Hangman is Coming Down From the Gallows, by withdiamonds, commentary by aynslee (4/4)

[aynslee]

When Sam finally comes for him, Dean’s caught completely by surprise.

They’re at the diner, mid-morning coffee and pancakes stuck dry in Dean’s throat while the demon and Kathy chat at the register. Kathy’s extra jumpy and the jangling coins in the register drawer sound louder than usual. She laughs and it echoes strident and unnatural around the room. Dean slurps at his coffee desperately, trying to get his pancakes down. It burns his tongue.

The heavy-set guy two booths down suddenly tenses, lowering his newspaper and looking around until he catches Ellie’s eye. She seems startled and glances quickly over at Dean. Moving carefully in his direction, she gives him a nervous smile, both of her eyes hollow in her damaged face. (I’m very curious about Ellie here. Is it possible that she’s a demon, and that she’s scared of real-Sam and his obvious power? Or is she a fellow sufferer like Dean, who’s sympathetic?)

The two young guys at the counter continue to shovel in their eggs and bacon, seemingly oblivious to the changed atmosphere of the diner. Ellie closes in on Dean, coffee pot shaking in her hand. He’s never been afraid of Ellie before, no matter what her face happened to look like on any given day, but right now he’s keeping a wary eye on the hand holding the coffee.

The clanking noise from the cash register gets louder and Dean turns in time to see Kathy back away from the demon, shaking her head, her face distorted with terror. The demon throws his head back and laughs like she told him a joke, and the coffee pot slips out of Ellie’s hand. It shatters when it hits the cracked and worn linoleum and coffee splashes up and across her legs. The skin blisters and burns but she doesn’t seem to notice.

The room thrums with tension, but the demon appears oblivious, lounging against the counter, leering at Kathy. (Interesting that he’s so smug that he doesn’t feel real-Sam coming.) Ellie gapes at him, sidling slowly over toward the man two booths down, not taking her eyes off the demon. The heavy-set guy folds his newspaper and starts to get to his feet.

And then Dean can’t move. His arms and legs are leaden and he can’t open his mouth to speak. The air is suddenly scorching, searing his lungs as he drags in a breath. He’s dizzy and disoriented, but he manages to turn his head slightly to watch as the door of the diner slowly but inexorably opens.

And Sam stands in the doorway. His Sam. Dean knows it in an instant, without conscious thought. This is Sam.

The door eases closed behind Sam, the bell above it tinkling softly. The air clears, cools, and Dean regains his balance. He’s barely aware of the tears streaming down his face. Sam.

No one moves, no one makes a sound. The demon straightens up, pushes away from the counter and Kathy. His eyes are black and fixed avidly on Sam’s face.

Dean blinks and the two young guys who have been eating breakfast at the counter every morning since Dean’s been in Hell, who only once ever looked up and acknowledged him, are ranged at Sam’s side, flanking him protectively. They look like they’re prepared to take on a whole demon army for Sam.

Or else they’re part of a demon army for Sam, and the horror of that thought has Dean half out of his seat, reaching for his brother. Everything will have been for nothing if Sam’s ready to lead a horde of demons out of hell. Dean can still think clearly enough to know that. He would sacrifice anything to prevent that.

He thought he already had.

Sam shakes his head, pinning Dean in place with a flick of his wrist. No.

“Sammy!” Dean cries out. His brother can’t do this to him. It’s won’t be any different than what Dean’s been suffering for this endless unfathomable time if Sam has turned into something dark, something other than Sam.

“Wait for me, Dean” Sam pleads quietly, determination and desperation at war on his face. “It’s all okay.”

The demon laughs again and it’s almost triumphant, as if what he’s been waiting for all along has finally happened. Kathy, Ellie, and the heavy-set guy are ranged behind him. Kathy looks terrified, but Ellie and her apparent boyfriend look prepared to do battle. Ellie smirks at Dean and says, “Sorry, sugar.” Now her eyes are cavernous in her twisted face.

The demon who’s been using Sam’s body to torment Dean for so long raises his eyebrows at Sam and says, “Finally. Took you long enough.” He looks at Sam, tilting his head and studying him almost curiously. He brings his arms up, crossing them in front of his chest, feet apart and shoulders straight.

Sam looks calmly back at him and the air crackles with tension. The silence is absolute, and then Sam finally breaks it.

“He’s mine.” It’s a simple statement, but it’s effective. Galvanizing, even. It’s more than enough. Relief and love flood through Dean, making him tremble. He shakes his head to clear it. He has to be ready when Sam needs him.

Dean’s not the only one who reacts to Sam’s words. The demon’s face distorts with fury, rage making him look so unlike Sam that Dean can’t believe he was ever fooled that this thing was really his brother.

“Yours?” the demon snarls. “I don’t think so. He was never yours. He belongs to Lilith. He always has and he always will.” Kathy blanches at the name, at hearing it spoken aloud. She looks as if she’s about to pass out with fear and she stumbles against Ellie, clutching frantically at her arm. The demon throws an angry look her way and she shrinks back even further.

Sam shakes his head. He looks around as if searching for something that’s not there. “Lilith’s not exactly on the front lines for this one, is she?” The demon scowls and Sam smiles darkly. “You can tell Lilith from me, she needs to watch her back. She’s pretty much at the top of my shit list.” He makes it sound a lot more menacing than the casual words alone would imply and Dean is impressed. That’s his baby brother.

The demon is less impressed. He snarls and lashes out, pointing at the blond counter guy and pinning him to the wall. The kid’s feet dangle off the floor and he clutches at his throat, gasping for air.

The demon stands, feet planted wide with the counter at his back, challenging Sam’s claim on Dean. Ten feet separate him from Sam and the door of the diner.

Dean chances a glance out the window. The Impala is waiting, idling next to the sidewalk in front of the door. There are no people around, the illusion of passersby and townspeople long gone. The sound of crockery smashing on the ground makes him jerk his head back to Sam.

Dishes and silverware are flying every which way, an expression of fierce concentration on Sam’s face. Kathy screams and ducks and a large dinner plate hits the heavy-set guy in the head. He ignores the blood that trickles down his forehead and into his eyes, blinking it away as he bares his teeth in a grin.

With a shock of surprise, Dean realizes that Sam is the one making all the cutlery whiz around the room. That’s my boy, he thinks, with the part of his brain that’s not terrified out of its mind. He makes another move to get up, planting his hands on the table in front of him and Sam snarls at him, “Dean. Stay the fuck where you are. Don’t fucking move.”

“Fuck that shit, Sammy,” Dean snaps back. There’s no way he’s not going to be by Sam’s side for this battle. He shoves to his feet.

“Dean!” Sam yells and again something pushes Dean down, something he can’t see or even really feel.

“Goddammit, Sam! Don’t you do that to me!” Dean struggles against it, but Sam is too strong.

And Dean’s not sure who he’s fighting against at this point. Too long spent with a Sam who wasn’t Sam and Dean’s left rudderless. He falls helplessly back into his seat and stares at Sam, watching in fascination as his brother fights the battle for Dean’s soul with his mind.

Kathy seems to have abandoned her hiding place behind the register and is now looking eagerly from Sam to the demon. She reaches into the pocket of her apron for something. The movement catches Sam’s attention and in an instant the heavy cash register slams into her and she falls to the floor with a grunt. Sam bends to slit her throat with Ruby’s knife, then straightens up, his face grim. He hasn’t even broken a sweat; he’s doing it all so effortlessly.

He throws Ellie back toward the kitchen, where she crashes into the wall, and the heavy-set guy ends up pinned to the ceiling. Sam stops short of slicing through his abdomen and making him burn, for which Dean is inordinately grateful.

The door of the diner swings open and the old couple from the steakhouse hustle in, followed closely by Darla, who licks her lips with a wanton smile. Her eyes light up as she looks from the demon Sam to the real one.

“Sam! Behind you, Sammy!” Dean yells in warning.

His brother doesn’t take his eyes off the demon. The two younger guys from the counter who are flanking Sam turn as one towards the door and all hell breaks loose as they attack. Dean sees the old woman go down under the blond guy, and Darla throws herself at the one with the mustache.

Sam tosses something to Dean. He’s not quite ready and he almost doesn’t catch it in time. It’s Ruby’s knife and Dean hefts the weight of it, moving it from hand to hand as he’s finally able to get to his feet.

“Now, Dean,” Sammy says softly. He has the Colt in his hand, aimed straight at the demon’s head. The demon isn’t laughing anymore and his face is twisted up with hate and rage. It makes him even more unrecognizable. Sam’s face has never in his life worn that expression.

Dean gets up and goes to his brother, ranging himself at Sam’s back. Shoulder to shoulder, and Sam says to the demon, “I told you, he’s mine, you son of a bitch,” and pulls the trigger.

The demon with Sam’s face, the one that’s had Dean so twisted up for so long, jerks, a red flash shooting through his body. As smoke pours from the bullet hole, he sinks to his knees, eyes unseeing as he pitches forward to the ground.

Ellie screams as Sam turns the gun on her and puts a bullet in her heart. (I’m thinking this answers my question about whether Ellie’s a demon!) Dean can hear Darla’s voice, hoarse and guttural, cursing Sam with every breath. The young guy with the blond hair is dead and Darla stands up with a look of triumph on her face, hands covered with his blood. Dean rushes forward and plunges the knife through her throat. Her eyes flash and then the light in them flickers out as she crumples to the ground.

The old man from the steakhouse has joined forces with his wife and together they plunge their hands into the young guy with the mustache’s chest and rip out his heart. His screams reverberate around the diner as Sam pulls the trigger of the Colt twice more in rapid succession.

Together, Sam and Dean move to the door. Dean holds the knife out in front of him, keeping everyone at bay, away from his brother, except there’s no one left to protect Sammy from. They’re all dead. (Whew! That was intense, so much so that I read with my mouth open, instead of thinking. Exciting!)

Then they’re out the door, heading for the car. There’s no howling, no dark shapes slinking around the Impala, but the breeze smells more of sulfur than it does of spring flowers. Smoke fills the sky and thunderclouds tower overhead.

Dean doesn’t stop to think, he just gets into the car at his brother’s side. Sam’s already thrown the car in gear by the time Dean slams the door closed, and they take off down the road and out of town.

The scenery isn’t exactly what Dean has gotten used to. The familiar landscape is unrecognizable. Charred trees bend in the wind, and familiar buildings appear deserted and run down, their decrepitude seeming ancient and primeval. (Nice to know they’re out of the façade of Dean’s hell.)

The wind howls, ash-filled and dark. Thunder crashes around them and lightening illuminates the sky, flashing on the road in front of them. Hail beats down on the car and ricochets off the hood, flying up to hit the windshield. The car sounds like it’s under mortar fire and Dean can’t help it, he lifts his hands and covers his ears.

Sam drives with fierce concentration, seemingly oblivious to the chaos and destruction around them.

Rain lashes at the car windows. Trees topple onto the road, their limbs reaching for the car. Dean spots a funnel cloud in the greenish sky ahead and Sam reaches across the front seat and places the Colt in Dean’s left hand.

He looks at Sam, but Sam doesn’t take his eyes off the road ahead. Dean transfers the gun to his right hand and Ruby’s knife to his left, ready. Prepared for whatever comes their way. The storm roars around them and still Sam drives.

Flames appear on the horizon, large red flames licking the trees, reducing them to cinders in a fraction of time. Soon there are no trees left, just a barren, dusty landscape. There’s nothing to fuel the flames, but still they burn, consuming the very air around them. (I like seeing the flames theme reappear. Obviously flames go with hell, but it also reminds us of the plane crash Dean was forced to watch on television.) Dean feels the unbearable heat of it even in the sanctuary of his car.

He loses track of time, or maybe he never had a grasp of it in the first place. He knows only that they could have been driving forever, or for no time at all.

They drive on, silence weighing heavily around them. Soon the road starts to climb, and it rises ever further in the distance, a promise Dean can’t yet acknowledge. No one pursues them, but that doesn’t mean anything to Dean.

Sam speaks at last. “Sleep.”

Dean does. There’s something in that single word that frees him for a while and he closes his eyes against the flames.

*

Dean wakes up and automatically turns away from the window, tucking his head into his shoulder to avoid the sharp beam of bright sunlight waiting for him.

Except the window is small and high in the wall, and the sunlight is diffuse, as if it’s being filtered through leaves. It’s not at all familiar, not what Dean’s used to. (Nice contrast here, with the sunlight being different. A new start for Sam and Dean both.)

Dean hears movement nearby, where someone is breathing quietly and evenly. Pulling his face out of his pillow, he looks up to find Sam staring at him almost hungrily. Dean closes his eyes. He’d tried to put a stop to the daily sex once he realized his brother wasn’t really his brother. Some days he’s been more successful with that than others.

He scoots backwards in the bed, but all that does is put him more firmly between the wall and Sam. His heart starts to flutter in panic and his breath is shallow.

“Dean,” Sam says, his voice soft, as if trying to soothe an injured animal, one that’s cornered and terrified. “Dean. You’re awake.” There’s something in his voice, something like wonder. It’s achingly familiar and Dean tries to block it out. The more like Sam the demon becomes, the more it hurts. (It must be killing Sam to have Dean look at him in terror.)

Okay, so today the demon is going to play it nice, be good-Sam, pretend everything is normal, just fine and dandy. That stopped making Dean feel any better, any safer, a long time ago. The demon’s volatile and Dean’s learned the hard way that he’s capable of turning on him in an instant, without warning or cause.

Dean says nothing, stays still and quiet, and Sam’s tentative smile fades a bit. “Hey, you hungry?” He looks hopeful, like a dog waiting for someone to pat it on the head. Dean remembers that expression, Sammy trying to convince Dean to let him drive the Impala when he was fourteen, or to tag along with Dean and his friends when they went out drinking when Sam was seventeen. Sometimes Dean let him, because Sammy’s a total lightweight and was always an amusing drunk.

Now he’s just a mean one. (This is one spot that made me want to cry. Sam’s been working so hard to get Dean out, knowing what he was going through, and now that he has Dean back, Dean’s petrified. And for Dean, the fact that he’s actually safe now, but he doesn’t know it, and has to spend more time thinking he’s still there with that demon. And the worst part is that he isn’t differentiating between real-Sam and demon-Sam here.)

“Dean, it’s me. Sam. Dude, it’s okay. You’re safe, you’re outta there. Dean, it’s just me.” Sam’s voice is soothing in its repetitiveness as he continues his litany of reassurance. Dean allows it to lull him into relaxing a fraction, unable to help himself. He fights it, but he’s just so tired.

“How long?” Dean asks, his speech slurred with exhaustion and fear. He doesn’t even know what he’s asking. How long has he been here? How long is the demon going to torment him? How long is eternity?

He doesn’t really expect an answer.

But Sam provides him with one. “Two days. It’s been two days.”

Dean stares at the face that looks so much like his brother. “Two days?” he repeats blankly. Two days of eternity? It’s only been two days? There’s only two days left? What does that mean, two days? It’s not an answer. He starts to feel agitated and he can’t catch his breath.

“Dean, Dean, it’s okay.” Sam looks worried, guilty. “Two days since I brought you home. You were there…” Sam hesitates. “Longer than that, you were there for a while,” he whispers.

Dean doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t know what any of it means. He tries to slow his breathing down. He doesn’t want to make Sam angry. (How horrid for Dean that he’s still in the mind-set of worrying about making Sam angry, thanks to the demon.)

“I’m sorry,” Sam says, voice so low that Dean almost doesn’t hear it. “I’m so sorry.”

Dean knows he’s supposed to get up now. He has to get up and dressed, shower and brush his teeth. They have to go to the diner, decide whether to eat breakfast or lunch, listen to Ellie talk and look at her face. He has to decide if he wants a hamburger or pancakes, and he can’t. He doesn’t know what to do.

So he goes back to sleep. It’s easier that way and Sam lets him.

The next time Dean wakes up the room is dark and there’s moonlight coming in through the high, open window. He seems to be alone and he looks around carefully. There’s something different about the room and he finally sees what he didn’t before.

It’s not the motel room. It’s the room he and Sam used to share when they were kids, whenever they stayed at Bobby’s house. (I’m glad Sam had a safe place to take Dean, one that’s not associated with motel rooms. I’m sure Dean will have an aversion to motels for a while, even if he won’t admit it.)

He hears his father’s voice in his head, mumbling as they seat themselves in a noisy auditorium, squeezed in with hordes of normal, middle-class parents, waiting to see Sam perform in his high school’s production of Our Town.

“What fresh hell is this?” John had said sotto voce to Dean as he opened the program to find Sammy’s face smiling out at them, while Dean struggled not to laugh. It had become something of a Winchester family joke and the phrase runs through Dean’s mind as he lies motionless, assessing.

What fresh Hell indeed?

He realizes with a start that he’s not alone. There’s a figure sleeping in the other bed, sprawled out on its stomach, feet hanging over the end of the bed. The sheet has slipped down and moonlight reflects over broad shoulders and messy dark hair.

Sam.

Dean watches Sam sleep for a long time. He’s confused, because he thinks that this could really be Sam. But he hasn’t seen Sam in so long - an eternity a voice whispers in his head - and he can’t be sure.

He slips quietly out of bed, keeping an eye on the sleeping form in the room with him. Dean’s dressed in boxers and nothing else. He doesn’t know where his clothes are and so he pulls the blanket from the bed and wraps it around himself. He eases out of the bedroom, pulling the door silently shut behind him.

He creeps down the stairs, and he still knows which steps creak. (It’s nice to see that Dean’s still in there, mentally.) Years of sneaking out at night to wander in the salvage yard, poking at the hulks of the wrecked cars Bobby collects, without either John or Sammy hearing him have made him adept at knowing which steps to avoid so as not to get caught.

Dean always had the feeling that Bobby knew each and every time Dean snuck out at night, but he never said a word about it.

He finds Bobby in the kitchen getting two cups out of the cupboard, his back to Dean. “Coffee’s almost ready, son,” he says without turning around.

Nodding, Dean stands uncertainly in the middle of Bobby’s homey kitchen, shivering in spite of the blanket he’s got clutched to his chest. “Sit down, boy,” Bobby says. Dean sits. He doesn’t know what else to do.

Bobby sets a cup of coffee down in front of him and Dean wraps his hands around it, warming his cold fingers. He sits there thinking, trying out and discarding questions in his head. Finally he simply says, “Is this real? Are you really Bobby?” His voice is low, and he doesn’t look up from his hands. His throat threatens to close on his next question. “Is that really Sam upstairs?” His voice is little more than a whisper.

“Aw, kid.” Bobby sounds sadder than Dean’s ever heard him. “Yeah, this is real. Sam went right down to Hell and brought you out. Took him a damn sight longer than he wanted it to, but he did it.”

“It took me longer than it should have,” a voice says, and Dean snaps his head around to see Sam standing in the doorway. He sounds sad, too, just like Bobby.

“But, this,” Dean waves his hand around to encompass the kitchen, the whole house, Bobby and Sam and himself. “It’s real? You’re real? You’re - you’re Sam?”

Sam nods, his eyes never leaving Dean’s.

“I saw you,” Dean says slowly. “I saw you in the car. In the mirror once. In the parking lot? And then you came?” he asks, staring up at his brother in wonder.

Sam nods again. He moves to the table and pulls out a chair. Bobby pours him a cup of coffee and sits down between them. “I could only stay for short periods of time at first. I practiced, learned things. Finally I could stay long enough to get you out.” He doesn’t speak again, as if that’s all the explanation Dean needs. Like that’s all there is to say. Maybe it is.

“And it’s really you?” Dean asks again.

Sam nods. “Yes.”

Dean thinks about that. “I’m gonna go take a shower.” He leaves Bobby and Sam sitting at the kitchen table staring after him, and he leaves his coffee untouched.

*

They stay at Bobby’s for two months. Dean has trouble staying awake for more than a few hours at a time, and he finds himself drifting off at odd moments and in weird places. He wakes up once under the Impala, socket wrench in his hand. Sometimes he finds himself in an old lawn chair on Bobby’s porch, the frayed seat sagging under his weight, or huddled on the couch in the front room, nose buried in a dusty cushion. Whenever or wherever he wakes, Sam is almost always there.

“Christ, Sam, stop watching me sleep. It’s kinda creepy, dude.” Dean blinks up at Sam, who starts guiltily and jerks his eyes away from where he’d been studying his brother’s sleeping form. Dean tries out a small smile. It’s been getting easier to do that lately.

His sleep is mostly dreamless, and usually blessedly quiet. There’s no howling filling him with dread, no scratching at the doors, no wind whistling in around the windowpanes. He’s started feeling sparks of his old energy coming back.

One morning he’s in the bathroom shaving and when he looks up from the sink, Sam is behind him, face in the mirror, and Dean freaks the fuck out. (Nice replay of that moment in hell.) His razor clatters to the floor and he spins around, horror squeezing his throat, choking him. He clutches at the sink behind him while Sam stares at him with dawning realization on his face.

“Fuck, Dean, Dean, it’s me, I’m sorry, man, I didn’t mean to - Bobby sent me up to tell you breakfast is ready.” Sam looks sick with guilt.

Dean’s heart pounds in his chest, but he manages to take a shallow breath, and then another one. He offers Sam a small nod and brushes past him, needing to get the fuck out of the bathroom. He starts nervously at every sound for the rest of the day while Sam watches him with miserable eyes.

Bobby cooks for them and holds huddled conversations with Sam when Dean’s not around. Dean knows they do this because he knows Sam and Bobby. Bobby cooks the kind of food they grew up with, the kind he taught Dean how to make over the years. John was never much of a cook, although he tried, and Sam’s talent in the kitchen has always involved opening cereal boxes, or maybe Pop Tarts.

Every summer until John pissed Bobby off so badly that he was no longer welcome in his home, the Winchesters spent a week or two here in this house. Dad would make use of Bobby’s library and pick Bobby’s brain, learning everything he could about the evil things he’d never expected to spend his life hunting.

Dean listened to their conversations around the kitchen table, refilling their coffee cups inconspicuously, trying not to draw attention to himself and get banished to the salvage yard while the adults talked. He didn’t really mind so much when he got chased away, because he never tired of the cars out there, but he wanted to learn, to know what bad things were out there in the dark.

Sometimes he and Sam fished in the stream behind the house, built dams and caught frogs, as carefree as they were ever allowed to be. In the warm summer evenings, Dean stood at the stove next to Bobby and watched him cook, committing to memory the way Bobby’s hands touched the food, the way he handled the pots and pans. He studied how Bobby stirred simple spaghetti sauce or layered macaroni and cheese in a pan so that it tasted so very different from the kind that came in a box, the kind with orange powder, that they might as well have been different foods.

During the rest of the time, when he and Dad and Sammy were on their own, Dean remembered what he learned in Bobby’s kitchen, and Dad would ruffle his hair gratefully as he got up from the table in some rented apartment after a meal of meatloaf or tuna casserole. (I’m so glad that Dean can spend this time getting his memories back, especially after they were twisted and perverted by that demon.)

Those memories seep into Dean’s soul, soothing him. The familiarity of this place comforts him, pushes other, darker memories farther and farther away. One day, he finds he can’t remember what was wrong with Ellie’s face. He hasn’t talked much about it to Sam, hasn’t told him what it was like. He doesn’t think are words sufficient to convey the sheer horror of it.

Sam sleeps in the other bed still, and he hasn’t made any attempts to touch Dean since the day he scared the shit out of him in the bathroom. Dean misses Sam’s touch, his hand on his shoulder or their arms brushing together in passing. He wants to feel his brother’s skin, warm and alive, but he doesn’t know how to do that anymore. He keeps the bathroom door locked whenever he’s in there.

He thinks Sam is waiting for him. (I love how sensitive Sam is, to what Dean needs. I never had any doubt that he would be, but it’s still nice to read.)

One evening after Dean brushes his teeth, he eyes the distance between the two beds thoughtfully. He has to keep himself from packing his duffle neatly every night, fighting the urge to give his amulet over into Sam’s care. Maybe if he moves the beds closer together it will keep him from wanting to run as far away as he possibly can. He pushes until there’s only a foot of space between them.

Sam looks at the beds when he comes in, but he doesn’t say anything. After they turn the lights out, when they’ve both settled, when Dean’s pillow is bunched up the way he likes it and the top of the sheet is tucked over the edge of the blanket just right, Dean closes his eyes and moves his arm, reaching ever so slowly across the space between them. Hesitantly, he rests his hand on Sam’s bed.

He opens his eyes and looks at Sam. Sam is watching him, eyes wide and bright in the dim light spilling in from the hallway. A tear runs down Sam’s face, but he doesn’t move closer, doesn’t say anything.

Dean closes his eyes and goes to sleep.

Dean still gets confused sometimes, but he’s gotten better at remembering that it’s really Sam beside him every day. Neither Bobby nor Sam pushes him, no one seems to expect him to talk, or stay awake for more than an hour or two at a time, or do the dishes, or anything at all, really.

He lurks in the hallway outside the kitchen and overhears Sam and Bobby talking about him. Sam sounds worried.

“I don’t know what else to do, Bobby,” he says.

“Just give him some time, kid. Dean’s strong, he’s gonna be fine. He’s like his daddy, he holds the important things close. It don’t seem like it, but he trusts you. Still, he trusts you still.” Bobby’s voice is warm and matter-of-fact.

Sam murmurs something Dean can’t make out, and then he says, “I just want my brother back.” Dean doesn’t think he’s ever heard Sammy sound so sad.

“You’ve got him back, Sam.” Bobby sounds calm and sure. “You went and you got him back.”

Dean does trust Sam, would still trust him with his life, his soul. It’s just his sanity that he’s not quite ready to surrender yet.

He can feel himself getting stronger, getting restless. He’s drawn to the Impala, as always, and he often spends the quiet hours of the afternoon sleeping in her back seat. He wakes up with his cheek stuck to the warm leather, sweating in the sun.

One day Sam wordlessly tosses him the keys and Dean drives around for hours. He shakes his head apologetically at Sam when he gets back. Sam has clearly been going out of his mind with worry the whole time Dean was gone. It was obviously hard for him, letting his brother out of his sight for so long. He’s just as clearly restraining himself from asking Dean where the hell he’s been all afternoon, or else throwing his arms around him in a relieved hug.

“Just trying to figure out how to get to the ocean from here, Sammy,” Dean says with a small smile. (This is so perfect-a wonderful match for Dean’s desire to drive away from that area in hell, only to find that he couldn’t get out. But now he can keep driving, with Sam.)

“Which ocean?” Sam asks.

Dean shrugs. “Don’t matter.”

Sam manages a smile back and Bobby, who’s come out onto the porch to see for himself that Dean is safely back, looks between them with a nod. “You boys are welcome to stay here as long as you like,” he says. “But don’t feel as if you have to.”

Part of Dean wants to stay here forever, tinkering with the cars in Bobby’s yard, letting Bobby feed them, Sam spending his days with Bobby’s books. The on-going demon war doesn’t concern him much, although he knows it should. He knows it concerns Sam, just as he knows he’ll have to let Sam tell him about it eventually. (This is so unlike the pre-hell Dean, to not be concerned with a demon war, so unlike his usual go-get-‘em attitude, but completely understandable and appropriate after what he’s been through. I have a feeling he’ll get back to the way he was.)

Dean doesn’t want to know what Sam’s been doing, doesn’t want to know about his powers, or about the fact that unless Dean didn’t see what he thought he saw, there are demons out there willing to fight for him, whether Dean likes it or not. He has a feeling Ruby had something to do with it all and Dean can’t seem to find the rage he knows should be there. It keeps slipping away whenever he tries to grab onto it.

He’s not giving up, he’ll still fight Sam on that, but not right this minute. He’s having a hard time mustering up the energy.

Dean doesn’t even know how long he was in Hell, how long he was gone. The days are warm, but the nights are cool and the leaves on the trees around Bobby’s house have turned a deep red-orange. He’ll have to look at a newspaper soon enough and then he’ll figure it out. He won’t ask Sam. Sam already feels guilty about how long it took him to get Dean out. He shouldn’t, but he does.

Dean has their beds shoved completely up against one another when Sam comes in one night. It’s midway through the second month and Dean is suddenly sick of the sadness and guilt in Sam’s eyes that never go away.

Dean’s already in bed, far away from the wall and close to the door, and Sam doesn’t say anything, just crawls in and settles down, giving Dean plenty of room to maneuver as far away as he wants. There’s a free and clear path to the door, the hallway, outside to the Impala. To freedom if he needs it.

He doesn’t, not any more. Not from Sammy. (This is so moving. Dean has come so far already, thanks to his own strength, as well as Sam’s willingness to just let him be, and give him time to recover.)

Dean takes a deep breath and scoots over toward Sam’s side. Sam raises an eyebrow and lifts his covers up, a clear invitation. (This part makes the fangirl inside of me cheer. It’s just the right touch. Sam’s showing Dean that he loves him, that he’s there and wants him, but there’s no real pressure.) It’s not easy, but Dean gradually moves around until he’s under the blanket, tucked in next to Sam. He holds himself rigid, his back against Sam’s chest but barely making contact. Sam makes no attempt to touch him. It takes a long time but slowly he relaxes back into Sam’s strength and warmth.

They lay in silence, the sound of their breathing filling the small bedroom. Then Sam’s arm comes around Dean’s chest and he gently lays his palm over Dean’s heart. Dean breathes. (They are slowly getting their relationship back. This is so meaningful for both of them, that Sam is waiting, and that Dean finally feels ready to get in bed with Sam. It’s nice that they’ve come full circle, from leaving Bobby’s house when Dean’s deal was up, to being back there after he’s saved.)

He knows they’ll have to leave soon. It’s almost time, and there’s work to be done. He still feels that pull to see an ocean and he still doesn’t give a damn which one.

But right now he’s just gonna stay here with Sam for a little while longer.