Fic: Monkberry Moon Delight
There’s a jug of kittens in the lampshade. They want razor blades for lunch.
Dean’s insistent. He grabs you by the collar and keeps saying, “Razor blades! Razor blades!” He stares so hard into your eyes you’re afraid he’ll burst his corneas, if that’s even possible. He does this sometimes, though, and you’re only starting to get used to it. He stares and stares as if it’ll help you read his mind, tell you what he’s really thinking.
It’s not impossible. Not that you can read his mind. But sometimes you can decode what he’s saying if you understand the context and take an educated guess. Like on that long drive from the hospital back to Bobby’s, when he asked if he could clean his toaster, and somehow you knew he needed to stop and take a piss.
You cried like a fucking baby for those three minutes it took him to find a good cluster of trees to hide behind on the side of the interstate. Tears of relief, really. Because even if he wasn’t saying what he wanted to say, you could work with it. You both could.
It’s hard goddamn work, though. Dean gets pissed and you get impatient and then Dean gets even more pissed. Like right now. Like how he shoves you away and starts pointing outside, scratches at his neck so hard it leaves red marks.
“Why can’t you follow the green papers?” he asks, as if it’s the most basic human function you’re failing at. “This isn’t a jellyfish with leaves on it!”
“Dean. Dude. Relax, okay? You need to calm down.”
“Landslide! Nothing ever follows a landslide! It’s all tar and fat!” He growls and yells and kicks a chair across the kitchen floor, and you can feel something bubbling up inside him. You reach out for his shoulder and he slaps your hand away without even hesitating. “Stop making bread!” he orders you, and flips over Bobby’s kitchen table, coffee everywhere, mugs shattered.
You take a step back. You’re going to let him do this, because he needs it, needs to show you how he feels. Not that it’s any different than before. Not that he’d ever come out and say it back when he did have the right words. He’d do something like this first and then wait and wait until it was eating him up inside and he could barely function, and then he’d finally tell you.
So maybe it is different.
He’s pitching empty beer bottles out the back door now, and you can hear them breaking against metal one after another, almost rhythmically. He stops after five or six and presses the palm of his hand against his temple, grabs the doorframe as his body starts to sway.
You ease in behind him, thread an arm around his waist. It’s a position you’re in more often than you’d like these days, but it’s still strange how willingly he leans into you.
You help him to the couch one room over, run to the bathroom for his medication and a cool, wet facecloth.
“Blackbirds. Four and twenty Blackbirds,” he mumbles.
“Guess your head’s the pie, huh?” you say, handing him some pills, a glass of water. Dean nods as he swallows them, winces.
He leans back, takes the facecloth and lays it over his eyes.
“Sparkplugs are under the carpet,” he tells you patting at your knee blindly, like a pleased parent, finally ready to reward their child. With… sparkplugs. He’s thanking you. You know that. But you let out a little laugh, because fuck if sometimes the shit Dean comes up with is just plain funny.
Dean chuckles a little then too, and any guilt you feel dissipates into thin air. This is how it needs to be.
You’re about to tell Dean some sappy shit about how you’ll get through this, like you have everything else, how he’s not alone and there’s no reason he can’t start hunting again once they have a decent handle on the aphasia thing. And the migraine thing.
But Bobby makes a hell of a commotion heading in the front door, mumbling a string of curses.
“There’s no goddamn way I’m dealin’ with these things. Stinkin’ useless squeaky little…”
“Bobby?” you say, forcing his attention away from whatever he’s got cupped against his chest.
“Huh? Oh. He doin’ okay?” Bobby asks, nudging his chin in Dean’s direction.
“Headache,” you tell him, and Dean raises a thumb’s-up.
“Whatcha go there, Bobby?” you ask, curious as to what’s got him so annoyed with life this time.
A bright-sharp squeak emanates from Bobby’s vicinity.
Dean pulls the facecloth off his eyes and gives you a self-satisfied smirk.
“Razor blades. In the lampshade.”
Bobby drops the kitten on Dean’s chest. It’s eyes are still cloudy-blue and its head is nearly as big as its body.
“You take it,” Bobby says, like it’s the weird cousin he’s forced to show around town. “There’s four more of ‘em out in the garage. Like they landed from goddamn space. I tell you, it’s just plain rude.”
Dean pets the kitten once, and hands it off to you.
“I folded those,” Dean says.
“I know, man. You told me so.”
fin.
Dean’s insistent. He grabs you by the collar and keeps saying, “Razor blades! Razor blades!” He stares so hard into your eyes you’re afraid he’ll burst his corneas, if that’s even possible. He does this sometimes, though, and you’re only starting to get used to it. He stares and stares as if it’ll help you read his mind, tell you what he’s really thinking.
It’s not impossible. Not that you can read his mind. But sometimes you can decode what he’s saying if you understand the context and take an educated guess. Like on that long drive from the hospital back to Bobby’s, when he asked if he could clean his toaster, and somehow you knew he needed to stop and take a piss.
You cried like a fucking baby for those three minutes it took him to find a good cluster of trees to hide behind on the side of the interstate. Tears of relief, really. Because even if he wasn’t saying what he wanted to say, you could work with it. You both could.
It’s hard goddamn work, though. Dean gets pissed and you get impatient and then Dean gets even more pissed. Like right now. Like how he shoves you away and starts pointing outside, scratches at his neck so hard it leaves red marks.
“Why can’t you follow the green papers?” he asks, as if it’s the most basic human function you’re failing at. “This isn’t a jellyfish with leaves on it!”
“Dean. Dude. Relax, okay? You need to calm down.”
“Landslide! Nothing ever follows a landslide! It’s all tar and fat!” He growls and yells and kicks a chair across the kitchen floor, and you can feel something bubbling up inside him. You reach out for his shoulder and he slaps your hand away without even hesitating. “Stop making bread!” he orders you, and flips over Bobby’s kitchen table, coffee everywhere, mugs shattered.
You take a step back. You’re going to let him do this, because he needs it, needs to show you how he feels. Not that it’s any different than before. Not that he’d ever come out and say it back when he did have the right words. He’d do something like this first and then wait and wait until it was eating him up inside and he could barely function, and then he’d finally tell you.
So maybe it is different.
He’s pitching empty beer bottles out the back door now, and you can hear them breaking against metal one after another, almost rhythmically. He stops after five or six and presses the palm of his hand against his temple, grabs the doorframe as his body starts to sway.
You ease in behind him, thread an arm around his waist. It’s a position you’re in more often than you’d like these days, but it’s still strange how willingly he leans into you.
You help him to the couch one room over, run to the bathroom for his medication and a cool, wet facecloth.
“Blackbirds. Four and twenty Blackbirds,” he mumbles.
“Guess your head’s the pie, huh?” you say, handing him some pills, a glass of water. Dean nods as he swallows them, winces.
He leans back, takes the facecloth and lays it over his eyes.
“Sparkplugs are under the carpet,” he tells you patting at your knee blindly, like a pleased parent, finally ready to reward their child. With… sparkplugs. He’s thanking you. You know that. But you let out a little laugh, because fuck if sometimes the shit Dean comes up with is just plain funny.
Dean chuckles a little then too, and any guilt you feel dissipates into thin air. This is how it needs to be.
You’re about to tell Dean some sappy shit about how you’ll get through this, like you have everything else, how he’s not alone and there’s no reason he can’t start hunting again once they have a decent handle on the aphasia thing. And the migraine thing.
But Bobby makes a hell of a commotion heading in the front door, mumbling a string of curses.
“There’s no goddamn way I’m dealin’ with these things. Stinkin’ useless squeaky little…”
“Bobby?” you say, forcing his attention away from whatever he’s got cupped against his chest.
“Huh? Oh. He doin’ okay?” Bobby asks, nudging his chin in Dean’s direction.
“Headache,” you tell him, and Dean raises a thumb’s-up.
“Whatcha go there, Bobby?” you ask, curious as to what’s got him so annoyed with life this time.
A bright-sharp squeak emanates from Bobby’s vicinity.
Dean pulls the facecloth off his eyes and gives you a self-satisfied smirk.
“Razor blades. In the lampshade.”
Bobby drops the kitten on Dean’s chest. It’s eyes are still cloudy-blue and its head is nearly as big as its body.
“You take it,” Bobby says, like it’s the weird cousin he’s forced to show around town. “There’s four more of ‘em out in the garage. Like they landed from goddamn space. I tell you, it’s just plain rude.”
Dean pets the kitten once, and hands it off to you.
“I folded those,” Dean says.
“I know, man. You told me so.”
fin.