I Feel the Failure of Protection in My Bones

[maychorian]

Fandom: Supernatural
Title: I Feel the Failure of Protection in My Bones
Author: Maychorian
Characters: John, Jimmy, Castiel, Dean, Sammy, Bobby
Category: Gen, AU, Pre-Series, Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Rating: PG-13
Warning: (skip) Mentions of child abuse. Language.
Spoilers: Through S4. Previous stories in 'verse.
Summary: "Well, something has happened, yes," the principal said slowly. "Not to your son, per se. More accurately, he did something to someone else."
Word Count: 5151
Disclaimer: This is my Father's world, but it's Kripke's playground.
Author’s Note: Part of the Rain Falling Down AU. Thank you, guys, for waiting so patiently for this. And many thanks to dickensgirl for thinking my OFC is adorable.

I Feel the Failure of Protection in My Bones

"Winchester! Phone call!"

Forehead wrinkling in confusion, John put his heels to the floor and rolled himself out from under the car he'd been working on. He rocked to his feet and pulled a shop rag from his pocket to wipe off as much grease as possible. It was a small garage, only a two-man operation since John had arrived, and it was a matter of half-a-dozen quick strides to cross the stained concrete work floor to reach his boss. Keith Oprisko stood in the doorway to the closet-sized office, holding the off-white handset in one hand, his eyebrows raised.

No one had ever called John here at his job before. He didn't give out the telephone number much, didn't even know anyone around Sioux Falls except Bobby Singer and Sammy's babysitter and...and the school.

Something had happened to Dean.

Just like that, a powerful band of steel appeared around John's chest and began to tighten, too quick, too hard. He grabbed the phone from Oprisko's fingers with more force than was necessary. Oprisko just gave him a quirk of the eyebrow and let him have it, going back to invoices.

"Yes?" John barked into the phone.

"Mr. Winchester? This is Mable Sebree, the principal at Jackson Elementary. We spoke when you enrolled Dean at the start of the year."

"Yes, I remember you." The words were harsh, terse, more suited for the jungle than a telephone conversation. John took a breath, tried to tone it down. "Has something happened to my son, Ms. Sebree? Is he sick, hurt?" That was all the poor kid needed, and just when he was starting to get his feet under him, starting to get along in school, starting to make friends. At least one friend, anyway.

"Well, something has happened, yes," she said slowly. "Not to your son, per se. More accurately, he did something to someone else."

"Dean?" John rocked back on his heels, pressing one hand to his forehead. He gave himself one second to feel the relief—not sick, not injured—let it flow over and through him, before confusion swiftly took its place. "Dean did something to someone else? He's in kindergarten!"

"And he has a mean right hook, apparently."

John felt his voice go low and dangerous without particularly meaning it to. "Excuse me?"

The principal let out a breath. "I apologize, Mr. Winchester. That was an ill-conceived attempt at levity. In any case, everyone involved in the incident is in my office now. We're still not sure exactly what happened, though, since one of them seems completely incapable of speaking at the moment. We'd like to hear all sides before we determine the outcome of this, but it's unclear as of now."

"My son, right? He's not talking?" Dammit. I knew this was too much, too soon.

"Oh, no, Dean is quite talkative. And very indignant. It's another child..." John heard rustling papers, evidently Sebree looking at some notes. "...Jimmy Novak, he's not talking. He seems very upset, but he just shakes his head when we question him."

"Jimmy? Jimmy's involved in this?" John pressed his thumb and forefinger into his eyes, despite the grease still staining them. He couldn't imagine gentle little Jimmy getting into a playground altercation, no matter how he stretched his imagination. Though Dean, he had to admit...Dean he could imagine getting into a fight all too easily. "Is he all right?"

"You know him? We've been trying to get ahold of his guardian, but Mr. Singer seems to be away from his telephone."

"Bobby's on a trip." Hunting trip. Left me behind with the kids, the fink. See if I ever let him do that again. "He'll be home this evening."

"Oh..." More paper rustling. The principal's voice went oddly hesitant. "Yes...I, I see that you share an address..."

"It's not like that," John said swiftly. "I rent a trailer on his property. The boys are friends."

"Of course." A few moments of silence. John couldn't begin to fill them. "Mr. Winchester, I think you'd better come in."

"Yeah. I'm on my way."

X

Dean wasn't just indignant. He was mad. Jackson Elementary was a relatively small school, and John had no problem remembering how to get back to the little clutch of offices with the principal's in the center like a brooding hen. He'd been there only a month and a half before, after all, registering his boy for his first school in their new life. He passed the receptionist with barely a nod, heading straight for the chairs outside Mabel Sebree's door.

"Daddy!"

Dean was standing on a chair, waiting for him. His lips were tight and pale with anger, face drawn, hair mussed. John couldn't see a mark on him, but the long-sleeved shirt and jeans covered most of him. He'd check him out in a minute.

First, though, there was Jimmy. Jimmy, who sat in the chair next to Dean's, braced and trembling, his hands clutching the seat on either side of his thighs, arms straight, shoulders hunched and wracked with tension. His head was down, his eyes fixed on the floor. And a dark red mark on his cheek was already starting to mottle into a bruise.

"Jimmy." John knelt in front of him, callused, grease-stained palm covering a fistful of small, whitened knuckles. Jimmy turned his face away, unable to meet his eyes. "It's all right, kiddo. It's over."

He wasn't sure what had happened here, but he was starting to get an inkling.

Dean reached out to grab his shoulder in a tiny fist, bunching up the fabric of John's jacket and pulling it tight. "He hurt him, Daddy. That mean boy was hurting Jimmy. No one gets to hurt Jimmy."

John looked up at him, trying not to smile. Yep, definitely getting an inkling. "So what did you do about it?"

Dean's eyes were made of green fire, brilliant and bright, and so like Mary's that John had to blink back a sudden surge of loss. "I hit him with a hockey stick."

"All right. Okay. Let me smooth this over with Ms. Sebree, and we're outta here."

Dean nodded, satisfied, and John stood up, giving Jimmy's fingers a quick squeeze as he went.

Sebree stood in the door to her office, waiting. John gave her a nod. "Where's the other one?"

She tilted her head, leading the way inside and shutting the door behind them. "Dennis is in the nurse's office. I had him in here for a bit, but he said that his head hurt."

The office was neat, tidy, a potted plant on the desk looking over a small kingdom of carefully placed papers and pens like a benevolent dictator. John sat across from her as she took her place at her desk, folding her hands in front of her. "Yes. Apparently my boy has a mean right hook. Or a mean hockey stick, anyway."

Sebree nodded gravely. "Mr. Winchester, we need to talk."

He simply nodded back.

"I'm...worried about your son. According to Dennis, he was playing catch with Jimmy when he accidentally hit Jimmy with the ball, and Dean ran up and hit him for no reason. Quite extraordinary, really.... Dean's class wasn't at recess at the time, only fifth grade, so Dean must have seen them out the window, then left the room without permission and went out to the playground for the express purpose of hitting Dennis with a stick."

"What does Dean say?"

"He says he saw Dennis 'being mean' to Jimmy. And he took it upon himself to defend his friend." She leaned back in her chair, blinking solemnly. "I must say I've never heard of such a thing before. That your little boy...he's five, isn't he?...that such a young child should take it upon himself to protect an older boy, five years his senior, to the point of mistaking a game of catch for bullying.... Well. It speaks of a possessive, jealous streak, strange for someone so young. And perhaps dangerous."

John could feel the little frown on his lips desperately wanting to pull down into a big, big frown. A huge one. "Principal Sebree," he began, careful to keep his voice even. "I think you're missing something here. This isn't just about Dean being protective, even possessive, which I can certainly see. This is also a case of one child's word against another's. Dennis says he wasn't doing anything wrong. Dean says that he was. From what you're saying... You seem to believe Dennis, not my boy."

A small wrinkle appeared on Mabel Sebree's formerly smooth forehead. So that hadn't occurred to her, then. "I... Yes, Mr. Winchester, it may be that I am making assumptions without proper evidence. But as Jimmy refuses to discuss the matter, I must handle this situation with the facts on hand. Dennis has never been a discipline problem before..."

"And Dean is new here, so you assume that he's at fault."

She blinked. Slowly. Three times. "When you put it like that, it sounds terrible."

"Principal Sebree." He leaned forward and rested his hands on the edge of the desk, looking her in the eye. "Ma'am. You seem like a reasonable person, someone who only wants to do right by these children. I appreciate that. What do you know about Jimmy's history?"

Mabel Sebree looked down, fumbling through her papers. "Very little, actually. His file is quite thin."

"Well, I will tell you something. In confidence. You're aware that Jimmy is Bobby Singer's foster child?"

"Yes."

"Before he came to Bobby, his situation was...bad. His last foster family was...well, let's just say they were about as far as you can get from an ideal family. He's not 'refusing to discuss the matter,' as you so calmly put it. This is how he deals with being hurt or threatened, by shutting down, by, sort of, taking himself away." To put it mildly. "From the way he's acting out there, my conclusion is that Dennis was, in fact, 'being mean' to him. And I sincerely doubt that that bruise on his cheek came from a missed ball in a game of catch."

"Mr. Winchester, I had no idea."

"I know," he said soothingly. "That's why I don't blame you for thinking as you did. But you can trust me, ma'am. If my boy thought there was a reason to be angry, a reason to run out of his class and hit another child with a hockey stick, then there was. No ifs. No buts. There was a reason. I trust him."

"You trust the judgment of a five-year-old boy?"

"Absolutely." John rose smoothly to his feet and tucked his hands in his pockets. "Thank you for your time, ma'am. I'd like to take Jimmy and Dean home now, if I may. Hopefully Jimmy will be able to discuss his perspective on the incident once he's calmed down a little. I'll let you know as soon as I learn anything."

She gave him a nod, calm as ever. "Certainly. I hope Jimmy is all right after all this. I am very sorry that he has suffered here." Her serenity faltered for a moment as she dipped her head, raising a hand to rub at her forehead. "Truly, that's the last thing I would ever want to happen at my school."

"It wasn't your fault," he said, and carefully took his leave.

Dean was waiting for him. He had pried one of Jimmy's hands away from the chair and was holding it in his, fiercely, and yeah, John could see a possessive streak. It didn't surprise him. Dean was that way with Sammy, too. Even with him. Getting there with Bobby.

Jimmy was special, though, had been from the moment Dean first heard his voice on the telephone. They had chosen each other, somehow, through the distance, despite their differences. John had found it creepy at first, but now he was only glad for it, one of the few things that had happened to them since Mary's loss that was not only strange, but sweet as well.

"C'mon, boys. Let's go home."

Dean hopped down from the chair and tugged Jimmy's hand, pulling him along. The older boy hesitated, clinging to his chair for a moment, then allowed himself to be carried along by Dean's insistence. He gave John a tiny, shrinking look, then fixed his gaze on the floor again. John let Dean lead the way, holding back a bit to put a hand on Jimmy's shoulder. He wasn't surprised to feel the boy flinch, and he let go almost immediately.

At the car, Dean opened the front passenger door and pushed Jimmy inside, forcing him to sit in the middle of the bench seat, between Dean and John. Another protective gesture in a day that had been full of them. John let him have his way, silently sliding behind the wheel, starting the car, pulling out of the school parking lot as red leaves stirred in their wake.

Two miles from home, the silence was broken by Dean's urgent voice. "Daddy, pull over. Jimmy's gonna be sick."

John pulled over on the shoulder in a spray of gravel. "Out, out!"

In seconds Jimmy was on his hands and knees in the short, prickly brown grass on the edge of the ditch while Dean hung back a few feet away, failing to suppress a grimace. One small hand traced the Impala's grill, and Jimmy puked and puked. John exited the car more slowly, came around to stand by his son.

"You gonna...help him out?" He tilted his chin toward Jimmy.

Dean's nose wrinkled. He kept his voice low, for John alone. "Throwing up is gross. 'Sides, I dunno what to do for that. Is there anything you can do for that?"

It was a good point. John shrugged, then made his way over to the distressed boy with hesitant steps, finally crouching beside him, within touching distance but trying not to crowd him. Jimmy had gotten to the point of throwing up nothing but long strings of pinkish saliva, throat and chest heaving, his arms shaking beneath him.

"Hey, Jimmy." John laid a hand on his back, tried to be ready to catch him in case his arms buckled. "It's okay. It's okay, now."

Jimmy shook his head shakily from side to side and sat back, scrubbing the back of his hand over his mouth. He seemed to press back into John's hand, trembling through the layers of shirt and jacket. John flattened his palm and tightened his fingers to let the kid know he wasn't going anywhere.

"Am I in trouble?"

God, the boy's voice was tiny. So fragile and lost and broken and terrified almost to death. Did he... Could he really think...?

John drew in a breath. "No. No, you're not in any trouble. None at all. Neither is Dean. You didn't do anything wrong."

Jimmy carded his fingers into his hair and pressed his hands against his scalp, holding tight and hard, as if punishing himself. "If I ever got sent to the principal office's in...back there...if I ever got in trouble... Mr. Baker would be so angry. He'd be so angry, Uncle John, I don't... Please don't be mad at me. I didn't mean to get Dean in trouble."

"Jimmy, you didn't do anything wrong. You aren't in trouble." He said it as firmly as he knew how, fighting past the lump in his throat. He was so far out of his depth, here, no idea what to do. Why wasn't Bobby here? He'd know what to do for this kid. He'd hug him and pet his hair and make him grilled cheese sandwiches, and Jimmy would slowly forget his terror, let the memories subside, and go play Lincoln Logs with Dean and Sammy, and everything would be okay. Singer was a bastard, anyway, for leaving John alone with this.

John cast his eyes to the heavens as if for guidance, even though he was ninety-five percent sure that there was no one up there anyway, then decided he might as well go for it. "I'm not mad, Jimmy," he murmured, and pulled the boy into his arms, holding tight. "Don't be scared anymore."

He could do grilled cheese. He could definitely do grilled cheese.

X

They picked up Sammy from the babysitter (the nice older lady two houses down from Bobby's place), and John made grilled cheese for lunch. Jimmy didn't eat much, nowhere near as much as he usually did, but at least he got a little food in him, and John gave him a bottle of the special store of ginger ale Bobby kept for the little sicknesses that always came up when you had young kids around the joint. There was play, of course, Lincoln Logs, a kids' record on the turntable in the corner, but quieter than usual and more subdued. Even little Sammy seemed to sense the somberness in the air and kept his toddler-shrieks to a minimum.

The mottled place on Jimmy's cheek slowly filled out, turned colors, dark and huge and infinitely wrong, like a stain in a sunlit sky.

John had seen the light blinking on the answering machine when they came in the door, but figured it was just Principal Sebree calling to tell Bobby about the incident at school, so he ignored it at first. Once the boys were setting in the living room, playing, he hit the button and listened. The first two messages were from the school, as he'd suspected, but the third was from Singer himself.

"Winchester. Ran into a little trouble on the hunt. Will you be all right if I take an extra day? Tell Jimmy I'm thinking about him and hoping he doesn't have another nightmare like last week. Tell your rascal boys to stay out of my file cabinets—there's scrap paper for coloring in the bottom drawer of my desk, dammit, that's what it's for. Here's the number where you can reach me."

John barely waited for the string of numbers to finish before picking up the phone and dialing. He scraped his thumbnail against his index finger as he listened to it ring, hoping Bobby was in the room and not out killing something or going to the library or whatever the hell Bobby did on a hunt. After the second ring the phone picked up, John's heart slowed back down to a reasonable rate, and he did his best to chew Singer's ear off over the phone.

"Do not take another day. I will not be all right. Forget the hunt and come home. You can call someone else to do it, or go back later, or anything except stay longer, you bastard. How long will it take you to pack up and get back here?"

A few seconds of silence, and Bobby said dryly, "I take it something happened."

"Jimmy needs you."

"I'll be back in three hours."

And John heard only the dial tone.

He hung the phone up and wandered over to the living room, leaning on the jamb with one shoulder to watch the kids play. He would need to talk to Dean, sometime, explain to him that violence was a last resort and he really should have talked to an adult first, but also that yes, of course, he had every right to hit a bully with a hockey stick and John was glad he'd done it. Maybe he should give the kid a few pointers, too, show him how to throw a punch. You were never too young to start learning.

Before that, though, he needed to get Jimmy's story. He'd promised Mabel Sebree. And if Dennis was the kind of small jackass John figured he was, he deserved to be punished to the fullest extent of Jackson Elementary's law.

Not right now, though. He'd give the child a few hours to calm down, fix popcorn and hot chocolate, read to the kids from one of the old Hardy Boys books Dean had found in an upstairs bedroom. After that Jimmy would be as relaxed as he would get, and hopefully he wouldn't freak out too much.

Or he could just make Bobby do it. Yeah. John liked that plan.

He was still thinking about that when Jimmy leaned over and murmured something in Dean's ear. The younger boy nodded, casual and unconcerned, and continued building his log cabin, while Jimmy stood and moved over to John. The young boy's face was clear, calm, completely unafraid, marred only by that big, ugly bruise.

John knew what this was. He stood up straight and backed off a little. "Castiel?"

He nodded serenely. "Jimmy asked me to talk to you. He doesn't want to discuss it. Or think about it. Or even remember that it happened. So here I am."

"All right." John ran a hand through his hair. He genuinely liked Jimmy, but this other personality still gave him the heebie jeebies. Couldn't show that, though. "Let's go to the kitchen."

They sat at the table. Jimmy—Castiel—folded his arms on the table and rested his chin on them, watching John with a gaze of cool blue, and let his legs dangle, occasionally kicking. It was a very childlike pose, only belied by his old, old eyes. "Dennis has been harassing Jimmy for quite some time. Weeks, now."

John nodded. "Why didn't you do something? Tell someone?"

"I offered. Jimmy didn't want me to help. He wanted to prove that he could handle school on his own. It's very difficult for him, though." Castiel turned his head to rest his cheek on his forearms, gazing out the window over the sink. "Very difficult," he repeated softly, painfully.

"I know."

"It's insidious, you know. The things humans do each other. It's the same in the memories Jimmy has let me see. Mr. Baker and this little boy named Dennis, they both started the same way. Just words. Little bumps in the hall. Nothing worth complaining about if you don't want to be labeled a sissy. A coward. A whiner. For Jimmy, this time, it all had the horrible pull of inevitability, as well. It had happened before. Why not again? He thinks he deserves it, somehow, for some unfathomable reason. I understand a great deal about the universe, Mr. Winchester. I know a lot about everything my father has created and ordered and set in motion. But somehow I cannot comprehend this."

Right. This part of Jimmy thought he was an angel. John leaned his chin on his fist and didn't comment.

"Today, Jimmy was too shocked to let me take control, but if he had, I don't know if I would have been able to prevent myself from smiting that little boy where he stood. Isn't that terrible?" He traced some invisible pattern on the table with his index finger, rubbing his fingernail on the glossy surface. "Speaking of, someone needs to look into Dennis's home life. That sort of behavior doesn't arise from a vacuum."

He seemed to be waiting for some sort of acknowledgment this time, so John nodded hesitantly. "I'll see what I can do. But Jimmy...Castiel...I need you to tell me what happened today. And I suppose I'll need you to repeat the story to Principal Sebree, so she can decide what she should do. Right now it's Dennis's word against Dean's. We need to know the real story."

Castiel just kept tracing that fingernail, back and forth, back and forth. "It is as Dean says. Dennis was being mean to Jimmy. He was always careful to do it when the monitor wasn't looking, of course, and most of the time it wasn't that serious. Just little names, taunts, sometimes shoving him. And then he went too far. Dean didn't like that."

"So Dennis...punched you. Punched Jimmy."

"Yes. Because Jimmy didn't want to play with him." He looked up. "I think Dennis is lonely. No one else wants to play with him either. That doesn't give him the right to hit Jimmy, though."

"No, it doesn't." John shook his head, meeting Castiel's gravity with his own. It felt supremely strange to be having this very serious, very grown-up conversation with a ten-year-old boy, but he could handle this part.

Castiel put his hands flat on the table and pushed back with a little sigh, sitting upright in the chair again. "Is Uncle Bobby coming home soon?"

"He'll be back in a few hours."

"Okay. Good. Thank you for talking with me, Uncle John."

He climbed down from the chair and went back to Dean and Sammy. John rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand, watching him go. He could see the moment when Castiel became Jimmy, when his posture loosened, went less rigid, when his steps lightened, and he seemed to be only ten years old again instead of ten thousand.

Bobby really couldn't get home fast enough.

X

Popcorn, hot chocolate, Hardy Boys. John's plan worked out pretty well. By the time the sun started to dip down outside he was on the couch, a sleepy Sammy cuddled in his lap with Dean on one side and Jimmy on the other, both curled up with their heads on his arms, listening with rapt attention. It made it a little hard to turn the pages and he could feel his left hand slowly going numb, but it didn't bother him much. A fire burned on the hearth, casting red and yellow shadows over the room, and everything was warm and close and comfortable and as safe as John ever felt, now.

Jimmy's head popped up off his shoulder when he heard the crunch of Bobby's tires outside, and he slipped down from the couch and was out the door before John finished the sentence he was on. Dean and Sammy stayed where they were, and John kept going, occasionally craning his head to glance out the window. He caught Bobby and Jimmy's reunion in a series of one-second snapshots, that way. The boy rushing to the Chevelle, Bobby kneeling down holding the kid's face in his hands, the two making their way back to the house each with an arm around the other. As they sometimes did, they settled on the porch swing to watch the sunset, Jimmy tucked under the man's arm with his head on his chest, and John turned his full attention back to the book.

When the chapter was done, he hefted Sammy in his arms and herded Dean out the back door to their trailer. It was good to have their own place, even though they spent most of their waking hours in Bobby's house, anyway. It had kept the two men from killing each other, at least, and also meant that John didn't have to go through all the parenting classes and other rigmarole Bobby was submitting himself to in order to be a foster parent for Jimmy. The trailer's furnishings were basic, but comfortable, and John put the boys to bed, even though he knew that Dean would soon be out of his bed, lying in Sammy's crib with his arms wrapped around his brother. John smoothed his hand over each little head, then put on his leather coat and slowly made his way back to the house, going around the outside to stand on the ground by the porch.

He stood there with his hands in his pockets, watching the sun go down. The angle kept the other two out of his view, and Bobby and Jimmy's voices were just murmurs from here, unintelligible. But he could hear the tone of the words. Both were calm, at least, though John could hear the residual pain shivering beneath Jimmy's voice, the suppressed anger in Bobby's.

After a while he heard a little shift of movement, and Bobby's voice rang out strong and clear. "Oh, come up here and sit with us, you jackass. We've had enough alone time."

Jimmy giggled, small and sweet, and John grinned as he walked around the corner and up the steps. Bobby and Jimmy swayed slowly back and forth in the porch swing, and he sat in the rocking chair nearby. "How was the hunt?"

Bobby waved a hand in dismissal, lifting it just a few inches from where it rested on Jimmy's shoulder. "Fine, fine. I was almost done. Had all the information I needed, just hadn't gotten to the last dirty deed. I gave it to Jim Murphy. He'll take care of it tomorrow or the next day."

He had pulled his jacket around to share with Jimmy, pressing the boy close and warm against his side. John had to smile a little at it, though it made him feel like a sap.

Jimmy craned his head back to look up at Bobby. "I was praying for you. That you'd be safe and everything would go good. Did you feel it?"

"Sure I did, puddin'," Bobby said softly, squeezing him in and planting a kiss on his forehead. "Sure I did."

John kind of doubted that, but it wasn't something you said. Jimmy's faith was, frankly, pretty bewildering after all he'd been through. But it helped him. Bobby did nothing to discourage it, and neither did John.

They sat on the porch, chatting about this and that, until the sun was entirely gone and the autumn chill began to deepen, digging into their bones. Jimmy had been yawning off and on for several minutes by then, and Bobby sent him to get ready for bed.

The men sat in silence for a few moments, staring into the dark. It was a familiar feeling.

"I never even thought about bullies," Bobby said. "All the other problems Jimmy has with school, and it just...never occurred to me." He gave a small, bitter chuckle. "Of course it would happen, though. Of course my kid would get picked on, pushed around by yet another human being. He hasn't been through enough already, I guess."

"You couldn'ta seen it coming," John said.

"I shoulda, though. I should be able to see anything that's gonna hurt him, stop it before it happens. Isn't that what you're supposed to do? Isn't that...isn't that what being a dad is all about?"

John stared into the dark. He felt his eyes burning, too long between blinks, but he couldn't seem to move. Not even for that.

Bobby let out a breath. "Sorry. I didn't mean it that way."

"It's..." It wasn't okay. Nothing about this was remotely okay. "It is what it is, I guess. Life isn't fair."

"No. No, it isn't."

And they sat in the dark, looking on nothing. Any monster that came tonight would have to go through them.

(End)

Next: And Singing Through the Seasons Young and Old