Joint Custody

He blinked away the sensation of grit in his burning eyes, then squinted at the page as words blurred together yet again, turning hand-lettered strokes into amorphous blobs of fading, aged ink. Didn't much help. Maybe it was time he broke down and got himself some of those drug store readers that magnified print without being a prescription for actual glasses. He really didn't want to go for prescription lenses. Because that would mean . . .

Well, hell, who'm I kiddin'? I am gettin' old. Feels like I'm knockin' on heaven's door some days. When the aches and pains sharpened with unwanted exuberance out of their usual low-level nag.

Then again, maybe what he needed was better light. Splurge on 100-watt bulbs, instead of sticking with 60s. He was using his eyes up, poring over so many old texts. Especially the hand-written ones, or the ones made on poor printing presses with inferior inks.

"But you're a cheap son of a bitch, Bobby Singer," he muttered, and reached for the whisky bottle to splash another modest measure into the tumbler.

It was late on a night with no moon. The porch light bled faintly into the house through windows in need of washing. Behind his desk, sprawled on a braided, faded rug before the ash-laden fireplace badly begging for cleaning, Rumsfeld lay sleeping, twitching as he chased rabbits in dreams.

Bobby grunted as he drank, revising that interior observation. Rot's a hunter's dog, ain't he? More likely chasin' demons.

When the phone rang, Bobby startled. Realized to his chagrin he was just starting to nod off over his book; but at least he'd set down the whiskey tumbler. That'd be a tragedy, were he to spill it across the text. He heaved himself out of the old chair as it creaked, shuffled to the rack of phones on the wall, realized it was his personal number ringing. That gave him latitude to be himself, rather than a member of various federal organizations.

He eyeballed the wall clock as he picked up the phone. "Who the hell is this to be callin' me after 11 p.m., and what the hell do you want?"

Silence. Bobby contemplated hanging up, but then heard something on the other end. A sigh. A mutter. Nothing he could interpret. Could be someone hurt, someone drunk, someone utterly exhausted.

Then, "It's John."

"I know a lot of Johns," Bobby growled. "Which—? " And then he stopped, chopping off the question. Didn't hide the surprise in his tone. "John Winchester?"

"Yeah, it's me." Again, silence. Then continuation. "Listen, Bobby, I know you told me not to darken your door again, and I haven't, and I'm not going to. I got that message, and I'll abide by it. Maybe a call is cheating, but, well . . . " The voice trailed off, that low, deep rumble Bobby hadn't heard in years, then renewed itself in an odd amalgam of hope and expectation. "I need to ask a favor."

Bobby felt the urge to spit, but that would dirty his floor. "John—"

"Not for me," Winchester added hastily. "For my boys, Bobby. They played no part in our falling out. That was two stubborn sons of bitches butting heads. But this isn't about you and me. It's about them."

Annoyance was replaced immediately by a knot of apprehension welling deep in his gut. "They okay?"

"They're fine. Better than fine, in fact." And then, amazingly, something like a lilt of pride crossed the phone line. "You oughtta see 'em, Bobby. All grown up now. Dean's the image of his mother, but all cocky and badass; and Sammy . . . well, you'd never recognize him. The kid sprouted, Bobby. Tops me by two-three inches now."

"Sam does?" It was incomprehensible. "He was always the scrawny kid!"

John chuckled. "You should have seen the sulk Dean threw when he realized his little brother was taller than him. He's got some heft to him, Dean does, but he's not the big big brother anymore."

Bobby thought back. It had been a few years since he'd last seen the boys. Dean was all wiry strength then, built compactly like his father, promising breadth of shoulder. Sam had always been a stringbean, but short for his age. The idea that he'd top a father who was around six-two was startling.

But nostalgia wasn't why John had called. Bobby scrubbed at his beard, resettled his cap. Recalled how he and John Winchester had parted. "Seein' as how it's for your boys, and not you, I'll do it. What do you need?"

"I'm close to ending it," John said. "Real close, Bobby. And I've finally got something that can take out this yellow-eyed son of a bitch."

Bobby bit down on the denial he wanted to throw back. He'd heard the refrain from so many hunters over the years about one thing or the other, and some of them were no longer alive. "John, he's one of the most powerful demons I've ever heard of. This better be somethin' special."

"It's a gun. Samuel Colt made it; yes, the Samuel Colt. And he made it for killing anything supernatural. It'll do it, Bobby. One bullet, head- or heart-shot, it's all over."

And in that tone, Bobby heard the obsession that had always driven John Winchester. As always, part of him admired the sheer guts of the man, the determination that allowed him to become the best of all the hunters Bobby knew. The other part of him, the part that had opened his aging heart to two motherless boys, begrudged John that obsession because of the boys.

'A father with two growing sons shouldn't be hunting,' he'd told John that night. 'Hunters just don't have families. Give your boys a real life. They lost their mother; don't take their father away from them, too.'

And then he'd said more, and John had, and in the end Bobby hoisted a shotgun into his arms and ordered that father off his property for good. He hadn't thought in that moment he was effectively banishing the boys as well, because that wasn't the intent; but he should have known a man as proud and stubborn as John Winchester wouldn't let his sons set foot where he couldn't.

"They're young men now, Bobby," John went on. "They're not kids anymore, and I've made them as tough, as prepared, as I could. But you were right that night—partly right, at any rate. I won't apologize for what I said—they were mine to raise, not yours—but it's true they didn't have the kind of life they should have. I'm to blame for that. I've been their CO, not their father. So . . . " A hesitation, and then the voice continued. "If I nail the son of a bitch, then maybe it ends. Maybe it's over. And Sam can go back to school, and could be Dean'll settle down, give me some grandkids. But if it doesn't go that way . . . hell, Bobby, I'm good, but not stupid. This thing's been killing for decades. Maybe centuries. There's no guarantee it won't take me out. And if that happens, my boys'll need a father. God knows I never was that, not the way they needed, just like you said that night. I think you could be."

Bobby was stunned. "This really John Winchester?"

"It's me, Bobby. And I mean it. I do. There's so much I would change if I could, crap to make up for . . . but I can't. I just want them—" He stopped short, hesitated, began again. "Well, I've been absent too damn much, and I want them to have someone, if it ends for me."

Bobby was struck speechless. Who on earth bequeathed a man his sons as if he were writing a last will and testament?

A man who loved them.

Dean, all sunshine and smiles, burnished gold every summer, or slicked with oil as he climbed all over engines in the yard. Sam, curled up for hours on the couch with his nose in a book, so lost in imaginary worlds he only came up for air when his brother grabbed the book away, or tickled him into wrestling.

Grown up now, John said. But still in need of a father.

Bobby felt a prickle behind his eyes. "You know I'll do anything for those boys. Whatever they need."

"This goes the way I hope, it won't be necessary. But, well . . ."

Silence, but loud with truths, and fears, and hopes.

Finally Bobby broke it. "This goes the way you hope, you bring those boys back around. Hear me, John? You bring those boys with you. And we'll have a few drinks, you and me, for old time's sake, and you'll tell me all the details of how you took out this son of a bitch. You got that?"

After a long moment, John answered. "Yeah." His tone was raw. "Yeah, Bobby. I got it."

"All right, then. Now get off this phone and let an old man get some sleep."

"'Night, Bobby."

Bobby hung up, stumped back into the study, turned off the light, headed upstairs.

When this was over, it would be good to have the boys in the house again. Even good to have John in the house again. Well, until they butted heads.

And they would.

"Stubborn son of a bitch," Bobby muttered as he climbed the creaking staircase. "And you damn well better come out of this alive, ya idjit."

It was the only way they'd ever make things right between them. And Bobby wanted things made right between them. Years down the road, they were both of them, him and John, graying around the edges, getting no younger; and maybe both of them required glasses to see clearly what needed reading. What needed killing. The life expectancy of hunters was much too short, and he couldn't help but think they'd lost too much time to the stupidities of pride and ego.

"Bring those boys around," Bobby murmured as he topped the stairs and walked into the bedroom he'd shared with a woman long-dead. "It'll be good to see all three of you."

And yet he realized, as he pulled off his cap and hung it on a wall hook, that even if John Winchester took out the demon, it wouldn't be over. Not twenty-plus years into the life. It would never be over for any Winchester, after so much time. Any more than it would ever be over for Bobby Singer.

~ end ~