Fic: Light the Length of August (Supernatural) 5/?

[broken_cinders]

Sorry this one took so long to post. I'm considered "essential staff" at my job. With everything going on writing has taken a bit of a back seat due to an increase in my hours. They've even approved overtime for us which is unheard of. My life consists of retail hell right now, but I finally got a few days off so I'm posting. Yay! I'm thinking about also putting up some of the little side bits that didn't make it in (of which there are several). Most of them are because I apparently didn't care whose PoV I was writing form in the the first draft. You know, I've got bits of this written all the way up through the current season and I just can't wait to share them. Once this story arc is finished, I may skip around in the timeline a bit.

Title: Light the Length of August - Chapter 5: Start Fresh
Fandom: Supernatural
Character(s): Sam, Cas, Dean
Pairing(s): Gen
Word Count: 3743
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: If you recognize it, it’s not mine. If you don’t recognize it, it still might not be mine. Any recognizable places or people have been fictionalized. I am not blind. I do not have any immediate acquaintances that are blind. Any mistakes on that front are entirely my own. If you spot an error, let me know. Research can only take me so far.
Summary: Sam thinks of himself as an intelligent guy. He knows life isn’t usually fair. He knows the job they do is dangerous. He knows for them there are no guarantees or ironclad promises. He also knows that time is running out to find his possibly demonic brother and help Cas. He doesn’t have time for another sucker punch from whatever higher power likes toying with him. He still wakes up in the hospital alone and blind.


They pulled into the center’s parking lot at a quarter till eight. Sam’s fingers drummed a nervous rhythm against the door. He could feel Cas glancing at him as he drove, but he couldn’t still his fidgeting. He kept hoping if he told himself this was for the best he would eventually believe it.

Coming to Brookhaven was the right decision. He had to learn how to work around this newest obstacle. Maybe it was the brittle morning light that felt like broken glass striking his eyes or maybe it was the quieter engine of Cas’s car that seemed to whine instead growl like the Impala, but he felt skittish. He longed to get out of the car and just run. When he walked through those doors, things were going to get a lot more real.

The car jerked to a stop. Sam and Cas sat next to each other in silence. Sam couldn’t glance over and read Cas’s expression. He was relying entirely on the sound of the angel’s breathing to give him some sense of what he was thinking. The fact that he had settled into something a bit like he was trying to control every inhale, left Sam wondering whether that meant he was struggling with whatever his missing grace was doing to his body and trying to hide it or if he had misgivings about the center.

Cas shifted, bumping up against Sam’s arm in the tight confines of the front seat. “Are you ready?”

Sam took his own steadying breath and nodded. It was now or never. Cas climbed out. By the time Sam was out of the car, he had made his way around and was pressing the handle of a bag into Sam’s hand. Sam reached out and claimed the hold that was becoming habitual on Cas’s arms.

They paused just long enough to speak with the receptionist. She told them to leave their bags at the desk, but quickly shepherded them into a large office. As they entered, someone stood across from them and offered a curt, “Good morning.” Sam nodded in the direction of the voice. It was soft, but authoritative.

“Hi,” Sam said, extending his hand. “I’m Sam Singer. This is Cas, my cousin.”

He was met with a surprisingly smaller hand that gripped his own tightly. “Dr. Singleton,” he said. Perhaps Sam had misread his tone earlier. He sounded warm, if professionally distant. “Pleasure to meet you. I have to admit, Dr. Kinder piqued my curiosity about you.”

“Really? Why?” Sam took a step back at Cas’s prompting and found a chair behind him. He sat, not quite letting himself settle into the cushy seat.

“She said you saved a girl from a rabid bear, charmed her best day nurse, and impressed the local sheriff.” His voice turned stern. “She also said you were a terrible patient and were unwilling to cooperate with staff about your post-release care program.”

Sam stiffened at the accusation. “The intention was to find a program like the one you run here. Aside from the obvious, I’m fine. I barely even cracked the arm and the ribs were just bruised.”

At Cas’s pointed throat clearing Sam huffed and added. “Fine, are bruised. I’ve had worse, and there’s no reason to be lying around in a bed that someone else might need when I could be up spending that time learning what I need to learn. Plus the food was awful,” Sam added, trying to lighten the mood a bit.

It didn’t work.

“I need you to understand that we have certain expectations for those in our program. No refusing to work with your instructors or fighting us. No skipping out early because you feel like it. This will be a six-week program. I understand that you are not from the area and you have obligations you have to get back to. Dr. Kinder was vague about that, but if you aren’t prepared to put in the full six weeks you should leave right now.”

Sam’s grip tightened on the chair arm. “You’re not going to scare me away. I may not like that I’m like this, but I am going to do what needs to be done. I don’t have an option. So if it’s a six-week program I’ll be here for six weeks.”

The man across from him hummed. “It’s a residential program. That means you’ll be living on our campus for the full duration of your stay. We do not, however, provide accommodation for family members. They are encouraged to visit during our open visiting hours, but otherwise will be expected to be elsewhere.”

Sam opened his mouth to ask what exactly the man was implying. Something in his attitude pushed Sam onto the offensive. Before he could speak, Cas jumped in and said, “Of course. I understand. When are visiting hours?”

“Every day between four pm and eight pm. We like to encourage you to come as often as you like - during those hours. Sam will be busy the rest of the time.”

Sam forced himself to relax back into the chair. It was just his nerves making this interview feel antagonistic. He tamped down his rising temper and asked, “What all is involved in this process?”

“You’ll start with a consultation visit with each of our three specialists to determine your needs and begin working from there. As part of this process, you’ll also be attending sessions with one of our in-house counsellors. This part of the program is non-negotiable.”

“I’ve never been great with counselling,” Sam admitted. He had to repress a shudder at his last brush with head doctors. He would never forget nurses flinging meds at him while Lucifer played party games in his head.

Dr. Singleton ignored the implications of the statement and barreled on. “So you’ve been before. Good. That means you already know a bit about what to expect. Do you have any preferences? Anything we should take into consideration when choosing?”

“Uh,” Sam said, eloquently. He hadn’t expected to be given much choice in the matter. “I don’t know?”

“That’s typical. Do you prefer a man or a woman?”

“Man, I guess.”

“Any family history of depression, anxiety, or other mental illness?”

“No.”

Dr. Singleton took a moment to scribble down a few notes. He cleared his throat and said, “That’s plenty to start with. Today is your one exception to the visitation rule. If you’d like, your cousin can accompany you on the tour and help get you settled. Then, after lunch, the real work begins.”

Sam frowned. “That’s it?”

“That’s it. What were you expecting?”

“I don’t know. Forms to fill out, maybe? More of a spiel?”

“Dr. Kinder sent over your records last night. If you want to know about the history of the facility, Mandy will be able to answer most of your questions. As for a spiel, I meet with a dozen people a day. Anything more than what we just had here would be insincere and a waste of both our times.”

Sam shrugged. “Fair enough. What now?”

The man across from him rose from his seat. Beside him Cas did the same so Sam climbed to his own feet. Cas’s light touch on his elbow guided him around the chairs and back towards the entrance.

“Now, you take a tour and get settled. Mr. Cas, you are welcome to stay until lunch. Mandy will show you around and make sure you get to both your room and the dining hall. You will have a guide for the first few days you are here.”

With that, Sam was ushered out the door and into the waiting clutches of an overly cheerful young woman who delighted in showing him around. She offered more information about the building and the program than Sam ever had a hope of remembering. He settled for trying to piece together the basics of a mental map and hoped for the best.

She talked all the way to the door of the room that was to be his for his stay. She produced a key and excused herself as Sam and Cas both hesitated in the doorway. Sam wasn’t sure about what might be in the room and the last thing he wanted was to go stumbling into the unfamiliar space. “Cas,” Sam prompted. So far Cas hadn’t hesitated to be Sam’s eyes when he needed it.

Cas cleared his throat. “It’s small, but sparse. The bed is along the left-hand wall. Your bags have been brought up and left at the foot. A desk with a chair are opposite us. There’s a door between the two, presumably the bathroom. And a dresser and wardrobe along the wall to your right.”

There was a tightness in the way he described the room. Sam bit his lip, itching to turn around and just leave. If they left now, they could just drive until the whole thing became a bad memory. Except Sam couldn’t outrun his world of lights and darks. He shifted in the doorway and dropped his grip on Cas’s arm to step forward into the room. “You hate it, don’t you,” he called over his shoulder as he took a few tentative steps forward.

“No,” Cas hurried to say. “It’s just not what I was expecting.”

“What do you mean?” Sam paused and tilted his head, listening to the way Cas shifted behind him.

“I suppose I’ve grown accustomed to hotel rooms,” he admitted. “There’s no television or radio. No refrigerator or anything of that sort. It just seems very bare.”

Sam shrugged. It sounded a lot like his freshman dorm only with the added bonus of being private. “It’s fine. I doubt there will be a lot of down time to watch TV, and like you said it’s not a motel. At least tell it’s not decked out in some garish theme. After that fish motel…” Sam shuddered at the memory. “I hated that place.”

“The room is mostly beige,” Cas offered. “The comforter on the bed is a deep grey. It doesn’t look particularly plush, but it’s clean and obviously well cared for.”

“Bed’s against the left wall?”

“Yes.”

Sam nodded and struck out that direction. He found the bed easily enough. He would explore the room later that evening. Right now, he felt a little overwhelmed and just needed to sit down.

“Sam, are you sure this is what you want?” Cas’s shoes made a soft shushing noise as he stepped over the carpeted floor to stand across from him.

“I told you,” Sam said. “It’s what I need. What does anyone want with a blind hunter? The least I can do is make sure I don’t accidentally get myself killed by wandering out in traffic or slow down someone else. Besides, even if we do find Dean and bring him home I have to be able to be self-sufficient. I’m a grown man, not a toddler. I can’t have people taking care of me for the rest of my life.”

A silence settled between them after that. Sam busied himself picking at a loose thread he had found on the hem of his shirt. After a long moment Cas finally said, “Dr. Singleton did not seem particularly friendly.”

“At least he says what he means.”

They both startled at the sharp rap on the door. They hadn’t bothered to close it when they came in. Mandy’s chipper voice called, “Hello? Sam? I’m here to take you down to the dining hall.”

Sam rose, nodding in her direction. “Thanks. Give me just a second.”

She slipped back out. Sam stepped over to Cas. He pulled him up into a tight hug. He didn’t usually go for this kind of physical affection, but it felt right. Cas would be leaving now. Sam almost asked him to stay. He was on the edge of the unknown here and having someone he trusted on his side would make the whole ordeal just a little bit more bearable. That wasn’t fair to Cas though. Instead, he pulled back and said, “Thank you, Cas. For everything. I don’t know what I’d have done without you.”

Cas’s grip tightened on Sam’s arm. “You’re welcome, although you don’t have to thank me.” He stepped back, allowing Sam a clear path to the door. “Call me if you need anything.”

Sam smiled at him. “Sure. Same. I’ll catch you later.”

Sam walked forward only to pause at the doorway to find his guide. Mandy instructed him to take her arm and together they left.

Mandy stayed with him through his first meal in the common dining room and chatted the entire time. He was beginning to think she was nothing but a stream of words. Even having held her arm, he found his impression was of the continual flow of her voice rather than of any physical feature he might conjure in his imagination.

He pushed his serving of spaghetti around his plate for a solid ten minutes. He wasn’t all that hungry and the pasta kept springing free of his fork no matter how he tried to twirl it or stab it. Eventually he gave up and let himself be shuffled to his next appointment.

The visit with Dr. Fisher after lunch was about as unremarkable as every other visit with every other doctor he’d ever had. She was thoughtful and made sure Sam knew exactly what she was doing, but otherwise was fully professional and aloof. Sam was getting sick of professionalism.

He ran through a battery of tests, including a second MRI. It was the first time he had ever failed so many tests in one go. In fact, it was probably the first time he had ever performed so badly on a test, period. He was really hoping these visits would be rare over the next few weeks. He had taken about all the poking and prodding he could stand. Yet it was the last task she set him that really gnawed at him.

They had taken seats in her office as she went through some basic questions about what he could and couldn’t see. It had been the same sort of things they had asked in the hospital. Finally, she said, “There’s a window in my office. Can you tell where?”

Sam was caught off guard by the question. He had been aware it was relatively well lit in the room, but he hadn’t realized there was more than one light source. He turned his head, paying attention to the way the grey field that filled his vision shifted. The light was brightest across from him where he presumed the doctor was sitting at her desk. “Behind you somewhere.”

She made a noncommittal noise. “Can you tell where the desk is in relation to the window?”

Sam squinted, trying to make sense of the pattern, but it was just a dull gradient. He shook his head. “No. Nothing’s defined,” he admitted. Somehow, despite the dozen basic tasks he’d failed to accomplish during their appointment, this one felt like the real failing. He hadn’t even tried to find the desk by touch. He could guess approximately where it was, but the fact that he could barely tell which direction light was coming from drove home just how much he was missing out on.

In the end, Dr. Fisher set up a time for him to come back so they could go over everything together before he was whisked away back to his room.

There was a woman waiting outside his door when they arrived. The soft smell of her perfume tickled Sam’s nose, and he resisted the urge to sneeze figuring it wouldn’t make that great of a first impression. Mandy patted his arm, then was gone down the hall.

“Hi there, Sam. My name is Helen. I’m your life-skills coach during your time here at Brookhaven.” She sounded short and her voice was light, but raspy.

Sam forced a smile onto his face and nodded towards her. “Nice to meet you. Where are we going next?”

“Nowhere.”

Sam must have looked confused, because she gave a light laugh then explained. “I usually do my first meetings here in the rooms. I’m here to help you unpack and to talk about what you want to get from the program.”

Sam’s brain raced through the possible ramifications. He had left most of his arsenal with Cas for safe keeping, but he’d kept a few odds and ends. The salt and holy water he could probably explain away, but the silver knife tucked into his shirt and the demon knife hidden at the bottom of his bag would raise some brows. “Um…I don’t really have much unpacking to do. It’s mostly just shirts.”

She seemed to pick up on his nerves. “No worries. You’re going to be doing the unpacking. I won’t pry or even touch your things if you don’t want.”

Sam sagged in relief. “That obvious, huh?”

She laughed again. Sam liked that easy casualness from her. It was refreshing after the cool distance of all the doctors he’d been dealing with. “It’s pretty common among our residents to be wary of letting someone go through their things.”

“Ah,” he said, fishing out his room key and opening the door for them. “Yeah. I’ll do the unpacking. Although there’s really not much.”

He led the way into the room and moved to the bed where his bags had sat untouched from earlier. Helen came in behind him as he began the tedious process of sorting through his clothes mostly by smell. He was careful to start a dirty pile next to the bag, not wanting to mix in the clothes he’d worn for three days straight with the semi-clean ones. He would probably just wash everything next laundry day and start fresh. He hadn’t been too diligent in keeping his clothes washed lately.

“Let’s talk while you sort,” Helen offered. He heard her pull out the desk chair and settle as she spoke. “What exactly are you hoping to get out of this?”

Sam shrugged, folding a t-shirt and adding it to the stack. “I have to be pretty independent. I need to learn how to take care of myself, by myself. I’m not an idiot. I realize this is going to limit what I can do, but I don’t have time to be dependent on my brother or my cousin, and they shouldn’t have to take care of me.”

“I’m going to be honest with you,” she said. Her voice was firm, but not unkind. “There’s no point in beating around the bush with these things. With your level of residual vision, at least as it stand now, you’re going to need help.”

Sam sighed, but didn’t say anything.

“That being said, I’ll bet you can do more than you think you can. So, full independence or as close as we can get. I can work with that, but it’s going to require some hard work on your part. For everything I put into this, you’re going to have to put in at least double the effort.”

Sam nodded. He could live with that. “Deal.”

“Good. Then let’s get to work. I’ll go easy on you today.” She moved in beside him, watching as he worked. “Let’s hang up those button ups so you can get the practice for organizing the closet space.”

With her help he managed to get everything into some sort of order, although by the end he was hopelessly lost. He’d known he had a number of colors and patterns, but he’d never really thought about it before. They hung them up according to a color system, but Sam couldn’t for the life of him remember how many red shirts he had, let alone what might be dirty at this point.

When he’d said as much Helen snorted. “Give it time. The first week is always the hardest because you’re not used to remembering everything you need to. But you do have homework. For tomorrow, I want you to wear that green flannel.”

Sam frowned. “I have no idea if I even remember where that is now.”

She patted him on the arm. “You’ll get there. We’ll start labelling things soon, but think of it like learning math. You have to know how to add before you can multiply.”

“So I’m learning addition and colors. I might even graduate kindergarten if I’m lucky.” Sam couldn’t help the bitter tone that crept into his voice at the thought. He’d gone to Stanford. Now he was organizing his shirts by color.

Beside him, Helen sighed. “I’m going to say this once, okay? What happened sucks. No one is ever going to say any different. That doesn’t mean your life is over. You need to decide how you plan to handle that fact. The world doesn’t stop just because you are blind now. So yes, for right now you’re learning addition. Give me six weeks and I’ll have you doing calculus, but if I catch you wallowing I’m going to assume it means you don’t have enough to do and I’m going to make sure you don’t have time for it. Understood?”

In that moment, Sam was reminded of a hundred other pep talks he’d been on the receiving end of as a kid. This one was kinder and filled with substantially less yelling. Sam smiled, softly. They weren’t happy memories exactly, but they brought up long forgotten fondness.

“What?” Helen said, sounding a little off put. “Normally that speech gets a very different reaction.”

“You just remind me of someone.”

“Who?”

“My father. He was a marine and he approached raising kids a lot like boot camp, but he made sure we could take on the world if we had to.”

“He sounds like my kind of guy.”

Sam threw his head back and laughed. “Oh, I’m sure you’d have gotten along famously. Or infamously.”

“Then no moping, cadet. Or it’ll be laps for sure.”

Sam gave a little half-hearted salute. “Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”

She made her way to the door. “Good. I’m going to go, but I’ll see you tomorrow morning, bright and early at eight o’clock. Rob should be by soon. Kick his ass for me.”

With that she slipped out the door. Sam was left thinking he didn’t know exactly what to think about her or this whirlwind of a day.

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