And Hansel said to Gretel...
New SPN fic, phew this one took a little while. It's a Sam/Jess and it of course contains some Dean. I was desperate to write a continuation of the Stanford fire scene so voila. Hope you enjoy you guys.
*
And Hansel said to Gretel; let us drop these breadcrumbs so that together we find our way home, because losing our way would be the most cruel of things.
“Sammy…” It’s the first thing he whispers to you. “Oh Sam.”
Funny how in the most important events in your life it’s the littlest things you remember the most vividly; like that time you were thrown against an iron rake by an angry poltergeist but all you remember is the shirt Dean was wearing while he held you - his white Metallica band shirt with the rip on the left sleeve that you sewed up that weekend Dad was fighting the Wendigo alone.
“Sam.”
Foil, foil, a foil blanket…you can’t help but find it funny, who thinks a foil blanket will help any in the long run, how much help is this flash of silver going to offer you in the white hot glow.
You laugh as they tuck it around your shoulders and you just can’t stop. Your mind screams pull yourself together but you just can’t seem to stop laughing. Your body shakes and shakes and you shudder uncontrollably who…makes…a blanket…like…this.
Dean kneels in front of you and his hands reach automatically for your face. “Sam. Stop it.”
Foil doesn’t help. You’re not even cold.
You shake and shake and shake and reach for the mask covering your mouth pulling the elastic, ripping the plastic from your face.
“Sam?”
“I’m not even cold Dean.” You tell him, “I’m not even cold.”
His eyes are dark in the orange night sky and he gazes at you intently and your laughing stops, but the shaking doesn’t. You hate what you see in his eyes. You hate that he’s sorry, you hate it.
“You need the mask back on Sammy, put it back on.” His words are gentle and you remember years gone by and band aids and kisses and bathtimes.
“Hey you’re ok Sammy it’s just a scratch.”
“Don’t cry Dean’s got you kiddo.”
“Sam, close your eyes and the soap won’t even go in, see?”
“No, I don’t…I…”
You don’t need the mask, you just need…you need…
A sob from somewhere to your right has you moving and you push the mask over your head and into the protesting arms of a paramedic.
There’s a cluster of girls clad in terry towelling bathrobes huddled sobbing on one another’s shoulders. Their cries are loud and obnoxious and you would like them to stop now please, thanks very much. But you’re too polite to tell them so and you can’t quite bring yourself to breathe right now let alone go and reprimand them.
Someone ought to tell them to keep it down though, no doubt they’re waking up other sleeping students. Really, it’s not at all considerate of them. Nor is the loud, garish sirens that fill the air and flash Dean’s worry lines a bright blue and white.
“Sam” he whispers tentatively. “Sammy…”
“They’re really fucking loud Dean.” You answer him, “someone needs to tell them, I have my interview tomorrow, Jess has art history at 9.30.”
“Sam. Come here…”
Dean tries to reach for you but you automatically take a step backward. Suddenly you realise you can’t see all that well and your eyes are streaming and the smell, god the fucking smell. What is that? Why can’t you smell anything else.
Your head pounds viciously and you have a horrible sense of déjà vu for the smallest of seconds, “It’s a nightmare.” One of the girls screeches and for a brief moment you think she’s right, “I can’t believe this.”
And suddenly you can’t stand it.
“Shut up, shut up, shut up, for fucks sake can you just shut the fuck up for two fucking seconds!” You whirl and scream at her, “Some of us have a god damned class in the morning.”
The girls jump and you recognise the one who’d been speaking. It’s Kate, Jess’s lab partner.
“Oh Sam…” she offers, stepping forward her face streaked with tears, her mouth contorted. “Sam…I’m sorry.” She whispers. “I’m so sorry, god…”
Dean’s hand is gripping your arm now, so tightly it goes slightly numb.
“I’m sorry Kate, I didn’t mean to yell” you offer, “It’s just you were talking kind of loud and Jess has this class tomorrow and I…”
Kate starts sobbing even harder and she takes a step toward you and you find yourself moving back, away, away from her, because you can’t stand that look on her face and it’s really fucking loud and for the life of you you can’t bring your brain to process any of this.
The girls stare at you like you’re some kind of freak and momentarily you think, how did they know. How did they see it? You’ve been careful at Stanford, so fucking careful of hiding your freak past, your family tradition, your twisted Brady Bunch upbringing. Why were they looking at you like that? Why can’t you seem to breathe properly, why is Dean, Mr ‘I don’t do physical affection’, reaching for you whenever he gets the chance.
You think it’s time you went back to bed now, back to Jess, back home. You’re tired and confused and you beat that fucking woman in white and maybe you didn’t get your Dad back right then but in a way you found your brother again and that was worth it all.
But now you want to go home. You want to curl up and take the woman you love in your arms and sleep with the scent of her shampoo in your nostrils and the feel of her warm body tucked into your side. You want to go back to your apartment, the first place in your life you’ve ever called home, the place where you decorated your first Christmas tree, and baked your first cookies and lived with your first love. Yeah you think you’ll go back now.
You turn and walk towards the apartment steps and Dean’s after you in a second. “Sam, no.”
“Dean man, I’ve gotta go sleep.” You offer and huh,when did your voice get so croaky?
“Come on.” Dean tells you, a hand firmly on your forearm, “Come on man.”
“Dean, man I told you, I have an interview tomorrow, I can’t come get Dad right now. You’re welcome to stay on the couch I know Jess’d love to properly meet you but right now I’m going back to bed.”
You turn back and this time it’s not just Dean in front of you but some police officers too. “Son, stay back.”
And the flashing makes your eyes hurt and the sirens are suddenly so loud they’re deafening you and you feel like maybe you can’t breathe again.
“This is my home.” You tell them. “Where else am I supposed to go?”
Dean mumbles something about a motel and the officers mumble with him, and you’re turning back to the steps, you don’t want to go to a motel, you want to go home, you want your plants, and your books, and your apartment and your bed and your Jess.
Why can’t anyone understand that?
You’re half way up the steps when they notice you and you’re gripped forcefully this time, and you know the hands on your left arm well enough to know they’re Dean, and they’re saying something like “can’t let you enter” and “dangerous” and “stay back” but all you can think of is the plants and how they’re probably going to get ruined in all this weird heat that’s crippling the air around you.
Jess loves those plants.
You have to get them. You have to bring them outside. It’s what she’ll want you to do. It’s what you both want.
“I need the plants.” You rasp. “The plants, they’re going to get ruined.”
“Sam…” Dean whispers into your ear, “it’s ok Sam, it’s all going to be ok.”
“The plants Dean…I need…it’s all…I need…”
“I know Sam. I know.”
You press against the arms holding you back determined to get in there. To climb those flights, to the third story, to your apartment.
Jess’ll be so pissed if you don’t get those plants.
Your vision’s blurry and the smell consumes you the closer you get to the entrance and no one will fucking let you move but time seems to clear up or stand still you’re not sure which as she comes through the door.
You’ve been waiting for her. You guess you hadn’t realised it but of course you had been. You had to make sure she got out, had to make sure you both came out of there.
You’d hoped she’d come stumbling out, coughing in her terry towelling bathrobe, her hair wet and her eyes frantic, you’d imagined her running down those steps in her nightgown scowling at you for leaving the plants up there, you hadn’t quite pictured her leaving your apartment in a bodybag.
No, that one throws you. It not only throws you it topples you right off your feet and you hit the ground with a thud.
You’re vaguely aware of Dean going down to the wet grass with you. You’re suddenly registering the thick black smoke and the curling flames, the horrified faces of the other students. You should be horrified, you should be disturbed but there’s no room inside your screaming mind but JessJessJess.
She’s impossibly small in there, that’s your first thought. It can’t be her. Jess is 5’7 when she’s wearing flat shoes, she wouldn’t fit in such a small bag. That.can’t.be.her.
Your mind implodes when the image screams through all the Jess’s and shows you exactly how she fit in there. Jess…the ceiling…the fire…consuming, eating, ravaging her porcelain skin. Of course there wouldn’t be much left.
Vaguely you think you’re going to have to salt and burn her, can’t have her walking restless as spirits of violent death often do. Can’t have that at all. Part of you wants to take her from the paramedics and run, just run away and be together. Just the two of you. The other part wants nothing more than to go save the fucking plants and for the life of you you can’t separate the two parts.
It’s your fault. Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. It’s your fault.
You hope Jess was wearing her bathrobe, you don’t want her cold in there, you don’t want her shivering. You brought her that bathrobe, you wrapped her wet body in it as she climbed from the bath, you cuddled her to your chest when the fire roared and the Californian storms raged outside.
“She needs her bathrobe.” You tell Dean. “She’ll be cold.”
“She’s not cold Sam.” Dean whispers into your hair, “she’s not cold now little brother.”
“That nightgown won’t be any good.” You reply. “It’s too thin. She’ll need something else on.”
“They’ll get her something else Sammy. They’ll get her something else.”
You’re only aware you’re in Dean’s arms when he rocks you back and forth gently and you both watch as Jessica leaves Stanford for the final time. Funny you’d always thought she’d be leaving with you. The two of you riding off into the sunset. You wonder what kind of sunset this is; the orange glow is there alright but with the flashing lights and the smoke and the fact that one of the couple is leaving in a body bag probably means it’s not the kind you were hoping for.
You climb unsteadily to your feet and watch her, watch as she disappears around the long drive in a black van marked ‘county morgue’, ‘can you tell them to get her her dressing gown.” You croak to the nearest policeman. “Can you tell them that?”
You gaze up a moment at your apartment window. Dean’s arm is around your shoulders but you can’t hear much of what he’s saying. Smoke erupts from the charred window pane, the flames seem gone, but the smoke blooms up and you quietly realise perhaps the plants didn’t make it after all.
Jess’ll be pissed.
But she won’t be will she?
She won’t be pissed ever again. She won’t be angry, or hurt, or giggly, or flirtatious or sarcastic, or thoughtful ever again. She won’t be here again.
Suddenly it hits you.
She won’t ever be coming back here, back home, to you. She won’t ever be walking in and throwing her bag down with a sigh, or kissing you deeply and asking you about your day, or bouncing in with the latest gossip she heard in the hall. She won’t ever be back here again. And you realise with the same cold hard clarity that neither will you.
Sam Winchester is dead.
The part of you that lived here, that knew real love for the first time. That laughed and learned and LIVED. He will never be coming back either. He may as well be in that body bag with Jessica.
You give up on the plants and you walk away as Dean is cornered momentarily by the police. You head for the car.
There’s police all around you, students, emergency services you stalk passed your old roommate Chris who’s shouting your name and staring at your apartment in abstract horror, and you head straight for the trunk. You open it and you don’t give a fuck who sees you. Withdrawing a shotgun for a single second you almost raise it, you picture it in your mouth. But the ghost of the past, a whispered goodnight from a woman who loved you, a blonde kiss, a soft laugh, a nurses uniform, they banish the thought.
You need to know.
Why you?
What did this?
Who did this?
You will make them pay.
You will rip them apart with your bare hands, you will burn THEM alive in front of you and watch them beg for mercy. You will scour the earth until you find them and then they’ll wish they’d never ever existed.
Dean cautiously steps up beside you. He looks terrified. Like if he looks hard enough and deep enough into your eyes he’s going to lose it worse than you have.
He can try.
But you’re already lost.
You throw the shotgun into the trunk.
“We’ve got work to do.”
*
Dean finds you the next morning and he says nothing as he slumps to the ground and leans against the shower next to you.
You shiver in the towel and grip your hair with your hands.
“You need to get into something warm Sammy.” Dean tells you a hand hovering above your towel clad knee like he’s terrified you’ll break into a thousand pieces if he touches you. “How long have you been here?”
Dean stayed up most of the night watching you, just watching, you knew he was there, you’ve always known when Dean’s there. You closed your eyes at some time around three and lulled him into the pretence. As soon as you heard him lose his own battle against sleep you were up and into the shower. You were there for hours. Long after the hot water runs out, you only climbed out because you were afraid you’d fall down in there. You’ve been sitting on the floor ever since.
“I can’t get if off Dean. Can you get it off?” You ask him quietly.
“What Sam? Get what off?”
“Please Dean just…”
“Sam…you have to tell me what’s going on buddy.”
His hand rests then, properly settles on your knee and you give in and lean your head against his shoulder. “The smoke Dean, it won’t…I can’t…it’s in my hair, it’s just…I can’t…”
Dean kneels then and climbs to his feet, you’re not really aware of what he’s doing until he’s back to his knees and he gently makes you tilt your head back and then you realize.
He adjusts the water temperature and you lie back and it should feel weird and it should feel awkward but you’re just completely overcome with the feeling of home as your brother keeps the cold water from your cheeks and runs it through your dark hair. He takes the shampoo and carefully, reverently in a way that’s so Dean, rinses and gently removes every last sud from your curls.
Then he physically lifts you off your feet till you’re stood and helps you back to the room. You’re limp and embarrassingly helpless but with the lack of sleep and the freaking smoke you can’t help but slump and give into your urge to be the little brother again, to give yourself completely to his capable hands. Dean’s careful with you, so careful and he runs a towel over your hair and makes you lie on the bed and then covers you with the duvet.
‘Sleep Sam.’ He tells you. And you sleep for 23 straight hours before waking again.
When you do wake, you wake to Dean once more. He’s pouring over some papers on the motel desk and when you swing your legs from the bed he flinches and shoves them into a folder. “Hey, you’re up. About time sleeping beauty.”
“What’s that?” You ask, suspicions heightened by his shifty behaviour.
“Nothing.”
“Dean…”
“Sam it’s nothing.”
You say nothing, just walk over to him and take the folder from his tight grip. His sigh is loud in the motel room but you barely hear it as the words on the front paper dart out at you.
“Police Report”
“Where did you get these?”
Dean’s eyes are shadowed and he wipes the back of his hand across his forehead wearily. “I slipped out a couple of hours ago, got a copy from the station.”
You slouch onto the bed and read them over.
By the end your eyes are blurring and that annoying shaking’s started again. Words like “faulty electrical wiring” and “remains of one body - female” stare up at you.
Not a body. Jess. Your Jess. Your blonde, blue eyed future wife. The woman you spent a year and a half loving, the woman you’d been ring shopping for just days ago.
“Identified by dental records”
Oh god. Her teeth, that smile…that wobbly tooth she had at the right side of her mouth the last few weeks. Was that really all that was left? All?
Dean watches you shake and tries to touch you but unlike the night before this time you pull away. “No.” You tell him softly. “No.” It’s the only word you can trust yourself to say.
You don’t want to eat, you don’t want to drink, you just want to curl up and die, and Dean trying to force you to do both later only makes you more exhausted. Only makes the fight inside you strengthen. Stop it Dean. Just stop.
You wake the next day and you’re not stupid enough not to realise Dean must have drugged you. Your phone has 47 messages…47…that’s how much Jess is worth at Stanford. 47 phone messages.
“I need to go to the apartment now.” You say.
Dean says “no”.
He has no choice but to follow you when you leave the room with the keys to the Impala.
“Sam this isn’t a good idea man. Lets leave it a day or two.”
But he’s already wrenching the keys from your grasp, he knows he’s not winning this one, it’s also a given that you’re not fighting this alone. He’s with you all the way. Even when he doesn’t agree.
“I need to be there now Dean.”
And not another word is spoken.
*
You’re apartment’s barely recognisable. Everything is lined in ash and charcoal. You feel as if maybe you’re outside of your body at this point, you think maybe you like that better. Nothing seems real. Maybe you’re dreaming all this, maybe this is all some kind of weird really long nightmare.
Dean’s at your shoulder, he places a hand on your back. ‘You ok Sammy?’
Fucking peachy you want to spit but instead you just numbly nod your head as you step over your blackened thresh hold. You remember when you and Jess first moved in here, you remember her smile, the way her hand glided over every surface wonder reflected in her eyes.
It’s ours Sam, all ours, I can’t believe I’m living with a boy for real.
You couldn’t believe it either. You’d watched her spin around in her yellow flowery sun dress and that smile…
“Identified through dental records”
And you’d wished so hard. So fucking hard for all this to be real, for the two of you to be happy, and she’d thrown herself into your arms and you swung her around and later on she’d called you weird as you put the line of salt under the windows and the symbols over the door but it didn’t matter. None of it mattered. Because you were together. You loved her and she loved you and for once in your life you were safe and happy and loved all at once.
You look around the apartment and let your fingers trail over the charred wood as she had so many months before. You’re a Winchester, of course wishes didn’t come true. You should have known. And as you and Dean stand in the remains of the home you’d loved it all comes crashing in on you.
You can never escape now. Here it is in ashes and debris, your dreams and your hopes and your memories, everything you’d wished for gone. When you’d walked out on your family two years before you hadn’t pictured the cost. Hadn’t even considered it really. And this was your penance. This was your dues for forgetting, for trying to escape for ever daring to be different, to be normal, to have a life.
Jessica had paid. For you.
That was a cost that should never have been paid.
Dean’s picking up things, gingerly sifting through the ashes, he has the EMF out, but any trace of sulphur is long gone. You don’t need the EMF to tell you what you and Dean saw that night, what you already know. It came back for you.
It came back again.
You move tentatively to where the window used to be and where a charred frame now remains. At your feet the remains of one of the plants stares up at you and for a moment you’re absurdly pleased you found one but then you notice how black and curled in on itself the leaf is and your breath hitches in your throat.
You and Dean look around the apartment for no more than ten minutes. It’s the worst ten minutes of your life.
As you go to leave you purposely force yourself to look up at the charred ceiling that’s black and burned partially away. Dean looks up too, he puts an arm around your shoulder and the two of you stare in silence for over a minute.
You can’t stop picturing her. You can’t stop. Her hair, her nightdress, her leg elegantly even in death pinned out on the ceiling. God it’s so fucking unfair you want to scream. You have so many memories of Jess so many beautiful and amazing memories but the only one you can’t forget, you can’t stop picturing is that. Is fucking THAT.
“You wanna go home now?” Dean asks gently.
And you laugh for a moment. Home? You’re already there.
*
The sixth day is Jess’s funeral.
Dean does your tie for you, you’re both in rental suits, you only had one for law faculty events that top students were invited to but that burned up with Jess. You’re exhausted and cold and hot all at once and you can’t keep anything down for long. Your nightmares are keeping you up at night and your memories are plaguing you in the day.
Dean wants to leave tomorrow.
Part of you can’t wait to be away from Stanford, to leave it all behind, the smoke, the burned out shell of an apartment, the sombre faces, the bathrobes and the plants, but another part is clinging on for dear life. If you leave tomorrow, if you leave you know, a part of you knows that’s it. There’ll be no coming back. No late night study sessions, no coffee runs from the library, no lectures, or parties or nights in with Jess. And you don’t think you’re quite ready to let that go yet. Not sure you’ll ever be ready really.
But Dean wants to go. And there’s no question as to whether you’re going with him this time.
Doesn’t make it any easier to leave it behind though. Doesn’t make it any easier at all.
You and Dean arrive at the church just after Jessica does and you watch through the Impala’s windscreen as you recognise her brothers and your friends carry her from the hearse. They called you, you’re sure of it. Your phone lies untouched since the fire in your motel room. Ironically you’d left it in the Impala by accident before you left Dean and returned and it’s the only thing that survived other than you. Those 47 messages are now at 62 and you haven’t listened to a one. You’re sure some are regarding the funeral, and you’re sure they probably had offers for you to be pall bearer, but you’re not sure you can stand even now, let alone attempting to carry your girlfriend’s coffin into a church.
Jess’s parents walk behind her, crying openly and you’re nauseous as you remember Christmas with the smiling couple, the welcoming arms, the actual feeling of belonging and a real family that existed on that day. You wonder what they think of you now. You wonder what they think of all this.
“Sammy. Come on.” Dean urges softly and reaches for your arm. You climb from the car unsteadily and watch the stream of people flow into the church. There’s a lot. Jess’d be touched, you’re not surprised, she knew a lot of people. Was loved by a lot of people.
You watch them go in and you and Dean bring up the rear before you pause a moment outside the church letting the doors shut before you.
“Sammy? You alright kiddo?”
You lean against the wall for a long moment and Dean leans next to you, watching and silent.
“I don’t want to go in.” You admit. “I don’t want to say goodbye to her.”
“You don’t want to do this Sam, then we’ll get back in the car and we’ll drive man just say the word…” Dean offers, “but Sammy man, if there’s even the slightest chance you’re gonna regret this in the long run kid, then we go in there. We go in there right now.”
He’s right. You know he’s right, how could you live with yourself if you drove away and left her behind without saying goodbye to her. The answer’d probably see you staring down the muzzle of a shotgun in your own palm.
You nod stiffly.
“I’m with you Sam.” Dean leans his forehead to yours. “I’m here.”
You know he is and you’ve never loved him more than you do in that moment.
“Yeah…” you whisper, stepping forward, “yeah I know.”
The two of you open the creaking church doors and are uncomfortable as it bangs behind you and everyone turns to stare. Their faces are filled with shock and sympathy and you recognize every single one of them and you unconsciously cling to Dean’s arm as he takes control and the two of you walk to a pew.
Jessica’s parents turn in their seats and her father’s eyes immediately flicker away. Oh Mr Moore you think sadly, I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry.
People murmur as you move and suddenly a group of girls in the third row you recognize form Jess’s sorority get to their feet and move, indicating you can have their place nearer to the front. You appreciate it, but part of you wants to sit as far away from the front as possible. Dean’s steering the both of you forward though and you figure boyfriend gets high priority at something like this.
Jess’s coffin is white. It’s stupidly small like that damned body bag and it has horrible silver handles. There’s roses on it. Jess always hated roses. She thought they were lame and tacky. Over rated Sam. She’d tell you. Totally over rated, give me wild flowers any day.
You wish they weren’t burying her. You’ve dug enough graves in your time to know what happens to the corpse down there and you’d rather just scatter her ashes. But then you remember and the bile rises in your throat. Jessica’s ashes are already scattered, they rained down on you from the ceiling that night.
And what kind of a twisted scattering that was? What kind of a twisted cremation for your beautiful girl. Not a fitting one that’s for sure.
A picture of Jess from the senior prom sits atop the coffin and you remember how much she hated it and rolled her eyes whenever she saw it, claiming she was both hung over and had run out of lip gloss when it was taken.
She’s never looked more beautiful to you.
The funeral’s a blur. Jess’s father talks of how she used to be scared of balloons (they made loud noises and one popped near her head when she was three), how worried she was she wouldn’t get into Stanford (needn’t have she got straight A’s), how wonderful of a daughter she was. The Priest talks of eternal life and he who goes before, and you wonder if this, sitting here listening to this knowing you’re responsible is what eternal damnation feels like. You’re almost surprised you made it past the holy water at the entrance because right about now you feel like a worse abomination than any demon you’ve ever encountered.
One of Jess’s friends (the curly haired Carol who had pinched your ass while Jess was in the bathroom a few months before) reads a bidding prayer and you and Dean bow your head at appropriate moments. Then there’s a long pause when the priest asks if anyone else would like to speak. Heads shuffle obviously in your direction and you figure this has to be it. You didn’t want your goodbye to be a fucking spectacle for the entire campus to see but you didn’t want a lot of things lately so Dean squeezes your hand and you climb to your feet and head to the lectern.
Your palms are sweaty, your knees are weak and you feel like you might fall down at any minute but you make it up there. Pausing momentarily to touch the top of her coffin with your fingertips.
“Watch where you’re going stretch.” You croak out as you stand before the congregation. You’re met with the anticipated confused looks. “Those are the first words Jess said to me last year.” You clear your throat. “You see I uh…I walked out of the library and Jess was coming in and I barrelled into her and she had…” you smile for the briefest of moments remembering her hair in the plait, long and golden down her back. “She had all these books and she dropped them and she puts these hands on her hips, tilts her head up at me and goes “watch where you’re going Stretch.” I’ve never fallen in love in a single moment before. I didn’t know what she meant and I told her that and she asked me if I’d ever heard of Stretch Armstrong. Apparently I was tall and long and she never could stop her mouth from running ahead of her brain. I carried her books back in, and she invited me for coffee and that was it. I was a goner.”
Jess’s mother sobs into a handkerchief and your eyes automatically block everyone else out until they rest on Dean. And everyone else fades away as it feels like you’re telling the story for his and Jess’s ears only. The way it was meant to be you guess.
“She was impossible, and beautiful and clever and sarcastic and she kicked my ass all the god damned time if I needed it. And I did, need it I mean. You know sometimes in this world, in this life we take things for granted, we get so caught up in the little things that we miss the big and before we know it life’s over and we hardly realize we’ve lived. Jessica never missed the little moments. She took every one and she made damned sure I remembered them. I don’t really know how to do this. How to stand here and tell everyone how much she meant to me, how much she still is to me. I could never do her justice.” Your throat hitches a moment and you have to swallow repeatedly and physically pull yourself back together.
“They say the true mark of a masterpiece is that you can look at it for hours, days, years and it forever continues to reveal itself. That’s how I felt about Jess, how I’ll always feel about Jess. She was a masterpiece in the making. And I couldn’t stop watching. I can’t ever, I will never ever stop watching. ”
Dean’s eyes fill suspiciously and you beg him not to lose it, if he loses it, you’re gone too.
“I love you Jess. I am so sorry. So, so sorry.” You stumble from the podium and place a hand on the edge of her coffin. “It should have been me.” You whisper. No one needs to hear your arrogant wishes. But it should have been. You know that. You kiss the tips of your fingers and run them over the wood remembering that yellow sundress and that smile and the braid and the books and Stretch Armstrong and the plants and the smurf pjs and the cookies and the nights in bed and that stupid, stupid white nightgown. “Forever”.
*
Jess’s body is lowered into the ground in the middle of the cemetery and it’s as soon as you’ve dropped the mound of dirt into the Palo Alto soil that Mr Moore turns on you.
“What happened Sam?”
Everyone begins to walk away and you stand and face the bearded man half crazed with grief no parent should have to face.
“I think it was an electrical fire sir.” You manage through your rapidly closing up throat.
“The police thought it might have been arson at first boy. Who do you know who could have done this. Jessy didn’t have any enemies Sam you know that.”
“Mr Moore please I…”
He steps forward, eyes narrowing. “You know something I can see it in your eyes boy. What happened?”
“Faulty wiring or something I…”
“It wasn’t fucking faulty wiring!” Mr Moore screams losing it and advancing on you. “You did something to someone didn’t you Sam? Admit it you had a fight and this is how someone got their revenge, on my little girl.”
“No. I…”
He grips your arms as Jess’s brothers arrive and reach for him. “Tell me the truth god damn it!”
“Back off right the fuck now!” Suddenly Dean’s there prying Mr Moore’s arms away from your arms, getting up in his face. “He’s just as much a victim as Jess is alright, if I hadn’t been there he would have been dead right along with her.”
“Rather him than my little girl”. Comes the reply and Dean’s fist shoots out in a second slamming the older man into the ground.
“Dean!” You reach forward as Mrs Moore and Chris and Jeff go down to the ground with Jess’s father.
People are standing staring now, there’s quite the crowd.
“Don’t you fucking dare say that.” Dean screams through the horrified silence of the graveyard. “Don’t you dare pops or I swear to god this won’t be the only funeral today.”
You’re pulling on his arm and shaking and mumbling and Mr Moore is sobbing and weeping and grasping the soil in his hands and Dean’s slowly getting control again and the whole god damn cemetery is staring at you and you just want to leave you just want to fucking leave now.
Dean finally realises the situation and comes back to himself gripping your arm tightly and steering you through the crowd and back to the Impala. You shut the doors and you both sit in silence breathing heavily. Well that was a fucking nightmare.
Dean guns the engine but you place a hand out and stop him and he wordlessly lets you and you both sit for a while until everyone gets in their cars and leaves, heads to the reception where you know neither of you will be heading.
When it’s clear you turn to your big brother “give us a minute?”
Dean nods and you turn and reach into the backseat lifting out the flowers you picked when you left your apartment the other day. The flowers Jess had always seen from your apartment, the ones she said she wanted in your future garden, in the home you would have made for yourselves.
You leave the car and walk back over the grass, it’s just the two of you again now, for the first time since the fire it’s just you two, just the way you wanted it.
“I…um…you always said roses were lame so I brought you uh…”
You look at the flowers and suddenly you realise that she’s never going to see them. She’s never going to run her fingers in their petals or bring them to her nose, never going to smile at you, tell you you’re the best boyfriend for finding any ever again.
You gaze momentarily at the picture on the grave, the smiling circle of Jess that’s all that’s left of her. You bite your lip and for the first time you feel like you actually might lose it soon.
“Jess…” you manage and then you’re on your knees, “oh god.” You kneel and lay the flowers down, “I should have protected you.” You stammer eyes filling once more, “I should have told you the truth.” You lean the flowers against her headstone now. “It should have been me.”
“Sam!”
You jump as Dean comes up behind you and you kneel your head down onto the soil.
“Sam.”
“Nuh uh.” You manage, “don’t touch me.”
“Sammy.”
You huddle down deeper into the soil and wonder just how far you’ll have to dig to join her.
“Oh Dean.” You finally whisper. “It’s my fault it’s all my fault.”
“Sam, no.” Dean’s on his knees now you know it, a hand rests on your back but you keep your head in the soil, in the grass. “It’s not man. It’s that demon, it is not your fault you hearing me?”
You hear him, you just don’t believe him.
“I should never have come here.”
“Sammy stop it.”
“I just want her back Dean.” You tell him choking on the soil. “I want her back man I want her to yell at me or to scream, or to laugh, anything, hell man I’d do it, I’d walk away from her if it just meant she’d come back. I’d do anything.” You sob then breaking down, “tell me what to do Dean. I need you to tell me what to do now.”
Dean’s your big brother he’ll have the answers, he can fix anything, he’ll fix this.
“Come here Sammy.” Dean whispers reaching for you, “Come here little brother.”
And he pulls you out of the dirt and hauls you into his arms and you’re clinging and crying and you’re not sure you’re breathing again but Dean holds on, he just holds onto you.
Your face is in his jacket and your fists are clenched in his shirt and his hands are on your hair and your back and he’s gripping you so fiercely you feel like you’re drowning. “It’s ok.” He murmurs, “I’ve got you Sammy, I’ve got you.”
“It should have been me.” You sob the tears never-ending, your heart physically aching in your chest, “it should have been me.”
“I’m here.” Dean whispers into your hair “I’m here.”
And after when you drive away and watch Palo Alto and Stanford and Jessica and your life disappear in the rear view mirror your brother rolls his window down and you watch the perfect sunset over the highway and you realise he is there.
He’s beside you and with you and here and maybe if there was one thing that could save your life right now it’s that fact.
He’s here.
You’re here.
You both are.
And maybe Jess’s death was some kind of covenant that bound you and Dean, two souls drifting, meant to be together again. Maybe there was some reason for that. Maybe in this stupid fucked up world two would always be stronger than one, and maybe you’d have to find out. Maybe it should have been you and maybe it was meant to be Jess. All you know is you loved her, and she loved you.
Watch where you’re going Stretch
And someday you’ll be together again.
You remember a night with Jessica huddled on your knee, her reading aloud, the wonder in her voice at the fairy tale and you think maybe your fairytale ends right here...
The night air cools around you as the open road stretches out ahead and you swear you hear Jess's voice on the breath of the wind, "And Hansel said to Gretel; let us drop these breadcrumbs so that together we find our way home, because losing our way would be the most cruel of things."
"I'll follow the breadcrumbs Jess" you promise silently. "I'll be home soon."
Authors notes ~
I pinched the line from Hansel and Gretal and One Tree Hill for the inspiration. The quote from Sam's speech about a masterpiece is taken from Jensen Ackles short film "Still Life" and it got to me.
*
And Hansel said to Gretel; let us drop these breadcrumbs so that together we find our way home, because losing our way would be the most cruel of things.
“Sammy…” It’s the first thing he whispers to you. “Oh Sam.”
Funny how in the most important events in your life it’s the littlest things you remember the most vividly; like that time you were thrown against an iron rake by an angry poltergeist but all you remember is the shirt Dean was wearing while he held you - his white Metallica band shirt with the rip on the left sleeve that you sewed up that weekend Dad was fighting the Wendigo alone.
“Sam.”
Foil, foil, a foil blanket…you can’t help but find it funny, who thinks a foil blanket will help any in the long run, how much help is this flash of silver going to offer you in the white hot glow.
You laugh as they tuck it around your shoulders and you just can’t stop. Your mind screams pull yourself together but you just can’t seem to stop laughing. Your body shakes and shakes and you shudder uncontrollably who…makes…a blanket…like…this.
Dean kneels in front of you and his hands reach automatically for your face. “Sam. Stop it.”
Foil doesn’t help. You’re not even cold.
You shake and shake and shake and reach for the mask covering your mouth pulling the elastic, ripping the plastic from your face.
“Sam?”
“I’m not even cold Dean.” You tell him, “I’m not even cold.”
His eyes are dark in the orange night sky and he gazes at you intently and your laughing stops, but the shaking doesn’t. You hate what you see in his eyes. You hate that he’s sorry, you hate it.
“You need the mask back on Sammy, put it back on.” His words are gentle and you remember years gone by and band aids and kisses and bathtimes.
“Hey you’re ok Sammy it’s just a scratch.”
“Don’t cry Dean’s got you kiddo.”
“Sam, close your eyes and the soap won’t even go in, see?”
“No, I don’t…I…”
You don’t need the mask, you just need…you need…
A sob from somewhere to your right has you moving and you push the mask over your head and into the protesting arms of a paramedic.
There’s a cluster of girls clad in terry towelling bathrobes huddled sobbing on one another’s shoulders. Their cries are loud and obnoxious and you would like them to stop now please, thanks very much. But you’re too polite to tell them so and you can’t quite bring yourself to breathe right now let alone go and reprimand them.
Someone ought to tell them to keep it down though, no doubt they’re waking up other sleeping students. Really, it’s not at all considerate of them. Nor is the loud, garish sirens that fill the air and flash Dean’s worry lines a bright blue and white.
“Sam” he whispers tentatively. “Sammy…”
“They’re really fucking loud Dean.” You answer him, “someone needs to tell them, I have my interview tomorrow, Jess has art history at 9.30.”
“Sam. Come here…”
Dean tries to reach for you but you automatically take a step backward. Suddenly you realise you can’t see all that well and your eyes are streaming and the smell, god the fucking smell. What is that? Why can’t you smell anything else.
Your head pounds viciously and you have a horrible sense of déjà vu for the smallest of seconds, “It’s a nightmare.” One of the girls screeches and for a brief moment you think she’s right, “I can’t believe this.”
And suddenly you can’t stand it.
“Shut up, shut up, shut up, for fucks sake can you just shut the fuck up for two fucking seconds!” You whirl and scream at her, “Some of us have a god damned class in the morning.”
The girls jump and you recognise the one who’d been speaking. It’s Kate, Jess’s lab partner.
“Oh Sam…” she offers, stepping forward her face streaked with tears, her mouth contorted. “Sam…I’m sorry.” She whispers. “I’m so sorry, god…”
Dean’s hand is gripping your arm now, so tightly it goes slightly numb.
“I’m sorry Kate, I didn’t mean to yell” you offer, “It’s just you were talking kind of loud and Jess has this class tomorrow and I…”
Kate starts sobbing even harder and she takes a step toward you and you find yourself moving back, away, away from her, because you can’t stand that look on her face and it’s really fucking loud and for the life of you you can’t bring your brain to process any of this.
The girls stare at you like you’re some kind of freak and momentarily you think, how did they know. How did they see it? You’ve been careful at Stanford, so fucking careful of hiding your freak past, your family tradition, your twisted Brady Bunch upbringing. Why were they looking at you like that? Why can’t you seem to breathe properly, why is Dean, Mr ‘I don’t do physical affection’, reaching for you whenever he gets the chance.
You think it’s time you went back to bed now, back to Jess, back home. You’re tired and confused and you beat that fucking woman in white and maybe you didn’t get your Dad back right then but in a way you found your brother again and that was worth it all.
But now you want to go home. You want to curl up and take the woman you love in your arms and sleep with the scent of her shampoo in your nostrils and the feel of her warm body tucked into your side. You want to go back to your apartment, the first place in your life you’ve ever called home, the place where you decorated your first Christmas tree, and baked your first cookies and lived with your first love. Yeah you think you’ll go back now.
You turn and walk towards the apartment steps and Dean’s after you in a second. “Sam, no.”
“Dean man, I’ve gotta go sleep.” You offer and huh,when did your voice get so croaky?
“Come on.” Dean tells you, a hand firmly on your forearm, “Come on man.”
“Dean, man I told you, I have an interview tomorrow, I can’t come get Dad right now. You’re welcome to stay on the couch I know Jess’d love to properly meet you but right now I’m going back to bed.”
You turn back and this time it’s not just Dean in front of you but some police officers too. “Son, stay back.”
And the flashing makes your eyes hurt and the sirens are suddenly so loud they’re deafening you and you feel like maybe you can’t breathe again.
“This is my home.” You tell them. “Where else am I supposed to go?”
Dean mumbles something about a motel and the officers mumble with him, and you’re turning back to the steps, you don’t want to go to a motel, you want to go home, you want your plants, and your books, and your apartment and your bed and your Jess.
Why can’t anyone understand that?
You’re half way up the steps when they notice you and you’re gripped forcefully this time, and you know the hands on your left arm well enough to know they’re Dean, and they’re saying something like “can’t let you enter” and “dangerous” and “stay back” but all you can think of is the plants and how they’re probably going to get ruined in all this weird heat that’s crippling the air around you.
Jess loves those plants.
You have to get them. You have to bring them outside. It’s what she’ll want you to do. It’s what you both want.
“I need the plants.” You rasp. “The plants, they’re going to get ruined.”
“Sam…” Dean whispers into your ear, “it’s ok Sam, it’s all going to be ok.”
“The plants Dean…I need…it’s all…I need…”
“I know Sam. I know.”
You press against the arms holding you back determined to get in there. To climb those flights, to the third story, to your apartment.
Jess’ll be so pissed if you don’t get those plants.
Your vision’s blurry and the smell consumes you the closer you get to the entrance and no one will fucking let you move but time seems to clear up or stand still you’re not sure which as she comes through the door.
You’ve been waiting for her. You guess you hadn’t realised it but of course you had been. You had to make sure she got out, had to make sure you both came out of there.
You’d hoped she’d come stumbling out, coughing in her terry towelling bathrobe, her hair wet and her eyes frantic, you’d imagined her running down those steps in her nightgown scowling at you for leaving the plants up there, you hadn’t quite pictured her leaving your apartment in a bodybag.
No, that one throws you. It not only throws you it topples you right off your feet and you hit the ground with a thud.
You’re vaguely aware of Dean going down to the wet grass with you. You’re suddenly registering the thick black smoke and the curling flames, the horrified faces of the other students. You should be horrified, you should be disturbed but there’s no room inside your screaming mind but JessJessJess.
She’s impossibly small in there, that’s your first thought. It can’t be her. Jess is 5’7 when she’s wearing flat shoes, she wouldn’t fit in such a small bag. That.can’t.be.her.
Your mind implodes when the image screams through all the Jess’s and shows you exactly how she fit in there. Jess…the ceiling…the fire…consuming, eating, ravaging her porcelain skin. Of course there wouldn’t be much left.
Vaguely you think you’re going to have to salt and burn her, can’t have her walking restless as spirits of violent death often do. Can’t have that at all. Part of you wants to take her from the paramedics and run, just run away and be together. Just the two of you. The other part wants nothing more than to go save the fucking plants and for the life of you you can’t separate the two parts.
It’s your fault. Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. It’s your fault.
You hope Jess was wearing her bathrobe, you don’t want her cold in there, you don’t want her shivering. You brought her that bathrobe, you wrapped her wet body in it as she climbed from the bath, you cuddled her to your chest when the fire roared and the Californian storms raged outside.
“She needs her bathrobe.” You tell Dean. “She’ll be cold.”
“She’s not cold Sam.” Dean whispers into your hair, “she’s not cold now little brother.”
“That nightgown won’t be any good.” You reply. “It’s too thin. She’ll need something else on.”
“They’ll get her something else Sammy. They’ll get her something else.”
You’re only aware you’re in Dean’s arms when he rocks you back and forth gently and you both watch as Jessica leaves Stanford for the final time. Funny you’d always thought she’d be leaving with you. The two of you riding off into the sunset. You wonder what kind of sunset this is; the orange glow is there alright but with the flashing lights and the smoke and the fact that one of the couple is leaving in a body bag probably means it’s not the kind you were hoping for.
You climb unsteadily to your feet and watch her, watch as she disappears around the long drive in a black van marked ‘county morgue’, ‘can you tell them to get her her dressing gown.” You croak to the nearest policeman. “Can you tell them that?”
You gaze up a moment at your apartment window. Dean’s arm is around your shoulders but you can’t hear much of what he’s saying. Smoke erupts from the charred window pane, the flames seem gone, but the smoke blooms up and you quietly realise perhaps the plants didn’t make it after all.
Jess’ll be pissed.
But she won’t be will she?
She won’t be pissed ever again. She won’t be angry, or hurt, or giggly, or flirtatious or sarcastic, or thoughtful ever again. She won’t be here again.
Suddenly it hits you.
She won’t ever be coming back here, back home, to you. She won’t ever be walking in and throwing her bag down with a sigh, or kissing you deeply and asking you about your day, or bouncing in with the latest gossip she heard in the hall. She won’t ever be back here again. And you realise with the same cold hard clarity that neither will you.
Sam Winchester is dead.
The part of you that lived here, that knew real love for the first time. That laughed and learned and LIVED. He will never be coming back either. He may as well be in that body bag with Jessica.
You give up on the plants and you walk away as Dean is cornered momentarily by the police. You head for the car.
There’s police all around you, students, emergency services you stalk passed your old roommate Chris who’s shouting your name and staring at your apartment in abstract horror, and you head straight for the trunk. You open it and you don’t give a fuck who sees you. Withdrawing a shotgun for a single second you almost raise it, you picture it in your mouth. But the ghost of the past, a whispered goodnight from a woman who loved you, a blonde kiss, a soft laugh, a nurses uniform, they banish the thought.
You need to know.
Why you?
What did this?
Who did this?
You will make them pay.
You will rip them apart with your bare hands, you will burn THEM alive in front of you and watch them beg for mercy. You will scour the earth until you find them and then they’ll wish they’d never ever existed.
Dean cautiously steps up beside you. He looks terrified. Like if he looks hard enough and deep enough into your eyes he’s going to lose it worse than you have.
He can try.
But you’re already lost.
You throw the shotgun into the trunk.
“We’ve got work to do.”
*
Dean finds you the next morning and he says nothing as he slumps to the ground and leans against the shower next to you.
You shiver in the towel and grip your hair with your hands.
“You need to get into something warm Sammy.” Dean tells you a hand hovering above your towel clad knee like he’s terrified you’ll break into a thousand pieces if he touches you. “How long have you been here?”
Dean stayed up most of the night watching you, just watching, you knew he was there, you’ve always known when Dean’s there. You closed your eyes at some time around three and lulled him into the pretence. As soon as you heard him lose his own battle against sleep you were up and into the shower. You were there for hours. Long after the hot water runs out, you only climbed out because you were afraid you’d fall down in there. You’ve been sitting on the floor ever since.
“I can’t get if off Dean. Can you get it off?” You ask him quietly.
“What Sam? Get what off?”
“Please Dean just…”
“Sam…you have to tell me what’s going on buddy.”
His hand rests then, properly settles on your knee and you give in and lean your head against his shoulder. “The smoke Dean, it won’t…I can’t…it’s in my hair, it’s just…I can’t…”
Dean kneels then and climbs to his feet, you’re not really aware of what he’s doing until he’s back to his knees and he gently makes you tilt your head back and then you realize.
He adjusts the water temperature and you lie back and it should feel weird and it should feel awkward but you’re just completely overcome with the feeling of home as your brother keeps the cold water from your cheeks and runs it through your dark hair. He takes the shampoo and carefully, reverently in a way that’s so Dean, rinses and gently removes every last sud from your curls.
Then he physically lifts you off your feet till you’re stood and helps you back to the room. You’re limp and embarrassingly helpless but with the lack of sleep and the freaking smoke you can’t help but slump and give into your urge to be the little brother again, to give yourself completely to his capable hands. Dean’s careful with you, so careful and he runs a towel over your hair and makes you lie on the bed and then covers you with the duvet.
‘Sleep Sam.’ He tells you. And you sleep for 23 straight hours before waking again.
When you do wake, you wake to Dean once more. He’s pouring over some papers on the motel desk and when you swing your legs from the bed he flinches and shoves them into a folder. “Hey, you’re up. About time sleeping beauty.”
“What’s that?” You ask, suspicions heightened by his shifty behaviour.
“Nothing.”
“Dean…”
“Sam it’s nothing.”
You say nothing, just walk over to him and take the folder from his tight grip. His sigh is loud in the motel room but you barely hear it as the words on the front paper dart out at you.
“Police Report”
“Where did you get these?”
Dean’s eyes are shadowed and he wipes the back of his hand across his forehead wearily. “I slipped out a couple of hours ago, got a copy from the station.”
You slouch onto the bed and read them over.
By the end your eyes are blurring and that annoying shaking’s started again. Words like “faulty electrical wiring” and “remains of one body - female” stare up at you.
Not a body. Jess. Your Jess. Your blonde, blue eyed future wife. The woman you spent a year and a half loving, the woman you’d been ring shopping for just days ago.
“Identified by dental records”
Oh god. Her teeth, that smile…that wobbly tooth she had at the right side of her mouth the last few weeks. Was that really all that was left? All?
Dean watches you shake and tries to touch you but unlike the night before this time you pull away. “No.” You tell him softly. “No.” It’s the only word you can trust yourself to say.
You don’t want to eat, you don’t want to drink, you just want to curl up and die, and Dean trying to force you to do both later only makes you more exhausted. Only makes the fight inside you strengthen. Stop it Dean. Just stop.
You wake the next day and you’re not stupid enough not to realise Dean must have drugged you. Your phone has 47 messages…47…that’s how much Jess is worth at Stanford. 47 phone messages.
“I need to go to the apartment now.” You say.
Dean says “no”.
He has no choice but to follow you when you leave the room with the keys to the Impala.
“Sam this isn’t a good idea man. Lets leave it a day or two.”
But he’s already wrenching the keys from your grasp, he knows he’s not winning this one, it’s also a given that you’re not fighting this alone. He’s with you all the way. Even when he doesn’t agree.
“I need to be there now Dean.”
And not another word is spoken.
*
You’re apartment’s barely recognisable. Everything is lined in ash and charcoal. You feel as if maybe you’re outside of your body at this point, you think maybe you like that better. Nothing seems real. Maybe you’re dreaming all this, maybe this is all some kind of weird really long nightmare.
Dean’s at your shoulder, he places a hand on your back. ‘You ok Sammy?’
Fucking peachy you want to spit but instead you just numbly nod your head as you step over your blackened thresh hold. You remember when you and Jess first moved in here, you remember her smile, the way her hand glided over every surface wonder reflected in her eyes.
It’s ours Sam, all ours, I can’t believe I’m living with a boy for real.
You couldn’t believe it either. You’d watched her spin around in her yellow flowery sun dress and that smile…
“Identified through dental records”
And you’d wished so hard. So fucking hard for all this to be real, for the two of you to be happy, and she’d thrown herself into your arms and you swung her around and later on she’d called you weird as you put the line of salt under the windows and the symbols over the door but it didn’t matter. None of it mattered. Because you were together. You loved her and she loved you and for once in your life you were safe and happy and loved all at once.
You look around the apartment and let your fingers trail over the charred wood as she had so many months before. You’re a Winchester, of course wishes didn’t come true. You should have known. And as you and Dean stand in the remains of the home you’d loved it all comes crashing in on you.
You can never escape now. Here it is in ashes and debris, your dreams and your hopes and your memories, everything you’d wished for gone. When you’d walked out on your family two years before you hadn’t pictured the cost. Hadn’t even considered it really. And this was your penance. This was your dues for forgetting, for trying to escape for ever daring to be different, to be normal, to have a life.
Jessica had paid. For you.
That was a cost that should never have been paid.
Dean’s picking up things, gingerly sifting through the ashes, he has the EMF out, but any trace of sulphur is long gone. You don’t need the EMF to tell you what you and Dean saw that night, what you already know. It came back for you.
It came back again.
You move tentatively to where the window used to be and where a charred frame now remains. At your feet the remains of one of the plants stares up at you and for a moment you’re absurdly pleased you found one but then you notice how black and curled in on itself the leaf is and your breath hitches in your throat.
You and Dean look around the apartment for no more than ten minutes. It’s the worst ten minutes of your life.
As you go to leave you purposely force yourself to look up at the charred ceiling that’s black and burned partially away. Dean looks up too, he puts an arm around your shoulder and the two of you stare in silence for over a minute.
You can’t stop picturing her. You can’t stop. Her hair, her nightdress, her leg elegantly even in death pinned out on the ceiling. God it’s so fucking unfair you want to scream. You have so many memories of Jess so many beautiful and amazing memories but the only one you can’t forget, you can’t stop picturing is that. Is fucking THAT.
“You wanna go home now?” Dean asks gently.
And you laugh for a moment. Home? You’re already there.
*
The sixth day is Jess’s funeral.
Dean does your tie for you, you’re both in rental suits, you only had one for law faculty events that top students were invited to but that burned up with Jess. You’re exhausted and cold and hot all at once and you can’t keep anything down for long. Your nightmares are keeping you up at night and your memories are plaguing you in the day.
Dean wants to leave tomorrow.
Part of you can’t wait to be away from Stanford, to leave it all behind, the smoke, the burned out shell of an apartment, the sombre faces, the bathrobes and the plants, but another part is clinging on for dear life. If you leave tomorrow, if you leave you know, a part of you knows that’s it. There’ll be no coming back. No late night study sessions, no coffee runs from the library, no lectures, or parties or nights in with Jess. And you don’t think you’re quite ready to let that go yet. Not sure you’ll ever be ready really.
But Dean wants to go. And there’s no question as to whether you’re going with him this time.
Doesn’t make it any easier to leave it behind though. Doesn’t make it any easier at all.
You and Dean arrive at the church just after Jessica does and you watch through the Impala’s windscreen as you recognise her brothers and your friends carry her from the hearse. They called you, you’re sure of it. Your phone lies untouched since the fire in your motel room. Ironically you’d left it in the Impala by accident before you left Dean and returned and it’s the only thing that survived other than you. Those 47 messages are now at 62 and you haven’t listened to a one. You’re sure some are regarding the funeral, and you’re sure they probably had offers for you to be pall bearer, but you’re not sure you can stand even now, let alone attempting to carry your girlfriend’s coffin into a church.
Jess’s parents walk behind her, crying openly and you’re nauseous as you remember Christmas with the smiling couple, the welcoming arms, the actual feeling of belonging and a real family that existed on that day. You wonder what they think of you now. You wonder what they think of all this.
“Sammy. Come on.” Dean urges softly and reaches for your arm. You climb from the car unsteadily and watch the stream of people flow into the church. There’s a lot. Jess’d be touched, you’re not surprised, she knew a lot of people. Was loved by a lot of people.
You watch them go in and you and Dean bring up the rear before you pause a moment outside the church letting the doors shut before you.
“Sammy? You alright kiddo?”
You lean against the wall for a long moment and Dean leans next to you, watching and silent.
“I don’t want to go in.” You admit. “I don’t want to say goodbye to her.”
“You don’t want to do this Sam, then we’ll get back in the car and we’ll drive man just say the word…” Dean offers, “but Sammy man, if there’s even the slightest chance you’re gonna regret this in the long run kid, then we go in there. We go in there right now.”
He’s right. You know he’s right, how could you live with yourself if you drove away and left her behind without saying goodbye to her. The answer’d probably see you staring down the muzzle of a shotgun in your own palm.
You nod stiffly.
“I’m with you Sam.” Dean leans his forehead to yours. “I’m here.”
You know he is and you’ve never loved him more than you do in that moment.
“Yeah…” you whisper, stepping forward, “yeah I know.”
The two of you open the creaking church doors and are uncomfortable as it bangs behind you and everyone turns to stare. Their faces are filled with shock and sympathy and you recognize every single one of them and you unconsciously cling to Dean’s arm as he takes control and the two of you walk to a pew.
Jessica’s parents turn in their seats and her father’s eyes immediately flicker away. Oh Mr Moore you think sadly, I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry.
People murmur as you move and suddenly a group of girls in the third row you recognize form Jess’s sorority get to their feet and move, indicating you can have their place nearer to the front. You appreciate it, but part of you wants to sit as far away from the front as possible. Dean’s steering the both of you forward though and you figure boyfriend gets high priority at something like this.
Jess’s coffin is white. It’s stupidly small like that damned body bag and it has horrible silver handles. There’s roses on it. Jess always hated roses. She thought they were lame and tacky. Over rated Sam. She’d tell you. Totally over rated, give me wild flowers any day.
You wish they weren’t burying her. You’ve dug enough graves in your time to know what happens to the corpse down there and you’d rather just scatter her ashes. But then you remember and the bile rises in your throat. Jessica’s ashes are already scattered, they rained down on you from the ceiling that night.
And what kind of a twisted scattering that was? What kind of a twisted cremation for your beautiful girl. Not a fitting one that’s for sure.
A picture of Jess from the senior prom sits atop the coffin and you remember how much she hated it and rolled her eyes whenever she saw it, claiming she was both hung over and had run out of lip gloss when it was taken.
She’s never looked more beautiful to you.
The funeral’s a blur. Jess’s father talks of how she used to be scared of balloons (they made loud noises and one popped near her head when she was three), how worried she was she wouldn’t get into Stanford (needn’t have she got straight A’s), how wonderful of a daughter she was. The Priest talks of eternal life and he who goes before, and you wonder if this, sitting here listening to this knowing you’re responsible is what eternal damnation feels like. You’re almost surprised you made it past the holy water at the entrance because right about now you feel like a worse abomination than any demon you’ve ever encountered.
One of Jess’s friends (the curly haired Carol who had pinched your ass while Jess was in the bathroom a few months before) reads a bidding prayer and you and Dean bow your head at appropriate moments. Then there’s a long pause when the priest asks if anyone else would like to speak. Heads shuffle obviously in your direction and you figure this has to be it. You didn’t want your goodbye to be a fucking spectacle for the entire campus to see but you didn’t want a lot of things lately so Dean squeezes your hand and you climb to your feet and head to the lectern.
Your palms are sweaty, your knees are weak and you feel like you might fall down at any minute but you make it up there. Pausing momentarily to touch the top of her coffin with your fingertips.
“Watch where you’re going stretch.” You croak out as you stand before the congregation. You’re met with the anticipated confused looks. “Those are the first words Jess said to me last year.” You clear your throat. “You see I uh…I walked out of the library and Jess was coming in and I barrelled into her and she had…” you smile for the briefest of moments remembering her hair in the plait, long and golden down her back. “She had all these books and she dropped them and she puts these hands on her hips, tilts her head up at me and goes “watch where you’re going Stretch.” I’ve never fallen in love in a single moment before. I didn’t know what she meant and I told her that and she asked me if I’d ever heard of Stretch Armstrong. Apparently I was tall and long and she never could stop her mouth from running ahead of her brain. I carried her books back in, and she invited me for coffee and that was it. I was a goner.”
Jess’s mother sobs into a handkerchief and your eyes automatically block everyone else out until they rest on Dean. And everyone else fades away as it feels like you’re telling the story for his and Jess’s ears only. The way it was meant to be you guess.
“She was impossible, and beautiful and clever and sarcastic and she kicked my ass all the god damned time if I needed it. And I did, need it I mean. You know sometimes in this world, in this life we take things for granted, we get so caught up in the little things that we miss the big and before we know it life’s over and we hardly realize we’ve lived. Jessica never missed the little moments. She took every one and she made damned sure I remembered them. I don’t really know how to do this. How to stand here and tell everyone how much she meant to me, how much she still is to me. I could never do her justice.” Your throat hitches a moment and you have to swallow repeatedly and physically pull yourself back together.
“They say the true mark of a masterpiece is that you can look at it for hours, days, years and it forever continues to reveal itself. That’s how I felt about Jess, how I’ll always feel about Jess. She was a masterpiece in the making. And I couldn’t stop watching. I can’t ever, I will never ever stop watching. ”
Dean’s eyes fill suspiciously and you beg him not to lose it, if he loses it, you’re gone too.
“I love you Jess. I am so sorry. So, so sorry.” You stumble from the podium and place a hand on the edge of her coffin. “It should have been me.” You whisper. No one needs to hear your arrogant wishes. But it should have been. You know that. You kiss the tips of your fingers and run them over the wood remembering that yellow sundress and that smile and the braid and the books and Stretch Armstrong and the plants and the smurf pjs and the cookies and the nights in bed and that stupid, stupid white nightgown. “Forever”.
*
Jess’s body is lowered into the ground in the middle of the cemetery and it’s as soon as you’ve dropped the mound of dirt into the Palo Alto soil that Mr Moore turns on you.
“What happened Sam?”
Everyone begins to walk away and you stand and face the bearded man half crazed with grief no parent should have to face.
“I think it was an electrical fire sir.” You manage through your rapidly closing up throat.
“The police thought it might have been arson at first boy. Who do you know who could have done this. Jessy didn’t have any enemies Sam you know that.”
“Mr Moore please I…”
He steps forward, eyes narrowing. “You know something I can see it in your eyes boy. What happened?”
“Faulty wiring or something I…”
“It wasn’t fucking faulty wiring!” Mr Moore screams losing it and advancing on you. “You did something to someone didn’t you Sam? Admit it you had a fight and this is how someone got their revenge, on my little girl.”
“No. I…”
He grips your arms as Jess’s brothers arrive and reach for him. “Tell me the truth god damn it!”
“Back off right the fuck now!” Suddenly Dean’s there prying Mr Moore’s arms away from your arms, getting up in his face. “He’s just as much a victim as Jess is alright, if I hadn’t been there he would have been dead right along with her.”
“Rather him than my little girl”. Comes the reply and Dean’s fist shoots out in a second slamming the older man into the ground.
“Dean!” You reach forward as Mrs Moore and Chris and Jeff go down to the ground with Jess’s father.
People are standing staring now, there’s quite the crowd.
“Don’t you fucking dare say that.” Dean screams through the horrified silence of the graveyard. “Don’t you dare pops or I swear to god this won’t be the only funeral today.”
You’re pulling on his arm and shaking and mumbling and Mr Moore is sobbing and weeping and grasping the soil in his hands and Dean’s slowly getting control again and the whole god damn cemetery is staring at you and you just want to leave you just want to fucking leave now.
Dean finally realises the situation and comes back to himself gripping your arm tightly and steering you through the crowd and back to the Impala. You shut the doors and you both sit in silence breathing heavily. Well that was a fucking nightmare.
Dean guns the engine but you place a hand out and stop him and he wordlessly lets you and you both sit for a while until everyone gets in their cars and leaves, heads to the reception where you know neither of you will be heading.
When it’s clear you turn to your big brother “give us a minute?”
Dean nods and you turn and reach into the backseat lifting out the flowers you picked when you left your apartment the other day. The flowers Jess had always seen from your apartment, the ones she said she wanted in your future garden, in the home you would have made for yourselves.
You leave the car and walk back over the grass, it’s just the two of you again now, for the first time since the fire it’s just you two, just the way you wanted it.
“I…um…you always said roses were lame so I brought you uh…”
You look at the flowers and suddenly you realise that she’s never going to see them. She’s never going to run her fingers in their petals or bring them to her nose, never going to smile at you, tell you you’re the best boyfriend for finding any ever again.
You gaze momentarily at the picture on the grave, the smiling circle of Jess that’s all that’s left of her. You bite your lip and for the first time you feel like you actually might lose it soon.
“Jess…” you manage and then you’re on your knees, “oh god.” You kneel and lay the flowers down, “I should have protected you.” You stammer eyes filling once more, “I should have told you the truth.” You lean the flowers against her headstone now. “It should have been me.”
“Sam!”
You jump as Dean comes up behind you and you kneel your head down onto the soil.
“Sam.”
“Nuh uh.” You manage, “don’t touch me.”
“Sammy.”
You huddle down deeper into the soil and wonder just how far you’ll have to dig to join her.
“Oh Dean.” You finally whisper. “It’s my fault it’s all my fault.”
“Sam, no.” Dean’s on his knees now you know it, a hand rests on your back but you keep your head in the soil, in the grass. “It’s not man. It’s that demon, it is not your fault you hearing me?”
You hear him, you just don’t believe him.
“I should never have come here.”
“Sammy stop it.”
“I just want her back Dean.” You tell him choking on the soil. “I want her back man I want her to yell at me or to scream, or to laugh, anything, hell man I’d do it, I’d walk away from her if it just meant she’d come back. I’d do anything.” You sob then breaking down, “tell me what to do Dean. I need you to tell me what to do now.”
Dean’s your big brother he’ll have the answers, he can fix anything, he’ll fix this.
“Come here Sammy.” Dean whispers reaching for you, “Come here little brother.”
And he pulls you out of the dirt and hauls you into his arms and you’re clinging and crying and you’re not sure you’re breathing again but Dean holds on, he just holds onto you.
Your face is in his jacket and your fists are clenched in his shirt and his hands are on your hair and your back and he’s gripping you so fiercely you feel like you’re drowning. “It’s ok.” He murmurs, “I’ve got you Sammy, I’ve got you.”
“It should have been me.” You sob the tears never-ending, your heart physically aching in your chest, “it should have been me.”
“I’m here.” Dean whispers into your hair “I’m here.”
And after when you drive away and watch Palo Alto and Stanford and Jessica and your life disappear in the rear view mirror your brother rolls his window down and you watch the perfect sunset over the highway and you realise he is there.
He’s beside you and with you and here and maybe if there was one thing that could save your life right now it’s that fact.
He’s here.
You’re here.
You both are.
And maybe Jess’s death was some kind of covenant that bound you and Dean, two souls drifting, meant to be together again. Maybe there was some reason for that. Maybe in this stupid fucked up world two would always be stronger than one, and maybe you’d have to find out. Maybe it should have been you and maybe it was meant to be Jess. All you know is you loved her, and she loved you.
Watch where you’re going Stretch
And someday you’ll be together again.
You remember a night with Jessica huddled on your knee, her reading aloud, the wonder in her voice at the fairy tale and you think maybe your fairytale ends right here...
The night air cools around you as the open road stretches out ahead and you swear you hear Jess's voice on the breath of the wind, "And Hansel said to Gretel; let us drop these breadcrumbs so that together we find our way home, because losing our way would be the most cruel of things."
"I'll follow the breadcrumbs Jess" you promise silently. "I'll be home soon."
Authors notes ~
I pinched the line from Hansel and Gretal and One Tree Hill for the inspiration. The quote from Sam's speech about a masterpiece is taken from Jensen Ackles short film "Still Life" and it got to me.