Part Seven: You Only Feel It When It’s Lost
On the morning of May 2, Sam and Dean hit the road, bound for Lincoln, Nebraska, over seven hours away. They figure they’ll start there, as they probably did on the morning this whole craziness began, and head to Lebanon, passing through Cortland just as the lunar eclipse hits its maximum.
“The moon will be at apogee tonight,” Sam explains as he studies his notes. “So the eclipse itself will last almost two hours.”
They stop for dinner at the bar and grille where they spent the first evening of their time in this monster-free universe. “You Shook Me All Night Long” blares from the jukebox. A hard-living woman in her forties takes their order, and Dean doesn’t even flirt with her. He’s too focused on Sam and the butterflies in his gut over what they’re about to do.
“It’s really all on your Sam,” Sam tells Dean as Dean downs his second shot of tequila. “There’s nothing for us to do but to try to be in the right place at the right time.”
“You know, there is another possibility,” Dean says as he takes a bite of his burger.
Sam starts to look away, so Dean opens his mouth, full of half-chewed food, just to see the grossed-out expression on Sam’s face. He grins, satisfied, and finishes chewing the bite.
“What are you talking about?” Sam asks, obviously irritated.
“Well, there’s a lot of universes out there,” Dean notes. “What’s to say your Dean and my Sam ended up together?”
Sam shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter,” he insists. “If I ended up in a universe without you, or another version of you, I’d do the exact same thing. I’d try to fix it.”
“But what if the universe where my Sam ended up doesn’t have magic?”
“Then I’d do what we’re doing,” Sam says. “I’d assume some version of me in a universe where there is magic would be trying to fix things.”
Dean takes another bite of his burger, washes it down with his beer.
“Hurts my head to think about,” he admits.
Sam smiles. “Yeah, well, don’t strain yourself. We Sams got it covered.”
“Haha. Very funny.” Dean’s dick perks up at the thought of multiple Sams, as it’s done a lot over the past year. “Hey, even if this works, how do we know we’ll end up in the right universes?”
“We don’t,” Sam admits, stirring his salad. “But there’s a theory that says that things will always try to return to their proper place if given the means and opportunity. Like a rubber band that snaps back into place if you let it go. It’s just a theory, but it’s one that makes sense to me. You and I don’t belong here. Getting back to where we once belonged shouldn’t take much, given the right circumstances.”
“Our lives as a Beatles song,” Dean muses. “Okay.”
As if on cue, “Get Back” comes on the jukebox.
“I’ll take that as a sign,” Dean says, winking at Sam.
Sam ducks his head, but Dean can see his blush, his broad grin and gorgeous dimples. Sam’s so easy. Dean’s still got it. Sam laughing and blushing at his stupid jokes is so familiar.
Sam glances at his watch. “Okay. Time to go.”
Dean pulls out his wallet, leaves some bills on the table.
“You okay to drive?” Sam asks, being an asshole because he can see for himself that Dean’s only had one beer. Plus the tequila shot, but only one of those, so Sam knows damn well Dean’s fine to drive.
“Fuck you.”
Sam smirks, which is also familiar and makes Dean’s chest bloom warm with love. He’ll never understand how this Sam can be so much like Dean’s brother but not be his brother. It shouldn’t be possible.
The thought of getting back home to his brother makes Dean’s stomach flutter.
//**//**//
The night air is cool and clean, another thing Dean’s gotten used to in this universe. Half the population means a lot less pollution. This is overall a healthier universe, Dean suspects.
The moon has already risen, bright and round, in a nearly cloudless sky. Nature is cooperating, for once. The eclipse will be as clear as day, so to speak. As Dean slides behind the wheel of the Impala, he’s suddenly overcome by emotion. If everything goes right, this will be his and this Sam’s last ride.
“What?” Sam’s staring at him because he’s just sitting there, hands on the wheel.
Before he can second-guess himself, Dean sits back, slides an arm along the seat back till he’s got his fingers tangled in Sam’s hair, beckons Sam to lead closer so Dean can kiss him.
“Happy Birthday,” he says when he lets Sam go.
Sam’s gazing at him, eyes bright in the moonlight.
“I’ll always remember you,” he reminds Dean. “The memories we made over this past year or so, that’ll always be part of me.”
Dean shakes his head, sliding his hand through Sam’s hair one last time before pulling his hand back, reaching down to turn the key in the ignition. The car roars to life.
“Your brother is gonna be so jealous,” he notes as he pulls out of the parking lot. When Sam doesn’t say anything, Dean adds, “You gonna tell him?”
“Hell no,” Sam says, shaking his head firmly. “But he’ll figure it out anyway.”
They don’t talk as they drive south on Route 77. Cortland is only twenty minutes away, and as they drive through there’s no sign of life except a lighted service station with no cars at the pump. They don’t pass any cars on the road, either, and Dean wonders vaguely if another wave of plague deaths hit the area the previous winter. The college where Sam worked and went to school had closed for a month after the Christmas holidays due to the newest strain of the virus, but news media had stopped reporting deaths a long time ago, especially deaths in other parts of the country. Too demoralizing. Dean was just grateful to keep Sam home safe.
As they pull out of Cortland, Dean slows down, then pulls over onto the shoulder at the five-mile marker.
“No sense driving off the road,” he mutters. “I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be parked when this thing happens. If it happens.”
Sam says nothing, but he seems to agree.
As the eclipse begins, they sit silently and watch, ignoring the creeping cold.
“Why is it red like that?” Dean asks when the Earth’s shadow completely covers the moon. The moon looks like it’s covered in blood.
“It’s the sun reflecting off the Earth’s atmosphere,” Sam says. “Perfectly normal.”
“Huh.” Dean reaches across the seat, takes Sam’s hand. “Now what?”
Sam shrugs. “Now we wait.”
It’s colder now, so Dean takes his hand back so that he can turn the car on and run the heater, just for a couple of minutes. The heat makes him drowsy, and he scoots down on the seat, crosses his arms so that his hands are tucked under his armpits.
“How long does it take?” Dean knows he sounds peevish. He’s never been a patient man. He hates waiting. He wants to find a motel and a hot shower.
“Could be as much as two hours,” Sam says.
Dean closes his eyes, just to rest them for a moment, he tells himself. He’s sick of staring at the stupid moon. Wishes he was in a nice soft bed.
Something startles him awake. Sam’s gone. The moon is bright and full and un-eclipsed. Dean panics. How long was he out? How could he have fallen asleep? Where was Sam?
“Dean!”
Dean’s head snaps up at the sound of his brother’s voice, and there he is, standing in the headlights, chest heaving as if he’s been running, tall and beautiful and perfect.
Sam, Dean’s brother.
Dean’s out of the car without thinking, crossing around the front of the car to gather Sam into his arms, and he can tell right away that this is his Sam because the big guy resists the hug, just a little. Dean had almost forgotten he did that.
Then Sam folds himself against Dean like the little brother he’s always been, melting into Dean’s embrace with relief stamped all over him. He can tell this is his Dean. Dean can just feel it.
“You did it,” Dean breathes, practically shaking with relief. He hasn’t let himself miss his brother until this moment, until he’s finally got him back. It wasn’t something he let himself think about, losing Sam.
Of course, he had that other Sam, who seemed so familiar that it was easy to pretend he hadn’t lost his brother at all.
But now, having his brother hunched and curled around him with his chin on Dean’s shoulder, his head pressed to Dean’s, he can’t imagine how he survived without him.
When Sam starts to pull away, it’s too soon. Dean lets him go reluctantly, clinging until the last moment, then holding him by the shoulders at arm's length.
“Let me look at you.”
Sam tolerates Dean’s gaze for another moment, then steps back, out of reach.
“Why weren’t you here six months ago?”
“Six months ago?” Dean frowns.
“The last lunar eclipse. I thought for sure you’d figure it out then.”
Sam’s shaking a little, pacing in front of Dean to mask the movement.
“We didn’t know,” Dean admits. “We only figured it out a little while ago.”
“You had that other me with you, didn’t you?” Dean could swear he notices a tightening of Sam’s jaw, a reflective flash of anger and hurt in his eyes. Jealousy, maybe.
“Well, yeah,” Dean says, shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans, just to keep himself from reaching for Sam again. “But there was no magic in that universe. No spells. Sam didn’t have any powers. Couldn’t work any mojo at all.”
“None at all?” Sam blinks, obviously surprised. “No psychic ability? Nothing?”
Dean shakes his head. “Nor monsters, neither. That universe was completely free of everything scary or spooky. No demons, no angels, no ghosts, although there were a shit-ton of dead people. Plagues. Wiped out half the world’s population and kept coming back for more.”
“Yikes.” Sam winces.
“Yeah. If we’d stayed there much longer, we might have got sick, too.” Dean shakes his head. “People gave up on vaccines ‘cause they didn’t really seem to help much. It was a dying world, that place.”
Sam stops pacing. “Wow. So you weren’t hunting.”
“Nothin’ to hunt,” Dean says with a shrug.
“So what did you do?”
“We drove around a lot, went back to old hunting grounds, tried to find old friends, any sign of hunters or anything that might be our kind of thing.”
Dean pulls his hands out of his pockets, shoves them under his armpits for warmth.
“Hey, man, it’s fuckin’ freezing out here. You mind if we take this back to the bunker?”
Sam’s gaze drops to the ground, and Dean can tell he’s nervous.
“What? You think maybe I’m not human?” he asks. “You wanna run the tests?”
“No, no, I’m sure you’re you,” Sam assures him. He looks around, back the way he came, as if he expects to see something, or someone.
“What?” Dean presses. “Did you leave something by the side of the road?”
“No,” Sam shakes his head. He’s shivering. “I’m sure it’s gone.”
“The spell bowl?”
Sam rolls his eyes. “The Impala. The other one.”
Dean whirls around, stares at his car. “What other one? Are you telling me there’s another Impala in some other universe?”
“Probably all the universes,” Sam says. “At least the ones with us in them.”
“Oh, no way,” Dean groans. “There’s only one Baby, you can’t tell me anything different. I won’t believe you.”
Sam rolls his eyes. “Whatever. Let’s go home.”
As he heads toward the driver’s side door, Dean’s certain that Sam’s referring to the car, not the bunker, just as he always does.
“So,” Dean says as he slides behind the wheel, reaching for the ignition. “The other me. What was he like?”
Dean feels weirdly jealous just asking, but he wants to know. He wants to hear all about that other universe. For reasons.
Sam frowns. “Just like you,” he admits. “Mostly.”
“Yeah?” Dean revs the engine, just for good measure. “And what did you and he get up to?”
He doesn’t mean it in a lewd way, but he shoots a quick side-eye at Sam anyway.
Sam’s just staring out the windshield, jaw clenched. Normal.
“Usual things,” he says with a shrug. “Hunting, killing monsters, saving a few people.”
“What happened to Michael?” Dean’s almost afraid to ask. He doesn’t sense the archangel in his head, so that’s good.
“Jack killed him,” Sam says.
Shivers run up Dean’s spine. “Okay, I’ll bite. What happened to Jack?”
Sam lets out a long sigh. “It’s a long story, Dean. Can we just get back to the bunker? Miracle needs to get out for a walk.”
“Miracle?”
Sam nods. “Your dog. Or rather, his dog. The other Dean adopted him.”
Dean’s flabbergasted. Dogs were always Sam’s thing. Dean doesn’t even like dogs.
“So how soon did you figure it out?”
Dean can feel Sam’s eyes on him, can almost feel him trying to figure out how much he should say, which is how Dean knows things got weird with that other Dean. Of course they did.
“He hates pie, loves dogs, never saw a smartphone in his life,” Sam says like he’s listing ingredients to a spell. “Didn’t take long.”
“He hates pie?” Dean tries to remember the last time he had a good piece of pie. Probably not at the last place he ate because he was too busy drinking. “Anything else?”
He feels Sam’s eyes on him again. So he knows. He knows.
Then Sam looks away, huffs out a breath. “Nothing important. Wasn’t a big deal. We were a little busy, with all the Michael stuff, then Chuck came back and started murdering worlds.”
“Murdering worlds?”
“Yeah. Apocalypse World wasn’t the only other universe, obviously,” Sam says. “We had to neutralize Chuck before he destroyed our universe, not to mention the one you were in.”
“How did you neutralize Chuck?”
“Jack did it,” Sam says with a shrug, like it’s nothing. “He’s in charge now.”
Dean blinks, genuinely shocked. He wasn’t expecting that.
“Lucifer’s kid’s in charge of the universe,” he states, fully expecting Sam to correct him. That just can’t be right.
But Sam shrugs again, like it’s nothing. Again.
“Jack’s in charge of all the universes, I guess,” he confirms. “He’s the new God.”
“Right.” Dean starts to roll his eyes, realizes Sam’s serious, and frowns instead. “Okay then.”
Dean thinks about this for a moment, then asks, “Does he still live in the bunker?”
“No, Dean.” Sam sounds annoyed. Good. “He’s God. He lives -- everywhere. And nowhere. He doesn’t technically live at all.”
“Right.”
They ride in silence for a few minutes. Dean thinks he recognizes the diner where he and the other Sam had lunch, after this whole thing started, a year-and-a-half ago. It’s closed and dark now, surrounded by more buildings than it was in the other, emptier universe, but it’s still called Mae’s.
Dean wonders if Gladys is still working there, if she ever did, here.
His head hurts.
Then a thought occurs to him. “Did you ever find out how we ended up in different universes without our memories?”
Sam nods. “Yeah. It was a job we did in Lincoln. Necromancer named Iaculus. He was killing people and eating parts of them to increase his power. We killed him but missed the fact that he had a brother, almost as powerful. Dude hexed us by separating us from each other, like we did to him and his brother.”
Sam shifts on the bench, won’t meet Dean’s eyes when Dean glances over. “Needless to say, his spell didn’t work quite the way he expected.”
Dean nods. “Instead of separating us, it made me fall into that dying universe and spit out a replacement for you.”
Sam takes a deep breath, letting it out again on a long sigh. “Yeah.”
“So forgetting everything that happened in Lincoln was part of the hex?”
“It was a side effect, yeah,” Sam agrees. “Reversing the spell was the first thing we tried. All that did was give us back our memories of what happened, which gave us enough to track down the brother.”
“I still don’t remember,” Dean says. “Not that it matters now.”
He feels Sam’s eyes on him, glances over just in time to catch Sam looking away quickly.
“What?” he prompts, unable to stop himself.
Sam takes a deep breath, pushes his hands down his legs like he’s wiping the sweat off them, although it isn’t even a little hot in the car.
“Nothing.”
“Sammy, you gotta do better than that,” Dean admonishes. “What’s eating you?”
Sam shakes his head. “You were gone eighteen months, Dean,” he says. “In a world without anything to hunt. I just keep wondering, what did you do?”
Dean shrugs. “I told you. We drove around to the scenes of all our old hunts, looking for any sign of folks that knew us, any signs that we ever hunted there, that kind of thing. Sam had a list, actually. Remembered every damn hunt, practically. As you would, if you had to.”
Sam nods thoughtfully. “How did you figure out he wasn’t me?”
Dean chuckles. “Same way you did,” he says. “Little things. I had a hunch right from those first few minutes in the car when you were looking at a real live map because you didn’t have GPS on your phone.”
Sam smiles. “Yeah. At first, I thought you were just being extra annoying, pretending not to know how to google something when we stopped for lunch.”
“Weird, them coming from a universe without tech,” Dean notes.
“You said the universe you landed in didn’t have smartphones either?”
Dean shakes his head. “We figured maybe the plague triggered a worldwide economic slowdown, right at the time things were speeding up here in our world. But Sam’s world didn’t have the plague, so maybe it was just a weird coincidence.”
Sam nods. “Probably. Weird, though.”
“Not half as weird as other-Me getting a dog,” Dean grumbles.
Lebanon looks just the way it should, thankfully, quaint little downtown area just as Dean remembers, before the nightmare of that other universe, where Lebanon was almost totally deserted.
He finds himself gripping the steering wheel as he turns off the main road out of town and onto the little side road toward the bunker. As soon as he heads down toward the riverbed, the bank rises up along the road, and Dean lets out the breath he didn’t even know he was holding. The bunker sits under the old abandoned power plant, just as it always has, the driveway down into the garage tucked around behind where it can’t be seen from the road.
Dean stops the car in front of the main doorway, slides out of the car with a contented sigh.
“Home sweet home.”
He pulls the key out of his pocket, marveling at the hope it represents. He could’ve left it in Carbondale, assuming they wouldn’t succeed. That would’ve been fine, in fact. But he brought it, believing in Sam’s ability to get them home.
He feels a pang of loss when he thinks about that other life, that other Sam, but then he pushes it down deep, determined never to think about it again. He’s back. His life can go on here just as it would’ve if he’d never left.
Dean strides with confidence to the steps leading down to the bunker’s front door, Sam at his heels. The bunker door makes its familiar clanging echo as he pushes it open.
“You left the lights on,” Dean notes.
Sam nods. “For Miracle.”
As if on cue, Dean hears the tap-tap of doggie toenails on the polished floors, coming from the direction of the bedrooms, his and Sam’s. As they descend the stairs, a furry, yellow mutt rounds the corner, sliding a little in his obvious excitement. He heads straight to Dean, then hesitates, ears twitching comically.
“It’s okay, boy,” Sam says, crossing around Dean to squat down and give Miracle a reassuring petting. “This is my brother,” he tells the dog.
Miracle whines and pushes his nose up under Sam’s hand.
“I know, boy. He doesn’t smell the same, does he?”
“I smell fine,” Dean insists gruffly. “He better not be sleeping in my bed.”
When Sam doesn’t answer, Dean growls, “You let him sleep in my bed? What the hell, Sam?”
Sam looks up, still fluffing Miracle’s sad face. “He really took to you, Dean. The other you.”
“Well, I’m home now,” Dean says, tamping down his anger at the way the other Dean obviously made himself at home here. Probably in more ways than Dean cares to think about. “He can damn well find someplace else to sleep.”
Sam nods, slides to his feet, and beckons the dog to follow him back up the stairs.
“Come on, boy, let’s get you outside for a walk.”
Miracle follows Sam up the stairs, limping a little, and Dean almost feels sorry for him. The dog was obviously expecting somebody else when he heard the roar of the Impala’s engine.
While Sam walks the dog, Dean explores the bunker, looking for signs of his doppelgänger. The kitchen’s well-stocked, and Dean grabs a beer to take to his bedroom.
The smell of dog is overpowering. Miracle obviously slept here. The other Dean let a dog sleep in Dean’s room. In his bed.
Out of a morbid curiosity that Dean doesn’t fully understand, he walks down the hall to Sam’s room, pushing the door open. There’s no dog smell in here. Sam’s room is in its usual messy state, bed unmade, dirty socks in the sink.
Sam doesn’t leave his socks in the sink. That’s something Dean does to annoy him.
Dean sniffs, gets a whiff of Sam’s sweat, Sam’s musk in the stale air.
There’s something else, something bitter and slightly salty.
Sex.
Okay. So Sam’s been wacking off. Recently. That’s allowed, isn’t it?
So why does Dean suspect there’s any more to it than that?
Just because Dean and the other Sam got up to some sexy times, doesn’t mean Sam and the other Dean did.
Does it?
No. No way. Because that would mean that Sam wanted that, all this time, and Dean never knew. Dean never guessed, in his wildest dreams, that Sam wanted that.
Which is why it never happened. Because if Sam had ever given the slightest hint, ever, Dean would’ve known.
Wouldn’t he? Sam’s a good liar, but that’s not something a guy can keep secret for an entire lifetime, not even Sam. Even when that other Sam admitted it was that way between him and his Dean, that didn’t mean that Dean’s brother felt like that. Dean had already worked that through in his mind, had already convinced himself that his Sam didn’t feel that way, no matter what the other Sam said.
So there’s just no way Dean’s brother and that other Dean got up to anything. No way Sam and that other Dean had sex. With each other.
And even if they did, it didn’t mean Sam felt that way about him. His own brother.
The front door clangs open and Dean jumps. Shit.
By the time Sam brings the dog back down the steps, then takes it into the kitchen for food and water, Dean is already stripping the sheets off his bed to launder. By the time Sam and the dog retreat to Sam’s room, Dean’s in the shower, washing off the whole multi-verse experience and looking forward to getting back to normal.
For some reason Dean can’t possibly explain, he’s too shy to go back to his room for sleep clothes after his shower, so he pads down the hallway with nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist, intending to sleep naked in the guest room. It’s only for one night, after all. Tomorrow he’ll wash the sheets and air out his room so he can move back in, where he belongs.
He’s just passing Sam’s door when it opens. Sam wears his sweatpants and the t-shirt he usually wears to bed, a look of surprise on his face when he sees Dean standing in the hall. It shouldn’t be awkward. Dean’s got a towel on, after all.
“Oh.” Sam’s gaze slips down Dean’s body, then skitters away as Dean stands frozen, anticipation making butterflies in his belly for reasons he won’t acknowledge.
Sam clears his throat. “Were you in here earlier?” It’s almost an accusation, but something in Sam’s voice makes him sound tentative. Maybe even a little hopeful.
“No,” Dean lies, puffing out his chest. “Why would I?”
“Huh.” Sam reaches over to his bureau. “Because you dropped your keys.”
Sam hands him the keys, and Dean’s too stunned to refuse. He takes them in his free hand, his other hand still clutching the towel around his waist.
“Thanks.”
Dean should leave. He knows that, but he can’t seem to move. The other Sam’s words are in his head again, urging him to say something. To tell Sam how he feels, that’s it. It’s now or possibly never, and what he had with that other Sam was just too good to pass up on here and now, with his Sam. The one he loves more than anyone, including that other Sam. If he keeps burying it, he knows that it’ll be the end of him. Somehow, sometime, he’ll slip up and get himself killed, too reckless and distracted by his own feelings for Sam, his own refusal to acknowledge the elephant in the room. It’ll be there on every hunt, tripping him up, making him a liability. He’ll die and separate himself from his brother, possibly forever, and Sam will never know, just like that monster in Lincoln, the one they killed. The one whose brother cursed them to live out their lives in separate universes. The one Dean can’t remember killing.
He has to do something. He’s fairly sure his life depends on it, although he can’t work out how exactly.
“Sam.”
“Dean.”
Sam’s eyes are wide and frightened. He’s got that expression he gets when he’s feeling lost and confused, when he needs Dean to step up and lead the way, to reassure him that everything’s gonna be okay.
“You go first,” Sam insists, and Dean decides that’s permission enough.
He steps up, right into Sam’s personal space, rising up on his tiptoes, and plants a chaste kiss on his lips, quickly but firmly, so there’s no mistake. It’s reassuring, he reasons as he steps back.
Sam’s eyes blink open in shock. He touches the tips of his fingers to his lips, obviously not quite believing what just happened.
Dean shrugs, shuffles his feet.
“Yeah. That other Sam said I should tell you, but I’m no good with words, so. Now you know.”
“So you and the other Sam.” Sam’s voice drops to a whisper, like it’s a secret.
“Yeah, well.” Dean looks down at Sam’s chest, then away. “He and his brother had been -- you know -- since that first year after Stanford. So.”
Sam frowns. “He thought you were his brother?”
“No! God, no.” Dean’s eyes widen, shocked at Sam thinking he would deliberately pull off that kind of deception. “He just got sad, you know? Missed his brother something awful.”
“Yeah.” Sam takes a deep breath. He scrapes his hand over his jaw, scratches the back of his head. “Me, too.”
“So you two.” Dean waves his hand between them, like he’s referring to him and Sam, instead of Sam and that other Dean.
“He didn’t exactly have a filter,” Sam says. “He was pretty honest with me, which was a little weird, frankly. When I told him we never -- never -” Sam waves his hand between them in an exact mirror of Dean’s gesture. “He got all protective and indignant on my behalf. Called you some choice names.”
Dean huffs out a breath. “Yeah, I’ll bet he did.”
“He -- he knew exactly how to get through my defenses. He could push buttons I didn’t even know I had, you know?” Sam’s eyes widen in fear, like he’s said the wrong thing.
Dean shakes his head. “I know what you’re saying. Sam -- that other Sam -- knew things about me that I just never - “ He clears his throat. “Anyway.”
Sam bites his lower lip and Dean watches, fascinated.
“He said you always -- even when we were kids.” Sam draws in a deep breath. “I didn’t believe him at first. It just didn’t seem possible. You never -- well, mostly never. At least not until after you picked me up at Stanford. And even then, I couldn’t be sure. Like, did I imagine that? And later, I was sure I was just imagining it. Then after Hell, I couldn’t be sure of anything anymore.”
“Sam,” Dean puts his hand up, finds the keys still dangling from his fingers. He licks his lips, glances up to find Sam staring at them, his own lips parted and damp. “You wanna take this to the guest bedroom?”
Sam’s eyes widen again, and Dean hastens to add, “I mean, I’m not sleeping in my room tonight, and yours smells like a brothel.”
Sam nods, follows Dean down the hallway to the guest bedroom, where Dean shuts the door behind them after flicking on the desk lamp and setting his keys down.
When he turns back to Sam, the kid’s just standing there, big hands dangling at his sides, looking lost and hopeful at the same time. Dean takes a breath and drops the towel to the floor. He steps into Sam’s personal space, reaching up to take his beautiful face between his hands. Sam’s shaking. He sets his hands on Dean’s waist, warm and real, long thumbs stroking Dean’s skin, making him shiver.
“I - ,” Dean murmurs, willing Sam to understand, to soak up all the love Dean feels for him. They don’t need this to express their love for each other. They already love each other more than anyone on the planet ever loved anybody. Dean’s sure of that.
“I know,” Sam nods, eyes filming over with emotion. “Me, too.”
He tips his head down and Dean goes up on tip-toes, slides his hands into Sam’s hair as their mouths meet.
The kiss is slow, tentative at first, just a press and release, but they already know how to do this. They’ve learned it from that other Sam and Dean. It’s new but it’s familiar, comfortable, like they’ve been doing this all their lives.
And when the kiss deepens and Sam’s big hands rove down over Dean’s back and ass, that’s familiar, too. Dean kisses Sam’s huge, sweaty neck and he already knows that if he applies suction in just the right place, Sam will moan.
Sam moans against his mouth and Dean feels the vibration all the way down to his toes. His cock is hard and leaking, pressed up against Sam’s thigh like it belongs there, like it’s already a part of Sam. Like all of Dean has always been a part of Sam. Dean doesn’t exist without Sam. That’s just the way it’s always been.
They end up necking and rubbing off on each other, gasping out their orgasms with a minimum of foreplay.
In the afterglow, as they lie tangled together on the bed, Dean has a terrible thought.
“Where’s the dog?”
Sam makes a sad little sound in the back of his throat. “He’s probably sleeping on his doggy bed in the pantry.”
“You got him a doggy bed?”
“Dean did,” Sam admits. “The other Dean. The one that loves dogs.”
Dean feels criticized. Inadequate. Jealous.
Hopelessly in love.
“As long as he’s not in my room,” Dean grumbles.
Sam’s got his head tucked under Dean’s chin, almost exactly the way he used to sleep when they were little. He tips his face up, pressing a kiss against Dean’s throat.
“He only sleeps there when the other Dean’s gone,” Sam says softly. “As long as you keep your door shut, he’ll sleep in his doggy bed.”
“He better,” Dean says. He tips his face down, breathes in Sam’s soft hair, fills his lungs with the scent of Sam’s fruity shampoo and sweat.
“You think they’re back together? The other Sam and Dean?”
Sam snuggles closer, making himself impossibly small against Dean’s chest, like he’s nesting there.
“I hope so. I think so. Yeah, probably.”
“Good,” Dean says. “Good.”
He hopes they’ll be happy, after everything. He thinks about something that other Sam had told him, about how he collected retirement brochures, hoping he could talk his Dean into the kind of life he and Dean had in Carbondale. A normal life, without the constant threat of separation by death.
He vows to talk about it with Sam one of these days, now that Chuck’s out of the picture. Now that Jack’s in charge. Dean doesn’t completely trust Jack, but he knows that Sam does, and that’s good enough.
Now that he knows that Sam really wishes for them to settle down and stop hunting so much, maybe Dean can find his way to considering that possibility.
After all, he and that other Sam had a nice life in Carbondale. It felt good, not being under the constant threat of imminent death or injury. He and that other Sam had managed to build a home together, one that didn’t involve monsters and killing. Dean managed to put the hunting life behind him with barely any regrets or guilt at all.
It might be a little harder to do, here in this universe that will always have something out there that needs killing. Here where the killing will never stop until one or both Winchesters are dead.
But Dean knows now that there’s a third option, a semi-retirement in which Dean and Sam can be happy and safe. He also knows that Sam wants that for them, that he’s ready to show Dean the way to that life, whenever Dean’s ready.
Dean’s a lucky man. He has a life partner who loves him more than he deserves, who wants to grow old with him because it really does beat the alternative with all its soul-selling and Hell dealing. They can finally put all that behind them.
All Dean needs to do is trust his brother. Finally.
Dean tips his face down into Sam’s hair and closes his eyes.
fin
BACK TO MASTERPOST
“The moon will be at apogee tonight,” Sam explains as he studies his notes. “So the eclipse itself will last almost two hours.”
They stop for dinner at the bar and grille where they spent the first evening of their time in this monster-free universe. “You Shook Me All Night Long” blares from the jukebox. A hard-living woman in her forties takes their order, and Dean doesn’t even flirt with her. He’s too focused on Sam and the butterflies in his gut over what they’re about to do.
“It’s really all on your Sam,” Sam tells Dean as Dean downs his second shot of tequila. “There’s nothing for us to do but to try to be in the right place at the right time.”
“You know, there is another possibility,” Dean says as he takes a bite of his burger.
Sam starts to look away, so Dean opens his mouth, full of half-chewed food, just to see the grossed-out expression on Sam’s face. He grins, satisfied, and finishes chewing the bite.
“What are you talking about?” Sam asks, obviously irritated.
“Well, there’s a lot of universes out there,” Dean notes. “What’s to say your Dean and my Sam ended up together?”
Sam shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter,” he insists. “If I ended up in a universe without you, or another version of you, I’d do the exact same thing. I’d try to fix it.”
“But what if the universe where my Sam ended up doesn’t have magic?”
“Then I’d do what we’re doing,” Sam says. “I’d assume some version of me in a universe where there is magic would be trying to fix things.”
Dean takes another bite of his burger, washes it down with his beer.
“Hurts my head to think about,” he admits.
Sam smiles. “Yeah, well, don’t strain yourself. We Sams got it covered.”
“Haha. Very funny.” Dean’s dick perks up at the thought of multiple Sams, as it’s done a lot over the past year. “Hey, even if this works, how do we know we’ll end up in the right universes?”
“We don’t,” Sam admits, stirring his salad. “But there’s a theory that says that things will always try to return to their proper place if given the means and opportunity. Like a rubber band that snaps back into place if you let it go. It’s just a theory, but it’s one that makes sense to me. You and I don’t belong here. Getting back to where we once belonged shouldn’t take much, given the right circumstances.”
“Our lives as a Beatles song,” Dean muses. “Okay.”
As if on cue, “Get Back” comes on the jukebox.
“I’ll take that as a sign,” Dean says, winking at Sam.
Sam ducks his head, but Dean can see his blush, his broad grin and gorgeous dimples. Sam’s so easy. Dean’s still got it. Sam laughing and blushing at his stupid jokes is so familiar.
Sam glances at his watch. “Okay. Time to go.”
Dean pulls out his wallet, leaves some bills on the table.
“You okay to drive?” Sam asks, being an asshole because he can see for himself that Dean’s only had one beer. Plus the tequila shot, but only one of those, so Sam knows damn well Dean’s fine to drive.
“Fuck you.”
Sam smirks, which is also familiar and makes Dean’s chest bloom warm with love. He’ll never understand how this Sam can be so much like Dean’s brother but not be his brother. It shouldn’t be possible.
The thought of getting back home to his brother makes Dean’s stomach flutter.
//**//**//
The night air is cool and clean, another thing Dean’s gotten used to in this universe. Half the population means a lot less pollution. This is overall a healthier universe, Dean suspects.
The moon has already risen, bright and round, in a nearly cloudless sky. Nature is cooperating, for once. The eclipse will be as clear as day, so to speak. As Dean slides behind the wheel of the Impala, he’s suddenly overcome by emotion. If everything goes right, this will be his and this Sam’s last ride.
“What?” Sam’s staring at him because he’s just sitting there, hands on the wheel.
Before he can second-guess himself, Dean sits back, slides an arm along the seat back till he’s got his fingers tangled in Sam’s hair, beckons Sam to lead closer so Dean can kiss him.
“Happy Birthday,” he says when he lets Sam go.
Sam’s gazing at him, eyes bright in the moonlight.
“I’ll always remember you,” he reminds Dean. “The memories we made over this past year or so, that’ll always be part of me.”
Dean shakes his head, sliding his hand through Sam’s hair one last time before pulling his hand back, reaching down to turn the key in the ignition. The car roars to life.
“Your brother is gonna be so jealous,” he notes as he pulls out of the parking lot. When Sam doesn’t say anything, Dean adds, “You gonna tell him?”
“Hell no,” Sam says, shaking his head firmly. “But he’ll figure it out anyway.”
They don’t talk as they drive south on Route 77. Cortland is only twenty minutes away, and as they drive through there’s no sign of life except a lighted service station with no cars at the pump. They don’t pass any cars on the road, either, and Dean wonders vaguely if another wave of plague deaths hit the area the previous winter. The college where Sam worked and went to school had closed for a month after the Christmas holidays due to the newest strain of the virus, but news media had stopped reporting deaths a long time ago, especially deaths in other parts of the country. Too demoralizing. Dean was just grateful to keep Sam home safe.
As they pull out of Cortland, Dean slows down, then pulls over onto the shoulder at the five-mile marker.
“No sense driving off the road,” he mutters. “I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be parked when this thing happens. If it happens.”
Sam says nothing, but he seems to agree.
As the eclipse begins, they sit silently and watch, ignoring the creeping cold.
“Why is it red like that?” Dean asks when the Earth’s shadow completely covers the moon. The moon looks like it’s covered in blood.
“It’s the sun reflecting off the Earth’s atmosphere,” Sam says. “Perfectly normal.”
“Huh.” Dean reaches across the seat, takes Sam’s hand. “Now what?”
Sam shrugs. “Now we wait.”
It’s colder now, so Dean takes his hand back so that he can turn the car on and run the heater, just for a couple of minutes. The heat makes him drowsy, and he scoots down on the seat, crosses his arms so that his hands are tucked under his armpits.
“How long does it take?” Dean knows he sounds peevish. He’s never been a patient man. He hates waiting. He wants to find a motel and a hot shower.
“Could be as much as two hours,” Sam says.
Dean closes his eyes, just to rest them for a moment, he tells himself. He’s sick of staring at the stupid moon. Wishes he was in a nice soft bed.
Something startles him awake. Sam’s gone. The moon is bright and full and un-eclipsed. Dean panics. How long was he out? How could he have fallen asleep? Where was Sam?
“Dean!”
Dean’s head snaps up at the sound of his brother’s voice, and there he is, standing in the headlights, chest heaving as if he’s been running, tall and beautiful and perfect.
Sam, Dean’s brother.
Dean’s out of the car without thinking, crossing around the front of the car to gather Sam into his arms, and he can tell right away that this is his Sam because the big guy resists the hug, just a little. Dean had almost forgotten he did that.
Then Sam folds himself against Dean like the little brother he’s always been, melting into Dean’s embrace with relief stamped all over him. He can tell this is his Dean. Dean can just feel it.
“You did it,” Dean breathes, practically shaking with relief. He hasn’t let himself miss his brother until this moment, until he’s finally got him back. It wasn’t something he let himself think about, losing Sam.
Of course, he had that other Sam, who seemed so familiar that it was easy to pretend he hadn’t lost his brother at all.
But now, having his brother hunched and curled around him with his chin on Dean’s shoulder, his head pressed to Dean’s, he can’t imagine how he survived without him.
When Sam starts to pull away, it’s too soon. Dean lets him go reluctantly, clinging until the last moment, then holding him by the shoulders at arm's length.
“Let me look at you.”
Sam tolerates Dean’s gaze for another moment, then steps back, out of reach.
“Why weren’t you here six months ago?”
“Six months ago?” Dean frowns.
“The last lunar eclipse. I thought for sure you’d figure it out then.”
Sam’s shaking a little, pacing in front of Dean to mask the movement.
“We didn’t know,” Dean admits. “We only figured it out a little while ago.”
“You had that other me with you, didn’t you?” Dean could swear he notices a tightening of Sam’s jaw, a reflective flash of anger and hurt in his eyes. Jealousy, maybe.
“Well, yeah,” Dean says, shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans, just to keep himself from reaching for Sam again. “But there was no magic in that universe. No spells. Sam didn’t have any powers. Couldn’t work any mojo at all.”
“None at all?” Sam blinks, obviously surprised. “No psychic ability? Nothing?”
Dean shakes his head. “Nor monsters, neither. That universe was completely free of everything scary or spooky. No demons, no angels, no ghosts, although there were a shit-ton of dead people. Plagues. Wiped out half the world’s population and kept coming back for more.”
“Yikes.” Sam winces.
“Yeah. If we’d stayed there much longer, we might have got sick, too.” Dean shakes his head. “People gave up on vaccines ‘cause they didn’t really seem to help much. It was a dying world, that place.”
Sam stops pacing. “Wow. So you weren’t hunting.”
“Nothin’ to hunt,” Dean says with a shrug.
“So what did you do?”
“We drove around a lot, went back to old hunting grounds, tried to find old friends, any sign of hunters or anything that might be our kind of thing.”
Dean pulls his hands out of his pockets, shoves them under his armpits for warmth.
“Hey, man, it’s fuckin’ freezing out here. You mind if we take this back to the bunker?”
Sam’s gaze drops to the ground, and Dean can tell he’s nervous.
“What? You think maybe I’m not human?” he asks. “You wanna run the tests?”
“No, no, I’m sure you’re you,” Sam assures him. He looks around, back the way he came, as if he expects to see something, or someone.
“What?” Dean presses. “Did you leave something by the side of the road?”
“No,” Sam shakes his head. He’s shivering. “I’m sure it’s gone.”
“The spell bowl?”
Sam rolls his eyes. “The Impala. The other one.”
Dean whirls around, stares at his car. “What other one? Are you telling me there’s another Impala in some other universe?”
“Probably all the universes,” Sam says. “At least the ones with us in them.”
“Oh, no way,” Dean groans. “There’s only one Baby, you can’t tell me anything different. I won’t believe you.”
Sam rolls his eyes. “Whatever. Let’s go home.”
As he heads toward the driver’s side door, Dean’s certain that Sam’s referring to the car, not the bunker, just as he always does.
“So,” Dean says as he slides behind the wheel, reaching for the ignition. “The other me. What was he like?”
Dean feels weirdly jealous just asking, but he wants to know. He wants to hear all about that other universe. For reasons.
Sam frowns. “Just like you,” he admits. “Mostly.”
“Yeah?” Dean revs the engine, just for good measure. “And what did you and he get up to?”
He doesn’t mean it in a lewd way, but he shoots a quick side-eye at Sam anyway.
Sam’s just staring out the windshield, jaw clenched. Normal.
“Usual things,” he says with a shrug. “Hunting, killing monsters, saving a few people.”
“What happened to Michael?” Dean’s almost afraid to ask. He doesn’t sense the archangel in his head, so that’s good.
“Jack killed him,” Sam says.
Shivers run up Dean’s spine. “Okay, I’ll bite. What happened to Jack?”
Sam lets out a long sigh. “It’s a long story, Dean. Can we just get back to the bunker? Miracle needs to get out for a walk.”
“Miracle?”
Sam nods. “Your dog. Or rather, his dog. The other Dean adopted him.”
Dean’s flabbergasted. Dogs were always Sam’s thing. Dean doesn’t even like dogs.
“So how soon did you figure it out?”
Dean can feel Sam’s eyes on him, can almost feel him trying to figure out how much he should say, which is how Dean knows things got weird with that other Dean. Of course they did.
“He hates pie, loves dogs, never saw a smartphone in his life,” Sam says like he’s listing ingredients to a spell. “Didn’t take long.”
“He hates pie?” Dean tries to remember the last time he had a good piece of pie. Probably not at the last place he ate because he was too busy drinking. “Anything else?”
He feels Sam’s eyes on him again. So he knows. He knows.
Then Sam looks away, huffs out a breath. “Nothing important. Wasn’t a big deal. We were a little busy, with all the Michael stuff, then Chuck came back and started murdering worlds.”
“Murdering worlds?”
“Yeah. Apocalypse World wasn’t the only other universe, obviously,” Sam says. “We had to neutralize Chuck before he destroyed our universe, not to mention the one you were in.”
“How did you neutralize Chuck?”
“Jack did it,” Sam says with a shrug, like it’s nothing. “He’s in charge now.”
Dean blinks, genuinely shocked. He wasn’t expecting that.
“Lucifer’s kid’s in charge of the universe,” he states, fully expecting Sam to correct him. That just can’t be right.
But Sam shrugs again, like it’s nothing. Again.
“Jack’s in charge of all the universes, I guess,” he confirms. “He’s the new God.”
“Right.” Dean starts to roll his eyes, realizes Sam’s serious, and frowns instead. “Okay then.”
Dean thinks about this for a moment, then asks, “Does he still live in the bunker?”
“No, Dean.” Sam sounds annoyed. Good. “He’s God. He lives -- everywhere. And nowhere. He doesn’t technically live at all.”
“Right.”
They ride in silence for a few minutes. Dean thinks he recognizes the diner where he and the other Sam had lunch, after this whole thing started, a year-and-a-half ago. It’s closed and dark now, surrounded by more buildings than it was in the other, emptier universe, but it’s still called Mae’s.
Dean wonders if Gladys is still working there, if she ever did, here.
His head hurts.
Then a thought occurs to him. “Did you ever find out how we ended up in different universes without our memories?”
Sam nods. “Yeah. It was a job we did in Lincoln. Necromancer named Iaculus. He was killing people and eating parts of them to increase his power. We killed him but missed the fact that he had a brother, almost as powerful. Dude hexed us by separating us from each other, like we did to him and his brother.”
Sam shifts on the bench, won’t meet Dean’s eyes when Dean glances over. “Needless to say, his spell didn’t work quite the way he expected.”
Dean nods. “Instead of separating us, it made me fall into that dying universe and spit out a replacement for you.”
Sam takes a deep breath, letting it out again on a long sigh. “Yeah.”
“So forgetting everything that happened in Lincoln was part of the hex?”
“It was a side effect, yeah,” Sam agrees. “Reversing the spell was the first thing we tried. All that did was give us back our memories of what happened, which gave us enough to track down the brother.”
“I still don’t remember,” Dean says. “Not that it matters now.”
He feels Sam’s eyes on him, glances over just in time to catch Sam looking away quickly.
“What?” he prompts, unable to stop himself.
Sam takes a deep breath, pushes his hands down his legs like he’s wiping the sweat off them, although it isn’t even a little hot in the car.
“Nothing.”
“Sammy, you gotta do better than that,” Dean admonishes. “What’s eating you?”
Sam shakes his head. “You were gone eighteen months, Dean,” he says. “In a world without anything to hunt. I just keep wondering, what did you do?”
Dean shrugs. “I told you. We drove around to the scenes of all our old hunts, looking for any sign of folks that knew us, any signs that we ever hunted there, that kind of thing. Sam had a list, actually. Remembered every damn hunt, practically. As you would, if you had to.”
Sam nods thoughtfully. “How did you figure out he wasn’t me?”
Dean chuckles. “Same way you did,” he says. “Little things. I had a hunch right from those first few minutes in the car when you were looking at a real live map because you didn’t have GPS on your phone.”
Sam smiles. “Yeah. At first, I thought you were just being extra annoying, pretending not to know how to google something when we stopped for lunch.”
“Weird, them coming from a universe without tech,” Dean notes.
“You said the universe you landed in didn’t have smartphones either?”
Dean shakes his head. “We figured maybe the plague triggered a worldwide economic slowdown, right at the time things were speeding up here in our world. But Sam’s world didn’t have the plague, so maybe it was just a weird coincidence.”
Sam nods. “Probably. Weird, though.”
“Not half as weird as other-Me getting a dog,” Dean grumbles.
Lebanon looks just the way it should, thankfully, quaint little downtown area just as Dean remembers, before the nightmare of that other universe, where Lebanon was almost totally deserted.
He finds himself gripping the steering wheel as he turns off the main road out of town and onto the little side road toward the bunker. As soon as he heads down toward the riverbed, the bank rises up along the road, and Dean lets out the breath he didn’t even know he was holding. The bunker sits under the old abandoned power plant, just as it always has, the driveway down into the garage tucked around behind where it can’t be seen from the road.
Dean stops the car in front of the main doorway, slides out of the car with a contented sigh.
“Home sweet home.”
He pulls the key out of his pocket, marveling at the hope it represents. He could’ve left it in Carbondale, assuming they wouldn’t succeed. That would’ve been fine, in fact. But he brought it, believing in Sam’s ability to get them home.
He feels a pang of loss when he thinks about that other life, that other Sam, but then he pushes it down deep, determined never to think about it again. He’s back. His life can go on here just as it would’ve if he’d never left.
Dean strides with confidence to the steps leading down to the bunker’s front door, Sam at his heels. The bunker door makes its familiar clanging echo as he pushes it open.
“You left the lights on,” Dean notes.
Sam nods. “For Miracle.”
As if on cue, Dean hears the tap-tap of doggie toenails on the polished floors, coming from the direction of the bedrooms, his and Sam’s. As they descend the stairs, a furry, yellow mutt rounds the corner, sliding a little in his obvious excitement. He heads straight to Dean, then hesitates, ears twitching comically.
“It’s okay, boy,” Sam says, crossing around Dean to squat down and give Miracle a reassuring petting. “This is my brother,” he tells the dog.
Miracle whines and pushes his nose up under Sam’s hand.
“I know, boy. He doesn’t smell the same, does he?”
“I smell fine,” Dean insists gruffly. “He better not be sleeping in my bed.”
When Sam doesn’t answer, Dean growls, “You let him sleep in my bed? What the hell, Sam?”
Sam looks up, still fluffing Miracle’s sad face. “He really took to you, Dean. The other you.”
“Well, I’m home now,” Dean says, tamping down his anger at the way the other Dean obviously made himself at home here. Probably in more ways than Dean cares to think about. “He can damn well find someplace else to sleep.”
Sam nods, slides to his feet, and beckons the dog to follow him back up the stairs.
“Come on, boy, let’s get you outside for a walk.”
Miracle follows Sam up the stairs, limping a little, and Dean almost feels sorry for him. The dog was obviously expecting somebody else when he heard the roar of the Impala’s engine.
While Sam walks the dog, Dean explores the bunker, looking for signs of his doppelgänger. The kitchen’s well-stocked, and Dean grabs a beer to take to his bedroom.
The smell of dog is overpowering. Miracle obviously slept here. The other Dean let a dog sleep in Dean’s room. In his bed.
Out of a morbid curiosity that Dean doesn’t fully understand, he walks down the hall to Sam’s room, pushing the door open. There’s no dog smell in here. Sam’s room is in its usual messy state, bed unmade, dirty socks in the sink.
Sam doesn’t leave his socks in the sink. That’s something Dean does to annoy him.
Dean sniffs, gets a whiff of Sam’s sweat, Sam’s musk in the stale air.
There’s something else, something bitter and slightly salty.
Sex.
Okay. So Sam’s been wacking off. Recently. That’s allowed, isn’t it?
So why does Dean suspect there’s any more to it than that?
Just because Dean and the other Sam got up to some sexy times, doesn’t mean Sam and the other Dean did.
Does it?
No. No way. Because that would mean that Sam wanted that, all this time, and Dean never knew. Dean never guessed, in his wildest dreams, that Sam wanted that.
Which is why it never happened. Because if Sam had ever given the slightest hint, ever, Dean would’ve known.
Wouldn’t he? Sam’s a good liar, but that’s not something a guy can keep secret for an entire lifetime, not even Sam. Even when that other Sam admitted it was that way between him and his Dean, that didn’t mean that Dean’s brother felt like that. Dean had already worked that through in his mind, had already convinced himself that his Sam didn’t feel that way, no matter what the other Sam said.
So there’s just no way Dean’s brother and that other Dean got up to anything. No way Sam and that other Dean had sex. With each other.
And even if they did, it didn’t mean Sam felt that way about him. His own brother.
The front door clangs open and Dean jumps. Shit.
By the time Sam brings the dog back down the steps, then takes it into the kitchen for food and water, Dean is already stripping the sheets off his bed to launder. By the time Sam and the dog retreat to Sam’s room, Dean’s in the shower, washing off the whole multi-verse experience and looking forward to getting back to normal.
For some reason Dean can’t possibly explain, he’s too shy to go back to his room for sleep clothes after his shower, so he pads down the hallway with nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist, intending to sleep naked in the guest room. It’s only for one night, after all. Tomorrow he’ll wash the sheets and air out his room so he can move back in, where he belongs.
He’s just passing Sam’s door when it opens. Sam wears his sweatpants and the t-shirt he usually wears to bed, a look of surprise on his face when he sees Dean standing in the hall. It shouldn’t be awkward. Dean’s got a towel on, after all.
“Oh.” Sam’s gaze slips down Dean’s body, then skitters away as Dean stands frozen, anticipation making butterflies in his belly for reasons he won’t acknowledge.
Sam clears his throat. “Were you in here earlier?” It’s almost an accusation, but something in Sam’s voice makes him sound tentative. Maybe even a little hopeful.
“No,” Dean lies, puffing out his chest. “Why would I?”
“Huh.” Sam reaches over to his bureau. “Because you dropped your keys.”
Sam hands him the keys, and Dean’s too stunned to refuse. He takes them in his free hand, his other hand still clutching the towel around his waist.
“Thanks.”
Dean should leave. He knows that, but he can’t seem to move. The other Sam’s words are in his head again, urging him to say something. To tell Sam how he feels, that’s it. It’s now or possibly never, and what he had with that other Sam was just too good to pass up on here and now, with his Sam. The one he loves more than anyone, including that other Sam. If he keeps burying it, he knows that it’ll be the end of him. Somehow, sometime, he’ll slip up and get himself killed, too reckless and distracted by his own feelings for Sam, his own refusal to acknowledge the elephant in the room. It’ll be there on every hunt, tripping him up, making him a liability. He’ll die and separate himself from his brother, possibly forever, and Sam will never know, just like that monster in Lincoln, the one they killed. The one whose brother cursed them to live out their lives in separate universes. The one Dean can’t remember killing.
He has to do something. He’s fairly sure his life depends on it, although he can’t work out how exactly.
“Sam.”
“Dean.”
Sam’s eyes are wide and frightened. He’s got that expression he gets when he’s feeling lost and confused, when he needs Dean to step up and lead the way, to reassure him that everything’s gonna be okay.
“You go first,” Sam insists, and Dean decides that’s permission enough.
He steps up, right into Sam’s personal space, rising up on his tiptoes, and plants a chaste kiss on his lips, quickly but firmly, so there’s no mistake. It’s reassuring, he reasons as he steps back.
Sam’s eyes blink open in shock. He touches the tips of his fingers to his lips, obviously not quite believing what just happened.
Dean shrugs, shuffles his feet.
“Yeah. That other Sam said I should tell you, but I’m no good with words, so. Now you know.”
“So you and the other Sam.” Sam’s voice drops to a whisper, like it’s a secret.
“Yeah, well.” Dean looks down at Sam’s chest, then away. “He and his brother had been -- you know -- since that first year after Stanford. So.”
Sam frowns. “He thought you were his brother?”
“No! God, no.” Dean’s eyes widen, shocked at Sam thinking he would deliberately pull off that kind of deception. “He just got sad, you know? Missed his brother something awful.”
“Yeah.” Sam takes a deep breath. He scrapes his hand over his jaw, scratches the back of his head. “Me, too.”
“So you two.” Dean waves his hand between them, like he’s referring to him and Sam, instead of Sam and that other Dean.
“He didn’t exactly have a filter,” Sam says. “He was pretty honest with me, which was a little weird, frankly. When I told him we never -- never -” Sam waves his hand between them in an exact mirror of Dean’s gesture. “He got all protective and indignant on my behalf. Called you some choice names.”
Dean huffs out a breath. “Yeah, I’ll bet he did.”
“He -- he knew exactly how to get through my defenses. He could push buttons I didn’t even know I had, you know?” Sam’s eyes widen in fear, like he’s said the wrong thing.
Dean shakes his head. “I know what you’re saying. Sam -- that other Sam -- knew things about me that I just never - “ He clears his throat. “Anyway.”
Sam bites his lower lip and Dean watches, fascinated.
“He said you always -- even when we were kids.” Sam draws in a deep breath. “I didn’t believe him at first. It just didn’t seem possible. You never -- well, mostly never. At least not until after you picked me up at Stanford. And even then, I couldn’t be sure. Like, did I imagine that? And later, I was sure I was just imagining it. Then after Hell, I couldn’t be sure of anything anymore.”
“Sam,” Dean puts his hand up, finds the keys still dangling from his fingers. He licks his lips, glances up to find Sam staring at them, his own lips parted and damp. “You wanna take this to the guest bedroom?”
Sam’s eyes widen again, and Dean hastens to add, “I mean, I’m not sleeping in my room tonight, and yours smells like a brothel.”
Sam nods, follows Dean down the hallway to the guest bedroom, where Dean shuts the door behind them after flicking on the desk lamp and setting his keys down.
When he turns back to Sam, the kid’s just standing there, big hands dangling at his sides, looking lost and hopeful at the same time. Dean takes a breath and drops the towel to the floor. He steps into Sam’s personal space, reaching up to take his beautiful face between his hands. Sam’s shaking. He sets his hands on Dean’s waist, warm and real, long thumbs stroking Dean’s skin, making him shiver.
“I - ,” Dean murmurs, willing Sam to understand, to soak up all the love Dean feels for him. They don’t need this to express their love for each other. They already love each other more than anyone on the planet ever loved anybody. Dean’s sure of that.
“I know,” Sam nods, eyes filming over with emotion. “Me, too.”
He tips his head down and Dean goes up on tip-toes, slides his hands into Sam’s hair as their mouths meet.
The kiss is slow, tentative at first, just a press and release, but they already know how to do this. They’ve learned it from that other Sam and Dean. It’s new but it’s familiar, comfortable, like they’ve been doing this all their lives.
And when the kiss deepens and Sam’s big hands rove down over Dean’s back and ass, that’s familiar, too. Dean kisses Sam’s huge, sweaty neck and he already knows that if he applies suction in just the right place, Sam will moan.
Sam moans against his mouth and Dean feels the vibration all the way down to his toes. His cock is hard and leaking, pressed up against Sam’s thigh like it belongs there, like it’s already a part of Sam. Like all of Dean has always been a part of Sam. Dean doesn’t exist without Sam. That’s just the way it’s always been.
They end up necking and rubbing off on each other, gasping out their orgasms with a minimum of foreplay.
In the afterglow, as they lie tangled together on the bed, Dean has a terrible thought.
“Where’s the dog?”
Sam makes a sad little sound in the back of his throat. “He’s probably sleeping on his doggy bed in the pantry.”
“You got him a doggy bed?”
“Dean did,” Sam admits. “The other Dean. The one that loves dogs.”
Dean feels criticized. Inadequate. Jealous.
Hopelessly in love.
“As long as he’s not in my room,” Dean grumbles.
Sam’s got his head tucked under Dean’s chin, almost exactly the way he used to sleep when they were little. He tips his face up, pressing a kiss against Dean’s throat.
“He only sleeps there when the other Dean’s gone,” Sam says softly. “As long as you keep your door shut, he’ll sleep in his doggy bed.”
“He better,” Dean says. He tips his face down, breathes in Sam’s soft hair, fills his lungs with the scent of Sam’s fruity shampoo and sweat.
“You think they’re back together? The other Sam and Dean?”
Sam snuggles closer, making himself impossibly small against Dean’s chest, like he’s nesting there.
“I hope so. I think so. Yeah, probably.”
“Good,” Dean says. “Good.”
He hopes they’ll be happy, after everything. He thinks about something that other Sam had told him, about how he collected retirement brochures, hoping he could talk his Dean into the kind of life he and Dean had in Carbondale. A normal life, without the constant threat of separation by death.
He vows to talk about it with Sam one of these days, now that Chuck’s out of the picture. Now that Jack’s in charge. Dean doesn’t completely trust Jack, but he knows that Sam does, and that’s good enough.
Now that he knows that Sam really wishes for them to settle down and stop hunting so much, maybe Dean can find his way to considering that possibility.
After all, he and that other Sam had a nice life in Carbondale. It felt good, not being under the constant threat of imminent death or injury. He and that other Sam had managed to build a home together, one that didn’t involve monsters and killing. Dean managed to put the hunting life behind him with barely any regrets or guilt at all.
It might be a little harder to do, here in this universe that will always have something out there that needs killing. Here where the killing will never stop until one or both Winchesters are dead.
But Dean knows now that there’s a third option, a semi-retirement in which Dean and Sam can be happy and safe. He also knows that Sam wants that for them, that he’s ready to show Dean the way to that life, whenever Dean’s ready.
Dean’s a lucky man. He has a life partner who loves him more than he deserves, who wants to grow old with him because it really does beat the alternative with all its soul-selling and Hell dealing. They can finally put all that behind them.
All Dean needs to do is trust his brother. Finally.
Dean tips his face down into Sam’s hair and closes his eyes.
fin
BACK TO MASTERPOST