Title: When All That's Left Is Denial

Author: HalfshellVenus

Characters: Sam, Dean, John (Gen)

Rating: K+

Summary: 3x100 drabbles on "Expectations"

Author's Notes: Written for the supernatural100 "Expectations" drabbles challenge.

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Dean

In the beginning, it was ice cream and hugs and his mother's lap at storytime. The needs of young children are few, and their wants are echoed across the world.

Afterward, it was simply being together. Where—whose house, what state, what reason—could change, but together was the part that mattered. So simple a thing—the only thing he would have asked for. When it shattered, Dean's soul went into hiding.

Now the focus changes. Good music. Available food. A warm body to take the edge off once in awhile. This is all Dean dares to hope for anymore.

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Sam

When I'm grown up, I can do what I want.

This was Sammy's catchphrase from the start. Every friend left behind, every piece of childhood denied, fueled resentment that defined him over time. Denying oneself breaks the person or the threads binding him to others. Sam's resistance to John's choices built promises for his future to keep.

The reality was sharper than the dream, and it flew so quickly—four years gone overnight.

After Jess, Sam's vision became revenge. He slides through others' lives, never drawing them into his danger.

I'm grown up. I will kill it before I die.

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John

It will be different once I've avenged her.

There is no if or then—there is only when.

This thought wavers and returns, always there in the back of his mind. More than twenty years of trying, his sons grown now and bound up in this dance of defeat. But he can't see that—doesn't believe it. It's not futility. It is a mission, an obsession, a probability all in one.

If he follows the clues, amasses the weapons, he will find the source and he will triumph.

And then it will all be different.

The "how" is always unexplained.

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