fic: The Long Silence of All That Lies Behind (SPN; Sam and Dean; gen)
The Long Silence of All That Lies Behind
Supernatural; Dean and Sam; pg; 5,738 words
"I thought I would always be able to protect them, and they didn't need to know. I didn't want them to worry."
Thanks to amberlynne and mousapelli for handholding and to luzdeestrellas for betaing. All remaining errors are mine.
~*~
The Long Silence of All That Lies Behind
The car catches his attention--1969 Chevy Malibu, mint condition, parked right there on the street in front of the house.
Dean stops scrolling, stares at the picture for a few seconds, and the words series of tragic accidents jump out at him from the article accompanying the photo.
"I think I got something," he says. Something that isn't demons, something that won't tie them up in knots, or add to the pile of secrets they're each hoarding. Something simple.
Sam looks like he's going to argue--seems like arguing is all they do these days--but he doesn't. Just nods and says, "Okay. Where?"
"Ozone Park, New York." Dean checks the article and pulls out the map, knowing that whatever route he picks, the traffic's going to be miserable. "We're only a few hours away."
"Ozone Park? Seriously?"
"Seriously."
Sam nods again, amused now. "Okay."
*
The neighborhood isn't quite what Dean expected. The picture in the article was of an unattached two-family house with faded pink and green siding, red brick steps leading to the front door, and a neatly-kept garden in the front yard.
The reality is older, sadder, less bright. As they drive down Atlantic Avenue, a large number of the buildings are covered in graffiti, and all the houses wear a vague attitude of defeat, as if they've given up and are just waiting for the day a demolition crew shows up to put them to rest.
They turn onto McKinley Avenue, and the kids playing football in the dying afternoon scatter ahead of the car like leaves swirling in the wind. Dean remembers being twelve, fourteen, old enough to want to be out all afternoon and young enough not to feel the chill of a late November day. There's a big square painted in the middle of the street, white lines faded, like nobody remembers how to play whatever game it was used for. Loud salsa music blares from a car parked on the corner, and three guys are drinking beer and peering under the hood, talking in Spanish too rapidly for Dean, with his two years of high school Spanish ten years ago, to follow.
The left side of the one-way street is a long empty stretch, so Dean pulls in, and the three guys start yelling at him.
Sam rolls down the window and one of the guys gestures to a sign Dean has been ignoring and says, "Alternate side of the street parking, man. You'll get a ticket if you park there."
Sam looks at Dean, and Dean shrugs. "Thanks, man," Sam says. "We won't be here long enough for that."
The guy shrugs in turn, and goes back to his conversation, but all three guys are watching the car with interest, and when Dean gets out, one of them says. "Qué lindo."
The first guy nods. "Sweet ride, man."
Dean smiles, apprehension about leaving the car on the street easing. He runs a hand over the Impala's roof. "She sure is."
"You get her from the original owner?" the first guy asks, and all three of them cross the street to circle her slowly, appraisal turning to admiration.
"Yeah," Dean answers with a pang. He forces himself to keep the smile on his face. He can't believe it's been a year--with everything else that's happened, he forgets sometimes, until it smacks him in the face. Now he's got less than a year himself, and too much to do before it ends.
"Cool."
The third guy, older than the other two, shorter and heavier and wearing a neatly trimmed beard, says, "You here about Joe DeMaio's car?"
Dean nods, glancing over at the Malibu brooding in front of the house. The Malibu doesn't have the same sleek lines as the Impala--it's a rounded, hulking thing that looks like it was built for power more than speed.
"Good luck with the daughter," the first guy says. The second guy laughs, elbows the first guy in the ribs, and says something in Spanish, but they both shut up when the older man glares at them.
"They've lived in this neighborhood for years," the older guy says. "Fallen on hard times lately."
Dean nods, not sure if the guy means the neighborhood or the DeMaio family. Probably both.
They talk about cars for a few minutes, as the late afternoon wanes into twilight. As they finally head up the steps and ring the doorbell, Dean notices the red paint is dull and flaking away, and the statue of Mary in the overgrown garden has been worn white by wind and weather.
A woman who is probably in her mid-forties answers, straight dark hair threaded with gray framing a pale moon face untouched by makeup. "Can I help you?"
"Sorry to disturb you," Sam says, pouring on the earnest charm, "but we heard you had an apartment for rent?"
*
Mrs. DeMaio is wearing a faded housecoat that was light blue once and is now the color of water in ice cube trays. She has on fuzzy gray slippers that were probably white when she bought them. Her hair is the same color as her slippers, thin and straight and combed back neatly from her thin, old-lady face; her eyes are set deep, with dark hollows beneath, and her nose is sharp and distinctive. The daughter's face is just as pale, but softer, fleshier, and her eyes are bright and watchful.
She leads them up the stairs, through the second floor apartment. "It's a nice apartment," she says, "a good place to raise a family." She looks at them, uncertain, and Sam smiles encouragingly, but offers no reassurance about anything. Dean doesn't smile at all; she's the kind of woman who would soak up the attention, and he doesn't want to raise any false hopes.
The apartment is large--six rooms altogether, bigger than most of the places they lived growing up, room for a dining room in addition to a living room, two bedrooms and a small bright room in the front whose purpose Dean can't suss out. Unlike the DeMaios' apartment, which looks like it dates from 1973, with its brown shag carpeting, brown paneled walls and brown refrigerator, this apartment is light and airy, even in the fading daylight, plaster walls painted a silvery white, with pale blue carpeting underfoot.
Dean slips the EMF meter on, one earbud in, and it rewards him with a steady whine as they walk past the bathroom and into the kitchen. Maria DeMaio chatters on about how it's a great place to live, she grew up here, and it's not as bad as some people think--it's so close to the subway, and do they work in the city? Her forehead wrinkles when she spots the bud in his ear, and he takes it out with an apologetic grimace.
Dean says they're writers, and she closes down. Dean's not sure if it's because it's some kind of new codeword for gay and she doesn't approve, or because she's figured out that they're here because of the series of dead tenants.
She leads them back down the stairs, quiet now. Sam starts asking questions, tries to get her to open up about the history of the house and its occupants.
While Sam's working his magic on the daughter and the wife, Dean checks out the backyard--garden going to seed, tall tree wrapped in a tarp lashed around with twine, and an empty lot behind it--and works his way back around to the front to contemplate the car.
"She's a beauty, isn't she?"
Dean jumps, startled, and turns to see an old man wearing a brown and grey plaid coat and one of those tweed hats like Sean Connery wore in The Untouchables. He's got a white moustache and is wearing thick black-rimmed glasses. He holds a rag in his hands, and Dean realizes he's been polishing the Malibu.
"Yeah," Dean says. "You Mr. DeMaio?"
"Call me Joe." He shrugs, holds up the dirty rag. "I'd shake but--"
"No problem," Dean answers. He jerks his chin at the car. "Sixty-nine?"
DeMaio nods. "Right off the assembly line. Hard getting parts for her now, though."
"I hear you." Dean remembers the weeks of scrounging through Bobby's scrap yard, of bidding for parts on EBay, of allowing himself the hope of saving the car, as if that would prove he would be able to save Sam, as well. "You're having trouble?"
"There's a knock in the engine. Can't figure it out. Old girl rattles sometimes."
Dean pats the roof of the car, which is cool to the touch, retaining no heat from the weak autumn sunshine. "You mind if I take a look? I know a little something," he says, shrugging one shoulder and nodding at the Impala. "Have to, to keep mine running."
The old man nods and pops the hood. "Sure, sure."
The engine's not in bad shape, though it looks like it hasn't been touched in a while. Old guy probably can't do much anymore--he looks like a good breeze would knock him over, and a classic car takes a lot of time and energy to maintain, not to mention money. Dean doesn't know if a union pension and social security allow for the kinds of expenses that might crop up, but he knows better than to ask.
He pokes around a little, makes soft humming noises to himself, and is so lost inside the familiar lines and curves of the engine that he doesn't notice Sam until he's standing right next to him. He almost hits his head on the underside of the hood.
"Jesus, Sam, make a little noise next time."
"Maybe you should pay more attention to your surroundings." For a second, Sam sounds so much like Dad that Dean's gut clenches, but he takes a deep breath, lets the grief roll through like a cramp.
Dean nods, point taken, and drops the hood. The old man is nowhere to be seen, which is a surprise, because Dean wouldn't have left some random stranger with his car, no matter how knowledgeable he seemed, but it's cold out and the guy is old, so maybe he's watching from the window. "What did we learn?"
"Not much we didn't know already. A married couple lived in the apartment for years before the husband died of a stroke, and the wife left to live with their daughter. The next tenants were another married couple--Johnny and Teresa Ciccatelli. They were younger, newlyweds. The wife grew up around the corner, and the husband was a real, um," Sam rubs his chin, frowning, "he was a problem, apparently. Mrs. DeMaio used some Italian word I don't know, but I gather it wasn't a compliment. They used to fight a lot. Neighbors called the cops once or twice, but the wife wouldn't press charges. And then, one day, she left. She went to a shelter, they think, or back to her family, who've since left the neighborhood and haven't kept in touch. Either way, Maria never saw the wife again. The husband left the keys in the mailbox and didn't even ask for the deposit back."
Sam shoves his hands into his pockets, his shoulders moving in a little shiver, and Dean realizes his own hands are cold. He heads across the street to the car, Sam at his shoulder, still talking.
"The tenant after that lived here for ten months before she drowned in the bathtub. Next one, also a neighborhood girl--her grandfather and Mr. DeMaio were in the Knights of Columbus together--lasted two months before she fell down the stairs and broke her neck. Then the apartment was empty for a while. Hard to get someone to rent it when the last two tenants have died. Especially if you're just asking around locally, where everybody knows the story."
"And then the guy last month?" He turns the heat on full blast, waits for it to warm up.
"Yeah. He was apparently the night manager at the McDonalds up the block, grew up flipping burgers there, worked his way up. He slipped in the shower, cracked his skull open." Sam frowns, squints off into the distance. "Could just be a run of spectacular bad luck, nothing supernatural at all."
"Something set the EMF meter off," Dean says, running the heel of his hand along the curve of the steering wheel, a habitual gesture, a comforting one. Sam inclines his head in agreement but doesn't offer another suggestion, so Dean says, "Poltergeist?"
Sam grunts noncommittally. "There's been some odd activity in the downstairs apartment--furniture moving on its own, doors and windows slamming, cold water suddenly scalding hot. Mrs. DeMaio said she's heard voices coming from upstairs." He shrugs. "Typical poltergeist mischief, but nothing deadly."
"EMF?"
"Nothing solid. It all happened to Mrs. DeMaio while she was alone. The daughter doesn't believe her; she thinks the old lady's losing it, though she didn't say it in so many words. So I don't know how reliable a witness she is." He shakes his head. "Spirit of the drowned girl?"
Dean nods, scrubs a hand over his face. "Could be." An angry spirit is probably easier to deal with than a poltergeist, and it's not like there's a shortage of deaths to investigate. "We know who she is?"
"Kristen Calloway. Grew up not far from here." He shakes his head again, looks around at the faded houses slumped over the cracked and littered sidewalk. "I don't get why they all seem to stay in this neighborhood."
The smell of something frying wafts out from a window, making Dean's mouth water. It's coming up on dinner time, but there are still kids riding past on bikes, though the football game broke up when the twilight deepened. People are coming home from work now, walking down the block from the subway station, occasionally greeting their neighbors.
"You don't?"
Sam frowns at him. "I just said I didn't. Do you?"
"Yeah," he says, looking in the rearview mirror at the faded white square painted in the center of the street, still visible in the darkness. "I think I do."
*
Kristen Calloway's parents live about six blocks away, on the other side of Liberty Avenue. It's a nicer, quieter part of the neighborhood, though the elevated subway tracks still overshadow everything else, and the roar and squeal of the trains never quite fades away; the people who've lived here their whole lives don't even seem to notice, and after a while Dean stops noticing, too.
"She didn't kill herself," Mrs. Calloway insists. She's a blocky woman with a hangdog face, salt and pepper hair, and a three-pack-a-day smoker's cough. Her husband is a big, beefy man with a red, pointy face like a ferret--he looks like a retired cop, did his twenty-five and got out with a pension and a drinking habit--but he just sits slumped in on himself in the easy chair, doesn't add anything to the conversation. "She was happy. She'd just found a new job, was talking about moving into the city."
"The police didn't find any evidence of a break-in," Sam starts.
Mrs. Calloway snorts and lights up another cigarette. "The police." The scorn in her voice reminds Dean of his father. He glances over at her husband, who doesn't even flinch, inured to his wife's seething disdain; he sits staring at a blank television screen, a million miles away. Dean understands how he feels.
They're not learning anything new here, and the dim, overheated apartment, with its nicotine-stained walls and smoke-filled air, is making Dean claustrophobic. He tips his head towards the door and Sam wraps it up, offers their condolences one more time, and then they're back out in the cold morning air.
"Why don't you go talk to the second girl's family, and I'll go back to the house, poke around a little more?" Dean says,
"You just want to get back under the hood of that Chevy."
Dean grins and doesn't deny it.
*
Nobody's around when Dean gets back to the DeMaios' house--the daughter mentioned a job in the city, so she's probably at work, and nobody answers when he rings the bell. The screen door isn't even locked, and the bolt on the front door is probably meant to be state of the art but is about fifteen years out of date. He locks it behind him--no need to let actual thieves in--and slips up the stairs silently. The door is closed but not locked, and it creaks when he pushes it open.
He takes his time sweeping for EMF, able to do a thorough job this time without Maria DeMaio watching him like a puzzled puppy; it buzzes intermittently in the kitchen and living room, and in the bedroom and the bathroom, it rises to a shrill pitch that hurts his ears. The bathroom has been scrubbed clean, no sign of either of the deaths that took place left on the pale blue tile or the porcelain tub, but even so, it makes his skin prickle. He pulls open the doors to the cabinet under the sink; the handle is loose and jiggles in his hand. There's a roll of toilet paper and a pair of rusty safety pins inside, but nothing else, no hint or clue as to what's killing the people who live here.
In the bedroom, the air is electric--whatever is haunting this place is stirring, and Dean knows he doesn't have much time before it puts in an appearance. He opens the closet, sees himself reflected in the speckled mirror hanging on the inside of the door, and frowns. The linoleum--which is teal and yellow beneath the ground-in dirt and probably older than Dean--is buckled and peeling, and Dean gets a glimpse of something underneath.
He uses the tip of his knife to pry it up enough to see the wood handle of a claw hammer. The EMF whines continuously, red lights all lit up, and with the help of his flashlight, Dean can see tufts of hair and dark scabs of dried blood clinging to the hammer's head.
"Yahtzee," he mutters, but there's no glee in it. They've obviously overlooked something, though he has a feeling if they get rid of the hammer, they'll get rid of the ghost, regardless of who it is.
The ghost must be thinking the same thing, because the bare hangers start rattling ominously, and he feels the otherworldly chill of ghostly fingers against his skin. Before he can grab the hammer, or even plan a defense, he's knocked ass over teakettle, and the closet door slams shut, bitter wind whipping the dust in the empty room into a frenzy.
Dean slowly levers himself to his feet, back flat against the wall, and inches his way out of the room and down the hall. He doesn't worry about stealth on the way out, scrambles down the stairs, takes them two at a time--it's a short staircase, only fifteen steps, but it feels like forever with an angry spirit at his back.
He's standing on the sidewalk, catching his breath and hunching his shoulders against the surprisingly chilly wind, when Joe DeMaio appears.
"Back again?" the old man asks.
"Wanted to get a better look at her pistons," Dean lies easily, pointing his chin at the Malibu. "I mean, you're putting high octane in her, right?" DeMaio nods. "So there's probably a sharp edge or groove in there somewhere, holding the heat and causing the problem." He babbles on about spark advance and combustion chambers for a couple of minutes, knowledgeable enough to only pay half-attention to what he's saying.
They pop the hood and Dean pokes around, segues from talking about the car to asking as casually as he can about the dead tenants.
DeMaio shakes his head. "A terrible thing. I never thought it would end up like this. Teresa was such a sweet girl, but her husband." He says something in Italian Dean doesn't understand, but from the old man's tone, he knows it's not complimentary. "I thought it wasn't my place--a man takes care of his family, you know? He shouldn't have other people telling him how to do that." Dean nods but keeps staring down at the engine, hoping the old man will keep talking. "A real man doesn't need to be told. So I knew what was happening--everybody in the neighborhood knew--but I didn't lift a finger to help her. When they moved out, I was glad to be rid of them, good riddance to bad rubbish." His voice is soft now, barely audible, and Dean straightens up, leans against the car to listen closely.
"I didn't lift a finger to help her," he repeats, "but I had to protect my own family. When it started, I went down to the botánica on Rockaway Boulevard, and the lady told me salt would do it."
"Salt," Dean mutters with an annoyed laugh, knowing he's still missing something.
"Salt," DeMaio confirms. "Across the thresholds, on the windowsills. My wife and daughter called me crazy, but they didn't question and I didn't explain." He shakes his head again, wipes his hands on his rag. "I thought I would always be able to protect them, and they didn't need to know. I didn't want them to worry."
They share a look of understanding, and Dean tries not to think about all the things Sam's going to have to worry about once he's gone, things he's never had to pay attention to before, things he doesn't know a damn thing about. He thinks of all the things he's always done to protect Sam, and how none of it's going to be enough when his year is up and he's not around to do them anymore.
The silence stretches, and the wind is cold against the nape of Dean's neck. He shivers, doesn't think of someone walking over his grave, the barren ground where Sam will scatter his ashes.
"So the husband killed her?" he says, because it's always a good idea to make sure the facts he has are right before he goes looking for the ones he doesn't know, didn't even know he didn't know until now, but that's the only scenario that makes sense.
"Dude, who are you talking to? And how did you know that?"
Dean jumps, startled at the sound of Sam's voice. "I swear to God, man, I am putting a freaking bell on you from now on."
Sam laughs, though there's an edge to it, always is lately, the two of them at each other's throats more often than not these days, like when they were teenagers and Sam was growing out of his clothes, out of his skin, out of his family. Sam's grown up since then, grown out of that habit, but he's been a fighter since the day he was born, and he isn't going to stop now. As much as it drives Dean crazy, he's glad Sam is like that--he knows that when he's gone, Sam will be able to keep going.
"Seriously, Dean. What the hell's going on with you?"
So many ways to answer that question, none of them what Sam wants to hear. "I was just talking to the old man. He was telling me about the tenant with the abusive husband. What was his name? Ciccatelli?"
"What old man?" Now Sam is giving him that concerned look, eyebrows drawn together, wrinkling his forehead, mouth turned down in a frown, gaze steady and penetrating.
Dean forces himself not to fidget, calling on years of meeting Dad's relentless gaze calmly to stare back at Sam without giving an inch. "Joe DeMaio. He knew there was a ghost. He was salting the house. I don't know why he stopped, but--"
Sam shakes his head, concerned look giving way to the patented Sam Winchester are you on drugs? face. "DeMaio died a few weeks before Kristen Calloway drowned. Had a heart attack one night and never woke up."
Dean raises a skeptical eyebrow. "I was just talking to the guy, Sam. We were working on the car and he was telling me--" He stops as it all clicks into place. He looks up at Sam, and it's like looking in a mirror, twin light bulbs lit. "The tenants started dying when DeMaio wasn't around anymore to protect the house."
At the same time, Sam says, "There are two ghosts."
"Oh, fuck me." Dean slams the hood down, then pats it absently, apologizing for the rough treatment the same way he would to his own car.
"How did you not--" Sam starts and then trails off, shaking his head. "Forget it, it's not important." It's not like Dean's not asking himself that same question, but he appreciates Sam letting it go for once. "I just got off the phone with Teresa Ciccatelli's mother. She didn't go home, and her family hasn't heard from her, or from Ciccatelli, since he moved away. And no shelter would give me any information."
"Can't blame 'em for that." Dean shrugs. He rarely feels any pangs of conscience when they flash their false badges, but he's glad they don't need to for this job. He hates those places, full of broken women with rightfully suspicious eyes, and crying kids who just want to go home. "I found the murder weapon in the apartment."
"You think salting and burning it will get rid of Teresa Ciccatelli's ghost?"
"I think it's the best bet we have, considering we don't know what her husband did with her body."
Sam nods, and they gather the supplies they'll need from the trunk.
*
Dean goes up the stairs first, shotgun at the ready, Sam scattering salt behind him, and here at least, they're still on the same page, too many years' spent living and training and hunting together for even constant arguing to disrupt their rhythm.
The sound of a woman crying echoes in the empty apartment, but the voices don't start until they're in the bedroom: You stupid bitch, I'll give you something to cry about, and then, Johnny, no, please.
Sam's mouth is tight, his eyes flat and his nostrils flared; Dean knows he's remembering some of the motels they stayed at as kids, some of the neighborhoods and trailer parks they lived in growing up, and the unavoidable sounds of other families' tragedies seeping through thin walls and open windows.
Dean yanks at the closet door, eager to get this over with, and silence the voices putting that look on Sam's face; it opens surprisingly easily under his hand, slams against the wall with a clatter.
"Under the linoleum," he says over the rising sound of crying and the ghostly wind that's begun whipping through the room. He points the shotgun at the buckled section of the floor and Sam crouches down, attempts to lay a salt ring around it, but the wind blows the salt away. "Just grab it," Dean says.
Sam nods, but when he reaches out, the ghost materializes, slams him back against the wall and flings the closet door closed again. Dean wants to avoid having to fire the shotgun--even though the neighborhood's not great, it's still the kind of place where gunfire draws attention--but the ghost is coming for him. The salt makes her dissipate for long enough for Dean to get to Sam's side.
"You okay?" He puts a hand under Sam's chin, tips his face up to get a look at his pupils. "You hit your head?"
"I'm fine," Sam snaps, batting Dean's hands away. "Get the hammer." Dean's torn, and he's going to say something about maybe getting Sam outside before coming back in alone, when Sam says, "Behind you!"
Dean turns and fires again. "Here." He shoves the shotgun at Sam and drops some shells in his lap before heading back to the closet.
Ghostly hands claw at him as he opens the door, and when he curls his hand around the handle of the hammer and pulls it out of its hiding place, all the skin on his body prickles from the way the ghost wraps itself around him. He backs away, and waves the hammer at Sam, who's aiming the shotgun in his direction from the doorway.
"Dean, come on."
"I'm trying, man."
They scramble down the stairs, two at a time, not even trying to be quiet now, the ghost howling in rage after them.
"We don't have much time," Sam says as they hurtle around the side of the house to the backyard, where he'd earlier dug a small hole and lined it with stones to use as a fire pit. "Someone's bound to have called the cops."
"No shit, Sherlock," Dean mutters, tossing the bloodied hammer into the dirt with one hand and digging the bottle of lighter fluid out of his pocket with the other. He douses it in butane while Sam covers it in salt.
Teresa Ciccatelli's ghost appears, shimmering in the weak autumn sunlight, and Dean can see she was pretty in a heavy-lidded, full-lipped way, even though her skull is bashed in and blood spatters her face and clothes.
Please, she says, as Dean strikes matches one after another and drops them on the hammer. Johnny, please. The wood catches, and then the hair clumped on the head of the hammer lights, and flames engulf the ghost.
Dean watches the fire lick along the handle as it burns, smoke rising in curls that look like ghosts, the heat cutting through the day's chill to warm his hands.
Sam nudges him in the ribs with a bony elbow. "Dean."
He looks up to see Joe DeMaio, still wearing his tweedy hat and clutching his oily rag, fading into the smoke. The old man inclines his head in thanks and then disappears for good.
*
Dean can hear sirens in the distance as they reach the car. There's a parking ticket tucked under the windshield wiper. He glares at it for a second, snorts at the ridiculous amount, then crumples it up and tosses it to the sidewalk, ignoring Sam's frown.
"We should probably get new plates," he says, after Sam has joined him in the front seat. "When I'm gone," he forces the words out, keeps his voice steady, "Bobby can hook you up with whatever you need for the car, help you stay off the Feds' radar. Take her back to see him every few months, and don't forget to change the oil."
"Dean--"
"If you're going to give her up--she doesn't blend in, and I know how big you are on blending in--just let Bobby keep her. You can get yourself one of those hybrid SUVs or something." He means it as an apology, an offering--something, shit, he doesn't even know, and it breaks his heart to even say it, though he knows Sam's probably better off in a less recognizable car.
"Goddammit, Dean, I'm not giving away the car, and I am not giving up on you. I wish you would get it through that thick skull of yours--"
Dean cuts him off by putting the radio on, and surprisingly, Sam lets him, though he still looks like a thundercloud, mouth pressed into a tight line and brows drawn together in frustration, and Dean knows the reprieve is only temporary. He finds the local classic rock station and, despite the fact that they're playing Jethro Tull, turns the volume up. He doesn't want to have this conversation again. Not when all he can think about right now is how it's only a few more months until he's gone, and Sam's going to be on his own, and there's so many things he needs to tell him, wants to do with him, and fighting is at the bottom of that list.
He normally hates driving in Manhattan, has routes marked in the atlas in orange highlighter to avoid it, but Sam likes the city, always has, so he goes left instead of right on Atlantic Avenue, heads towards the Brooklyn Bridge and the skyline he knows is just over the horizon. He's pretty sure they can find something to do. Possibly something involving naked girls and liquor.
A commercial comes on, and he says, "We should go to Scores, or maybe Goldfinger's."
Sam reaches out, flicks the radio off. "No."
"Come on, Sammy. Live a little." He glances over, gives a cajoling half-grin, pushes his luck. "Not like I got a lot of that left."
"And whose fucking fault is that, you stupid bastard? Do you think I don't know that?"
He almost misses the light turning red, hits the brakes hard, making them squeal. "Sammy--"
"Don't fucking call me that right now. Don't do this, Dean. Don't keep making me do this."
"If we're lucky, and traffic is moving, we could hit the library first."
"I'm not a kid anymore, Dean. Bribing me isn't going to get you what you want."
"What I want, Sam? What I want?" He tries to keep the anger out of his voice and fails. "You keep telling me I have to give a shit about myself, and, well, maybe I do, Sam. Maybe what I want is to have a good time while I have some time left, without fighting with you every time you open your goddamn mouth."
Sam looks so hurt and angry that Dean can't even take any satisfaction from leaving him speechless, which almost never happens. Sam's jaw works for a few seconds, like he's biting back all the words he wants to fling at Dean, and then he says, "The New York Public Library has a great occult collection."
Dean knows the conversation isn't over, knows Sam isn't going to ever give up on him, and though he'll never admit it, part of him doesn't want him to. But he'll take a few hours without fighting, a few hours of just hanging out with Sam and being alive. He reaches over, gives Sam's knee a squeeze, and laughs when Sam starts and gives a strangled yelp. He shoots another amused glance at his brother and smiles. When the light turns green, he hits the gas and aims for the horizon.
end
*
Notes: Title and cut-text from "There Is No Clear Light" by Pablo Neruda. I grew up in Ozone Park, and lived there up until five years ago, and while the ghost story isn't real, I've tried to paint an accurate picture of the neighborhood as it was when I left.
*
11/12/07
~*~
Feedback is adored.
~*~
Supernatural; Dean and Sam; pg; 5,738 words
"I thought I would always be able to protect them, and they didn't need to know. I didn't want them to worry."
Thanks to amberlynne and mousapelli for handholding and to luzdeestrellas for betaing. All remaining errors are mine.
~*~
The Long Silence of All That Lies Behind
The car catches his attention--1969 Chevy Malibu, mint condition, parked right there on the street in front of the house.
Dean stops scrolling, stares at the picture for a few seconds, and the words series of tragic accidents jump out at him from the article accompanying the photo.
"I think I got something," he says. Something that isn't demons, something that won't tie them up in knots, or add to the pile of secrets they're each hoarding. Something simple.
Sam looks like he's going to argue--seems like arguing is all they do these days--but he doesn't. Just nods and says, "Okay. Where?"
"Ozone Park, New York." Dean checks the article and pulls out the map, knowing that whatever route he picks, the traffic's going to be miserable. "We're only a few hours away."
"Ozone Park? Seriously?"
"Seriously."
Sam nods again, amused now. "Okay."
*
The neighborhood isn't quite what Dean expected. The picture in the article was of an unattached two-family house with faded pink and green siding, red brick steps leading to the front door, and a neatly-kept garden in the front yard.
The reality is older, sadder, less bright. As they drive down Atlantic Avenue, a large number of the buildings are covered in graffiti, and all the houses wear a vague attitude of defeat, as if they've given up and are just waiting for the day a demolition crew shows up to put them to rest.
They turn onto McKinley Avenue, and the kids playing football in the dying afternoon scatter ahead of the car like leaves swirling in the wind. Dean remembers being twelve, fourteen, old enough to want to be out all afternoon and young enough not to feel the chill of a late November day. There's a big square painted in the middle of the street, white lines faded, like nobody remembers how to play whatever game it was used for. Loud salsa music blares from a car parked on the corner, and three guys are drinking beer and peering under the hood, talking in Spanish too rapidly for Dean, with his two years of high school Spanish ten years ago, to follow.
The left side of the one-way street is a long empty stretch, so Dean pulls in, and the three guys start yelling at him.
Sam rolls down the window and one of the guys gestures to a sign Dean has been ignoring and says, "Alternate side of the street parking, man. You'll get a ticket if you park there."
Sam looks at Dean, and Dean shrugs. "Thanks, man," Sam says. "We won't be here long enough for that."
The guy shrugs in turn, and goes back to his conversation, but all three guys are watching the car with interest, and when Dean gets out, one of them says. "Qué lindo."
The first guy nods. "Sweet ride, man."
Dean smiles, apprehension about leaving the car on the street easing. He runs a hand over the Impala's roof. "She sure is."
"You get her from the original owner?" the first guy asks, and all three of them cross the street to circle her slowly, appraisal turning to admiration.
"Yeah," Dean answers with a pang. He forces himself to keep the smile on his face. He can't believe it's been a year--with everything else that's happened, he forgets sometimes, until it smacks him in the face. Now he's got less than a year himself, and too much to do before it ends.
"Cool."
The third guy, older than the other two, shorter and heavier and wearing a neatly trimmed beard, says, "You here about Joe DeMaio's car?"
Dean nods, glancing over at the Malibu brooding in front of the house. The Malibu doesn't have the same sleek lines as the Impala--it's a rounded, hulking thing that looks like it was built for power more than speed.
"Good luck with the daughter," the first guy says. The second guy laughs, elbows the first guy in the ribs, and says something in Spanish, but they both shut up when the older man glares at them.
"They've lived in this neighborhood for years," the older guy says. "Fallen on hard times lately."
Dean nods, not sure if the guy means the neighborhood or the DeMaio family. Probably both.
They talk about cars for a few minutes, as the late afternoon wanes into twilight. As they finally head up the steps and ring the doorbell, Dean notices the red paint is dull and flaking away, and the statue of Mary in the overgrown garden has been worn white by wind and weather.
A woman who is probably in her mid-forties answers, straight dark hair threaded with gray framing a pale moon face untouched by makeup. "Can I help you?"
"Sorry to disturb you," Sam says, pouring on the earnest charm, "but we heard you had an apartment for rent?"
*
Mrs. DeMaio is wearing a faded housecoat that was light blue once and is now the color of water in ice cube trays. She has on fuzzy gray slippers that were probably white when she bought them. Her hair is the same color as her slippers, thin and straight and combed back neatly from her thin, old-lady face; her eyes are set deep, with dark hollows beneath, and her nose is sharp and distinctive. The daughter's face is just as pale, but softer, fleshier, and her eyes are bright and watchful.
She leads them up the stairs, through the second floor apartment. "It's a nice apartment," she says, "a good place to raise a family." She looks at them, uncertain, and Sam smiles encouragingly, but offers no reassurance about anything. Dean doesn't smile at all; she's the kind of woman who would soak up the attention, and he doesn't want to raise any false hopes.
The apartment is large--six rooms altogether, bigger than most of the places they lived growing up, room for a dining room in addition to a living room, two bedrooms and a small bright room in the front whose purpose Dean can't suss out. Unlike the DeMaios' apartment, which looks like it dates from 1973, with its brown shag carpeting, brown paneled walls and brown refrigerator, this apartment is light and airy, even in the fading daylight, plaster walls painted a silvery white, with pale blue carpeting underfoot.
Dean slips the EMF meter on, one earbud in, and it rewards him with a steady whine as they walk past the bathroom and into the kitchen. Maria DeMaio chatters on about how it's a great place to live, she grew up here, and it's not as bad as some people think--it's so close to the subway, and do they work in the city? Her forehead wrinkles when she spots the bud in his ear, and he takes it out with an apologetic grimace.
Dean says they're writers, and she closes down. Dean's not sure if it's because it's some kind of new codeword for gay and she doesn't approve, or because she's figured out that they're here because of the series of dead tenants.
She leads them back down the stairs, quiet now. Sam starts asking questions, tries to get her to open up about the history of the house and its occupants.
While Sam's working his magic on the daughter and the wife, Dean checks out the backyard--garden going to seed, tall tree wrapped in a tarp lashed around with twine, and an empty lot behind it--and works his way back around to the front to contemplate the car.
"She's a beauty, isn't she?"
Dean jumps, startled, and turns to see an old man wearing a brown and grey plaid coat and one of those tweed hats like Sean Connery wore in The Untouchables. He's got a white moustache and is wearing thick black-rimmed glasses. He holds a rag in his hands, and Dean realizes he's been polishing the Malibu.
"Yeah," Dean says. "You Mr. DeMaio?"
"Call me Joe." He shrugs, holds up the dirty rag. "I'd shake but--"
"No problem," Dean answers. He jerks his chin at the car. "Sixty-nine?"
DeMaio nods. "Right off the assembly line. Hard getting parts for her now, though."
"I hear you." Dean remembers the weeks of scrounging through Bobby's scrap yard, of bidding for parts on EBay, of allowing himself the hope of saving the car, as if that would prove he would be able to save Sam, as well. "You're having trouble?"
"There's a knock in the engine. Can't figure it out. Old girl rattles sometimes."
Dean pats the roof of the car, which is cool to the touch, retaining no heat from the weak autumn sunshine. "You mind if I take a look? I know a little something," he says, shrugging one shoulder and nodding at the Impala. "Have to, to keep mine running."
The old man nods and pops the hood. "Sure, sure."
The engine's not in bad shape, though it looks like it hasn't been touched in a while. Old guy probably can't do much anymore--he looks like a good breeze would knock him over, and a classic car takes a lot of time and energy to maintain, not to mention money. Dean doesn't know if a union pension and social security allow for the kinds of expenses that might crop up, but he knows better than to ask.
He pokes around a little, makes soft humming noises to himself, and is so lost inside the familiar lines and curves of the engine that he doesn't notice Sam until he's standing right next to him. He almost hits his head on the underside of the hood.
"Jesus, Sam, make a little noise next time."
"Maybe you should pay more attention to your surroundings." For a second, Sam sounds so much like Dad that Dean's gut clenches, but he takes a deep breath, lets the grief roll through like a cramp.
Dean nods, point taken, and drops the hood. The old man is nowhere to be seen, which is a surprise, because Dean wouldn't have left some random stranger with his car, no matter how knowledgeable he seemed, but it's cold out and the guy is old, so maybe he's watching from the window. "What did we learn?"
"Not much we didn't know already. A married couple lived in the apartment for years before the husband died of a stroke, and the wife left to live with their daughter. The next tenants were another married couple--Johnny and Teresa Ciccatelli. They were younger, newlyweds. The wife grew up around the corner, and the husband was a real, um," Sam rubs his chin, frowning, "he was a problem, apparently. Mrs. DeMaio used some Italian word I don't know, but I gather it wasn't a compliment. They used to fight a lot. Neighbors called the cops once or twice, but the wife wouldn't press charges. And then, one day, she left. She went to a shelter, they think, or back to her family, who've since left the neighborhood and haven't kept in touch. Either way, Maria never saw the wife again. The husband left the keys in the mailbox and didn't even ask for the deposit back."
Sam shoves his hands into his pockets, his shoulders moving in a little shiver, and Dean realizes his own hands are cold. He heads across the street to the car, Sam at his shoulder, still talking.
"The tenant after that lived here for ten months before she drowned in the bathtub. Next one, also a neighborhood girl--her grandfather and Mr. DeMaio were in the Knights of Columbus together--lasted two months before she fell down the stairs and broke her neck. Then the apartment was empty for a while. Hard to get someone to rent it when the last two tenants have died. Especially if you're just asking around locally, where everybody knows the story."
"And then the guy last month?" He turns the heat on full blast, waits for it to warm up.
"Yeah. He was apparently the night manager at the McDonalds up the block, grew up flipping burgers there, worked his way up. He slipped in the shower, cracked his skull open." Sam frowns, squints off into the distance. "Could just be a run of spectacular bad luck, nothing supernatural at all."
"Something set the EMF meter off," Dean says, running the heel of his hand along the curve of the steering wheel, a habitual gesture, a comforting one. Sam inclines his head in agreement but doesn't offer another suggestion, so Dean says, "Poltergeist?"
Sam grunts noncommittally. "There's been some odd activity in the downstairs apartment--furniture moving on its own, doors and windows slamming, cold water suddenly scalding hot. Mrs. DeMaio said she's heard voices coming from upstairs." He shrugs. "Typical poltergeist mischief, but nothing deadly."
"EMF?"
"Nothing solid. It all happened to Mrs. DeMaio while she was alone. The daughter doesn't believe her; she thinks the old lady's losing it, though she didn't say it in so many words. So I don't know how reliable a witness she is." He shakes his head. "Spirit of the drowned girl?"
Dean nods, scrubs a hand over his face. "Could be." An angry spirit is probably easier to deal with than a poltergeist, and it's not like there's a shortage of deaths to investigate. "We know who she is?"
"Kristen Calloway. Grew up not far from here." He shakes his head again, looks around at the faded houses slumped over the cracked and littered sidewalk. "I don't get why they all seem to stay in this neighborhood."
The smell of something frying wafts out from a window, making Dean's mouth water. It's coming up on dinner time, but there are still kids riding past on bikes, though the football game broke up when the twilight deepened. People are coming home from work now, walking down the block from the subway station, occasionally greeting their neighbors.
"You don't?"
Sam frowns at him. "I just said I didn't. Do you?"
"Yeah," he says, looking in the rearview mirror at the faded white square painted in the center of the street, still visible in the darkness. "I think I do."
*
Kristen Calloway's parents live about six blocks away, on the other side of Liberty Avenue. It's a nicer, quieter part of the neighborhood, though the elevated subway tracks still overshadow everything else, and the roar and squeal of the trains never quite fades away; the people who've lived here their whole lives don't even seem to notice, and after a while Dean stops noticing, too.
"She didn't kill herself," Mrs. Calloway insists. She's a blocky woman with a hangdog face, salt and pepper hair, and a three-pack-a-day smoker's cough. Her husband is a big, beefy man with a red, pointy face like a ferret--he looks like a retired cop, did his twenty-five and got out with a pension and a drinking habit--but he just sits slumped in on himself in the easy chair, doesn't add anything to the conversation. "She was happy. She'd just found a new job, was talking about moving into the city."
"The police didn't find any evidence of a break-in," Sam starts.
Mrs. Calloway snorts and lights up another cigarette. "The police." The scorn in her voice reminds Dean of his father. He glances over at her husband, who doesn't even flinch, inured to his wife's seething disdain; he sits staring at a blank television screen, a million miles away. Dean understands how he feels.
They're not learning anything new here, and the dim, overheated apartment, with its nicotine-stained walls and smoke-filled air, is making Dean claustrophobic. He tips his head towards the door and Sam wraps it up, offers their condolences one more time, and then they're back out in the cold morning air.
"Why don't you go talk to the second girl's family, and I'll go back to the house, poke around a little more?" Dean says,
"You just want to get back under the hood of that Chevy."
Dean grins and doesn't deny it.
*
Nobody's around when Dean gets back to the DeMaios' house--the daughter mentioned a job in the city, so she's probably at work, and nobody answers when he rings the bell. The screen door isn't even locked, and the bolt on the front door is probably meant to be state of the art but is about fifteen years out of date. He locks it behind him--no need to let actual thieves in--and slips up the stairs silently. The door is closed but not locked, and it creaks when he pushes it open.
He takes his time sweeping for EMF, able to do a thorough job this time without Maria DeMaio watching him like a puzzled puppy; it buzzes intermittently in the kitchen and living room, and in the bedroom and the bathroom, it rises to a shrill pitch that hurts his ears. The bathroom has been scrubbed clean, no sign of either of the deaths that took place left on the pale blue tile or the porcelain tub, but even so, it makes his skin prickle. He pulls open the doors to the cabinet under the sink; the handle is loose and jiggles in his hand. There's a roll of toilet paper and a pair of rusty safety pins inside, but nothing else, no hint or clue as to what's killing the people who live here.
In the bedroom, the air is electric--whatever is haunting this place is stirring, and Dean knows he doesn't have much time before it puts in an appearance. He opens the closet, sees himself reflected in the speckled mirror hanging on the inside of the door, and frowns. The linoleum--which is teal and yellow beneath the ground-in dirt and probably older than Dean--is buckled and peeling, and Dean gets a glimpse of something underneath.
He uses the tip of his knife to pry it up enough to see the wood handle of a claw hammer. The EMF whines continuously, red lights all lit up, and with the help of his flashlight, Dean can see tufts of hair and dark scabs of dried blood clinging to the hammer's head.
"Yahtzee," he mutters, but there's no glee in it. They've obviously overlooked something, though he has a feeling if they get rid of the hammer, they'll get rid of the ghost, regardless of who it is.
The ghost must be thinking the same thing, because the bare hangers start rattling ominously, and he feels the otherworldly chill of ghostly fingers against his skin. Before he can grab the hammer, or even plan a defense, he's knocked ass over teakettle, and the closet door slams shut, bitter wind whipping the dust in the empty room into a frenzy.
Dean slowly levers himself to his feet, back flat against the wall, and inches his way out of the room and down the hall. He doesn't worry about stealth on the way out, scrambles down the stairs, takes them two at a time--it's a short staircase, only fifteen steps, but it feels like forever with an angry spirit at his back.
He's standing on the sidewalk, catching his breath and hunching his shoulders against the surprisingly chilly wind, when Joe DeMaio appears.
"Back again?" the old man asks.
"Wanted to get a better look at her pistons," Dean lies easily, pointing his chin at the Malibu. "I mean, you're putting high octane in her, right?" DeMaio nods. "So there's probably a sharp edge or groove in there somewhere, holding the heat and causing the problem." He babbles on about spark advance and combustion chambers for a couple of minutes, knowledgeable enough to only pay half-attention to what he's saying.
They pop the hood and Dean pokes around, segues from talking about the car to asking as casually as he can about the dead tenants.
DeMaio shakes his head. "A terrible thing. I never thought it would end up like this. Teresa was such a sweet girl, but her husband." He says something in Italian Dean doesn't understand, but from the old man's tone, he knows it's not complimentary. "I thought it wasn't my place--a man takes care of his family, you know? He shouldn't have other people telling him how to do that." Dean nods but keeps staring down at the engine, hoping the old man will keep talking. "A real man doesn't need to be told. So I knew what was happening--everybody in the neighborhood knew--but I didn't lift a finger to help her. When they moved out, I was glad to be rid of them, good riddance to bad rubbish." His voice is soft now, barely audible, and Dean straightens up, leans against the car to listen closely.
"I didn't lift a finger to help her," he repeats, "but I had to protect my own family. When it started, I went down to the botánica on Rockaway Boulevard, and the lady told me salt would do it."
"Salt," Dean mutters with an annoyed laugh, knowing he's still missing something.
"Salt," DeMaio confirms. "Across the thresholds, on the windowsills. My wife and daughter called me crazy, but they didn't question and I didn't explain." He shakes his head again, wipes his hands on his rag. "I thought I would always be able to protect them, and they didn't need to know. I didn't want them to worry."
They share a look of understanding, and Dean tries not to think about all the things Sam's going to have to worry about once he's gone, things he's never had to pay attention to before, things he doesn't know a damn thing about. He thinks of all the things he's always done to protect Sam, and how none of it's going to be enough when his year is up and he's not around to do them anymore.
The silence stretches, and the wind is cold against the nape of Dean's neck. He shivers, doesn't think of someone walking over his grave, the barren ground where Sam will scatter his ashes.
"So the husband killed her?" he says, because it's always a good idea to make sure the facts he has are right before he goes looking for the ones he doesn't know, didn't even know he didn't know until now, but that's the only scenario that makes sense.
"Dude, who are you talking to? And how did you know that?"
Dean jumps, startled at the sound of Sam's voice. "I swear to God, man, I am putting a freaking bell on you from now on."
Sam laughs, though there's an edge to it, always is lately, the two of them at each other's throats more often than not these days, like when they were teenagers and Sam was growing out of his clothes, out of his skin, out of his family. Sam's grown up since then, grown out of that habit, but he's been a fighter since the day he was born, and he isn't going to stop now. As much as it drives Dean crazy, he's glad Sam is like that--he knows that when he's gone, Sam will be able to keep going.
"Seriously, Dean. What the hell's going on with you?"
So many ways to answer that question, none of them what Sam wants to hear. "I was just talking to the old man. He was telling me about the tenant with the abusive husband. What was his name? Ciccatelli?"
"What old man?" Now Sam is giving him that concerned look, eyebrows drawn together, wrinkling his forehead, mouth turned down in a frown, gaze steady and penetrating.
Dean forces himself not to fidget, calling on years of meeting Dad's relentless gaze calmly to stare back at Sam without giving an inch. "Joe DeMaio. He knew there was a ghost. He was salting the house. I don't know why he stopped, but--"
Sam shakes his head, concerned look giving way to the patented Sam Winchester are you on drugs? face. "DeMaio died a few weeks before Kristen Calloway drowned. Had a heart attack one night and never woke up."
Dean raises a skeptical eyebrow. "I was just talking to the guy, Sam. We were working on the car and he was telling me--" He stops as it all clicks into place. He looks up at Sam, and it's like looking in a mirror, twin light bulbs lit. "The tenants started dying when DeMaio wasn't around anymore to protect the house."
At the same time, Sam says, "There are two ghosts."
"Oh, fuck me." Dean slams the hood down, then pats it absently, apologizing for the rough treatment the same way he would to his own car.
"How did you not--" Sam starts and then trails off, shaking his head. "Forget it, it's not important." It's not like Dean's not asking himself that same question, but he appreciates Sam letting it go for once. "I just got off the phone with Teresa Ciccatelli's mother. She didn't go home, and her family hasn't heard from her, or from Ciccatelli, since he moved away. And no shelter would give me any information."
"Can't blame 'em for that." Dean shrugs. He rarely feels any pangs of conscience when they flash their false badges, but he's glad they don't need to for this job. He hates those places, full of broken women with rightfully suspicious eyes, and crying kids who just want to go home. "I found the murder weapon in the apartment."
"You think salting and burning it will get rid of Teresa Ciccatelli's ghost?"
"I think it's the best bet we have, considering we don't know what her husband did with her body."
Sam nods, and they gather the supplies they'll need from the trunk.
*
Dean goes up the stairs first, shotgun at the ready, Sam scattering salt behind him, and here at least, they're still on the same page, too many years' spent living and training and hunting together for even constant arguing to disrupt their rhythm.
The sound of a woman crying echoes in the empty apartment, but the voices don't start until they're in the bedroom: You stupid bitch, I'll give you something to cry about, and then, Johnny, no, please.
Sam's mouth is tight, his eyes flat and his nostrils flared; Dean knows he's remembering some of the motels they stayed at as kids, some of the neighborhoods and trailer parks they lived in growing up, and the unavoidable sounds of other families' tragedies seeping through thin walls and open windows.
Dean yanks at the closet door, eager to get this over with, and silence the voices putting that look on Sam's face; it opens surprisingly easily under his hand, slams against the wall with a clatter.
"Under the linoleum," he says over the rising sound of crying and the ghostly wind that's begun whipping through the room. He points the shotgun at the buckled section of the floor and Sam crouches down, attempts to lay a salt ring around it, but the wind blows the salt away. "Just grab it," Dean says.
Sam nods, but when he reaches out, the ghost materializes, slams him back against the wall and flings the closet door closed again. Dean wants to avoid having to fire the shotgun--even though the neighborhood's not great, it's still the kind of place where gunfire draws attention--but the ghost is coming for him. The salt makes her dissipate for long enough for Dean to get to Sam's side.
"You okay?" He puts a hand under Sam's chin, tips his face up to get a look at his pupils. "You hit your head?"
"I'm fine," Sam snaps, batting Dean's hands away. "Get the hammer." Dean's torn, and he's going to say something about maybe getting Sam outside before coming back in alone, when Sam says, "Behind you!"
Dean turns and fires again. "Here." He shoves the shotgun at Sam and drops some shells in his lap before heading back to the closet.
Ghostly hands claw at him as he opens the door, and when he curls his hand around the handle of the hammer and pulls it out of its hiding place, all the skin on his body prickles from the way the ghost wraps itself around him. He backs away, and waves the hammer at Sam, who's aiming the shotgun in his direction from the doorway.
"Dean, come on."
"I'm trying, man."
They scramble down the stairs, two at a time, not even trying to be quiet now, the ghost howling in rage after them.
"We don't have much time," Sam says as they hurtle around the side of the house to the backyard, where he'd earlier dug a small hole and lined it with stones to use as a fire pit. "Someone's bound to have called the cops."
"No shit, Sherlock," Dean mutters, tossing the bloodied hammer into the dirt with one hand and digging the bottle of lighter fluid out of his pocket with the other. He douses it in butane while Sam covers it in salt.
Teresa Ciccatelli's ghost appears, shimmering in the weak autumn sunlight, and Dean can see she was pretty in a heavy-lidded, full-lipped way, even though her skull is bashed in and blood spatters her face and clothes.
Please, she says, as Dean strikes matches one after another and drops them on the hammer. Johnny, please. The wood catches, and then the hair clumped on the head of the hammer lights, and flames engulf the ghost.
Dean watches the fire lick along the handle as it burns, smoke rising in curls that look like ghosts, the heat cutting through the day's chill to warm his hands.
Sam nudges him in the ribs with a bony elbow. "Dean."
He looks up to see Joe DeMaio, still wearing his tweedy hat and clutching his oily rag, fading into the smoke. The old man inclines his head in thanks and then disappears for good.
*
Dean can hear sirens in the distance as they reach the car. There's a parking ticket tucked under the windshield wiper. He glares at it for a second, snorts at the ridiculous amount, then crumples it up and tosses it to the sidewalk, ignoring Sam's frown.
"We should probably get new plates," he says, after Sam has joined him in the front seat. "When I'm gone," he forces the words out, keeps his voice steady, "Bobby can hook you up with whatever you need for the car, help you stay off the Feds' radar. Take her back to see him every few months, and don't forget to change the oil."
"Dean--"
"If you're going to give her up--she doesn't blend in, and I know how big you are on blending in--just let Bobby keep her. You can get yourself one of those hybrid SUVs or something." He means it as an apology, an offering--something, shit, he doesn't even know, and it breaks his heart to even say it, though he knows Sam's probably better off in a less recognizable car.
"Goddammit, Dean, I'm not giving away the car, and I am not giving up on you. I wish you would get it through that thick skull of yours--"
Dean cuts him off by putting the radio on, and surprisingly, Sam lets him, though he still looks like a thundercloud, mouth pressed into a tight line and brows drawn together in frustration, and Dean knows the reprieve is only temporary. He finds the local classic rock station and, despite the fact that they're playing Jethro Tull, turns the volume up. He doesn't want to have this conversation again. Not when all he can think about right now is how it's only a few more months until he's gone, and Sam's going to be on his own, and there's so many things he needs to tell him, wants to do with him, and fighting is at the bottom of that list.
He normally hates driving in Manhattan, has routes marked in the atlas in orange highlighter to avoid it, but Sam likes the city, always has, so he goes left instead of right on Atlantic Avenue, heads towards the Brooklyn Bridge and the skyline he knows is just over the horizon. He's pretty sure they can find something to do. Possibly something involving naked girls and liquor.
A commercial comes on, and he says, "We should go to Scores, or maybe Goldfinger's."
Sam reaches out, flicks the radio off. "No."
"Come on, Sammy. Live a little." He glances over, gives a cajoling half-grin, pushes his luck. "Not like I got a lot of that left."
"And whose fucking fault is that, you stupid bastard? Do you think I don't know that?"
He almost misses the light turning red, hits the brakes hard, making them squeal. "Sammy--"
"Don't fucking call me that right now. Don't do this, Dean. Don't keep making me do this."
"If we're lucky, and traffic is moving, we could hit the library first."
"I'm not a kid anymore, Dean. Bribing me isn't going to get you what you want."
"What I want, Sam? What I want?" He tries to keep the anger out of his voice and fails. "You keep telling me I have to give a shit about myself, and, well, maybe I do, Sam. Maybe what I want is to have a good time while I have some time left, without fighting with you every time you open your goddamn mouth."
Sam looks so hurt and angry that Dean can't even take any satisfaction from leaving him speechless, which almost never happens. Sam's jaw works for a few seconds, like he's biting back all the words he wants to fling at Dean, and then he says, "The New York Public Library has a great occult collection."
Dean knows the conversation isn't over, knows Sam isn't going to ever give up on him, and though he'll never admit it, part of him doesn't want him to. But he'll take a few hours without fighting, a few hours of just hanging out with Sam and being alive. He reaches over, gives Sam's knee a squeeze, and laughs when Sam starts and gives a strangled yelp. He shoots another amused glance at his brother and smiles. When the light turns green, he hits the gas and aims for the horizon.
end
*
Notes: Title and cut-text from "There Is No Clear Light" by Pablo Neruda. I grew up in Ozone Park, and lived there up until five years ago, and while the ghost story isn't real, I've tried to paint an accurate picture of the neighborhood as it was when I left.
*
11/12/07
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Feedback is adored.
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