Moving On (Destiel)

14: I am overasked with this title thing

A/N: Happy Eastern to those of you who celebrate it, and a happy day to all of you!

Dean stood a few steps behind his brother when Sam knocked. He would have waited in the car, but this meeting was too spontaneous to assume anyone was home, and Dean would not leave his brother standing in front of an empty house.

"Oh, hey you two!" A smile spread on Jody's face when she opened the door and realized who it was. "Back already?"

"Yeah, Sammy here missed Jessica," Dean said with a smirk. 

Sam shot him a glare and they could hear footsteps of an upcoming Jessica. She smiled of the sight of Sam and pulled him into a hug. Sam seemed overwhelmed at first but let her drag him into the house. 

She was obviously fearing Dean might abduct him away. But who was Dean to get his brother away from a girl, especially a pretty one like Jess?

"I hope that's okay with you. I spontaneously got some things to take care of and would just waste Sam's youth with dragging him along." 

Dean tried his best to disguise it as a joke, but he didn't really want to endanger his innocent youth by bringing him into close contact with bad influences in the drug scene.

"No, it's fine with me and my husband. Sam is always allowed to come." She eyed him for a few seconds. "Are you sure you're okay?" she inquired. With that knowing adult look in his eyes. 

She must have seen the weariness in both Sam's and Dean's eyes.

But it wouldn't be the first time Dean had to fake a smile, pretend he was fine. If you could study poker-face, he'd master all tests. 

"Yeah, I'm awesome, why? Didn't even have one of the worse subjects in class today, and lunch didn't make me want to barf, is that believable?"

Jody chuckled, but her eyes didn't lose that serious, worried look. "Yeah, you're probably right. Just making sure. Sam kinda dropped that you were basically doing all of your father job's as he is not able to...?"

Damnit Sam. "Oh, well. Not that big of a deal. You know, some people shouldn't be allowed to procreate when they can't handle kids. I mean, what is protection for?"

"Right."

Dean did the math in his head. "right" + nothing else = person was not convinced. 

So he added a little more, without wanting to lay it on thick. "Sammy's my little brother, and you know. I like children. I love playing with them, so that's what I did all my life with Sam. That way I'm probably closer to him than my dad is, and in his eyes, I might fill a father-and-brother figure in one." He laughed it off, until he heard Jody next, well-chosen words.

"Sam also mentioned your mother died early. And that things haven't been the same since then."

"Father-brother-and-mother in one," Dean joked, "and people still say men aren't able to multitask." 

But he realized that Jody wasn't in the mood to take his jokes. He sighed. "We're fine, really. Sure, life's not easy, and it might have been even bad in the last few weeks, but you can blame our move into another city. Much stress, naturally. It's going better now. Sam has no reason to complain." 

Biggest lie in the century, but Dean Winchester was known for his lies. And denial.

"There are different definitions of 'I'm fine'," Jody felt helpful to inform him, as if he didn't know that already. "Plus, it wasn't himself Sam was complaining about. He said you're doing too many things out of your age. Things no teen should have to worry about."