were delicate, almost dainty. Even his body had altered, compact muscle becoming something more slender and ephemeral. Even his voice had changed a little, the rough gravel smoothed into a warm baritone that carried to every corner of the room just like the others.
He was still undeniably Dean though, if his irritated scowl was anything to go by, even if he looked like one of the fair folk right now.
“Ideas?”
Sam shrugged, feeling painfully helpless. “I think we’re still pretty much in the same boat we were before. Jasmine cast the spell, and only Jasmine can undo it. And obviously that’s a little more complicated than we originally thought it was going to be.”
“Yeah, got that,” Dean muttered. He finally sat down, perching on the edge of the piece of furniture and peering down at what was, for him, about a ten story drop. His wings twitched as he studied the carpet below him, which made Sam worry a little. Dean normally didn’t care for heights or flying, but his brother was eying the distance speculatively and without a hint of fear. The shimmering wings began to beat more steadily and rapidly as Dean climbed to his feet.
“Don’t,” Sam said abruptly, his heart clenching with fear.
Dean looked up from the chasm, taking a startled step backward, and the wings resumed their former mindless fluttering. “Don’t what, Sammy? You need to be a little more specific when you’re ordering me around.”
“You’re about two seconds from doing something monumentally stupid. Now cut it out before I lock you in the drawer.”
To his credit, his brother refused to be coy about it. “You’ve seen Jasmine, dude. Pretty sure these things are fully functional. It’d be a shame not to try them out.”
“Yeah, well can you test them a little closer to the ground? If you belly-flop off of that, there probably won’t be a second try.”
Sam was hovering close enough to his brother to see it when Dean rolled his eyes. “You’re such a wuss sometimes.”
“I’ll remember that next time we need to get on a plane.”
Dean’s almost translucent skin somehow managed to become even paler. “Planes are something else entirely, Sam, and they crash all the time. This body is pretty much designed to fly.” He craned his head over his shoulder, trying to get a better look at the wings he could probably feel behind him. “I think my bones are even hollow or something,” he added, flexing one tiny fist. “I feel like I could just step off this thing and float away.” He took a small experimental step closer to the abyss.
“Don’t!” Sam dropped off the side of the bed and in front of the nightstand and his idiot of a brother. “Swear to God Dean, if you jump off of that thing trying to fly I will send fifty pictures of you to Bobby, and I’ll make sure he sends them to every hunter we know.”
Dean made a huffing sound and dropped back down to the nightstand, his feet dangling over the lip. “You are such a little bitch sometimes,” he said, his expression a sullen pout that wouldn’t have been out of place on a toddler.
“I wouldn’t be if you weren’t such a jerk,” Sam replied. “What do you say we finish up breakfast?”
Dean’s face immediately brightened. “That’s right, there’s still pancakes!” He willingly climbed onto Sam’s offered hand and allowed himself to be transported to the table, which worried Sam a little. Up until this point Dean had barely tolerated the indignity of being carried from one location to the next. He had gone from petulant and angry to almost jubilant in a split second, and the last time he’d seen that kind of mood swing had been with Jasmine.
Sam had a bad feeling that the longer his brother kept the form of a fairy, the worse this would get.
It turned out to be a well-founded fear. Dean became more erratic as the day went on, swinging from giddiness to rage to sorrow and back again with every event. His brother’s legendary short attention span became almost nonexistent, to the point where Sam felt like pulling out his hair. He would have drugged his brother for a little peace and quiet if he hadn’t been afraid that he would get the dosage wrong.
He finally let Dean attempt flying, using a stack of three books surrounded by all the pillows in the room. The extra measures of safety turned out to be unnecessary; Dean’s new wings synced up pretty much perfectly with the rest of his new body and he took to flying with very little effort and surprising grace. That seemed to do quite a bit toward keeping him calm and focused, which made perfect sense once Sam had time to sit down and think about it. Dean had always been a person of motion, and now that he could fly simply pacing wasn’t enough. Besides, it apparently took a lot of energy to keep moving at those speeds, which meant that Dean needed to eat at least once an hour once he started zipping around the room on those insect wings. Sam wondered if this would make his fear of flying better or worse once they got his brother back to normal.
His brother made a delicate, practiced touch-down on the table, accompanied by a tinkling, bell-like sound similar to what they’d heard around Jasmine, although Dean’s was a little bit lower in pitch. “You think Reka’s got her calmed down yet?”
“Probably.” Sam wanted to add something biting about the two of them getting distracted by something shiny, but given his brother’s current state he had a feeling it wouldn’t go over well. “I’m guessing they’re trying to figure out how to fix this without making it worse.” He wasn’t sure exactly how it could get much worse, but he knew that it was very possible. They were Winchesters. Shit happened.
Dean snorted out a laugh, somehow making the sound almost musical. “Or Jasmine fell in love with a rose bush or a lily pad. Freaking fairies, man. Like toddlers with ADD.” He grinned, completely ignoring the fact that, for the moment at least, he fit into that category. “Hey, think we can get some cheeseburgers?”
Sam huffed in amusement and went to the room’s mini-fridge. He’d picked one up specifically to keep his brother’s new metabolism cared for, pinching off pieces pretty much every hour once his brother figured out how to fly and how much energy it took. It took maybe five seconds to warm up the chunk and he watched his brother devour it with joyous abandon. As entertaining as all this was, it couldn’t stay this way. The longer he stayed this way, the harder it would be to change him back.
By the time Jasmine and her mentor returned, Dean had figured out how to turn on the ball of light effect when he flew, though apparently the accompanying sound was unfortunately standard. It was a little worrying how unbothered his brother was by the delicate tinkling of bells, and one more sign that something was wrong with this whole situation.
“I believe we have it figured out now,” Reka said simply. “We know why Jasmine’s attempts to change your brother back didn’t work. She didn’t have the proper focus.”
“Great,” Sam said. “Let’s fix it.”
“We can’t.”
Sam felt his lungs freeze, which was annoying and inconvenient. “What do you mean you can’t fix it? She’s the one who did this to him in the first place.”
“And she shouldn’t have been able to do it.” The purple-tressed fairy was eying Dean again with speculative interest. “Jasmine doesn’t have the ability to turn a full human into one of us. None of the fae do. If I were you two, I’d look a little closer into the family history. There’s a good-sized chunk of fae blood in you from somewhere up the tree, or her magic would never have worked quite the way it did.”
“Why can’t you undo it?”
“Why do you think those of us who like to play do so with mortals?” There was almost a pitying look on her face now. “We can’t use it on each other. Just humans, never other fairies, and now that’s what Dean is.”
Sam gritted his teeth. “He wasn’t a fairy twenty-four hours ago. Now put him back.”
A cold, imperious look swept over her delicate features. “Watch your tone. Jasmine can’t undo what has been done, and neither can I.” With that she reached for the other fairy’s arm and streaked away.
“Perfect.” He slammed a fist down onto the pressed wood of the table. “Freaking enigmatic fairies. Can’t ever say something useful.”
“Calm down,” Dean ordered, flitting over to rest on Sam’s shoulder. “Weren’t you paying attention?”
“You mean when they said that they couldn’t change you back?”
“Exactly!” Sam felt a sharp tug as Dean grabbed onto a few strands of hair, probably for balance. Shoulders weren’t really meant to be perched upon. “They can’t change me back.”
“Which is precisely the point!” Sam flung his arms out without thinking, forcing his brother from his perch and into the air. Dean hovered for a moment before settling down on the table. “They both told us that the only way to lift fairy magic is for the fairy responsible to undo it.”
“You’re forgetting some of the basics, kiddo. What are the limitations of fairy magic? C’mon, no way you’re that rusty.”
“Iron,” he replied quickly. He thought for a moment. “And their glamour can’t last over running water.”
“Yahtzee.”
Sam sighed. “Dean, this isn’t a glamour. You’re really a fairy.”
“Easy on the f-word, Sam. If crossing running water breaks down a glamour, maybe it’ll at least weaken a transformation.” He shrugged, the wings fluttering behind him. “It’s worth a shot.”
“And if it doesn’t work?”
“I have a plan,” his brother said, a bright smile lighting his too-pretty features.
Great. Dean had a plan. Those words had never once ended badly, really. Sam grabbed his jacket and waited for his brother to resume his position on his shoulder.
It wasn’t difficult to find a decent-sized river in Ohio, even if they required a bridge that was sturdy enough to handle the Impala but deserted enough that they could experiment a little.
Simply driving across the bridge while in the car elicited a shiver from his brother, but no discernable change, so Sam parked the Impala on the side of the road and they walked back across. The same shiver, this time a little more prolonged, but it didn’t seem to make any difference in Dean’s appearance. “I think we need to get closer,” Dean said, his voice oddly thoughtful. “Distance matters.”
Sam obliged, making his way down the riverbank and walking along until he found a spot shallow enough to ford. He started across, only to stop abruptly as his brother’s startled cry. “What’s wrong?”
“Put me down, Sam,” his brother said through gritted teeth.
Sam reached his hand up blindly, unable to turn his head because of the death grip Dean had on his hair, and Dean fell onto it, heavier than Sam expected. He was taller, too, maybe eight inches rather than the previous two, though he still looked more fairy than human. “Where do you want me to put you?”
“Drop me in the water,” Dean said grimly.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
“I’m serious, Sam! The water’s working, but just walking over it isn’t gonna be enough. I can tell. Now put me into the water.”
The current was relatively fast, but at the moment at least the water was only about a foot deep. Sam bit his lip and complied with his brother’s request. Dean dropped beneath the surface, the current of the river moving him away faster than Sam could keep pace. He saw what was possibly his brother’s head before the longest thirty seconds of his life began.
He was just starting to gain some real momentum on a complete freak-out when he heard coughing. It didn’t take long to zero in on the sound and slog through the water to the waterlogged form of his brother on the opposite bank. Dean was on his knees, hacking up river water and possibly his spleen, thankfully fully dressed. Guess that meant the clothes had successfully weathered the transformation. “You OK?”
“Super,” Dean choked out. He stayed crouched there for several minutes before wearily standing up. “Hey, Sammy?”
“Yeah?”
“No more chicks for a while, right?”
“I’ll remind you of that.” And he did, three weeks later when they were standing in the middle of a bar brawl that would totally have been avoided if his brother hadn’t been hitting on the sister of the guy he was simultaneously hustling.
