Chapter Text
The Christmas Wish~
Dean sat at the kitchen table and looked over the paperwork again. His heart was heavy, but it needed to be done, and it needed to be signed. He wiped at his eyes and sniffled. This was one of the hardest things he’d ever had to do, besides bury his dad and stepmom, and it felt like his heart was being torn in two. He’d called his brother Sam to come over because trying to do this on his own was just too much, but now he was thinking Sam was the wrong person to lean on since his brother was openly sobbing beside him.
“They’re custody papers, Dean. Y-you just sign them and you become h-her legal guardian.” Sam’s voice was catching from all his crying and it wasn’t helping Dean’s own grief. In two days’ time they had to bury their youngest brother Adam. It wasn’t fair, having to bury a young man who was practically still a child himself.
“I know, Sammy. I’m just…this feels….he’s really gone .”
“I know.” Sam’s voice cracked and his face crumpled as he burst into tears again.
“I sign these, and, uh, when do I get her?” Dean looked up at the woman sitting across from them. Tessa was the social worker assigned to his case and he was grateful for her patience and understanding with everything their family had gone through.
“We want her with family, so we can get her settled here with you by this weekend.” She replied.
“No, not my place. Adam willed me the house too. For Maya. I’ll move in there, so her life is not disrupted. I don’t want her giving everything up to move into my tiny one bedroom apartment in L.A.” Dean said. “I’ll make the move here.”
She smiled and nodded. “That’s even better for her.”
“I’ll call my friend Jo, get her to start packing my place up tonight and ship my stuff out here for me.” He said.
“I’m moving out here too.” Sam decided. “To be near to you both.”
“You’re sure?” Dean asked skeptically.
“I’m certain.” Sam replied.
Dean was glad. He didn’t want his only remaining family member, save for Maya to be halfway across the country. First though, they had to get through burying their baby brother.
The funeral was surreal and moving in was even more so. Soon Dean found himself with a sad, lethargic eight year old thrust at him and he was terrified he would screw up and do something wrong by her. It was February, cold out, and there wasn’t much he could do to cheer her up. As soon as he’d arrived in Jasper Falls South Dakota, he’d known he was out of his element. He’d been a mechanic with a successful business back in L.A., but he’d also been a musician with a pretty successful band. Even in a state like California he’d easily gotten by on his income. Now he was forced to give up his music and find steady work at the only place currently hiring in town; the post office. It paid well, and combined with the life insurance policy left behind by his brother, there would be enough money to take care of Maya and everything she would need. She was what mattered now.
The school recommended a therapist and Dean thought that was a great idea, for both of them. He sought out one that specialized in children for his niece and one that could help him adapt to his new parental role and everything that came with it for himself. Slowly they began learning how to live together. Maya was bright, bubbly, and the sweetest child imaginable, and he found himself falling more in love with her than he felt was even possible.
Growing up, he’d only had limited contact with his brother Adam. After his parents had divorced, his father, John had taken a job in Minnesota where he’d taken a job. Dean has been nine at the time, Sam only five. John had met his second wife Kate less than a month after relocating there and less than a year later, they were married. Dean remembered how upset his mother, Mary had been, though she wouldn’t tell him why. He was only ten at the time and he thought it was because she was jealous, that their dad had found a new woman to love. Now, as an adult he understood it better. His father had moved on from the family he had promised to love and cherish, and he’d built himself a new one. John had abandoned Mary and his first two sons. Dean never harbored any ill will towards Kate or Adam though. It wasn’t their fault, and Kate was never anything but loving towards him and Sam. Sam, however, was a spiteful little shit who refused to go visit, and refuse to acknowledge Kate as his stepmother or Adam as his brother for more than a decade.
It took time for Sam to finally grow up and get over his petty selfishness. Dean, however, took every opportunity to visit his second family out in Minnesota, not so much because he wanted to see his dad, but because he wanted to get to know his little brother, to bond with him and spend time with him. Adam was a great kid, smart like Sam, daring like him, sarcastic like both of them, and fun to be around. When, at 17 he decided he wanted to join the Marines, no one was really surprised. Their dad had been a Marine, and so had Dean. The day he turned 18, he enlisted, and right after graduation, he was headed off to boot camp. Things went to shit while he was away though.
Just after he’d finished boot camp, Kate was struck by another driver on her way home from work. It had been raining hard and the other driver had never seen her black car in the rain and dark. The coroner swore she had died instantly. Adam was permitted to come home for the wake and funeral, and while he was there, his girlfriend Anna did her best to console him. Her idea of consolation led to her getting pregnant, and when he ended up stationed at Camp Lejeune North Carolina, he called her out there to marry him. Dean went as his best man, and Sam and John were there too. It was a sweet wedding, and Dean really wished them a lifetime of happiness, but the fates really seemed to have it in for his baby brother.
Anna’s pregnancy was complicated almost from the start. She’d been born with an undiagnosed congenital heart defect that they didn’t find until she was six months pregnant, and not until she had begun to develop pre-eclampsia. She was put on bed rest, which Adam took dead serious, pampering her and giving her everything she could possibly need or want in order to make sure she was comfortable. For being only 19, he was an ideal husband and soon to be father, and Dean admired him. Then tragedy struck again. When Anna went into labor two weeks early, she went into cardiac arrest. They did an emergency C-section, taking the baby so there would be less stress on her body but by then the damage was done. She made it to recovery, got to see her baby girl and hold her, kiss her and name her Maya Janelle Grace Winchester, but that night, as she closed her eyes to get some rest at Adam’s insistence, her heart stopped beating for the last time. Adam was alone with a newborn baby, and his heart was torn in two. He’d already seen too much tragedy for someone so young, and Dean’s heart broke for his little brother.
He stayed for a while, to help with the baby after Anna’s funeral. Adam had to keep working but Dean couldn’t stay on the base, so he took Maya back to Minnesota, to their father John’s house. John spoiled his granddaughter, and he loved watching her grow. When he got a new job in South Dakota, Maya went with him, and when Adam’s enlistment was up, he joined them there. He bought a house, used the degree he’d earned in electrical engineering to get a fantastic job, and his life was really starting to look up again. Dean made regular trips out there to see them, and he had a special bond with his only niece. Sam didn’t have any kids yet, so Maya was spoiled rotten. Last year, John had gotten sick. He’d hidden the fact that for the last ten years he’d been fighting cancer. It finally won, and they buried him on a warm spring morning in March. All that were left were the Winchester boys and Maya. Then the unthinkable happened.
Dean had just finished an unbelievable set, playing to a crowd so loud the cheering had been downright deafening and had left him riding a high all the way back to his dressing room, until he saw the message waiting for him. His Uncle Bobby had called, saying it was urgent and he needed to call him back ASAP. Bobby wasn’t really his uncle, he was their dad’s best friend, but when he needed to pull weight and get a message to Dean, he used the word “uncle”. That meant something bad had happened. It had been with a growing sense of dread in his stomach that he’d called Bobby back and gotten the news.
Adam had been shot. He’d gone out on a date, his first since Anna died, and they were with a group of friends. They’d all gone out to a bar and a fight broke out. Someone had pulled a gun. Adam had attempted to disarm the man and…
He’d flown out that night on the red eye, not even caring that planes scared the shit out of him, and gone straight to the hospital to identify the body. In the last decade he’d shed more tears than any one person should ever have to, and there would still be more. His dad and Kate dying had been painful but nothing compared to losing his little brother. Adam wasn’t even 30 yet, he’d had his whole life ahead of him. He was supposed to be there to warn Maya’s future boyfriends or girlfriends to treat her well, to remind her how beautiful and amazing she was, to call her daddy’s little princess until he was old and gray, to walk her down the aisle on her wedding day. Dean’s heart shattered when he saw his brother lying cold and lifeless on that metal table, and he mourned for his niece all of the things she would miss out on. He had to compose himself before he could even go and see her. He was the adult, the mature one that was supposed to be strong. She needed him to be strong for her, and he intended to be.
In the end, he did end up being the stronger one. Sam, surprisingly, was the one that couldn’t stop crying. He had eventually bonded with Adam and they’d become rather close, but never quite as close as Dean had been with him, which was why the day he’d arrived, a lawyer had approached him about taking custody of Maya, and about the insurance policy that had been established for her. He’d never wavered in his acceptance of the responsibility. Maya was family, and he loved her dearly. He’d go to the end of the earth for her, even if he had to learn how exactly to be a father.
By summer they had established a routine, and things were going pretty good. Maya had finished up second grade and was eagerly anticipating starting third. Her grades had only suffered slightly, much to Dean’s surprise, with everything she’d been through, and therapy seemed to really be helping her. It was helping him too, being able to talk about his fears, his hopes, his regrets and his concerns where Maya was concerned. Sam still hadn’t moved out there to be by them, so aside from the occasional visit from Bobby, Dean was pretty much doing things all on his own. He’d made a couple of friends at the post office, Garth, another carrier who loved to talk his ear off in the break room as they got their morning coffee, and Donna, the only other person he’d ever met that was even bubblier than Garth. He liked them both though, and got along well with each of them.
In September Sam called to tell him he’d met someone. Her name was Eileen, and he was pretty sure he was in love with her. She was a security specialist and Dean knew moving just wasn’t going to be an option for him anymore. It kind of stung knowing he and Maya would continue to be alone but hey, if Sam had found the love of his life, maybe soon she’d have some cousins to play with. He couldn’t begrudge his brother finding love. Sometimes he wished he could find it himself. When he’d played with the band his life had been too hectic to even think of settling down and while he loved playing music, he didn’t love the constant movement, the new cities every night, the sense of never being truly settled. So maybe delivering mail wasn’t the most fulfilling job he could imagine, at least he felt grounded. He was home every night, had dinner on the table and could help Maya with her homework, get her into the shower and into bed on time, and still have time to kick back and relax for a bit before he had to head to bed. One day, he wanted to open his own automotive shop. He had money saved. Another couple thousand and maybe one more classic rebuilt and he’d have what he’d need to do it. He just needed to have patience.
Maya tucked a lock of her dark red hair behind her ear and watched her uncle from her seat at the table. She could see him sitting in the living room, staring at the television, though she was pretty sure he wasn’t really watching what was on because that was a commercial for diaper cream. He always changed the channel when that kind came on. That meant he was deep in thought again. There were lines on his forehead and a tiny frown on his mouth which meant he was probably worrying about her again. She didn’t like it when he worried about her. What she really wanted was for him to be happy. They’d been living together for almost a year now and he was the best uncle ever. He read her stories at bedtime, he played at the park with her, he got her enrolled in dance and karate classes, and once, he’d even said it was ok to have ice cream for breakfast. That had been awesome!
The commercial changed to one about women’s underwear, and still he didn’t move. He was thinking extra hard. When he sighed, his shoulders slumped and he looked so sad all of a sudden. Every time she asked him if he was sad though, he denied it, saying he was just tired. She looked down at the paper in front of her and tapped her pencil on the edge of it thoughtfully. This was a preformed letter, meant to be written to Santa. It could say anything she wanted it to. All she had to do was write down what she wished for and then with help from her teacher, her letter would be put in an envelope and mailed straight to Santa up at the North Pole. Her teacher had said they needed to get the letters sent out early, so Santa could have the time to read them all, and that was why they were mailing them out at the beginning of November. All she knew is she had to write something down.
She thought about the things she really wanted. There wasn’t much really that she didn’t already have. Unlike some kids her age, she wasn’t greedy or selfish, nor was she materialistic. With one last glance over at her uncle, she decided what she really wanted, more than presents for herself, was for him to be happy. She just wasn’t sure what would make him cheer up. Hopefully Santa would know. Her pencil scratched across the paper as she wrote out her list, and 15 minutes later, after she had filled up the entire paper, she folded it neatly in half and placed it back in her folder. She’d been so good this year, Santa just had to grant this one wish for her. Her Uncle Dean deserved to be happy.