Fire Prompt
Title: Errrr....not so much
Author:
Queeniegalore
Category: gen
Rating: g
Summary: A fire takes the boys back to a place neither of them wanted to go ever again
Prompt used: prompt 1, fire extinguisher
Spoilers: None
Sam knew how the fire had started, and so did Dean. Nothing to do with ghosts or demons or anything they could kill, unless you could take a shotgun to old hotels and faulty wiring in general - and Dean nearly did. Neither of them had been hurt and the Impala was fine, which were the main things. Sam had lost his favourite hoodie and Dean’s lucky boxers were a little scorched, but really? Everything was ok.
Which didn’t explain why Sam was in the backseat of the car huddled in on himself and shaking like a leaf.
Dean had been the one to smell the smoke, lying half awake in bed and listening to Sam snore. The fire had started across the other side of the room, in the wall behind the switched on bar heater that had to be at least twenty years old. Dean had smelled the smoke, and for a few moments he’d thought he was dreaming. When he heard the crackling he’d opened his eyes in confusion, when he saw the flickering orange glow he was up in a heartbeat and charging over to Sam, wrenching the covers off him and pulling him out of bed. By then the flames were rising in earnest, still a few feet away but gaining. Dean had hurled Sam up and thrown him bodily out of the room before charging back in and grabbing what he could find of their stuff. Outside, Sam had started making a ruckus fit to raise the dead, screaming for help, screaming for his brother, screaming in fury at life in general. Maybe a minute had passed before the place was swarming with well intentioned people with fire extinguishers and Dean was back, shivering in his boxers and nothing else.
That was the story. That was what had happened. Sam had made Dean tell it over and over, and Dean had, assuring him that there was nothing supernatural involved, nothing but that damned heater. And Sam, eventually, had believed him. He knew the truth. Knew what had caused the fire, and knew that, once again, Dean had saved his life and everything was peachy.
So why the shaking? Dean wanted to ask but didn’t, fearing an answer that was too simple and obvious and insane. Dean wanted to grab his brother and say, ‘Look, Sam, I’m here in front of you, and we’ve got Led Zeppelin playing and neither of us is pinned to the ceiling, you got that?’ He couldn’t quite make himself do it, though. Because he understood, even though he didn’t want to, even though he thought it was stupid. He understood, because holding Sammy in his arms and running for the door was where it had all started, and after twenty six years they hadn’t gotten anywhere.
He drove on, steadily, and tried to see their lives laid out like the road in front of them. Sam would calm down, soon enough, and they’d move on to the next job. And the next, and the next. And one day - there was no doubt in his mind - one day they’d find the thing that they were after and they’d kill it. He could see it as clearly as he could see Sammy in the rearview mirror. One day they’d be shot of the thing, whether it went out in blood or…or fire.
Would things ever change, though? Would he ever stop dragging his brother out of burning buildings, for as long as they both lived? Would they forget their mother and Jess, would they move on, would they live?
Maybe not. Maybe never. But they’d survive. They’d be scorched and singed but never ever burned up. And that would just have to be good enough.