SPN FIC - You Are My Sunshine
This is a little experiment - the time frame between "Wendigo" and Thanksgiving, told in bits of dialogue. (Insert the usual disclaimer here…)
"So...how do you do that?"
"Do what?"
"E-mail."
Sam peered at his brother over the lid of the laptop. "You've never sent an e-mail."
"No, I've never sent a frickin' e-mail, Sam. Sue me." Dean stared at his burger for a long while, then said crossly, "Who would I have sent it to?"
"Me?" Sam suggested.
Length: 2,165 words
Pairings: None
Rating: PG for language
Spoilers: Just the Pilot
You Are My Sunshine
By Carol Davis
This would have been easier, Dean thought, if it hadn’t been for the damn chocolate chip cookies. And the note. Missed you. Love you.
He’d seen the cookies. Sam had told him about the note.
November 13
Laundry
“They’ll wrinkle if you leave them like that.”
“Uh-huh,” Dean said.
“Seriously, man.”
“You figure I’m a doppelganger? Somebody who looks like me, but gives a crap whether his stuff gets wrinkled? I’ve been doing laundry like this my whole life. How come all of a sudden it’s wrong?”
Sam got up off the bed and left the room.
November 14
What Happens in Vegas
“No,” Sam said. “I don’t.”
“You did the last time. They’ve got that all-you-can-eat buffet for eight bucks, remember? You ate so much you had to go out in the parking lot and puke.”
“Sounds like fun,” Sam replied in a tone that said he would rather have Dean bludgeon him with the salt gun.
“They’ve got that banana cream pie.”
“Would you drop it?”
“It’s good pie, Sam.”
Sam started flicking the edge of the remote with his thumbnail. “Why don’t you admit that the real reason you want to go to the Double Horseshoe is to see if that waitress still works there?”
“What waitress? Oh…hell, Sam, that was seven years ago.”
“Huh,” Sam said.
November 15
They Don’t Have Sex in Utah
“I am right. You do not now, nor have you ever liked Utah.”
“What’s to like? A whole damn state full of women who don’t believe in having sex.”
Sam finished peeling the wrapper off his burger and took a bite. Made a face, but kept chewing. “The Mormons don’t believe in premarital sex. They have sex. Where do you think the whole population of Utah came from? The stork?”
“Maybe.”
“God, Dean.”
“They don’t like you blaspheming in Utah, either.”
November 16
The Weather Channel
Beer was proof there was a God, and He had taste buds.
Dean took a long, cold swallow, let the beer sluice down his gullet and percolate for a few seconds in his stomach, then heaved what he thought was a fantastically impressive belch.
Sam didn’t notice.
Sam had been watching the Weather Channel for three hours and fourteen minutes. Had been watching it when Dean left to go to the Qwik Stop for refreshments, and was still watching it when Dean came back. He’d been majoring in pre-law at Stanford, not meteorology, but he was focused on those big green blobs of precipitation drifting across the map of the United States like his whole future depended on them.
“Why do they keep saying ‘our?” Dean mused. “’Our’ forecast. Like they’re wherever you’re at. Aren’t they in Georgia?”
His brother hit a button on the remote. The TV obediently twinked over to the Cartoon Network.
November 17
Let It Snow, Let It Snow
“Hell,” Dean said vehemently. “Now ain’t that just friggin’ perfect.”
The Impala, the other cars in the motel parking lot, the parking lot itself, and everything else he could see was covered with snow. And not just a little snow, like the sugar on a donut. Big-time snow. Fifty billion tons of it.
“Close the door,” Sam told him.
“And then what? You gonna ask Scotty to beam us out of here?”
“It’s like eight degrees, man. Shut the damn door.”
“I think you oughta get your girly temperature-sensitive ass out of that bed and come help me clean off the car.”
“It’s your car.”
“You like it here? ‘Cause you’re staying here. You make me dig the car out on my own, and I’m leaving your ass right here.”
“So don’t dig it out.”
“Sam, we’re in fucking Utah.”
Sam, with a perfectly straight face, replied, “I thought you said nobody fucks in Utah.”
“Are you gettin’ out of bed?”
“Highway’s closed.”
“What, are you psychic?”
“Weather Channel,” Sam said.
“The TV’s off. You pick up signals in the fillings in your teeth or something?”
“Last night. They forecast anywhere from eighteen to thirty inches of snow for this area. If there’s that much snow, the highway’s closed. At least through the mountains.” Snuffling, Sam got out of bed and wandered into the bathroom. When he came back out, he said, “You’ve got one shovel. What did you want me to shovel with?”
“Improvise,” Dean told him.
November 18
The Greatest Hits of Mullet Rock
“You’re being ridiculous.”
“Okay, so you pick, smartass. What’re you gonna listen to? Jewel?”
“Jewel’s got some good songs.”
Dean winced. “I don’t even know you.”
“All those tapes you’ve got are Dad’s. You like them because he likes them. You could develop some taste of your own, you know.”
“I wouldn’t be picking friggin’ Jewel.”
November 19
“So…how do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“E-mail.”
Sam peered at his brother over the lid of the laptop. “You’ve never sent an e-mail.”
“No, I’ve never sent a frickin’ e-mail, Sam. Sue me.” Dean stared at his burger for a long while, then said crossly, “Who would I have sent it to?”
“Me?” Sam suggested.
November 20
Chick Flick Moments
“Then what was her favorite movie? When Harry Met Sally?”
Sam didn’t say anything. For a second Dean was afraid he’d gone too far. He was putting together an apology when Sam shrugged.
“What, then?” Dean asked. “Beaches?”
“Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”
“Seriously?”
“Followed closely by…”
“Titanic.”
“American Pie.”
“No shit. So she didn’t like that weepy stuff?”
“She liked to laugh.”
“She must, if she picked you out of a crowd.”
“Yeah,” Sam murmured. “I guess.”
November 21
If Wishes Were Horses
“What’re you doing?”
“It’s her birthday.”
“Jessica?”
“Mom.”
“Oh,” Dean said. “Yeah.”
“Do you remember when I was born?”
“Yeah. I guess. I remember when they brought you home. I thought you were weird-looking. Your head came to a point.”
“Jess’s birthday is the same as yours. January 24.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“That would’ve worked out. You could do all your shopping all at once.”
Sam held out the snapshot he’d been looking at - one of the few they had of their mother. Dean took it from him and sat looking at it silently for a minute.
“You got a picture of her?” Dean asked finally. “Jess.”
“Her mother gave me one. The ones we had -“ Sam let that go unfinished. “I can’t look at it. Not yet.”
“We could do something. If you want. In January.”
Sam got up off the bed and left the room.
November 22
Weird Scary Shit
“You’re not gonna… I don’t think I can eat that.”
“Why? Because it’s not tofu?”
“I don’t eat tofu.”
“It’s not that bad,” Dean insisted. “It’s -“ Then he had to stop. And look. “Holy crap. Something’s moving under the gravy.”
“You were gonna eat that.”
“No I wasn’t.”
“Dean, man, it’s moving.”
“I know it’s moving. I was the one who said it first.”
“Your food is moving, man.”
They stared at Dean’s plate, transfixed, for almost a minute. Then a bubble of laughter got past Sam’s lips. A moment later they were both laughing, big whoops of noise that made the other customers in the diner turn to stare in their direction. They laughed until their faces were streaked with tears and their noses were running.
“God, man, get the salt gun,” Sam wheezed.
Their waitress was unamused. “Sump’n wrong?” she scowled.
The Winchesters both shook their heads. Then Dean got himself together enough to say, “Didn’t say on the menu that the Salisbury steak was possessed.”
“What?”
Dean pointed. “It’s aaaaaaliiiive,” he guffawed.
He and Sam sat there laughing until the gravy had congealed enough to suffocate whatever was underneath it. When Dean’s dinner finally lay still, Sam wiped his nose with a napkin and announced solemnly, “That was classic.”
“Dad would have laughed.”
“You think?”
“Yeah. Even Dad would think that was funny.”
“Where the hell is he, man?”
“Someplace,” Dean said.
November 23
Ease on Down the Road
“How far is it?”
“Looks like about three hundred miles.”
“We get an early start, we could be there by lunchtime. If you can get your ass out of bed before lunchtime.”
“Did he do this to you, while I was gone? Bail like this?”
“Not for this long.”
“Did he know you’d come and get me?”
“I don’t know, Sam.”
Sam sat down on the edge of the bed and rubbed wearily at his eyes with the pads of his fingers. “It wasn’t there,” he told Dean, barely above a whisper. “I’d swear it. There was nobody - nothing in the apartment but me and her. Until you came back. Did you see anything? Anything at all?”
“No, man,” Dean replied softly.
“I can get up early. Just set the alarm.”
November 24
Turkey and Cookies and I Love You
If not for the cookies, Dean thought, this would be a hell of a lot easier.
If not for Jessica - if not for the fact that his brother had gotten on a bus and gone to California and made a life for himself - if not for the fact that Sam had made himself a home and had been part of an “us,” if not for the fact that that thing had ruined everything…
This would be easier.
Or maybe it wouldn’t.
The motel room kitchenette had dishes, but they were leftovers, garage sale finds. Nothing matched, and most of the plates were chipped. Not that that was a novelty; the three of them had eaten thousands of meals from dishes most people would have regarded as trash.
With one eye on the door Dean laid out cutlery and glasses and paper napkins.
If the kitchenette had had a stove instead of a microwave, he would have tried putting together a real meal. But this would do - and maybe it was the best option, since he couldn’t guarantee Sam would be gone more than an hour or so. Probably less, since it had taken some serious sweet-talking to get the town librarian agree to meet with him on a holiday.
“And you’re gonna do what?” Sam had asked him.
“Check around town,” he’d said glibly. “Talk to the man on the street. See what kind of gossip’s going around.”
He’d done that, for a few minutes. Then had hit the one market that was open this morning.
Running purely on instinct, he put the plastic plates into the microwave when the time felt right. He’d just taken them out when he heard the throaty rumble of the Impala out in the parking lot. “Am I good, or am I good?” he murmured.
Sam came in a minute later with a fistful of photocopies, his face and hands chapped red by the wind. “I got -“ he said, then stopped. “What’s…”
“Made some dinner,” Dean told him.
A couple of Swanson’s Hungry Man turkey dinners, sitting on top of the chipped china plates. Cokes, because Mom had never served beer on Thanksgiving. A boxed apple pie.
“I -“ Sam said.
“Sit down and eat. This frozen stuff doesn’t stay hot long.”
“Yeah.”
He just stood there holding his photocopies. Didn’t seem to be seeing the wobbly table and the mismatched chairs, or the Swanson’s dinners. Just stood there with his coat on and his nose starting to run from the warm air of the motel room after being out in the wind.
“We were gonna… Her mom makes dinner.”
Dean nodded. “The thing is, man…with Dad gone…”
“You would have been by yourself.”
“No big deal.”
Sam laid the photocopies on the bed and shrugged out of his coat. He disappeared just for a moment, to find tissues in the bathroom to blow his nose. Then he pulled out the chair at one of the places Dean had set and sat down. “I like these,” he said. “Remember? It was always a big deal when Dad would let us buy these.”
“I don’t think I nuked ‘em enough. They still look kind of frozen.”
“What the hell,” Sam said.
Dean tipped his head toward the TV. “Parade’s on.”
“It’s on all day.”
That seemed to be a “no, thanks,” so Dean didn’t bother reaching for the remote. He popped the tab off his Coke and extended the can toward his brother, tipped slightly, trying to prompt a toast. But instead of responding in kind, Sam closed his eyes, knit his reddened fingers together, and rested his chin on them.
Must’ve been something she did, Dean thought, because never once had they said grace before a meal, the three of them. The Winchester men. If that was what Sam was doing. Maybe he just had a headache.
“Where is he, Dean?” Sam asked softly.
“Damned if I know.”
Sam pulled in a long, shuddering breath. “I need to find him. I need to know.”
“We’ll find him.”
“But for now it’s just us.”
“Yeah,” Dean said. “Just us.”