(no subject)
Have a coda!
Someone last night posted something about how the dichotomy of the two goodbye scenes said incredibly depressing things about the Winchesters. I felt that warranted slightly further exploration. Um, and potentially Sam and Dean actually having a conversation. Because they really need to just hug it out.
Eleison, Sam/Dean, PG-13, 925 words.
He wanted to say something.
Sam's faced down his last night on earth so many times it's lost all meaning. He's lost count of last words, last moments. In the last five minutes of their lives, normal people care about family and grace. Normal people say the things they've always wanted to, because fear is still a motivator. Sam double checks the ammo and wonders if he should have closed the car windows against a forty percent chance of rain.
Sam's spent long enough laid out cold that he knows he's not invincible, but the rules have never applied for either of them. Death doesn't seem all that threatening anymore, just a place like any other, a highway laid out through the final frontier that's still two lanes.
Driving back, sheets of rain across the windshield like a river of water, Sam thinks about Jo's coffee cup between them, sitting there cold, then how long they can go on a single tank of gas, whether or not he's doing the laundry when they get back. Dean needs socks again, and Bobby's been out of milk for three days. Sam doesn't feel devastated or heartbroken. He doesn't feel anything but the slow build of a caffeine withdrawl headache underneath his temples. The styrofoam cup is three quarters full, and Sam thinks about it, but Jo added two packages of sugar outside of Jasper. He knows better. And in the end, it's not all that hard to fall asleep.
Even with the fault lines between them, the walls and the trenches, the hard won boundaries that Sam wishes he hadn't fought for, Dean's easy to read. He does the dishes and Sam knows everything, because Dean can't keep it out of the set of his shoulders and Sam's been learning this language since before he had a heartbeat, before he knew english or how to load a .22 or anything at all. Dean's heart isn't broken, just fractured, the kind of injury you keep working through, the kind you don't bother taking anything for. It's loss and not grief, loss of possibilities and the only white picket fence daydream Dean has ever had, even if Sam knows he didn't love her, at least not in any way that might have made things easier.
Family is the only thing that's ever mattered to Dean, and Sam's shattered that, shaken up all the pieces of their brotherhood and thrown them to the four winds. They're buried at a crossroads and scattered all along the highways, lost in road dust and medians and a shallow grave just outside of a convent in Maryland.
Dean's grief, caught between emergency weather reports on the kitchen radio and steam rising up off the water, is born of trying to create something out of smoke and mirrors and sheer force of will, then watching it fall apart. Dean needs more than Jo could have given him, more than Bobby and Ellen and every truck stop waitress and homecoming queen could ever offer, and it's not that Sam's the only one left. It's that there's never been anyone else.
Dean's leaning against the counter, trying to keep weight off his leg, and Sam takes the dish towel. The world might be ending, but it won't tonight. Sam might not be afraid enough of death to talk, but he's afraid enough of this.
"Don't," Dean says, a little too sharply, and Sam steps in closer, shoulder to shoulder.
"I still have things I want to say," Sam says. "But I don't want there to be anything left. If you're not going to say anything when that's what we're up against, I want you to mean it."
"So say it," Dean says. "Whatever else you want to say, just get it the hell over with."
"They couldn't fix themselves," Sam says. "Michael and Lucifer - they're wrong. We're not going to be the perfect vessels."
"Really, Sam?" Dean says, bitten out. "Because you might want to pass along that memo -"
"We're not," Sam says, "because I'm not letting this stay broken." Dean turns, and Sam's looking down at his furious, terrified face. Then - because he has to, because he wants to - he kisses him.
Sam's planned this out, careful lists in his head of what it's supposed to be: an apology, a benediction, the kind of kiss you give the only girl you've ever thought about falling in love with when you're saying goodbye, forgiveness. It's none of those things.
It's just a kiss, like being seventeen in the backseat of the Impala and figuring out how to fit his mouth over someone else's, like the way Jess kissed him good morning and used the same brand of toothpaste for three years. It's Dean's mouth against his, a warm combination of chapstick and coffee, and it doesn't solve anything or mean anything or save the world. It feels good, the first person Sam's kissed in a while, and pulling back, his mouth is a little warmer and his pulse is a little faster. It's not an answer, but Dean's grip on Sam's shirt is suddenly less tight, and when Sam slides his fingers into Dean's belt loop, pulling him in, his shoulders come down.
"Well," Dean says, not quite smiling but close, and Sam bends his head until they're nose to nose in the warm quiet of the kitchen, letting his eyes close.
"Addiction felt easier than missing you," he says, Dean's hands warm against the small of his back, and it's not everything, but it's a start.
Someone last night posted something about how the dichotomy of the two goodbye scenes said incredibly depressing things about the Winchesters. I felt that warranted slightly further exploration. Um, and potentially Sam and Dean actually having a conversation. Because they really need to just hug it out.
Eleison, Sam/Dean, PG-13, 925 words.
He wanted to say something.
Sam's faced down his last night on earth so many times it's lost all meaning. He's lost count of last words, last moments. In the last five minutes of their lives, normal people care about family and grace. Normal people say the things they've always wanted to, because fear is still a motivator. Sam double checks the ammo and wonders if he should have closed the car windows against a forty percent chance of rain.
Sam's spent long enough laid out cold that he knows he's not invincible, but the rules have never applied for either of them. Death doesn't seem all that threatening anymore, just a place like any other, a highway laid out through the final frontier that's still two lanes.
Driving back, sheets of rain across the windshield like a river of water, Sam thinks about Jo's coffee cup between them, sitting there cold, then how long they can go on a single tank of gas, whether or not he's doing the laundry when they get back. Dean needs socks again, and Bobby's been out of milk for three days. Sam doesn't feel devastated or heartbroken. He doesn't feel anything but the slow build of a caffeine withdrawl headache underneath his temples. The styrofoam cup is three quarters full, and Sam thinks about it, but Jo added two packages of sugar outside of Jasper. He knows better. And in the end, it's not all that hard to fall asleep.
Even with the fault lines between them, the walls and the trenches, the hard won boundaries that Sam wishes he hadn't fought for, Dean's easy to read. He does the dishes and Sam knows everything, because Dean can't keep it out of the set of his shoulders and Sam's been learning this language since before he had a heartbeat, before he knew english or how to load a .22 or anything at all. Dean's heart isn't broken, just fractured, the kind of injury you keep working through, the kind you don't bother taking anything for. It's loss and not grief, loss of possibilities and the only white picket fence daydream Dean has ever had, even if Sam knows he didn't love her, at least not in any way that might have made things easier.
Family is the only thing that's ever mattered to Dean, and Sam's shattered that, shaken up all the pieces of their brotherhood and thrown them to the four winds. They're buried at a crossroads and scattered all along the highways, lost in road dust and medians and a shallow grave just outside of a convent in Maryland.
Dean's grief, caught between emergency weather reports on the kitchen radio and steam rising up off the water, is born of trying to create something out of smoke and mirrors and sheer force of will, then watching it fall apart. Dean needs more than Jo could have given him, more than Bobby and Ellen and every truck stop waitress and homecoming queen could ever offer, and it's not that Sam's the only one left. It's that there's never been anyone else.
Dean's leaning against the counter, trying to keep weight off his leg, and Sam takes the dish towel. The world might be ending, but it won't tonight. Sam might not be afraid enough of death to talk, but he's afraid enough of this.
"Don't," Dean says, a little too sharply, and Sam steps in closer, shoulder to shoulder.
"I still have things I want to say," Sam says. "But I don't want there to be anything left. If you're not going to say anything when that's what we're up against, I want you to mean it."
"So say it," Dean says. "Whatever else you want to say, just get it the hell over with."
"They couldn't fix themselves," Sam says. "Michael and Lucifer - they're wrong. We're not going to be the perfect vessels."
"Really, Sam?" Dean says, bitten out. "Because you might want to pass along that memo -"
"We're not," Sam says, "because I'm not letting this stay broken." Dean turns, and Sam's looking down at his furious, terrified face. Then - because he has to, because he wants to - he kisses him.
Sam's planned this out, careful lists in his head of what it's supposed to be: an apology, a benediction, the kind of kiss you give the only girl you've ever thought about falling in love with when you're saying goodbye, forgiveness. It's none of those things.
It's just a kiss, like being seventeen in the backseat of the Impala and figuring out how to fit his mouth over someone else's, like the way Jess kissed him good morning and used the same brand of toothpaste for three years. It's Dean's mouth against his, a warm combination of chapstick and coffee, and it doesn't solve anything or mean anything or save the world. It feels good, the first person Sam's kissed in a while, and pulling back, his mouth is a little warmer and his pulse is a little faster. It's not an answer, but Dean's grip on Sam's shirt is suddenly less tight, and when Sam slides his fingers into Dean's belt loop, pulling him in, his shoulders come down.
"Well," Dean says, not quite smiling but close, and Sam bends his head until they're nose to nose in the warm quiet of the kitchen, letting his eyes close.
"Addiction felt easier than missing you," he says, Dean's hands warm against the small of his back, and it's not everything, but it's a start.