Chapter Text
From the beginning, it was a disaster.
The house was burning, and inside Mary was burning, too, horribly and impossibly. John huddled on the lawn, arms around a terrified Dean and a screaming Sammy, watching his life go up in inexplicable smoke. He barely heard when the fire engines arrived, barely could hear himself when he mumbled some kind of answer to the question, “What happened?”
John didn't know what had happened. He only knew that he had been asleep in his chair when he heard Mary scream. That he'd pelted up the stairs to the sound of her screams coming from the nursery. That he'd found the room on fire (and Mary, oh Mary, impossibly on the ceiling, impossibly burning) and grabbed Sam, grabbed Dean, sent them running outside while he tried to (do what?) save his wife (but she was impossibly on the ceiling). That he'd been unable to get to her and was forced by the billowing flames to run from the house.
That he was alone on the lawn, with two terrified children and no home. Not any more. (Oh, Mary, no...)
The EMTs were blessedly gentle when they took his arm and guided him to the waiting ambulance. They were gentle when they took Sammy from his arms and allowed Dean to stay glued to him. (“There's blood on the baby's cheek. Check for injuries.”) Gentle when they questioned him about whether he was hurt, whether the boys were hurt. John stared out the back of the ambulance at his house burning, long hoses belching gouts of water from the fire engines, everything black except where strobed by emergency lights and the orange hell of the flames. The noise was deafening as neighbors gathered in pajamas and robes, standing on the street, on the sidewalk, agog at what was going on at the Winchester house.
Someone popped into view at the door of the ambulance (“John, omigod, is there anything we can do?”) and vanished. Then another (“John, are you all right? Where's Mary?”)
Where's Mary? Mary was on the ceiling in the nursery, impossibly burning, burning far more than the tears streaking hot and urgent down his cheeks. A small voice (“Dad?”) wiggled into his attention and he wrapped his arm tighter around Dean, feeling the small body shake and hitch against his side. What to say?
“It's okay, son,” he managed, weak as a kitten. “We're okay. Sammy's okay. You did good.”
“Where's Mom?”
Dear god. Mom is burning in the nursery. What happened? What will we do? How can I go on without her, with two babies?
Then sudden, miraculous quiet as the back door of the ambulance was closed.
“We're taking you to the hospital, just a precaution,” one EMT said. (“I think he's in shock,” the other said, somewhere out of view. “Wouldn't you be?”)
“My house,” John said, fumbling for some shred of sanity.
“They're taking care of your house,” the EMT murmured. “Just let us take care of you and your boys.”
And suddenly that seemed like the best idea. It seemed like the only idea that made sense, to let the people who knew what they were doing take care of this. He would bow to the will of people who hadn't seen his Mary on the ceiling, screaming. He felt the ambulance move and someone holding the arm that wasn't around Dean, and then everything grew blessedly dimmer and John withdrew inside himself to try and make sense of the impossible.
Time passed in a blur. He stayed in the hospital for a day, Dean refusing to be taken from his side, afraid even to go to the restroom alone, Sam in a bed in the pediatrics unit while experts made sure he wasn't somehow injured internally. (There'd been blood on the baby's face. Where had the blood come from? Nobody could tell. Maybe he'd bitten his lip, with the two teeth that had barely broken free of his gums.)
Nurses came and went. Doctors came and went. Police and a fire investigator came and John stumbled through his short story again. Neighbors came, with clothing to lend, (John at least had smoke-damaged clothes although no shoes. Dean was in his pajamas) support to lend. No relatives came to visit: Mary had been an only child whose parents died before she and John married; John's father had left home when John was four and never come back, and John's mother had died five years ago, before Dean was born. There were cousins, he supposed, somewhere, at least on the Campbell side, but he'd never met any of them and didn't expect them to magically show up to help.
No, they were definitely on their own, a man and two small children. Completely adrift.
The firefighters had saved the downstairs, he found out, although smoke and water damage was extensive. Half the upstairs was pretty much a loss. Mary (oh Mary) was found in what was left of the nursery. She'd died of smoke inhalation, they said, the merciful answer. He'd seen the gash, the blood, the impossible screaming burning on the ceiling.
Their car was undamaged. With pure luck, he'd fallen asleep with the keys in his pocket, so at least they had the Impala to live in, if nothing else. Then somehow they were in a motel room, the three of them, Sammy still crying, Dean still clinging, until a neighbor came to sit with the boys for a while so John could see if anything was salvageable from the house (a small box of photos, some coats and boots from the downstairs closet, some knick-knacks, unbroken dishes, a few of Dean's toys, his guns from their locker, the walker Sammy had not yet begun to use, oddly, the unused leather journal that was all John had left of his absentee father, everything smoky and water-damaged) and go to the funeral home to make numb arrangements for his wife's funeral. (We were supposed to grow old together, Mary. How can I do this?)
He learned, better, how to soothe Sammy. When to feed him. How to change him. Mary had done all that, while John worked long hours at the shop. Dean, surprisingly, at four years old knew more about taking care of the baby than John did. Sammy cried so much. Had he always cried so much? How much had John missed, wrapped up in work and letting Mary do most of the childcare? Taking care of the boys was a full-time job in itself, although Dean was no trouble but spent long periods of time just sitting quietly, not letting John out of his sight. Getting a whole night's sleep was impossible. Eventually they learned that one way to keep Sammy quieter was to let Dean hold him or sleep beside him.
The funeral was a blur. (The casket closed because there was nothing left that anyone would want to see.) Neighbors, friends, co-workers, all came to share the sadness, to offer sympathy and support. And then it was over, and John found himself in an anonymous motel room with a four-year-old and a baby in a borrowed crib and tried to figure out what, exactly, he was supposed to do now? First he opened the empty journal his father had left him and began to write: “I buried my wife today. Even as I write that down, I don't believe it. Last week we were a normal family … eating dinner, going to Dean's T-ball game, buying toys for Sammy. But in an instant it all changed... when I try to think back, get it straight in my head... I feel like I'm going crazy. Like someone ripped both my arms off, plucked my eyes out... I'm wandering around, alone and lost, and I can't do anything.
“Mary used to write in these books she kept by the bed. She said it helped her remember all the little things, about the boys, me... I wish I could read her journals, but like everything else upstairs, they're gone. Burned into nothing. She always wanted me to try writing things down. Maybe she's right. Maybe it will help me to remember, to understand...”
Cracking open the bottle of whiskey he'd bought somewhere in a grief-stricken haze seemed like a good idea, under the circumstances. Once the boys were asleep, he had a drink. Then two. Then another and another until the pain lessened and he fell mercifully asleep to no nightmares. He woke, hazily, to Sammy crying in pitch darkness and for a long moment couldn't think where he was or what was going on. Oh, right. Whiskey. He staggered to the tiny hotel fridge and took out one of the bottles some neighbor had thoughtfully made. He should warm it. Right. He remembered that. Was there a warmer somewhere? He couldn't remember and Sammy just would not stop crying.
“Dad?” Dean said blearily.
“Can you make your brother shut up?” John barked, holding the damn bottle under the hot water tap, knowing it wasn't enough but unable to find the damn warmer thing wherever it was. Not like he remembered how to use it anyway. Not at the moment.
He finally got at least the worst of the chill off the bottle and handed it to Dean, who was curled around Sammy in the (borrowed) crib. “See if he'll take that.”
And then he fell back, dizzily, onto the bed. (Dear god, I just left a four-year-old to take care of an infant because I'm drunk. Fucking drunk on the night after my wife's funeral. Oh, Mary, I'm so sorry. What am I gonna do?) And then oblivion claimed him again.
In the morning, wrestling with a raging hangover (and the damn baby is crying again. Probably a stomach ache from the too-cold milk last night. Will he ever shut up?) and trying to get cereal for Dean and warm another bottle, this time using the warmer that he'd finally found, he found himself irrationally furious at Sam for his crying. Some part of him wanted to pick the damn baby up and just shake him, shake him until he stopped crying, shake him until there could be a little peace for his pounding head and the guilt, oh, the guilt (I got drunk with two babies in the room. Anything could have happened.).
Dean watched him warily and hustled to do what he could. Trying to quiet Sammy. Getting into his own clothes without being told. Eating his cereal quickly while sitting next to Sammy where John had put him on the bed.
John left them there and drowned his guilt in a hot shower that took the edge off the headache, at least. When he came back out, he found the boys silent on the bed, Sammy cuddled asleep next to Dean, who watched John like he was some kind of dangerous animal. (Could the little boy possibly know how John had almost shaken his brother like a doll?)
“Did he take all of his bottle?” he asked, hearing his voice come out rougher than he intended.
“Mos' of it.” Dean wrapped an arm protectively around the sleeping baby. “Is Ms. Anders coming?”
John cleared his throat. “Yeah, yeah I think so. Look, last night...” But what could he say that a four-year-old would understand? “Last night Dad was sick.”
“Sick?” Dean sounded worried. Of course he did. His mother had just died, a fact the little boy didn't yet fully grasp. He'd watched his house burn down. He was in a strange place, doing strange things. And now Dad was sick? It's surprising he wasn't downright terrified.
“Better now.” John tried to lose himself in something resembling normality, washing their bowl then pouring cereal for himself. They were almost out of milk. Dean was hoping that some near-stranger would show up. Sam was a mystery. (The dark figure had been in the nursery, standing over Sam's crib. Wasn't that what he'd seen?) John was at a loss. What would become of them?
Clearly, though, after last night, alcohol had to go off the menu. Completely off.
He poured the remains of the bottle down the sink and threw the empty away before the day's sitter arrived.
- - - - - - - - - -
John Winchester was a quiet man. He'd never been one to join arguments or express his feelings openly. He'd quietly grown up as the only son of a single mother, a boy whose father had left the family when he was four and never came back. He'd kept quiet, stayed out of trouble, worked part-time jobs before and after school to help his mother keep them together. When he was 17, he asked his mother for permission to join the military. Even though she cried and initially said no, she finally gave in and John Winchester became a quiet Marine. He'd come home and in short order found himself in love with a lively, vivacious blonde Mary Campbell. No one was more surprised than him when she agreed to marry him.
John Winchester was a quiet man. He'd always been a quiet man, one dedicated to keeping his head down and doing the right thing for his family. The events of November 1983 left him a quietly shattered man.