TITLE: In Truth Lies
E-MAIL: eli @ popullus.net
ARCHIVE: Ask, please.
RATING: PG
POSTED: Sept. 5, 2006
SUMMARY: Even -- or especially -- at school, always expect the unexpected.
AUTHOR NOTES: For the spn_flashback challenge, prompt 145: One of the boys is stuck writing 'What I did on my summer vacation' as an essay.
DISCLAIMER: Read
The place didn't make much difference; when they were actually around for the day that was everybody's first day of school, there were four things Dean expected:
One, having no new anything in his bag except a notebook, because whatever else he used last year still worked, didn't it? Dad was right about that, but up at number two was how there were always new names, new cliques, same old story. Again. Coming in at number three was the instant pile of homework, like the teachers had been storing all this stuff up inside and were just gonna burst if they held it in any longer. Topping it all off, though, was number four: a little bouncy-ball excited freak of a brother.
Swear to God, Sam started up as soon as the weekend before the first day kicked in, which so wasn't right, but at the same time, it really was. It was Sam.
Him moving up to middle school only made it worse. Sam had been pouting for months about that camp that he couldn't have gone to, anyway, and he'd dragged his feet through every practice, even after he'd started reliably hitting the targets. Ten years old, and he was more like a teenager than Dean, Dad had grumbled one night after Sam had slammed the bathroom door. But Sam had lit up brighter than a flare last week when they had driven past the sign that had been changed to read, WELCOME, STUDENTS. Dean had quickly squashed the rush of relief at seeing that happiness on Sam's face by tugging on Sam's hair and asking if he'd like some ribbons to go with that giggle.
So what had happened since a quarter to eight that morning, when Dean deliberately hadn't looked at Sam while he'd kept on walking to get to the high school?
Sam was at the little table in the kitchen, as still as if he'd been turned to stone. Dean closed the door behind him, because they might be just into September but it was already getting chilly, and Sam didn't look up at that noise, either. He stayed slumped over, chewing on his lip and scowling at the sheet of paper lying between his elbows like it was telling him, You can do better. You HAVE to do better. It was that exact frustrated, hurt scowl, and after the last few months, Dean had had enough of that to last him for a while.
He swung his bag into their room and heard it thump against a bed as he said, "Jeez, Sammy, it was the first day."
"Shuddup."
"Whatever. I'm just saying, nothing's ever that bad on the first day."
Sam scooted down further in his chair. "Whad'you know?"
Dean cuffed him lightly on the back of the head, and when Sam shot up straight, glaring, Dean gave him a smirk and said, "At least four more years worth of stuff than you do, little brother."
Huffing, Sam grumbled something, Dean didn't catch what, but before he could poke him about being too chickenshit to say it out loud, Sam was giving him a sideways, speculative look that raised every suspicious instinct Dean had.
"What?"
Sam opened his mouth, shut it, then quickly asked, "So what'd you write? About your summer vacation?"
Dean snorted. "Write?"
"You know," Sam said, waving a hand at something obvious only to him. "What did you say about what you did while normal kids went to camp?"
Just like that, Dean's own frustration flared, and he gave Sam's chair leg a hard kick.
"Quit it!" Sam protested, and swung out an arm, but Dean easily stepped out of range.
"You quit it, Sammy. God." Dean spun away, because it felt like the more grown-up thing to do than sticking out his tongue. He went for the refrigerator, yanking the door open, staring inside, seeing nothing. Why did Sam keep doing this? Training wasn't always fun. Hunting usually was. Both could seriously suck, some...well, lots of times. But Sam made it all seem like a punishment. Made it something that Dad had to force him to do, and--
"C'mon, Dean."
Reluctantly, Dean turned back around to look at Sam sitting there at the table with his eyes wide and annoyed and...really hurt, like Dean had kicked him. Dean fought back a groan.
"Look, if you didn't spend all those hours practicing, you'd still be hitting your feet instead of the target," he said, trying not to sound like Dad, but Dad was right about this. "You need to know this."
"Right." Sam's mouth set in that stubborn line that Dean was growing to really, really hate. "But I don't want to write about it."
Confused, now, Dean frowned. "So don't."
"I have to! That's what my Social Studies homework is for tomorrow: what I did on my summer vacation, which wasn't a vacation, it was a--"
"Oh, give me a break, Sammy," Dean groaned. "Just lie."
That got a full-on pout, which made Sam look like he was five again. "I don't wanna."
"Yeah, I got that," Dean sighed, closing his eyes so he wouldn't have to see that please, Dean in Sam's. Then an answer came to him; not The Answer, but it was good enough for here and now. He looked up again and said, "Fine. So tell them about the camping trip."
"The camping--" Sam stopped, his mouth gaping. "You mean the hunt Dad took us on for that werewolf in Wyoming?"
"Yeah." Dean nodded. "Just leave out the part about the part-human thing with the really big teeth. Or," he said, when Sam screwed up his face, "y'know, turn it into a bear or something. We went camping. We had a fire. That's all they need to know."
"'We had a fire,'" Sam muttered.
Dean shrugged. "We did."
Sam went back to scowling down at the sheet of paper, but at least it was a grumpy scowl, Dean figured. He went over to the refrigerator again, and this time reached in immediately for the last of the juice that wouldn't survive with Sam sitting out there.
"They're not gonna buy that that was all we did all summer," Sam said behind him.
Dean didn't mention that one afternoon they'd spent at a beach where the water had been colder than snow, or the Hitchcock County fair where he'd won the dinosaur that Sam had kept calling an overgrown lizard. He also didn't bother with a glass, and he took a big swallow from the bottle before turning back with his eyebrows raised. "Hey, I'm not doing your homework for you, Sammy."
"I wasn't--" Sam's mouth snapped shut. He turned his back on Dean, and started tapping his pen on the paper.
"Because I've already done middle school."
The tapping picked up speed. Dean shook his head, then started around the table to get to their bedroom.
"And," he said after he'd passed by Sam, "just because I never had to do some stupid summer vacation ess--"
Something hit his shoulder and he spun, hearing it clatter on the floor at his feet. After a glance down, he looked up at Sam, who was trying to glare and to not look like he was about to make a run for the door.
Dean kicked the pen back across the floor. It skittered to a stop under Sam's chair. "I hope you weren't aiming for my heart, Sammy, because that? Would be just pathetic."
Sam stuck out his tongue.
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