Supernatural Fan Fiction ❯ Through the Looking Glass ❯ Watching You ( Chapter 1 )

Disclaimer: You'll see many things in this story—great song lyrics, adorable little boys, sexy grown up boys, and a couple of parents wandering vaguely in the background. Unfortunately, none of these things belong to me. Drat.

 

Characters: Dean and Sam Winchester, John Winchester

 

Setting: From Sam's a bit before Sam's birth all the way to the point right after Dean sees Sam in AHBL II.

 

Warnings: Slight spoilers for AHBL II, so if you're living on a rock in the Arctic ocean somewhere and still haven't seen this episode, be cautious. Also—Wee!Chesters! I don't know if that counts as a warning, per se, but they're here. Oh, and this story is short.

 

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Through the Looking Glass

 

Driving through town, just my boy and me,

With a Happy Meal in his booster seat,

Knowing that he couldn't have the toy `til his nuggets were gone.

Green traffic light turned straight to red.

I hit my brakes and mumbled under my breath.

His fries went a-flying and his orange drink covered his lap.

Well, then my four-year-old son said a four-letter word.

It started with “s” and I was concerned.

So I said, “Son, now where'd you learn to talk like that?”

 

By the time he was four years old, Dean Winchester knew that he wanted to be just like his daddy. He knew even at such a young age that a lot of boys said that, but he was certain that no one in the whole wide world meant it like he did, just as he was certain that no one felt the way he did about his daddy.

 

From the time he was old enough to toddle around with some semblance of balance, Dean had been following John around every chance he got. It got to be that the harshest punishment his parents could devise was “Go to your room while Daddy works.” Oh, he loved Mary, of course, with all his little-boy heart, but he literally worshipped John, and nothing could convince him that the man might be less than perfect.

 

As for Mary and John themselves, well, they tolerated this unabashed hero-worship with a smile, certain that he, like all other children, would grow out of it. They had no way of knowing that while it would fade, it would never diminish altogether. They had no way of knowing what would come out of it in time.

 

In the meantime, though, the hero-worship had its uses, because Dean would do just about anything his father asked of him. He might argue about it, might contest it, might even throw a tantrum if he felt strongly about the matter, but he never openly rebelled against John's word.

 

And sometimes he didn't even need to be told what to do.

 

Dean would always remember the day that Sammy came home. He hadn't really understood what “pregnant” meant, or why when Mommy said it over breakfast with the air of someone announcing her appointment as Queen of the Universe Daddy suddenly grinned and laughed his big laugh and leapt up and pulled her over to dance with him right there in the kitchen while the first batch of pancakes burned on the stove.

 

Dean didn't understand why Mommy got so big all of the sudden, or why everything seemed to make her cry, or why Daddy started talking about remodeling their third bedroom, or why everyone went around smiling all the time and treating Mommy like a queen.

 

Dean didn't understand why one night a long time after Mommy and Daddy danced in the kitchen they suddenly got up and left in the middle of the night for no apparent reason while one of Mommy's friends came to baby-sit.

 

Dean didn't understand any of it. All he knew was that Mommy and Daddy left and when they came back, they had a whole new person with them. A tiny, fragile, wriggly, wrinkled little boy, all wrapped in a blue blanket, brown eyes peering curiously out at the world.

 

The first thing Mommy did when she came in was hug him, and then, without even asking if he wanted it, she handed Dean the baby. She said that his name was Sam, and he was Dean's little brother, and what did he think of that? Then John decreed that Dean would watch out for him and take care of him, always.

 

Dean stared down at the baby already beginning to fall asleep in his arms, the voices of his parents—even Daddy's voice—muted and faraway in the face of this new and wonderful thing, and thought that maybe this was one thing his daddy didn't need to tell him to do.

 

He said, “I've been watching you, Dad, ain't that cool?

I'm your buckaroo, I wanna be like you,

And eat all my food and grow as tall as you are.

We got cowboy boots and camo pants.

Yeah, we're just alike, hey, ain't we, Dad?

I wanna do everything you do.

So I've been watching you.”

 

When Sammy—who became known by that name before his first week on Earth was fairly over—was six months old, something bad happened: Mommy went away, and no one would tell Dean where she was or when she was coming back.

 

They all seemed sad and withdrawn all the time, and for some reason a lot of people seemed to cry when they looked at Dean or Sammy, and no one told Dean anything.

 

They left their home and stayed at a motel, and they only had what people gave him, and still no one explained.

 

Daddy barely talked at all, but he paid a lot of attention to his children, especially to Sammy. He seemed to be thinking all the time, like he was figuring something out, and he still wouldn't tell Dean when Mommy was coming back.

 

Then Daddy went away and was replaced by one of Daddy's sad-faced friends, and for two days he was gone, and when Dean asked where he was and where Mommy was the friend just looked sad and asked if he wanted to play checkers.

 

Then Daddy came back and thanked his friend and waited for the friend to leave and then put what they had in two bags and put Dean and Sammy in the truck and drove away.

 

Things got even more confusing after that, and Dean didn't know what was going on, why Daddy didn't want to stay in one place, but he was beginning to understand that something had gone terribly wrong.

 

Maybe Mommy wasn't coming back.

 

And Daddy was mad, mad like Dean had never seen him.

 

But the thing was, he didn't seem to be mad at anyone. He was just mad.

 

And if Daddy was mad…well, then Dean was, too.

 

Dean didn't ask again where Mommy was.

 

We got back home and I went to the barn.

I bowed my head and I prayed real hard.

Said, “Lord, please help me help my stupid self.”

Then this side of bedtime later that night,

Turning on my son's Scooby Doo nightlight,

He crawled out of bed and got down on his knees.

He closed his little eyes, folded his little hands,

And spoke to God like he was talking to a friend.

And I said, “Son, now where'd you learn to pray like that?”

 

Dean wasn't even grown up yet the first time his dad put a gun in his hands, but he didn't need to be, and he'd never felt more proud in his life than when he learned to shoot and hit his target every time.

 

He learned to hunt before he learned to ask a girl out, and he learned to kill before he learned algebra. He learned that asking “How” usually got him nothing, and that asking “Why” was even more pointless. Most of all, he learned unswerving obedience to his father, which was not something that had required a lot of teaching in the first place, but whatever.

 

But there was another thing, one other rule, that was more important than obedience to his dad.

 

Watch out for Sammy.

 

It became his duty, his life. Always his first thought was for Sammy, as was his dad's. It didn't bother him, devoting his life to Sammy, and it didn't bother him that John seemed to worry so much more about him than he did Dean himself. After all, Dad always said that if they didn't take care of Sammy, then he'd get hurt.

 

And if Dad said it, then it was true.

 

Period.

 

He said, “I've been watching you, Dad, ain't that cool?

I'm your buckaroo, I wanna be like you,

And eat all my food and grow as tall as you are.

We like fixing things and holding Mama's hand.

Yeah, we're just alike, hey, ain't we, Dad?

I wanna do everything you do.
So I've been watching you.”

 

Sammy didn't want to be like Dad, and Dean just didn't get that. Sammy wanted to be Sam and go to school and get good grades and hated hunting, and Dean didn't get that either. Sammy chafed against orders and argued with Dad, and that was perhaps the strangest thing of all.

 

He came to call it “The Sammy Conundrum” in his head. It sounded clean, scientific, and it made it seem like he had a hope of figuring his brother out.

 

He never did

 

And Sammy never did try to become like their father.

 

But oddly enough, he loved the kid all the same, maybe more for it.

 

With tears in my eyes, I wrapped him in a hug.

Said, “My little bear is growing up.”

He said, “But when I'm big, I'll still know what to do.”

 

And even years later, now, when Dean was twenty-seven and grown up and had lost his idol, his father, and held his brother as Sam died and made a deal and condemned himself to an eternity in hell—even now, he hadn't grown out of his hero-worship. Even now, he was that little boy who strove to emulate his father, to be his father.

 

Even to copy his father's mistakes.

 

Because it had been a mistake, he knew that. He knew it would hurt Sam, knew Sam would probably kill himself over it, like he himself almost had over John. It had been a mistake.

 

But as he stared at his brother, watching him in bewilderment, and as he stepped forward to pull Sam into his arms, to hold him and feel him breathe, Dean knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that it had been a mistake he'd gladly make again. He'd sacrificed his life to save his brothers, and now he had Sam back and he'd make that sacrifice again, without hesitation, any day, if this was the result.

 

Dean Winchester was like his father, and he was proud.

 

“`Cause I've been watching you, Dad, ain't that cool/

I'm your buckaroo, I wanna be like you,

And eat all my food and grow as tall as you are.

By then I'll be strong as Superman.

We'll be jut alike, hey, won't we, Dad?

When I can do everything you do,

`Cause I've been watching you.”

 

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Author's Note: Okay, so it's short and fairly pointless, and perhaps even senseless. Sue me. Plot bunnies don't always make sense—that's why they hop all the time. I tried to make Wee!Dean as cute as possible to make up for it, and also for the lack of Sammy-ness. Please review!