comment fic meme!
Following the results of the poll we took last month (don't make it easy on us or anything, guys, haha!), we've decided to hold a comment fic meme once every three months. This gives everyone time to write and prompt to their heart's content, and allows us mods to keep up with y'all. And we're starting right now!
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Warnings: Sadness, angst, not!happy!ending, major character death (do NOT read if you're sensitive to this, I will NOT be flamed for killing someone off!) A lot more Dean-centric than I meant for it to be, sorry *blush*
Right, here it goes....
He watches Bobby help Sam out of the car. Sam wobbles a little before finding his balance and batting Bobby’s hand away. A look of hurt washes over Bobby’s face but it is gone as fast as it came and replaced by nothing but sadness. It matches his own face.
Sam slowly makes his way over to the small beach house Dean rented for them. In all the years they hunted together, with and without dad, they never went to the beach. Dean knew Sam loved the beach, he’d been there a few times while at Stanford, but somehow they’d never gone.
When Sam reaches the small porch stretched along the front of the beach house, Dean makes his way outside to welcome him with a broad smile that fades as soon as he sets eyes on Sam up close.
‘Sam, everything okay? You look -’
Sam cuts him off with a jerky wave of his hand and a scowl.
‘I’m fine Dean, stop mother-henning over me.’
He bites his lip in an effort to stay quiet, but he wants nothing more than to yell at Sam to stop being a stubborn bastard and admit he’s not feeling well. His skin is pale, stretched tight over his bones. His eyes have dark circles under them and his once floppy, shiny hair is now dull and dry. He’s lost at least 40 pounds and hasn’t been eating well in months, but Sam continues to insist he is fine.
Instead, Dean just nods and lets Sam shuffle into the house by himself. His eyes meet Bobby’s over the hood of the car and if he notices the wetness in them, he chooses to ignore it. Bobby nods at Dean and moves to get the bags out of the trunk. Dean turns and heads back into the house, looking for Sam.
‘Sam? Where are you, dude?’
No answer. He’ll never admit to it, but every time Sam doesn’t answer his calls, Dean panics a little. His heart starts beating a little faster, he starts breathing a little shallower. He tries not to rush through the house, but it’s close, trying to find Sam, make sure he’s alright.
Sam’s not in the small second bedroom at the front of the house and not in the larger bedroom at the back of the house, overlooking the beach and the ocean. When Dean looks out the window though, there Sam is. Sitting on the beach at the shore line, staring out over the water. Dean’s first thought is “shit, he’ll catch a cold”, but he stomps it down quickly. Sam has more than once expressed his irritation at Dean for treating him like a child and the last thing Dean wants this week is to piss Sam off.
Dean watches Sam sit in the sand for a while, until Bobby finds him and stands next to him, looking at Sam.
‘Are you going to be okay?’
He doesn’t answer for a long time. He knows Bobby doesn’t mean just now, he knows. And that is exactly why he can’t answer. Instead, he shrugs and attempts a weak smile at Bobby. He’s grateful when Bobby takes it and turns to leave.
‘Tell him goodbye, yeah?’
Dean nods and watches Bobby go. For a second, he feels as if his last tether is leaving, the last thing grounding him to life and sanity, but he refuses to acknowledge it. He’s managed so far, he can manage a bit longer too.
On his way out, he grabs two soda’s from the fridge and a blanket. If he can’t make Sam wrap it around himself, he can pretend it is to sit on. Call him surprised when Sam smiles at him and takes the blanket from him to fold it around himself.
‘Thanks, Dean, kinda cold out here.’
Dean murmurs something affirmative and plops down in the sand. If he sits a little closer to Sam than brotherly, neither says anything. It’s something Dean needs and Sam knows it. Dean needs to feel close to Sam, touch him to make sure he’s still here. Finding comfort and support in Sam’s body against him, although Dean’ll swear up and down it is the other way around.
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The silence stretches, being filled only by the soft sound of the water lapping at the shore. Dean takes the time to look at Sam closely, taking advantage of a rare moment Sam lets him. With his guard down, Sam looks even paler and weaker. Dean wants to yell and rage at the world, how unfair it all is, how his little brother does not deserve to be sick, but he tried that and it didn’t help. Castiel won’t answer his prayers and when the doctors gave up on Sam, that was really Dean’s last hope.
Somewhere during the hours of silence, Sam gets up and goes to bed. Leaving Dean alone with nothing but his thoughts and regrets. They do that for days. Dean’ll get up and make breakfast, which they eat in silence. Sam’ll sit on the sand, staring at the ocean until Dean calls him in for lunch. Sam heads back out until dinner is ready. Drinks inside until Sam gets up and goes to bed. Dean all the while thinking, waiting, feeling. Panicking.
It’s been five days since Bobby left. Five days since Sam said a word. Five days since Dean started losing his little brother for good. Two days since Dean broke the seal on the first bottle of whiskey. He doesn’t know how many he’s emptied, how many Bobby left them with, but there are still two untouched bottles in the kitchen so he doesn’t worry much. He hadn’t counted on Sam worrying though.
‘Sam? What are you doing?’
‘Pouring whiskey down the drain.’
It’s the angry tone laced in Sam’s voice that makes him snap. He crosses the distance between them with three large steps and snatches the bottle from Sam’s hand.
‘Are you insane?’
Sam flinches a little, Dean notices with a sick sense of satisfaction, but recovers quickly, the anger visible on his face.
‘I could ask you the same thing, Dean. What do you think you’re doing? Drinking yourself to death? You promised, Dean!’
Rage bubbles up inside him and he has nothing left to fight it down anymore. Without thinking about it, Dean flings the bottle away. It hits the wall and explodes into a million little pieces, leaving a stain on the wall. It fits how Dean is feeling, and he scowls at the stupid metaphor. If he weren’t two days into a binge, he wouldn’t have taken his anger out at Sam, but he is and he does.
‘Where do you get off being angry at me, Sam?’
He takes a threatening step closer to Sam and pokes him in the chest with a finger angrily.
‘You’re the one leaving me! You don’t have to stay behind with nothing! You won’t be alone! You won’t have to bury your brother’s body and salt and burn it because that’s what we do! You won’t have to live the rest of your life knowing you failed to save your brother! You are not -’
With a gasp, Dean stops himself dead cold. What is he doing? Through his watery eyes, he can see Sam’s sad face, the tears on his cheeks, the slight tremble in the hand he lifts to wipe away Dean’s own tears. Sam’s voice is fond when he speaks.
‘Oh god, Dean, you are such in idiot.’
Dean snorts through his tears and takes a step back from Sam. He can’t be so near to him without flinging himself in his arms and sobbing like a baby. He’s got some pride left.
‘Thanks Sammy, an insult was just what I needed.’
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‘Why do you always think you have to be the hero, huh? Can’t you see this is killing you?’
Sam pulls back and holds dean at arm’s length, forcing Dean to look at him.
‘What you’re doing? That’s hurting me more than helping me, Dean. You think you’re hiding everything from me? That you’re hurting, drowning, scared? I know, I know it all, because I’m all that too. Stop doing this to yourself and help me. Talk to me. Do this with me instead of for me.’
Sam pulls him back in a hug and whispers softly in his ear, a warm, alive breath on his neck.
‘Please Dean. Please stop this and help me. Talk to me.’
What finally breaks him is not Sam’s words or his arms wrapped around him. It’s not his soft plea or his slightly trembling body. What finally breaks Dean and has him a sobbing mess in Sam’s arms? The soft press of Sam’s lips behind Dean’s ear. The brush of his lips against Dean’s neck is what makes his knees buckle and his hands clench tight in Sam’s shirt. That’s what makes him cry against Sam’s shoulder for what seems like ages.
That soft kiss is what makes Dean cry when Sam takes a turn for the worst when they’re at Bobby’s a few weeks later. What makes him cry when Sam slips into a coma with nothing but a prayer for a new heart. It’s what makes him cry when Bobby tells him to let go of his little brother’s dead body. And what makes him cry when he lights the match that will send his little brother to his father.
That soft kiss is what makes him smiles when the claws of the werewolf penetrate his chest to rip his heart out.
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*sniff. sniff sniff.* Emotionally manipulate me, why don't ya? Because I love it.
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