Beatty, 1988 (part 3 of 9)
Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 + a/n | Full Story (.PDF) | Artwork by starry_ice
satan in a sunday suit (i).
It's Sunday, of course. No complimentary breakfast. It's Sunday, and nothing opens until after lunch, because everyone in town has flocked to Beatty's neapolitan selection of churches--Latter Day Saints, Southern Baptist, the vague (Unitarian Universalist, maybe) "Community" Church.
Truthfully, John has half a mind to sit Dean in the back of one of the services and leave the kid there until he has everything sorted out. But he can't, knows he can't, because there isn't a decent suburban father in the country that'd do that; and they have a cover to keep.
So he leaves Dean at The Phoenix instead. Don't answer the door, don't leave the room, and don't make too much noise.
Of all the possible downsides to taking Dean along, people as a source of the worst thus far? He hadn't considered that. By the time the day's out, they're going to need at least a name and a hometown, and John can't remember who they were last night, with Andrew Kimmel.
No one makes much of a fuss when a lone man blows into town guarded and singular, and partial to people who were much the same. He could be any number of things; doesn't matter. Long as he's not stirring up an overabundance of trouble (and even if he is, so long as he gets gone when he knows he's overstayed his welcome) he's a ghost. Man dragging along a kid--then he's a person. And people need stories to keep them living, even more than they need them to keep the dead down.
John's been tailing the proprietor of Beatty Mercantile since the Southern Baptist service let out. He waits a respectable couple minutes before he swings through the door. The door closes behind him, and he's not John Winchester anymore.
--
The town is as unnerving by daylight as it is by night. A little Mayberry, a little Stepford. Dean's about twelve paces from the front door of their room at The Phoenix before he gets accosted by someone from the tourism bureau named Jim Beatty. And yes, his last name does match the town's!
He's so glad Dean noticed.
Dean mentally reiterates last night’s lamentation. What a god awful place. But anywhere is better than sitting in the room, throwing jacks at the wall and wishing Sam could be there to annoy him. At least that'd give him something to do.
With Sam gone, there's no reason Dean shouldn't leave the stupid room. Something comes to kill him--whatever's out there, in the sky, or the electrics, or the whole damn town--and it can do so just as easy at The Phoenix as it can on the street. He knows that much.
Besides, the town's got a collective population of what feels like just over twelve. And no one under the age of Old. If there were any axe murderers in the mix, they'd have been weeded out of a town like this a long time ago. Any monsters, and they'd all be dead. Nothing doing.
Jim's quite the character, though. Real nice, as far as people go. Kind of a space cadet (space lieutenant, actually) but he's not so bad. Kind of like Sam, only easier to fool and not as frowny all the time. Point in case, Dean has never seen someone smile so much in his life--be so proud of his little town, his home.
Dean vaguely remembers 'home' and he doesn't remember ever being really proud of it. Maybe he should have been. Maybe he should have been, when he had the chance. But it's hard to be proud of wood and paint and foundation if you don't know it's going to burn to the ground.
Vaguely, he wonders if Jim knows something they don't.
"You know what I think? 'S that if people just wandered in, they'd come around real nice and settle down to live here. You think you're going to live here, kid?"
Dean shrugs. Sure, why not. He's not really following the slough of words that Jim keeps pouring forth. He doesn't really want to be told about the Gold Rush and the glory days and the way Rita wants to open up her own little museum of local history (complete with true-to-life old mining relics!) again. He doesn't really want to talk to anyone. But Jim Beatty's smiling at him like he's just won the lottery, so he shrugs.
Sure, why not.
"See, I told you people'd come around! And they'd love it. And here you are! You're going to love it, I just know. I just know!"
who's old jim? (i)
Richard Fainall nods to the shopkeeper. He has the clothes on his back and the kid in his room and, apparently, an airplane out in the bush. He and his wife are recently separated, but he's taking his boy to a baseball game in California, where his family's from. Wife's back in Milwaukee and she's expecting them to call, so it'd be nice if he could just borrow the telephone. It'll be quick.
(Clarisse Fainall does indeed have a place in Milwaukee--got a yard and even a view of the church. It's three feet across and six feet deep. A little snug, but not bad for Milwaukee.)
Beatty Mercantile allows him use of the phone anyway. "Hey, it's me. Pete and I got laid up in town called Beatty. It's in Nevada. Plane's acting up--ask Jim where it came from, alright?
"Three days. I promised."
Answering machine. John ever gets a phone, he's going to answer it even if it kills him. He hates leaving messages. If he wanted to talk at himself, he'd have sent a damn post card.
"Three days, huh?" Beatty Mercantile pipes up. He's older than John but younger than Richard Fainall; balding, and from the looks of it, proud of the fact. "You might wanna buy some flowers or something, 'cause the ex-misses ain't gonna be happy."
"Oh?"
"Lots of people planning to up and leave, is all. You're gonna have to fight for that fuel."
That's almost never a good thing to hear. Entire populations don't generally get a hankering to move in droves, like sheep, or cattle to the slaughter. John inquires as to why.
"Old town. Business a little slow, I'm sure you noticed. Everyone's just tryin' to leave--it'll be like Rhyolite up north soon enough. Just a bunch of empty buildings and the ghosts that live in 'em. Everyone else'll be gone, 'cept for old Jim."
An anomaly. That's absolutely never a good thing to hear.
"Who's old Jim?"
--
How amazing would this be, if nothing ever changed? How amazing how amazing how amazing. You could be anything you wanted and you wouldn't have to worry. You'd be safe and nothing would get taken away from you, and you wouldn't have to pick up the pieces and throw them out, because they don't fit together no more.
How amazing would this be?
"Pretty amazing."
Jim's really not liking his, what does Rita call it, when she's talking to that Simon character--this noncommittal attitude. That's not impressive at all! He hop-skips, takes the kid by the collar of his jacket and tries to twirl him around.
Kid, feet firmly rooted in the dirt, knees locked and pockets filled with hands, doesn't move with his top half and spins out. Hits the ground like a rubber ball and rolls back upright, ends up crouched like a sprinter on the starting blocks. Two hundred yard; Jim did that once, in school. First place. He was the only boy in his grade.
Now that's impressive. Jim tells him so.
"What the hell is wrong with you!" And he's mad, and that's not good. Rita tells him it's not good. Gets empty mugs (and sometimes full mugs) thrown at him, he's not careful. Rita's not good when she's mad. She calls him an invisible devil and throws things at him (mostly misses, but sometimes it hurts).
But this little boy can't hurt him, not like Rita. He doesn't own a diner, so he doesn't have any mugs.
Jim holds his hand out. He's sorry, so sorry. Not really, but he'll say it if it makes the kid feel better. "Let me help you up!"
Kid takes his hand, albeit grudgingly--and it's so funny how people will do that, like they can't decide whether they're supposed to want help or not--and from the looks of it, he goes up and up and up, his eyes get so big.
Jim stands him up like he's playing with the old mannequins in Beatty Mercantile, or Gloria Tanner's lace and dress sale comes around summertime. Kid falls to the ground like a soggy shirt, and his whole self looks white and clammy, against the brown dry of the road.
"Y--you, what--"
Jim wishes the kid would look at him again. He wants another look at those great big shiny saucer eyes of his.
satan in a sunday suit (ii).
It was like having his heart grabbed, instead of his hand. Stomach torn out. Vertical climb, and the spiraling vertigo that comes after. Everything, everything all at once. Dean's fingers dig into the dirt and it's comfortingly warm before it turns hot hot hot and it's all he can do to just keep forcing air through his lungs both ways; his breath just hitches and it's up and up and up like panic.
His whole self freezes from the inside out and he's sprawled in the middle of the road in the middle of nowhere in the middle of August.
He's going to throw up. He's got that sick feeling that comes from not having any more working parts left, and he's going to throw them all up--stomach, lungs, intestines, all of it--because he hasn't even eaten anything yet (he can't believe it's the food he thought was lethal).
"What are you--?" he shouts, though it's really more of a tea kettle whine, it sounds so thin and reedy and pathetic. What did you do?
That's the kind of question you can't ask, you can't because it doesn't ever get answered it's the kind you gotta figure out--but that's Dad's turf, not his, all he's gotta do is keep Sammy safe and oh god, Sammy.
No, he's in Minnesota. Hundreds of miles away. He's good.
And Jim's just staring at him like the buffoon he is and Dean is really, really--not going to dry-retch, because he's gotta make sure Sammy's--no, he got left. Sammy got left. He's good, he's fine, he doesn't need to be worried about he's good. Either that or Dean got taken, and he's the one in the wrong spot, not Sammy.
Dean doesn't know what to he think so he just says: "Do not touch me again." He pushes the words out with the air and hopes to god he doesn't suck any back in, too. Jim jumps back. He's looking at him like he's a really interesting little sideshow. Bastard.
You can't stay here if you're gonna do stuff like that these are my rules you have to get gone you're gonna be like that where'd all the fire come from (and why can't he look back)? Because he does and it hurts, it really hurts, like a blow to the ribs, and everything shatters until he's looking at himself sideways. He's holding a gun he knows how to work but he doesn't know how to use, and lying out of his ass to Sammy about everything because at least this way, they die? Sammy'll never know what hit him--not like the ground that's rising up to meet them as Dad tries to fly that death trap Beech Duchess that's real and Dean can see it, feel the pain fracture through the--wire shopping cart lying bent against a wall of sandbags, and him feeling worse than bent I hate you I hate you I hate you. That's what this is, that's exactly it, Sammy you're not here but you're right, you're always going to be right.
This? This is fear. Not of Jim, though. Right? That'd be stupid. There's something-- It's-- God, why is he so stupid? and when did he stop listening to Dad?
He tries to breathe out deep and he can feel tears pool like hot wax in his eyes. Hecan'tbreathehecan'tbreathe he cannot panic. He--
He just--
It's gonna be okay. It'll all be perfect and lovely because it's Beatty--or your money back. It's gonna be okay.
It's really, really not. Dean has his forehead pressed to the road, concentrates on expelling breaths in out in out into the dirt and coherence right along with them. He can't breathe because his stomach's clogging up his airway. Just hitched in his throat, full of tickling writhing things and if he could just--
Just--
He feels lanky arms wrap around him, and everything locks in. Redoubles. Short circuit like an overstimulated radio. "'S gonna be okay. I'll take you to Rita's. Rita's real nice, she'll fix you up. Free ice cream, you went to Sunday School today. Free ice cream is the best."
Nerves, muscles, bones. Everything's screaming. It's the noise pain makes, panic makes, at a fever-pitch. He can feel Jim Beatty's embrace like it's breaking every part of him and good intentions have never hurt this bad. It is not okay.
Everything dies.
It's gonna be okay.
And he's really alone.
It's gonna be okay.
His arms aren't there, his legs. His insides are seeping out like sweat, Dad's on business, and Sammy's just gone, gone and if Dean had arms left, he'd be reaching out for that whiny, three-foot security but he's gone he's gone he's gone and this is it, this's the end he just--
He just.
He needs to be Dad's son.
They are not like everyone else; everyone else hasn't seen the things they've--hasn't even dreamed of the things they know like other people know Friday night movies and Christmas trips to Grandma's.
They can beat this. He can beat this. He just needs to. He needs to do something. (But what can he do?) He just needs to find his pocket. Rita's real nice; she'll fix him right up. Dean has a bit of Rita's salt in his pocket, left from the night before. It's nothing, nothing and it's not going to save him, but he just--
Needs to breathe. He'll run, he'll limp, he'll crawl, he'll just fall right where Jim drops him and he won't get up. He'll lay there like a bird struck by lightning. He doesn't care.
Just needs to breathe.
Fifty miles away and seven years later, his fingers close around something cold and ridged and round.
He smashes it against another something--it's hard, he doesn't know what, but it's hard; the glass shatters and Jim shrieks and Dean crashes.
He's supposed to run, now. Propel his body forward through sheer force of will, because he has to, he doesn't have any choice. Thing in Jim--or maybe the thing Jim is--is gonna shake it off, and if Dean's not out, thing's for sure gonna kill him then.
Jim is mewling nonsense: You hit me with that bottle you hit me with you bled me with killing me with what is this, salt? Why you got salt in your pocket, thief--Rita's gonna hurt you 'cause you hurt me--
Dean's looking up at Jim, and Jim's looking back with a confused, betrayed tinge to the edges and angles that make his face. It's not angry. Not vengeful. Not anything like it should be. Blood drips from the bridge of Jim's nose into Dean's face, into the dirt.
Lot of blood.
Head wound means a lot of blood, you got a real body. He knocked Sam in the head with the back door of the Impala once. Sam was just barely walking and what with the way he fell back and screeched, it was like his whole head was getting cut in half, there was so much blood. That wasn't such a good day.
Today isn't such a good day.
They're still in the middle of the road in the middle of town, and the sun's out and it's a Sunday afternoon in August, and even though Jim's screaming bloody murder no one's coming. Ghosts don't hurt, don't bleed. Ghouls don't panic. But people never hurt like that, they grab you. Not like that, Dean doesn't think.
Thinking is hard.
Dean feels the vindictive prick of rock and road shrapnel score the back of his skull and the underside of his arms as he makes a half-hearted attempt to move. You run. You take your brother, and you run. Don't look back.
But it's pretty good right here, too. Not so bad, in any case. Just gonna stay right here.
It's gonna be okay.
courage (i)
John Winchester and the John Winchester that might have been have one thing in common: both knew this day would come.
John always knew someday he'd see his sons laid out, grounded by a rogue pitch, breath snapped out of lungs like air from a popping balloon. A baseball, or something darker, it doesn't matter. His first impulse is the same--to run out from the stands and into the outfield, scoop up his child, throw everything else to the wind.
And his actions are the same.
Stay in the dugout, don't budge; betray nothing. Don't even look at Dean.
He's got a job to do. Maybe he's a father, and he's got to let his kid start lining up his own gigs. Mary's in the stands next to him keeping him down by the seat of his pants, telling him not to coddle their children; not right now. Maybe he's a hunter, and it's spirits first, damage-tallying later. It changes nothing. His actions are the same.
But the John Winchester that might have been probably doesn't pull a .45 from his bag of groceries--rock salt, a gallon of water--and aim it at the offending Little Leaguer.
"These are consecrated rounds, Jim, so you step away from my boy right now."
When Old Jim turns his head up toward him, John's a little relieved to find that the blood painting the road burnt red isn't Dean's. "This is rock salt, and this is about to be holy water. Got a silver knife and I know how to throw it straight. Got more than enough to keep you hurting."
Dean rolls onto his hands and knees, and he's folded into himself the way he used to curl into a corner of his crib at night, a lifetime ago. Something in John flares up, an old familiar guilty disgusting feeling, and John banishes it away along with the unsolicited memories.
John can see his heaving shoulders and the way the dust billows out from under him with every exhalation, and he knows that's as far as Dean's going to get for a while yet.
He releases the safety. "Don't test me."
Old Jim splits from Dean, fast as smiling. He's babbling something about guns and help! and POLICE! and for a moment, John's concentration wavers. His thought process skids and slides, off balance.
What is this thing?
It's evil. One look at Dean, and he knows it is. But honestly...? Seems a lot like the scared fool doesn't know what he's done wrong. John's not sure what the thing is pulling, but with the way he's screeching and hollering, this probably isn't going to end well.
John resigns himself to yet another setback. This is why he hates going in blind--learning by trial and error tends to get people maimed, killed, or incarcerated.
Member of Beatty's police is just coming down the lane with a birdlike young lady--making wedding plans, from the way John hears the conversation boomerang from "Do what you always do with that ivory lace around the fringe, Gloria," to "Drop the weapon and put your hands in the air, sir."
John complies, and he knows the officer is relieved because as she runs up it only just seems to register that she's not on duty, she's in a white Sunday sundress, and she's not packing. The officer confiscates John's gun and tells him to, if he'd please, get up and take a walk with her; why don't they sort this all out at the station, instead of disturbing all the rest of the Sunday crowd.
Yes, ma'am; he's just gotta see to his boy. Gloria's spread out in the dirt, collapsed right there where she stood. Looking at Dean. Maybe thinks about helping him, and looking at John, and maybe thinking about helping the officer instead. She's not doing a good job of tending to either, she's so busy invoking the Holy Trinity.
They're starting to draw a crowd. The Phoenix deskclerk; the Phoenix proprietor, Benton Southerly; Southerly's cardshark buddy, Greg Morgan; the woman from the diner, Rita--John feels like he knows half the town by now, and they're pooling out of the woodworks to watch the streetshow. They shy like fire from wind as John clears the distance between him and Dean, without waiting for approval.
John crouches down and pulls at him so he's sitting upright; he keeps a bracing grip on Dean's shoulder and brushes the hair from his eyes. He can feel the lean, childish muscle jump and squirm beneath his grip, keeping the same syncopated beat as Dean's breaths.
Kid's all rhythm; always all rhythm. John lets out a bemused tch in spite of himself as he runs his hands all down Dean's body, looking for anything broken or abraded. Dean hasn't taken his eyes from the ground and his mouth's twisted like he's tasting something stale and awful, and John doesn't really know if his terse, monosyllabic commands are getting through--breathe, son. Breathe--one, two, three, one--but he keeps himself upright when John lets go and bit by bit he's gaining a little color back.
That's the best John can hope for right now, that kid's gonna pull through on his own, because he's already heaving himself to his feet and turning heel. Yes, ma'am, I see the crowd. Yes, I think the station would be an excellent place to close the book on this little misdemeanor.
"Snap to, Dean. We're walking. Ain't no one going to carry you."
Then Dean starts laughing, a delirious, choked sound, and whatever remaining damper that'd been moderating his breathing is blown all to hell and it sounds like he's going to asphyxiate here and now, drowned in his own supernatural terror. And this time it's not John's militant conviction that holds him back but Miss Jenny Gardner's hand-cuffs, which she claps around his wrists with a little too much gleeful exuberance (so she could hide something in her sundress after all--innocent like Sunday but as deceptive as anything).
Just a formality, is all, she explains. Miss Jenny Gardner appears to be a fan of formalities. She doesn't seem at all concerned that there's a nine-year old sick with the last dregs of a panic attack nobody can seem to quite explain, and that old rebellious something in John's chest twinges when he realizes why.
In this little town, he and Dean are the strangest things they've ever seen. He can only imagine what their audience is thinking of him now. John's not the self-conscious type, and he's been told he's a quart short of friendly concern for the opinions of others, but he's beginning to think that in this particular town, it probably about twelve hours too late be making a helpful, favorable impression.
Anything off happens in this town, and it's them that did it. Anything sets the kid off, it's his daddy's fault. Daddy's done something, or didn't do something, or hasn't done near enough--maybe all of the above.
It's a load, all right, heavier than Miss Jenny Gardner's handcuffs, shiny with newness and blinding in the sunlight.
John hazards a glance back over his shoulder, and is surprised with what he sees.
Woman from that diner, one who sat up with Dean while John was winning them room and board--she's got Dean kissed up awkwardly against her chest. She looks about as familiar with the motion as Dean does, but he catches fractured pieces of her uncertain whispers and she's caught the same general idea as John--just breathe, baby, breathe. Follow my lead, now; there ya go--and that just has to suffice.
Town's crazy as all hell and John can feel it in every inch of him that it's going to get a hell of a lot weirder, time they split, but if ever there were a reason it existed--
It's a lot like the rest of the world that way.
courage (ii).
Police station's musty as ever. Smells like a gas leak and a pile of wet socks, mixed together. Rita can't honestly say the diner smells much better--just add a layer of smoke and alcohol atop to garnish--but it's August. The smell's downright unseasonable.
God, she doesn't know what she's saying. It's just the waiting that's painful, though it's not like she has to. It's really none of her affair. Just seems like everywhere she turns since these two boys stumbled in, they're there. She's a little scared and a lot curious and ever since she sat down with this boy, his face's been digging at her. Just looks so lost. She makes a show of switching the National Geographic in her hands with a Newsweek from '82--it's got a picture of Stephen Jay Gould and a dinosaur that looks like it was swiped from the set of Godzilla, which definitely lends credence to that whole evolution deal--and snatches another look at the kid.
She doesn't even know his name. He's mostly coming down now, though he doesn't look any less like he's going to be violently ill if someone so much as looks at him funny. Looks drawn and exhausted, too, but that frankly don't surprise her. She knows where he was at three this morning and she can guess he didn't drop right off into down pillows and silk sheets right after; and the last half hour working to breathe like it wasn't natural and automatic can't have helped.
Kid's daddy's making a phone call in the room just behind them. Wall vibrates with every shouted word; it doesn't sound like the call's going quite the way he wanted. Rita's got her head slid right up against the wall as he leans against it, hears words like "...lost him? The hell you mean you lost him. Jim, so help me--"
Rita thinks maybe it's some hired gun, supposed to bust them out of Beatty; maybe he took the cash upfront and turned tail. Jim, she didn't know.
She sneaks another look at the kid, switches to a 1986 Vogue. Wonders what happened. Wonders if Jenny'd spill a story if she got a few rounds of Jack in her.
But then, you shouldn't exploit people on Sunday.
She can just ask the kid, he starts looking more like a human and less like Stephen Jay Gould's pretty pretty corpse. His eyes screw shut every time there's another bellow through the wall, and he kneads the bridge of his nose just between his eyebrows.
"Can I get you anything? Cuppa water?"
It comes out in her Waitress Voice, more impersonal than she meant.
"--Get it myself," he grates out, the beginning of which is lost somewhere in his throat. He slides down from the chair bonelessly, and the kid just looks so damn whacked Rita wants to pour an entire pitcher of water down on him, like it'd spruce him up like a plant.
He sways a little, like he's fighting vertigo, and wins. Marches with newfound purpose to the bathrooms just across the room and disappears within.
Kid's coming around then. That's good; that's real good. Rita ain't ever had a little brother; might've had a child, but she lost it a few months in. Not careful enough, said her mother. Up until this point, the only child she really knew was Simon Walker, and he's thirty-five; and he was such a sorry excuse for one this kid usurped his position in just under twelve hours.
Pulled at the protective streak in her, maybe. Made her want to serve him drinks and let him sit the tables, blinds $100/$200, No Limit Hold'em. Show him things so he wouldn't find them when she wasn't watching.
Which is just silly. He's not even hers. Besides, the nicest thing he's said to her was her shitty town fucking sucked.
Nevertheless, after she flips through Vogue back to front and once upside down, and he still doesn't come back, she ventures into the bathroom herself.
Station crapper's only got one stall, and the door gives at her touch. Smells just as bad in here as it did in the front room, but not any worse.
Kid's bent over the toilet, hands glued to the rim like he doesn't care what kind of shit he's touching. He's making half-hearted dips toward the toilet, but nothing more comes up (because mmm, Rita can smell the vomit now; old familiar smell but never any more welcome than it was the first time).
"You good?"
And his head bounces on his neck like he doesn't want to dignify that with a response, but it's almost a shrug and it's almost something like a Yeah, sure, lady.
"You want that cuppa water now?"
Same response. He doesn't make any move to follow her as she makes to leave, but he lets go the toilet and he'll catch up on his own time.
"You know. You coulda done that in there. Give them an excuse to change that sorry carpet in there, maybe air the place out a little. Here, someone's just going to have to come in with a bottle of bleach and some ammonia. You're going easy on them. What the hell for? Town sure ain't going easy on you."
Kid makes a little noise and she's not sure what it is, but it sounds better than sick.
Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 + a/n | Full Story (.PDF) | Artwork by starry_ice
satan in a sunday suit (i).
It's Sunday, of course. No complimentary breakfast. It's Sunday, and nothing opens until after lunch, because everyone in town has flocked to Beatty's neapolitan selection of churches--Latter Day Saints, Southern Baptist, the vague (Unitarian Universalist, maybe) "Community" Church.
Truthfully, John has half a mind to sit Dean in the back of one of the services and leave the kid there until he has everything sorted out. But he can't, knows he can't, because there isn't a decent suburban father in the country that'd do that; and they have a cover to keep.
So he leaves Dean at The Phoenix instead. Don't answer the door, don't leave the room, and don't make too much noise.
Of all the possible downsides to taking Dean along, people as a source of the worst thus far? He hadn't considered that. By the time the day's out, they're going to need at least a name and a hometown, and John can't remember who they were last night, with Andrew Kimmel.
No one makes much of a fuss when a lone man blows into town guarded and singular, and partial to people who were much the same. He could be any number of things; doesn't matter. Long as he's not stirring up an overabundance of trouble (and even if he is, so long as he gets gone when he knows he's overstayed his welcome) he's a ghost. Man dragging along a kid--then he's a person. And people need stories to keep them living, even more than they need them to keep the dead down.
John's been tailing the proprietor of Beatty Mercantile since the Southern Baptist service let out. He waits a respectable couple minutes before he swings through the door. The door closes behind him, and he's not John Winchester anymore.
--
The town is as unnerving by daylight as it is by night. A little Mayberry, a little Stepford. Dean's about twelve paces from the front door of their room at The Phoenix before he gets accosted by someone from the tourism bureau named Jim Beatty. And yes, his last name does match the town's!
He's so glad Dean noticed.
Dean mentally reiterates last night’s lamentation. What a god awful place. But anywhere is better than sitting in the room, throwing jacks at the wall and wishing Sam could be there to annoy him. At least that'd give him something to do.
With Sam gone, there's no reason Dean shouldn't leave the stupid room. Something comes to kill him--whatever's out there, in the sky, or the electrics, or the whole damn town--and it can do so just as easy at The Phoenix as it can on the street. He knows that much.
Besides, the town's got a collective population of what feels like just over twelve. And no one under the age of Old. If there were any axe murderers in the mix, they'd have been weeded out of a town like this a long time ago. Any monsters, and they'd all be dead. Nothing doing.
Jim's quite the character, though. Real nice, as far as people go. Kind of a space cadet (space lieutenant, actually) but he's not so bad. Kind of like Sam, only easier to fool and not as frowny all the time. Point in case, Dean has never seen someone smile so much in his life--be so proud of his little town, his home.
Dean vaguely remembers 'home' and he doesn't remember ever being really proud of it. Maybe he should have been. Maybe he should have been, when he had the chance. But it's hard to be proud of wood and paint and foundation if you don't know it's going to burn to the ground.
Vaguely, he wonders if Jim knows something they don't.
"You know what I think? 'S that if people just wandered in, they'd come around real nice and settle down to live here. You think you're going to live here, kid?"
Dean shrugs. Sure, why not. He's not really following the slough of words that Jim keeps pouring forth. He doesn't really want to be told about the Gold Rush and the glory days and the way Rita wants to open up her own little museum of local history (complete with true-to-life old mining relics!) again. He doesn't really want to talk to anyone. But Jim Beatty's smiling at him like he's just won the lottery, so he shrugs.
Sure, why not.
"See, I told you people'd come around! And they'd love it. And here you are! You're going to love it, I just know. I just know!"
who's old jim? (i)
Richard Fainall nods to the shopkeeper. He has the clothes on his back and the kid in his room and, apparently, an airplane out in the bush. He and his wife are recently separated, but he's taking his boy to a baseball game in California, where his family's from. Wife's back in Milwaukee and she's expecting them to call, so it'd be nice if he could just borrow the telephone. It'll be quick.
(Clarisse Fainall does indeed have a place in Milwaukee--got a yard and even a view of the church. It's three feet across and six feet deep. A little snug, but not bad for Milwaukee.)
Beatty Mercantile allows him use of the phone anyway. "Hey, it's me. Pete and I got laid up in town called Beatty. It's in Nevada. Plane's acting up--ask Jim where it came from, alright?
"Three days. I promised."
Answering machine. John ever gets a phone, he's going to answer it even if it kills him. He hates leaving messages. If he wanted to talk at himself, he'd have sent a damn post card.
"Three days, huh?" Beatty Mercantile pipes up. He's older than John but younger than Richard Fainall; balding, and from the looks of it, proud of the fact. "You might wanna buy some flowers or something, 'cause the ex-misses ain't gonna be happy."
"Oh?"
"Lots of people planning to up and leave, is all. You're gonna have to fight for that fuel."
That's almost never a good thing to hear. Entire populations don't generally get a hankering to move in droves, like sheep, or cattle to the slaughter. John inquires as to why.
"Old town. Business a little slow, I'm sure you noticed. Everyone's just tryin' to leave--it'll be like Rhyolite up north soon enough. Just a bunch of empty buildings and the ghosts that live in 'em. Everyone else'll be gone, 'cept for old Jim."
An anomaly. That's absolutely never a good thing to hear.
"Who's old Jim?"
--
How amazing would this be, if nothing ever changed? How amazing how amazing how amazing. You could be anything you wanted and you wouldn't have to worry. You'd be safe and nothing would get taken away from you, and you wouldn't have to pick up the pieces and throw them out, because they don't fit together no more.
How amazing would this be?
"Pretty amazing."
Jim's really not liking his, what does Rita call it, when she's talking to that Simon character--this noncommittal attitude. That's not impressive at all! He hop-skips, takes the kid by the collar of his jacket and tries to twirl him around.
Kid, feet firmly rooted in the dirt, knees locked and pockets filled with hands, doesn't move with his top half and spins out. Hits the ground like a rubber ball and rolls back upright, ends up crouched like a sprinter on the starting blocks. Two hundred yard; Jim did that once, in school. First place. He was the only boy in his grade.
Now that's impressive. Jim tells him so.
"What the hell is wrong with you!" And he's mad, and that's not good. Rita tells him it's not good. Gets empty mugs (and sometimes full mugs) thrown at him, he's not careful. Rita's not good when she's mad. She calls him an invisible devil and throws things at him (mostly misses, but sometimes it hurts).
But this little boy can't hurt him, not like Rita. He doesn't own a diner, so he doesn't have any mugs.
Jim holds his hand out. He's sorry, so sorry. Not really, but he'll say it if it makes the kid feel better. "Let me help you up!"
Kid takes his hand, albeit grudgingly--and it's so funny how people will do that, like they can't decide whether they're supposed to want help or not--and from the looks of it, he goes up and up and up, his eyes get so big.
Jim stands him up like he's playing with the old mannequins in Beatty Mercantile, or Gloria Tanner's lace and dress sale comes around summertime. Kid falls to the ground like a soggy shirt, and his whole self looks white and clammy, against the brown dry of the road.
"Y--you, what--"
Jim wishes the kid would look at him again. He wants another look at those great big shiny saucer eyes of his.
satan in a sunday suit (ii).
It was like having his heart grabbed, instead of his hand. Stomach torn out. Vertical climb, and the spiraling vertigo that comes after. Everything, everything all at once. Dean's fingers dig into the dirt and it's comfortingly warm before it turns hot hot hot and it's all he can do to just keep forcing air through his lungs both ways; his breath just hitches and it's up and up and up like panic.
His whole self freezes from the inside out and he's sprawled in the middle of the road in the middle of nowhere in the middle of August.
He's going to throw up. He's got that sick feeling that comes from not having any more working parts left, and he's going to throw them all up--stomach, lungs, intestines, all of it--because he hasn't even eaten anything yet (he can't believe it's the food he thought was lethal).
"What are you--?" he shouts, though it's really more of a tea kettle whine, it sounds so thin and reedy and pathetic. What did you do?
That's the kind of question you can't ask, you can't because it doesn't ever get answered it's the kind you gotta figure out--but that's Dad's turf, not his, all he's gotta do is keep Sammy safe and oh god, Sammy.
No, he's in Minnesota. Hundreds of miles away. He's good.
And Jim's just staring at him like the buffoon he is and Dean is really, really--not going to dry-retch, because he's gotta make sure Sammy's--no, he got left. Sammy got left. He's good, he's fine, he doesn't need to be worried about he's good. Either that or Dean got taken, and he's the one in the wrong spot, not Sammy.
Dean doesn't know what to he think so he just says: "Do not touch me again." He pushes the words out with the air and hopes to god he doesn't suck any back in, too. Jim jumps back. He's looking at him like he's a really interesting little sideshow. Bastard.
You can't stay here if you're gonna do stuff like that these are my rules you have to get gone you're gonna be like that where'd all the fire come from (and why can't he look back)? Because he does and it hurts, it really hurts, like a blow to the ribs, and everything shatters until he's looking at himself sideways. He's holding a gun he knows how to work but he doesn't know how to use, and lying out of his ass to Sammy about everything because at least this way, they die? Sammy'll never know what hit him--not like the ground that's rising up to meet them as Dad tries to fly that death trap Beech Duchess that's real and Dean can see it, feel the pain fracture through the--wire shopping cart lying bent against a wall of sandbags, and him feeling worse than bent I hate you I hate you I hate you. That's what this is, that's exactly it, Sammy you're not here but you're right, you're always going to be right.
This? This is fear. Not of Jim, though. Right? That'd be stupid. There's something-- It's-- God, why is he so stupid? and when did he stop listening to Dad?
He tries to breathe out deep and he can feel tears pool like hot wax in his eyes. Hecan'tbreathehecan'tbreathe he cannot panic. He--
He just--
It's gonna be okay. It'll all be perfect and lovely because it's Beatty--or your money back. It's gonna be okay.
It's really, really not. Dean has his forehead pressed to the road, concentrates on expelling breaths in out in out into the dirt and coherence right along with them. He can't breathe because his stomach's clogging up his airway. Just hitched in his throat, full of tickling writhing things and if he could just--
Just--
He feels lanky arms wrap around him, and everything locks in. Redoubles. Short circuit like an overstimulated radio. "'S gonna be okay. I'll take you to Rita's. Rita's real nice, she'll fix you up. Free ice cream, you went to Sunday School today. Free ice cream is the best."
Nerves, muscles, bones. Everything's screaming. It's the noise pain makes, panic makes, at a fever-pitch. He can feel Jim Beatty's embrace like it's breaking every part of him and good intentions have never hurt this bad. It is not okay.
Everything dies.
It's gonna be okay.
And he's really alone.
It's gonna be okay.
His arms aren't there, his legs. His insides are seeping out like sweat, Dad's on business, and Sammy's just gone, gone and if Dean had arms left, he'd be reaching out for that whiny, three-foot security but he's gone he's gone he's gone and this is it, this's the end he just--
He just.
He needs to be Dad's son.
They are not like everyone else; everyone else hasn't seen the things they've--hasn't even dreamed of the things they know like other people know Friday night movies and Christmas trips to Grandma's.
They can beat this. He can beat this. He just needs to. He needs to do something. (But what can he do?) He just needs to find his pocket. Rita's real nice; she'll fix him right up. Dean has a bit of Rita's salt in his pocket, left from the night before. It's nothing, nothing and it's not going to save him, but he just--
Needs to breathe. He'll run, he'll limp, he'll crawl, he'll just fall right where Jim drops him and he won't get up. He'll lay there like a bird struck by lightning. He doesn't care.
Just needs to breathe.
Fifty miles away and seven years later, his fingers close around something cold and ridged and round.
He smashes it against another something--it's hard, he doesn't know what, but it's hard; the glass shatters and Jim shrieks and Dean crashes.
He's supposed to run, now. Propel his body forward through sheer force of will, because he has to, he doesn't have any choice. Thing in Jim--or maybe the thing Jim is--is gonna shake it off, and if Dean's not out, thing's for sure gonna kill him then.
Jim is mewling nonsense: You hit me with that bottle you hit me with you bled me with killing me with what is this, salt? Why you got salt in your pocket, thief--Rita's gonna hurt you 'cause you hurt me--
Dean's looking up at Jim, and Jim's looking back with a confused, betrayed tinge to the edges and angles that make his face. It's not angry. Not vengeful. Not anything like it should be. Blood drips from the bridge of Jim's nose into Dean's face, into the dirt.
Lot of blood.
Head wound means a lot of blood, you got a real body. He knocked Sam in the head with the back door of the Impala once. Sam was just barely walking and what with the way he fell back and screeched, it was like his whole head was getting cut in half, there was so much blood. That wasn't such a good day.
Today isn't such a good day.
They're still in the middle of the road in the middle of town, and the sun's out and it's a Sunday afternoon in August, and even though Jim's screaming bloody murder no one's coming. Ghosts don't hurt, don't bleed. Ghouls don't panic. But people never hurt like that, they grab you. Not like that, Dean doesn't think.
Thinking is hard.
Dean feels the vindictive prick of rock and road shrapnel score the back of his skull and the underside of his arms as he makes a half-hearted attempt to move. You run. You take your brother, and you run. Don't look back.
But it's pretty good right here, too. Not so bad, in any case. Just gonna stay right here.
It's gonna be okay.
courage (i)
John Winchester and the John Winchester that might have been have one thing in common: both knew this day would come.
John always knew someday he'd see his sons laid out, grounded by a rogue pitch, breath snapped out of lungs like air from a popping balloon. A baseball, or something darker, it doesn't matter. His first impulse is the same--to run out from the stands and into the outfield, scoop up his child, throw everything else to the wind.
And his actions are the same.
Stay in the dugout, don't budge; betray nothing. Don't even look at Dean.
He's got a job to do. Maybe he's a father, and he's got to let his kid start lining up his own gigs. Mary's in the stands next to him keeping him down by the seat of his pants, telling him not to coddle their children; not right now. Maybe he's a hunter, and it's spirits first, damage-tallying later. It changes nothing. His actions are the same.
But the John Winchester that might have been probably doesn't pull a .45 from his bag of groceries--rock salt, a gallon of water--and aim it at the offending Little Leaguer.
"These are consecrated rounds, Jim, so you step away from my boy right now."
When Old Jim turns his head up toward him, John's a little relieved to find that the blood painting the road burnt red isn't Dean's. "This is rock salt, and this is about to be holy water. Got a silver knife and I know how to throw it straight. Got more than enough to keep you hurting."
Dean rolls onto his hands and knees, and he's folded into himself the way he used to curl into a corner of his crib at night, a lifetime ago. Something in John flares up, an old familiar guilty disgusting feeling, and John banishes it away along with the unsolicited memories.
John can see his heaving shoulders and the way the dust billows out from under him with every exhalation, and he knows that's as far as Dean's going to get for a while yet.
He releases the safety. "Don't test me."
Old Jim splits from Dean, fast as smiling. He's babbling something about guns and help! and POLICE! and for a moment, John's concentration wavers. His thought process skids and slides, off balance.
What is this thing?
It's evil. One look at Dean, and he knows it is. But honestly...? Seems a lot like the scared fool doesn't know what he's done wrong. John's not sure what the thing is pulling, but with the way he's screeching and hollering, this probably isn't going to end well.
John resigns himself to yet another setback. This is why he hates going in blind--learning by trial and error tends to get people maimed, killed, or incarcerated.
Member of Beatty's police is just coming down the lane with a birdlike young lady--making wedding plans, from the way John hears the conversation boomerang from "Do what you always do with that ivory lace around the fringe, Gloria," to "Drop the weapon and put your hands in the air, sir."
John complies, and he knows the officer is relieved because as she runs up it only just seems to register that she's not on duty, she's in a white Sunday sundress, and she's not packing. The officer confiscates John's gun and tells him to, if he'd please, get up and take a walk with her; why don't they sort this all out at the station, instead of disturbing all the rest of the Sunday crowd.
Yes, ma'am; he's just gotta see to his boy. Gloria's spread out in the dirt, collapsed right there where she stood. Looking at Dean. Maybe thinks about helping him, and looking at John, and maybe thinking about helping the officer instead. She's not doing a good job of tending to either, she's so busy invoking the Holy Trinity.
They're starting to draw a crowd. The Phoenix deskclerk; the Phoenix proprietor, Benton Southerly; Southerly's cardshark buddy, Greg Morgan; the woman from the diner, Rita--John feels like he knows half the town by now, and they're pooling out of the woodworks to watch the streetshow. They shy like fire from wind as John clears the distance between him and Dean, without waiting for approval.
John crouches down and pulls at him so he's sitting upright; he keeps a bracing grip on Dean's shoulder and brushes the hair from his eyes. He can feel the lean, childish muscle jump and squirm beneath his grip, keeping the same syncopated beat as Dean's breaths.
Kid's all rhythm; always all rhythm. John lets out a bemused tch in spite of himself as he runs his hands all down Dean's body, looking for anything broken or abraded. Dean hasn't taken his eyes from the ground and his mouth's twisted like he's tasting something stale and awful, and John doesn't really know if his terse, monosyllabic commands are getting through--breathe, son. Breathe--one, two, three, one--but he keeps himself upright when John lets go and bit by bit he's gaining a little color back.
That's the best John can hope for right now, that kid's gonna pull through on his own, because he's already heaving himself to his feet and turning heel. Yes, ma'am, I see the crowd. Yes, I think the station would be an excellent place to close the book on this little misdemeanor.
"Snap to, Dean. We're walking. Ain't no one going to carry you."
Then Dean starts laughing, a delirious, choked sound, and whatever remaining damper that'd been moderating his breathing is blown all to hell and it sounds like he's going to asphyxiate here and now, drowned in his own supernatural terror. And this time it's not John's militant conviction that holds him back but Miss Jenny Gardner's hand-cuffs, which she claps around his wrists with a little too much gleeful exuberance (so she could hide something in her sundress after all--innocent like Sunday but as deceptive as anything).
Just a formality, is all, she explains. Miss Jenny Gardner appears to be a fan of formalities. She doesn't seem at all concerned that there's a nine-year old sick with the last dregs of a panic attack nobody can seem to quite explain, and that old rebellious something in John's chest twinges when he realizes why.
In this little town, he and Dean are the strangest things they've ever seen. He can only imagine what their audience is thinking of him now. John's not the self-conscious type, and he's been told he's a quart short of friendly concern for the opinions of others, but he's beginning to think that in this particular town, it probably about twelve hours too late be making a helpful, favorable impression.
Anything off happens in this town, and it's them that did it. Anything sets the kid off, it's his daddy's fault. Daddy's done something, or didn't do something, or hasn't done near enough--maybe all of the above.
It's a load, all right, heavier than Miss Jenny Gardner's handcuffs, shiny with newness and blinding in the sunlight.
John hazards a glance back over his shoulder, and is surprised with what he sees.
Woman from that diner, one who sat up with Dean while John was winning them room and board--she's got Dean kissed up awkwardly against her chest. She looks about as familiar with the motion as Dean does, but he catches fractured pieces of her uncertain whispers and she's caught the same general idea as John--just breathe, baby, breathe. Follow my lead, now; there ya go--and that just has to suffice.
Town's crazy as all hell and John can feel it in every inch of him that it's going to get a hell of a lot weirder, time they split, but if ever there were a reason it existed--
It's a lot like the rest of the world that way.
courage (ii).
Police station's musty as ever. Smells like a gas leak and a pile of wet socks, mixed together. Rita can't honestly say the diner smells much better--just add a layer of smoke and alcohol atop to garnish--but it's August. The smell's downright unseasonable.
God, she doesn't know what she's saying. It's just the waiting that's painful, though it's not like she has to. It's really none of her affair. Just seems like everywhere she turns since these two boys stumbled in, they're there. She's a little scared and a lot curious and ever since she sat down with this boy, his face's been digging at her. Just looks so lost. She makes a show of switching the National Geographic in her hands with a Newsweek from '82--it's got a picture of Stephen Jay Gould and a dinosaur that looks like it was swiped from the set of Godzilla, which definitely lends credence to that whole evolution deal--and snatches another look at the kid.
She doesn't even know his name. He's mostly coming down now, though he doesn't look any less like he's going to be violently ill if someone so much as looks at him funny. Looks drawn and exhausted, too, but that frankly don't surprise her. She knows where he was at three this morning and she can guess he didn't drop right off into down pillows and silk sheets right after; and the last half hour working to breathe like it wasn't natural and automatic can't have helped.
Kid's daddy's making a phone call in the room just behind them. Wall vibrates with every shouted word; it doesn't sound like the call's going quite the way he wanted. Rita's got her head slid right up against the wall as he leans against it, hears words like "...lost him? The hell you mean you lost him. Jim, so help me--"
Rita thinks maybe it's some hired gun, supposed to bust them out of Beatty; maybe he took the cash upfront and turned tail. Jim, she didn't know.
She sneaks another look at the kid, switches to a 1986 Vogue. Wonders what happened. Wonders if Jenny'd spill a story if she got a few rounds of Jack in her.
But then, you shouldn't exploit people on Sunday.
She can just ask the kid, he starts looking more like a human and less like Stephen Jay Gould's pretty pretty corpse. His eyes screw shut every time there's another bellow through the wall, and he kneads the bridge of his nose just between his eyebrows.
"Can I get you anything? Cuppa water?"
It comes out in her Waitress Voice, more impersonal than she meant.
"--Get it myself," he grates out, the beginning of which is lost somewhere in his throat. He slides down from the chair bonelessly, and the kid just looks so damn whacked Rita wants to pour an entire pitcher of water down on him, like it'd spruce him up like a plant.
He sways a little, like he's fighting vertigo, and wins. Marches with newfound purpose to the bathrooms just across the room and disappears within.
Kid's coming around then. That's good; that's real good. Rita ain't ever had a little brother; might've had a child, but she lost it a few months in. Not careful enough, said her mother. Up until this point, the only child she really knew was Simon Walker, and he's thirty-five; and he was such a sorry excuse for one this kid usurped his position in just under twelve hours.
Pulled at the protective streak in her, maybe. Made her want to serve him drinks and let him sit the tables, blinds $100/$200, No Limit Hold'em. Show him things so he wouldn't find them when she wasn't watching.
Which is just silly. He's not even hers. Besides, the nicest thing he's said to her was her shitty town fucking sucked.
Nevertheless, after she flips through Vogue back to front and once upside down, and he still doesn't come back, she ventures into the bathroom herself.
Station crapper's only got one stall, and the door gives at her touch. Smells just as bad in here as it did in the front room, but not any worse.
Kid's bent over the toilet, hands glued to the rim like he doesn't care what kind of shit he's touching. He's making half-hearted dips toward the toilet, but nothing more comes up (because mmm, Rita can smell the vomit now; old familiar smell but never any more welcome than it was the first time).
"You good?"
And his head bounces on his neck like he doesn't want to dignify that with a response, but it's almost a shrug and it's almost something like a Yeah, sure, lady.
"You want that cuppa water now?"
Same response. He doesn't make any move to follow her as she makes to leave, but he lets go the toilet and he'll catch up on his own time.
"You know. You coulda done that in there. Give them an excuse to change that sorry carpet in there, maybe air the place out a little. Here, someone's just going to have to come in with a bottle of bleach and some ammonia. You're going easy on them. What the hell for? Town sure ain't going easy on you."
Kid makes a little noise and she's not sure what it is, but it sounds better than sick.
Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 + a/n | Full Story (.PDF) | Artwork by starry_ice