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Title: Untitled #8
Rating: PG
Category: Light het oneshot
Word Count: 896
Characters: Dean/Carmen
Spoilers: S2: “What is and What Should Never Be”
Summary: He remembers the guitar from his life before this.
Warnings: None
Author’s Notes: Originally written May 31, 2007. Remember that black guitar in Dean's "What is and What Should Never Be" wish universe apartment? Well. I--a while ago--wrote fic about that.
Disclaimer: The following characters and situations are used without permission of the creators, owners, and further affiliates of the television show, Supernatural, to whom they rightly belong. I claim only what is mine, and I make no money off what is theirs.



- - - - -


He has never played a black guitar. He picks it up now, testing its weight, the smoothness of its body and the sharp metallic pluck of its strings. It’s been years since he learned how to play. As he crosses the small living room to the opened window, he thinks to those late nights when Dad knocked back whiskey and slapped down dog-eared cards against the other men and Sam slept with a book tucked to his chin inside the tent. Too young for poker and Jack and too old for sleeping bags and Dickens, Dean stayed on his own and let one of the hunter’s sons teach him how to play.

“You really carry this with you all the time?” Dean asked, looking up from the strings. The guitar was old; it had a crack in its side and stains on its wood. When it played, the songs were out of tune but honest.

The boy shrugged. “Yeah,” he admitted. “Helps keeps your mind sane, y’know? Gives you a break from the rest of this mess.”

Dean nodded and strummed a few of the chords he had learned only that night. Two years later that boy would die when a werewolf ripped out his innards beneath a full summer moon. Dean wouldn’t learn of his death until the winter, and by then, it was too late to ask the boy’s father for the guitar.

Now Dean sits on the window ledge in an apartment he forgets he owns, and he plays that familiar song he learned so long ago. He’s surprised that he stills remembers it, but the guitar drags the melodies from his fingertips. It’s the guitar doing the talking, not him anymore.

“That’s one I haven’t heard before.”

Startled, Dean looks up quickly, chord breaking beneath his fingers. Carmen is standing in front of him, shower damp hair resting on her shoulders and white bathrobe falling just past her knees. She has a cup of coffee clutched between her hands, and she smiles as he stares at her.

“Where’d you learn that one?” she asks.

“Oh,” he stumbles, thinking of fire burning in the night and knives sharpened deftly, “I just remembered it. From when I was a kid.”

She sits down on the windowsill next to him. So close he can smell her coffee, better than anything he’s ever gotten from a gas station, and without her makeup, he can see the small spray of freckles on the bridge of her nose.

When he remains quiet, she says, “Dean, you okay? You haven’t been yourself lately.” Her hand on the small of his back is both unfamiliar and comfortable. He doesn’t move away from her touch.

He smiles at her, still cradling the guitar between his fingers and thinking of what he’s planning to do now that he knows of the people who have died without him. That she doesn’t even exist—no, not really—and that he needs to find the djinn to return back to his reality and back to Sam.

He bends his head because he cannot look at her for too long without feeling that cold ache in his stomach. She should mean nothing to him.

“Hey,” he says after a long pause, “what was our first date like?” At first she doesn’t answer and he looks back up at her to find a smirk on her lips.

“Don’t tell me you don’t remember.”

“Sure I do,” he lies. “I just—I just like the way you tell it.”

“You brought me a bouquet of flowers when you picked me up. We went to watch fireworks down at the park, but it started to storm halfway through, so they had to stop it. Since you didn’t want me to go home yet, we went into one of those empty pavilions…” She trails off when a smile creeps across her face and says nothing more. Dean wishes he could remember the rest of their night beneath the storm and fireworks.

“Have we ever talked about our future?” he asks. “Y’know, together?”

Carmen narrows her eyebrows at him curiously. “Are you sure you’re okay? This isn’t like you. All these questions, up so early…” Dean doesn’t move, and she sets her coffee mug down on the floor, takes the guitar away from him and rests it on the couch. When she comes back to him, she settles between his sprawled legs, presses her back to his chest, and sighs.

He bends his head to the nape of her neck, kisses the bare skin where her hair’s fallen away, and wraps his hands around her to rest on her soft bathrobe. Over her stomach, she loops her fingers through his own.

“We’ve talked about it before,” she says “Our future. Not really about marriage because I don’t know if either of us are ready for that, but kids?” She turns her head to look up at him, meet his eyes. “Yeah, we both want kids. You especially.”

She smiles and for a brief moment, she appears sad and distant. But he kisses her anyway and pulls her tighter to him. The rising sun creeps inside the room and strikes the body of the guitar, making it glisten and shine. Outside the window, a flock of birds rises into the air and sing. He listens to their song and holds onto Carmen.

End

Date: 2008-03-27 02:33 pm (UTC)
ext_16275: (Default)
From: [identity profile] legoline.livejournal.com
Can't you just picture Sam going off the deep end, so desperate and so full of grief (and guilt) that he just refuses to stop playing until Dean's out of Hell?


*whimpers quietly* Oh God. Oh GOD. *sobs sobs sobs really loudly*

WRITE IT!!!

(*pokes you to write Sam&pianoangst instead* ;D)

Me-sa? O_O But...*pokes you* You can write it better :D *nods*

Haha, I'm already giddy! Now I'm going to be fighting to get the mail first! *pushes everybody else out of the way* Gah, I'm so impatient! *sits on hands*


Heehee! It's nothing special though! Don't be disappointed!

Date: 2008-03-27 02:49 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] pixel-0.livejournal.com
But the big fic o'religious doom beckons! It's calling me! See? Don't you hear it? *runs off to avoid Sam&pianoangst fic* ;D

Hon, you could just send me a letter--a piece of paper that just says "Hi Pix"--and I'd be happy. So long as the mail isn't a bill--or more annoying college info--I'm a happy camper. :)

Date: 2008-03-27 03:10 pm (UTC)
ext_16275: (Default)
From: [identity profile] legoline.livejournal.com
But! Sampiano is calling you too! (Hey, we could BOTH write it :D See how we both interpret a prompt like that...)

So long as the mail isn't a bill--or more annoying college info--I'm a happy camper. :)

*channels Joshua* No bills! Tricks and treats! That's the plan!

Date: 2008-03-27 05:41 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] pixel-0.livejournal.com
Oh, fic! I scribbled stuff completely ignored it during lunch. (We could! :D)

*thumbs up* I can totally work with that plan. :)

Date: 2008-03-27 05:48 pm (UTC)
ext_16275: (Default)
From: [identity profile] legoline.livejournal.com
YES! Scribbled stuff! Tricks and treats! (I've been watching DA a lot recently :D )

(Dude, we COULd. Should we?)

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