Fic: It's All Been Erased

[summergen-mod.livejournal.com]

Title: it's all been erased
Author: july_july_july
Recipient: desertport
Rating: R
Warnings: Cussing and some violence.
Notes: Many, many thanks to my brave and speedy beta!
Summary: Only in dreams, we see what it means. Reach out our hands, hold onto hers. But when we wake, it's all been erased. And so it seems, only in dreams. -Weezer, "Only in Dreams"



The first night after Sam left, Dean slept like a baby. The argument had lasted all day with Dean playing umpire. He was fucking tired. Dad left for the bar a couple hours after Sam got on the greyhound. Dean tidied up the room, put the broken lamp into the trash along with the toothbrush that Sam had forgotten. Then he walked down to the office and said they'd only be needing the one room, thanks.

It was dark by then, so he lay down on the bed and made a list of things Sam had taken with him: his clothes duffel, his utility knife, a wad of cash, deck of cards, cell phone, some fraudulent credit, and a couple different Blue Cross policies. When he ran out of things on the list, he closed his eyes and started over again. When he opened his eyes, it was the next morning.

Dad didn't sleep at all, it looked like. He was sitting upright in the chair, nursing an enormous cup of coffee and a black eye. Dean yawned, stretched, and really needed to fucking pee like right now.

"He'll be back tomorrow," John said while Dean was washing his hands.

Dean considered his reflection. He needed a shave. And he looked tired, sure, but not wrung out like Dad. Didn't even looked surprised 'cause the only thing Dean had been sure of since yesterday was they've really done it this time.

"No. He won't."

////

Dean knew that he was dreaming. That was the worst part. When he was a kid, he had dreams about trying to run, but his legs wouldn't work. There would be a rawhead or a ghost behind him, but he couldn't get away or his gun was jammed or he'd forgotten where he was. This was kind of like that.

The witch was closing in on him. He couldn't see what was in her hands, but he knew it was bad news. And he knew Dad was just outside the door by the sound of his footsteps, heavy and unapologetic. Dean's back was against the wall, and all he had to do was shout and backup would come. He opened his mouth and yelled and screamed and begged, but no sound ever came out. And she just got closer and closer until he could feel her breath on his cheek.

Fine then, he decided in that particular dream logic. He'd do it himself. He pulled a switchblade from his back pocket--which was weird, he didn't have a switchblade. And he stabbed the witch again and again and again. He was covered in blood that wasn't really blood when the door opened.

"Dean? Are you in here?"

It was too tall to be Dad.

"Dean?"

I'm over here, dude, he tried to say. We're gonna need to do some serious laundry, though.

The too-tall figure in the door, whose face Dean couldn't see but whose identity he was certain of, turned and walked away. Dean tried to get up and run after him, but he slipped in the blood and landed on his knees, and then he couldn't get up again.

Hey! Boy-genius! I'm over here! Hey!

It wasn't even two AM when Dean woke up, desperate to say something, but unwilling to wake his father.

////

They stayed busy, by John's design. No sooner had they torched one thing, than they were off to kill something else. Like somewhere there was a buzzer waiting to go off and when it did, when some cosmic authority called time!, John and Dean would have nothing more than a growing pile of dead things to recommend them.

For a while, Dean slept the same exhausted, dreamless sleep of that first night. It took a couple weeks before his dreams started breaking through again. It started with the voiceless one and got worse from there. Every night they seemed a little more real. There were words, numbers, music, and emotions he couldn't shake. The weirdest thing was the way the sucker-punch seemed to follow him into waking life. Like a hangover, the feeling dogged him all the next day.

So he started to like their schedule. In New Mexico, they killed a nest of chupacabras. It wasn't demanding work. It was a long boring grind. Chupacabras were some kind of cross between a sewer rat and a rabid lapdog. With fangs. Dean set out bait, like a salt lick for deer, only this was a casserole dish full of goat blood. He and Dad spent the next thirty-six hours picking off the vicious little fuckers one by one. By the end of the second night, they had a pile of dead monsters about six feet high. They torched 'em and drove back to the motel in silence.

Dean didn't even get his boots off before he was asleep.

////

He was chasing a girl. It felt like he was running flat out, but he wasn't even breathing hard. She was just a few yards ahead of him, running barefoot through the grass. Occasionally she turned her head to look at him. But her dark hair blew in front of her face so he couldn't see it. She laughed like she knew he'd never catch up.

The weird thing was, Dean felt like he already knew her. Or that he already knew he wanted to know her or needed her or something like that. It was a primal feeling, radiating from the base of his spine, from the same place that told him when to duck, when to run, when to fire. It said she was his, a certain and established truth, and all of this was a just the prologue for the real competition. They ran for what felt like hours, fast and painless across territory he hadn't seen before.

'Black Dog' was playing in Dean's head when he woke up, and he had a hard on for the record books. It was almost dawn, late enough for some desperately needed alone time in the shower. He might as well, since Dad was going to want to be on the road by seven.

////

They criss-crossed the country six times in three months. Dean didn't even realize they were coming up on Christmas until Jim called to ask them their plans. Dad grunted said something non-committal. Then he took down a few names and numbers. They hadn't even gotten the ectoplasm off their boots and it was time for another job.

Some mothers hired hitmen to get their daughters on the cheer squad. Other mothers appealed to a lower authority. It was a medium-sized town in Arizona, but the rate of high-school fatalities was pushing one per month. All of them were contenders for valedictorian at a nearby private school.

"This is fucked up," Dean said. The papers were all over the table and the beds and the walls, so he was eating cold pizza standing up. "Who cares this much about grades?"

Dad snorted.

"Seriously, though. This is fucked up."

"Uh-oh."

"What uh-oh?"

"You're not gonna like this." Dad held up a Polaroid from the case file they'd nicked that afternoon.

Dean put the pizza down, wiped his hands on one of the crappy paper napkins. He picked up the picture and suddenly his dinner was not sitting so pretty. A bunny, nailed to the wall by his ears and his paws, spread in the shape of a pentacle.

"Sorry, Dean," Dad said, not sounding sorry at all. "It's a witch."

"Fuck."

////

Occasionally, the dreams were good. In this one, he was a superhero. He was picking up boulders and tossing them aside like they were nothing. Dean couldn't be sure what was underneath them, but he did remember Dad telling him it was important. It was really important, and Dean was the only one who could find it.

Dean picked up the massive rocks one at a time and threw them so far that they disappeared. He was a man on a mission and he knew he was winning. Somewhere, maybe, he realized it was a dream. But he didn't really care because, hey, superpowers.

At the bottom of the pile was a little kid, curled up in a ball. Slowly, the kid unfolded himself and there was a brown bowl cut and a serious expression and worshipful eyes.

"Dean?" Sam held his hands up the way he had when he was little, maybe three or four.

"I gotcha." Dean's grown-up self picked up his brother. "See? No sweat."

Sam didn't say anything, just turned his face and put his ear up against Dean's heart.

"You did good," Dean said. "Look how good you did."

He woke up feeling better than he had in weeks.

////

It wasn't just any witch. This lady was a fucking professional. Dean had a feeling they were going to be spending the next couple months retracing her footsteps, trying to find out what she'd been doing before she showed up on the Winchester family radar. Right now, they had a list of honor roll students who needed surveillance.

They caught up with her in a gated community outside of Phoenix at the home of some poor kid named Eunice. The witch was scaling the side of a two story house to plant a hex bag on what had to be Eunice's windowsill. It wasn't really a good time to start firing guns, so Dean settled for a well-aimed rock.

As expected, it got her attention. She recovered quickly, though, and cut through the backyard towards the houses under construction. Plenty of cover there and a multitude of hiding places, which was why John was waiting there with a forty four and a silencer. Dean followed her as far as the second story of a massive skeletal house. In the back, some kind of monster pool was under construction, a yard full of concrete and rebar. He questioned why anyone would need a pool the size of a normal house.

"Hey! Bitch!" he yelled, more to alert Dad than anything. He stepped deliberately towards the gaping back wall, his gun in hand. She was around here somewhere. "I'm talking to you, broomstick for hire!"

If he'd just seen one of them, it might have gone okay. But he saw both of them: Dad coming up the stairs on his left and the two-by-four swinging down on his right. Instead of ducking and rolling or turning his back on Dad and trusting him to cover, Dean did neither. He took the blow in his ribs and went backwards out the empty window frame. It took forever to fall, and he had time to see the witch turn. He knew exactly where she was headed because it was exactly where he would have gone.

The impact must have knocked some cobwebs loose, because it was maybe thirty seconds before he realized what Dad was screaming at him.

"Where did she go?"

Third floor, he said, but nothing came out. Instead, he pointed up with his left index finger, up.

Dad disappeared.

It took him longer than usual to get his breath back, and it wasn't breathing so much as gargling air. Hurt like fuck, too. Not in his ribs, like it normally did, but a little lower. This was a different, burning stabby pain, not the sharp lightning-strikes he was familiar with. Experimentally, he wiggled his fingers. Golden. Then Dean looked down towards his toes, ready to give them a go.

"Uh-oh."

There was three feet of rebar sticking up through his belly.

His head rolled back into its starting position. Don't move. Don't move. Dean blinked hard, and tried to remember what was next. Every plan he could think of involved Dad coming back to get him. Wait for Dad. Wait for Dad. That became the refrain of the next half hour. He couldn't think about anything else. If he thought about the rebar, his heart rate picked up. Likewise with the witch, Jim, Christmas, anything. Except wait for Dad.

"Dean? You out here?"

"Yep." It was clipped, but audible. The moon was behind the clouds now. The yard was an inky black. And kinda fuzzy around the edges.

"Up and at 'em. There's a dead lady in a dumpster says we need to skip town."

"Not sure that's in the cards, Dad."

There was a telling pause. Then Dad turned on the flashlight, swung it around and caught Dean in it broadside.

"Shit."

"Sorry," Dean said.

Dad was already on the phone, though, stating the nature of his emergency. He knelt down next to Dean and took his vitals, passed them along. Dad ended the phone call with a heated "Stay on your own goddamn line."

"Sorry," Dean tried again.

"Don't be sorry. Just stop bleeding."

Dean smiled. Dad pulled off his coat and laid it over Dean's chest. It felt a little warmer, and then it didn't feel like anything. He looked up and all he got was more cloud cover.

"Dean! No sleeping on the job!"

"'Kay." But his eyes slid shut anyway.

"I'm serious, Dean. Look at me. Look at me."

"Do me a favor?"

"Depends." That was Dad for you.

"Call Sam."

"Dean."

"Mean it. This goes bad, you have to call Sam."

Dad looked like he wanted to refuse, so Dean shut his eyes. It was the most appropriate fuck-you he could come up with in the moment.

////

He never dreamed about her, like even his subconscious was afraid to go there. Apparently the blood loss, though, made tonight an exception.

There was a game he and Mom used to play. On Saturday mornings, Dad slept in, so Dean and Mom went to the grocery store by themselves. Dean was always the first to wake up, and he had to tiptoe so he wouldn't wake up Dad or Sammy, who had just started sleeping through the night.

Dean picked his way down the hall and into his parent's room. Mom left the door open just for him. He only ever had to touch her once, just barely on her arm, and she was awake. She blinked a couple times and then smiled at him. Like always, she put a finger up to her lips. That was the signal that he should go get dressed.

On Saturdays he got to wear whatever he wanted. Dean put on his favorite overalls and a t-shirt, even though it was kind of getting cold outside. Feeling a little brave, he didn't put shoes on at all. Mom was in the kitchen waiting for him, in sneakers and jeans and a blue sweatshirt with a bird on it. She raised an eyebrow when she saw his feet, but she didn't say anything. That was part of the game; they didn't talk until they were outside in the car. He balked at the front door, the chill from the ground already sinking into the soles of his feet.

Mom smiled at him and knelt down and he hopped on her piggy-back. When they got to the car, she opened the side door and set him down. Dean put his own seatbelt on by standing up to get the shoulder part and hanging onto the buckle while he slid down. Mom opened her door, put her belt on, and shut the door.

"Jeez," she said. "You're getting heavier every day. You ready, kid?"

Dean nodded. It was a short drive to the grocery store, but Mom always took it slow. She stopped completely at every stop sign and used the blinker for every little turn. Sometimes Dad would roll his eyes, but Mom called it modeling good behavior and said maybe he could learn a thing or five. The parking lot was empty. Mom drummed her fingers on the wheel.

"See any cars?"

Dean shook his head.

"You didn't even look!"

"Did so."

"Alright then. Here we go."

Then Mom took her foot off the brake and her hands off the wheel.

"Look, Dean! No hands!"

The car moved, directionless. Dean shrieked as it veered towards the store front.

"Quick!" she said. "Dean, quick!"

He leaned over and grabbed the wheel, jerking it hard to the right.

"Whew. Thank goodness you were here."

They played like that for another five minutes, until the manager came out and unlocked the front door. Mom carried him all the way inside and put him in the cart. On the way out, she carried him to the car before the groceries and then she did it again at home. His feet never touched the ground.

////

"Heyyyyy. Hot nurse."

"Mr. Erskine?"

"Thas me. Really fabulous rack. Top notch."

"That's very kind of you to say, sir."

"Right back at ya...Betty."

"It's Adelaide. But I appreciate the sentiment."

"Look like a Betty to me. Those are the blouse bunnies of a Betty. Trust me. I know what 'm talking about."

"For Christ's sake, Dean."

Dad entered his field of vision like the world's crankiest whack-a-mole.

"Stop giggling, dumbass. They already think you might have brain damage."

"'S'at coffee fer me?"

"No." Dad set it down on the table next to him. "You're gonna be IV only a little while longer."

"Wut?" Dean looked over, disbelieving of how heavy his head really was. Behind Dad was a bank of machinery, all beeping or pumping or recording. "'S'at all mine?"

"Yes it is."

"Shiiiiiit." Three syllables.

"Yeah. If we're lucky, we'll make it to Jim's for New Year's."

"No tree?"

"It's Christmas Eve, Dean. No tree."

"Damn. I like the tree. And the nog."

"Everybody likes the nog."

"Hey."

"Yeah?"

"What?"

"You said 'hey'."

"Right. Oh yeah. Hey, did you call him?"

Dad looked away for a minute and sighed.

"No. I didn't."

"Oh. Good."

"I'm gonna...I'm gonna go give Jim a call. Let him know you're up and about."

"Say hi for me."

"Will do. Try not to proposition any nurses while I'm gone."

"No promises."

"I'll, uh, I'll ask if he'll save us some nog."

"Thanks. I like the nog."

"I know you do." He stood up to go, then paused in the doorway. "Your phone kind of...splintered when you fell on it. How about I go pick you up one, call it your Christmas gift."

"Nah," Dean said, wishing Betty would come back. "'S okay. I'd rather have the sniper rifle you've got stashed at Jim's place."

"How the hell did--" Dad shook his head. "You're sure, though. About the phone."

"Yeah. I'm sure."