“Dude, snakes?”
When Sam didn’t drink and didn’t push his body to exhaustion during the day, Sam dreamed.
And when Sam dreamed… he dreamed of Jessica.
They went to the zoo one day, Jessica’s idea.
Sam laughed when Jessica had her face painted, then huffed and puffed when she begged him to get his done as well.
“I look stupid,” Sam grinned after it was finished and they had matching face paint. Sam stood behind Jessica and had his arms around her, bent over so they could look in the mirror together.
“I think you make a very beautiful butterfly, Samuel,” Jessica teased him. “The glitter really brings out your eyes.”
“Oh, yeah?” Sam knew he looked like an idiot with the sparkling pink wings painted on his cheeks - Dean would never let him live it down if he saw it - it was just hard to care when he was with Jessica.
Sam rubbed his cheek on Jessica’s, messing up both of their wings and she squealed and squirmed to get out of his hold.
“Sam! How could you!” Jessica tried to look mad, but she was laughing, just as happy as Sam was in that moment. “Now it’s ruined,” she pouted.
Sam looked at Jessica, her golden curls, her blue eyes, the freckles on her nose that were hidden under paint. Sam’s lips curled up in a soft smile, love shined from his eyes.
“No, now it’s perfect.”
When Sam didn’t dream of fire, when he didn’t dream how she was dead and it was his fault, Sam dreamed of little moments with Jessica.
And without fail, he woke up with his pillow wet from where, even asleep, he hid the tears.
Sam didn’t usually turn over in bed and accidentally kick his teenage brother though.
Harry was stretched out in the bed beside Sam, one arm tossed over his face, the other bent at an awkward angle between them. When Sam lifted his head, just to check, he saw Dean stretched out on the other bed, sound asleep.
They both looked peaceful, like their little road trip Dean wanted so bad wasn’t tearing them apart from the inside out like it was Sam.
Yeah, they weren’t in Santa Clara County, Dean just instinctively avoided the area after Sam let it slip how much he didn’t want to go back, but Jessica was on Sam’s mind from the second they hit the state line.
It didn’t matter though, it was in the past and Sam needed to move on, get over it. That had been Dean’s advice back before…
Before Dad sold his soul to save Dean’s life…
Before Harry showed up…
Back when it was just Dean driving with Sam carrying the fresh grief in the passenger seat while they searched for their dad…
“Jessica wouldn’t want you to be miserable, Sammy. Right? I mean, shoe on the other foot, would you want her to be miserable for the rest of her life?”
Sam wouldn’t, but if it had been her fault that Sam burned to death, trapped in the ceiling? Yeah, Sam might be a little pissed.
Since he didn’t think he’d be able to go back to sleep anyway, Sam quietly slipped out of bed and dug around in the cheap and flimsy motel dresser where Dean insisted they put their clothes.
“I paid for a week, and we’re staying,” Dean said, staring hard at the other two who weren’t arguing. Dean slapped a hand on the dresser and Sam could hear the excitement in his voice, not hidden well enough from Sam. “So pick a drawer and put your shit in here. Think of it like practice.”
It was Dean’s excitement that kept Sam from mentioning anything at all demon or Jessica related. If Dean wanted some version of a family vacation after the year he had, after everything he did for Sam, Sam figured he more than earned it.
Sam dressed quickly, quietly, then pulled his sneakers on to go for a run. Running was as good as hunting most of the time, Sam could go and go and go and not think about any of the heavy shit that weighed on him.
It was different when Sam ran with Harry, when he had to temper himself and only run a little harder than Harry to challenge him. When it was just Sam, he could push himself until his lungs burned, his legs screamed, and then he would push harder.
Sam knew it was twisting a healthy habit to something sick, but it wasn’t any worse than Dean’s drinking.
They all had something.
Since Dean found a cheap motel right by the ocean, Sam went to the beach to run. It took more concentration to run in the sand, more effort. It was nice though, only having the dark water lapping at Sam’s feet, the sky a perfect and endless black…
Sam would rather cut off his right hand than live in California again, but just for the moment… just when it was Sam and the water, Sam and the night… It wasn’t horrible.
Dean’s reaction when Sam returned to the motel after the sun rose, drenched in sweat, was horrible.
“Sam, you gotta quit.” Dean was waiting for him, sitting outside on the hood of the car, only dressed in a pair of ratty sweatpants he liked to sleep in. Dean’s hair was tousled from sleep, but his eyes were wide awake.
“Quit what?” Sam asked, dropping his hands from where he’d been rubbing a stitch in his side. Sam ran hard, he probably hit at least ten miles in the two hours he had been gone. He forgot how much harder it was to run in sand than concrete or even though woods.
“You know what,” Dean said, his gaze boring in Sam even when Sam dropped his eyes to his soaked sneakers. “You gotta quit punishing yourself, man. It wasn’t your fault.”
Sam pushed his bangs off his forehead and clenched his jaw. It was his fault.
If it weren’t for Sam, Dean would have Mom.
If it weren’t for Sam, Jessica would be alive.
There was something wrong with Sam, more than just the visions. Everything Sam touched, he ruined. Sam got his own mom killed when she got between him and Azazel, he got Jessica killed twenty-two years later.
Hell, if Sam was a better hunter, Dad never would have had to trade himself for Dean. And even then, the last thing Sam said to him was that he didn’t care about Dean.
If Dean was smart, he’d take Harry back to Bobby’s and cut Sam off. Dean wouldn’t do it, he was as stubborn as he was loyal, but he should.
“Look, if you won’t cut it out for me, do it for the kid.” Dean slid off the hood and put his hand on top of Sam’s head just for a second as he walked past him. “You’re setting a shit example.”
Yeah, Sam would add that to his list of ways that he couldn’t get a single thing right.
Sam gave himself a few minutes to cool down before he followed Dean inside their room. It was supposed to be Harry’s day to pick something to do.
They had hit the beach at Dean’s request, where Harry turned out to be such a terrible swimmer that they dedicated that day and the next to teaching him to swim.
Technically, Sam tried to teach him to swim while Dean sat his ass in the sand and drank while he built a sandcastle. By the time Harry had the basics down, Dean had found some sand tools and enlisted Sam and Harry both in helping him build ‘the best damn castle this beach has ever seen’.
It was a pretty pathetic castle the three of them built, but Sam had never seen Dean as relaxed as he was when they inspected it after finishing.
“Man, that is a sweet castle,” Dean said cheerfully. The castle sucked, it was already caving in on itself, but Sam realized then that it was the first sandcastle that Dean had ever built.
“I wouldn’t live there,” Harry quipped, more at ease with Dean since their case ended in Louisiana.
“Yeah?”
Sam saw Dean slowly set his bottle on the ground and knew what was coming. Dean lunged for Harry, grabbing him around the waist, and dragged him to the castle, lifting just enough to drop him in the middle of it, crushing the whole thing.
“You’ll live here and you’ll like it!”
When Dean whined that Sam was going to ruin their vacation by dragging them to museums when he got to pick something to do, Sam put some effort in finding something Dean would like.
“Sam, you’re kidding.” Dean laughed at the bus they were supposed to board, the one decorated in the pale images of dead celebrities.
“Hollywood’s Haunted Tour,” Harry read, looking from the bus to Sam. “Is it really haunted?”
“Fuck no,” Dean said, still grinning with his hands tucked in his pockets while he acted all butthurt about Sam’s choice. “It’s just touristy shit, kid.”
“If you don’t want to do it, we could check out a museum,” Sam said lightly, as if he couldn’t tell Dean and Harry were both inching their way to the bus.
“Shut up, Sam.”
Sam knew Dean’s obsession with celebrities would keep him more than entertained, but he put some effort in trying to make Harry just as entertained.
“What’s this?” Harry asked after they took seats on the top of the tour bus. Sam hesitated for a second, kind of hoping his half-assed idea he had the night before wouldn’t blow up in his face.
“Some of these places actually were haunted,” Sam told him quietly, pointing out the addresses he listed out for Harry on the papers he gave him. “Dad went to a few of them, I thought, I dunno… I thought maybe you’d want to know.”
Dean looked at Sam over Harry’s head while Harry immediately began reading Dad’s notes that Sam copied over for him. Sam had included anything he thought was relevant - 406 Sunset Blvd did have a ghost, but it was the maid that had been killed there, not the movie star, and Dad had to tear down a wall to find the body to burn.
It was all there, Harry’s history too in a way.
“When did you find time to do that?” Dean asked Sam while Harry was distracted by immediately flipping through the pages Sam printed.
“It took me five minutes this morning while you were in the shower,” Sam lied.
Dean looked like he wanted to call Sam out, but the tour started and Sam watched Dean fanboy over the celebrity houses and Harry study the notes Sam gave him when they drove past a house he listed.
It wasn’t the days spent doing stupid shit with his brothers that weighed like elephants on Sam’s chest. It was the nights with the saltwater breeze playing with Sam’s mind that made him too relieved to only have one more night in California.
Harry and Dean were sitting at the little table inside the motel when Sam finished in a quick and cold shower. There was a box of donuts opened up that Dean was digging through while Harry clipped through a stack of brochures slowly.
“Why do I have to choose?” Harry asked Dean, sounding like it was a repeat of an argument.
Sam snagged a jelly-filled donut, one that he knew Dean must have bought for him since Dean hated jelly donuts, and he picked up a few brochures curiously while Dean and Harry bickered.
“Because it’s your day, so you have to pick something,” Dean said. He might as well have said ‘because I said so’ with the bossy way he said it.
Sam bit back a smile and looked at the pamphlets he grabbed. The second one made him roll his eyes and subtly tuck it in his pocket.
Sky-diving, really? Neither of them must have looked when they swiped the brochures because Dean was scared of planes and Harry had been in a plane crash just… damn, had it already been six weeks ago?
“Why don’t you guys pick?” Harry asked, shoving the brochures to Dean. “I don’t care what we do.”
“Nope.” Dean shoved them back at Harry and crossed his arms over his chest, literally staring deadpan at Harry in the same expression Harry had.
How Dean thought Harry looked like Sam when he was all Dean was beyond Sam. Dean saw what he wanted to see. They were the same freaking person.
“Your day, you pick,” Dean insisted.
Harry’s eyebrows twitched down and he looked to Sam for backup. Like Sam was going to get involved between whatever Dean and Little Dean had going on between them.
“Eenie meanie miney moe it,” Sam suggested.
“That’s a phrase that makes complete sense to me,” Harry said, sarcastic as could be.
“Dude, he lived in a closet,” Dean said to Sam. “He doesn’t get references, like, at all.”
“Oi! I do too get references!” Harry cried with pinkening cheeks while Sam sighed heavily at Dean’s absolute lack of tact.
When Sam told him that Harry said he lived in a cupboard, he meant like ‘hey, I think our brother was abused’ not ‘let’s bring it up to mock him’. Of course, knowing Dean, he probably thought cracking a joke about something that was really messed up was how to show his support or something.
Sam shouldn’t hold Dean to high standards though. It wasn’t like Dean was the image of good mental health or trauma processing. Dad was the same way Dean was, he just drank away his grief and never talked about anything that bothered him.
Actually… Sam shifted uncomfortably while Dean started shooting pop culture references at Harry… maybe it was a family trait. Some families handed down shit like cancer, the Winchester’s just developed the worst possible coping mechanisms until they landed in a grave years too early.
The Winchester Legacy: saving people, hunting things, burying pain… the family motto.
Sam snorted at himself, causing two sets of green eyes to turn to him.
“What? You don’t think we should make him pick?” Dean asked, somehow interpreting Sam’s snort as disagreement with him.
“Maybe there’s something Sam really wants to do that he’d like to pick,” Harry said, a hopeful lilt to his voice.
Sam smiled at Harry, picking on him some. “You know what? I couldn’t care less what we do today.”
Which would be how Harry ended up arbitrarily choosing a pamphlet for the Los Angeles Zoo.
Awesome.
Harry and Dean seemed perfectly happy to go walk around and check out a bunch of zoo animals for their last day in California so Sam kept his mouth shut about it.
It felt like a punch to the stomach over and over every time Sam saw blonde curls or heard a warm laugh. Every time he turned a corner, he swore - just for a second - that Jessica would be there.
Sam had his hands in his pockets and hung back some while Dean bounced from exhibit to exhibit like a kid after eating too much sugar. Even Harry didn’t look as excited as Dean was, though he did look amused when Dean refused to go in the snake exhibit.
“You’re not scared of snakes, right?” Harry taunted him, probably payback for that morning judging by the light in Harry’s eye. “They won’t hurt you.”
“No I’m not scared of snakes.” Dean straightened his back and set his jaw before he yanked open the door and sarcastically waved an arm for Harry to go first.
“Dude, snakes?” Sam whispered when they stepped in the air conditioned and dark building.
“They don’t have legs, Sam,” Dean whispered back. “They’re creepy.”
Sam smiled and filed that away for the next time Dean wanted to start a prank war.
Harry didn’t seem bothered by snakes, he liked them. And since Sam had never been in the exhibit before, it was just opened that summer it said, he sort of walked around and talked about what he knew of snakes to Harry.
“Anaconda’s are the largest snakes in the world,” Sam said, looking at a huge green snake that was hissing at them from its enclosure.
“He doesn’t seem very big,” Harry said. He corrected himself before Sam could read the sign by the enclosure. “Oh, he’s just a baby.”
“I think it’s a she,” Sam said, reading the information on it.
“Mm, I think you’re wrong,” Harry said confidently. He grinned at Sam, friendly and open. “That’s okay though, you’ve been wrong twice now. I won’t bring it up much.”
“Twice?” Sam asked, hurrying after Harry when he moved to the next cage. “What else do you think I was wrong about?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Harry said, sounding like he knew that Sam was going to worry about it. “Really, it’s not a big deal. One bloke can’t know everything, right?”
“You- you told me to sing to a hellhound!” Sam hissed, keeping his voice low so the others around them didn’t call the cops or cps or something. “I almost lost my leg!”
“That was… bad advice from a book,” Harry said slowly. He peeked up at Sam and blinked at him. “You’re not- not really mad, right? We’re just joking?”
Obviously Sam wasn’t mad. Harry was a kid, one that got a two week crash course in hunting before they took him on a case. Sam nearly lost his leg anyway, he just also looked stupid as hell singing ‘Yellow Submarine’ to a hellhound.
“No, I’m not mad.” Sam put his hand on Harry’s hair, ruling it lightly. Sam wasn’t surprised that Harry always seemed to lean in Sam’s touch some when Sam did it; Sam had been the same way when he was Harry’s age.
It was just Sam doing the same random shit for Harry that Dean did for Sam. If Sam wasn’t completely ruining being a big brother, it was because Dean set the curve.
“You probably mixed up hellhounds with the guards of hell,” Sam told Harry kindly while they watched two of the pythons in the enclosure wrestle and wrap themselves around each other.
“Guards of hell?” Harry asked. “And - er… what guards hell?”
“According to the legends? A Cerberus,” Sam explained. “A great giant dog with three-heads, each one equally deadly. Supposedly, only the Trickster Loki was ever able to sneak in Hell after playing his flute to put the guards to sleep.”
Harry shook lightly under where Sam still had his hand on his head. When Sam glanced down to see if he was okay, he saw that Harry was shaking with silent laughter.
“I bet- I bet…” Harry snorted and Sam grinned slowly, even if he was confused it was funny seeing Harry dissolving in a fit of hysteria that he tried to speak around.
“I bet those dogs are fluffy,” Harry finally said, his voice choked with laughter. “Just… Just really bloody fluffy.”
Sam didn’t get the joke, but he still laughed when Harry suddenly darted out of the building, his laughter trailing behind him.
Dean was thrilled about whatever had Harry cracking up. Not only did it mean they got to leave the exhibit to track their brother, but Dean had a smug look that Harry was having as good of a time as he was.
“Told you, Sammy, we all needed a vacation,” Dean said when they stopped to get lunch at one of the cafes that sold liquor. Dean had a beer and burger, Harry got a chicken sandwich and soda, Sam had a salad and water.
They were like the three bears of healthy eating.
“Sure,” Sam agreed, distracted by a girl getting her face painted at a stand across from where they sat. She was a brunette, her boyfriend that laughed with his face already painted was too short, but Sam’s heart clenched just looking at them.
Sam missed Jessica, but Sam missed who he had been when he was with her too. Sam used to be as happy as that dude was, just… light and free and looking forward to the future.
Sam didn’t know who he was anymore, but he suddenly knew he had a stop they had to make before leaving in the morning.
Dean didn’t say anything when Sam asked if he could drive the next morning. He just took one look at Sam’s face, at the way Sam wouldn’t quite meet his eyes, and he handed over the keys.
It was two hours out of their way, two hours driving up Interstate Five to get to Jessica’s hometown, but neither of Sam’s brothers complained. When Sam pulled in the cemetery and just sat in the car, working up the courage to go remind himself that she was gone, she wasn’t just around any corner, she wasn’t there… that was when Dean taught Sam how to be a brother.
“You don’t have to,” Dean said quietly.
Sam looked out in the cemetery and could see the tree where Jessica was buried beside it. He couldn’t see her grave from where they parked, but he knew it was there.
“Yeah, I do,” Sam disagreed, his voice broken. Sam did have to. If nothing else, Sam had to remind himself that she wasn’t coming back.
“Well you don’t have to do it alone. We’ll come with you, come on,” Dean said, unusually solemn. Sam looked at him with wet eyes, tears he couldn’t have hid if he tried, and Dean grabbed his knee. “It’s alright, Sammy. We got you.”
Sam swallowed a sob and nodded, stumbling some when he got out of the car.
Dean, because he was Dean and he was always there when Sam couldn’t do something on his own, led the way through the cemetery. Dean had been there for the funeral, they left to find their dad the same day.
Harry stayed beside Sam, his eyes on the ground and his fingers just lightly bumping in Sam’s side every few steps. It wasn’t annoying, it was comforting. Like Harry was just trying to say he was there too.
Maybe Sam was reading too much into it, but he knew he couldn’t have made the walk without Dean or Harry.
Jessica’s grave was as beautiful as it had been when it was first placed there. It was decorated with flowers and photos, tiny stuffed bears and crosses.
Dean pulled Harry back when Sam’s legs collapsed and he hit his knees in front of it all. Sam didn’t notice, didn’t have eyes for anything except the framed photo leaning against Jessica’s grave.
It was Jessica on the last day of their second year at Stanford. She had thrown her arms in the air, twirling around in celebration, and someone thankfully snapped a photo. Her head was thrown back, catching all the sunlight on her face, and she was beautiful.
Jessica was the most beautiful woman to ever exist and she chose Sam.
She chose wrong, but it still felt like heaven to have been loved by her.
Sam stayed there for hours, cycling through hurt that stabbed through him, anger that made his blood boil, and grief that wanted to drown him.
Sam whispered apologies, words of love. Sam asked for forgiveness, asked if he would see her again one day.
If Hell existed, then Heaven had to. And if that was where Jessica waited, then Sam would find a way to balance all his debts in the world so he could join her one day.
Sam didn’t care about his visions or how it tied him to Azazel anymore. Sam wouldn’t go dark side, he wouldn’t turn evil, because he couldn’t.
Jessica was waiting.
“Sorry,” Sam said again.
“Harry, hit him,” Dean said calmly.
“I’m not hitting Sam,” Harry said for the fifth time.
It was too quiet in the car after they finally left the cemetery. Sam felt like an asshole as soon as they pulled away.
How many good days did Dean get? Good days that didn’t involve some waitress or a bottle of jack? And Dean had been all childishly happy with his vacation that he wanted to spend with Sam and Harry and Sam ruined it.
So Sam kept apologizing, Dean kept telling Harry to hit him, Harry kept refusing.
It should have been a long drive back to Bobby’s place, but Sam - surprisingly - slept for a lot of the drive. He took shifts with Dean, at one point he even drove while Harry sat up front and they tormented Dean with horrible pop music, but when Sam didn’t drive, he slept.
Dreamlessly, peacefully.
If Sam wanted to think about it, he’d think the weight off his chest, his sleep, was from facing his past or something. Sam didn’t want to think about it, he just wanted to get back to Bobby’s and figure out what was next.
When Harry was asleep and Sam and Dean were the two awake, Dean brought up school, mentioning that they’d need something to enroll Harry with. Sam did alright with forgeries, they rarely got caught with their plethora of fake ID’s, so he promised to make something.
“Your problem’s going to be that he doesn’t want to go to school here,” Sam said quietly when they were nearing Bobby’s. Harry was passed out in the back, stretched across the bench with his backpack under his head.
“Well he’s not going back,” Dean said firmly. “So either he’s a drop out or he goes to high school.”
“He’s not dropping out,” Sam said, just as firm. Sam’s attention was sidetracked for a moment by a pack of birds - owls, maybe? - flying low just ahead of them up Bobby’s lane, but he shook it off and focused. “I’m just warning you, he’s got friends back at whatever school he went to.”
“If he even went to school,” Dean said in a rush, his hands tightening reflexively on the steering wheel. “I’ve been thinking about it. You know how Bobby said his school didn’t exist? And the kid doesn’t know jack about shit?”
Sam didn’t think that was exactly fair, but sure.
“I think he didn’t go to school,” Dean said confidently. “I bet those assholes kept him locked up or something and that’s why he ran away with just a bag of shitty clothes and some pictures from a convict.”
Sam opened his mouth to dispel Dean’s theory, then he actually considered it. That wasn’t actually the stupidest thing Dean had ever said.
“No way,” Sam said, remembering how Harry talked about his friends. “He’s got friends, he had to have met them somewhere.”
“Then he can make new ones,” Dean said. He pulled the car up to Bobby’s house and killed the engine. “Friends come and go, Sammy. Family is forever.”
Sam made a mental note to try and take Dean on a vacation once a year. Sam’s older brother was more relaxed than Sam had seen him in… ever, actually. Dean climbed fluidly out of the car and waved Sam off when he reminded him about Harry sleeping in the back.
“Let him sleep,” Dean said. “It’s a nice night, I’ll crack the car windows for him. If he wakes up, he’ll see we’re home and come inside.”
Wow. Dean was using big words like ‘home’ and offering to leave the windows of his car down? The guy must have needed that trip more than Sam could have guessed.
“Hey, Dean.” Sam caught up with Dean on the back porch and he ducked his head, kicking his foot out nervously. “I am sorry, man. I was a dick.”
“Aw, Sammy, don’t get soft on me now.” Dean aimed a light punch to Sam’s shoulder before opening the front door. “You’re always a di—”
There was a crash from far within Bobby’s house that wiped the smiles off both of their faces. There were good odds that Bobby was drunk and fighting imaginary spirits again, but there were just as good odds that something broke in, attacked him—
It was birds.
Sam and Dean burst in the living room and Dean had his gun drawn while Bobby swung a broom at… a freaking owl. There were three of them flying around the living room, hooting at Bobby. A big white one seemed to take a lot of pleasure in diving at Bobby with its claws out while the smaller grey one hooted happily on the ceiling fan.
“Dude, owls?” Dean said, pocketing his gun.
Sam squinted at the one flying around, evading Bobby’s broom and his yells. Did it…?
“Is that a letter? Tied to its ankle?” Sam asked.
Just in case he was seeing things, Sam pinched his own thigh. But there was definitely some type of letter tied to the owl’s foot. And, when Sam got a good look at the third one resting on the top of a bookcase, it had a box tied to its ankle.
… carrier owls?
“Fuckin’ thing broke my damn window!” Bobby took one more swing at the white owl before it landed on the ceiling fan and- and honest to God that owl looked so unimpressed that Sam would have laughed if he wasn’t so confused.
“Don’t tell me you’re using carrier pigeons now?” Dean asked Bobby. Dean held a hand up to the owls on the ceiling fan and the white one hooted before flying straight to him.
“They flew through the damn window!” Bobby said, eyeing the owl suspiciously. It was a pretty owl, sweet too as it nuzzled Dean and let him carefully remove the letter from its ankle.
“Maybe it’s Rufus,” Sam suggested, more mystified than helpful about who would communicate with an owl and how the hell they trained an owl to carry letters. Some of Bobby’s hunter friends were more paranoid than Bobby though, so Sam supposed anything was possible.
“Or…” Dean unrolled the thick paper that had been rolled up tightly and frowned at it. Sam inched closer to read over his shoulder and was even more confused.
Harry,
Happy birthday, mate!
Where are you? Did you go with Sirius? Mum’s gone spare. You have to come back soon, the Quidditch Cup is on August 22nd. You will be back then, right? You have to! Dad got tickets from work and we’ll be in the Top Box, Harry. The. Top. Box.
Oi, before you blame me, I couldn’t exactly hide that you weren’t at your relatives since you sent Hedwig to my house. Mum thought the muggles locked you away again and she was going to storm over and… well, nothing nice, I suppose. I didn’t tell her anything, but I told her that Dumbledore knew who you were with and she left and came home talking about ‘little boys with murderers’ so I reckon she might have missed the part where Sirius was innocent.
I hope Hedwig finds you and I hope you get back before the match. If you’ve died though, I reckon I’ll invite Seamus.
-Ron
PS: I was kidding about inviting Seamus, but if you’re trying to spend time with Sirius or whatever and think that’s more important than the World Cup then I’ll just tell you about it on the train.
Sam read the letter three times in the time it took Dean to read it once and every reread didn’t make any of it any clearer.
“What…”
“… the fuck?” Dean finished, picking up Sam’s sentiment when Sam’s voice trailed off. “Is it Harry’s birthday?!”
Sam rolled his eyes at Dean before he noticed that Bobby had suddenly gone very still when Dean said Harry’s name.
Yeah, there were a lot of questions to be asked, but Sam didn’t think Harry’s birthday was exactly at the top of the list.