I went to Missouri, and I learnt the truth.
Title: I went to Missouri, and I learnt the truth.
Author: Aleesha
Disclaimer: I own the box set, does that count for anything?...No?...Well sue me and that's about all you get.
Rating: T
Word count: 1098
Summary: Dean is alone, and so, he dreams
Authors Notes: Title is taken from the episode 'Home'
Beta Credits: Kudos for my fantastic beta,
tilly_rose_starall mistakes, however, are mine.
I went to Missouri, and I learnt the truth.
Sometimes Dean dreams.
Because he is all alone, because his Mum is gone dead and buried and his Dad is gone barely hanging on, and Sam's gone too he’s ‘normal’ now.
They’re all gone, and Dean is glad.
Glad because now he doesn’t have to pretend anymore, to keep up the façade, the cockiness, the attitude that ‘Everything is fine.’
Because no one is there to see it slip; to hear him cry out in his sleep.
To feel the wetness of a cheek, the grittiness of the dirt and salt that cakes his face.
No one’s there and that’s alright it isn’t and Dean is happier not really because if he is a mess he is he’ll clean it up himself if he can.
It’s easier to be alone it’s not, to not have anyone to let down again and
again.
x
He is all alone, and so, he dreams.
Of old trees and plastic guns and sunshine.
Of blue walls and paper planes and warm arms.
Of laughter, and home-cooked meals and orange juice.
He dreams of his mother.
x
He’s sitting on a countertop, legs swinging over the edge, in a kitchen, a house he hasn’t been in since he was four.
He plays with his lighter, watches as it burns up and dies down.
But he isn’t burning anything, not really, so his cheast shouldn’t hurt but it does and the acrid smoke shouldn’t burn his throat but it is.
He can smell other things too, like baby powder take your brother outside and cedar wood as fast as you can, now! and the rain don’t look back.
His eyes sting and his feet are numb from the dew covering the wet grass. But he’s sitting on a countertop and he isn’t four anymore, he’s twenty-three.
And it shouldn’t still hurt this much, but it does.
Because his memories of that night are so vivid that they burn.
x
And then he isn’t alone anymore.
Because she’s there.
She’s pretty and young.
And achingly alive.
And Dean doesn’t care if he burns up, just as long as she’s still there, burning with life.
x
He recognizes the song she’s humming as she walks over to the counter but the ache in his chest isn’t nostalgia and plucks an orange from the fruit bowl.
It’s a blood orange, Dean can see it, can almost taste it. Bitter-sweet- just like his dreams.
She smiles as she slices it, laughs as the juice spills across her hand, sticky and almost red, but it isn’t blood not this time.
“Deano,” she says “honey, try some of this orange.”
Leaning forward, she passes him a segment, and he catches her scent.
She smells of sandalwood, honey and life.
And Dean would give almost anything to keep her that way.
x
He swings his legs while watching as the juice slides down her wrist, where it catches the light, and it sparkles for a second, like her teeth do, like her smile as she breathes “I love you baby.”
And the droplet is orange and red at the same time, and it seems to burn, until it does, until it catches alight and the flames lick at pale skin like bone and blonde hair.
“I’ll always be here for you” she says “Even when I’m not.”
He wants to ask her what that means, but she’s leaning over and kissing his cheek and her lips are warm, burning up.
And she is on fire.
Don’t leave me, Mum please.
But she is already gone.
And he is alone, again.
x
He is alone, so he walks to the mirror, to look for something, anything, to tell him that it’ll be different.
But it isn’t, nothing’s changed.
Dad’s gone and Sam’s gone.
And there’s nothing left, not really.
So he lets his gaze linger on a cheek, ghosts his rough fingers over cold skin.
But there’s nothing there, no ashes on his face, no trace of a kiss from a woman who burnt away to nothing.
Because she left him too.
Because everyone always leaves him.
x
It didn’t matter that Dean loved his Mother so much it hurt. She left.
It didn’t matter that Dean begged his Father to take him with him. He left.
It didn’t even matter that Sam promised he’d stay. Because he left too.
x
Sometimes the shadows that circle Deans eyes threaten to swallow him whole, and the bruises that steal the colours, that shade everything grey, threaten to steal away the light.
Sometimes, the ties that bind his flesh threaten to tear out.
Like his heart did when he was four and she turned to ash, or when he was nine and his Dad went missing for the first time, or when he was twenty-two and Stanford stole what was left of his family.
Sometimes, Dean thinks, the burn on his hand, the cut on his chest, the smudge on his face, is proof.
That he is all that’s left of a family who burnt away to nothing.
x
Sam asked him once
“Dean, why can’t we just try to be normal?”
Because, he’d thought, sometimes the idea of normal burns.
“Why does Dad keep doing these things, keep hunting?”
Because, he’d thought, sometimes it’s better to be the flame than the one getting burnt.
“Dean, come with me, please, why don’t we just escape all this?”
Because, he’d thought, sometimes it’s easier to burn than to fade away.
x
Dean sits in his car, his Impala.
The one thing, the only constant in his life these days other than dirty motels, cheap beer and nameless faces.
Never leaving, never changing.
And he flicks his lighter, just like in his dreams.
He watches as the flame dances while it consumes the air.
Because sure the lighter burns, and if there’s one thing Dean has never liked; it’s fire.
But with the slightest pressure of his thumb, a flick of his wrist.
The flame extinguishes.
And Dean is left alone, all alone.
But the darkness calms him, the black consumes him, and that’s okay.
Because darkness always comes before the light.
And Dean knows it’s stupid to wish, to hope.
Because, didn’t you know? Hope died when he was four.
But maybe if he keeps going, keeps being everything or nothing at all for the people he loves, someday someone will come back.
x
But until they do, Dean’s alright.
Because he has his lighter.
Because when that runs out, he’ll have the dark.
And maybe, one day, that’ll run out too.
And then, he’ll have the light.
End