Hi, all! This is a multi-part story that was originally supposed to be a short for my series of shorts, The Chick Flick Moments that Never Happened to Dean Winchester. But I liked the idea so much that I decided to flesh it out more. Please let me know what you think. It's nearly finished so there shouldn't be more than a few days between chapters.

Raising Winchester

For Winchesters, concealing and manipulating emotion was as easy and as innate as breathing. Festering, kinetic rage appeared as nonchalant indifference if you plastered a smirk on your face and concentrated the energy into sarcasm. Fear didn't exist if you squared your shoulders and willed a defiant glint your eye. But it felt unnatural to Dean to shutter away excitement behind long-suffering sighs and muffled curses as he packed his duffle bag. The raw glee of being away was rattling around inside him like fireflies at dusk.

After months of John gone on weeks-long hunts and Dean being saddled with his little brother in the world's smallest motel rooms in the country's crappiest towns, he was finally free. Free of Sammy's endless questions and obsessive studying; of Sammy's demands for food they couldn't afford or school supplies he couldn't find; of feeling more like a father than a twenty-year-old. He hadn't been to a bar or touched a woman in nearly eleven weeks. And now, he was being liberated for seven little brother-free days—Sammy shackles off, collar up.

He was heading away from the merciless cold of whatever square state they were in, and down to the warmth and green of Pastor Jim's land in Georgia for—Dean fought the smile nipping at the corners of his lips—"intensive training in Latin and hand-to-hand." While Dean nearly fell asleep at the thought of all of the work, he could already feel the heat of the sun on his skin and hear the churn and ripple of the water at the docks. Every damn person seemed to be caught in the spell of little Sammy, with the adorable dimples and impeccable manners and the big blue eyes, Pastor Jim had taken a shine to Dean, and that gave him a disgusting amount of hope that the entire week away wouldn't be stuck in the dark gallows of Jim's church clumsily reciting Latin.

Sammy was on the other bed of their tiny motel room, making a meal off of his thumbnail. Dean forced his lips into a glum line and he looked up at Sam, sighing in annoyance before he sent a pillow flying at his anxious little brother. "Why do you look like you're about to be held hostage by a priest?" Dean asked with perfectly feigned irritation.

"I want to come." Sam flopped backwards on the rickety bed. The rusted springs groaned in response. "Why do you get to go?" He asked in wobbly lilt that made him sound very much like the little brother he was.

"Because if I'm stuck in this room for one more day, I'm going to start gnawing on the furniture."

Sam chuckled as his eyes panned their humble little motel room just off the interstate and wearily stood up, unpacking his overflowing backpack. With that shock of brown hair, he looked more like a mop with eyes and an almost sixteen-year-old kid. "Why can't I go with you?"

Dean carded his hands through his short hair and zipped up his bag. "Because you, Revenge of the Nerds, have tests all week. You gotta keep that grade point…thingie up. Lord only knows why."

"For a future—you know that thing you never plan for." Sam wrinkled his nose sourly, "but this school is lame, Dean. And we're leaving when you get back, so I can go with you. It'll be fun. I'm better at Latin than you are. I can help you." Those glittering blue eyes met Dean's with palpable eagerness.

The same Dean was suppressing.

"Only you would think learning latin would be fun. Thanks, Sammy, but I got this." He smirked and moved around the bed to ruffle his fluffy hair. "I'll be back before you know it. And you'll get Dad all to yourself."

Sam's face fell, drained of emotion like it did when he didn't want to talk about something because it would hurt someone's feelings. The tension between John and Sam was steadily mounting and churning like lava building in a once-dormant volcano. Because John had stepped up Sam's training. Real hunts had been added to the drills, and Sam had less time to dedicate to extracurricular activities and studying.

Dean knew Sammy didn't want to be left alone with him. He'd been not-so-subtly saying it for weeks. "Look, I talked to Dad…he's pretty beat, ya know. I don't think he's even up to killing his shadow right now. And he mentioned taking you to that snooze-worthy museum exhibit you've been creaming over."

Dean swore he saw fireworks in his little brother's blue eyes. Shame for that kid to be so excited about crusty, historic crap. They seriously needed to invest in some porn. Dean pushed off the bed. He drummed his fingers against his thighs, lingering in the room as if killing time. He shouldered his duffle and backed towards the door.

"All right, sport. Dad should be back in the morning. Uh, liquor's in the fridge—drink some. All the good drugs, including my pot stash are in the Impala—take some. Money's hidden in the old coffee can—spend it. Do everything I would do, Sammy. That's an order." Dean said, coolly as he backed out of the door and tamped down the urge to run.

He stepped over the threshold when he felt a pang in his stomach cutting through the private flutters of glee. He glanced over a leather-clad shoulder at his little brother. Suddenly, he felt like a neurotic mom, needing to remember that he was wearing a ratty blue fleece and a pair of Dean's jeans. That Sam had a healthy high pink in his cheeks and was swallowing and averting his eyes because he was upset and feeling left out. He dropped his duffle and spread his arms. "Get over here, bitch."

Sam rolled his eyes, begrudgingly dragged himself off the bed and wearily threw his arms around his brother. The head on his shoulder, the fingers fisting Dean's jacket, and the fondly mumbled "jerk" told him that Sam was putting on a performance of his own.

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Leather jacket tucked in the straps of his duffle, sunglasses on, Dean ambled up the tree-lined walkway of Jim's secluded cabin. He reached the door and squinted at the note nailed to the door. "Dean, I left a list of the incantations and exorcisms you need to learn before you leave. How and when you learn them is up to you. I will be staying in the rectory. Enjoy the cabin. Hope to see you for dinner at least once."

Dean whistled and smiled. He let his duffle thunk onto the eroded wood of the porch and walked around the house, where the lush canopy parted to reveal the blue of the lake and the yellow of the Georgia sun. Lifting a hand, Dean squinted at the bikini-clad girls downstream splashing intently in the water. He licked his lips and peeled off his shirt, sprinting for the end of the docks. Airborne, Dean Winchester had the freedom he finally craved.

Her name was Ingrid, and she was a dancer. Her toned upper body, the flecks of glitter in her skin and her penchant for Lucite heels and thick, thick eyeliner told him that she was kind of dancer who was naked by the end of her performance. She was as gorgeous as she was guarded, and their goodbye was as easy as Dean had hoped. Dean brushed her hair out of her face, twirled the fiery tresses around his fingers and reeled her in, kissing her languidly in hot sun. She sparkled in the sunlight like some strange fairy of debauchery. "If you're ever in Austin ," she drawled, "come see me."

Dean smirked, all bravado and leer. "Kiss me like that again, and I'll move to Austin ," he said.

And she was on him again. Dean lifted her up long limbs crossing around him and they kissed and stumbled into grass just beyond the cabin. He pulled away, breathing heavily and wishing he didn't have to leave.

"One more for the road?" Ingrid mumbled, still biting his bottom lip.

The last thing Dean wanted to think about now was his father's stern face and Sammy's gleeful one, but that flashed in his mind, along with the anvilous burden of duty Responsibility; Life and Death. He smiled down at Ingrid, pliant and willing beneath him. "I'll take as many as I can get, sugar."

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Dean all but ran off the bus and down the road to begin his two-mile trek back to the into the sparse city limits. Somewhere between Little Rock and Oklahoma City , Dean realized that the impatient beat of his heart and the restless shaking of his leg that he mistook for the fact he had to leave the slice of Heaven back in Georgia was really because the stupid bus wasn't going fast enough.

He missed his scrawny, whiny, angsty string-bean of a little brother.

He jogged across the icy Iowa parking lot. He huffed out a few frosty breaths, pretending the cold was the reason for his haste. He nearly skidded on a patch of unsalted ice. The Impala wasn't parked in front of the room, meaning dad wasn't home. As Dean unlocked the door, he hoped they hadn't been fighting while he was gone. He poked his head into the dark room, immediately noticing that the threshold was salt-free. The room smelled strangely sour, like rain and mud. He flicked on the light and was startled by a flurry of activity, the chuffing sounds of frenzied motion, undulating shadows in the dark. His duffle bag had been discarded and his gun drawn before he could register the activity. Dean kick the door shut, and heard an echo from across the small room, head the telltale creak of the rusted hinges of the bathroom door.

Dean ambled into the room with a practiced, fatal grace, finger on the trigger. Their small hotel room had been destroyed. Ransacked or searched. He stepped over juts of splintered wood that used to be a desk and crunched on the glass from the framed landscape. Dean didn't care about missing clothes, the busted television or even their brand new laptop.

He only had one concern: "Sammy!"