sn:/all or nothing
Nov. 5th, 2006 09:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eighth_horizonSalvation AU. Danielle and Sarah talk about what it’s like to try house-hunting - or anything - with Dean. Character study. Whose? You decide.
PG, 2254 words.
All or Nothing
(c)2006 b stearns
____________
September, 2017
-|-
“He’s driving me crazy,” Danielle said.
Sarah didn’t get many calls from Danielle.
It wasn’t that they had nothing in common, or didn’t mesh personality-wise; the fundamentals were there as far as sense of humor and dedication to family. And loving a Winchester - any Winchester - could be very easy or very difficult depending on when you caught them.
Their approach to most things differed, however. Sarah was perfectly capable of directness when she felt it was necessary, but between her upbringing and her experience with the people in her family’s social circle, she had vast amounts of arch tact at her disposal. She had a way of quietly causing people to do what they should, and/or insulting anyone she chose without letting them even realize it. The line between passive aggression and perceived upper class sensibility was a fine one, and when Sarah chose to cross it there was usually nothing passive about her brand of aggression.
Danielle Surma, though, was just really...tense.
The dark-haired, honey-eyed, mocha-skinned scientist was sharp of mind, tongue and approach and may not have even had a passive setting on her dial. She was soft spoken and conservative but still loud in the same inaudible way Dean often was - she was a presence no one could ignore. But where Dean had developed a stillness over time that came from the centering that family could bring, Danielle was almost constantly poised to brace her foot in a door. Somewhere along the line she had decided that she had to get the world before it got her, and strive nonstop for something that she didn’t seem to be able to identify. She was a driven, ambitious, fast moving and bold person who didn’t mince words.
Sarah understood why all of that attracted Dean. Danielle was not for fun. She was a constant challenge, a raving beauty who was large on both the raving and the beauty. Those two didn’t rest. They riled each other and demanded all or nothing, every degree of passionate response, rage and adoration and hilarity. Dean’s understanding of living a full life had always meant that he should constantly be moving. Together, they were the definition of inertia.
The difference was that Dean knew what he wanted, from everyone and everything, and getting there did not feel like settling, to him. And, whether he made it plain or not, he trusted. Himself, the people he loved. He trusted.
It was important to Sarah that she be part of integrating Danielle into the family. She wanted it to work, wanted them all to be happy. Look, see, I’m perfectly sane and I’ve done fine with these guys, I’ve seen ghosts too, no big deal.
Sam was often completely confused by Danielle but not to the point of disliking her. It was more a matter of amusement than anything else. The first time he’d met her - dinner with the four of them not long after Dean had cleared a ghost from Danielle’s lab - he had later told Sarah that Danielle was a damn lunatic. But he’d conceded that she did not confuse motion with progress and that she was also plainly besotted with Dean. The constant underlying hint of helpless adoration softened her edges and endeared her to Sam by default.
No, Sarah didn’t get many calls from Danielle, but when she did it was because Danielle believed that Sarah had some basic understanding of Dean that had escaped everyone else.
Also, she was slightly intimidated by Sam, and had gone as far as to admit it to Dean.
Whatever that really meant, or to what degree she felt it, was not discussed. Dean thought it was hilarious and Sarah thought maybe it was kind of charming and Sam tried to be horrified, but deep down...he preferred it. He did not attempt to analyze that to any extent. He just tried not to stare at her too hard.
“We’ve looked at forty seven houses,” Danielle said. “I’m not exaggerating.”
“How many realtors have you worn out?” Sarah said, watching three-year-old Allie push grapes around the bowl in her lap on the floor. The toddler was holding a book open with her other hand, The Poky Puppy. The soon to be married couple had been looking for houses and planning a family and talking about forever, because Dean had come to understand that such things were possible after watching his brother get away with it. They had been doing very normal things in a very not-normal way.
“Two,” Danielle said. “He will not tell anybody why he really doesn’t like a place. Not me, not anybody. It’s always something about the floor joists or the size of a particular room or the direction the front windows face. Even things we could change? He won’t even consider them.”
“Dean knows a lot about houses,” Sarah said, knowing it was arguably the one of the most loaded things she’d ever said to her soon to be sister in law. Had Danielle been paying real attention, she’d have picked up on many things. To Dean’s mind it was apparently lucky that she hadn’t. She was not privy to the entire past, she had no idea about Sam’s powers, and she did not know the full story of how Sam and Sarah had met. Just a ghost, pretty much the same thing with you and Dean. Danielle had not asked. Danielle would really not have wanted to hear a little girl was jumping out of a painting and slashing people, and almost killed us both before Dean set the rest of her remains on fire. Dean had drawn a line in the sand and was taking a running jump at normalcy, and for better or worse he was not pulling Danielle into everything he’d seen or done. She knew he and Sam had spent time ‘investigating’ things. He simply had never expanded on what that meant.
“But not enough to figure out what he wants,” Danielle said. “I’m getting the idea that he either really doesn’t want a house...or he doesn’t want the permanence and can’t admit it.”
Oh, boy.
“He wants the permanence,” Sarah said quickly. “Trust me on that one. If that’s what it was, he’d say so. You know that. He hasn’t lived in a house since he was little, Danielle. And I think he just wants things to be perfect.”
Dean wanted what Sam and Sarah had. He wanted to build that for himself.
No sense telling her that each house was telling Dean a story. Dean would not talk about it, would not admit to a thing, but Sarah had watched with great interest when Dean checked each house she and Sam had looked at years earlier. Dean and Sam had been very careful. He’d never said a word but Sarah had watched Dean run his fingers along walls and arches and jambs, watched him walk the perimeters, watched him walk the yards by section. One house in Redding that Sarah had been particularly fond of had been off limits. She’d never made it through the door because Dean had said no. No explanation, just no, not this one, after he’d run a hand down the door and touched the knob. He’d closed down and glared at the house like it might try and lure them in. Sam had never questioned him, just accepted his opinion with a placid agreement and a wink to Sarah. She didn’t grill Sam either, because she knew something was going on and Dean was visibly wrestling with some sort of embarrassed determination by bestowing a pass/fail grade on each house.
When Dean seemed to know more about each house they saw than the seller did, it made her wonder.
She did go look for info on that address, though, because it was the only one Dean had been openly disturbed about. It didn’t take her long to discover that seven years earlier there had been a domestic dispute ending in murder/suicide. It made Sarah think long and hard about what she really knew about Dean and what she needed to know about him. She felt in her heart that he had no idea what had gone on in the houses he said no to. He was not psychic, he did not share Sam’s gifts/curses/abilities. It may not even have been anything as solid as the echoes of the emotional dynamics both between and soaked into the walls. She had often felt that certain rooms or whole buildings had a certain tone. It was not out of the realm of possibility that houses retained not just tones but personalities of their own. She’d seen and heard stranger things.
He had gone so far as to lie facedown on the floor of the master bedroom in the house they were currently in, looking for something. When Sam had finally asked him if it was okay, Dean had said, Yeah, whatever, if you guys like it.
“He can be a perfectionist about some things,” Danielle said. “Is this one of those things that has to do with having to move constantly when he was a kid?”
“Yes,” Sarah said. “I really think so. This is one thing you need to be patient about, because when you both finally agree on one, it’ll be the best thing for you both. Let him get comfortable. It’ll pay off.”
Danielle sighed, and to Sarah it sounded equal parts annoyance and relief.
“He’s worth it,” Danielle said. “I just want to smack him for the cloak and dagger crap. Like he has some mysterious point system for all this that I’ll never get a copy of.”
Sarah wanted to laugh but didn’t. Danielle probably understood Dean better than she realized. Whether she’d ever learn to wholeheartedly trust him or listen to more than what she wanted to hear was anyone’s guess.
“He’s trying so hard because you’re worth it,” Sarah said, knowing it was true. “A house can be part of a family, and he’s got to be able to...trust someone before he’ll let them in.”
Danielle was silent for a long moment.
Sarah knew by that silence that her hint had come through loud and clear. She smiled to herself. It was going to be quite a wedding, and not by size or scope. It would be small and sweet in a non-denominational church, but it would be such a large step, commonplace to most yet one of the bravest things Dean would ever do.
“He makes me want to put up with things I don’t have patience for,” Danielle said finally. “That’s good, isn’t it?”
Danielle’s parents had divorced just after she had turned fourteen; Sarah knew at least that much. She’d met Danielle’s brother Jason and liked him immediately but had not met Danielle’s parents. She was curious about how much was nature and how much was nurture. It seemed better to wait for Danielle to volunteer things, which didn’t happen often. At least...not in so many words.
“Yes,” Sarah said. Allie chose then to roll a grape across the floor to her. “That’s the best feeling in the world, sometimes.”
“I guess I just can’t wait to have everything be ours,” Danielle said. “I just want...home.”
“If you ask him, he might say the same thing,” Sarah said, wiggling her fingers at Allie before patting the top of her own stomach. Daughter number two was due in the next month and Sarah found herself trying to picture Danielle pregnant someday. She’d probably try and rush that, too.
Now, now, Sarah, she chided herself, then said, “He’s listening and wanting your input, right?”
“Yes,” Danielle said. “It just seems like there’s no way we’ll ever find something we both like.”
“Oh, you will,” Sarah said. “It’s such a big decision for both of you, but you’ll both know home when you find it. Any day now. Dean helped me and Sam pick out our house, and I’ve never been happier anywhere. Just give it a little longer. Then, if it all gets out of hand, I’ll help you smack him.”
Danielle laughed. That didn’t happen often - it was usually a smirk or a chuckle, but when she did laugh she meant it. There was nothing false about her; Sarah would say that willingly. Even when she was trying to be what she thought she was supposed to be, she still shone through. “Two women ganging up on him? He’d love it. Don’t give him a reason to drag this out.”
Sarah smiled to herself. “It’ll all be okay,” she said. “It really will. It’ll never be boring, but it’ll be okay.”
“Thanks,” Danielle said. “I just...I know I’m the outsider. You never make me feel like I am, I don’t mean that, but you just...I don’t think you were ever an outsider with these guys, not for a minute.”
Okay. That was true. How and why it was true was less complicated than one would think. “I’m just such a tomboy, that’s all,” Sarah said, and Danielle laughed again. “See, I have even you fooled.”
“Yeah, well, I have my doubts. Listen, I’m standing in the yard of the forty eighth house and Dean’s coming around the side again - I’ll go do something publically inappropriate to him and see how that affects his judgment.”
“Good for you,” Sarah said with a grin. “Always christen the yard first.”
After all, that was how she and Sam had conceived Allie.
-|-
PG, 2254 words.
All or Nothing
(c)2006 b stearns
____________
September, 2017
-|-
“He’s driving me crazy,” Danielle said.
Sarah didn’t get many calls from Danielle.
It wasn’t that they had nothing in common, or didn’t mesh personality-wise; the fundamentals were there as far as sense of humor and dedication to family. And loving a Winchester - any Winchester - could be very easy or very difficult depending on when you caught them.
Their approach to most things differed, however. Sarah was perfectly capable of directness when she felt it was necessary, but between her upbringing and her experience with the people in her family’s social circle, she had vast amounts of arch tact at her disposal. She had a way of quietly causing people to do what they should, and/or insulting anyone she chose without letting them even realize it. The line between passive aggression and perceived upper class sensibility was a fine one, and when Sarah chose to cross it there was usually nothing passive about her brand of aggression.
Danielle Surma, though, was just really...tense.
The dark-haired, honey-eyed, mocha-skinned scientist was sharp of mind, tongue and approach and may not have even had a passive setting on her dial. She was soft spoken and conservative but still loud in the same inaudible way Dean often was - she was a presence no one could ignore. But where Dean had developed a stillness over time that came from the centering that family could bring, Danielle was almost constantly poised to brace her foot in a door. Somewhere along the line she had decided that she had to get the world before it got her, and strive nonstop for something that she didn’t seem to be able to identify. She was a driven, ambitious, fast moving and bold person who didn’t mince words.
Sarah understood why all of that attracted Dean. Danielle was not for fun. She was a constant challenge, a raving beauty who was large on both the raving and the beauty. Those two didn’t rest. They riled each other and demanded all or nothing, every degree of passionate response, rage and adoration and hilarity. Dean’s understanding of living a full life had always meant that he should constantly be moving. Together, they were the definition of inertia.
The difference was that Dean knew what he wanted, from everyone and everything, and getting there did not feel like settling, to him. And, whether he made it plain or not, he trusted. Himself, the people he loved. He trusted.
It was important to Sarah that she be part of integrating Danielle into the family. She wanted it to work, wanted them all to be happy. Look, see, I’m perfectly sane and I’ve done fine with these guys, I’ve seen ghosts too, no big deal.
Sam was often completely confused by Danielle but not to the point of disliking her. It was more a matter of amusement than anything else. The first time he’d met her - dinner with the four of them not long after Dean had cleared a ghost from Danielle’s lab - he had later told Sarah that Danielle was a damn lunatic. But he’d conceded that she did not confuse motion with progress and that she was also plainly besotted with Dean. The constant underlying hint of helpless adoration softened her edges and endeared her to Sam by default.
No, Sarah didn’t get many calls from Danielle, but when she did it was because Danielle believed that Sarah had some basic understanding of Dean that had escaped everyone else.
Also, she was slightly intimidated by Sam, and had gone as far as to admit it to Dean.
Whatever that really meant, or to what degree she felt it, was not discussed. Dean thought it was hilarious and Sarah thought maybe it was kind of charming and Sam tried to be horrified, but deep down...he preferred it. He did not attempt to analyze that to any extent. He just tried not to stare at her too hard.
“We’ve looked at forty seven houses,” Danielle said. “I’m not exaggerating.”
“How many realtors have you worn out?” Sarah said, watching three-year-old Allie push grapes around the bowl in her lap on the floor. The toddler was holding a book open with her other hand, The Poky Puppy. The soon to be married couple had been looking for houses and planning a family and talking about forever, because Dean had come to understand that such things were possible after watching his brother get away with it. They had been doing very normal things in a very not-normal way.
“Two,” Danielle said. “He will not tell anybody why he really doesn’t like a place. Not me, not anybody. It’s always something about the floor joists or the size of a particular room or the direction the front windows face. Even things we could change? He won’t even consider them.”
“Dean knows a lot about houses,” Sarah said, knowing it was arguably the one of the most loaded things she’d ever said to her soon to be sister in law. Had Danielle been paying real attention, she’d have picked up on many things. To Dean’s mind it was apparently lucky that she hadn’t. She was not privy to the entire past, she had no idea about Sam’s powers, and she did not know the full story of how Sam and Sarah had met. Just a ghost, pretty much the same thing with you and Dean. Danielle had not asked. Danielle would really not have wanted to hear a little girl was jumping out of a painting and slashing people, and almost killed us both before Dean set the rest of her remains on fire. Dean had drawn a line in the sand and was taking a running jump at normalcy, and for better or worse he was not pulling Danielle into everything he’d seen or done. She knew he and Sam had spent time ‘investigating’ things. He simply had never expanded on what that meant.
“But not enough to figure out what he wants,” Danielle said. “I’m getting the idea that he either really doesn’t want a house...or he doesn’t want the permanence and can’t admit it.”
Oh, boy.
“He wants the permanence,” Sarah said quickly. “Trust me on that one. If that’s what it was, he’d say so. You know that. He hasn’t lived in a house since he was little, Danielle. And I think he just wants things to be perfect.”
Dean wanted what Sam and Sarah had. He wanted to build that for himself.
No sense telling her that each house was telling Dean a story. Dean would not talk about it, would not admit to a thing, but Sarah had watched with great interest when Dean checked each house she and Sam had looked at years earlier. Dean and Sam had been very careful. He’d never said a word but Sarah had watched Dean run his fingers along walls and arches and jambs, watched him walk the perimeters, watched him walk the yards by section. One house in Redding that Sarah had been particularly fond of had been off limits. She’d never made it through the door because Dean had said no. No explanation, just no, not this one, after he’d run a hand down the door and touched the knob. He’d closed down and glared at the house like it might try and lure them in. Sam had never questioned him, just accepted his opinion with a placid agreement and a wink to Sarah. She didn’t grill Sam either, because she knew something was going on and Dean was visibly wrestling with some sort of embarrassed determination by bestowing a pass/fail grade on each house.
When Dean seemed to know more about each house they saw than the seller did, it made her wonder.
She did go look for info on that address, though, because it was the only one Dean had been openly disturbed about. It didn’t take her long to discover that seven years earlier there had been a domestic dispute ending in murder/suicide. It made Sarah think long and hard about what she really knew about Dean and what she needed to know about him. She felt in her heart that he had no idea what had gone on in the houses he said no to. He was not psychic, he did not share Sam’s gifts/curses/abilities. It may not even have been anything as solid as the echoes of the emotional dynamics both between and soaked into the walls. She had often felt that certain rooms or whole buildings had a certain tone. It was not out of the realm of possibility that houses retained not just tones but personalities of their own. She’d seen and heard stranger things.
He had gone so far as to lie facedown on the floor of the master bedroom in the house they were currently in, looking for something. When Sam had finally asked him if it was okay, Dean had said, Yeah, whatever, if you guys like it.
“He can be a perfectionist about some things,” Danielle said. “Is this one of those things that has to do with having to move constantly when he was a kid?”
“Yes,” Sarah said. “I really think so. This is one thing you need to be patient about, because when you both finally agree on one, it’ll be the best thing for you both. Let him get comfortable. It’ll pay off.”
Danielle sighed, and to Sarah it sounded equal parts annoyance and relief.
“He’s worth it,” Danielle said. “I just want to smack him for the cloak and dagger crap. Like he has some mysterious point system for all this that I’ll never get a copy of.”
Sarah wanted to laugh but didn’t. Danielle probably understood Dean better than she realized. Whether she’d ever learn to wholeheartedly trust him or listen to more than what she wanted to hear was anyone’s guess.
“He’s trying so hard because you’re worth it,” Sarah said, knowing it was true. “A house can be part of a family, and he’s got to be able to...trust someone before he’ll let them in.”
Danielle was silent for a long moment.
Sarah knew by that silence that her hint had come through loud and clear. She smiled to herself. It was going to be quite a wedding, and not by size or scope. It would be small and sweet in a non-denominational church, but it would be such a large step, commonplace to most yet one of the bravest things Dean would ever do.
“He makes me want to put up with things I don’t have patience for,” Danielle said finally. “That’s good, isn’t it?”
Danielle’s parents had divorced just after she had turned fourteen; Sarah knew at least that much. She’d met Danielle’s brother Jason and liked him immediately but had not met Danielle’s parents. She was curious about how much was nature and how much was nurture. It seemed better to wait for Danielle to volunteer things, which didn’t happen often. At least...not in so many words.
“Yes,” Sarah said. Allie chose then to roll a grape across the floor to her. “That’s the best feeling in the world, sometimes.”
“I guess I just can’t wait to have everything be ours,” Danielle said. “I just want...home.”
“If you ask him, he might say the same thing,” Sarah said, wiggling her fingers at Allie before patting the top of her own stomach. Daughter number two was due in the next month and Sarah found herself trying to picture Danielle pregnant someday. She’d probably try and rush that, too.
Now, now, Sarah, she chided herself, then said, “He’s listening and wanting your input, right?”
“Yes,” Danielle said. “It just seems like there’s no way we’ll ever find something we both like.”
“Oh, you will,” Sarah said. “It’s such a big decision for both of you, but you’ll both know home when you find it. Any day now. Dean helped me and Sam pick out our house, and I’ve never been happier anywhere. Just give it a little longer. Then, if it all gets out of hand, I’ll help you smack him.”
Danielle laughed. That didn’t happen often - it was usually a smirk or a chuckle, but when she did laugh she meant it. There was nothing false about her; Sarah would say that willingly. Even when she was trying to be what she thought she was supposed to be, she still shone through. “Two women ganging up on him? He’d love it. Don’t give him a reason to drag this out.”
Sarah smiled to herself. “It’ll all be okay,” she said. “It really will. It’ll never be boring, but it’ll be okay.”
“Thanks,” Danielle said. “I just...I know I’m the outsider. You never make me feel like I am, I don’t mean that, but you just...I don’t think you were ever an outsider with these guys, not for a minute.”
Okay. That was true. How and why it was true was less complicated than one would think. “I’m just such a tomboy, that’s all,” Sarah said, and Danielle laughed again. “See, I have even you fooled.”
“Yeah, well, I have my doubts. Listen, I’m standing in the yard of the forty eighth house and Dean’s coming around the side again - I’ll go do something publically inappropriate to him and see how that affects his judgment.”
“Good for you,” Sarah said with a grin. “Always christen the yard first.”
After all, that was how she and Sam had conceived Allie.
-|-
