Under my skin, part 2
One | Two | Three
Driving is actually a little easier now. With a set of eyes on either side of the car, they can meet their sights at the middle of the lane and keep the Impala perfectly centered.
That is, until Sam glances away from the road and over to the laundromat across the street. Dean jerks at the sudden change in scenery. "Fuck! Eyes closed or on the road, Sammy, I'm dead serious."
Dean sees the guilt under Sam's response of "Dude, chill," as he closes his eyes and lets Dean see enough of their surroundings for both of them.
He grins. "You're totally transparent."
They pull into the library's parking lot, about ten miles from their motel. Dean tries to lag behind solely on principle, but Sam just tugs him along and that's that.
The library is nearly empty, same as the other day. The librarian greets them with a pleasant smile, and she's much younger and cuter than the one from before. Dean lets his eyes linger on how her milky pale breasts curve above the neckline of her blouse and lets himself imagine, if just for a moment, what it would be like to pop the buttons open one two three four five and wrench her head back by her hair pull on it until she gasps then rub his cock through that tight line between her breasts. Dean snaps his eyes over to Sam, who stops the thought in its track and looks back guiltily. Dean grins and punches him on the arm. "Keep it in your pants!" he thinks to him. Sam blushes and purses his lips.
Their table near the science fiction section is free again and Dean insists on sitting at it. Sam goes straight for the local newspaper archive on the computer and dives right in. Dean knows he should be helping, but Sam actually likes doing this and has a better idea of what to look for, so he just pulls out his dice.
Seven dice, all black and white, all the same exact size. He rolls them on a New Yorker magazine to dull the noise. Double fours, the one is good, he'll roll that three again, three fives are fifteen and those are no good either. He takes the bad dice and rolls them again.
He plays until he either wins or loses. He bends his rules to accept certain multiples, discards the ones he has a bad feeling about, shuffles them around. And then he either wins or loses. He plays for probably fifteen more minutes, just rolling dice and counting numbers and winning or losing and barely takes notice of Sam's frustration. Sam is always frustrated over something.
It's a really good round but Sam doesn't seem to care because the frustration spikes and he slams his pen against the table. "Dean!"
Dean looks up sharply at the noise. "What?"
"That game doesn't make any sense! Either play something with real rules, or cut it out!"
Dean knows that Sam understands the rules, because Dean understands them. What Dean knows Sam knows, so he doesn't see what the problem is.
"Because it's not supposed to make sense. The rules are arbitrary and depend on your whims and compulsions rather than a real structure!" Sam sighs and rubs his forehead. "Just, please, not while I'm trying to concentrate on something else?"
Dean nods, even though he's a little stung by the whole exchange. Sam is sorry but doesn't take back what he said.
He digs around for a few newspapers at Sam's command and doesn't complain because it's not like he has anything better to do. Sam is piece-by-piece trying to find others who caught this ghost ship curse and actually survived it, people who learned to live with constantly having someone else in his or her head.
Dean eventually gets sick of waiting around, so he looks closer at the dates that are buzzing around Sam's head, the years and people and hints and-
-and all of a sudden it clicks.
"Sam! Sam, there's a pattern! We just missed it because we've only found about half of it." Dean tries to sketch out the pattern in his head but his thoughts are moving too fast for even him to follow.
"Okay, so it's pretty weird. There are two sets of years the curse cycles through, overlapping each other. Starting in 1922, the year after it went down, someone must have caught it every five years, but at the same time, it was also repeating every eight. It was documented in '22 but not '27, and then again in '32 and '37, skipping '42, again in '47. Nobody drowned in 1930, or '38, but they did in '46, '54 and '62."
"Oh." Sam sees it now but he never would have on his own, and he doesn't get how Dean saw himself.
"It's just the patterns. Sam, I see patterns, that's what I do. Everything has a pattern."
"Okay. Then in that case, we know there must be people who have survived the curse, because a numerical pattern makes too much sense even if this one seems unduly tricky. If we can just find someone else that got it? Dean, if we just find someone else, they can tell us what to expect, tell us if it gets worse, if they figured out a way to make it stop!"
Dean looks over. Sam is so excited, so sure that the answer lies with finding someone who has survived this. "But how are we going to find record of survivors? The only way you were able to find the people that died from it was by figuring out where they killed themselves and piecing it together with psychological symptoms that they showed beforehand, which were only publicized because it was part of the whole suicide package. Without the suicide, going crazy wouldn't have made the headlines."
Sam leafs through some of his print-offs as if the answer is just going to jump out at him. Dates, names and relationships are all circling through his head at an ungodly speed, so fast it's making Dean dizzy. "But some people mentioned seeing a ghost ship, so if I looked through old blogs or journals or…"
"But that would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. There have been so many wrecks here that there must be other ghost ships, so how would you even know if they saw the right one?" Dean rubs his forehead to try to stave off the headache that must have come from Sam. "Want to just get out of here and come back tomorrow? We got a late start so it's about to close anyways."
Sam nods but the humiliation and anger of giving up, if even only for the night, is stifling.
"Sam," Dean says quietly and tries to send as much calm his way as he can. "We're going to be okay. Please don't freak out."
The silence stretches for a time while Sam stacks his anger into neat piles one on top of another and pushes it all into a corner. When it's done he doesn't have to acknowledge it anymore, so he gives a small smile and is good enough again. "Do you have anything in mind or are we just going back to the motel?"
"Let's go get something to eat, maybe have a few beers. We should take advantage of all the lonely women on vacation, Sammy!"
His eyes must be glazing over because he's thinking about all the things he'd love to do to a beautiful girl tonight and he has a habit of staring off into space at times like these. He could eat her out so messy that he slides right in, take her from behind against the wall out back bite her shoulder fuck her so hard her feet come off the ground hold her tight tight tight so she can't go anywhere fast and she'd take it so well, moaning and moving like she can't get enough fingernails digging in and she's coming apart at the seams.
Dean coughs and adjusts himself in his pants, not even trying to hide it because Sam can tell anyways. "That was awkward," he thinks, because he can't tell what part of that was his and what was Sam's and now their fantasies are getting tangled up with each other's for fuck's sake. Sam shifts a little, moves his shoulders around because he isn't exactly sure where they're supposed to be right now, what emotion they're supposed to convey for this incredibly weird situation.
"Hey, dude, it's not a big deal," Dean says, discarding the awkwardness since some things are more important than that, like making sure his little brother doesn't start feeling guilty over stuff that's out of his control. "It's not like I didn't tell you everything back when we were teenagers, right? Now you'll get to see me in action, too. You might pick something up for once!"
Sam grimaces and says "Dean, grow some tact."
Every bar and diner and restaurant they pass on the way back from the library is packed with tourists. Most of the places are way too overpriced even for D. Hasselhoff's card and nobody in those places are looking for a quick hookup, so in the end they decide to play it safe. They park the Impala back at the motel and walk about half a mile to a small dive where the music is loud and the beer is relatively cheap. Dusk is just falling and the night is still young. "We've survived nearly two days of this shit," he thinks.
They sit in a low-lit corner and order burgers and beers, plus a salad for Sam and a couple shots of whiskey for Dean. They sit back and chat and eye all the girls walking past, except this is a whole new kind of weird since Sam, apparently, has a completely overactive imagination to compensate for his problem of never getting laid.
Dean has always loved undressing hot girls with his eyes, imagining what she would look like without her small dress and what he could do to her to make her scream, but Sam takes it to a whole new goddamn level. Almost every cute girl he sees, and some that aren't quite as such, he mentally strips down and bends over the nearest surface, fucks her tight pussy or her ass or her glossy mouth, all in fleeting mentions and subconscious thoughts, as if he can't help himself.
The first time wasn't completely unexpected, because holy shit Dean was looking at her like that too, all hourglass figure and ash-blonde hair and blue eyes and pouty lips. After the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh time it happened he grew more and more amused.
"Dude, I've known you your entire life and you'd think I wouldn't be surprised by anything you do anymore, Sammy, but damn. What the hell are you doing as such a monk? You have way too much repressed sexual energy to be healthy." There's a frantic, horny vibration in the tips of his fingers and the back of his mouth that nothing, not even acknowledgment from Dean, is damping.
Sam shrugs, taps a beat on the tabletop, but his mind cycles through "I still miss Jess. It's nerve-wracking to talk to girls in bars because I won't ever actually know them. What if she's someone I'd hate? It's so awkward and I never figured out how to make instantaneous connections with just anybody."
"That's why you stop thinking with your upstairs brain and let your downstairs brain take over. Sammy! You need some action in your life, man."
Sam shakes his head tightly, and even without the curse it would be obvious to Dean that he's uncomfortable and nervous. He can feel the little security bubble Sam's built up around himself that keeps out intruders people he doesn't know they can get in and hurt him and they're not safe only Dean is safe.
Dean swirls his beer around, then puts it down in favor of his third shot. "Whatever floats your boat, but let me tell you, it's even better in real life." He eats peanuts in counts of two, crunch munch, and tries not to look at Sam too closely.
"Yes, Dean, I remember. It's not like I've never gotten laid before."
"Well it's obviously been too long."
Neither of them can help being horny at this point. They're both periodically shifting in their seats and adjusting the inseam of their jeans. It's fucking embarrassing, is what it is, but that doesn't keep Dean's eyes off those girls' legs, or stop him from thinking what they'd feel like wrapped around his waist. He shouldn't be this turned on when his brother is watching from inside his head, but he's always been a bit of a showoff.
Sam scoffs. "That's for sure."
Dean throws a french fry at him. "Oh shut up."
Sam picks the french fry off his jacket and eats it. Dean feels his hesitation to say something, so he silently urges him on. "Look, it's getting a little late, so I'm going to head back to the motel. I didn't get my mid-morning princess nap like some of us, so I'm just going to…" He cuts off and blushes, realizes that it's no use wasting breath on white lies. He's still humming with tension and a bar full of hot girls obviously didn't do anything to lessen it.
"Going to go back and jerk off?" Dean asks with a shit-eating grin. "Good on you. Think it'll make you less bitchy tomorrow?"
Sam rolls his eyes. "Fuck off. Go get laid or something, and try not to bother me too much with it."
"I'll land the prettiest girl here, just for you," Dean says. "It's not like you're willing to go the extra mile to get someone in bed, so you might as well live vicariously through me." He rolls the base of his beer bottle around on the table, around and around, and concentrates on that instead of Sam's face because that was kind of weird even for them, and he doesn't know how Sam will take it.
Sam just raises an eyebrow and chuckles. "That statement was way too well-adjusted for you, Dean. Look at you, all accepting of our situation and shit." He finishes his beer and stands up. "I'm out of here. Don't stay out too late."
"Yes, mom."
Sam walks out and seizes up whenever anyone brushes up against him. The air outside is balmy and refreshing compared to the stifling bar, but Dean concentrates on ignoring all sensory perceptions coming from Sam since it's completely distracting when he's not right next to him. Instead, he gets up and walks over to the girl Sam had been staring at in particular all night, the one with the hourglass figure and ash-blonde hair and blue eyes and pouty lips.
"Hey," he says with a smile, tries to make it look honest and and friendly. "Can I buy you a drink?"
It only takes him about ten minutes to get Gloria practically eating out of his hand. She's grinning boldly and pushes her breasts together even tighter and steps just a little closer. She likes math and ancient civilizations and birds, but when she starts to ask who he had been with earlier and what he did for a living, he puts his hand on her waist, slides it up and down the sleek material of her dress and says "Hey, want to take this somewhere else?"
She smiles, then reaches over to grab a napkin to wipe her lipstick off with. "Yeah, I do. Is out back good enough for you? My sister works early tomorrow so my place isn't a great option."
Dean grins. "That's the best damn idea I've heard all night." He runs a hand across her bare shoulders, rubs circles with his thumb one two three four, her skin so soft compared to his hard calluses, then pulls her tight to his side. "Shall we?"
Sam had gotten back the the motel room a few minutes ago, stripped down and is now brushing his teeth. He's concentrating so hard on Dean and Gloria, an all-consuming concentration that he hardly even registers spitting the toothpaste and sliding into bed.
Dean leads Gloria into the single-occupancy men's room and locks the door behind them. He pulls her close to him, runs his fingers through her hair once twice thrice and again, then gives it a sharp tug. She gasps but smiles immediately after. Dean slides his hands down down the steep curve of her back until they rest on the perfect swell of her ass. He grabs ahold and pulls her even closer, even tighter so he can grind into her, quick jerks and small circles.
Sam is stretched out in bed now, so deliciously turned on. He rubs his cock through his boxers, pulling on it and teasing the head gently with the thin cotton. His eyes are closed and he leans into each pass of his hand, lets out a huff of breath every time his arousal trips up and up. Dean feels every movement spike deep in his stomach.
Gloria reaches up to knead her fingers on Dean's neck, then pulls him down to kiss him. She opens her mouth immediately, drinks him in. He kisses her back, controlled and steady but with a hint of teeth.
Sam is almost all the way hard now. He's eased his cock out of his boxers, which he then pushes off his legs. His touch is a little tentative, kind of teasing.
"Just go for it, Sammy," Dean thinks as he starts to get his hands up under her dress. "It's like when we were younger and you would watch sometimes. Peeking through the door or pretending to be asleep in the motel. You were such a little perv, huh Sam?"
Sam gasps in a sudden breath and jerks himself faster. "Stop messing around and fuck her already!" he thinks, then takes enough control over Dean's body to hike Gloria's dress up past her waist and to spin her around. He makes Dean press her up against the wall and sink to his knees behind her. He gives back most of the control and watches as Dean flicks his tongue forward to taste her. She gasps and tries to roll her hips back into Dean's mouth but his hands on her waist keep her steady.
He darts in again and goes for her clit, burying his mouth deep between her legs to reach it from behind. He sucks it between his lips and worries it with his tongue. Gloria pants and her legs are trembling like she wants to slide down to the floor and fall apart. She's so wet and it's smearing all around his mouth and nose; he's going to smell like her for hours. The idea of that only makes him press closer and lick harder.
He lets go with one hand so he can reach down and rub his cock through his jeans. He pops the button and draws down the zipper so he can pull it out and finally finally wrap his hand around it. It's so damn good and he bucks up into his hand. He's been wound tightly for long enough that this is making fire slam through every pore. Everything that Sam feels Dean feels just as strongly. His pent-up sex drive, his over-sensitive skin, his buried frustration and his tight stomach are all superimposed into Dean's head and it sends him spiraling further and deeper into themselves.
Sam is sprawled out in his bed completely blissed out, rubbing his hard cock and smearing the precome around, his mouth open as if there was a girl riding his face. "Please Dean, please," Sam begs, trying to stand up in Dean's body but too lost in pleasure to get the coordination right.
"Oh god," Dean thinks and his mouth goes slack against the inside of Gloria's thigh. His stomach feels like it just collapsed with filth and disgust and so goddamn hot he can't remember how to breathe. "Fucking hell, Sammy."
Gloria is a begging, whimpering mess against the bathroom wall, her legs and stomach weak against Dean's hands. He stands up and takes a moment to take out and roll on a condom, then wraps an arm around her waist to help keep her upright. He leans forward far enough to bite her ear, a warning of sorts, and starts to slide his cock into her.
Dean thrusts forward shallowly, sinking in and out and in and farther and in until he's finally deep deep in her, all the way as far as he can. Gloria is breathing hard and she shifts around to try to adjust. Dean rocks back and forth minutely, keeping mostly still but trying to relieve some of the maddening arousal. He drags his hands over her beautifully soft skin to tease a nipple, then dips a hand down to rub at her clit and to touch the stretched skin where his cock is pushed so deep into her.
She rubs herself back on Dean, panting and whining and unbelievably slick. Sam clenches his teeth way too tight and almost stops breathing from the sheer ecstasy, because months of getting off with just your hand is months of knowing what you're missing, and oh fuck this is what he had been missing. His skin is so hot it feels like it's dissolving off and he's writhing on the bed like a starved addict. It's like being his younger, voyeuristic self again, hungry to know everything about Dean, except he's touching the girl himself, touching her right alongside his big brother.
Dean fucks up into Gloria harder because this right here is driving him absolutely insane. He knew from the start that this would be weird, a little too intimate for their comfort levels, but he didn't think of how Sam would be right there, or how he would feel his brother fall apart because of him. He fucks her while Sam fucks his fist and they're both panting hard, Sam into his hand and Dean into Gloria's neck.
Sam bullies his way into Dean's control until he can trap Gloria's wrists in front of her with one hand and wrenches her head back by her hair. He lowers Dean's mouth to bite her, not hard enough to hurt but hard enough that she clenches her entire body tighter tighter and oh right there that feels like heaven. He fucks her a little rougher and tightens his arm around her torso.
She's so slick and so hot and so soft and Sam's breathy moans fill Dean's head. Sam rubs his thumb over the head of his cock he's so close and again and again because he knows what Dean likes most, then comes hard enough for Dean to feel it under his tongue. Sam pulses into his hand as he works himself through it. His mind goes completely blank for the first time since this whole crazy thing started.
Dean rubs Gloria's clit almost brutally. Sam's orgasm is still curling his toes, and it makes his fingers clumsy and uncoordinated, but she shudders and keens anyways. Dean falters and then his tightly-reined control slips away and he comes deep inside and so damn hot. The pleasure breaks his head open and freezes his limbs. Gloria comes a few moments later, and the way she clenches down and violently shoves herself back on his cock sends him reeling.
"Oh god oh god oh god," Sam whimpers as the aftershocks wreak havoc through his body. It's too much way too painful and he bites his lip to distract him from fire burning Dean oh fuck too much.
The world stops for a minute while Dean catches his breath. He pants into the bare skin of Gloria's shoulder, feels his hot breath reflected right back at him, then pulls out. He peels off the condom and drops it into the trash and zips his wet, softening cock back into his pants. Gloria turns around to smile at him and adjust her clothes back to the way they were in front of the mirror. Her makeup is a little smudged and her eyes are wild.
Gloria pulls Dean down for a wet, shallow kiss, tugs on his hair to bring him closer. Dean smiles against her lips and curls his tongue against hers, slow and playful. She pulls away too soon for Dean's liking and ducks out of reach when he tries to lean in again. She picks her lipstick out of her purse and reapplies the dark red color to her mouth in three graceful swipes.
Dean had his hand on her hip but he pulls it away when she clips her bag closed. "Can I buy you another drink?" he asks with a smile.
Gloria grins back, and her mouth is so much wider and expressive with lipstick. "No thanks, babe. I have to get going home soon. Thanks for the awesome time." She grabs his hand and presses a lipstick mark to his knuckles, then walks out of the bathroom.
Dean follows after a moment and tries not to think about Sam too much. He bypasses a last round at the bar and slowly makes his way back to the motel.
His plan of not thinking about Sam becomes a moot point when he gets back to their room. Sam is laying under the sheet of the far bed, nodding off to sleep.
"Dude, you reek," he says instead of a greeting.
Dean rolls his eyes and collapses on his bed. "You're welcome." He flips his shoes off with his toes and sinks into a light-headed, content sleep.
Dean wakes up first. The light coming in from around the curtains is turning from dawn to daylight, and it's getting way too bright.
He looks over at Sam, who is still sleeping soundly. He really doesn't want to talk about last night with Sam today so he puts the memory as far from his mind as he can and protects it with a wall of evasion. He doesn't get out of bed yet, just stays under the blankets and stares at the ceiling and listens to Sam's dreams.
They aren't terribly interesting dreams, which is funny, because Dean sort of assumed that Sam dreamed in parallel universes or in arcane languages or in sunny, wild adventures in California.
Instead, he woke up after being asleep for hours in the Impala while Dean drove from coast to coast. In another, which only lasted for about six seconds before moving on, he poured a shot of whiskey and holy water for dad. Then he slips into a completely different consciousness and Dean doesn't even register his dreams anymore.
And it's not like Sam is awake, right? So his brain forgets about the ban he put on examining what he and Sam did last night, and he trips right into the thick of it.
He fucked Gloria and she was hot, but Sam had watched and felt all of it, and it had been uncomfortably intimate for them. Dean's stomach flips over. He doesn't want to think about Sam like this because it's awkward and his mouth tastes like bile and it might possibly possibly have been kind of arousing.
Dean proves unsuccessful at not thinking about all this for a few minutes, then Sam rolls over onto his back and it turns out Sam is just as bad at not-thinking about it as he is.
Sam starts to dream again. This time he's right here in their same motel room. He's still on his back, but he's jerking off under the covers, and Dean is laying next to him on top of the comforter, just watching his face. In the dream, the only thing Sam can concentrate on is Dean's eyes on him. He's breathing hard and hot so apparently it feels pretty great to be stared at by your brother.
Oh, fucking hell. One two three four-
Dean wrenches himself out of Sam's head. The dream continues in the back of his mind, but he's no longer living that brief second in full detail. He throws off the covers, stands up and ignores Sam in one motion. He goes into the bathroom to brush his teeth, and hyper-focuses on the sound of it filling his senses enough that he can drown out Sam.
He spits, rinses, swishes around mouthwash, brushes again, and decides against flossing before going back out. Sam is still dreaming, and although the dream has shifted (are they shellfish now?), Dean hums AC/DC and tries not to pay any attention. He really wants to get some coffee in him before the awkwardness sets in.
Dean is dressed and on his way to the coffee shop when Sam wakes up. If he remembers the dream, he doesn't dwell on it, he simply sits up and blinks blearily at the carpet.
"Morning sunshine," Dean thinks at him as he walks up the steps into the café one two skip the third four five tap six seven.
"Good morning," Sam thinks back. "I'll be right over so get me a coffee and a bagel and find a table."
Dean laughs. "Bossy, bossy! Do you get off on ordering me around like this?"
Sam shrugs a little. "Well it's pretty awesome when you do things I tell you to do without complaining, so you should probably shut up right about now."
Dean pulls a mental face at Sam, but doesn't try to press his case any farther. The café is packed full and there's a line a few people too long. There's nothing to do now but accept his fate and wait with everyone else. "You have a highly evolved sense of entitlement when it comes to me, you know?"
Sam smiles in that smug way he does when he's particularly pleased at getting his way.
He drives the Impala over the few blocks between the motel and the café so that they can go directly to the library again after they get coffee and breakfast. He walks up the stairs one two skip the third four five tap six seven like Dean, and slips through the door just as a couple gets up from their table. He sneaks over and snags it before anyone else can. "You're focusing too hard on not thinking about last night," Sam thinks from the safety of half a room away.
Dean refuses to fall prey to the bait and avoids the topic even more vigorously. He hums Metallica until it's his turn to place his order. "Medium coffee, small Americano with four shots of espresso, a bacon and sausage breakfast sandwich and an everything bagel with cream cheese, please," he tells the cute barista. (And seriously, when aren't baristas cute? They make his coffee, which automatically gives them a huge advantage.)
"Would you like the bagel toasted?"
"Yes," Dean responds with a smile. Smile nicely and she won't know he's possibly having a semi-incestuous crisis in his head. Smile smile smile away.
"Could I get a name please?"
"It's Damien."
"All right, Damien, it comes to $16.75 please."
Dean rolls his eyes at the overpriced tourist trap prices, but pulls out his money clip where all the bills are in order and all facing the right way. He has a stack of twenties and ones, but no fives, so he gives her twenty two dollars. He likes to keep his money in as high values as possible, which means ridding himself of ones in order to get a five in return.
He's pretty good at not thinking about it regardless of what Sam says, so when their order comes up and he brings everything to the table that Sam acquired, he can look him in the eye and smile no differently than any other day.
Sam won't quit looking at him though. Even when Dean looks away, he sees himself in full-on Sam concentration, but he refuses to think about the reason so the only thing Dean can do is wonder what's going on in his freaky head. "Sammy, Sammy, what's so important?"
Sam shrugs and eventually tears his eyes off him but still doesn't give any indication of what was so engrossing. They finish their coffee in near silence and then pack up to head back to the library unceremoniously.
"Hey Sam," Dean says out loud on the way to the car because out loud is more solid than thought. "What do you say we look for a new case just in case we can't figure ours out?"
Sam would have disagreed any other week; he has the pursed lips and furrowed forehead that forewarns a bitchface. However, he sighs and nods. "Fine. There's probably only so much we can find about the curse."
Dean looks over. He looks at Sam a moment too long because that wasn't quite right, was it? But there it is. It seems like Sam gets that it could all be a dead end and maybe they're going to have to ride this one out, hopefully winning against all odds to keep their lives.
As Dean expected, the library doesn't yield many more results. Sam compiles two lists: one for the people that caught and died from the curse, and the other for people who most likely outlasted it. Of the few probable survivors, none are still alive.
Someone from the more recent sets of victims has a cousin living nearby, and that's the closest they've found to a lead so far. "Do you want to come talk to Clarence Shedd with me?" Sam asks after another hour of chasing down bad leads.
Dean looks up from his computer. "Well, I've been digging up a few other cases for us to look into, so why don't you go talk to him while I finish up here?"
Sam turns and levels a bitchface at him so fast Dean gets dizzy. "Dean, seriously? Why do I get the feeling you don't care about breaking this curse that, more often than not, makes people kill themselves? A little enthusiasm, please!"
Dean shrugs and squints at the table. One two three four knots in a square suppress the anger. "But there are survivors, we think, and the mind reading bit isn't that bad, right? Sam, people are dying out there and we're just sitting here trying to solve a problem that won't necessarily get in the way. I know rationality is usually your thing, but apply some objectivism and be real."
They stare each other down for a few moments, and they have both gotten better at hiding their thoughts from each other. Dean knows Sam's annoyed and feels a little betrayed but he's keeping specific thoughts tight to his chest. "Okay fine, dickhead. I'll talk to the cousin and you keep looking for another case, but if he knows anything we're following it through."
Sam takes a moment to pack up his backpack. He holds his hand out for the keys. "I shouldn't take more than an hour," is the last thought he directs at Dean before leaving with an angry posture tightening his back.
Dean hates the satisfaction of getting his way, feels dirty and manipulative, but instead of dwelling on it for any significant amount of time he kicks his feet up into the chair Sam vacated and goes through recent newspapers from the surrounding areas.
Like he said, Sam gets back an hour later. His face is tightened into a scowl and there's a dark cloud over his eyes.
"What did you find?" Dean asks, sensing the potential threat and completely disregarding it.
"The guy wasn't too thrilled to talk about his cousin, and when I asked if she had mentioned hearing voices he got angry and threw me out. Said I was dishonoring her name by implying she was crazy." Sam is tapping his foot and fingers in counter rhythm to each other, but it's uncoordinated like he isn't giving it much thought. Sam lets Dean into his body long enough to even out the syncopation and there now his world is better.
"Anything else?" Dean asks.
"You could have paid attention, ass."
"Yeah, but I was multitasking. You didn't actually find anything useful, huh?"
Sam rolls his eyes upwards. There's something frustrating him to the point of madness but it's hidden and fuck him for hiding shit. "Dude, you're overreacting so much," he grits out around clenched teeth.
"Oh, so you think you can tell me when to shut up now, is that it?" An irrational anger settles over Dean. He hates being a bitch but dammit Sam drives him up the wall sometimes.
"Yeah, well when you're calmly walking to your death, I can tell you to do whatever the fuck I want," Sam spits back. He flares his nostrils and the anger multiplies between them.
"If we're on a goddamn timer, then I'd rather spend my last days doing what we usually do, not waste them away in the library hoping for a clue to spontaneously materialize."
"But we can't just give up! Not when there's even a tiny chance we can guarantee ourselves an out on this thing."
"That's the thing though, Sammy. We'll probably both live and maybe both die, but neither of us will be left behind so can't we just take this as it comes and hope for the best?"
"Then what about killing the demon? Is that not important to you anymore? I mean, a year ago that used to the the only thing you could focus on! Or what about Bobby? Do you want to die on him without doing all we can to stay in the game?"
"Shut up. Of course I still want to kill the demon," Dean says, but is at a slight loss for what else to say. On one hand, killing the demon and getting revenge for his parents is one of the most prominent things on his mind, but on the other hand, he's just so tired and wants to live out his theoretically last living days with his brother and a minimal amount of research.
Sam tries to push his anger aside. "Okay, this is so not helping. You're right, let's be rational. Just breathe in and out, one two three four five, and not be so mad okay?" Sam pleads, partly to himself.
The library is quiet and Dean focuses on that while trying to do what his brother asked.
"It's just not like you to give up like this," Sam tries again.
Dean mentally shushes him. "I'm not being angry, just like you said. Be quiet."
Sam grits his teeth. "But there's a very obvious problem at hand here that you're brushing off like it's nothing. What's holding you back?"
"Sam! What did I just say? Shut the fuck up!" Dean snaps. "I'm trying to be calm and civilized here, but that isn't going to work if you keep dragging up the subject."
"And we'll never accomplish anything unless you stop avoiding stuff you don't want to deal with."
Dean doesn't want to think about how all he wants to do is disappear into the thick of America with Sam and forget about the dumb monkey wrenches the universe throws at them.
Instead, he takes another deep breath. "Fine. Fine, what you said. Let's start at the beginning with what we know about the curse. There's definitely a pattern to the ship sightings and it curses partnerships with mind-reading, which is the dumbest thing I've ever heard of, by the way. The victims usually drown themselves but we don't know why. It could be the curse driving them mad, or maybe something about it is compelling them to take the dive. Who knows. At this point, I just want to know why they kill themselves so we can try to prevent it."
"Sammy, come on," Dean says for probably the eighth time in an hour.
"You're whining," Sam replies. "Just another hour, okay?"
Dean rolls his eyes. "Fuck you. We could be physically training ourselves with these constraints and that would be productive too, so why can't we do something I'd actually enjoy instead of fermenting here?"
"Don't be so melodramatic. We'll leave soon." Sam flips through a few more pages of old newspapers on the computer's archive.
Dean rolls his head back and lets out an exaggerated groan of despair. "Fine. I hate you."
"Whatever. I'm perfectly justified in pissing you off right now."
"Fuck that. You're just a Sherlock Holmes wannabe; I want to go do something," Dean says. He braces himself for Sam's bitchface, but instead he just smiles a small, sarcastic smile at him and then they're better than they were a few minutes ago.
A couple minutes later Sam starts to lose his thunder and rethinks his anger. Dean laughs in triumph because he's as good as won this round, and it's his duty to be thrilled.
"Yeah, you won this one. Stop gloating."
"Nope. I get gloating rights for the rest of the day. Deal with it." He stands up with a stretch. "Pack your bags and let's hit the road."
They drop everything off at the motel and since the sun is still beating down like unforgiving sin, Sam makes Dean put sunscreen all over his face, neck and arms. "You'll burn like a tomato," Sam says when Dean tries to protest. "Then you'll complain when it hurts and make me buy you aloe while you pretend to be incapacitated. No thanks."
Dean rolls his eyes but succumbs. "Okay fine, jerkwad. This one time."
"And for the rest of the week, too. You're already more freckled than a few days ago, and don't think I forget how much you complain about them." Sam shrugs. "I win."
They find a more-or-less secluded strip of beach a few miles from their motel.
"Same old rules?" Dean asks out loud as he shakes out his limbs and stretches a little.
Sam nods.
"No face shots, no tickling, no mercy," Dean says for posterity. "Also, no mental shenanigans. When I win I want it to be fair and square."
Sam rolls his eyes but smiles and accepts the additional term. "On the count of three?"
"Yeah."
They face each other, crouched down a little. "One…two…three," Sam says and they jump towards each other. They throw and dodge punches, having a hard time controlling solely their own motions. They circle each other, darting in and out of reach, sneaking in jabs and blocks.
Eventually Dean realize he's nowhere near gaining the upper hand, so he bends down even further to slam his shoulder into Sam's abdomen and yank his knees from under him, knocking them both to the sand. They roll around on the ground for a couple minutes until Dean finally gains control and pins Sam down. He grins at him from up above and Sam grows and mock bites at the air from beneath.
"What'll you do now, huh, Sammy?" Dean asks with a smirk. Sam looks back at him a little too closely and Dean is starting to get suspicious when Sam loosens the hold on his wrists enough to dart his hands in past Dean's defenses like fishes, and tickle ruthlessly at his ribs.
Dean tries his hardest not to make a sound. He lets go of Sam and jumps away, but Sam's fingers follow, tickling up and down and up and down his sides. Dean tries to elbow him away, hit him or knee him, but Sam is a determined little shit, always wanting to make him scream.
"You cheater!" Dean gasps once he manages to slip Sam's reach. "I fucking hate you!"
Sam is practically rolling with laughter, bursting with smug pride. "Some things are too tempting to pass up." He stands up and brushes himself off. "No hard feelings, yeah?"
Dean flips him off. "Whatever. Want to go again? And don't think you'll be able to pull that over me again, you two-timing bastard. Shake on it."
He holds his hand out for Sam to shake in honor, but instead of shaking, Sam just lightly scrapes his fingernails over the sensitive skin of Dean's palm.
Dean snatches his hand back in exaggerated horror, then slaps Sam on the face. "Damn you, that isn't funny."
They head back to the motel. "We've been here too long," he says to Sam. "It's driving me fucking nuts." He jingles for the keys in his pocket, then unlocks the door. Their motel is a wreck, like usual, with their entire meager wardrobes strewn about the floor. He toes at a shirt by the entrance. It looks as big as a tent so it's probably Sam's, but who actually knows. It's not like they keep strict track anyways.
"So, we take off tomorrow morning and see what's up in Kitty Hawk?" Dean asks. "Even if it's just a basic ghost like I think, it'll be good to get a head start."
Sam shrugs and goes into the bathroom to take a piss, leaving the door open so he can talk unhindered. "Yeah, that sounds good."
Dean sits down on his bed. This motel is the same as any other, with the compact room, beds too close together, ugly clock on the wall, TV in the middle. He stands up again and walks back out the still-open front door. "Damn, I want a fucking cigarette," he thinks. He sits on the tail of the Impala and jiggles his legs. He's bored and it eats away at him, leaving him with nothing to do but lean on his car and look at the pale sky.
He can tell Sam is rolling his eyes. "If you smoke a cigarette then it'll be like I'm smoking a cigarette, and that's gross."
Dean shrugs. "Then have one with me instead."
"I don't understand why you think your flawed and faulty logic is persuasive." But Sam finishes playing with his hair in the bathroom or whatever he was doing and joins him outside. "Do you have them squirreled away in the car somewhere or is this going to require an expedition?"
"Expedition. Come on. There's a gas station just across the street."
"Okay okay, fine. I'll go. Just let me take a shower first. You might be a dirty monkey who doesn't mind swimming in his sweat all day, but I'm itching to get clean." Sam gives in because it's not like there's anything else to do for the rest of the day but smoke through a pack of Reds.
Dean ignores the jibe. "Yeah, whatever. I don't really give a fuck."
"Yeah, I caught that bit."
Sam is habitually fast at showering, but it feels like forever when Dean is just sitting outside, scuffing his feet in the dusty gravel and feeling the phantom torrent of water on his skin. "Hurry it up would you?"
"I haven't even touched the soap yet. Calm down." Sam absently shampoos his hair, skips the conditioner, and finally makes his way to the soap. He drifts off into thoughts about shirts he wants to mend, how much toothpaste is left, that book he finished the other day, and washes down his body. He runs his hands over his tight washboard abs, muscled arms, scarred shoulders, rubs his cock, once, twice, and oh now that feels good.
"Sam!" Dean snaps. "Bad time."
Sam pulls his hand away guiltily. "Sorry oh god that's awkward I mean it was sort of out of line, or rather-"
"Stop. Stop apologizing it's okay." Dean rubs the back of his neck and tries to not think about it. "Just. Not now. It's a little weird but don't apologize."
Sam rinses off and steps out of the shower. He towels down methodically and is out again in mere minutes. His hair is limp and damp and pushed back awkwardly and uncombed.
"You look silly," Dean says after examining him.
"Better silly than sticky and gross. My balls aren't sweating like some unmentioned brother of mine."
Dean flips him off and starts off across the street. As far as expeditions go, it's pretty unexciting. There aren't any close calls with traffic, nobody tries to rob the gas station, the clerk is disgustingly normal. Dean lights up as soon as he's out of the convenience store, and almost immediately the tremors and restlessness that have been driving him insane all day bleed away.
He smiles around the filter and offers one to Sam. Sam huffs like someone is actually going to judge him for indulging in a smoke now and then.
"Dude. Me and Bobby are pretty much the only two people in the world who know you, and neither of us actually care. Even dad smoked sometimes."
Sam lights the cigarette despite how not-helpful that statement was. "You know, I don't take pride like you do in how few friends we have."
"What, you need something more? I'm not good enough for you?"
Sam laughs and goes to sit down on the curb at the edge of the parking lot. He shakes his head like he can't believe Dean sometimes, and the frustration coming from him is enough to make Dean pay attention.
"I'm fine with our life Dean, I've told you before and you have to believe me, but don't you ever want friends sometimes? People to go visit who we don't have to hide shit from?"
Dean looks at him for a while. One two three four five breaths. Is blunt honesty best in this situation? Yeah, Sam can tell anyways. "Not particularly. I'm good like this. There's nothing else I need." Dean sits down next to Sam, a little bit too close, close enough that their shoulders are pressed together and their knees knock against each others'. He takes a drag of his cigarette, holding the smoke in his mouth and letting it out slowly so it trickles past his parted lips in lazy drifts. Sam watches the smoke and doesn't say anything else. They'll talk about it some other day.
They stay on the edge of the parking lot near the ugly old gas station. Cars pull in and out to fill up; they just sit there and smoke and watch the sun set over the strip of hotels and beach.
The ghost ends up being as easy as they had hoped. A simple haunting of an old unsolved murder, hanging on to the last attempts of revenge. Sam has to dig fast to her remains while Dean distracts her at the crime scene, getting tossed around like a rag doll.
Dean is about to get the upper hand when she bursts into flame. "You stole my goddamn thunder, Sam!" he pants from the floor as ashes flutter down on him. "I almost had the poker in my hand."
"Which would have worked fine had it actually been made out of iron, Dean," Sam thinks back. "What would you have done if it was made out of something else?"
Dean gets up and brushes himself off. "Yeah, like what? Fire pokers are made out of iron, Sam. Ever come across any different?" He picks up the poker and inspects it. "Yeah, iron."
Sam collapses out of the grave in relief that he had burned her in time anyways. "Whatever, douchebag. I win this round." Sam drags himself up and shakes off the filth. "I'll be back to the house in probably ten minutes. Don't be acting suspicious."
Dean checks around for anyone coming to inspect the noise, but the closest houses show no sign of waking. "I'll be fine, just get your ass back here. It's been a long day and I want to sleep."
"Me too. I'll be over soon."
He hears the Impala's growl from a distance a handful of minutes later. He slips out of the dark shadows, through patches of moonlight, and in through the waiting passenger door.
"Hey, you okay?" Sam asks quietly. He stares in particular at the bruises on Dean's face and scratches on his upper arm.
Dean laughs. The adrenaline is still bubbling around in him. "Hell yeah. You know I am, Sammy. Come on, stop worrying about me." Dean bounces his knees for the twenty-minute drive back because Sam is driving his baby and it's not that bad since he's only a thought away from being in control, but still he'd rather be behind the wheel himself.
The adrenaline has made him horny and fidgety. Sam yanked him away from death yet again, tying them together with another knot for the collection. It pulls something loose in him that Sam might actually be forever, that Sam will fight just as hard as he will to protect what they've cultivated, not that he's ever doubted that Sam is willing to save his life again and again. It makes his neck hot and his jeans feel too tight and his ribs throb in exquisite pain.
He sits forward suddenly to pop open the glove compartment, and pulls out the pack of Reds. "You want one Sammy?" Sam nods, not because he particularly does, but because Dean is offering and he takes whatever Dean wants to give him.
"Peer pressure!" Dean comments with a laugh and wiggle of his eyebrows.
Sam takes the outstretched cigarette and reaches in to snatch the lighter out of Dean's hand before Dean can use it. "Hey!" Dean says. Sam just lights his cigarette and rolls down the window a couple turns. He takes a nonchalant drag and savors the bitter, pungent smoke. It's only then a couple moments before he turns around and grins because he can't keep up the charade of mock-ignoring Dean anymore. He reaches across the few inches and lights Dean's cigarette for him, kind of an apology, kind of just because he feels like it, and also because it makes a really cool glow on his face. Dean keeps a brief eye on the road so that Sam can watch the flame.
Sam tosses the car keys back to Dean once they're in the motel room again. Dean tucks them into his pants pocket before taking them off and walking into the bathroom for his bi-daily tooth ritual.
His toothbrush makes shoof shoof shoof noises as he brushes his teeth, but then again it always does.
"Onomatopoeia," Sam thinks absently while he takes off his shirt and puts on a slightly cleaner one to sleep in. He joins Dean in the bathroom and brushes his teeth alongside him.
"Dork," Dean says. Shoof shoof, one two, shoof shoof. He changes sides, shoof shoof shoof. He doesn't care what the noise is called.
Dean's still jittery, has been jittery for days. He hates having the jitters but he doesn't know how to will them away so maybe they're here to stay this time. It's sort of like after any other hunt, except Sam has the jitters too which makes it all feel more like tenfold, even though it's only the two of them.
He looks at Sam because Sam is already looking at him. "Cigarette?" he asks.
"We just brushed our teeth," Sam declines.
Dean looks down at his toothbrush and shakes the excess water off at Sam's face. "Okay fine, you're right."
They finish getting ready for bed in silence, trying not to think about anything. Sam looks over at him and is kind of annoyed about something, is buzzing with the urge to get angry. He wants Dean to pick a fight and disrupt their peace as a distraction to something he refuses to name. Dean ignores him and keeps his mouth shut because that isn't anything he wants to touch with a ten-foot pole.
Neither of them are tired, but a solitary night off seems like an acceptable way to pass the time. They zone out to some mindless episodes of MythBusters, laying in bed and drinking beer, even though that means Dean will have to brush his teeth again later. It's been a weird few days but goddamn it's always fun to watch shit blow up and get destroyed.
"Hey, you want another one?" Dean asks as he gets up and heads for the mini-fridge.
Sam is about to answer, about to say yeah sure, when his sight catches and latches on to the bare skin of Dean's back. So much skin barely hiding rippling muscles and strong bone and pumping blood. Dean doesn't see what's so fascinating about his skin. "Living, breathing big brother, that's what's so fascinating," Sam thinks back.
"Same as every other day." Dean thinks he should change the subject, and he doesn't want to turn around and look at Sam, because then they could see each other and who knows what that would mean.
"Yeah, I like that bit too." Sam wants something, but it's a vague, half-formed want, and Dean can't tell what it is. "Dean, just look at me you jerk."
Dean looks over. Dammit he can't help himself, but if Sam wants something then Dean needs it (or will die trying to convince himself of that).
Sam looks at him dark and focused. "Bring me that beer, you," he says, but there's something cracking here. They're slipping off-script, nearing a line.
He needs to break eye contact, so he pops the tops off the beers with his ring and brings them back, a little tipsy turvy wobbly on his feet. He hands over Sam's beer and then flops down into his bed with a sigh. He counts the empty beer bottles out of habit, just cataloguing the room and keeping track. There are five empties and each of them are working on another.
Things were still today. Long stretches of quiet punctuated by brief conversations, while Sam kept a close eye on him without lending much thought as to why. He feels like he's bubbling over with an itchy, furiously impassioned hunger to see Dean in every single permutation imaginable. He rocks his hips up just barely and lets loose a pleased sigh at the slight pressure.
Dean wishes he was surprised but he can tell that this has been building longer than he should admit. He can't help the arousal that furls out and stains his stomach; he craves this arousal because it's real and it's Sam and it's something only for the two of them.
They lay there and breathe in sync and the heat between them feeds off of each other's. Sam wants to turn his head and look at Dean, but the shame keeps him looking up at the ceiling. He tickles his stomach in circles to distract himself from the wrong and bad and we probably shouldn't until Dean mutters "You can, you know. Look."
He looks and Dean doesn't understand what Sam sees, because Sam thinks he's perfect and kind of pretty and magical. He moans a little at the fierce attention that Sam is directing at him, because Sam is seeing all of him and everything about him, and it's claustrophobic except that it's Sam and so it feels good better than good; if Sam wants it then it's already a done deal, he wants it too.
Sam slips his hand down and rubs himself through his old cotton boxers but he's focused more on Dean's face. Dean's profile, rather, because Dean is staring steadfastly ahead. He's hard - so goddamn hard from Sam's focus on him and he won't let Sam keep his eyes to his half of the room - and he shifts his hips to chase any available friction. He hasn't touched himself yet, can't quite bear to, but he's moments away from giving in fuck the consequences whatever they may be.
"Just look at me," Sam says in his head, close and intimate like he's whispering in his ear and not a bed away, and he nudges Dean's face towards his. Jesus, there's a difference between knowing Sam's thoughts, and then to see them like proof spread out for him to pick through. "Don't you realize that's the most I've ever wanted from you? Just look at me see me I'm only your little brother so just fucking look at me and stop staring through me like I'm temporary because I'm not."
Sam is almost sliding off his bed on the side closest to Dean to be as near as possible without actually getting up and sliding in with Dean, which isn't something either of them are at all prepared to even think about. He pulls his boxers down past his knees and the rush of satisfaction he feels when he gets his hand around his bare cock makes Dean's mouth water. Sam closes his eyes tight and watches himself through Dean; his arm flexing and pulling, his flushed cheeks, wet mouth, so thoroughly Sam even in this foreign side of him.
He gives in. He can't help himself, not with Sam beating himself off just feet away to Dean looking at him, just looking at him, like he doesn't want anything else (Dean the protector provider idol brother everything).
Dean slips his fingers under the elastic of his boxers and starts to pull at his cock before he loses his nerve since this is because of Sam, because Sam wants it, Sam getting him hot and wanting something he's spent innumerable years trying not to think about, Sam Sam Sam, it'll never not be about Sam.
Dean loses himself in the pleasure (he's always been good at that). He has to blink away from Sam because it's a little too much all at once, but the goddamn noises coming from his little brother's mouth are enough to make him to gasp and twitch. Sam is tangled up with him, and so maybe he has every single wire in his brain crossed and knotted and frayed, but that got them to the here and right now, so he can probably live with it.
"Dean," Sam says out loud. "Dean, oh fuck, I can't-- it's so--" He gasps, and with a last squeeze to the head of his cock he comes all over his hand. It's a brutal orgasm and he shivers through the long tremors.
There's no hope of lasting any longer. Dean feels the tension come to a head and he almost chokes on his tongue with how hard he comes. His come is slippery and warm between his fingers, makes his hand glide almost frictionless over his cock as he wrings the last of his orgasm out.
Dean hasn't had a chance to come down all the way when Sam stands up and walks to the bathroom to rinse his hands off. Dean keeps his eyes on the ceiling and gathers his thoughts. Sam walks back with damp hands and a tentative smile, stops next to Dean. "Hey, you good?" he asks.
Dean looks at him and grins because he doesn't know what he's actually supposed to think right now. "Of course I'm good," he says and reaches over to wipe his jizz off on Sam's shirt.
Sam yelps impressively and jumps back. "Dean, that's disgusting! What was that for?"
Dean laughs and gets up to brush the old beer taste out of his mouth.
One | Two | Three
Driving is actually a little easier now. With a set of eyes on either side of the car, they can meet their sights at the middle of the lane and keep the Impala perfectly centered.
That is, until Sam glances away from the road and over to the laundromat across the street. Dean jerks at the sudden change in scenery. "Fuck! Eyes closed or on the road, Sammy, I'm dead serious."
Dean sees the guilt under Sam's response of "Dude, chill," as he closes his eyes and lets Dean see enough of their surroundings for both of them.
He grins. "You're totally transparent."
They pull into the library's parking lot, about ten miles from their motel. Dean tries to lag behind solely on principle, but Sam just tugs him along and that's that.
The library is nearly empty, same as the other day. The librarian greets them with a pleasant smile, and she's much younger and cuter than the one from before. Dean lets his eyes linger on how her milky pale breasts curve above the neckline of her blouse and lets himself imagine, if just for a moment, what it would be like to pop the buttons open one two three four five and wrench her head back by her hair pull on it until she gasps then rub his cock through that tight line between her breasts. Dean snaps his eyes over to Sam, who stops the thought in its track and looks back guiltily. Dean grins and punches him on the arm. "Keep it in your pants!" he thinks to him. Sam blushes and purses his lips.
Their table near the science fiction section is free again and Dean insists on sitting at it. Sam goes straight for the local newspaper archive on the computer and dives right in. Dean knows he should be helping, but Sam actually likes doing this and has a better idea of what to look for, so he just pulls out his dice.
Seven dice, all black and white, all the same exact size. He rolls them on a New Yorker magazine to dull the noise. Double fours, the one is good, he'll roll that three again, three fives are fifteen and those are no good either. He takes the bad dice and rolls them again.
He plays until he either wins or loses. He bends his rules to accept certain multiples, discards the ones he has a bad feeling about, shuffles them around. And then he either wins or loses. He plays for probably fifteen more minutes, just rolling dice and counting numbers and winning or losing and barely takes notice of Sam's frustration. Sam is always frustrated over something.
It's a really good round but Sam doesn't seem to care because the frustration spikes and he slams his pen against the table. "Dean!"
Dean looks up sharply at the noise. "What?"
"That game doesn't make any sense! Either play something with real rules, or cut it out!"
Dean knows that Sam understands the rules, because Dean understands them. What Dean knows Sam knows, so he doesn't see what the problem is.
"Because it's not supposed to make sense. The rules are arbitrary and depend on your whims and compulsions rather than a real structure!" Sam sighs and rubs his forehead. "Just, please, not while I'm trying to concentrate on something else?"
Dean nods, even though he's a little stung by the whole exchange. Sam is sorry but doesn't take back what he said.
He digs around for a few newspapers at Sam's command and doesn't complain because it's not like he has anything better to do. Sam is piece-by-piece trying to find others who caught this ghost ship curse and actually survived it, people who learned to live with constantly having someone else in his or her head.
Dean eventually gets sick of waiting around, so he looks closer at the dates that are buzzing around Sam's head, the years and people and hints and-
-and all of a sudden it clicks.
"Sam! Sam, there's a pattern! We just missed it because we've only found about half of it." Dean tries to sketch out the pattern in his head but his thoughts are moving too fast for even him to follow.
"Okay, so it's pretty weird. There are two sets of years the curse cycles through, overlapping each other. Starting in 1922, the year after it went down, someone must have caught it every five years, but at the same time, it was also repeating every eight. It was documented in '22 but not '27, and then again in '32 and '37, skipping '42, again in '47. Nobody drowned in 1930, or '38, but they did in '46, '54 and '62."
"Oh." Sam sees it now but he never would have on his own, and he doesn't get how Dean saw himself.
"It's just the patterns. Sam, I see patterns, that's what I do. Everything has a pattern."
"Okay. Then in that case, we know there must be people who have survived the curse, because a numerical pattern makes too much sense even if this one seems unduly tricky. If we can just find someone else that got it? Dean, if we just find someone else, they can tell us what to expect, tell us if it gets worse, if they figured out a way to make it stop!"
Dean looks over. Sam is so excited, so sure that the answer lies with finding someone who has survived this. "But how are we going to find record of survivors? The only way you were able to find the people that died from it was by figuring out where they killed themselves and piecing it together with psychological symptoms that they showed beforehand, which were only publicized because it was part of the whole suicide package. Without the suicide, going crazy wouldn't have made the headlines."
Sam leafs through some of his print-offs as if the answer is just going to jump out at him. Dates, names and relationships are all circling through his head at an ungodly speed, so fast it's making Dean dizzy. "But some people mentioned seeing a ghost ship, so if I looked through old blogs or journals or…"
"But that would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. There have been so many wrecks here that there must be other ghost ships, so how would you even know if they saw the right one?" Dean rubs his forehead to try to stave off the headache that must have come from Sam. "Want to just get out of here and come back tomorrow? We got a late start so it's about to close anyways."
Sam nods but the humiliation and anger of giving up, if even only for the night, is stifling.
"Sam," Dean says quietly and tries to send as much calm his way as he can. "We're going to be okay. Please don't freak out."
The silence stretches for a time while Sam stacks his anger into neat piles one on top of another and pushes it all into a corner. When it's done he doesn't have to acknowledge it anymore, so he gives a small smile and is good enough again. "Do you have anything in mind or are we just going back to the motel?"
"Let's go get something to eat, maybe have a few beers. We should take advantage of all the lonely women on vacation, Sammy!"
His eyes must be glazing over because he's thinking about all the things he'd love to do to a beautiful girl tonight and he has a habit of staring off into space at times like these. He could eat her out so messy that he slides right in, take her from behind against the wall out back bite her shoulder fuck her so hard her feet come off the ground hold her tight tight tight so she can't go anywhere fast and she'd take it so well, moaning and moving like she can't get enough fingernails digging in and she's coming apart at the seams.
Dean coughs and adjusts himself in his pants, not even trying to hide it because Sam can tell anyways. "That was awkward," he thinks, because he can't tell what part of that was his and what was Sam's and now their fantasies are getting tangled up with each other's for fuck's sake. Sam shifts a little, moves his shoulders around because he isn't exactly sure where they're supposed to be right now, what emotion they're supposed to convey for this incredibly weird situation.
"Hey, dude, it's not a big deal," Dean says, discarding the awkwardness since some things are more important than that, like making sure his little brother doesn't start feeling guilty over stuff that's out of his control. "It's not like I didn't tell you everything back when we were teenagers, right? Now you'll get to see me in action, too. You might pick something up for once!"
Sam grimaces and says "Dean, grow some tact."
Every bar and diner and restaurant they pass on the way back from the library is packed with tourists. Most of the places are way too overpriced even for D. Hasselhoff's card and nobody in those places are looking for a quick hookup, so in the end they decide to play it safe. They park the Impala back at the motel and walk about half a mile to a small dive where the music is loud and the beer is relatively cheap. Dusk is just falling and the night is still young. "We've survived nearly two days of this shit," he thinks.
They sit in a low-lit corner and order burgers and beers, plus a salad for Sam and a couple shots of whiskey for Dean. They sit back and chat and eye all the girls walking past, except this is a whole new kind of weird since Sam, apparently, has a completely overactive imagination to compensate for his problem of never getting laid.
Dean has always loved undressing hot girls with his eyes, imagining what she would look like without her small dress and what he could do to her to make her scream, but Sam takes it to a whole new goddamn level. Almost every cute girl he sees, and some that aren't quite as such, he mentally strips down and bends over the nearest surface, fucks her tight pussy or her ass or her glossy mouth, all in fleeting mentions and subconscious thoughts, as if he can't help himself.
The first time wasn't completely unexpected, because holy shit Dean was looking at her like that too, all hourglass figure and ash-blonde hair and blue eyes and pouty lips. After the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh time it happened he grew more and more amused.
"Dude, I've known you your entire life and you'd think I wouldn't be surprised by anything you do anymore, Sammy, but damn. What the hell are you doing as such a monk? You have way too much repressed sexual energy to be healthy." There's a frantic, horny vibration in the tips of his fingers and the back of his mouth that nothing, not even acknowledgment from Dean, is damping.
Sam shrugs, taps a beat on the tabletop, but his mind cycles through "I still miss Jess. It's nerve-wracking to talk to girls in bars because I won't ever actually know them. What if she's someone I'd hate? It's so awkward and I never figured out how to make instantaneous connections with just anybody."
"That's why you stop thinking with your upstairs brain and let your downstairs brain take over. Sammy! You need some action in your life, man."
Sam shakes his head tightly, and even without the curse it would be obvious to Dean that he's uncomfortable and nervous. He can feel the little security bubble Sam's built up around himself that keeps out intruders people he doesn't know they can get in and hurt him and they're not safe only Dean is safe.
Dean swirls his beer around, then puts it down in favor of his third shot. "Whatever floats your boat, but let me tell you, it's even better in real life." He eats peanuts in counts of two, crunch munch, and tries not to look at Sam too closely.
"Yes, Dean, I remember. It's not like I've never gotten laid before."
"Well it's obviously been too long."
Neither of them can help being horny at this point. They're both periodically shifting in their seats and adjusting the inseam of their jeans. It's fucking embarrassing, is what it is, but that doesn't keep Dean's eyes off those girls' legs, or stop him from thinking what they'd feel like wrapped around his waist. He shouldn't be this turned on when his brother is watching from inside his head, but he's always been a bit of a showoff.
Sam scoffs. "That's for sure."
Dean throws a french fry at him. "Oh shut up."
Sam picks the french fry off his jacket and eats it. Dean feels his hesitation to say something, so he silently urges him on. "Look, it's getting a little late, so I'm going to head back to the motel. I didn't get my mid-morning princess nap like some of us, so I'm just going to…" He cuts off and blushes, realizes that it's no use wasting breath on white lies. He's still humming with tension and a bar full of hot girls obviously didn't do anything to lessen it.
"Going to go back and jerk off?" Dean asks with a shit-eating grin. "Good on you. Think it'll make you less bitchy tomorrow?"
Sam rolls his eyes. "Fuck off. Go get laid or something, and try not to bother me too much with it."
"I'll land the prettiest girl here, just for you," Dean says. "It's not like you're willing to go the extra mile to get someone in bed, so you might as well live vicariously through me." He rolls the base of his beer bottle around on the table, around and around, and concentrates on that instead of Sam's face because that was kind of weird even for them, and he doesn't know how Sam will take it.
Sam just raises an eyebrow and chuckles. "That statement was way too well-adjusted for you, Dean. Look at you, all accepting of our situation and shit." He finishes his beer and stands up. "I'm out of here. Don't stay out too late."
"Yes, mom."
Sam walks out and seizes up whenever anyone brushes up against him. The air outside is balmy and refreshing compared to the stifling bar, but Dean concentrates on ignoring all sensory perceptions coming from Sam since it's completely distracting when he's not right next to him. Instead, he gets up and walks over to the girl Sam had been staring at in particular all night, the one with the hourglass figure and ash-blonde hair and blue eyes and pouty lips.
"Hey," he says with a smile, tries to make it look honest and and friendly. "Can I buy you a drink?"
It only takes him about ten minutes to get Gloria practically eating out of his hand. She's grinning boldly and pushes her breasts together even tighter and steps just a little closer. She likes math and ancient civilizations and birds, but when she starts to ask who he had been with earlier and what he did for a living, he puts his hand on her waist, slides it up and down the sleek material of her dress and says "Hey, want to take this somewhere else?"
She smiles, then reaches over to grab a napkin to wipe her lipstick off with. "Yeah, I do. Is out back good enough for you? My sister works early tomorrow so my place isn't a great option."
Dean grins. "That's the best damn idea I've heard all night." He runs a hand across her bare shoulders, rubs circles with his thumb one two three four, her skin so soft compared to his hard calluses, then pulls her tight to his side. "Shall we?"
Sam had gotten back the the motel room a few minutes ago, stripped down and is now brushing his teeth. He's concentrating so hard on Dean and Gloria, an all-consuming concentration that he hardly even registers spitting the toothpaste and sliding into bed.
Dean leads Gloria into the single-occupancy men's room and locks the door behind them. He pulls her close to him, runs his fingers through her hair once twice thrice and again, then gives it a sharp tug. She gasps but smiles immediately after. Dean slides his hands down down the steep curve of her back until they rest on the perfect swell of her ass. He grabs ahold and pulls her even closer, even tighter so he can grind into her, quick jerks and small circles.
Sam is stretched out in bed now, so deliciously turned on. He rubs his cock through his boxers, pulling on it and teasing the head gently with the thin cotton. His eyes are closed and he leans into each pass of his hand, lets out a huff of breath every time his arousal trips up and up. Dean feels every movement spike deep in his stomach.
Gloria reaches up to knead her fingers on Dean's neck, then pulls him down to kiss him. She opens her mouth immediately, drinks him in. He kisses her back, controlled and steady but with a hint of teeth.
Sam is almost all the way hard now. He's eased his cock out of his boxers, which he then pushes off his legs. His touch is a little tentative, kind of teasing.
"Just go for it, Sammy," Dean thinks as he starts to get his hands up under her dress. "It's like when we were younger and you would watch sometimes. Peeking through the door or pretending to be asleep in the motel. You were such a little perv, huh Sam?"
Sam gasps in a sudden breath and jerks himself faster. "Stop messing around and fuck her already!" he thinks, then takes enough control over Dean's body to hike Gloria's dress up past her waist and to spin her around. He makes Dean press her up against the wall and sink to his knees behind her. He gives back most of the control and watches as Dean flicks his tongue forward to taste her. She gasps and tries to roll her hips back into Dean's mouth but his hands on her waist keep her steady.
He darts in again and goes for her clit, burying his mouth deep between her legs to reach it from behind. He sucks it between his lips and worries it with his tongue. Gloria pants and her legs are trembling like she wants to slide down to the floor and fall apart. She's so wet and it's smearing all around his mouth and nose; he's going to smell like her for hours. The idea of that only makes him press closer and lick harder.
He lets go with one hand so he can reach down and rub his cock through his jeans. He pops the button and draws down the zipper so he can pull it out and finally finally wrap his hand around it. It's so damn good and he bucks up into his hand. He's been wound tightly for long enough that this is making fire slam through every pore. Everything that Sam feels Dean feels just as strongly. His pent-up sex drive, his over-sensitive skin, his buried frustration and his tight stomach are all superimposed into Dean's head and it sends him spiraling further and deeper into themselves.
Sam is sprawled out in his bed completely blissed out, rubbing his hard cock and smearing the precome around, his mouth open as if there was a girl riding his face. "Please Dean, please," Sam begs, trying to stand up in Dean's body but too lost in pleasure to get the coordination right.
"Oh god," Dean thinks and his mouth goes slack against the inside of Gloria's thigh. His stomach feels like it just collapsed with filth and disgust and so goddamn hot he can't remember how to breathe. "Fucking hell, Sammy."
Gloria is a begging, whimpering mess against the bathroom wall, her legs and stomach weak against Dean's hands. He stands up and takes a moment to take out and roll on a condom, then wraps an arm around her waist to help keep her upright. He leans forward far enough to bite her ear, a warning of sorts, and starts to slide his cock into her.
Dean thrusts forward shallowly, sinking in and out and in and farther and in until he's finally deep deep in her, all the way as far as he can. Gloria is breathing hard and she shifts around to try to adjust. Dean rocks back and forth minutely, keeping mostly still but trying to relieve some of the maddening arousal. He drags his hands over her beautifully soft skin to tease a nipple, then dips a hand down to rub at her clit and to touch the stretched skin where his cock is pushed so deep into her.
She rubs herself back on Dean, panting and whining and unbelievably slick. Sam clenches his teeth way too tight and almost stops breathing from the sheer ecstasy, because months of getting off with just your hand is months of knowing what you're missing, and oh fuck this is what he had been missing. His skin is so hot it feels like it's dissolving off and he's writhing on the bed like a starved addict. It's like being his younger, voyeuristic self again, hungry to know everything about Dean, except he's touching the girl himself, touching her right alongside his big brother.
Dean fucks up into Gloria harder because this right here is driving him absolutely insane. He knew from the start that this would be weird, a little too intimate for their comfort levels, but he didn't think of how Sam would be right there, or how he would feel his brother fall apart because of him. He fucks her while Sam fucks his fist and they're both panting hard, Sam into his hand and Dean into Gloria's neck.
Sam bullies his way into Dean's control until he can trap Gloria's wrists in front of her with one hand and wrenches her head back by her hair. He lowers Dean's mouth to bite her, not hard enough to hurt but hard enough that she clenches her entire body tighter tighter and oh right there that feels like heaven. He fucks her a little rougher and tightens his arm around her torso.
She's so slick and so hot and so soft and Sam's breathy moans fill Dean's head. Sam rubs his thumb over the head of his cock he's so close and again and again because he knows what Dean likes most, then comes hard enough for Dean to feel it under his tongue. Sam pulses into his hand as he works himself through it. His mind goes completely blank for the first time since this whole crazy thing started.
Dean rubs Gloria's clit almost brutally. Sam's orgasm is still curling his toes, and it makes his fingers clumsy and uncoordinated, but she shudders and keens anyways. Dean falters and then his tightly-reined control slips away and he comes deep inside and so damn hot. The pleasure breaks his head open and freezes his limbs. Gloria comes a few moments later, and the way she clenches down and violently shoves herself back on his cock sends him reeling.
"Oh god oh god oh god," Sam whimpers as the aftershocks wreak havoc through his body. It's too much way too painful and he bites his lip to distract him from fire burning Dean oh fuck too much.
The world stops for a minute while Dean catches his breath. He pants into the bare skin of Gloria's shoulder, feels his hot breath reflected right back at him, then pulls out. He peels off the condom and drops it into the trash and zips his wet, softening cock back into his pants. Gloria turns around to smile at him and adjust her clothes back to the way they were in front of the mirror. Her makeup is a little smudged and her eyes are wild.
Gloria pulls Dean down for a wet, shallow kiss, tugs on his hair to bring him closer. Dean smiles against her lips and curls his tongue against hers, slow and playful. She pulls away too soon for Dean's liking and ducks out of reach when he tries to lean in again. She picks her lipstick out of her purse and reapplies the dark red color to her mouth in three graceful swipes.
Dean had his hand on her hip but he pulls it away when she clips her bag closed. "Can I buy you another drink?" he asks with a smile.
Gloria grins back, and her mouth is so much wider and expressive with lipstick. "No thanks, babe. I have to get going home soon. Thanks for the awesome time." She grabs his hand and presses a lipstick mark to his knuckles, then walks out of the bathroom.
Dean follows after a moment and tries not to think about Sam too much. He bypasses a last round at the bar and slowly makes his way back to the motel.
His plan of not thinking about Sam becomes a moot point when he gets back to their room. Sam is laying under the sheet of the far bed, nodding off to sleep.
"Dude, you reek," he says instead of a greeting.
Dean rolls his eyes and collapses on his bed. "You're welcome." He flips his shoes off with his toes and sinks into a light-headed, content sleep.
Dean wakes up first. The light coming in from around the curtains is turning from dawn to daylight, and it's getting way too bright.
He looks over at Sam, who is still sleeping soundly. He really doesn't want to talk about last night with Sam today so he puts the memory as far from his mind as he can and protects it with a wall of evasion. He doesn't get out of bed yet, just stays under the blankets and stares at the ceiling and listens to Sam's dreams.
They aren't terribly interesting dreams, which is funny, because Dean sort of assumed that Sam dreamed in parallel universes or in arcane languages or in sunny, wild adventures in California.
Instead, he woke up after being asleep for hours in the Impala while Dean drove from coast to coast. In another, which only lasted for about six seconds before moving on, he poured a shot of whiskey and holy water for dad. Then he slips into a completely different consciousness and Dean doesn't even register his dreams anymore.
And it's not like Sam is awake, right? So his brain forgets about the ban he put on examining what he and Sam did last night, and he trips right into the thick of it.
He fucked Gloria and she was hot, but Sam had watched and felt all of it, and it had been uncomfortably intimate for them. Dean's stomach flips over. He doesn't want to think about Sam like this because it's awkward and his mouth tastes like bile and it might possibly possibly have been kind of arousing.
Dean proves unsuccessful at not thinking about all this for a few minutes, then Sam rolls over onto his back and it turns out Sam is just as bad at not-thinking about it as he is.
Sam starts to dream again. This time he's right here in their same motel room. He's still on his back, but he's jerking off under the covers, and Dean is laying next to him on top of the comforter, just watching his face. In the dream, the only thing Sam can concentrate on is Dean's eyes on him. He's breathing hard and hot so apparently it feels pretty great to be stared at by your brother.
Oh, fucking hell. One two three four-
Dean wrenches himself out of Sam's head. The dream continues in the back of his mind, but he's no longer living that brief second in full detail. He throws off the covers, stands up and ignores Sam in one motion. He goes into the bathroom to brush his teeth, and hyper-focuses on the sound of it filling his senses enough that he can drown out Sam.
He spits, rinses, swishes around mouthwash, brushes again, and decides against flossing before going back out. Sam is still dreaming, and although the dream has shifted (are they shellfish now?), Dean hums AC/DC and tries not to pay any attention. He really wants to get some coffee in him before the awkwardness sets in.
Dean is dressed and on his way to the coffee shop when Sam wakes up. If he remembers the dream, he doesn't dwell on it, he simply sits up and blinks blearily at the carpet.
"Morning sunshine," Dean thinks at him as he walks up the steps into the café one two skip the third four five tap six seven.
"Good morning," Sam thinks back. "I'll be right over so get me a coffee and a bagel and find a table."
Dean laughs. "Bossy, bossy! Do you get off on ordering me around like this?"
Sam shrugs a little. "Well it's pretty awesome when you do things I tell you to do without complaining, so you should probably shut up right about now."
Dean pulls a mental face at Sam, but doesn't try to press his case any farther. The café is packed full and there's a line a few people too long. There's nothing to do now but accept his fate and wait with everyone else. "You have a highly evolved sense of entitlement when it comes to me, you know?"
Sam smiles in that smug way he does when he's particularly pleased at getting his way.
He drives the Impala over the few blocks between the motel and the café so that they can go directly to the library again after they get coffee and breakfast. He walks up the stairs one two skip the third four five tap six seven like Dean, and slips through the door just as a couple gets up from their table. He sneaks over and snags it before anyone else can. "You're focusing too hard on not thinking about last night," Sam thinks from the safety of half a room away.
Dean refuses to fall prey to the bait and avoids the topic even more vigorously. He hums Metallica until it's his turn to place his order. "Medium coffee, small Americano with four shots of espresso, a bacon and sausage breakfast sandwich and an everything bagel with cream cheese, please," he tells the cute barista. (And seriously, when aren't baristas cute? They make his coffee, which automatically gives them a huge advantage.)
"Would you like the bagel toasted?"
"Yes," Dean responds with a smile. Smile nicely and she won't know he's possibly having a semi-incestuous crisis in his head. Smile smile smile away.
"Could I get a name please?"
"It's Damien."
"All right, Damien, it comes to $16.75 please."
Dean rolls his eyes at the overpriced tourist trap prices, but pulls out his money clip where all the bills are in order and all facing the right way. He has a stack of twenties and ones, but no fives, so he gives her twenty two dollars. He likes to keep his money in as high values as possible, which means ridding himself of ones in order to get a five in return.
He's pretty good at not thinking about it regardless of what Sam says, so when their order comes up and he brings everything to the table that Sam acquired, he can look him in the eye and smile no differently than any other day.
Sam won't quit looking at him though. Even when Dean looks away, he sees himself in full-on Sam concentration, but he refuses to think about the reason so the only thing Dean can do is wonder what's going on in his freaky head. "Sammy, Sammy, what's so important?"
Sam shrugs and eventually tears his eyes off him but still doesn't give any indication of what was so engrossing. They finish their coffee in near silence and then pack up to head back to the library unceremoniously.
"Hey Sam," Dean says out loud on the way to the car because out loud is more solid than thought. "What do you say we look for a new case just in case we can't figure ours out?"
Sam would have disagreed any other week; he has the pursed lips and furrowed forehead that forewarns a bitchface. However, he sighs and nods. "Fine. There's probably only so much we can find about the curse."
Dean looks over. He looks at Sam a moment too long because that wasn't quite right, was it? But there it is. It seems like Sam gets that it could all be a dead end and maybe they're going to have to ride this one out, hopefully winning against all odds to keep their lives.
As Dean expected, the library doesn't yield many more results. Sam compiles two lists: one for the people that caught and died from the curse, and the other for people who most likely outlasted it. Of the few probable survivors, none are still alive.
Someone from the more recent sets of victims has a cousin living nearby, and that's the closest they've found to a lead so far. "Do you want to come talk to Clarence Shedd with me?" Sam asks after another hour of chasing down bad leads.
Dean looks up from his computer. "Well, I've been digging up a few other cases for us to look into, so why don't you go talk to him while I finish up here?"
Sam turns and levels a bitchface at him so fast Dean gets dizzy. "Dean, seriously? Why do I get the feeling you don't care about breaking this curse that, more often than not, makes people kill themselves? A little enthusiasm, please!"
Dean shrugs and squints at the table. One two three four knots in a square suppress the anger. "But there are survivors, we think, and the mind reading bit isn't that bad, right? Sam, people are dying out there and we're just sitting here trying to solve a problem that won't necessarily get in the way. I know rationality is usually your thing, but apply some objectivism and be real."
They stare each other down for a few moments, and they have both gotten better at hiding their thoughts from each other. Dean knows Sam's annoyed and feels a little betrayed but he's keeping specific thoughts tight to his chest. "Okay fine, dickhead. I'll talk to the cousin and you keep looking for another case, but if he knows anything we're following it through."
Sam takes a moment to pack up his backpack. He holds his hand out for the keys. "I shouldn't take more than an hour," is the last thought he directs at Dean before leaving with an angry posture tightening his back.
Dean hates the satisfaction of getting his way, feels dirty and manipulative, but instead of dwelling on it for any significant amount of time he kicks his feet up into the chair Sam vacated and goes through recent newspapers from the surrounding areas.
Like he said, Sam gets back an hour later. His face is tightened into a scowl and there's a dark cloud over his eyes.
"What did you find?" Dean asks, sensing the potential threat and completely disregarding it.
"The guy wasn't too thrilled to talk about his cousin, and when I asked if she had mentioned hearing voices he got angry and threw me out. Said I was dishonoring her name by implying she was crazy." Sam is tapping his foot and fingers in counter rhythm to each other, but it's uncoordinated like he isn't giving it much thought. Sam lets Dean into his body long enough to even out the syncopation and there now his world is better.
"Anything else?" Dean asks.
"You could have paid attention, ass."
"Yeah, but I was multitasking. You didn't actually find anything useful, huh?"
Sam rolls his eyes upwards. There's something frustrating him to the point of madness but it's hidden and fuck him for hiding shit. "Dude, you're overreacting so much," he grits out around clenched teeth.
"Oh, so you think you can tell me when to shut up now, is that it?" An irrational anger settles over Dean. He hates being a bitch but dammit Sam drives him up the wall sometimes.
"Yeah, well when you're calmly walking to your death, I can tell you to do whatever the fuck I want," Sam spits back. He flares his nostrils and the anger multiplies between them.
"If we're on a goddamn timer, then I'd rather spend my last days doing what we usually do, not waste them away in the library hoping for a clue to spontaneously materialize."
"But we can't just give up! Not when there's even a tiny chance we can guarantee ourselves an out on this thing."
"That's the thing though, Sammy. We'll probably both live and maybe both die, but neither of us will be left behind so can't we just take this as it comes and hope for the best?"
"Then what about killing the demon? Is that not important to you anymore? I mean, a year ago that used to the the only thing you could focus on! Or what about Bobby? Do you want to die on him without doing all we can to stay in the game?"
"Shut up. Of course I still want to kill the demon," Dean says, but is at a slight loss for what else to say. On one hand, killing the demon and getting revenge for his parents is one of the most prominent things on his mind, but on the other hand, he's just so tired and wants to live out his theoretically last living days with his brother and a minimal amount of research.
Sam tries to push his anger aside. "Okay, this is so not helping. You're right, let's be rational. Just breathe in and out, one two three four five, and not be so mad okay?" Sam pleads, partly to himself.
The library is quiet and Dean focuses on that while trying to do what his brother asked.
"It's just not like you to give up like this," Sam tries again.
Dean mentally shushes him. "I'm not being angry, just like you said. Be quiet."
Sam grits his teeth. "But there's a very obvious problem at hand here that you're brushing off like it's nothing. What's holding you back?"
"Sam! What did I just say? Shut the fuck up!" Dean snaps. "I'm trying to be calm and civilized here, but that isn't going to work if you keep dragging up the subject."
"And we'll never accomplish anything unless you stop avoiding stuff you don't want to deal with."
Dean doesn't want to think about how all he wants to do is disappear into the thick of America with Sam and forget about the dumb monkey wrenches the universe throws at them.
Instead, he takes another deep breath. "Fine. Fine, what you said. Let's start at the beginning with what we know about the curse. There's definitely a pattern to the ship sightings and it curses partnerships with mind-reading, which is the dumbest thing I've ever heard of, by the way. The victims usually drown themselves but we don't know why. It could be the curse driving them mad, or maybe something about it is compelling them to take the dive. Who knows. At this point, I just want to know why they kill themselves so we can try to prevent it."
"Sammy, come on," Dean says for probably the eighth time in an hour.
"You're whining," Sam replies. "Just another hour, okay?"
Dean rolls his eyes. "Fuck you. We could be physically training ourselves with these constraints and that would be productive too, so why can't we do something I'd actually enjoy instead of fermenting here?"
"Don't be so melodramatic. We'll leave soon." Sam flips through a few more pages of old newspapers on the computer's archive.
Dean rolls his head back and lets out an exaggerated groan of despair. "Fine. I hate you."
"Whatever. I'm perfectly justified in pissing you off right now."
"Fuck that. You're just a Sherlock Holmes wannabe; I want to go do something," Dean says. He braces himself for Sam's bitchface, but instead he just smiles a small, sarcastic smile at him and then they're better than they were a few minutes ago.
A couple minutes later Sam starts to lose his thunder and rethinks his anger. Dean laughs in triumph because he's as good as won this round, and it's his duty to be thrilled.
"Yeah, you won this one. Stop gloating."
"Nope. I get gloating rights for the rest of the day. Deal with it." He stands up with a stretch. "Pack your bags and let's hit the road."
They drop everything off at the motel and since the sun is still beating down like unforgiving sin, Sam makes Dean put sunscreen all over his face, neck and arms. "You'll burn like a tomato," Sam says when Dean tries to protest. "Then you'll complain when it hurts and make me buy you aloe while you pretend to be incapacitated. No thanks."
Dean rolls his eyes but succumbs. "Okay fine, jerkwad. This one time."
"And for the rest of the week, too. You're already more freckled than a few days ago, and don't think I forget how much you complain about them." Sam shrugs. "I win."
They find a more-or-less secluded strip of beach a few miles from their motel.
"Same old rules?" Dean asks out loud as he shakes out his limbs and stretches a little.
Sam nods.
"No face shots, no tickling, no mercy," Dean says for posterity. "Also, no mental shenanigans. When I win I want it to be fair and square."
Sam rolls his eyes but smiles and accepts the additional term. "On the count of three?"
"Yeah."
They face each other, crouched down a little. "One…two…three," Sam says and they jump towards each other. They throw and dodge punches, having a hard time controlling solely their own motions. They circle each other, darting in and out of reach, sneaking in jabs and blocks.
Eventually Dean realize he's nowhere near gaining the upper hand, so he bends down even further to slam his shoulder into Sam's abdomen and yank his knees from under him, knocking them both to the sand. They roll around on the ground for a couple minutes until Dean finally gains control and pins Sam down. He grins at him from up above and Sam grows and mock bites at the air from beneath.
"What'll you do now, huh, Sammy?" Dean asks with a smirk. Sam looks back at him a little too closely and Dean is starting to get suspicious when Sam loosens the hold on his wrists enough to dart his hands in past Dean's defenses like fishes, and tickle ruthlessly at his ribs.
Dean tries his hardest not to make a sound. He lets go of Sam and jumps away, but Sam's fingers follow, tickling up and down and up and down his sides. Dean tries to elbow him away, hit him or knee him, but Sam is a determined little shit, always wanting to make him scream.
"You cheater!" Dean gasps once he manages to slip Sam's reach. "I fucking hate you!"
Sam is practically rolling with laughter, bursting with smug pride. "Some things are too tempting to pass up." He stands up and brushes himself off. "No hard feelings, yeah?"
Dean flips him off. "Whatever. Want to go again? And don't think you'll be able to pull that over me again, you two-timing bastard. Shake on it."
He holds his hand out for Sam to shake in honor, but instead of shaking, Sam just lightly scrapes his fingernails over the sensitive skin of Dean's palm.
Dean snatches his hand back in exaggerated horror, then slaps Sam on the face. "Damn you, that isn't funny."
They head back to the motel. "We've been here too long," he says to Sam. "It's driving me fucking nuts." He jingles for the keys in his pocket, then unlocks the door. Their motel is a wreck, like usual, with their entire meager wardrobes strewn about the floor. He toes at a shirt by the entrance. It looks as big as a tent so it's probably Sam's, but who actually knows. It's not like they keep strict track anyways.
"So, we take off tomorrow morning and see what's up in Kitty Hawk?" Dean asks. "Even if it's just a basic ghost like I think, it'll be good to get a head start."
Sam shrugs and goes into the bathroom to take a piss, leaving the door open so he can talk unhindered. "Yeah, that sounds good."
Dean sits down on his bed. This motel is the same as any other, with the compact room, beds too close together, ugly clock on the wall, TV in the middle. He stands up again and walks back out the still-open front door. "Damn, I want a fucking cigarette," he thinks. He sits on the tail of the Impala and jiggles his legs. He's bored and it eats away at him, leaving him with nothing to do but lean on his car and look at the pale sky.
He can tell Sam is rolling his eyes. "If you smoke a cigarette then it'll be like I'm smoking a cigarette, and that's gross."
Dean shrugs. "Then have one with me instead."
"I don't understand why you think your flawed and faulty logic is persuasive." But Sam finishes playing with his hair in the bathroom or whatever he was doing and joins him outside. "Do you have them squirreled away in the car somewhere or is this going to require an expedition?"
"Expedition. Come on. There's a gas station just across the street."
"Okay okay, fine. I'll go. Just let me take a shower first. You might be a dirty monkey who doesn't mind swimming in his sweat all day, but I'm itching to get clean." Sam gives in because it's not like there's anything else to do for the rest of the day but smoke through a pack of Reds.
Dean ignores the jibe. "Yeah, whatever. I don't really give a fuck."
"Yeah, I caught that bit."
Sam is habitually fast at showering, but it feels like forever when Dean is just sitting outside, scuffing his feet in the dusty gravel and feeling the phantom torrent of water on his skin. "Hurry it up would you?"
"I haven't even touched the soap yet. Calm down." Sam absently shampoos his hair, skips the conditioner, and finally makes his way to the soap. He drifts off into thoughts about shirts he wants to mend, how much toothpaste is left, that book he finished the other day, and washes down his body. He runs his hands over his tight washboard abs, muscled arms, scarred shoulders, rubs his cock, once, twice, and oh now that feels good.
"Sam!" Dean snaps. "Bad time."
Sam pulls his hand away guiltily. "Sorry oh god that's awkward I mean it was sort of out of line, or rather-"
"Stop. Stop apologizing it's okay." Dean rubs the back of his neck and tries to not think about it. "Just. Not now. It's a little weird but don't apologize."
Sam rinses off and steps out of the shower. He towels down methodically and is out again in mere minutes. His hair is limp and damp and pushed back awkwardly and uncombed.
"You look silly," Dean says after examining him.
"Better silly than sticky and gross. My balls aren't sweating like some unmentioned brother of mine."
Dean flips him off and starts off across the street. As far as expeditions go, it's pretty unexciting. There aren't any close calls with traffic, nobody tries to rob the gas station, the clerk is disgustingly normal. Dean lights up as soon as he's out of the convenience store, and almost immediately the tremors and restlessness that have been driving him insane all day bleed away.
He smiles around the filter and offers one to Sam. Sam huffs like someone is actually going to judge him for indulging in a smoke now and then.
"Dude. Me and Bobby are pretty much the only two people in the world who know you, and neither of us actually care. Even dad smoked sometimes."
Sam lights the cigarette despite how not-helpful that statement was. "You know, I don't take pride like you do in how few friends we have."
"What, you need something more? I'm not good enough for you?"
Sam laughs and goes to sit down on the curb at the edge of the parking lot. He shakes his head like he can't believe Dean sometimes, and the frustration coming from him is enough to make Dean pay attention.
"I'm fine with our life Dean, I've told you before and you have to believe me, but don't you ever want friends sometimes? People to go visit who we don't have to hide shit from?"
Dean looks at him for a while. One two three four five breaths. Is blunt honesty best in this situation? Yeah, Sam can tell anyways. "Not particularly. I'm good like this. There's nothing else I need." Dean sits down next to Sam, a little bit too close, close enough that their shoulders are pressed together and their knees knock against each others'. He takes a drag of his cigarette, holding the smoke in his mouth and letting it out slowly so it trickles past his parted lips in lazy drifts. Sam watches the smoke and doesn't say anything else. They'll talk about it some other day.
They stay on the edge of the parking lot near the ugly old gas station. Cars pull in and out to fill up; they just sit there and smoke and watch the sun set over the strip of hotels and beach.
The ghost ends up being as easy as they had hoped. A simple haunting of an old unsolved murder, hanging on to the last attempts of revenge. Sam has to dig fast to her remains while Dean distracts her at the crime scene, getting tossed around like a rag doll.
Dean is about to get the upper hand when she bursts into flame. "You stole my goddamn thunder, Sam!" he pants from the floor as ashes flutter down on him. "I almost had the poker in my hand."
"Which would have worked fine had it actually been made out of iron, Dean," Sam thinks back. "What would you have done if it was made out of something else?"
Dean gets up and brushes himself off. "Yeah, like what? Fire pokers are made out of iron, Sam. Ever come across any different?" He picks up the poker and inspects it. "Yeah, iron."
Sam collapses out of the grave in relief that he had burned her in time anyways. "Whatever, douchebag. I win this round." Sam drags himself up and shakes off the filth. "I'll be back to the house in probably ten minutes. Don't be acting suspicious."
Dean checks around for anyone coming to inspect the noise, but the closest houses show no sign of waking. "I'll be fine, just get your ass back here. It's been a long day and I want to sleep."
"Me too. I'll be over soon."
He hears the Impala's growl from a distance a handful of minutes later. He slips out of the dark shadows, through patches of moonlight, and in through the waiting passenger door.
"Hey, you okay?" Sam asks quietly. He stares in particular at the bruises on Dean's face and scratches on his upper arm.
Dean laughs. The adrenaline is still bubbling around in him. "Hell yeah. You know I am, Sammy. Come on, stop worrying about me." Dean bounces his knees for the twenty-minute drive back because Sam is driving his baby and it's not that bad since he's only a thought away from being in control, but still he'd rather be behind the wheel himself.
The adrenaline has made him horny and fidgety. Sam yanked him away from death yet again, tying them together with another knot for the collection. It pulls something loose in him that Sam might actually be forever, that Sam will fight just as hard as he will to protect what they've cultivated, not that he's ever doubted that Sam is willing to save his life again and again. It makes his neck hot and his jeans feel too tight and his ribs throb in exquisite pain.
He sits forward suddenly to pop open the glove compartment, and pulls out the pack of Reds. "You want one Sammy?" Sam nods, not because he particularly does, but because Dean is offering and he takes whatever Dean wants to give him.
"Peer pressure!" Dean comments with a laugh and wiggle of his eyebrows.
Sam takes the outstretched cigarette and reaches in to snatch the lighter out of Dean's hand before Dean can use it. "Hey!" Dean says. Sam just lights his cigarette and rolls down the window a couple turns. He takes a nonchalant drag and savors the bitter, pungent smoke. It's only then a couple moments before he turns around and grins because he can't keep up the charade of mock-ignoring Dean anymore. He reaches across the few inches and lights Dean's cigarette for him, kind of an apology, kind of just because he feels like it, and also because it makes a really cool glow on his face. Dean keeps a brief eye on the road so that Sam can watch the flame.
Sam tosses the car keys back to Dean once they're in the motel room again. Dean tucks them into his pants pocket before taking them off and walking into the bathroom for his bi-daily tooth ritual.
His toothbrush makes shoof shoof shoof noises as he brushes his teeth, but then again it always does.
"Onomatopoeia," Sam thinks absently while he takes off his shirt and puts on a slightly cleaner one to sleep in. He joins Dean in the bathroom and brushes his teeth alongside him.
"Dork," Dean says. Shoof shoof, one two, shoof shoof. He changes sides, shoof shoof shoof. He doesn't care what the noise is called.
Dean's still jittery, has been jittery for days. He hates having the jitters but he doesn't know how to will them away so maybe they're here to stay this time. It's sort of like after any other hunt, except Sam has the jitters too which makes it all feel more like tenfold, even though it's only the two of them.
He looks at Sam because Sam is already looking at him. "Cigarette?" he asks.
"We just brushed our teeth," Sam declines.
Dean looks down at his toothbrush and shakes the excess water off at Sam's face. "Okay fine, you're right."
They finish getting ready for bed in silence, trying not to think about anything. Sam looks over at him and is kind of annoyed about something, is buzzing with the urge to get angry. He wants Dean to pick a fight and disrupt their peace as a distraction to something he refuses to name. Dean ignores him and keeps his mouth shut because that isn't anything he wants to touch with a ten-foot pole.
Neither of them are tired, but a solitary night off seems like an acceptable way to pass the time. They zone out to some mindless episodes of MythBusters, laying in bed and drinking beer, even though that means Dean will have to brush his teeth again later. It's been a weird few days but goddamn it's always fun to watch shit blow up and get destroyed.
"Hey, you want another one?" Dean asks as he gets up and heads for the mini-fridge.
Sam is about to answer, about to say yeah sure, when his sight catches and latches on to the bare skin of Dean's back. So much skin barely hiding rippling muscles and strong bone and pumping blood. Dean doesn't see what's so fascinating about his skin. "Living, breathing big brother, that's what's so fascinating," Sam thinks back.
"Same as every other day." Dean thinks he should change the subject, and he doesn't want to turn around and look at Sam, because then they could see each other and who knows what that would mean.
"Yeah, I like that bit too." Sam wants something, but it's a vague, half-formed want, and Dean can't tell what it is. "Dean, just look at me you jerk."
Dean looks over. Dammit he can't help himself, but if Sam wants something then Dean needs it (or will die trying to convince himself of that).
Sam looks at him dark and focused. "Bring me that beer, you," he says, but there's something cracking here. They're slipping off-script, nearing a line.
He needs to break eye contact, so he pops the tops off the beers with his ring and brings them back, a little tipsy turvy wobbly on his feet. He hands over Sam's beer and then flops down into his bed with a sigh. He counts the empty beer bottles out of habit, just cataloguing the room and keeping track. There are five empties and each of them are working on another.
Things were still today. Long stretches of quiet punctuated by brief conversations, while Sam kept a close eye on him without lending much thought as to why. He feels like he's bubbling over with an itchy, furiously impassioned hunger to see Dean in every single permutation imaginable. He rocks his hips up just barely and lets loose a pleased sigh at the slight pressure.
Dean wishes he was surprised but he can tell that this has been building longer than he should admit. He can't help the arousal that furls out and stains his stomach; he craves this arousal because it's real and it's Sam and it's something only for the two of them.
They lay there and breathe in sync and the heat between them feeds off of each other's. Sam wants to turn his head and look at Dean, but the shame keeps him looking up at the ceiling. He tickles his stomach in circles to distract himself from the wrong and bad and we probably shouldn't until Dean mutters "You can, you know. Look."
He looks and Dean doesn't understand what Sam sees, because Sam thinks he's perfect and kind of pretty and magical. He moans a little at the fierce attention that Sam is directing at him, because Sam is seeing all of him and everything about him, and it's claustrophobic except that it's Sam and so it feels good better than good; if Sam wants it then it's already a done deal, he wants it too.
Sam slips his hand down and rubs himself through his old cotton boxers but he's focused more on Dean's face. Dean's profile, rather, because Dean is staring steadfastly ahead. He's hard - so goddamn hard from Sam's focus on him and he won't let Sam keep his eyes to his half of the room - and he shifts his hips to chase any available friction. He hasn't touched himself yet, can't quite bear to, but he's moments away from giving in fuck the consequences whatever they may be.
"Just look at me," Sam says in his head, close and intimate like he's whispering in his ear and not a bed away, and he nudges Dean's face towards his. Jesus, there's a difference between knowing Sam's thoughts, and then to see them like proof spread out for him to pick through. "Don't you realize that's the most I've ever wanted from you? Just look at me see me I'm only your little brother so just fucking look at me and stop staring through me like I'm temporary because I'm not."
Sam is almost sliding off his bed on the side closest to Dean to be as near as possible without actually getting up and sliding in with Dean, which isn't something either of them are at all prepared to even think about. He pulls his boxers down past his knees and the rush of satisfaction he feels when he gets his hand around his bare cock makes Dean's mouth water. Sam closes his eyes tight and watches himself through Dean; his arm flexing and pulling, his flushed cheeks, wet mouth, so thoroughly Sam even in this foreign side of him.
He gives in. He can't help himself, not with Sam beating himself off just feet away to Dean looking at him, just looking at him, like he doesn't want anything else (Dean the protector provider idol brother everything).
Dean slips his fingers under the elastic of his boxers and starts to pull at his cock before he loses his nerve since this is because of Sam, because Sam wants it, Sam getting him hot and wanting something he's spent innumerable years trying not to think about, Sam Sam Sam, it'll never not be about Sam.
Dean loses himself in the pleasure (he's always been good at that). He has to blink away from Sam because it's a little too much all at once, but the goddamn noises coming from his little brother's mouth are enough to make him to gasp and twitch. Sam is tangled up with him, and so maybe he has every single wire in his brain crossed and knotted and frayed, but that got them to the here and right now, so he can probably live with it.
"Dean," Sam says out loud. "Dean, oh fuck, I can't-- it's so--" He gasps, and with a last squeeze to the head of his cock he comes all over his hand. It's a brutal orgasm and he shivers through the long tremors.
There's no hope of lasting any longer. Dean feels the tension come to a head and he almost chokes on his tongue with how hard he comes. His come is slippery and warm between his fingers, makes his hand glide almost frictionless over his cock as he wrings the last of his orgasm out.
Dean hasn't had a chance to come down all the way when Sam stands up and walks to the bathroom to rinse his hands off. Dean keeps his eyes on the ceiling and gathers his thoughts. Sam walks back with damp hands and a tentative smile, stops next to Dean. "Hey, you good?" he asks.
Dean looks at him and grins because he doesn't know what he's actually supposed to think right now. "Of course I'm good," he says and reaches over to wipe his jizz off on Sam's shirt.
Sam yelps impressively and jumps back. "Dean, that's disgusting! What was that for?"
Dean laughs and gets up to brush the old beer taste out of his mouth.
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