The Winchester Code

Chapter 20 - Birthday Wishes

Chapter 20

Birthday Wishes

“Dean, I was thinking,” I say as I walk into my brother’s room. “It’s Kevin’s birthday soon. We should do something.”
“Something?”  He asks. “Something like what?”
“He’ll be twenty, so something fun.” Dean opens his mouth to make a suggestion, but I put up my hand to stop him “We are not taking him to a strip club.”
“Fine.” Dean mumbles. “How about –”
“No, no gay bars eithers.”
“He doesn’t like girls, he doesn’t like guys, what the hell, man!”
I smile to myself. “I’m pretty sure he likes girls. Or, at least,” I shrug, “One girl.”
“One girl, what do you –” the realisation of my words sink in and a massive smile spreads across his face. “Oh.”
“Well, his birthday is the last day of summer, so how about we take him to the beach or something?”
“The beach?” Dean asks. “Happy birthday, profit, here. Get eaten by a whale.”
“Whales don’t eat people.”
“Then explain Jonah!”
“Ok, so not the beach. It’s a long drive anyway, what about a water park?”
“With kids peeing in the water left, right and centre?” He pulls a horrified face. “No.”
“Kids pee in the ocean as well.” I argue. “At least there are no whales.”
“Fine.” He rolls his eyes, but his little smile tells me he likes the idea. “Now you just need to convince our little prophet.”
“Or we could tie him up and force him to come.” I suggest sarcastically.
“That could work.” He smiles.
“Dean, we are not going to tie him up and force him to come!”
“Good luck convincing him then.”

I find Kevin in my room (that has been overtaken by Zai, so it is pretty much her room). He is sitting at my desk, papers scattered everywhere and the tablet in his hands. He has hardly left this position for the two weeks that Zai has been comatose.
“Hey Sam,” He greets as I walk in.
“Hey,” I walk over and sit on the empty side of my double bed. I pull up the cover at Zai’s feet and run my hand along the arch of her foot. She doesn’t react, so I press down on her toe nail, counting the seconds that it takes for the skin to turn from white to pink again.
“She keeps mumbling stuff.” Kevin informs me.
“Does she?”
“Yeah, like, I can’t always make it out, but she seems to be arguing or laughing, and sometimes she’s crying, like with tears and everything, but she doesn’t wake up.”
“Kev,” I say, covering up Zai’s feet again. I grab her hand lift it over her head. I let it drop and Kevin turns at the sound of it smacking her face. “Your birthday’s next week.”
“Is it?” He asks sincerely.
“Yeah.”
“Oh.”
“You’ll be twenty.” I remind him.
“Yeah.” He nods into his tablet.
“We were thinking of throwing you a party.”
“With hunters friends? Angels? Demons?” He turns to me. “No offence Sam, but I don’t have friends, and your friends are, well…” He shakes his head and turns back to his work. “You guys don’t keep very good company.”
“We kept you, didn’t we?”
“My point exactly.”
I smile and turn back to Zai. She doesn’t look any better, even though Cas has confirmed that he is making good progress on whatever is wrong with her insides.
“We were actually thinking the Schlitterbahn.”
“The waterpark?”
“Yeah.”
Kevin looks from me to Zai. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “Sounds good.”
“Really?” I am a little surprised at the shock in my voice. “Cool.”
“Yeah.” He agrees. “It will be good to get away for a while. Plus, I need to get my tan back.”
“Awesome, so what cake?”
“Cake?”
“Yeah, birthday cake.”
“Mum always –” He pauses. “Any, I don’t mind.”
“Alright.” I stand up and pat his shoulder as I leave.

“You know what, Sam?” Dean asks as he munches on a bowl of noodles next to me. We sit together on the couch, watching Dean’s favourite TV show, Doctor Sexy. Currently there are adverts interrupting our viewing experience.
I twirl some noodles around my fork and look at him. “What?”
He wipes the noodle broth from his face with the back of his hand and swallows properly before continuing. “Zai needs to go to school.”
“What?” I ask again.
“Well, if she wakes up, she’ll needs something normal.”
“When.” I correct. “When she wakes up.”
“School’s normal.” He continues. “She should go back to school.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“Well we went to school, didn’t we?”
“Yeah,” I agree. “But we also had to move every three weeks.”
He taps his chin with his fork. “Well, she could go to school here in Lebanon, you know that Smith Center place?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Settled then. She’s going to school if she wakes up.”
“When.” I sigh, as the sitcom comes back on.  “When she wakes up.”