WHO: Dean Winchester, Claire Bennet (future) WHERE: Claire's house WHEN: Saturday, April 1, 2006; before dinnertime WHAT: Dean has a gift for Claire's birthday that's part April Fools' gag and part genuine birthday present. RATING: PGish STATUS: log; COMPLETE!
"Oh come on!" Dean groaned, listening as something started rattling in the engine. The point of Claire's gag gift was to be just believable enough for Claire to not instantly know he was pulling an April Fools day prank, but to be cheap. Too much planning had gone into this prank for the car to die on the side of the road now and ruin everything.
Dean let out an audible sigh of relief when the car managed to make it into Claire's driveway. It was just in time, evidently, because just as the car came to a stop and he turned off the engine he noticed the hot smell and saw a few traces of smoke coming from under the hood. This junker was going back to the junkyard...but first it had a very important role to play in Claire Bennet's birthday.
With a smirk on his face, he honked the horn.
With Sarah in some sort of insane magic coma, even with the assurances that she was in 'there' and would be fine after she healed and could wake up, Claire hadn't given much thought to anything but that since Heidi had told her. Dean had taken her to the Hyperion and stayed with her there until he'd convinced her to come home earlier and get some sleep, which she'd been doing until recently, so when the car honking came, Claire was still in the tank and shorts she'd slept in, standing in her kitchen scrubbing the sleep out of her eyes.
It definitely didn't sound like the Impala's car horn, she'd know that sound anywhere. A glance at the clock told her it was nearly dinnertime, but she'd put all thoughts of celebrating her birthday aside - at least until now. Was something going on?
Moving through the house, she went to the front door and opened it, Pepper bouncing out and into the yard as Claire stared at the small green car in her driveway. With Dean.
She looked behind her, then back to Dean, then craned her neck as though trying to see beyond the yard and driveway.
"... Where's the Impala? And what are you driving that for?"
He'd never be caught dead in a car like that.
Dean knew this part was going to be the hardest part. Seeing her, and knowing how upset she had been just a few hours ago, Dean wanted to skip straight to the part where she got the car she clearly wanted so much...but he reminded himself that this was part of the plan.
Stepping back from the car a little so she could get a good look at it in all of its smoking, hatchbacked glory, Dean grinned. "Happy birthday, Supergirl."
For a few moments, the words didn't process as they were no doubt intended. Yes, it was her birthday, but what did that have to do with her question?
Oh. Oh.
For a few more moments after that realization, she was torn between being dumbstruck and finding it endearing. It was not exactly a great car - okay, it was a bad car, and it was so far from anything Dean would ever drive that she wondered if he was actually drunk... but maybe he'd meant it for her? Tried to pick something he thought she might like, a 'girl' kind of car, meaning to fix it up for her in his spare time.
God, why was she rationalizing this? Dean Winchester has purchased a really bad car. Still, he looked so damned pleased with himself, standing there, it made her feel a little guilty for not being genuinely anything but baffled. And, yes, questioning his head just a little.
"Dean, you bought me a car?" she said, forgetting shoes as she stepped off the porch and moved toward the gate in the fence, to get to the driveway. "You didn't have to do that."
The expression on Claire's face was priceless. He personally thought she should know that he'd never put her in a car like this (even waiting on him to drive her everywhere until she was 90 was preferable to this piece of shit car), and he could tell for a moment she did too, but the dumbfounded look was replaced with the fake smile, and Dean knew he had her.
"I know I didn't have to, but you deserved a car for your birthday." Not a lie, not at all, he just wasn't being specific about the type of car he got for her. "What do you think?"
And wasn't that the million dollar question of the moment. Still smiling that smile, Claire looked from Dean to the car, looked it over, then looked back at him.
Dammit, if she lied outright, he'd guess. He obviously knew it needed work - he had to, he just had to, she refused to think he was that far gone - so pointing that out would just sound impatient and ungrateful.
Quick, Bennet, think. By the time she came to a stop in front of him, she had her answer.
"It's totally unexpected, and that's really sweet of you to think of doing this," she said, then stretched and kissed him, hoping the combo of not-exactly-lies, public kissing (which they still weren't doing many places) and the kiss itself would keep him off the scent.
Despite himself, Dean looked very smug. While he knew she didn't LIKE this car (as no one could), the fact that she was pretending made him feel good. It meant he was important enough to her that she'd lie about the car that she obviously hated. Luckily, Dean had a better back up waiting.
"Take a good look at her." Because she's about to go off to that big old junkyard in the sky. "I got a hatchback because it looked girly, and green's sort of a girly color, right?" Only not as girly of a color as the purplish color that her new car was, and this hatchback was not nearly as smooth as her new one.
"We'll have to take her for a spin later."
This car can move? Claire thought ti, but she didn't say it, instead just stood there and looked at the car.
"Yeah, green can be girly - I meant, there are other colors that are probably considered girlier, we've got a whole paint catalogue at the garage with them in it," she said, moving forward to check out the front, and nearly knocking loose a wiper in the process.
Okay, that's what this was. A failure of intent to reach 'girly'. Dean mastering anything girly was a doomed process as it was, so Claire bit back the impulse to correct him and tell him she didn't really need a girly car. All this time around him had given her an appreciation for cars - and a special affection for the Impala, not just as a car, but more, what that car meant to Dean - so she would have been happy
After circling the car, she threw another big smile his way, and then opened the door to sit in the driver's seat, intending to poke around a bit and see if there were some surprises inside the car. Maybe he'd already done something cool with the inside?
Dean fought the urge to laugh when she climbed inside the car. It was bad in there. He had been too busy detailing her new car until it was in mint condition to bother doing anything with the old junker. There were a few fast food wrappers in the front floor boards stuck together with what he could only assume was melted cheese, there were a couple of empty beer cans rolling around in the back, and there was enough dust and crumbs on every surface to cover the entire state of California. Knowing that she was going to be pretty busy for a few moments just taking in the horror that was the interior of the car, Dean snuck away.
Quickly he went around the corner and jogged the block to where Sam had parked the car. With a proud look he started the car, admiring the way it ran quietly and smoothly manuevered onto the road. He rolled down the window right before he reached Claire's house, then slowly eased the Rogue up behind the junker. He could see Claire's profile through the back windshield. She was sitting in the drivers seat in much the same position he had left her in, so she was probably shocked as hell. He couldn't really blame her, but he still thought it was funny.
With one last look at Claire, Dean layed on the horn, honking it three long times in rapid succession. "Hey Bennet? Wanna move that old junker out of the driveway?"
Claire hadn't really noticed that Dean had left, but his lack of presence wouldn't have been a bother - she'd just have assumed he went into the house for food or drink while she looked at the car. Her car.
Oh, God, this car was awful and it was hers. Looking around at the interior, which was by far so much worse than the exterior, she began to suspect this was some kind of joke. All right, maybe not suspect, just hope, because even if he had lost his mind and decided this was girly and made for her, he had to know the inside was insane.
Hands to her face, she was still trying to sort out what this was - if this was serious or his idea of a prank or maybe an attempt to help keep her mind off what was happening with Sarah - when the blaring horn scared the life out of her. She yelped and flung herself sideways, nearly falling out of the car on her ass when the door latch failed. With cheerleader-bred reflexes, she managed to get out on her feet so she could face the back of the car.
What she saw stopped her dead. The vehicle in front of her... it could have been hers at first glance, the one she'd been given all those years ago.
She'd been confused before, but now she was absolutely stunned.
Dean smirked, honking the horn again just because he could and because she looked shocked enough to need a small reminder to breathe. He didn't want her to pass out, no matter how much time he had spent working on the car. Inside she'd find even more things to earn that stunned expression, from the spotless interior he had vacuumed and cleaned himself to the Superman floor mats that one of the guys had helped him dye in a light pink/darker pink color scheme. There was a pair of sunglasses Dean stole from her things a few days ago in one of the cup holders, and a big cardboard card signed by all of the guys in the shop sitting up in the back seat. Dean had worked his ass off on this, and enlisted the help of everyone in the garage--including Ralph-- in order to make this work, and he thought it was all worth it thanks to Claire's utterly amazed look.
"Well, Bennet, you gonna move that old clunker or am I going to have to take this thing back where I found it?"
Though she jumped a bit at the next honk, Claire was able to shake off the shock enough to move forward, reaching out tentatively to touch the Rogue's hood, as if afraid it was going to vanish. Rather than answer his question, she moved slowly around the vehicle, eventually coming back to her original spot with the conclusion that if this vehicle had had a Conquistadors bumper sticker on it, and a small ding in the side from an unknown stray shopping cart, it could have been her vehicle exactly.
"Is it- did you-" At a loss to actually get to words out, she pointed at the Rogue and then at herself, a still-shocked question on her face.
"I told you I got you a car for your birthday, but it looks like I got you two." Dean said, an almost too pleased grin on his face. "And I'm Batman, so I pulled a few strings. Besides..." he added with a smirk. "I needed a back up in case you didn't like the first car."
Dean got out of the Rogue, taking the keys with them, and pressed them into one of Claire's hands. "Why don't you go sit in the driver's seat and go see what that feels like? I'm going to make you pick just one of these cars, and it's only fair you see what this Versa feels like before you decide."
Dean knew full well that the car was a Rogue by now, both because he knew how important it was to her and because he had spent the last few weeks ordering parts for a ROGUE, finding out all of the complicated internal and external workings of the ROGUE, and cursing the crazy people who came up with the ROGUE a few days ago when he had a minor set back with some of the wiring. However, he wasn't about teasing her about the first time she talked to him about the car, when she knew the name of the car and he didn't.
Two cars. Picking one. A Rogue that could have been hers, right down to the exact paint color. And it was all Dean's doing.
"It's mine?" she said, looking at him, then the rogue, then him again. "It's mine. You bought me a car." Her gaze flickered to the the vehicle again. "You bought me a Rogue."
That one talk they'd had because of the wrecked Rogue that had come into the garage, just that one, and he'd done this. For her.
A second later, she was clinging to him, arms and legs both, uncaring if all her neighbors and anyone else saw them. From that position, she attacked his face and neck with quick, gleeful little kisses, at least until her gaze momentarily landed on the other eyesore she'd momentarily forgotten in the excitement. Being born on April 1st had lead to years of pranks played on her on her birthday, but her years in hiding hadn't held as many good pranks, because she inevitably wasn't all that close to anyone to the degree they'd know her well enough to really fool her.
But Dean Winchester knew her better than anyone and he'd known that she'd at least reason out his insanity in order to not potentially hurt his feelings when he'd played being excited and proud so convincingly. Or rather, he hadn't played it, he'd just been proud of himself and excited for another car entirely. Well played, indeed.
"April Fool's birthday prank. You're such an ass," she said emphatically, the tone belied by the grin as she nipped at the end of his nose.
Dean would be lying if he didn't admit he was looking forward to the moment when she got it, REALLY got it, and the kiss she gave him, the way she almost attacked him in her excitement, made it all worth it. Hearing her call him an ass was pretty good too, because he was getting pretty attached to his new nickname. And that nip to the tip of his nose.
"Prank?" he asked innocently. "What prank? I get you two cars so you can choose between them and I get all of your attitude. Maybe I should choose for you, you want the green one, right? I'll just go take this thing back..."
Dean was clearly all talk and no threat, because Claire was still tightly wound around him as he started walking toward the Rogue.
"No, no, the Rogue's mine," Claire said, clinging to him tighter, as though he was the Rogue itself. She was certain he was teasing, but she both didn't mind playing along and she wanted him to be sure that he knew how much she wanted the Rogue. And even now, it wasn't about the car, and it wasn't really about it being 'all hers' like the first had - this time, it was about Dean listening to some random part of her past and wanting to give it back to her.
The thought earned him a deep, thorough kiss without restraint before she lifted her head and looked back over his shoulder again.
"That car? IS AWFUL. I can't believe you actually touched it, let alone drove it," she said, gesturing emphatically with one hand. "And you made me think it was a real gift and I was trying so hard not to hurt your feelings. SO VERY HARD! And it was all a prank!"
"Don't talk about your car like that." Dean said teasingly, going backward a little bit to lean about the Rogue. "You said it was sweet, so you can keep the green one." His smug smile was just getting more and more smug by the moment, because it was pretty clear that she loved the car. It made all of the hours of work, all of the sneaking around and coordinating, worth it.
"Happy birthday, Claire," he said, voice serious for a moment. "Why don't you get in and try it out?"
His seriousness was enough to give Claire the brief pause required to truly let this all sink in, to grasp what he'd done for her. He'd talk all day long about avoiding chick flick acts or Oprah moments, but this was without a doubt the sweetest, most thoughtful thing anyone had done for her in a long, long time. she didn't know how he'd managed it - and even now, worried about how much he'd spent of his savings to do this for her, but that worry also made this more poignant.
Resting her head on his shoulder before pressing her face against his neck, she hugged him hard. "Thank you," she said softly. "Thank you so much.
Dean held her tight. He might not have worked up to actually saying "I love you," in the romantic sense yet, but he was pretty sure he was feeling it. He was a firm believer that actions spoke louder than words anyway. His father had not been very likely to say a lot of mushy things either, but he had taken Dean's place in the crucial moment. Winchesters, Dean was sure, showed how they felt a hell of a long time before they said it.
"Welcome." he said softly. "You earned it. You really, really earned it."
Shaking her head, clearly bemused, Claire let go of her leglock around his waist to slip to the ground in front of him. She definitely didn't know what he thought she'd done to 'earn' it.
"I don't know about that," she said, moving to open the Rogue's driver's side door. What she saw inside made her squeal like the girliest of girly girls.
"Oh God, look at the floormats! I LOVE THEM." With an excited bounce, she hopped in, looking everywhere inside as she wriggled in the seat, finding it was extra comfortable. She ran a hand over the seat gently, almost thoughtfully, as she inspected the rest, noting with a huge grin the giant card and, with a softer smile, her own sunglasses.
The garage sticker above the inspection sticker wasn't strange, as she'd have guessed he had the car tuned up at the garage to be thorough, but the information on the inspection sticker did give her pause, as it was an inspection from months earlier. After noting the mileage, barely a few miles different from the paperwork she'd done - and maybe it was weird to have memorized the details of that car, but she'd spent too much time staring at the paperwork that day, remembering the past - she looked up at Dean.
"Is this- Did you rebuild it for me?" she asked softly, eyes wide.
She had noticed the mileage. Dean was going to wait to tell her until later, but the fact that she noticed, that she remembered the mileage on the wrecked car in the shop, meant that he had made the right choice. He nodded, getting a proud look on his face. "All of the guys pitched in, especially with hiding it from you, but I did most of the work." He ran a hand over the hood, looking over the car with a smug look.
"The seats inside were cheap, damn foreign cars, so I put in some new ones with better padding and upholstery..."
Dean continued on, telling her about other modifications he had made that made the car even better than the original Rogue had been, from the slight upgrades he had made to the things he had rebuilt entirely. He didn't know if she would understand all of the technical things he had done, as she was still new to the car business, but he thought she deserved to know just what kind of car she was driving. Dean knew the Impala like the back of his hand, after all, and he assumed that everyone else wanted to know their car as well.
"But I don't remember any paperwork or calls about it being to-" Claire paused, finally grasping the enormity of what he'd done, from keeping the whole process from her to rebuilding a vehicle that by rights would normally have ended up for parts. the rest of what he said she definitely heard, but it wasn't the most ever present thing in her mind at the moment - what he'd done was.
She knew he was capable of it, of course, as he'd rebuilt the Impala after it was practically destroyed, but that he'd put that much work into a vehicle he wouldn't normally give a tenth of that much attention to, and done it for her, made her feel a way she couldn't accurately name, other than to know it was an amazing feeling.
On a day when she'd thought there would be no reason to celebrate, let alone feel as happy as she did right now, he'd given her more than a car, he'd given her a piece of day that could be her birthday apart from all the worry.
Pushing the door back open, Claire scrambled out of the Rogue and went to him to throw her arms around him again, this time her face pressed to his chest and her feet still on the ground.
"I have the best boyfriend ever," she whispered, soft enough that the words may or may not have carried to his ears. It wasn't a 'term' they'd agreed to use or not to use, but it fell naturally from her lips and she didn't correct herself after.
Dean held her tightly, glad that this crazy idea of his had worked out. While some might have worried about the safety of a car that had been 'totaled,' she trusted his skills. The fact that his hardwork had given her the car instead of a huge dip in his savings seemed to make the present more special to her as well instead of less, and he was thankful for that. Somehow they always just got one another...and it wasn't really a new development that came from sleeping together. From his first days in the city, from their first interactions, the similarities in their lives brought them together, but, more than that, they allowed Dean and Claire to be more honest with one another than they were with nearly anyone.
That was why he didn't blink when she called him her boyfriend. He'd always shied away from the term before, because most of the women he 'dated' were one night stands, but Claire had stopped being a string of one night stands a long, long time ago. It sounded natural even though it was the first time she had called him that--was it, he wondered, the first time she had thought it?
"You really do." He said smugly, tightening his arms around her. "I have a pretty good girlfriend, too...except she watches too many chick flicks and is the owner of a Nissan Versa and a perfect green Honda Civic." The corners of his lips turned up as he pressed a kiss to Claire's forehead. "Happy birthday, Supergirl."