Fic: Help Me If You Can (I'm Feeling Down)
(One of these days, I'll write a fic where Sam's not sick. But not today.)
Title: Help Me If You Can (I’m Feeling Down)
Summary: “The first time Sam sneezes, it ends in a panic attack.” - This is the first time Sam gets sick, not long after he’s gotten out of Hell.
Verse: Frayed ‘verse fic. This is the third one I’ve written, after Nothing to Kill or Die For and No Scratching, but it takes place before the other two.
Note: Birthday fic for tarotgal. I sent her the first scene one day, she gave me the inspiration for expanding it further, and it developed from there. Thanks, tg!
Fandom: Supernatural
Characters: Sam, Dean
Rating: PG, for mentions of Hell trauma
Word count: 2,949
The first time Sam sneezes, it ends in a panic attack.
He’d been sick all morning, stuffed up and sniffly, following Dean around and being clingy at every opportunity.
He’s currently sitting on the floor in the living room, resting against the couch, hand running back and forth through the fibers of the carpet. Dean, having finally gotten Sam to calm down, is sitting at the table paying their bills, like your average guy who just happens to have a Hell-traumatized brother to look after. He glances up from time to time, just checking on Sam.
“Doing okay, Sammy?” he asks, tapping a pen against the table.
Sam grimaces, wrinkling his nose, and then snaps forward with a sudden sneeze. “hehKTCSHSHH!”
What Dean doesn’t expect is Sam immediately slamming his body back into the couch with a sharp cry, hands flying up to his face, fingers twisting in his hair. He starts whimpering desperately, like a caged animal trying to escape from danger.
“Whoa, whoa, Sammy, it’s okay!” Dean cries. “Hey, listen to me. Sam, listen.”
Sam is still busy trying to press his whole body into the couch. Dean quickly shoves his chair back, rushing over to crouch down next to his brother.
“Hey! Sam!” he says sharply, which sometimes actually gets Sam to focus.
Sam goes suddenly quiet, hands still covering his face, his whole body tensed in anticipation of pain.
“It was just a sneeze, Sam,” Dean says quietly. “You’re okay. It’s just a cold. You sneezed.”
“Wha…?” Sam breathes in great gasps, still coming down from his panicked fight or flight moment.
“It’s just what happens sometimes when you’re sick. Remember?” A hundred and twenty years of Hell and neither Michael nor Lucifer had ever given him a bad cold.
Sam shakes his head in confusion, sniffling. He closes his eyes and leans his head back against the couch cushions, whispering, “Bad day…”
On the good days, it’s easier. It’s easier for Sam to think straight, and he can remember how the world works, even if he never quite feels comfortable in it. He can remember things from before, reminisce with Dean about hunting poltergeists in tenth grade. He can help with the dishes and the laundry and go outside for walks in the neighborhood. He can sort of function like a person.
But on the bad days, he spends most of the time just trying to remember that he’s in a safe space, that he’s not about to be flayed or burned or drowned or buried alive. He spends the day just trying to come to grips with being in his own body, just riding out all of the sensations and stimulation until things get a little better and he can start to put the pieces back together again.
“I know, Sammy,” Dean sympathizes. “Just give it a few days. It’ll get better.”
* * *
The next day it’s worse.
Dean wakes with a start, jerking his head up off the pillow, blinking wide-eyed in the morning sunlight. Laying on his stomach, he reaches up to rub at his eyes with the heel of one hand, taking note of the headache that’s throbbing dully through his sinuses. He sniffs experimentally, and the pressure intensifies.
Great.
Next to him, Sam is curled up on his side, hugging a blanket to his chest and breathing noisily through his mouth. Not surprisingly, he sounds even more congested than he did the night before.
Dean yawns, stretching out against the mattress. Slowly, so as not to disturb Sam, he rolls over and slides off the edge of the bed, feet landing on the soft carpeted floor. He tiptoes out of the room, keeping the door ajar, and turns the corner into the kitchen. He fumbles sleepily with the coffee pot, setting it to brew. With Sam still sick, and the sinus pressure and achy feeling building in his own body, he has the feeling he’s going to need a lot of coffee to get through this day.
He stands dumbly in front of the coffee pot, watching the slow drip of coffee from the filter and sniffling occasionally. And then, before he can do anything about it, there’s a sudden tickle in his nose.
“HAH’TCHSHH!” he sneezes loudly, burying his nose in the sleeve of his t-shirt. “Aw, shit,” he mumbles into the fabric.
The last thing he needs is for this to be a sneezy cold. Yesterday, even after he’d explained it several times to Sam, his brother had still been twitchy every time he sneezed. Nothing had been as bad as the first time, but the noise still took Sam by surprise, the sensation just made him that much more miserable.
Dean can feel another sneeze building. He inhales quickly and then covers his face with his hands, trying to stifle the sound. “ah-tchh! ishh!”
Man, this is gonna be a long day, he thinks, sighing.
He watches the steady drip of coffee slow down, then stop, and reaches for a clean mug, pouring himself a cup. From the surface of the coffee, tendrils of steam waft slowly into the air. He wraps one hand around the mug, savoring the warmth, and shuffles over to the couch positioned under the living room windows.
As he sits down, the springs creak under his weight until he shifts to a comfortable spot. The apartment had come partially furnished, which Dean was grateful for, but nobody ever said it was good furniture. He makes a mental note to get serious about finding some more comfortable things for the place, especially for Sam’s sake.
He stares out the window for a while at the parking lot below, quietly sipping from his mug. It’s almost completely still outside, since most of the residents have already left for school or work. Dean watches a woman running out of the apartment building, fumbling with a fancy purse and a brightly-colored gym bag as she races toward her car.
From the other room comes a startled cry as Sam jolts awake in typical Sam fashion. Sleep without any nightmares is a rarity now, for both of them, and this is just another usual morning. Dean leaves his coffee mug on the windowsill and hurries to the bedroom.
Sam has managed to tangle himself up in the blankets and is fighting desperately to get free, with a wide-eyed look on his face that means he isn’t completely aware of what’s going on.
“Shh, Sammy, it’s okay,” Dean starts saying immediately, reaching out a hand to help untangle his brother. “Hey, wake up, buddy. You’re okay, you were just dreaming.”
“No,” Sam insists, pushing Dean’s hands away. “Stop it- Please…”
“Sammy, it’s okay.”
“I’m not- not s’posed to be here… I… what…” he mumbles incoherently. His hands fly up to his forehead, long fingers pulling at his hair.
“Sam, you’re home. You’re safe.” Dean reaches up a hand to smooth down Sam’s bed head, not surprised when Sam recoils.
Then Sam starts coughing, and it seems to snap him out of his half-dreaming state. He looks up at Dean, blinking in confusion. “…I’m Sam?”
“You’re Sam,” Dean assures him.
“…All of me?” he asks, digging his fingernails into his bare chest.
Dean reaches forward and taps a finger against the anti-possession tattoo on Sam’s chest. “Remember that? Means nothing can get inside you.”
Sam brushes the tattoo with his fingers, staring at it, then looks up at Dean. “Except him.” He cocks his head and smiles in such a Lucifer-like way that Dean sucks in a sharp breath.
“No.” He shakes his head. “He… he’s gone, Sam,” Dean falters, trying to keep his voice even. Sam spent a century locked in a room with three beings Dean knows almost nothing about, and it suddenly hits him how much he still doesn’t know about what happened to Sam. “It’s okay, he’s gone,” he repeats, trying to believe it.
Then Sam’s coughing again, and just like that, he’s back to his old (new) self. He touches a hand to his forehead, then points at Dean like a parent making a point. “Not all the time.” Sam looks quickly around the room, making sure that for now, it’s just them, and then his hands are in his hair again in that nervous, self-comforting gesture.
“You’re right, Sam,” Dean agrees. “But he can’t get inside you anymore, okay? He’s locked away and not coming back out.”
Sam nods. “Okay… okay…” he whispers. He takes a couple of deep breaths, sniffling and rubbing his knuckles against his nose.
“You with me?” Dean asks, still leaning down to be near his brother.
Sam looks up at him and blinks. “Yeah…” he answers. “Yeah, I’m… I’m…” He trails off, but he does that a lot these days, so Dean doesn’t comment on it.
Instead, he clears his throat and says, “So, you ready to get out of bed, or do you wanna go back to sleep for awhile?”
“I’ll get up,” Sam answers, already moving to climb out of the bed. “Don’t want to sleep anymore…”
“Yeah, I hear ya,” Dean answers, then scrunches up his face. His head bobs down to his shoulder, quickly stifling a sneeze. “Ngk! …ahhh…” It’s almost silent, but not quite.
Sam looks up at him curiously, halfway out of the bed. “What are you doing?” he asks.
“That was, um… a sneeze.” Dean sniffs wetly, feeling even more congested than before he sneezed. Clearly, the sneezes are not going to bring any relief today if he keeps trying to stop them from happening.
“Oh,” Sam says seriously. His brow furrows and he gets that look of concentration on his face, the same one he used to get when they were researching a hunt. “Are you sick, too?”
“Yeah,” Dean answers.
“Oh… was it me?” Sam asks. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you sick.” He looks worried, and a little scared.
“It’s okay, Sam. It’s not your fault - it just happens.”
“Okay.” Sam doesn’t look convinced, but he climbs out of bed and wanders into the living room, leaving Dean to follow behind him.
* * *
The day passes quietly, each of them just trying to distract themselves from feeling bad. Dean watches TV, flipping through baseball games and cooking shows and Dr. Sexy reruns, while Sam stares out the window and bounces a rubber ball against the living room wall and paces restlessly through the apartment, constantly moving. Dean tries to get him to watch TV, but Sam can’t concentrate. His nerves are all on edge, and he has to be doing something to keep himself distracted, or it all falls apart.
The hours pass by, and life revolves around food and decongestants and keeping each other company. Dean digs some cold medicine out of the bathroom cabinet - not expired, thank God - and counts out doses for him and Sam, coaxing his brother into taking the pills despite Sam’s protests that they’ll get stuck in his throat.
Around lunchtime, Sam gets tired of pacing, and flops down on the couch next to Dean. “I don’t feel right…” he complains quietly, drawing his feet up onto the couch so he’s curled into a position that should be impossible for someone his height.
“You probably have a fever,” Dean explains. Of course, he probably has a fever, too, so he can’t just check Sam’s forehead like he usually does. Time to break out the thermometer. He pushes himself up off the couch and retrieves it from the bathroom, pulling off the plastic cap as he comes back into the living room.
“Hey, Sam?” he begins.
“Hmm?”
“Can I take your temperature?” Dean shows him the thermometer. He already knows Sam is not going to like this, so he tries to approach it as gently as possible. “I know this isn’t going to feel good, and I know it’ll taste weird, but can you put this under your tongue for a minute so I can figure out how high your fever is?”
Sam looks skeptical. He shakes his head. “Talk… talk first.”
Well, of course Sam doesn’t trust him. Purposely causing his brother pain is not something Dean wants to do, either. But he thinks for a moment, calling up one of the random facts from his latest trivia book. “I bet you didn’t know that one 60-minute cassette has 565 feet of tape inside, huh?”
Sam smiles slightly and shakes his head, then obediently opens his mouth.
“I’m sorry, Sammy,” Dean says again. “I’m just trying to help you feel better.”
Sam nods but doesn’t say anything, making a face as the metal tip of the thermometer touches his tongue. He closes his mouth around it, breathing congestedly, and they both wait for the beep that seems to take forever to come.
When it does, Dean takes the thermometer out and Sam rubs a hand over his mouth, still looking grossed out. Dean looks at the display. It’s not a terrible fever, but definitely enough to make Sam uncomfortable. Which means it’s up to Dean to keep him cooled down and distracted from how he feels.
“So, what do you say we get you something nice and cold to drink, and I’ll make some lunch, huh?” Dean asks, putting on his most upbeat voice.
“I’m… I’m not really hungry,” Sam replies, tracing patterns in the fabric of the sofa.
“C’mon, you gotta eat something.” Dean’s voice is softer now, coaxing. “How about… uhhh… sneeze- huh’ngk! - what about some pasta?” he suggests after stifling the sneeze into his shoulder.
“…The spiral kind?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“…Okay,” Sam agrees. He likes the texture of it. Spaghetti noodles, on the other hand, were ruled out a couple of months ago. Dean can understand.
“Awesome.” Dean pats Sam on the leg encouragingly and heads into the kitchen. “Buttered noodles, coming right up.” He just has to keep the routines up until it’s time to go back to sleep. He silently hopes that for once, it won’t be too hard to do.
* * *
The best part of Dean’s day comes when Sam decides to go to bed early. He’s worn himself out, pacing back and forth all day and refusing to sit still and rest for very long.
Okay, so maybe Dean sort of suggests it, but Sam eagerly agrees, which means he must be pretty tired. So he helps Sam get settled in bed, makes sure there’s a bottle of water and plenty of tissues and the one small lamp that glows a warm gold color in the dark, and then leaves the room for a while so Sam will fall asleep.
When he comes back in thirty minutes later, Sam is completely out, sprawled on his stomach atop a pile of blankets, his feet hanging off the edge of the mattress. His arms are wrapped around his pillow, hugging it tightly to his face, and one blanket is wrapped around his shoulders. He looks comfortable, in a disheveled sort of way.
Dean closes Sam’s door with a soft click, and retreats across the apartment to his own bedroom. One of Sam’s soft blankets is bunched up on Dean’s bed from when he was pacing around with it earlier, and Dean falls face-first into it as he collapses onto the bed with a tired sigh.
He lays there, stretched out on his stomach, just appreciating that for the moment, there’s nothing he’s supposed to be doing. He can just lay here and feel like crap and it won’t matter to anyone else. He loves his brother, and would do anything for him, no questions asked. But sometimes, he just gets tired. Especially when he has a cold, too.
It’s not long before the itchy feeling starts getting strong again, and he takes a couple of hitching breaths before muffling the first sneeze in Sam’s blanket. “mph’CHSHhhh!”
And after the first sneeze, he’s gone. It’s like his body suddenly realizes how badly he’s needed to sneeze all day, and now the tickle is there and it’s not letting up.
“Huh’CHSHH! HRSCHHuhh! Huh’CHSHHahh!” All of his sneezes are strong and it feels so good not to be holding back anymore. He rests his head against the blanket, feeling his breath catch as another sneeze builds, and then another.
“DSHHHuh! Ahh’TCHSHH!”
When the sneezes subside for awhile, he stays there, feeling still kind of crappy, but also totally relaxed, like the tension in his body has all drained away. Yeah, they’re both still sick, but Sam is okay. He’s not hurt, he’s not hallucinating too badly, and for now, he’s sleeping soundly.
Dean, other than this stupid cold, feels okay, too. He’s got a safe place to be with his brother for as long as he needs to. When he feels better, he’ll keep working on fixing the place up. He feels like, as crazy as things are, it all might actually work out for once.
Eventually, he wanders back into Sam’s room and curls up next to his brother on the empty side of the bed. Sam tends to sleep a little better when he’s not alone.
* * *
When Dean wakes up in the morning, he’s still congested, but there’s a fresh cup of coffee waiting for him on the nightstand. Sam, looking much less pale and feverish, is sitting on the floor with his back against the wall, reading a book. When Dean sits up in bed, sleepily rubbing a hand over his face, Sam looks up at him and smiles.
“I feel better today,” he says. “Do you feel better?”
Dean eyes the cup of coffee, then looks back at his brother.
“Yeah, Sammy. I feel better.”
Title: Help Me If You Can (I’m Feeling Down)
Summary: “The first time Sam sneezes, it ends in a panic attack.” - This is the first time Sam gets sick, not long after he’s gotten out of Hell.
Verse: Frayed ‘verse fic. This is the third one I’ve written, after Nothing to Kill or Die For and No Scratching, but it takes place before the other two.
Note: Birthday fic for tarotgal. I sent her the first scene one day, she gave me the inspiration for expanding it further, and it developed from there. Thanks, tg!
Fandom: Supernatural
Characters: Sam, Dean
Rating: PG, for mentions of Hell trauma
Word count: 2,949
The first time Sam sneezes, it ends in a panic attack.
He’d been sick all morning, stuffed up and sniffly, following Dean around and being clingy at every opportunity.
He’s currently sitting on the floor in the living room, resting against the couch, hand running back and forth through the fibers of the carpet. Dean, having finally gotten Sam to calm down, is sitting at the table paying their bills, like your average guy who just happens to have a Hell-traumatized brother to look after. He glances up from time to time, just checking on Sam.
“Doing okay, Sammy?” he asks, tapping a pen against the table.
Sam grimaces, wrinkling his nose, and then snaps forward with a sudden sneeze. “hehKTCSHSHH!”
What Dean doesn’t expect is Sam immediately slamming his body back into the couch with a sharp cry, hands flying up to his face, fingers twisting in his hair. He starts whimpering desperately, like a caged animal trying to escape from danger.
“Whoa, whoa, Sammy, it’s okay!” Dean cries. “Hey, listen to me. Sam, listen.”
Sam is still busy trying to press his whole body into the couch. Dean quickly shoves his chair back, rushing over to crouch down next to his brother.
“Hey! Sam!” he says sharply, which sometimes actually gets Sam to focus.
Sam goes suddenly quiet, hands still covering his face, his whole body tensed in anticipation of pain.
“It was just a sneeze, Sam,” Dean says quietly. “You’re okay. It’s just a cold. You sneezed.”
“Wha…?” Sam breathes in great gasps, still coming down from his panicked fight or flight moment.
“It’s just what happens sometimes when you’re sick. Remember?” A hundred and twenty years of Hell and neither Michael nor Lucifer had ever given him a bad cold.
Sam shakes his head in confusion, sniffling. He closes his eyes and leans his head back against the couch cushions, whispering, “Bad day…”
On the good days, it’s easier. It’s easier for Sam to think straight, and he can remember how the world works, even if he never quite feels comfortable in it. He can remember things from before, reminisce with Dean about hunting poltergeists in tenth grade. He can help with the dishes and the laundry and go outside for walks in the neighborhood. He can sort of function like a person.
But on the bad days, he spends most of the time just trying to remember that he’s in a safe space, that he’s not about to be flayed or burned or drowned or buried alive. He spends the day just trying to come to grips with being in his own body, just riding out all of the sensations and stimulation until things get a little better and he can start to put the pieces back together again.
“I know, Sammy,” Dean sympathizes. “Just give it a few days. It’ll get better.”
* * *
The next day it’s worse.
Dean wakes with a start, jerking his head up off the pillow, blinking wide-eyed in the morning sunlight. Laying on his stomach, he reaches up to rub at his eyes with the heel of one hand, taking note of the headache that’s throbbing dully through his sinuses. He sniffs experimentally, and the pressure intensifies.
Great.
Next to him, Sam is curled up on his side, hugging a blanket to his chest and breathing noisily through his mouth. Not surprisingly, he sounds even more congested than he did the night before.
Dean yawns, stretching out against the mattress. Slowly, so as not to disturb Sam, he rolls over and slides off the edge of the bed, feet landing on the soft carpeted floor. He tiptoes out of the room, keeping the door ajar, and turns the corner into the kitchen. He fumbles sleepily with the coffee pot, setting it to brew. With Sam still sick, and the sinus pressure and achy feeling building in his own body, he has the feeling he’s going to need a lot of coffee to get through this day.
He stands dumbly in front of the coffee pot, watching the slow drip of coffee from the filter and sniffling occasionally. And then, before he can do anything about it, there’s a sudden tickle in his nose.
“HAH’TCHSHH!” he sneezes loudly, burying his nose in the sleeve of his t-shirt. “Aw, shit,” he mumbles into the fabric.
The last thing he needs is for this to be a sneezy cold. Yesterday, even after he’d explained it several times to Sam, his brother had still been twitchy every time he sneezed. Nothing had been as bad as the first time, but the noise still took Sam by surprise, the sensation just made him that much more miserable.
Dean can feel another sneeze building. He inhales quickly and then covers his face with his hands, trying to stifle the sound. “ah-tchh! ishh!”
Man, this is gonna be a long day, he thinks, sighing.
He watches the steady drip of coffee slow down, then stop, and reaches for a clean mug, pouring himself a cup. From the surface of the coffee, tendrils of steam waft slowly into the air. He wraps one hand around the mug, savoring the warmth, and shuffles over to the couch positioned under the living room windows.
As he sits down, the springs creak under his weight until he shifts to a comfortable spot. The apartment had come partially furnished, which Dean was grateful for, but nobody ever said it was good furniture. He makes a mental note to get serious about finding some more comfortable things for the place, especially for Sam’s sake.
He stares out the window for a while at the parking lot below, quietly sipping from his mug. It’s almost completely still outside, since most of the residents have already left for school or work. Dean watches a woman running out of the apartment building, fumbling with a fancy purse and a brightly-colored gym bag as she races toward her car.
From the other room comes a startled cry as Sam jolts awake in typical Sam fashion. Sleep without any nightmares is a rarity now, for both of them, and this is just another usual morning. Dean leaves his coffee mug on the windowsill and hurries to the bedroom.
Sam has managed to tangle himself up in the blankets and is fighting desperately to get free, with a wide-eyed look on his face that means he isn’t completely aware of what’s going on.
“Shh, Sammy, it’s okay,” Dean starts saying immediately, reaching out a hand to help untangle his brother. “Hey, wake up, buddy. You’re okay, you were just dreaming.”
“No,” Sam insists, pushing Dean’s hands away. “Stop it- Please…”
“Sammy, it’s okay.”
“I’m not- not s’posed to be here… I… what…” he mumbles incoherently. His hands fly up to his forehead, long fingers pulling at his hair.
“Sam, you’re home. You’re safe.” Dean reaches up a hand to smooth down Sam’s bed head, not surprised when Sam recoils.
Then Sam starts coughing, and it seems to snap him out of his half-dreaming state. He looks up at Dean, blinking in confusion. “…I’m Sam?”
“You’re Sam,” Dean assures him.
“…All of me?” he asks, digging his fingernails into his bare chest.
Dean reaches forward and taps a finger against the anti-possession tattoo on Sam’s chest. “Remember that? Means nothing can get inside you.”
Sam brushes the tattoo with his fingers, staring at it, then looks up at Dean. “Except him.” He cocks his head and smiles in such a Lucifer-like way that Dean sucks in a sharp breath.
“No.” He shakes his head. “He… he’s gone, Sam,” Dean falters, trying to keep his voice even. Sam spent a century locked in a room with three beings Dean knows almost nothing about, and it suddenly hits him how much he still doesn’t know about what happened to Sam. “It’s okay, he’s gone,” he repeats, trying to believe it.
Then Sam’s coughing again, and just like that, he’s back to his old (new) self. He touches a hand to his forehead, then points at Dean like a parent making a point. “Not all the time.” Sam looks quickly around the room, making sure that for now, it’s just them, and then his hands are in his hair again in that nervous, self-comforting gesture.
“You’re right, Sam,” Dean agrees. “But he can’t get inside you anymore, okay? He’s locked away and not coming back out.”
Sam nods. “Okay… okay…” he whispers. He takes a couple of deep breaths, sniffling and rubbing his knuckles against his nose.
“You with me?” Dean asks, still leaning down to be near his brother.
Sam looks up at him and blinks. “Yeah…” he answers. “Yeah, I’m… I’m…” He trails off, but he does that a lot these days, so Dean doesn’t comment on it.
Instead, he clears his throat and says, “So, you ready to get out of bed, or do you wanna go back to sleep for awhile?”
“I’ll get up,” Sam answers, already moving to climb out of the bed. “Don’t want to sleep anymore…”
“Yeah, I hear ya,” Dean answers, then scrunches up his face. His head bobs down to his shoulder, quickly stifling a sneeze. “Ngk! …ahhh…” It’s almost silent, but not quite.
Sam looks up at him curiously, halfway out of the bed. “What are you doing?” he asks.
“That was, um… a sneeze.” Dean sniffs wetly, feeling even more congested than before he sneezed. Clearly, the sneezes are not going to bring any relief today if he keeps trying to stop them from happening.
“Oh,” Sam says seriously. His brow furrows and he gets that look of concentration on his face, the same one he used to get when they were researching a hunt. “Are you sick, too?”
“Yeah,” Dean answers.
“Oh… was it me?” Sam asks. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you sick.” He looks worried, and a little scared.
“It’s okay, Sam. It’s not your fault - it just happens.”
“Okay.” Sam doesn’t look convinced, but he climbs out of bed and wanders into the living room, leaving Dean to follow behind him.
* * *
The day passes quietly, each of them just trying to distract themselves from feeling bad. Dean watches TV, flipping through baseball games and cooking shows and Dr. Sexy reruns, while Sam stares out the window and bounces a rubber ball against the living room wall and paces restlessly through the apartment, constantly moving. Dean tries to get him to watch TV, but Sam can’t concentrate. His nerves are all on edge, and he has to be doing something to keep himself distracted, or it all falls apart.
The hours pass by, and life revolves around food and decongestants and keeping each other company. Dean digs some cold medicine out of the bathroom cabinet - not expired, thank God - and counts out doses for him and Sam, coaxing his brother into taking the pills despite Sam’s protests that they’ll get stuck in his throat.
Around lunchtime, Sam gets tired of pacing, and flops down on the couch next to Dean. “I don’t feel right…” he complains quietly, drawing his feet up onto the couch so he’s curled into a position that should be impossible for someone his height.
“You probably have a fever,” Dean explains. Of course, he probably has a fever, too, so he can’t just check Sam’s forehead like he usually does. Time to break out the thermometer. He pushes himself up off the couch and retrieves it from the bathroom, pulling off the plastic cap as he comes back into the living room.
“Hey, Sam?” he begins.
“Hmm?”
“Can I take your temperature?” Dean shows him the thermometer. He already knows Sam is not going to like this, so he tries to approach it as gently as possible. “I know this isn’t going to feel good, and I know it’ll taste weird, but can you put this under your tongue for a minute so I can figure out how high your fever is?”
Sam looks skeptical. He shakes his head. “Talk… talk first.”
Well, of course Sam doesn’t trust him. Purposely causing his brother pain is not something Dean wants to do, either. But he thinks for a moment, calling up one of the random facts from his latest trivia book. “I bet you didn’t know that one 60-minute cassette has 565 feet of tape inside, huh?”
Sam smiles slightly and shakes his head, then obediently opens his mouth.
“I’m sorry, Sammy,” Dean says again. “I’m just trying to help you feel better.”
Sam nods but doesn’t say anything, making a face as the metal tip of the thermometer touches his tongue. He closes his mouth around it, breathing congestedly, and they both wait for the beep that seems to take forever to come.
When it does, Dean takes the thermometer out and Sam rubs a hand over his mouth, still looking grossed out. Dean looks at the display. It’s not a terrible fever, but definitely enough to make Sam uncomfortable. Which means it’s up to Dean to keep him cooled down and distracted from how he feels.
“So, what do you say we get you something nice and cold to drink, and I’ll make some lunch, huh?” Dean asks, putting on his most upbeat voice.
“I’m… I’m not really hungry,” Sam replies, tracing patterns in the fabric of the sofa.
“C’mon, you gotta eat something.” Dean’s voice is softer now, coaxing. “How about… uhhh… sneeze- huh’ngk! - what about some pasta?” he suggests after stifling the sneeze into his shoulder.
“…The spiral kind?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“…Okay,” Sam agrees. He likes the texture of it. Spaghetti noodles, on the other hand, were ruled out a couple of months ago. Dean can understand.
“Awesome.” Dean pats Sam on the leg encouragingly and heads into the kitchen. “Buttered noodles, coming right up.” He just has to keep the routines up until it’s time to go back to sleep. He silently hopes that for once, it won’t be too hard to do.
* * *
The best part of Dean’s day comes when Sam decides to go to bed early. He’s worn himself out, pacing back and forth all day and refusing to sit still and rest for very long.
Okay, so maybe Dean sort of suggests it, but Sam eagerly agrees, which means he must be pretty tired. So he helps Sam get settled in bed, makes sure there’s a bottle of water and plenty of tissues and the one small lamp that glows a warm gold color in the dark, and then leaves the room for a while so Sam will fall asleep.
When he comes back in thirty minutes later, Sam is completely out, sprawled on his stomach atop a pile of blankets, his feet hanging off the edge of the mattress. His arms are wrapped around his pillow, hugging it tightly to his face, and one blanket is wrapped around his shoulders. He looks comfortable, in a disheveled sort of way.
Dean closes Sam’s door with a soft click, and retreats across the apartment to his own bedroom. One of Sam’s soft blankets is bunched up on Dean’s bed from when he was pacing around with it earlier, and Dean falls face-first into it as he collapses onto the bed with a tired sigh.
He lays there, stretched out on his stomach, just appreciating that for the moment, there’s nothing he’s supposed to be doing. He can just lay here and feel like crap and it won’t matter to anyone else. He loves his brother, and would do anything for him, no questions asked. But sometimes, he just gets tired. Especially when he has a cold, too.
It’s not long before the itchy feeling starts getting strong again, and he takes a couple of hitching breaths before muffling the first sneeze in Sam’s blanket. “mph’CHSHhhh!”
And after the first sneeze, he’s gone. It’s like his body suddenly realizes how badly he’s needed to sneeze all day, and now the tickle is there and it’s not letting up.
“Huh’CHSHH! HRSCHHuhh! Huh’CHSHHahh!” All of his sneezes are strong and it feels so good not to be holding back anymore. He rests his head against the blanket, feeling his breath catch as another sneeze builds, and then another.
“DSHHHuh! Ahh’TCHSHH!”
When the sneezes subside for awhile, he stays there, feeling still kind of crappy, but also totally relaxed, like the tension in his body has all drained away. Yeah, they’re both still sick, but Sam is okay. He’s not hurt, he’s not hallucinating too badly, and for now, he’s sleeping soundly.
Dean, other than this stupid cold, feels okay, too. He’s got a safe place to be with his brother for as long as he needs to. When he feels better, he’ll keep working on fixing the place up. He feels like, as crazy as things are, it all might actually work out for once.
Eventually, he wanders back into Sam’s room and curls up next to his brother on the empty side of the bed. Sam tends to sleep a little better when he’s not alone.
* * *
When Dean wakes up in the morning, he’s still congested, but there’s a fresh cup of coffee waiting for him on the nightstand. Sam, looking much less pale and feverish, is sitting on the floor with his back against the wall, reading a book. When Dean sits up in bed, sleepily rubbing a hand over his face, Sam looks up at him and smiles.
“I feel better today,” he says. “Do you feel better?”
Dean eyes the cup of coffee, then looks back at his brother.
“Yeah, Sammy. I feel better.”