Hey Jude | Fifteen [Day 3]
Sam
It was on the morning of the fifth day of Sam's hospital stay that a nurse came into his room during breakfast and said, "Your therapist wants to talk with you once you finish your breakfast, Sam."
Forcing a smile and nodding, Sam continued to eat his watery eggs and pancakes.
Jimmy poked his head around the curtain. He was holding his plate of pancakes in one hand and stuffing them into his mouth with the other. He took a seat at the end of Sam's bed and said, "You're leaving today."
Sam glanced at him. "Why do you say that?"
The other boy shrugged as he cut another large bite of pancake. "That's what the nurses always say before someone gets discharged." He moved the pancake around in the syrup and shoved it into his mouth. "Just watch. This time tomorrow you'll be at home in your own bed."
Once he finished his breakfast, like the nurse said, he padded down the hallway to where the therapist spent her days. He'd never seen her leave her office. He wondered if she spent her whole day seeing messed up kids or if she did something else in between. He didn't know what she could be doing locked up in this office all day other than seeing kids, but then again, he also didn't really know how mental hospitals worked or what kinds of things the therapists working in them were required to do.
Letting out a breath and half hoping Jimmy's prediction was correct, he knocked on the door. Almost instantly, it swung open, revealing the woman he'd been seeing every day after group. She was as old as he thought his mother would be were she alive, wore black slacks and suit jackets, had chestnut colored hair that barely brushed her shoulders, and a smile that never quite seemed to reach her eyes.
"Hello Sam," she said. "Come in!" She held the door open and he stepped around her into the office. She shut the door behind him and took a seat in the swivel chair by her desk while he took a seat on the couch that was pressed up against the wall opposite the desk.
"How are you feeling, Sam?" she asked, pulling a yellow notepad off of her desk and clicking open a pen. She looked at him expectantly.
Sam took a breath and smiled. "I've been better," he said, "but I feel a lot better than I did when I first was admitted." The first part was true. The second part was a lie. Nothing had changed in his mind since he'd been admitted. He just wanted to go home.
The therapist wrote something down on the notepad before looking up at him and saying, "I know it's only been five days, but how would you feel about going home today?"
Sam tried to look surprised, and a part of him was, despite what Jimmy had said. After only five days in the hospital, they were letting him walk free? It almost sounded too good to be true and he'd learned that in his life if something sounded too good to be true, it probably was. "Really?" he asked. "I can go home today?"
The therapist smiled at him. "Yes," she said. "You've been doing really well and I think that as long as you continue to see a therapist outside of the hospital, it would be okay if you went home today. You could go home with your brother once he gets finished with school for the day."
This time the smile that broke out on Sam's face was a little less forced. "Yes!" he said. "I would love to go home with my brother. I miss him a lot."
"Then it's settled," she said, sitting back in her chair. "You can go home today as long as you continue seeing your school therapist on the side. I'll call your school today and make sure they let your brother know that he can come pick you up once school is let out."
Sam forced one last smile, thanked the therapist for her time and all she'd done for him during the past few weeks, before he left her office and headed back to his room.
"Sammy, where are you going?" Jimmy's voice called out.
He looked up. The boy was waving at him from down the hall towards the group room.
"It's time for group!"
"Oh, yeah," Sam said almost to himself, shaking himself slightly. He changed directions and headed towards the group room.
Once he got close enough, Jimmy pulled him closer and whispered, "So? Was I right? Are you going home today?"
Sam nodded. "Yeah," he replied. "My brother is coming to pick me up after school."
Jimmy didn't say anything else, but he sighed heavily and Sam wondered not for the first time just how long Jimmy had been there.
"Today we're going to be talking about forgiveness," the therapist running the group for that day said. Sam noticed it was the same man who had been running the group when he first was admitted into the hospital. Bruce. "And instead of talking about who you are forgiving, we're going to talk about who you would like to forgive you for something you've done. You don't have to say why you want them to forgive you if you don't want to. You can just tell us their name when it's your turn."
Sam swallowed hard. This was not the group he wanted to be a part of the day he was supposed to be getting out of the hospital. He would have to talk about Jess. He didn't want to talk about Jess. Because she was the only person he could think of that he wished could forgive him. He'd let her die. He hadn't done anything to save her when he should have. He closed his eyes briefly and when he opened them, Anna was already talking about how she wanted her little brother to forgive her for everything she'd put him through in the past year.
Next was Jimmy, who also talked about his siblings. Then the twins, who couldn't think of anyone they wanted to forgive them. Then a new girl whose name Sam learned was Bela Talbot. She only said her mother. Then it was Sam's turn. He swallowed. He wanted to give only a name, but if he was supposed to be doing so much better, wouldn't he have to explain?
"Jess," he said softly. "Jessica Moore."
He didn't say anything else.
Once group was finished, he went back to his room and sat on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands, images of Jess, of how he'd seen her the night she died, replaying in his mind.
He heard a sigh and looked up.
Jess was sitting on the edge of Jimmy's bed, picking at a loose string on her white dress.
"That wasn't fair," she said, not looking at him. "That wasn't a real answer."
Sam swallowed. He knew what she meant. Saying her name in group. She thought that wasn't fair. He didn't know why. "But…I let you die," he said softly, staring at his hands.
She sighed again. "Dilly dally, shilly shally, isn't it time you did the forgiving?"
When Sam looked up again, she was gone.
Dean
During Dean's last class of the day, the principal poked his head into his classroom and said to his teacher, "I need to speak with Dean Winchester."
Every head in the room turned to him. Dean heard snickers at the back of the classroom, but he ignored them. He just stared at his teacher until she nodded. He got up and started to gather up his books, but the principal said, "We'll only be a second. You don't need to bring your things with you."
He set his belongings back down and followed the principal out into the hall.
"How're things going, Dean?" the principal asked once the door swung shut behind them.
He shrugged one shoulder. "Good, I guess." He didn't elaborate. The last thing he wanted to do was talk with his principal about the direction his life was currently headed in.
"I got a call from the hospital Sam is in."
Dean had been staring absentmindedly down the hallway, but the minute the principal said Sam's name, his eyes snapped back to his face. "Has something happened? Is he okay?"
"Your brother's just fine," the principal reassured him. "In fact, it sounded like he's doing better than fine. They said that he's good to be sent home. They want you to pick him up today once you get done with school. That's what I came to tell you."
Dean let out a gasping breath. Sam was able to come home? Today? He'd only been in the hospital for five days and already they were saying he could come home? He wanted to question it. He wanted to know why in the world Sam was being let out of the hospital so soon after he'd slit his wrists, but he'd missed his little brother. He'd missed falling asleep to the sound of his breathing. He'd missed seeing his mussed up morning hair and the way he looked in his too big hand-me-down hoodies. He'd missed Sam and he wanted him home. He was tempted to ask to leave early, but he doubted that even after everything he'd been through, the principal wasn't going to let him leave school early.
After saying goodbye to the principal and thanking him for telling him about Sam, he went back into class and stared at the clock, watching the minutes tick slowly by. He had less than thirty minutes before the final bell rang, but every second felt like twice that.
Soon you'll be seeing Sammy again, he reminded himself over and over again. You'll be bringing Sammy home and everything is going to be okay.
Everything isn't how it was before, a voice whispered in the back of his mind.
He closed his eyes briefly. That voice had been there before, telling him the same thing only two days ago when he'd woken up from that awful nightmare. He knew it was right, but he wanted so badly to believe that everything truly was going to be okay.
But he wasn't the kind of person that got that kind of happiness.
He wasn't the kind of person that truly got to have everything be okay.
Not anymore.
The bell rang, pulling Dean out of his thoughts so quickly that he jumped. He blinked. Everyone around him was gathering their books together and leaving. The teacher had long since written the homework on the board. He copied it down quickly, gathered up all of his books, and darted out of the classroom, heading straight for the student parking lot. He didn't even bother stopping at his locker on the way. He dumped his books in the passenger seat of his car and peeled out of the parking lot, heading for the hospital.
The drive to the hospital took almost an hour and a half with rush hour traffic, but to Dean it felt like it took five times that. When he finally pulled into the hospital parking lot, he realized he was shaking and he wasn't sure if that was from excitement at getting to see Sam again and bring him home or something else entirely. Something he really didn't want to spend too much time thinking about.
Walking in the main entrance of the hospital, he didn't need to check to see which floor the psychiatric unit was on. He'd been visiting the hospital almost every day after school anyway just to see if he could see Sam, if by some miracle the rules had changed or if the woman standing guard at the entrance to the unit would let him in today. The rules never changed and she never did, but he returned each day anyway. Now he wouldn't have to worry about that. Now he would be able to take Sam home. He could bring him back where he belonged: with him.
Once he got to the entrance of the psychiatric unit, he swallowed and glanced at the woman. She didn't even bother looking up from her book today.
"I'm taking my brother home," he said, raising his chin slightly. "You have to let me in today, so I can go get him."
"They'll bring him out to you," she said without looking up from her book. "There's no reason you need to go into the unit. You're not allowed in anyway."
Dean clenched his jaw and curled his hands into fists. He wanted to yell at this woman, give him a piece of his mind, tell her everything he and his brother had been through and then dare her to keep him from Sam for one more second, but he didn't. As much as he wanted to, he didn't. He knew that wouldn't help anything.
For a split second, Lisa's smiling face appeared in his mind and he heard her voice say, Wow. Dean Winchester, growing up. Shocking. Nice, but shocking.
He closed his eyes briefly, mentally shaking himself. He'd ended it with Lisa. He wasn't getting her back. He could see it in her eyes when she looked at him as they passed in the hallways at school. He might as well try to push her out of his mind too.
The clock on the wall ticked fifteen minutes by before the door to the psychiatric unit opened and out came Sam along with a woman whom he could only assume was Sam's therapist. There was a smile on Sam's face and, for a brief moment, Dean felt hope surge in his chest, but then he realized: the smile didn't meet Sam's eyes. This was all for show.
Swallowing hard, he forced a smile of his own and looked at the therapist. She smiled back at him and stretched out her hand.
"You must be Sam's big brother, Dean," she said, grinning. Dean wasn't sure he bought her smile either. "I'm Dr. Mayfair. It's a pleasure to meet you."
Taking her hand and shaking it, he replied, "It's a pleasure to meet you too." He glanced at his brother who was standing slightly off to the side. He was staring out the nearby window with an absentminded look on his face. Dean swallowed again and returned his attention to Dr. Mayfair. "Is there anything I should know before I take him home?"
"Just that he needs to keep seeing the school therapist," she said. "He's doing much better than he was when he was admitted and I think that as long as he keeps seeing the school therapist, he'll continue doing well and everything will go back to normal very quickly."
He wasn't doing well before this either, Dean thought, looking at Sam again. Going 'back to normal' wouldn't really be good.
But he didn't say this.
Instead, he smiled at Dr. Mayfair, thanked her for taking care of his brother, and began leading Sam back towards the car. Sam gave her another one of his artificial smiles and waved goodbye. She waved back. And then the smile dropped from his face like it'd never been there to begin with. Dean didn't mention it. He just led Sam to the car.
If they're letting him out, there has to be a reason, he thought as they got in the car and headed out of the hospital parking lot. They're not just letting him go just cause. He really must be doing better. Otherwise they'd be keeping him longer. He has to be doing better.
But even in his head, the words sounded like a desperate plea, like he was trying to convince himself more than telling himself the truth.
As he turned onto the freeway, heading in the direction of the foster home, he glanced at Sam. He was sitting slumped against the passenger door, staring out the window and Dean couldn't help thinking this was exactly how he'd looked in his car the day of Jessica's funeral, the day he'd tried to kill himself.
He glanced at Sam's wrists and could see the gauze bandages still poking out from under the shirt he was wearing. He wondered when they'd finally be able to come off. He wondered if there was any hope of his brother's arms looking remotely the same ever again.
"So the place we're staying at is pretty nice," he said, forcing his eyes back onto the road. "We get to share a room because there's not enough room in the house for every foster kid that lives there to have their own room, but it's okay. Our room is a lot bigger than the room in our old house and our beds are more comfortable."
"It won't be the same," Sam said softly.
This made Dean look at him.
"Yeah?" he said. "So? That's a good thing, right? I mean after…after everything that happened, isn't that a good thing?"
Sam shrugged.
Dean turned his eyes back to the road.
Sam whispered one more time, so softly he almost didn't hear it, "It won't be the same."
"But that's a good thing," he replied almost instantly, his voice significantly louder than his little brother's.
But he wasn't really sure he believed it and he wasn't really sure why.