WHO: John & Sam Winchester WHERE: Winchester & co house WHEN: Sunday, February 19, 2006; late a.m. WHAT: John thinks it's time his youngest faces what he's really running from. RATING: TBD STATUS: thread; in-progress
The usual traffic through the garage side entrance to the house was anyone going to and from the garage, John or Mary heading to their bedroom, or anyone headed downstairs. John was currently sitting on the short flight of steps that led up from the side entry way toward the rest of the house, a coffee mug in hand, another beside him wrapped in some kind of warming holder – he wasn't sure, it was Mary's territory, but it kept the coffee hot. Unlike his early morning coffees that were laced with something strong on what was now a daily basis, the only thing in this mug was coffee because John wanted a clear head.
He wasn't sitting there waiting for the usual traffic – no, he was there waiting for Sam. This was the fourth night Sam had been out and John had a short list of places his son had likely been and an even shorter list of reasons as to why Sam was. But things needed to change now, not just because he knew the distance was upsetting others that Sam was gone, but because John was worried about his kid. It was time to stop thinking he couldn't be the one to help set Sam on a better path and just try.
If Sam needed a lot of comfort from this talk, he was going to need to call Mary in, as John wasn't certain he could do it right with his own emotional state since Mary had been taken and then brought back. Once, he'd been able to do the Dad-making-up-for-no-Mom comfort, but that had been years ago, back before half a lifetime of hunting had changed that and a hundred years had changed him forever. What he was certain of was that he could say things to Sam straight, because it felt like what he should do. Of course, feeling like the thing to do left John wondering just how high the percentage of failure was going to be once he'd started.
He just hoped they could actually talk, not just butt heads, as John wasn't sure he had the full arsenal of Winchester fire right now to go toe to toe with Sam. This felt like the quiet between storms and John knew they'd managed to say what they needed to in times like this before.
When the door opened, John looked up from the mug in his hands.