The Gauntlet - Part 2 (Sparta Verse)
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Sam washed the dishes, carefully using only the tips of the fingers on his left hand, keeping the newly healed skin under the thin bandage dry. He put his full concentration into the task, and pretended he was alone. Behind him, the box fans were going full bore, one in the bedroom window, and one blocking the way to the bedroom, filling up the door jamb, and making a small clicking noise. That was okay with Sam, as long as the clicking noise was steady.
He knew the box fans had been set up by Dad and he wanted to feel only resentment, but they sure did help. And he was almost tired enough to shove the fan in the doorway aside and just go lay down in the cool hum, but that would mean making noise, and then Dad would ask what he was doing, and Sam didn’t want to be talking to Dad right now. He wanted to stay so far under that particular radar as to become invisible. He’d read about radars in school and about the kind of stealth planes that could fly under them. He wanted to be like that.
As he finished the dishes and wiped the counter, he could hear the TV being turned on and Dad was saying something to Dean about John Wayne, and Sam could hear Dean say yes, and then the volume got turned up. He pulled the stopper out of the drain and as the cold water sluiced the suds away, Sam ran his right index finger under the tap again and decided he didn’t want to sit and watch TV with Dad and Dean, let alone a John Wayne movie. Dad loved John Wayne, and of course, that meant that Dean loved him too. Plus they’d probably already seen this one, whichever one it was, what was the point in seeing it again?
He thumbed the blister on his forefinger, where it circled in a tight half moon, all the way around at the first joint. The blister was from cocking the crossbow and then messing with the site and then firing the damn thing. He’d done that over and over and over, all afternoon. It hurt whenever he bumped it against anything, which he’d been doing constantly.
He wanted to pop it to release the pressure, but Dad always said no, and gave Sam hell when he did it. Blisters turned into calluses and that was the right thing for a hunter’s hands. Sam had never dared say he didn’t want to be a hunter until this summer, but saying it again, or doing anything out of line with being a hunter would be a bad idea. A really bad idea because there were so many switches in those woods. Plus, Dad knew the blister was there, he’d be watching.
Turning off the water and the light over the sink, he wiped his hands on his shorts, and walked across the wooden floor. He tried not to tip toe, but he didn’t want to attract any attention. Any more attention, because he’d gotten enough that day. It had been bad enough to have Dad at his side, snapping commands, and pushing Sam’s shoulder down each time it had been his turn to practice with the crossbow. They’d traded off, him and Dean, but even when it wasn’t his turn, Dad had kept Sam close and made him pay attention.
He made it all the way to the screen door and had slipped through halfway when he heard it.
“Sam?”
It was Dad.
“Where are you going?”
Sam turned and looked at the back of Dad’s head. He felt his shoulders tense and the awful twisting start in his stomach. He knew why Dad was asking. The last time Sam had gone out the screen door by himself at night was to try to run away. He’d gotten all the way down the mountain, but Dad had found him anyway. Even in the dark.
“Steps,” he said. He waited with his hand curling around the edge of the screen door.
“Steps?”
“Just going to sit out here,” he said. As hard as he tried, he couldn’t keep the tone out of his voice, the one that Dad hated, the one that made him respond like he felt Sam was mouthing off.
“Just sitting,” he said now. Then he let the screen door slam shut, and waited a second. There was nothing from inside the cabin, so that probably meant that Dad was satisfied, watching TV again, and not wondering if Sam was running off. And for the moment, Sam had the porch and the night to himself.
The night air under the eave of the porch was thick with damp; moths fluttered and bumped against the bare bulb next to the door, making weird flickery shadows on Sam’s legs as he sat on the top step. His toes curled and uncurled against the rough wood and he could feel the splinters on the riser digging into the back of his calves. Out in the woods, the cicadas clicked and hummed, and there was a vague and faraway whoosh as the wind moved the tops of the trees.
But other than that, it was quiet. Sam brought his finger to his mouth and ran his tongue along the edge of the blister. It tasted a little like salt and then all of a sudden, it tasted bitter, and Sam knew he’d messed with it too much, and broken the blister. He spat into the air to clear his mouth. Pus drained in a warm line down his finger and across his palm. Sam sighed and rested his head on his other hand, with his elbow on his knee, and let his hand dangle to one side so the blister could drain.
It had been another awful day.
In Sam’s mind, Sam’s first bulls eye had been a fluke, but even so, Dad had wanted him to get there again. To that place where it had happened. And had kept at him all afternoon.
How were you standing when you did it before? Dad had wanted to know. Were your shoulders level? Do it again, Sam.
Standing in the heat had been crappy, not getting any breaks, except one for water from the jug, getting sweat in his eyes, all that had been bad. Having Dad barking orders had been hard, but watching Dean pretend to be glad that Sam was doing so well had been the worst part.
Because Sam had done well, Dad had said so. Or at least as well as can be expected at this stage.
He’d not known Dad was keeping score, exactly, until he turned his head to the side at one point to wipe away a gnat that had flown into it and saw Dad writing on a scrap of paper with a little stubby pencil. When Dad saw him looking, he showed both Sam and Dean the sheet. There had been two columns, one with a D and one with an S. The D column had lots and lots of 5’s and 6’s, and hardly any M’s. The S column had a lot of M’s, but there were also a few 8’s and 9’s.
So when you’re hitting it, you’re hitting it, Dad had said.
That’s when Dean had stopped smiling, had stopped enjoying himself. His scores had gone all over the place, erratic, until finally Dad had called it a day, and told Dean to wipe down the crossbow and for Sam to check the field for errant quarrels while he made dinner. So out into the field Sam went with the sun cutting at an angle through the trees in blinding slices while Dean sat on the porch and wiped down the butt of the crossbow and checked the string and cleaned off the dust in the nice shade. When Sam had come up the stairs with the quarrels in his hand, Dean’d not said a word, but had followed Sam silently in and silently washed his hands at the kitchen sink.
Dinner had also been silent. When Dad had asked about it, Dean had shrugged his shoulders and said he was tired. But that was okay. It was okay if Dean wasn’t tired and didn’t feel like talking, Dad never seemed to have a problem with that. But if it had been Sam not talking, he’d be accused of sulking, and he’d catch it, he’d always catch it. It wasn’t fair. Dad had even traded dish duty out and made it Sam’s turn, and let Dean take a break. Let Dean watch a movie on the couch.
His stomach growled because he was still hungry, but he’d not felt like eating much, sitting at the table with Dean acting like that. And with Dad watching him like a hawk.
He checked his blister, moving his thumb across the top of it to push the rest of the pus out. It stung, but it was distracting him, and that was good. He looked at the rough edge of skin, and thought about tearing off the top to expose the raw flesh underneath; it would probably hurt and be even more distracting.
There was a click of the screen door, and Sam looked up to see Dean standing there, the screen door swinging shut behind him.
“You’re not supposed to mess with those, Dad said.”
“So?” said Sam, snapping back. Dean wasn’t a tattletale normally, but he could feel the nerves in his stomach start up. “I know what Dad said.”
“So why are you doing that?” Dean moved out from under the eave to stand on the top step next to Sam.
Dean’s scowl said everything that Dean wasn’t saying out loud. Sam didn’t need anything else to tell him that Dean was pissed. But his mouth was all scrunched up too, like his feelings were hurt, but he’d be damned if he’d mention anything like that to Sam.
Sam stood up, and wiped the remains of the pus on his shorts, and looked at Dean. Dean was taller than him, and bigger. Those shoulders are going to be as wide as an axe handle, Dad sometimes said. But sometimes, like now, he looked different. Not like a big brother at all. Sam never knew what to do with that, never knew how to think or feel about it. Big brothers were supposed to be big brothers, always. At least that’s the way it was in the books.
He tucked his head down and worried the edge of the blister, and watched a thin line of pus form along the edge. It gleamed in the acid porch light.
“I didn’t want to be better than you,” he said, low. “I don’t want it.”
He heard Dean snort, and looked up. That scowl was firmly in place, and Dean rolled his shoulders back. “Like you could ever be better than me.” He watched Dean take a deep breath as the anger colored his face. “And you know what else? You suck.”
That stung. Sam felt his eyes well up, blinked really fast so Dean wouldn’t see and call him a crybaby. He tried to swallow, but his throat felt too thick. “I know it’s your crossbow, but Dad made me and-”
“Shut up, just shut up.” Dean gave him a little shove, two hands on Sam’s shoulders. “And don’t do me any favors, you get me? When Dad says aim and shoot, you do it, you just do it-”
“What’s going on out here?”
Both of them turned. Dad was standing just on the other side of the screen door, with the hum of the fans and the murmur of the TV. His shoulders made a broad, dark outline; Sam could barely see the edge of his face. The worst part was that Sam didn’t know how much Dad had heard. Whether he’d heard Sam say, I don’t want it. And whether he would take that as Sam stepping out of line.
Dean shrugged, and turned his head away, just in that second, even from Dad, and Sam knew that as mad as he was, Dean wasn’t going to say anything about the blister. Or complain, even, because that was Sam’s job.
“Get in here,” said Dad. He pushed open the screen door and stepped back to let them come in. It was actually a little cooler in the house than it had been on the front porch, and Sam knew it was the fans. The floor felt good beneath his feet, smooth after the roughness of the porch.
Dean went back to the couch and threw himself down on it, propping his feet up on one arm and tucking his head on the other. He was bathed in the glow of the TV while he ignored Sam. It didn’t matter what was on, now, didn’t matter that it left Sam to his own devices. And to Dad. Who was looking at him.
“What happened here?”
Dad was reaching out his hand and there was nothing Sam could do but hold his hand out so that Dad could take it and see that the blister had broken, and that the skin was all rough around the edges because Sam had popped it.
“I didn’t mean to mess with it,” said Sam, his voice coming out in a croak. “It just happened.” He didn’t want a switch whipping, not over this. Why couldn’t he have left it alone?
“Alright,” said Dad. He dropped Sam’s hand and turned away. “Come here.”
Nerves dancing in his stomach, Sam followed Dad across the kitchen in the darkness, with only the glow of the TV and some light from the front porch to light his way. Dad flipped on the light over the sink, and pulled down the first aid from the top of the fridge.
“Let’s rinse it out first,” he said.
“I really didn’t mess with it, Dad,” said Sam, getting a little desperate.
Dad paused a bit to look at him, placing the box on the counter. “I know that, Sam,” he said. “The soapy dishwater probably softened it some. We’ll get it fixed up.”
Sam didn’t know what to think, so he let Dad wash out the blister with the dishwashing soap, which stung. And then he watched Dad dry his hand and put on some antibacterial cream. Then as he was opening up a long finger bandage, he paused. Tucking his shoulders down a little, he asked, “So what’s this about you not wanting to be better than Dean?”
So Dad had heard. And naturally, he was going to ask, and want an answer. But it was kind of quiet, and Dad was standing very still, and seemed to be in a listening mood, so maybe it would be okay.
“Just on the crossbow,” Sam said, feeling rather bold at saying it out loud. “Because Dean likes it an’ I don’t want him to hate me.”
“I see,” said Dad. He started putting the bandage around Sam’s finger. He smoothed the bandage with his thumb as he said, “Dean doesn’t hate you, Sam.”
“But he would,” Sam said, insisting. “If I keep getting high scores.”
Dad turned away to start putting the tube of cream and the box of bandages back in the first aid kit. For a moment, he acted like Sam wasn’t there; his concentration was fully on what he was doing. But then he stopped, and put his hands on the edge of the box. He was close enough that Sam could smell Dad’s sweat from the heat of the day.
“That won’t work, Sam,” Dad said, looking only at the box, at his hands. “You hold back, to be nice, and then Dean holds back, to be nice. And before you know it, you’re both holding back.” He banged the lid shut, and lifted it to put it on top of the fridge. Then he turned to Sam. His eyes were dark. “But what if you needed to save Dean’s life only you didn’t know how because you’d been holding back?”
The questions slammed into Sam, making him feel like he’d been running full out in the heat of the day. It scared him to hear Dad talking like this. But Dad wasn’t finished.
“What if Dean got hurt because of that? How would you feel then? Would it be worth making Dean feel better now?”
Sam didn’t know what to think. It would have been much easier if Dad had just punished him for popping his blister than to think about this.
“I don’t know,” he said. He didn’t look over at Dean, but he could feel him there, lying on the couch. Could he hear what they were saying?
“Do you want Dean to die because you weren’t doing your best?”
Sam’s chin pushed out and he tried to tighten his mouth so it wouldn’t wobble like he was going to cry, because he wasn’t. He wasn’t. What Dad said was mean. He knew it was mean, and it was all because Dad was trying to make a point, and he was using Dean to do it.
“Do you?”
Scowling, he looked at his feet and shook his head. He scrubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand, and swallowed. “No,” he said. “No, I don’t want that.”
“So you’re going to do your best?”
“Anything but the crossbow,” he said, trying to get out that much.
“This isn’t a bargaining table, Sam. It’s all or nothing.”
Dad had him in his cross-hairs. Either Sam agreed to do his best because he didn’t want Dean to die. Or Sam didn’t agree because he didn’t care whether Dean died. Even if Dean hated him most times, Sam didn’t want that.
“Well?”
“No,” said Sam.
“No?” Dad sounded shocked.
“Er, yes,” said Sam now. It was all mixed up in his head. He pressed his thumb into the bandage over his blister and tried to focus on that and not crying. Dad hated it when he cried, hated it when things weren’t tied down and under control. His stomach lurched and growled at the same time; Sam pressed his arm across his middle to try and quiet it. “Yes, I’ll do it. Do my best.”
“Fine,” said Dad. “Is that your stomach?”
Sam nodded, head down, his hair in his eyes.
“You still hungry?”
He didn’t want to say yes, because that would mean that he’d not eaten his dinner, and Dad was always going on about wasting good food. But his stomach growled again, and so Sam had to nod again.
“Huh,” said Dad. “Dean, you hungry?”
“Yes,” said Dean loudly from the couch.
Dad looked at Sam. “Cereal it is, then.” He was reaching up to the top shelf for the corn flakes, and the bowls, getting out the gallon of milk with one hand and the sugar bowl with the other. He started pouring out three bowls of cereal, and then he stopped. He turned his head sideways to look at Sam. “Layer it?”
This was how Sam liked it, and he nodded his head even though he didn’t feel like smiling, since he’d just agreed to train and train hard, even if it meant he got better than Dean. So he rested his head in his hand and leaned on his elbow on the edge of the counter to watch. Dad shook out some milk over the first layer of corn flakes, and then added some sugar. Then he poured out another thin layer of corn flakes, more milk, more sugar, and so on, till the bowls were heaped with layers of cereal, cold milk, and lots of sugar.
“Here’s yours,” said Dad, handing him a bowl. “Get some spoons.”
Dad carried the bowls over to the couch where Dean was and told Dean to sit up so he wouldn’t spill, like Dean was three years old or something. That was kind of funny, but when Sam walked over with the spoons, Dean still wasn’t looking or talking to him. Would it be worth it if Dean never talked to him again if it meant that he would never die because Sam had screwed up? Of course the answer was yes, it had to be. But as he sat next to Dean, it was hard not to look at Dean and start saying he was sorry then and there. Especially about the crossbow.
No one said anything as they watched the end of the John Wayne movie, though Sam didn’t recognize which one it was. He slouched down and he propped the bowl on his stomach and watched the TV without really seeing it. His mouth was full of milk and corn flakes that crunched with satisfying loudness between his teeth, and his stomach was quieting down to a contented murmur. It was a nice treat, but it would have been nicer if it had been otter pops. He still hadn’t had one all summer, and the way things were going, he wasn’t going to. But he didn’t dare ask. Not after today.
Pretty soon, his spoon was scraping the bottom of the bowl, and he could see Dean tipping his bowl back to drink the milk that way. Sam didn’t like to drink milk after cereal had been in it, the little floaty bits would pass over his teeth and sometimes he thought they were bugs or something that shouldn’t be there. But Dean didn’t care. Dad didn’t either. He was tipping his bowl back, too. Sam got up and hurried over to the sink to rinse his bowl out before anyone could see. Then, without being asked, he went over and got Dad’s bowl and Dean’s and took them over to the sink.
“Bed,” said Dad, as he got up and turned off the TV. “Brush your teeth, and get to bed, we’ve got an early day tomorrow.”
Sam didn’t say what he wanted to say, that every day was an early day. Instead, as he followed Dean into the bathroom, he kept his mouth shut. As he chivied his way into a spot in front of the mirror, he tried to catch Dean’s eye. But no, Dean was studiously following the line of his toothbrush, up and down, up and down. He wasn’t going to give Sam any of his time, that was for sure.
By the time they’d gotten stripped down to their t-shirts and underwear for bed, and Dean turned off the light, the silence beneath the hum of the fans was huge, heavy bell over Sam’s head. In the darkness, with his head on the pillow, staring up at the ceiling, it started to expand. What if the bulls eye had been a fluke, and the 8’s and 9’s were just accidents and he never really did get better? What if he never got the stance for knife throwing right, and the knife always went wild? What if he never learned to shoot a rifle properly and one day a monster came and killed Dean? What if-
“What’s the matter with you now?” asked Dean over the fan, the tone in his voice telling Sam he was already out of patience.
“Nothing,” said Sam. He swallowed, tried to swallow, but he felt two huge hot tears slide down the sides of his face and into his ears. He could hear his blood pounding, like he was underwater. He was never going to get better, and it shouldn’t matter, hadn’t mattered before, but Dad had said-and what if Dean died and it was Sam’s fault?
“Oh for Pete’s sake, are you crying? Just because Dad yelled at you?”
“No,” Sam said. His throat was tightening up.
“Then what is it, and hurry up because I want to go to sleep.”
Sam clutched at the sheet and pulled it up to his chin, even though this made him too warm. But he needed the sheet, needed something to hide under. Dean wasn’t happy with him, and while that wasn’t new, what Sam had to say would probably make it worse. But he had to say it, it was choking him.
“Sam.”
“D-dad said,” said Sam, starting, but then he stopped because his lips were going numb and he knew Dean would make fun of him for stuttering. “Dad said that if I didn’t get better you would get k-killed.”
“What?” He felt Dean sit up in bed next to him, a shadow of pale grey against the dark. “That’s not what Dad said. Weren’t you paying attention?”
Dean had been listening after all and had heard-
Sam rolled towards Dean. “Don’t hate me Dean, I don’t want you to die-”
But Dean shoved him back with a hard elbow as he slid back down under the sheets. “I’m not going to die just because you can’t do what Dad says. And stay on your own side of the bed, crybaby-you’ll get the sheets wet-it’s just as bad as if you peed the bed.”
Hot rage made Sam sit up, indignant, his mouth open. “I do not pee the bed!”
Just as Dean sat up to retort to this, a loud bang on the other side of the wall startled them both into silence.
“Knock it off in there,” came Dad’s voice, just about as clear as if he were standing right next to the bed. “Not another sound from either of you or I swear to god we’ll get up and run laps. You hear me in there? Sam? Dean?”
“Yes, sir,” said Dean.
“Yes,” said Sam.
Sam slid back down till his head was on the pillow. He let the sheet fall at his waist and willed the fan’s breeze to cool him off.
“He’s mad,” Sam whispered. His voice sounded wavery in his own ears, and he knew that would make Dean mad.
It did.
“He’s pissed,” snapped Dean, his voice a hiss. “Because you can’t do what he says. Why can’t you do what he says, why do you have to go and make a fuss every time you stub your toe?”
Sam took a deep breath and opened his mouth to try and explain but a second later, Dean rolled in close and clamped his hand hard over Sam’s mouth.
“Shut up,” said Dean low, but quite clearly. “Just shut up, or he’s going to come in here, and you don’t want him to come in here, do you?”
Sam knew that no he didn’t, so he shook his head no and waited for Dean to take his hand away. Then he opened his mouth to try to explain, but Dean just poked him hard in the shoulder.
“Don’t, Sam,” he said. “Just go to sleep. Just-just go to sleep. Do me that one favor, okay?” There was a heavy thump as Dean fell back on the bed, and the sheets lofted over Sam’s legs, and then settled.
His lower lip was still quivering, and he didn’t want Dean to be even more mad at him, so Sam pressed the back of his hand hard up against his mouth and rolled away from Dean. He curled into the pillow, making himself small on the mattress, felt the dampness beneath his cheek.
Sometimes, when Dean seemed to like him, that made it okay, and everything was bearable. Even Dad yelling at him, or handing out a whipping, he could get through it if he thought that Dean was on his side, even a little bit. He could run laps or clean weapons or even eat nasty, Dad-scrambled eggs if Dean was there, with a friendly smack on the shoulder or even a there you go Sammy, I knew you could do it. But when was the last time he’d heard that? When was the last time anything had been good? And when was the last time he’d thought about playing soccer? When was the last time he could recall racing across a grassy green playing field, with a brassy blue Colorado sky overhead, and the soccer moms on the sidelines handing out kool-aid and cookies?
Sam felt himself shake hard enough to move the bed as he tried not to cry, but Dean wasn’t saying anything, was just pretending Sam wasn’t there. Sam buried his head in his arms and tried to calm himself by humming along with the fan, with his mouth pressed up against the pillowcase, breathing in and out as slowly as he could to ease the ache in his chest.
Dean slapped him in the back, hard. “Knock it off, you freak.”
Sam swallowed and buried his head even further. It had been a long time since Dean had brought him honey on a spoon, too. It was never going to get any better. Never.
The End
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