If the Moon Smiled (She Would Resemble You)
If the Moon Smiled (She Would Resemble You)
Summary: Sam has a seizure, Dean comes to visit, Jess is an awesome girlfriend, and for some strange reason, this story didn't turn out as depressing as most of my others. Epileptic!Sam 'verse
A/N: Did I just... write something happy? No, can't be. That would be far too weird.
XXX
The sun is beginning to rise and Dean has just finished reburying the now-incinerated corpse of an unfortunate woman named Sarah who found her spirit stuck in the basement of an old farmhouse, when his phone rings, which is lucky because he finds it several feet away, hidden in the grass, and he hadn't noticed that it had fallen from his pocket when Sarah turned up to protest her second demise by tossing him through the air.
He grabs it up with the hand that isn't occupied by his shovel and glances at the Caller ID before answering.
“He okay?” he asks, forgoing the greetings because Jess doesn't call often and when she does it usually means one thing.
Her silence says it all.
“Big one, huh?” He sweeps his gaze over the grave site, making sure he hasn't dropped anything else, before he heads off towards the Impala.
“How do you do that?” Jess asks, clearly amazed, as if she doesn't know how very obvious she is.
“It's a gift,” Dean says, just a little impatiently. “So what happened?”
“Seizure in the shower,” she snaps to it, getting right to the point, so maybe he sounded a little more impatient than he meant to. “He's been doing so well lately, it was just completely out of the blue. I mean, one minute we were- no, actually, never mind what we were doing. Shit, I didn't mean to say that.”
Dean totally can't help the grin that spreads across his face and he can almost hear Jess turning red through the phone.
“Oh shut up, Dean,” she says, though he hasn't said anything. “It's not funny. He's hurt.”
His grin drops and he quickens his pace, striding to the Impala. Yeah, that's one way to sober up the moment. “How bad?”
“His ankle's broken and he's got a shitty concussion, keeps throwing up. We're still at the hospital.”
“Can I talk to him?” He places the shovel in the boot and rounds the car.
“I'm in the cafeteria, getting coffee. We've been here all night and, let me tell you, those bedside chairs are really horrible to sleep in.”
“You're preaching to the choir, Jess.”
“Oh yeah, duh.” She laughs a little, tinged with worry and exhaustion. “Anyway, he was sleeping when I left and he wasn't making much sense when he was awake, except that he wants you. That's been pretty clear.”
“That'll probably wear off with the concussion,” Dean says, because it will but he's already calculating the distance between here and there.
Jess waits a beat and this time he can hear the smile in her voice. “So how long?”
“Give me four hours, sweetheart. See you then.”
XXX
“You look like shit,” Dean says as he walks into Sammy's hospital cubical three hours and forty-two minutes later and he's not just teasing. Sam's left leg is in plaster up to his knee (hmm blank canvas...) and Jess neglected to mention that the concussion is a package deal, coming complete with an inch-long stitched-up gash above Sam's left eyebrow, blackening his eye.
“Dean.” Sam frowns, looking a little lost. Dean can tell he's slept off most of the post-seizure exhaustion but he seems like he's still in the fuzzy stage, when he's confused and slow on the uptake. Must be the concussion, Dean guesses. “Um, did I know you were coming?”
Hell if Dean knows. He looks to Jess, sitting in the chair beside Sam's bed, dressed in pink slippers and a matching pink robe. She looks adorable, even with bags under her eyes and dishevelled hair, and, not for the first time, Dean acknowledges the fact that if she wasn't Sammy's girl, he would definitely be pulling out all his best moves.
“Don't even think about it,” Jess warns playfully, apparently reading his mind. “One Winchester is hard enough to handle.”
“Huh?” Sam asks, looking even more lost.
“Don't worry, Sam,” Jess says, smiling at him in the way she always does, like Sam is the absolute best thing in the world. (Dean doesn't disagree.) It's the same smile that let Dean in on just how serious Sam and Jess were, a simple flash of teeth and upturned lips that translates into 'You're so freaking awesome, I can't imagine being without you.' Sam smiles at Jess in the exact same way.
The realization had hurt, unexpectedly. That smile used to be for him and no one else, and though he doesn't doubt that Sammy loves him, it had stung to suddenly understand that he'd moved down to second place.
“I did tell you,” Jess is telling Sam gently, “But it was hours ago and you weren't really awake anyway.”
“Oh,” Sam says, then, “Uh, hi.”
“Hi,” Dean returns indulgently. He's been around Sam and his concussions long enough to know when to go at the kid's pace, even if that pace goes backwards and jumps to unrelated topics or goes around in circles.
“Well.” Jess stands and stretches her arms up above her head, fingers laced together. “I need coffee. Dean?”
“God yes. Ask them what the strongest coffee they've ever made is, then get them to make it stronger than that.” He's going to need it. He hasn't even had breakfast, just grabbed a quick shower at the motel before checking out and getting on his way, and he can't quite remember when he last slept for more than a couple hours at a time so caffeine is a definite necessity.
“You got it,” Jess says, looking amused, “But if it tastes like dirt, don't blame me.”
She turns to leave, pulling her dressing gown tighter around her.
“Hey, what about me?” Sam asks as Jess pulls the curtain open.
“I don't think coffee and concussions go well together, Sam,” she says with just a hint of teasing and a fond eye roll to Dean, before she flutters out of the cubical.
Sam pouts, looking all of two years old with his bottom lip out and his mop of hair sticking up in all directions.
“You know coffee's for big boys, Sammy,” Dean grins.
“Oh shut up,” Sam says, which only makes Dean grin harder.
Sam huffs a sigh, blowing hair out of his eyes for a split second before it falls straight back in. “So where's Dad? Is he with you?”
“Nah, he's in Delaware, hunting a werewolf. I called him but he couldn't get away.” Dean sits down in the vacated chair and puts his feet up on the bed, careful not to let them touch Sam because, although he assumes the kid is loaded up on painkillers, he'd rather not risk hurting his little brother.
Sam frowns, “And what were you doing?”
It's Dean's turn to sigh. “Let's not go through this again. I'm perfectly capable of hunting on my own.”
“I'd feel better if you had backup, if Dad had backup.”
“We don't always do solo hunts, Sammy, only when it can't be avoided.” He's so sick of talking about this. He knows Sam worries but they just end up arguing. “Anyway,” he continues quickly, “You're the one getting yourself injured and from what I hear, you had a partner when you messed yourself up.” He waggles his eyebrows suggestively and Sam's mouth drops open.
“Oh my God, I can't believe she told you that.”
“I think it just slipped out, and it seems that's not the only thing-”
“Shut up, Dean,” Sam moans, covering his face with his hands.
Dean allows himself a lecherous grin before getting down to business. “So what went wrong? Last I heard, you were doing great on your meds, and aren't you doing that diet thing?”
Sam shrugs a shoulder, “Ketogenic, and yeah but it's not exactly foolproof. Doc thinks I've built up a tolerance to the stuff I'm on. He's gonna find something new to try.”
“Lame.” Dean makes a sympathetic face because trialling new meds can be a huge fucking ordeal. Some of them help and some of them don't, some of them have nasty side effects and some have really fucking horrible side effects and frankly, Dean's surprised that there are any left for Sam to trial.
“Yeah,” Sam agrees, then after a brief hesitation, “Are you going to stay for a bit or is this just a quick visit 'cause I'm in the hospital?”
Sam bites his lip, looking up at him from under his unruly hair, and it's so freaking obvious that Sam wants him to stay, even if he won't ever say so to Dean's face now that the clingy part of the concussion is over. Dean glances at Sam's plastered leg and black eye, and remembers how exhausted Jess looked and Sammy looks, and thinks that, yeah, they probably need a Dean for a while.
XXX
It's the weekend so Dean figures they'll all be squashing themselves onto the couch and watching movies together, getting some recovery time, but as soon as they get to Sam and Jess's apartment after finally leaving the hospital, Sam starts stressing about some assignment he's now behind on because of the night spent whacked out on drugs in the ER and Jess somehow manages to transform from a sleep-deprived zombie into a fresh-faced girl on the go in the space of ten minutes and dashes out the door to go to work, even though she's running off of caffeine and vending machine candy, because, as she says, the rent has to be paid and Sam's medical bills and hell no, Sam, you are not going to work today or tomorrow so sit down and shut up, love ya, bye.
Sam spends half an hour staring at his assignment, pen poised but immobile, before he gives up, dropping his face into his hands. “I'm too spaced out,” he moans in frustration, letting his pen fall onto the desk with a small clatter.
“Drugs, concussion or aura?” Dean asks. He's in the kitchen, making coffee and trying to figure out what he's allowed to feed Sam.
Sam rubs his eyes, obviously still exhausted. “Can I pick all three?”
“'course.” Dean closes the cupboard he was looking through. “Sam, is there anything here that your whacked-up diet lets you eat?”
“There's chicken salad in the fridge,” Sam says tiredly, “But I'm so not hungry right now.”
“Tough,” Dean responds, grabbing the Tupperware container of salad and his coffee and bringing them through to the sitting room. He sets them on the coffee table between the couch and the TV set, then turns to Sam. “Come. Eat. Watch television. Fall asleep and drool on my shoulder, it'll be like old times.”
Sam makes a face and reaches for his crutches but he left them on the floor when he sat down at the desk because he's an idiot and now he can't reach them.
“What would you do without me?” Dean asks as he scoops them up and lets Sam steady himself on his shoulder until he's sorted out balancing himself.
Sam laughs. “Probably fall on my ass a lot more often than I do anyway.”
Dean grins. That's good. If Sam can joke about epilepsy then he's not in one of his post-seizure angst sessions, which don't come as often as when he was a teenager, angry and frustrated by his limitations, but even though Sam's pretty much accepted that he's going to have to deal with fits for the rest of his life, that doesn't mean it's not hard on him sometimes, especially when he's tired and hurting after a big one.
“Well, there's a surprise,” Dean crows as he walks beside Sam to the couch. “I thought I was in for hours of emo Sammy.”
Sam slaps him on the shoulder and almost tips over on his crutches. Dean has to grab his elbow to stop him from hitting the floor.
“Haha,” Sam says once he's not in imminent danger of breaking his other leg. “You just wait until I have another fit and smack my cast on something, then you can listen to me bitch for hours.”
Fair enough. For Sammy, breaking his ankle isn't the worst part. The worst part is waking up on the floor and feeling like he's re-broken it every time he has a fit until it heals.
“Sucks to be you, kiddo,” Dean agrees lightly.
They settle themselves down on the couch and Sam drops his crutches on the floor again because he's a moron, apparently, but at least he's smiling.
“Not always,” Sam says, “It's never too bad when I have you and Jess fussing over me.”
“I knew it! You only have these fits because you want the attention!”
Sam holds up his hands in mock surrender. “You got me.”
Dean leans back against the couch, grinning. This is kid amazing, sitting here with a black eye and stitches and his leg in plaster, and he's happy. Sammy's happy. Dean's not going to lie and say he was all for Sam going off to college. He couldn't believe it when Sam revealed his Stanford acceptance letter, couldn't believe that Sam wanted out, wanted a life that didn't involve Dean, wanted to give up the search for a cure and with it, his dreams of being a hunter. It took a while for it to sink in that Sammy didn't want the hunters life any more, and it took a lot longer for Dean to stop feeling like the kid abandoned him.
But it's all worked out. Sam has Jess and a future and Dean pops in now and then, and maybe epilepsy rears it's ugly head sometimes when Dean's not there - his main reasoning for college being a bad idea- but he's learnt that Sam is actually pretty good at looking after himself and that, when he can't, Jess looks after Sam just as well as Dean used to. The girl is amazing. She just takes Sam's epilepsy in her stride, powering through any obstacles or stumbling blocks in her way.
Dean quizzed her, honestly, the first time he swung by after Sam called with the news that they were an official couple, subtly - or so he thought - asking her a few questions about Sammy's meds, because to understand Sammy, you have to understand his medication. He's been on a myriad of different drugs over the years and a lot of them make him irrational or depressed or so tired that he starts biting the heads off of everyone around him, and it's important to know what's going on in his doped-up head. Sammy can be a mess of side-effects, especially when he's trialling new drugs, and any girl who can't deal with that has no business being around his little brother.
So he'd been sitting there all suspicious and trying to act casual but Jess caught on after the third question. She had raised her eyebrows with a smile, obviously amused, perhaps even approving. “Are you testing me?” she asked, before rattling off what must have been a 5000 word essay on Sam's latest concoction of drugs. Dean had decided right there and then that Sam had found a keeper.
Smiling a little at the memory, Dean picks up the remote and channel surfs his way to an episode of Futurama, then grabs a cushion for Sam when the idiot goes to prop his casted leg up on the coffee table without one. He rolls his eyes. “You're hopeless, you know that?” he ribs him affectionately.
Sam yawns and leans back so he's shoulder to shoulder with Dean. “Thought we agreed that I just want you to look after me.”
“Well, good. If you don't feel like being a whiny bitch, you can eat your weird high-fat, low-carb salad.” He reaches forward to pick up the container, grabbing a sip of his coffee as he does so, and holds it up in front of Sam's face until he takes it.
“I do feel like being a whiny bitch,” Sam points out. “You know I don't feel like eating,”
“And you know I don't give a shit. Food is good for you. I don't know how you missed the memo but it's my job to drill it into your head that following this diet-”
“Reduces my risk of having seizures, I know, Dean. Aren't I the one whose been on this eating plan for the last few months?” Sam asks in exasperation.
“Well, look at that, it only took you 20 years to figure out eating is important.”
Sam rolls his eyes but he scoops a forkful of salad into his mouth, like the obedient kid he isn't, and Dean smirks his victory.
He shifts a little until his position is completely comfortable, knowing that in about ten minutes he's probably going to be smothered by a six foot, sleeping, drooling sasquatch and won't be able to get up for a couple of hours.
And he is completely okay with that.
END