Dean's twelfth birthday
Another installment in the post-Haystack lil-Dean birthday stories. Twelve! Almost a teenager. Gack. *laughs* And my love and deepest thanks to innie_darling for brainstorming, fine-tuning, and hand-holding on this and another upcoming Haystack-related story. If I were a cat, I'd be rubbing against your shins in adoration, my dear. For reals.
Previous birthdays:
Dean's eighth birthday
Dean's ninth birthday
Dean's tenth birthday
Dean's eleventh birthday
V.
It’s pretty much been an unqualified success. He worried about it a little beforehand, but now, driving home, he’s damn proud of himself.
“You all right?” He glances at Dean, sprawled in the passenger seat.
“Uh-huh,” Dean says softly. “It was great.”
Sam smiles and turns his attention back to the road. It’s a good drive from the city back out to where Mel’s family’s property lies, and if he’d known they were going to be out here back when he thought this up, he probably wouldn’t have done it.
But Dean adores hockey, adores going to the games, and it’s been well worth it. No friends - Dean can hang out with his buddies later, maybe even Chris if Sam’s feeling generous - not even Mel along. Boys’ night out, she’d called it, before kissing both of them and warning Sam to be careful on the roads, remember the plows won’t be out here for days if not weeks. He’d felt funny about not taking her along, but she didn’t give a rip about hockey, and he got the feeling without ever actually hearing her say it that she’d like the alone time. Time to go through a few more boxes, maybe just deal with her loss without having to think about the two males in her life for a few hours.
Dean had been a surprising asset after Mel’s mom died. Or maybe not so surprising, Sam thinks now, and gives him another fond look. Dean’s expression is hard to read, his face almost hidden in the folds of the new leather jacket.
“Hey, you like the coat, don’t you?” Sam asks.
“It’s great.” Dean nods fast. “Smells good.”
“Is it warm enough?”
“Yeah. I’m good.”
It’s been an ongoing struggle between Mel and Dean, trying to get him to wear anything remotely warm, and Sam still feels kinda good about his advice a couple of weeks ago. “Leather,” he’d told her with a shrug over breakfast. “Something leather. That he’ll wear.”
She frowned. “He’s just twelve, Sam. Do twelve-year-olds wear leather jackets?”
Sam grinned and snorted. “This one will. I promise.”
He likes the one she picked, too - soft brown leather, a lot like Dean’s old jacket, packed away now in the storage space in Seattle. He thinks sometimes about digging that one out, giving it back to Dean, but it’ll still be too big. And there’s some maybe selfish part of him that likes the idea that they’re creating new memories.
The new jacket fits perfectly, and Dean likes it. And that’s what counts.
And Dean liked what they did for his birthday, too. The game was great, and Dean had shouted himself a little hoarse, mostly when Scott Jackson took the ice. Dean’s got a crazy fanboy crush on Jackson, met him a couple of months ago at a junior hockey league thing and he’s been nuts for the guy ever since.
Tonight Jackson scored two goals, and Dean was all over the map, grinning so hard Sam thought his face would split in half. Ate too much crappy food, and Sam really can’t think of a better birthday. It just feels - right. Dean’s doing great, and Sam is, too. This is working. This family, himself and Dean and Melanie, it feels RIGHT. His. Theirs.
They’re just a couple of miles from Mel’s folks’ place when he realizes Dean’s gone silent. Sam glances at him. “Something on your mind?”
“Sam?”
“Yeah, Dean?”
Dean doesn’t look tired, but the goofy grin of earlier is gone. He looks - pensive, Sam thinks. Thoughtful. “Let’s go to the North,” Dean says.
“Dean -“
“Come on. Please?”
Sam considers, and then pulls the truck into the right lane. “Man, it’s all covered with snow right now. Nothing there.”
“I know.”
The north pasture - the North, Mel calls it, and so Sam and Dean do, too - is nothing more than a wide-open space in wintertime, a few trees but mostly cleared for the livestock Mel’s family ceased keeping decades ago. The view, however, is beautiful, even in winter, and on a clear night like tonight the heavy moon casts a cool, distant light on the snow, a glow that makes Sam’s chest ache deep inside.
He parks the truck by the gate. There are tracks in the snow, not many, but man-made. “Somebody’s been up here recently.”
Dean’s already climbing out. “Come on,” he says, reaching behind the seat to grab his backpack. Sam frowns, and follows.
Their boots crunch in the snow, a rhythmic squeaking, and Sam watches his breath plume in the frosty air. “Dean? Where the hell are we going?”
Dean casts a look over his leather-clad shoulder, corner of his mouth lifted in a familiar Elvis-y smirk. “Just over here.”
He lets Dean steer him to the fence, and watches while Dean slings the backpack off his shoulder, starts digging around. “You stay here,” Dean orders. He isn’t smiling when he looks at Sam.
“Okay,” Sam says cautiously.
Dean digs earmuffs out of his bag and puts them on, and that’s when Sam starts to feel really uneasy, because Dean won’t wear them under threat of death - says they’re girly - and now he’s digging something else out, another set of earmuffs that he hands to Sam, and something wrapped in a soft old chamois. Something Sam recognizes.
“You stay here,” Dean repeats, teeth flashing in a sudden grin, and uncovers the Glock 17.
“No,” Sam says thickly. “Dean. No way.”
“It’s okay.” Dean nods once, crisply. He handles the semi-auto pistol with authority, authority Sam has never taught him. “I can do this. Watch.”
The moon on the snow makes the field almost as bright as early morning. Dean’s eyes are sharp, sharper than Sam’s. His tongue feels frozen to the roof of his mouth, words jammed up in his throat like an arterial clot, and his knees tremble while Dean plants his feet carefully a few dozen yards away, still and confident in his stance. His face is sober, thoughtful, cold.
Along the far fence are paint cans, upended and placed on the posts. A row, eight in all, and Sam thinks with distant wonder, He planned this. Came out here sometime, a day or two ago, and put the cans up, waiting for target shooting. For me to see.
“Dean,” he tries to say, but nothing emerges but a puff of vapor dissipating in the air, and Dean begins to fire.
He’s forgotten to put on the ear warmers, and the gunfire strikes his eardrums like pokes with a sharp pencil. He ignores the wincing pain. Watches as each of the paint buckets jumps nimbly from its post, flies to the left or right, tumbles noiselessly onto the snow. One of the pines nearby explodes with birds, rousted from their nighttime roosts, and Sam flinches.
Dean takes his time, expression never changing between shots. Only a thin chilly smile of satisfaction when the final two cans fly off their perches. Then he lowers the weapon slowly, and turns his face to look at Sam.
There is nothing to be said. It’s all there, in Dean’s young, calm face. Sam has not taught him to do this, and their father never had the chance. Dean has taught himself. Sam doesn’t know how, or when. When could Dean have had the chance? Where? They only come up here occasionally, and almost never in winter. So Dean has been practicing for a while. Summer, at least, and maybe longer. Practicing shooting, with a gun that Sam hasn’t used in years, put aside because it was always one of Dean’s favorites, the old Dean, the grownup, older-brother Dean.
This Dean holds the weapon like he remembers. And the cold barb in Sam’s chest is not in any way due to the outdoor temperature. He watches while Dean methodically walks over, the Glock already wrapped once more in chamois. It’s so cold outside, it won’t be hot. It’s safe.
“I’ll clean it again when we get home,” Dean tells him, looking up into Sam’s stunned eyes.
Sam can think of nothing to say. He swallows, and Dean’s strange, too-adult expression wavers, becomes almost sullen. “I can do it,” he says in a low taut voice. “You gotta let me help you, Sam. You said I could, but you never do. I can HELP you. I can do it. Okay?”
There is nothing, nothing but ice in his heart, in his soul - I wanted to keep you from this, give you the boyhood you never had, Dean, don’t you GET that, seeing you with a gun is like an ABORTION, it’s so damned wrong, and you just made it look right, RIGHT, and that’s so wrong - until he sees the tears shimmering in Dean’s wide, hurt eyes. “Whatever,” Dean whispers, shoulders sagging, and Sam gives a wounded grunt and sweeps Dean into his arms, ignoring Dean’s quick angry struggle and pulling him close until Dean gasps and wraps shaking arms around him.
“I wanted you to be p-proud,” Dean whispers, and Sam closes his eyes.
“I am,” he says. “That was - amazing.”
“I can do it. I know I can. Let me.”
Sam inhales the cold-clean smell of Dean’s hair and gives a quick, hard nod. “Okay. Okay then.”
Previous birthdays:
Dean's eighth birthday
Dean's ninth birthday
Dean's tenth birthday
Dean's eleventh birthday
V.
It’s pretty much been an unqualified success. He worried about it a little beforehand, but now, driving home, he’s damn proud of himself.
“You all right?” He glances at Dean, sprawled in the passenger seat.
“Uh-huh,” Dean says softly. “It was great.”
Sam smiles and turns his attention back to the road. It’s a good drive from the city back out to where Mel’s family’s property lies, and if he’d known they were going to be out here back when he thought this up, he probably wouldn’t have done it.
But Dean adores hockey, adores going to the games, and it’s been well worth it. No friends - Dean can hang out with his buddies later, maybe even Chris if Sam’s feeling generous - not even Mel along. Boys’ night out, she’d called it, before kissing both of them and warning Sam to be careful on the roads, remember the plows won’t be out here for days if not weeks. He’d felt funny about not taking her along, but she didn’t give a rip about hockey, and he got the feeling without ever actually hearing her say it that she’d like the alone time. Time to go through a few more boxes, maybe just deal with her loss without having to think about the two males in her life for a few hours.
Dean had been a surprising asset after Mel’s mom died. Or maybe not so surprising, Sam thinks now, and gives him another fond look. Dean’s expression is hard to read, his face almost hidden in the folds of the new leather jacket.
“Hey, you like the coat, don’t you?” Sam asks.
“It’s great.” Dean nods fast. “Smells good.”
“Is it warm enough?”
“Yeah. I’m good.”
It’s been an ongoing struggle between Mel and Dean, trying to get him to wear anything remotely warm, and Sam still feels kinda good about his advice a couple of weeks ago. “Leather,” he’d told her with a shrug over breakfast. “Something leather. That he’ll wear.”
She frowned. “He’s just twelve, Sam. Do twelve-year-olds wear leather jackets?”
Sam grinned and snorted. “This one will. I promise.”
He likes the one she picked, too - soft brown leather, a lot like Dean’s old jacket, packed away now in the storage space in Seattle. He thinks sometimes about digging that one out, giving it back to Dean, but it’ll still be too big. And there’s some maybe selfish part of him that likes the idea that they’re creating new memories.
The new jacket fits perfectly, and Dean likes it. And that’s what counts.
And Dean liked what they did for his birthday, too. The game was great, and Dean had shouted himself a little hoarse, mostly when Scott Jackson took the ice. Dean’s got a crazy fanboy crush on Jackson, met him a couple of months ago at a junior hockey league thing and he’s been nuts for the guy ever since.
Tonight Jackson scored two goals, and Dean was all over the map, grinning so hard Sam thought his face would split in half. Ate too much crappy food, and Sam really can’t think of a better birthday. It just feels - right. Dean’s doing great, and Sam is, too. This is working. This family, himself and Dean and Melanie, it feels RIGHT. His. Theirs.
They’re just a couple of miles from Mel’s folks’ place when he realizes Dean’s gone silent. Sam glances at him. “Something on your mind?”
“Sam?”
“Yeah, Dean?”
Dean doesn’t look tired, but the goofy grin of earlier is gone. He looks - pensive, Sam thinks. Thoughtful. “Let’s go to the North,” Dean says.
“Dean -“
“Come on. Please?”
Sam considers, and then pulls the truck into the right lane. “Man, it’s all covered with snow right now. Nothing there.”
“I know.”
The north pasture - the North, Mel calls it, and so Sam and Dean do, too - is nothing more than a wide-open space in wintertime, a few trees but mostly cleared for the livestock Mel’s family ceased keeping decades ago. The view, however, is beautiful, even in winter, and on a clear night like tonight the heavy moon casts a cool, distant light on the snow, a glow that makes Sam’s chest ache deep inside.
He parks the truck by the gate. There are tracks in the snow, not many, but man-made. “Somebody’s been up here recently.”
Dean’s already climbing out. “Come on,” he says, reaching behind the seat to grab his backpack. Sam frowns, and follows.
Their boots crunch in the snow, a rhythmic squeaking, and Sam watches his breath plume in the frosty air. “Dean? Where the hell are we going?”
Dean casts a look over his leather-clad shoulder, corner of his mouth lifted in a familiar Elvis-y smirk. “Just over here.”
He lets Dean steer him to the fence, and watches while Dean slings the backpack off his shoulder, starts digging around. “You stay here,” Dean orders. He isn’t smiling when he looks at Sam.
“Okay,” Sam says cautiously.
Dean digs earmuffs out of his bag and puts them on, and that’s when Sam starts to feel really uneasy, because Dean won’t wear them under threat of death - says they’re girly - and now he’s digging something else out, another set of earmuffs that he hands to Sam, and something wrapped in a soft old chamois. Something Sam recognizes.
“You stay here,” Dean repeats, teeth flashing in a sudden grin, and uncovers the Glock 17.
“No,” Sam says thickly. “Dean. No way.”
“It’s okay.” Dean nods once, crisply. He handles the semi-auto pistol with authority, authority Sam has never taught him. “I can do this. Watch.”
The moon on the snow makes the field almost as bright as early morning. Dean’s eyes are sharp, sharper than Sam’s. His tongue feels frozen to the roof of his mouth, words jammed up in his throat like an arterial clot, and his knees tremble while Dean plants his feet carefully a few dozen yards away, still and confident in his stance. His face is sober, thoughtful, cold.
Along the far fence are paint cans, upended and placed on the posts. A row, eight in all, and Sam thinks with distant wonder, He planned this. Came out here sometime, a day or two ago, and put the cans up, waiting for target shooting. For me to see.
“Dean,” he tries to say, but nothing emerges but a puff of vapor dissipating in the air, and Dean begins to fire.
He’s forgotten to put on the ear warmers, and the gunfire strikes his eardrums like pokes with a sharp pencil. He ignores the wincing pain. Watches as each of the paint buckets jumps nimbly from its post, flies to the left or right, tumbles noiselessly onto the snow. One of the pines nearby explodes with birds, rousted from their nighttime roosts, and Sam flinches.
Dean takes his time, expression never changing between shots. Only a thin chilly smile of satisfaction when the final two cans fly off their perches. Then he lowers the weapon slowly, and turns his face to look at Sam.
There is nothing to be said. It’s all there, in Dean’s young, calm face. Sam has not taught him to do this, and their father never had the chance. Dean has taught himself. Sam doesn’t know how, or when. When could Dean have had the chance? Where? They only come up here occasionally, and almost never in winter. So Dean has been practicing for a while. Summer, at least, and maybe longer. Practicing shooting, with a gun that Sam hasn’t used in years, put aside because it was always one of Dean’s favorites, the old Dean, the grownup, older-brother Dean.
This Dean holds the weapon like he remembers. And the cold barb in Sam’s chest is not in any way due to the outdoor temperature. He watches while Dean methodically walks over, the Glock already wrapped once more in chamois. It’s so cold outside, it won’t be hot. It’s safe.
“I’ll clean it again when we get home,” Dean tells him, looking up into Sam’s stunned eyes.
Sam can think of nothing to say. He swallows, and Dean’s strange, too-adult expression wavers, becomes almost sullen. “I can do it,” he says in a low taut voice. “You gotta let me help you, Sam. You said I could, but you never do. I can HELP you. I can do it. Okay?”
There is nothing, nothing but ice in his heart, in his soul - I wanted to keep you from this, give you the boyhood you never had, Dean, don’t you GET that, seeing you with a gun is like an ABORTION, it’s so damned wrong, and you just made it look right, RIGHT, and that’s so wrong - until he sees the tears shimmering in Dean’s wide, hurt eyes. “Whatever,” Dean whispers, shoulders sagging, and Sam gives a wounded grunt and sweeps Dean into his arms, ignoring Dean’s quick angry struggle and pulling him close until Dean gasps and wraps shaking arms around him.
“I wanted you to be p-proud,” Dean whispers, and Sam closes his eyes.
“I am,” he says. “That was - amazing.”
“I can do it. I know I can. Let me.”
Sam inhales the cold-clean smell of Dean’s hair and gives a quick, hard nod. “Okay. Okay then.”