Hunter's Lullaby: chapter twelve
Chapter 12
Portsmouth, May 17
Dean fell asleep around midnight, curled on his left side on Rania’s hospital bed. The morphine injection had partially relieved him of the pain, but his face remained tense, even in sleep, and he moaned from time to time.
Sam sat on a chair next to the bed and watched him in concern. The baby had seemed perfectly fine on the ultrasound - she had been sucking her thumb and moving her legs almost lazily. Dean’s physical exam showed nothing wrong. Rania thought they were facing the same problem as before. There were still ligament and bone movements during the last trimester of a normal pregnancy, allowing the pelvis to get ready for the birth. All they could hope was that it wouldn’t last any longer than the first time.
“Hey Sam?” Rania whispered, entering the room. “I made some coffee. You wanna come and share a cup with me?”
Sam looked at Dean once again, hesitating.
“Come on. He’s gonna sleep for at least a couple of hours.”
“Yeah, okay.”
They sat in the living room and drank silently for a couple of minutes. Rania looked tired; she had spent part of the day taking care of a hunter who had been badly injured during a hunt and was still concerned about his health. “Vengeful spirit, particularly nasty,” she had said.
“I’m not worrying too much about your brother,” Rania said. “I’m worried about the way he hurts, but not about the pregnancy.”
“Yeah… Well, I don’t like seeing him like that.”
“Pretty understandable. He’s lucky to have you.”
Sam waved his hand dismissively. “He’s always been there for me, you know.”
“Sam…” Rania bit her lower lip and started to curl a strand of hair around her finger. “You know, since I discovered what kind of world we live in, I’ve come to realize what the word “evil” really means.”
“Yeah, I hear you.”
“I’ve seen things like… a little boy who had been possessed and whose body had practically been ripped to shreds. That’s evil to me, that’s wrong. Not… not two brothers loving each other a little more than they should.”
Sam’s hands started shaking around his steaming cup. He felt his throat closing on itself and swallowed loudly. “Rania. You… Listen, I… Fuck. He sold his soul for me. He’s… Dean is the only person who has always been there and I know it’s fucked up but it works for us. It-”
“Hey, calm down. You don’t have to justify yourself. I’m not judging here.”
“And we thought we hid it so well.”
“I’m your doctor. I’m seeing Dean under special circumstances, where he’s vulnerable and feeling like everything is out of his control. It’s hard to hide one’s feelings in that kind of situation. The way he’s always seeking your eyes, the concern you show on your face. Maybe it’s because I’m a woman but yeah, I figured it out pretty quickly.”
“Bobby doesn’t know. Nobody does.”
“And I have no intention of spreading the news. As a matter of fact, I never would’ve brought it up if I didn’t have some… medical concerns.”
“About what?”
“Are you the father of Dean’s child?”
Sam blushed and bent his head. “Yes. Yes, I am.”
“That’s what I thought. Sometimes, when siblings or even barely related people conceive a child together, there’s a chance that-”
“Oh my God. Consanguinity,” Sam whispered, feeling suddenly light-headed. “It hadn’t even crossed my mind.”
“Relax, Sam. Inbreeding is really not like what we see in movies. To have a degenerate generation, the inbreeding must have been going on for many years in an isolated region. In your case, it just means that Dean and you share a lot of the same genes, so if there’s a genetic disease running in your family, the baby’s chances of developing it are slightly higher.”
“Oh. Well, I don’t think there’s any particular diseases running in our family but there could be. Our mother’s family are all dead and we don’t know a lot about our father’s.”
“That’s why I wanna run some blood tests with the both of you.”
“Yeah. Okay… but maybe we could start with me. If you don’t find anything, you won’t have to test Dean’s blood, right?”
“Right.”
“I don’t want to give him anything else to worry about if we don’t have to. He tends to hold himself responsible for everything in our lives, even when he doesn’t have any control over it.”
“Yeah, I get it. Deal. I’ll test you first, but only if you promise me something.”
“What?”
“I don’t want you to worry about it either. You have enough stuff on your shoulders right now. All we’re talking about is probabilities and statistics for now.”
“Okay, I’ll try.”
Rania smiled warmly and patted Sam on the knee. “I’m sure your daughter will be perfectly fine.”
Sam couldn’t tell if it was only because he was tired, but hearing Rania acknowledging him as their baby’s father brought him ridiculously close to tears.
::: :::
The pain lasted longer this time - five days, to be precise - but it went smoother. Dean obediently received his morphine shots, and after three days, the pain had subsided enough that he could switch from injections to pills, and Sam could go back to work. Sam had waited for him to get a little better to tell him Rania knew about them, and Dean had reacted better than he would’ve thought. “What can we do about it, huh? Hey, by the way, this doesn’t give you the right to get all touchy-feely with me when she’s around.”
On the fifth day, when Sam got home from work, he found Dean showered and waiting for him in the living room, still pale but looking relieved and steady. He must have lost a couple of pounds during the last few days but, all in all, he looked better.
“So, how do you feel?”
“Better. Still sore, but I haven’t had any morphine since this morning. I think the worst is over.”
That night, Bobby called. Dean couldn’t bring himself to talk to him and Sam did his best to keep his story straight and spare their friend as much as he could. He could tell Bobby was still suspicious but he had apparently decided to cut them some slack.
They went to bed early. Sam helped Dean up the stairs on slightly shaking legs and had very inappropriate thoughts while keeping his hand on Dean’s ass. Their sexual activities had become less frequent as Dean’s pregnancy had progressed, and Sam had to admit to himself that he missed it. The second trimester horniness that some books and internet sites talked about didn’t affect Dean, apparently. Or maybe his embarrassment about his body balanced the hormone’s effects. Either way, Sam found himself jerking off in the shower more and more often.
And he knew that tonight Dean was in no state to do any kind of physical activity, but as he watched him lying down on the bed, one hand over his belly to keep a better balance, he felt a rush of desire flowing through his veins and thought that maybe…
Sam slowly lay down next to Dean, brushing his fingers against Dean’s thigh and kissing the patch of skin below his ear.
“Sam…”
“Look, I know you’re still hurting but I was thinking you could let me do all the work. I could start by blowing you and-”
“Sam, please stop. I can’t.”
“Okay, alright, m’sorry,” Sam answered, careful to keep his tone as neutral as possible. He didn’t want to sound like he was blaming Dean.
“Oh, geez, don’t be like that. Now I feel like some blushing virgin.”
Sam rose on his elbow, smiling. “Don’t worry. I will never, ever, mistake you for a blushing virgin.”
“Shut up. It’s not that I don’t wanna. It’s just… It feels strange… down there.”
“What kind of strange?”
“Strange,” Dean repeated, rolling his eyes and blushing a little. “Like… the skin is kind of numb and I don’t know… it tickles, inside.”
“Where exactly?” Sam asked, a sudden thought blossoming in his head.
“Oh, for the love of…” Dean raised his arms in annoyance. “My perineum. Just below my balls. There, you happy?”
“Can I take a look?”
“What? No!”
“Dean. It’s not like I’ve never see what you’ve got down there.”
“It’s not the same thing. I don’t want you looking at me like some kind of perverted gynecologist.”
But Sam had already turned on the light and was sitting near Dean’s hips, tugging on the waistband of his briefs.
“Sam.”
“Dean. Humor me. I just want to make sure everything is alright.”
“Everything is alright, Sam. M’still sore, that’s all.” Dean groaned, but at the same time, he lifted his hips, allowing Sam to settle between his legs. “But please, go on, have an eyeful,” he added sarcastically. “This is so humiliating.”
“Raise your knees.”
“Sure thing, doc”,” Dean went on, but did as he was told, covering his face with his arm.
That’s when Sam stopped breathing. Because, as he had vaguely guessed, there was a major change in Dean’s physiology down there. The perinea skin was swollen and red and, right in the middle, there was a thin opening about two centimeters long.
Of course, Sam thought, biting his bottom lip hard. The curse had been incredibly effective so far. Why would it have made all those changes to allow Dean’s body to create and carry a baby if said baby wouldn’t be able to be born naturally?
“Dean, don’t panic, okay?”
“Why? Why shouldn’t I panic?” Dean asked, eyes wide, rising on his elbows.
“There’s… it’s like…I…it’s an opening of-”
“No.”
Dean fought to sit up, pushing Sam with his legs and trying to pull up his boxer briefs all at the same time. When he finally succeeded, he stood up, short of breath and looking shocked. “No,” he repeated, like he wanted to convince himself somehow.
“Dean, it’s not really like a v-”
“Don’t say it! Sam don’t you fucking dare.”
“Look, it’s like everything shifted a bit and-”
“Shut up!” Dean shouted, gasping for air. “I don’t wanna have that conversation. Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit!”
“We need to call Rania.”
“I don’t want this! You hear me?”
“Dean, calm down, you’re gonna hyperventilate.”
Dean gulped another enormous breath before sitting down. He bent forward a little, then froze and cursed. “And now I can’t even put my head between my legs anymore. Fuck.”
::: :::
Sam was pacing nervously in front of the curtain Rania had drawn around the exam table. He reminded himself of an anxious father-to-be, and had to bite the meat of his thumb to repress an inappropriate laugh.
“Shit!”
“Does it hurt?”
“No. Cold.”
“Ok, Dean. Deep breath.”
There was a pause, then a grunt, then Rania was talking again. “Yeah, okay. I’m almost done. You’re doing good. Feel that?”
“Yeah.”
“And that?”
“Definitely. Ok, that hurt.”
“I’m done. Wait, I’ll get you a towel.”
A few minutes later, Rania stepped out from behind the curtain and went to wash her hands in the small bathroom nearby. Then it was Dean’s turn to appear, his tee half pulled down, swaying slightly as he passed in front of Sam, pointing a finger at him: “You, not a word.”
“I didn’t-”
Then Sam caught sight of the gynecological stirrups added to the exam table and he did shut up. They joined Rania at her desk where she was writing quickly in Dean’s file.
“So,” she said after a while. “We know what the pain was about this time. It’s a birth canal and it seems perfectly functional.”
“Oh my God,” Dean whispered.
“What does that mean? Will he be able to give birth naturally?”
“Yes, I believe so. I was able to touch the cervix.”
“Holy shit,” Dean rasped.
“So what now? Shouldn’t you continue to plan on a C-section? Isn’t it safer?”
“I feel sick,” Dean announced in a choked voice.
“Of course it’s not safer. Sam, I’m not gonna risk a surgery in less than ideal conditions, exposing Dean and your baby to infection if it’s not necessary.”
“M’gonna be sick,” Dean said, getting up and trying to run to the trashcan next to the exam table. He fell on his knees and started to retch violently, holding himself on one arm as his other was bearing the weight of his belly. Sam knelt beside him and helped him into a steadier position.
“Fuck,” Dean groaned between dry-heaving. “Fuck, Sammy.”
“Take it easy.”
Dean’s body was hot and he was shivering. Rania settled next to him and put a wet towel on his neck, patting him softly in the back. “Come on, Dean. It’s okay, just your nerves acting out. Deep breaths.”
Dean vomited one last painful time, a long trickle of bile that had him moaning in discomfort. Sam helped him sit down and wiped his face with the washcloth as Rania put a glass of water into his shaking hands.
“This is a freaking nightmare.”
“Dean, the idea didn’t even cross your mind?” Rania asked gently.
“Yeah, it did, for about one second back when you told me I had a uterus. And then I buried it very, very deep inside and promised myself to never think about it ever again.”
Dean wiped his mouth with his hand, then frowned. “You thought that it could happen.”
“Yeah. I did. I mean, the curse is very powerful.”
“Thanks for sharing, by the way.”
“Dean, calm down,” Sam warned.
“Oh yeah, easy for you to say when you’re not gonna be the one pushing a baby through your all new va-… Ok. Not going there.”
Dean was still sweating profusely. He sighed from the bottom of his lungs, then frowned. “Huh. Feels strange.”
“What?” It was Rania’s turn to frown.
“My belly… It’s like… hardening.”
“Does it hurt?”
“No it’s just like the muscles are tensing a bit?”
Rania put her hand against Dean’s stomach, and Sam couldn’t help but to do the same, surprised to find the muscles pretty strained, more than when he himself would do push-ups or sit-ups. It was different.
“It’s a Braxton-Hicks contraction,” Rania announced.
“Those false ones?” Dean asked and surprised Sam again with all the information he had gathered by himself.
“Yes. They’re going to happen from time to time until the birth. It’s like the uterus is practicing for the real deal.”
“How am I gonna tell the difference?”
“Trust me, you’ll know. The real ones will be much more powerful, and they’ll hurt.”
“Personal space, guys,” Dean said, looking down at his belly where Rania and Sam’s hands were still lying.
Sam shook himself out of contemplation and stood up, helping Dean at the same time but keeping him close. He still seemed unsteady on his legs.
“I can’t do that,” Dean announced simply. “M’sorry, Rania but I can’t. Can’t freaking push a baby out of me.”
“You can and you will, Dean.”
“Sam, you gotta tell her.”
Sam shrugged. He was starting to get used to the idea and an endless list of questions was popping up in his mind. Besides, it’s wasn’t exactly like Dean had any real choice here. “Dean, women have been doing it for thousands of years.”
“Exactly. Do I look like a woman to you? Wait, you know what? Don’t answer that.”
::: :::
Dean sulked for two days, refusing all of Sam’s attempts to talk about the actual birth and locking himself in the shed for hours at a time. After that, things slowly went back to normal, but Sam often noticed a fearful and distant look on Dean’s face when he didn’t think Sam was watching. Sam didn’t blame him. He tried to imagine what he himself would feel like if he was in Dean’s situation, but just couldn’t.
Sam was now gathering all the info he could get his hands on about labor and delivery, the signs they should watch for and the progression of it. Now that a C-section wasn’t scheduled anymore, there was no way to predict when Dean would actually go into labor and so they would have to deal with the element of surprise. Rania could give Dean some Pitocin to trigger the cramps, but she didn’t like the idea. The curse has been following its own course and obviously knew what to do and she didn’t want to mess with it. She stated that she would use the synthetic hormone only if Dean passed his due date or if his own health, or the baby’s, were at risk.
She would deliver the baby alone. There was no need to involve other people for a natural birth and besides, it would be complicated as she couldn’t tell when Dean would go into labor. For the same reason, they wouldn’t use the clinic for the delivery. Rania said she could do it home. She had already planned to get equipment and supplies from the clinic and to enlist Sam as her assistant if she needed an extra hand. They planned a meeting later, at the beginning of June, for Rania to go over every medical procedure she would perform during the labor and delivery and what she would ask of Sam if she needed too. Dean had not been happy with the fact that Rania didn’t want him to be there, but she had refused to change her mind. “You do not need any more reasons to worry than you already have. I want Sam to be ready for everything. You’ll be in labor, Dean. You’ll have yourself and the baby to take care of.”
So there, they were settled. And as the last week of May flew by, Sam found himself more and more excited at the idea of actually seeing his daughter, holding her into her arms. And despite all the worry and uncertainty, he felt happier than he had in the last four years.
::: :::
Hampton Falls, June 2
When Sam woke up that morning, it was almost ten and the sun was shining brightly through the curtains. He wasn’t surprised to find himself alone. Dean was now almost thirty weeks pregnant and the last trimester’s symptoms and side effects were starting to manifest. He had trouble finding a comfortable position while sleeping, and as the baby took more space, his stomach was compressed and he often suffered from gastric reflux when lying down. His bladder was compressed as well and he had to go to the bathroom at least two or three times a night. He would wake up already tired, Sam could tell, even if Dean didn’t complain as often as Sam would have expected. His weight gain had reached fifteen pounds on Rania’s scales during their last appointment and his gait was beginning to show the strain his body was exposed to. He was slower and less graceful, his back was slightly bent backward, and his feet were more apart than usual, which was probably the most obvious change given Dean’s usual bow-legged stance. Sam had found himself shocked by these changes even more than the actual expansion of Dean’s belly. He didn’t know why and, of course, would never tell Dean, but seeing his brother losing the feline grace he had always possessed - and of which Sam had always been a bit jealous - was unsettling.
Sam walked downstairs and started the coffee maker before making his way to the living room where he could hear the TV. He found Dean watching Young Frankenstein, his back propped up against the couch’s arm in a half-sitting position. A bowl full of strawberries was balanced on his belly.
“It’s a baby, you know, not a shelf,” Sam greeted, snatching a strawberry from the bowl and settling himself on the floor near the couch.
“Can be both,” Dean answered without taking his eyes away from the screen. He was already dressed, Sam noticed, wearing his now tight and worn maternity jeans and one of the new tees Sam had bought him in the sporting goods section of a store - the fabric was light and stretchy. Sam was kind of proud of his purchase.
Dean had sawdust in his hair and on the bottom hem of his pants.
“You worked on the crib this morning?”
“Yep.”
“Did you get any sleep at all?”
“Course I did. Shut up. This is the best part.”
They watched the end of the movie together, Sam sipping at his coffee and Dean going through another bowl of strawberries before drinking a whole liter of apple juice. When the movie was over, they sat side by side on the couch in a comfortable silence. God, it was a luxury to be lazy; to be allowed to be, at least, Sam thought, stretching his legs and arms.
“Yeah, I know, you’re awake,” Dean announced, looking down at his belly where the perfect semi-sphere was suddenly disrupted by a series of waves before a big bump showed on the left upper side. Dean hissed but smiled as the bump slowly disappeared and his belly returned to its usual shape.
“Holy fuck, Dean, are you ok? What was that?”
“Nothing. I mean, she was moving, obviously.”
“Is that normal? Did it hurt?”
“Well it did feel uncomfortable when she pushed on my bladder but dude, calm down. She’s getting big and she’s like… pretty acrobatic. Nothing wrong there.”
“That was-”
“Your face is like… white as a freaking sheet. Sensitive much?” Dean asked, smiling maliciously.
“Hey, maybe she turned.”
“Maybe,” Dean said, brushing his fingers quickly over the small bump of his navel.
Their daughter had still been facing left with her head up and legs toward the birth canal when Rania had checked during their last appointment. It was still early but she would eventually turn to prepare for the birth, legs upward and head down.
“You know,” Dean said, looking serious all of sudden. “If she was born now, she’d have a good chance of surviving, given the appropriate care.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“And that could happen, I mean, a lot of things could happen or, ya know… not go as planned.”
“Ye-ah.” Sam wasn’t sure he liked the way the conversation was going, given Dean’s avoidance of his eyes. “What… are you worried?”
“Well, for her, yes, of course I’m worried. I’ve thought about all of this, and I know Rania is already getting the birth certificate ready, just in case.”
“Dean, what is it?”
“Your name should be listed on it. As the father. I mean, obviously you are but officially, I want your name to be on the papers, not mine.”
“Why?”
“Sam. It’s a freaking magical pregnancy and I’m a man and we don’t know. What if? What if she needs intensive care and I’m not… Well, not ok and… You’ll have to go to the hospital with her.”
“No.”
“Sam….”
“Your name is gonna be on the birth certificate and anyway, we won’t need it because she won’t be born prematurely and you’ll be all right.”
“Come on, man, m’trying to have a serious conversation here. It’s not like we know for sure that everything’s gonna be ok,” Dean tried again, but Sam was shaking his head furiously, refusing to go there.
The last months had been so intense, so strange, like they had been dropped in an alternate universe. Sam felt too close to his own feelings to think about what would happen if-
No.
“We do as we said, Dean. I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”
Dean sighed but didn’t insist. Instead, he slowly rose on his feet, swaying a bit as he had trouble keeping his balance, and winked at Sam.
“Got something to show you.”
“What?”
“In the shed.”
“You finished it?”
“Gave it the second coat of varnish this morning. You can’t touch it yet; it won’t be dry.”
Sam followed Dean to the shed, more than curious to finally see what his brother was capable of. He saw him hesitating a bit near the door. “Okay so, I want the truth. No wow, nice try, or it’s very original. If it’s ugly, you say it’s ugly, we clear?”
The crib wasn’t ugly - of course it wasn’t, but Sam was still surprised to see how beautiful it was. The wood was light colored and the lines were simple but somehow very graceful. The feet rested on two rocking boards that curved softly inwards. The most impressive part, however, was the protection symbols delicately carved into the wood all around their daughter’s name, which was carved in tall letters into the crib’s headboard.
“Dean, it’s beautiful,” Sam said in amazement.
“The flip side of the base plank there, where we’ll put the mattress, is salt-coated. And there’s iron filings too. The varnish is like child-proof and non-toxic or something.”
“I had no idea you were this talented.”
“Come on, shut up,” Dean said, uneasy.
“I’m being serious here, man.”
“So, I guess you like it?”
“Yeah. I do. Can’t believe you did that. It’s like professional work.”
Sam wrapped his arm around Dean’s thickened waist and pressed a kiss on the side of his head, laughing when Dean fought to free himself, accusing him of being a giant sap. Still, Sam could tell he was pleased and proud of Sam’s reaction to the crib, under his macho and underestimated act.
::: :::
Portsmouth, June 10
The meeting started with Rania bearing good news for Sam. She had received the final analysis of his blood sample and could confirm that he hadn’t inherited any genetic diseases. Sam barely had time to feel relief before Rania took him in the exam room and started talking about the birth.
She took her time, showing Sam everything she would use during the baby’s delivery, from the nasal suction bulb designed to clear the baby’s airways to the fetal heart monitor and the surgical pliers to cut the umbilical cord. Sam felt uneasy and a bit light-headed when he saw the forceps shining coldly under the exam room’s florescent light, but he managed to keep himself together. They finished with the baby incubator which had already been moved from the clinic. Then, they kept talking as Sam wrote everything Rania said in a notebook, while they sat next to each other on the hospital bed.
“What we’re doing tonight, you know it’s just precautions, right Sam? Hopefully, everything will go smoothly enough and all you’ll have to do is take care of Dean. I just like being prepared, you know?”
“Yeah. But still. I like being prepared too. I wanna be able to help if you need me.”
“How does Dean feel about all of this?”
“I don’t know. Every time I try to talk about it he cuts me off. I did see him reading some stuff, though, but… it’s hard, for him. Picturing himself doing this and dealing with the most recent changes to his body.”
“I get that.”
“He won’t let me anywhere close to him, not since...” Sam blushed and shook his head. “Huh. You did not need to know that.”
“Sam, I do know that children aren’t born in a cabbage patch.” Rania laughed and patted Sam on the thigh. “Still, our next appointment is three days from now and I’ll have to talk to Dean about the labor and delivery. He needs to know which signs are an indication of the beginning of labor and what he’ll need to do during the birth. I wanna teach him some breathing exercises to help him through the contractions.”
“I don’t think dealing with the pain will be a problem. We’ve had our fair share of injuries over the years and our Dad emphasized developing a high pain tolerance.”
Smiling as if she had a secret, Rania twisted a strand of hair around her finger. “You men are all the same. Listen, I don’t have any doubt that Dean is tough and well-trained to deal with pain but a delivery hurts, Sam. Not only does it hurt, but it’s really intense, physically speaking. It can last for hours, and that’s enough to break anyone, no matter how well-trained he is. So you’ll need all the tips and advice I’m gonna give to you, trust me.”
“I didn’t mean that women are any less-”
“I know. Relax. Feeling a bit nervous yourself?”
“Freaking terrified,” Sam answered sincerely. “What if… what if something happens and we can’t get here in time?”
“That’s why I want you to know everything there is to know. As a precaution. You know, the average duration for a first natural birth is about sixteen hours. It’s nothing like the stuff you see on TV, where the mother-to-be is alright one minute and screaming her head off the next. It could be different with Dean, but I don’t think it will be.”
“Wow. Sixteen hours.”
“Yep. So, no real worries there but I’ve managed my schedule to be sure I won’t be too far away or unable to leave work. I gave my hospital duties to a colleague and I’m on vacation from July third ‘til the second week of August. Anyway, if Dean should have premature contractions I have some I.V. meds here that can stop them, but I don’t think that’ll happen since the curse has been so efficient from the beginning. And, starting from the beginning of the thirty-seventh week of pregnancy, I’ll be available night and day.”
“Why is that? I mean, what is it about the thirty-seventh week?”
“Officially, the baby is considered as having reached its maturity at that point. Women that go into labor after the thirty-seventh week are not given drugs to stop it. We just let nature follow its course.”
“But it’s… the thirty-seventh week is like… four weeks from now or so?”
“Yes, given the official due date, it puts you guys at the beginning of the second week in July.”
Too close, Sam thought. He wasn’t ready; they weren’t ready. They would never really be, even if the pregnancy lasted for two years, he realized. Rania was looking at him with a playful spark in her dark, beautiful eyes. “Everything is going to be fine, Sam.”
::: :::
It was the middle of the afternoon when Sam finally got back from Rania’s. The weather outside was hot, the air charged with humidity. Sam had stopped on the way to buy one of those giant Slurpees Dean had always been found of, even if he knew his brother would probably be asleep. The heat was hard on him. There was no air conditioning in the house and, even if the tall trees surrounding it kept the worst of the heat outside, Dean would still start to sweat mid-morning. He was prone to getting short of breath as well because of the pressure the uterus was putting on his lungs, and his ankles would start to swell whenever the temperature got higher than seventy degrees. He had no energy to get through a day without taking a nap or two - falling asleep on the couch most of the time, because Dean Winchester did not take naps. It was a matter of perspective. And vocabulary.
Sam entered the house quietly and froze. He could hear a woman screaming at the top of her lungs. Dean, he thought, putting the Slurpee on the floor and taking his knife out of his pocket.
The guns. They were all locked up in the basement except for the one they kept in the kitchen. Shit. The knife would have to do, Sam resolved, cringing as he heard the screams getting louder, more desperate.
“Dean!” he called, feeling a cold fear crawling under his skin. He was in the living room without remembering having walked there, ready to slaughter anything or anyone that was in their home, menacing his brother and their child.
Sam froze for a second time, then sighed in relief, realizing what he should have the minute he entered the house if he hadn’t be so stressed by his meeting with Rania.
Dean was sitting on the couch, a bowl of popcorn balanced on top of his belly, watching something on the internet. That’s where the screams were coming from. Closing his knife and putting it back in his pocket, he circled the couch to sit next to his brother, surprised when Dean didn’t acknowledge his presence in any way and that the popcorn bowl was still full, as though not a kernel had been eaten. As a matter of fact, Dean had the strangest look on his face; a mixture of atonement and incredulity.
The screams reached another agonizing level and Sam finally turned his attention to the video Dean was watching. It wasn’t a horror movie, as he’d first thought. It was a BBC documentary featuring a woman in labor. The poor mother-to-be was sweating and panting on a hospital bed, surrounded by nurses, a doctor and her husband, who looked half amazed, half terrorized. The woman’s screams were muffled as a deep and clinical narrator’s voice took over. “At this stage, the contractions are longer and stronger. Diana is exhausted. She’s been in -”
“Dean, I really don’t think you should watch this,” Sam warned, unable to keep his eyes away from the screen.
“She’s been in labor for twenty hours, Sam, and she still isn’t fully dilated,” Dean said, in a somewhat dreamy voice.
“Dean-”
“She refused to have an epidural sooner and then she asked for it a couple of minutes ago, but they can’t. She’s too close to ten centimeters. The poor woman is like… out of her mind.”
“Got you a Slurpee. Sour cherry.”
“Not thirsty. Not hungry either. Want some popcorn?”
Dean handed the bowl to Sam and frowned in concentration as the doctor examined the woman. He then announced that the dilation was complete and that Diana was ready to push.
“Finally,” Dean said, clasping his hands together. “Thought the poor girl would never get there.”
“I really don’t think you should be-”
“Sam,” Dean snapped impatiently, “I’m the pregnant one, not you. I’ll have to deliver your daughter, so stop trying to spare me or to decide what I should or shouldn’t know.”
There it was, the irritation and reproach behind Dean’s words. He obviously still didn’t understand why Rania had insisted on meeting Sam alone. He felt rejected. Of course Dean would. So Sam stuffed his mouth full of popcorn and watched as the narrator explained how the expulsion phase worked.
The mother’s screams shifted after that, becoming lower, almost like growls, as she pushed through the contractions, face a deep shade of crimson, all her muscle shaking. That’s when the camera shifted and they got a closed-up view of the baby’s head slowly coming out from the woman’s distended vagina.
“Holy fuck,” Dean whispered, eyes going wide. “No way. There’s no way a baby can through there. It’s too small.”
“The body is made for this,” Sam answered in a thin, unconvinced voice because shit, Dean was right. The woman was most probably going to be torn apart.
“Why don’t those assholes help her instead of telling her to push like a retarded choir?”
“What do you want them to do?”
“I don’t know, fuck. It’s the twentieth century and we can travel to the moon but a poor woman has to give birth like that? Holy Christ, look! The head is stuck! She’s gonna burst, Sam. She’s-”
“It’s out, Dean”,” Sam said in sync with the narrator.
“Oh god, does the baby have a deformity or something? Why is he grey? He’s dead, right? Why does the damn doctor keep saying everything looks fine?”
“He’s not breathing yet, that’s why he looks bluish.”
Then the woman gave another push and the shoulders were free. At the same time an impressive quantity of pinkish liquid was released and splashed onto the bed sheets.
“Sam, you were right. It was a bad, bad idea to watch this,” Dean said, shutting his eyes.
“Oh my God, Dean. Look. The baby’s out. You gotta look.”
A small bundle covered in fluids and blood was wriggling and wailing between the doctor’s hands as the mother and father held each other, smiling. The husband started to cry and kissed his wife’s forehead with adoration. It was this perfect Hallmark moment, and Sam was totally caught up in it.
“He’s alright,” Dean whispered as if he was trying to convince himself. “He’s not blue anymore.”
“Wanna turn it off now?”
“Huh. Yeah.”
Dean wriggled his hips until he was close enough to the edge of the couch to stretch out his hand and close the computer’s screen. He turned and looked at Sam, letting out a loud breath.
“How am I supposed to do that?”
“Your body will know what to do, Dean.”
“Yeah right. But what if it’s not enough? What if the curse has it all wrong and the baby gets stuck in the birth canal or something?”
“If Rania is confident enough to go with a natural birth, she won’t get stuck.”
Dean bit his lips, looking uncertain and still scared by what he’d just seen.
“Don’t wanna screw this up, Sam.”
“You won’t.”
“How can you be sure? What if I hurt her or…?
“You won’t, Dean. That’s how babies are supposed to be born.”
“From women, not cursed men.”
“I’m not worried. You’ve been taking care of me all my life and you’ve changed and accepted so many things since the beginning of the pregnancy. I trust you. You gotta trust yourself.
“Yeah but - Ah! Holy…”
Dean looked at his belly, wincing in pain as the form of his bump suddenly changed, all of it shifting left, rippling, irregular waves distorting the skin. “I think she’s turning,” he groaned, holding his breath.
Sam couldn’t help but put both of his hands on Dean’s belly, feeling the baby’s movements as she kept twisting and shifting. He could actually feel what had to be a foot pushing against his hand. Dean’s whole belly shifted as their daughter finally settled, giving the semi-sphere shape a slightly different look then before as it stuck out a bit more in the middle and was less round near the hips.
“Dean, are you ok?”
“Yeah,” Dean said, taking a deep breath. “It kind of hurt, though. She definitely turned.”
“
You think?” Sam asked, laughing nervously. “That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen, and felt.”
Dean gave him a thoughtful look and put his own hands over Sam’s in a rare acceptance of their physical bond together with the baby. “Well, at least one of us is ready for the birth,” he said with affection. And it was as if the baby had choosen this particular moment to turn, like she’d want to reassure Dean somehow.
It seemed to work.
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