Abby had spent the past thirty-ish minutes trying, and failing, to wake Dean up. Sam hadn't come back to the room after Abby's conversation with him, so it was just her and Dean. Dean was never easy to wake up, and if someone deliberately woke him up he was extremely grumpy. Abby had stomped around the room, turned on the sink as loudly as possible, coughed again and again, and flushed the toilet, but nothing seemed to rouse her brother.
She was about to throw water on his face and pretend it was from a leak in the ceiling when she heard a voice from the outside of the door. "Hey, Dean, let me in," a familiar voice said, kind of loudly.
"Abs, go let Sam in," Dean mumbled, his face still half-pressed into the pillow. Of course that woke him up she thought as she went over and opened the door. Sam entered and put a paper bag with a logo on the table in the room. Abby hovered near him, her hunger pains making themselves known incessant at the smell of food. Sam wordlessly handed Abby a takeout container marked with an A and a juice box, which she would have found demeaning if she hadn't been so eager to eat. She sat down at the other chair at the table, so she was now looking at Sam, and Dean, still in his bed, was to her left.
Inside the takeout container were pancakes, sausages, and an orange. She started eating immediately and the smell of food seemed to wake Dean up. He rolled out of bed and trudged over to the table.
"Here," Sam said, handing Dean a takeout container marked with "D" and a cup Abby figured out was full of coffee due to the strong smell. The siblings ate in silence except for the sound of birds chirping outside the window. Usually in the morning Abby liked to talk to Dean about anything she was thinking about and Dean would half pay attention, but Sam's presence meant Abby was unable to discuss her thoughts, as the subject of them was sitting across from her.
After Dean scarfed his food down he went to pay for the motel room, as the owner had stopped Sam on his way in to tell him they had to pay or they would get kicked out. The remaining siblings sat in silence as they finished their food. Abby had finished her pancakes and sausage and really wanted to eat her orange, she loved fruits, but she had yet to get the hang of peeling one. If Dean had been there, she would have asked him to peel it, but he wasn't, so she began to try and peel it herself, not wanting to ask Sam for help. She attempted to dig her small finger into the peel like she had seen Dean do before, but she couldn't break the skin. After a few unsuccessful attempts, she was interrupted by Sam.
"Here, let me," he said, holding out his hand. Abby gave him the orange, and he broke the skin easily. Sam didn't just give it back to her then, like she expected him to, but kept peeling it, and once he had one slice pretty much cleaned off he handed it to her. They continued in silence, Sam peeling slices and handing them to Abby for her to eat. It made Abby feel like she did when Dean braided her hair or read her a goodnight story, comfortable and safe, and Abby could feel the wall she had put up against Sam slipping. Sam, unbeknownst to Abby, was lost in a memory that took place over 3 years from the present.
•┈୨♡୧┈•
The sun beat down on the gangly teen and little girl as they sat on a curb, in yet another nameless town. The Winchester family had been investigating a curse on the town, and John and Dean had gone to talk to someone or another who they thought might know something. They had left an 18 year old Sam and 5 (almost 6) year-old Abby in the motel. Despite orders from John to stay put, Sam had decided Abby needed to get out of the stuffy room so they had walked to a street nearby for a change of scenery. Less than three weeks ago Sam had graduated from high school, and two months before that he had received his acceptance letter from Stanford. Sam had yet to tell anyone that he had applied to Stanford, let alone got in.
Sam looked down at his little sister. He had no idea if he was going to go to Stanford. He wanted to. God, he wanted to. But he also wanted to stay with his baby sister. Dean was a great big brother, but he wasn't going to remind Abby to brush her teeth or eat fruits and vegetables.
"Hey Abs," he said, nudging the little girl's shoulder "You wanna go buy an orange from the guy over there," Sam leaned his head slightly toward the guy selling fruits outside a store less than half a block away from them.
"Yeah!" Abby said excitedly, which was more telling of her general nature than her love for oranges. Sam handed her a five-dollar bill and she excitedly skipped over to the man. Sam watched as the old man gave her an orange, and was happy to see her smile as she skipped back to Sam. He had been able to tell she was getting bored, and he also knew her blood sugar was probably low. Abby sat down right next to him and handed him the orange. Sam peeled the orange and gave each slice to her.
"Sammy, you take some," Abby said, staring up at Sam and trying to hand him a slice he had just given her.
"No, Abs, it's all yours," he said. If Sam had to pick what he was most proud of right then he would have picked his sister and how kind she was, against all odds given the people John was raising her around. Sam tried not to think about how different Abby's childhood had been from his and Dean's, because when he did his heart started to hurt and he ended up wanting to just take her and run somewhere far away.
Sam peeled the last slice and set the peel down on the other side of him, not wanting to get up to throw it away and ruin the perfectness of the moment.
"Abs," he started, "if when you were older, like me and Dean, you had a chance to stop hunting would you?"
"How would I be able to stop hunting?" Abby asked, confused by his question. In her five-year-old mind, hunting was just how they lived. There wasn't another option.Why would she want to stop hunting, it was saving people, and traveling around was fun.
"I dunno... just, it's a hypothetical," Sam said, not wanting to give anything away.
"What's a hypothetical?" Abby asked. Her dad and Dean always rolled their eyes when Sam used big words and called them "stuck up," but Abby loved big words. Besides, Sam was always happy to explain what they meant, so they weren't confusing.
"A hypothetical is something that doesn't actually exist but you pretend it does for the sake of the question," Sam said.
"Oh okay," Abby said, and then looked away from Sam, across the very not-busy street, clearly thinking hard. "Would I have to leave you and Dean and Dad?" She asked.
"Yeah,"
A beat.
"I don't know," Abby said, being honest in a way only children can be. She thought it would be cool to live in a normal house and have a bedroom to decorate. But she didn't want to leave her brothers and dad. Besides, hunting was saving people, and Abby liked saving people. At least, she was pretty sure she did.
Sam sighed. "Was that a bad answer?" Abby asked, looking up at Sam.
"No, it was good. I'm just... trying to figure some stuff out,"
"Big kid stuff?"
"Yeah, big kid stuff."
Abby leaned against her big brother, and he wrapped his arm around her. They watched the sun go down, and when it got to be dark enough, they went back to the motel. There, Sam helped Abby change into PJs and brush her teeth. He tucked her into bed and kissed her forehead goodnight. She fell asleep quickly, looking tiny in the huge bed. She looked so peaceful and innocent in the bed.
As Sam watched her sleep, he realized that he was going to go to Stanford. Sam decided he was going to go to Stanford, get a good job, and an apartment, and then he was going to come find Abby and take her away from John and hunting. Then neither of them would have to hunt anymore. Dean would be able to visit whenever he wanted, maybe even live with them if he wanted. But most importantly, Abby would be safe, and she would get to have as normal a childhood as Sam could give her.
•┈୨♡୧┈•
Sam was jolted out of his memory by Dean rushing into the room.
"Dad stayed here, and I got the room number!" he said, immediately turning around and leaving. Sam and Abby followed him out of their room to another, where he looked at Sam and gestured to the door. Sam groaned and knelt down to pick the lock. As he did so, Abby rubbed her hands on her jeans, trying to get off some of the orange juice that had gotten all over her hands and forearms from the orange. Sam got the door opened, and they filed in.
"Holy shit," Dean said, to which Sam gave him a dirty look. Abby thought holy shit was a pretty reasonable reaction, considering the room looked like a crazy person had been there. The bed was messy, and there were papers with various words and pictures hanging up on all the walls. A lot of papers and pictures. There was also salt on the floor, which did not put any of the siblings at ease. Dean picked up a half-eaten hamburger and sniffed it, groaning in reaction. Why he would sniff it, Abby had no idea.
"I don't think he's been here for a couple days at least," Dean said. No shit, Sherlock Abby thought.
Abby went over and looked at some of the pictures and newspaper clippings on the walls while Sam bent down and touched the salt. "Salt, Cat's-eye shells. He was worried, trying to keep something from coming in."
"Guys, these are the Centennial Highway victims," Abby said, having decoded the connection between the various papers her father had presumably put up on the wall. Sam and Dean came over and stood behind her, also looking through the various newspaper clippings.
"I don't get it. I mean, different men, different jobs, age, ethnicities. There's always a connection right? What do these guys have in common?" Dean thought out loud as Sam went to the other side of the room, something clearly having piqued his interest. Abby looked at a picture of that was stuck into the frame of the mirror.
"Huh. Dad figured it out." Sam said.
"What do you mean?" Dean asked.
"He found the same article we did. Constance Welch. She's a woman in white." Sam said.
"You sly dogs," said Dean, which Abby thought wasn't exactly the term she would use for the victims. "All right, so if we're dealing with a woman in white, Dad would have found the corpse and destroyed it." Dean continued.
"She might have another weakness." said Sam.
"No, Dad would want to make sure," Dean said. His faith in their father sometimes put Abby off, she thought highly of her father but knew that he wasn't always the smartest at hunting. He was just the least likely to admit when he was wrong. The article didn't say where she was buried, so Sam and Dean decided to go ask her husband. It was decided Abby could go with them, under the strict condition she stay in the car. That was alright with her, as she found the interrogating part of investigations boring. Dean went to go start the car when Sam stopped him.
"Hey Dean, what I said earlier about Mom and Dad, I'm sorry-" Abby had no idea what he was talking about, then she remembered the weird tension between Sam and Dean when Dean had come back covered in mud the night before, and figured Sam probably said something stupid then.
"No chick flick moments," Dean said, cutting Sam off. Abby rolled her eyes, she always thought that saying of her brothers was bullshit.
"All right, jerk," Sam said, chuckling slightly.
"Bitch," Dean said back.
"Idiots," Abby said, and Dean left the room. Abby was about to follow them when Sam stepped in front of her.
"Hey, while Dean starts up the car, I want to talk to you about..." Sam was cut off by his phone ringing. "What, Dean?"
Whatever Dean said, it made Sam straighten up. "What about you?" Sam asked. Whatever Dean said, Abby didn't get the chance to ask because Sam grabbed Abby's arm and started pushing her toward the back of the room.
"What's going on?" Abby asked, looking back at her brother.
"We've got to go. Like right now." Sam said. He opened the window and swung his legs through. "C'mon, I've got you," he said, gesturing for Abby to follow. She swung her legs over, and Sam picked her up by her armpits and set her on the ground. He then lightly pushed her ahead of him. They waited for the police officers to drive away, then drove off to the address of the Woman in White's husband.
"Just, please stay in the car," Sam said once they got there, turning around to look at Abby. She nodded, but was already sucked back into her book and really had no interest in talking to some old guy about his dead wife.
Once Sam left the car and Abby determined he was an adequate distance away, she reached under the seat she was sitting on and pulled out a wooden box. On the top was carved a dragonfly and a bunch of words in a language Abby couldn't read. She undid the clasp opened the box, and placed the picture she had taken from John's room in it. It showed a happy family, two parents, and two young boys, both in baseball uniforms. Abby closed the box and put it back where she got it, out of view from anyone who wasn't looking for it.
•┈୨♡୧┈•
"So what did he say," Abby said when Sam got back into the car.
"Uhh, not much," Sam said. Abby was pretty sure this was a lie, but she decided not to press it. She was just starting to warm up to Sam again, she didn't want to make him mad.
"Okay, I'm gonna go check out the highway but I'm dropping you off at the motel first," Sam said, now driving Baby back to where they had come from.
"What? I can help you investigate!" Abby protested, "Dean's not here so you need backup!"
"Nope. Not happening kiddo. Besides, I've got a plan for Dean," Sam said, grinning a bit. Abby did like his fake 911 call plan, so she decided to let him off the hook for what was, in her opinion, unnecessary over-protection. After Sam parked at the motel, he watched as she headed to the motel room, wanting to make sure she got in safely. After opening the door, Abby turned around and looked at Sam with a small smile and waved before heading in. Sam reciprocated the gesture and expression. Going back to Stanford seemed less and less like a good thing and more like something he had to do. But right now, he had work to do.
•┈୨♡୧┈•
Hours later, the sun had been down for a long time and Abby had packed up all of their stuff, walked around the hotel room about a million times, and finished her book. When Sam and Dean finally walked in the door she was lying on one of the beds in her pjs and Converse, staring at the ceiling. She shot up at the sound of them coming in, "What happened? Why were you gone so long? Is she gone?"
"Woah, woah slow down," Dean chuckled.
"The short version is she killed her kids so she didn't want to go home, Sammy took her home, and now she's gone." Abby decided not to ask for elaboration on how Sam "took her home." She assumed it had something to do with the holes in Sam's shirt and how he was rubbing his chest like it was sore.
"Also, Dad left Jericho and we've got coordinates from his journal," Dean continued.
"So where are we going?" she asked.
"We're gonna figure that out on the way," Dean said. Sam and Dean carried the Winchester's scarce belongings out to Baby, including some of the clothes and weapons their father had left behind in his motel room.
"Okay, here's where Dad went. It's called Blackwater Ridge, Colorado," Sam said. The siblings had been on the road for a while, and Sam was figuring out what the coordinates their father had left for Dean meant.
"Sounds charming. How far?" Dean said.
"About 600 miles," Sam said
"If we shag ass, we can make it by morning." Abby wasn't very sure what Dean meant by "shag ass" but she didn't ask. She did lean forward a bit, excited at the implied prospect of Sam getting to stay with them a bit longer. She hadn't completely forgiven him for leaving and never calling, but he was still her Sammy and she had really, really missed him.
"Dean, um" Sam stuttered, and Abby sank back, knowing what that meant.
"You're not going," Dean said shortly.
"The interview's in like 10 hours, I gotta be there," Sam said. Abby looked away, out the window. She didn't know why she felt so sad at Sam's departure. So what, he peeled an orange for her? He had still left her for 3 years with nothing. She should be happy to see him go. So why was she so sad?
The siblings drove in silence and darkness the rest of the drive to Stanford. Abby didn't fall asleep and instead focused on not crying. She wasn't a little girl, she shouldn't cry. That's what Dad always said. She was frustrated at herself for wanting to cry, because why should she over Sam? He didn't deserve it. At least, that's what Dad would say.
•┈୨♡୧┈•
Baby pulled up to Stanford at an hour Abby would usually be asleep by. Sam got out and grabbed his bag.
"You'll call me if you find him?" he asked Dean, leaning down to look through the window. Abby slowly moved over to the passenger side of the car. "Maybe I can meet up with you later, huh?"
"Yeah all right," Dean said shortly. Sam moved down the car to where Abby was. He opened the door right next to her and knelt down, so they were almost eye to eye.
"Sorry I have to leave again Abs," he said. Abby felt tears coming to her eyes again and she tried very hard to blink them away.
"It's okay," she said, trying to make herself feel better along with her big brother.
"No, it's not," Sam said. "I'll call okay? And you call me too. Anytime you want to." He said. This is what Sam wished he had said to her before he left the first time, but John hadn't let him say goodbye. This time, Sam wasn't going to let Abby go back to hating him as much as she had.
Abby nodded in response, now blinking very fast to stop the tears from coming down her cheeks. Why did she care so much? You're not a little girl, stop crying kept repeating in her mind in her Dad's voice, but it didn't do anything. Sam was about to stand up when Abby, with the impulsivity of a nine-year-old, got out of the car, stood on the street between the curb where Sam was and the car, and threw her arms around his neck. Sam held tightly onto his baby sister.
But, Sam had to go. He had a life to live and Abby wasn't a part of that, as much as he wanted her to be. So, Abby pulled back and Sam let her go. If he could have, he would have kept holding her until the sun came up, because if she was in his arms, he would know she was safe. Abby wiped her cheeks with her hand, now back in her seat in Baby, the tears she had fought so hard to keep back now escaping from her eyes.
"Bye Sammy," she said sadly.
"Bye baby," Sam said, kissing her on the forehead before getting up, picking up his bag which he had put down, and walking back towards Stanford. Sam turned back to watch as Dean put Baby into drive and drove off. Abby turned away, not wanting Sam to see her cry anymore. Sam watched the car until it was out of sight. He felt like there was a weight on his chest that was making it hard to breathe.
In Baby, Abby was wiping her cheeks of tears with the wrist of her pjs when she noticed Dean's visible discomfort.
"Dean? You okay?" She asked.
"Something's wrong," Dean said.
"What d'ya mean?"
"I dunno. C'mon," he said, turning the car around, and heading back towards Sam's dorm. "I'm just gonna make sure he got in okay," Dean said, before getting out and heading up to the dorm.
Moments later, right after Dean reached the doorway, Abby heard Sam yell "No!" from inside the dorm. She sat upright, her nose almost pressed against the car window as she watched Dean run in, yelling Sam's name. She almost got up to follow him, but she knew if anything happened to her because she blindly followed Dean somewhere, Dean would be pissed.
Seconds later, Abby watched Dean practically pull Sam out of the building, and she could see through the doorway the fire from within. She stayed inside the car, as she watched first responders arrive and Dean and Sam watched in horror as the building burnt.
Later, Dean got into the car as Sam was talking to some firefighters, probably giving an account of what had happened.
"Hey kiddo, I think Sam's gonna end up coming with us," Dean said softly. "The demon, the one that killed Mom," Dean started. Abby hated talking about Mom and the demon. It always made her feel weird. Not sad, like it made Dean, or angry like it made Dad, but something else. More like she was uncomfortable. Sam and Dean always talked about Mom like she was some angel, and Abby never knew how to respond. She had no memories of her, and so she usually just sat in silence.
"Well, it uh... it was here, just now, and killed Sam's girlfriend, Jess."
That explained pretty much everything about what had happened to Abby. "Oh," was all she could think to say. After a bit, Sam got into the car, and Dean drove off. Abby felt her eyelids getting heavy and got her pillow and blanket situated. She lay down and quickly fell asleep. Her dreams were full of burning mothers on ceilings that night.
A/N guys this chapter is almost 4k words, oops