SPN Fic: The Number You Have Reached
Title: The Number You Have Reached
Characters: Sam, Dean
Genre: Gen
Rating: G
Word-count: 952
Spoilers: None; tentatively set early S5-ish, but there's no reference to any plot points.
Summary: Sam's concerned because his brother's just woken up out of a twelve-day coma. Dean's more worried about the fact that there are people trying to grope his face with sharp implements, and Sam, for some reason, isn't there.
Notes: Written one crazy midnight, because you know what? hoodie_time has a face-shaving tag. I think that's all that needs to be said here.
The phone almost buzzes its way off the pile of papers before the realization fights its way up through Sam's sleep-deprived daze. Luckily, reflexes are still good for something even when your brain feels like a wad of rusty steel wool. He reacts just in time for the phone to slither off the stack onto his waiting palm.
The number's not familiar, and he's tempted to just hit cancel and head for the nearest mattress (or couch, or bathtub, or living room floor - he's not fussy, at this point), but instinct kicks in again, and he lifts the phone to his ear.
“Sam?”
The voice is rough and distant, almost inaudible, and even over the crappy connection he can hear the strain, tell how much effort it's taking Dean just to talk. They were supposed to tell him. He promised Dean - ignored the doctors who said his brother probably couldn't hear, and promised Dean that he'd be there the minute he woke up; he just had to finish the case before somebody else got it worse than Dean had. He left, and he hated himself for it, and he made the nurse behind the front desk swear they'd call him the instant Dean's big toe wiggled.
And now here he is, listening to Dean struggle to grate out the monosyllable of his name. He can almost see the veins trembling in his brother's forehead, the question staring in his eyes.
“Sam?” the voice rasps again, lifting so high this time he almost thinks for a second he's got the wrong person on the other end of the line, because how the hell could his big brother sound so damn little? But the breathing's heavy and distinct, coming loud and clear through the static, and God, he wasn't sure he'd be hearing that breathing ever again.
“Hey, man, I'm here,” he stammers out quickly. “Listen, you're gonna be okay now - you were out for a couple of days - ” (a week and a half, but Dean doesn't need to know that now) “ - but you're gonna get better soon. Okay? Witch got you,” he goes on before Dean can ask. “I guess she must've known where we were staying, 'cause when we got back to the room there was a hex bag stuffed into the Kleenex box in the bathroom.” He feels a shudder squirm down his spine, remembering the sudden, inexplicable blood from Dean's mouth, so unexpected that at first he thought it was some elaborate and tasteless joke his brother had rigged up to watch him cringe. “I'm sorry, Dean. You're gonna be okay,” he repeats, and knows it's for himself as much as for his brother.
Silence. The breathing hitches, evens.
“Dude,” Dean whispers. Sam listens, but there's another pause, as though Dean's stopping to rest halfway through the sentence.
“Yeah?” he prompts tentatively when the voice doesn't go on.
“They wanna shave me,” Dean says.
Sam blinks.
“So?” he asks finally. “You've kinda been gathering moss these past few days. You wanna start growing a beard or something?”
“Tell 'em they can't shave me, Sammy,” Dean says simply, as if those seven words are all he has the energy to pronounce.
“Okay,” Sam agrees, bemused, “I'll tell them.” And though Dean doesn't respond, Sam hears relief in the silence.
“Listen,” he announces, grabbing his jacket and shrugging into it one arm at a time while juggling the phone between hands, “I'm coming over there now. Be there in ten minutes. Hey!” he orders, “don't you fall asleep again. Okay?” He waits.
“Okay,” the answer comes at last, tired and obedient and tiny.
“Right,” Sam says, and, though it feels like switching off a lifeline, he hangs up. The familiar, terrible breathing is swallowed off into nothingness. He pockets the dead air, and heads for the door.
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
The hair's sharp and new, tense under his fingers as he flicks a thumb through the lather at the corner of Dean's jaw. His brother's eyes are closed, but it's clear that in spite of his self-imposed blindness Dean senses every slightest movement of the razor across his skin. Sam feels himself caught in slow motion, concentrating muscles he didn't even realize his arms contained in his effort to keep his hands steady as he works.
Dean's Adam's apple jumps, and Sam's hand pauses without conscious thought, waiting for the momentary tremor to subside.
When he's done, he wipes Dean's chin and throat clean, throws away the towels and the disposable razor, then sits back down awkwardly, his hands hanging suddenly useless and clumsy at his side. Dean still doesn't open his eyes, and at first Sam thinks maybe he's gone and fallen asleep.
Then, “Thanks.”
Just the one word, and as soon as it's faded into silence there's nothing to suggest Dean ever spoke: no movement, no emotion on the freshly-smooth face, no sign of eyes moving back and forth under the closed lids. Sam doesn't know what to say.
“Hey,” he mutters, “I'm not gonna let a bunch of strangers take a razor to my own brother.”
Dean doesn't respond. Just lies there, breathing slowly as he settles back into oblivion, a stray splotch of shaving cream nestled in the curve of his ear. Sam leans forward to wipe it away, and Dean doesn't even flinch.
He's asleep.
“I was never going to just leave you alone here, you know,” Sam tells him - even though he probably can't hear.