(Untitled)

[wayward_dad]

Though the waterfall wasn't that far away from the hut John shared with the boys (and now Jess, too), he took his time returning. Sharon's confession was weighing heavily on his mind, unsurprisingly. It was the last thing in the world he'd ever expected to hear from her. But he had and now everything had been turned upside-down and rightside-up

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[unchosen_son]

Sam had been trying to clean up the room while Jess was out, some quiet determination to be on his best behaviour mildly crippling him. At least, when it came to her. He glanced up when the door opened and gave his father a brief nod of hello, until he saw that he looked...well, definitely not at his best. "Dad?" he asked warily.

[weary_head]

Dean raised his head from the bed where he'd been napping through the worst of the afternoon heat, successful despite Sam's best efforts to clean as noisily as possible.

The wary note in his brother's voice roused him from sleep like no banging drawer ever could, and Dean blinked at his father through the open door. There was an odd set to his shoulders, one Dean was more accustomed to cataloging as pain than reluctance, as John Winchester was a do or do not kind of man. "You hurt?" he asked, sitting up.

[wayward_dad]

"Hey, Sam," John said, the brief smile tugging at his lips not quite making it to his eyes. When Dean sat up, he merely shook his head at the question, still searching for the words to tell them.

Evidence of Sam's cleaning was a welcome distraction. His eyes roamed slowly over the neatened areas and the small piles waiting to be sorted. Compartmentalized.

It was times like this that John wished like hell he could just do the same. Things would be a lot easier.

But it wasn't as though life had been easy or kind to John Winchester.

"I need to talk to you," he said, standing inside their doorway.

[unchosen_son]

Sam watched their father with a daunted look in his eyes, feeling a good bit of fear biting at him. There was never really any good talks within the Winchester family and when John Winchester looked like that, he couldn't imagine it was going to be any decent. "About what?"