Chapter Text
December 25th, 2003
“This is your car? Seriously?”
If Dean didn’t know any better, he’d think this dude was buttering him up for something. Ricky had paused somewhere behind him, and it took everything Dean had not to look over his shoulder to gauge his reaction. “Didn’t take you for a car guy,” he said, trying and failing not to sound smug about it.
“You weren’t kiddin’ about the classics, huh?” Ricky muttered, whistling low as he opened the passenger door.
The icy cold of the door handle bit at Dean’s fingers. The diner wasn’t far, but neither of them were keen on freezing their balls off, so driving it was. Dean felt a twinge of guilt for leaving Baby out in the open like this. The hood sparkled with frost, but he’d had the foresight to cover the windshield the night before. He made a mental note to look her over before he headed off to…
Shit. He had no idea where he was headed next.
That was tomorrow’s problem.
“We supposed to be in here?” Dean asked sceptically as Ricky let them into Billie’s diner less than five minutes later. The dude only shrugged, blowing hot air into his cupped palms.
“Bee’s whole family are outta town for the holidays. If they didn’t want me in here, they shouldn’t’a gave me a key.”
Dean snorted. Fair. He rubbed his hands together, trying to get some feeling back into his icy skin. Ricky disappeared into the kitchen, muttering something about getting the oven going. The diner looked much the same as it always had; that “We serve donuts, not pigs” sign still standing proud behind the counter. The glass case of pastries and pies was empty; the smell of coffee only faintly lingering behind the strong lemony cleaning product smell. The only change from before was in the corner by the stereo, where there stood a tall slim Christmas tree beneath two giant wreaths.
“What’s with the dick tree?” Dean called, not really expecting an answer.
Ricky poked his head out from the kitchen looking too pleased with himself. “Finally somebody appreciates my genius. No one else noticed it.” The bitterness of that was evident in his voice as he disappeared back to whatever he was cooking up.
Dean didn’t know what it said about him that he had noticed but he wasn’t going to think too hard on it either.
An hour later, they sat at a table pulled up next to the dick tree. Dean had set up the TV and battled with the VCR remote while Ricky cooked up their burgers and pie. Dean had offered to help, but the guy was in the zone, Bethany-free stereo blasting Zeppelin loud enough to rattle the glass in the counter. Lucky for them there wasn’t a damn soul around this place to call the cops.
“Please don’t kill me Mr. Ghostface,” they both mimicked the woman on screen in equally terrible girl voices, “I wanna be in the sequel.” They glanced sideways at each other, grinning like the idiots they were.
“How many times you watched this crap anyhow?” Dean said, taking a swig of his beer. After that Ghostface stunt Ricky’d pulled this morning, they’d argued between Scream, The Ring, and The Exorcist (Dean would’ve picked a western or one of those dumb college sex quest movies Hollywood was churning out these days if he’d had the chance) but he drew the line at The Exorcist. He’d had enough of ghosts for one week. Besides, priests, nuns, ghosts – the last thing he needed on his mind was that first solo hunt on his seventeenth birthday. And since neither of them had been keen on that creepy chick from The Ring, then Scream it was. Besides, Drew Barrymore was hot. And the dude behind the mask…
“Not enough,” Ricky replied. His eyes never left the screen, but Dean noticed his leg bouncing beneath the table.
Dean picked at his cherry brandy pie, watching Ricky out of the corner of his eye. There was something off about him. Quieter. Or maybe it was the first time Dean had seen him without constantly moving around or talking out of his ass. Besides that night on the balcony, Ricky was always doing something with his hands, always looking for something to keep him going. Keep him distracted, Dean supposed. Dean’s eyes dropped to the beaded bracelet on his wrist.
Maybe he was projecting. Whatever.
“I know I’m pretty, Kansas, but if you’re gonna stare you might as well kiss me about it.”
Dean’s face flushed so deeply red the pie almost paled in comparison. “Shut up, man.” He crossed his ankles under the table, using the movement as an excuse to shuffle a little further away from Ricky. He cast another sheepish look at the guy; at the small white scar on his forehead from the nasty cut he’d got falling off his skateboard the last time Dean had been around these parts. The dude’s eyes were still glued to the screen but he was smiling like a bastard who’d just won a game only he knew he was playing.
Dean took another swig of his beer. “Told you not to pick your stitches.”
“Who says I did?”
“Told ya you’d need a dog cone.”
“And I told you to lick my balls.”
“Fuck you,” Dean laughed, feeling his shoulders relax a little again.
“Fuck me yourself, Michael,” Ricky said through a mouthful of food.
“Gross.” Dean’s beer was half-way to his lips when he paused. “Why do you keep sayin’ my name like that?”
“Like what?” Ricky said, around twenty shades too innocently.
“Shut up. You know what.” Dean felt his ears pinken. He knew where this was headed.
Ricky finally dragged his gaze from the TV to look Dean up and down, assessing him. “Hm, you sure you’re ready for that conversation, Kansas?”
Shit.
Dean cleared his throat. “Dunno what you’re talkin’ about.”
“Sure.” Ricky said, turning back to the TV. They watched in silence as the Scream killer crept up behind the kid yelling at his TV about the very trope he was about to fall victim to. The silence only stretched on and on and blood poured over the windscreen of the reporter’s car. It became a heavy thing, the tension of unsaid words between them stronger than the thrill of the movie.
A buzzing in Dean’s pocket caused them both to jump. Dean pulled out his cell and frowned at the number he didn’t recognise.
Maybe it’s Sammy, some small childish part of him thought. Maybe it’s dad, another, colder, part of him thought. Dean let it ring as he shuffled into the kitchen. Debated whether to answer it at all. If it was Sam, it would be awkward, right? But if it was dad…
If it was his dad, it wasn’t worth the fight to ignore it.
“How’s it goin’, son?”
At the sound of Bobby’s voice at the other end of the phone, Dean’s heartbeat finally slowed to a less dangerous pace. He could have sworn the room got a few degrees warmer. What was it about this place that kept throwing him into a pit of nostalgia? It took him right back to that last time; the day he couldn’t bring himself to get out of his motel bed. Too lonely, too fucking useless to get up and make something of himself for the day like his dad expected him to do. Right up until Bobby had called and saved his ass.
Bobby had a knack for putting shit in perspective. The old man never sugar-coated shit, but he had a way of making Dean’s problems feel a whole lot smaller and his options a hell of a lot bigger. He wondered, not for the first time, if Bobby knew that. How much he’d helped. How much he was helping right now, as he bitched about snow and Rufus and burnt pie and warm beer.
He never once asked Dean what his next move was. Just wanted to know he was doing okay and if he was eating better than Bobby apparently was.
Ten minutes later, Dean slid back into the booth with a different kind of heaviness on his chest. He missed Bobby. Probably should’ve offered to drop down over the holidays, show the old man how to bake a real pie. But it just wasn’t the same without Sam.
He checked his texts. Pulled up his brother’s number, then put his phone back in his pocket again. He felt its weight in his jacket like it was weighing him down, burning a hole through his ribs. He should text Sam. He should.
He doesn’t wanna hear from me.
“You wanna talk about it?” Ricky’s voice startled Dean when he reached for his phone once again.
“Shut the fuck up and eat your pie, asshole,” Dean said, without a trace of venom in his voice. He sounded tired.
Ricky pulled a mocking face and took a sip of his beer. “Take it you haven’t told your family to fuck off yet?” His eyes were fixed carefully on the TV now, his leg bouncing erratically beneath the table.
Dean picked at the label on his beer. He only snorted in response because what could he say to that, really? But then he looked at Ricky again. Really looked. There was something about the way he pushed his pie around his plate – the way his hands shook a little. The light too dull in his dark eyes.
Then Dean realised. No one had called him all day.
Here Dean was feeling sorry for himself like the asshole he was, and this guy had no one. Really no one.
“You uh… you heard from your folks lately?”
Ricky let out a strangled kind of laugh, but finally his leg stilled. “Not over my dead body. But I’m sure they wouldn’t mind that,” he added quietly.
Fuck. Dean didn’t know what to say to that, either. He’d never been good with words. He could bullshit you all day long – he was a professional bullshitter – but what the fuck do you say to that?
“I’m kiddin’, you dick,” Ricky elbowed him. “Sorta.”
Dean blew out a breath, slumping down lower in his chair. “Nah, man, I get it.”
Ricky looked him over once again. “Mm, I guess you do, huh?”
They stared at each other for a moment, silent understanding passing between them in a way that narrowed down the whole world around them. Suddenly it was just like that night at the motel. The air charged between them, the glow of the TV lighting up Ricky’s cheekbones just like the moon that night on the balcony. Ricky’s big brown eyes staring at Dean like he saw him – really saw him, even though it was impossible. Even though he could never know who Dean Winchester was, what he was capable of. Didn’t even know his real name. But just like that night, Ricky looked at him like he understood that they were alone in this world, but right now they were alone together.
The same look that Dean recognised in Lee, but more intense and less… urgent.
Dean felt a lump form in his throat. Words felt distant in his mind, his tongue too heavy. But he held out his beer and waited patiently for Ricky to clink his own bottle against it.
Ricky’s smile didn’t fully meet his eyes when he said, “Happy Halloween, Dean.”
Dean froze. Ricky’s smile widened.
“How did- that’s-“
“You talk a lot when you’re drunk,” Ricky’s smile turned into a full blown smirk as Dean dropped his head into his hands.
“What the fuck. Why didn’t you…”
Ricky shrugged one shoulder and took a long drag from his beer. “Dunno. I mean, guess you didn’t mean to tell me or you woulda corrected me by now, right? Michael?”
“Shut up,” Dean breathed.
“Nah, it’s cool – don’t roll your eyes at me, dick, I get it! Shit, if I thought about changin’ my name before I came here, I woulda. Probably,” he added after a moment’s consideration, toying with the silver hoop in his ear.
Dean looked at him long and bemused. “Right,” he said slowly. The pie in his stomach was quickly turning to lead. What the fuck else had he told him? Had he said anything about the life? About monsters and his dad and all that crap?
Images of that phone call flashed through his mind, welcome as a thorn in his ass. He knew he’d been crying. Once the tears started they just wouldn’t seem to stop, no matter how loud he cranked the music or how much he drank. Eventually, unable to walk anymore, he lay on his back and dialled the number of the one person he had left. Sam hated him, he'd crossed a line with John he’d never recover from, and Lee…
Lee was gone.
So, he’d called Ricky. He remembered the taste of hot tears spilling into his mouth as he finally got the words out. It’s over. He remembered the soft shushing noises coming through the phone as the sobs wracked his body. He remembered the sleeves of his flannel soaked with snot and tears and spilled whisky, and he remembered that hole in his chest, so empty it hurt. Like no air, no drink, no food, no words would ever fill it again.
He remembered Ricky rambling, saying whatever shit seemed to come to mind as Dean silently cried on the other end, sniffling, painful hiccups jerking his body, as he pretended to listen to his friend and not that voice in his head that rang clear as a bell in a voice he wasn’t sure was his own or his father’s: You are useless. You’re alone. You’ll always be alone. You’ll never be good enough.
He remembered staring at the empty whisky bottle on the floor, eyes unfocused, and mind stuck in a terrified loop of I’m just like dad and I’ll never be enough like him. He remembered a voice, almost angry now, but not angry like John. Different angry.
“You’re a good guy, Mike.”
“‘m not.”
“Yeah, man, you are.”
“Not even my – hiccup – name. ‘s Dean.”
A pause on the other end of the line. Then:
“You’re a good person, Dean. You’re gonna be alright. I’m here for ya, okay, asshole?”
“Kay.”
Ricky interrupted the flashback with a hand on Dean’s elbow.
“Relax, Kansas, unless your deepest darkest secret is that you fucked your cowboy boyfriend on a mechanical bull, I think you’re good.”
Dean’s face went molten. “Told you about that, too, huh?”
Ricky shrugged again, then tilted his head to the ceiling like he was trying to work out exactly how that had gone down. Dean pointed a finger in his face, warning him to shut up.
“I didn’t say anything!”
“Shut up,” Dean repeated.
“But seriously…”
“I will kill you.”
“You do own a gun,” Ricky deliberated, casting a disapproving look at Dean’s jacket. He frowned at Dean then. “Why do you own a gun anyhow? You hunt or some shit.”
Or some shit. Dean looked at the TV as he said, “Uh. Yeah, a bit.”
“Gross.”
“Can be.”
“Ever come across anything weird?” Ricky turned fully to face him.
Dean frowned. There was no way this guy knew anything about the supernatural outside movies and crap. Another thing Dean envied him for. “Like what?”
Ricky waved his hands as he talked, back in full spirits. “You know, werewolves, aliens, vampires, centaurs, big foot.”
“Big foot?” Dean repeated, deadpan.
“The truth is out there, my guy,” Ricky reached for another two beers in the cooler beneath the table and handed one to Dean. “Can’t stay buried forever.”
“Trust me,” Dean said, taking the proffered beer and using the corner of the table to flick the cap off, “it’s people you gotta look out for.”
On the screen before them, the Scream killer picked that exact moment to fall down the stairs. Ricky turned to Dean with a raised brow, and they burst into laughter.
After a moment, Ricky said, “Teach me how to do that.”
“Do what?”
“That thing with the beer,” he pushed on.
Dean groaned, pretending to be annoyed but secretly giddy for the chance to show off a little. He motioned for the guy to hand him another beer. “It’s all in the wrist,” he said, scooting over to the edge of his seat so Ricky could shift closer.
It took eighteen attempts – ten more than it had taken Sam when Dean had taught him as a kid – before Ricky managed to flick the cap off. After that, the dude opened the rest of their beers for them all evening, looking far too proud of himself every time.
It was past three in the morning when they braved the cold and walked back to the motel. Ricky swore to Dean that his car would still be outside the diner when he returned, no doubt at the ass crack of dawn. Promised Dean could impale him on a pair of antlers if it wasn’t. They’d just finished watching The Lost Boys and yet another round of pie and beers and right then Dean thought that was the funniest thing he’d ever heard.
They stumbled into Ricky’s room, and Dean’s boots were still on when he crashed face first into bed. Ricky crawled under the covers a minute later, much less dressed than Dean.
“You smell like pie.”
“You smell like beer.”
“You gonna kiss me about it or not?”
“You wish, Kansas.”
“Mm.” Dean said, his eyes shut and breathing slowing down. The bed was warm, his belly fuller than it’d been in weeks, for the first time in so long Dean felt safe. As he drifted off to sleep, Ricky’s words were so soft, Dean couldn’t be sure he hadn’t dreamt it.
“Thanks for today, Dean. I needed it.”
December 26, 2003
Dean left Ricky’s CD on his pillow. Left Lee’s tape there, too. There was some good stuff on there. He scrawled one of his burner numbers on the dude’s arm as he slept like the dead, adding a note to call anytime.
He had no idea when he’d see his friend again. No guarantee he ever would, really. In truth, he didn’t know where he was headed next, but as he slipped out the door of Ricky’s motel room, he folded one of the dude’s drawings of a Zeppelin logo into his wallet. Figured if he ever got a tattoo, he wanted it to be this.
The Impala was still in one piece where he’d left her, and Dean couldn’t resist doubling back to the motel for one last look. Call him a sap, but nostalgia really was kicking his ass in this place. He pulled into the parking lot, letting the engine idle as the heat slowly came on and defrosted his icy hands.
A curtain opened in the window above and a messy head of greeny-browny-black curls appeared. Dean held up his middle finger and, as if he’d blown a kiss, Ricky pretended to catch it and press it to his heart. Dean grinned, shaking his head as he revved the engine and sped out of the parking lot.
He remembered Bobby’s bitching about the burnt apple pie. Maybe this time he’d make it to Sioux Falls without a pitstop for heartbreak on the way. Dean felt the loneliness chase after him with every step toward his car. Felt its icy breath on the back of his neck like a ghost chained to his heels. But for once, he didn’t feel so alone in that loneliness.