FIC: He Tells My Story (1/1)
Title: He Tells My Story
Author: Zubeneschamali
Rating: PG
Word count: 3,834
Summary: Missing scenes for 15.20. Spoilers abound. One of the ways Sam learns to cope is by helping kids who've lost family to the supernatural. It becomes something a lot bigger.
A/N: It's been a long time since an ep inspired me to write fic right away. But there were people on Twitter using Hamilton lyrics from the finale to make themselves even sadder about the SPN finale, and I know dugindeep and I always lose it when Eliza gets to the line about the orphanage. Then the wheels in my head started turning, and this is the result. Many thanks to fiercelynormal for beta reading and testing the number of Kleenex needed to finish the story.
It starts with a summer camp.
Well, first it starts with Eileen. She calls Sam on Skype right after Jody calls her (thank god that Jody took on the task of informing the hunter phone tree), and she's one of the few people Sam's willing to pick up for. She lets him talk, waits through his painful breaths when that's all he can manage, and she doesn't insist on coming to the bunker but promises to check in on him.
So he texts her as he's on the road to Austin. "I need your help."
"of course. anything."
"There's a hunt. Someone called one of the phones that-" He can't bring himself to type it. "I'm going to Austin. Werewolves, I think."
There's a long pause, and he's sure she's going to ask if he's up for it. But all she replies is, "2 days away. meet u there."
"Thanks, Eileen. I need to do this. It's just…" Sam isn't sure how to express it, how to put into words the fear that he'll leave himself open because he's fighting alone-maybe that he'll even do it on purpose. So he hits Send.
Her reply is quick and matter-of-fact. "u need someone to watch your back."
The hunt goes well, and so does the one after that, even if Sam can tell that he's being too cautious during fights. So he pulls back, does some simple hunts on his own, takes care of the dog, visits Jody and Donna and the girls. All the while, there's a wound in his chest that won't heal, a mirror of the hole the rebar left, but he does what Dean asked and carries on.
In the years after Chuck and before Canton, they and other hunters had noticed that things were different. People seemed more open to supernatural explanations, or at least to acknowledging that something weird was going on. They only ever told a handful of people what really happened, that everyone else winked out of existence for a short while. None of them remember being gone or dying, not exactly. Sam remembers Jody's brow furrowing and then easing as he told her, like something that had been puzzling her now made sense. Eileen had figured it was an aftereffect of her resurrection. But more and more often, when a witness tried to explain something…not natural…they referred to "that weird day, you remember?" or "that time when, you know?" as a point of reference.
So the phone call from Austin was only the first of many. Agent Bon Jovi, as well as Agents Plant, Singer, Tyler, and more, becomes known in the law enforcement community as the man to contact if something unexplainable occurs. Sam can't handle them all-some days he can't handle anything at all-but he farms out the calls to his network, and the hunts get done. He can even start charging consulting fees here and there, and soon it becomes enough to (frugally) live on.
It's Eileen's idea to start keeping a database, and at first it's just a way to sort out who's got what assignments. Maybe it would be easier to do in the bunker, but Sam can't go back there, not yet. Of course, he wraps up each entry in the database by noting the outcome, and he eventually realizes two things.
He's visiting Eileen's place, and she's looking over his shoulder as he enters the information from a hunter in Massachusetts who took out the spirit of an old sea captain going after the descendants of the men who'd mutinied against him. "How many is that now?" she asks.
He turns to talk to her. "How many what?"
She points at the last column. "The remaining descendants are safe. There were five of them, right?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"So how many is that? Total?"
Sam stares at her. Then he looks back at the screen. "I don't know."
"Here." She reaches over him, does some Excel magic, and says, "Eighty-seven."
"Eighty-seven?"
Her expression softens, and she puts a hand on his shoulder. "Plus three in Austin. Plus who knows how many more, but this many for sure." She takes a deep breath and goes on, "I know it was hard for you to stay here, after Dean. I know it's still hard. But there are ninety people who are still alive because of you. And more every day. If that helps."
He looks away, feeling that punch to the gut every time he thinks of Dean. Everyone around him knows that his tears can well up at any moment, and they do now. He turns his head enough so she can see his lips as he whispers, "Thank you," and then looks away.
She leaves him with a pat to the shoulder as he stares at the screen. The numbers blur before him, but he breathes through it until his chest stops hurting.
Ninety people.
The other thing he realizes on his own. There are the people they save, yes, but just because they're alive doesn't mean their lives are intact. He starts keeping track of those like him who have been left behind, the siblings and children and parents who had someone torn away from them in a way they can't explain to the outside world.
He goes to Garth with his idea-not even an idea, really, but a germ that he needs to talk through. When he's done stumbling through it, Garth asks, "You mean like a support group?"
"Maybe? I just want some way to show these people that they're not alone. Especially the kids. It's hard enough to lose a parent, or both parents, but to have seen something that you can't even talk about to grownups, even now…"
"Yeah, I get that." Garth puzzles it over for a moment, and then his face brightens. "There's this summer camp a couple of towns over. Every year they do one for kids who are cancer survivors. Same kind of thing. They've been through something that other kids and even most adults don't understand, but here they can be with each other and be normal for a week or two."
"That's it." Sam feels a slow, unfamiliar smile spread over his face. "Garth, you're a genius."
It takes months and months to plan, but the more Sam shares his idea, the more people are willing to help. Sam can keep doing small hunts and answering the phone to verify hunters' fake identities and burying his head in his work while others make the contacts with people he can't bring himself to reach out to.
Camp Not Afraid of the Dark opens in Minnesota the next summer with five counselors and twenty kids. Sam's not sure he can make himself go, but Garth pleads and Jody and Donna insist, so he gets in the Impala and cruises up I-35. It's a pretty little camp, tucked back into the woods around the inevitable lake, somewhere he's never been before.
He gets there as the campers are arriving, and he hangs back, watching them get settled in. After a little while, a young man with medium-length light brown hair comes up to him with a clipboard and a warm smile. "Hi! Welcome to Camp Not Afraid of the Dark! Are you a parent or guardian?"
"What? No, I'm...I'm one of the staff, I guess. Is Garth or Donna here?"
"Yeah, I can get Donna." The young man pauses and then looks at him more closely. "You look really familiar."
Sam hunches in on himself. "Yeah, I get that sometimes."
"Are you-are you Sam? Sam Winchester?"
He nods, gut suddenly twisting with nerves. Who is this kid that he's supposed to know, who's probably going to ask about Dean, and oh god, Sam never should have come here-
"I'm Lucas. Lucas Barr." He waits hopefully, and then his face falls. "You probably don't remember me. It was a long time ago."
"Lake Manitoc," Sam says slowly. "Your-your dad. And your grandpa."
"Yeah, that's right." Lucas gives him a small, sad smile. "Garth told me about Dean. I'm really sorry."
"Thanks." He swallows hard against the lump in his throat, and after a moment he can speak again. "So what are you doing here?"
"I'm a counselor! Sheriff Hanscum tracked me down and said she wanted to see how I was doing, kind of a follow-up after all these years. I told her what I was up to, and she asked if I wanted to help out, and I said yes. It's a great idea. I wish something like this had been around when I was a kid."
"Yeah, I bet. Um, what is it that you're up to?"
"I'm starting my last year of college. I'm majoring in social work. I want to be a therapist, help kids with traumatic experiences like me." Lucas gestured at the camp around them. "I never thought I'd really be able to help kids just like me, though. I'm so glad this place is here."
For a moment, all Sam can see is Dean playing with little green army men in a park, helping a much smaller Lucas draw a picture of what he'd seen but couldn't find the words for. The familiar rush of grief is tempered with gratitude, and he manages a weak smile. "I'm glad to hear that, Lucas. Thanks for coming out."
He finds his way to a cabin they've set aside for him before he breaks down. He remembers it clear as day, the beautiful Wisconsin lakefront not so different from where he is now, Dean trying everything he could think of to get through to a traumatized child, even putting a crack in his own armor in the process. Sam had still been so deep in his grief over Jess, but overhearing Dean talk about how he tried to be brave despite his fear had been a window into his brother that he'd sorely needed at the time.
Now, it just makes him miss Dean all the more.
Sam pulls himself together enough to go to the opening campfire. Donna gives him a big hug, as does Jody, and of course Garth. But they let him stand in the background, watching as the staff and then the counselors introduce themselves. Lucas is the only one he's met before; there are other hunters in the world who've saved kids, after all. They all say a little about themselves, the family members or close friends they lost to something unnatural, and the kids all solemnly nod in understanding.
Then Garth asks if he wants to say a few words, and he starts to shake his head. He hasn't prepared for this, can't possibly come up with anything that won't just set him bawling. But Lucas is looking at him expectantly, and he realizes that this is one more thing Dean would want him to do.
So he steps forward and gives the kids a small wave. "Hi. My name's Sam."
"Hi, Sam!" they chorus back at him.
"I, um. I lost my mom when I was really little. She, um. She was killed by a demon. It changed our whole lives, me and my brother, but we couldn't talk about it to anyone else. Not to kids at school, not to anyone."
Some of the kids are nodding like they know what that's like, and his heart aches for all of them. He goes on, "So that's why you're here. You've all had something terrible happen to you, and you made it through. But it was something that wasn't supposed to happen. Something you can't talk about. But here you can." He gestures at the counselors. "You can talk to them. Or to us. We know what it's like. We won't think it's weird or that you're making it up."
One little girl in the front row ducks her head as tears suddenly well up. The boy sitting next to her, maybe twelve or thirteen, puts his arm around her, and Sam has to look away. "But if you don't want to talk, that's okay, too," he goes on. "You can go hiking, or swimming, or whatever. You can eat as many marshmallows as you want." There are a couple of giggles, and he lets them subside. "The important thing is, you're not alone. Not while you're here. And not when you go back out there." He points towards the road behind them in the dark. "I want you to remember that."
There are a few sniffles from the group, and he puts on a watery smile as he looks at Lucas. "And despite what the name says, it's okay to be afraid of the dark. You know that more than most people, I think. It's okay to be afraid. Just don't let it stop you from being brave."
Later, when the campers are in their cabins, Donna helps Sam put out the fire. "What you said tonight was really good, Sam. I think that's just what those kids needed to hear."
"I tried to think about what I would have wanted to hear from adults if I'd ever had something like this." He swallows. "If we'd ever had something like this."
She puts a hand on his wrist. "Dean would be so proud of you right now. All these kids, helping them cope with what they've been through. It's a good thing you're doing here, Sam."
He ducks his head, nodding with a sniff. "Thanks."
The week-long camp turns out to be really fun. Not to say it isn't sad at times, and Sam's sure not a single person makes it through without crying at least once. But even the quietest kids are talking by the end-Lucas makes sure of that.
And for the first time, Sam can tell strangers stories about Dean without breaking down. It still hurts, oh, it hurts. But he's not alone.
They run the camp for three years, and it gets bigger every time. It's Lucas who approaches Sam with an idea he and a couple of the counselors have been kicking around to take it up a notch. "It'll take a lot of money," he says. "And more actual trained professionals. But there are kids who need even more than this, Sam. These kids all have relatives or guardians taking care of them. Plenty more don't. They need a place to go. Getting put in the system is hard enough; it's even tougher for these kids."
"I wouldn't even know how to start," Sam says, even though his mind is racing.
"Sure you do. Just like with the camp. We need a home base and probably a lawyer. And money."
"I have plenty of that." Lucas looks at him quizzically, and Sam goes on, "Claire is actually really good at fundraising. She's gotten enough to keep the camp going and more. I think it would be a good start, at least."
"That's awesome! So does that mean you'll do it?"
Sam thinks about it for a moment. "Let me look into it, yeah."
It's Charlie, of all people, who contacts Sam and offers to help. He had only checked in on her once post-Chuck, to make sure that Stevie was back and unharmed, and then promised to leave them alone. But Garth is persistent with the hunters' network, and it turns out Stevie has a law degree, and just like that, they're drawing up paperwork.
It's a lot of planning and justification and inspection and review. Sam makes what feels like a hundred presentations to different state and local officials, drawing on the allies he's made in law enforcement since the not-a-Rapture. (Dean called it that once, and Sam's never described it that way to anyone else, since that would mean talking about Dean, but it's the shorthand in his head.) He learns how to sense when people automatically understand what he means by "specially traumatized children" and when he needs to call on one of his allies to back him up.
And in the end, he gets all the approvals he needs. Construction starts, and at the fifth round of Camp Not Afraid of the Dark, Sam makes the announcement. "We're so glad we've been able to hold this camp for you for five years now. But there are kids who need somewhere to go all year round. If you know anybody like that, please let us know. We have a place for them to stay. It's, um." He has to clear his throat and bite his lip for a moment before he can go on. "It's in Lawrence, Kansas, and it's called Dean's Place."
He goes to the official opening, when the first kids who've lost their parents to the supernatural enter the shiny new building and pick out their rooms. It can hold a dozen kids for now, but there's room on the property to expand. Lucas is the lead counselor, and Alex is moving in to be the staff nurse, and they're both thrilled. It's a short walk to the local elementary school, and they've prepared some materials for the teachers to help them integrate the kids from Dean's Place into the regular classrooms. Never using the word "orphanage" is one of the tips, even if that's what it says on all the paperwork. It's just a different kind of home, with different kinds of brothers and sisters.
Right inside the front door, there's a lounge area for visitors with lots of bright, colorful pictures and a mural on one wall. Past the front desk are the kitchen and dining areas, and then one wing of bedrooms in each direction. In the center is a quiet room, and when Sam walks inside, he almost has to turn around and walk right back out.
Somehow, the hunters' network got a hold of a bunch of photographs of him and Dean. Mostly of Dean. Jody still has a key to the bunker, or maybe it was Eileen. At any rate, there are a couple dozen photos, one of them as kids in the Impala, one of Dean holding a pool cue with a confident smirk, one of him grinning fiercely with a streak of blood down his cheek that surprises Sam for a minute until he realizes that the kids living here have probably seen worse.
The biggest image isn't a photo, but an honest-to-god oil painting portrait, and Sam desperately wants to see Dean again just so he can give him shit for it. He's behind the wheel of the Impala, looking out the driver's side window, leather jacket on and amulet around his neck. There's the vague shape of a person in the passenger seat, but the focus is all on Dean and the curve of the road visible behind him. Baby's paint is gleaming in the sun, and Dean has a content smile on his face. It makes Sam's heart hurt, but it also gives him hope. Somewhere out there, Dean is riding around, just like this.
He has to believe that.
"So, what do you think?"
It's Jody, standing at his shoulder. Sam didn't even hear her come up behind him, another sign that his hunter instincts are weakening as he spends more time organizing and managing others than salting and burning. "It's amazing," he says. "All of it. The whole place. The kids are going to love it."
"Yeah, I think they will." She eyes him for a moment. "You wanna come meet them? Tell them about the guy this place is named after?"
Sam shakes his head. "Not right now. Maybe later."
"Whenever you're ready."
"I don't know, I just-this is so weird, that this actually came about. I mean, I've never been good with kids. That was always Dean."
"You're plenty good with kids, Sam. You'll make a great dad someday."
"No, I don't-" He shakes his head, takes a step back as if the idea is actually something standing in front of him. "That's probably not a good idea."
"Why not?" She eyes him more closely.
He's about to reply that she won't understand when it hits him. She had a son, one who was taken from her in one of the worst ways imaginable. And she might not understand all of Sam's fears, but she will certainly understand the one where he won't be able to protect his child from the darkness of the world.
So instead he says, "I was born different, you know. Azazel amplified it, but it was it me all along. I don't want to pass that on to someone else. I don't want to watch someone I love go through what I did."
"Oh, Sam." Jody puts a hand on his arm. "That's all gone, isn't it? Without Chuck and his self-centered storytelling, it's just about you and your choices. No one's going to use anyone as a pawn, not anymore. I mean, I understand that it's a scary idea, believe me. It takes a lot of courage to bring a child into this world, especially knowing the things you know. But it's also a sign of faith, and of hope. You're doing so much to build a future for others. Maybe you should think about a future for yourself."
"Maybe I don't want a future for myself," he says quietly.
"Sam Winchester." It's her mom voice, and he responds to it almost automatically, straightening his shoulders and looking up. "You know that's not true. And I'm not saying there wasn't a time when it was. We worried about you after Dean left, you know. But you pulled through that, and you'll keep going. I know you will."
He offers her a tiny smile, all he can manage. "Thanks, Jody." There's more that he could say, but that's really all it needs to be.
"All right." She pats his arm and lets go. "You come join us when you're ready, okay?"
After she's gone, he looks at Dean's portrait again. He can hear the thrum of the Impala, smell the gasoline and fast food wrappers and too many onions. He can feel the heat of the sun on the seats, hear the rattle of the army men trapped in the door. He can hear Dean humming along to Zeppelin, see his thumb tapping the wheel.
For the first time, he lets himself imagine having someone else in the car with him. Someone to pass their legacy to, someone with his hair and Dean's eyes and their mother's smile and their father's laugh. Jody's right, it's about faith in the future, and he's worked so hard to pull this place together to provide that hope and faith to kids who have had it ripped away from them. Maybe he can let a little of that hope into his own heart, even without Dean by his side.
Hope, after all, is kinda the whole point.
Author: Zubeneschamali
Rating: PG
Word count: 3,834
Summary: Missing scenes for 15.20. Spoilers abound. One of the ways Sam learns to cope is by helping kids who've lost family to the supernatural. It becomes something a lot bigger.
A/N: It's been a long time since an ep inspired me to write fic right away. But there were people on Twitter using Hamilton lyrics from the finale to make themselves even sadder about the SPN finale, and I know dugindeep and I always lose it when Eliza gets to the line about the orphanage. Then the wheels in my head started turning, and this is the result. Many thanks to fiercelynormal for beta reading and testing the number of Kleenex needed to finish the story.
It starts with a summer camp.
Well, first it starts with Eileen. She calls Sam on Skype right after Jody calls her (thank god that Jody took on the task of informing the hunter phone tree), and she's one of the few people Sam's willing to pick up for. She lets him talk, waits through his painful breaths when that's all he can manage, and she doesn't insist on coming to the bunker but promises to check in on him.
So he texts her as he's on the road to Austin. "I need your help."
"of course. anything."
"There's a hunt. Someone called one of the phones that-" He can't bring himself to type it. "I'm going to Austin. Werewolves, I think."
There's a long pause, and he's sure she's going to ask if he's up for it. But all she replies is, "2 days away. meet u there."
"Thanks, Eileen. I need to do this. It's just…" Sam isn't sure how to express it, how to put into words the fear that he'll leave himself open because he's fighting alone-maybe that he'll even do it on purpose. So he hits Send.
Her reply is quick and matter-of-fact. "u need someone to watch your back."
The hunt goes well, and so does the one after that, even if Sam can tell that he's being too cautious during fights. So he pulls back, does some simple hunts on his own, takes care of the dog, visits Jody and Donna and the girls. All the while, there's a wound in his chest that won't heal, a mirror of the hole the rebar left, but he does what Dean asked and carries on.
In the years after Chuck and before Canton, they and other hunters had noticed that things were different. People seemed more open to supernatural explanations, or at least to acknowledging that something weird was going on. They only ever told a handful of people what really happened, that everyone else winked out of existence for a short while. None of them remember being gone or dying, not exactly. Sam remembers Jody's brow furrowing and then easing as he told her, like something that had been puzzling her now made sense. Eileen had figured it was an aftereffect of her resurrection. But more and more often, when a witness tried to explain something…not natural…they referred to "that weird day, you remember?" or "that time when, you know?" as a point of reference.
So the phone call from Austin was only the first of many. Agent Bon Jovi, as well as Agents Plant, Singer, Tyler, and more, becomes known in the law enforcement community as the man to contact if something unexplainable occurs. Sam can't handle them all-some days he can't handle anything at all-but he farms out the calls to his network, and the hunts get done. He can even start charging consulting fees here and there, and soon it becomes enough to (frugally) live on.
It's Eileen's idea to start keeping a database, and at first it's just a way to sort out who's got what assignments. Maybe it would be easier to do in the bunker, but Sam can't go back there, not yet. Of course, he wraps up each entry in the database by noting the outcome, and he eventually realizes two things.
He's visiting Eileen's place, and she's looking over his shoulder as he enters the information from a hunter in Massachusetts who took out the spirit of an old sea captain going after the descendants of the men who'd mutinied against him. "How many is that now?" she asks.
He turns to talk to her. "How many what?"
She points at the last column. "The remaining descendants are safe. There were five of them, right?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"So how many is that? Total?"
Sam stares at her. Then he looks back at the screen. "I don't know."
"Here." She reaches over him, does some Excel magic, and says, "Eighty-seven."
"Eighty-seven?"
Her expression softens, and she puts a hand on his shoulder. "Plus three in Austin. Plus who knows how many more, but this many for sure." She takes a deep breath and goes on, "I know it was hard for you to stay here, after Dean. I know it's still hard. But there are ninety people who are still alive because of you. And more every day. If that helps."
He looks away, feeling that punch to the gut every time he thinks of Dean. Everyone around him knows that his tears can well up at any moment, and they do now. He turns his head enough so she can see his lips as he whispers, "Thank you," and then looks away.
She leaves him with a pat to the shoulder as he stares at the screen. The numbers blur before him, but he breathes through it until his chest stops hurting.
Ninety people.
The other thing he realizes on his own. There are the people they save, yes, but just because they're alive doesn't mean their lives are intact. He starts keeping track of those like him who have been left behind, the siblings and children and parents who had someone torn away from them in a way they can't explain to the outside world.
He goes to Garth with his idea-not even an idea, really, but a germ that he needs to talk through. When he's done stumbling through it, Garth asks, "You mean like a support group?"
"Maybe? I just want some way to show these people that they're not alone. Especially the kids. It's hard enough to lose a parent, or both parents, but to have seen something that you can't even talk about to grownups, even now…"
"Yeah, I get that." Garth puzzles it over for a moment, and then his face brightens. "There's this summer camp a couple of towns over. Every year they do one for kids who are cancer survivors. Same kind of thing. They've been through something that other kids and even most adults don't understand, but here they can be with each other and be normal for a week or two."
"That's it." Sam feels a slow, unfamiliar smile spread over his face. "Garth, you're a genius."
It takes months and months to plan, but the more Sam shares his idea, the more people are willing to help. Sam can keep doing small hunts and answering the phone to verify hunters' fake identities and burying his head in his work while others make the contacts with people he can't bring himself to reach out to.
Camp Not Afraid of the Dark opens in Minnesota the next summer with five counselors and twenty kids. Sam's not sure he can make himself go, but Garth pleads and Jody and Donna insist, so he gets in the Impala and cruises up I-35. It's a pretty little camp, tucked back into the woods around the inevitable lake, somewhere he's never been before.
He gets there as the campers are arriving, and he hangs back, watching them get settled in. After a little while, a young man with medium-length light brown hair comes up to him with a clipboard and a warm smile. "Hi! Welcome to Camp Not Afraid of the Dark! Are you a parent or guardian?"
"What? No, I'm...I'm one of the staff, I guess. Is Garth or Donna here?"
"Yeah, I can get Donna." The young man pauses and then looks at him more closely. "You look really familiar."
Sam hunches in on himself. "Yeah, I get that sometimes."
"Are you-are you Sam? Sam Winchester?"
He nods, gut suddenly twisting with nerves. Who is this kid that he's supposed to know, who's probably going to ask about Dean, and oh god, Sam never should have come here-
"I'm Lucas. Lucas Barr." He waits hopefully, and then his face falls. "You probably don't remember me. It was a long time ago."
"Lake Manitoc," Sam says slowly. "Your-your dad. And your grandpa."
"Yeah, that's right." Lucas gives him a small, sad smile. "Garth told me about Dean. I'm really sorry."
"Thanks." He swallows hard against the lump in his throat, and after a moment he can speak again. "So what are you doing here?"
"I'm a counselor! Sheriff Hanscum tracked me down and said she wanted to see how I was doing, kind of a follow-up after all these years. I told her what I was up to, and she asked if I wanted to help out, and I said yes. It's a great idea. I wish something like this had been around when I was a kid."
"Yeah, I bet. Um, what is it that you're up to?"
"I'm starting my last year of college. I'm majoring in social work. I want to be a therapist, help kids with traumatic experiences like me." Lucas gestured at the camp around them. "I never thought I'd really be able to help kids just like me, though. I'm so glad this place is here."
For a moment, all Sam can see is Dean playing with little green army men in a park, helping a much smaller Lucas draw a picture of what he'd seen but couldn't find the words for. The familiar rush of grief is tempered with gratitude, and he manages a weak smile. "I'm glad to hear that, Lucas. Thanks for coming out."
He finds his way to a cabin they've set aside for him before he breaks down. He remembers it clear as day, the beautiful Wisconsin lakefront not so different from where he is now, Dean trying everything he could think of to get through to a traumatized child, even putting a crack in his own armor in the process. Sam had still been so deep in his grief over Jess, but overhearing Dean talk about how he tried to be brave despite his fear had been a window into his brother that he'd sorely needed at the time.
Now, it just makes him miss Dean all the more.
Sam pulls himself together enough to go to the opening campfire. Donna gives him a big hug, as does Jody, and of course Garth. But they let him stand in the background, watching as the staff and then the counselors introduce themselves. Lucas is the only one he's met before; there are other hunters in the world who've saved kids, after all. They all say a little about themselves, the family members or close friends they lost to something unnatural, and the kids all solemnly nod in understanding.
Then Garth asks if he wants to say a few words, and he starts to shake his head. He hasn't prepared for this, can't possibly come up with anything that won't just set him bawling. But Lucas is looking at him expectantly, and he realizes that this is one more thing Dean would want him to do.
So he steps forward and gives the kids a small wave. "Hi. My name's Sam."
"Hi, Sam!" they chorus back at him.
"I, um. I lost my mom when I was really little. She, um. She was killed by a demon. It changed our whole lives, me and my brother, but we couldn't talk about it to anyone else. Not to kids at school, not to anyone."
Some of the kids are nodding like they know what that's like, and his heart aches for all of them. He goes on, "So that's why you're here. You've all had something terrible happen to you, and you made it through. But it was something that wasn't supposed to happen. Something you can't talk about. But here you can." He gestures at the counselors. "You can talk to them. Or to us. We know what it's like. We won't think it's weird or that you're making it up."
One little girl in the front row ducks her head as tears suddenly well up. The boy sitting next to her, maybe twelve or thirteen, puts his arm around her, and Sam has to look away. "But if you don't want to talk, that's okay, too," he goes on. "You can go hiking, or swimming, or whatever. You can eat as many marshmallows as you want." There are a couple of giggles, and he lets them subside. "The important thing is, you're not alone. Not while you're here. And not when you go back out there." He points towards the road behind them in the dark. "I want you to remember that."
There are a few sniffles from the group, and he puts on a watery smile as he looks at Lucas. "And despite what the name says, it's okay to be afraid of the dark. You know that more than most people, I think. It's okay to be afraid. Just don't let it stop you from being brave."
Later, when the campers are in their cabins, Donna helps Sam put out the fire. "What you said tonight was really good, Sam. I think that's just what those kids needed to hear."
"I tried to think about what I would have wanted to hear from adults if I'd ever had something like this." He swallows. "If we'd ever had something like this."
She puts a hand on his wrist. "Dean would be so proud of you right now. All these kids, helping them cope with what they've been through. It's a good thing you're doing here, Sam."
He ducks his head, nodding with a sniff. "Thanks."
The week-long camp turns out to be really fun. Not to say it isn't sad at times, and Sam's sure not a single person makes it through without crying at least once. But even the quietest kids are talking by the end-Lucas makes sure of that.
And for the first time, Sam can tell strangers stories about Dean without breaking down. It still hurts, oh, it hurts. But he's not alone.
They run the camp for three years, and it gets bigger every time. It's Lucas who approaches Sam with an idea he and a couple of the counselors have been kicking around to take it up a notch. "It'll take a lot of money," he says. "And more actual trained professionals. But there are kids who need even more than this, Sam. These kids all have relatives or guardians taking care of them. Plenty more don't. They need a place to go. Getting put in the system is hard enough; it's even tougher for these kids."
"I wouldn't even know how to start," Sam says, even though his mind is racing.
"Sure you do. Just like with the camp. We need a home base and probably a lawyer. And money."
"I have plenty of that." Lucas looks at him quizzically, and Sam goes on, "Claire is actually really good at fundraising. She's gotten enough to keep the camp going and more. I think it would be a good start, at least."
"That's awesome! So does that mean you'll do it?"
Sam thinks about it for a moment. "Let me look into it, yeah."
It's Charlie, of all people, who contacts Sam and offers to help. He had only checked in on her once post-Chuck, to make sure that Stevie was back and unharmed, and then promised to leave them alone. But Garth is persistent with the hunters' network, and it turns out Stevie has a law degree, and just like that, they're drawing up paperwork.
It's a lot of planning and justification and inspection and review. Sam makes what feels like a hundred presentations to different state and local officials, drawing on the allies he's made in law enforcement since the not-a-Rapture. (Dean called it that once, and Sam's never described it that way to anyone else, since that would mean talking about Dean, but it's the shorthand in his head.) He learns how to sense when people automatically understand what he means by "specially traumatized children" and when he needs to call on one of his allies to back him up.
And in the end, he gets all the approvals he needs. Construction starts, and at the fifth round of Camp Not Afraid of the Dark, Sam makes the announcement. "We're so glad we've been able to hold this camp for you for five years now. But there are kids who need somewhere to go all year round. If you know anybody like that, please let us know. We have a place for them to stay. It's, um." He has to clear his throat and bite his lip for a moment before he can go on. "It's in Lawrence, Kansas, and it's called Dean's Place."
He goes to the official opening, when the first kids who've lost their parents to the supernatural enter the shiny new building and pick out their rooms. It can hold a dozen kids for now, but there's room on the property to expand. Lucas is the lead counselor, and Alex is moving in to be the staff nurse, and they're both thrilled. It's a short walk to the local elementary school, and they've prepared some materials for the teachers to help them integrate the kids from Dean's Place into the regular classrooms. Never using the word "orphanage" is one of the tips, even if that's what it says on all the paperwork. It's just a different kind of home, with different kinds of brothers and sisters.
Right inside the front door, there's a lounge area for visitors with lots of bright, colorful pictures and a mural on one wall. Past the front desk are the kitchen and dining areas, and then one wing of bedrooms in each direction. In the center is a quiet room, and when Sam walks inside, he almost has to turn around and walk right back out.
Somehow, the hunters' network got a hold of a bunch of photographs of him and Dean. Mostly of Dean. Jody still has a key to the bunker, or maybe it was Eileen. At any rate, there are a couple dozen photos, one of them as kids in the Impala, one of Dean holding a pool cue with a confident smirk, one of him grinning fiercely with a streak of blood down his cheek that surprises Sam for a minute until he realizes that the kids living here have probably seen worse.
The biggest image isn't a photo, but an honest-to-god oil painting portrait, and Sam desperately wants to see Dean again just so he can give him shit for it. He's behind the wheel of the Impala, looking out the driver's side window, leather jacket on and amulet around his neck. There's the vague shape of a person in the passenger seat, but the focus is all on Dean and the curve of the road visible behind him. Baby's paint is gleaming in the sun, and Dean has a content smile on his face. It makes Sam's heart hurt, but it also gives him hope. Somewhere out there, Dean is riding around, just like this.
He has to believe that.
"So, what do you think?"
It's Jody, standing at his shoulder. Sam didn't even hear her come up behind him, another sign that his hunter instincts are weakening as he spends more time organizing and managing others than salting and burning. "It's amazing," he says. "All of it. The whole place. The kids are going to love it."
"Yeah, I think they will." She eyes him for a moment. "You wanna come meet them? Tell them about the guy this place is named after?"
Sam shakes his head. "Not right now. Maybe later."
"Whenever you're ready."
"I don't know, I just-this is so weird, that this actually came about. I mean, I've never been good with kids. That was always Dean."
"You're plenty good with kids, Sam. You'll make a great dad someday."
"No, I don't-" He shakes his head, takes a step back as if the idea is actually something standing in front of him. "That's probably not a good idea."
"Why not?" She eyes him more closely.
He's about to reply that she won't understand when it hits him. She had a son, one who was taken from her in one of the worst ways imaginable. And she might not understand all of Sam's fears, but she will certainly understand the one where he won't be able to protect his child from the darkness of the world.
So instead he says, "I was born different, you know. Azazel amplified it, but it was it me all along. I don't want to pass that on to someone else. I don't want to watch someone I love go through what I did."
"Oh, Sam." Jody puts a hand on his arm. "That's all gone, isn't it? Without Chuck and his self-centered storytelling, it's just about you and your choices. No one's going to use anyone as a pawn, not anymore. I mean, I understand that it's a scary idea, believe me. It takes a lot of courage to bring a child into this world, especially knowing the things you know. But it's also a sign of faith, and of hope. You're doing so much to build a future for others. Maybe you should think about a future for yourself."
"Maybe I don't want a future for myself," he says quietly.
"Sam Winchester." It's her mom voice, and he responds to it almost automatically, straightening his shoulders and looking up. "You know that's not true. And I'm not saying there wasn't a time when it was. We worried about you after Dean left, you know. But you pulled through that, and you'll keep going. I know you will."
He offers her a tiny smile, all he can manage. "Thanks, Jody." There's more that he could say, but that's really all it needs to be.
"All right." She pats his arm and lets go. "You come join us when you're ready, okay?"
After she's gone, he looks at Dean's portrait again. He can hear the thrum of the Impala, smell the gasoline and fast food wrappers and too many onions. He can feel the heat of the sun on the seats, hear the rattle of the army men trapped in the door. He can hear Dean humming along to Zeppelin, see his thumb tapping the wheel.
For the first time, he lets himself imagine having someone else in the car with him. Someone to pass their legacy to, someone with his hair and Dean's eyes and their mother's smile and their father's laugh. Jody's right, it's about faith in the future, and he's worked so hard to pull this place together to provide that hope and faith to kids who have had it ripped away from them. Maybe he can let a little of that hope into his own heart, even without Dean by his side.
Hope, after all, is kinda the whole point.