#jacketnatural

NO NO YOURE RIGHT

when they first go into johns motel room in the pilot you can see dean grab the jacket where john had left it in pretty sure

Dean taking the jacket, even as a kid, is something Sam could never get away with. (see: john pulling a gun on a 18 year old sam when he got upset at john taking his hotdog. im not kidding) If Sam had taken the jacket, it would not have gone unmentioned, it would not be addressed with a mere look. Sam is punished for simply reminding John he exists, for taking up space and advocating for his emotional and physical needs all throughout childhood. Taking the jacket would be further encroaching on John's adamant ignorance of the child with something ever so slightly wrong with him that he can't quite look at. Taking the jacket would force John to look too closely. And we can't have that.

But the jacket is grief, the jacket is fatherly comfort taken by force. And so Sam doesn't get that. Doesn't grow up feeling safe around John, isn't allowed to grieve or acknowledge or feel his mother's death. He sees how he is excluded and grows resentful, more vocal about other areas he isn't supported. Goes on about moving around too much, because he can't shrug into the fantom hug of his father for support as he moves through school after school, drifting. Not even tethered to John, not even tethered to the grief that defines his family so deeply.

The hair isn’t what's startling about her. It’s the oversized brown leather jacket she’s swathed in, the sleeves uncuffed that her hands just barely peek out from, that ends at the middle of her thighs. It looks like a piece of armor on her. It looks like a blanket on her. It looks startling like a mirror to Dean, who knows that jacket well.

Or: Claire's got some emotional turmoil in a stolen oversized leather jacket. Dean remembers the feeling.