As Long As I'm Around 2/2
Summary: He couldn't remember what had happened, or why there was so much pain. All he knew was that Dean wasn't there. Hurt/ comfort/ angst. Gen.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or its awesome characters.
(Part 1)
They talked to him.
He heard their voices, muffled and fragmented like a badly-tuned radio. They spoke in between the footsteps and the hands that moved around him and manipulated him. Sometimes he thought he understood what they were saying.
“...hear me...”
“...hurt...?”
“...feeling today...”
Sometimes there would be a pause, as if they were expecting an answer. An answer from him.
But it was never the voice he wanted to hear, never the hand he needed to feel, and it was too difficult to try to respond.
Dean was gone.
Sometimes the pain would surge, engulfing and overwhelming, his leg, or more often his head, and in some bizarre way he would welcome it, because the physical pain was a distraction from the greater agony in his mind. Sometimes it was so bad that it carried him away into dark empty nothing, and for a while he wouldn’t know.
But then he would surface, slowly, and the pain was upon him again, and no matter how much he yearned and reached and called Dean was never there.
He’d never known sickness without his brother, never been hurt without having Dean beside him. He’d never imagined anything could keep him away. His over-protective older brother.
But Dean had left him.
The one absolute certainty in his life was no longer a guarantee, and the knowledge was too terrifying to contemplate.
*********************************************************
He found himself staring stupidly. Familiar camouflage canvas... black webbing straps. The broken zipper head and that odd little ink stain on the side pocket that bore a distinct resemblance to a wendigo.
Sam’s duffle.
Sam’s clothes, his books.
His wallet.
Dean could remember seeing it on the bed. He could remember how it had tipped over when Sam had sat down after their fight. Sam had been packing it when Dad had called, folding his shirts and his spare pair of jeans. They’d been about to leave the motel.
And then Dad had phoned, and his news about Mom’s killer and Jess’s killer and his flat refusal to allow them to follow it had ignited the smouldering embers of the old argument, had lit the fuse of the worst fight Dean could remember between them. Sam had sulked, and Dean had stormed out to find a bar.
And when he’d returned, Sam was gone. Gone to chase the demon, gone to do what he wanted in defiance of his family.
Dean had reconstructed the events in the motel room after his own departure. He’d pictured Sam sitting there, fuming. He’d pictured the stubborn determination on his face, the cramming of his remaining possessions into his bag. He’d imagined the tight-lipped resolve with which Sam had slipped away before Dean returned.
Because Sam had told him. Sam had said he would leave, said he couldn’t put up with it any longer.
“If you want to stay here just sitting around on your ass, feel free... I’m going to find this thing.”
There had been no other explanation when he’d returned and found the empty motel room. Sam was gone, as he’d threatened. His possessions were gone.
But this: this made nonsense of that.
This didn’t fit with that neatly-constructed picture. There was no possible reason for Sam to leave his things: his clothes, everything he owned, his driver’s licence and money. There was nothing that could have induced him to leave the only photograph he had of Jess.
Blistering rage faltered, faded. Slow, bitter fear took its place. There was only one reason for Sam to pack his things neatly and put them in the Impala before he left.
He had been planning to return.
But he hadn’t.
********************************************************
They said he was unconscious. They said it was a coma or something, that they weren’t sure how much he understood.
Katie Jessup didn’t know about that. She just felt sorry for him.
She listened to what they said, the conversation at the nurses’ station that she wasn’t really meant to hear. She was only a cleaner, the lowliest of staff members, and she wasn’t supposed to be interested in the patients.
But how could she help being interested in this one?
He didn’t have a name. At least not one that anyone knew. He was unidentified, unclaimed by any loved ones; the hospital had him registered as “John Doe”.
The doctor was not happy with his progress.
Katie wasn’t supposed to know that either, really, but she’d perfected the art of merging into the background when important people said important things. She learned a lot that way. And she knew that Dr. Price was concerned that “John” was still unconscious. They were all waiting for him to wake up and tell them something; who he was, who they could call. Where he belonged.
It had been five days since he’d been brought in, but so far the only information they had was a name.
Katie wondered about this Dee. A girlfriend, maybe, or fiancée? “John” didn’t really look old enough for a wife, and he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. Whoever she was, he was disturbed by her absence.
She ran a cloth over the already spotless bedside cabinet. Most patients had flowers there, cards, or chocolates or fruit. “John” had nothing.
She stood still for a moment and looked at him: bruises dark against unnatural pallor, tanned skin disappearing under white plaster. A physique produced by hard outdoor activity, weakened now by trauma. He’d almost died in the ER. She’d seen Dr. Price’s face the last time he’d examined his patient: “John” could still die.
He stirred a little as she stood there, and his breathing quickened momentarily. Her own breath caught. He didn’t open his eyes, but faint as drifting leaves came the now-familiar name.
“De...” The desolation in his tone made her eyes prickle. Dee... she wasn’t there. She was never there, and he just kept calling.
Timidly she touched his hand.
“It’s okay...”
His fingers moved, grasping, but not for her.
“It’s okay,” she said again. “She’ll come... Dee won’t leave you.”
She tried to believe it.
********************************************************
The motel room was empty.
He’d floored the accelerator, broken every speed limit; he’d covered the distance between the gas station and Robertson in a time that would have surprised even him if he’d given it a thought.
He stood in the impersonal neatness of the unoccupied room and felt stupid for having hoped that he would find his brother that easily. He wasn’t sure why he’d expected Sam to be there, five days on, five days after Dean had left.
The thought was tragically ironic. He’d been so angry that Sam had left, so furious when he’d discovered Sam was gone.
And all along it had been Dean who had left Sam.
For one horrible moment he just stood, thoughts darting wildly. Sam wasn’t there. Sam had disappeared five days ago, somewhere in this little town. Five days he’d been missing, while Dean had raged and cursed and driven further and further away. And he wasn’t answering his phone, which meant that he couldn’t.
I should have known something was wrong when he didn’t pick up. I should have known Sam wouldn’t just ignore me like that.
Nightmare images paraded. Sam lying broken in a deserted alley after a mugging gone wrong... Sam huddled limply in a cave, the victim of some unspeakable monster... Sam unconscious and freezing in a ditch... Sam sick... Sam injured... Sam dead.
When their loved ones disappeared, normal people went to the police.
Dean didn’t like the police. The police didn’t like Dean. Odd things happened around the Winchesters and officials were not usually receptive to the idea of supernatural perpetrators. And then there was the little matter of his apparent death after committing murder and assault.
No, he couldn’t go to the police.
He’d just have to find Sam on his own.
********************************************************
Sandra Dillford enjoyed her job. It didn’t pay very well. But everyone had to tighten their belts these days, and she was always the first to know when something dramatic happened. She could still remember that evening when young Jim Havelock had accidentally sliced his femoral artery with a scythe; he’d come staggering in, blood everywhere, gasping and clutching his leg... excitement was rare, but when it came it was worth it.
Her friends regarded her with more respect now that she was employed at the hospital. As receptionist, she was not just a mere secretary. She knew things. She could tell things, although she often didn’t because that made her more interesting.
And her job gave her the opportunity to meet people, although she had to admit that they weren’t often young, or attractive.
The man standing in front of her was both. Particularly the latter.
Sandra had bid a reluctant farewell to fifty several years previously, but her friends assured her she looked younger. Many men preferred more mature women, anyway. She tilted her head and smiled.
“Can I help you?”
“I’m looking for my brother.” He didn’t smile back.
She looked up at him through stubby eyelashes.
“What’s your brother’s name?”
“Sam. Sam Winchester.”
She turned to her computer, ran through the patient list, but there was no record of a Sam Winchester. She gave him her special sympathetic smile.
“I’m sorry, sir, we don’t have a Sam Winchester. But I suppose that’s good news - better that he’s not in the hospital!” she tittered. The sound faded uncertainly when he didn’t respond in kind.
“Was he meant to be here?”
He ran his hand roughly through his hair.
“I... I don’t... no. He wasn’t meant to be here. I was just hoping maybe...”
“You were hoping he was in hospital?” Her light laugh became a cough as he stared at her.
“No. I was hoping someone had seen him. I... I don’t know where he is.”
“You don’t know where...” Her voice trailed off as for the first time a startling possibility occurred to her.
A worried young man...
A missing brother...
She blinked, her eyes widening, and cleared her throat.
“Are you Dee?”
********************************************************
Hit and run.
Not a monster, or a ghost. Not some angry vengeful spirit.
Just a criminally thoughtless human, driving carelessly, driving too fast. Skidding on a slippery road and too scared - or too drunk - to stop and think of the person he’d left lying on the ground behind him.
Dean didn’t want to think about that, about Sam unconscious on that icy road, in pain, struggling to breathe. He recoiled at the thought of Sam surrounded by strangers, even if they had been kind. Sam, hurt and alone. Sammy. His little brother.
He’d just wanted to clear his head, to deal with the fight. He’d just wanted a walk.
Sam was strong, and capable; Sam was a fearsome demon hunter.
Sam looked so small.
It was illogical; it was all wrong. It was appalling that he could be so defenceless.
It was unthinkable that he’d been lying badly injured in hospital for five days and Dean had not been there. He’d almost died, from a collapsed lung, from blood loss. Sam could have died, and Dean wouldn’t even have known.
He wanted to wrap his arms around Sam. He wanted to run away and pretend this wasn’t happening. He wanted to yell, to hit someone, to blame someone for this whole hideous mess, for Sam’s condition and Dean’s oblivion.
But there was no-one to blame, unless it was himself, and only a fool or a coward would try to ignore it. And Sam was too fragile, too pale and limp and breakable - too broken - to be held. He stood by the bed and looked down at his unconscious brother, and his face was stony with all the emotions he couldn’t show.
********************************************************
“...stubborn and selfish...”
“... you might be wrong...”
Angry.
“... don’t expect me to come after you...”
Gone.
He didn’t understand. But he knew. Dean was gone, and he wasn’t coming back. Whatever had happened, whatever Sam had done, it was unforgiveable. He could apologize, and repent, feel sorrow and remorse for the hideous unknown sin that he’d committed, but Dean was still angry. Dean was still absent.
Sam was still alone.
The pain was bad, now. It ached, his leg, his arm; a dull relentless pulsation with his heartbeat. He wanted help, wanted something to take the pain away, but there was only one thing that would really work, and it was the one thing he couldn’t have. Someone would come eventually, sooner if he cried out, but it wouldn’t be the someone he wanted.
Dean.
There was pain in his chest, and he didn’t know if it was broken bones and torn flesh, or something more irreparable.
“Dean...” It was hopeless and pointless and he couldn’t help it, the moan that escaped him or the futile grasping of empty fingers.
He’d been unanswered for so long. He’d reached so many times for a hand that wasn’t there.
And then fingers met his, calloused and strong, and his hand was suddenly warm in a familiar hard grip. He heard it, the voice he’d called for. Not angry; not threatening; the voice of security and protection. Of love.
“Sammy...”
********************************************************
They were bloodshot and a little unfocused. They’d been so angry last time he’d seen them; furious and frustrated, with cleverly concealed hurt.
“Dean?” Stunned now; incredulous; Sam was too weak to hide anything.
“The one and only.” The words were flippant. The tone was not.
“Dean...”
Chilled fingers moved, clutched his with a desperate grip. Amazement gave way to distress.
“I thought... I...” Sam’s voice quivered. “You were gone...” Anguish and misery filled exhausted blue-green eyes, slid unchecked down and soaked into the pillow.
“Sammy...” Dean swallowed. “I thought... I thought you were gone. When I came back and you weren’t there... I thought you’d left.”
Sam blinked. Tears clung to wet eyelashes.
“But...”
“I didn’t know that you were hurt. I thought you were angry. I thought you’d left to... to... you know. If I’d known... if I knew...” His voice cracked. “I didn’t know, Sammy.”
“I... I thought you were just too angry to come.” It was a tiny whisper.
Dean had been angry. He’d been furious that Sam could leave like that. He’d been too angry to think clearly, to think that Sam wouldn’t just ignore him.
“I didn’t know.” His own eyes were wet now. “I’m sorry, bro. I’m so sorry. I swear, if I’d known you were hurt, I would have been here. I would never... I would never...”
His free hand reached out, gripped his brother’s shoulder. Sam’s eyes slid shut, heavy with exhaustion and the lingering threads of an unconsciousness from which he’d so recently emerged.
“D...Dean...”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t... don’t...”
“I’m not gonna leave you, Sammy.” His hand slid across and rested lightly on the side of Sam’s neck. Comforting. Reassuring.
Sam sighed, turned his head to lean against Dean’s hand.
“Promise...” It was the softest murmur.
“I’m not leaving you. I promise.”
***********************************************************
“...don’t expect me to come after you...”
An angry voice sparked brief remembered fear. Memories of that fight, insubstantial, incoherent; distressing. Dean had... Dean was...
Dean was there.
“I’m not leaving you...”
He still didn’t really understand. But now it didn’t matter.
He wasn’t alone.
“I promise.”
His hand quivered, fingers reaching. But this time an answering hand tightened around his. This time the responding voice was the one he needed, deep and steady, and soft with rarely-shown tenderness.
“Sammy...” It’s okay... I’m here... I’m not gonna leave you.
He didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
Dean was with him. Dean would stay while he slept, and be there when he woke. Whatever had happened, whatever he didn’t understand or remember, he didn’t have to contend with it alone.
He drifted away again, and this time there were no angry voices to trouble his sleep.
**************************************************************
His arm ached. He’d been sitting in the same position for longer than was really comfortable, after driving more miles than he liked to remember. But he didn’t think of moving.
Sam was asleep. Sam’s hand was relaxed in his, a little warmer than it had been. On the pillow a dark dishevelled head was turned slightly to face him, as if even in sleep Sam needed to keep him in view. As if Dean had to be the first thing Sam saw when he woke.
There was so much that still needed to be faced. Sam would be laid up for weeks, even after he left the hospital. And there were issues that they would have to discuss, the issues which had precipitated all of this in the first place. There would have to be long conversations, difficult and probably emotional, if Sam remembered... when Sam remembered.
But that was all in the future.
For now it was enough that he was here. He was with Sam, where he should be, watching over him, which was his job.
Whatever had to be faced, it would always be easier when they were together.
He leant back in the chair and let his own eyes drift shut.
**************************************************************
The hospital hummed. Rhythmic bleeps of heart monitors and the soft regular hiss of oxygen... the purr of wheels underlying the dull clank of the elevator... fingers on computer keyboards, good old-fashioned pens scratching out recordings on patient charts, light footsteps and quiet night-time voices.
A middle-aged doctor smiled at a younger red-headed nurse in the shared relief of a patient’s unexpected recovery. A pulse that had been a little uneven, a little too fast and too weak, was steadier now. Incoherent confusion had settled into drowsy lucidity.
The doctor mused with satisfaction on the efficacy of modern medical science, and departed, secretly content at the thought of a peaceful evening. The nurse had her own theories, but she didn’t voice them. She’d hoped for a mother, but it seemed that a brother was what had been needed all along.
A small silent figure paused with a vase of flowers in one hand and a cloth in the other, unnoticed by the two in the room. She’d imagined the girlfriend, the romantic reunion of the lovers when at last Dee arrived. And then in the end, Dee was Dean, and the envisaged beautiful girl was in fact an older brother.
It might have been disappointing. But how could she feel anything but relief that “John” was no longer alone, that that sad reaching hand was no longer grasping for another that didn’t come? It might not have been the romance she’d pictured, but perhaps this was a happier ending after all.
And at the front desk, Sandra Dillford reflected complacently on the excitement and drama of her job, and a coy smile curled her mouth as she pictured the handsome Dean Winchester. Her friends were going to be so envious...
Fin
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or its awesome characters.
(Part 1)
They talked to him.
He heard their voices, muffled and fragmented like a badly-tuned radio. They spoke in between the footsteps and the hands that moved around him and manipulated him. Sometimes he thought he understood what they were saying.
“...hear me...”
“...hurt...?”
“...feeling today...”
Sometimes there would be a pause, as if they were expecting an answer. An answer from him.
But it was never the voice he wanted to hear, never the hand he needed to feel, and it was too difficult to try to respond.
Dean was gone.
Sometimes the pain would surge, engulfing and overwhelming, his leg, or more often his head, and in some bizarre way he would welcome it, because the physical pain was a distraction from the greater agony in his mind. Sometimes it was so bad that it carried him away into dark empty nothing, and for a while he wouldn’t know.
But then he would surface, slowly, and the pain was upon him again, and no matter how much he yearned and reached and called Dean was never there.
He’d never known sickness without his brother, never been hurt without having Dean beside him. He’d never imagined anything could keep him away. His over-protective older brother.
But Dean had left him.
The one absolute certainty in his life was no longer a guarantee, and the knowledge was too terrifying to contemplate.
*********************************************************
He found himself staring stupidly. Familiar camouflage canvas... black webbing straps. The broken zipper head and that odd little ink stain on the side pocket that bore a distinct resemblance to a wendigo.
Sam’s duffle.
Sam’s clothes, his books.
His wallet.
Dean could remember seeing it on the bed. He could remember how it had tipped over when Sam had sat down after their fight. Sam had been packing it when Dad had called, folding his shirts and his spare pair of jeans. They’d been about to leave the motel.
And then Dad had phoned, and his news about Mom’s killer and Jess’s killer and his flat refusal to allow them to follow it had ignited the smouldering embers of the old argument, had lit the fuse of the worst fight Dean could remember between them. Sam had sulked, and Dean had stormed out to find a bar.
And when he’d returned, Sam was gone. Gone to chase the demon, gone to do what he wanted in defiance of his family.
Dean had reconstructed the events in the motel room after his own departure. He’d pictured Sam sitting there, fuming. He’d pictured the stubborn determination on his face, the cramming of his remaining possessions into his bag. He’d imagined the tight-lipped resolve with which Sam had slipped away before Dean returned.
Because Sam had told him. Sam had said he would leave, said he couldn’t put up with it any longer.
“If you want to stay here just sitting around on your ass, feel free... I’m going to find this thing.”
There had been no other explanation when he’d returned and found the empty motel room. Sam was gone, as he’d threatened. His possessions were gone.
But this: this made nonsense of that.
This didn’t fit with that neatly-constructed picture. There was no possible reason for Sam to leave his things: his clothes, everything he owned, his driver’s licence and money. There was nothing that could have induced him to leave the only photograph he had of Jess.
Blistering rage faltered, faded. Slow, bitter fear took its place. There was only one reason for Sam to pack his things neatly and put them in the Impala before he left.
He had been planning to return.
But he hadn’t.
********************************************************
They said he was unconscious. They said it was a coma or something, that they weren’t sure how much he understood.
Katie Jessup didn’t know about that. She just felt sorry for him.
She listened to what they said, the conversation at the nurses’ station that she wasn’t really meant to hear. She was only a cleaner, the lowliest of staff members, and she wasn’t supposed to be interested in the patients.
But how could she help being interested in this one?
He didn’t have a name. At least not one that anyone knew. He was unidentified, unclaimed by any loved ones; the hospital had him registered as “John Doe”.
The doctor was not happy with his progress.
Katie wasn’t supposed to know that either, really, but she’d perfected the art of merging into the background when important people said important things. She learned a lot that way. And she knew that Dr. Price was concerned that “John” was still unconscious. They were all waiting for him to wake up and tell them something; who he was, who they could call. Where he belonged.
It had been five days since he’d been brought in, but so far the only information they had was a name.
Katie wondered about this Dee. A girlfriend, maybe, or fiancée? “John” didn’t really look old enough for a wife, and he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. Whoever she was, he was disturbed by her absence.
She ran a cloth over the already spotless bedside cabinet. Most patients had flowers there, cards, or chocolates or fruit. “John” had nothing.
She stood still for a moment and looked at him: bruises dark against unnatural pallor, tanned skin disappearing under white plaster. A physique produced by hard outdoor activity, weakened now by trauma. He’d almost died in the ER. She’d seen Dr. Price’s face the last time he’d examined his patient: “John” could still die.
He stirred a little as she stood there, and his breathing quickened momentarily. Her own breath caught. He didn’t open his eyes, but faint as drifting leaves came the now-familiar name.
“De...” The desolation in his tone made her eyes prickle. Dee... she wasn’t there. She was never there, and he just kept calling.
Timidly she touched his hand.
“It’s okay...”
His fingers moved, grasping, but not for her.
“It’s okay,” she said again. “She’ll come... Dee won’t leave you.”
She tried to believe it.
********************************************************
The motel room was empty.
He’d floored the accelerator, broken every speed limit; he’d covered the distance between the gas station and Robertson in a time that would have surprised even him if he’d given it a thought.
He stood in the impersonal neatness of the unoccupied room and felt stupid for having hoped that he would find his brother that easily. He wasn’t sure why he’d expected Sam to be there, five days on, five days after Dean had left.
The thought was tragically ironic. He’d been so angry that Sam had left, so furious when he’d discovered Sam was gone.
And all along it had been Dean who had left Sam.
For one horrible moment he just stood, thoughts darting wildly. Sam wasn’t there. Sam had disappeared five days ago, somewhere in this little town. Five days he’d been missing, while Dean had raged and cursed and driven further and further away. And he wasn’t answering his phone, which meant that he couldn’t.
I should have known something was wrong when he didn’t pick up. I should have known Sam wouldn’t just ignore me like that.
Nightmare images paraded. Sam lying broken in a deserted alley after a mugging gone wrong... Sam huddled limply in a cave, the victim of some unspeakable monster... Sam unconscious and freezing in a ditch... Sam sick... Sam injured... Sam dead.
When their loved ones disappeared, normal people went to the police.
Dean didn’t like the police. The police didn’t like Dean. Odd things happened around the Winchesters and officials were not usually receptive to the idea of supernatural perpetrators. And then there was the little matter of his apparent death after committing murder and assault.
No, he couldn’t go to the police.
He’d just have to find Sam on his own.
********************************************************
Sandra Dillford enjoyed her job. It didn’t pay very well. But everyone had to tighten their belts these days, and she was always the first to know when something dramatic happened. She could still remember that evening when young Jim Havelock had accidentally sliced his femoral artery with a scythe; he’d come staggering in, blood everywhere, gasping and clutching his leg... excitement was rare, but when it came it was worth it.
Her friends regarded her with more respect now that she was employed at the hospital. As receptionist, she was not just a mere secretary. She knew things. She could tell things, although she often didn’t because that made her more interesting.
And her job gave her the opportunity to meet people, although she had to admit that they weren’t often young, or attractive.
The man standing in front of her was both. Particularly the latter.
Sandra had bid a reluctant farewell to fifty several years previously, but her friends assured her she looked younger. Many men preferred more mature women, anyway. She tilted her head and smiled.
“Can I help you?”
“I’m looking for my brother.” He didn’t smile back.
She looked up at him through stubby eyelashes.
“What’s your brother’s name?”
“Sam. Sam Winchester.”
She turned to her computer, ran through the patient list, but there was no record of a Sam Winchester. She gave him her special sympathetic smile.
“I’m sorry, sir, we don’t have a Sam Winchester. But I suppose that’s good news - better that he’s not in the hospital!” she tittered. The sound faded uncertainly when he didn’t respond in kind.
“Was he meant to be here?”
He ran his hand roughly through his hair.
“I... I don’t... no. He wasn’t meant to be here. I was just hoping maybe...”
“You were hoping he was in hospital?” Her light laugh became a cough as he stared at her.
“No. I was hoping someone had seen him. I... I don’t know where he is.”
“You don’t know where...” Her voice trailed off as for the first time a startling possibility occurred to her.
A worried young man...
A missing brother...
She blinked, her eyes widening, and cleared her throat.
“Are you Dee?”
********************************************************
Hit and run.
Not a monster, or a ghost. Not some angry vengeful spirit.
Just a criminally thoughtless human, driving carelessly, driving too fast. Skidding on a slippery road and too scared - or too drunk - to stop and think of the person he’d left lying on the ground behind him.
Dean didn’t want to think about that, about Sam unconscious on that icy road, in pain, struggling to breathe. He recoiled at the thought of Sam surrounded by strangers, even if they had been kind. Sam, hurt and alone. Sammy. His little brother.
He’d just wanted to clear his head, to deal with the fight. He’d just wanted a walk.
Sam was strong, and capable; Sam was a fearsome demon hunter.
Sam looked so small.
It was illogical; it was all wrong. It was appalling that he could be so defenceless.
It was unthinkable that he’d been lying badly injured in hospital for five days and Dean had not been there. He’d almost died, from a collapsed lung, from blood loss. Sam could have died, and Dean wouldn’t even have known.
He wanted to wrap his arms around Sam. He wanted to run away and pretend this wasn’t happening. He wanted to yell, to hit someone, to blame someone for this whole hideous mess, for Sam’s condition and Dean’s oblivion.
But there was no-one to blame, unless it was himself, and only a fool or a coward would try to ignore it. And Sam was too fragile, too pale and limp and breakable - too broken - to be held. He stood by the bed and looked down at his unconscious brother, and his face was stony with all the emotions he couldn’t show.
********************************************************
“...stubborn and selfish...”
“... you might be wrong...”
Angry.
“... don’t expect me to come after you...”
Gone.
He didn’t understand. But he knew. Dean was gone, and he wasn’t coming back. Whatever had happened, whatever Sam had done, it was unforgiveable. He could apologize, and repent, feel sorrow and remorse for the hideous unknown sin that he’d committed, but Dean was still angry. Dean was still absent.
Sam was still alone.
The pain was bad, now. It ached, his leg, his arm; a dull relentless pulsation with his heartbeat. He wanted help, wanted something to take the pain away, but there was only one thing that would really work, and it was the one thing he couldn’t have. Someone would come eventually, sooner if he cried out, but it wouldn’t be the someone he wanted.
Dean.
There was pain in his chest, and he didn’t know if it was broken bones and torn flesh, or something more irreparable.
“Dean...” It was hopeless and pointless and he couldn’t help it, the moan that escaped him or the futile grasping of empty fingers.
He’d been unanswered for so long. He’d reached so many times for a hand that wasn’t there.
And then fingers met his, calloused and strong, and his hand was suddenly warm in a familiar hard grip. He heard it, the voice he’d called for. Not angry; not threatening; the voice of security and protection. Of love.
“Sammy...”
********************************************************
They were bloodshot and a little unfocused. They’d been so angry last time he’d seen them; furious and frustrated, with cleverly concealed hurt.
“Dean?” Stunned now; incredulous; Sam was too weak to hide anything.
“The one and only.” The words were flippant. The tone was not.
“Dean...”
Chilled fingers moved, clutched his with a desperate grip. Amazement gave way to distress.
“I thought... I...” Sam’s voice quivered. “You were gone...” Anguish and misery filled exhausted blue-green eyes, slid unchecked down and soaked into the pillow.
“Sammy...” Dean swallowed. “I thought... I thought you were gone. When I came back and you weren’t there... I thought you’d left.”
Sam blinked. Tears clung to wet eyelashes.
“But...”
“I didn’t know that you were hurt. I thought you were angry. I thought you’d left to... to... you know. If I’d known... if I knew...” His voice cracked. “I didn’t know, Sammy.”
“I... I thought you were just too angry to come.” It was a tiny whisper.
Dean had been angry. He’d been furious that Sam could leave like that. He’d been too angry to think clearly, to think that Sam wouldn’t just ignore him.
“I didn’t know.” His own eyes were wet now. “I’m sorry, bro. I’m so sorry. I swear, if I’d known you were hurt, I would have been here. I would never... I would never...”
His free hand reached out, gripped his brother’s shoulder. Sam’s eyes slid shut, heavy with exhaustion and the lingering threads of an unconsciousness from which he’d so recently emerged.
“D...Dean...”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t... don’t...”
“I’m not gonna leave you, Sammy.” His hand slid across and rested lightly on the side of Sam’s neck. Comforting. Reassuring.
Sam sighed, turned his head to lean against Dean’s hand.
“Promise...” It was the softest murmur.
“I’m not leaving you. I promise.”
***********************************************************
“...don’t expect me to come after you...”
An angry voice sparked brief remembered fear. Memories of that fight, insubstantial, incoherent; distressing. Dean had... Dean was...
Dean was there.
“I’m not leaving you...”
He still didn’t really understand. But now it didn’t matter.
He wasn’t alone.
“I promise.”
His hand quivered, fingers reaching. But this time an answering hand tightened around his. This time the responding voice was the one he needed, deep and steady, and soft with rarely-shown tenderness.
“Sammy...” It’s okay... I’m here... I’m not gonna leave you.
He didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
Dean was with him. Dean would stay while he slept, and be there when he woke. Whatever had happened, whatever he didn’t understand or remember, he didn’t have to contend with it alone.
He drifted away again, and this time there were no angry voices to trouble his sleep.
**************************************************************
His arm ached. He’d been sitting in the same position for longer than was really comfortable, after driving more miles than he liked to remember. But he didn’t think of moving.
Sam was asleep. Sam’s hand was relaxed in his, a little warmer than it had been. On the pillow a dark dishevelled head was turned slightly to face him, as if even in sleep Sam needed to keep him in view. As if Dean had to be the first thing Sam saw when he woke.
There was so much that still needed to be faced. Sam would be laid up for weeks, even after he left the hospital. And there were issues that they would have to discuss, the issues which had precipitated all of this in the first place. There would have to be long conversations, difficult and probably emotional, if Sam remembered... when Sam remembered.
But that was all in the future.
For now it was enough that he was here. He was with Sam, where he should be, watching over him, which was his job.
Whatever had to be faced, it would always be easier when they were together.
He leant back in the chair and let his own eyes drift shut.
**************************************************************
The hospital hummed. Rhythmic bleeps of heart monitors and the soft regular hiss of oxygen... the purr of wheels underlying the dull clank of the elevator... fingers on computer keyboards, good old-fashioned pens scratching out recordings on patient charts, light footsteps and quiet night-time voices.
A middle-aged doctor smiled at a younger red-headed nurse in the shared relief of a patient’s unexpected recovery. A pulse that had been a little uneven, a little too fast and too weak, was steadier now. Incoherent confusion had settled into drowsy lucidity.
The doctor mused with satisfaction on the efficacy of modern medical science, and departed, secretly content at the thought of a peaceful evening. The nurse had her own theories, but she didn’t voice them. She’d hoped for a mother, but it seemed that a brother was what had been needed all along.
A small silent figure paused with a vase of flowers in one hand and a cloth in the other, unnoticed by the two in the room. She’d imagined the girlfriend, the romantic reunion of the lovers when at last Dee arrived. And then in the end, Dee was Dean, and the envisaged beautiful girl was in fact an older brother.
It might have been disappointing. But how could she feel anything but relief that “John” was no longer alone, that that sad reaching hand was no longer grasping for another that didn’t come? It might not have been the romance she’d pictured, but perhaps this was a happier ending after all.
And at the front desk, Sandra Dillford reflected complacently on the excitement and drama of her job, and a coy smile curled her mouth as she pictured the handsome Dean Winchester. Her friends were going to be so envious...
Fin