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Dean watches as John and Sam embrace, acknowledging the argument that swiftly cut through the last ties that bound them together, and mending their bridges with a word and a hug that conveyed what they weren’t willing to say out loud.
“If you walk out that door, don’t ever come back.”
Dean doesn’t think they understood just how much that argument killed him. Each standing firmly on their own side, looking like they knew that Dean was going to pick their side. Sam, knowing Dean as the protector, who raised him, who would give everything for him. Or John, seeing Dean as the loyal little soldier, who understood that duty came first, before themselves.
And Dean, wouldn’t, couldn’t, choose between them. And so Dean watched as each grew angrier at his refusal, at his betrayal, and began spitting words that they shouldn’t have meant, and yet seemed to completely accept and emphasize.
And Dean sat, caught in the middle of two powerful, unrelenting forces, trying to decide which he wanted more – an out for Sam, Sammy, his little kid brother who just wanted a normal life away from the blood and pain and darkness of the hunting life – or Dean’s own, terrible, impossible want to be a family, to see his brother and father to stop, to wait, to listen, to understand-
Dean, however, understood that Dean never got what he want, never was anything other than a disgraced hero for Sam, or anything more than a loyal soldier, good cannon fodder, for John.
And so Dean stayed silent, and in his silence, allowed for his family, the one thing he had left, to shatter and crumble before his eyes. His silence lasted far, far longer than that night, however. For weeks, months, Dean wouldn’t say a word, fear sitting in a lump in his throat, trying so hard to be the good son that John had always wanted, and the good soldier that Dean had always fallen short of. The wall in his throat fought with the want to scream, to call Sammy, make sure he was okay, that he got to California okay, and the fear of angering John even more, of opening the festering wound that pulsed so obviously between every interaction.
And for years, Dean had stayed silent, apart from the occasional, “Yessir,” that croaked out of his mouth when John called for another hunt.
All Dean did, for four years was to follow every suggestion, every order, trying so hard to be enough of a good son for both himself and Sam, but it seemed every time that he met up with John he wasn’t enough for even one of them. All John could see was the mistakes he made, showing that he wasn’t good enough. As a result, John stopped meeting up with Dean, tired of always having to save Dean’s ass from yet another monster.
Dean was getting pretty good at hunting by himself, but somehow, somehow, John always caught wind of the times Dean had his ass kicked, and none of the times Dean was actually doing alright.
It was touch-and-go for a while, with Dean learning how to have his own back. Dean could even admit it to himself, if not anyone else, that his coping mechanisms were going to eventually get him killed, but with no one else to watch his six and to stitch him up afterward, no one else really could talk.
(Bobby called every so often, and Dean would sit, silently staring at the phone ringing in his hand, as he let it go to voicemail. Every time, Bobby would leave another heart wrenching voicemail, pleading with Dean to answer, to make sure he was okay, and the lump in Dean’s throat would sit heavier, feeling like it wanted to rip his throat open and let the pain and fear come racing out-
Dean would always, always text back with a simple, “I’m okay.”)
And in the quiet of his deserted motel room, Dean would practice his lines that he would say to the witness, over and over again until his voice came out clear and not-so-weak as usual, until Dean could speak around the lump that had never gone away since that fateful night. It pained him to force out his voice around the wall, every word another shot in the heart from John and Sam, but Dean had always been a bit of a masochist.
When Dean could finally go to the bar and pick up a girl for a night, he couldn’t bear to take off the amulet Sam had given him. He concentrated all his energy on making it good for her, trying to ignore how even his moans got stuck in his throat, not being able to fight their way out.
(Dean always appreciated the bartenders that noticed he wasn’t one for talking, and just slid a drink over to him without a word being spoken.)
Dean remembered cold, dark nights, alone in a motel room halfway across the country from the little brother he tried so desperately to forget. But in the dark, alone, Dean would count the hours back and wonder if Sammy was partying, having a beer with friends; maybe with a girl he could finally settle down with. He couldn’t imagine it. Sam would most likely but studying his ass off in the middle of the night for a test or some shit he’d have the next day, not wasting a single moment of the new life he’d been given. He’d be so, so different from his fuck-up brother, and Dean couldn’t be prouder.
Every week, John would call, terse and cold, briefly ask if he was alright, and without waiting for much of an answer, give him the next job and the allotted time constraints he expected it to be done in. Dean thought it was pathetic, the way he would look forward to these calls, because it was the only personal interaction he would receive. But a tiny part of Dean, overruled by the part that was ecstatic over the call, would always question why John never said anything to the cracked, “Yessirs” he would get from a disused voice.
When the time came that Dean hadn’t gotten his weekly phone call from John, Dean freaked. Because even though John hadn’t shown any kind of care for Dean since Sam left, Dean would never stop hoping for the vague memories of the John that went to baseball games with him, the one that motherhenned when he got a scratch on his knee.
And Dean, in his brilliance, had a couple shots, called Bobby, found that he hadn’t heard from John, and he was concerned too, got it in his head that the best thing to do was to go get Sam from Stanford. In his drunken mind, Dean knew that if Bobby couldn’t find him, there was no way Dean was going to, and that was apparently enough to rip Sam from his normal, and drop him back into the darkness that Dean had never gotten out of.
The moment Dean saw Sam, though, the lump in his throat almost vanished, and, for the first time in four years, Dean didn’t have to rehearse what he was going to say. His voice scratchy and hoarse, yet in a stronger voice than he’d been able to conjure for years, “Whoa, easy there, tiger.”
Sam’s voice sounded like salvation and retribution all at once. And six months later, when they were all finally together again, John and Sam, not fighting, in front of him, Dean’s wish was coming true.
But instead of feeling relief, the lump in Dean’s throat fell harder in place than ever before. Because Sam was always the son that John had hoped for. The strong-willed, smart, and strong son who had a mind of his own, and the strength to go through with his vision. Dean stood in direct contrast, standing smaller and less… grand, than Sam himself. Sam’s first reaction to seeing John had been one of independence, while Dean’s first thought was to apologize for not knowing it was a trap.
It physically hurt Dean to see Sam welcomed back so openly, so naturally, after years of silence and tension, while Dean had been there all along and never did anything right, according to John. Dean had tried, for years, to get a smile from John, a “good job, son,” even once, and now John had seen Sam for all of thirty seconds before enveloping him in a hug and forgiving him for all the shit that happened before.
And it killed Dean for his father to admit that he worried, that he cared about them when Sam was there. Dean was trying desperately to hold back tears as he realized that the John that was talking to Sam was so very different from the John that usually talked to Dean.
Sam was the healing balm to their family, and Dean… Dean was not.
Unbidden, a memory rose from when Dean and Sam were staying with Pastor Jim while their dad was off on a hunt. Every night, the older man would read a parable from the Bible, and explain it to the brothers, making sure they understood it. The one that had always stood out to him was the parable of the Prodigal Son.
Now, Dean could understand the story a little bit better.
For some reason, John was almost always willing to look the other way when it came to Sam, and yet John would nitpick at the same things and more with Dean. Dean had always tried so hard, and always fallen short.
Dean’s throat burned, holding tears back as he watched as his father and brother forgave each other. If this was what Dean always wanted, why did it feel like his world was falling apart?
Maybe he had wanted John to finally be proud of him. Maybe he wanted to finally be equal in the eyes of his father. Maybe he wanted Sam to see what this life had done to his father. Maybe he wanted Sam to get out while he still could. Maybe Dean wanted Sam all to himself. Maybe he wanted to finally be good enough.
Dean hated himself. John and Sam were finally forgiving each other, and yet Dean was over on the side, hating every second they were in the same room. He hated that he didn’t want them to be on speaking terms again. Hated himself for the fear of never being good enough, for either Sam or John.
Then the demons came, and Dean cursed himself for being distracted. And Sammy, using his big brain that had gotten him into college, got them out of a horrible situation. And outside, John was looking at Sam with such pride, overlooking Dean entirely, and Dean knew he couldn’t take it. Couldn’t bear to yet again be measured with his little brother and lose, yet again.
And Dean knew that John was thinking that if Sammy hadn’t been hunting for four years, and Dean had never stopped, why was Sam saving all their lives?
Dean didn’t want to answer that question.
So, Dean shoved them away. He let their father drive away, and pried his brother off his father, separating them. Dean knew that his father was stronger, colder, more determined without Sam around.
Because for Sammy, John still tried to be their father.
(Dean’s mistakes cut those ties long, long ago.)
*
Later, once Dean was sure Sam was asleep, he opened the Bible to a passage he never thought he’d read again.
Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’
“The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’
‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’
Dean scoffed bitterly. In stories, at least, things always had a happy ending. John would never say something like that to Dean.
With a final check of the salt lines, Dean crawled into bed, minding his injuries. Despite meeting with his father for the first time in over six months and Sam sleeping peacefully less than an arm’s length away, the lump in his throat sat heavier than before. Dean had never felt so alone.
*