Archive of Our Own ^beta

Day 20: ALT 8. Allergies

Sam doesn’t know why the teachers seem so annoyed with him all the time. His first ever report card, Kindergarten, is all E for exceptional in academic areas, but the behavior area has a G for good with a comment ‘needs to stop pretending to be sick,’ except that Sam doesn’t pretend to be sick. Other kids get stomach aches and get sent to the nurse too, not just him.

But dad is angry, says that he doesn’t care about the school, but no son of his was gonna be a ‘wuss’. Sam was young, but he knew that ‘wuss’ meant ‘girly’ meant ‘weak’ meant ‘bad’. Dean had hugged him that night, said “teachers suck,” and listened while Sam complained that it wasn’t his fault his stomach hurt.

“It’s okay if it hurts,” Dean tells him the next morning, “just don’t say anything, then they can’t tell dad about it, and he won’t get angry.”

So that’s how Sam handles it for the next few years, until fourth grade, when he starts to need to use the bathroom a lot. That’s not really something he can pretend away. When he needs to go, he needs to go. And his stomach hurts, and he gets worried he’s gonna throw up. Sometimes he does.

Sometime around this time, he stops liking food. He doesn’t know why, but a lot of the greasy diner food starts to just . . . smell really bad to him. He likes the french fries and sodas, and sometimes the sandwiches. BLTs are his favorite.

His teacher sends home a letter with Sam’s dad’s name (Mr. Winchester) on the front of the sealed envelope. He’s so scared, but he knows better than to open it. 13-year-old Dean, in 8th grade, takes the letter from him. Dad’s away on a trip.

Sam hates disappointing Dean, even more than he hates disappointing dad. But Dean reads the letter and makes a ‘huh’ sound. He doesn’t look disappointed, Sam thinks from his seat at the rickety table where he’s trying to do math work while Dean makes mac-and-cheese for the third time that week.

But then Dean also looks at the mac-and-cheese, then back to the letter, and then he gets out some bread and peanut butter. “Guess this’ll be your dinner for tonight,” he said.

“What?”

“Well,” Dean said slowly, “Mrs. King says it seems like you might not be able to eat dairy. She says that might be why you don’t like milk and have to go to the bathroom all the time.”

Sam thinks about it for a moment. He’d heard something about people being dairy intolerant in his science class last year. About how most animals didn’t drink milk after infancy, and humans used to be that way too. How some humans didn’t have the necessary bacteria in their stomachs to break it down.

“Sorry,” he says eventually, nodding towards the Macaroni and Cheese.

Dean just shrugs as he puts the bread in the small toaster oven. “More for me,” he says with a smile, but there’s worry tightening the corners of his eyes. The county food pantry is in the next town over, and there’s no way for them to get there, so the Winchester boys had been surviving off of gas station meals and the occasional dig through Walmart’s dumpsters. Expiration dates were just a number, according to dad.

It was hard to find enough food if you had to be picky. Sam feels shame well up inside him. He can’t even eat right. Maybe Sam could try to find a job, like Dean does, washing dishes at the cafe in town after school and on weekends. Except, this tiny town doesn’t have much in the way of other restaurants, so maybe Sam will find some other way to make money, pay for his own food.

The first place Sam tries is the greenhouse just a few blocks from school. The woman looks at him and asks if he has a work permit. He asks what that is.

“You’re definitely not over 14, and if you’re not 14, you need a work permit for someone to hire you. Your parents and the employer have to sign it.”

Except that Sam didn’t think John had ever signed anything for Dean, and his brother had gotten jobs when their father had already been gone for days. Sam’s just nine, and small for his age on top of that. There’s no way he could convince someone he was 14, not like Dean probably had.

One day after school, when a librarian had quietly told him that she was sorry, but she didn’t have the authority to hire him or give him any paid job, Sam sat himself on a hard stone bench outside the restaurant where Dean washed dishes.

Dean had said he would ask the owner if he could take home some food tonight, but they needed all the money Dean made for rent and this particular owner was tight-fisted, so it wasn’t likely.

Sam’s stomach was hurting, along with his lower back. Apparently, these could be caused by eating things he shouldn’t. That being said, he was hungry, and the lunch at school (they got free lunch) had been mashed potatoes and creamy gravy. The potatoes had probably had butter, and the gravy had definitely had milk. And then there was the creamed corn, which . . . didn’t the name say it all?

“Hey kid,” came a voice from above him, “What’s got you lookin’ so down?”

Squinting in the sun, Sam looked up at the man. He looked normal enough, jeans and a flannel and a beer-gut. He had thick, dark eyebrows, and his pale face was ruddy, like he’d been drinking.

“I wanted to get a job,” Sam said eventually, thinking about those stories where strangers helped eachother out of impossible situations. Maybe this man was an angel sent by God to help him? “Food’s expensive and my . . .” he pauses for a moment, doesn’t want to get CPS called, “guardian only makes enough money for rent. And I just found out I can’t eat stuff that has milk in it.”

There was quiet for a moment. “You hungry kid?”

“Yes sir.”

“You need some money, kid?”

“Mm hm.” Sam looks back down at his lap. The sun had been hurting his eyes, and now he had a headache.

“Let me show you how to make a little cash then, pipsqueak.”

Sam almost bites back at the name, because he’s small, but not that small, but this so far seems like the best thing that’s happened to him in a while, so he takes the man’s hand.

************************************************************

Later, the following few minutes are crystal-clear in his mind, the short walk across the road (sun warming the left side of his face), slipping into an alleyway between two Main-Street businesses (sudden damp coolness), back to a crumbling brick wall spray-painted with small-town graffiti, artless white sprays of cuss words that Dean would cuff him on the back of the head for saying.

Then, the man pulls out a small wad of cash from his pockets (Sam only knows the amount because he counted it later, after he woke up in the motel room the next morning, forty-two dollars in ones, fives, and a ten) and that’s where Sam’s memory gets a bit fragmented. He remembers cold air on his skin, no clothes (doesn’t remember why or how), remembers the texture of brick against his palms, leaning his weight against his hands for some reason. An odd spray of something thick and hot against his bare back. Tears dripping off his nose for some reason.

Then an oddly clear memory of asking if this was his new job, and the man saying, “It could be, so long as you don’t tell no-one about it.”

Then the vague feeling of being clothed again, the skin of his back feeling sticky, he’s shaking.

Memories get clearer what must be a few minutes later, because the man is still there, leaning on another wall with his pants caught at his knees (Sam didn’t look any higher than the knees, was the sun still too bright? He doesn’t remember that). Sam’s sitting on the ground, maybe he slid down while putting his shoes on? And Dean comes running around the corner.

That’s the other really vivid part of the memory. Dean’s face. He looks scared at first, then horrified, then sad (but sad doesn’t seem like a strong enough word) then angry. So angry. He’s got a gun in his hand.

The man who gave Sam the money raises his hands, backs away with words that Sam can’t remember after. Dean shoots him, and the loud echo of the gun makes Sam jolt. It’s that jolt that makes him aware of the scrapes on his knees and hands as they rub across denim and asphalt.

At that point, he thinks he throws up for some reason, because there’s vomit on his jeans.

****************************************************************

After that there’s no clarity, barely any memory at all, until Dean is chucking everything they have into the car dad had gotten for them ‘in case of emergencies’.

“We gotta go Sammy,” he says, “We’ll get out of this state, get to the other side of the fucking country. Oregon is probably nice this time of year, and I’ll call dad to tell him where we are and-” Dean is rambling.

“Dean?”

Dean’s head snaps up, relief coloring it, though there’s still an expression of heart-breaking sadness there too. “Hey Sammy, you with me?”

“Um,” Sam says, and nods. “I’m . . . are you okay?”

“Am I okay?” Dean asks in that tone of voice that means ‘are-you-kidding-Sammy?’

“You seem scattered.”

“Sam, you were the one who was . . . was . . .” Dean seems to be trying to think of a word. “Hurt.”

“Was I?” Even to himself, his voice sounds vague. “I guess my hands and knees hurt a bit. Did I fall when the man gave me money?”

Dean runs hands through his hair. “Oh God,” he chokes, “oh God, I don’t- oh God, Sammy,” and he grabs Sam into a hug and carries him to the car in a way he hasn’t for a few months because Sam is a big boy, almost in middle school. But he does today and puts Sam in the passenger seat up front, where he almost never gets to sit, even when it’s just Dean and him.

“New plan,” he says as he adjusts the driver’s seat to match the length of his legs, “We’ll go to South Dakota, see Uncle Bobby.”

And Sam is happy about that. Uncle Bobby is the greatest, and he’s pretty sure there’s no milk or cream in his chili.