Asking the Stars (part 3)
Rated: PG 13 (no language in this one, but that may change in the next part)
Disclaimer: I don’t own Supernatural. This story is just for my amusement.
Summary: Wee!chesters (Sam is six, Dean is ten) The pressures of the hunting life affect Dean. The boys stay with a family friend and get a taste of normalcy.
“I- I’m worried about him, Marian. I’m just- I’m worried,” John stuttered, as he watched the boys playing from her kitchen window.
Sammy scampered after the little boy from next door, in the midst of a game of freeze tag that never lasted long with only two players. Dean sat and watched from the picnic table, his scabby knees pulled into his chest and hugged by pale arms.
Dean had calmed down a bit in the day since their arrival, but he still wasn’t eating much and had crawled into bed with his dad and little brother the night before.
…
John hadn’t met Marian Breedlove under the best of circumstances.
Mary had died six months earlier, and he was just beginning his career investigating the supernatural.
Marian’s husband Waylon had died on a hunt a few years before, and she’d decided it was time to part with his belongings; holding onto the past had been keeping her from moving on.
John was happy to take the equipment off of her hands. Rifles and good knives were expensive, and Waylon’s weaponry had been well cared for and still had plenty of fight in it yet.
They’d gotten to talking- Marian recalling her husband’s adventuresome spirit, and John sharing some fond memories of his wife. The older woman had been a school guidance counsellor before retiring at the age of sixty, a rare sympathetic ear in a circle more comfortable discussing ten ways to banish a spirit than grief or loss.
John had brought the boys to stay once before; he had a broken leg at the time, and Sammy was in the terrible twos and needed a supervisor that could catch him.
He’d never left them alone overnight with anyone else since Mary had died. His general rule of thumb was that other people couldn’t be trusted… but Dean needed some stability, so he was making a concession to the rule- albeit somewhat grudgingly.
He tried to provide everything his boys needed to thrive, but at the end of the day he was one parent, not two and he always seemed to come up short. Dean filled in the gaps with Sammy, but he often wondered how the boys were affected by not having a mother figure in their lives.
Dean remembered Marian, but Sam had been too little the last time they’d met.
John had been worried that his youngest would make a scene about being left to stay with a strange lady, but the little boy seemed to relish the older woman’s attention; delighting in the fresh baked cookies she gave to him and his brother, and listening raptly as she read aloud from an old hard covered book of Greek mythology.
Dean was too old to be read to like a little baby, but he lingered on the outskirts of the room, cleaning his father’s guns within listening distance and secretly enjoying the stories as well.
He could be happy here, but only if his dad would stay too.
…
On the morning he was set to leave for Durango, John couldn’t find his boots.
The massive brogans with their cracked leather and fraying laces should have been easy to find; he’d left them on Marian’s porch the night before, flanked by Dean’s boots and Sammy’s little running shoes that lit up every time he took a step.
He searched all over the house, asking Marian and the boys if they had seen them, but turning up nothing. Luckily he had an old pair of shoes in the impala, which he put on before coming inside to say goodbye to everyone.
He gave Marian a gentle embrace, his muscles thanking her for agreeing to protect what he held most dear. She was braver than most to agree to watch two rambunctious kids she barely knew for an unknown length of time.
Sammy hugged him genially, seemingly forgetting his earlier outrage at being left behind. He handed John a wrinkled drawing of a snowman and asked his dad to bring back a Sasquatch claw for him to wear on a chain.
A boy at his last school had had a bear tooth around his neck, and Sammy had been impressed.
John laughed and promised to do his best before turning to his other son.
“Be good for Mrs. Breedlove and look after Sammy, okay?”
The boy nodded solemnly and stood on his tiptoes to whisper something in his father’s ear.
John nodded in reply before climbing into the car and heading down the dusty road.
His face was only visible in profile as he drove away, hiding the tears that shone on his cheeks.
…
Marian quickly distracted the boys by asking them to tend to the chickens; Dean’s face was tear streaked, although he brushed them away when he met her eye, his face reddening with embarrassment.
Sammy ran to feed the chickens, scattering huge handfuls inside the cosy little henhouse; if this continued they would soon be too fat to fit in their nest boxes. Marian handed Dean a wicker basket lined with a tea towel, and showed him how to carefully lift the eggs from the straw.
She knew the boy had been trained like a warrior, so she was surprised to see how gently he handled each egg, working slowly so as not to break a single one.
She would try and move slowly with him, although her personality tended to like to jump into ‘projects’ with both feet; she would be patient, he seemed like he could break as well.
…
Dean didn’t come downstairs for dinner.
Sammy ate his macaroni and cheese with gusto, seemingly impressed that it was possible to actually make macaroni and cheese that didn't come in a box. He chatted with Marian about his favorite chicken and the new school he’d be starting on Monday, and wondered aloud what his dad was having for dinner.
It took all of Marian’s strength not to run up the stairs two at a time (in spite of her arthritic hip) and give Dean a hug. She wanted to rock him in her arms and promise him that everything would be alright.
This might have worked if she had been dealing with Sam, but Dean was trickier. Only four years older than his brother, but wise beyond his years and with a sense of dignity that wouldn’t permit any obvious babying.
Summoning all of her willpower, she washed the dishes while Sammy dried and then ran a bath for the little boy. She sat on the hamper for half an hour while he splashed around in the tub, diving his little action figures off the soap dish, and performing rescue missions with a plastic boat.
She was glad to see that Sam seemed so well adjusted and felt a flood of warmth for John, although she knew his brother probably was probably equally responsible for the youngster's innocence.
Despite living out of a suitcase in a constant state of upheaval the little boy seemed happy.
She wished his brother was as well.
…
At eight o’clock, after Sammy had been read to and tucked in, she headed down the hall to her son’s childhood room; Jeremy was a big shot lawyer now, newly married and living in Boston with his college sweetheart. The walls were lined with penants of various sports teams, and the closet had some clothes in it, but she had cleared out the chest of drawers and moved her son’s basketball trophies and most of his belongings into storage.
She wanted Dean to feel that this was his room, even if it was only temporary.
Marian knocked gently on the door, hesitantly turning the handle after getting no response. The bed was neatly made and Dean’s beat up duffle bag was still sitting unpacked on the desk. She sat down in the wooden rocking chair by the window and looked out at the stars.
It was pitch black outside, and the moon and constellations stood out in stark relief. Her eyes traced the ram and the river, and she sighed at the beauty of the spiral galaxy Triangulum. She heard a small sound from the closet and went over to open the door, gently waking the boy- already in pyjamas, his feet in a giant pair of leather boots.
“Dean? Do you want to get into bed?”
Marian picked up the boots and placed them on the nightstand, and offered Dean a hand to stand up. The shadows under his eyes were darker than ever, but he accepted her help and even let her tuck him under the covers.
“Are you hungry? I can bring your dinner up on a tray if you want.”
“No thanks,” he replied quietly, reaching over to tuck one of the laces into its boot.
“I made macaroni and cheese. Your brother said it was better than Kraft Dinner, which I take it is quite the compliment from a six year old.”
“My stomach hurts,” Dean said, looking away from her at the spidery silhouettes the trees cast upon his wall.
“I’ll be right back, hon,” she promised. “Unless you’re tired and want to sleep?”
“It’s only eight o’clock,” Dean said disgustedly, as Marian laughed at the typical response; it was something Jeremy would have said at that age, easily insulted at the suggestion that he was still a child.
She patted his knee, and padded down the hall to the kitchen. Putting the kettle on to boil, she sobered at the thought that in many ways Dean had never had the chance to be a child.
John loved his boys, there was no doubt about that, but hunting monsters and babysitting was no life for a ten year old, and the weight of responsibility placed on them was far too big for Dean's shoulders.
Heading back to Jeremy’s- Dean's- room carrying two hot mugs of ginger tea, she checked in on Sam, not surprised to see Dean sitting in a chair keeping a silent vigil.
“C’mon honey, let’s let Sam sleep,” Marian whispered; the boy stood up reluctantly, peering back over his shoulder as he followed her out into the hall.
“This might help settle your tummy. My grandma used to make it for me and my brother when we weren’t feeling good.”
She moved the rocker closer to the bed and tucked Dean in for the second time.
“Did my dad call when I was upstairs?” Dean wanted to know.
“Sorry, hon. Why don’t we phone him in the morning?”
“He said he would call when he got there.”
“He might have arrived very late. Too late to call.”
“What if he’s hurt? Hunting is dangerous- my dad knows a lot of people who have died.” Dean looked pale, and his eyes opened really wide with his final pronouncement.
“Do you worry about that, Dean? That something might happen to your dad when he’s on a hunt?”
The boy nodded briefly, and took a little sip of tea.
“Sometimes my stomach hurts when I’m worried,” Marian said offhandedly, like she wasn’t talking about Dean at all, but merely relaying an interesting fact. “The worry is in my head but I feel it in my belly. Isn’t that strange?”
The boy nodded, and took another sip from his mug.
They sat there for a while, drinking their tea in an amicable silence.
...
“I don’t want to sleep.”
“You can stay up a little longer if you want. Do you want to look at the stars with me?”
Dean shrugged indifferently, but followed her over to the window anyway. Stargazing was girly, but he didn’t want to go to bed quite yet.
Marian showed him Caelum and Dorado, tracing their path with her finger through the pane of glass.
“I know it’s stupid… but sometimes I think my mom is a star,” Dean said quietly, his eyes still fixed on the sky.
“That’s not stupid- it’s a big universe... and anyone who claims to know all of its secrets is lying.”
She showed him Orion and explained that the name translated to ‘the great hunter’.
“Do you think my dad is thinking about me and Sammy?” Dean asked suddenly.
“I’m sure you’re always in his thoughts, Dean; you and your brother. Do you want to go to sleep? Stargazing always makes me tired for some reason… maybe because it makes you feel so small.”
Dean nodded and crawled into bed where Marian proceeded to tuck him in for the third time.
“If you need anything, my room is just at the end of the hall. Goodnight hon.”
She flicked off the light, and was just about to shut the door when a low voice echoed her sentiment.
“Nite, Mrs. Breedlove, and... thanks for the tea.”