crack me open
Title: crack me open
Creator: winchesterloved
Recipient: gluisa88
Rating: T
Word Count or Media: 2950
Warnings:
[Spoiler (click to open)]
possibly uncomfortable lack of personal space, and abundance of violence/dysfunction between the boys
Author's Notes: More a somewhat disjointed series of vignettes than a retelling of a story. For Supernatural Summergen 2015
Summary: Written to prompts - "Prison break ish - Dean is on death row for a crime he didn't commit- Sam gets himself thrown into prison so he can help Dean escape" and "Outsider POV where Sam and Dean are awkward/terrifying/socially clueless/way too codependent (not wincest but the outsider finds their codependency uncomfortable). Perhaps Sam and Dean can sense that they are making the outsider uncomfortable and try to behave more "normal", but only succeed in being more awkward/terrifying/socially clueless or whatever."
Prison changes a person like war doesn’t - it doesn’t help that they’ve been through both by the time Sam breaks Dean out. They’re both a bit tattered - it doesn’t always show outwardly, but sometimes they get weird looks.
---
“I didn’t do it, Sam.”
Evidence says you did, goes through Sam’s mind, stops right at the tip of his tongue.Truth is, much as he tries to convince himself he doesn’t know Dean anymore, he does. And he knows Dean would never have killed a man in cold blood over an unpaid debt. He knows Dean would never lie to him about this.”Yeah,” he says instead. “I know.”
Dean looks almost surprised for a moment, but relief takes over instead. “Okay,” he says. Beat. “You best get out of here before you get dragged right back into my muck.” He raises his hand, presses it against the glass separating them. “It was good seeing you, Sam.”
Sam is too shocked to speak for a moment, but then his brain catches up and the chair scrapes noisily on the linoleum floor as he stands up. “Oh, fuck you.”
“Sam…”
“No,” he spits. “You think I’m going to just - what? Walk away? Leave you here to rot knowing you’re innocent? Is that what you think of me? Is - ”
“Shut up, Sam,” Dean says. “What do you think I expect you to do? There’s no getting out of this. And I get it, okay? You feel guilty - ”
“I don’t feel guilty,” Sam hisses, sitting back down to lean towards Dean, even though he does. It’s still not the point, though, so he barrels on. “This isn’t about me feeling guilty. You’re going to spend the rest of your life in prison because of a crime you never committed, and you think I’m just going to move on?”
“That’s what normal people do,” Dean counters helpfully. “This is your chance. You went for it, going for Stanford, and it was the right choice. Now’s your chance to do it again. But this time we’re gonna do it properly, no shouting matches.”
“With one of us in a prison cell?” Sam says, can’t help the sneer in his voice, but his chest still twinges when Dean’s face drops.
“That’s the hand I got dealt,” Dean says, refusing to rise to the bait. “We just gotta deal with it.”
“Yeah.” Sam stands up. “That’s what I’m going to do.”
“Sam - ”
“No,” Sam says. “You’re my brother. I’m not saying goodbye.”
---
Sam catches a glimpse of Dean the second day he gets his orange jumpsuit. His face is furious, and the guard has to prod him none too gently in the back to get him moving again. What the fuck are you doing, Sam reads, all too easily. Sam just smiles.
He finds that a bit more difficult when he sees Dean again, two weeks later. Dean’s face is bruised, and he walks with a limp. He forces one, forces his facial muscles to contort into some semblance of a smile. It doesn’t reach his eyes, and Dean doesn’t look reassured.
By the end of the month, Sam’s smile doesn’t reach his lips. Dean’s bruises don’t heal, and his gait is broken, unsteady.
He gets to talk to Dean for five minutes every two weeks, is the deal he makes with the Warden. The bruised ribs he suffers from envious inmates for the favour is a small price to pay.
---
“You’re a fucking idiot,” Dean snarls the first time he sees Sam, and Sam has to yell out that he’s fine for the guard to refrain from stopping the session immediately. He almost laughs at that - Dean’s in chains even now, and the guard thinks he’s more dangerous than his fellow inmates.
“I’m a fucking genius, is what,” Sam says, grinning, because he’s too happy to finally see Dean and be able to touch him to be surly.
“You’re a fucking idiot,” Dean maintains, but he sits back down and glares at Sam. “You had a fucking life in front of you and you throw it all away for - for -”
“For you,” Sam supplies, still grinning, and yeah, that might be a bit unbalanced, he’ll admit that.
“For me? You want to talk to me five minutes every half a year, you don’t need the orange outfit -”
“Not like that,” he says, although he thinks he probably would if it were the only way, and feels a bit unsettled when he doesn’t feel unsettled at the realisation.
Dean just stares at him, uncomprehending and incredulous and more than a little bit worried. The anger’s mostly receded, for now.
“Dude,” he says. “I’m gonna break you out.”
---
“Dude,” Sam leans forward, grin still on his face, and whispers conspiratorially, so close Dean feels Sam’s breath puffing out onto Dean’s nose. “I’m gonna break you out.”
Fuck. Sam has gone insane. He looks down at the spastic clench Sam has on his forearms, never once loosened for even half a moment since he was let into the holding room, and says - “They’re going to put you in the fucking psych ward.”
Sam grins again, but this time it’s just a flash of dimples and mischief in his eyes, like every time Sammy had outwitted an enemy, all smug intelligence - no threat of insanity behind it. Bingo, he hears, clear as a bell in his head.
Fuck, Sam’s insane.
---
Sam isn’t actually insane, for the most part, but he makes a good enough show of it that he gets sent to the psych ward, and then pretends well enough that he doesn’t have all the issues he has that he gets sent back, but not without getting what he needs. Dean isn’t half as lucky, and the Warden goes back on his word when Sam wants to see his brother. They’re helping him in there, son - you don’t want to see him now, he says.
The unfortunate fact is that Sam very much wants to see him, but more importantly, Sam very much needs to see him. The Warden realises that fact three months later, when no inmate will walk three feet within Sam Winchester, because he goes ballistic when touched. When a week after that Dean gets released and sustains multiple severe injuries without even seeming to notice, he begins to wonder if he should have separated Sam and Dean Winchester in the first place.
The question goes unanswered when two weeks after that, a mere six months since Sam Winchester was incarcerated, the Winchester brothers go missing.
---
The morning every news station they can get to is running the news of the escaped Winchester brothers, Dean is doing his best to drive a cherry Mustang decently enough not to be suspicious, with six-foot-four of little brother plastered to his side. “Dean,” gets moaned into his shoulder like Sam is dying, and he’s really got enough memories of that not to be even remotely amused.
“Yeah, Sammy,” he says. “Right here, man. You okay?”
Sam chokes out a garbled laugh, and just presses closer. “We need to go deep, man.”
“Yemen?” Dean tries, experimentally, and feels marginally better when Sam puffs a breath into the shoulder now growing suspiciously damp that Dean recognises as a laugh.
“Don’t think I’m ready for that, dude,” Sam finally says, voice muffled, and it doesn’t sound like it’s just Yemen he’s talking about.
---
They come in on a Tuesday, when the morning crowd has filtered out like most decent sorts do, and they’d look for the world like clean-cut Southern boys if not for - well, everything. There are a few suspicious rusty stains on the well-worn flannel, and they smell distinctly, unsettlingly of smoke. They head right for the one booth out of the immediate periphery of anyone walking in through the single entrance, moving so absurdly in sync it feels like they’ve teleported into one of those 90’s music videos, and one of them has a death grip on the other’s shirt hem, quite entirely belying the words coming out of his mouth, along the lines of “You’re a fucking moron, Dean.”
“Fuck off, Sam,” Dean says easily, sinks an elbow into Sam’s ribs in a gesture that must hurt, and probably does, judging from the brief wince, but apparently not enough to make him let go. There’s nothing in Dean’s face that is remotely hostile though, and he doesn’t seem particularly interested in making Sam, who’s still holding onto the fabric rather creepily like a little boy, let go. Sliding into the seat right beside Dean, instead of sitting opposite like normal people do, however, is too much, garnering an eye-roll and a terribly put-on “Dude.”
It doesn’t make her feel any less scandalised when Sam complies, face turning red almost like he didn’t even know what he’d been doing, because Dean proceeds to worm a leg right beside Sam’s under the table. And then -
“Hey - hey, we’re good, buddy. You’re good.” Which doesn't even make sense, but whatever.
“Morning,” she says pointedly, when neither of them seem interested in acknowledging her presence. Dean looks up, and the look of mild surprise on his face is so genuine she almost believes he has no idea what they’re acting like. “So - can I get you anything?”
“Morning, sweetheart,” comes back at her in form of a lazy drawl. “I’ll have a full breakfast - and this one’ll have a stack of pancakes.”
“Coming right up,” she says, gives a friendly pat on Dean’s shoulder, and -
“Don’t touch him,” growled like nothing she’s ever heard before, before she snatches her hand away, and stares into Sam’s livid face, frozen.
And then Dean chuckles. “He’s like an overprotective puppy,” he says, grinning, fondness painted so clearly in his voice and on his face she tears her eyes away from Sam to stare incredulously at Dean, because one, these people are clearly mental, and two, puppy?!
“I’ll just get your orders,” is what she settles on saying finally, because she doesn’t want to get into this anymore than she already has. She walks back into the kitchen, catches a familiar blue car pulling in, and throws in an extra order for the police chief, who drops by every Tuesday morning for her famous pancakes.
When she comes back out not half a minute later, James is sitting at his usual spot right across from where the boys were sitting, except neither of them are there, and there’s no sign they’ve ever been there.
“Where’d they go?” She asks, out of pure curiosity, and James looks at her peculiarly.
“Where’d who go?”
“The two boys - men - sitting there just right before you came in,” she says, waves her hand at the empty booth.
James squints a little, perplexedly. “There wasn’t a single soul in here.”
“They were just there, I’ve only been gone a minute,” she says.
He shrugs. “Probably had some business to do,” he says. “Hey,” he adds, just as she’s turning to go, still bewildered, and slaps mugshots of two men on the table. “Probably won’t see anything, but keep an eye out for these two, yeah? Just escaped from prison not two weeks ago. One’s charged with serial murder, the other one robbed a bank. Suspected of murder too, just like his brother.”
---
“You,” Sam seethes, “need to fucking tell me when you’re hurt.”
“Seventh time,” Dean says blandly, and Sam is momentarily confused. “Seventh time you’re telling me, Sammy,” he says, ruffles Sam’s hair a bit weakly, and Sam can’t help it, pushes his head into the touch.
Then he shakes his head gingerly. God, it hurts. “Shouldn’t have let her touch you,” Sam says stubbornly.
Dean laughs. “That’s what you say about everyone. Don’t think she’d have started with me if you hadn’t gone ballistic on her ass though,” he says, thoughtfully, looks down at Sam working on the stitches. It’d felt unnecessary the first few months they were out of prison and started hunting again. It wasn’t like it even hurt more than a twinge. Two infected gashes and one completely broken-down little brother later, he’d revised his opinion.
Sam just keeps on working at the stitches, doesn’t even lift his head.
“Shit, Sammy - you know that’s not what I meant.”
He shrugs. “That’s the truth though.”
Dean sighs. “You shouldn’t have come after me in prison.”
Sam laughs a little, feeling the vibrations rattle around in his head. God, it hurts. Dean’s said it so many times and Sam’s countered it just as many, he doesn’t even know why Dean keeps bringing it up. “You’re my brother,” he says. “That’s good enough for me.”
Dean’s fingers move a little, scritching his scalp like he’s a large dog. For all Dean bitches about his hair… Then Dean sighs again, but it’s a content sound. “Me too, Sam.”
---
Dean thinks Sam is stealing his underwear in Texas. More importantly, Dean accuses Sam of stealing his underwear, and yeah, okay - it’s not exactly completely untrue, but they basically live in a fucking pocket together, there’s no way any person could possibly keep track of all this, and maybe he has been hogging the more comfortable pairs, but it’s sure as hell not remotely one-sided. Dean takes all the good socks, leaves Sam the threadbare, falling-apart ones with barely any elasticity left, and he’s the one who has to deal with socks slipping off his foot when they’re running around in a graveyard trying to stay alive, so there’s really no reason Dean should act so outraged about it.
“Seriously, dude, what the fuck, man?” Gets thrown at him again, and the entire laundromat turns to look at them, all raised eyebrows and whatnot, like there’s something to stare at. Granted, Dean is kinda loud, proclaiming to the world their laundry issues, but it’s not like it’s a library.
“Dean, I don’t even know which underwear is yours and which is mine,” he says, and heads swivel, brows raise - again.
“Yeah, you apparently think all the good ones are yours,” Dean shoots back, and all the eyes widen in such synchronicity it’s really quite remarkable.
“Fine,” he hisses, finally lowering his voice, since everyone else seems to think that the laundromat is a library. The dryer stops right on time, and he starts fishing clothes out, underwear and all, into the laundry cart. “We’ll sort them out. End of fucking discussion. No more underwear stealing accusations.”
“Fine,” Dean snaps, like a piss baby, and Sam rolls his eyes.
“Just be quiet,” Sam advises, and then they sit on the bench and start sorting through the clothes.
“That’s mine,” Dean says at one point, and that’s just bullshit, because Dean’s calling everything comfortable his.
“Fuck you, man. It’s not like your dick needs all that space.”
“Fuck you, you know that’s not true,” Dean retorts, and a guy walks past them, shakes his head at them.
They finally sort through the entire cart, and as they’re stuffing their clothing into their respective duffels, a girl nods at them, and says - “You’re a fucking weird couple.”
“We’re brothers,” Sam says, unsure of what caused the misunderstanding, and the girl just makes a face and leaves.
“Texas is fucking weird,” Dean says, after a moment.
Sam shrugs. “At least we got the socks sorted out,” he says. Dean makes a noncommittal noise.
Two states later, Dean walks out of the bathroom buck naked and yells - “Samuel Winchester, you steal my underwear one more time - !”
---
They’re squatting in some derelict farmhouse a few miles out of some podunk town when they get into an argument over - well, nothing, in essence. Dean yells, Sam yells, they both yell a bit more, and then one of them throws a punch, and it turns into a full-out brawl from there on.
It’s a glorious ten minutes, like sparring, except better - because Dean isn’t pulling any punches and Sam is incensed enough to become a force of nature. If the sting of the cut in his inner cheek feels like sanctification, and the bitter iron on his tongue taste like absolution, it’s only one more reason to clock his brother harder on the jaw. Dean probably doesn’t really feel anything - which is a distinct advantage for Dean, but only because Sam loves him too much to take advantage of the fact that he could probably kill Dean by slicing an artery open or something, which Dean wouldn’t even realise until he died of blood loss, the fucking asshole.
It’s probably also why Sam ends up on his back with Dean standing over him for a moment before collapsing beside him on the filthy ground. It takes only a minute before Dean starts laughing, hysterical and delirious and like it’s the most painful thing on earth. Sam joins in a second later, and they lie there surrounded by (lying on) all sorts of disgusting shit around them laughing violently like two deranged, stupid idiots, con-fucking-gratulations.
“I could’ve killed you,” Sam says, because not saying it doesn’t make him feel any better about the fact that his brother could die and not even know it. Remarkably, neither does saying it. “Cut you right open and let you bleed out, and you wouldn’t even know,” he continues, chuckling helplessly, tears (from laughter, definitively) seeping from the corners of his eyes. “You wouldn’t even know, you fucking fucker.”
Dean turns, looks at Sam. Then - “Yeah.” Turns back. “Sorry, Sammy.”
Sam bites his lip hard enough to draw blood. When he’s sure his voice won’t waver (from rage), he turns to Dean. “Fuck you, Dean,” he says, quietly, voice hoarse. He doesn’t know what it says about them that it’s the closest he’s ever come to saying I love you to his brother.