The shark, she is jumped
Title: Take my Life (and Fuck it Up)
Summary: Sam was perfectly happy at Stanford, but then Dean comes to get him; he was always going to chose his brother.
Word count: 1,300
Rated: pg-13 (language, sexuality)
Notes: Set S1; Spoilers through “pilot”
Genre: slash, angst
Characters: Sam/Dean
A/N: Written for spnpromptcake for the prompt: Sam/Dean; “touching you makes me feel alive, touching you makes me die inside” (Slept So Long by Jay Gordon); Rope
A/N 2: Well, I finally caved and wrote Wincest. Didn’t someone say this fandom was like roofies?
Disclaimer: I’m pretty sure this is ‘fair use,” because comments don’t count as payment, no matter how much I love them.
The Sam who was going to be a lawyer knows that correlation isn’t causality, but that Sam died. The Sam who dreams of Jess burning on the ceiling looks at his brother and feels hatred pooling hot in his stomach.
You did this. You walked right up and made me chose, and you brought the fire with you.
Four years ago, Sam had dusted “Winchester” off his boots like so much grave-dirt and he hadn’t looked back. He’d built a new life without the smell of lighter fluid and ashes permeating every pore and piece of clothing. That first year alone in Palo Alto, Sam had cut himself free of every tangled, twisted tie that bound him to his train-wreck of a family.
I slept without you so long, and I was happy. I was safe.
Then his goddamned bother waltzed into his apartment like everything Sam owned was still joint property. It wasn’t. Sam had LSAT scores, Jess, and a safe, normal future, and none of it belonged to Dean. Sam’s new life was fee of cemeteries, do-it-yourself stitches, and claustrophobic desires that were wrong, wrong, wrong.
But then Dean had been under him, saying “easy tiger,” with that little roll of his hips and Sam had been 16 again, confused with hormones and adrenaline and desperate to touch. Four years of being someone new hadn’t been long enough and Sam caved for those green eyes. He’d gone chasing around the country because if Dean wanted him to, that was enough.
And everything burned.
Sam makes a fist with his fingernails cutting his palm and he hates. Dean made him chose, and now Jess is dead. Sam will never be a lawyer. He’ll never be free, and god knows he’s not going to be safe. And he’d make the same choice again, and again, and every time.
***
In the passenger seat of the Impala- no need to sit in the back now that it’s just the two of them- the familiar old-leather smell of the car and Dean’s jacket eases a homesickness Sam didn’t know he had. Even though they’re off to hunt some mythical creature that shouldn’t exist outside of nightmares, it’s Stanford that feels like somebody else’s dream. How could anything be real but the verdant weeds rolling alongside the highway and Dean singing Wayward Son off key?
Sam knows he complained about missed Christmases and Thanksgivings, and when it comes right down to it, his best memories are of being away from his family; the outside stuff was never good. But they were. Sam’n’Dean, forever. Blood ties formed an invisible rope that could spool out cross-country and never break.
And maybe hunting is in his blood too; more of it comes back than he’d have guessed. He’s still a decent shot, he can still roll out of a fall and come up running. He can’t stop Dean from getting hurt. But then, he never could.
“Stay still,” he orders, pressing Dean’s thigh into the motel mattress. Dean huffs, but does as he’s told. He leans back on his left arm stretched straight behind him and lifts his other elbow, giving Sam a better angle to dab disinfectant on the gash running from his abs towards his shoulder-blade.
“Gonna need stitches,” Sam says, trailing his fingers up his brother’s side, reading the minute shift of muscle with each pained breath, drinking in the body heat that feels like a gift in this cold, anonymous room.
“Med kits’s on the table, Doogie,” Dean prompts. Sam knows; that’s where the hydrogen peroxide came from. His hesitation is something else entirely. But there’s no distraction to be invented, no Dad to do the dirty work if Sam flattens what he’s feeling into anger and storms off like he would have before. He fetches the needle, along with the floss that’ll have to do. Hopefully this part of hunting is like riding a bike, too. In a kinder world, he wouldn’t have to find out on his own brother’s skin.
Sam ties off a knot at the end of the string. Dean looks lazy (perfect) and careless (perfect) despite the blood sluicing down in rivulets, curving with the jut of his hipbone. Sam’s fingers are the ones clumsy with concern.
Before it had never been much: Wrestling too often, staying down after the match was over to feel the familiar weight and hot breath on his neck. Sitting too close, Dean throwing an arm over Sam’s shoulder and Sam curving into his side too intimately. Assuring their dad they didn’t need another room, could still share a bed- and then assuring him they absolutely did need their own room. Furtive glances and too-loud banter when they changed, doors left casually open when they showered, brief touches of slick wet skin on skin.
Sam’s fingers are unsteady and piercing Dean’s skin requires more pressure than he remembers. The needle goes in hard and deep when he forces it and Dean jerks involuntarily. Sam wants to say sorry, but that’s not how they do it.
“Jeeze, quit being a baby,” fingers still tacky with his brother’s blood.
“Fuck you,” familiar bravado, better than painkillers they can’t afford.
Sam hovers in close, his own shadow obscuring his hands as the needle pushes in and out, bloody string following after, stitching up skin and muscle, tying everything back together where it belongs. Sam can feel the breath from his nose on his fingers, close to Dean’s skin. So Dean can feel it too.
“Done,” he murmurs, running a finger over his handiwork- it’s ugly, but it’s theirs. He’s still holding the needle. Dean could feel the slightest twitch of Sam’s hand, with the taunt excess thread forming a tangible blood-soaked link between two bodies that were always tied together, anyway.
“I gotta,” Sam explains, giving the string a little tug to illustrate. Gotta break the bond, cut the cord. Dean is looking down at Sam like he could stare forever. Sam can’t meet his eyes for more than a moment before he feels the heat on his cheeks. So he bends forward, puts his teeth on the knot and his lips next to his brother’s broken skin.
The thread breaks easily, but his mouth is still brushing against the wound, breathing the taste of Dean’s blood- their blood. The moment of pretend necessity passes and he hasn’t pulled back. He should pull back. He puts his free hand on Dean’s hip and kisses the unbroken skin just above the stitches. Dean puts a hand into his hair, a caress that turns into a painful tug. “Sammy.”
Before it had been a subtle code of double meanings, always limited to the deniable. It had been nothing like this. Now, it’s pushy and demanding; Dean grabs his collar and flips him back onto the bed. He shoves Dean’s leg out from under him so they collapse chest to chest. Whatever caution held them back before, whatever fear of breaking what they already had is gone; Nobody asks permission because “yes” is too wrong to say out loud and “no” is impossible. Sam’s hands scrabble at Dean’s bare chest, unsure if the goal is punishment or pleasure. Dean kisses him hard enough that he must not know, either.
“You fuck everything up,” Sam says, once his mouth’s his own again. It’s meant as an accusation, but it comes out sounding like praise.
Because maybe the green in Dean’s eyes is the color of damnation, but when they kiss Sam is dying- and he’s being born- and it was always going to happen this way. There’s a rope made of blood that ties them together, and it’s incest, and it’s sin, and it’s ugly- but it’s theirs.
Summary: Sam was perfectly happy at Stanford, but then Dean comes to get him; he was always going to chose his brother.
Word count: 1,300
Rated: pg-13 (language, sexuality)
Notes: Set S1; Spoilers through “pilot”
Genre: slash, angst
Characters: Sam/Dean
A/N: Written for spnpromptcake for the prompt: Sam/Dean; “touching you makes me feel alive, touching you makes me die inside” (Slept So Long by Jay Gordon); Rope
A/N 2: Well, I finally caved and wrote Wincest. Didn’t someone say this fandom was like roofies?
Disclaimer: I’m pretty sure this is ‘fair use,” because comments don’t count as payment, no matter how much I love them.
The Sam who was going to be a lawyer knows that correlation isn’t causality, but that Sam died. The Sam who dreams of Jess burning on the ceiling looks at his brother and feels hatred pooling hot in his stomach.
You did this. You walked right up and made me chose, and you brought the fire with you.
Four years ago, Sam had dusted “Winchester” off his boots like so much grave-dirt and he hadn’t looked back. He’d built a new life without the smell of lighter fluid and ashes permeating every pore and piece of clothing. That first year alone in Palo Alto, Sam had cut himself free of every tangled, twisted tie that bound him to his train-wreck of a family.
I slept without you so long, and I was happy. I was safe.
Then his goddamned bother waltzed into his apartment like everything Sam owned was still joint property. It wasn’t. Sam had LSAT scores, Jess, and a safe, normal future, and none of it belonged to Dean. Sam’s new life was fee of cemeteries, do-it-yourself stitches, and claustrophobic desires that were wrong, wrong, wrong.
But then Dean had been under him, saying “easy tiger,” with that little roll of his hips and Sam had been 16 again, confused with hormones and adrenaline and desperate to touch. Four years of being someone new hadn’t been long enough and Sam caved for those green eyes. He’d gone chasing around the country because if Dean wanted him to, that was enough.
And everything burned.
Sam makes a fist with his fingernails cutting his palm and he hates. Dean made him chose, and now Jess is dead. Sam will never be a lawyer. He’ll never be free, and god knows he’s not going to be safe. And he’d make the same choice again, and again, and every time.
***
In the passenger seat of the Impala- no need to sit in the back now that it’s just the two of them- the familiar old-leather smell of the car and Dean’s jacket eases a homesickness Sam didn’t know he had. Even though they’re off to hunt some mythical creature that shouldn’t exist outside of nightmares, it’s Stanford that feels like somebody else’s dream. How could anything be real but the verdant weeds rolling alongside the highway and Dean singing Wayward Son off key?
Sam knows he complained about missed Christmases and Thanksgivings, and when it comes right down to it, his best memories are of being away from his family; the outside stuff was never good. But they were. Sam’n’Dean, forever. Blood ties formed an invisible rope that could spool out cross-country and never break.
And maybe hunting is in his blood too; more of it comes back than he’d have guessed. He’s still a decent shot, he can still roll out of a fall and come up running. He can’t stop Dean from getting hurt. But then, he never could.
“Stay still,” he orders, pressing Dean’s thigh into the motel mattress. Dean huffs, but does as he’s told. He leans back on his left arm stretched straight behind him and lifts his other elbow, giving Sam a better angle to dab disinfectant on the gash running from his abs towards his shoulder-blade.
“Gonna need stitches,” Sam says, trailing his fingers up his brother’s side, reading the minute shift of muscle with each pained breath, drinking in the body heat that feels like a gift in this cold, anonymous room.
“Med kits’s on the table, Doogie,” Dean prompts. Sam knows; that’s where the hydrogen peroxide came from. His hesitation is something else entirely. But there’s no distraction to be invented, no Dad to do the dirty work if Sam flattens what he’s feeling into anger and storms off like he would have before. He fetches the needle, along with the floss that’ll have to do. Hopefully this part of hunting is like riding a bike, too. In a kinder world, he wouldn’t have to find out on his own brother’s skin.
Sam ties off a knot at the end of the string. Dean looks lazy (perfect) and careless (perfect) despite the blood sluicing down in rivulets, curving with the jut of his hipbone. Sam’s fingers are the ones clumsy with concern.
Before it had never been much: Wrestling too often, staying down after the match was over to feel the familiar weight and hot breath on his neck. Sitting too close, Dean throwing an arm over Sam’s shoulder and Sam curving into his side too intimately. Assuring their dad they didn’t need another room, could still share a bed- and then assuring him they absolutely did need their own room. Furtive glances and too-loud banter when they changed, doors left casually open when they showered, brief touches of slick wet skin on skin.
Sam’s fingers are unsteady and piercing Dean’s skin requires more pressure than he remembers. The needle goes in hard and deep when he forces it and Dean jerks involuntarily. Sam wants to say sorry, but that’s not how they do it.
“Jeeze, quit being a baby,” fingers still tacky with his brother’s blood.
“Fuck you,” familiar bravado, better than painkillers they can’t afford.
Sam hovers in close, his own shadow obscuring his hands as the needle pushes in and out, bloody string following after, stitching up skin and muscle, tying everything back together where it belongs. Sam can feel the breath from his nose on his fingers, close to Dean’s skin. So Dean can feel it too.
“Done,” he murmurs, running a finger over his handiwork- it’s ugly, but it’s theirs. He’s still holding the needle. Dean could feel the slightest twitch of Sam’s hand, with the taunt excess thread forming a tangible blood-soaked link between two bodies that were always tied together, anyway.
“I gotta,” Sam explains, giving the string a little tug to illustrate. Gotta break the bond, cut the cord. Dean is looking down at Sam like he could stare forever. Sam can’t meet his eyes for more than a moment before he feels the heat on his cheeks. So he bends forward, puts his teeth on the knot and his lips next to his brother’s broken skin.
The thread breaks easily, but his mouth is still brushing against the wound, breathing the taste of Dean’s blood- their blood. The moment of pretend necessity passes and he hasn’t pulled back. He should pull back. He puts his free hand on Dean’s hip and kisses the unbroken skin just above the stitches. Dean puts a hand into his hair, a caress that turns into a painful tug. “Sammy.”
Before it had been a subtle code of double meanings, always limited to the deniable. It had been nothing like this. Now, it’s pushy and demanding; Dean grabs his collar and flips him back onto the bed. He shoves Dean’s leg out from under him so they collapse chest to chest. Whatever caution held them back before, whatever fear of breaking what they already had is gone; Nobody asks permission because “yes” is too wrong to say out loud and “no” is impossible. Sam’s hands scrabble at Dean’s bare chest, unsure if the goal is punishment or pleasure. Dean kisses him hard enough that he must not know, either.
“You fuck everything up,” Sam says, once his mouth’s his own again. It’s meant as an accusation, but it comes out sounding like praise.
Because maybe the green in Dean’s eyes is the color of damnation, but when they kiss Sam is dying- and he’s being born- and it was always going to happen this way. There’s a rope made of blood that ties them together, and it’s incest, and it’s sin, and it’s ugly- but it’s theirs.