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Betrayal in the Highest
It was January, and Caleb was already regretting agreeing to come to Kentucky.
The weather was miserable — freezing rain turning the farmyard to mud, bitter wind cutting through every layer he owned — but he had promised Dean he would come for the late Christmas gathering.
Jim, Bobby, and Mac were all inside while Caleb stood alone in the barn, elbow-deep in the engine of his Jeep. Between the cold, stiff fingers and awkward angle, the spark plugs were refusing to cooperate.
Caleb muttered a curse under his breath and slammed the wrench down onto the hood.
“Stubborn piece of—”
The familiar rumble of an Impala cut him off.
Caleb glanced toward the open barn door as the black car rolled into the yard.
Finally.
He wiped grease from his hands with an already ruined rag and stepped outside just as the driver’s door opened.
Dean climbed out first, looking exhausted.
John followed more slowly from the other side of the car.
And then Sam exploded out of the backseat.
“You lied to me!” the nine-year-old screamed.
The entire yard went silent.
Dean froze instantly.
John’s expression hardened on reflex.
“Sam—”
“No!” Sam shouted, backing away from the car before John could reach for him. “Don’t tell me to calm down!”
Caleb straightened slowly.
Well. This was already worse than expected.
Sam’s breathing was ragged, eyes red and furious.
“You knew!” he yelled. “All of you knew!”
Dean stepped forward carefully.
“Sammy—”
“Stop calling me that!”
The crack in Sam’s voice made Dean stop dead in his tracks.
John rubbed a hand over his jaw, already looking irritated.
“We are not doing this out in the yard.”
“Oh, so now you wanna talk about it?” Sam snapped. “After lying to me my whole life?”
“Sam.”
“No! You don’t get to do that!” Sam shouted. “You don’t get to use that voice like I’m in trouble when you’re the one hiding monsters and ghosts and whatever else from me!”
Caleb could practically see Dean panicking beside the Impala.
John, meanwhile, had gone eerily still.
“You read my journal,” John said flatly.
Sam laughed bitterly.
“Yeah, I did! Somebody had to tell me the truth!”
Dean stepped in quickly before John could respond.
“I told him everything on Christmas Eve.”
John’s eyes flicked sharply toward Dean.
That was apparently the wrong thing to say.
“You WHAT?” Sam whirled on his brother. “You did not tell me everything!”
Dean blinked.
“What?”
“You told me monsters were real!” Sam shouted. “You told me Mom died because of one! But nobody told me I’ve been living in some creepy cult my whole life!”
“The Brotherhood is not a cult,” John growled.
Sam barked out a harsh laugh.
“Oh, really? Because from where I’m standing it sure looks like one!”
“Watch your mouth.”
“No!”
Sam shoved Dean when the older boy tried stepping closer again.
“You all lied to me!” Sam yelled. “Pastor Jim lied! Caleb lied! Bobby lied! You made me think I was crazy!”
“You were never crazy,” Dean said immediately.
“Then why didn’t anybody tell me the truth?”
Nobody answered.
And honestly, that silence said more than anything else could have.
Sam’s face crumpled for half a second before hardening again.
“You know what the worst part is?” he asked quietly.
Dean already looked sick.
“I trusted you.”
The words hit Dean harder than any punch could have.
“Sammy…”
“Don’t.”
John stepped forward then, voice firm and sharp.
“We kept this from you to protect you.”
Sam rounded on him instantly.
“Protect me from what? My own family?”
“You are a child.”
“And whose fault is that?” Sam screamed.
The yard fell silent again.
Even John looked caught off guard by that one.
Sam’s chest heaved as tears spilled down his face unchecked now.
“You let Dean know!” he shouted. “Why does he get to know everything and I get treated like some stupid baby?”
“Because Dean has responsibilities you don’t understand yet,” John snapped.
“Oh, I understand plenty!” Sam shot back. “I understand Dad disappears for weeks at a time and Dean lies for him! I understand everybody whispers when they think I can’t hear them! I understand that none of you trust me!”
“That’s not true,” Dean said immediately.
“Then why does everybody keep secrets from me?”
Dean opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
And that seemed to hurt Sam more than anything else.
The kid let out one shaky breath before turning and storming toward the house.
“Sam!” Dean called after him.
Sam stopped just long enough to glare over his shoulder.
“I hate all of you right now.”
Then he disappeared inside, slamming the back door hard enough to shake the windows.
Nobody moved for a few seconds.
Dean looked devastated.
John just looked tired.
Caleb finally sighed and shoved his hands into his jacket pockets.
“Well,” he muttered. “That went about as bad as it possibly could’ve.”
John shot him an annoyed look.
“You already knew he found out.”
“Yeah,” Caleb answered evenly. “Dean called me Christmas Eve after you disappeared again.”
John’s jaw tightened.
Dean looked down at the muddy ground immediately.
Caleb ignored both of them.
“You should’ve told him years ago.”
“He was too young.”
“He still is,” Caleb shot back. “That’s kinda the problem.”
John’s expression darkened, but Caleb didn’t particularly care.
Dean suddenly pressed both hands over his face.
“I don’t know what to do anymore,” he admitted quietly.
And there it was.
Not fear of monsters.
Not fear of John.
Just a scared thirteen-year-old trying desperately to hold his family together with shaking hands.
Caleb’s anger softened immediately.
“Hey,” he said gently. “C’mere.”
Dean walked over automatically, and Caleb rested a hand briefly on the back of his neck.
“You didn’t screw this up, Deuce.”
Dean laughed humorlessly.
“Sure feels like I did.”
“This was always gonna happen eventually.”
John looked toward the house, expression unreadable.
“He’ll calm down.”
Caleb looked at him incredulously.
“No, John,” he said quietly. “He won’t.”
That finally got John’s attention.
Caleb glanced toward the farmhouse windows.
“Sam’s not mad because monsters are real,” he continued. “He’s mad because everybody he trusted knew the truth except him.”
John didn’t answer.
Because there wasn’t really anything to say.
Upstairs, something slammed loudly.
Dean flinched instinctively toward the sound.
And for the first time, Caleb realized something that unsettled him more than Sam knowing about monsters ever could.
The kid wasn’t scared anymore.
He was angry.
And anger lasted a hell of a lot longer than fear.
About twenty minutes later, Caleb climbed the stairs.
He found Sam’s bedroom door half-shut.
There was no yelling anymore. No crashing sounds.
Just silence.
Caleb knocked lightly against the wood.
“Go away.”
Caleb ignored that and pushed the door open anyway.
Sam sat on the floor beside the bed with his knees pulled to his chest, face buried against crossed arms. His shoulders were tense, but Caleb could hear the uneven breathing from across the room.
The kid had cried himself out.
Caleb quietly shut the door behind him and leaned against it.
“If you don't get this room cleaned up, Jim is gonna make you muck stalls for a month.”
Sam didn’t laugh.
Didn’t even look up.
Caleb sighed and crossed the room before lowering himself carefully onto the floor beside him.
For a minute, neither of them spoke.
“You knew too,” Sam finally whispered.
There was no anger left in it now.
That somehow made it worse.
“Yeah,” Caleb admitted.
Sam nodded once like he already knew the answer.
“You all talk about monsters like it’s normal,” he said quietly. “Like this is just life.”
“For us, it kinda is.”
“That’s messed up.”
Caleb snorted softly.
“Yeah. It really is.”
Sam finally lifted his head enough to look at him.
His eyes were red and swollen.
“I thought Dad was crazy before,” Sam admitted. “Now I find out he’s actually hunting monsters and somehow that makes more sense.”
Caleb barked out a laugh before he could stop himself.
Sam looked mildly offended.
“You think that’s funny?”
“A little.”
That earned him the tiniest glare.
Caleb’s smile faded after a second.
“Listen, Sammy…”
“It’s Sam.”
The correction came instantly.
Caleb studied him quietly for a long moment.
Not defiant.
Not dramatic.
Just hurt.
Deeply hurt.
And suddenly the correction didn’t feel childish at all.
It felt final.
“…Okay,” Caleb said softly. “Sam.”
The boy looked down at his hands.
“You know the worst part?” Sam asked quietly.
Caleb waited.
“I miss before.”
That one hit hard.
Because Caleb knew exactly what he meant.
Before monsters.
Before secrets.
Before realizing the adults around you could lie straight to your face and call it love.
Caleb leaned back against the bed frame with a tired sigh.
“Yeah,” he admitted quietly. “Me too.”
Sam wiped angrily at his eyes.
“I don’t think I can trust any of you anymore.”
Caleb nodded slowly.
“That’s fair.”
Sam frowned slightly, probably expecting an argument.
Caleb didn’t give him one.
“You got lied to,” Caleb continued. “You got left outta something huge, and everybody made decisions for you without asking what you wanted.” He shrugged tiredly. “You got every right to be mad.”
Sam stared at him silently.
“But,” Caleb added gently, “Dean wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
At that, Sam’s expression cracked a little.
“I know,” he whispered miserably. “That almost makes it worse.”
Because Dean had lied to protect him.
And somehow that hurt deeper.
Caleb rested an arm across his knees.
“Your brother loves you more than anybody else in this world,” he said quietly. “Sometimes so much that he makes dumb decisions.”
A tiny huff of laughter escaped Sam despite himself.
“Yeah,” he mumbled.
Caleb nudged his shoulder lightly.
“For what it’s worth? Dean’s downstairs acting like he personally ruined your life.”
“He kinda did.”
“Little dramatic there, kid.”
Sam finally smiled.
Just barely.
But it was enough.
Caleb looked at the boy beside him and felt something twist painfully in his chest.
Because the innocence was still gone.
He could see it now.
The world had shifted under Sam’s feet, and there was no putting it back the way it had been before Christmas Eve.
But maybe — if they were careful — they could stop him from losing everything else too.