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The small, messy ‘DW’ and ‘SW’ carvings had always marked home, and with it safety.
Sam remembers the first time they carved their initials, it was into an old, battered wooden table in the apartment they had been calling home for six months. Their dad had agreed to let them stay until the end of summer, he needed to take it easy anyway as he was recovering from a broken arm and maybe letting the boys have some semblance of a proper home for a few months would do them good. Sam had made a couple of friends at school and the youngest Winchester’s peace seemed to have calmed down his older brother, who had actually spent time focussing on school instead of picking fights with the other kids in his class.
“De?” Sam looked at his older brother who was flicking through a comic book as he sprawled on the sofa in the open plan living/dining room.
“Hmm?” Dean didn’t look up, instead staring at the colourful pages in front of him.
“Do we have a home now?”
The innocent question from his younger brother was enough to make him look up as he asked, “What?”
“Is this our home now?” He raised an eyebrow as he sat at the dining table and waited patiently for an answer.
“Uh, I guess so.” Dean nodded. “Why?”
“Because Tommy at school says his house isn’t home yet because they just moved and they haven’t put any pictures up yet.”
“So?” Dean was used to his brother talking nonsense and rambling at a hundred miles an hour but he was struggling to see the point of this conversation.
“We don’t have any pictures.” Sam shot him a pointed look, waiting for realisation to dawn. When it didn’t, he dramatically sighed and explained, “If we don’t have pictures, how can this be home?”
Dean contemplated the question, which he hadn’t been expecting Sam to ask, before answering, “You don’t need to have pictures.”
“We don’t have a dog either.”
“Excuse me?”
“We don’t have a dog. Tommy says once they unpack they’re going to get a dog because you need a dog to call it home.”
“You don’t need a dog either.”
“What about a picket fence?” Dean silently shook his head. “A garden?” Another shake of the head. “But Tommy said…”
“I don’t care what Tommy said, I’m saying you don’t need any of that.” Dean didn’t know who this Tommy kid was but he was damn sure he knew more than the little brat who’d been filling Sam’s brain with stupid thoughts.
Sam thoughtfully chewed on his lip before sighing again and slowly nodding. “Okay.”
Dean tried to return his attention to his comic but he could see the slump of Sam’s shoulders and the slight frown on his face. Muttering under his breath, he got to his feet and crossed the room. Grabbing a knife from his backpack which was slung over the back of one of the chairs, he looked at Sam and said, “Home is somewhere you spend time with me and dad, somewhere you feel safe.” Slowly carving a ‘D’ into the wood, he explained, “You don’t need a dog…or a fence…or a garden…or pictures.” Adding a ‘W’ beside it, he handed the knife to Sam and said, “Your turn.”
Sam raised an eyebrow but an encouraging look from Dean had him carving his initials too. When he had finished, they both looked at the tabletop and a slow smile graced Sam’s lips. “Now is this home?”
Dean chuckled and ruffled the shaggy mop of hair. “Yeah Sammy, now it’s home.”
Both boys had been devastated when John had moved them on a couple of weeks later, taking one last look at the tabletop before they had walked out of the first place they had really called home.
The second time they had carved their names it was into the large wooden headboard at the head of the double bed in Bobby’s spare room. They had spent the summer with the older hunter while John worked on a nearby case involving a werewolf and although Dean wasn’t one for overly affectionate, emotional displays, he couldn’t and wouldn’t deny that it was the best summer they had ever had.
“De?” Sam yawned as he pulled his pyjama top over his head.
“Yeah?” Dean stifled a yawn of his own as he pulled the covers back and slipped into the side of the bed closest to the door.
“Do you remember the apartment we stayed in last summer?”
His eyebrows furrowed but he slowly nodded. “Yeah, why?” Suspicion crept into his voice.
“You told me that home was somewhere you feel safe and spend time with family?” Dean mutely nodded. “Well, Uncle Bobby’s house is somewhere I feel safe and I’ve spent all summer with you and him.”
“Sammy, it’s getting late and we need to go to bed, is this going somewhere?”
Climbing into the bed, Sam nodded. “Uncle Bobby’s house is home.”
It was a statement as opposed to a question but Dean still replied with, “I guess so.” Sam stared intently at him and Dean scrubbed a hand over his face and asked, “What are you saying?”
“Think about it Dean…real hard.” Sam smiled encouragingly and Dean didn’t know whether to smile back or cry out in frustration at the riddle that Sam seemed to be posing.
“Okay.” He replayed their conversations from the previous summer over in his head until a slow smile graced his lips. “I get it.” Reaching under his pillow, he pulled out the knife and handed it to Sam.
Sam accepted it and carefully carved his initial into the headboard before handing the knife to Dean and watching as he did the same. When the older boy had finished, Sam beamed up at him. “Perfect.”
Dean chuckled and returned the knife to its place beneath the pillow before laying down and mumbling, “Home sweet home.”
As Sam lay down beside him, he whispered, “Night De.”
“Night Sammy.”
The following morning Bobby had caught sight of the carvings and asked the boys why they thought taking a knife to his headboard had been a good idea. When they had explained the reason, he had wiped away a tear, which he had blamed on the dust in the messy living room, before taking them to the park to play baseball and then calling at a diner for ice cream on the way home. When John had returned to collect them, Sam had complained and cried while Dean had taken a lingering look at Bobby’s house before climbing into the Impala and watching as it faded into the distance.
The last time they had carved their initials together had been in the Impala as they had waited for John to return from the woods after disposing of a Wendigo.
“De, we spend a lot of time in the Impala, right?”
“Yeah, practically half our lives.” Dean leant against the window and yawned.
He stared out of the window but his gaze drifted to the ashtray and the embedded army man as he quipped. “We have lotsa memories in here.”
Dean’s gaze drifted to the front of the car as he thought about the familiar rattling sound that dad said was caused by the Lego blocks he had jammed into the vents when he was younger. “We sure do.”
“So I guess you could say that the Impala is home…right?” He raised an eyebrow and waited.
Dean smirked as he reached under the seat and retrieved a knife before handing it to Sam. Grabbing another from his backpack, he joined Sam as they carved their initials into the rear window deck. When they had finished, they sat back and chuckled. Dean’s voice was unusually soft as he said, “This is one home we aren’t leaving.”
“You mean it?” Hope shone in Sam’s hazel eyes.
“Yeah, I promise.” Dean nodded, sincerity shining in his.
As the years passed, the carved initials in the door would mean they were never homeless. Dean kept his promise but in a completely unforeseen, at least by Dean, twist of fate, it was Sam who broke it by leaving for Stanford. He had been given a full scholarship and after a lot of soul searching, he had decided that it was time to go it alone. John had been less than supportive but it was Dean’s reaction that had shocked him the most. His brother hadn’t shouted, hadn’t screamed, hadn’t begged or pleaded with him to stay…he had calmly driven him to the bus stop and wished him luck. Of course what Sam hadn’t seen were the tears and the lost look in Dean’s eyes as he had driven away alone.
Jessica smiled as she said, “This place is starting to look like a real home now, right?”
“Yeah.” Sam smiled and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead. “It’s looking great.”
Yawning, she stretched her arms above her head. “Well, I’m gonna go to bed. Don’t stay up too late, we have an early start tomorrow.”
“I won’t. I’ll be up soon. Promise.”
“Goodnight.” She kissed his cheek before heading out of the living room and up the stairs.
Sitting on the sofa, Sam looked at the coffee table, internally arguing with himself. Sighing, he grabbed a penknife out of his jacket pocket and lay on his back on the floor, shuffling until he was half under the table so he could carve his initials into the underside of it, where nobody would see them. When he had finished, he nodded to himself before heading up to bed.
The following morning he was up before Jessica and he inspected his work from the night before, feeling a stab of homesickness when he miserably noted that his initials weren’t accompanied by those of his older brother. This was the life he had always dreamed of when he was younger but so far it wasn’t quite living up to those dreams and he idly wondered if Tommy was enjoying a white-picket-fence, apple pie life with a dog and a garden.
As Sam sat in the passenger seat, staring out of the window at the rain, he thought about everything he had lost; his girlfriend, their house, any chance of a normal life. Listening to Dean tunelessly sing along to the music blaring from the speakers, he couldn’t help but chuckle to himself as his thoughts turned to what he still had. He still had his brother, he still had a seat in the Impala and one day they’d find their dad and he’d make things right with him too. He still had a home and as he glanced back at the initials carved into the door, he realised that it wasn’t the carvings that had provided safety all those years ago, it was the man sitting beside him. Vowing never to lose sight of that again, he closed his eyes and smiled.
“Someone is surprisingly cheerful tonight.” Dean’s voice drifted through the air but Sam didn’t open his eyes.
“Hmm. It uh, it’s kinda nice to be home.” His voice was soft and sleepy but Dean clearly heard the words.
Smirking to himself, he muttered, “You’re such a girly bitch.”
“Better than being a jerk.” Sam cracked one eye open and returned the smirk.
Chuckling, Dean quietly admitted, “It’s nice to have you back Sammy.”
“It’s Sam.”
“Whatever. Either way…welcome home.”