Sam is Waiting for the Fall
Title: Sam is Waiting for the Fall
Author: yami_faerie
Rating: PG-13? (there's swearing and stuff)
Genre/pairing: hurt/comfort, gen
Characters: Sam, Dean, Cas
Word count: approx. 2,000
Summary: Sam gets dosed with demon blood. Dean stays with him in the panic room as he detoxes and gets sick.
Spoilers: takes place a month after 5.14 "My Bloody Valentine"
Author's Note: Another from the Sneezy Sam comment-fic meme. The prompt is again from shangrilada: "On a hunt, Sam somehow gets dosed with demon blood, in front of Dean. Dean is obviously MAD MAD MAD MAD but not at Sam because it wasn't even a little his fault. They sit down in the panic room together and wait for it to get bad. And Sam gets sick from it--really really fucking sick, in Dean's opinion--but Sam keeps saying that it's going to get worse, that the other times he was detoxing were so so so much worse, and eventually he tells Dean about it and Dean cannot believe that he used to lock Sam down here alone."
Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural in any way, shape or form. So there.
There aren’t many things worse than a hunt gone sideways, but a hunt gone sideways that leaves Dean hauling a demon-blood-dosed Sam out of an abandoned warehouse would definitely be one of them.
Sam’s shivering violently in the passenger seat as the Impala roars down the interstate to Sioux Falls. “D-Dean,” he says. “H-h-hurts.”
The shivering is probably something more like muscle spasms or something, Dean doesn’t know. “We’re almost there,” he says shortly. “Don’t start hallucinating.”
Sam gives a jerky nod and wraps his arms around himself. “S-s-s-sorry.” He gives a pained groan and presses his forehead to the window.
“Don’t apologize,” Dean snaps, “it wasn’t your fault.”
Fucking group of demons grabbing Sam and bleeding all over his mouth and Dean can’t do a damn thing to stop them until Sam throws them off and bleeds one dry and sends the rest back to Hell and then Dean’s dragging Sam to the car and Sam’s moaning that he’s sorry, he didn’t want it but he fucking wants more, Dean make it stop get it out of me -
Sam starts scrambling for the door handle and Dean barely manages to pull the Impala over to the shoulder before Sam tumbles out and starts throwing up. Dean gets out and runs around to the other side of the car, catching Sam by his shoulders when he lurches to his feet, looking feverish and glassy-eyed.
“Fuck, Dean,” Sam’s saying, “I can’t do this, not again, not again don’t put me back down there, please…” His knees buckle and Dean barely manages to keep him upright.
“Sam,” Dean says quietly, “we’ve gotta get you clean, you know we’ve gotta do this.”
Sam’s breath hitches and he starts crying and shaking his head yes and no and he knows but he can’t. Dean grits his teeth and helps Sam back into the car.
They reach Bobby’s house ten minutes later. Two minutes after that, Sam’s locked up. The big difference between this time and the other two is that Dean locks himself in, too.
***
“Hate this,” Sam says morosely.
He’s a sweaty mess right now, making his hair limp and greasy. He’s propped up against one of the walls, and he’s not suffering muscle spasms anymore, but now he’s really shaky so Dean has to hold his cup when he sips at water.
“C-cold, Dean.”
That’s when Dean realizes Sam’s not shaky, he’s actually shivering, and pretty violently at that. Dean goes to the door and yells for Cas to bring him a thermometer.
Castiel’s grace is still draining, which means he doesn’t go flying off as often lately, so he obliges Dean and returns after a few minutes with a thermometer in hand. “Do you require anything else?” he asks quietly.
“Some more water,” Dean sighs, “maybe a washcloth.”
Castiel nods and makes his way out of the basement. Dean plops down next to Sam and sticks the thermometer in his mouth.
102.8. Fan-fucking-tastic.
“You’re sick,” Dean says with another sigh.
Sam shivers and moans out another apology. Stop apologizing, Sam, none of this is your fault, Dean’s not mad at you, he’s here and he isn’t going anywhere.
“I don’t think you got sick like this before,” Dean says, and Sam gives a jerky shake of his head.
“Usu-usually just s-sweaty and muscle cramps,” he tells Dean quietly. “Then the - the p-pain and the hallu-” He breaks off and starts coughing. “Hallucinations,” he manages weakly. “Bad.”
“It’s gonna get bad?” Dean asks, but he already knows the answer. He listened to Sam’s screams and pleas before, he cuffed Sam to the bed when it got bad, he drank until he couldn't hear Sam anymore. But the thing is, Sam deserves better than that. Sam’s never given up, and Dean still wants to, but right now, Sam’s more important.
Castiel returns with the things Dean asked for. “He’s getting sick this time,” Dean tells the angel as they funnel cold water through the bars and into Dean’s bowl.
“It has only been a month since the last time,” Cas replies. “I believe it’s causing more strain on Sam’s body as a result.”
“Awesome.” Dean rests his head against the iron door. “Fuck.”
Cas doesn’t say anything, but there is real sympathy in his blue eyes.
Sam keeps shivering on the floor.
***
“What do you see?” Dean asks Sam as he places a cold washcloth on his forehead. “When you hallucinate? You never said before.”
“You n-never asked,” Sam returns breathlessly before he starts coughing again.
Sam has a point, there.
“Right,” Dean says, scrubbing at his face tiredly. “Sam -”
“S’fine,” Sam cuts him off. He doesn’t look upset, just tired and sick.
Dean still kinda hates himself right now.
“It isn’t fine,” he tells Sam. “Nothing’s been fine for a while, man.”
Sam nods a little and coughs and shivers and twitches and Dean helps him drink more water.
“Alis-Alistair,” Sam mumbles a few minutes later.
“What?” Dean asks a little too sharply.
“Before,” Sam says, and Dean realizes that Sam must be talking about his hallucinations. “Alistair and… M-mom.”
“You saw Mom?” Dean asks quietly. “What did she say?”
Sam chuckles breathlessly, but it isn’t humorous at all. “P-proud a’me,” Sam says, and he looks so fucking sad right now. “A-and I talked to myself, but I was younger.” Sam coughs some more.
“How old were you?” Dean asks, curious in spite of himself.
“Fourteen, I-I think,” Sam replies. “I j-just wanted to be no-normal.”
There’s no such thing as normal, anymore.
Dean swallows hard. “What about when we found you flinging yourself all over the walls and I had to cuff you to the cot?”
Sam gives a shaky-shrug that looks more like a freaky twitch. “Don’ r’member. Bu-but I think you were there, too.”
Dean closes his eyes, praying that Sam isn’t saying what he thinks he’s saying. “You hallucinated me?”
Sam nods and Dean dunks the washcloth back into the cold water, wringing it out and returning it to his brother’s forehead.
“Y’said you hated me.”
Dean sits back and takes a deep breath. “I was angry. Before. I won’t deny that, but you were a mess and I was a mess and I didn’t know what to do.”
Sam slowly draws his legs up to his chest and pulls away from the washcloth. “Thought you were gonna hunt me.”
Dean blinks. “What? Sam, I said if I didn’t know you, sure, but I do know you.”
Sam shakes his head, coughs and wraps his shaking arms around his legs. “Tha’s n-not what you said later.”
Dean frowns. “Later when?”
Sam shivers and scrunches his eyes closed. “H-hurts,” he says. “D’n, s’getting worse, y’should g-go.”
“What did I say later?” Dean asks, ignoring what Sam said for the moment, but Sam gives a jerky shake of his head and abruptly shoves himself to his feet, weaving his way over to the cot and sinking onto it, his back to Dean.
Dean clenches his jaw and rises. “Sam,” he says, but Sam’s rocking himself now, arms wrapped around his chest and mumbling to himself. Dean moves closer and realizes that Sam’s saying the same thing over and over and over again.
“No more no more no more no more no more nomorenomorenomorenomore -”
“Sam!” Dean snaps, seizing his brother’s shoulders tightly and shaking him a little. “Sam, please -”
“You said you were done tryin’ to save me,” Sam shouts, suddenly pushing Dean away and staggering to his feet again. “You don’ trust me, you’re prob’ly waiting for me to give in and say ‘yes’ and -” He breaks off into a million coughs and god, Dean does not want to do this right now.
Sam leans against the wall and runs shaky hands through messy hair. “Go,” he chokes out. “Please.”
But Dean can’t. Not this time.
“I was never done,” he says softly and pinches the bridge of his nose.
Sam doesn’t hear him, and Dean’s heart breaks a little bit more.
***
Sam coughs and moans for a while, and Dean manages to coax him back onto the cot so he can get the washcloth back on his forehead, but they don’t really talk for the next hour.
“How bad does it hurt?” Dean finds himself asking. “The withdrawals?”
Sam isn’t looking at Dean. He’s turned on his side, facing away. “Bad,” he says quietly. “Did… y-y-you never listened, before?”
Dean swallows hard. “I was usually well on my way to drunk by the time that started,” he admits.
Sam doesn’t say anything for a few minutes. “I-it burns all over,” he says at last. “And I get th-thirsty as fuck but then” - he pauses to cough several times and groans - “I keep s-seeing things and I don’t know wh-what’s real an’ what isn’t, and sometimes I j-just sit when it hurts less, but all I want is more so I can just - just stop it.”
He begins to cough again and curls up.
Dean sits and silently wonders why the hell he always left Sam in here to deal with this all by himself.
Sam moans into the thin mattress and shivers some more.
***
The hallucinations start soon after, and it’s bad.
Sam is in pain the entire time, yelling, writing, screaming in pain, begging for the pain to stop, begging for forgiveness.
“I never wanted this!” he yells at no one. “Why the fuck didn’t you just kill me?”
Dean doesn’t want to hear any of this. He wants to drink until his passes out.
But he doesn’t. Dean stays in the panic room with Sam for eighteen hours while Castiel brings water, granola bars, even a thin blanket.
Sam’s fever climbs to 105 and Dean tries very, very hard not to panic. He thinks he may have to haul Sam upstairs for a cool bath if it goes on for much longer. Sam is barely sweating anymore. He mostly flops around on the cot and cries silently into the mattress and it breaks Dean’s heart to watch it all, every second.
It’s hour twenty when Sam’s fever breaks along with the worst of the delirium. Dean insists that Sam needs to go upstairs to get clean and get some fluids into him so he doesn’t get any more dehydrated than he already is.
“M’not done yet,” Sam tries to protest, but Dean is sure that the worst is over. He remembers that Sam went about this long before the screams stopped last time, but Dean knows there’s still another two days to go before Sam regains his strength.
Dean’s losing hope in terms of stopping the Apocalypse without saying ‘yes’ to Michael, but right now, he has a little brother to focus on, a little brother who’s still somehow determined not to give up.
***
“Sam,” Dean says when they finally leave Bobby’s place three days later, “before, when you said I was done tryin’ to save you -”
Sam tenses up. “Forget it,” he says at once.
“Sam,” Dean says, and his brother finally looks at him. Dean sighs and rubs his mouth hard. “We’re family. You don’t just give up on family, no matter what.”
Sam nods, but he still doesn’t look reassured. “When did I say I was done, anyway?” Dean asks. “I remember tellin’ not to walk out that door -”
“Your voicemail,” Sam cuts in quietly. “The night I… you know.”
Dean frowns, thinking back to that night. “I don’t remember sayin’ anything like that,” he says. “I said I was mad, but that we’re still family.”
Sam shakes his head and pulls out his phone. “No,” he says, “Dean, you didn’t say that at all.”
He dials his voicemail and plays a message Dean doesn’t recognize despite the fact that it’s his voice.
“Listen to me, you bloodsucking freak. Dad always said I'd either have to save you or kill you. Well, I'm giving you fair warning. I'm done trying to save you. You're a monster, Sam - a vampire. You're not you anymore. And there's no going back."
Dean doesn’t understand. “I never said that,” he blurts. “Sam, I-I never said any of that.”
Sam’s expression is a mix of disbelief, resignation and maybe even hope. Dean pulls the Impala over to the side of the road and turns to face him.
“I never said that,” Dean repeats more firmly. “I said I was mad and I owed you a beatdown, but that we’re still family and I was… sorry.”
Sam opens his mouth a little like he might speak, but nothing comes out.
“Sam,” Dean says, and he knows he has to get this out here and now, “everything’s so fucked up right now, and maybe I still worry that the only thing we’ll be able to do is become angel condoms and destroy the planet, but there is nothing you’ve done that could ever make me think you’re past saving. You hear me? Nothing.”
Sam swallows hard, blinks several times and looks away. “Okay,” he whispers, voice rough. Dean knows he wants to cry. Dean thinks that maybe he’s allowed this time.
He turns on the radio and starts driving, but he also takes a moment to clasp Sam’s shoulder and squeeze it. He puts all the other things he wishes he knew how to say into it.
Based on the teary smile he gets in return, Sam understands every last word.
END
Author: yami_faerie
Rating: PG-13? (there's swearing and stuff)
Genre/pairing: hurt/comfort, gen
Characters: Sam, Dean, Cas
Word count: approx. 2,000
Summary: Sam gets dosed with demon blood. Dean stays with him in the panic room as he detoxes and gets sick.
Spoilers: takes place a month after 5.14 "My Bloody Valentine"
Author's Note: Another from the Sneezy Sam comment-fic meme. The prompt is again from shangrilada: "On a hunt, Sam somehow gets dosed with demon blood, in front of Dean. Dean is obviously MAD MAD MAD MAD but not at Sam because it wasn't even a little his fault. They sit down in the panic room together and wait for it to get bad. And Sam gets sick from it--really really fucking sick, in Dean's opinion--but Sam keeps saying that it's going to get worse, that the other times he was detoxing were so so so much worse, and eventually he tells Dean about it and Dean cannot believe that he used to lock Sam down here alone."
Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural in any way, shape or form. So there.
There aren’t many things worse than a hunt gone sideways, but a hunt gone sideways that leaves Dean hauling a demon-blood-dosed Sam out of an abandoned warehouse would definitely be one of them.
Sam’s shivering violently in the passenger seat as the Impala roars down the interstate to Sioux Falls. “D-Dean,” he says. “H-h-hurts.”
The shivering is probably something more like muscle spasms or something, Dean doesn’t know. “We’re almost there,” he says shortly. “Don’t start hallucinating.”
Sam gives a jerky nod and wraps his arms around himself. “S-s-s-sorry.” He gives a pained groan and presses his forehead to the window.
“Don’t apologize,” Dean snaps, “it wasn’t your fault.”
Fucking group of demons grabbing Sam and bleeding all over his mouth and Dean can’t do a damn thing to stop them until Sam throws them off and bleeds one dry and sends the rest back to Hell and then Dean’s dragging Sam to the car and Sam’s moaning that he’s sorry, he didn’t want it but he fucking wants more, Dean make it stop get it out of me -
Sam starts scrambling for the door handle and Dean barely manages to pull the Impala over to the shoulder before Sam tumbles out and starts throwing up. Dean gets out and runs around to the other side of the car, catching Sam by his shoulders when he lurches to his feet, looking feverish and glassy-eyed.
“Fuck, Dean,” Sam’s saying, “I can’t do this, not again, not again don’t put me back down there, please…” His knees buckle and Dean barely manages to keep him upright.
“Sam,” Dean says quietly, “we’ve gotta get you clean, you know we’ve gotta do this.”
Sam’s breath hitches and he starts crying and shaking his head yes and no and he knows but he can’t. Dean grits his teeth and helps Sam back into the car.
They reach Bobby’s house ten minutes later. Two minutes after that, Sam’s locked up. The big difference between this time and the other two is that Dean locks himself in, too.
***
“Hate this,” Sam says morosely.
He’s a sweaty mess right now, making his hair limp and greasy. He’s propped up against one of the walls, and he’s not suffering muscle spasms anymore, but now he’s really shaky so Dean has to hold his cup when he sips at water.
“C-cold, Dean.”
That’s when Dean realizes Sam’s not shaky, he’s actually shivering, and pretty violently at that. Dean goes to the door and yells for Cas to bring him a thermometer.
Castiel’s grace is still draining, which means he doesn’t go flying off as often lately, so he obliges Dean and returns after a few minutes with a thermometer in hand. “Do you require anything else?” he asks quietly.
“Some more water,” Dean sighs, “maybe a washcloth.”
Castiel nods and makes his way out of the basement. Dean plops down next to Sam and sticks the thermometer in his mouth.
102.8. Fan-fucking-tastic.
“You’re sick,” Dean says with another sigh.
Sam shivers and moans out another apology. Stop apologizing, Sam, none of this is your fault, Dean’s not mad at you, he’s here and he isn’t going anywhere.
“I don’t think you got sick like this before,” Dean says, and Sam gives a jerky shake of his head.
“Usu-usually just s-sweaty and muscle cramps,” he tells Dean quietly. “Then the - the p-pain and the hallu-” He breaks off and starts coughing. “Hallucinations,” he manages weakly. “Bad.”
“It’s gonna get bad?” Dean asks, but he already knows the answer. He listened to Sam’s screams and pleas before, he cuffed Sam to the bed when it got bad, he drank until he couldn't hear Sam anymore. But the thing is, Sam deserves better than that. Sam’s never given up, and Dean still wants to, but right now, Sam’s more important.
Castiel returns with the things Dean asked for. “He’s getting sick this time,” Dean tells the angel as they funnel cold water through the bars and into Dean’s bowl.
“It has only been a month since the last time,” Cas replies. “I believe it’s causing more strain on Sam’s body as a result.”
“Awesome.” Dean rests his head against the iron door. “Fuck.”
Cas doesn’t say anything, but there is real sympathy in his blue eyes.
Sam keeps shivering on the floor.
***
“What do you see?” Dean asks Sam as he places a cold washcloth on his forehead. “When you hallucinate? You never said before.”
“You n-never asked,” Sam returns breathlessly before he starts coughing again.
Sam has a point, there.
“Right,” Dean says, scrubbing at his face tiredly. “Sam -”
“S’fine,” Sam cuts him off. He doesn’t look upset, just tired and sick.
Dean still kinda hates himself right now.
“It isn’t fine,” he tells Sam. “Nothing’s been fine for a while, man.”
Sam nods a little and coughs and shivers and twitches and Dean helps him drink more water.
“Alis-Alistair,” Sam mumbles a few minutes later.
“What?” Dean asks a little too sharply.
“Before,” Sam says, and Dean realizes that Sam must be talking about his hallucinations. “Alistair and… M-mom.”
“You saw Mom?” Dean asks quietly. “What did she say?”
Sam chuckles breathlessly, but it isn’t humorous at all. “P-proud a’me,” Sam says, and he looks so fucking sad right now. “A-and I talked to myself, but I was younger.” Sam coughs some more.
“How old were you?” Dean asks, curious in spite of himself.
“Fourteen, I-I think,” Sam replies. “I j-just wanted to be no-normal.”
There’s no such thing as normal, anymore.
Dean swallows hard. “What about when we found you flinging yourself all over the walls and I had to cuff you to the cot?”
Sam gives a shaky-shrug that looks more like a freaky twitch. “Don’ r’member. Bu-but I think you were there, too.”
Dean closes his eyes, praying that Sam isn’t saying what he thinks he’s saying. “You hallucinated me?”
Sam nods and Dean dunks the washcloth back into the cold water, wringing it out and returning it to his brother’s forehead.
“Y’said you hated me.”
Dean sits back and takes a deep breath. “I was angry. Before. I won’t deny that, but you were a mess and I was a mess and I didn’t know what to do.”
Sam slowly draws his legs up to his chest and pulls away from the washcloth. “Thought you were gonna hunt me.”
Dean blinks. “What? Sam, I said if I didn’t know you, sure, but I do know you.”
Sam shakes his head, coughs and wraps his shaking arms around his legs. “Tha’s n-not what you said later.”
Dean frowns. “Later when?”
Sam shivers and scrunches his eyes closed. “H-hurts,” he says. “D’n, s’getting worse, y’should g-go.”
“What did I say later?” Dean asks, ignoring what Sam said for the moment, but Sam gives a jerky shake of his head and abruptly shoves himself to his feet, weaving his way over to the cot and sinking onto it, his back to Dean.
Dean clenches his jaw and rises. “Sam,” he says, but Sam’s rocking himself now, arms wrapped around his chest and mumbling to himself. Dean moves closer and realizes that Sam’s saying the same thing over and over and over again.
“No more no more no more no more no more nomorenomorenomorenomore -”
“Sam!” Dean snaps, seizing his brother’s shoulders tightly and shaking him a little. “Sam, please -”
“You said you were done tryin’ to save me,” Sam shouts, suddenly pushing Dean away and staggering to his feet again. “You don’ trust me, you’re prob’ly waiting for me to give in and say ‘yes’ and -” He breaks off into a million coughs and god, Dean does not want to do this right now.
Sam leans against the wall and runs shaky hands through messy hair. “Go,” he chokes out. “Please.”
But Dean can’t. Not this time.
“I was never done,” he says softly and pinches the bridge of his nose.
Sam doesn’t hear him, and Dean’s heart breaks a little bit more.
***
Sam coughs and moans for a while, and Dean manages to coax him back onto the cot so he can get the washcloth back on his forehead, but they don’t really talk for the next hour.
“How bad does it hurt?” Dean finds himself asking. “The withdrawals?”
Sam isn’t looking at Dean. He’s turned on his side, facing away. “Bad,” he says quietly. “Did… y-y-you never listened, before?”
Dean swallows hard. “I was usually well on my way to drunk by the time that started,” he admits.
Sam doesn’t say anything for a few minutes. “I-it burns all over,” he says at last. “And I get th-thirsty as fuck but then” - he pauses to cough several times and groans - “I keep s-seeing things and I don’t know wh-what’s real an’ what isn’t, and sometimes I j-just sit when it hurts less, but all I want is more so I can just - just stop it.”
He begins to cough again and curls up.
Dean sits and silently wonders why the hell he always left Sam in here to deal with this all by himself.
Sam moans into the thin mattress and shivers some more.
***
The hallucinations start soon after, and it’s bad.
Sam is in pain the entire time, yelling, writing, screaming in pain, begging for the pain to stop, begging for forgiveness.
“I never wanted this!” he yells at no one. “Why the fuck didn’t you just kill me?”
Dean doesn’t want to hear any of this. He wants to drink until his passes out.
But he doesn’t. Dean stays in the panic room with Sam for eighteen hours while Castiel brings water, granola bars, even a thin blanket.
Sam’s fever climbs to 105 and Dean tries very, very hard not to panic. He thinks he may have to haul Sam upstairs for a cool bath if it goes on for much longer. Sam is barely sweating anymore. He mostly flops around on the cot and cries silently into the mattress and it breaks Dean’s heart to watch it all, every second.
It’s hour twenty when Sam’s fever breaks along with the worst of the delirium. Dean insists that Sam needs to go upstairs to get clean and get some fluids into him so he doesn’t get any more dehydrated than he already is.
“M’not done yet,” Sam tries to protest, but Dean is sure that the worst is over. He remembers that Sam went about this long before the screams stopped last time, but Dean knows there’s still another two days to go before Sam regains his strength.
Dean’s losing hope in terms of stopping the Apocalypse without saying ‘yes’ to Michael, but right now, he has a little brother to focus on, a little brother who’s still somehow determined not to give up.
***
“Sam,” Dean says when they finally leave Bobby’s place three days later, “before, when you said I was done tryin’ to save you -”
Sam tenses up. “Forget it,” he says at once.
“Sam,” Dean says, and his brother finally looks at him. Dean sighs and rubs his mouth hard. “We’re family. You don’t just give up on family, no matter what.”
Sam nods, but he still doesn’t look reassured. “When did I say I was done, anyway?” Dean asks. “I remember tellin’ not to walk out that door -”
“Your voicemail,” Sam cuts in quietly. “The night I… you know.”
Dean frowns, thinking back to that night. “I don’t remember sayin’ anything like that,” he says. “I said I was mad, but that we’re still family.”
Sam shakes his head and pulls out his phone. “No,” he says, “Dean, you didn’t say that at all.”
He dials his voicemail and plays a message Dean doesn’t recognize despite the fact that it’s his voice.
“Listen to me, you bloodsucking freak. Dad always said I'd either have to save you or kill you. Well, I'm giving you fair warning. I'm done trying to save you. You're a monster, Sam - a vampire. You're not you anymore. And there's no going back."
Dean doesn’t understand. “I never said that,” he blurts. “Sam, I-I never said any of that.”
Sam’s expression is a mix of disbelief, resignation and maybe even hope. Dean pulls the Impala over to the side of the road and turns to face him.
“I never said that,” Dean repeats more firmly. “I said I was mad and I owed you a beatdown, but that we’re still family and I was… sorry.”
Sam opens his mouth a little like he might speak, but nothing comes out.
“Sam,” Dean says, and he knows he has to get this out here and now, “everything’s so fucked up right now, and maybe I still worry that the only thing we’ll be able to do is become angel condoms and destroy the planet, but there is nothing you’ve done that could ever make me think you’re past saving. You hear me? Nothing.”
Sam swallows hard, blinks several times and looks away. “Okay,” he whispers, voice rough. Dean knows he wants to cry. Dean thinks that maybe he’s allowed this time.
He turns on the radio and starts driving, but he also takes a moment to clasp Sam’s shoulder and squeeze it. He puts all the other things he wishes he knew how to say into it.
Based on the teary smile he gets in return, Sam understands every last word.
END