After the End

Chapter Four

"Dean, does your car have a cassette player?" Jack wondered from the backseat, his hands folded in his lap as he watched the world through the window, sometimes glancing at the others in the car. Clearly, the kid had never been in a moving vehicle before. He was quiet for the most part, but every now and then, he would mumble to himself, or ask Castiel some simple question about something he had seen through the window. Dean enjoyed looking up and seeing the wonder in the kid's eyes. It reminded him of his own childhood, before he was forced to grow up too soon after his mom's death. Jack's boyish wonder was like a breath of fresh air.

Dean glanced at the radio for a moment, then looked at Jack in the rearview mirror. "Yeah, but we've only got one tape," he answered, digging through the glove box while Sam slept peacefully in the passenger seat. Cas was asleep too, his head leaned against the window in the seat next to Jack. "Looks like some AC/DC," he read, squinting at the writing that was fading on the tape. There used to be so many tapes in various places throughout the car because John had an arsenal of different music. Dean grew up listening to all kinds of bands and music genres. He loved nothing more than a little classic rock, which he was happy to subject Jack to. The kid could use some good music in his life. Dean briefly wondered if the kid had even listened to music before, considering he had been born in the midst of an apocalypse. For a second, Dean had an image of Castiel teaching Jack the words to some obscure pop song and the two of them jamming out, which made him chuckle.

"Maybe we could find more tapes," Jack replied, his face lit up with excitement. Dean had to remind himself that this kid wasn't really a teenager and a lot of this stuff, he really hadn't seen before. "I've never heard of AC/DC," he added. "Can we listen?"

Dean chuckled, checking the tape to make sure it still looked playable. "Sure, if this damn thing still works," he agreed, pushing the tape into the cassette player. He really wasn't sure it would work after years of gathering dust in the glove box, but surprisingly, the sounds of AC/DC soon started playing throughout the car. The smile that lit up Jack's face was contagious. "You like it?" Dean asked over the music.

"It's great!" Jack beamed, nodding his head in time with the song. Dean smiled, satisfied as he continued driving down the long stretch of highway, his fingers tapping the steering wheel as the songs played. He watched Jack every few seconds, his heart swelling as the kid slowly learned the words to the choruses in each song and began to sing along.

For a few hours, they continued driving, replaying the same few songs on the only tape they had. Sam and Cas slept through it all, but Dean didn't mind bonding with the kid for a while. He loved introducing Jack to the wonders of classic rock, especially since Jack seemed to like it. He even enjoyed answering every little question about the band members, other rock bands in the same era, and whatever else the kid could conjure up within the few hours they spent talking. Eventually, they had to stop because they were almost out of gas. In the middle of a small town, Dean parked the Impala in front of a beat up grocery store. The building was still perfectly intact, but it looked rundown. The windows were cracked, but not shattered. There seemed to be a lot of stuff on the shelves inside, but that was just from what Dean could see from outside. He wanted to check it out to see if anything was important enough to squeeze into the car with the rest of their belongings, so he slowly reached over and thumped Sam on the forehead to wake him up.

Sam's eyes shot open, startled as he thrashed around before calming himself, his eyes traveling around their new surroundings. "Where are we?" Sam mumbled sleepily, stretching as he glanced at Dean in question. Cas was also starting to wake up, his eyes blinking slowly as Dean failed to stop himself from looking at him in the mirror. His hair was sticking up on the side from where he had been laying on it and he was too out of it to fix it. Dean thought it was adorable looking, so he didn't mention it either. Instead, he tore his eyes away, back to looking at Sammy, the safest place for his eyes to stay fixed on.