Hey Jude | Six [Sam]
The minute Dean dashed back up the stairs to meet Lisa, Sam pressed his back up against the wall and slowly slid down it. He wrapped his arms around himself. He was shaking and he couldn't seem to stop. He couldn't even seem to move. He knew he had to. He had to catch the bus home. Dean couldn't drive him home. And, even if he could, it wouldn't be for a while. He'd have to finish his date with Lisa and then come back to the school and pick him up. Depending on how long Dean took, Sam could've potentially walked home by then.
Maybe it'd be better to do it that way, a small voice whispered in his mind. If you take your time, you won't be home alone for very long. Maybe not even at all.
It was a tempting. If Sam missed his bus and walked slowly home, he wouldn't get there until Dean did. Maybe even after. They lived a good ways away from the school. If he did that, he wouldn't be home alone and if he wasn't home alone then the monster wouldn't have a chance to visit him. It was rare for the monster to emerge from its slumber during daylight hours, but it'd happened a couple of times when Dean was out with a girl. Like he was today.
Sam swallowed hard, thinking of how he'd almost told Dean about the monster today before he left to go out with Lisa. He'd stopped himself at the last second for two reasons: one, he didn't know how his brother would react, and, two, it would've been selfish for him to tell him something so important when he was supposed to be going out to have fun with a girl.
And that's what it would be now if he ended up having to call Dean to pick him up because he missed the bus.
Selfish.
Dean was having fun night out. It wouldn't be fair of Sam to call him back from that fun to take him home just because he was afraid of something that only might happen.
Letting out a heavy breath, Sam forced himself to his feet, before he fell back into step with the crowd that was surging up the stairs to the front of the school where the buses were parked. He gnawed at his lip, wondering what he was going to do when he got home. Maybe if he went to the room at the end of the hall, the room with his mother's ghost sleeping in the walls, the monster wouldn't wake up. He knew the monster was as afraid of that room as his father was. He'd run in there once when it had been trying to get to him. It had stopped on the threshold, yelling at him, demanding he come out. He hadn't. Not until Dean got home, but he didn't enjoy the hours he had to sit in that room. Truth be told, Sam was afraid of that room, too. They all were. But it might be worth spending the afternoon in that room if it meant avoiding the monster and what it would do to him if he stayed in his own room.
He was just exiting the school building when someone stuck out their food and he tripped, falling to the hard concrete. He threw out his arms in an attempt to break his fall, but he misjudged the angle of his fall and ended up twisting his wrist. He let out a gasp of pain both from the awkward angle of his wrist and the cement scraping at his knees through his jeans.
The kids around him snickered. A few pointed at him and openly laughed. Even fewer gave him worried glances before hurrying away.
Sam ignored all of them. He winced as he pushed himself up into a sitting position and looked at his bleeding palms before he began examining his wrist.
He knew he hadn't broken it. If he had, the pain would be much worse and he wouldn't be able to move it as freely as he could now, but it still hurt a lot and he had to press his lips tightly together to keep himself from crying out in pain when he tried rolling it.
"Sam? Are you okay?"
He looked up.
Jess was standing over him, looking more worried than any of the other kids had. She knelt down next to him, her eyes darting over his body. He noticed they paused briefly on his skinned knees and bleeding palms.
Her brows narrowed and her lips pursed. "I don't know why they think this kind of thing is funny," she muttered almost to herself. "You could've really gotten hurt. Or even hurt someone else if you fell into them."
She shook her head as she helped him to his feet and began examining his wrist. A part of him wanted to push her away, tell her he didn't need her help and he could take care of himself, but another part of him wanted to let her continue doing what she was doing. He let her fingers gently prod at his skin and when he let out a gasp of pain as then pressed down on his joints, she looked up at him. There was worry in her eyes. It was strange to think that there could be someone other than Dean who worried about him.
"I don't think it's broken," she said, letting go of his hand. "Probably just sprained. You should try to get a brace on it or wrap it in gauze for a couple of days, so it can heal properly."
Sam nodded, but didn't say anything in reply. Jess gave him a small smile before she turned on her heel and began walking down towards where their bus was parked. He followed a couple feet behind.
Their bus was one of the last ones in the long yellow line and, though the driver hadn't yet shut the doors, it was clear they were late. They were the last ones to get on the bus.
Sam sat down in one of the seats near the front and Jess took her usual seat next to him. The driver pulled the handle, closing the doors. A minute later, the long line of buses began to move out of the school parking lot, looking like a trail of yellow ants.
Jess got off the stop before Sam's. She didn't say anything to him as she stood, shouldered her backpack, and got off the bus. Before it began to pull away, she turned around and smiled and waved at him, before continuing on down the street towards her house. The driver let Sam off at the next corner where his house sat. He stared down to the corner where Jess had been let off. He couldn't see her anymore, but he kept playing the moment she'd found him on the floor in the cafeteria over and over again. He thought of how she'd asked him to spend lunch with her every day, how she'd stood up to his tormenters for him. Even though she'd said she didn't understand why his bullies were bullies to begin with, he didn't understand why she didn't let them just continue bullying him. Everyone else did. To them, he was no one. Everyone else went out of their way to pick on him and, yet, she went out of her way to be nice to him. Why? He didn't get it. He couldn't fathom it. It made no sense to him. It never had.
He turned his gaze to the house in front of him. He stared at the peeling white paint, the warped wood of the front door, the grimy windows and dirty, torn curtains hanging in them.
He swallowed hard.
The monster was in there. All he had to do was get to his room without alerting the monster to his presence, but that was easier said than done. He could try climbing in through the window, but he knew Dean locked their window when they went to school. He'd have to go through the door, through the living room where the monster was. He didn't have any other choice. All he could do was pray the monster was still sleeping.
He knew the minute he opened the door this was not the case.
The TV was on, blaring the sports channel. He could hear the hiss of a beer can as the monster popped it open and then a slurping sound as it took a drink. He could tell it was the monster and not his father. Only the monster drank.
He swallowed again, his grip on the door handle tightening. He took a tentative step into the house, then another. He turned, closing the door behind him as quietly as he possibly could. He chanced a glance at the monster, wearing his father's skin, sitting his father's armchair. It didn't seem to notice he'd walked into the house. Still, he held his breath as he began to tiptoeing across the living room towards the hallway. His steps were slow, quiet. He didn't make a sound. He was almost there. If he could get to the hallway unnoticed, then he could spend the afternoon in his bedroom. He wouldn't have to worry about anything.
"Where do you think you're going?"
Sam froze. Someone was freezing his insides. He could feel a stab of cold fear in the pit of his stomach, but it was spreading throughout the rest of his body, like someone had replaced his blood with liquid nitrogen. He slowly turned around.
"I'm going to my room," he said, his voice barely above a whisper. He was shaking so badly that his voice shook, too. "I need to do homework."
"Not gonna say hello first?" the monster asked. It looked angry and amused at the same time, like it knew how incriminating any answer to that question would be.
Sam swallowed again. His hands were clenched into fists at his sides to keep his hands from shaking, but now they were shaking, too. He dug his nails into his palms until it hurt, but that just made it worse. He tried to think of an acceptable answer to the monster's question, but all he could think of was that he was seeing his father less and less often. Soon the monster was going to overtake him completely and they would be one and the same.
The thought made a lump form in Sam's throat and he had to fight back tears.
He missed his father.
"Come here," the monster said.
Sam forced his legs to move, taking steps towards the creature impersonating his father. He stopped a few feet from the couch, but the monster gestured for him to come closer. He moved until he was standing directly in front of it.
The creature appraised him, its eyes moving over his body. He resisted the urge to cross his legs or cover his chest in an attempt to shield himself from the monster's gaze. He may have been wearing clothes, but he felt like he was wearing nothing.
"Take off your jacket," the monster said.
Sam dropped his backpack to the floor and shrugged out of his jacket, letting it fall next to his pack. He kept his eyes fixated on the wall behind the monster, not wanting to see how it was looking at him. He knew it could see him shaking. He knew it was enjoying this.
"When is your brother supposed to be home?" it asked.
"I don't know," Sam whispered in reply. He knew what the monster was going to do. His shaking increased. It was the middle of the day, but it didn't care. It was hungry now.
"Soon, do you think?" It sounded annoyed that Sam didn't know the answer.
"I don't know," he said again.
"Long enough," it mumbled, half to itself.
There was a short silence. The monster was thinking, weighting its options. Sam's eyes flicked to the hallway, to the room he knew was at the end of it.
"Take off your shirt," the monster said.
Sam didn't move.
"I said, take off your shirt." This time the monster spoke through gritted teeth.
Sam shook his head.
The monster stood. Sam didn't have to look at its face to know it was furious.
"What did you say?" it said, moving so close to him he had to take a step back.
"I didn't say anything," he replied, looking into its face finally. "But I meant, 'no'."
"You don't disobey me," the monster hissed.
Sam swallowed hard and looked at the monster for a long moment. He moved his hands to the edge of his shirt. He started to lift it.
The monster smirked at him.
Without warning, Sam's hand flew out and hit the monster as hard he could in the face. For a moment, they both seemed stunned that had happened and no one moved. Then the monster lunged at him and Sam immediately began moving in the direction of the hallway. All he had to do was get to the room at the end of the hall. The monster wouldn't dare come into the room. It was afraid of the ghost that slept in the walls.
A hand clamped down around Sam's injured wrist and he let out a cry of pain. The monster pulled him back towards the armchair it had been sitting in a moment ago. He writhed in its grip, struggling to get away. He knew if the monster got back to that armchair, it was over. He would have to endure whatever torture it had conjured up for him and he wouldn't be able to stop it. He wanted to scream, but he couldn't seem to make his vocal cords work like that.
He kicked at the monster. His foot connected with flesh and he heard a grunt. The grip on his wrist loosened just enough that he was able to wrench out of it. He didn't hesitate this time. He sprinted down the hall to the bedroom. He whirled around in the doorway. The monster was staggering upright. It looked up at him and for a moment they were both frozen again: Sam with his hand on the door, the monster bracing itself against the hallway wall. Then the spell was broken and the monster began lumbering down the hall after him just as he slammed the door shut, turning the lock.
The monster hit the door and Sam jumped back. The door held, but he could already see the wood splintering around the hinges. He slowly backed away from the door until his legs hit the edge of the bed and then he sat down. He looked frantically around the room, trying to find something to defend himself with or something that would buy him some time, but there was nothing. Only a closet full of clothes and nothing large enough that he could fend off someone as large as the monster with. He thought about trying to push the armoire in front of the door, but he knew he wasn't strong enough.
Then he spotted the window near the armoire. He dashed over to it, removed the lock and began pushing up. It went up halfway and then stopped. Sam tried to squeeze himself out, but the space wasn't even big enough to fit his head through. He glanced back at the door. The monster was shouting unintelligible words through the wood. It was still hitting it, trying to break the door down. The wood was splintering more now. He didn't have much time before the wood gave way. He tried pushing the window up farther, but it still wouldn't move. He tried closing it and then opening it again, but it still wouldn't budge.
There was a sickening crack behind him. He looked around. The door was staring to come off its hinges. He didn't have much time. He turned back to the window and pushed it up again. Still it wouldn't move.
"Come on!" he shouted. "Open up!"
The window slid up all the way.
Not wasting a second, he shoved his upper body through the window and dropped down in a heap on the ground outside the window. It slammed itself shut behind him. He watched through the window as the door broke off the hinges and collapsed onto the floor of the bedroom. He saw the monster step into the room. He didn't stay to watch what it was going to do next. He took off around the side of the house and ran as fast as his legs would carry him down the street. It wasn't until he reached the corner that he realized he had nowhere to go. Everything he owned was back at the house he'd left behind. He hadn't even grabbed his backpack to bring with him.
Frustration filled him as he kicked the street sign as hard as he could, but it only resulted in his toe hurting and even more frustration. He sat down on the curb and put his face in his hands. Without warning, he began to sob, great heaving sobs that wracked his body. He knew that the people in the houses around him could probably hear him crying, but he couldn't make himself stop. He knotted his fingers in his hair and pressed the heel of his palms into his eyes, trying to make the tears stop, but they wouldn't. He replayed the moment of panic in the master bedroom right before the window opened and he was able to free himself over and over again and just sobbed harder. He was going to pay for this. He knew it. Whenever the monster came to him next, it would be ten times worse than it normally was.
He should've just let the monster do what it wanted to him. He shouldn't have fought back.
And then, just as suddenly as he'd started crying, he stopped. Something occurred to him.
The window had only opened after he'd shouted at it and it had shut itself behind him.
He glanced at the little white innocuous house back down the street.
His mother had rescued him.
The thought just made him want to cry all over again.
"Sam?"
The voice was one he recognized, but it still made him jump. He turned and saw Jess standing over him. He noticed how dark the sky had gotten and realized he must've been sitting here crying a lot longer than he thought he had.
"Are you okay?" she asked, her voice soft and tentative. She reached out to him. He automatically recoiled. She withdrew her hand. "Why were you crying?"
"I wasn't crying," Sam replied, turning away from her. He crossed his arms, resting his elbows on his knees. He stared at the cracked and faded asphalt. He watched an ant carrying a bit of gravel towards a small anthill that had been created in the center of a crack in the gutter.
"Your father hurts you like mine does, doesn't he." She said this as a statement.
Sam turned to look at her again. She was staring at the ants, too, her expression unreadable. He didn't say anything in reply, but he knew from her words and the way she'd spoken then he didn't have to. She knew. She didn't need him to confirm it.
"Does Dean know?" she asked, her voice soft, barely above a whisper.
He shook his head.
"You need to tell him."
He shook his head again.
"Sam -"
"Jess." His voice was soft, but she didn't say anything else. He went back to staring at the ants. "Until you tell someone about your dad, I don't see why I have to tell anyone about mine."
She said nothing else and sat down next to him on the curb.
They sat like that in companionable silence for a long time, the world growing dark around them, neither one of them wanting to go back to the houses they were forced to call home. They didn't want to face what was waiting for them there. Sam wondered where Dean was and when he was going to get home. He didn't know when he'd decided it, but he wasn't going back until he saw Dean walk through the front door. Then he would know it was safe to go back.
For now anyway.
"Sam?"
Jess's voice startled him out of his thoughts.
He turned to look at her. She'd placed her hand on his arm. She was still staring at the ants in the gutter, but her expression looked pained.
"Why do we let bad people do bad things to us?"
She looked up at him then. There were tears in her eyes.
Sam pressed his forehead to hers without thinking about it. He took her hand in his and laced their fingers together. He expected her to pull away, but she didn't. She let out a shuddering breath and closed her eyes. He closed his as well. He didn't say anything. He didn't know how to answer her question. It didn't seem like there was a right answer. Or, at least, no answer that he would be satisfied with giving her.
Letting out a soft breath, Sam stroked Jess's cheek with his thumb. Her skin was so soft.
"I don't know," he finally whispered.
They stayed like that. For how long, Sam didn't know. It could've been minutes or hours, but then, quite suddenly, he realized he was kissing her and she was kissing him. He wasn't sure when they'd started kissing or how. He only knew now that they'd started he never wanted to stop.
They were clinging to each other like they were afraid the other was going to disappear. Jess's nails were digging into Sam's skin. Sam's fingers were gripping Jess's clothes, pulling her as close as he could. She'd wrapped her arms around his body, her fingers were in his hair, holding his mouth against his.
Finally, they pulled away at the same time and looked into each other's eyes, both shocked by what had just happened. Jess's green eyes shone brightly in the dim moonlight, her hair lit up almost like a halo. She had to be an angel, Sam decided. Only angels were this beautiful and kind.
They pressed their foreheads together again, breathing a little heavier, their eyes closed.
"What now?" Sam whispered.
"I guess now you're my boyfriend," Jess said.
She sounded breathless, but she also sounded happy and when Sam opened his eyes again, he saw she was smiling. He smiled back.
"Yeah," he said, lacing their fingers together. "I guess I am."