maygra
in
maygra_fic
SPN FIC: A Year and a Day - part sixteen
A Year and a Day - part sixteen
by Maygra
Dean, Sam, Bobby, possibly Dean/Sam.
R overall
WIP
Head's up: Likely to come a little slower because of, you know, having to work and stuff during the week.
The characters and situations portrayed here are not mine, they belong to the CW. This is a fan authored work and no profit is being made. Please do not link to this story without appropriate warnings. Please do not archive this story without my permission.
Notes: I'm inflicting a WIP on you all, because I'm having a hell of time getting my word count out and thus, feel the need to put it out there as an impetus to finish.
Summary: Breaking the deal Dean made was always a given. How Sam would do it, not so much.
+++++
Now I will tell you what I've done for you -
50 thousand tears I've cried.
Screaming, deceiving and bleeding for you -
And you still won't hear me.
(going under)
I'm dying again
I'm going under (going under)
Drowning in you (drowning in you)
I'm falling forever (falling forever)
I've got to break through
I'm going under
~Going Under - Evanescence
+++++
Day 372
There were places on the reservation he would not be allowed to go, Fr. Bernard told him before he left. That east would take him deeper into the reservation, into New Mexico. But there was a truckstop and trading post at the junction of 87 and 264, and if Sam were to be looking for a ride, he'd likely find it there, either east or south toward Winslow.
Dean missed him by a couple of hours. He'd been there, the woman in the store remembering him. Not because he was white, but because it was rare to find a white man in Hopi clothing. He'd bought jeans and a shirt and a pair of cheap flip flops. He'd paid in cash. Everyone paid in cash.
Dean had no idea where Sam had gotten the money since by all reports he'd had nothing at all, but he suspected Chosovi's grandmother was the most likely source. He'd caught a ride with a market truck that made the run between Winslow and the trading post, had helped unload it to pay for the ride.
No one remembered Sam at the distribution warehouse, and the truck Sam had caught a ride in was out doing another run. No amount of charm would get him the route from the market manager, and he didn't have enough cash himself to make it worth his while.
So he waited. Waited and fretted and called Bobby twice to see if he'd heard anything.
It was dusk before the driver got back and he was understandably wary, less so when Dean offered him fifty bucks, he said he'd dropped him off at the diner at the end of 66.
Maybe once Dean would have found grudging amusement at that, but all he could think was that it had been hours ago. Sam could be halfway across the state by now.
Only he wasn't.
Dean almost missed him. The diner was pretty crowded for one thing; noisy, with a mix of voices in Spanish and English, music on the jukebox, the clank of dishes and the smell of spicy food and grilled meat.
He actually stared right at Sam and didn't recognize him at first.
When he finally did, it was Sam's eyes that caught him; familiar and not, the same wide set hazel turned up at the corners. Wide and staring and slightly haunted -- the same expression in them Dean had seen staring back at him from mirrors for nearly a year.
It was a little surreal to just see Sam sitting there and Dean was moving before he thought about it, almost knocking a waitress down, and Sam rising up, both of them ignoring the rest of the people in the diner, the stares, and the sudden lull in the conversation.
Sam's hair was way past long and into ridiculous lengths, barely held back with whatever he'd tied it with. His shoulders were just as broad but Dean could feel where the muscle was pared down to the bone under the too loose shirt, echoing the gauntness in his face. Not emaciated, not skeletal, but very much a Sam who'd been honed down to the essentials.
There might have been a couple of snide comments, which Dean ignored entirely, because Sam didn't hesitate to return his desperate hug and grip the back of Dean's jacket.
It was the waitress that broke them apart, her apologetic and embarrassed "Excuse me" finally making Dean step to one side, without actually losing his grip on Sam's sleeve. He pushed Sam back into the booth, and followed him onto the same side, afraid Sam might actually bolt after having been avoiding this for so many days.
People were still staring; he knew it. Could feel their gaze on the back of his head, mixes of misunderstanding and disgust with curiosity and maybe even a little empathy. Dean didn't care at all. He'd lived through hell, on a couple of different levels. What other people thought of him or Sam, of them, didn't matter at all.
He gripped the back of Sam's neck and pulled their foreheads together. "I swear, I'm gonna kick your ass all the way back to Nebraska," he said.
Sam chuckled at that and Dean caught the edge of smile, the curve of Sam's lips and the flash of teeth. He felt wetness on his thumb where it rested on Sam's cheek.
"Okay. You can do that," Sam said and his voice sounded different, hoarse and deep and too soft. "I didn't….I'm sorry," he said.
"It doesn't matter. It doesn't…" Dean said. He had no idea what Sam was apologizing for and at the same time could think of a hundred things Sam might think he might need to be sorry about, a hundred more that he himself regretted. "I don't want to know anything else right now. Just that you're okay. Just tell me you're okay."
"I'm okay," Sam said. "You?"
"Jesus, Sam. Do you even have to ask?"
Sam nodded and pulled back a little. "Yeah. I do."
Maybe he did. "I'm okay."
They didn't stay. Sam had been sitting with nothing but a cup of coffee in front of him, and while Dean didn't care about the other people, it was still too loud and too crowded. Dean led the way -- or rather, nudged other people aside, afraid to let go of Sam's shoulder.
Sam stopped at the car and ran his hands over the roof, but didn't say anything. He got in when Dean unlocked the door, and sat there with his hands folded in his lap, uncomfortable in the car as he hadn't been in the diner.
"Motel?" Dean asked. "Or food…or. We could just go. Drive."
"Motel," Sam said after a moment. "We…probably…there's some stuff you need to…"
Of all the reactions Dean had expected, Sam suddenly sucking in stuttering breath and letting it out on a barely muffled sob wasn't one of them. But Dean's reaction was as natural as breathing, just pulling Sam to him, maneuvering his knee and elbows around the steering column and giving Sam a place to land. His arms wrapped as tightly around Sam as he could, twisted and bent over his brother like he could protect him from the sky falling down on him. "Its okay, Sam…It's okay. Done. It's over," Dean said, unembarrassed that his own tears were soaking into the back of Sam's shirt, or that his throat had gotten so tight he could barely get the words out. "It's over…we're okay."
"No. No…it's not," Sam said and gripped Dean's leg and squeezed, pushing up, and Dean let him. "We need to…find a place. We need to talk. I should have stayed…" He stopped again and drew another breath, wiping his face with his sleeve. "We should…there's a motel…It's -- we need money. I don’t have any money…do you have--" and without much light Dean could still see the lost look on Sam's face, confused and unfocused, the tone in his voice that he hadn't heard since Sam was a child and wanting something he couldn't have.
"I've got it covered, Sam," Dean said, and got the car started, returning his hand to what felt like the most natural place for it to be on the back of Sam's neck.
Getting out of the car to check them in felt like an argument he couldn't win, afraid Sam might disappear again, but Sam got out when he did, hovered uncertainly behind him, and relaxed only slightly when Dean returned with the key. Under the harsh security lights in parking lot, Dean took a good look at his brother, noting the things he hadn't before. Sam didn't seem to know what to do with his hands, and his shirt was buttoned wrong. Underneath the too short hem of his jeans Sam's feet were filthy and crusty with mud or blood. He kept looking around like he couldn't stand to stare at any one thing for too long, or like he was waiting for something to come out of the dark at them.
Closing the door of their room brought an audible sigh from Sam and he sat down on one of the beds suddenly, hands to his head, to his face and ears, and then down again, not looking at Dean. Dean set his keys down on the table and eased down beside him, shoulder pressing lightly to Sam's and Sam seemed to relax at that.
"I should have stayed," Sam said finally leaning forward. "At the reservation. I should have…I didn't expect it to be so much…there's so much…"
It was an understatement of epic proportions, but Dean didn't think that was what Sam meant at all. "So much what…"
"Everything. Sound. Lights. Color…life, just….so much."
Overloaded. That much Dean understood, months before he didn't jump at every unexplained sound, flinch at the sudden brightness of a room light, or the headlights of a car flashing through a window. He started to get up, to at least close the curtains of the room, turn off the overhead light, but Sam gripped his arm, and then his hand, spreading his own over Dean's to open his palm and uncurl his fingers, pushing up his sleeve, tracing the scars there.
There were scars on Sam's hands too, ones Dean didn't remember seeing. Hundreds of small white scars on the backs of his hands and along his forearms. Deep lateral marks across his palms that were white ridges, that spoke of cuts that had gone to the bone, that should have severed tendons and nerves. His own were more numerous but hadn't scarred nearly as deeply, places where the flesh had been torn away and healed in pieces, and Sam rubbed his thumb across the worst of them, brushing lightly, like he could erase them.
Dean finally closed his hand over Sam's stopping him, because Sam was so intent, and so silent again that Dean wasn't sure he would stop on his own.
He wasn't ready to ask where Sam had been, what he'd done. That really was too much, just now, just here. "Why did you leave Sam…you sent a message. You knew I'd come."
"I just…I wanted you to know. I wanted…I wasn't ready. I needed to be ready."
"Ready for what?"
Sam didn't answer but his eyes were fixed on Dean's face, and when his hand came up to touch the scarring that ran along Dean's jaw and throat, Dean only barely managed not to flinch. He was pretty sure he didn't but Sam's hand stopped just short of touching, then dropped to his lap again. "It took me too long. I'm sorry. I'm sorry…"
"Stop. Stop saying that," Dean said, and twisted around, facing Sam dead on and pushing at his shoulder to make him turn as well, to look Dean in the face. "What did you need to be ready for, Sam? To see me? These are just scars."
"They're more than that."
"No. No they aren't."
"I should have been faster. I'm--"
"Whatever. Just…don't apologize. You got me out of hell."
Sam shook his head. "I haven't. Not yet. I haven't…"
"What...?" He didn't even know what Sam meant, but it made his blood run cold and the sweat break on his skin, and the same gut clenching roll of fear spread through him in a way he was sure he'd never be rid of.
"A year and a day. That was the condition. I haven't…it hasn't been that…I …couldn't…"
He couldn't do it. Having spent his own month in hell without hope of reprieve, Dean could only barely imagine what he'd have done if given the chance to escape. In his head, in his gut, he knew he'd have taken it, done whatever it took, promised anything. Sam had held out much longer…in the cold and dark…
"They wouldn't let me stay," Sam was saying softly. "I begged them to let me stay…to finish it, but…"
"So…" he felt numb, couldn't feel his limbs. Was too aware of the acid in his stomach, the clench of cold dread in his guts and in his heart. "She's coming for me…I'm…" Going back and he wondered if the bitch was laughing even now.
"No."
Dean nodded without actually hearing him. He got up, and his knees threatened to fail him. This time she'd have to drag him kicking and screaming for real.
"No." He barely felt Sam's arms come around him, holding him up. "I'll go back. It's a day. I thought it would be easier if I didn't see you until it was done, but maybe they were right. It was so hard, not to…to just let go."
"Go back?" Dean asked, some portion of it finally making it through his fear-numbed brain. "You'll go back…."
"I'll go back. I will. I promise. She won't get you. I thought it would be harder, to come back and then leave, but they were right. I was starting to forget why."
Dean twisted around. Sam looked….he looked like Sam, finally, in ways Dean couldn't really describe. Exhaustion haunted his face still, but his eyes were focused, no longer lost, no longer haunted by whatever he was seeing. This time Sam didn't hesitate when he touched the scarring, pushing the neck of Dean's shirt back to see the discoloration of burn scarring that went across the back of his shoulder, touching the tips of the white scars on his chest.
Dean felt exposed, and raw, and he did flinch then, jerking back, only to have Sam grip his neck as Dean had done Sam's. "I'm sorry," Sam said again, firmly, not letting Dean look away. "I'm sorry it took me so long to figure it out. That I wasn't….that I was too scared at first to even try."
Dean shook his head, not trusting himself to speak because he might scream or cry or run. He didn't understand.
"A year and a day, Dean. That's the price. It hasn't been that yet. But I'll pay it."
"Pay what…" Dean got out, through clenched teeth.
"A day there…once a year, until the debt is settled."
"And if you don't?"
"I will."
"Explain in smaller words," Dean said and Sam smiled at him, the familiar crooked smile that Dean hadn't even stopped to realize he'd missed. Everything about Sam, yes, but the details had all blurred. He pulled Sam's hand from his face and looked at the stretched line of scars, the small even marks. Sam didn't move when he touched them, counted them.
He was finding it hard to breathe when he reached Sam's elbow and reached for the other arm. He lost count after a hundred, but nearly as many more stretched up Sam's arm.
Almost as many on Sam's right, not as even and the last few were shallower, more jagged, but the very last one was deeper and wider, and not nearly as healed, the skin red around the edges of it.
Days. One for every day Sam had been gone, that Sam had been there, out of Dean's reach.
Three hundred and sixty-five days in a year. Plus one. But Sam had waited.
Thirty days from the first time the crossroads demon sank her claws in him to the day she'd tossed him at Bobby's feet. Thirty days for Sam to have done the impossible.
Thirty days of having his soul and body ripped to shreds over and over. And over, and over…
It wasn't over. That's what Sam was telling him. Nearly a year of frantic searching, months of building hope on hope, battling with despair over what Sam was doing, what he might be enduring. Of never knowing when she might turn up to taunt and tease and tempt him. Of fearing that Sam might be suffering worse.
Then believing Sam had done it, freed himself and Dean.
His shove sent Sam sprawling back, hitting the bed awkwardly and stumbling, falling….
Dean was out the door before Sam hit the floor.
+++++
part seventeen
by Maygra
Dean, Sam, Bobby, possibly Dean/Sam.
R overall
WIP
Head's up: Likely to come a little slower because of, you know, having to work and stuff during the week.
The characters and situations portrayed here are not mine, they belong to the CW. This is a fan authored work and no profit is being made. Please do not link to this story without appropriate warnings. Please do not archive this story without my permission.
Notes: I'm inflicting a WIP on you all, because I'm having a hell of time getting my word count out and thus, feel the need to put it out there as an impetus to finish.
Summary: Breaking the deal Dean made was always a given. How Sam would do it, not so much.
+++++
Now I will tell you what I've done for you -
50 thousand tears I've cried.
Screaming, deceiving and bleeding for you -
And you still won't hear me.
(going under)
I'm dying again
I'm going under (going under)
Drowning in you (drowning in you)
I'm falling forever (falling forever)
I've got to break through
I'm going under
~Going Under - Evanescence
+++++
Day 372
There were places on the reservation he would not be allowed to go, Fr. Bernard told him before he left. That east would take him deeper into the reservation, into New Mexico. But there was a truckstop and trading post at the junction of 87 and 264, and if Sam were to be looking for a ride, he'd likely find it there, either east or south toward Winslow.
Dean missed him by a couple of hours. He'd been there, the woman in the store remembering him. Not because he was white, but because it was rare to find a white man in Hopi clothing. He'd bought jeans and a shirt and a pair of cheap flip flops. He'd paid in cash. Everyone paid in cash.
Dean had no idea where Sam had gotten the money since by all reports he'd had nothing at all, but he suspected Chosovi's grandmother was the most likely source. He'd caught a ride with a market truck that made the run between Winslow and the trading post, had helped unload it to pay for the ride.
No one remembered Sam at the distribution warehouse, and the truck Sam had caught a ride in was out doing another run. No amount of charm would get him the route from the market manager, and he didn't have enough cash himself to make it worth his while.
So he waited. Waited and fretted and called Bobby twice to see if he'd heard anything.
It was dusk before the driver got back and he was understandably wary, less so when Dean offered him fifty bucks, he said he'd dropped him off at the diner at the end of 66.
Maybe once Dean would have found grudging amusement at that, but all he could think was that it had been hours ago. Sam could be halfway across the state by now.
Only he wasn't.
Dean almost missed him. The diner was pretty crowded for one thing; noisy, with a mix of voices in Spanish and English, music on the jukebox, the clank of dishes and the smell of spicy food and grilled meat.
He actually stared right at Sam and didn't recognize him at first.
When he finally did, it was Sam's eyes that caught him; familiar and not, the same wide set hazel turned up at the corners. Wide and staring and slightly haunted -- the same expression in them Dean had seen staring back at him from mirrors for nearly a year.
It was a little surreal to just see Sam sitting there and Dean was moving before he thought about it, almost knocking a waitress down, and Sam rising up, both of them ignoring the rest of the people in the diner, the stares, and the sudden lull in the conversation.
Sam's hair was way past long and into ridiculous lengths, barely held back with whatever he'd tied it with. His shoulders were just as broad but Dean could feel where the muscle was pared down to the bone under the too loose shirt, echoing the gauntness in his face. Not emaciated, not skeletal, but very much a Sam who'd been honed down to the essentials.
There might have been a couple of snide comments, which Dean ignored entirely, because Sam didn't hesitate to return his desperate hug and grip the back of Dean's jacket.
It was the waitress that broke them apart, her apologetic and embarrassed "Excuse me" finally making Dean step to one side, without actually losing his grip on Sam's sleeve. He pushed Sam back into the booth, and followed him onto the same side, afraid Sam might actually bolt after having been avoiding this for so many days.
People were still staring; he knew it. Could feel their gaze on the back of his head, mixes of misunderstanding and disgust with curiosity and maybe even a little empathy. Dean didn't care at all. He'd lived through hell, on a couple of different levels. What other people thought of him or Sam, of them, didn't matter at all.
He gripped the back of Sam's neck and pulled their foreheads together. "I swear, I'm gonna kick your ass all the way back to Nebraska," he said.
Sam chuckled at that and Dean caught the edge of smile, the curve of Sam's lips and the flash of teeth. He felt wetness on his thumb where it rested on Sam's cheek.
"Okay. You can do that," Sam said and his voice sounded different, hoarse and deep and too soft. "I didn't….I'm sorry," he said.
"It doesn't matter. It doesn't…" Dean said. He had no idea what Sam was apologizing for and at the same time could think of a hundred things Sam might think he might need to be sorry about, a hundred more that he himself regretted. "I don't want to know anything else right now. Just that you're okay. Just tell me you're okay."
"I'm okay," Sam said. "You?"
"Jesus, Sam. Do you even have to ask?"
Sam nodded and pulled back a little. "Yeah. I do."
Maybe he did. "I'm okay."
They didn't stay. Sam had been sitting with nothing but a cup of coffee in front of him, and while Dean didn't care about the other people, it was still too loud and too crowded. Dean led the way -- or rather, nudged other people aside, afraid to let go of Sam's shoulder.
Sam stopped at the car and ran his hands over the roof, but didn't say anything. He got in when Dean unlocked the door, and sat there with his hands folded in his lap, uncomfortable in the car as he hadn't been in the diner.
"Motel?" Dean asked. "Or food…or. We could just go. Drive."
"Motel," Sam said after a moment. "We…probably…there's some stuff you need to…"
Of all the reactions Dean had expected, Sam suddenly sucking in stuttering breath and letting it out on a barely muffled sob wasn't one of them. But Dean's reaction was as natural as breathing, just pulling Sam to him, maneuvering his knee and elbows around the steering column and giving Sam a place to land. His arms wrapped as tightly around Sam as he could, twisted and bent over his brother like he could protect him from the sky falling down on him. "Its okay, Sam…It's okay. Done. It's over," Dean said, unembarrassed that his own tears were soaking into the back of Sam's shirt, or that his throat had gotten so tight he could barely get the words out. "It's over…we're okay."
"No. No…it's not," Sam said and gripped Dean's leg and squeezed, pushing up, and Dean let him. "We need to…find a place. We need to talk. I should have stayed…" He stopped again and drew another breath, wiping his face with his sleeve. "We should…there's a motel…It's -- we need money. I don’t have any money…do you have--" and without much light Dean could still see the lost look on Sam's face, confused and unfocused, the tone in his voice that he hadn't heard since Sam was a child and wanting something he couldn't have.
"I've got it covered, Sam," Dean said, and got the car started, returning his hand to what felt like the most natural place for it to be on the back of Sam's neck.
Getting out of the car to check them in felt like an argument he couldn't win, afraid Sam might disappear again, but Sam got out when he did, hovered uncertainly behind him, and relaxed only slightly when Dean returned with the key. Under the harsh security lights in parking lot, Dean took a good look at his brother, noting the things he hadn't before. Sam didn't seem to know what to do with his hands, and his shirt was buttoned wrong. Underneath the too short hem of his jeans Sam's feet were filthy and crusty with mud or blood. He kept looking around like he couldn't stand to stare at any one thing for too long, or like he was waiting for something to come out of the dark at them.
Closing the door of their room brought an audible sigh from Sam and he sat down on one of the beds suddenly, hands to his head, to his face and ears, and then down again, not looking at Dean. Dean set his keys down on the table and eased down beside him, shoulder pressing lightly to Sam's and Sam seemed to relax at that.
"I should have stayed," Sam said finally leaning forward. "At the reservation. I should have…I didn't expect it to be so much…there's so much…"
It was an understatement of epic proportions, but Dean didn't think that was what Sam meant at all. "So much what…"
"Everything. Sound. Lights. Color…life, just….so much."
Overloaded. That much Dean understood, months before he didn't jump at every unexplained sound, flinch at the sudden brightness of a room light, or the headlights of a car flashing through a window. He started to get up, to at least close the curtains of the room, turn off the overhead light, but Sam gripped his arm, and then his hand, spreading his own over Dean's to open his palm and uncurl his fingers, pushing up his sleeve, tracing the scars there.
There were scars on Sam's hands too, ones Dean didn't remember seeing. Hundreds of small white scars on the backs of his hands and along his forearms. Deep lateral marks across his palms that were white ridges, that spoke of cuts that had gone to the bone, that should have severed tendons and nerves. His own were more numerous but hadn't scarred nearly as deeply, places where the flesh had been torn away and healed in pieces, and Sam rubbed his thumb across the worst of them, brushing lightly, like he could erase them.
Dean finally closed his hand over Sam's stopping him, because Sam was so intent, and so silent again that Dean wasn't sure he would stop on his own.
He wasn't ready to ask where Sam had been, what he'd done. That really was too much, just now, just here. "Why did you leave Sam…you sent a message. You knew I'd come."
"I just…I wanted you to know. I wanted…I wasn't ready. I needed to be ready."
"Ready for what?"
Sam didn't answer but his eyes were fixed on Dean's face, and when his hand came up to touch the scarring that ran along Dean's jaw and throat, Dean only barely managed not to flinch. He was pretty sure he didn't but Sam's hand stopped just short of touching, then dropped to his lap again. "It took me too long. I'm sorry. I'm sorry…"
"Stop. Stop saying that," Dean said, and twisted around, facing Sam dead on and pushing at his shoulder to make him turn as well, to look Dean in the face. "What did you need to be ready for, Sam? To see me? These are just scars."
"They're more than that."
"No. No they aren't."
"I should have been faster. I'm--"
"Whatever. Just…don't apologize. You got me out of hell."
Sam shook his head. "I haven't. Not yet. I haven't…"
"What...?" He didn't even know what Sam meant, but it made his blood run cold and the sweat break on his skin, and the same gut clenching roll of fear spread through him in a way he was sure he'd never be rid of.
"A year and a day. That was the condition. I haven't…it hasn't been that…I …couldn't…"
He couldn't do it. Having spent his own month in hell without hope of reprieve, Dean could only barely imagine what he'd have done if given the chance to escape. In his head, in his gut, he knew he'd have taken it, done whatever it took, promised anything. Sam had held out much longer…in the cold and dark…
"They wouldn't let me stay," Sam was saying softly. "I begged them to let me stay…to finish it, but…"
"So…" he felt numb, couldn't feel his limbs. Was too aware of the acid in his stomach, the clench of cold dread in his guts and in his heart. "She's coming for me…I'm…" Going back and he wondered if the bitch was laughing even now.
"No."
Dean nodded without actually hearing him. He got up, and his knees threatened to fail him. This time she'd have to drag him kicking and screaming for real.
"No." He barely felt Sam's arms come around him, holding him up. "I'll go back. It's a day. I thought it would be easier if I didn't see you until it was done, but maybe they were right. It was so hard, not to…to just let go."
"Go back?" Dean asked, some portion of it finally making it through his fear-numbed brain. "You'll go back…."
"I'll go back. I will. I promise. She won't get you. I thought it would be harder, to come back and then leave, but they were right. I was starting to forget why."
Dean twisted around. Sam looked….he looked like Sam, finally, in ways Dean couldn't really describe. Exhaustion haunted his face still, but his eyes were focused, no longer lost, no longer haunted by whatever he was seeing. This time Sam didn't hesitate when he touched the scarring, pushing the neck of Dean's shirt back to see the discoloration of burn scarring that went across the back of his shoulder, touching the tips of the white scars on his chest.
Dean felt exposed, and raw, and he did flinch then, jerking back, only to have Sam grip his neck as Dean had done Sam's. "I'm sorry," Sam said again, firmly, not letting Dean look away. "I'm sorry it took me so long to figure it out. That I wasn't….that I was too scared at first to even try."
Dean shook his head, not trusting himself to speak because he might scream or cry or run. He didn't understand.
"A year and a day, Dean. That's the price. It hasn't been that yet. But I'll pay it."
"Pay what…" Dean got out, through clenched teeth.
"A day there…once a year, until the debt is settled."
"And if you don't?"
"I will."
"Explain in smaller words," Dean said and Sam smiled at him, the familiar crooked smile that Dean hadn't even stopped to realize he'd missed. Everything about Sam, yes, but the details had all blurred. He pulled Sam's hand from his face and looked at the stretched line of scars, the small even marks. Sam didn't move when he touched them, counted them.
He was finding it hard to breathe when he reached Sam's elbow and reached for the other arm. He lost count after a hundred, but nearly as many more stretched up Sam's arm.
Almost as many on Sam's right, not as even and the last few were shallower, more jagged, but the very last one was deeper and wider, and not nearly as healed, the skin red around the edges of it.
Days. One for every day Sam had been gone, that Sam had been there, out of Dean's reach.
Three hundred and sixty-five days in a year. Plus one. But Sam had waited.
Thirty days from the first time the crossroads demon sank her claws in him to the day she'd tossed him at Bobby's feet. Thirty days for Sam to have done the impossible.
Thirty days of having his soul and body ripped to shreds over and over. And over, and over…
It wasn't over. That's what Sam was telling him. Nearly a year of frantic searching, months of building hope on hope, battling with despair over what Sam was doing, what he might be enduring. Of never knowing when she might turn up to taunt and tease and tempt him. Of fearing that Sam might be suffering worse.
Then believing Sam had done it, freed himself and Dean.
His shove sent Sam sprawling back, hitting the bed awkwardly and stumbling, falling….
Dean was out the door before Sam hit the floor.
+++++
part seventeen