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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Sam was curled up on the dirty motel carpet, hands up to try and block the blows to the neck or the chest. Sam's face was an array of blood and dark red marks where Dean's fists had plowed into. One eye was closing, and the other was watching him with an emotion Dean didn't recognize.
It was another first, he realized suddenly, and it made him want to vomit, because the unknown emotion was fear. For the first time, Sam was afraid of him.
Dean pushed himself off of Sam, feeling incredibly sober. Sam was still watching him fearfully, hands still up to protect his throat. Not his face, for some bizarre reason; just the places where if he placed a punch just right, Dean could kill him-
Dean shot up off the floor, the room unsteady around him, and raced for the door. "D'n, no," Sam whispered, and his torn, terrified voice was all the incentive Dean needed to push himself outside.
The door slammed shut behind him as he hurried out into the parking lot. He made it to the bushes near the sign before he threw up, emptying his stomach of probably most of the alcohol he'd imbibed. His head pounded and he stumbled to his knees, hands braced out against the still warm concrete. No one passed the motel, no cars rushing by at the midnight hour, no one walking from the bar to the suburbs not far from where they were staying. Yet Dean still felt as if the eyes of the world were staring at him, condemning him for what he'd done.
His eyes caught sight of his hands, and they ached suddenly, fiercely. They were bloody and slightly swollen and would be stiff as hell tomorrow morning. Some of it was his blood. Most of it was Sam's.
He threw up again.
Sam. Oh god, Sam. Sam who'd been protecting him from himself, keeping him from going to the bar and probably either dying in a barfight or giving himself alcohol poisoning. He'd seen it all clearly and Dean? Dean hadn't seen a damn thing.
Except rage. And Sam's face, there and ready to be pounded.
Tears burned in his eyes, and his stomach threatened to rebel for a third time. He'd hurt Sam, deliberately. He'd wanted to, even. He'd hit Sam, abused Sam, because there was no other way it could be anything but abuse. And Sam hadn't fought back, had just taken it, and there was so much wrong with that Dean didn't even know where to begin.
He'd left Sammy alone back in the room. He'd just left him lying there on the filthy carpet, bleeding, probably with a hell of a concussion. Goddammit. When had things gotten so messed up? Where had Dean gone wrong?
He pushed himself up onto trembling limbs and wiped his mouth. He blinked and tried to push away the last vestiges of drunkeness, because there was a possibility that Sam would need a hospital. And Dean needed to be sober enough to answer questions when the ambulance arrived.
Dean wasn't driving. He'd crash her, Sam had been right. And god, when had Dean put the car's well-being over Sam's? When had Sam put the car's well-being over his own?
He made his way back to the room, weaving only a little. The door was still unlocked, which was good because Dean didn't have the key on him. He'd been prepared to step outside without a key, without common sense. Without his backup, his best friend, his brother.
The room was dark and quiet. Sam wasn't on the floor anymore, but he wasn't anywhere that Dean could see. Had he come outside? No, Dean would've heard that. So where was his brother?
A sound from the bathroom caught his attention. There was no light on, and the door was only partially shut. Dean swallowed and made his way silently towards the bathroom.
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Not now. Now, as Dean carefully pushed the door open, he could tell Sam hadn't registered his entrance at all.
Sam was curled up with his back against the wall, open first aid kit beside him. He was slowly brushing alcohol swabs against his cuts, not even flinching as they wiped away the blood. His left eye was completely swollen shut now, and the red marks were quickly turning into huge bruises. His cheeks were both cut open, his lips were a bloody mess, and when he coughed, blood flew out into his waiting hand.
The worst part, though, was the look on Sam's face. The despair, the grief. The resignation and hurt.
The alcohol swab was too bloody to do any real good anymore, and the realization seemed to destroy any last energy and will Sam had. The swab fell to the floor, and Sam's head hung to his chest, his good eye closing.
The door's hinges squealed slightly as they were pushed open all the way, and Sam immediately snapped to attention. He quickly tried to shove himself away from the door, his good eye locked on Dean with fear and the same resignation that Dean had seen before. But he still wasn't protecting his face, wasn't doing anything except waiting for Dean to break more of him.
Dean slowly moved forward and knelt next to Sam. He found two unused alcohol patches and ripped the packages open. In slow movements, like with an injured animal that was cornered, Dean carefully and gently began to clean Sam's face.
Sam hissed at the contact but didn't say anything. He just kept watching Dean. Waiting.
Dean's stomach wouldn't stop churning, fingers and alcohol tracing over all the damage he'd done. God, he'd done this to Sam. Not some demon, not some angel. Dean. In an ironic sort of way, the same alcohol that had wound up hurting Sam so much was helping clean him up.
It was clear from the way Sam held himself, from the way he'd startled upon Dean's entrance, that he'd been expecting to clean himself up. That Dean would have gone on and left him there, alone, in the motel room.
When he was done, Dean started looking for the butterfly bandages, for the cheek that had gotten the worst of it. Sam's hand caught his, though, forcing him to stop. Dean glanced up and found Sam gazing at him with no fear, just sadness. And the same resignation as before, and Dean felt himself getting angry again. This time, with himself.
"Could've stopped me," Dean found himself saying, because it was the truth. Sam had more than enough strength to have stopped what had happened. He just...hadn't.
Sam shrugged and did look away then. "Not like I didn't have it coming," he whispered, words thick and fumbled through swollen lips. Resigned and ashamed.
And god, Dean had never wanted so badly to take something back as he did then, to take back the punches, to take back the abuse, both physical and verbal. The cuts would heal, the bruises would fade. What he'd said would get played on a single track, stuck on repeat, in Sam's head for the rest of who knew how long.
Dean didn't have butterfly sutures for that.
And then it dawned on Dean just why Sam hadn't protected his face, and he shut his eyes tight. Sam had thought he deserved it. He'd let Dean hurt him.
There was no way to fix this. To fix Sam.
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Not like I didn't ask for it, literally, but *SOB*
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It gets a little better. *pets* It was just too good a prompt not to do, and I've been trying to stay away from this damn meme because it's SO GOOD, and then I saw this one and it all went to hell. :P
~Nebula
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~Nebula
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For the first time, Dean said what had never needed to be said between them. It had always been implied, always shared with nudges and affection and statements filled with love. But tonight, tonight it had to be said out loud as it was.
"I'm sorry, Sammy."
Sam was already shaking his head, turning away from Dean, and it wasn't happening. Dean caught his face gently between Dean's hands and forced him to turn back. Sam's good eye glistened from the light outside, and he refused to look at Dean directly. That was fine.
"It's not true. You didn't...you didn't do those things, Sam."
"Dean-"
"I was wrong to say them. I was drunk and you were right, I had no business going anywhere. You stopped me from hurting myself." He swallowed, fingers gently brushing one of the cuts. "Just not me from hurting you."
Sam tried to shrug it off again, but Dean wouldn't let him. "Anyone ever hurts you again, you hurt them back," Dean said fiercely, just as demanding as he'd been when he'd struck Sam. "You hear me?"
Slowly Sam's eye turned to catch Dean's gaze. "What if it's you?" he asked softly.
"It won't be," Dean said firmly. Sobriety had never sounded so good in his life, and that was another first, too. Dean wasn't touching alcohol for a long, long time. And he'd never get drunk enough to get angry at Sam, either. Sam, who hadn't deserved any of the lashings Dean had poured out on him.
"If it is?"
"Then you fight back," Dean said. It wouldn't happen, but Sam needed to know. "You fight back, you hear me?"
Sam nodded, then winced. Concussion. "Gonna have to wake you every couple hours," Dean said quietly. He'd stay up all night waiting. Usually, he slept, and set his alarm to wake him for the constant vigil. Not tonight. If Dean slept without nightmares in the nights coming ahead, he'd be surprised.
If he slept at all.
Sam let him continue to clean him in silence, his lone good eye slowly starting to blink shut in exhaustion. The resigned air was fading away, though Dean knew what he'd done that night would take a long time to forget. Probably already forgiven, and god knew Dean didn't deserve it, but that was Sam, and it made Dean's eyes burn a little bit more thinking about it.
He leaned against the wall, next to Sam, and hauled his little brother in. Sam slid over with a soft sigh, and Dean took the trust, the acceptance, the forgiveness so freely offered with that move. "I'm so sorry, Sammy," he whispered, guilt and regret clouding his tone.
Sam remained silent for a long time, enough that Dean thought he'd fallen asleep. When he spoke, it was in a voice that was barely a whisper. "Promise?"
Dean shut his eyes, one lone tear slipping free. "I promise," he said.
It was a promise he wasn't going to forget, one he was going to make sure Sam remembered, too.
~Nebula
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~Nebula
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You just killed me.
This is wonderful, exquisitely painful, and I love you forever for doing it. <3
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~Nebula
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I always love it when I see that you've posted and I'm never disappointed. This was so good.
I'm kinda glad they didn't do this on the show even though I could definitely see Sam taking it. It was hard enough to read much less having to watch.
Great Job!
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