Occam's Razor Part 12
Saying goodbye to Missouri was very different from saying goodbye to Bobby.
Instead of hugs, Missouri gave each of them brown paper bags with sandwiches, fruit, and slices of pie. Like Bobby, she felt compelled to give advice, but in lieu of the dire and all-too-familiar warning of watch out for Sammy, she snapped you--both you boys--get yourselves here if ever you feel you need it.
When Dean moved to join Sam in the back seat, Sam playfully kicked him back and shut the door, grinning his brightest grin when his elder brother flipped him off. Dean still hesitated at the passenger door and threw a wary, stormy look in John's direction before he slammed the door extra hard and blasted the radio. John, for once, didn't reach for the dial or smack his eldest son’s hand away, but settled for his trademark I’d think twice if I didn’t want to be running extra miles glare.
Sam normally didn't mind long drives. It was one of the rare times he was able to completely relax, read what he wanted, draw if he felt like it, or just watch out the window and think without threat of his father barking at him to get up for a chore or run or train. Since Dean had turned fourteen, he almost always rode shotgun, which permitted Sam to stretch out and camp on the bench in the back.
Now though, he was nearly crawling out his skin. He wanted to start rustling through the trunk searching for hidden compartments where the journal might be, or go ruffling through his father's forbidden duffels.
Part of him longed to tell Dean, to make a game of hide and seek like they had when they were young, to double-team and work to distract their dad so the other could rummage through the trunk or burrow into the bottom of bags. But however well-intentioned, Dean quickly proved to be his biggest obstacle.
Their father was trying--it was clear to Sam's newly-sharpened brain. He backed off on their training, took them to nicer places to eat, tried to watch TV with them in the evenings. Sam found himself vacillating between pity that his father was so clearly disconnected, and rage that he thought ten extra dollars on dinner or a Pay-Per-View movie would endear him to his sons. However, his new graciousness allowed Sam more opportunities to attempt little searches--opportunities that his overbearing brother interrupted.
"I'm going to the car," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
"I'm going for a run," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
"I'm going to the store," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
"I'm going to the Laundromat," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
Just about the only things that weren't a guarantee of being followed by his brother were done in the bathroom, and even then he got a "don't lock the door."
Sam swung between longing to share his secret hunt with Dean and wanting to knock him unconscious so he could have five minutes free of hovering.
He finally snapped after two weeks. Sam had finished folding laundry and made his third attempt of the day to step outside when Dean leapt to his feet and followed. Sam sighed, wandered down to a bench at the end of the parking lot, and slumped miserably onto it while Dean flicked his lighter beside him.
"Dean," he said carefully, "you remember what Missouri said about us spending time apart?"
"You mean, when she lied to me so Dad could show up?" He slammed his lighter shut.
"But I'm normal now."
"You've never been normal." Dean meant it as a joke, but Sam couldn't prevent the hitch in his breathing. His brother nudged him. "So you want to get rid of me so you can mope, is that it?"
"I'm not moping."
"You keep going off on these little 'errands' of yours, but half the time you just sit and get that look."
"What look?"
"That I'm-still-sad-but-if-I-put-my-hands-in-my-hoodie-no-one-will-notice-look. It's a classic."
"I'm not sad."
"Dude...you saw--"
"I know what I saw!" Sam clenched his hands into fists inside his hoodie pockets, realized what he was doing, and ripped them free. "Dammit, Dean, I need...time."
"Yeah, well," Dean said bitterly, "so do I."
The boys started slow. Sam heeded Missouri's warnings and let his brother fuss and hover, but did his best to gradually spend time apart. Truth be told, he'd gotten used to Dean's focus and attention, and when they split up for longer and longer periods he found himself missing him more than he expected. Dean still insisted on a stricter routine than they'd had before Julian, and even when he picked up a girl or two in their current town, he always insisted on having meals with Sam and being home around Sam's usual bedtime, even if he did have an annoying habit of launching himself onto the bed and chatting his brother's ear off as he tried to kill the extra energy.
The nightmares didn’t vanish as quickly as either of them would have liked. For the first few weeks they were back on the road, Sam jolted awake too terrified to move and, upon realizing he couldn’t, terrified that Missouri's fix hadn't held. Dean had to hover over him and turn him on his back so he could see the fireless ceiling, and talk and coax and crack jokes until Sam got his bearings, and often neither of them were able to fall back to sleep for a while.
After that though, the nightmares came less often, and with less intensity. Sam was more often than not jolted awake by Dean barking his name, and was able to relax as his brother mumbled "just a dream, s'no fire, go back to sleep," from the next bed.
And then, after weeks of aborted search attempts, bad luck, and failures, the journal found Sam without him even trying.
***
Dad had taken Dean out to wipe out a poltergeist, a low-level gig he wanted Dean to take the lead on. Dean had been gunned as usual, scrubbing the weapons and downing coffee, keyed up and bright-eyed as he lay salt lines down and gave Sam strict orders not to leave the room, to answer the phone if they called, and to keep his knife and gun close at hand.
Sam searched, fruitlessly, for nearly two hours, before giving in and starting on the load of distance learning materials Pastor Jim had secured for him.
John nearly kicked the door in around midnight, hauling in a limping and swearing Dean.
"Sonofawhore, sonofabitch, sonofawhorebitchwenchbitchwhore--" Dean ranted.
"Sam! Kit. Towels. Now!"
Sam’s stomach lurched before he shot up out of his chair and book off for the bathroom. John had stripped off his jacket to tie around his elder son's left leg, and it was already soaked through. Sam sprinted from the bathroom to find his brother on his back, his father tossing his bloody jacket aside and cutting away what little remained of Dean's left pant leg to get to his son's injuries.
"Dad." Sam handed over the kit and moved to hold his brother's shoulders down. “Dean-“ he wanted to say something comforting, the way his brother always managed to when Sam was hurt (and Sam had never been this hurt, nor could he remember seeing his brother covered in this much blood and oh God how much can a person lose before--)
"Fuck almighty, Sam, quit staring at me like that. Someone get me a goddamn drink before you start stitching."
"I'm seein' bone, son," John said calmly, slicing through the cheap motel towels with his knife and binding the strips around his leg. Dean hissed, and Sam pressed firmer, forcing him to the mattress. "This is a doctor's job."
"Goddamnit, Dad, no. Just give me some whiskey and something to bite on and you do it."
"There's no way this didn't get an artery. I'm not messing with it, Dean. Sammy, go grab the Jones' papers. Then get the door and the car ready. Got it?"
"I'm gonna dig that sonofabitch up and burn him all over! I'm gonna summon his spirit and exorcise it fourteen times and then I'm gonna summon his wife and his kids and his nephew and his niece and his dog and I'm gonna burn them and then I'm gonna--"
Sam sprinted to the car, found the Jones' insurance policy--one dependent, a son in trade school--opened the back door, and had the motor running when John dragged a still swearing Dean out and dumped him over the Impala's backseat.
"--burn his whore mother and her whore cat and her whore house and their whore cow and--"
"Blinds shut, lights out, no answering the phone," John ordered Sam.
"I'm going with you."
"Back inside. Check the salt."
"No, Dad! I'm going with Dean."
"Inside!" John barked. Dean's tirade ceased.
"Sam," he called. Sam bolted around to crowd into the back with his brother.
"I'm here," Sam assured, gripping his brother's arm. "I'm coming--"
"No--go back inside, bud."
"No!"
"Yeah. I need you to."
"You wouldn't leave me!"
"Sammy, I'm eighteen. It'll be tough enough for Dad to stick with me. You'd be stuck in the waiting room and it'd drive you nuts, and I'd be worried someone would notice you didn't have a parent with you." He offered a strained, pain-filled grin. "I'm fine, kiddo. I'll be back before you know it and you'll have plenty of time to mother-hen. Kay?"
Sam's throat felt swollen. "But--"
"I'm not going anywhere, dummy," Dean said, rubbing roughly on Sam's head with his knuckles. Sam squirmed away. "C'mon, this hurts like hell and I'm bleeding all over Dad's seats. Inside. Promise I'll be back in one piece and you can wait on me hand and foot."
Sam's eyes burned. "Okay," he managed. "But--Dean, listen--"
"Shove it. I know, moron. Back at you."
"Sam, out of the car," John growled. Sam squeezed his brother's arm and nodded. Dean grinned and flipped him off, playfully, as Sam shut the door and watched his father screech out of the parking lot.
***
The room was a mess. Sam was used to it. He went and got the stain removers from under the sink, the bleach and hand wipes, and set to work. He stripped the bloody sheets and dumped them in the tub with a boatload of Clorox, sprayed the mattress with disinfectant to wreck any DNA, cleaned up the carpet and gathered the remains of the motel towel and his brother's pants in a bag he tossed into the dumpster out back. He neatly packed his and his brother's things, ensured his father's duffels were in order, and then, while hanging the sheets up to dry, debated what to do with his father's jacket. Generally, John forbade the boys to touch his things or rummage through his pockets, but Sam was too restless and anxious to sleep, and his father wouldn't want to ditch the coat and buy a new one of if he didn't have to. Sam picked it up, grabbed the laundry detergent, and headed into the bathroom to work.
He'd spent a good ten minutes scrubbing at the stains, folding the collar and pleats over, rubbing down the pockets and the back, when he felt a small, square lump down by the end of the right side. He dipped his hands in the coat pockets, but they were empty. He felt again, and sure enough, there was something there--something hard and flat and rigid.
It couldn't be.
Sam's heart raced. He took a deep breath, told himself his hands weren't shaking. Flipped the coat and ran his hands along the inseam until he felt it: a secret, roughly sewn pocket with a small slit on the top. Folded inside was a small, square, black leather notebook, slight and thin and beaten with age. Sam clutched it, heart pounding, and sank onto the closed toilet lid, trying to steady his heart rate before he flipped it open.
And he could have cried.
It was it--it had to be. But it wasn't written in English. It was a combination of symbols, sketches, and what were probably words, but they weren't in any language Sam was familiar with. John hadn't only written it--he'd coded it.
No. No no no no!
Sam felt tears of fury, hurt, grief, and frustration welling up. The journal--the secret journal, the one devoted to him--was here, in his hands. And he was alone. And he couldn't read it.
He let a few self-pitying tears fall and slammed the book to the counter. He couldn't possibly recreate it before his father got home: besides, there might be details in the drawings he'd miss. He couldn't decode it. And if he up and confronted him, he'd never know what was inside. Their father, ever the con-man, would manipulate it and keep the journal somewhere Sam would never find it again. And Sam would never know the truth--what he'd been subjected to, what his father believed, what he honestly might be.
Sam closed his eyes and wiped his damp face. It was time to stop crying and think--hard.
WWDD: What Would Dean Do?
The answer came in a jolt. Sam threw on his hoodie, tucked the journal inside, grabbed all the quarters he could find--screw Dean and his stupid arcade/magic-finger obsession--and the room key, and bolted down the main office. The receptionist insisted there was no photocopier but pointed him to the local library--which Sam knew couldn't possibly be open at this hour--and it took his best sad face to get her to look up a local round-the-clock-Kinko’s in the downtown area. Three and a half miles away.
Sam thanked her and headed back out into the lot. Three and a half miles there, three and a half miles back.
He paused at the edge of the asphalt, stretched out, and thought of everything Dean had taught him. Don't think ahead, think of what you've left behind. Breathe deep and let it hold. Picture the thirst and the tired and the burn going into your muscles and pushing harder. Never panic. If you start to, run harder until you forget it. Let the focus be physical. And whenever you feel like you won't make it, just remember I'm right here.
His brother's voice in his head, Sam took off down the darkness of the road.
Next
Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI Part VII Part VIII Part IX Part X Part XI
Instead of hugs, Missouri gave each of them brown paper bags with sandwiches, fruit, and slices of pie. Like Bobby, she felt compelled to give advice, but in lieu of the dire and all-too-familiar warning of watch out for Sammy, she snapped you--both you boys--get yourselves here if ever you feel you need it.
When Dean moved to join Sam in the back seat, Sam playfully kicked him back and shut the door, grinning his brightest grin when his elder brother flipped him off. Dean still hesitated at the passenger door and threw a wary, stormy look in John's direction before he slammed the door extra hard and blasted the radio. John, for once, didn't reach for the dial or smack his eldest son’s hand away, but settled for his trademark I’d think twice if I didn’t want to be running extra miles glare.
Sam normally didn't mind long drives. It was one of the rare times he was able to completely relax, read what he wanted, draw if he felt like it, or just watch out the window and think without threat of his father barking at him to get up for a chore or run or train. Since Dean had turned fourteen, he almost always rode shotgun, which permitted Sam to stretch out and camp on the bench in the back.
Now though, he was nearly crawling out his skin. He wanted to start rustling through the trunk searching for hidden compartments where the journal might be, or go ruffling through his father's forbidden duffels.
Part of him longed to tell Dean, to make a game of hide and seek like they had when they were young, to double-team and work to distract their dad so the other could rummage through the trunk or burrow into the bottom of bags. But however well-intentioned, Dean quickly proved to be his biggest obstacle.
Their father was trying--it was clear to Sam's newly-sharpened brain. He backed off on their training, took them to nicer places to eat, tried to watch TV with them in the evenings. Sam found himself vacillating between pity that his father was so clearly disconnected, and rage that he thought ten extra dollars on dinner or a Pay-Per-View movie would endear him to his sons. However, his new graciousness allowed Sam more opportunities to attempt little searches--opportunities that his overbearing brother interrupted.
"I'm going to the car," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
"I'm going for a run," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
"I'm going to the store," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
"I'm going to the Laundromat," said by Sam, was instantly rejoined with "I'll go too," by Dean.
Just about the only things that weren't a guarantee of being followed by his brother were done in the bathroom, and even then he got a "don't lock the door."
Sam swung between longing to share his secret hunt with Dean and wanting to knock him unconscious so he could have five minutes free of hovering.
He finally snapped after two weeks. Sam had finished folding laundry and made his third attempt of the day to step outside when Dean leapt to his feet and followed. Sam sighed, wandered down to a bench at the end of the parking lot, and slumped miserably onto it while Dean flicked his lighter beside him.
"Dean," he said carefully, "you remember what Missouri said about us spending time apart?"
"You mean, when she lied to me so Dad could show up?" He slammed his lighter shut.
"But I'm normal now."
"You've never been normal." Dean meant it as a joke, but Sam couldn't prevent the hitch in his breathing. His brother nudged him. "So you want to get rid of me so you can mope, is that it?"
"I'm not moping."
"You keep going off on these little 'errands' of yours, but half the time you just sit and get that look."
"What look?"
"That I'm-still-sad-but-if-I-put-my-hands-in-my-hoodie-no-one-will-notice-look. It's a classic."
"I'm not sad."
"Dude...you saw--"
"I know what I saw!" Sam clenched his hands into fists inside his hoodie pockets, realized what he was doing, and ripped them free. "Dammit, Dean, I need...time."
"Yeah, well," Dean said bitterly, "so do I."
The boys started slow. Sam heeded Missouri's warnings and let his brother fuss and hover, but did his best to gradually spend time apart. Truth be told, he'd gotten used to Dean's focus and attention, and when they split up for longer and longer periods he found himself missing him more than he expected. Dean still insisted on a stricter routine than they'd had before Julian, and even when he picked up a girl or two in their current town, he always insisted on having meals with Sam and being home around Sam's usual bedtime, even if he did have an annoying habit of launching himself onto the bed and chatting his brother's ear off as he tried to kill the extra energy.
The nightmares didn’t vanish as quickly as either of them would have liked. For the first few weeks they were back on the road, Sam jolted awake too terrified to move and, upon realizing he couldn’t, terrified that Missouri's fix hadn't held. Dean had to hover over him and turn him on his back so he could see the fireless ceiling, and talk and coax and crack jokes until Sam got his bearings, and often neither of them were able to fall back to sleep for a while.
After that though, the nightmares came less often, and with less intensity. Sam was more often than not jolted awake by Dean barking his name, and was able to relax as his brother mumbled "just a dream, s'no fire, go back to sleep," from the next bed.
And then, after weeks of aborted search attempts, bad luck, and failures, the journal found Sam without him even trying.
***
Dad had taken Dean out to wipe out a poltergeist, a low-level gig he wanted Dean to take the lead on. Dean had been gunned as usual, scrubbing the weapons and downing coffee, keyed up and bright-eyed as he lay salt lines down and gave Sam strict orders not to leave the room, to answer the phone if they called, and to keep his knife and gun close at hand.
Sam searched, fruitlessly, for nearly two hours, before giving in and starting on the load of distance learning materials Pastor Jim had secured for him.
John nearly kicked the door in around midnight, hauling in a limping and swearing Dean.
"Sonofawhore, sonofabitch, sonofawhorebitchwenchbitchwhore--" Dean ranted.
"Sam! Kit. Towels. Now!"
Sam’s stomach lurched before he shot up out of his chair and book off for the bathroom. John had stripped off his jacket to tie around his elder son's left leg, and it was already soaked through. Sam sprinted from the bathroom to find his brother on his back, his father tossing his bloody jacket aside and cutting away what little remained of Dean's left pant leg to get to his son's injuries.
"Dad." Sam handed over the kit and moved to hold his brother's shoulders down. “Dean-“ he wanted to say something comforting, the way his brother always managed to when Sam was hurt (and Sam had never been this hurt, nor could he remember seeing his brother covered in this much blood and oh God how much can a person lose before--)
"Fuck almighty, Sam, quit staring at me like that. Someone get me a goddamn drink before you start stitching."
"I'm seein' bone, son," John said calmly, slicing through the cheap motel towels with his knife and binding the strips around his leg. Dean hissed, and Sam pressed firmer, forcing him to the mattress. "This is a doctor's job."
"Goddamnit, Dad, no. Just give me some whiskey and something to bite on and you do it."
"There's no way this didn't get an artery. I'm not messing with it, Dean. Sammy, go grab the Jones' papers. Then get the door and the car ready. Got it?"
"I'm gonna dig that sonofabitch up and burn him all over! I'm gonna summon his spirit and exorcise it fourteen times and then I'm gonna summon his wife and his kids and his nephew and his niece and his dog and I'm gonna burn them and then I'm gonna--"
Sam sprinted to the car, found the Jones' insurance policy--one dependent, a son in trade school--opened the back door, and had the motor running when John dragged a still swearing Dean out and dumped him over the Impala's backseat.
"--burn his whore mother and her whore cat and her whore house and their whore cow and--"
"Blinds shut, lights out, no answering the phone," John ordered Sam.
"I'm going with you."
"Back inside. Check the salt."
"No, Dad! I'm going with Dean."
"Inside!" John barked. Dean's tirade ceased.
"Sam," he called. Sam bolted around to crowd into the back with his brother.
"I'm here," Sam assured, gripping his brother's arm. "I'm coming--"
"No--go back inside, bud."
"No!"
"Yeah. I need you to."
"You wouldn't leave me!"
"Sammy, I'm eighteen. It'll be tough enough for Dad to stick with me. You'd be stuck in the waiting room and it'd drive you nuts, and I'd be worried someone would notice you didn't have a parent with you." He offered a strained, pain-filled grin. "I'm fine, kiddo. I'll be back before you know it and you'll have plenty of time to mother-hen. Kay?"
Sam's throat felt swollen. "But--"
"I'm not going anywhere, dummy," Dean said, rubbing roughly on Sam's head with his knuckles. Sam squirmed away. "C'mon, this hurts like hell and I'm bleeding all over Dad's seats. Inside. Promise I'll be back in one piece and you can wait on me hand and foot."
Sam's eyes burned. "Okay," he managed. "But--Dean, listen--"
"Shove it. I know, moron. Back at you."
"Sam, out of the car," John growled. Sam squeezed his brother's arm and nodded. Dean grinned and flipped him off, playfully, as Sam shut the door and watched his father screech out of the parking lot.
***
The room was a mess. Sam was used to it. He went and got the stain removers from under the sink, the bleach and hand wipes, and set to work. He stripped the bloody sheets and dumped them in the tub with a boatload of Clorox, sprayed the mattress with disinfectant to wreck any DNA, cleaned up the carpet and gathered the remains of the motel towel and his brother's pants in a bag he tossed into the dumpster out back. He neatly packed his and his brother's things, ensured his father's duffels were in order, and then, while hanging the sheets up to dry, debated what to do with his father's jacket. Generally, John forbade the boys to touch his things or rummage through his pockets, but Sam was too restless and anxious to sleep, and his father wouldn't want to ditch the coat and buy a new one of if he didn't have to. Sam picked it up, grabbed the laundry detergent, and headed into the bathroom to work.
He'd spent a good ten minutes scrubbing at the stains, folding the collar and pleats over, rubbing down the pockets and the back, when he felt a small, square lump down by the end of the right side. He dipped his hands in the coat pockets, but they were empty. He felt again, and sure enough, there was something there--something hard and flat and rigid.
It couldn't be.
Sam's heart raced. He took a deep breath, told himself his hands weren't shaking. Flipped the coat and ran his hands along the inseam until he felt it: a secret, roughly sewn pocket with a small slit on the top. Folded inside was a small, square, black leather notebook, slight and thin and beaten with age. Sam clutched it, heart pounding, and sank onto the closed toilet lid, trying to steady his heart rate before he flipped it open.
And he could have cried.
It was it--it had to be. But it wasn't written in English. It was a combination of symbols, sketches, and what were probably words, but they weren't in any language Sam was familiar with. John hadn't only written it--he'd coded it.
No. No no no no!
Sam felt tears of fury, hurt, grief, and frustration welling up. The journal--the secret journal, the one devoted to him--was here, in his hands. And he was alone. And he couldn't read it.
He let a few self-pitying tears fall and slammed the book to the counter. He couldn't possibly recreate it before his father got home: besides, there might be details in the drawings he'd miss. He couldn't decode it. And if he up and confronted him, he'd never know what was inside. Their father, ever the con-man, would manipulate it and keep the journal somewhere Sam would never find it again. And Sam would never know the truth--what he'd been subjected to, what his father believed, what he honestly might be.
Sam closed his eyes and wiped his damp face. It was time to stop crying and think--hard.
WWDD: What Would Dean Do?
The answer came in a jolt. Sam threw on his hoodie, tucked the journal inside, grabbed all the quarters he could find--screw Dean and his stupid arcade/magic-finger obsession--and the room key, and bolted down the main office. The receptionist insisted there was no photocopier but pointed him to the local library--which Sam knew couldn't possibly be open at this hour--and it took his best sad face to get her to look up a local round-the-clock-Kinko’s in the downtown area. Three and a half miles away.
Sam thanked her and headed back out into the lot. Three and a half miles there, three and a half miles back.
He paused at the edge of the asphalt, stretched out, and thought of everything Dean had taught him. Don't think ahead, think of what you've left behind. Breathe deep and let it hold. Picture the thirst and the tired and the burn going into your muscles and pushing harder. Never panic. If you start to, run harder until you forget it. Let the focus be physical. And whenever you feel like you won't make it, just remember I'm right here.
His brother's voice in his head, Sam took off down the darkness of the road.
Next
Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI Part VII Part VIII Part IX Part X Part XI