Fifty Percent: Part One

[gwendolyngrace]

Fic title: Fifty Percent
Author name: gwendolyngrace
Artist name: sazzlette
Genre: (rps, wincest, het, gen) Gen / Het
Pairing: John/OFC
Rating: R
Word Count: 46,450, Posted in 5 1/2 parts
Warnings/Spoilers: (if applicable) Told in two eras: 2007 and 1989. The 2007 storyline is set between “Bad Day at Black Rock” and “Sin City”; the flashback sequence references “Something Wicked.”
Summary: While cleaning out John’s storage locker, Sam finds an envelope from his father addressed to someone from their past. Dean objects to delivering it, but Sam happens upon a hunt that takes them practically to her doorstep. Could they be demons released when the Gate opened? In 1989, shortly after the shtriga hunt, the Winchesters settle in small-town Ohio while John figures out whether or not he can keep hunting. Beverly Kirkland, the children’s librarian, meets the boys and their father. After a chance encounter with John, she reluctantly grows closer to him, all the while wondering what it is about the family that doesn’t quite add up….
Author’s Notes: So many things about this, but I don’t want to give stuff away. Right. Well, first off, I had this in my head long before “Supernatural: Rising Son” came out, and before I found out that Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Mary-Louise Parker were a couple (and then they broke up before I finished drafting this). The idea came up while I was writing Trost und Freude for a holiday exchange - but takes place *before* that in the Wee!chester timeline. I’m very grateful to sazzlette for her art of awesome (10 sketches, count'em OMG! - AND a music mix!), etakyma for her unfailing willingness to read what I’ve written and tell me how to fix it, july_july_july for her incredibly insightful beta-reading, and Wikipedia for lots of helpful information, ranging from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles collectibles to the names of Kansas Governors to facts (and missing information) about our MOTW.
Link to fic: Part One, Part Two, Part Three-A, Part Three-B, Part Four, Part Five
Link to art: http://community.livejournal.com/lightontheblue/24577.html



June 2007
Black Rock, NY

“All right, I’m heading over to start going through the lockup for munitions,” Dean announced a day or two after Bela had shot Sam (and made off with Dean’s winning scratch tickets).

“Don’t open any more curse boxes,” Sam advised.

“Yeah, no shit, Sherlock. You gonna come?”

“Nah. Lifting boxes and shifting stuff around? Not with this shoulder.”

But by day two, Sam decided differently. There just wasn’t any point to sitting around the motel room, and there wasn’t anywhere to go or any way to get there without the Impala. True, he needed the R&R, but he had to admit to curiosity, and there was also the nagging hope that something Dad had left behind would shed light on breaking Dean’s deal.

“S’matter, Sammy, no good movies on the Playboy channel this month? Or do they all involve clowns?” his brother teased when he pulled out of the lot with Sam sitting shotgun.

“Bite me. Bitch,” Sam added deliberately.

Dean grinned. Sam smiled into his lap. This was how it was supposed to be: Dean annoying but affectionate, Sam riding along to offer support and the occasional course correction.

Their trip down memory lane continued all that morning and, after lunch break, into the evening. Dean brought a couple fluorescent lamps inside so they could see. Sam found an outlet for the laptop and typed up notes on the items they found or wanted more information about. He particularly wanted to know why the heck Dad had a piano, but he’d settle for details on the use of several odd-looking charms or any one of the more curious artifacts, like the silver inkwell, the crystal sword, or the stuffed squirrel.

“Hey, would you look at this stuff,” Dean said, bringing up a box with baseball cards, school papers, and envelopes filed in it. An old model volcano stuck out of the top.

“God, you remember how much shit Dad gave you over not telling him about that volcano thing?” Dean continued. “Guess Dad was more sentimental than we gave him credit for.”

Sam accepted the box and unceremoniously dumped the model volcano into a large trash bin. He ran his hand over the files—both his and Dean’s old papers and report cards—and stopped at a sealed manila envelope. He pulled it out.

“Sam, check this—”

“Hey, Dean. Do you remember Mrs. Kirkland?”

Dean sneezed. “That children’s librarian in Ohio? Yeah. Yeah, I kinda remember. Why?”

“‘Cause Dad’s got an envelope with her name on it.”

Dean dropped the ammo box he’d found and came over. “Huh.”

Sam looked up at him. “Should we open it?”

“Nah.” Dean sniffed. His nose twitched. “Whatever that is, it’s got nothing to do with us. Leave it or get rid of it. Doesn’t matter.”

“Dean.” Sam squinted at him. Dean was far from the most nostalgic person, but his tone had more tension in it than the dismissive nature of the words. Possibly the volume of Dad’s mementos was getting to him. “Dude, we should…maybe we should send it to her?”

“What, out of the blue, here’s a random envelope from seventeen years ago? Nah, Sam. Just toss it.” That time he definitely sounded dismissive.

Sam said nothing. He studied Dean for a sign that he was hiding something, but Dean just shrugged and turned back to the pile he’d been working on. Sam set the envelope aside and slipped it into his laptop satchel. Underneath another sheaf of papers, there was also a small box, also wrapped in brown paper and addressed to her. He cached that in his bag, too.

“Freakin’ armor, man,” Dean observed. He pulled out a bulletproof vest and a riot shield. “Where did he get this stuff? And what the hell was he thinking, hoarding all this crap?”

“Yeah,” Sam agreed. “Would you ever think of Dad as a packrat?”

“Mr. ‘Your gear should never expand beyond what you can carry?’ No way.” He sneezed again. “Damn. I think there’s mold or something in this corner.”

“Wanna get out of here for a while?” Sam offered.

“Sure, let’s get dinner.”

Considering how much was crammed into the locker, Sam wasn’t a bit surprised when Dean tired of the task within a couple more days. He had begun scanning the news and magazine sites in the evenings, preparing someplace for them to go on the off chance Dean announced his boredom.

“Dude, this is tedious,” Dean announced that evening. They’d been eating their meals at Biggerson’s all week. Dean had declared his intention to work his way through the entire menu, except for salads, and Sam was pretty sure his brother had already worked his way through all the eligible waitresses. All of which meant he’d been right to start looking for a job. He waited until Dean had selected the chicken special before suggesting a road trip.

“So, I found something that might be our kind of gig,” he opened.

“Oh, yeah?” Dean duckbilled his lips, tilting his head side to side. “I guess the locker isn’t going anywhere. What’s blowing up your skirt?”

“Uh…okay, well, I saw a missing persons report in the Columbus Dispatch. Lauren Kennedy, she’s a 19-year-old student at Case Western up in Cleveland. Her roommate reported her missing six days ago. Then last night she was picked up in Northwood Park where she’d allegedly taken out a whole bar full of truckers.”

“Whoa,” Dean said, imitating Keanu. “You thinking demon?”

“Pretty much, yeah. Her lawyer says she doesn’t remember anything.”

“So what then, demon takes off and leaves the human to take the rap?”

“Sounds like it.”

“But if the demon’s gone—”

“Well, I did a little digging and found another story, same deal. Guy goes missing in Columbus, and shows up five days later just outside of Cleveland. Two days before Lauren goes missing.”

“Yeah?” Dean’s interest increased perceptibly. Before he’d been half-listening; now, he sat up straighter, leaned his elbows on the table.

“Yeah, and he was arrested in the middle of a crime, caught red-handed.”

Dean closed his eyes, eyebrows rising. He opened his eyes again to ask: “What’d he do?”

“Burned down a house—and he’s suspected of two other arsons on the night before he was arrested.”

“And no memory, right?”

“Yup.”

“Huh.” Dean waited while the waitress brought their food. When she had walked away, Dean rearranged the contents of his plate in preparation for eating. “One thing, though—if the demon’s hijacking people, making them do crazy stuff, then taking another ride…won’t it have left Columbus by now?”

“Maybe,” Sam admitted. “But odds are the demon will find someone else in the area. So—”

“Yeah, okay, look for missing persons reported in the last couple days.” Dean cut a piece of chicken and shoved it in his mouth. “Still, we’ll be chasing this thing and who knows what its next move is gonna be?”

“Got a better chance of catching it if we get to Ohio, at least,” Sam muttered. They ate in silence for a while. “There’s something else we could do…while we’re in the area.”

“Cedar Point?” Dean leered, mouth full.

“No, not….” Sam wrinkled his nose at his brother. “No. Um. We could take that letter to Mrs. Kirkland.”

Dean paused with the fork halfway to his mouth. “I thought you threw that thing out.”

“Well, I didn’t.”

“Sam, it’s got nothing to do with us,” he said sternly. He pulled the meat off his fork with his teeth and chewed angrily.

“Dean. I remember. We lived in Dublin from September to the end of January—five months. That’s as long as I remember staying anywhere at one time.”

“Yeah, so?” Dean reinvigorated the attack on his chicken.

“So…tell me that’s not significant. Maybe…maybe Mrs. Kirkland had something to do with why we were there so long. Maybe she deserves to know what happened to Dad.”

“Listen, Sam,” Dean said with a decidedly more militant tone, “Staying in that town so long…it had nothing to do with her.”

Sam could tell that Dean was growing more agitated. He sounded like he always did when he wished Sam would drop the subject, take his word as absolute. It was so much like Dad that Sam wanted to kick him under the table. Instead, he just fired back: “How do you know?”

“Sam….” Sure enough, Dean pushed his plate away, as if the conversation had ruined his appetite. He pressed himself into the seat cushion. Sam figured that if they’d been in a motel room or somewhere else less confined than the booth, Dean would have moved away from him. “Don’t you get it?” he said finally, as if the admission caused physical pain. “Think about the timing, dude. It was right after Fort Douglass. The shtriga.”

Sam fought to keep his jaw closed. As it was, he knew his expression probably looked bitchy—bitchier than he intended. Dean’s eyes burned through him, accusing him of bringing up something he thought Dean had buried over a year ago.

“Dean. Please tell me you’re not still beating yourself up about all that.”

“I’m not, Sam. Okay? You’re the one digging in the dirt, here. You want to know why we stayed in Dublin that long? I’m telling you. Not because of some…librarian.” He said it the way an octogenarian would say “floozy.”

“Okay…” Sam said slowly. “That doesn’t change the fact that there’s something to check out in the area. And like you said, the locker isn’t going anywhere.”

Dean pushed his mashed potatoes around on his plate. “Yeah. Okay. But just to check out the case, deal?”

Sam nodded, schooling his face to blandness. He wasn’t sure why Dean was so adamantly against the sidetrip, but he set it to rest for the moment. “Sure.”


~*~

September 1989
Dublin, Ohio

Beverly noticed him immediately, the moment he came into the Dublin Library. He appeared on a Saturday, shepherding two boys over to the Children’s Section, passing right by her desk. “Sammy, here,” he said gruffly, with the tone she recognized from countless parents at the edge of their patience. “Sammy! No….” He grabbed little grubby hands before the child—he couldn’t have been more than six—could slip between two picture book racks and get away.

“Sammy” whined a protest, but quietly, as if used to libraries and aware that he wasn’t allowed to be loud. His father plunked him down at the table just beyond Beverly’s desk. The boy glared mutinously, but stayed where his father put him.

“Dean, get over here,” the father barked testily. From the annoyance that laced his voice, it had already been a difficult morning for the three of them. The older boy snapped around at his name. He was standing in front of a metal upright rack, had been about to twirl it around, but he abandoned it immediately and crossed to the table. His father was trying to get his little brother set up with a picture book.

Something about the way they interacted—the younger boy’s restrained protests, the older one’s immediate obedience—raised Beverly’s hackles. The little one didn’t respond to censure with wails or noise she generally had to endure from others his age. The elder boy watched his father like a hawk, putting himself between his brother and the dad, and taking over the task without prompting. Neither made eye contact with anyone else, including their father. After more than seven years on the job, she could discern the telltale signs of an abusive parent. She hadn’t seen any of the three of them before, and in a town the size of Dublin, with one library, that suggested they had moved recently. Escaping Social Services, perhaps? She stepped forward to offer assistance, perhaps to intervene.

“May I help you find something?” she asked neutrally.

He looked away from his sons. “Dean” had opened the book and was enticing “Sammy” to look at the pictures and sound out the words. He had a good face, the father—if a little craggy, at least well proportioned and fairly handsome. He seemed about her age, maybe a year or two older. Dark eyes burned intensely under a forehead that hadn’t yet begun to wrinkle. He had a strong nose, even better cheekbones, and a jaw that was so sharp it could have split logs, even beneath its two-day stubble. His hair was as dark, but not quite as shaggy, as his younger son’s. It hadn’t been cut in a while.

His smile was not unfriendly, but it dismissed her nonetheless. “We’re fine, thanks.”

“We have a fairly good intermediate section,” she continued anyway, pointing to the stacks of pre-teen books. “If your son would like something for himself.”

The man’s eyebrows rose, as if the thought of his son reading age-appropriate material were foreign. Or perhaps just the idea of him reading for himself was what was foreign. He shook his head. “No, thanks.” Then he angled himself back to the pair of children, shutting her out. “Dean, keep your brother occupied. Got that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll be in the reference section if you need me,” he added. He pointed across the floor. With a curious smirk at Beverly, he got up and left them at the table.

Beverly couldn’t quite believe the man’s gall. Parents treated the library—and herself, specifically—as a makeshift babysitting service all the time, even when they hadn’t enrolled their kids in the programs she ran for that purpose. But they usually weren’t so blatant about it. Luckily, parents weren’t her direct customers. The kids were.

“It’s Dean, isn’t it?” she asked quietly. He looked up but didn’t nod right away. It came after he’d raked his eyes over her, in a mirror of his father’s assessment. “Well, Dean, I’m Mrs. Kirkland. This is my bailiwick, so—”

“Your what?” Dean asked timorously.

“My bailiwick. My fiefdom. My domain, you might say. The children’s section, I mean. So if you or your brother would like to find something in particular, you just ask.” She returned to her desk. In between reviewing selections for the month’s purchase list, she stole glances at the youngsters.

It surprised her when perhaps half an hour later, Dean appeared in front of her chair. “Excuse me?”

“Yes?” she said, smiling in her usual helpful way.

“Where’s the bathroom?”

“Oh. It’s just to the right of the circulation desk. Would you like me to show you?”

“No, I’ll find it, thanks.” He turned his back on her and reached the table in five quick strides. He grabbed his brother’s arm.

“No, Dean!” the little one whined, jerking away.

“Come on,” Dean whined back.

“I don’t gotta,” came the response.

“Well, Dad said you gotta stay with me, so—”

“No, he didn’t, he said keep me occupied. That means busy an’ quiet. An’ I’m okay, Dean. I’ll stay here, I promise.”

The older boy glanced in the general direction of the reference section. Beverly got the impression he was weighing the likelihood that their father would return while he was gone. Would catch him leaving his brother unattended. He seemed to deflate.

Beverly stood up. “I’ll be right here,” she announced. “I can keep an eye on—is it Sammy?—while you step away. If you like.”

Dean pointed a warning finger at his brother. “Don’t move,” he ordered, and hurried off toward the bathroom.

Sammy smiled at Beverly in apology. “Dean thinks I can’t tie my shoe without getting hurt,” he muttered. “But I can!” He brought put one of his sneakered feet on the chair Dean had vacated. He untied the laces, then deftly fastened them again. “See?”

“Yes,” Beverly said soberly. She sat with him, to get to his level. “Is that Corduroy?”

Sammy flipped it closed. “Yeah. But I’ve read it before. It’s boring.”

“What do you like to read?”

Sammy shrugged, but Beverly felt a little thrill. She loved this part—helping young minds find stimulation. It was one of the reasons she preferred the small-town library, where she could get to know her regulars and keep tabs on them year after year. After a few well-placed questions, she had a good idea of what would appeal to her young client.

“Let me bring you a couple choices,” she told him, rising. She pulled Charlotte’s Web, an illustrated adaptation of Treasure Island, The Mouse and the Motorcycle, some of the Wayside School books, several Encyclopedia Brown books, and an illustrated book about the American Revolution. Sammy opened the top book and began to read. His lips moved a little while he sounded out the words silently.

“What’s a Red-coat?” he sounded it out carefully.

“A British soldier.”

“Oh. I like playing soldiers. My Dad was a Marine.”

“How hard are you finding that to read, Sammy?”

“It’s okay,” he said with a shrug. “George Washington—he’s on the dollar bill. He was the first President.”

“That’s right.” Beverly made a mental adjustment to his reading level, shifting it up a bit.

Dean returned. “Sammy, don’t pester the lady.”

“M’not,” Sammy defended himself.

“Not at all,” Beverly added. “We were just picking out a few books that are more exciting than Corduroy. What about you?” she asked to bring him into the conversation. “Do you prefer history? Sports?”

Dean shrugged. “I was only reading to Sam to keep him quiet.”

“An’ busy,” Sam interjected, as if this were something his brother told him a lot. “What’s this word?” He held out his book to Beverly, pointing.

“Can you sound it out?” she challenged.

Sam rolled his eyes, but took the book back. “Fusilier,” he said. “I know how it sounds, but what does it mean?”

To her surprise, Dean answered first. “It’s like a rifleman, dummy.”

Beverly hid her smirk behind her hand. “That’s not very nice, Dean,” she said lightly. She kept asking them questions about what they’d read, what they liked, and how difficult certain books were, until she had a fair idea of what would tempt each of them. “You hang out here,” she said. “I’ll be back with some more things for both of you.” Ignoring Dean’s little groan, she rose and walked around her section efficiently.

She pulled copies of Hatchet, Tom Sawyer, White Fang, one of the Hardy Boys mysteries, an illustrated Robin Hood, and Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing. She brought them all back to the table.

Dean’s eyes went wide. “We’re not gonna be here that long,” he said incredulously.

“We’ll set you up with library cards,” Beverly replied. “You can each take out up to five books and keep them for two weeks.”

Sam looked at his brother sharply. The two exchanged an intense look, as if communicating telepathically. “I’m not sure we’ll be here in two weeks,” Dean said to Sam apologetically.

“Are you…visiting? On vacation?” Beverly guessed.

“Oh, uh, no.…” He sounded suddenly guilty, as if he hadn’t meant her to hear him. Beverly backed off—given the father’s reticence, she thought perhaps Dean had been told not to share any details about their situation. It occurred to her suddenly that they might be transients. But the homeless problem in Dublin didn’t come close to the populations in Columbus or even Dayton.

“Tell you what,” she said sweetly. “You two look through these for now and pick out one each to read while you’re waiting for your dad. When he gets back you can ask about cards.”

Dean hesitated. Sammy raked his teeth—he’d lost one recently—over his bottom lip as he watched his brother. Dean looked at Sam again and seemed to make a decision. “Okay,” he said firmly, with a strange smile that made him look older than the ten she guessed he was. “We’ll look at these.”

After about an hour, Beverly began to wonder if their father was coming back. It wasn’t unheard of, sad to say—just last April, she’d had to call Child and Family Services for a little girl abandoned by her mother. Between helping other families, she kept checking on the boys, who were still flipping through the books. A couple times, Sam went to pull something else off a shelf, or Dean would turn the pages listlessly, not really reading but too bored not to read. Just as Beverly was about to go prowl the reference section herself in search of their father, she saw him crossing the open central area by circulation. His old leather mailbag looked bulkier—and heavier—than it had on the way in.

“Hey, boys,” he said affectionately as he approached. “Ready for lunch?”

“Dad! You’re done already?” Dean jumped to his feet, pushing the book away.

“For now, anyway. Sammy?”

Sam was absorbed in the adaptation of Treasure Island. His father frowned down at him. “Whatcha got there, buddy?” He crouched at Sam’s level to peer at the book. Beverly couldn’t quite believe that this man and the gruff, impatient one from mid-morning were the same person. She reminded herself that abusers could be charming and engaging…when they wanted to be.

Dean pointed toward her desk. She couldn’t pretend not to see, or hear him accuse, “She gave it to him.”

The father’s head swiveled and their eyes met. Beverly kept hers wide, open and innocent, what Tom used to call her “Bambi” look. She couldn’t quite keep the corner of her mouth straight; it quirked toward her ear, giving her face what she knew was an ironic twist. She steeled herself for an argument.

But to her surprise (and pleasure), he smiled in a much more friendly way than before. There was no mistaking the look of attraction, but he hid it well. Beverly tried to envision herself as he saw her: 5’7” in a petite frame, hour-glass figure, dark brown hair that rested on her shoulders and matched her eyes. She knew from experience that her heart-shaped face and apple cheeks, her button nose and full lower lip, gave her a cherubic appearance. Tom had assured her once that any man would consider her the “whole package.” They’d been in love so she’d been inclined to soft-pedal his praise, but in her less modest moments before the mirror, she had to admit, she had kept herself looking pretty hot, even on the other side of thirty.

‘They didn’t bother you, did they?” he asked calmly after a moment.

“Not at all. They’ve been very good.”

Sam looked up. He cupped his hand around his mouth to whisper in his father’s ear.

“Not today, Sammy,” his dad said, shaking his head and straightening up. “But…maybe we’ll come back another time. Okay?” Sammy didn’t look pleased, but he set the book aside. “Grab your gear, boys,” the father continued. Dean hurried to gather up the backpack he’d put on one of the other chairs; Sam looked at the books, then up at his father again.

“I’ll put those away, Sam,” Beverly told him, jumping in to keep the father from getting annoyed. “Don’t worry about it.”

Sam smiled over to her and accepted the light jacket Dean handed him. “Bye,” he said, as they filed out behind their dad.

“Bye, Sam. I hope to see you again,” Beverly said. She meant it, but she took care to sound neutral.


~*~NOW~*~

“Hey, Sam!” Dean’s sharp voice pulled him awake.

“Huh?” he startled, head bouncing on the car window, where he’d been leaning. He must have been asleep for a while; he had a real crick in his neck.

“Look alive, princess, we’re here.”

“Where’s here?”

“Uh…your case? Plain City? Columbus? Demon hunting? Any of this ring a bell?”

“Yeah, I know—” Sam sat up, cracking vertebrae as he stretched. Dean was winding him up. He knew it and he let it work every time, and he hated that. “I meant,” he started again, forcing himself calm, “where have you decided we’re starting?”

Dean flicked a credit-card-sized room key into Sam’s lap. “I’m starting with a shower and maybe a steak dinner.” He opened his door and slammed it shut on the way to the trunk.

Five minutes later they were in room 129 of the Dutchman Motel: ten by fifteen feet with two beds, an efficiency bathroom, and a desk in the corner. The walls were neutral white, for once, but two giant prints hung above each bed, Kincade knockoffs or similar, highlighting the Pennsylvania-Dutch, it looked like: single-horse carriages, farmscapes with hex marks painted brightly on their gabled roofs. The bedspreads underneath were imitation quilts; the furniture was in mission-style and mostly looked severe and uncomfortable. But it wasn’t the worst room they’d ever rented.

“Hey, Internet,” Dean pointed out to him while he dumped his duffel on the desk chair, as if he were offering Sam a cookie.

“Good,” he acknowledged, because not to do so would make Dean pout. And a petulant Dean was twice as annoying as Dean when he was magnanimous.

Dean pulled out his dop kit and disappeared into the bathroom shortly after they settled in. Moments later, Sam heard the water run. He flicked on the TV to provide his own soundtrack and pulled out his phone. With Dean so testy about sticking to the case, there was only one person Sam could think of who might shed some light on Dad’s secret past.

“Hey, Bobby, it’s Sam,” he said into the answering machine after listening through Bobby’s greeting. “Just wanted to let you know Dean and I are in Columbus, Ohio, on a case, possibly a demon…. Also, we found something in Dad’s locker and…I just wondered if you knew anything about her. It. About it. Uh…not urgent. Just…call me if you get a chance.” He punched “End” and saw about circumventing the $9.95 daily charge for the net.


~*~THEN~*~

The second time Beverly saw Sam and Dean was after school the next week. The library was on several bus routes, so she ran programs especially for kids who didn’t have anyone waiting right at home right at 3:00. When half a busload of children clattered in, Beverly was expecting them. She wasn’t expecting Sam and Dean to be among them.

Sam ignored the activities she’d set up in the little playroom off in the corner away from other patrons. He came right up to her desk. “Hi,” he said brightly. “Um. I don’t know if you remember….”

“Treasure Island, wasn’t it?” Beverly confirmed. “Would you like to pick up where you left off?” She was already in motion.

Sam nodded. Beverly went to the shelf and pulled the edition for him.

“Thanks. I’ll put it back when…later.”

“You don’t have to,” Beverly said. She showed him the cart. “But if you’d like to put it here when you’re done, that would be helpful.”

“Okay.” He sat at the table. Within seconds, he’d found his place and got swept away with sand and seaspray.

Dean had ducked his head into the activity room, but came out shortly to check on his brother. “‘Cha doin’?”

“Duh. M’readin’.”

“Treasure Island,” Dean said, feigning interest. “Oh, yeah. I remember that. The butler did it.”

“Dummy, there’s not even a butler,” Sam replied sincerely.

“Whatever.”

Several kids came out a little noisily to browse the stacks and “New Books” display. Beverly went over to quiet them by helping find selections. Planning her approach, she pulled another couple books off the shelves and brought them back with her.

“It’s good to see you again,” she told Dean casually. “These might interest you.”

Dean glanced at the covers, but just shrugged in response to her offer.

“Dean hates reading,” Sammy volunteered. Dean blushed.

“Lots of young people don’t like to read.” Beverly smiled openly. “What do you like? Sports?” He looked like an active child.

“Cars,” Dean said, so softly that Beverly could barely hear him.

Cars were not her area. “Hm. Well, would you like to take a look in Periodicals? I’m sure we get Motor Trend. Car & Driver?”

He smiled slyly. “I like those—my dad got me some of those for—last year.”

“Well, they issue monthly, so sounds like you’ve missed a few. The section’s that way.” She pointed. “Sam’s fine here.”

He glanced at his brother, who nodded at him. “M’okay, Dean, jeez.”

“Okay.” He wandered away.

Sam looked at the covers of the books Beverly had shown Dean. “What’s this one about?”

“It’s about a young man, a little older than your brother, who fights in the Revolution.”

Sam opened it up. “Dean’s class had to read a book last year about that, but he wouldn’t because of the title.”

“Johnny Tremain?” Beverly asked, tapping the front page of the book.

“No. It had my name in it. My Brother Sam is Dead. He freaked in class. They sent him to the nurse.” Sam wrinkled his nose. “But then he pretended like he’d never got upset at all.”

“Sounds like he likes you a lot, huh?”

Sam shrugged. “No, he doesn’t,” he muttered. “He treats me like a baby. Thinks I can’t do anything by myself.”

“So, he takes care of you?”

“Yeah, I guess. Most of the time he acts like I’m toxic waste.”

Beverly smiled, showing white, even teeth. “Brothers are like that. Especially older brothers.”

A girl came up to the table. “Mrs. Kirkland, is someone reading this?” she asked, picking up Sign of the Beaver.

“No, Krista—it’s sitting closed on the table,” Beverly teased.

“I mean, that boy—he’s not going to check it out, is he?”

“I don’t think so. You go ahead.” She got up. “Excuse me,” she said to Sam. She walked over to her desk with Krista, took her library card, scanned the book’s bar code, and stamped the slip inside it. She handed it back with Krista’s card. Over Krista’s shoulder, she saw that Sam watched the whole process hungrily.

Another student came to the desk to ask a question and Beverly checked on the reading activities on her way back, so it was a while before she could ask Sam if he wanted a library card.

At his wide-eyed nod, Beverly smiled knowingly. She beckoned him to the desk. “We can fill out the paperwork. Is your dad coming to pick you up?”

Another nod.

“Okay, well, he’ll have to sign for it when he comes, but that will only take a second. Do you know your address?”

He did, but not the zip. Beverly filled that in for him. “How about your phone number?”

“Hey, Sammy, whatcha doin’?” Dean approached.

Sam pointed to the application under Beverly’s hand. “Liberry card,” he explained.

“Would you like one, too?” Beverly asked.

Dean wrinkled his nose as if the idea of a library card and that of gym socks worn ten days straight bore a similar smell. “Nah,” he said. He plunked down at the table, put his feet on another chair, and opened up the magazine he’d brought with him. It wasn’t about cars—it was a copy of MAD.

Beverly winked at Sam. “Do you want to put the phone number in yourself?”

Sam accepted the pen, but hovered with it over the page. “Um…Dean? What’s the new number?”

Dean slapped the magazine onto the tabletop and came over. He snatched the pen away from Sam and wrote in seven digits. “Gonna have to learn it, Sammy.”

“It’s only been two days,” Sam whined.

Beverly took the form back. “Once your dad signs this, you can take out—”

“—Up to five books. An’ keep’em for two weeks. You said before.”

“How is it possible,” Dean drawled, “that you can’t learn our new phone number, but you remember a tiny detail like that from a week ago? You’re such a geekasaur.”

Sam gave his brother a look that would not have been out of place on a teenage girl experiencing hormonal shift. “The geekasaur was the smartest of all the dinosaurs,” he claimed, “and could hunt other, much larger creatures with the power of its amazing brain.”

“But it was still no match for the stronger, faster Dean-osaur!” Dean told him. He reached out and before Beverly could say, “No roughhousing!” he turned Sam’s arm behind his back.

Sam wasn’t perturbed in the slightest, though. He whirled around in the direction of his chicken wing.

“Guys!” Beverly said sternly. “No fighting.”

“Sorry,” they said together, dropping their hands, but grinning.

“This is a library, not a gymnasium,” she continued in the arch tones of her old professor from her library science master’s program at Northwestern. Back when she’d figured out a big city was not her style, to say nothing of being apart from Tom for all that time. But she put the memories away and smiled again, unable to resist the charming way they broke apart and pushed each other back to the table.

They were still reading when the last of the other kids got picked up. “Is your dad going to be along soon?” she asked. “Not that I’m in a hurry, but…shouldn’t you be getting home for dinner?”

“He’s coming,” Dean said confidently.

It was another half hour before he showed up. He had on an old t-shirt under flannel, and though his hands looked scrubbed recently, there was something that looked like motor oil under his nails.

“Why aren’t you ready to go?” he asked Dean.

Dean jumped up, dropping the magazine in the middle of his page. “We are, sir,” he said with deference, grabbing his bag hastily. “Sammy, get your gear.”

“Dad, sign my card!” Sam requested exuberantly.

“What?” he snapped, sounding exasperated and understandably confused.

“My liberry card. Please?” He pointed to Beverly over at the desk.

“Oh.” The father frowned at her. “Corrupting my sons?” he asked, but there was a definite flirtatious edge to the accusation. Beverly found herself happy she’d worn her new red blouse. Not that it was particularly sexy—she was still a children’s librarian in Ohio—but she knew that it set off the color in her cheeks, brought out the reddish highlights in her hair, and made her eyes look chocolatey-brown. It hugged her in the right places. The short sleeves made her arms look more trim than they really were, and didn’t make her look too hippy, either. Though she couldn’t do much about the plain trousers, at least she was wearing a shoe with a bit of a heel on it. She reminded herself that he was probably married, but she still had sense to take his wolfish assessment as a compliment.

“Yes, if you consider self-education subversive,” she replied, pulling herself out of their staring match. “Just fill out this top line…and if you’ve got a daytime number? Put that here…and sign down here.”

He printed strong block letters. For the daytime number, he pulled out a business card and copied the number off it. Then he scribbled a signature and handed it all back. His wedding ring glinted where he rested his hand on the counter.

“Okay…John,” she said, flicking her eyes over the name and hiding disappointment. She reached into the desk drawer and took out a temporary card. “I’m Beverly. This is for today,” she continued, printing “SAM WINCHESTER” across the top. “His permanent card will take about a week.”

John smiled. “Thanks,” he said warily.

Sam stepped forward with five books. Beverly entered the card info by hand and demagnetized the books, stamping the insert. “There you go,” she said, pushing the pile toward him. He tipped the stack into his bookbag.

“Okay, champ,” John patted the back of Sam’s head once and steered him away from the desk. “See you around,” he purred with a nod toward her, then turned to usher the boys out of the building.

It took Judith all of ten seconds to rush over to her from Media. “Who was the dreamboat?”

Beverly looked at the application. “John Winchester,” she read. “But ease off, Judes. He’s married.”

“Are you sure?” Judith leered at her. At least it wasn’t the look of pity Judith usually offered when an “eligible” guy appeared.

“Saw the ring, Judes.”

“Oh.” And there was the look of pity, right on cue. “Too bad. He’s cute.”

“Cute?” Beverly could think of a number of adjectives to describe John Winchester, but “cute” wasn’t one of them. “There’s something off in that family, though,” she continued. Her musing was more to keep Judith from turning the conversation to another lecture on how It’s been nearly three years; don’t you think it’s time to get out there again? that always seemed to accompany Judith’s discourse.

“Oh, Bev, he was here for five minutes—”

“No, they’ve been here before,” Beverly explained. “And something—that older boy—I can’t put my finger on it.”

“Child abuse?” Judith asked seriously, all trace of “girl talk” vanished.

“I thought so at first. But…I’m not sure. I don’t think so. But I don’t know what it is.”

“Well, you’ll figure it out. You always do, Bev. Now, please,” Judith continued, “let me see if Andrew’s free for dinner Friday—”

“Judes, Andrew’s a very nice guy, for a market analyst. He’s very clean-cut, kind to small animals, and environmentally conscious. And he and I are just not compatible.”

“But you barely—”

“I went on two dates with him,” Beverly said. “Two dates, Judith, and he treated me like porcelain the whole time. Plus, he’s boring. On the first date, he seemed afraid to bring up any topic deeper than the latest Swarzenegger film. On he second, all he talked about was his work and how computer software is going to revolutionize industry.”

“I just don’t understand—I mean, he said he just didn’t want the evening to turn into talking about his ex or—anything,” she finished lamely.

“Meaning you warned him to avoid the topic. Look, stop trying to find someone for me, Judith, please!” Beverly said defensively. “I’m sorry. Look, just…. I’m okay, okay? I’m really okay.”

And she really was. Mostly.


~*~NOW~*~

“Could you tell us anything you noticed about the suspect when she was here?”

The bartender at Lowell’s Tavern looked at Sam like he did not for one second believe he or Dean were ATF agents. Dean’s choice of their aliases, Edward Haskell and Lawrence Mondello, may have had more to do with that than the assessing look Dean was giving the beer list, the pool table, and the only waitress. Sam cleared his throat. Dean jerked his attention back to the barman, who decided to give up his information.

“We don’t get a lot of single chicks here, unnerstand,” he said. “An’ she was…well, she was pretty obviously trolling for it, y’know?” He waited while Sam nodded. “She got Munch and Luke sniffin’ after her. You ask me, she just wanted ‘em to start a brawl over her.”

“So, she was inciting them to fight?”

“Hell, yeah. Said something about it being the only way to escape.”

“Escape what?” Dean scoffed. The bartender just shrugged.

“What about anything else in the mix?” Sam asked, as if off-handedly. “Did you notice any unusual…substances around?”

“Like?” The bartender frowned at him.

Sam swallowed and tried to look official. “Anything like a yellow powder, kinda sulfurous, or maybe like black smoke or oil?”

The bartender gave Sam the look. The one that said, “Are you on any unusual substances?” He shook his head. “Cops went over this place pretty thorough. Didn’t find anything to suggest drugs.”

“But she did seem different, right?” Dean finally asked a follow-up. “After the fight?”

“Yeah, she seemed freaked. It was an act for the cops, if you ask me.”

“One other question. Have you ever seen this guy?” Sam held up the photo of the first missing and found guy: David Owen.

“That’s Davy—Travis’s little brother.”

Sam glanced at Dean to make sure he was paying attention. He in turn widened his eyes a little in a signal Sam understood: We’ll talk later.

“Was Travis a regular?”

“Sure. Still is, though since they found Davy up in Cleveland he’s been dealing with that, y’know?”

“Okay, thank you.”

Outside, Dean said: “Maybe this thing does have a local connection.”

“Yeah. Something’s not adding up yet, though.”

“Like what?”

“Well, like…why’s the demon staying put for nearly a week before making them into criminals?”

Dean shrugged. “Are we sure the thing’s moving in a straight line? I mean, maybe it ends up nearby five days later…”

“…But it goes somewhere else in between?” Sam frowned. “Yeah. Something to check out.”

Ever practical, Dean nodded, but said: “Okay, well, first, let’s concentrate on figuring out what happened when it did show up.”


~*~THEN~*~

Beverly saw Sam and Dean after school every few days for the next couple weeks. Their father always picked them up, but sometimes he told them to hang out a little longer while he used the reference or other sections. She never saw him take out any books himself, but his mailbag was usually stuffed with copies from the microfiche readers.

Dean displayed lukewarm interest during Banned Books week, but refused to fill out a library card application, however much he wanted to flip through Go Ask Alice. By contrast, Sam was going through his five-book limit in record time. He brought back two of his first five books three days after taking them out, and by the time Beverly had learned that he thought Taran should have stood up to Eilonwy and Will Stanton and Charles Wallace were both totally cool and Superfudge was totally lame and Encyclopedia Brown was the smartest kid ever (except for Dean), she had logged at least twenty books on Sam’s card. Dean only read what he had to read. On afternoons when she wasn’t busy, Beverly noticed him struggling through his homework.

“Need help with anything?” she offered during one such occasion.

Dean looked up. “I can’t remember what the coordinates are for Oklahoma City.”

“Coordinates?”

“Yeah. Longitude and latitude.”

“What class is this for?” she asked curiously.

“It’s a report on our summer vacation.”

“You spent your summer in Oklahoma?”

“Only part of it,” Sam volunteered over the margins of his book.

Dean kicked Sam under the table. Beverly pretended not to notice.

“Dean, let me show you where you can find that information,” she said to keep the sibling rivalry to a minimum under her watch.

That afternoon, when John came to pick them up, Beverly said, “Sam’s quite a voracious reader.”

“I know,” John said, looking a little mystified by it. “Sometimes I can’t get him to put down the books and do his chores.”

“What’s Dean’s excuse, then?” Beverly grinned. “He strikes me as the type who’d rather be playing baseball or football than chores.”

John shook his head. “Dean? He…he does what he’s told. Mostly,” he added very quietly. “C’mon boys,” he called, not too loudly, but with enough intensity to bring them running.

“C’n we go to Wendy’s?” Dean asked as the family moved toward the exit.

“We’ve done Wendy’s three times this week,” Beverly overheard John say. “How about Chinese?”

Which explained why, an hour later, she had a craving for orange chicken and egg roll. She called in her order from the library before leaving. After three tries, her car started and she drove to How Fun’s to pick up her take out.

“Mental note, Bev,” she told herself while waiting for her order, “get the car checked out next week.”

The door opened behind her with a musical tinkle. She looked around reflexively. It was John Winchester. He saw her, too, and laughed quietly once as he came over to the takeout counter.

“You gave me a taste for it,” she explained. She had no idea why she felt the need to defend herself. Maybe because the look he gave her was…a little wolfish.

“I guess there’s not a lot of choices around here for Chinese,” he surmised.

“Not good Chinese,” she agreed. “But…I’m sorry—but you left the library over an hour ago. I thought you’d be done with supper by now.”

John nodded. “We went for a run first.”

“Oh. All of you?” She knew she was fishing, but she couldn’t help it. He was attractive, dammit, but there was also the mystery man factor about him. Even after nearly three weeks, she couldn’t put her finger on what was wrong with the family. They were so insular—Dean and Sam almost never interacted with any of the other kids. It wasn’t normal. For the boys’ sake, if not her own, she let her curiosity persist.

John had nodded again. “It’s a little hard to pace both Dean and Sam, but Sammy’ll catch up.”

Beverly knew she was going to ask her next question and God, it embarrassed her to pry. She told herself it was to get to the bottom of their family situation and that it had nothing to do with his magnetism. “Does…does your wife run with you, too?”

John’s eyes narrowed. Beverly held up her left hand, thumb curling around her ring finger. And John’s walls went up, hard and solid and thick.

“Sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn’t mean to—” even with the walls, she saw it. Saw the grief and loss and the absence of his wife in his eyes. She recognized it from the mornings when she still occasionally woke up expecting Tom to be lying next to her.

Expecting Tom to be alive.

“I’m sorry,” she said again, and meant something very different.

John looked away. On impulse, because it seemed like the easiest way to show him how clearly she understood, Beverly fumbled for the chain around her neck. She pulled it out from inside her crew-neck blouse. The plain gold band glinted in the light from the paper lanterns.

His head turned back to her sharply at the sudden movement, as if he were prepared to flinch away from a hand outstretched in sympathy. When he saw the wedding ring on its chain, he froze. Slowly, his eyes dragged up her neck, chin, nose, to meet hers.

“I get it,” Beverly said simply, and tucked the ring back over her heart. They stood silently for a moment.

Then Mr. How came out with their bags of food. Beverly paid for hers. As John approached the counter, pulling out his wallet, she nodded to him. “Goodnight,” she said with kindness, meaning “I’m sorry” again.


~*~NOW~*~

“Look, I told you, my client has nothing to say to the press.”

Sam nodded. Lauren Kennedy’s lawyer was a long shot as far as information went, but it might get them one step closer to figuring out how to track this thing. Sam still thought it was a demon; Dean had expressed doubt, but then, this whole case had him fairly crabby. “Did she say anything to anyone before leaving Cleveland?”

The attorney shook her head. “Look, it’s not ancient Assyrian. What part of ‘No Comment’ do you not understand?”

Dean decided to contribute. “Listen, sweetheart, we’re trying to help your client. Honestly, if you have anything you can tell us that would put this in perspective—”

“Our perspective is that we’ll leave this to the courts, and not the newspapers. Now get out!”

Sam put his hand on Dean’s shoulder. “We’re going, we’re going,” he assured her as he pressed Dean to back away and out of the office.

Outside, Dean jabbed a finger toward the ground rapidly. He immediately pulled at his tie, loosening his collar against the late June heat. “This is nuts, Sammy. Tell you what we should be doing—talking to her ourselves.”

“Dean, you know we can’t just walk into a jail anymore—any jail,” Sam pointed out, trying not to sound testy. It had been Dean’s idea to pull that job for Deacon, which had put the FBI hot on their tails and really raised their importance on the wanted lists. Not only was it dangerous in itself, it made their jobs that much harder to do when they had to keep a low profile.

“I’m just saying, that’s where the witnesses are.”

“There are witnesses around here, too. And besides, we know this thing is picking its next victim based on where it last stopped. That’s here. Did you find anything on those missing persons reports I gave you?”

Dean scowled. He hated being told that his instincts were wrong, almost as much as he hated Sam giving the orders. While he was generally content to switch off being the lead dog, he nevertheless got frustrated when Sam shut down his methods or treated him as his subordinate. Which was weird, considering that he’d never minded that Dad had issued orders easy as breathing.

He didn’t make an issue of it, though, and instead pulled out his notes. “Okay, there were fourteen new files opened in the area since Wednesday, which is the day Lauren was apprehended. Eight of them were kids. I checked out the remaining six, but my money’s on this one.” He reached into the back seat and handed Sam one of the manila folders with the printout Sam had put together.

“Gareth Barker?”

“Yep.”

“Okay, why him?” Sam said. They climbed in the car and Sam began to leaf through the file while Dean pulled into traffic.

“Well, first of all, because he was just reported missing yesterday, which is the same interval that passed between when David Owen was caught and Lauren Kennedy went missing. Second, he and his car both disappeared, while everyone else went missing without their vehicle. And third, because his apartment had sulfur in it.”

Sam’s eyebrows shot up. Dean grumbled a lot, but he could investigate a case like no hunter Sam knew. “Okay. Any leads on where he took off?”

“Nope,” Dean said, cranking the wheel left toward their room. “But Sam, we gotta figure out how to get ahead of this thing. I mean, it can keep joyriding back and forth, but if we can’t anticipate where it’s going to wind up—”

“We’ll just be following it until we can catch a break,” Sam finished with a nod.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, I know.” Sam sighed.

“So what do you want to do?”

Sam shrugged. “Watch for a report with a sighting of this guy. See where he shows up, if he commits any crimes, I guess.”

Predictably, that didn’t sit well with Dean. He preferred action to waiting, and the idea that another innocent would have to suffer before they could suss the pattern really went against Dean’s heroic self-image. He said so, in no uncertain terms, at least a dozen times that evening.

“Look, Dean, I know. It sucks, okay? I don’t like having to wait for some of the hunts to come to us, either. But sometimes, that’s the way it is.”

Dean cocked his head toward him. “You feeling all right?”

Sam looked at the ceiling. “Yes, I’m fine. I’m not any happier than you are that this is a dead end so far, okay?”

“Okay,” Dean said cautiously.

“So don’t…just don’t make it sound like I’m keeping you from doing something important.”

Dean backed down. “Let’s…let’s concentrate on what we can figure out about its pattern,” he offered. He joined Sam at the desk and began to sift through Sam’s papers. Sam moved his hand to intercept a fraction of a second too late.

“Don’t look—”

Dean smacked his hand away. “Don’t look?” he repeated glibly, pulling out the folder. Like a dog catching the scent of blood, Dean turned Sam’s secret into an opportunity to torment him. “Sammy,” he drawled, “are you saying you don’t want me to help with research now?” He fanned himself dramatically with the folder, ignoring Sam’s attempts to grab it away. “Can’t be. You may be geekboy el supremo, but you’ve never objected to me pulling a little weight in that department.”

Sam knew Dean was just torturing him to get a rise out of him, but he also knew that Dean really wouldn’t want to see what was in the file. He didn’t really have a choice, so he played into Dean’s teasing the way Dean expected him to do. “Dean, give it—” Sam reached up, but Dean pushed him back into the desk chair. Standing, he had better leverage and more reach than Sam was accustomed to him having.

“Nuh-uh,” Dean taunted. “You don’t want me to see this, which means…hey, is it porn?” He grinned widely.

“No,” Sam said, aware, but unable to stop from sounding incensed at the accusation.

“‘Cause you know, I warned you about the midget obsession, Sasquatch.” Dean snapped the folder out of his grasp again. “It’s not anything to do with the deal?” he asked, suddenly serious and angry. “Because I told you—”

“What? No, Dean—it’s got nothing—”

Dean opened the folder and looked at the note Sam had placed inside, at the address on the envelope in their father’s block writing. He flicked his eyes to Sam’s face. Sam winced at the anger, accusation, and betrayal in Dean’s eyes. “Dude. I told you to throw this out.”

“Dean, Dublin’s only a few miles—”

“I mean it, Sammy, you don’t even know if she—”

“I checked, okay?” Sam stood up to grab Dean’s arm and wrench the folder away. “That’s what the note is. While I was in the library, I looked her up. Mrs. Kirkland still lives in Dublin.”

“Sam—”

“What, Dean?! I mean, what the hell has you so dead set against delivering this?”

Dean paced the room, leaned against the bathroom doorjamb. “Dude, I just think…I just think we should stay out of it. It’s none of our business.”

“Why, because Dad and Mrs. Kirkland were—”

“No, that’s got nothing to do with—”

“Well, then what, Dean? Because I know you know Dad was human, so tell me this isn’t another episode of how perfect—”

“You have no fucking clue, Sam—”

“So, clue me, Dean!” Sam raised his arms to the side. “Tell me what I’m missing here. Is it about Mom? Did you think Dad was gonna—”

“Shuddup!” Dean yelled. He pushed off the wall and grabbed his keys. “Man, I do not have to deal with this,” he muttered as he threw himself out the door.

Sam raked his hands through his hair. Dean’s attitude surprised him more than it probably should have. Only a couple months ago, Dean had laughed off a demon’s accusation that he was a walking billboard for lust. Considering that he basically made himself a slave to his carnal desires, he had a huge problem accepting any hint that their dad had ever got laid. But he knew as well as Sam that Dad hadn’t been completely immune to women. So why was this particular relationship putting a bug up his butt?

He stared at the address on the envelope for a long time before sighing, setting it aside, and pulling out Gareth Barker’s missing persons report to read it again.

Continued....

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