The Huntress -Chapter 9
A/N: Okay, so after the three last chapters, I thought it would be nice to take a breather. So beware: ahead is an unreasonable amount of schmoop and a slice of domestic life.
<3
::: :::
Freeport, May 14
Driving under the sun, through the light traffic, Sam sang to himself. He didn’t even know the name of the song -it was one of the current top-40 that kept playing on the student’s radio station during his lunch break. Spring in Maine was especially beautiful and Sam felt like he had no worries at all, which was great. Two weeks had passed since Dean’s second hypnosis session and everything had changed for the best if you asked him. Dean slept well at night, had had no more strange premonitions or messages or images sent by the baby. He also looked better, despite the fact that he was still putting on way too much weight for his liking. Since the beginning of the pregnancy, he had put on more than twenty-three pounds and there were still three months to go. Rania was a little worried, basically because she was afraid Dean might start suffering from high blood pressure, which would lead to preeclampsia, which would lead, to quote her, “to a shitty situation that I don’t want to think about”, but so far, so good. Dean’s vitals remained normal.
They would have to let Clover go sooner than they had thought at first, though. Dean wasn’t just gaining weight. His belly was swelling in that particular way that that was all too recognizable as belonging to a pregnant woman. Sam was kind of amazed to realize that this time, though, the shape of Dean’s belly wasn’t the same as it had been with Sumiko. It was less… pointy, larger, like the baby was stretched out and resting solely on Dean’s hips.
Still. In public, Dean could pass for a chubby guy with a taste for beer, but in the intimacy of their home, Clover had been witnessing the changes on a daily basis and Dean had noticed the way the young woman stared a little too long for his liking in the belly area. He was sad for Sue, mainly, because she loved Clover, but Sam had told him that they didn’t need to cut her out completely. She could still babysit Sumiko at her place whenever they needed it.
Next week, Dean had been saying for the last two weeks. Sam was content to let him make the decision.
When Sam finally arrived home, he was surprised to find Dean waiting for him on the porch stairs. His expression and stance were those of a determined, bad ass hunter, complete with his green vest, his boots, and a duffle on his shoulder, like he was ready to go and take down a werewolf. Of course, the effect was completely ruined by the fact that Sam knew the duffle really was a diaper bag, and that instead of a gun, Dean was holding a smiling little girl with a yellow skirt, a pink shirt and a tiny, clumsily made ponytail on the top of her head.
Sam didn’t even have time to cut the engine before Dean was walking toward him at a quick efficient pace.
“What’s going on?” he asked while Dean got Sumiko settled in her baby seat. She was yelling “daa-daam” and making her hi/bye sign enthusiastically at him.
“Nothing is going on,” Dean groaned, falling into the passenger seat and closing the door with way too much force. “I need to get out of here. Just… drive.”
“Um. Okay. But where-“
“I don’t know!” Dean replied with frustration and Sam wisely kept his mouth shut.
They'd been on the road for five minutes when Dean exploded. “I’m gonna go crazy. Hell, I probably already am!”
“What? Did the baby…?”
“No, the baby didn’t do anything! And I… I’m becoming a freaking housewife! A fat housewife.” Dean added, blushing violently.
“Dean, you’re not-“
“What? Fat? Because man, I can see myself in a mirror, ya’ know. Doesn’t matter what I try. Christ! I’m eating fucking green stuff all day long, but I just…”
“Rania told you if you eat healthy then there's nothing else you can do-“
“Don’t patronize me! Can you look me in the eyes and tell me I’m not getting fat?”
“I’m driving!”
“Lame excuse!”
“Dean. What’s going on?”
“Wha’s going on? I’m trapped at home all day long and the only person I can talk to… well when the baby-sitter isn't there, is a ten month old baby! Don’t get me wrong, she’s my daughter and I love her, but I’m like… Holding whole conversations where the only answer I get is a bubble of saliva and a wet smile! And that’s not the worst of it… I’m becoming fucking good at cleaning the house. I vacuum every two days so Sue won't swallow something left on the floor and I’m a fucking king at separating colors when I do the laundry… and… and… when I fold the clean clothes I sometimes freaking hum to myself!”
Sam didn’t say anything. It was hard enough as it was not to burst out laughing.
“I’m watching daytime TV!” Dean added in a disgusted voice. “And those cooking shows… sometimes I write the recipe down! Today I watched this ad about a product that’s supposed to wash out every stain and there I was, instead of laughing, actually thinking about buying one! Call now and we'll throw in our wonderful special brush at no extra charge!”
The last words were practically roared. Sue made a small whining noise and Dean looked at her in the rear view mirror, his face softening in record time. “It’s okay, baby, daddy’s not mad,” he said in a carefully controlled voice.
“Dean, you’re just tired of being cooped up at home. I get it.”
“No you don’t, because you go to work everyday. With people.” Dean said, his tone a mix of awe and jealousy.
“Okay, what do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“But surely there's something you-“
“Anything! I just need to see some people, Sam.”
“Uh. Okay.”
Sam tried to think of something. He would probably feel trapped at home with their daughter too sometimes if the tables were reversed. Add to that the fact that, sooner rather than later, Dean would have to declare his condition too pronounced to even go out anymore…
Despite Dean’s visible exasperation, Sam wasn’t worried about this sudden burst of anger. This, this was normal. This was Dean. It seemed to Sam that this was the first time since the beginning of the pregnancy that his brother had behaved like himself. Not a single day passed without Sam questioning himself about the whole hypnosis session and everything Dean had said that he couldn’t make sense of. He knew he hadn't had a choice in trying to break the special connection between Dean and the baby. It had been getting too dangerous. Still, he wondered if there would be consequences to this decision.
One thing was certain, though: even if Dean had his own doubts and insecurities concerning that particular issue, the effects had still been positive. The only thing that was really bothering him was his weight gained and Sam figured there was nothing they could do about that. It was true, Dean was eating healthy -even more so than when he'd been pregnant with Sumiko- and was as active as he could be. To Sam’s eyes, he was gorgeous. His shape had this softer, rounder edge to it, and sometimes, it touched Sam on a very possessive level. Dean looks round and full with my child, he would think, then blush, imagining the punch he would probably receive if he ever dared say that out loud.
“Stop there,” Dean suddenly said, pointing ahead of them and to his left.
It was the baseball field Sam passed by each day on his way to work and there seemed to be a t-ball game going on with a few parents sitting on the old bleachers near the field and kids who couldn’t be more than seven or eight playing.
“You wanna…?”
“Yeah, slow down or you’re gonna miss the entrance.”
Sam stopped the car.
“T-Ball?”
“Yeah. Not too many people but people still, out in the open, and besides, Sumiko better start understanding the rules right now because she’ll start playing in a couple of years.”
Sam stopped the car and took a look at Sumiko who was trying to shove two fingers up the same nostril. “She’s ten months old, Dean.”
“Come on, Sammy.”
“Okay.”
“Kay!” Sumiko declared. Okay was her latest word. She’d spent hours repeating it earlier that week.
“Yeah okay, baby girl.”
Sumiko clapped her hands together and shook her head from left to right, endangering the state of her small, precarious ponytail, which suddenly made Sam think of something.
“Hey Dean?”
“What?”
“You did this ponytail for Sumiko?”
Dean looked at him for a long second as his face turned bright red. “It’s… She’s got this Mohawk thing going on and I thought… Fuck, stop looking at me like that. She’s a girl! We’ll have to do her hair sooner or later.”
“You know, I would have paid a good amount of money to see you doing that.”
“Shut up.”
There was a hot-dog stand nearby and Dean was eying it, looking so miserable it twisted something in Sam’s guts. It was true. Dean was eating so healthily it was almost scary to see him measuring and preparing his portion of steamed vegetables and pulling the skin off his grilled chicken. It was unfair that it disturbed him to put on so much weight while he did everything he could to prevent it.
“I’ll go get us something to eat. Find us a place,” he said, voice firm, already heading to the stand.
When he got back, Dean was sitting apart from the other parents with Sue standing in the V between his legs, yelling and clapping and pointing at everything she saw. When Dean got a look the two chili dogs Sam handed to him, his eyes opened wide and became as bright as those of a child on Christmas morning. He took the cardboard tray hesitantly, licking his lips without seeming to notice the involuntary gesture.
“Sam I’m not-“
“Hey, Dean, stop it. You’re not a freaking anorexic starlet. I love you, you look gorgeous just the way you are, and you have to right to eat what you like. Now, come on. Brought you a diet coke, though.”
Sam sat with his own chili dogs, not wanting Dean to feel guilty. Sumiko eyed their food with curious eyes, but Dean took some small cheese pieces and a sippy cup of milk out of the bag and that was that. She was way more interested in the t-ball game, bouncing on her feet and turning to Sam and Dean to babble some unintelligible words about what she was seeing.
It was a great idea, after all. Dean looked relaxed and like he was enjoying himself, pointing put some of the players to Sam and analyzing their game play, guessing who had some natural talent. Sam himself felt more at peace than he had in the last few months and when Dean grabbed his hand suddenly to put it on his belly, he felt a powerful wave of affection and love threaten to submerge him.
“She moving?”
“Yeah. Wait for it… wait for… There.”
It was still very subtle, but Sam could feel it, the small poking against Dean’s taut skin.
“Hey baby,” he murmured, bending over Dean’s belly.
Sumiko, who was sitting between them, give him her brightest smile. “Daadaam,” she said, doing her hi/bye sign.
Dean burst out laughing.
“She thinks you’re talking to her. Gosh, this little one is going to be so jealous when her sister is born. Won’t you, monkey?” he added, taking Sumiko into his arms and tickling her waist. Her laugh was goofy and high-pitched and it was like this perfect Hallmark moment until Sumiko paled and threw up her cheese and milk all over Dean’s left shoulder.
“Okay, time to go home, what do you think?” Dean asked Sam, shrugging, because when you've spent most of your life hunting monsters, often ending up covered in blood or ectoplasm or slime, baby vomit wasn’t really all that disturbing.
They had fun that night. Sumiko fell asleep on the way back home, the small pink hair clip barely holding the three hairs that were left in her ponytail. Dean did too, surrounded by the acrid smell of vomit, which, for some reason, was kind of cute. When they arrived home, Dean stirred and stretched as much as he could, sitting in the Impala.
“Home sweet home,” he mumbled, stifling a yawn, all of his irritation and impatience forgotten.
That night, they made love. Sam took Dean from behind as his brother was kneeling on the bed, holding onto the bed posts. He came twice, first when Sam opened him, then again after long, blissful minutes of fucking, as he was groaning for his brother to go harder, deeper and Sam was stripping his cock. Sam’s orgasm was triggered by the delicious clenching of Dean’s inner walls around his dick, the sensation so overwhelming he practically screamed out his love for his brother.
Dean let him get away with it.
::: :::
Two days later, Dean explained to Clover that he wouldn’t need her to come every week anymore. She seemed sincerely sad and was glad they would still call her if they needed a baby-sitter. That same day, Bobby called Sam. He was at work, fixing a bug at the computer science lab during his lunch break.
“Bobby, what’s going on?”
“Nothing important. How are you guys doin’?”
“Good. We’re good.”
“What about the hypnotic suggestion? Is it still holding on?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Sam, you remember asking me about those two hunters… Jason Shatner and Isabelle Marchand?”
“Yeah.”
“You never told me why.”
“Oh. It’s… nothing. Once when we were at Rania’s for Dean to be checked out they came in. The guy had been badly bitten by a black dog and the woman was very worried. Dean had… well, the baby acted out that time, sending random images to Dean that probably didn’t mean anything. Like she was picking up the tension in the room.”
“Hum.”
“Hum what?”
“Well, there's a chance it was an intentional message, not just random images, because something happened to Isabelle recently.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, she and Jason were taking down a poltergeist in Jefferson City. Nasty thing. Had been haunting the house since it was built. Anyway, they were practically done with the ritual when the house burst into flame all by itself. Shatner had time to get out, but Isabelle Marchand stayed trapped inside. She died.”
“God.”
“Supernatural fire. In a matter of minutes, there was nothing left of the house.”
“A poltergeist can do that?”
“Apparently. Anyway, just wanted to keep you informed.”
“Thanks.”
Sam spent the rest of the day thinking about what Dean had said just after their brief meeting with Isabelle and Jason. He had seen an image of the creepy twins from the Shinning and then had heard their father’s voice, what he had said to him that horrible night the demon had killed their mom.
The fire. Maybe that’s what the baby had been seeing in Isabelle and Jason’s future. As for the creepy twins, Sam couldn’t make sense of it, but maybe it had something to do with the poltergeist in the house.
He decided not to tell Dean any of this. His brother was insecure enough as it was with their decision to severe the connection without adding any more questions concerning the baby’s powers.
::: :::
Freeport, June 2
“I don’t like surprises.”
Dean was all but pouting in the car, mumbling his guess about a freaking picnic that was probably the gayest thing ever. Sam just smiled. It was a warm evening, perfect for what he had planned. Dean was now in his 26th week, had put on 32 pounds and showed no sign of slowing down. He had started having the same symptoms that had appeared only toward the end of Sue’s pregnancy: water retention, back pain and shortness of breath. Rania was still worried about the weight gain, but so far Dean’s blood pressure had remained within the normal range, although it now tended toward being a little higher than he was used to. The baby would be a big one. Measurements showed that she was now three weeks ahead of what was considered normal for a 26 week foetus. For all those reasons, Dean had declared that now was the time to remain secluded in their beach house. Sam knew the gig by now, but that didn’t meant he wasn’t allowed to do a little something special for Dean’s last public appearance.
He drove them to Portland without saying a word that would give away the secret and without reacting to his brother’s childish attitude. The Portland Orchestra was giving a series of concerts during the spring and summer that were free and open to public -the events taking place in a park near the Port. The first concert of the summer season was always a special event, Sam had learned from a work colleague who had given him a small brochure about it.
As soon as Sam had read what was going to be played, he had started to make plans. The best thing about the park was that it was gigantic and, on the south end, there were a series of trails and smaller rest areas crisscrossing a hill under the cover of trees. Sam had found the perfect spot for them to be intimate, but not too far from the stage where the orchestra would be playing. The view would be perfect.
When he parked the Impala on the side of the road, Dean raised both eyebrows at him, still looking very annoyed.
“A picnic in the woods. Great…” He mumbled, extricating himself from the car and going to get Sue from the back seat.
“DAD-DEE” She yelled, clapping her hands together as if she knew something special was going to happen.
This time, Dean had made her tiny pigtails and Sam had witnessed the whole thing, how Sue had been trying to escape his grip while his badass of a brother worked as fast as he could, the comb between his teeth, skillfully manipulating tiny rubber band around two even tinier locks of hair.
“Shut up,” Dean had said when he was done. “You think this is the first time I've done this? Who do you figure had to untangle your hair every day because you were afraid of the barber?”
“You’d do me in pigtails?”
“Of course not! You looked girly enough as you were.”
Still, it had been all kinds of cute.
“So?” Dean asked, Sumiko canted on his right hip.
“So, follow me.” Sam smiled wickedly, taking the duffle and the thick wool blanket from the trunk.
They didn’t have to walk long to arrive at the small clearing Sam had spotted before. He put the duffle down and was laying out the blanket when he heard Dean’s exclamation of surprise.
“A freaking classic concert, Sammy?”
The musicians were already starting to warm up on the stage, and there were a lot of people arriving at the park to get the better spots. Sam’s smile widened. “Yeah, why not?”
“This surprise sucks.”
“Come on, let’s eat.”
Dean grumbled because he had to sit on the ground and then about Sumiko who didn't want to stay still and that he was tired and would have trouble digesting. Sam just kept on smiling and helped him down despite all the mumbling, then ran after Sumiko who was walking clumsily on the uneven ground.
They both got quiet once the food was out of the bag. Sumiko stuffed the couscous salad Sam had made for her into her mouth while Dean and Sam ate their sandwiches. More people arrived as the sun started to set, giving an orangey tint to everything. Sumiko looked excited to be outside at this hour. She was sitting next to Dean, resting her head on the top of his belly while he gave her small pieces of bread. “Yeah, that’s right. Grown up food always looks better, right, monkey?”
“Kay!” Sumiko agreed, opening her mouth like a baby bird.
Two sets of green eyes illuminated by the fading sunlight. Sam took his iPhone from the duffle and took a picture, which annoyed Dean greatly. “Hey, what have I said? We can’t allow ourselves to take pictures of my… condition.”
“Don’t worry. No belly in the picture, I swear.”
“Mmm,” Dean didn’t sound convinced, but he let the matter drop and opened the big fruit salad container.
When they were finished with the lunch, Sumiko wanted to explore her surroundings and Sam went with her. She held his index finger tightly in her small hand, using the other to point at different things she saw. Dean cleaned the blanket of their meal’s contents and lay on his back, arms crossed behind his head, one of his legs propped up. He knew there wasn’t anybody close and, just like home, he was more relaxed, his outer shirt open and his belly propped up, looking round and full and so, so gorgeous despite his -or because of his weight gain.
As the sun went down, it became a little less warm outside, Sam put Sumiko in her black AC/DC hoodie. He had seen it in a store front two weeks ago while out for lunch with some colleagues and couldn’t resist, thinking about the expression on Dean’s face when he showed it to him. It still was a little too large for Sue, so Sam rolled up the sleeves, then tied the hood with the laces around Sumiko’s heart-shaped face. “Wow!” He said, exaggerating his enthusiasm, “Look at you, sweetheart, you’re so pretty!”
She looked down at herself, smiling her four-tooth smile, and clapped her hands together.
“Come show daddy how badass you look,” Dean called, sitting up, and Sumiko all but ran to him, mumbling some nonsense that made Dean burst out laughing.
There was one last mic test and some city official climbed on stage. Sumiko froze when she heard the voice echo and Sam sat next to her, holding her through the official’s speech and keeping an eye on Dean’s face to see how it changed when the man explained what the concert would feature.
The speech ended with the words: “So tonight is our opening night, and we always have a little something special planned. This year, we’re going classic, with the best rock songs of the sixties and seventies!”
Dean repressed his surprised expression as quickly as he could and shook his head. As the first notes of Children of Revolution started, he didn’t try to hide his smile anymore and turned toward Sam, rolling his eyes. “Look at you, all proud of yourself. Okay, Sam, you’re awesome, is that what you’re waiting to hear?”
“Damn right,” Sam said in the cockiest tone he could manage. And hell yeah, he was proud of himself, just as if he’d asked the Portland Orchestra to play Dean’s favorite music as a personal favor.
After a couple of minutes of not being entirely sure she enjoyed all the noise, Sumiko started smiling, mostly because Sam entertained her by singing the lyrics over the instrumentals while making goofy faces. She accepted being put in her stroller with the help of a sipping cup full of juice and, by the fourth song, she was already beginning to look sleepy despite the loud music.
Sam and Dean sat next to her on the blanket and Dean let himself lean against Sam’s chest, letting him bear the weight of his upper body and his round stomach. Sam didn’t say anything because displays of affection outside the bedroom were still rare between them and each time, he was afraid of breaking the magic. After a while, he slid one of his arms over his brother, holding him around the chest, feeling Dean’s body move with each inhale and exhale as well as the vibration from his throat as he hummed along with the songs.
It was close to ten o’clock in the evening when they announced the last song. Sumiko was sleeping soundly, her hoodie-covered head resting on her shoulder. Dean’s weight was heavy and hot and felt nice against Sam’s chest. The Rolling Stone’s Angie started with the chords and Dean immediately started following the beat with his fingers on his thigh.
“’Ve always loved this song,” he murmured.
He sang the first verse almost inaudibly in a hoarse voice that was miles away from the one he used in the car just to annoy Sam.
This, this voice was wonderful, broken and raw, and it raised an old memory in Sam’s mind.
“Dad used to sing this sometimes, right?”
“Yeah. He sometimes sang it when he was in the mood, which wasn't all that often.”
“Was he any good?”
Dean snorted. “I don’t know, man. Was so impressed to hear my dad sing I didn't care if he was good or not.
“Angie.”
“Angie. I like the name too. It’s a strong name, the name of someone who knows what she wants.”
“Angie…” Sam repeated again. He wasn’t listening to the song anymore. Something in Dean’s tone had grabbed his attention. He pushed himself up and angled his head to look at Dean’s face. “You really like the name?”
“Well… Yeah.”
“Like… enough to name our second daughter after it?”
Dean shrugged. “Maybe? I mean… I doubt we’ll find another magical name - we don’t even know if it works anyway. With everything that has happened to her, and she’s not even born yet, I guess a normal name would be nice.”
Sam really liked the name, especially the way it sounded when Dean sang it. “But Angie is a nickname. Would she be an Angela, Angelina or Angelica?”
“You serious?”
Dean moved so that he could see Sam better. “About the name? Angie?”
“Why not? I like it.”
“Well…"
“Oh, Dean, I just remembered something.”
It was perfect. Sam kissed Dean’s cheek, feeling close to euphoria. “There's this old goddess… Well, it’s not really a goddess. It’s an old personified concept, comes from the Greeks-”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“The name Angelia. It means messenger.”
“Oh.”
Dean seemed speechless for a little while. “It’s nice.” he whispered.
“Yeah, right?”
“How the hell do you know these things?”
“I’m a geek.”
“That, you are.”
“So? What do you say? Angelia Winchester. Angie.”
Dean raised a surprised eyebrow. “Just like that?”
“Why not?”
Dean smiled. “There goes normal. Our daughter, the messenger.”
“We don’t have to if-“
“No. No, I like it. And she likes the song.”
“What?”
“Don’t panic. No special connection here. Just, she's been moving since they started playing it.”
“Well, that’s settled then.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
Dean lay on his back, eyes raised to the stars. “You really think we can pull it off?” He asked as the last notes of the songs drifted into the night.
Sam lay on his side, resting his head in his hand. “Dean…”
“I mean, this… pregnancy started all wrong and dramatic and… Now, it seems so normal - hey, normal, word of the day. Anyway, you know what I mean, right? Don't you get the feeling that it's all gonna come back to bite us in the ass?”
Yeah, sometimes Sam thought the exact same thing. Severing the connection had been good for all of them, the baby included, but with their luck, he sometimes felt they got away too easy. Then again, they were so used to the damn Winchester “luck” that maybe it was just a matter of perception. Most of all, Sam wanted to believe everything would be fine.
“Everything will be fine,” is what he said, putting as much conviction as he could into those words.
Then, he bent down toward Dean’s stomach and added, “Right, Angie?” before kissing the jutted navel of Dean’s belly.
“Stop it, you dork,” Dean murmured, pushing Sam away from him.
But he was still smiling. Sam kissed him again, on the mouth this time. As Dean responded eagerly to it, shoving his tongue in Sam’s mouth, Sam thought he heard something in the woods nearby, a very discreet snap, as though a branch had been stomped on. Then, the crowd exploded in an ovation, eagerly applauding the orchestra’s conductor over the praise of the city official and Sam forgot about something as insignificant as a branch snapping in the woods.
::: :::
Freeport, June 11
The day had been as hot as a real summer day. The kids at school were loud and agitated, the promise of two months of vacation seeming closer than ever now that the temperature was getting warmer. It was a Friday and Sam couldn’t wait to get home and take a shower. The cooling system at the school wasn’t very efficient and Sam felt his shirt sticking to his body, wet with sweat. When he got into the Impala, the black, leather seat covered damn Impala, it felt like he was burning alive. He opened the four windows and drove fast, but even so by the time he got back home, his hair was dripping sweat onto his face.
Their house by the beach was beautiful in this late spring. The garden needed some work and the trees some trimming. Maybe they could give the porch a coat of paint too. All those projects were on Sam's summer agenda. Ten more days and he would be on vacation. It would be a relief to spend some real time with Dean and Sumiko. He would be able to help Dean with his home job, allow him to rest. Since Clover wasn’t coming home to babysit anymore, Dean had to take care of the house and Sumiko all by himself and his pregnancy was starting to seriously take a toll on him. The worst of it would definitely be getting through July and August and Sam would be there every step of the way.
Sam didn’t go into the house right away. He walked around the garden and looked down at the beach. Dean liked to take Sumiko there after her afternoon nap, when the weather permitted it, and sure enough, they were there. Sam took off his shirt and left it on the fence, then went down the soft soil path that led to the beach.
Dean had found an old beach umbrella in the garden shed and was using it to protect Sumiko, as well as himself, from the sun. They were both sitting on a long towel, Sumiko wearing a small green jumpsuit and a large white hat, sunglasses perched unevenly on her nose. She was taking sand in both hands and trying to fill a plastic bucket with Dean's help. A white tee was stretched over his stomach, his maternity jeans rolled up to his knees. He was barefoot and his ankles were slightly swollen. His hair was a wet mess, his face red from the heat. He smiled and Sam felt his heart clench a little at the sight of Dean’s visible tiredness.
“Hey,” He said, crouching near the both of them.
“Dadam!” Sumiko sang, letting go of the sand she was holding to crawl toward him.
“Give me a kiss,” Sam asked, taking her on his lap.
She did, mouth open and wet, pressing it lightly against Sam’s cheek. He felt something prickling his skin and when he looked at Sumiko, he saw brown grains around her mouth.
“Dean? Did you let her eat sand?”
Dean shrugged. “Maybe a little.”
“It’s not good for her.”
“Come on! I didn’t do it on purpose. Beside, you used to eat sand all the time when you were young and Dad said it cleaned your digestive system.” Dean added.
“You’re shitting me.”
“Well, you stayed stuck in your oral phase a freakishly long time. One morning, you were four I think, Dad woke up and you were sucking a silver bullet like it was candy.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Hey, got something to show you.”
Dean grabbed Sumiko and took her sunglasses away. She blinked at Sam and smiled.
“What?”
“On her cheeks and nose. Look closely.”
Sam squinted his eyes and observed his daughter’s face, guessing immediately what Dean was referring to. Sumiko’s first freckles had started to appear. She had three on the bridge of her nose and two on her left cheek.
“Oh, would you look at that,” he said softly.
“Yeah,” Dean agreed, sounding disgusted. “I mean, I cover her with like… 8000 fps sunscreen every hour and still.”
“They're c-“
“I swear to god, if you say cute I’m gonna punch you.”
“Well she’s got your skin.”
“Yeah, poor baby,” Dean winced then, tried to shift from one hip to the other, and paled all of a sudden.
“Dean?”
“Sam, hold her,” he snarled between clenched teeth.
Sue let out a small whimpering noise, but didn’t resist. Instead, she buried her face in the crook of Sam’s neck while Dean wrapped his arms around himself and groaned loudly.
“Aw, fuck, here we go again,” he murmured.
“The pain?”
“Yeah… Holy shit, Sam.”
“You sure it’s the same thing as-“
“YES! For Christ’s sake, stop talking to me.”
“Well… um… okay. Stay here, lie down, I’ll take Sue into the house and come back for you.”
Sumiko gripped Sam’s neck, whimpering daa-daa-dee almost constantly while Dean twisted and lay on his side. The sun was still hot in the sky, there was a small breeze coming from the ocean, but not enough to cool Sam down. He stood up and ran to the house to put Sumiko in her play pen, then walked back to the beach to find Dean throwing up in the plastic bucket, which, for some reason, was one of the most pathetic things he’d ever seen.
He kneeled under the umbrella and held Dean as best he could.
“Don’t say anything,” Dean panted.
“I won’t.”
“I know what I must look like.”
“I don’t care.”
Dean wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and tried to get his knees under him, but another wave of pain struck him and he had to grip both of Sam’s arms not to fall on his stomach. “Shit, it hurts.”
“Come on. We’ll walk slowly. Sue’s in her pen.”
Dean braced himself and Sam could finally help him up, although he couldn’t unfold his body completely. They made their way very slowly to the house, Sam practically bearing all of his brother’s weight.
“Just thinking about what's causing this makes me wanna puke again,” Dean grumbled between pants.
“What? Your birth canal?”
“You had to go ahead and say it, didn't you? Shit, Sam, m’gonna fall. I can’t go on, it…”
“Just a little more, or do you want me to carry you bridal style?”
Dean snorted, then stumbled into Sam’s arms. “Fuck, don’t make me laugh.”
As they were walking around the garden to the front door, Sam caught a glimpse of something red move into the woods. It was gone in a blink and he didn’t give it a second thought, concentrated on getting Dean safely inside and relieving his pain.