heidi8
in
pear_vodka
SPN Fic: A LIfe Between Us (PG, Preseries)
Title: A Life Between Us
Author: heidi8
Recipient: eloise_bright
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: The characters belong to Eric Kripke and/or WB/the CW, and are used in the noncommercial, derivative work below without permission.
Author's Notes: Many thanks to gwendolyngrace and affectingly for the betas - all remaining errors are my own. Song title is from the Finn Brothers' song of that name.
Summary: Pre-series. Dean was fifteen years old when he woke up one morning and he was about three when he went to sleep that night...
Dean's been driving for about two hours and his sports bottle is almost empty of the Coca Cola he'd poured into it at the Seven-Eleven that morning. They'd left Green Cove Springs a little before sunrise, Dad in the passenger seat, mellow from the Tylenol 3 he'd been taking since he broke his ankle the week before, and Sam in the back seat with his nose in a book or three. Dean'd grabbed almost five hours of sleep before they left, between his last few games of pool at Ollie's Bar a few blocks away. The sports bottle's from there; a few weeks ago, he'd picked a few up when some customers left them behind.
There were always tourists passing through this time of year, mostly heading down south with the birds, and they were happy to bet a few tens on the fresh-faced kid. They'd been there long enough that the owner of the place, and the regulars at the tables to the left of the bar, seemed to find it amusing to watch Dean hustle any travelers or newcomers. Well, as long as he bought a round or two with his winnings and left a generous tip for the owner, who also worked the bar, they acted like they were amused, and that was good enough.
Sammy had come up with a dozen arguments against leaving when Dad first got hurt, 'cause he wanted to finish the quarter - his first in a real junior high school - in this town. But the by-the-week apartment expenses were eating into their stash of cash, even with what little Dean was pulling through pool locally and in the bars closer to Gainesville. There, he could always outfox the overboozed college boys who didn't seem to care that he wasn't yet sixteen. Now Dad was feeling up to traveling, finally, his ankle healed enough that the bumps and jolts while driving didn't make him shudder even with the medicine. He was restless, so they were on the move, up to Blue Earth so Dad could finish recuperating at Pastor Jim's.
The glove compartment holds a stash of fake IDs, including the useful insurance card that they'd used to get Dad patched up after his fall, but in Dean's pocket is a real Florida learner's permit, nearly three months old and certifying that he was legally allowed to drive a car as long as someone over twenty-one was in the passenger seat. He's been driving for almost six years, of course, but not on highways unless there was no other option. Now, though, he can happily spend two or three days in transit back to Minnesota.
Or he'd be happy about it if his arms weren't starting to ache, as if he was stretching just a little more than he should to the steering wheel. From the back of his neck through his wrists, something feels wrong, and his legs are a little too tensed as he stretches toward the pedals. He moves up a bit in the seat and shoves a jacket behind him. Must've overdone it with the pool cue last night, Dean thinks.
Dad opens his eyes, scarfs down half a bottle of water and blinks at Dean. "You're slouching too much, kid. Getting tired already? You're barely past the state line."
He's probably an hour into Georgia, actually, but there's no need to tell Dad how long he's been out of it. "No, I'm..." Dean straightens his shoulders and adjusts himself in the seat, then leans over and finishes the Coke before snagging another pretzel from the half-empty bag.
"You are, though," Sammy cuts in from the back seat. "Your head's normally over the headrest and it's not now."
"That's because I'm leaning forward, brat." He throws a pretzel over his shoulder and it bounces off Sam's knee onto the floor.
"Boys," Dad warns, his fingers pressed against his forehead as if he's shoving away a headache. "Next rest stop, we'll take a break."
"But we've hardly gone 150 miles yet!" Dean's complaining and wants to press on through Georgia. "I can make it to Tennessee, easy!"
"One more hour," Dad concedes, already starting to doze again. "Wake me before noon and we'll make a lunch..."
"If we're not stopping for another hour," Sam gripes from the back, "I need more of those pretzels."
Dean moves to flick another one into the back and calls out, "Catch!" while Sam lunges forward to grab it and the bag.
"To eat, not as target practice, Dean!"
*****
Two more hours and he pulls the car off the highway and into a Cracker Barrel. His arms, legs, back and neck are killing him, and his hands are slipping off the wheel but he's been trying to ignore it and focus on the center line and moving at a solid seventy miles per hour. There's at least nineteen hours to go, and the usual setup would have them spend another two days driving it, but he's miserable and tense and tight and not sure he can take another four or five hours of driving. It's Indian summer here in western Georgia, so maybe they can stop a little early, find some place with a pool, and he can soak the tiredness out of his joints. He feels ancient, and blames the overwarm sun leaking in through the car windows
They've carefully nudged Dad awake so Sammy can help him out on the passenger side while Dean gets the crutches out of the trunk for Dad. By the time Dad and Dean get to the restaurant, Sam's holding a booth for them. Dad sits next to him and Dean slides a chair over from a nearby table to support John's right foot. Dad's avoided sitting in the back seat as long as he's conscious and upright, so he hasn't been propping the foot up enough.
They linger over barbecue and fried chicken. Dean's not that hungry, but he's muzzy-headed, so he guzzles a Coke, then pours the free refill into his sports bottle to bring back to the car. Dad isn't eating much either - the painkillers haven't been good for his appetite - so he picks at some pancakes and bananas while they read. Dad had picked up two local papers and USAToday when they walked in, and they're each going through one while they eat, making sure there's nothing nearby they need to stop for, or anything they'll pass on their way to Minnesota. They hardly talk, but that's not unusual. Dad likes to be able to concentrate on the articles, so they're used to focusing on their own dribs and drabs of research.
The waitress flirts a bit when she brings the check, tossing out a compliment about the two adorable boys; she asks if they're twins, which is something they've never heard before. Sam mutters that he doesn't have any bizarrely disfiguring freckles and Dean kicks him under the table. The table must be extra-wide, because he has to slide down in the seat a bit to reach Sam's knee.
When they stand up to leave, carrying the folded and marked up papers, root beer and bag of extra fries, Dean realizes that Sam's shot up another inch or two in the last few weeks, and he hadn't noticed. The kid hit five feet before the school year started, but Dean's been closing in on six feet recently, and had hit five feet by the time he was twelve anyway. He doesn't feel threatened by it, or at least he's been telling himself that.
Dad notices too, and stops them in the parking lot by the side of the car. He pulls his sunglasses off and blinks a few times, then shakes his head and tells them to move so they're standing side by side.
And Sam comes up to Dean's chin, instead of somewhere in the vicinity of his shoulder.
Sam hasn't grown - his jeans and shirt fit like they normally do - but Dean realises that if he'd been wearing something other than sweatpants, a t-shirt and flip-flops, he would've been disappearing inside his clothing and stepping out of his shoes. "The fuck?" he blurts out as he looks down, and then Dad opens the back door and shoves both of them in. He climbs into the driver's seat and Dean can't figure out how he's going to get them anywhere with his ankle immobilized. When he gets his voice back, he says, "Dad, you can't - I-"
"Quiet," Dad demands. Dean sits back silently, and listens to a volley of questions. "When did you notice this happening? Why didn't you say anything? Did you eat or drink anything unusual or weird in the last few days? Did you talk to anyone who looked suspicious? What the hell did you do, Dean?"
He knows what he's supposed to say - when something unexpected or hard to explain has happened to any one of them, they've gone through the past day or five or ten, working backwards through time. Dean talks - with Sammy cutting in every so often - telling about the drive, how he felt stretched and compressed all at once, how he and Sammy had loaded their stuff into the car while John dealt with the front office, what they'd had for breakfast - all the information that Dad scribbles onto a notepad.
"Last night-" He really listens to his his own voice this time, and it's a lot higher than it's supposed to be. He sounds like Sam, almost, and now that they're sitting next to each other, their heads are at about the same height. He takes a moment to collect his thoughts and speaks again in that childish voice. "I came back from Ollie's, showered, went to sleep - nothing weird. And I didn't feel off until we hit the road this morning - but I drove last night, back from the bar."
Dad seems not to notice his voice or how his hands have started to shake as he brings the sports bottle up to his mouth, but he thinks that's more nerves than whatever is causing this.
"What did you do at Ollie's? Anyone new in the crowd? There's always tourists, salesmen - anyone-"
Dean tilts his head, trying really hard to remember, but his thoughts feel strange and foggy. He knows who he is, where he is, where they're coming from and where they're going, but his memories from yesterday are like he's watching a show on TV and anything before that.... He can hardly recall. He hesitates and says, "Played pool and bought the last round before I came home. Before that, went swimming with Sammy... I don't really remember the-"
"Hell, Dean, what did you do?" Dad turns to Sammy and asks, "You were with him at the city pool? Did anything happen there, anything at all? What did he eat and drink? Did you have the same?"
"Um...." Sam sounds a little panicky and a little sulky. "We both had hot dogs for dinner and shared a milkshake and then we came home. We only talked to the guy at the entrance, and we swam together almost all the time, and Dean was perfectly normal the whole time. But, Dad, do we have to figure it out now? Here? Odds are, whatever it was started back in Green Cove Springs, so shouldn't we just turn around and figure it out while we're driving?"
Dad sighs; he's understandably exasperated and drained and frustrated, and Dean's furious with himself for creating this situation; he doesn't know what he did, but obviously, he did something idiotic, and now he's really, really screwed.
"Sammy, we can't just do that. Dean seems to be getting younger, which means that soon, he'll be shorter than you, and we don't know what'll happen to his body or his mind next. There's no way he can drive. And I can't drive safely now, which means that the best we can do is figure this out on our own, here and now. We can do it - we're Winchesters."
He turned away from Sammy and back to his notepad, and then Sammy blurted out, "I am, too."
"You're what?" Dad asked distractedly.
"I'm a Winchester, and I know how to drive. Sort of," Sammy said. "Dean was driving when he was ten - and I'm eleven and a half and he's given me six lessons and I'm taller than Dean was when he was twelve and I can do it."
Dad rounded on Dean. "You've been giving him driving lessons? Since when?"
"I don't know - he asked me and it didn't seem fair how you taught me before I was ten and he's almost twelve. He can do it." Dean thinks Sammy's right - if they went back to Green Cove they might be able to solve the problem and stop him shrinking before he disappears into nothing. He doesn't really mind being the same age as Sammy right now, but he doesn't want to get any younger, to suddenly be eight or five or a baby - Sammy won't know what to do. Dad needs him to help with Sammy and what good will Dean be if he's a little kid? He tells himself that Dad probably has a solution in his journal, or he'll call Pastor Jim and see whether he's seen something like this before. But he feels like an idiot that he can't do anything to stop it himself and he can't let himself cry in front of Sammy, or Dad.
Sam's voice cuts into his foggy thoughts. "Dad, you always say that when there's something wrong, you start your research at the source. I can get us back there, and I look enough like Dean's driver's license that if I get pulled over, I can say I'm him, and with you in the front seat..."
Dad huffs in the front seat, thinks for a moment, then opens the door so he can step out. "Let me try calling around first - I'll be back in a few minutes, and if nobody has a quick fix or answer, you can do it. Get up here, get used to the seat and the wheel, but don't turn it on until I get back."
Sam and Dean watched him on the phone for a few minutes in silence, and then Sam speaks. "You're still my big brother, even if you're littler than me right now, and you've always helped me. Now, I get to help you and I'm going to do it right."
"How do you know?" Dean says. He's worried about Sammy driving, and whether they'll find a way to stop this change and get him back to normal, and what Dad's going to say when - if, or when - everything is fixed, and so many other things he can't really name.
"Well, you taught me, and I trust you. I'll always trust you...."
******
"First time I saved you," Sam says. "On the I-10 and the I-75, right back into Florida." Sam's hands were tight on the wheel, just like they were thirteen years before, when Dean had been shaking with nerves in the back seat and he'd been behind the wheel on a highway for the first time, Dad in the middle of the front bench, helping him hold the wheel while he got used to it, speaking cautions and instructions as Sam drove.
******
At first, Sam had thought Dad would have him go to the nearest car rental place - if they had a modern car with cruise control, Dad could've driven back himself - but once Sam had started driving on the surface streets between the restaurant and the highway, Dad seemed comfortable enough with his reach and his ability.
"Don't go over sixty," he'd barked early on, "and don't go below fifty. Keep it steady, don't change lanes and don't get distracted."
"I don't get to pick the music, even now?" Sam had asked, but Dad said no, he wanted him to be focused on what he was doing.
"Maybe in an hour, when you're used to it," he'd said, and an hour later, he popped in one of the cassettes from when Sam was a lot younger, and the Dean sang along in a childish voice from the back seat to "Farmer in the Dell" over and over again.
This should have been a chance for Dad to see him as a grownup, as someone able to help and make suggestions and be listened to, and for the duration of the ride, it was almost like that. Yes, Dad was worried about Dean, who got smaller and younger every hour, but as the hours passed, he started to give Sam bits of advice about changing lanes, passing cars, slowing for ramps, and other tricks and traps of driving the heavy car.
By the time they got back to Green Cove Springs, it was coming on nightfall. Dean had climbed into the front seat and sat between Sam and Dad, wrapped in Sam's sweatshirt and Dad's jacket; they'd stopped about a hundred miles back for a pit stop, and Sam had rinsed out Dean's sports bottle and filled it with juice. Ever since, he'd been sucking on it as if it were a baby bottle. Dean couldn't be more than three years old now. All Sam had wanted to do was pick him up and hold him on his lap, but he had to keep driving. Dean was depending on him.
They couldn't go back to the apartment, although they technically had a few days left on the month's rental. Dad had dropped the keys in the mail that morning, and even if they wanted to break in, there was too much of a risk that someone who remembered them would see them with an unexplainable toddler. Instead, Dad had Sam drive by Ollie's; there was a strip of stores a block away, and Dad used the phone there to check around and see if anyone he'd spoken to before had learned anything that might help. While he was gone, Dean leaned against Sammy, sleepy-eyed and tiny.
When Dad limped back to the car, there was a light in his eyes and a harsh smile on his face. He told Sam to drive over to Ollie's and park by the delivery entrance. While they drove he asked, "We're how many miles from St. Augustine now?"
"I dunno, but it's less than an hour. Our class had a field trip there about three weeks ago."
Dad pulled things out of the glove compartment. "Big thing for the tourists there, right? And it's part of the lore here in Green Cove, too." He sat back down to get the sports bottle out of Dean's hands, but the tug woke him up completely and he was not giving it up easily.
"Mine! You no take it!" Dean whined as Sam pulled up to the bar and turned off the car.
"Dean..." Dad said warningly.
"No! Mine! I thirsaly!"
"Shhh, shhh!" Sam, said, pulling Dean onto his lap. "It's ok - I'm here. Let him have it and I'll give you..." He glanced around the car and spotted the box of tapes under the dashboard. "Look! Here's a nice mix tape for you to chew on!"
Dean handed over the bottle, then grabbed the case and started flipping it open and closed, pulling the tape out and putting it back in. "You'd better hope he doesn't pull the tape out. Dean'll kill you, salt you and burn you if it gets ruined," Dad warned, and Sam smiled at his optimism that Dean would be back to normal and able to be angry about something like a broken tape. Once Dad had the bottle in hand, he slid back out of the car and, holding one of his crutches almost like a billy-club, went to the side door and walked right in.
They sat there for about ten minutes waiting for Dad, but to Sam, who had no experience dealing with little kids, it felt like an hour. Sam tried to pacify Dean with the last of the pretzels and by reading to him, neither of which worked. But when Dean pushed the now tooth-marked cassette into his hand and said, "Play! Please!" he turned on the mix of Metallica and Led Zeppelin songs. It was almost funny to watch Dean try to sing along, and it was a good distraction.
When Dad finally came out of the bar, he wasn't alone; he was almost dragging the bartender by his collar to the back seat, and then he pushed the man in. Dean hid his head in Sam's shirt and Sam held him tight.
"Archie, I'd like you to meet my son, Sam - he's the one at the wheel - and his little brother Dean - that's the little one next to him. Dean's almost sixteen, which I think you already know. Now, tell me - what the hell did you give him last night? Because I know that whatever caused this, it happened here."
"Nothing!" Archie gasped. "Nothing that would've done this, at least!"
Dad pushed him against the back of the seat and said, "Are you sure? You didn't give him anything to drink, anything to eat? Anything, maybe, from the real Fountain of Youth?"
"It doesn't do this! I've never seen it take years off someone like this!"
"So you did give him something?" Dad demanded.
"He told us he was leaving today, and I wanted to send him off with something. So I filled his sports bottle - that one he's always carrying around - with some of the water from the Fountain - we use it to make our house beer! All it's supposed to do is make you feel a few years younger, not make you be a few years younger!"
"I thought it had something to do with the damned bottle, but..." Dad was muttering almost to himself, and Archie looked like he wanted to bolt back into the bar but was too afraid of John Winchester to chance it.
Dean tugged at Sam's ear and said, "Sammy! Sammy! Bottle had water!" Dean piped up. "All the water, in the bottle!" And Sam understood what made Dean's water bottle different from every other one.
"Um, sir?" Sam said to Archie, "Was Dean's bottle totally empty when you filled it up?"
"No, there was a little water in the bottom of it. I poured it out before I filled it up."
Sam didn't want to say too much in front of Archie - he'd basically put a spell on Dean with the water, even if he hadn't expected this to be the result, and he didn't trust him at all. "Dad, can we talk to you in private?" he asked, glancing at Archie. Dad seemed to know what Sam was really asking, so he bundled the man out of the car and told him to wait by the door, then told Sam to go on. "Dean's been carrying Holy Water in that bottle, so he can have it with him all the time as a 'just-in-case' - and I've been doing the same with mine. We did clean then out on Friday afternoon when we were packing, so we could use them for regular drinks on the drive, but if he didn't rinse out the cap, there may've been a little bit left in there or something. But I'd bet anything that the Holy Water reacted with the water from the Fountain, and that's what's causing this. Dean's been drinking from the stupid bottle this whole trip!"
"Not anymore," Dad announced. "And I'll salt and burn all of them tonight." He leaned into the front seat and patted Dean on his head, touching the hair that had changed to blond as the day had gone by. He said softly, "You staying this way for now, little man? No more drinking from that damned bottle, so you'll stop getting younger?" Dean nodded, eyes wide open. "Good boy. Now, Sammy, we've got two options." Dad was thinking aloud, addressing him the way he usually spoke to Dean. Sammy felt a thrill of excitement to be part of this, though it was tempered by his worry for Dean. "We can go break into one of the local libraries, and hope that they have enough books on the Fountain of Youth lore -" Sammy interrupted him with a big yawn, quickly followed by an apology - "so we can find some way to reverse this thing *and* hope that Dean'll sleep while we work, or we can make camp for the night, get some food and rest and start researching in the morning. With the way you're yawning, I think it's option number two."
Sam drove to a grocery store and the three of them went in together, even though Dean was shoeless and enveloped in one of Sam's sweatshirts that they'd rescued from the trunk. Sam was happy to have a chance to stretch his legs, and Dean seemed thrilled to bounce in the front of the grocery cart. Twenty minutes later they were back at the car with a bag full of supplies, including a few touristy toddler-sized t-shirts emblazoned with flamingos and pelicans, and of course, some diapers. They hadn't had an accident yet, but Dad didn't want to risk it overnight. It was pushing nine when they pulled into a motel near the center of the town, and once they'd checked in, Dad carried Dean to the room while Sam followed with the groceries.
Dean was sleepy again, thanks to the motion of the car and the music on the tape deck, and Sam was beyond exhausted from the day's driving. He hadn't thought it would be so tiring to sit all day behind the wheel - it wasn't that draining when you were a passenger - but concentrating on the road had wiped him out. Dad was going back out for a while- to make some more phone calls and bring in a few more things from the car. "Dean, get Sammy ready for bed," he said absent-mindedly as he closed the door.
Sam stood stock still in the middle of the room, looking at his big brother, who was curled up on the bed further from the door, his eyes dazed and his thumb in his mouth. "But I don't know what to do," Sam said as he latched the chain at the top of the door, like Dean always did when they were alone. "I- Dean? Dean - what do I do? When I was little, how did you...?"
For as long as Sam could remember, Dean had been there to help him get dressed or brush his teeth, or take a bath, or feed him. How hard could it be, if Dean had managed it at six or seven? Sammy was nearly twelve - he should be able to do this.
"You hungry?" he asked his brother.
Dean shook his head; that was okay - Sammy wasn't hungry either. "Milk? Daddy get milk?" Dean requested.
He hadn't - it would've been too difficult to keep cool in the room - but there was powdered formula and water to mix it with, and some sippy cups. "You wait, I can figure this out," he told Dean while he started reading the instructions.
Mix spoonful with 8 oz water, then shake until dissolved, the label read. "But where do I mix it?" Sam wondered. Dean picked up a sippy cup and threw it onto the floor. As Sam picked it up, he asked, "Are you trying to tell me what to do?" He laughed - taking instructions from a baby - even a Dean-baby - was kind of ridiculous. But yeah, he could mix it right in there, so he opened the container and used the scoop inside to pour some of the powdered stuff into the sippy cup. He filled it up the rest of the way with the water Dad had bought at the store, put the top on and shook it, which made Dean laugh and kick his feet a bit. When it looked drinkable, he handed it to Dean, then sat down on the bed himself.
Dean crawled back onto his lap and leaned his head against Sam's left arm, which startled Sam a bit. "Is it good?" he asked Dean, and Dean sighed and nodded a bit.
Suddenly, Sam realized something. "No, you can't go to sleep yet! You need a bath and your new shirt and your teeth need to be brushed and..." He tried to sit Dean up and take the sippy cup away, but Dean wasn't letting go of it, and Sam didn't have any tapes to bribe him with in here. "Do you want a bath?" he asked hoping that the promise of splashing in water would get Dean to relinquish the sippy cup.
"No, want to sleep."
Sam sighed. He didn't want Dean to start screaming - it might bother the people in the adjoining rooms - but he needed to have his face washed at least. "Stay here," Sam said in what he hoped was a Dad-like commanding voice, then went into the bathroom and brought back a towel and a wet washcloth. He sat Dean on the towel and sponged down his little face and hands, which were still sticky from the juice. "Better get all of this off you - we don't know what will happen if we don't." He thought about it for a moment, and said, "But you're not any smaller than you were back at the bar, so I think you're staying this size for a while. I hope."
"Me, too," Dean replied.
"You understand everything I'm saying, don't you?" Dean shook his head, but smiled; Sam wanted to think that his brother was making a joke of it. That would be just like him, whether he was three or fifteen. He pulled off Dean's shirt and realized that somewhere along the line, Dean's boxer shorts had gone missing - Dad had pinned them on back at the rest stop, but somewhere between the grocery and here, they must've fallen off.
"Oh, gah," Sam winced. "No pants, that means you need the diapers. Ugh, hopefully Dad'll be back before you need to be changed. Well, if I have to...."
Dean stood up on the bed, totally awake again - and now naked - and shouted, "No! I won't! I won't! No, no, Sammy, no! I'll be good!" As Sam reached to grab him, the little boy bolted off the bed and jumped for the door. He pulled it open, but the latch on the top stopped it at three inches. Dean tried to slide his body through the door, but Sam had reached him by then, and pulled him back and shut the door.
"Don't you cause a scene!" Sam whispered fiercely. "If people hear you they'll come to the room and see us alone and Dad'll get in trouble and they'll take us away and...."
Oh. He was speaking Dean's own words back to him; this was the same thing Dean had said so many times over the years, except for the last year or two. Sam had thought that was because Dean was old enough to be alone with him in the motel or the apartment without worrying about Social Services or something. But Sammy wasn't even twelve, and Dean was so little tonight, and the risk, the danger and the fear were all back.
"Can't go outside," Dean said quietly. "I know. I forgot."
"Will you be good? Will you be a good boy for me? I know you don't wanna wear them, but Dad got them for you and we have to. We have to keep safe."
"I non' wanna," Dean said one more time, but he let Sam steer him back to the bed.
"Dean, don't feel bad. They're not baby diapers - they're big-boy overnight pants. See? They're for kids up to five years old," Sam read from the package, and Dean sniffled a little. Sam didn't think he bought the argument, but if he just put them on, it would be ok.
"I do it myself," Dean said, which made Sam sigh in relief - if Dean could do it....
And he could. Once they were on, Sam pulled one of the new shirts over Dean's head - it was labeled as Size 4, and it went almost down to his knees. "Little thing," Sam said, handing the sippy cup back to Dean. He pulled the comforter and the sheets back and straightened three pillows on the bed. "You snuggle down - I'm going to brush my teeth and I'll be right back."
He moved to turn off the light, but Dean said, "No, Sammy, please no. No dark yet."
"But you don't like sleeping when the lights are on. You always say...." Except things were different tonight, so maybe Dean's sleeping preferences were different, too. Sammy left the light on until he came back out of the bathroom in his pyjamas. Dean looked like he was asleep, but he opened his eyes when Sam nudged him closer to the wall, climbing under the covers himself.
"I wants more milk, please" Dean murmured, and Sam climbed back out to make another cup-full of the formula by the light of the street lamp outside the window. "You stay up for Daddy? Someone has 'ta," Dean asked.
Dean usually did that - watching TV or reading a book or magazine until Dad came home, so he could undo the chain and let him in. Sam knew that Dean fell asleep sometimes when he was waiting, when they didn't know how late Dad would be back, or if he was coming back that night at all, but now that Dean had reminded him about it, Sam knew that he had to stay awake and wait for Dad to come back. Maybe he'd have some new information or a new idea about how to get Dean to grow up quickly. He didn't mind it for a night or so - it was a bit of an adventure, in a way - but he didn't want to be the big brother forever! He missed his Dean and he really wanted him back.
So when Sam brought the cup back to Dean, he brought a book and his flashlight, too, so he could read while he waited. Dean took the cup and snuggled up to Sam, pressing his back against Sam's side. "Thanks for being Daddy's helper," Dean whispered as he closed his eyes. While Sam read, he absently patted Dean's hair, and in their own ways, they waited for Dad to come back and tell them what was going to happen next.
******
"Wish we had a demon to test it on," Dean said.
"We could put an ad in the Daily Demon Newsletter - Winchesters Looking for Volunteers for Demonic Science Experiment! We want to see if spraying demons with a mix of two special waters will make them de-age into nothingness! That should go over well."
"Nah, don't want to tip our hand. Or give them a chance to find an antidote."
"Can demons even use iron as an antidote? I don't think they can..."
"If you see one show up with a bottle of baby formula - now fortified with iron! - then let me know straight away, Sammy."
"Will do. I still think it was a pretty weird antidote."
"It was a weird potion from the start. Mix Fountain of Youth water with Holy Water and get a de-aging potion, so sure, why not re-age me by giving me baby formula?"
"You still think Dad knew when he bought it that it would work?"
"I dunno, I never asked. Makes sense, doesn't it? Reversible thermodynamics and the oxidation process and ninety percent of what we deal with doesn't respond properly to the laws of physics anyway. What matters is, it worked."
"Sort of."
"How was it only sort of?"
"Dean, you haven't grown an inch in height since that day!"
"Yeah, and you're so thrilled by that because the track I was on, if I had, I'd be taller than you are now."
"Oh, you only wish."
"Hmmm. No, that's not what I'd've wished for...."
They sped toward the crossroads. It wasn't a perfect plan, and it still had some holes, like how to get the demon to drink the stuff, or at the very least, not notice the giant water guns they'd be packing. But, Sam thought as they covered the miles, that was how they liked it best, really - improvising, figuring things out as they went along. As their dad would have said, "We can do it - We're Winchesters."
Author's Note: Thanks to wendywoowho for the antidote!
The prompt was "One of the boys being de-aged, and the other having to solve the problem, while caring for his "little" brother. Bonus if you can fit John in somehow."
Note-type comments: This is probably the longest fic I've written in at least three years, and it took a long time for me to choose a prompt from eloise_bright's list - and I had at least two false starts on this fic. It began life as one section of a "Five Things" story, and grew from there. I thought that my use of a songtitle from a Finn Bros song would be a giveaway that it was me, but I don't know if anyone guessed. I'm curious to know if anyone did! You can download the song here.
The image (from Smallville) that partially inspired the fic is
Author: heidi8
Recipient: eloise_bright
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: The characters belong to Eric Kripke and/or WB/the CW, and are used in the noncommercial, derivative work below without permission.
Author's Notes: Many thanks to gwendolyngrace and affectingly for the betas - all remaining errors are my own. Song title is from the Finn Brothers' song of that name.
Summary: Pre-series. Dean was fifteen years old when he woke up one morning and he was about three when he went to sleep that night...
Dean's been driving for about two hours and his sports bottle is almost empty of the Coca Cola he'd poured into it at the Seven-Eleven that morning. They'd left Green Cove Springs a little before sunrise, Dad in the passenger seat, mellow from the Tylenol 3 he'd been taking since he broke his ankle the week before, and Sam in the back seat with his nose in a book or three. Dean'd grabbed almost five hours of sleep before they left, between his last few games of pool at Ollie's Bar a few blocks away. The sports bottle's from there; a few weeks ago, he'd picked a few up when some customers left them behind.
There were always tourists passing through this time of year, mostly heading down south with the birds, and they were happy to bet a few tens on the fresh-faced kid. They'd been there long enough that the owner of the place, and the regulars at the tables to the left of the bar, seemed to find it amusing to watch Dean hustle any travelers or newcomers. Well, as long as he bought a round or two with his winnings and left a generous tip for the owner, who also worked the bar, they acted like they were amused, and that was good enough.
Sammy had come up with a dozen arguments against leaving when Dad first got hurt, 'cause he wanted to finish the quarter - his first in a real junior high school - in this town. But the by-the-week apartment expenses were eating into their stash of cash, even with what little Dean was pulling through pool locally and in the bars closer to Gainesville. There, he could always outfox the overboozed college boys who didn't seem to care that he wasn't yet sixteen. Now Dad was feeling up to traveling, finally, his ankle healed enough that the bumps and jolts while driving didn't make him shudder even with the medicine. He was restless, so they were on the move, up to Blue Earth so Dad could finish recuperating at Pastor Jim's.
The glove compartment holds a stash of fake IDs, including the useful insurance card that they'd used to get Dad patched up after his fall, but in Dean's pocket is a real Florida learner's permit, nearly three months old and certifying that he was legally allowed to drive a car as long as someone over twenty-one was in the passenger seat. He's been driving for almost six years, of course, but not on highways unless there was no other option. Now, though, he can happily spend two or three days in transit back to Minnesota.
Or he'd be happy about it if his arms weren't starting to ache, as if he was stretching just a little more than he should to the steering wheel. From the back of his neck through his wrists, something feels wrong, and his legs are a little too tensed as he stretches toward the pedals. He moves up a bit in the seat and shoves a jacket behind him. Must've overdone it with the pool cue last night, Dean thinks.
Dad opens his eyes, scarfs down half a bottle of water and blinks at Dean. "You're slouching too much, kid. Getting tired already? You're barely past the state line."
He's probably an hour into Georgia, actually, but there's no need to tell Dad how long he's been out of it. "No, I'm..." Dean straightens his shoulders and adjusts himself in the seat, then leans over and finishes the Coke before snagging another pretzel from the half-empty bag.
"You are, though," Sammy cuts in from the back seat. "Your head's normally over the headrest and it's not now."
"That's because I'm leaning forward, brat." He throws a pretzel over his shoulder and it bounces off Sam's knee onto the floor.
"Boys," Dad warns, his fingers pressed against his forehead as if he's shoving away a headache. "Next rest stop, we'll take a break."
"But we've hardly gone 150 miles yet!" Dean's complaining and wants to press on through Georgia. "I can make it to Tennessee, easy!"
"One more hour," Dad concedes, already starting to doze again. "Wake me before noon and we'll make a lunch..."
"If we're not stopping for another hour," Sam gripes from the back, "I need more of those pretzels."
Dean moves to flick another one into the back and calls out, "Catch!" while Sam lunges forward to grab it and the bag.
"To eat, not as target practice, Dean!"
*****
Two more hours and he pulls the car off the highway and into a Cracker Barrel. His arms, legs, back and neck are killing him, and his hands are slipping off the wheel but he's been trying to ignore it and focus on the center line and moving at a solid seventy miles per hour. There's at least nineteen hours to go, and the usual setup would have them spend another two days driving it, but he's miserable and tense and tight and not sure he can take another four or five hours of driving. It's Indian summer here in western Georgia, so maybe they can stop a little early, find some place with a pool, and he can soak the tiredness out of his joints. He feels ancient, and blames the overwarm sun leaking in through the car windows
They've carefully nudged Dad awake so Sammy can help him out on the passenger side while Dean gets the crutches out of the trunk for Dad. By the time Dad and Dean get to the restaurant, Sam's holding a booth for them. Dad sits next to him and Dean slides a chair over from a nearby table to support John's right foot. Dad's avoided sitting in the back seat as long as he's conscious and upright, so he hasn't been propping the foot up enough.
They linger over barbecue and fried chicken. Dean's not that hungry, but he's muzzy-headed, so he guzzles a Coke, then pours the free refill into his sports bottle to bring back to the car. Dad isn't eating much either - the painkillers haven't been good for his appetite - so he picks at some pancakes and bananas while they read. Dad had picked up two local papers and USAToday when they walked in, and they're each going through one while they eat, making sure there's nothing nearby they need to stop for, or anything they'll pass on their way to Minnesota. They hardly talk, but that's not unusual. Dad likes to be able to concentrate on the articles, so they're used to focusing on their own dribs and drabs of research.
The waitress flirts a bit when she brings the check, tossing out a compliment about the two adorable boys; she asks if they're twins, which is something they've never heard before. Sam mutters that he doesn't have any bizarrely disfiguring freckles and Dean kicks him under the table. The table must be extra-wide, because he has to slide down in the seat a bit to reach Sam's knee.
When they stand up to leave, carrying the folded and marked up papers, root beer and bag of extra fries, Dean realizes that Sam's shot up another inch or two in the last few weeks, and he hadn't noticed. The kid hit five feet before the school year started, but Dean's been closing in on six feet recently, and had hit five feet by the time he was twelve anyway. He doesn't feel threatened by it, or at least he's been telling himself that.
Dad notices too, and stops them in the parking lot by the side of the car. He pulls his sunglasses off and blinks a few times, then shakes his head and tells them to move so they're standing side by side.
And Sam comes up to Dean's chin, instead of somewhere in the vicinity of his shoulder.
Sam hasn't grown - his jeans and shirt fit like they normally do - but Dean realises that if he'd been wearing something other than sweatpants, a t-shirt and flip-flops, he would've been disappearing inside his clothing and stepping out of his shoes. "The fuck?" he blurts out as he looks down, and then Dad opens the back door and shoves both of them in. He climbs into the driver's seat and Dean can't figure out how he's going to get them anywhere with his ankle immobilized. When he gets his voice back, he says, "Dad, you can't - I-"
"Quiet," Dad demands. Dean sits back silently, and listens to a volley of questions. "When did you notice this happening? Why didn't you say anything? Did you eat or drink anything unusual or weird in the last few days? Did you talk to anyone who looked suspicious? What the hell did you do, Dean?"
He knows what he's supposed to say - when something unexpected or hard to explain has happened to any one of them, they've gone through the past day or five or ten, working backwards through time. Dean talks - with Sammy cutting in every so often - telling about the drive, how he felt stretched and compressed all at once, how he and Sammy had loaded their stuff into the car while John dealt with the front office, what they'd had for breakfast - all the information that Dad scribbles onto a notepad.
"Last night-" He really listens to his his own voice this time, and it's a lot higher than it's supposed to be. He sounds like Sam, almost, and now that they're sitting next to each other, their heads are at about the same height. He takes a moment to collect his thoughts and speaks again in that childish voice. "I came back from Ollie's, showered, went to sleep - nothing weird. And I didn't feel off until we hit the road this morning - but I drove last night, back from the bar."
Dad seems not to notice his voice or how his hands have started to shake as he brings the sports bottle up to his mouth, but he thinks that's more nerves than whatever is causing this.
"What did you do at Ollie's? Anyone new in the crowd? There's always tourists, salesmen - anyone-"
Dean tilts his head, trying really hard to remember, but his thoughts feel strange and foggy. He knows who he is, where he is, where they're coming from and where they're going, but his memories from yesterday are like he's watching a show on TV and anything before that.... He can hardly recall. He hesitates and says, "Played pool and bought the last round before I came home. Before that, went swimming with Sammy... I don't really remember the-"
"Hell, Dean, what did you do?" Dad turns to Sammy and asks, "You were with him at the city pool? Did anything happen there, anything at all? What did he eat and drink? Did you have the same?"
"Um...." Sam sounds a little panicky and a little sulky. "We both had hot dogs for dinner and shared a milkshake and then we came home. We only talked to the guy at the entrance, and we swam together almost all the time, and Dean was perfectly normal the whole time. But, Dad, do we have to figure it out now? Here? Odds are, whatever it was started back in Green Cove Springs, so shouldn't we just turn around and figure it out while we're driving?"
Dad sighs; he's understandably exasperated and drained and frustrated, and Dean's furious with himself for creating this situation; he doesn't know what he did, but obviously, he did something idiotic, and now he's really, really screwed.
"Sammy, we can't just do that. Dean seems to be getting younger, which means that soon, he'll be shorter than you, and we don't know what'll happen to his body or his mind next. There's no way he can drive. And I can't drive safely now, which means that the best we can do is figure this out on our own, here and now. We can do it - we're Winchesters."
He turned away from Sammy and back to his notepad, and then Sammy blurted out, "I am, too."
"You're what?" Dad asked distractedly.
"I'm a Winchester, and I know how to drive. Sort of," Sammy said. "Dean was driving when he was ten - and I'm eleven and a half and he's given me six lessons and I'm taller than Dean was when he was twelve and I can do it."
Dad rounded on Dean. "You've been giving him driving lessons? Since when?"
"I don't know - he asked me and it didn't seem fair how you taught me before I was ten and he's almost twelve. He can do it." Dean thinks Sammy's right - if they went back to Green Cove they might be able to solve the problem and stop him shrinking before he disappears into nothing. He doesn't really mind being the same age as Sammy right now, but he doesn't want to get any younger, to suddenly be eight or five or a baby - Sammy won't know what to do. Dad needs him to help with Sammy and what good will Dean be if he's a little kid? He tells himself that Dad probably has a solution in his journal, or he'll call Pastor Jim and see whether he's seen something like this before. But he feels like an idiot that he can't do anything to stop it himself and he can't let himself cry in front of Sammy, or Dad.
Sam's voice cuts into his foggy thoughts. "Dad, you always say that when there's something wrong, you start your research at the source. I can get us back there, and I look enough like Dean's driver's license that if I get pulled over, I can say I'm him, and with you in the front seat..."
Dad huffs in the front seat, thinks for a moment, then opens the door so he can step out. "Let me try calling around first - I'll be back in a few minutes, and if nobody has a quick fix or answer, you can do it. Get up here, get used to the seat and the wheel, but don't turn it on until I get back."
Sam and Dean watched him on the phone for a few minutes in silence, and then Sam speaks. "You're still my big brother, even if you're littler than me right now, and you've always helped me. Now, I get to help you and I'm going to do it right."
"How do you know?" Dean says. He's worried about Sammy driving, and whether they'll find a way to stop this change and get him back to normal, and what Dad's going to say when - if, or when - everything is fixed, and so many other things he can't really name.
"Well, you taught me, and I trust you. I'll always trust you...."
******
"First time I saved you," Sam says. "On the I-10 and the I-75, right back into Florida." Sam's hands were tight on the wheel, just like they were thirteen years before, when Dean had been shaking with nerves in the back seat and he'd been behind the wheel on a highway for the first time, Dad in the middle of the front bench, helping him hold the wheel while he got used to it, speaking cautions and instructions as Sam drove.
******
At first, Sam had thought Dad would have him go to the nearest car rental place - if they had a modern car with cruise control, Dad could've driven back himself - but once Sam had started driving on the surface streets between the restaurant and the highway, Dad seemed comfortable enough with his reach and his ability.
"Don't go over sixty," he'd barked early on, "and don't go below fifty. Keep it steady, don't change lanes and don't get distracted."
"I don't get to pick the music, even now?" Sam had asked, but Dad said no, he wanted him to be focused on what he was doing.
"Maybe in an hour, when you're used to it," he'd said, and an hour later, he popped in one of the cassettes from when Sam was a lot younger, and the Dean sang along in a childish voice from the back seat to "Farmer in the Dell" over and over again.
This should have been a chance for Dad to see him as a grownup, as someone able to help and make suggestions and be listened to, and for the duration of the ride, it was almost like that. Yes, Dad was worried about Dean, who got smaller and younger every hour, but as the hours passed, he started to give Sam bits of advice about changing lanes, passing cars, slowing for ramps, and other tricks and traps of driving the heavy car.
By the time they got back to Green Cove Springs, it was coming on nightfall. Dean had climbed into the front seat and sat between Sam and Dad, wrapped in Sam's sweatshirt and Dad's jacket; they'd stopped about a hundred miles back for a pit stop, and Sam had rinsed out Dean's sports bottle and filled it with juice. Ever since, he'd been sucking on it as if it were a baby bottle. Dean couldn't be more than three years old now. All Sam had wanted to do was pick him up and hold him on his lap, but he had to keep driving. Dean was depending on him.
They couldn't go back to the apartment, although they technically had a few days left on the month's rental. Dad had dropped the keys in the mail that morning, and even if they wanted to break in, there was too much of a risk that someone who remembered them would see them with an unexplainable toddler. Instead, Dad had Sam drive by Ollie's; there was a strip of stores a block away, and Dad used the phone there to check around and see if anyone he'd spoken to before had learned anything that might help. While he was gone, Dean leaned against Sammy, sleepy-eyed and tiny.
When Dad limped back to the car, there was a light in his eyes and a harsh smile on his face. He told Sam to drive over to Ollie's and park by the delivery entrance. While they drove he asked, "We're how many miles from St. Augustine now?"
"I dunno, but it's less than an hour. Our class had a field trip there about three weeks ago."
Dad pulled things out of the glove compartment. "Big thing for the tourists there, right? And it's part of the lore here in Green Cove, too." He sat back down to get the sports bottle out of Dean's hands, but the tug woke him up completely and he was not giving it up easily.
"Mine! You no take it!" Dean whined as Sam pulled up to the bar and turned off the car.
"Dean..." Dad said warningly.
"No! Mine! I thirsaly!"
"Shhh, shhh!" Sam, said, pulling Dean onto his lap. "It's ok - I'm here. Let him have it and I'll give you..." He glanced around the car and spotted the box of tapes under the dashboard. "Look! Here's a nice mix tape for you to chew on!"
Dean handed over the bottle, then grabbed the case and started flipping it open and closed, pulling the tape out and putting it back in. "You'd better hope he doesn't pull the tape out. Dean'll kill you, salt you and burn you if it gets ruined," Dad warned, and Sam smiled at his optimism that Dean would be back to normal and able to be angry about something like a broken tape. Once Dad had the bottle in hand, he slid back out of the car and, holding one of his crutches almost like a billy-club, went to the side door and walked right in.
They sat there for about ten minutes waiting for Dad, but to Sam, who had no experience dealing with little kids, it felt like an hour. Sam tried to pacify Dean with the last of the pretzels and by reading to him, neither of which worked. But when Dean pushed the now tooth-marked cassette into his hand and said, "Play! Please!" he turned on the mix of Metallica and Led Zeppelin songs. It was almost funny to watch Dean try to sing along, and it was a good distraction.
When Dad finally came out of the bar, he wasn't alone; he was almost dragging the bartender by his collar to the back seat, and then he pushed the man in. Dean hid his head in Sam's shirt and Sam held him tight.
"Archie, I'd like you to meet my son, Sam - he's the one at the wheel - and his little brother Dean - that's the little one next to him. Dean's almost sixteen, which I think you already know. Now, tell me - what the hell did you give him last night? Because I know that whatever caused this, it happened here."
"Nothing!" Archie gasped. "Nothing that would've done this, at least!"
Dad pushed him against the back of the seat and said, "Are you sure? You didn't give him anything to drink, anything to eat? Anything, maybe, from the real Fountain of Youth?"
"It doesn't do this! I've never seen it take years off someone like this!"
"So you did give him something?" Dad demanded.
"He told us he was leaving today, and I wanted to send him off with something. So I filled his sports bottle - that one he's always carrying around - with some of the water from the Fountain - we use it to make our house beer! All it's supposed to do is make you feel a few years younger, not make you be a few years younger!"
"I thought it had something to do with the damned bottle, but..." Dad was muttering almost to himself, and Archie looked like he wanted to bolt back into the bar but was too afraid of John Winchester to chance it.
Dean tugged at Sam's ear and said, "Sammy! Sammy! Bottle had water!" Dean piped up. "All the water, in the bottle!" And Sam understood what made Dean's water bottle different from every other one.
"Um, sir?" Sam said to Archie, "Was Dean's bottle totally empty when you filled it up?"
"No, there was a little water in the bottom of it. I poured it out before I filled it up."
Sam didn't want to say too much in front of Archie - he'd basically put a spell on Dean with the water, even if he hadn't expected this to be the result, and he didn't trust him at all. "Dad, can we talk to you in private?" he asked, glancing at Archie. Dad seemed to know what Sam was really asking, so he bundled the man out of the car and told him to wait by the door, then told Sam to go on. "Dean's been carrying Holy Water in that bottle, so he can have it with him all the time as a 'just-in-case' - and I've been doing the same with mine. We did clean then out on Friday afternoon when we were packing, so we could use them for regular drinks on the drive, but if he didn't rinse out the cap, there may've been a little bit left in there or something. But I'd bet anything that the Holy Water reacted with the water from the Fountain, and that's what's causing this. Dean's been drinking from the stupid bottle this whole trip!"
"Not anymore," Dad announced. "And I'll salt and burn all of them tonight." He leaned into the front seat and patted Dean on his head, touching the hair that had changed to blond as the day had gone by. He said softly, "You staying this way for now, little man? No more drinking from that damned bottle, so you'll stop getting younger?" Dean nodded, eyes wide open. "Good boy. Now, Sammy, we've got two options." Dad was thinking aloud, addressing him the way he usually spoke to Dean. Sammy felt a thrill of excitement to be part of this, though it was tempered by his worry for Dean. "We can go break into one of the local libraries, and hope that they have enough books on the Fountain of Youth lore -" Sammy interrupted him with a big yawn, quickly followed by an apology - "so we can find some way to reverse this thing *and* hope that Dean'll sleep while we work, or we can make camp for the night, get some food and rest and start researching in the morning. With the way you're yawning, I think it's option number two."
Sam drove to a grocery store and the three of them went in together, even though Dean was shoeless and enveloped in one of Sam's sweatshirts that they'd rescued from the trunk. Sam was happy to have a chance to stretch his legs, and Dean seemed thrilled to bounce in the front of the grocery cart. Twenty minutes later they were back at the car with a bag full of supplies, including a few touristy toddler-sized t-shirts emblazoned with flamingos and pelicans, and of course, some diapers. They hadn't had an accident yet, but Dad didn't want to risk it overnight. It was pushing nine when they pulled into a motel near the center of the town, and once they'd checked in, Dad carried Dean to the room while Sam followed with the groceries.
Dean was sleepy again, thanks to the motion of the car and the music on the tape deck, and Sam was beyond exhausted from the day's driving. He hadn't thought it would be so tiring to sit all day behind the wheel - it wasn't that draining when you were a passenger - but concentrating on the road had wiped him out. Dad was going back out for a while- to make some more phone calls and bring in a few more things from the car. "Dean, get Sammy ready for bed," he said absent-mindedly as he closed the door.
Sam stood stock still in the middle of the room, looking at his big brother, who was curled up on the bed further from the door, his eyes dazed and his thumb in his mouth. "But I don't know what to do," Sam said as he latched the chain at the top of the door, like Dean always did when they were alone. "I- Dean? Dean - what do I do? When I was little, how did you...?"
For as long as Sam could remember, Dean had been there to help him get dressed or brush his teeth, or take a bath, or feed him. How hard could it be, if Dean had managed it at six or seven? Sammy was nearly twelve - he should be able to do this.
"You hungry?" he asked his brother.
Dean shook his head; that was okay - Sammy wasn't hungry either. "Milk? Daddy get milk?" Dean requested.
He hadn't - it would've been too difficult to keep cool in the room - but there was powdered formula and water to mix it with, and some sippy cups. "You wait, I can figure this out," he told Dean while he started reading the instructions.
Mix spoonful with 8 oz water, then shake until dissolved, the label read. "But where do I mix it?" Sam wondered. Dean picked up a sippy cup and threw it onto the floor. As Sam picked it up, he asked, "Are you trying to tell me what to do?" He laughed - taking instructions from a baby - even a Dean-baby - was kind of ridiculous. But yeah, he could mix it right in there, so he opened the container and used the scoop inside to pour some of the powdered stuff into the sippy cup. He filled it up the rest of the way with the water Dad had bought at the store, put the top on and shook it, which made Dean laugh and kick his feet a bit. When it looked drinkable, he handed it to Dean, then sat down on the bed himself.
Dean crawled back onto his lap and leaned his head against Sam's left arm, which startled Sam a bit. "Is it good?" he asked Dean, and Dean sighed and nodded a bit.
Suddenly, Sam realized something. "No, you can't go to sleep yet! You need a bath and your new shirt and your teeth need to be brushed and..." He tried to sit Dean up and take the sippy cup away, but Dean wasn't letting go of it, and Sam didn't have any tapes to bribe him with in here. "Do you want a bath?" he asked hoping that the promise of splashing in water would get Dean to relinquish the sippy cup.
"No, want to sleep."
Sam sighed. He didn't want Dean to start screaming - it might bother the people in the adjoining rooms - but he needed to have his face washed at least. "Stay here," Sam said in what he hoped was a Dad-like commanding voice, then went into the bathroom and brought back a towel and a wet washcloth. He sat Dean on the towel and sponged down his little face and hands, which were still sticky from the juice. "Better get all of this off you - we don't know what will happen if we don't." He thought about it for a moment, and said, "But you're not any smaller than you were back at the bar, so I think you're staying this size for a while. I hope."
"Me, too," Dean replied.
"You understand everything I'm saying, don't you?" Dean shook his head, but smiled; Sam wanted to think that his brother was making a joke of it. That would be just like him, whether he was three or fifteen. He pulled off Dean's shirt and realized that somewhere along the line, Dean's boxer shorts had gone missing - Dad had pinned them on back at the rest stop, but somewhere between the grocery and here, they must've fallen off.
"Oh, gah," Sam winced. "No pants, that means you need the diapers. Ugh, hopefully Dad'll be back before you need to be changed. Well, if I have to...."
Dean stood up on the bed, totally awake again - and now naked - and shouted, "No! I won't! I won't! No, no, Sammy, no! I'll be good!" As Sam reached to grab him, the little boy bolted off the bed and jumped for the door. He pulled it open, but the latch on the top stopped it at three inches. Dean tried to slide his body through the door, but Sam had reached him by then, and pulled him back and shut the door.
"Don't you cause a scene!" Sam whispered fiercely. "If people hear you they'll come to the room and see us alone and Dad'll get in trouble and they'll take us away and...."
Oh. He was speaking Dean's own words back to him; this was the same thing Dean had said so many times over the years, except for the last year or two. Sam had thought that was because Dean was old enough to be alone with him in the motel or the apartment without worrying about Social Services or something. But Sammy wasn't even twelve, and Dean was so little tonight, and the risk, the danger and the fear were all back.
"Can't go outside," Dean said quietly. "I know. I forgot."
"Will you be good? Will you be a good boy for me? I know you don't wanna wear them, but Dad got them for you and we have to. We have to keep safe."
"I non' wanna," Dean said one more time, but he let Sam steer him back to the bed.
"Dean, don't feel bad. They're not baby diapers - they're big-boy overnight pants. See? They're for kids up to five years old," Sam read from the package, and Dean sniffled a little. Sam didn't think he bought the argument, but if he just put them on, it would be ok.
"I do it myself," Dean said, which made Sam sigh in relief - if Dean could do it....
And he could. Once they were on, Sam pulled one of the new shirts over Dean's head - it was labeled as Size 4, and it went almost down to his knees. "Little thing," Sam said, handing the sippy cup back to Dean. He pulled the comforter and the sheets back and straightened three pillows on the bed. "You snuggle down - I'm going to brush my teeth and I'll be right back."
He moved to turn off the light, but Dean said, "No, Sammy, please no. No dark yet."
"But you don't like sleeping when the lights are on. You always say...." Except things were different tonight, so maybe Dean's sleeping preferences were different, too. Sammy left the light on until he came back out of the bathroom in his pyjamas. Dean looked like he was asleep, but he opened his eyes when Sam nudged him closer to the wall, climbing under the covers himself.
"I wants more milk, please" Dean murmured, and Sam climbed back out to make another cup-full of the formula by the light of the street lamp outside the window. "You stay up for Daddy? Someone has 'ta," Dean asked.
Dean usually did that - watching TV or reading a book or magazine until Dad came home, so he could undo the chain and let him in. Sam knew that Dean fell asleep sometimes when he was waiting, when they didn't know how late Dad would be back, or if he was coming back that night at all, but now that Dean had reminded him about it, Sam knew that he had to stay awake and wait for Dad to come back. Maybe he'd have some new information or a new idea about how to get Dean to grow up quickly. He didn't mind it for a night or so - it was a bit of an adventure, in a way - but he didn't want to be the big brother forever! He missed his Dean and he really wanted him back.
So when Sam brought the cup back to Dean, he brought a book and his flashlight, too, so he could read while he waited. Dean took the cup and snuggled up to Sam, pressing his back against Sam's side. "Thanks for being Daddy's helper," Dean whispered as he closed his eyes. While Sam read, he absently patted Dean's hair, and in their own ways, they waited for Dad to come back and tell them what was going to happen next.
******
"Wish we had a demon to test it on," Dean said.
"We could put an ad in the Daily Demon Newsletter - Winchesters Looking for Volunteers for Demonic Science Experiment! We want to see if spraying demons with a mix of two special waters will make them de-age into nothingness! That should go over well."
"Nah, don't want to tip our hand. Or give them a chance to find an antidote."
"Can demons even use iron as an antidote? I don't think they can..."
"If you see one show up with a bottle of baby formula - now fortified with iron! - then let me know straight away, Sammy."
"Will do. I still think it was a pretty weird antidote."
"It was a weird potion from the start. Mix Fountain of Youth water with Holy Water and get a de-aging potion, so sure, why not re-age me by giving me baby formula?"
"You still think Dad knew when he bought it that it would work?"
"I dunno, I never asked. Makes sense, doesn't it? Reversible thermodynamics and the oxidation process and ninety percent of what we deal with doesn't respond properly to the laws of physics anyway. What matters is, it worked."
"Sort of."
"How was it only sort of?"
"Dean, you haven't grown an inch in height since that day!"
"Yeah, and you're so thrilled by that because the track I was on, if I had, I'd be taller than you are now."
"Oh, you only wish."
"Hmmm. No, that's not what I'd've wished for...."
They sped toward the crossroads. It wasn't a perfect plan, and it still had some holes, like how to get the demon to drink the stuff, or at the very least, not notice the giant water guns they'd be packing. But, Sam thought as they covered the miles, that was how they liked it best, really - improvising, figuring things out as they went along. As their dad would have said, "We can do it - We're Winchesters."
Author's Note: Thanks to wendywoowho for the antidote!
The prompt was "One of the boys being de-aged, and the other having to solve the problem, while caring for his "little" brother. Bonus if you can fit John in somehow."
Note-type comments: This is probably the longest fic I've written in at least three years, and it took a long time for me to choose a prompt from eloise_bright's list - and I had at least two false starts on this fic. It began life as one section of a "Five Things" story, and grew from there. I thought that my use of a songtitle from a Finn Bros song would be a giveaway that it was me, but I don't know if anyone guessed. I'm curious to know if anyone did! You can download the song here.
The image (from Smallville) that partially inspired the fic is