FIC: Whispered Words and Secret Smiles (2/3)
Name: Whispered Words and Secret Smiles. (2/3)
Rating: NC-17
Fandom: Supernatural
Words: 9,324 (in three parts)
Pairing/Characters: Dean/Sam, John, Castiel.
Summary: From the moment Mary dies, Dean and Sam are close. Closer than usual brothers, really. This is their story.
Warnings/Spoilers: Incest, spoilers for seasons 1-3, vague for 4 after the initial episode.
Disclaimer: I don't own this.
Author’s Note: Inspired by John Winchester’s journal, typed up here.
Beta: skullgirl013
Comments: PLEASE! COMMENT! It feeds the bunnies for more fic. :) Please! It makes my day so much. I will reply to all comments I receive, even if it takes me a few days. :)
Part Summary: Dean doesn’t move. He just lies there. Completely still. His fingers play over his lips. He’s old enough to know kissing your brother is wrong. He knows he should feel so disgusted. But instead he just holds onto that moment in his head and the feeling of Sam’s lips on his.
Extra note: Oh, wow, this got rec'd oncrack_impala. Thank you so much!
-Part 1- -Part 2- -Part 3-
Part 2
1989, July.
It’s summer and they’ve moved on twice since Sam originally started school. Sam settles in to every new school he goes to, makes friends and seems completely happy. He relies on Dean less as time goes by and Dean’s sleeping alone now. Every night. He misses the comfort of Sam next to him, but that’s okay. Sam’s growing up and so is he. He’s noticing girls now. And boys. He sees the soft planes of girls’ skins, their curves and freckles, but he sees boys too, when they change for PE. He finds himself fascinated by them. They’re harder, paler, with shorter hair and more angular faces.
He doesn’t have thoughts to go with his noticing yet. Not really. He just looks and appreciates. And he’s not yet associated the things he does at night, under the covers of his bed, face buried in his pillow with these thoughts. With this appreciation.
During the holidays he trails Dad around. He’s finally found out about what Dad does and it’s okay. He’s accepted it and he wants in. So dad said he could. He’s been shooting for two years. Dad taught him when he was seven. But now he wants to shoot real things. With Dad. The things Dad hunts. And Dad is starting to accept this.
So Dad hires a babysitter. Takes Dean out in the Impala and lets him take down his first creature. A Rawhead. Shoots and kills it in one shot. One shot. Dad is impressed.
Dad takes him out on hunts from then on. Sometimes during school days. Dean doesn’t complain. Hunting is better than school.
1990, June.
When Dean almost loses Sam he starts sleeping with him again. Sam’s scared now, so Sam climbs in bed next to him and snuggles up. He doesn’t know how long it’ll last but he’ll take what he can get. He swears he’ll never let a Shtriga near Sammy again. Or anything else. Just never.
Sam whimpers in his sleep for the first week of motel rooms. Then he starts to calm down when Dean works out that he can roll them over, slide his arm around Sam’s middle, a leg between Sam’s knees and pull him in so close it’s like they aren’t even two boys anymore. And Sam calms down.
Dean releases him slowly over the course of a month. First he pulls his face away from the back of his neck, then the leg goes away, then the arm. Finally, Sam doesn’t climb back into bed with him.
And that’s okay.
Really, it is.
Dean thinks if he keeps telling himself this he’ll believe it.
1991, February.
Sam and Dean aren’t that close anymore.
And that’s okay. Dean’s twelve now. He doesn’t need his little brother hanging around like a bad smell. He still looks after him, even when he’d rather terrorise the town with a friend or hunt with Dad, but that’s okay. He can do this.
He makes his first sawed-off shotgun and Sam finds it under the sofa. He pulls it out, runs his hands down it and Dean grabs it off him because the way he did that... Dean doesn’t even know anymore. Everything’s confusing for him and Sam doesn’t help.
“What’s this, Dean?” Sam asks.
Dean looks at it. “Just something I made, Sammy. It’s nothing.” He puts it in the bin but Dad retrieves it later. Dean doesn’t see it again.
1992, June.
Dean sleeps at night, his hand clamped around the amulet he wears. The amulet Sam gave him for Christmas. He swears he’ll never take it off.
He wakes up on the couch to hear voices and pads through to Sam’s bedroom. They’re renting an apartment now. Dad’s sticking around in this town for a while, he guesses.
“What’s going on?” he asks, sleepily. He doesn’t know why he fell asleep but he did. Now he’ll go to bed, he thinks.
Dad steps to one side and Dean sees that Sam... Sam has a gun in his hand. And Dad’s just standing there.
Dean runs across the room, wrenches the gun forcefully from Sam’s hand and holds it out of reach. “What the hell, Sammy?” he shouts.
Sam bursts into tears. “Dad gave it to me!” he wails.
Dean blinks. He looks at John. “Dad...?”
“Sam saw something in his closet. I was going to ...”
John doesn’t finish his sentence because Dean hits him. It’s the first time he ever hits him and he never regrets it.
John grabs him by the arm, pulls him from the room and Dean expects... he doesn’t know what he expects. To be beaten? John never beat him before but he wouldn't put it past him now. He looks livid. But Dean is positive he’s more angry that John. “He’s just a kid!” Dean yells.
“There’s a monster in his closet,” John says. He looks so helpless and he’s looking into Dean’s eyes like he sees something there that shouldn’t be there.
“Then let me deal with it,” Dean says. “Don't... don't do this to Sam.”
And Dean works it out. He works out what John sees. Dean’s older than he should be. He has guns and knows how to deal with monsters and John gave him that. In exchange for his childhood.
Dean goes into the bedroom, walks past Sam and jerks open the closet door. There’s nothing in there. It’s just a closet. “Look, Sammy,” he says. He grabs Sam by the arm and pulls him over, gently, to look. “Nothing here.” He kisses him on the hair and it’s like being kids again. Innocent, young kids. “Go to sleep.”
Dean doesn’t talk to John for a week.
1993, November.
Dean supposes Sam’s learned to read a calendar finally because he’s crying when he crawls into bed next to Dean. It’s the anniversary of Mom’s death. Dean strokes his hair, holds him close and thinks how long it’s been since they did this last.
Sam was seven or eight and Dean... Dean was eleven. Dean was still young.
Dean’s fourteen now and the world is making less sense as he goes along. Especially where his brother is concerned. Sam’s so young and innocent and perfect.
Dean just pulls him in closer and holds him tight. “I miss mom,” Sam whispers. He doesn’t remember her like Dean does, he’s sure of this, but it can’t be easy for him.
“I miss her too,” Dean says. “But as long as we have each other...” he trails off.
Sam lifts himself up and looks at Dean, who’s staring at the ceiling. “You’re the best brother I could have,” he says.
Dean turns to look just as Sam goes to kiss him on the cheek. Their lips slam into each other’s and stop. There’s a long, frozen moment, then Sam pulls back, scrabbles off, out of the bed and runs back to his own.
Dean doesn’t move. He just lies there. Completely still. His fingers play over his lips. He’s old enough to know kissing your brother is wrong. He knows he should feel so disgusted. But instead he just holds onto that moment in his head and the feeling of Sam’s lips on his.
So that’s what kissing is like, he realises.
1995, May.
Girls and boys taste different, Dean discovers.
Girls taste of mint or lip-gloss or both. Sometimes they taste of cherry or banana or strawberry. It’s sweet and they feel nice when he holds them. Soft and supple. They’re smooth and he likes them. He likes them a lot.
Boys, however... boys taste of mint, too, at times. Other times they taste like their latest meal or something they’ve been sucking on. They’re hard and they kiss back fiercely and grab at him. He likes their muscles and their smell. Aftershave and sweat. He likes them, too, a lot.
He isn’t sure if he has a favourite. Isn’t sure if he likes girls or boys more. He just knows he likes them both. Girls don't give it up easily, boys throw themselves into lip-locks almost too nonchalantly. Dean just takes what he can get and he gets boys more often because he doesn’t have as much time to get to know girls before they move on again.
Boys want more than Dean is willing to give at this point in his life. Girls are more reserved, less likely to push. Dean finds himself in closets with them. A lot.
He has his tongue down Michelle Richey’s throat when the door opens and there’s a girl and a boy there. The girl is blonde, obviously one of the first years at the high school. And the boy... the boy is Sam.
“I... we... Mop?” Sam says.
Dean grabs the mop from behind Michelle, getting a grope in at the same time without meaning to and thrusts it at Sam. Sam just grabs it and runs.
When Dean gets home, Sam doesn’t talk to him and Dean can’t work out what he’s done.
1996, October.
Sixteen year old boys have needs. And Dean goes for it when he’s older because he’s ready and he wants it and he’s sick of being permanently horny with no outlet.
He starts off with a girl. Kathy. They date for a whole month. He spends every waking moment with her and he really, really likes her. They’re joined at the hip at school and he takes her out every evening. Dad lets him take the car out, sometimes, so he takes her out in the Impala and they go to a drive-in.
Dean brings her back to the motel room because he knows Dad’s taken Sam out. He doesn’t know why, he just knows he has.
It’s when they’re lying in bed afterwards, not a shred of clothes between them, that Dean realises he’s holding her like he holds Sam.
And then she decides she wants to go again and she’s sitting on him when she says, “Condom?”
“Drawer,” Dean says.
She leans across, reaches into the top drawer of the bedside table before Dean can stop her. He screams, she screams harder, falls off the bed and pulls the drawer with her, Dean’s gun landing on the floor by her.
“Why the hell do you even have that?” she screams.
He doesn’t know what to say.
So he just watches as she gets dressed, fast and runs from the room. He runs to the door, naked, and just stands there, watching her run. He doesn’t call after her.
“Dean?”
He turns to see Sam stood in the corridor. His eyes are wide and Dean remembers he’s naked and he sees Sam’s expression and he doesn’t know what to do because there’s a look on his face and Dean just dodges back inside, grabs his pants and pulls them on, hissing, “Don't tell Dad!”
1997, May.
“Hey, Sammy?”
Sam cracks open an eye. It’s dark. “Eurgh?” he says, in reply.
Dean crouches over his bed with a parcel. “Happy fourteenth.”
Sam just stares at him. “Huh?”
“Your birthday, dumbo.” Dean laughs. “Happy birthday.” His amulet catches the light as it dangles from his neck.
Sam takes the parcel and opens it. There’s a knife inside. One he’d been eying, like any hunter’s son would. “Awesome!”
Dean smiles at him, ruffles his hair. “Go back to sleep, kiddo.”
Sam looks at him. “You’re the best big brother ever,” he says.
And Dean remembers that kiss from years before. And Sam’s so different now. He’s older and bigger and wider and Dean wonders, for a moment, what it would be like to kiss him again. Would it feel the same? Would he get the right reaction of disgust this time?
Sam looks like a rabbit in headlights, so he obviously remembers too.
“Night, kid,” Dean says, helplessly.
He makes a move to go away and Sam catches his wrist, pulls him back. He stumbles, lands on the bed next to him and Sam pulls him in, kisses his lips and then looks terrified. “Sorry,” he mumbles.
Dean just looks up at him, stunned. “Why?”
Sam looks back. Dean isn’t sure he knows what he asked. Dean isn’t sure what he asked. Why sorry or why did he kiss him?
1997, May.
It hasn’t been mentioned and that’s just fine with Dean.
And he’d never admit that after that one, closed-lipped kiss he went off and had sex with another boy for the first time.
His first time. Thinking about his brother. He would never admit that. Not as long as he lives.
He wonders, sometimes, if Sam thinks about it. If Sam is confused, too, or just gets it in some way, like the smart kid he is.
Dean fails all his exams.
John just looks at him with this look of disappointment and Dean wonders what he expected. He switched their schools so often Dean got lost in the school system years ago and no teacher ever bothered with the troubled guy in the leather jacket at the back of class because his track record wasn't worth it.
Sam, though. He concentrates in class, befriends all his teachers and excluding the flip-knife and bully incident, he gets on fine with his classmates. They like him, he likes them and it’s all good. Dean’s happy for him. He thinks Sam will leave. Go to college. And that’s fine. Dean has Dad. And hunting.
But now he’s graduated, or failed at graduating, whichever, Dad thinks he can look after himself. John sends him out on hunts and sometimes he’s gone for a whole week before he comes back to Sam, who always gives him this relieved look when he comes home and tells Dean, then John, about his latest achievement at school. John spends more and more time away from home and Dean thinks that’s fine. Sam is growing up. Sam can look after himself.
1999, July.
Dean comes home and finds Sam with a girl.
It’s summer and Sam had opted to not come with Dean and John on a hunt. Said he had homework to do.
Naked Sam and naked girl from his class.
Homework.
Yeah.
Dean doesn’t know why he flips out. Sam is sixteen, so is the girl. Dean should have seen it coming. But he still overreacts. Throws the girl out and yells at Sam until he looks like he’s about to cry. Maybe it’s because Dean thought Sam liked guys. Liked him. Maybe he wanted someone to talk to about the guys. Maybe he just wanted Sam all to himself.
Sam leaves and Dean can’t ask him to come back because he’s too livid. For no reason. No reason at all. And he’s not jealous. No.
Sam comes back after a while and doesn’t talk to Dean.
2001, August.
“Sammy?”
Dean just stands in the doorway and stares. He hasn’t gone into Sam’s motel room for a long time now. They’re past sharing and Sam’s part-time jobs mean he can afford his own room. They don't really talk anymore. They just hunt, patch each other up and move on. Sometimes Dad and Sam hunt. Sometimes Dean and Sam hunt. Sometimes Dean and Dad hunt. Sometimes they all go separate ways. They aren’t really a family anymore.
Sam looks round, pausing his packing. “Dean.”
“Sam... why are you packing?”
Sam puts his laptop in his bag. “I’m going to college, Dean.”
Dean takes a step into the room. “Does dad know?”
“He will do in ten minutes.”
Dean just stares. “And me? When were you planning to tell me?”
Sam stops now, turns around and looks at Dean intensely. “I wasn't going to.”
Dean swallows convulsively, heart in his throat. “Why?” His voice sounds small and childlike again. Sam looks away.
“Too hard.”
“Why?” Dean repeats. “It’s not like we’re brothers anymore.”
“Dean...” Sam takes a step forward then seems to think better of it.
Dean just keeps staring at him. “Where are you going?”
Sam still doesn’t meet his eyes. “Stanford.”
Dean smiles. “You always were the smart brother. I couldn’t do that. The college thing.” He walks forward, a few long strides, wraps his arms around him and holds him close. “I’m proud of you, Sammy.”
Sam holds him back, just as tightly and Dean thinks that Sam’s going and he’s never going to see him again, so he pulls back and he kisses him, hard, mouths pressed firmly together.
Sam’s lips part, he leans into the kiss, a hand going to Dean’s head and pulling him in. Dean slides his tongue over Sam’s lips and inside and when their tongues touch it’s electric. Meant to be. They kiss harder, hands grabbing at shoulders and heads and anything they can get to.
They stumble, hit the bed, Dean on top, leg between Sam’s, still kissing him, one hand holding his weight off his little brother. The bag falls from the bed and the laptop lands with a loud clatter, breaking the spell.
Sam slides out from under Dean, grabs his laptop and puts it back in his bag, zipping it up. The sound of the zip sounds so final to Dean.
“You have my email address, right?” Sam doesn’t look round.
“Will you reply if I use it?” Dean asks, eyes boring into his back.
Sam doesn’t move. “I might.”
“Liar,” Dean says, quietly.
Sam picks the bag up and slings it over his shoulder. “I’ll go tell Dad I’m leaving.”
Dean follows him with his eyes as he walks over to the door and steps into the corridor. He looks back and Dean just stares at him. As he goes to leave, Dean says, desperately, “Sammy!”
Sam stops, looks round. “Dean?” A note of hope in his voice.
“Kick ass at college for me, okay? Kiss a lot of pretty girls and party a lot.” Dean offers him a tired smile.
“Sure, Dean.” Sam smiles. “Kill some sons of bitches for me.”
“I promise,” Dean says.
Then Sam leaves. And Dean is alone.
Next part.