Deadhead Sticker on a Cadillac - pt 1
Title: Deadhead Sticker on a Cadillac
Author:
coiledsoul
Rating: PG-13 for swearing
Pairing, if any: Gen, Sam, Dean, some John
State: California
Word Count: 5100
Disclaimer: If I owned them, I wouldn't be sitting here at this computer right now for damn sure.
Author's Notes: Thanks go to my awesome betas
amy_star_ and
lanthano for the comma lessons and the handholding. I owe you guys drinks, or a kidney. Your pick. Just don't both pick the kidney option.
The title comes from "The Boys of Summer" original recording by Don Henley, not that other band. A line or two may have been stolen from "Road Trippin'" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I recommend downloading both of these songs. They're great tunes and were the true inspiration for this fic. I have a whole soundtrack for this fic actually but have no way of sharing it for download right now. Here's the list anyway. If you're clever you might see a theme:
The Deadhead ST
01 - My Morning Jacket - One Big Holiday
02 - Red Hot Chili Peppers - Road Trippin'
03 - Kings of Leon - Californai Waiting
04 - Death Cab for Cutie - Summer Skin
05 - Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication
06 - Led Zeppelin - Going to California
07 - Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers - Runnin' Down a Dream
08 - Captain and Tenille - Love Will Keep Us Together
09 - Death Cab for Cutie - Brothers on a Hotel Bed
10 - Don Henley - The Boys of Summer
(Sidenote: Californication is a really really great album to listen to when think about the boys. Just ask
mona1347.)
Summary: Roadtrip fic. Dean takes Sam to Stanford, the long way. Even Jesus considered the Devil's offer for a second out there in the desert.
John Winchester hates California. Dean could count on one hand how many times they’ve been there. They only crossed the state line when they were hunting something truly evil, something killing people, and never for more than a day or two. Anything else and John would give Caleb or another nearby hunter the lead. If asked about it, all Dad would ever say was, "Too many Goddamn hippies." Dean thinks it has something to do with the Marines and Camp Pendleton so he never prods too much when the subject comes up.
So, it stands to reason that part of Sam’s decision to attend Stanford was to finally get the last word with their dad.
*****
“When do you have to be there?”
“About a month from now, student housing opens late August.”
“When are you telling Dad?” Dean says as he stares at the ceiling of their darkened motel room, blinking hard. He knew this, this something, was coming, but the shock of hearing it out loud, where it can’t be taken back or ignored, hurts worse than anything. A full ride one-way ticket to Stanford fucking U. Wow. Check out the big brain on Brad.
All spring in Montana Dean had watched Sam, unable to confront him with the truth he saw unfolding before his eyes, just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Dean doesn’t think John even noticed his younger son’s actions that practically screamed exit strategy. The later than usual nights at the library, Sam conveniently bringing in the mail every morning before he or Dad could check the box. John could sense a poltergeist from 10 miles, but the inner workings of Sam’s mind were completely off his radar. If he wasn’t busy trying to remember how to breathe right now, he might be a little proud of Sam’s subterfuge.
“As soon as I work up the nerve,” Sam says from the other bed with a weak laugh that sounds anything but real.
Dean blurts out, “I’m taking you there,” with only the smallest hint of desperation.
“No, Dean. I need to do this by … just let me go all right? I’ve got cash saved. I’ll be fine.” Sam’s please and don’t make this any harder go unsaid.
“I’m taking you. We’ll leave early by a couple of weeks, take the long way, drive up the coast. See it all, just the two of us. We’ll be like the Griswolds.” Nice to know he can still think on his feet even as his heart’s being ripped from his chest.
“Can I skinny dip with Christie Brinkley?” Sam asks.
“Not if I do first.”
They both pause and stare at their own half of the ceiling, pondering the lameness of their forced humor. God forbid they should actually say what they feel about the most important decision Sam’s ever made.
“Look Dean, I appreciate the offer…”
“No, you look, you little shit.” Dean says as he sits up and faces Sam’s bed, feet on the floor and elbows on his knees. Sam turns on his side to face him. The light from the half moon outside reflects in two pairs of too shiny eyes. “I’ve known for a long time that you’d take off the minute you figured out how. You remember in Colorado when they wanted to bump you up from 6th grade to 7th?”
“Of course I remember. You wouldn’t quit calling me The Geek Wonder for weeks. It didn’t matter anyway; we left before they could move me.”
“Yeah, well, that’s when I knew - knew you’d do something like this someday. I could see the gears starting to turn inside your giant head.” Dean reaches out and raps on Sam’s head with his knuckles for emphasis. Sam bats his hand away half-heartedly.
“We both know what this life is like. So if you’re going to walk away from…” Dean pauses and looks away from Sam, remembers to breathe. “Look, if you want me to be okay with this, I need to know you’re safe before you go find your ‘normal.’ Whatever the fuck that means.” Sam is silent, absorbing his brother’s words, the uncharacteristic openness of them. He knows that if he lets Dean do this it will be the closest his brother’s ever come to defying their Dad in his entire life. He wonders which of them John will kill first.
“Dean, you don’t have to.”
“Yeah, I kinda do.”
*****
They’re in Las Cruces, New Mexico for the summer hunting a pack of Chupacabra and Dean divides all his time for the next two weeks between family hunts and hustling pool for the extra cash they’ll need for the trip. When Sam decides he’s found the nerve, the Impala is already gassed up and their bags are inside. After the final feud and Dad’s ultimatum, both of which Dean knew were inevitable, he waits a six pack before he knocks on his Dad’s door to tell him that he’s taking Sam to Palo Alto to make sure he gets settled in, and he’ll be back in a couple of weeks. There. That was easy. John grunts and cracks another tall boy, stares at the floor for a minute, then pins Dean with his gaze.
“Your mother would be proud of him.”
The statement startles Dean and hurts him in a way he can’t define. It’s certainly not the response he was expecting after all the yelling earlier. He’s not sure what to say so he nods as John continues to look him straight in the eye. “Make him safe, son.” Dean nods again, the action as binding as anything he might have said aloud, then turns and leaves the motel room. They ride out of town at dawn with the sun rising over the hills behind them. When Dean turns off his cell phone and throws it in the glove box, Sam says nothing.
A full day of hard driving and good use of Dean’s radar detector, and they make it to San Ysidro just after dusk. They get a room, wash the Arizona dust off, lock the car tight - “no Dean, you cannot take a .38 across the border” - and head into Tijuana. They’re knee deep in coeds and tequila shots by midnight. Fairy lights and colored papel picado hang across the partially hidden courtyard at the back of the bar-cum-restaurant they wandered into. The colors blur in front of Sam’s eyes and he’s swaying just a little to the music when mescal-fueled inspiration hits him.
“You know, you could always come with me. Stay in Palo Alto.” Sam says, then pauses as he repeats the words in his head, realizing what he’s just said and wondering why he hasn’t asked before now. Oh right, because I have a better chance at winning the lottery. He presses anyway, “Yeah! We could get a place together, be roommates. You could get a job doing lots of things, even go to school if you wanted.”
The courtyard is loud with an odd combination of the usual crowded bar revelry, distant mariachi music from inside the restaurant, and whatever pop crap they play for the 18-year-old kids driving down to drink on the weekends. The brunette Tammy/Mandy/Sandy Dean’s been necking with for the last 4 shots or so is pretty and easy and Dean uses all these distractions to pretend he hasn’t heard Sam.
“Dean. Dean, are you listening to me?” Sam says a little more loudly, tilting his head from side to side as he tries to catch Dean’s eye on the other side of his new friend’s head. Sam has developed a habit of treating the women Dean acquires as if they were accessories, pieces of jewelry that Dean wears. He’s never rude to them, he just knows their value in the grand scheme of Dean. “I’m serious,” Sam says, his tequila coated tongue sibilant as he reaches for another shot. And what do you know, at that moment he really is. “Just you and me, big brother, it’d be awesome.”
Dean smiles at Sam as he stands up, his right arm extended behind him as Tammy/Mandy/Sandy drags him off to dance/fuck/who knows. He looks back and says nothing, just winks at Sam before he’s swallowed by the crowd.
*****
They take the 5 straight through San Diego, only stopping once for gas. The city doesn’t settle right with them. It’s too clean and cheerful. Dean sums the feeling up in two words - Pod People. In Oceanside they switch to the PCH. Sam’s driving because Dean’s never seen the Pacific Ocean (though he hasn’t either for that matter) and after one too many swerves into the oncoming lane, Sam wouldn’t get back in the car after their last bathroom break until Dean gave him the keys. All four windows are down and they are shirtless from the heat and the call of sunshine. Their backs are sticky slick on the vinyl seats as the wind whips around them.
On an empty stretch of the narrow two-lane highway, Dean shimmies up through the open passenger window and twists until he’s sitting in the sill, bare feet on the seat and arms stretched out over the roof of the Impala. Sam laughs as Dean whoops for no reason at all. The view is like nothing they’ve ever seen before. The water is vast and overwhelming, a mirror for the sun. The occasional surfers they see are miniscule amongst the giant waves.
When Dean eases himself back into the car his eyes have a lightness to them that Sam’s never seen before. He thinks maybe he hasn’t looked that way since he was four.
Dean grins and punches Sam in the arm on the way to turning up the radio.
*****
It’s early afternoon when they stop in Venice for lunch.
“Fish tacos? No fucking way, man. The only time I’d ever eat a fish taco is when I’ve got one sitting on…”
Sam gives Dean The Suffering Little Brother Look (TM Sam Winchester, all rights reserved) and shakes his head as he orders three.
Dean warily eyes the rest of the menu written on two surfboards nailed to either side of the window in the concession stand. They’re both starving after walking the strip from Venice to the Santa Monica pier and back again.
“I’ll have a burger and fries, and there better be cow on that bun.”
When the food comes, they head for a picnic bench not far away. Sam sits facing the ocean. Dean faces the strip, shades in place, watching a group of bikini-clad girls roller-blading by. There isn’t a cloud in the sky and a cool breeze blows in off the ocean as they soak up the sun and dig into the food.
“Dean?” Sam says, pausing between his second and third taco.
“Yeah?” he says, glancing over at Sam. He’s glad he’s wearing sunglasses as he catches the way-too-serious look on Sam’s face.
“I meant what I said in Tijuana.”
“You mean when you said Chuck Norris was a hack and tried to convince me that The Rock could kick his ass any day with a hand tied behind his back?”
“No. I mean yes, of course he could. Chuck sells exercise equipment on infomercials now. He’s completely lost his edge. But that’s not what I’m talking about.”
Dean looks away, pauses to take a drink of soda then says, “What about Dad, Sam?”
“What about you, Dean?” Sam retorts. “What do you want?”
It occurs to Dean that it’s entirely possible no one has ever seriously asked him that before.
*****
They check into the Safari Inn in Burbank because that’s where Clarence and Alabama Worley stayed. But Dean knows better than to give Sam that kind of ammo and doesn’t mention it as he gets out of the car and heads for the office. When he gets back to the car, Sam’s grin is sly and his eyes twinkle as he pokes, “You never got over Patricia Arquette did you?” Dean tells Sam he’s number one with his middle finger.
They were always too poor and too busy during the times they weren’t in school for John to take them to an amusement park bigger than a county fair and it was usually business-related anyway. On the drive through Arizona, they decided that visiting one was imperative but they quickly agreed that Disneyland was out of the question - “I’ve seen some shit man, but that mouse creeps me out” - so Universal Studios it is. They get up early the next day and get to the park just as it opens, chattering on about what they’ll ride first and wondering if they’ll get to see anyone famous on the studio lot tour. As the day wears on though, they do their best to enjoy it but it’s crowded and loud and surreal and completely unfamiliar and makes them edgy. They try to hide their unease, neither one wanting to ruin it for the other.
After a few hours they stop for sodas. Dean bitches at the cashier about the highway robbery they call prices. Sam is only half listening as he steps away from Dean and looks around at all the smiling faces and happy families and feels more than ever the absurdity that has been his life until he received his acceptance letter.
As Dean sidles up beside him, Sam says in a voice filled with sad wonder, “We really are freaks aren’t we?”
Dean looks around and figures out where Sam’s thoughts have turned. Then he eyes Sam warily, knowing the argument they’re about to have like the back of his hand. He sighs, then counters, “We got by all right, Sam. You made it into college, didn’t you?”
“It’s more than that, Dean. What’s all our training been for? Who decided it was up to us to look for the things no one else sees and kill them? Where is the demon that killed mom? It’s been 18 years Dean, my entire life and Dad is still out there all Don Quixote and shit, chasing windmills and dragging you and me along for the ride. And for what? Nothing, Dean. Nothing. It’s not our fight, it’s his.” Sam’s voice has become shrill and he steps back from Dean, surprised at his outburst and slightly ashamed that he’s having this argument again.
Dean looks around to make sure no one heard Sam’s tantrum before he turns cold eyes on him. “You don’t remember that night, Sam, but I do. These people, they’re the ones living in a fantasy land, not us. They’re all safer because of people like us, like Dad. It’s just, it’s the cards we were dealt, you know?”
Shamed or not, Sam’s never been one to back down when he’s on a roll. He spits out, “Whatever, and quit saying ‘us.’ You were only a kid too, Dean. And the cards we were dealt? God, Dean! Listen to yourself. Dealt by who? Fate? Dad? I’ll deal my own hand, thanks. Do you really think our lives have been what Mom would have wanted for you and me? That Dad did right by her, raising us the way he did?”
Dean looks away, anywhere but Sam’s face, trying to come back with a reason or a purpose and failing. Exasperated, he can only say, “I don’t know, Sam. I don’t know, okay? Are you happy now?”
Sam looks contrite but says nothing.
Dean bows his head and pinches the bridge of his nose before he sighs and says, “Come on. Let’s get out of here. I think I’ve had all the fun I’m gonna have in this place.”
He turns on his heel and heads off toward the nearest exit.
“Dean, wait,” Sam pleads as he hurries to catch up.
Part 2
Author:
coiledsoul
Rating: PG-13 for swearing
Pairing, if any: Gen, Sam, Dean, some John
State: California
Word Count: 5100
Disclaimer: If I owned them, I wouldn't be sitting here at this computer right now for damn sure.
Author's Notes: Thanks go to my awesome betas
amy_star_ and
lanthano for the comma lessons and the handholding. I owe you guys drinks, or a kidney. Your pick. Just don't both pick the kidney option.
The title comes from "The Boys of Summer" original recording by Don Henley, not that other band. A line or two may have been stolen from "Road Trippin'" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I recommend downloading both of these songs. They're great tunes and were the true inspiration for this fic. I have a whole soundtrack for this fic actually but have no way of sharing it for download right now. Here's the list anyway. If you're clever you might see a theme:
The Deadhead ST
01 - My Morning Jacket - One Big Holiday
02 - Red Hot Chili Peppers - Road Trippin'
03 - Kings of Leon - Californai Waiting
04 - Death Cab for Cutie - Summer Skin
05 - Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication
06 - Led Zeppelin - Going to California
07 - Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers - Runnin' Down a Dream
08 - Captain and Tenille - Love Will Keep Us Together
09 - Death Cab for Cutie - Brothers on a Hotel Bed
10 - Don Henley - The Boys of Summer
(Sidenote: Californication is a really really great album to listen to when think about the boys. Just ask
mona1347.)
Summary: Roadtrip fic. Dean takes Sam to Stanford, the long way. Even Jesus considered the Devil's offer for a second out there in the desert.
John Winchester hates California. Dean could count on one hand how many times they’ve been there. They only crossed the state line when they were hunting something truly evil, something killing people, and never for more than a day or two. Anything else and John would give Caleb or another nearby hunter the lead. If asked about it, all Dad would ever say was, "Too many Goddamn hippies." Dean thinks it has something to do with the Marines and Camp Pendleton so he never prods too much when the subject comes up.
So, it stands to reason that part of Sam’s decision to attend Stanford was to finally get the last word with their dad.
*****
“When do you have to be there?”
“About a month from now, student housing opens late August.”
“When are you telling Dad?” Dean says as he stares at the ceiling of their darkened motel room, blinking hard. He knew this, this something, was coming, but the shock of hearing it out loud, where it can’t be taken back or ignored, hurts worse than anything. A full ride one-way ticket to Stanford fucking U. Wow. Check out the big brain on Brad.
All spring in Montana Dean had watched Sam, unable to confront him with the truth he saw unfolding before his eyes, just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Dean doesn’t think John even noticed his younger son’s actions that practically screamed exit strategy. The later than usual nights at the library, Sam conveniently bringing in the mail every morning before he or Dad could check the box. John could sense a poltergeist from 10 miles, but the inner workings of Sam’s mind were completely off his radar. If he wasn’t busy trying to remember how to breathe right now, he might be a little proud of Sam’s subterfuge.
“As soon as I work up the nerve,” Sam says from the other bed with a weak laugh that sounds anything but real.
Dean blurts out, “I’m taking you there,” with only the smallest hint of desperation.
“No, Dean. I need to do this by … just let me go all right? I’ve got cash saved. I’ll be fine.” Sam’s please and don’t make this any harder go unsaid.
“I’m taking you. We’ll leave early by a couple of weeks, take the long way, drive up the coast. See it all, just the two of us. We’ll be like the Griswolds.” Nice to know he can still think on his feet even as his heart’s being ripped from his chest.
“Can I skinny dip with Christie Brinkley?” Sam asks.
“Not if I do first.”
They both pause and stare at their own half of the ceiling, pondering the lameness of their forced humor. God forbid they should actually say what they feel about the most important decision Sam’s ever made.
“Look Dean, I appreciate the offer…”
“No, you look, you little shit.” Dean says as he sits up and faces Sam’s bed, feet on the floor and elbows on his knees. Sam turns on his side to face him. The light from the half moon outside reflects in two pairs of too shiny eyes. “I’ve known for a long time that you’d take off the minute you figured out how. You remember in Colorado when they wanted to bump you up from 6th grade to 7th?”
“Of course I remember. You wouldn’t quit calling me The Geek Wonder for weeks. It didn’t matter anyway; we left before they could move me.”
“Yeah, well, that’s when I knew - knew you’d do something like this someday. I could see the gears starting to turn inside your giant head.” Dean reaches out and raps on Sam’s head with his knuckles for emphasis. Sam bats his hand away half-heartedly.
“We both know what this life is like. So if you’re going to walk away from…” Dean pauses and looks away from Sam, remembers to breathe. “Look, if you want me to be okay with this, I need to know you’re safe before you go find your ‘normal.’ Whatever the fuck that means.” Sam is silent, absorbing his brother’s words, the uncharacteristic openness of them. He knows that if he lets Dean do this it will be the closest his brother’s ever come to defying their Dad in his entire life. He wonders which of them John will kill first.
“Dean, you don’t have to.”
“Yeah, I kinda do.”
*****
They’re in Las Cruces, New Mexico for the summer hunting a pack of Chupacabra and Dean divides all his time for the next two weeks between family hunts and hustling pool for the extra cash they’ll need for the trip. When Sam decides he’s found the nerve, the Impala is already gassed up and their bags are inside. After the final feud and Dad’s ultimatum, both of which Dean knew were inevitable, he waits a six pack before he knocks on his Dad’s door to tell him that he’s taking Sam to Palo Alto to make sure he gets settled in, and he’ll be back in a couple of weeks. There. That was easy. John grunts and cracks another tall boy, stares at the floor for a minute, then pins Dean with his gaze.
“Your mother would be proud of him.”
The statement startles Dean and hurts him in a way he can’t define. It’s certainly not the response he was expecting after all the yelling earlier. He’s not sure what to say so he nods as John continues to look him straight in the eye. “Make him safe, son.” Dean nods again, the action as binding as anything he might have said aloud, then turns and leaves the motel room. They ride out of town at dawn with the sun rising over the hills behind them. When Dean turns off his cell phone and throws it in the glove box, Sam says nothing.
A full day of hard driving and good use of Dean’s radar detector, and they make it to San Ysidro just after dusk. They get a room, wash the Arizona dust off, lock the car tight - “no Dean, you cannot take a .38 across the border” - and head into Tijuana. They’re knee deep in coeds and tequila shots by midnight. Fairy lights and colored papel picado hang across the partially hidden courtyard at the back of the bar-cum-restaurant they wandered into. The colors blur in front of Sam’s eyes and he’s swaying just a little to the music when mescal-fueled inspiration hits him.
“You know, you could always come with me. Stay in Palo Alto.” Sam says, then pauses as he repeats the words in his head, realizing what he’s just said and wondering why he hasn’t asked before now. Oh right, because I have a better chance at winning the lottery. He presses anyway, “Yeah! We could get a place together, be roommates. You could get a job doing lots of things, even go to school if you wanted.”
The courtyard is loud with an odd combination of the usual crowded bar revelry, distant mariachi music from inside the restaurant, and whatever pop crap they play for the 18-year-old kids driving down to drink on the weekends. The brunette Tammy/Mandy/Sandy Dean’s been necking with for the last 4 shots or so is pretty and easy and Dean uses all these distractions to pretend he hasn’t heard Sam.
“Dean. Dean, are you listening to me?” Sam says a little more loudly, tilting his head from side to side as he tries to catch Dean’s eye on the other side of his new friend’s head. Sam has developed a habit of treating the women Dean acquires as if they were accessories, pieces of jewelry that Dean wears. He’s never rude to them, he just knows their value in the grand scheme of Dean. “I’m serious,” Sam says, his tequila coated tongue sibilant as he reaches for another shot. And what do you know, at that moment he really is. “Just you and me, big brother, it’d be awesome.”
Dean smiles at Sam as he stands up, his right arm extended behind him as Tammy/Mandy/Sandy drags him off to dance/fuck/who knows. He looks back and says nothing, just winks at Sam before he’s swallowed by the crowd.
*****
They take the 5 straight through San Diego, only stopping once for gas. The city doesn’t settle right with them. It’s too clean and cheerful. Dean sums the feeling up in two words - Pod People. In Oceanside they switch to the PCH. Sam’s driving because Dean’s never seen the Pacific Ocean (though he hasn’t either for that matter) and after one too many swerves into the oncoming lane, Sam wouldn’t get back in the car after their last bathroom break until Dean gave him the keys. All four windows are down and they are shirtless from the heat and the call of sunshine. Their backs are sticky slick on the vinyl seats as the wind whips around them.
On an empty stretch of the narrow two-lane highway, Dean shimmies up through the open passenger window and twists until he’s sitting in the sill, bare feet on the seat and arms stretched out over the roof of the Impala. Sam laughs as Dean whoops for no reason at all. The view is like nothing they’ve ever seen before. The water is vast and overwhelming, a mirror for the sun. The occasional surfers they see are miniscule amongst the giant waves.
When Dean eases himself back into the car his eyes have a lightness to them that Sam’s never seen before. He thinks maybe he hasn’t looked that way since he was four.
Dean grins and punches Sam in the arm on the way to turning up the radio.
*****
It’s early afternoon when they stop in Venice for lunch.
“Fish tacos? No fucking way, man. The only time I’d ever eat a fish taco is when I’ve got one sitting on…”
Sam gives Dean The Suffering Little Brother Look (TM Sam Winchester, all rights reserved) and shakes his head as he orders three.
Dean warily eyes the rest of the menu written on two surfboards nailed to either side of the window in the concession stand. They’re both starving after walking the strip from Venice to the Santa Monica pier and back again.
“I’ll have a burger and fries, and there better be cow on that bun.”
When the food comes, they head for a picnic bench not far away. Sam sits facing the ocean. Dean faces the strip, shades in place, watching a group of bikini-clad girls roller-blading by. There isn’t a cloud in the sky and a cool breeze blows in off the ocean as they soak up the sun and dig into the food.
“Dean?” Sam says, pausing between his second and third taco.
“Yeah?” he says, glancing over at Sam. He’s glad he’s wearing sunglasses as he catches the way-too-serious look on Sam’s face.
“I meant what I said in Tijuana.”
“You mean when you said Chuck Norris was a hack and tried to convince me that The Rock could kick his ass any day with a hand tied behind his back?”
“No. I mean yes, of course he could. Chuck sells exercise equipment on infomercials now. He’s completely lost his edge. But that’s not what I’m talking about.”
Dean looks away, pauses to take a drink of soda then says, “What about Dad, Sam?”
“What about you, Dean?” Sam retorts. “What do you want?”
It occurs to Dean that it’s entirely possible no one has ever seriously asked him that before.
*****
They check into the Safari Inn in Burbank because that’s where Clarence and Alabama Worley stayed. But Dean knows better than to give Sam that kind of ammo and doesn’t mention it as he gets out of the car and heads for the office. When he gets back to the car, Sam’s grin is sly and his eyes twinkle as he pokes, “You never got over Patricia Arquette did you?” Dean tells Sam he’s number one with his middle finger.
They were always too poor and too busy during the times they weren’t in school for John to take them to an amusement park bigger than a county fair and it was usually business-related anyway. On the drive through Arizona, they decided that visiting one was imperative but they quickly agreed that Disneyland was out of the question - “I’ve seen some shit man, but that mouse creeps me out” - so Universal Studios it is. They get up early the next day and get to the park just as it opens, chattering on about what they’ll ride first and wondering if they’ll get to see anyone famous on the studio lot tour. As the day wears on though, they do their best to enjoy it but it’s crowded and loud and surreal and completely unfamiliar and makes them edgy. They try to hide their unease, neither one wanting to ruin it for the other.
After a few hours they stop for sodas. Dean bitches at the cashier about the highway robbery they call prices. Sam is only half listening as he steps away from Dean and looks around at all the smiling faces and happy families and feels more than ever the absurdity that has been his life until he received his acceptance letter.
As Dean sidles up beside him, Sam says in a voice filled with sad wonder, “We really are freaks aren’t we?”
Dean looks around and figures out where Sam’s thoughts have turned. Then he eyes Sam warily, knowing the argument they’re about to have like the back of his hand. He sighs, then counters, “We got by all right, Sam. You made it into college, didn’t you?”
“It’s more than that, Dean. What’s all our training been for? Who decided it was up to us to look for the things no one else sees and kill them? Where is the demon that killed mom? It’s been 18 years Dean, my entire life and Dad is still out there all Don Quixote and shit, chasing windmills and dragging you and me along for the ride. And for what? Nothing, Dean. Nothing. It’s not our fight, it’s his.” Sam’s voice has become shrill and he steps back from Dean, surprised at his outburst and slightly ashamed that he’s having this argument again.
Dean looks around to make sure no one heard Sam’s tantrum before he turns cold eyes on him. “You don’t remember that night, Sam, but I do. These people, they’re the ones living in a fantasy land, not us. They’re all safer because of people like us, like Dad. It’s just, it’s the cards we were dealt, you know?”
Shamed or not, Sam’s never been one to back down when he’s on a roll. He spits out, “Whatever, and quit saying ‘us.’ You were only a kid too, Dean. And the cards we were dealt? God, Dean! Listen to yourself. Dealt by who? Fate? Dad? I’ll deal my own hand, thanks. Do you really think our lives have been what Mom would have wanted for you and me? That Dad did right by her, raising us the way he did?”
Dean looks away, anywhere but Sam’s face, trying to come back with a reason or a purpose and failing. Exasperated, he can only say, “I don’t know, Sam. I don’t know, okay? Are you happy now?”
Sam looks contrite but says nothing.
Dean bows his head and pinches the bridge of his nose before he sighs and says, “Come on. Let’s get out of here. I think I’ve had all the fun I’m gonna have in this place.”
He turns on his heel and heads off toward the nearest exit.
“Dean, wait,” Sam pleads as he hurries to catch up.
Part 2