Where the Shadows Lie, Chapter Seven
Title: Where the Shadows Lie
Author: JALover7
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Sam+Dean gen
Spoilers: 7.23 “Survival of the Fittest”
Genre: angst, hurt/comfort
Disclaimer: Supernatural isn’t mine, but you already know that.
Summary: Coda to the season 7 finale, so major spoilers. In his quest to rescue Dean from Purgatory, Sam gets help from an unexpected source, and something that’s been missing for a long time comes back. Multiple chapters, WIP. Chapter titles inspired by "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy and "The Hobbit."
Where the Shadows Lie
Chapter Seven: Into the West
Sam spends the next few days helping Dean heal from months of starvation and dehydration. The lack of real food and enough water in Purgatory did a huge number on Dean’s body, and Sam can tell just by the lack of appetite he exhibits. He has no appetite for the things he usually eats. Burgers, pie, french fries, they do nothing for him. Dean seems to prefer simple foods, things Sam knows he would never admit to eating. He’s particularly fond of peanut butter on toast for some reason, and he can’t get enough of Jody’s chicken noodle soup. He has a strong liking for rare steak (very rare steak), and Sam slowly weans him off the rare stuff and onto meat that's been properly cooked. He also really seems to like nuts - pretty much any kind that Sam puts in front of him - and berries, too.
He doesn’t eat much at first, and Sam figures it’s a good thing, because too much too fast is sure to make him sick after not eating for so long.
But it’s not long before Sam can see the changes in his brother physically. His face appears less guant after a few days, some of the color comes back into his cheeks, and after a few weeks Sam can’t see his ribs anymore.
Sam dresses and redresses Dean's wounds. He continues to give him the antibiotics, which helps them heal. The color eventually fades away from the nasty one on his arm, and Sam knows Dean will be left with a pretty impressive scar.
Fixing his brother's emotional scars, on the other hand, presents a bit of a challenge.
Sam’s not sure what to do with Dean. He leaves the TV on, and Dean just kind of stares at it for a long time, flipping idly through the channels and never really settling on anything for too long. Certain things freak him out. Lighting storms, hurricanes, pretty much any movie or TV show where the weather is bad freaks him out. He also seems more afraid of dogs than he ever used to be.
He gives Dean a few of his books to read, but he was never much of a reader to start with, and everything just sits on the table untouched.
In the end, it’s Jody who has the breakthrough.
She comes home one day with a sketchpad and a nice wooden box of colored pencils. While Dean eyes the items curiously, Sam tells Jody he isn’t sure this will work; Dean's never been much of an artist. But she mentions how she’s seen art therapy work wonders on traumatized kids and adults, and she thinks maybe Dean can give it a shot. Sam turns to his brother to see how he’ll take to it, only to find that Dean has already started drawing.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dean draws for a good week. He stops every once in awhile to eat, or to sleep, or to take a bath. But mostly he spends his time drawing.
His drawings come to life vividly on the page. Sam never thought his brother could draw this well. He’s never seen him draw anything more complicated than a stick figure.
It’s through the drawings that Sam finally sees just what Dean went through during his time in Purgatory.
There’s a picture of Cas, angel wings spread wide, face in agony, being torn apart by a bright light.
There’s a picture of lightning setting a tree on fire, rain melting the leaves off the branches.
There's that giant creature that scared Dean so badly right before they left, and it looks just as terrifying on paper.
There are hellhounds, and vampires, and zombies. A rougaru. Sam begins to understand where Dean’s fear of dogs came from.
One day, Sam wakes up and finds Dean sitting at the kitchen table, scribbling away at a piece of paper. It’s nothing but a red circle, drawn over and over. The red pencil is broken in half, pieces of it liter the table, and Dean’s hand is bleeding, dripping more red onto the already saturated paper.
Sam yanks the pencil from his hand so quickly that Dean yelps and stands up from the table, shoving Sam away from him. He stands in the kitchen, panting heavily, face streaked with tears, and as he reaches up with his unbloodied hand to grab the amulet, Sam decides it’s time to get his brother out of the house.
After he cleans and bandages his hand, Sam packs up Dean’s sketchbook and his pencils, bundles him into the car, and takes him to the park.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dean’s wary at first, confused, but he’s developed enough of a trust that he follows Sam without protest.
The park turns out to be just the thing that Dean needs.
It’s a beautiful day. The sun is shining, there’s a nice breeze blowing through the trees, and the clouds in the sky create a myriad of fluffy shapes and pictures. Dean looks around him in awe, mouth open wide, and Sam can’t help but laugh. When Dean turns to him and frowns, Sam smiles.
“Close your mouth, Dean. You’re letting all the flies in.”
It’s a stupid joke, and Sam knows it.
But then Dean smiles back at him, and it’s all worth it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sam starts taking Dean to the park everyday. He works it into their routine. Breakfast. Bath. TV. Lunch. Afternoon at the park. Home for dinner. Drawing. Bed.
The park is clearly Dean’s favorite. He finds all kinds of things to draw there. Flowers, trees, fluffy clouds. It’s like he’s a five year old rediscovering the world. Sam’s heart aches at the innocence of it. He enjoys watching Dean draw at the park, watching him just walk around and look at everything like he’s never seen anything like it before.
It’s not until Dean goes to bed at night that Sam sits on the living room couch and allows himself to cry. He cries at the unfairness of it all, at the thought that Dean isn’t himself anymore. He misses his brother. The one who called him Geek Boy, made fun of him for doing research instead of going to the bar, told him to make sure he brought back some damn pie. The Dean that was obsessed with his car and with girls and with booze. Sure, Dean could be a jerk, and a pig, and just plain annoying. But that was his brother. That was Dean. This...this is still his brother, but he’s broken, and Sam just wants to fix him, and he doesn’t know how.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One day, about a week after Sam first gets Dean out of the house, they find themselves in an unfamilar part of the park. There’s a small lake with a few benches spread around it, and on one of them sits an old woman with a dog.
She looks up at them and smiles, waving politely. School’s not out for summer yet, and it’s still pretty early in the afternoon, so Sam figures she’s not used to seeing people in the park at this hour.
As she waves, her black lab barks playfully and starts to run toward them, pulling his leash out of the woman’s hands.
“Baxter, come back here this minute!”
At the sight of the dog running toward them, Dean actually growls low in his throat. The dog skids to a halt at Dean’s feet, sits down on the ground, and whines, tail tucked between his legs.
“Dean, it’s okay. He’s not going to hurt you,” Sam assures him, taken aback at the fact that his brother just growled at a dog about a tenth of his size.
But Dean’s face softens as the dog whimpers at his feet. Then he slowly bends down. Sam watches in awe as Dean reaches a shaky hand out to it. The dog stops whining and looks up at him with puppydog eyes that could rival even Sam’s.
Slowly, Dean pats the dog on the head. Once. Twice. The dog barks, and his tail comes up and starts wagging. The dog licks Dean’s hand, and Dean flinches away and pulls his hand back. But then the dog gets up on his hind legs, tail still wagging, and barks again, panting. Dean looks at him for a second, then reaches out again. This time, when the dog licks his hand, Dean actually smiles at him. Then he starts to pet him again.
“I’m sorry. I hope he didn’t bother you.”
Sam looks up to see the old woman has hobbled over to them on her cane.
“Not at all,” Sam assures her, smiling as he looks down to find the dog on his back, legs scrabbling at the sky as Dean rubs his belly. “Not at all.”
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dean spends the next hour playing with Baxter. He plays fetch with a stick he finds, throws a red rubber ball that the woman gives him, and runs around with him. Just yesterday, Dean had whined when a commercial for pet food came on the television. Now he’s playing fetch with this woman’s dog like it’s nothing. Sam sits on the bench with the old woman and marvels.
“Your brother...he’s not quite right, is he?”
It’s a bold statement, very blunt, and Sam doesn’t answer her right away.
“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pry. I just...he reminds me of someone, actually.”
“Who?” Sam asks.
“When I was a girl, my little sister, she...she went through a trauma. Saw something she shouldn’t have seen.”
The woman pauses, lost in thought, and Sam doesn’t pry for more details. When she continues, he listens closely.
“She wouldn’t talk for months. Wouldn’t tell any of us how she was feeling. My parents and I, we didn’t know how to help her. There weren’t really any drugs to help with that kind of thing back then, and psychiatry wasn't what it is now.”
Sam nods in understanding, waiting for her to continue.
“My sister loved playing with dolls. Even though I was too old to play with dolls at that point, I thought maybe if I played with her, it would help bring back some happy memories, maybe help her see how much I loved her and wanted to help her. After awhile she started smiling again. Then a few weeks later out of the blue she started talking again. My parents were so happy.”
Sam smiles as he realizes what the woman is trying to tell him.
“If you want to get through to your brother, just do the things you used to do together, whatever they are. Something that’s familiar to him, something he enjoys. Maybe reminding him about the good times will help bring him back to you.”
Twenty minutes later, Sam finally manages to drag Dean away from Baxter so he and Anita can go home.
As he drives them back to Jody’s, Sam thinks about everything Anita told him, and he silently thanks whoever will listen for letting them stumble into her path that day.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Of course, the first thing Sam thinks of that makes his brother happy is women, and that’s just not an option. The second, third, and fourth things are hunting, beer, and food. Hunting is most definitely not a good idea. Beer is out for obvious reasons, and since Dean doesn’t seem to enjoy eating food anymore anyway that’s also out. Sam’s not sure what else to try.
Then it hits him. Those are all things Dean liked to do, but aside from hunting and beer, none of them are things he liked to do with Sam. What the two of them really have in common is movies. When they were little, Dean made Sam watch every movie that he ever thought was cool. Most of them involved guns and explosions, John McClane types and Clint Eastwood types and Steve McQueen types. Sam has a list a mile long in his head of all the movies they ever watched together. Movies they watched because “you’re not a man until you’ve seen this movie, Sammy,” or “because Steve McQueen is the man, Sammy,” or just because “dude, I’m the oldest and I know what’s best for you.”
Sam writes down all the movies he can think of that they ever watched together, as kids or as adults. When he’s done, the list takes up about five sheets of paper.
That night, he downloads “The Great Escape” and streams it on Jody’s TV.
Dean smiles and laughs his way through the whole thing, eyes lit up like a five year old’s on Christmas morning.
Sam’s pretty sure Dean’s laugh is the best sound he’s heard in years.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next day, Dean sits quietly in the park and draws a picture of the two of them sitting on the couch watch Steven McQueen dig an escape tunnel.
It’s definitely Sam’s favorite picture so far.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Over the next few weeks, Sam and Dean breeze through The List. They still go to the park during the day. Sometimes they see Anita and Baxter, and Dean plays fetch with the dog while Sam talks to Anita, or sits by quietly and reads.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(The Thing With Feathers)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One day, Sam buys a football and they go outside and throw it around for an hour. Neither of them says a word, but it’s still one of the best days Sam’s had in a while.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dean still draws pictures. He usually draws the two of them watching their latest movie. Sam really likes the one of him posing as John McClane on their Die Hard movie marathon night.
On the bad days, Dean draws pictures of Purgatory. One particularly gruesome one shows Dean having his skin peeled off and eaten by some creature Sam can’t identify. Sam’s not sure if this one actually happened, and truthfully he doesn’t want to know. When Dean’s done, he just stares at it until Sam gathers up the sketchbook and pencils. He hides them away, grabs the football, and takes his brother to the park.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One night, while they’re sitting at the table eating dinner, Sam sloshes chocolate milk all down his shirt, and Dean laughs until he can't breathe, bent over the table gasping for air. Sam wipes the milk off his shirt as he joins his brother in laughing.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One day, Dean draws a picture full of Sams. There are so many of him, and they tower over Dean, holding weapons. He's written words next to their heads, things they are yelling at him, things like "pathetic" and "you're worthless" and " I'll never save you." He's just finished writing “I hate you” next to one of them when Sam finds him. His hands are shaking, and tears are falling silently down his face and soaking the paper.
Sam takes the pencil from Dean and puts it down. He wraps his brother's hand around the amulet and holds it tight.
“I love you, Dean. Whatever they told you, it’s not true. I saved you. You’re okay now. We’re going to get through this. I promise.”
He says it all slowly, meaning every word of it, almost grateful for the fact that Dean’s too far gone to shy away from the chick flickyness of it all.
In the end, Dean starts to sob, and Sam pulls his brother close and tells him over and over again that’s it’s all going to be okay.
Aftter that, the bad days become fewer and farther between.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One night, Sam gets Dean to watch “The Labyrinth.” Sam was sick the first (and only) time they watched it, and it’s still the only movie he was ever able to make his brother watch against his will.
Dean wouldn’t admit it the first time, and he won’t admit it now, but despite protestations of “David Bowie is so gay,” Sam knows his brother loved it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the beginning, Dean would have nightmares every night. At first he would wake up from them screaming in terror, and Sam would get down on the floor quietly, grab Dean’s hand, and wrap it around the amulet. Just like he did that first night, he would breath deeply and evenly, willing Dean to calm his own breathing down with Sam's. When he was calm again, he would nod and fall back to sleep, hand still wrapped around his amulet.
Evenutally, the nightmares begin to fade. He still has them almost every night, but they don’t usually last long, and he rarely wakes in the middle of the night screaming anymore.
And then suddenly Sam doesn’t need to wake Dean from the nightmares at all. When the dreams get so intense that Dean jerks awake, he grabs the amulet and holds on tight, slowly calms his breathing down like Sam taught him, and then falls asleep again.
On those nights, Sam rolls back over and smiles to himself.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One day, a particularly bad storm rolls through the area. The wind howls through the trees outside, thunder rumbles so hard the floor shakes, and lightning flashes so close Sam swears he can feel his hair stand on end.
Dean spends that day hiding in the bedroom closet. Sam climbs in with him. It’s a tight fit, but Dean doesn’t seem to mind. They use the sheets and blankets to build a makeshift fort, and Sam tells his brother some of the stories Dean used to tell him when they were little.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One day, Sam takes his brother out to see “The Avengers.” He knows how excited Dean was about this movie. He just hopes that Dean will be able to handle the crowds and the loud theater.
It turns out he needn't have worried. Dean doesn’t freak out once at the lights or the crowd or the movie itself. His eyes light up like he’s a ten year old boy, excited about his first superhero movie. When the Hulk throws Loki around the room like a rag doll, Dean laughs along with the audience so hard that he cries.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That night after dinner, Sam is sitting on the couch reading when Dean walks up to him and holds out a piece of paper. Sam takes it from him gently.
Dean drew a picture of Sam saving him from Purgatory.
Dean drew himself all in black, small, crouching in terror. Sam towers over him, big and bright, surrounded by yellow light, and he’s got angel wings and a superhero cape on, like Dean isn’t sure whether Sam’s his guardian angel or his Superman.
Sam feels his heart clench in his chest, and he lets out a sound halfway between a gasp and a sob.
“Thank you,” he finally manages to get out.
Dean shakes his head, then points from himself to Sam.
“I don’t understand.”
Dean walks back to his sketchpad and writes out two words, then brings the pad to Sam.
In neat letters, Dean has written the words, Thank you.
Sam blinks the tears from his eyes and says, “You’re welcome.”
Dean nods and smiles, then takes the picture from Sam and tapes it to the fridge with the rest of the nice ones they’ve decided to keep.
Sam joins his brother and makes a few small adjustments until the new picture sits in the very middle of all the rest. Right where it belongs.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That night, Sam offers Dean a piece of pie - cherry pie, his favorite - and Dean grins as he eats the whole thing.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dean sleeps straight through that night without waking once from a nightmare. When Sam wakes the next morning, he’s still grasping the amulet tightly in his sleep, and there’s a smile on his face.
...to be concluded...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AN: I really hope you guys like this chapter, I think it's one of my favorites. Thanks again to everyone who's been reading and reviewing. :)