Life's a road (I just don't want to be on it)
Title: Life's a road (I just don't want to be on it)
Pairing: Sam/Dean
Rating: T
Word Count: 4379
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Summary: Sometimes, when it's like this, when it's just this shade of Winchester normal, he can almost forget that it was once just Sam riding with the Impala under his fingertips, sinking steady into bleary-eyed darkness and interstate highways while the world spun around him.
in the car, it's cold and hard, metal inside banging on the metal out, like it's never going to stop, and they've already come this far ahead, there's no use in turning back. The sky has opened up (should have expected it), swathing the world in burgundy, too much blood for him not to taste at the back of his throat. He closes his eyes and maybe if he can't see it, it'll all go away. His heart is heavy against his ribcage, thinks it might be jutting out where bone gives way to tattered flesh and that's alright. At least things are back to the way they were.
He's driving.
There's a warm body on cool leather that he can't help but touch because God it feels like he's been gone forever but hasn't been gone at all. Sometimes, when it's like this, when it's just this shade of Winchester normal, he can almost forget that it was once just Sam riding with the Impala under his fingertips, sinking steady into bleary-eyed darkness and interstate highways while the world spun around him.
Like it always has.
He takes one of his tapes (glove compartment, jammed in a little too tight to fit, but Sam kept them and that's what counts) and lets his fingers just brush Sam's knee. It's faded there, blue jean giving way to almost white, skin almost touching through fabric. He thinks he hears Sam mutter Dean in his sleep, and it should sound like every other time he's said it except it doesn't - it doesn't sound like words, sounds like air, like Sam's breathing him in and breathing out because after years of being ripped apart and sown back together, fingers under each other's skin and kisses on top of it, it's only natural that Sam holds some of Dean inside of him.
"Yeah, Sammy," he says. "I got you." His hand doesn't leave the too-hard bones of Sam's knee.
This...this is solid, this is real. For once the tightness in his throat (like coils of demon smoke) eases away, and he exhales
____
completely unaware that he's being watched, Dean tips his head back until the sun peaks over the crown of his hair, alighting his face in the faint hints of yellow daybreak. There's a bit of morning dew on the hood of the Impala and it leaves long streaks on her windows, sticks slick and damp to the back of his pants.
It's one of those mornings, ones that Dean thinks are oddly reminiscent of the year before the Deal, before when hunting was just what they did, something they could get out of if they really wanted to, 'cause really, that was Dad's life, and they were just along for the ride.
It's a little like that. Quiet.
But Dean's still crisply aware that there's a loaded shotgun at his side and that even though the sun's shining like pinpricks over the edges of autumn leaves, he's got his reaction time down to about two seconds if he so much as hears Sam breathing irregularly.
This time, he's not taking any chances.
He listens for his brother's footsteps near some bushes -- safe -- thinks about turning on some music, wonders if it would spoil the mood, when he hears them. They don't sound like dogs (that much he knows); their growl is deeper, menacing, like blood is just sauce on top of meat. Dean can't swallow, throat tight, eyes darting. They run between the trees, circle back, cast shadows, throw echoes.
Like it's all happening again.
His body grows cold-hot, melts, burns, freezes, and he thinks no no fuck Sam no help as he reaches to get sweaty palms onto the trigger, into anything.
Hell flashes before his eyes and paints the world crimson, like he never left and it's back to soul tearing and flesh ripping and somewhere someone screams and it sounds like a desperate Sam but maybe he's wrong because he can't, doesn't, can't think.
Crunching in the leaves and something's coming towards him; its obsidian eyes eclipse the sun and all Dean can do to keep from falling (like there's hell in front of him, opened up) is collapse backward into the Impala. He can't-
It's not time to collect, Sam brought him back, he can't-
It smiles at him and the world shifts, goes from red to grainy black to translucent gold and Dean does fall (Sam just a whisper on his lips), backs of his knees hitting the hood as he goes down (please) and somewhere there's a voice and a distant sort of touch, like he's miles deep and he's trying to get out.
There's Sam, and he's saying Dean Dean over and over until Dean doesn't know if it started raining or if Sam's started crying, but a drop lands in his mouth and burns like acid and he knows
____
there's no way out.
Sam cards a rough hand through his hair, but Dean's still trembling all over. The starch fabric of motel sheets rubs raw into his skin. He wants to ask Sam (what that was, what he is, why can't they just go back), but the thought of it hurts in ways he didn't even know existed.
He's staring at the ceiling, tries to picture what this would be like if angels saved him, instead of Sam. Maybe they'd come with an army, show him things that Sam kept from him, tell him things Dad never wanted him to know. Maybe they'd have wings and ways out that didn't involve deals and debts and sacrifice. Maybe they could have saved Sam too.
The hand in his hair never ceases its movement, and Dean thinks he can hear the demons laughing.
It's only later (seconds that don't really pass at all) that he realizes the sound is something nervous and hesitant, half-choked at the back of Sam's throat: "Hey Dean."
There's a trace of Sammy in there, he knows, and it feels like him when he touches Dean. Maybe it's not just because of bone structure that it's the same. Maybe they can be how they once were. Maybe Dean's dreaming all of this, and it's not real, not real because after all that Dean's done for him, Sam can't just give himself up.
Dean tries not to let the tears slip past his eyes, but they do anyway, by sheer gravity. He pretends like the air hasn't just gotten hot and that he can breathe and that his heart isn't about to break itself on his ribcage.
"What did you do, Sam?"
The hand pauses above his ear. His fingers flit gently across the top before Sam's eyes just let in the crinkles of black (spilled ink on paper). They're filled dark and wide until Dean can see himself in them (like he's trapped beneath the surface).
Sam says "I'm sorry" as he touches Dean's face, hair, neck.
Dean closes his eyes and tries to forget everything he knows about demons, how to kill them, what they do, and thinks that if he could just expose the cloud inside him to sunlight, it would burn through and leave Sam. Just Sam.
That's all he ever wanted.
He wakes up
____
hours later, all Dean can do to keep from hurling is push a fist to his mouth and turn away as he remembers. Sam sits by him, tries to rub his back, but Dean shrugs his hands away.
"Please, Dean. It was the only way."
Dean chuckles deep down in himself, in the parts that were lost a long time ago (because that's irony) and instead manages a weak sob as he runs his hands across his face, over eyes with still untainted irises.
Dean wants to know how long. Sam says that since he was gone, maybe a little bit before; he tried everything he could, tried everything, Dean, and he just couldn't-
Sam clutches at the sides of Dean's shirt, and Dean can't just sit there, can't not touch the delicate bones of Sam's wrists, slide hands up his arms, push him roughly towards his chest, hair threaded through fingers that's still too long but so familiar 'cause it's Sam.
Dean keeps his eyes trained on the carpet of the motel room; it's stained beige against blue, just enough so that it stands out.
He just couldn't leave him there. Just couldn't. Not when it was his fault, Sam's mumbling against his neck. It's broken, just on the edge of crumbling.
Dean presses Sam closer and says "I'll fix you, Sammy," even though he knows what's resting behind those black, black eyelids against his shoulder. "I'll fix you."
And somewhere, if demons are laughing, angels are crying.
Dean closes his eyes, tries to ignore the licks of hellfire playing at his sides where Sam's hands are touching him like sin, doesn't want to think about what they'll do later to wake up sweaty and tangled and trying to piece themselves together to how it used to fit before. He keeps Sam's mouth busy with his tongue (the same one that knows Latin) because if he didn't, he'd have to ask and he doesn't really want to know
____
are you sure?"
They're in Tulsa, chasing something crazy fast and smart. Dean thinks it's a demon, but Sam just smiles that dangerous grin he's adopted (less Sammy, more something) and says that no demon would dare come near them now; trust me, Dean.
Dean doesn't ask, just stares at Sam's back as he's bending over to get something out of their packs - not salt; they don't carry that around anymore. His shirt seems too tight, like whatever's filling Sam up inside is expanding his skin, bursting to get out.
Dean wants to press fingertips to his neck, arms, chest, ask if it hurts.
Sam flips himself onto the couch, taps randomly on the remote, cool blue reflected from the screen in his eyes. There's pizza on the table, and they're twelve and sixteen again, killing time by watching old horror movies (black and white), making fun of everything, waiting for Dad.
It's like that.
Except there's no salt on the window sills, by the door; the pizza's gone a bit stale, tastes a bit like rotten eggs; Dad's not coming home, and Sam-
"Dean?" He cocks his head to the side, looks speculative.
Dean twists his ring around his finger three times (there's no place like home there's no place like home there's no place like home). His gaze is a little gone, somewhere to the left of Sam's head where the blinds are open, and everyone can see. Sam brings them shut with a flick of his wrist.
"Yeah?" he says, finally, voice raspy like unshed tears.
"You coming?" Sam gestures towards the movie, black and white, pizza like rotten eggs, spot next to him on the couch.
"Yeah."
____
he's not coming home either. Dean sits in the car, instead. He can see Sam's shadow against the illuminated window of the motel room, and he traces the outline with light fingers, edges blurred when Sam moves. Maybe it's the beer that's making the world tilt (maybe it's Sam) because less than half of it is lying on the passenger's seat getting warm.
There's an uncomfortable burn in his throat, and he takes another swill to wash it down, pushes his collar away -- too tight -- until his fingers reach raised skin, drawn like salt lines down his neck.
Three parts Hell, one part Sam.
He wonders if that's how the deal went, if Hell let Sam keep some part of himself, all those good memories (too few) locked safe before everything else was shattered and thrown about to soak up fire and brimstone, torn into by demon claws, bit into by hellhounds, burnt back to fit the framework of the old Sam.
His Sam.
Yeah, he takes another drink, liquid sloshing against the bottom, that's what it must feel like, to belong to Hell, not just in it.
They're Winchesters. This is what they do: buy one, get the other half-off.
Dean runs his fingernails over the scratches and hopes they'll scar. At least that's something Hell can't take
____
from Oklahoma onto Nebraska, they're driving along the long scenic route around Arkansas and up through Missouri. Dean turns up the stereo so loud once they're near the border that he spends the ten minutes they're parked outside a gas station apologizing to his baby, checking if anything's strained.
Sam doesn't say anything about it - the music or the way they don't set foot or tire in Kansas.
They make love in a hotel with gardenias planted in the front, something like picket fences along the interstate, Dean whispering low in Sam's ear, and Sam telling him it's okay, it's okay, I'm still here.
The next day they catch word of some explosions of glass in the quaint shop windows on the edge of town, and Sam's eyes light up with sparks of interest (like hounds on a trail) that Dean pretends he can't see
____
what Sam does at night, where he goes when the light from passing cars has stopped painting his body in reds and blues, when his flesh has cooled and he's unwound himself from Dean, and they're both lying on the sheets, wide-awake and panting - Dean doesn't want to be told.
Sam comes back every morning, and there's not a scratch on him that Dean didn't put there (and that's either good or really, really bad). Dean's sure that's damn near impossible, but he gratefully takes the coffee that Sam offers, slips their fingers together, and watches Sam smile, slow and open, before he takes to the newspapers and his laptop, always searching for the same thing and just missing it.
Bobby calls. He says that whatever they're hunting means bad news for Sam, that they should just stop because they're getting themselves into a world of trouble messing with things that even they don't understand. Dean looks through the slits in the window at the Impala resting there under the lamplight.
The sheets are bunched around his waist; other bed, made; the side of the bed that's not his, cold.
Yeah, he says. I know.
He doesn't tell Sam
____
he sometimes has dreams that feel so real he thinks they just might be.
In them he sees hell and pain, and every image he remembers lights a fire beneath his skin that feels like the slow drag of a knife. It's just glimpses of red, bursts of hot color that leave him desperate and blind even in sleep. He grits his teeth together so hard that by morning they ache like they've been pulled out and shoved back in at odd angles; when he bares them in front of the mirror, they look like they always have.
At night (when it gets bad), he gropes for the warm weight of Sam and never fails to find fingertips at his forehead, smoothing the creases, wiping the sweat that's formed there, wind brushing across his arms, feather touches sweeping down the length of his body.
A voice speaks to him, sits next to him until he falls asleep (dreams of his mother instead of hell, but that's just as horrific), and is there when he wakes up to brush back angry tears threatening to spill over closed eyes.
Dean presses himself closer to the touch. He holds the wrist, and a thumb comes to swipe along the back of his hand. It burns, and Dean shifts away, uncomfortable, seeing red and red over and over again.
I'm sorry, Dean.
The voice is deeper than Sam's usually is, sounds like it's apologizing for more than just the heated flesh that Dean is sure he imagined because it's cooled with a light kiss to his forehead.
Dean brings a hand up and touches his jaw -- s'okay -- and if his hand scrapes against more stubble than Sam usually has then it's just because he maybe forgot to shave. He feels a smile parting his fingertips where they dip into his cheeks, lips soft against his palm. Sleep now. I'll watch over you.
____
"you okay?"
It's Sam's turn to drive, and they're making their way down to wherever he's picked up some information. Might be good, but it's a long shot, especially when all they're hunting are explosions and strange sightings (or not, as the thing likes to the burn eyes right out of their sockets): something that sounds like a demon but much worse.
Dean thinks (knows) Sam's not telling him everything (anything), but there's trust and just a hint of fear that blurs the edges just below the surface and keeps him following.
He's stopped picking up the phone when Bobby calls. Sam watches while he deletes the messages after they've gone to voicemail.
It's better that way, if they just have road to worry about, the hunt and each other to live off of.
Dean drums his fingers on his knee, technique he uses with interrogators, police chiefs. To throw them off.
"I'm good." He turns his head to look at Sam squinting against the glare of the sun and tries to grin, but his smile is shoved painfully tight against his teeth, mouth and refuses to stretch like hooks are holding it in place.
Something cold clings to him after Sam gives him a pointed look and a shrug (tense, rigid), just briefly tearing his eyes away from the road. It's enough for Dean not to be able to shake it off until after they've passed cornfield after cornfield, put every coffee shop and little town that isn't home but could have been in their rearview mirror along with a guy by the side of the road, eyes deep and dark (but not like Sam's), trench coat, briefcase, and a sign (Anywhere but here.) that Sam had laughed at and Dean had secretly wished was him.
Sam hisses out breath between his teeth like it's a warning, like he can read Dean's thoughts, and Dean presses his thighs into the seat and watches the grasses rush by, dry and yellowed and dying.
It doesn't stop until he goes to sleep and feels hands gently card through his hair, soothe away worries he didn't even know were building up. He tries to think of nothing but the presence above him and the way it feels so different from what it is during the day: hard on the warmed hood of the Impala, their bodies straining against the pace Sam sets for them, taunt muscles slipping in and out of place.
It's just enough to let him forget
____
he doesn't take coffee with cream; it's what Sam likes. It's not that he's accommodating, never was, but it's just easier to order them both the same.
(Sam's smile is a bit more luminous when he does.)
He slides across from him onto red patent leather. It sinks and groans as he shifts, hands the coffee over to Sam.
"Where are we off to now, geek boy?" he gestures at the laptop, takes a sip from his own cup and only grimaces a little. He's getting better at it.
"Not we," Sam says. "Me."
He looks over the top of the screen and closes it with a click. Dean means to protest, but the words dissipate like smoke in his throat. Something low and uncomfortable churns in his belly.
"No, Dean. It's just something I have to do alone, and then we can go back to hunting regular shit and getting pissed at bars. Whatever you want." He shoves his laptop into the bag and takes the keys from Dean's pocket, pats his lap. "I promise."
Dean wants to smirk, leer "Whatever I want?" but Sam's eyes look a little darker from this angle, the sun hitting pupils and absorbing heat like hellfire. He's gone with a backward "I'm taking the car," before Dean has a chance to say anything.
He's left sitting there with two white cups filled with coffee, and the thought Anywhere but here flashes in his mind. The rumble of the Impala as Sam drives away drowns it out
____
as the colors run together into oblivion, Dean's still on the inside looking out. The hotel room is cold, and the rain whips into the trees outside. He's waiting for Sam to get back; its been hours
____
days, a week have passed, but he can't tell.
Sometimes Dean wakes up and the nightmares are right there, in front of his eyes, surrounding him, with no Sam to keep them at bay. He imagines he feels a comforting presence that brings him back to sleep, but that's just wishful thinking, and Dean's never been a believer.
He gets restless, paces, but doesn't leave the room too much. Sam will come back, and he'll know where to find Dean - right where he left him.
They can go hunt the regular shit and get pissed at bars and maybe see the Grand Canyon or whatever they want.
Sam promised so Dean waits
____
for a little while, it stops raining. Dean doesn't expect the slam of the door or Sam falling into him, eyes still hooded black and panting. He doesn't expect to feel charred skin beneath his palms or the rush of drying blood, fresh over unbroken skin. He doesn't expect it, but notices and says nothing.
Dean lets Sam rest bone weary on top of him and smiles for the first time in weeks. Whatever Deal Sam made, whatever thing he had to kill, whatever he had to do to fulfill it: it's over now.
Dean's still smiling as he gets the water and towels to wash Sam off, as he kneels, starts at the feet, works his way up. He's still smiling as Sam's eyelids drift closed, but not enough to not be able to look Dean in the eyes, and say, with a tired grin, We won before his head drops back, and he sleeps.
Dean lets the water run cold before he stops staring at Sam's face, before daybreak creeps up by millimeters over the horizon. His mind stutters over we as other thoughts (vicious, unstoppable thoughts) slither through the cracks that it makes.
His knees have gone numb a long time ago, long before he noticed there was something missing in the night, space that should have been filled with warmth: empty.
And Dean saw it all, the nightmares right before him, with his eyes wide open
____
awake to the sound of Sam packing, Dean tries to lift himself up slowly. He's on the carpet, head resting against the mattress, legs thrown at odd angles.
He swallows, throat dry. "Sam? What are you doing?"
When Sam turns, the midday sun slants across his face (light clinging to skin, everywhere, but his eyes). He flicks his hair to the side and scrunches up his nose in a way that Dean thinks only Sam can manage.
"I found us a case." He takes a news clip from the table, two coffee cups sitting precariously near the edge. "It says here that a Susan Walker was brutally stabbed to death by an invisible man. Sounds like our sort of thing. Thought we might check it out."
He shrugs, and Dean almost lets himself forget the night before, the weeks before. He ignores the tugs like hooks in his skin, that uncomfortable ripple of flesh like it's melting, the way he can't shake how he knows he didn't (couldn't) fix Sammy.
Almost.
"Awesome. When do we leave,
____
bitch," Dean yells back after Sam sticks his head out the window, tells him not to forget the yogurt. As soon as he walks in and hears the gas station door ding, he does, and he knows that Sam will call him a jerk for it while he eats his Cheetos, guzzles down Coke; he looks forward to it.
The cold from the fridge feels even better now, and if Dean stands there for a few extra minutes, it's because he's debating the merits of turkey versus ham. He grabs one of each; he'll eat whatever Sam doesn't like.
He gets everything rung up (candy bars, too: for the road) and is just about to walk out, stands midway between the outside with its cracked Nevada dirt, plateaus ahead and Impala shining black in the sun and the gas station, little block in the wildness, when he sees him.
Dean thinks he's the same guy, the one with the sign and the trench coat, but he's tattered, walks with a limp, and reaches a hand to feel at his back, sliding up and down. Dean can't help but think that somewhere, someplace, in other circumstances they might have met, but he shakes the thought out of his head as soon as it enters.
They pass each other; Dean tries to focus on the car, his brother, but there's a secret sort of grandeur in the stranger's eyes that keeps his gaze a second longer than it should.
He looks like he wants to say something, but doesn't. They walk in opposite directions and Dean leaves it, him, everything but what's in front of him, behind.
Sam's sitting shotgun in the Impala. They've got a truck full of weapons, can kill any evil son of a bitch they find, the radio's blasting something his Dad used to listen to. There's a road that never ends ahead of them, and if there are glimmers of something else along the way, Dean can only hope; he doesn't expect anything but what it's going to give them.
It's how things are supposed to be.
He turns back just for a second (there's something telling him to), but the guy's gone without even a ding to signal he was ever even there. He shrugs his shoulders back and tries to ignore the warmth coursing through him.
It's almost sunset, the sky just tinted red and blazing. Dean sets his eyes against it and watches the dust churn as he pulls onto the road.
He's riding
Pairing: Sam/Dean
Rating: T
Word Count: 4379
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Summary: Sometimes, when it's like this, when it's just this shade of Winchester normal, he can almost forget that it was once just Sam riding with the Impala under his fingertips, sinking steady into bleary-eyed darkness and interstate highways while the world spun around him.
in the car, it's cold and hard, metal inside banging on the metal out, like it's never going to stop, and they've already come this far ahead, there's no use in turning back. The sky has opened up (should have expected it), swathing the world in burgundy, too much blood for him not to taste at the back of his throat. He closes his eyes and maybe if he can't see it, it'll all go away. His heart is heavy against his ribcage, thinks it might be jutting out where bone gives way to tattered flesh and that's alright. At least things are back to the way they were.
He's driving.
There's a warm body on cool leather that he can't help but touch because God it feels like he's been gone forever but hasn't been gone at all. Sometimes, when it's like this, when it's just this shade of Winchester normal, he can almost forget that it was once just Sam riding with the Impala under his fingertips, sinking steady into bleary-eyed darkness and interstate highways while the world spun around him.
Like it always has.
He takes one of his tapes (glove compartment, jammed in a little too tight to fit, but Sam kept them and that's what counts) and lets his fingers just brush Sam's knee. It's faded there, blue jean giving way to almost white, skin almost touching through fabric. He thinks he hears Sam mutter Dean in his sleep, and it should sound like every other time he's said it except it doesn't - it doesn't sound like words, sounds like air, like Sam's breathing him in and breathing out because after years of being ripped apart and sown back together, fingers under each other's skin and kisses on top of it, it's only natural that Sam holds some of Dean inside of him.
"Yeah, Sammy," he says. "I got you." His hand doesn't leave the too-hard bones of Sam's knee.
This...this is solid, this is real. For once the tightness in his throat (like coils of demon smoke) eases away, and he exhales
____
completely unaware that he's being watched, Dean tips his head back until the sun peaks over the crown of his hair, alighting his face in the faint hints of yellow daybreak. There's a bit of morning dew on the hood of the Impala and it leaves long streaks on her windows, sticks slick and damp to the back of his pants.
It's one of those mornings, ones that Dean thinks are oddly reminiscent of the year before the Deal, before when hunting was just what they did, something they could get out of if they really wanted to, 'cause really, that was Dad's life, and they were just along for the ride.
It's a little like that. Quiet.
But Dean's still crisply aware that there's a loaded shotgun at his side and that even though the sun's shining like pinpricks over the edges of autumn leaves, he's got his reaction time down to about two seconds if he so much as hears Sam breathing irregularly.
This time, he's not taking any chances.
He listens for his brother's footsteps near some bushes -- safe -- thinks about turning on some music, wonders if it would spoil the mood, when he hears them. They don't sound like dogs (that much he knows); their growl is deeper, menacing, like blood is just sauce on top of meat. Dean can't swallow, throat tight, eyes darting. They run between the trees, circle back, cast shadows, throw echoes.
Like it's all happening again.
His body grows cold-hot, melts, burns, freezes, and he thinks no no fuck Sam no help as he reaches to get sweaty palms onto the trigger, into anything.
Hell flashes before his eyes and paints the world crimson, like he never left and it's back to soul tearing and flesh ripping and somewhere someone screams and it sounds like a desperate Sam but maybe he's wrong because he can't, doesn't, can't think.
Crunching in the leaves and something's coming towards him; its obsidian eyes eclipse the sun and all Dean can do to keep from falling (like there's hell in front of him, opened up) is collapse backward into the Impala. He can't-
It's not time to collect, Sam brought him back, he can't-
It smiles at him and the world shifts, goes from red to grainy black to translucent gold and Dean does fall (Sam just a whisper on his lips), backs of his knees hitting the hood as he goes down (please) and somewhere there's a voice and a distant sort of touch, like he's miles deep and he's trying to get out.
There's Sam, and he's saying Dean Dean over and over until Dean doesn't know if it started raining or if Sam's started crying, but a drop lands in his mouth and burns like acid and he knows
____
there's no way out.
Sam cards a rough hand through his hair, but Dean's still trembling all over. The starch fabric of motel sheets rubs raw into his skin. He wants to ask Sam (what that was, what he is, why can't they just go back), but the thought of it hurts in ways he didn't even know existed.
He's staring at the ceiling, tries to picture what this would be like if angels saved him, instead of Sam. Maybe they'd come with an army, show him things that Sam kept from him, tell him things Dad never wanted him to know. Maybe they'd have wings and ways out that didn't involve deals and debts and sacrifice. Maybe they could have saved Sam too.
The hand in his hair never ceases its movement, and Dean thinks he can hear the demons laughing.
It's only later (seconds that don't really pass at all) that he realizes the sound is something nervous and hesitant, half-choked at the back of Sam's throat: "Hey Dean."
There's a trace of Sammy in there, he knows, and it feels like him when he touches Dean. Maybe it's not just because of bone structure that it's the same. Maybe they can be how they once were. Maybe Dean's dreaming all of this, and it's not real, not real because after all that Dean's done for him, Sam can't just give himself up.
Dean tries not to let the tears slip past his eyes, but they do anyway, by sheer gravity. He pretends like the air hasn't just gotten hot and that he can breathe and that his heart isn't about to break itself on his ribcage.
"What did you do, Sam?"
The hand pauses above his ear. His fingers flit gently across the top before Sam's eyes just let in the crinkles of black (spilled ink on paper). They're filled dark and wide until Dean can see himself in them (like he's trapped beneath the surface).
Sam says "I'm sorry" as he touches Dean's face, hair, neck.
Dean closes his eyes and tries to forget everything he knows about demons, how to kill them, what they do, and thinks that if he could just expose the cloud inside him to sunlight, it would burn through and leave Sam. Just Sam.
That's all he ever wanted.
He wakes up
____
hours later, all Dean can do to keep from hurling is push a fist to his mouth and turn away as he remembers. Sam sits by him, tries to rub his back, but Dean shrugs his hands away.
"Please, Dean. It was the only way."
Dean chuckles deep down in himself, in the parts that were lost a long time ago (because that's irony) and instead manages a weak sob as he runs his hands across his face, over eyes with still untainted irises.
Dean wants to know how long. Sam says that since he was gone, maybe a little bit before; he tried everything he could, tried everything, Dean, and he just couldn't-
Sam clutches at the sides of Dean's shirt, and Dean can't just sit there, can't not touch the delicate bones of Sam's wrists, slide hands up his arms, push him roughly towards his chest, hair threaded through fingers that's still too long but so familiar 'cause it's Sam.
Dean keeps his eyes trained on the carpet of the motel room; it's stained beige against blue, just enough so that it stands out.
He just couldn't leave him there. Just couldn't. Not when it was his fault, Sam's mumbling against his neck. It's broken, just on the edge of crumbling.
Dean presses Sam closer and says "I'll fix you, Sammy," even though he knows what's resting behind those black, black eyelids against his shoulder. "I'll fix you."
And somewhere, if demons are laughing, angels are crying.
Dean closes his eyes, tries to ignore the licks of hellfire playing at his sides where Sam's hands are touching him like sin, doesn't want to think about what they'll do later to wake up sweaty and tangled and trying to piece themselves together to how it used to fit before. He keeps Sam's mouth busy with his tongue (the same one that knows Latin) because if he didn't, he'd have to ask and he doesn't really want to know
____
are you sure?"
They're in Tulsa, chasing something crazy fast and smart. Dean thinks it's a demon, but Sam just smiles that dangerous grin he's adopted (less Sammy, more something) and says that no demon would dare come near them now; trust me, Dean.
Dean doesn't ask, just stares at Sam's back as he's bending over to get something out of their packs - not salt; they don't carry that around anymore. His shirt seems too tight, like whatever's filling Sam up inside is expanding his skin, bursting to get out.
Dean wants to press fingertips to his neck, arms, chest, ask if it hurts.
Sam flips himself onto the couch, taps randomly on the remote, cool blue reflected from the screen in his eyes. There's pizza on the table, and they're twelve and sixteen again, killing time by watching old horror movies (black and white), making fun of everything, waiting for Dad.
It's like that.
Except there's no salt on the window sills, by the door; the pizza's gone a bit stale, tastes a bit like rotten eggs; Dad's not coming home, and Sam-
"Dean?" He cocks his head to the side, looks speculative.
Dean twists his ring around his finger three times (there's no place like home there's no place like home there's no place like home). His gaze is a little gone, somewhere to the left of Sam's head where the blinds are open, and everyone can see. Sam brings them shut with a flick of his wrist.
"Yeah?" he says, finally, voice raspy like unshed tears.
"You coming?" Sam gestures towards the movie, black and white, pizza like rotten eggs, spot next to him on the couch.
"Yeah."
____
he's not coming home either. Dean sits in the car, instead. He can see Sam's shadow against the illuminated window of the motel room, and he traces the outline with light fingers, edges blurred when Sam moves. Maybe it's the beer that's making the world tilt (maybe it's Sam) because less than half of it is lying on the passenger's seat getting warm.
There's an uncomfortable burn in his throat, and he takes another swill to wash it down, pushes his collar away -- too tight -- until his fingers reach raised skin, drawn like salt lines down his neck.
Three parts Hell, one part Sam.
He wonders if that's how the deal went, if Hell let Sam keep some part of himself, all those good memories (too few) locked safe before everything else was shattered and thrown about to soak up fire and brimstone, torn into by demon claws, bit into by hellhounds, burnt back to fit the framework of the old Sam.
His Sam.
Yeah, he takes another drink, liquid sloshing against the bottom, that's what it must feel like, to belong to Hell, not just in it.
They're Winchesters. This is what they do: buy one, get the other half-off.
Dean runs his fingernails over the scratches and hopes they'll scar. At least that's something Hell can't take
____
from Oklahoma onto Nebraska, they're driving along the long scenic route around Arkansas and up through Missouri. Dean turns up the stereo so loud once they're near the border that he spends the ten minutes they're parked outside a gas station apologizing to his baby, checking if anything's strained.
Sam doesn't say anything about it - the music or the way they don't set foot or tire in Kansas.
They make love in a hotel with gardenias planted in the front, something like picket fences along the interstate, Dean whispering low in Sam's ear, and Sam telling him it's okay, it's okay, I'm still here.
The next day they catch word of some explosions of glass in the quaint shop windows on the edge of town, and Sam's eyes light up with sparks of interest (like hounds on a trail) that Dean pretends he can't see
____
what Sam does at night, where he goes when the light from passing cars has stopped painting his body in reds and blues, when his flesh has cooled and he's unwound himself from Dean, and they're both lying on the sheets, wide-awake and panting - Dean doesn't want to be told.
Sam comes back every morning, and there's not a scratch on him that Dean didn't put there (and that's either good or really, really bad). Dean's sure that's damn near impossible, but he gratefully takes the coffee that Sam offers, slips their fingers together, and watches Sam smile, slow and open, before he takes to the newspapers and his laptop, always searching for the same thing and just missing it.
Bobby calls. He says that whatever they're hunting means bad news for Sam, that they should just stop because they're getting themselves into a world of trouble messing with things that even they don't understand. Dean looks through the slits in the window at the Impala resting there under the lamplight.
The sheets are bunched around his waist; other bed, made; the side of the bed that's not his, cold.
Yeah, he says. I know.
He doesn't tell Sam
____
he sometimes has dreams that feel so real he thinks they just might be.
In them he sees hell and pain, and every image he remembers lights a fire beneath his skin that feels like the slow drag of a knife. It's just glimpses of red, bursts of hot color that leave him desperate and blind even in sleep. He grits his teeth together so hard that by morning they ache like they've been pulled out and shoved back in at odd angles; when he bares them in front of the mirror, they look like they always have.
At night (when it gets bad), he gropes for the warm weight of Sam and never fails to find fingertips at his forehead, smoothing the creases, wiping the sweat that's formed there, wind brushing across his arms, feather touches sweeping down the length of his body.
A voice speaks to him, sits next to him until he falls asleep (dreams of his mother instead of hell, but that's just as horrific), and is there when he wakes up to brush back angry tears threatening to spill over closed eyes.
Dean presses himself closer to the touch. He holds the wrist, and a thumb comes to swipe along the back of his hand. It burns, and Dean shifts away, uncomfortable, seeing red and red over and over again.
I'm sorry, Dean.
The voice is deeper than Sam's usually is, sounds like it's apologizing for more than just the heated flesh that Dean is sure he imagined because it's cooled with a light kiss to his forehead.
Dean brings a hand up and touches his jaw -- s'okay -- and if his hand scrapes against more stubble than Sam usually has then it's just because he maybe forgot to shave. He feels a smile parting his fingertips where they dip into his cheeks, lips soft against his palm. Sleep now. I'll watch over you.
____
"you okay?"
It's Sam's turn to drive, and they're making their way down to wherever he's picked up some information. Might be good, but it's a long shot, especially when all they're hunting are explosions and strange sightings (or not, as the thing likes to the burn eyes right out of their sockets): something that sounds like a demon but much worse.
Dean thinks (knows) Sam's not telling him everything (anything), but there's trust and just a hint of fear that blurs the edges just below the surface and keeps him following.
He's stopped picking up the phone when Bobby calls. Sam watches while he deletes the messages after they've gone to voicemail.
It's better that way, if they just have road to worry about, the hunt and each other to live off of.
Dean drums his fingers on his knee, technique he uses with interrogators, police chiefs. To throw them off.
"I'm good." He turns his head to look at Sam squinting against the glare of the sun and tries to grin, but his smile is shoved painfully tight against his teeth, mouth and refuses to stretch like hooks are holding it in place.
Something cold clings to him after Sam gives him a pointed look and a shrug (tense, rigid), just briefly tearing his eyes away from the road. It's enough for Dean not to be able to shake it off until after they've passed cornfield after cornfield, put every coffee shop and little town that isn't home but could have been in their rearview mirror along with a guy by the side of the road, eyes deep and dark (but not like Sam's), trench coat, briefcase, and a sign (Anywhere but here.) that Sam had laughed at and Dean had secretly wished was him.
Sam hisses out breath between his teeth like it's a warning, like he can read Dean's thoughts, and Dean presses his thighs into the seat and watches the grasses rush by, dry and yellowed and dying.
It doesn't stop until he goes to sleep and feels hands gently card through his hair, soothe away worries he didn't even know were building up. He tries to think of nothing but the presence above him and the way it feels so different from what it is during the day: hard on the warmed hood of the Impala, their bodies straining against the pace Sam sets for them, taunt muscles slipping in and out of place.
It's just enough to let him forget
____
he doesn't take coffee with cream; it's what Sam likes. It's not that he's accommodating, never was, but it's just easier to order them both the same.
(Sam's smile is a bit more luminous when he does.)
He slides across from him onto red patent leather. It sinks and groans as he shifts, hands the coffee over to Sam.
"Where are we off to now, geek boy?" he gestures at the laptop, takes a sip from his own cup and only grimaces a little. He's getting better at it.
"Not we," Sam says. "Me."
He looks over the top of the screen and closes it with a click. Dean means to protest, but the words dissipate like smoke in his throat. Something low and uncomfortable churns in his belly.
"No, Dean. It's just something I have to do alone, and then we can go back to hunting regular shit and getting pissed at bars. Whatever you want." He shoves his laptop into the bag and takes the keys from Dean's pocket, pats his lap. "I promise."
Dean wants to smirk, leer "Whatever I want?" but Sam's eyes look a little darker from this angle, the sun hitting pupils and absorbing heat like hellfire. He's gone with a backward "I'm taking the car," before Dean has a chance to say anything.
He's left sitting there with two white cups filled with coffee, and the thought Anywhere but here flashes in his mind. The rumble of the Impala as Sam drives away drowns it out
____
as the colors run together into oblivion, Dean's still on the inside looking out. The hotel room is cold, and the rain whips into the trees outside. He's waiting for Sam to get back; its been hours
____
days, a week have passed, but he can't tell.
Sometimes Dean wakes up and the nightmares are right there, in front of his eyes, surrounding him, with no Sam to keep them at bay. He imagines he feels a comforting presence that brings him back to sleep, but that's just wishful thinking, and Dean's never been a believer.
He gets restless, paces, but doesn't leave the room too much. Sam will come back, and he'll know where to find Dean - right where he left him.
They can go hunt the regular shit and get pissed at bars and maybe see the Grand Canyon or whatever they want.
Sam promised so Dean waits
____
for a little while, it stops raining. Dean doesn't expect the slam of the door or Sam falling into him, eyes still hooded black and panting. He doesn't expect to feel charred skin beneath his palms or the rush of drying blood, fresh over unbroken skin. He doesn't expect it, but notices and says nothing.
Dean lets Sam rest bone weary on top of him and smiles for the first time in weeks. Whatever Deal Sam made, whatever thing he had to kill, whatever he had to do to fulfill it: it's over now.
Dean's still smiling as he gets the water and towels to wash Sam off, as he kneels, starts at the feet, works his way up. He's still smiling as Sam's eyelids drift closed, but not enough to not be able to look Dean in the eyes, and say, with a tired grin, We won before his head drops back, and he sleeps.
Dean lets the water run cold before he stops staring at Sam's face, before daybreak creeps up by millimeters over the horizon. His mind stutters over we as other thoughts (vicious, unstoppable thoughts) slither through the cracks that it makes.
His knees have gone numb a long time ago, long before he noticed there was something missing in the night, space that should have been filled with warmth: empty.
And Dean saw it all, the nightmares right before him, with his eyes wide open
____
awake to the sound of Sam packing, Dean tries to lift himself up slowly. He's on the carpet, head resting against the mattress, legs thrown at odd angles.
He swallows, throat dry. "Sam? What are you doing?"
When Sam turns, the midday sun slants across his face (light clinging to skin, everywhere, but his eyes). He flicks his hair to the side and scrunches up his nose in a way that Dean thinks only Sam can manage.
"I found us a case." He takes a news clip from the table, two coffee cups sitting precariously near the edge. "It says here that a Susan Walker was brutally stabbed to death by an invisible man. Sounds like our sort of thing. Thought we might check it out."
He shrugs, and Dean almost lets himself forget the night before, the weeks before. He ignores the tugs like hooks in his skin, that uncomfortable ripple of flesh like it's melting, the way he can't shake how he knows he didn't (couldn't) fix Sammy.
Almost.
"Awesome. When do we leave,
____
bitch," Dean yells back after Sam sticks his head out the window, tells him not to forget the yogurt. As soon as he walks in and hears the gas station door ding, he does, and he knows that Sam will call him a jerk for it while he eats his Cheetos, guzzles down Coke; he looks forward to it.
The cold from the fridge feels even better now, and if Dean stands there for a few extra minutes, it's because he's debating the merits of turkey versus ham. He grabs one of each; he'll eat whatever Sam doesn't like.
He gets everything rung up (candy bars, too: for the road) and is just about to walk out, stands midway between the outside with its cracked Nevada dirt, plateaus ahead and Impala shining black in the sun and the gas station, little block in the wildness, when he sees him.
Dean thinks he's the same guy, the one with the sign and the trench coat, but he's tattered, walks with a limp, and reaches a hand to feel at his back, sliding up and down. Dean can't help but think that somewhere, someplace, in other circumstances they might have met, but he shakes the thought out of his head as soon as it enters.
They pass each other; Dean tries to focus on the car, his brother, but there's a secret sort of grandeur in the stranger's eyes that keeps his gaze a second longer than it should.
He looks like he wants to say something, but doesn't. They walk in opposite directions and Dean leaves it, him, everything but what's in front of him, behind.
Sam's sitting shotgun in the Impala. They've got a truck full of weapons, can kill any evil son of a bitch they find, the radio's blasting something his Dad used to listen to. There's a road that never ends ahead of them, and if there are glimmers of something else along the way, Dean can only hope; he doesn't expect anything but what it's going to give them.
It's how things are supposed to be.
He turns back just for a second (there's something telling him to), but the guy's gone without even a ding to signal he was ever even there. He shrugs his shoulders back and tries to ignore the warmth coursing through him.
It's almost sunset, the sky just tinted red and blazing. Dean sets his eyes against it and watches the dust churn as he pulls onto the road.
He's riding