Work Text:
"Dean, I'm pregnant.." I trailed off, wincing as his face ran through a gamut of emotions before settling on what looked like fear. He ran his hands through his hair, turning away from me as I waited for any sort of response.
We'd slept together two weeks ago. I'd been in a state and drinking at the bar, and he'd happened to walk in. What happened after shouldn't have, but it had and I'd been stupid and now here we both were, outside the local coffee shop so I could tell him the truth.
I knew where this would likely lead. Dean traveled a lot, he hadn't told me what he did for a living but I got the sense it might not've been completely proper, or even completely legal. He couldn't be a dad.
When he didn't respond, I continued, "Look, I know you-"
"Are you fucking serious?!" he turned on me surprisingly quickly, the rage now evident in his voice. "You told me you were on the pill!"
"I- I was, I am, it's not totally effective though." I was stuttering through an explanation, his anger more than I'd prepared for. I wasn't going to tell him that I often forgot to take it, or took it at the wrong time.
He let out a huffy breath, refusing to look at me, then asked, "You're sure it's mine?"
I scoffed. "You broke a dry spell of about two months for me, and I haven't slept with anyone since. I'm sure it's yours."
He seemed to calm down a bit, but I could still see the rage simmering under his carefully composed exterior. "What're you going to do?"
"I don't know. I can't kill it, I just can't. I was going to, I don't know, see it through, hope it all works out?" It was a pipe dream, but I didn't know what else I could do.
The rage was back then. "No. You're getting rid of it. I can't be a part of this."
"Dean!" I was shocked at that. "It's my choice!"
"I don't need this," he spat back, the calm from a few moments before completely gone. Then, to my shock and disgust, he turned his back on me and walked away.
I was stunned into silence for a few seconds, then shouted after him, "What're you doing?! We have to talk about this!"
He shrugged, hands in his jacket pockets. "I don't have to talk about anything with you. This is your fault, now fix it."
"Dean!" I shouted. I had trailed a few steps behind him, but now I jogged to catch up as he was unlocking his car that was parked on the street. Without thinking, I grabbed his forearm.
He practically threw me off as he slid into the drivers' side. "This isn't happening," I muttered, a bit numb to the surreal reality that he was leaving. I didn't know Dean that well, true, but he didn't seem like that much of a dick.
When he rolled his window down and commanded, "Move," I didn't even think, just shot to the side and returned to my spot on the sidewalk, staring at him in disbelief as he started his car up and shot out onto the street, not bothering to look back as he made a beeline for anywhere that wasn't here.
Two weeks later, and I hadn't heard anything from him. I'd spent the time oscillating between panicking and planning, trying my best to hold it together in the face of the fact that this kid I was carrying would end up fatherless.
So I was shocked when a knock at my door one night revealed the man of the hour himself, standing in my doorway looking anxious, with a plastic shopping bag in hand.
"Can we talk?" he asked, looking quite ashamed.
"I thought you didn't need to talk to me about anything," I shot back, but stepped aside to let him in before closing the door after him. I didn't look at him, just walked around and stood where I had been at the kitchen counter, poring through my finances, trying to find small ways I could cut spending and hopefully get some money in the bank.
Dean walked to my side, casting an uneasy glance at the papers in front of me before looking up at my face. "Y/N, I'm so sorry about how I left things. You didn't deserve that, and I can't apologize enough for it. I just, never in a million years thought I'd be hearing that, let alone from someone I barely knew."
He waited for me to respond, so I decided to throw him a lifeline. "I get it. It was a lot. I'm sorry it happened." My voice sounded stiff, robotic even to me.
"It's not your fault," he responded, sounding so sincere I wanted to cry. "And look, I travel a lot. I can't be a perfect father. But I want to try. I want this."
I turned to him, shocked at his words, but before I could get anything out, he held a hand up to silence me and set the bag on the counter. "I know this doesn't make things better, but just to show you how dedicated I am, I got some stuff."
I watched with curiosity as he pulled the first item out of the bag. It was a small package of diapers. "We're going to need a lot of these," he said, a small smile ghosting across his face. I didn't say anything, and he reached in the bag again. This time, it was a tiny winter hat. "This, to keep their head warm in these freezing winters." Again, no response, so he went ahead and pulled the final item from the bag. It was a pacifier. "And this, because I'm sure they're going to be driving us up a wall with the crying all the time." This time, it was a full grin from him.
I took the hat in my hands, feeling the soft fabric between my fingers as I let the tears spill over. "What do you even do for work?"
I think the question took him by surprise, but he answered anyway. "I uh- it's a long story. I'll tell you, but it's probably better if you just don't know."
A frustrated sigh escaped my lips as I slapped a palm down on the counter, hat softening the noise. "How is that supposed to work? You could never be here, and you can't even be honest about me with something as simple as your job."
"It's not simple. Not with me. I'm sorry," he offered, looking more and more defeated as the conversation went on.
"And remember when you had that your little outburst? How am I supposed to trust you with a child after that?"
He looked down at the ground, running a hand through his hair. "That wasn't me, you have to believe me. I was already in a shitty mood.. it took me completely by surprise."
He didn't offer further explanation, and I didn't ask. It was a weak excuse, and we both knew it.
I thought it over, how rough his life seemed. His body had been littered with scars that I couldn't miss even with all the lights out as he'd insisted. He'd been drinking the cheapest beer at that bar, which really said something at a bar like that, and the motel room he'd taken me back to had been far from glamorous.
"Look, I appreciate all this, I really do. And if you want to come visit, say, ten years down the line, feel free. I'll tell the kid you're an old friend. But I think for both my sanity and the kid's.. it'd probably be better if you just stay gone."
The look on his face told him my words were hitting him just as hard as they were hitting me. I didn't want to raise a kid without a dad. But I also didn't want to raise a kid that thought his dad only cared enough to visit every six months. I didn't want to raise a kid with that sort of inconsistency. And I barely knew Dean. What would we even agree on? Would he be trying to dictate how we raise our kid from 1000 miles away?
"I.. I can respect that," he finally said, taking a few seconds to look down at the pacifier in his hands. His eyes looked so sad I wanted to cry, I wanted to take back what I'd said, but I steeled myself and held on.
"I'm so sorry," I offered again, and he looked up as he heard the tears in my voice.
"No, sweetheart," he argued, and took a step forward to wrap me in a hug. He felt warm, he felt safe. But what I felt and what I knew were two very different things, and I didn't protest when he stepped away from me. "You have my number. Call me if you ever need anything. I won't bother you again."
He set the bag on the counter slowly, carefully. After that, he was gone impossibly quick. As the door slammed shut, I wanted to run after him, I wanted more than anything to keep him here.
"God damnit," I sobbed, hiccupping through the tears as my hands shook with anxiety. I held tight to the hat and let myself crumple to the floor, grief shuddering through my body. I couldn't understand why I was reacting this strongly to Dean's disappearance. The only thing I knew was that I felt like a chasm had opened up in my life, and I couldn't fix it.