[#159] What's Left? (Supernatural)

[o0o0wormy0o0o]

Theme Prompt: #159 - Memory
Title: What’s Left?
Fandom: Supernatural
Rating/Warnings: Probably T, CW for autistic overload, dissociation, self dislike, swearing, and disagreements between sam and dean
Bonus: No
Word Count: 997
Summary: Dean has always been a guy who focuses on sensations, and sometimes when he gets overwhelmed it’s hard not to sink back into his memories - coping mechanism? I hardly know her! AKA Dean is autistic (even if he doesn’t know it) and gets lost in some memories




Dean couldn’t drag his eyes away from the asphalt, the blacktop almost glowing in the light of the motel sign.

“Dean! Are you even listening?!”

It’s funny how life works out - how time seems to fold in on itself, a jumble of shapes and sounds and feelings so big nothing else seems to matter. Jesus his dad would think he was a wreck, a disappointment. Sitting here, ass on the grimy concrete steps of some stupid motel instead of researching, or interviewing witnesses, or doing anything to hunt down the son-of-a-bitch he and Sam had come here for. His eyes, however, were trapped in the reflection of the motel sign on the damp street.

“Jesus Dean I swear it’s like you never even listen to me when I try to talk some god damned sense into you!”

One moment he’s at a motel, lost in the air and the sounds and the cold and the sensations of everything around him, god there was so much around him. The smells, the lights, and then, without moving an inch, he was 4. His dad was in the kitchen, doing something loud and big with the groceries and his mom was upstairs with his brother and god Sam was so loud and everything is folding in on itself and his head feels so long and the room is tilting and-

“-just sit there?! Dammit Dean-”

Now he was young, way too young, and sitting outside a grocery store with nowhere near enough money in his pocket and a baby brother who needed to eat and he had no clue when he would see his dad again but he didn’t have another choice and the hum of the neon lights was curling through his mind and god it felt like that sound, that fucking hum was sinking into his bones and everything was warm and-

“Dean!”

He was back, outside the motel. Time smoothed out again and the itching that had settled at the base of his spine seemed to fade into small pinpricks of sensation. The knot that had formed at the bottom of his skull relaxed and his shoulders shifted down. And he was here. In the now. Outside the motel.

“Yeah I heard you.” Dean shook out his arms and stood, trying to bring himself all the way back to the present. He looked towards where Sammy was leaning against the impala, arms crossed and glaring. “I get it, I messed up, so sue me.”

Sam just rolled his eyes and huffed, shaking his head and staring off into the window of the motel office. “You can just say you were lost in thought there, Dean. D’you think I’m stupid?”

Dean just shrugged and looked back at the street, “Nah, sorry, I was just thinkin’ about something. What do you say we head inside and take another look at that Matt guy, huh? He seemed weird.”

“Yeah yeah, sure, go ahead and shower, I’m gonna grab a drink.” Sam tossed Dean the room keys and pushed himself off the car, wandering off in the direction of the machines they had scoped out earlier. Dean just stared at the keys for a second, feeling himself drift off slightly again, before making his way to their room.

He was fine. He was fine. He threw his jacket onto the bed and made his way to the shower, stripping as he went. Nothing a cold shower couldn’t fix.

Sometimes, it was easy to get lost in his head, but that was just part of the gig, right? A guy can only handle so much fucked up shit before his mind wandered off every so often, snagged on the barbs of memories and monsters he hadn’t really processed. What hunter wasn’t a little fucked in the head, eh?

But even in the shower, with the freezing water pounding into his face, it was hard not to get lost again. To wander off, stuck on the the past like a rat in a glue trap. Dean had always been the type of guy to get caught up in the moment’s sensations, it's what made him such a good hunter. But even now, sometimes, the memories were hard to shake.

For just a moment, Dean allowed his eyes to fall shut and let himself wander back again. Back in time, to any time he could think of really, to try and get his shit in order. God, Dean didn’t know what the fuck was wrong with him. Getting lost like that was not fucking cool, if that shit happened on a hunt? He could get himself and whoever else he was with killed.

But no, Dean let his memories crowd all of those thoughts out. He let himself ignore the part of his mind that was smart, the part that sounded just like his dad, and fell back into a lazy morning with Lisa. He could feel the way the sheets, fresh and crisp, melded with that bullshit name-brand comforter she had absolutely insisted on (and he would never admit to loving) and he breathed in the scent of her home, their home. Their life. He was warm and secure and loved. He was encompassed by angel wings and lost in a pair of steely blue eyes, with the tang of ozone on his tongue and a ringing in his ears. He had creaking leather underneath him and the sound of an engine rumbling in the back of his mind. He could hear a humming - a lullaby - just barely there, a tune as familiar to him as his own breathing.

And then Sam was pounding on the bathroom door, telling him to get his ass out of the shower.

And he was in a motel bathroom, covered in gooseflesh with his teeth chattering and trying to drown out that god damned voice. And he was alone.

God, he was alone.

All he had left were his memories.

And that would have to be enough.