And Make Their Quiet Pleas for Sanity
Dang it, you guys, I think I have a fever. And my sinuses are draining all over the place. I don't wanna work on spngenlove right now, but I need to. And I'll just stop whining now. If this installment gets a little incoherent toward the end, that's why. I think I lost the narrative thread at some point.
Fandom: Supernatural
Title: And Make Their Quiet Pleas for Sanity
Author: Maychorian
Characters: Bobby, Jimmy, Castiel, John, Dean
Category: Gen, AU, Pre-Series, Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Rating: PG-13
Warning: ( skip) Discussion of child abuse. Language.
Spoilers: Through S4. Previous stories in 'verse.
Summary: Jimmy doesn't want to go to school, and Bobby doesn't know what to do.
Word Count: 5181
Disclaimer: This is my Father's world, but it's Kripke's playground.
Author’s Note: Part of the Rain Falling Down AU.
And Make Their Quiet Pleas for Sanity
When the Winchesters left, Jimmy stared down the road after them, solemn and sad. He was in a funk for days, missing them, not saying anything about it but just...missing them. Bobby tried to distract him, but he wasn't really familiar with this kind of problem. He couldn't ply the kid with drinks until he forgot about it, couldn't slap him on the back and tell him to buck up, and that was about the extent of his consolation skills.
September was on them before they knew it, and that promised to be a darn good distraction, all right. Bobby fumbled his way through parental rituals he'd never performed before: enrollment, back-to-school shopping, nights spent awake staring at the ceiling hoping that his boy would do all right in a new school, that he would make friends and get along with his teachers and just...well...not have a total and utter breakdown over it, that was all.
Because Jimmy, usually the sweetest and most cooperative kid in the universe, was no help whatsoever when it came to this. He didn't want to go. He didn't want to go to school and he dragged his feet and he begged Bobby not to make him, but Bobby's hands were kind of tied over this one.
"Please don't make me go," he pleaded one day in late August, tears in his eyes, hands up around his face as if in a vain search for something to grab onto. "Please don't make me. I don't wanna go to school, Uncle Bobby, I don't wanna. Please don't make me."
Bobby sighed, shoulders slumping. He swept the hat off his head and rubbed his forearm over the sweat just below his hairline. They were standing in the kitchen, all the windows open and a fan running, and the heat was still oppressive. He'd been thinking about turning on the A/C when he'd come around the corner and found the kid like this, just standing there, crying. School started in a week and it was all either of them could think about.
"You gotta go, buddy," Bobby said. "Them's the rules. You don't gotta like 'em, but it's the way it is."
"I don't need school," Jimmy said desperately, burying his hands in his dark hair and tugging on it. "I know everything I need to know, I do! I can read and write and everything. I know stuff, way more than other kids. I don't need it and I don't want it, so why do I gotta?"
"It's the way it is, puddin'. The government." Bobby made that word into the worst cuss he'd ever uttered, spreading his hands helplessly. "Rules. They're keeping an eye on me, y'know, making sure I do right by you. And I intend to."
"Right, yeah, I'll do right by you," Jimmy rushed on, seizing on that idea. "I know I was lazy this summer but I can stop. I can help you. I can do lots of things. I can keep the house clean, or, or do something in the yard, and, and I can help with your research!" He scooped a book off the random stack that always seemed to sit on the kitchen table and started reading aloud. In the original Aramaic.
"Jimmy, that's not what..."
"Or other things, I can do other things." The boy's fingers were white around the book. "I can help with the formulas for the magic stuff you put together. You got quadratic equations? I can solve them." He grabbed a piece of scrap paper and a pencil and sat down at the table, poised to write, forehead wrinkled in concentration. "I'll show you, I will!"
And then the frantic demonstration ground to a halt. Jimmy sat there, tense, straining. A series of expressions flickered over his face-desperation, stubbornness, pleading, the stern, stony mask of old Jimmy when he was very displeased with something.
"Jimmy..." Bobby sat across the table from him, reached over to grip his frozen hands. "Jimmy, what are you trying to do?"
"I can do it!" The words ricocheted out of his mouth in a fierce burst, angry, scared. "He can do it, but he won't, he says... Come on! Do it!"
A sudden spike of terror numbed Bobby, too. The two personalities inside Jimmy were at war. How could this do anything but tear the boy apart? He had to stop this, he had to calm the kid down before he hurt himself.
"Jimmy, son, stop it. Stop it. It's all right. I believe you-you don't have to show me. I believe you."
Jimmy's hands went limp in his, the pencil falling the short distance to the tabletop and rolling away. The boy stared down at their linked hands, shoulders hunched, breath fast. At least he seemed to listening.
"Jimmy..." Bobby bit his lip. "I'm sorry, but even if you could do advanced calculus, even if you're a rocket scientist in there, you still gotta go to school."
"Please, no," Jimmy whispered.
And this quiet, shattered plea did more to break Bobby's heart than anything else had all summer, and that was saying a hell of a lot.
"Why are you so scared, huh?" he asked with the same quietness. "What's so terrible about school?"
Jimmy's shoulders crept up even further, almost hiding his ears, and he trembled in Bobby's grip. "Please... Please, I don't wanna tell you. I...just, I can't go to school, please don't make me."
Bobby frowned. "I'm sorry, but that's not good enough. Tell me why."
The boy darted a glance at him, eyes bright with moisture. Bobby felt horrible. But he kept his face stern, commanding. He needed to know what this was about.
Jimmy took a deep breath. He spoke slowly, reluctantly, as if every word hurt something inside. "Last year... It was all messed up."
Bobby sat very still.
The boy swallowed thickly. His voice was barely audible, and Bobby held himself rock-solid and silent, listening. "I couldn't do anything, I couldn't do anything right. Mr. Baker... He looked over my assignments, said it was important for me to do good at school, but I couldn't do anything right. I tried, I tried really hard." He looked up at Bobby, begging him to understand through eyes swimming with terrified tears, then quickly lowered his gaze again.
"I tried so hard, but it was never good enough. And just...I know it's gonna be the same. I'm still...I'm still just Jimmy, even though Cas... I mean, I know it's gonna be the same. And nobody...nobody at school is gonna care. They didn't before, not even right after my parents died and I had to move into a foster home and start all over at a new school... No one cared, I was just a foster kid. Why should they care now? It's not gonna be any different."
Bobby was trembling now, too, though not with fear. He tried to gather himself, tried to think of something to say, but nothing came to mind. It was like staring at a deep pit, a canyon ripped open by an earthquake, and wondering if some spackle might help. "Kiddo... Did you ever tell...? Your teachers, did they...?"
Jimmy shook his head and plunged quickly on, trying to explain. "I told my teachers that I wanted to do better, but they were all so busy, and... Nothing I said seemed to matter. Nothing, not anywhere. And then I...I stopped asking. I tried so hard, but I was never good enough, and I never will be. I'm not enough."
No one had noticed. God damn it all, this kid had been taken to pieces on a daily basis and no one had noticed. The failure was immense, overwhelming, and utterly enraging. Bobby didn't have words for the fury that was coiling inside him, eating up his gut and stealing his voice.
"Aw, Jimmy..."
"I'm sorry, I'll try to do better!" The kid was frantic again, tugging at his hands to free them from Bobby's grip, probably so he could tear at his hair again. Bobby refused to let go, unsure what else he could do. "I always tried, I did, but I can try harder. I'll do anything you want, just please don't make me go to school. Please, please don't make me go. I wanna stay here with you, Uncle Bobby, please let me stay."
"Kid, you gotta..." Bobby felt utterly helpless against this. Anything he could say or do would surely be inadequate. Talk about not enough. How could he possibly provide what this grievously wounded child needed? He didn't even know what it was.
Jimmy stared at him, sniffing, beseeching.
"C'mere." Bobby tugged on the boy's hands, pulled him around the table and into his arms. Jimmy came willingly and leaned against him, stiff with tension at first but slowly relaxing. Bobby rubbed his back and tried to figure out where to start.
"Jimmy, who told you you weren't good enough? Mr. Baker? One of your teachers?"
A faint shake of the head. "No one told me. I figured it out for myself."
Ah. Even worse. Bobby remembered what he'd read in those books about child abuse, how it was entirely natural for the child to believe that the violence and pain was somehow his own fault. The only alternative was to believe in a chaotic world where horrible things happened for no reason, and that defied childish logic and rationality. Believing that the fault laid with them gave these children some sense of control, a wisp of hope, even if it was entirely futile. Much easier to believe things would get better if I do this right, if I act just this way, if I do this, or this, or this... than to give into despair and surrender to the inevitable. It was defense and survival, same as the split personality.
But he didn't need it anymore. Time to move on. Somehow, if only Bobby could find the right words.
"They told you that by the way they treated you," Bobby said solemnly. "Kiddo, they were wrong. They were dead wrong. You're plenty good enough. You're one 'a the best little boys in all fifty states. Toldja that before, didn't I?"
Jimmy nodded against him, trembling. "You said something like that, yeah."
"Well, who you gonna believe? Them or me?"
The trembling went up a notch. Bobby held him tighter, heat be damned. The kid's voice was low, scared. "I want to believe you."
"Maybe part of you does."
Old Jimmy understood it, Bobby was pretty sure. Old Jimmy understood a lot of things. He was spooky like that.
But this Jimmy just went still against him, suddenly stone. It was the stillness of a hunted animal staring into a predator's eyes. "What do you mean?"
Bobby scowled softly to himself. This maybe was not such a good time for this conversation. Then again, maybe they'd been ignoring it long enough. "You call him Castiel."
Jimmy pushed away from him, skinny little arms thrusting off his chest with surprising power. Bobby let go, shocked by the vehemence in that gesture, and stared at the white-faced boy who stumbled across the kitchen and leaned against the cabinet to stare back at him. For a moment the kid's mouth just opened and closed, nothing coming out. Then, "You know?"
"I knew since day one," Bobby said gently. "Well, I knew somethin' was going on. That bastard messed you up in a hundred ways, and it's not your fault, it's not. You needed the reassurance of this, and it helped you get through to the other side, and I don't blame you one tiny bit. But honey, you gotta believe me when I tell ya that there's no angel inside you."
Jimmy went even whiter, impossible as it was, flinching back against the counter. "What?"
"Castiel, right? An angel of Thursday. I looked it up. That's who you think you got inside you. But it's just you, Jimmy. You ever heard of split personalities? You did it to protect yourself-from Baker, from the pain, from the confusion of your psychic abilities. It was good, honest, it kept you sane and in one piece long enough to find me. But you don't need it anymore. You're stronger than that."
"No, no, no." The words were faint and horrified. Jimmy shook his head from side to side, volume steadily building. "No, no, no no no. No, Uncle Bobby, no, you don't understand!"
"Son, I do understand. I understand everything." Bobby rose to his feet and carefully crossed the kitchen, hands spread open and wide. "It's okay, it's okay. They're both part of you, this personality and the one you call Castiel. I like 'em both. I like all of you. You can be yourself. It's gonna be okay."
"He's an angel, Uncle Bobby. He's an angel. He came and he saved me, but he's hurt too, he's trapped inside me, that's why he can't leave, but he's an angel, he really is. Please, please, you hafta believe me." Jimmy's voice was low and urgent, but he sagged back against the cabinet, giving in. Being this desperate for this long must be exhausting.
Bobby paused, hating the way the kid shrank away from him. "I'm not gonna hurt you. Either of you. I want to help."
The boy lowered his head for a moment, and when he raised it, it was old Jimmy, Castiel, the angel, the split, the shield, calm and certain and rigid as granite. His hands came down and his back straightened, and he stood tall and still, regal and commanding. "Bobby Singer. You understand nothing of this situation."
Bobby inclined his head slightly, telling him that he was listening. He backed off a step, waiting, aware that this little guy needed the space, the distance.
Castiel nodded slowly, taking this gesture of respect as his due. "I am an angel of the Lord. I am separate from Jimmy Novak, complete in myself, a wholly different entity, only imprisoned in this body."
Bobby kept his hands out, his voice soothing. This was just as much his kid as young Jimmy was. "Castiel, this is a fiction you invented to protect yourself. Angels aren't real. Jimmy...you grew up in a Christian household, learned the Bible at your parents' knee. Of course when the psychic stuff started showing up, it scared you. So you decided it came from God. It's okay. It was a logical conclusion. But it's false."
Castiel shook his head, slow, solemn. "Jimmy Novak is not psychic. He is a perfectly normal little boy, besides the unique touch that makes him fit to be an angelic vessel. He knows the future because I know the future, because I came from there. I saw the end of the world and I brought myself back here to change it. In the process I was injured, my grace twisted and cut, and I cannot heal it alone. If I were fully myself, I would be able to prove this to you, but all I have now are words."
"I never heard of angels traveling through time." Bobby shook his head, forehead wrinkling. "I never heard of anything like this ever before, and believe me, I've read a lot of books. No one's seen an angel in hundreds of years, and the accounts before then are strictly religious. Angels don't exist."
Castiel's mouth twisted. "And yet I am here. Time is fluid, Uncle Bobby. Sometimes it can be bent. Before I came here in 2008, no angel had walked the earth in two thousand years. But I am here now."
Oh, this elaborate fantasy. Bobby sighed and wiped the sweat from his forehead again. The story Jimmy had built for himself was deep, entrenched, a protective fortress built with roots digging into his soul. Bobby started to wonder if this was the right path to take, trying to root out something so completely intertwined with the boy's spirit. He didn't see how he could dismantle it without taking Jimmy apart right along with it.
But no. The truth was always better than the lie, even if it hurt.
Castiel sighed, too. He sounded old, and exasperated, and very, very tired. "This is why I didn't tell you who I was immediately," he said. "This lack of faith in the majority of humans in this time... It's very frustrating."
Bobby might have found his expression intimidating, if he wasn't sure deep down that this was really his Jimmy, somewhere in there. The boy's head tipped back, eyes closing, and he pulled in a deep breath, tension flooding his body like that of an athlete preparing to sprint or jump or attempt some other feat.
The lightbulb above their heads flickered even though the light wasn't on, and Bobby looked up in sudden alarm. The radio next to the sink turned on, hissed with static, turned off again. More lights began to strobe on and off, the kitchen, then the next room.
The kid was shaking, a torrent of blood flowing from his nose.
"Jimmy!" Bobby grabbed his arms. "Castiel! Stop it! What are you trying to do?"
"Trying...to...show you," Castiel said through gritted teeth. It was the first time his voice had sounded anything but calm. This was the same desperation that had heightened Jimmy's voice when he begged Bobby not to make him go school, what felt like years ago.
"Stop it!" Bobby shook him, gently at first then with mounting panic. Tendons stood out on the kid's neck, his face drawn and long in a wrenching grimace. And blood, more blood, too much blood. "Stop! You're hurting yourself! Castiel! You're hurting Jimmy!"
The light show ended abruptly and Castiel slumped bonelessly toward the floor, head bouncing limply off Bobby's shoulder as he fell. Bobby caught him in his arms, lowered them down. They were getting blood everywhere, smearing it down Jimmy's neck, all over Bobby's chest. He didn't care as long as the flow had stopped.
He knelt there, clasping the exhausted child to him, heart pounding frantic and wild against his ribs. What the hell. What the hell.
"Sorry," Castiel murmured, a warm breath ghosting over the hollow of Bobby's throat. "I'm sorry. I can't do it anymore. I can't show you. My wings... I think they're broken."
The utter heartbreak in that small, weary voice sent a lump rocketing into Bobby's throat, all but suffocating him. He didn't think it would do any good at this point to tell the boy that the wings didn't exist. It was enough that Jimmy, that Castiel believed it, and felt the brokenness in himself. God, this poor kid.
"It's okay," he whispered. "We'll get 'em fixed."
"You don't think they're real," Castiel said bitterly.
Bobby never wanted to hear that kind of despair in Jimmy's voice, not ever again. "But you do," he said thickly. "So we'll get 'em fixed, somehow. I swear we will."
Castiel nodded wearily into his shoulder. "I want to believe you," he said in a tiny voice. "Jimmy wants to believe you, too. Do you want to believe us?"
"I..." Bobby blinked, trying to bring his thoughts into order. He considered himself to be a rational man, a man of science and knowledge, even if the realm of knowledge he pursued was exceedingly esoteric. He had accepted the existence of demons, when he was forced to. Why couldn't he believe in angels, too?
Because all of the lore, all of the research, all of the witnesses spoke against their existence, that was why.
Bobby blew out a lungful of air. "Yeah. Yeah, I want to believe you."
The kid drew in a deep, shaky breath. "Well, that's something."
Yeah, something. Not enough, but something. Bobby cradled Castiel to his chest, stroking his fingers through the dark, messy hair. After awhile he felt the little shift, the change in breathing, and knew that Jimmy had come forward again. He didn't stop caressing his hair, though, and Jimmy didn't move, didn't speak, not for a long time.
X
Jimmy got even more depressed and uncooperative after that. Bobby kept a sharp eye out, but he didn't see Castiel again, not even for a brief moment to study some ancient book or pause to enjoy the sunset, both things the older personality had done in the past. It was as if the roles were suddenly reversed, and Jimmy was protecting Castiel instead of the other way around. Both were wounded, and Bobby could help neither.
Jimmy saw him looking, once, and gave him a grim little smile, strange on his young face. "He's tired," he said, almost stiffly, accusingly, clearly feeling that it was Bobby's fault that his "angel" didn't want to come out. "He wore himself out trying to prove who he was to you."
Yep, that was definitely accusation in the kid's voice.
Bobby swallowed. "I'm sorry. I didn't want to hurt you, either of you. You know that, right?"
"Yeah." Jimmy nodded shortly, looking away. "He's just kinda...curled up, trying to rest. Castiel worries that he's not gonna be enough, too, y'know. He saw the end of the world and it was awful, and he came back to try to fix it, and he's all alone and he's hurt and he's scared, and he's not used to being any of those things. It's hard for him."
"I'm sorry," Bobby said again, helplessly. "I wish I could help."
Jimmy gave him a calculating look. "You could let us stay home from school. It's gonna be useless, anyway."
It always came back to that, now. Bobby frowned and shook his head. Jimmy heaved a full-body sigh and went back to what he'd been doing.
A couple days later the phone rang in the evening. It was late enough in the day that Bobby figured it probably wasn't one of those annoying social workers or something, but he still hesitated before picking up the handset. Jimmy was draped stomach-down over the armchair in the sitting room, head and shoulders hanging over the arm and feet in the air, staring listlessly into the fire. School started in three days and the kid was less and less inclined to do anything but brood about it.
"Singer Salvage," Bobby greeted shortly.
"Hey..." The guy on the other end sounded hesitant, unsure of what he was doing. "This is John Winchester. Is Jimmy there? Dean wants to talk to him."
Bobby could hear the incredulity in the other man's voice. He guessed Dean hadn't wanted to talk to someone for a really long time, and now he was asking, John couldn't do anything but comply. "Yeah, he's here," he said more warmly.
He held the handset toward the boy. "Phone's for you. It's Dean."
Jimmy perked up instantly, looking more bright-eyed and interested than he had since the subject of school first came up. He popped out of the chair like a tousle-haired jack-in-the-box and reached eagerly for the phone. Bobby gave it to him and backed off, watching, just glad to see the kid looking happy for a little while.
"Hi, Dean!" Jimmy chirped, perky as a jaybird in spring. "How's Sammy? What've you been doing?"
The boys had only seen each other face-to-face for a few days, but already they had developed their own language, their own vocabulary and collection of in-jokes. Bobby sat back and observed, keeping still and hopefully unnoticed. A couple of times Jimmy's eyes flickered in a way that made him think that Castiel was coming out for a moment, but the feeling always passed quickly. It was obvious, though, that both Jimmy and Castiel had an immense fondness for Dean, curious about absolutely everything the younger boy had to say.
They chatted for a long time. Bobby had a sudden, frightening glimpse of what having a teenager might be like. Then Jimmy grinned brilliantly, chirped a good-bye, and held the phone toward Bobby. "Uncle John wants to talk to you."
Bobby felt his brow furrow. "Uncle John, huh?"
Jimmy nodded, completely casual and unconcerned. He wiggled the handset a little and Bobby took it. The boy flopped back into the armchair, still carrying a small smile and an air of lightheartedness, and gazed dreamily into the dying fire.
"Yeah?" Bobby turned slightly away, wondering what the hell Winchester had to say to him.
"Singer..." The younger man still sounded unsure of himself. "Listen, I've been thinking..."
"Didja hurt yourself?" Bobby couldn't resist asking.
John let out a startled chuckle, and the tension was broken. He continued speaking, more easily now. "Dean, you know, he hasn't been talking much. At all. And now this psychic little kid comes out of the blue, and suddenly he has a friend, and he wants to talk, and just... I don't want 'im to slide backward, y'know? And he's gonna start kindergarten and I was thinking maybe I should I find a place to settle, just for a little while, but I gotta keep moving, gotta learn all I need to know. There's this Murphy guy in Minnesota who's willing to teach me some things, and I was gonna put Dean in school there, but... Who knows if he'll make any friends there. Who knows how he'll do. And meanwhile there's Jimmy, and..."
"You don't wanna lose what you got," Bobby said. "I get it. And yeah, I know Jim Murphy. He's a good guy. But he doesn't know any more about the supernatural than I do, that I can tell ya. You want to learn, I guess I can throw a few books at you, set up a target range in the back of the junkyard. You could do worse."
Winchester chuckled again, relief in it, lightness. "Yeah, I could. So, uh... You don't happen to know of any job openings around your parts? For a mechanic, maybe?"
Bobby grinned now, unable to help himself. "I guess I could help you out. You'd better hurry out here, though. School's about to start, and I have no idea how the enrollment thing works when you're so late."
"Yeah, I have no idea either. Ma...Mary, she was the one who took care of preschool and all that."
Sadness surged through the man's voice, swift and strong as an undertow. Bobby felt himself softening. Again.
Weird to think about, but it was true. They were both new to this stuff.
Single parenthood.
Bobby cleared his throat, got out a gruff, "See you tomorrow, then? Minnesota's not that far."
"Tomorrow," John said. "Thanks, Bobby. I owe you. Big."
"I'll make you pay, don't worry."
"I figured."
Before the other man could hang up, Bobby cleared his throat again. "Uh, John?"
"Still here."
"Listen...you don't owe me that much. Jimmy needs Dean, too. I...well, I guess I'll explain when you get here."
John's voice lowered. "The...thing he does?"
"Yeah. Jimmy... He's gonna need a friend, just as much as Dean does."
They hung up, and Bobby made his way to the sitting room, leaning on the armchair next to Jimmy's feet. "Hey, kiddo. It was good to hear from Dean, yeah?"
Jimmy twisted on his side to look at him, arms akimbo against the chair's arm. "Yeah. I missed him."
Bobby nodded, patted his foot. "He missed you too."
"Dean's important," the boy said solemnly, something like Castiel's intense gravity shimmering in his young eyes. "So is Sam. Everything depends on them." He twisted back around to stare into the fire. "But right now they're just little kids. We need to keep them safe."
Bobby's heart gave a little pulse of pain at the way Jimmy said that, as if he wasn't a kid himself, as if he was an adult and this was all his responsibility. Too much, it had to be too much for such a young boy.
"Hey, you know... Dean's gonna be starting school, too."
Jimmy nodded. The lightheartedness had been fading fast as they talked. Now it was almost gone.
"Do you think you'd be a little less unhappy about going back to school if you knew Dean was going to be there, too?"
Jimmy looked at him from under his arm, doubt clear in his blue eyes, flickering in the old firelight. "That's not gonna happen," he said flatly. "Uncle John will keep him close, always, both of them, and Uncle John never stops traveling."
Bobby smiled. "What if you were wrong, just this once?"
Jimmy popped up again, almost as quickly as when he heard that Dean was on the phone. His eyes were wide and unbelieving. "Is that what he wanted to talk to you about?"
Bobby nodded, enormously glad to be giving the kid good news, just this once. "You won't be in the same grade, but kindergarten through sixth is all in the same building, so I'm sure you'll find a way to see each other. And after school, of course, and weekends."
Those blue eyes slowly widened until they seemed to take up half his face. "They're coming back here?"
"Tomorrow."
Jimmy grinned, bigger and brighter and broader than he had since the Winchesters had first driven away. He lunged forward to throw his arms around Bobby's neck in an exuberant hug, then ran off, bounding up the stairs, his cry trailing behind him in a wave of joy. "I have to get my room ready!"
Bobby chuckled softly and turned away.
Maybe the school year wasn't going to be so horrible, after all.
Maybe it would be okay if Castiel didn't come back.
Even as that thought half-formed in his mind, Bobby knew it was false. Jimmy was Castiel was Jimmy was Castiel. Even if Bobby didn't really want the so-called angel around, this eerie reminder of Jimmy's pain, he was part of the boy. And the truth was that Bobby missed him, too, missed his serious expression and big words and earnest, ancient eyes. If someone had asked Bobby two months ago, he would have said he'd be fine if "old Jimmy" disappeared forever, leaving behind just the happy, singing child who loved Bartholomew and food and following Bobby around like a puppy. But things had changed. These two...they were two sides of the same coin, diametrically opposed, yet still made of the same substance, the same stuff. Castiel had earned his respect and trust just as Jimmy had earned his affection and loyalty.
It was unfair, maybe, to pin all of his hopes on a five-year-old who was traumatized himself. But Bobby was really hoping that having Dean around would make this better, somehow, some way. Just knowing that he was coming had already made an enormous difference for Jimmy. Maybe things would turn out all right.
"Pinnin' all your hopes on tomorrow, Singer," Bobby muttered to himself disgustedly. "Just watch out you don't suddenly pop on a little red wig and burst into song."
Still. Tomorrow couldn't come fast enough.
(End)
Next: Short #2
Fandom: Supernatural
Title: And Make Their Quiet Pleas for Sanity
Author: Maychorian
Characters: Bobby, Jimmy, Castiel, John, Dean
Category: Gen, AU, Pre-Series, Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Rating: PG-13
Warning: ( skip) Discussion of child abuse. Language.
Spoilers: Through S4. Previous stories in 'verse.
Summary: Jimmy doesn't want to go to school, and Bobby doesn't know what to do.
Word Count: 5181
Disclaimer: This is my Father's world, but it's Kripke's playground.
Author’s Note: Part of the Rain Falling Down AU.
And Make Their Quiet Pleas for Sanity
When the Winchesters left, Jimmy stared down the road after them, solemn and sad. He was in a funk for days, missing them, not saying anything about it but just...missing them. Bobby tried to distract him, but he wasn't really familiar with this kind of problem. He couldn't ply the kid with drinks until he forgot about it, couldn't slap him on the back and tell him to buck up, and that was about the extent of his consolation skills.
September was on them before they knew it, and that promised to be a darn good distraction, all right. Bobby fumbled his way through parental rituals he'd never performed before: enrollment, back-to-school shopping, nights spent awake staring at the ceiling hoping that his boy would do all right in a new school, that he would make friends and get along with his teachers and just...well...not have a total and utter breakdown over it, that was all.
Because Jimmy, usually the sweetest and most cooperative kid in the universe, was no help whatsoever when it came to this. He didn't want to go. He didn't want to go to school and he dragged his feet and he begged Bobby not to make him, but Bobby's hands were kind of tied over this one.
"Please don't make me go," he pleaded one day in late August, tears in his eyes, hands up around his face as if in a vain search for something to grab onto. "Please don't make me. I don't wanna go to school, Uncle Bobby, I don't wanna. Please don't make me."
Bobby sighed, shoulders slumping. He swept the hat off his head and rubbed his forearm over the sweat just below his hairline. They were standing in the kitchen, all the windows open and a fan running, and the heat was still oppressive. He'd been thinking about turning on the A/C when he'd come around the corner and found the kid like this, just standing there, crying. School started in a week and it was all either of them could think about.
"You gotta go, buddy," Bobby said. "Them's the rules. You don't gotta like 'em, but it's the way it is."
"I don't need school," Jimmy said desperately, burying his hands in his dark hair and tugging on it. "I know everything I need to know, I do! I can read and write and everything. I know stuff, way more than other kids. I don't need it and I don't want it, so why do I gotta?"
"It's the way it is, puddin'. The government." Bobby made that word into the worst cuss he'd ever uttered, spreading his hands helplessly. "Rules. They're keeping an eye on me, y'know, making sure I do right by you. And I intend to."
"Right, yeah, I'll do right by you," Jimmy rushed on, seizing on that idea. "I know I was lazy this summer but I can stop. I can help you. I can do lots of things. I can keep the house clean, or, or do something in the yard, and, and I can help with your research!" He scooped a book off the random stack that always seemed to sit on the kitchen table and started reading aloud. In the original Aramaic.
"Jimmy, that's not what..."
"Or other things, I can do other things." The boy's fingers were white around the book. "I can help with the formulas for the magic stuff you put together. You got quadratic equations? I can solve them." He grabbed a piece of scrap paper and a pencil and sat down at the table, poised to write, forehead wrinkled in concentration. "I'll show you, I will!"
And then the frantic demonstration ground to a halt. Jimmy sat there, tense, straining. A series of expressions flickered over his face-desperation, stubbornness, pleading, the stern, stony mask of old Jimmy when he was very displeased with something.
"Jimmy..." Bobby sat across the table from him, reached over to grip his frozen hands. "Jimmy, what are you trying to do?"
"I can do it!" The words ricocheted out of his mouth in a fierce burst, angry, scared. "He can do it, but he won't, he says... Come on! Do it!"
A sudden spike of terror numbed Bobby, too. The two personalities inside Jimmy were at war. How could this do anything but tear the boy apart? He had to stop this, he had to calm the kid down before he hurt himself.
"Jimmy, son, stop it. Stop it. It's all right. I believe you-you don't have to show me. I believe you."
Jimmy's hands went limp in his, the pencil falling the short distance to the tabletop and rolling away. The boy stared down at their linked hands, shoulders hunched, breath fast. At least he seemed to listening.
"Jimmy..." Bobby bit his lip. "I'm sorry, but even if you could do advanced calculus, even if you're a rocket scientist in there, you still gotta go to school."
"Please, no," Jimmy whispered.
And this quiet, shattered plea did more to break Bobby's heart than anything else had all summer, and that was saying a hell of a lot.
"Why are you so scared, huh?" he asked with the same quietness. "What's so terrible about school?"
Jimmy's shoulders crept up even further, almost hiding his ears, and he trembled in Bobby's grip. "Please... Please, I don't wanna tell you. I...just, I can't go to school, please don't make me."
Bobby frowned. "I'm sorry, but that's not good enough. Tell me why."
The boy darted a glance at him, eyes bright with moisture. Bobby felt horrible. But he kept his face stern, commanding. He needed to know what this was about.
Jimmy took a deep breath. He spoke slowly, reluctantly, as if every word hurt something inside. "Last year... It was all messed up."
Bobby sat very still.
The boy swallowed thickly. His voice was barely audible, and Bobby held himself rock-solid and silent, listening. "I couldn't do anything, I couldn't do anything right. Mr. Baker... He looked over my assignments, said it was important for me to do good at school, but I couldn't do anything right. I tried, I tried really hard." He looked up at Bobby, begging him to understand through eyes swimming with terrified tears, then quickly lowered his gaze again.
"I tried so hard, but it was never good enough. And just...I know it's gonna be the same. I'm still...I'm still just Jimmy, even though Cas... I mean, I know it's gonna be the same. And nobody...nobody at school is gonna care. They didn't before, not even right after my parents died and I had to move into a foster home and start all over at a new school... No one cared, I was just a foster kid. Why should they care now? It's not gonna be any different."
Bobby was trembling now, too, though not with fear. He tried to gather himself, tried to think of something to say, but nothing came to mind. It was like staring at a deep pit, a canyon ripped open by an earthquake, and wondering if some spackle might help. "Kiddo... Did you ever tell...? Your teachers, did they...?"
Jimmy shook his head and plunged quickly on, trying to explain. "I told my teachers that I wanted to do better, but they were all so busy, and... Nothing I said seemed to matter. Nothing, not anywhere. And then I...I stopped asking. I tried so hard, but I was never good enough, and I never will be. I'm not enough."
No one had noticed. God damn it all, this kid had been taken to pieces on a daily basis and no one had noticed. The failure was immense, overwhelming, and utterly enraging. Bobby didn't have words for the fury that was coiling inside him, eating up his gut and stealing his voice.
"Aw, Jimmy..."
"I'm sorry, I'll try to do better!" The kid was frantic again, tugging at his hands to free them from Bobby's grip, probably so he could tear at his hair again. Bobby refused to let go, unsure what else he could do. "I always tried, I did, but I can try harder. I'll do anything you want, just please don't make me go to school. Please, please don't make me go. I wanna stay here with you, Uncle Bobby, please let me stay."
"Kid, you gotta..." Bobby felt utterly helpless against this. Anything he could say or do would surely be inadequate. Talk about not enough. How could he possibly provide what this grievously wounded child needed? He didn't even know what it was.
Jimmy stared at him, sniffing, beseeching.
"C'mere." Bobby tugged on the boy's hands, pulled him around the table and into his arms. Jimmy came willingly and leaned against him, stiff with tension at first but slowly relaxing. Bobby rubbed his back and tried to figure out where to start.
"Jimmy, who told you you weren't good enough? Mr. Baker? One of your teachers?"
A faint shake of the head. "No one told me. I figured it out for myself."
Ah. Even worse. Bobby remembered what he'd read in those books about child abuse, how it was entirely natural for the child to believe that the violence and pain was somehow his own fault. The only alternative was to believe in a chaotic world where horrible things happened for no reason, and that defied childish logic and rationality. Believing that the fault laid with them gave these children some sense of control, a wisp of hope, even if it was entirely futile. Much easier to believe things would get better if I do this right, if I act just this way, if I do this, or this, or this... than to give into despair and surrender to the inevitable. It was defense and survival, same as the split personality.
But he didn't need it anymore. Time to move on. Somehow, if only Bobby could find the right words.
"They told you that by the way they treated you," Bobby said solemnly. "Kiddo, they were wrong. They were dead wrong. You're plenty good enough. You're one 'a the best little boys in all fifty states. Toldja that before, didn't I?"
Jimmy nodded against him, trembling. "You said something like that, yeah."
"Well, who you gonna believe? Them or me?"
The trembling went up a notch. Bobby held him tighter, heat be damned. The kid's voice was low, scared. "I want to believe you."
"Maybe part of you does."
Old Jimmy understood it, Bobby was pretty sure. Old Jimmy understood a lot of things. He was spooky like that.
But this Jimmy just went still against him, suddenly stone. It was the stillness of a hunted animal staring into a predator's eyes. "What do you mean?"
Bobby scowled softly to himself. This maybe was not such a good time for this conversation. Then again, maybe they'd been ignoring it long enough. "You call him Castiel."
Jimmy pushed away from him, skinny little arms thrusting off his chest with surprising power. Bobby let go, shocked by the vehemence in that gesture, and stared at the white-faced boy who stumbled across the kitchen and leaned against the cabinet to stare back at him. For a moment the kid's mouth just opened and closed, nothing coming out. Then, "You know?"
"I knew since day one," Bobby said gently. "Well, I knew somethin' was going on. That bastard messed you up in a hundred ways, and it's not your fault, it's not. You needed the reassurance of this, and it helped you get through to the other side, and I don't blame you one tiny bit. But honey, you gotta believe me when I tell ya that there's no angel inside you."
Jimmy went even whiter, impossible as it was, flinching back against the counter. "What?"
"Castiel, right? An angel of Thursday. I looked it up. That's who you think you got inside you. But it's just you, Jimmy. You ever heard of split personalities? You did it to protect yourself-from Baker, from the pain, from the confusion of your psychic abilities. It was good, honest, it kept you sane and in one piece long enough to find me. But you don't need it anymore. You're stronger than that."
"No, no, no." The words were faint and horrified. Jimmy shook his head from side to side, volume steadily building. "No, no, no no no. No, Uncle Bobby, no, you don't understand!"
"Son, I do understand. I understand everything." Bobby rose to his feet and carefully crossed the kitchen, hands spread open and wide. "It's okay, it's okay. They're both part of you, this personality and the one you call Castiel. I like 'em both. I like all of you. You can be yourself. It's gonna be okay."
"He's an angel, Uncle Bobby. He's an angel. He came and he saved me, but he's hurt too, he's trapped inside me, that's why he can't leave, but he's an angel, he really is. Please, please, you hafta believe me." Jimmy's voice was low and urgent, but he sagged back against the cabinet, giving in. Being this desperate for this long must be exhausting.
Bobby paused, hating the way the kid shrank away from him. "I'm not gonna hurt you. Either of you. I want to help."
The boy lowered his head for a moment, and when he raised it, it was old Jimmy, Castiel, the angel, the split, the shield, calm and certain and rigid as granite. His hands came down and his back straightened, and he stood tall and still, regal and commanding. "Bobby Singer. You understand nothing of this situation."
Bobby inclined his head slightly, telling him that he was listening. He backed off a step, waiting, aware that this little guy needed the space, the distance.
Castiel nodded slowly, taking this gesture of respect as his due. "I am an angel of the Lord. I am separate from Jimmy Novak, complete in myself, a wholly different entity, only imprisoned in this body."
Bobby kept his hands out, his voice soothing. This was just as much his kid as young Jimmy was. "Castiel, this is a fiction you invented to protect yourself. Angels aren't real. Jimmy...you grew up in a Christian household, learned the Bible at your parents' knee. Of course when the psychic stuff started showing up, it scared you. So you decided it came from God. It's okay. It was a logical conclusion. But it's false."
Castiel shook his head, slow, solemn. "Jimmy Novak is not psychic. He is a perfectly normal little boy, besides the unique touch that makes him fit to be an angelic vessel. He knows the future because I know the future, because I came from there. I saw the end of the world and I brought myself back here to change it. In the process I was injured, my grace twisted and cut, and I cannot heal it alone. If I were fully myself, I would be able to prove this to you, but all I have now are words."
"I never heard of angels traveling through time." Bobby shook his head, forehead wrinkling. "I never heard of anything like this ever before, and believe me, I've read a lot of books. No one's seen an angel in hundreds of years, and the accounts before then are strictly religious. Angels don't exist."
Castiel's mouth twisted. "And yet I am here. Time is fluid, Uncle Bobby. Sometimes it can be bent. Before I came here in 2008, no angel had walked the earth in two thousand years. But I am here now."
Oh, this elaborate fantasy. Bobby sighed and wiped the sweat from his forehead again. The story Jimmy had built for himself was deep, entrenched, a protective fortress built with roots digging into his soul. Bobby started to wonder if this was the right path to take, trying to root out something so completely intertwined with the boy's spirit. He didn't see how he could dismantle it without taking Jimmy apart right along with it.
But no. The truth was always better than the lie, even if it hurt.
Castiel sighed, too. He sounded old, and exasperated, and very, very tired. "This is why I didn't tell you who I was immediately," he said. "This lack of faith in the majority of humans in this time... It's very frustrating."
Bobby might have found his expression intimidating, if he wasn't sure deep down that this was really his Jimmy, somewhere in there. The boy's head tipped back, eyes closing, and he pulled in a deep breath, tension flooding his body like that of an athlete preparing to sprint or jump or attempt some other feat.
The lightbulb above their heads flickered even though the light wasn't on, and Bobby looked up in sudden alarm. The radio next to the sink turned on, hissed with static, turned off again. More lights began to strobe on and off, the kitchen, then the next room.
The kid was shaking, a torrent of blood flowing from his nose.
"Jimmy!" Bobby grabbed his arms. "Castiel! Stop it! What are you trying to do?"
"Trying...to...show you," Castiel said through gritted teeth. It was the first time his voice had sounded anything but calm. This was the same desperation that had heightened Jimmy's voice when he begged Bobby not to make him go school, what felt like years ago.
"Stop it!" Bobby shook him, gently at first then with mounting panic. Tendons stood out on the kid's neck, his face drawn and long in a wrenching grimace. And blood, more blood, too much blood. "Stop! You're hurting yourself! Castiel! You're hurting Jimmy!"
The light show ended abruptly and Castiel slumped bonelessly toward the floor, head bouncing limply off Bobby's shoulder as he fell. Bobby caught him in his arms, lowered them down. They were getting blood everywhere, smearing it down Jimmy's neck, all over Bobby's chest. He didn't care as long as the flow had stopped.
He knelt there, clasping the exhausted child to him, heart pounding frantic and wild against his ribs. What the hell. What the hell.
"Sorry," Castiel murmured, a warm breath ghosting over the hollow of Bobby's throat. "I'm sorry. I can't do it anymore. I can't show you. My wings... I think they're broken."
The utter heartbreak in that small, weary voice sent a lump rocketing into Bobby's throat, all but suffocating him. He didn't think it would do any good at this point to tell the boy that the wings didn't exist. It was enough that Jimmy, that Castiel believed it, and felt the brokenness in himself. God, this poor kid.
"It's okay," he whispered. "We'll get 'em fixed."
"You don't think they're real," Castiel said bitterly.
Bobby never wanted to hear that kind of despair in Jimmy's voice, not ever again. "But you do," he said thickly. "So we'll get 'em fixed, somehow. I swear we will."
Castiel nodded wearily into his shoulder. "I want to believe you," he said in a tiny voice. "Jimmy wants to believe you, too. Do you want to believe us?"
"I..." Bobby blinked, trying to bring his thoughts into order. He considered himself to be a rational man, a man of science and knowledge, even if the realm of knowledge he pursued was exceedingly esoteric. He had accepted the existence of demons, when he was forced to. Why couldn't he believe in angels, too?
Because all of the lore, all of the research, all of the witnesses spoke against their existence, that was why.
Bobby blew out a lungful of air. "Yeah. Yeah, I want to believe you."
The kid drew in a deep, shaky breath. "Well, that's something."
Yeah, something. Not enough, but something. Bobby cradled Castiel to his chest, stroking his fingers through the dark, messy hair. After awhile he felt the little shift, the change in breathing, and knew that Jimmy had come forward again. He didn't stop caressing his hair, though, and Jimmy didn't move, didn't speak, not for a long time.
X
Jimmy got even more depressed and uncooperative after that. Bobby kept a sharp eye out, but he didn't see Castiel again, not even for a brief moment to study some ancient book or pause to enjoy the sunset, both things the older personality had done in the past. It was as if the roles were suddenly reversed, and Jimmy was protecting Castiel instead of the other way around. Both were wounded, and Bobby could help neither.
Jimmy saw him looking, once, and gave him a grim little smile, strange on his young face. "He's tired," he said, almost stiffly, accusingly, clearly feeling that it was Bobby's fault that his "angel" didn't want to come out. "He wore himself out trying to prove who he was to you."
Yep, that was definitely accusation in the kid's voice.
Bobby swallowed. "I'm sorry. I didn't want to hurt you, either of you. You know that, right?"
"Yeah." Jimmy nodded shortly, looking away. "He's just kinda...curled up, trying to rest. Castiel worries that he's not gonna be enough, too, y'know. He saw the end of the world and it was awful, and he came back to try to fix it, and he's all alone and he's hurt and he's scared, and he's not used to being any of those things. It's hard for him."
"I'm sorry," Bobby said again, helplessly. "I wish I could help."
Jimmy gave him a calculating look. "You could let us stay home from school. It's gonna be useless, anyway."
It always came back to that, now. Bobby frowned and shook his head. Jimmy heaved a full-body sigh and went back to what he'd been doing.
A couple days later the phone rang in the evening. It was late enough in the day that Bobby figured it probably wasn't one of those annoying social workers or something, but he still hesitated before picking up the handset. Jimmy was draped stomach-down over the armchair in the sitting room, head and shoulders hanging over the arm and feet in the air, staring listlessly into the fire. School started in three days and the kid was less and less inclined to do anything but brood about it.
"Singer Salvage," Bobby greeted shortly.
"Hey..." The guy on the other end sounded hesitant, unsure of what he was doing. "This is John Winchester. Is Jimmy there? Dean wants to talk to him."
Bobby could hear the incredulity in the other man's voice. He guessed Dean hadn't wanted to talk to someone for a really long time, and now he was asking, John couldn't do anything but comply. "Yeah, he's here," he said more warmly.
He held the handset toward the boy. "Phone's for you. It's Dean."
Jimmy perked up instantly, looking more bright-eyed and interested than he had since the subject of school first came up. He popped out of the chair like a tousle-haired jack-in-the-box and reached eagerly for the phone. Bobby gave it to him and backed off, watching, just glad to see the kid looking happy for a little while.
"Hi, Dean!" Jimmy chirped, perky as a jaybird in spring. "How's Sammy? What've you been doing?"
The boys had only seen each other face-to-face for a few days, but already they had developed their own language, their own vocabulary and collection of in-jokes. Bobby sat back and observed, keeping still and hopefully unnoticed. A couple of times Jimmy's eyes flickered in a way that made him think that Castiel was coming out for a moment, but the feeling always passed quickly. It was obvious, though, that both Jimmy and Castiel had an immense fondness for Dean, curious about absolutely everything the younger boy had to say.
They chatted for a long time. Bobby had a sudden, frightening glimpse of what having a teenager might be like. Then Jimmy grinned brilliantly, chirped a good-bye, and held the phone toward Bobby. "Uncle John wants to talk to you."
Bobby felt his brow furrow. "Uncle John, huh?"
Jimmy nodded, completely casual and unconcerned. He wiggled the handset a little and Bobby took it. The boy flopped back into the armchair, still carrying a small smile and an air of lightheartedness, and gazed dreamily into the dying fire.
"Yeah?" Bobby turned slightly away, wondering what the hell Winchester had to say to him.
"Singer..." The younger man still sounded unsure of himself. "Listen, I've been thinking..."
"Didja hurt yourself?" Bobby couldn't resist asking.
John let out a startled chuckle, and the tension was broken. He continued speaking, more easily now. "Dean, you know, he hasn't been talking much. At all. And now this psychic little kid comes out of the blue, and suddenly he has a friend, and he wants to talk, and just... I don't want 'im to slide backward, y'know? And he's gonna start kindergarten and I was thinking maybe I should I find a place to settle, just for a little while, but I gotta keep moving, gotta learn all I need to know. There's this Murphy guy in Minnesota who's willing to teach me some things, and I was gonna put Dean in school there, but... Who knows if he'll make any friends there. Who knows how he'll do. And meanwhile there's Jimmy, and..."
"You don't wanna lose what you got," Bobby said. "I get it. And yeah, I know Jim Murphy. He's a good guy. But he doesn't know any more about the supernatural than I do, that I can tell ya. You want to learn, I guess I can throw a few books at you, set up a target range in the back of the junkyard. You could do worse."
Winchester chuckled again, relief in it, lightness. "Yeah, I could. So, uh... You don't happen to know of any job openings around your parts? For a mechanic, maybe?"
Bobby grinned now, unable to help himself. "I guess I could help you out. You'd better hurry out here, though. School's about to start, and I have no idea how the enrollment thing works when you're so late."
"Yeah, I have no idea either. Ma...Mary, she was the one who took care of preschool and all that."
Sadness surged through the man's voice, swift and strong as an undertow. Bobby felt himself softening. Again.
Weird to think about, but it was true. They were both new to this stuff.
Single parenthood.
Bobby cleared his throat, got out a gruff, "See you tomorrow, then? Minnesota's not that far."
"Tomorrow," John said. "Thanks, Bobby. I owe you. Big."
"I'll make you pay, don't worry."
"I figured."
Before the other man could hang up, Bobby cleared his throat again. "Uh, John?"
"Still here."
"Listen...you don't owe me that much. Jimmy needs Dean, too. I...well, I guess I'll explain when you get here."
John's voice lowered. "The...thing he does?"
"Yeah. Jimmy... He's gonna need a friend, just as much as Dean does."
They hung up, and Bobby made his way to the sitting room, leaning on the armchair next to Jimmy's feet. "Hey, kiddo. It was good to hear from Dean, yeah?"
Jimmy twisted on his side to look at him, arms akimbo against the chair's arm. "Yeah. I missed him."
Bobby nodded, patted his foot. "He missed you too."
"Dean's important," the boy said solemnly, something like Castiel's intense gravity shimmering in his young eyes. "So is Sam. Everything depends on them." He twisted back around to stare into the fire. "But right now they're just little kids. We need to keep them safe."
Bobby's heart gave a little pulse of pain at the way Jimmy said that, as if he wasn't a kid himself, as if he was an adult and this was all his responsibility. Too much, it had to be too much for such a young boy.
"Hey, you know... Dean's gonna be starting school, too."
Jimmy nodded. The lightheartedness had been fading fast as they talked. Now it was almost gone.
"Do you think you'd be a little less unhappy about going back to school if you knew Dean was going to be there, too?"
Jimmy looked at him from under his arm, doubt clear in his blue eyes, flickering in the old firelight. "That's not gonna happen," he said flatly. "Uncle John will keep him close, always, both of them, and Uncle John never stops traveling."
Bobby smiled. "What if you were wrong, just this once?"
Jimmy popped up again, almost as quickly as when he heard that Dean was on the phone. His eyes were wide and unbelieving. "Is that what he wanted to talk to you about?"
Bobby nodded, enormously glad to be giving the kid good news, just this once. "You won't be in the same grade, but kindergarten through sixth is all in the same building, so I'm sure you'll find a way to see each other. And after school, of course, and weekends."
Those blue eyes slowly widened until they seemed to take up half his face. "They're coming back here?"
"Tomorrow."
Jimmy grinned, bigger and brighter and broader than he had since the Winchesters had first driven away. He lunged forward to throw his arms around Bobby's neck in an exuberant hug, then ran off, bounding up the stairs, his cry trailing behind him in a wave of joy. "I have to get my room ready!"
Bobby chuckled softly and turned away.
Maybe the school year wasn't going to be so horrible, after all.
Maybe it would be okay if Castiel didn't come back.
Even as that thought half-formed in his mind, Bobby knew it was false. Jimmy was Castiel was Jimmy was Castiel. Even if Bobby didn't really want the so-called angel around, this eerie reminder of Jimmy's pain, he was part of the boy. And the truth was that Bobby missed him, too, missed his serious expression and big words and earnest, ancient eyes. If someone had asked Bobby two months ago, he would have said he'd be fine if "old Jimmy" disappeared forever, leaving behind just the happy, singing child who loved Bartholomew and food and following Bobby around like a puppy. But things had changed. These two...they were two sides of the same coin, diametrically opposed, yet still made of the same substance, the same stuff. Castiel had earned his respect and trust just as Jimmy had earned his affection and loyalty.
It was unfair, maybe, to pin all of his hopes on a five-year-old who was traumatized himself. But Bobby was really hoping that having Dean around would make this better, somehow, some way. Just knowing that he was coming had already made an enormous difference for Jimmy. Maybe things would turn out all right.
"Pinnin' all your hopes on tomorrow, Singer," Bobby muttered to himself disgustedly. "Just watch out you don't suddenly pop on a little red wig and burst into song."
Still. Tomorrow couldn't come fast enough.
(End)
Next: Short #2