Title: Rain Out of Thirst
Author:
voleuseRating: PG
Word count: 350
Summary: I've never tried to do anything but this.
Timeline: Spoilers for 3.11
Prompt: February 29 - Supernatural, Sam Winchester and Missouri Moseley (gen): slow burn - Sam seeks her out to ask a few questions.
Dean had said he'd never wanted to go back home. Sam hadn't meant to, either, but Dean was two months gone, and Sam hadn't dreamed of anything since Tuesday had wrapped and trapped him.
Sam turned in his motel bed, twisted so he didn't have to see the empty mattress on the other side of the room. He stared at the ceiling, and pictured blood dripping down.
Hours later, the sun finally hit his face, and he scrounged through his knapsack and found the map to Kansas.
*
He halfway expected a Welcome Home sign to grace the entrance to Missouri's place, but there was only the curtain pulled back, and a hand-stencilled card with her business hours taped to the glass.
When he walked inside, she called out from the kitchen. "All I've got is lemonade, and don't you even think of asking for a beer."
Sam slouched into the sofa and ground his teeth until she appeared.
She watched him from the doorway, her eyes narrowing. "I don't know," she finally said.
He took a proffered glass from her hand, and drank the lemonade. It was too sour, but cold. "Which question are you answering?"
"Both of them." She sat next to Sam, and she didn't touch him. She folded her hands together and waited for him to set the glass down. "Any of them. I don't know."
"What's the point of being," Sam said, "whatever I am, if I can't even--"
"Save him?" She watched him, didn't answer.
"Save anybody," he concluded. "Why should I even bother?"
Missouri took the glass from his hands, her fingers ghosting next to his, and stood.
He didn't expect her to answer that question either, and she didn't.
*
The next morning, he woke on Missouri's sofa, and he couldn't find his shoes. When he sat up, she cleared her throat.
"I made you some sandwiches," she said, "and a bottle of lemonade."
Sam swallowed, looked down. Nodded. "Thanks."
"I hope you find whatever--" She stopped, sighed. "I'll be here, Sam."
He nodded again, and didn't look at her. "I know."
###
A/N: Title and summary adapted from Gerrit Kouwenaar's When Color Returns:
I've never tried to do anything but this:
to make stones soft
to make fire out of water
to make rain out of thirst
Crossposted.