A
Warm Summer Rain
Author: dodger_winslow
Genre: Gen, pre-series kinda
Word Count: 4375
Rating: PG13 for language
Spoilers: Up through Children Shouldn't Play with Dead
Things
Disclaimer: I don't own the boys, I'm
just stalking them for a while.
Summary: "Are you from around here?" she asked.
"I’m a teacher at the elementary school. Mrs. Jessup. Maybe you were one
of my students when I was a little closer to the age of the woman who invited you
over for a peek through her living room window."
Author's Note: Third in what turned out to be a trilogy.
Who knew? Not me. First part is Parental Instincts,
second is My Hero,
by Dean Winchester.
A Warm Summer Rain
Upon reflection, he probably should have come
on a weekday, but it was Saturday, they were finished with the job, and he
wanted to check before they left. Just check. He was sure she wouldn’t still
live there, but he couldn’t leave town without at least checking.
The house looked exactly the way he
remembered it, but the trim was green now, instead of blue. It was sad, really,
to still have such a clear memory of this place. He’d been here, what? A whole fifteen minutes, twenty years ago? It was more than
sad, actually. Pitiful might be a better word for it.
But still, he remembered.
Standing on the street beside the Impala,
Dean studied the house, looking for any obvious indicator of who lived here,
what their name might be. It would be too easy, of course, for them to have
hung a sign from the yard light, or nailed one to the too-white siding that
proclaimed, "Welcome to the whoever-the-hell-we-ares."
No, that would be too easy and nothing was
ever easy.
Hell, their mailbox wasn’t even streetside like a mailbox should be. Rather, it was right
beside the front door, close enough to make rifling through the mail in search
of a name a little bit like introducing yourself unless you had the cover of
night to cover your ass while you were doing it.
Sighing, Dean stared at the house in an
irritated kind of dismay, trying to figure out what the hell he was supposed to
do now. The answer was obvious: Get back in the car, drive back to the motel,
roust Sammy’s ass out of bed and get on the road again. That was the obvious
right answer here, but he didn’t want to do it. Not without knowing first. It
shouldn’t make a damn bit of difference, but it did.
He had no idea why, but it did.
Maybe they weren’t home. Or if they were,
maybe they were asleep. It was still relatively early – well before
And maybe he’d win the freakin’
lotto while things were going his way. Because they did that so often … went
his way.
Like their last hunt. That definitely went
his way. Right down the crapper.
Rolling his shoulders at the memory, Dean
grimaced a little as muscles flexed and unflexed
around the dull ache of his spine, igniting half a dozen twinges and tweaks
along the way. Fucking spirits anyway. How many times
did he have to get thrown across a room, or out a window, or down a flight of
stairs before it was Sammy’s turn, anyway?
What? Did the Powers that Be – if there even was
such a thing – get their jollies seeing him busted up and bleeding? Was it some
kind of turn-on to watch him hob across the room with a twisted knee or try to
shave around the smattering of cuts running down the side of his face and neck
from going through yet another pane of plate glass on his way to the ground
outside.
The hard ground. Full of freakin’ rocks.
Dean sighed. He scratched absently at the
pull of healing flesh along his cheekbone only to be reminded of the hella shiner stained like grape jelly around his right eye.
Freakin’ spirits.
Well, the day wasn’t getting any younger and
he wasn’t attracting any less attention just standing in the street like an
idiot, so he decided what the hell, he’d give it a shot. What was the worst
that could happen? He could get arrested for being a perv, or maybe shot by an
irate husband, but at least he would have tried.
They could put that on his gravestone. Here
lies Dean Winchester: He was one trying son of a bitch.
Moving casually like he wasn’t angling to get
a peep inside a respectable house in a respectable neighborhood, Dean stepped
out of the street and into the yard. He bent down, playing the good citizen
retrieving garbage that didn’t exist as he glanced up, squinting through the
sheer curtains to get about as half-assed a view of the inside as he was going
to get unless he walked right up to the window and cupped his hands on the
glass.
And that was when the front door opened.
Busted.
Dean froze in place, his mind clicking like
an abacus as he calculated the odds of playing it casual, lying, lying harder
or just flat out running like a punk bitch caught peeping the neighbor’s window.
"Can I help you with something?" a
woman called from the doorway.
It was her. But she didn’t sound too peeved.
That was good. Or too freaked out. That was better. Or too prone to calling the cops. That was best.
Deciding that playing it cool with a good
dose of lying harder was the way to go here, Dean shifted strategies from
garbage retrieving to shoe tying. He looked up, lifting his hand in a casual
wave as he flashed the woman at the door his best
charm-the-socks-off-old-ladies smile. That was really Sam’s specialty – his
being more along the lines of charm-the-panties-off-nubile-coeds – but he could
improvise when necessary, and sometimes a little panties-charming worked as
well on old ladies as sock-charming did.
Sometimes even better.
"No, thanks. Just tying my shoe," he called back.
"Before or after you got your peek in my
window?" She didn’t sound charmed. Not out of either her socks or her
panties. Stepping more fully out the door, she studied him with teacher eyes
from the front porch, the kind that could not only tell you were lying about
who ate your homework, but could also pick out a tobacco stain on your skivies from fifty yards out.
He risked a quick glance her direction.
She was older, of course, but still exactly
the way he remembered her in the details, down to the color of her eyes and the
way she had of looking like she disapproved but was willing to be convinced she
was wrong if you tried hard enough. That expression made him nervous the first
couple of months he was in her class, but he’d come to realize she wore it to
keep from showing what an easy touch she was.
How kind she was, how much she was always
looking to help a kid out rather than screw him over. That was probably a
failing in her profession, so she hid it to keep from being eaten alive by kids
who’d take an even break and turn it into an unfair advantage.
But as much as she might try to seem
otherwise, she couldn’t really hide the way she was for long. Dean saw it in
the way she just kept trying to reach him even though he had her on full-out
ignore from day one.
And his dad had her number from the first
time they met. He told Dean in the car on the way home from Parent’s Night that
she was one of the good ones, one of the ones who cared more than she should
and would help you out as much as she could.
He told Dean to take her an apple his first
day back to class after Parent’s Night. It was one of the few times Dean
remembered balking at something his dad suggested … balking to such a degree
that his dad actually made it an order.
"Just do it," he’d said.
"Trust me son, you won’t regret it."
Dean was sure she’d think he was the biggest
geek ever born, some kind of punk suck-up bitch who was trying to buy her with
shiny fruit and an Eddie Haskell routine.
But she didn’t. She smiled when he shoved it
at her, muttering that it was from his dad, not from him; but it wasn’t the
kind of smile he expected. It was one of those smiles you want instead of the
kind that makes you feel like a moron, or a suck-up punk bitch. It was a smile
that told him his dad was right, he wasn’t going to
regret this; one that said she did understand it was a
thank-you-for-giving-a-damn thing instead of a kiss-your-ass-with-fresh-fruit
thing. She looked him straight in the eyes when she told him apples were her
favorite thing.
He didn’t realize until weeks later that she
was lying.
Dean stepped off her lawn quickly, ducking
his head to keep from meeting her eyes. He hadn’t really expected it to be her.
It had been twenty years. He was sure she wouldn’t still live here, or he never
would have actually come.
"Sorry, ma’am," he called. "I
thought someone else lived here. She kind of invited me over to take a peek,
but I guess I got the wrong house. Sorry again. No offense intended."
He was backing away, turning to head for the
Impala when she asked, "What happened to your face? Looks like you got in
a bit of a tussle."
"That’s from the last wrong house I went
to," he said, flashing her a wicked grin across
the roof of the Impala between them. "And it wasn’t so much a tussle as a
smack down. But I’m fine, ma’am. He was a big guy, but I can be a lot faster
than I look when I need to be."
Okay, she was charmed now, smiling a little
as he spoke.
He remembered that smile. Remembered how much
it meant to him once, how much seeing it had made the world seem like a
different place somehow.
A safer place.
"Sorry again," he said. "I
really didn’t mean to disturb you."
"Nice car," she noted as he opened
the door to get in.
He hesitated, glanced over at her again. She
was looking at the Impala, not at him, so he felt safe to stay a couple moments
longer, safe to talk to her for a minute just to remember what it felt like to
hear her voice.
"Thanks. Used to be my
dad’s."
"Really? You’ve kept it in excellent condition. It looks
almost new."
"I re-built it recently," he said.
Then he looked away, studied the far end of the street to keep what was in his
head from slipping down into his eyes.
"Was it in an accident?" she asked.
He nodded. "Yeah.
Just a fender bender though. Nothing serious, just enough to get me going, but
once I had her on the blocks, it seemed like as good a time as any to apply a
little spit and polish."
When she didn’t respond, he risked a glance
at her. She was watching him the way he was afraid she would be.
"I should go," he said, but he
didn’t make a move to go.
"Do I know you?" she asked with a
small frown.
"No, ma’am. I don’t think so."
"Are you from around here?" she
asked. "I’m a teacher at the elementary school. Mrs. Jessup. Maybe you
were one of my students when I was a little closer to the age of the woman who
invited you over for a peek through her living room window."
He chuckled and said again, "No, ma’am.
I’m not from this area. Just passing through."
She didn’t believe him. He could see it in
her eyes. "What’s your name?" she asked.
"John," he lied.
"John?"
"Yes, ma’am. But I’m not from this area. I must just remind you of
someone. Someone very handsome, no doubt."
"Dean," she said.
He tried not to react. He failed.
Her face broke to a delighted grin. "Oh, good Lord. Dean Winchester. Of
course. This was your father’s car. I remember it now. The last time I
saw this, he had a U-haul hitched to it, and you were doing your best to break
my heart as you walked away and left me on my doorstep." She’d stepped
away from her door, was standing at the top of three small stairs between her
front stoop and the sidewalk. "What has it been? Twenty years, give or
take?"
"I’m sorry," he heard himself
saying. "You really do have me confused with someone else."
She looked hurt, wounded, more than a little
surprised. She didn’t say anything for a long moment, then she said,
"Well, I’d probably let you get by with that if I had any idea why you
could possibly want me to believe such a thing. But as it is, I can’t think of
a single reason why you’d lie to me, so I’m going to just pretend you didn’t
and give you a chance to make amends. How’s your father?"
He actually flinched when she asked it. Flinched. Then looked away. Looked
down the street again, tried not to hear his heart pounding in his ears, tried
not to feel his skin flushing with pain.
"Oh," she said quietly "I’m
sorry."
He couldn’t look at her. He just shook his
head, kept looking at the end of the street.
"Why don’t you come inside for a
while," she offered after several moments of awkward silence. "We
could sit and talk like old times. You could tell me about dinosaurs, and I’ll
tell you all about traditions and fables."
"I should go," he said again, his
voice quiet, ashamed. "I didn’t come here for that. I just … I don’t know.
I just wanted to see if you still lived here, I guess. I was curious."
"Dean, would you look at me,
please?"
He looked at her. She’d come down from her
stoop, was standing on the other side of the Impala now, watching him across the
roof. The way she looked at him was so familiar. It made him feel like he was
seven again. Made him feel like he was seven and he could sit beside her and
tell knock-knock jokes, and somehow that would make everything better.
Make it hurt less.
Make everything feel a little less empty.
Jim used to make him feel that way. Until the
year he spent in Mrs. Jessup’s class, Jim was the only one who ever made
him feel that way.
"Come inside," she said. "Sit
with me for a while. Please?"
He glanced at the house. "What about
your husband?"
"My husband’s been dead for three
years," she said.
He closed his eyes, opened them again.
"I’m sorry."
She smiled sadly. "So am I. I miss
him."
Dean nodded. He looked at his hands.
"I told him all about you, you
know," she said. "He was very jealous of the boy who brought me
chocolate chip cookies and invited me over to eat Thanksgiving dinner."
Dean smiled a little. "Yeah.
I was quite the player at that age."
"You flirted very well for a second
grader."
"I wasn’t flirting," he said before
he realized he was actually saying it. He glanced at her, and she was smiling.
"Okay, maybe a little. The shoes thing … that was flirting, I guess. But
most of it was just me trying to make you like me."
"You didn’t have to try, Dean."
"Yeah. I could tell you had a crush on me from the first
time you saw me."
She laughed at that. He smiled,
remembering the sound of her laughter when he told her he’d heard chocolate was
the way to a woman’s heart. His dad had coached him on that line for more than
a half an hour before school, told him exactly what it meant, exactly how to
say it so it would come off funny instead of stupid. He was so nervous he
almost didn’t say it, so nervous he almost left her cookies on the corner of
the desk and just skipped school that day.
He was so afraid she’d think he was some kind
of freak, bringing cookies to his teacher like she’d think he was some big deal
or something, like she’d give a shit that he and Sammy and dad has spent all
weekend making cookies just to get seven of them that weren’t burned, or lumpy,
or so God-awful tasting you could use them to exorcise a garbage demon.
When she asked him why seven, he’d almost had
a heart attack. Why seven? Because there were only seven
edible cookies in three bags of Toll House Chocolate Chips. But he
couldn’t tell her that, so he said something about seven being a power number.
When she bought it he felt like he’d climbed
Loved her when she laughed at his joke and
didn’t think he was a freak for bringing her cookies.
He loved her that whole year. Not loved her
the way he learned to love women later. Just loved her
because she made him feel right. Made him feel there.
Made him feel alive.
Alive like his mother used to make him feel.
He remembered how scared he was to go sit by
her at lunch the first time. He was sure she’d tell him teachers and students
couldn’t sit together in the lunchroom, and he’d have to go back to his table
and sit alone again, have to walk all the way across that room in front of all
those kids, every one of them knowing he went over to sit with her and she’d
told him to go away.
He didn’t remember a single one of those kids
now, but he remembered how isolated he felt from them at the time. How much
they were living in one world all together, and he was living in a completely
different world, all by himself.
All by himself, except for her.
Dad and Sammy were there, of course. And Jim. But she was different.
She was so very, very different.
Dad got it. They never talked about it at
all, but Dad got it. He got it the moment he met her, understood why Dean
talked about her so much, understood why he started reading books to Sammy, and
why he started doing his homework so he’d have all the right answers when she
called on him in class.
Talk about scared. The first time he
raised his hand to answer one of her questions was worse than the first time he
faced a pissy spirit bent on sending his ass straight
to hell. He was scared she wouldn’t call on him; he was scared she would. He
was scared he’d give the wrong answer; scared his throat would close up and he
wouldn’t be able to give her any answer at all. Scared he’d misunderstand the
question; scared he’s say something so stupid that everybody in the whole class
would laugh at him, especially her, and he’d never be able to look her in the
eyes again.
He was scared of everything when she called
his name, so scared he almost gave up and looked down at his desk, pretending
like she couldn’t see him, like nobody could see him because he wasn’t even
there. But just as he was about to look away, look down, disappear forever and
never come back, she smiled at him.
Just that.
Smiled at him. Smiled like she knew he had the right answer, and she
only called on him so he could show everybody else what she already knew. That
Dean was smart. That Dean knew the answers. That Dean existed.
That he was there, and she could see him.
The way she smiled at him that day was the
only reason he was able to work up the nerve to go sit with her at lunch a
couple of weeks later. Because she thought he was smart. Because she didn’t
laugh at him when he told her he liked her shoes; and because that one time he
stopped at her desk and couldn’t think of a single thing to say so he told her
what they’d had for dinner, she didn’t look at him like what in the hell did
you tell me that for?
Even at seven, he knew that was the lamest
thing anybody had ever said to anybody in the history of forever; but she just
smiled a little and told him what she’d had for dinner. And what she’d had for
dessert, too.
It was the coolest thing anybody had ever
done for him – at least, anybody that wasn’t Dad or Sammy or Jim – and it made
him willing to risk that long walk across the lunchroom with his lunch sack
clutched in one hand, knowing every kid in the place thought he was the lamest
freak ever, and she was going to put him in his place and send him back where
he came from, and she didn’t.
She just didn’t.
"Yes, you’re absolutely right,
Dean," she said. "I had the biggest crush on you all year long. We
were the talk of the teacher’s lounge. There was a school-wide pool on whether
or not you’d ask me to the second grade dance."
He flicked her a
quick glance. "There was no second grade dance," he said. "Or I
probably would have."
"You were a player at that age,"
she teased.
"You should see me now," he
quipped.
And she laughed. Laughed like she did when he
told her chocolate was the way to a woman’s heart. "I’ll just bet you are.
The first time I met your father, I knew you were going to grow up to be just
like him."
He had to look away, had to look down to keep
her from seeing what her words did to him, how deeply they cut, how much they
made him bleed.
"Oh, Dean." She reached out across the Impala, put her hand on
his and squeezed. "I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I’m … I’m so
sorry."
He nodded. "Got an orange?" he
asked.
She squeezed his hand harder.
He looked up then, looked right at her.
"He died saving my life. We were … we worked together. A
semi t-boned the Impala. He died saving me. Gave his
life for mine."
"That doesn’t surprise me," she
said quietly.
"I hate him for it." He almost
choked on the words. Almost broke down right there, almost fell apart right in
the street, holding hands with his second grade teacher across the roof of the
Impala between them.
"Don’t," she said.
"I can’t help it. I do."
"Don’t," she said again. "He’s
your father, Dean. He was your hero." She smiled at him, tears in her
eyes. "That’s what heroes do."
"He and Sammy are all I had. All I’ve
ever had."
"He was your father," she said
again. "If he could save you, there wasn’t anything else he could do. You
can’t blame him for that. It isn’t fair to blame him for loving you that
much."
Dean put his forehead down on the roof of the
car. The heat from the morning sun had baked the metal warm. He closed his eyes
and concentrated on breathing, concentrated on the warmth of his father’s car
against his face, the warmth of his teacher’s hand in his.
"Come inside for a while," she said
again after several long moments of silence. "Come sit with me and
talk."
He looked up, met her eyes. He could feel
tears on his face, and it didn’t matter. He wasn’t scared of how she’d see him,
that she’d see him.
She’d always been able to see him. There was
a time in his life when that made all the difference in the world.
He felt that way now. He felt like her seeing
him made all the difference in whether or not he still existed.
"Do you mind?" he asked quietly.
She smiled. "I’ve missed our
talks," she said.
"I have, too," he returned.
Sam called at a quarter till one. He wanted
to know what Dean was doing, where in the hell he’d disappeared to with out so
much as a note. Dean told him to hold on to his panties, he’d be back in half
an hour.
He didn’t leave Mrs. Jessup’s house for
another two hours. Sam called seven times in those two hours. Dean let the call
bounce to voice mail every time, making a different joke at Sam’s expense every
time:
"He’s worse than a girlfriend."
"He probably has a question about
quantum physics."
"He can’t find his own shoes without me
there to hold his hand."
"Now he’s just trying to piss me
off."
"Bet he’s twelve shades of red right
now."
"Probably can’t figure out how to turn
the TV on."
"Gotta
love him. If you didn’t, you’d
have to kill him."
By the time Dean left her house, he felt like
something had shifted inside him. The hollow shell he’d become since his dad’s
death seemed a little less hollow, a little less empty, a little less filled
with nothing but the nothing of nothing. It wasn’t really a change so much as
it was just a difference.
A difference that made a
difference.
He hugged her when he left, held on to her as
long as he wanted to hold on to her, and then a couple seconds longer so he
could whisper in her ear, "I won’t ever forget you, Mrs. Jessup."
He let go of her then and walked away without
a backward glance. He could feel her watch him leave, and it felt like seven
chocolate chip cookies and a shiny, red apple washed clean by a warm, summer
rain.
finis