Sammy Without Sound
Title: Sammy Without Sound
Summary: Sam is doing a good job of scaring John and Dean senseless. Then a witch comes along and helps.
Warnings/Spoilers: No spoilers, bad language.
Wordcount: 8,253
Author's Note: Sammyverse! Asthmatic Sam and BFF Winchesters. It's Pre-Stanford; Sam is 16 and Dean is a few days shy of 21. Title pillaged from the Motion City Soundtrack song "Mary Without Sound."
--
Dean can't remember the last time he sat in the backseat for any period of time, and he's all alone back here and feels like he's being punished for something.
Sam loves stretching out in the backseat and leaving all his shit back here and pretending like he has his own little apartment. The backseat is Sam's constant, and he's almost seventeen and has never had a fucking home and he has lungs that think breathing is optional so he needs that, and now he's not even here, he's up in the front seat with his feet up on the window and his head on John's lap because he and John are trading off Sam-time and it's John's turn.
No music, just the engine and Sammy breathing. Dean's starving, but they're waiting until Sam wakes up before they stop, and he's wheezing all quiet so they're not going to fuck with that.
Plus he won't be asleep much longer. The doctor told them to expect him to sleep a lot, but yeah, Sam doesn't do that.
Sure enough, twenty minutes later Dean hears coughing and John's quiet voice, sees John's shoulder moving to rub his back. John pulls to a stop in front of the first diner. Sam sits up, stretches.
“You feel less hot,” John says, softly, and Sam nods and pulls his scarf up around his mouth. “Want soup?” John says.
Another nod.
“That's my boy. Let's get you bundled up.”
**
“Sam-time,” Dean calls before they can sit down, and John laughs quietly and takes his arm from around Sam's shoulders to make room for Dean's. Dean has Sam slide into the booth before him, so he's protected or whatever the fuck, and Sam shivers and rests his head against the wall.
The waitress comes by for their orders and John hounds the waitress about peanuts before Dean can, and Dean decides Sam's recovered enough to be fucked with a little and starts taking everything off the table and handing it to Sam. Sam takes the coffee creamers dutifully but gets confused when Dean starts forcing the jelly containers and salt and pepper shakers and forks on him. He looks up at John for help.
John reaches across the table and thwacks Dean in the head, then turns to giggly Sam and says, “Look who's smiling,” and fuck that that's the thing to get the kid to smile, but Dean will take it, because two days ago Sammy was a lump in a hospital bed who was crying without even knowing it with a throat swollen closed and a fever that made the doctors shake their heads so yeah, you laugh at your brother getting smacked around in a diner booth, Sam, you laugh at whatever the fuck you want.
Dean tries to take the stuff back but Sam clings to all of it and rests his cheek against Dean's shoulder. The timer on Sam's watch goes off. Med time.
Sam's throat can't handle pills, so he's on all these antibiotic syrups and apparently they don't make them in the awesome grape flavor Sam fucking loved when he was a little kid, they're just these clear syrups that make him shudder. He can't drink anything cold, either, so he takes them with sips of tea that Dean already cooled down with an ice cube. He definitely can't manage coffee, so his lungs are growling and he keeps falling asleep for two minute stretches, half the time sitting up. Sam's throat is quite the little bitch right now, and he keeps taking his fingers and touching the base of it which is freaking them the fuck out because he's been known to do that when he's having an allergic reaction and the thing is fucking closing up, so yeah, if he could stop that soon, that'd be great.
John's turkey dinner came with mashed potatoes, and he says, “You want to try these, champ?”
Sam clears his throat for a minute and says, “Not yet,” and they smile at him because it's good to hear him talk, even if it's that gravely ghost of a voice, and he smiles back.
“Two hours more on the road,” John says. “Almost done.” He's really adamant about getting out of state because child protective services is breathing the fuck down their necks, and going east would have been faster but, no, John seems convinced that going south is as much medicine for Sam as the antibiotics, because who ever caught pneumonia while heading south? Sam won't. Sam won't.
“s'fine,” Sam says. “I can sleep anywhere.”
“No,” John says. “You need a bed.”
“M'feeling better,” Sam says, tucking himself against Dean's shoulder.
“Can do a nebulizer at the motel,” Dean says, because obviously the kid's still fucking taking his inhaler but he's having a bitch of a time with it because of how swollen his throat still is, and since he physically cannot get his usual asthma pills down, he's been grinding them up and drinking them in warm water and none of them are really sure how well that's working. The kid's breathing, but they're just listening all the time. They're kind of waiting for the other fucking shoe to drop, because apparently the kid almost fucking dying from something six-year-olds get two weeks into his second semester of sophomore year and having to flee the fucking hospital because the insurance goes bad doesn't count as two shoes, but whatever, welcome to the bullshit of being and of loving Sam Winchester, you end up in a diner in January either fighting to swallow tea or fighting about who gets to have the sick one's head on his shoulder for the next hour because the kid almost fucking died, okay? Everything else is kind of tabled. Everything.
“Feeling better,” Sam says again, which should be a relief but seriously, how the fuck would the kid feel worse?
“Lungs must ache,” Dean says.
Sam shakes his head, slowly. He's falling asleep now. “Safe. Not worried right now.”
**
Dean's Sam-time continues into the beginning of the drive, so he stays in the backseat and Sam tries to sleep but can't, so he and Dean play Hangman and Sam wants to read but he's still a little too dizzy and Dean won't read him the next chapter of the book he's actually reading because he's already read it to him three fucking times because he keeps forgetting and his fever's still high enough that Dean doesn't trust that this is going to be the time he magically does, so he finds some paperback on the floor that he knows Sam's made it through before and reads the first chapter to him, and Sam stays awake so he keeps reading even though his fucking throat gets sore because what's he supposed to do, whine about it?
Sam's starting to sound kind of bad.
“Dad?” Dean says. “I think we should stop. Do the last hour tomorrow.”
“Yeah?” John glances back at them.
“He's fading fast and the wheezing's picking up.”
Sam lowers himself down, curls up with his head in Dean's lap.
“All right,” John says. “You're doing great, Sam. Next motel.”
But the next motel is fucking disgusting and John comes out snarling and says no way would his kids be sleeping there even if they were the fucking models of good fucking health, and Sam smiles a little and they keep driving. The place where they finally stop is way outside their normal price range, and Dean can tell John's more nervous than usual about getting caught, but it's just the one night and it's so fucking nice, and Dean and John feel like fucking superheros leading Sam to his room and putting him between the cool clean sheets and Sam's all sleepy and feverish, cuddling his pillow and mumbling “thank y' love y'” and yeah, fucking cart them away to jail, just let Sam sleep, you know?
“You can have the other bed,” John says, wrestling with the fold-out-couch.
“Yeah?”
John nods. “If he wakes up scared, he's going to want to see you first.”
You can say a lot of shit about John but you can not say he's not fucking excellent when Sam is really sick. Day-to-day asthma stuff is not his fucking forte, but that's okay, Dean can take that and God knows Sam can, but when Sam's too sick to take care of himself Dean has this bad habit of shutting down and daydreaming about running away or taking a knife and excising all his damn fucking feelings, but that's when John's at his best. John fights a crises like he'd fight a demon.
He comes to the bed and feels Sam's forehead. “Definitely cooler.”
Dean nods, snapping together pieces of the nebulizer. “He's getting well.”
“How long do you think?”
“'til he's hunting again?” Dean looks at him. “Three weeks, maybe?”
“Just 'til he's back on his feet.”
Dean shrugs. “Tomorrow. You know Sam.”
John puts his hand on top of Dean's head and Dean closes his eyes, relaxes.
“He's okay,” John says, gently. “He's not going anywhere.”
John is fighting their fucking demons.
**
The night's not great; Sam with a fever is a Sam who doesn't sleep well, and he has two coughing fits that leave him in tears, but that isn't new for this week. They hold him still through it and tell him it's okay, that he doesn't have to be fucking embarrassed, Jesus, he can't fucking swallow and his body's making him cough for minutes at a time, what the hell is he supposed to do, laugh about it? And then he fucking does laugh a little and John whispers that it'll be okay and Dean rubs between his shoulder blades.
“Too good t'be true,” Sam says after the second one, his palm against his cheek like he's trying to push the tears back into his face.
Dean says, “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“You guys.” He swallows and squeezes his eyes shut, breathes out hard. “Gonna leave soon?”
Dean says, “Jesus, Sam.”
“Other shoe,” he croaks out, and he wraps one hand in each of their shirts and holds on tight.
**
As-fucking-predicted, he's up on his own the next morning, just simple stuff, setting up the nebulizer, crushing his pills, measuring out the syrups, reading the paper. They keep an eye on him and stay out of his way. John goes for a coffee run alone and Dean thinks is the longest he's been alone with Sam since he's been sick, probably longer. He makes tea for the kid even though he knows John will come back with some, just to have something to do. They don't have honey. Sam loved that shit when he was a kid. Drank it out of the bottle.
“How are you feeling?” Dean says. “Don't bullshit me.”
Sam takes out the nebulizer mouthpiece, swallows and winces, says, “Ready to be well.”
“Yeah. Throat any better?”
He nods a little.
“Fever's still going down?”
Nods more.
“Chest?”
Aaaaand there's the hesitation Dean was dreading.
“Nice clean hotel room, man,” Dean says.
“I know. Just bad luck. Not terrible, just...”
The truth is, Sam's lungs have been fucking remarkable through this whole thing, to the point where one of the fucking parade of doctors asked them why the fuck Sam was so sick and they mentioned the kid having the world's shittiest immune system because his body's too busy freaking the fuck out at every molecule of dust it can breathe in to focus on silly things like germs, and the doctor looked at the chart and said Sam was breathing really well for someone with asthma that bad and Sam, half-awake, looked smug as fucking hell, because fuck was he working hard (working too hard at breathing to have time for silly things like strep, but that's what family's for, right?)
“You have to tell us if the cough gets wet, okay?” Because it would just be fucking like their lives for the infection to drop down and get a timeshare in Sam's lungs just as he's getting over strep.
“You'll hear,” Sam says. “That's the only way I can ever tell. It all feels the same.” He loses his voice completely halfway through that last sentence, and Dean says, “Okay, shut up,” and Sam nods, sticks the nebulizer back in.
John comes back with two coffees and a tea, and Sam shivers while he drinks and John shows them something he saw in the newspaper-woman chokes on an engagement ring found in her soup, man found in bed chewed to death by maggots.
“Sounds like a witch,” Dean says.
Sam puts down his cup and crawls under the covers. The kid can say more without talking than most people can say in a conversation. He has a face like a whole fucking movie.
“Hey,” Dean says. “No one's talking about hunting.”
Sam's face does not buy this for a fucking second.
John sighs and feels Sam's forehead, slides his hand back and forth between his shoulder blades. “Breathing sounds rough.”
Sam nods and presses his face into his pillow.
“We could stay here another night,” John says, “if you're comfortable here.” He breathes out. “I really wanted to get you somewhere warm.”
“It's January,” Sam says, voice muffled in his pillow but mostly in his throat. “Not gonna be that warm anywhere.” He's coughing, then, fingers clutching the edge of the mattress, and John puts his hand on top of his head and leaves it there until the fit's passed. Sam doesn't come up from his pillow, so they leave him alone, let him compose himself.
“How's the fever?” John says.
Dean shrugs because Sam took his own damn temperature today, and Sam holds up one finger, then none, then one again.
“Good.” John rubs his hand up and down Sam's spine. “My strong boy.”
Dean says, “C'mon, Sammy, roll over,” and hands him the nebulizer, and Sam falls asleep five more minutes into the treatment, but that's okay.
And Dean lets John drag him over to the table and show him an article about a man being blinded that the newspapers haven't connected to the other two but John thinks are related, and shit, this is compelling, and Sam breathes out staggered and mean.
**
One step forwards, two steps back: Sam takes a shower and comes out of the steam with a spiked fever and wracking chills. Half an hour later he's delirious and John's fucking panicking, looking up where the nearest hospital is, and Dean's saying wait wait wait because the cough is still dry and the fever's higher but it's the same fever, it's the same illness and they'd tell them the same fucking things and give them the same fucking meds and expose his fucked-up lungs to the same fucking germs and so he lets John call Sam-time and watches him sit on the bed with Sam under his arm while Sam breathes fast and wheezes and shaky-voice warns Dean about wendigos.
“We're fine,” Dean says. “Don't worry.”
“They m-move really fast.” He chokes on the next wheeze and his hand flies to his throat.
“Shhh.” John strokes his hair. “Shhh, just wait it out, Sammy.”
Dean tries to coax him into drinking some of this liquid Tylenol crap but it has this fucking menthol shit in it that's supposed feel good on sore throats except Sam's sore throat doesn't want anything but to be left the fuck alone, and every sip of it makes him cough and his eyes are teared the fuck up and Dean says “okay okay here” and trades off sips with him. It tastes like shit and leaves this hideous cold feeling in the top of his chest so who the fuck knows how Sam's getting through this.
He falls asleep kicking his feet and still mumbling about werewolves, one arm slung over John and his face buried in his side, and John wipes the sweat off his forehead and smooths his hair over and over.
**
Dean's spent a dozen, if that, nights away from Sam in his entire life. Every single fucking sound Sam's chest makes from the normal to the hideous works like a fucking white noise machine to Dean, but he knows, he always fucking knows, when he needs to wake Sam up, which is why he's kind of confused when what wakes him up is Sam shuffling around because he didn't sound that bad.
Sam comes out of the bathroom with a glass of water, sees Dean awake, and turns back and returns to bed with two glasses. He sets one on the nightstand and nudges it towards Dean.
“Thanks, Sammy.”
Sam nods and winces while he drinks from his, but he's drinking.
“Need your inhaler?” Dean asks.
Sam shakes his head.
“Cool.”
Sam takes Dean's hand and puts it on his forehead, raises his eyebrows.
“Definitely cooling down. You freaked us out, man.”
“Sorry.”
“Shut up, okay?”
He rubs his eye. “Can't sleep.”
“You need more of the pain stuff, kiddo.”
Sam nods, then frowns. “Where's Dad?”
Dean looks over at the empty sofa bed and, well, shit, John can come and leave quietly when he wants to.
They both fucking know where he is; there's a fucking witch on the loose, where the hell else would he be?
“Son of a bitch,” Dean breathes.
Sam wheezes out a sigh and rubs the base of his throat.
“He knew you'd be safe with me,” Dean says. “It's okay. It's good, yeah? Trusting us together? I mean, trusting that I can take care of you? And trusting you too,” and Dean's just fucking babbling because Sam looks so fucking upset (and Dean just came uncomfortably close to being uncomfortable). Dean says, “Hey, you know what? C'mere,” because that's what he should have said, that's what he should have been saying from the moment John left.
Sam comes over to Dean's bed and rests his ear over Dean's heart. Dean can hear Sam breathing, scratchy and swollen and normal.
Dean rubs his back and says, “See? Upsides.”
Sam nods, but he does it all small, and Dean's thinking that it's probably hurting him to move his neck.
“Got to get you pain meds,” Dean says, quietly.
Sam nods again but then fucks it all up by wrapping his arms around Dean and Jesus, fucking cuddly Sam, all fever-hot and skinny and not fucking dead.
“See, I can't exactly get you meds now...”
Sam pushes his face into Dean's side.
Okay. Dean switches on the TV, keeps the volume low. He sees Sam peek open an eye so he switches it to some cartoon because Sam is sick, okay?
Sam falls asleep eventually, and Dean thinks he's breathing a little worse, and John staggers in bleeding.
**
Even with his hands a little shaky, Sam's the best doctor of all of them, easy, and he cleans and stitches the gash on John's leg without saying anything, and Dean medicates both of them and then hits the laptop to figure out how the hell to take out this witch.
“We've got to go back out,” John says, and he takes a pull from the whiskey bottle. “We know where she is, she's going to be moving.”
Dean says, “Now? You're hurt.”
“Sammy's fixing me up, it's fine.”
Sam hesitates with the needle halfway through a stitch, like he's thinking about just stopping there, and Dean can't exactly fucking blame him.
Dean says, “We can't risk that right now with Sam sick, Dad. If something happens to us...”
“Nothing's going to happen.” John cups Sam's chin and makes him look at him. “Nothing's going to happen. We know you're in no state for a rescue mission, okay? We'll be safe and back soon.”
“He's going to worry,” Dean says. “He's in no fucking state to worry.”
“He won't worry.”
“It's Sam!” Dean says. “Sam worries.”
Sam looks down at John's leg, takes this really wheezy breath, keeps stitching.
Dean says, “He's too sick.”
“I'm not asking him to hunt! God, no, Sam.” His hand is on Sam's head again, and Dean can tell Sam wants him to get the fuck off. “You just stay here and sleep and Dean and I will be back before you know it.”
Sam shakes his head without looking up. “Please, Dad.”
“Sam, she killed two people in one day, who knows what she'll do tomorrow? All you have to do is sleep, Sam. This doesn't affect you.”
Sam calmly finishes the stitches, bandages John's leg, and then gets up and goes to the bathroom and slams the door.
John pulls his boots back on. “You were never this much fucking trouble.”
“He's sick. He's not ready to be alone.”
Dean pulls his jacket on. “I'm going with or without you, Dean. I'm sorry. This has to get done.”
Dean closes his eyes and resists the urge to scream because Sam can't fucking scream right now and Jesus, just, fuck.
“Okay,” he says. “Okay. Hold on.”
He goes to the bathroom and tries the knob. Locked. He knocks and says, “Sammy?” Christ, it's just like when the kid was fucking eight and he'd have temper tantrums and lock John and Dean out of the fucking motel rooms. “Sam, fucking answer me.”
Nothing.
Dean rests his forehead against the door. “Sam, we're going to be back really soon. I'm going to measure out meds for you, okay? Take them. And I'll see you soon, all right? Jesus, Sam, say something so I know you're not fucking dead in there, okay?”
“Go to hell.”
That'll work.
“I'm sorry, Sammy,” he says.
He expects John to stalk off, to growl something about how Sam's being a baby because he fucking is, but if Dean's going to put on cartoons for him he'll give him this one too, okay, but John knocks on the door and says, “Get some rest, Sam. Please be safe.”
A long pause, then Sam croaks out, “Be safe.”
**
The witch says she's going to scare them senseless.
They shoot the shit out of her altar partway through her chant, and they're out of her fucking castle, panting, ears ringing, before Dean realizes that the ringing has stopped but nothing has taken its place.
He says “Dad,” and John doesn't look and Dean doesn't hear it and holy shit, holy shit, what are they going to tell Sam? (How the fuck are they going to tell anyone anything, they can't fucking hear.)
**
John drives so fucking slowly, and they keep grabbing at each other's sleeves, and Jesus. Dean can't hear himself move around on the seat. Dean can't tell if the music's playing. When Dean closes his eyes, John might as well not fucking exist.
They open the door to the motel room, and Sam is sitting on his bed looking fucking terrified, and he stands up and starts yelling and Christ that must be hurting his throat and fuck fuck Sam what are you saying and then Sam stares at them and understands way faster than Dean would have expected but it's fucking Sam, why the fuck is he ever surprised?
“No,” Sam's mouth is saying. “No no no no.”
And in a second he changes from scared to angry and Dean gets it but Christ Sam he's scared out of his fucking mind right now okay but Sam goes to the fold-out couch and kicks the covers aside and buries his face in the pillow and won't fucking look at them.
Dean's tired. He's so fucking tired, and he thinks he could sleep for a hundred years and wake up and this would all be a fucking nightmare. He lis down and tries to sleep while John goes immediately to the laptop, but he can't sleep, and he can't figure out why, until it hits him hard and he feels like he's fucking choking-he can't hear Sam breathing.
For all he knows, Sam isn't fucking breathing.
He sits up and squints through the darkness and watches Sam's chest rise and fall, watches it stutter when he coughs and shake when...fuck, is he crying?
No. Just coughing more. Just coughing for a long time, and Dean says, “Sam, do you want me?” and Sam ignores him and coughs and Dean tucks his chin on his knees and just watches.
**
Somehow he falls asleep and when he wakes up it's dark and cold and the air is thick and fucking silent and shit, shit, he's shaking, he's actually physically fucking shaking, and he calls out for Sam Sam Sam Dad Sam Dad Sam Sam and thrashes the fuck around because fuck it he has no pride where is his fucking family and then there's a hand on him, fucking boiling hot so one guess who that is but it still doesn't feel like Sam, and even when Sam has both hands on Dean's shoulders and Dean can see his silhouette and his hair flopping all the fuck everywhere, Dean can even see the kid's chest moving but he can't hear it. And Jesus fucking Christ Sam would probably kill him if he knew how much of his identity Dean's constructed around his fucking asthma but at this point it's a sense, it's its own fucking sense and it doesn't seem like it should even be fucking connected to hearing, there's hearingseeingtouchingsmellingtasting and then there's Sam and that fucking witch took some of his Sam-sense, she ruined his Sam-time, Dean just want all of his brother, okay?
Sam lies down next to him and coughs into Dean's pillow, and Dean puts his hand on Sam's chest even though he knows he hates it because he just needs to fucking feel Sam breathe and Sam lets him, Sam puts his hand over Dean's and holds it there. His breathing feels bad because he's scared. He's so scared, because Dean can't hear and John can't hear and they left Sam fucking alone and who the fuck knows if it's going to get better and Dean's scared too. Jesus fucking Christ is Dean scared and what he wouldn't goddamn do to hear his kid's scratchy breathing right now.
**
Dean wakes up to John's hands pulling at his ears, pushing back his hair, eyes that say anything? Dean shakes his head and mouths “you?” and John shakes his head.
John wakes Sam up next, gently, with a hand on his forehead, and he gets Sam to open his mouth and looks down his throat, and he gives Dean a look that makes it really fucking obvious that Sam, the only one who can hear, sure as fuck can't talk, and isn't that just its own special fucking curse
The good news is that Sam doesn't seem mad at them anymore. The bad news is that it's probably because he's too fucking sick.
John writes sent some emails, going to meet with some people, give Sammy his meds on the hotel stationery, and Dean finds that typically vague and nods but Sam just rubs his eyes and coughs and coughs and winces and John writes wet or dry? on the sheet but Sam just shrugs, so maybe he is still mad, and that's not information to be fucking keeping to yourself, Sam, okay? He's the only who who can hear the cough.
But the quiet is probably getting to Sam, and there's no reason everything should be silent and hideous and horrible for him, too, so Dean puts his hand on Sam's back and says, “You okay?” and Jesus it's weird, and if Sam didn't give him that small smile Dean would think he fucked it up.
But Sam watches him, nods, and that's nice and all except Sam clearly fucking isn't.
So once John's gone Dean says, “Okay, Sammy, here we go,” and he helps Sam up and to the bathroom and keeps up this whole running fucking monologue while he puts a cool washcloth on Sam's neck and measures out his meds. Sam doesn't seem comforted by any of it, and Dean doesn't know what th hell to do.
“Think your fever's up,” Dean says, while Sam's wincing around the antibiotics, and he gently opens Sam's mouth and slips the thermometer under his tongue. Sam's sitting on the sink, and he rests his head against the wall and watches Dean, and Dean's fucking deaf so this is a ridiculous thought but he thinks Sam looks quiet.
He takes Sam's hand and rubs it between his. He keeps talking but he can't keep track of what he says. It feels like the words are just getting away from him all the time, and that things are going to fall out that he just does not want to fucking say, and Sam will hear them and Sam will be the only one to hear them and that's already sort of a dangerous situation, and now Dean can't even keep track of himself. He's confused why John left them alone.
He doesn't hear the thermometer beep and Sam doesn't take it out, so Dean waits a good amount of time before he checks it. Almost a hundred and two and a half. Shit.
“What's going on in there?” Dean says, and runs his thumb, very gently, over Sam's Adam's apple.
Sam winces and closes his eyes. And leans into Dean's thumb.
Dean says, “I know. I know. I'm sorry.”
They stretch out on the sofa bed and play Hangman. Sam, of course, knows the ASL alphabet from some book he read a hundred years ago, and he teaches the letters to Dean and they sign them into each others' palms even though it's plenty fucking light enough for them to see (Dean thinks it will be light enough for fucking ever because fuck if he's ever losing Sam in the dark like that again.)
Halfway through their fourth game (E __ __ A __ H __ ) Sam's grip around his ribcage tightens and Dean sure as fuck knows what his name looks like on his brother's lips, so he says, “Okay, okay, Sammy, don't worry,” and tosses Sam his inhaler while he works on setting up the nebulizer. He can't hear Sam shake it. God, these little fucking noises. He can't hear his footsteps on the carpet. He can't hear Sam's fucking breathing.
Sam lies with his head on his lap while he does the neb treatment, his eyes closed, fingers digging into the mattress. Throat must be fucking killing him.
“What's going on in there?” Dean says, quietly. “How do you sound? You've got to be our ears, buddy.”
Sam doesn't answer. He's really tired.
He signs E-M-P-A-T-H-Y as he falls asleep, guiding Dean's head onto his chest.
**
It's not until an hour later when Dean wakes up to Sam bolting for the bathroom, when he follows immediately behind and loops an arm around Sam's stomach to hold him up and rubs his back while he pukes and shit, why is this happening, what is this, Sam hasn't thrown up since the first few days when he was getting sick, why is this coming back now, it's not until then that Dean figures out what's up.
He doesn't know how the hell it took them so long, except that Sam can be damn fucking sneaky when he wants to be, and Sam didn't want to talk about this.
Sam couldn't fucking talk about this.
Because Dean's mumbling, “It's okay, it's okay, Sammy”s the whole time, and then asking Sam questions while he wipes his mouth--”Are you okay? Are you done? How's your throat holding up? Sammy, you okay?” and Sam's eyes are down and he's not answering.
It's like he doesn't even hear him.
“I'm going to scare the Winchesters senseless.” That's what the witch said. Scare the Winchesters senseless.
Jesus Christ. Sam.
And he remembers the look on Sam's face when they got back-terrified. He thought he'd lost his hearing from being sick, probably thought the fever got too high, was alone and sick and deaf and then...shit, then how angry, how fucking betrayed he was that they'd done this to him, and how they keep asking him what the cough sounds like and he doesn't know, he can't hear himself breathe either and Jesus Christ he must be scared, why didn't he fucking tell Dean and Dean signs S-A-M into Sam's hand over and over and Sam stays curled up with his other hand around his throat and Dean thinks that maybe Sam thinks he knew all along and Jesus if that isn't just the most horrible thing he can fucking imagine, if Sam just assumed that Dean would notice and he didn't.
Dean calls John's phone over and over and over, hanging up and calling back, and he comes home and Dean writes SAM CAN'T HEAR and John...John just goes to Sam and takes his face in his hands and looks at him like he's about to cry, and then he whispers something that looks like “I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry” but none of them can fucking prove it, and then he's drunk and on his laptop and Dean and Sam play more Hangman. Sam sleeps with his hand feeling Dean's heartbeat, and Dean stays the fuck awake.
**
John IMs with Pastor Jim, then dials his number and has Sam cough into the phone.
Dry Jim replies. Definitely dry.
Sam and John are relieved. Dean, who hasn't forgotten the vomiting, the fever that isn't going the fuck away, the fact that he's coughing at all, the fact that who the fuck knows how badly he's wheezing, isn't.
He draws a picture of a shoe and watches Sam sleep, watches his chest rise and fall, watches it snag on its way down, every damn time. He doesn't know if that's normal. He's not used to watching Sam's chest. (He's used to watching Sam's smile. Fuck, he misses watches that smile.)
**
It's only been two days since they lost their hearing and if you'd asked Dean hypothetically, so, how would your family react? he would have said he'd be the one all depressed and angsty and Sam would be Action Sam and John would be who the fuck knows where, but instead there's Action John at the laptop and Sam won't get out of bed and Dean wishes he could run.
**
Sam's getting sicker and he's locked further and further inside himself and they have no idea what's fucking wrong, and they can't keep calling Pastor Jim to have him listen to the cough (because they've already done in three times, still dry, it's not fucking pneumonia).
Dean traces out “What's going on in there?” on Sam's chest. He doesn't worry about touching it anymore. He doesn't worry about touching Sam in front of John. Doesn't worry about anything expect whether he'll get to hear his kid breathe ever again. Sam's the worrier. He'll take care of everything else. Dean just needs to keep him fucking alive so that he can.
So he and John draw Sam back out, remind him that they're here and they're not going to let him dry up in a soundless sick box. They make him soup. John buys honey and rents DVDs. Dean reads him that chapter of his book over and over and fucking over again, and they get into this new normal after a few days.
Sam counts breaths and checks his peak flows and writes down numbers and forces down the meds. John looks for ways to kill witches and break curses. Dean plays tic tac toe with his kid and when John's gone, they play house.
They pretend that they're going to be deaf for their whole fucking lives and that they're okay with it and that this is normal. They insult each other in sign language and draw dirty pictures on the notepad and write down dialogue for the movies they watch. Sam sews some old socks into mittens. Dean cleans his gun over and over and over. Sam forces down the meds. Forces down the meds. Forces down the meds.
Sam becomes a fucking master at signing 'I love you.' That sign is just his bitch. He holds it up sarcastically when John and Dean shove him into bed before he's ready and apologetically when he pukes on one of them and hideously, cruelly, painfully when he's falling asleep or when Dean makes him tea. It's this one fucking sign, quicker than any one word, just this one handshape. It's too fucking easy and that scares Dean to death. He doesn't sign it, but he plays with Sam's hair more than he used to and he doesn't really give much of a shit if John sees. This isn't real life. It's only real life when it's just him and Sam.
**
Who knows when the fuck they're getting out of this goddamn town, and they can't live much longer on the shit John can grab in the five minutes he's willing to leave them alone (something about having two deaf kids scares him a fuck of a lot more than having one, even if Sam is only a bit more useless than he was before) so the three of them trek over to the grocery store to pick up lunch meat and pie and liquor and to scour the fucking shelves for something Sam can get down his throat. It's just so fucking crowded, all these people everywhere all pushing their fucking carts into Dean, expecting him to hear where they're going, and John is sullen and defensive and leading them around like ducklings and Dean turns around and Sam is gone, Sam is just fucking gone.
He grabs John's arm and they swing around and call Sam's name with their voice and their hands and where the fuck is he, and some lady comes over and asks them something but they don't fucking know, they don't know anything, and they don't know where Sam is.
He could be anywhere. He could have wandered out of the store in some delirious fucking panic or dropped blue and dead in the cereal aisle, he could be anywhere and what are they supposed to do, make an announcement over the loudspeaker like Sam's a fucking five-year-old, a fucking five-year-old who can hear?
John's here but he might as well not be for how scared Dean is, and honestly this is the first time Dean can remember, ever, that he's felt like giving up. It's a feeling he's seen on John's face more times than he can count (a hunt gone wrong, Mary's birthday, Sam's birthday, November fucking second, nothing connected with Dean, ever) and on Sam's a few times (panicked eyes going dim in the middle of the night, blue lips under an oxygen mask, shaking his head, I can't, I can't) but he's never fucking felt it, he's never felt like giving up even when he's begging one of them not to die of a fucking head wound or screaming through three fractures in one leg, and what a fucking trip that this is the thing to break him, an over-bright grocery store on a Thursday morning with his dad right next to him and but no fever hot hand on his shoulder, no wheezing an inch below his ear, no Sam.
So what the hell, what the fuck is he supposed to do now?
So Dean's fucking frantic, pulling away from John, scouring every fucking aisle and then there he is, there's Sam. He's by the fucking rotisserie chickens, pressed up against the ovens, shivering, nose red, eyes glassy.
“Don't you dare fucking do that to me again, you understand me?” Dean growls, and of course Sam doesn't understand him, Sam can't fucking hear him, and Dean signs NO NO NO NO over and over.
Sam signs sorry sorry sorry and clings to Dean but Dean doesn't want to touch him, now that Dean's found him he doesn't even want to fucking look at him because goddamn him, how can this one fucking kid mean this fucking much to him, scare him this fucking much? To put it plainly, fuck Sam.
And then some mother-type walks by and stops, puts one hand on Sam's cheek and one on his fucking chest and is all goddamn concerned and Sam is trying to figure out what she's saying and he's trying to get her the fuck off of him and okay, he's putting it plainly, right? NO. Hands the fuck off. Dean takes his kid back and holds him tighter than he's ever held fucking anything.
**
Then the credit card gets questioned so shit, time to go, and Dean thinks John's finally noticing that Sam's stopped getting better, that he's not in much better shape than he was when they got here. John heads south without pause and writes a note for Dean at the first rest stop- why don't you go back and sit with him and if that's not a sign of how fucked up their lives have gotten Dean doesn't know what is.
He climbs into the backseat and Sam squishes in close, shivering, and pulls his legs up onto the seat. He's a fucking furnace, and Dean turns Sam's head towards him and opens his mouth to show Sam should too. Sam obeys, winces. He's barely been able to open wide enough to get a spoon and some soup in since last night.
Still really swollen, still shaking with that damn fever. Why aren't the antibiotics working? He puts a hand on Sam's forehead and pushes back his hair. If he could just talk to the kid, if he could hear the wheezing and how lucid he is, if Sam could fucking talk he could hear how scared he is from one fucking word, okay, and Jesus, fuck this curse, fuck it, Sam needs to hear himself. Sam has to know. Sam worries.
He's half asleep on Dean's shoulder when Dean picks up Sam's hand and sees that his color's fucking shit, purple around his fingernails. Fuck. He reaches forwards and grabs John's shoulder, and John jerks so hard he almost drives them into a guardrail.
Sam's confused, rubbing at his eyes with one hand while Dean holds out the other to John, and John pulls over and looks at both of them with these wide eyes and that's when Dean notices that he's holding Sam by the fucking wrist and the undersides of Sam's arms are bumpy. Sam has motherfucking hives, and that's what this has been for fucking days, it's a motherfucking allergic reaction and if they had heard Sam's breathing they would have goddamn known that it wasn't a normal wheeze, that it was higher and tighter and bad and that the swollen throat wasn't just strep and holy shit. Holy motherfucking goddamn shit.
John pulls back onto the road and drives. Fast.
**
Allergic reactions get through triage fast, but it feels like ages for Dean because Sam's miserable and scared and John's in full papa-bear mode, growling at anyone who gets close to Sam without washing his hands, making the doctors write down the names of every damn thing they try to give Sam. The hospital offers to get them a sign language interpreter, and what the hell are they supposed to say, we're a whole family of deaf guys and none of us know sign language? None of us can even talk to each other? So they just get mad and protective instead and at least that's fucking easy, at least that's normal.
And people keep talking at Sam, wrenching his mouth open and talking to each other over his head and giving him shots and touching his chest and making him blow into shit and he's on autopilot, he's limp and listless and letting them do whatever and Sam you can't do that.
Dean's writing notes back and forth with the one nurse who seems at all fucking sympathetic, and she's saying the doctor wants to pull all the antibiotics and Dean's writing no he's too sick you can't and he thinks he's going to fucking lose it, because they want to keep him here and monitor him and plug him full of different things for days and he can't hear, and if John and Dean leave him alone for a fucking second who the hell knows what he's going to decide to be allergic to next, Sam is the toughest fucking thing around, God knows he is, but Sam collects information and Sam thinks about it and Sam deals with it, but a fucking witch he didn't even go after took that away, and Sam can't deal, he physically cannot deal.
Sam's on oxygen and he has his IV but they don't have any beds, so he's still on that gurney and he's uncomfortable and upset so John climbs up and sits behind him and props him up, strokes his hair, is gentle and soft the way he always is when Sam is so sick. Sam rubs his eyes and he's just watching Dean, so Dean fingerspells out dirty jokes which takes for fucking ever but it's worth it for Sam grinning and rolling his eyes.
Sam falls asleep the second they get him into a room, and Dean is glued to his fucking side, watching his chest rise up and fall down and John writes him a note that says I have a lead and he's out the door. He's just gone. The way he always is when someone else is here to fix Sam.
It's okay. Dean isn't going anywhere.
When John comes back, he's so dirty there's practically smoke coming after him, but he writes Dean a note and says, killed the bitch. Curse is broken. It's gradual. Harder we fight, faster it'll come off. One of us by one.
Dean is fighting so fucking hard. No way he'll be waiting more than an hour or two. He lays his head next to Sam's sleeping shoulder. A few more hours and everything will be fine. He'll be able to take care of Sam.
**
John's hearing comes back first. John is a fucking warrior. John kills demons.
If the doctors are totally confused by John deaf in the morning and hearing by the afternoon, they cover it well enough. John demands names and dosages. He nags the doctors by Sam's window so Sam can see, so Sam can feel safe.
Sam is too busy watching Dean.
**
Sam's hearing comes back next, and Dean can't even believe it, this fucking sick kid in a bed hears faster than he does?
He seems more scared than he was before. His eyes are going wide when he breathes out, and he tugs John's sleeve and says things to him and then a doctor's here and Sam's talking to him, Sam's gesturing towards his throat.
Dean signs OK OK OK OK into Sam's palm, and Sam strokes his hair, comforts him, but Sam is the one who looks terrified. Sam is the one looking at Dean's ears like they're never going to work again and Christ, Sam, don't. You can hear. You don't need Dean at all.
**
The first thing he hears is Sam's breathing.
Whistling, tight, forced. Breathing.
He looks up at Sam, says, “Hi.”
Sam gets this slow, enormous smile. “Hi.”
Dean rests his ear on Sam's chest. It makes some monitor beep and fuck if he cares.
It's Sammy. It's really Sammy.
Every single fucking sound of this kid's breathing, every single fucking one of them. Jesus. Jesus, Sam.
“It's going to be okay,” Sam says. “It's all going to be fine now. I'm not worried anymore.”
Dean's hand fucking betrays him and almost makes the fucking 'I love you' sign, Jesus fucking Christ (and why should that be such a problem, why does Dean ever say it, why can John and Sam say it but not him) but Sam grabs his fingers and twists them up in his. He doesn't make him do it.
And they are quiet because they want to be.
Summary: Sam is doing a good job of scaring John and Dean senseless. Then a witch comes along and helps.
Warnings/Spoilers: No spoilers, bad language.
Wordcount: 8,253
Author's Note: Sammyverse! Asthmatic Sam and BFF Winchesters. It's Pre-Stanford; Sam is 16 and Dean is a few days shy of 21. Title pillaged from the Motion City Soundtrack song "Mary Without Sound."
--
Dean can't remember the last time he sat in the backseat for any period of time, and he's all alone back here and feels like he's being punished for something.
Sam loves stretching out in the backseat and leaving all his shit back here and pretending like he has his own little apartment. The backseat is Sam's constant, and he's almost seventeen and has never had a fucking home and he has lungs that think breathing is optional so he needs that, and now he's not even here, he's up in the front seat with his feet up on the window and his head on John's lap because he and John are trading off Sam-time and it's John's turn.
No music, just the engine and Sammy breathing. Dean's starving, but they're waiting until Sam wakes up before they stop, and he's wheezing all quiet so they're not going to fuck with that.
Plus he won't be asleep much longer. The doctor told them to expect him to sleep a lot, but yeah, Sam doesn't do that.
Sure enough, twenty minutes later Dean hears coughing and John's quiet voice, sees John's shoulder moving to rub his back. John pulls to a stop in front of the first diner. Sam sits up, stretches.
“You feel less hot,” John says, softly, and Sam nods and pulls his scarf up around his mouth. “Want soup?” John says.
Another nod.
“That's my boy. Let's get you bundled up.”
**
“Sam-time,” Dean calls before they can sit down, and John laughs quietly and takes his arm from around Sam's shoulders to make room for Dean's. Dean has Sam slide into the booth before him, so he's protected or whatever the fuck, and Sam shivers and rests his head against the wall.
The waitress comes by for their orders and John hounds the waitress about peanuts before Dean can, and Dean decides Sam's recovered enough to be fucked with a little and starts taking everything off the table and handing it to Sam. Sam takes the coffee creamers dutifully but gets confused when Dean starts forcing the jelly containers and salt and pepper shakers and forks on him. He looks up at John for help.
John reaches across the table and thwacks Dean in the head, then turns to giggly Sam and says, “Look who's smiling,” and fuck that that's the thing to get the kid to smile, but Dean will take it, because two days ago Sammy was a lump in a hospital bed who was crying without even knowing it with a throat swollen closed and a fever that made the doctors shake their heads so yeah, you laugh at your brother getting smacked around in a diner booth, Sam, you laugh at whatever the fuck you want.
Dean tries to take the stuff back but Sam clings to all of it and rests his cheek against Dean's shoulder. The timer on Sam's watch goes off. Med time.
Sam's throat can't handle pills, so he's on all these antibiotic syrups and apparently they don't make them in the awesome grape flavor Sam fucking loved when he was a little kid, they're just these clear syrups that make him shudder. He can't drink anything cold, either, so he takes them with sips of tea that Dean already cooled down with an ice cube. He definitely can't manage coffee, so his lungs are growling and he keeps falling asleep for two minute stretches, half the time sitting up. Sam's throat is quite the little bitch right now, and he keeps taking his fingers and touching the base of it which is freaking them the fuck out because he's been known to do that when he's having an allergic reaction and the thing is fucking closing up, so yeah, if he could stop that soon, that'd be great.
John's turkey dinner came with mashed potatoes, and he says, “You want to try these, champ?”
Sam clears his throat for a minute and says, “Not yet,” and they smile at him because it's good to hear him talk, even if it's that gravely ghost of a voice, and he smiles back.
“Two hours more on the road,” John says. “Almost done.” He's really adamant about getting out of state because child protective services is breathing the fuck down their necks, and going east would have been faster but, no, John seems convinced that going south is as much medicine for Sam as the antibiotics, because who ever caught pneumonia while heading south? Sam won't. Sam won't.
“s'fine,” Sam says. “I can sleep anywhere.”
“No,” John says. “You need a bed.”
“M'feeling better,” Sam says, tucking himself against Dean's shoulder.
“Can do a nebulizer at the motel,” Dean says, because obviously the kid's still fucking taking his inhaler but he's having a bitch of a time with it because of how swollen his throat still is, and since he physically cannot get his usual asthma pills down, he's been grinding them up and drinking them in warm water and none of them are really sure how well that's working. The kid's breathing, but they're just listening all the time. They're kind of waiting for the other fucking shoe to drop, because apparently the kid almost fucking dying from something six-year-olds get two weeks into his second semester of sophomore year and having to flee the fucking hospital because the insurance goes bad doesn't count as two shoes, but whatever, welcome to the bullshit of being and of loving Sam Winchester, you end up in a diner in January either fighting to swallow tea or fighting about who gets to have the sick one's head on his shoulder for the next hour because the kid almost fucking died, okay? Everything else is kind of tabled. Everything.
“Feeling better,” Sam says again, which should be a relief but seriously, how the fuck would the kid feel worse?
“Lungs must ache,” Dean says.
Sam shakes his head, slowly. He's falling asleep now. “Safe. Not worried right now.”
**
Dean's Sam-time continues into the beginning of the drive, so he stays in the backseat and Sam tries to sleep but can't, so he and Dean play Hangman and Sam wants to read but he's still a little too dizzy and Dean won't read him the next chapter of the book he's actually reading because he's already read it to him three fucking times because he keeps forgetting and his fever's still high enough that Dean doesn't trust that this is going to be the time he magically does, so he finds some paperback on the floor that he knows Sam's made it through before and reads the first chapter to him, and Sam stays awake so he keeps reading even though his fucking throat gets sore because what's he supposed to do, whine about it?
Sam's starting to sound kind of bad.
“Dad?” Dean says. “I think we should stop. Do the last hour tomorrow.”
“Yeah?” John glances back at them.
“He's fading fast and the wheezing's picking up.”
Sam lowers himself down, curls up with his head in Dean's lap.
“All right,” John says. “You're doing great, Sam. Next motel.”
But the next motel is fucking disgusting and John comes out snarling and says no way would his kids be sleeping there even if they were the fucking models of good fucking health, and Sam smiles a little and they keep driving. The place where they finally stop is way outside their normal price range, and Dean can tell John's more nervous than usual about getting caught, but it's just the one night and it's so fucking nice, and Dean and John feel like fucking superheros leading Sam to his room and putting him between the cool clean sheets and Sam's all sleepy and feverish, cuddling his pillow and mumbling “thank y' love y'” and yeah, fucking cart them away to jail, just let Sam sleep, you know?
“You can have the other bed,” John says, wrestling with the fold-out-couch.
“Yeah?”
John nods. “If he wakes up scared, he's going to want to see you first.”
You can say a lot of shit about John but you can not say he's not fucking excellent when Sam is really sick. Day-to-day asthma stuff is not his fucking forte, but that's okay, Dean can take that and God knows Sam can, but when Sam's too sick to take care of himself Dean has this bad habit of shutting down and daydreaming about running away or taking a knife and excising all his damn fucking feelings, but that's when John's at his best. John fights a crises like he'd fight a demon.
He comes to the bed and feels Sam's forehead. “Definitely cooler.”
Dean nods, snapping together pieces of the nebulizer. “He's getting well.”
“How long do you think?”
“'til he's hunting again?” Dean looks at him. “Three weeks, maybe?”
“Just 'til he's back on his feet.”
Dean shrugs. “Tomorrow. You know Sam.”
John puts his hand on top of Dean's head and Dean closes his eyes, relaxes.
“He's okay,” John says, gently. “He's not going anywhere.”
John is fighting their fucking demons.
**
The night's not great; Sam with a fever is a Sam who doesn't sleep well, and he has two coughing fits that leave him in tears, but that isn't new for this week. They hold him still through it and tell him it's okay, that he doesn't have to be fucking embarrassed, Jesus, he can't fucking swallow and his body's making him cough for minutes at a time, what the hell is he supposed to do, laugh about it? And then he fucking does laugh a little and John whispers that it'll be okay and Dean rubs between his shoulder blades.
“Too good t'be true,” Sam says after the second one, his palm against his cheek like he's trying to push the tears back into his face.
Dean says, “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“You guys.” He swallows and squeezes his eyes shut, breathes out hard. “Gonna leave soon?”
Dean says, “Jesus, Sam.”
“Other shoe,” he croaks out, and he wraps one hand in each of their shirts and holds on tight.
**
As-fucking-predicted, he's up on his own the next morning, just simple stuff, setting up the nebulizer, crushing his pills, measuring out the syrups, reading the paper. They keep an eye on him and stay out of his way. John goes for a coffee run alone and Dean thinks is the longest he's been alone with Sam since he's been sick, probably longer. He makes tea for the kid even though he knows John will come back with some, just to have something to do. They don't have honey. Sam loved that shit when he was a kid. Drank it out of the bottle.
“How are you feeling?” Dean says. “Don't bullshit me.”
Sam takes out the nebulizer mouthpiece, swallows and winces, says, “Ready to be well.”
“Yeah. Throat any better?”
He nods a little.
“Fever's still going down?”
Nods more.
“Chest?”
Aaaaand there's the hesitation Dean was dreading.
“Nice clean hotel room, man,” Dean says.
“I know. Just bad luck. Not terrible, just...”
The truth is, Sam's lungs have been fucking remarkable through this whole thing, to the point where one of the fucking parade of doctors asked them why the fuck Sam was so sick and they mentioned the kid having the world's shittiest immune system because his body's too busy freaking the fuck out at every molecule of dust it can breathe in to focus on silly things like germs, and the doctor looked at the chart and said Sam was breathing really well for someone with asthma that bad and Sam, half-awake, looked smug as fucking hell, because fuck was he working hard (working too hard at breathing to have time for silly things like strep, but that's what family's for, right?)
“You have to tell us if the cough gets wet, okay?” Because it would just be fucking like their lives for the infection to drop down and get a timeshare in Sam's lungs just as he's getting over strep.
“You'll hear,” Sam says. “That's the only way I can ever tell. It all feels the same.” He loses his voice completely halfway through that last sentence, and Dean says, “Okay, shut up,” and Sam nods, sticks the nebulizer back in.
John comes back with two coffees and a tea, and Sam shivers while he drinks and John shows them something he saw in the newspaper-woman chokes on an engagement ring found in her soup, man found in bed chewed to death by maggots.
“Sounds like a witch,” Dean says.
Sam puts down his cup and crawls under the covers. The kid can say more without talking than most people can say in a conversation. He has a face like a whole fucking movie.
“Hey,” Dean says. “No one's talking about hunting.”
Sam's face does not buy this for a fucking second.
John sighs and feels Sam's forehead, slides his hand back and forth between his shoulder blades. “Breathing sounds rough.”
Sam nods and presses his face into his pillow.
“We could stay here another night,” John says, “if you're comfortable here.” He breathes out. “I really wanted to get you somewhere warm.”
“It's January,” Sam says, voice muffled in his pillow but mostly in his throat. “Not gonna be that warm anywhere.” He's coughing, then, fingers clutching the edge of the mattress, and John puts his hand on top of his head and leaves it there until the fit's passed. Sam doesn't come up from his pillow, so they leave him alone, let him compose himself.
“How's the fever?” John says.
Dean shrugs because Sam took his own damn temperature today, and Sam holds up one finger, then none, then one again.
“Good.” John rubs his hand up and down Sam's spine. “My strong boy.”
Dean says, “C'mon, Sammy, roll over,” and hands him the nebulizer, and Sam falls asleep five more minutes into the treatment, but that's okay.
And Dean lets John drag him over to the table and show him an article about a man being blinded that the newspapers haven't connected to the other two but John thinks are related, and shit, this is compelling, and Sam breathes out staggered and mean.
**
One step forwards, two steps back: Sam takes a shower and comes out of the steam with a spiked fever and wracking chills. Half an hour later he's delirious and John's fucking panicking, looking up where the nearest hospital is, and Dean's saying wait wait wait because the cough is still dry and the fever's higher but it's the same fever, it's the same illness and they'd tell them the same fucking things and give them the same fucking meds and expose his fucked-up lungs to the same fucking germs and so he lets John call Sam-time and watches him sit on the bed with Sam under his arm while Sam breathes fast and wheezes and shaky-voice warns Dean about wendigos.
“We're fine,” Dean says. “Don't worry.”
“They m-move really fast.” He chokes on the next wheeze and his hand flies to his throat.
“Shhh.” John strokes his hair. “Shhh, just wait it out, Sammy.”
Dean tries to coax him into drinking some of this liquid Tylenol crap but it has this fucking menthol shit in it that's supposed feel good on sore throats except Sam's sore throat doesn't want anything but to be left the fuck alone, and every sip of it makes him cough and his eyes are teared the fuck up and Dean says “okay okay here” and trades off sips with him. It tastes like shit and leaves this hideous cold feeling in the top of his chest so who the fuck knows how Sam's getting through this.
He falls asleep kicking his feet and still mumbling about werewolves, one arm slung over John and his face buried in his side, and John wipes the sweat off his forehead and smooths his hair over and over.
**
Dean's spent a dozen, if that, nights away from Sam in his entire life. Every single fucking sound Sam's chest makes from the normal to the hideous works like a fucking white noise machine to Dean, but he knows, he always fucking knows, when he needs to wake Sam up, which is why he's kind of confused when what wakes him up is Sam shuffling around because he didn't sound that bad.
Sam comes out of the bathroom with a glass of water, sees Dean awake, and turns back and returns to bed with two glasses. He sets one on the nightstand and nudges it towards Dean.
“Thanks, Sammy.”
Sam nods and winces while he drinks from his, but he's drinking.
“Need your inhaler?” Dean asks.
Sam shakes his head.
“Cool.”
Sam takes Dean's hand and puts it on his forehead, raises his eyebrows.
“Definitely cooling down. You freaked us out, man.”
“Sorry.”
“Shut up, okay?”
He rubs his eye. “Can't sleep.”
“You need more of the pain stuff, kiddo.”
Sam nods, then frowns. “Where's Dad?”
Dean looks over at the empty sofa bed and, well, shit, John can come and leave quietly when he wants to.
They both fucking know where he is; there's a fucking witch on the loose, where the hell else would he be?
“Son of a bitch,” Dean breathes.
Sam wheezes out a sigh and rubs the base of his throat.
“He knew you'd be safe with me,” Dean says. “It's okay. It's good, yeah? Trusting us together? I mean, trusting that I can take care of you? And trusting you too,” and Dean's just fucking babbling because Sam looks so fucking upset (and Dean just came uncomfortably close to being uncomfortable). Dean says, “Hey, you know what? C'mere,” because that's what he should have said, that's what he should have been saying from the moment John left.
Sam comes over to Dean's bed and rests his ear over Dean's heart. Dean can hear Sam breathing, scratchy and swollen and normal.
Dean rubs his back and says, “See? Upsides.”
Sam nods, but he does it all small, and Dean's thinking that it's probably hurting him to move his neck.
“Got to get you pain meds,” Dean says, quietly.
Sam nods again but then fucks it all up by wrapping his arms around Dean and Jesus, fucking cuddly Sam, all fever-hot and skinny and not fucking dead.
“See, I can't exactly get you meds now...”
Sam pushes his face into Dean's side.
Okay. Dean switches on the TV, keeps the volume low. He sees Sam peek open an eye so he switches it to some cartoon because Sam is sick, okay?
Sam falls asleep eventually, and Dean thinks he's breathing a little worse, and John staggers in bleeding.
**
Even with his hands a little shaky, Sam's the best doctor of all of them, easy, and he cleans and stitches the gash on John's leg without saying anything, and Dean medicates both of them and then hits the laptop to figure out how the hell to take out this witch.
“We've got to go back out,” John says, and he takes a pull from the whiskey bottle. “We know where she is, she's going to be moving.”
Dean says, “Now? You're hurt.”
“Sammy's fixing me up, it's fine.”
Sam hesitates with the needle halfway through a stitch, like he's thinking about just stopping there, and Dean can't exactly fucking blame him.
Dean says, “We can't risk that right now with Sam sick, Dad. If something happens to us...”
“Nothing's going to happen.” John cups Sam's chin and makes him look at him. “Nothing's going to happen. We know you're in no state for a rescue mission, okay? We'll be safe and back soon.”
“He's going to worry,” Dean says. “He's in no fucking state to worry.”
“He won't worry.”
“It's Sam!” Dean says. “Sam worries.”
Sam looks down at John's leg, takes this really wheezy breath, keeps stitching.
Dean says, “He's too sick.”
“I'm not asking him to hunt! God, no, Sam.” His hand is on Sam's head again, and Dean can tell Sam wants him to get the fuck off. “You just stay here and sleep and Dean and I will be back before you know it.”
Sam shakes his head without looking up. “Please, Dad.”
“Sam, she killed two people in one day, who knows what she'll do tomorrow? All you have to do is sleep, Sam. This doesn't affect you.”
Sam calmly finishes the stitches, bandages John's leg, and then gets up and goes to the bathroom and slams the door.
John pulls his boots back on. “You were never this much fucking trouble.”
“He's sick. He's not ready to be alone.”
Dean pulls his jacket on. “I'm going with or without you, Dean. I'm sorry. This has to get done.”
Dean closes his eyes and resists the urge to scream because Sam can't fucking scream right now and Jesus, just, fuck.
“Okay,” he says. “Okay. Hold on.”
He goes to the bathroom and tries the knob. Locked. He knocks and says, “Sammy?” Christ, it's just like when the kid was fucking eight and he'd have temper tantrums and lock John and Dean out of the fucking motel rooms. “Sam, fucking answer me.”
Nothing.
Dean rests his forehead against the door. “Sam, we're going to be back really soon. I'm going to measure out meds for you, okay? Take them. And I'll see you soon, all right? Jesus, Sam, say something so I know you're not fucking dead in there, okay?”
“Go to hell.”
That'll work.
“I'm sorry, Sammy,” he says.
He expects John to stalk off, to growl something about how Sam's being a baby because he fucking is, but if Dean's going to put on cartoons for him he'll give him this one too, okay, but John knocks on the door and says, “Get some rest, Sam. Please be safe.”
A long pause, then Sam croaks out, “Be safe.”
**
The witch says she's going to scare them senseless.
They shoot the shit out of her altar partway through her chant, and they're out of her fucking castle, panting, ears ringing, before Dean realizes that the ringing has stopped but nothing has taken its place.
He says “Dad,” and John doesn't look and Dean doesn't hear it and holy shit, holy shit, what are they going to tell Sam? (How the fuck are they going to tell anyone anything, they can't fucking hear.)
**
John drives so fucking slowly, and they keep grabbing at each other's sleeves, and Jesus. Dean can't hear himself move around on the seat. Dean can't tell if the music's playing. When Dean closes his eyes, John might as well not fucking exist.
They open the door to the motel room, and Sam is sitting on his bed looking fucking terrified, and he stands up and starts yelling and Christ that must be hurting his throat and fuck fuck Sam what are you saying and then Sam stares at them and understands way faster than Dean would have expected but it's fucking Sam, why the fuck is he ever surprised?
“No,” Sam's mouth is saying. “No no no no.”
And in a second he changes from scared to angry and Dean gets it but Christ Sam he's scared out of his fucking mind right now okay but Sam goes to the fold-out couch and kicks the covers aside and buries his face in the pillow and won't fucking look at them.
Dean's tired. He's so fucking tired, and he thinks he could sleep for a hundred years and wake up and this would all be a fucking nightmare. He lis down and tries to sleep while John goes immediately to the laptop, but he can't sleep, and he can't figure out why, until it hits him hard and he feels like he's fucking choking-he can't hear Sam breathing.
For all he knows, Sam isn't fucking breathing.
He sits up and squints through the darkness and watches Sam's chest rise and fall, watches it stutter when he coughs and shake when...fuck, is he crying?
No. Just coughing more. Just coughing for a long time, and Dean says, “Sam, do you want me?” and Sam ignores him and coughs and Dean tucks his chin on his knees and just watches.
**
Somehow he falls asleep and when he wakes up it's dark and cold and the air is thick and fucking silent and shit, shit, he's shaking, he's actually physically fucking shaking, and he calls out for Sam Sam Sam Dad Sam Dad Sam Sam and thrashes the fuck around because fuck it he has no pride where is his fucking family and then there's a hand on him, fucking boiling hot so one guess who that is but it still doesn't feel like Sam, and even when Sam has both hands on Dean's shoulders and Dean can see his silhouette and his hair flopping all the fuck everywhere, Dean can even see the kid's chest moving but he can't hear it. And Jesus fucking Christ Sam would probably kill him if he knew how much of his identity Dean's constructed around his fucking asthma but at this point it's a sense, it's its own fucking sense and it doesn't seem like it should even be fucking connected to hearing, there's hearingseeingtouchingsmellingtasting and then there's Sam and that fucking witch took some of his Sam-sense, she ruined his Sam-time, Dean just want all of his brother, okay?
Sam lies down next to him and coughs into Dean's pillow, and Dean puts his hand on Sam's chest even though he knows he hates it because he just needs to fucking feel Sam breathe and Sam lets him, Sam puts his hand over Dean's and holds it there. His breathing feels bad because he's scared. He's so scared, because Dean can't hear and John can't hear and they left Sam fucking alone and who the fuck knows if it's going to get better and Dean's scared too. Jesus fucking Christ is Dean scared and what he wouldn't goddamn do to hear his kid's scratchy breathing right now.
**
Dean wakes up to John's hands pulling at his ears, pushing back his hair, eyes that say anything? Dean shakes his head and mouths “you?” and John shakes his head.
John wakes Sam up next, gently, with a hand on his forehead, and he gets Sam to open his mouth and looks down his throat, and he gives Dean a look that makes it really fucking obvious that Sam, the only one who can hear, sure as fuck can't talk, and isn't that just its own special fucking curse
The good news is that Sam doesn't seem mad at them anymore. The bad news is that it's probably because he's too fucking sick.
John writes sent some emails, going to meet with some people, give Sammy his meds on the hotel stationery, and Dean finds that typically vague and nods but Sam just rubs his eyes and coughs and coughs and winces and John writes wet or dry? on the sheet but Sam just shrugs, so maybe he is still mad, and that's not information to be fucking keeping to yourself, Sam, okay? He's the only who who can hear the cough.
But the quiet is probably getting to Sam, and there's no reason everything should be silent and hideous and horrible for him, too, so Dean puts his hand on Sam's back and says, “You okay?” and Jesus it's weird, and if Sam didn't give him that small smile Dean would think he fucked it up.
But Sam watches him, nods, and that's nice and all except Sam clearly fucking isn't.
So once John's gone Dean says, “Okay, Sammy, here we go,” and he helps Sam up and to the bathroom and keeps up this whole running fucking monologue while he puts a cool washcloth on Sam's neck and measures out his meds. Sam doesn't seem comforted by any of it, and Dean doesn't know what th hell to do.
“Think your fever's up,” Dean says, while Sam's wincing around the antibiotics, and he gently opens Sam's mouth and slips the thermometer under his tongue. Sam's sitting on the sink, and he rests his head against the wall and watches Dean, and Dean's fucking deaf so this is a ridiculous thought but he thinks Sam looks quiet.
He takes Sam's hand and rubs it between his. He keeps talking but he can't keep track of what he says. It feels like the words are just getting away from him all the time, and that things are going to fall out that he just does not want to fucking say, and Sam will hear them and Sam will be the only one to hear them and that's already sort of a dangerous situation, and now Dean can't even keep track of himself. He's confused why John left them alone.
He doesn't hear the thermometer beep and Sam doesn't take it out, so Dean waits a good amount of time before he checks it. Almost a hundred and two and a half. Shit.
“What's going on in there?” Dean says, and runs his thumb, very gently, over Sam's Adam's apple.
Sam winces and closes his eyes. And leans into Dean's thumb.
Dean says, “I know. I know. I'm sorry.”
They stretch out on the sofa bed and play Hangman. Sam, of course, knows the ASL alphabet from some book he read a hundred years ago, and he teaches the letters to Dean and they sign them into each others' palms even though it's plenty fucking light enough for them to see (Dean thinks it will be light enough for fucking ever because fuck if he's ever losing Sam in the dark like that again.)
Halfway through their fourth game (E __ __ A __ H __ ) Sam's grip around his ribcage tightens and Dean sure as fuck knows what his name looks like on his brother's lips, so he says, “Okay, okay, Sammy, don't worry,” and tosses Sam his inhaler while he works on setting up the nebulizer. He can't hear Sam shake it. God, these little fucking noises. He can't hear his footsteps on the carpet. He can't hear Sam's fucking breathing.
Sam lies with his head on his lap while he does the neb treatment, his eyes closed, fingers digging into the mattress. Throat must be fucking killing him.
“What's going on in there?” Dean says, quietly. “How do you sound? You've got to be our ears, buddy.”
Sam doesn't answer. He's really tired.
He signs E-M-P-A-T-H-Y as he falls asleep, guiding Dean's head onto his chest.
**
It's not until an hour later when Dean wakes up to Sam bolting for the bathroom, when he follows immediately behind and loops an arm around Sam's stomach to hold him up and rubs his back while he pukes and shit, why is this happening, what is this, Sam hasn't thrown up since the first few days when he was getting sick, why is this coming back now, it's not until then that Dean figures out what's up.
He doesn't know how the hell it took them so long, except that Sam can be damn fucking sneaky when he wants to be, and Sam didn't want to talk about this.
Sam couldn't fucking talk about this.
Because Dean's mumbling, “It's okay, it's okay, Sammy”s the whole time, and then asking Sam questions while he wipes his mouth--”Are you okay? Are you done? How's your throat holding up? Sammy, you okay?” and Sam's eyes are down and he's not answering.
It's like he doesn't even hear him.
“I'm going to scare the Winchesters senseless.” That's what the witch said. Scare the Winchesters senseless.
Jesus Christ. Sam.
And he remembers the look on Sam's face when they got back-terrified. He thought he'd lost his hearing from being sick, probably thought the fever got too high, was alone and sick and deaf and then...shit, then how angry, how fucking betrayed he was that they'd done this to him, and how they keep asking him what the cough sounds like and he doesn't know, he can't hear himself breathe either and Jesus Christ he must be scared, why didn't he fucking tell Dean and Dean signs S-A-M into Sam's hand over and over and Sam stays curled up with his other hand around his throat and Dean thinks that maybe Sam thinks he knew all along and Jesus if that isn't just the most horrible thing he can fucking imagine, if Sam just assumed that Dean would notice and he didn't.
Dean calls John's phone over and over and over, hanging up and calling back, and he comes home and Dean writes SAM CAN'T HEAR and John...John just goes to Sam and takes his face in his hands and looks at him like he's about to cry, and then he whispers something that looks like “I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry” but none of them can fucking prove it, and then he's drunk and on his laptop and Dean and Sam play more Hangman. Sam sleeps with his hand feeling Dean's heartbeat, and Dean stays the fuck awake.
**
John IMs with Pastor Jim, then dials his number and has Sam cough into the phone.
Dry Jim replies. Definitely dry.
Sam and John are relieved. Dean, who hasn't forgotten the vomiting, the fever that isn't going the fuck away, the fact that he's coughing at all, the fact that who the fuck knows how badly he's wheezing, isn't.
He draws a picture of a shoe and watches Sam sleep, watches his chest rise and fall, watches it snag on its way down, every damn time. He doesn't know if that's normal. He's not used to watching Sam's chest. (He's used to watching Sam's smile. Fuck, he misses watches that smile.)
**
It's only been two days since they lost their hearing and if you'd asked Dean hypothetically, so, how would your family react? he would have said he'd be the one all depressed and angsty and Sam would be Action Sam and John would be who the fuck knows where, but instead there's Action John at the laptop and Sam won't get out of bed and Dean wishes he could run.
**
Sam's getting sicker and he's locked further and further inside himself and they have no idea what's fucking wrong, and they can't keep calling Pastor Jim to have him listen to the cough (because they've already done in three times, still dry, it's not fucking pneumonia).
Dean traces out “What's going on in there?” on Sam's chest. He doesn't worry about touching it anymore. He doesn't worry about touching Sam in front of John. Doesn't worry about anything expect whether he'll get to hear his kid breathe ever again. Sam's the worrier. He'll take care of everything else. Dean just needs to keep him fucking alive so that he can.
So he and John draw Sam back out, remind him that they're here and they're not going to let him dry up in a soundless sick box. They make him soup. John buys honey and rents DVDs. Dean reads him that chapter of his book over and over and fucking over again, and they get into this new normal after a few days.
Sam counts breaths and checks his peak flows and writes down numbers and forces down the meds. John looks for ways to kill witches and break curses. Dean plays tic tac toe with his kid and when John's gone, they play house.
They pretend that they're going to be deaf for their whole fucking lives and that they're okay with it and that this is normal. They insult each other in sign language and draw dirty pictures on the notepad and write down dialogue for the movies they watch. Sam sews some old socks into mittens. Dean cleans his gun over and over and over. Sam forces down the meds. Forces down the meds. Forces down the meds.
Sam becomes a fucking master at signing 'I love you.' That sign is just his bitch. He holds it up sarcastically when John and Dean shove him into bed before he's ready and apologetically when he pukes on one of them and hideously, cruelly, painfully when he's falling asleep or when Dean makes him tea. It's this one fucking sign, quicker than any one word, just this one handshape. It's too fucking easy and that scares Dean to death. He doesn't sign it, but he plays with Sam's hair more than he used to and he doesn't really give much of a shit if John sees. This isn't real life. It's only real life when it's just him and Sam.
**
Who knows when the fuck they're getting out of this goddamn town, and they can't live much longer on the shit John can grab in the five minutes he's willing to leave them alone (something about having two deaf kids scares him a fuck of a lot more than having one, even if Sam is only a bit more useless than he was before) so the three of them trek over to the grocery store to pick up lunch meat and pie and liquor and to scour the fucking shelves for something Sam can get down his throat. It's just so fucking crowded, all these people everywhere all pushing their fucking carts into Dean, expecting him to hear where they're going, and John is sullen and defensive and leading them around like ducklings and Dean turns around and Sam is gone, Sam is just fucking gone.
He grabs John's arm and they swing around and call Sam's name with their voice and their hands and where the fuck is he, and some lady comes over and asks them something but they don't fucking know, they don't know anything, and they don't know where Sam is.
He could be anywhere. He could have wandered out of the store in some delirious fucking panic or dropped blue and dead in the cereal aisle, he could be anywhere and what are they supposed to do, make an announcement over the loudspeaker like Sam's a fucking five-year-old, a fucking five-year-old who can hear?
John's here but he might as well not be for how scared Dean is, and honestly this is the first time Dean can remember, ever, that he's felt like giving up. It's a feeling he's seen on John's face more times than he can count (a hunt gone wrong, Mary's birthday, Sam's birthday, November fucking second, nothing connected with Dean, ever) and on Sam's a few times (panicked eyes going dim in the middle of the night, blue lips under an oxygen mask, shaking his head, I can't, I can't) but he's never fucking felt it, he's never felt like giving up even when he's begging one of them not to die of a fucking head wound or screaming through three fractures in one leg, and what a fucking trip that this is the thing to break him, an over-bright grocery store on a Thursday morning with his dad right next to him and but no fever hot hand on his shoulder, no wheezing an inch below his ear, no Sam.
So what the hell, what the fuck is he supposed to do now?
So Dean's fucking frantic, pulling away from John, scouring every fucking aisle and then there he is, there's Sam. He's by the fucking rotisserie chickens, pressed up against the ovens, shivering, nose red, eyes glassy.
“Don't you dare fucking do that to me again, you understand me?” Dean growls, and of course Sam doesn't understand him, Sam can't fucking hear him, and Dean signs NO NO NO NO over and over.
Sam signs sorry sorry sorry and clings to Dean but Dean doesn't want to touch him, now that Dean's found him he doesn't even want to fucking look at him because goddamn him, how can this one fucking kid mean this fucking much to him, scare him this fucking much? To put it plainly, fuck Sam.
And then some mother-type walks by and stops, puts one hand on Sam's cheek and one on his fucking chest and is all goddamn concerned and Sam is trying to figure out what she's saying and he's trying to get her the fuck off of him and okay, he's putting it plainly, right? NO. Hands the fuck off. Dean takes his kid back and holds him tighter than he's ever held fucking anything.
**
Then the credit card gets questioned so shit, time to go, and Dean thinks John's finally noticing that Sam's stopped getting better, that he's not in much better shape than he was when they got here. John heads south without pause and writes a note for Dean at the first rest stop- why don't you go back and sit with him and if that's not a sign of how fucked up their lives have gotten Dean doesn't know what is.
He climbs into the backseat and Sam squishes in close, shivering, and pulls his legs up onto the seat. He's a fucking furnace, and Dean turns Sam's head towards him and opens his mouth to show Sam should too. Sam obeys, winces. He's barely been able to open wide enough to get a spoon and some soup in since last night.
Still really swollen, still shaking with that damn fever. Why aren't the antibiotics working? He puts a hand on Sam's forehead and pushes back his hair. If he could just talk to the kid, if he could hear the wheezing and how lucid he is, if Sam could fucking talk he could hear how scared he is from one fucking word, okay, and Jesus, fuck this curse, fuck it, Sam needs to hear himself. Sam has to know. Sam worries.
He's half asleep on Dean's shoulder when Dean picks up Sam's hand and sees that his color's fucking shit, purple around his fingernails. Fuck. He reaches forwards and grabs John's shoulder, and John jerks so hard he almost drives them into a guardrail.
Sam's confused, rubbing at his eyes with one hand while Dean holds out the other to John, and John pulls over and looks at both of them with these wide eyes and that's when Dean notices that he's holding Sam by the fucking wrist and the undersides of Sam's arms are bumpy. Sam has motherfucking hives, and that's what this has been for fucking days, it's a motherfucking allergic reaction and if they had heard Sam's breathing they would have goddamn known that it wasn't a normal wheeze, that it was higher and tighter and bad and that the swollen throat wasn't just strep and holy shit. Holy motherfucking goddamn shit.
John pulls back onto the road and drives. Fast.
**
Allergic reactions get through triage fast, but it feels like ages for Dean because Sam's miserable and scared and John's in full papa-bear mode, growling at anyone who gets close to Sam without washing his hands, making the doctors write down the names of every damn thing they try to give Sam. The hospital offers to get them a sign language interpreter, and what the hell are they supposed to say, we're a whole family of deaf guys and none of us know sign language? None of us can even talk to each other? So they just get mad and protective instead and at least that's fucking easy, at least that's normal.
And people keep talking at Sam, wrenching his mouth open and talking to each other over his head and giving him shots and touching his chest and making him blow into shit and he's on autopilot, he's limp and listless and letting them do whatever and Sam you can't do that.
Dean's writing notes back and forth with the one nurse who seems at all fucking sympathetic, and she's saying the doctor wants to pull all the antibiotics and Dean's writing no he's too sick you can't and he thinks he's going to fucking lose it, because they want to keep him here and monitor him and plug him full of different things for days and he can't hear, and if John and Dean leave him alone for a fucking second who the hell knows what he's going to decide to be allergic to next, Sam is the toughest fucking thing around, God knows he is, but Sam collects information and Sam thinks about it and Sam deals with it, but a fucking witch he didn't even go after took that away, and Sam can't deal, he physically cannot deal.
Sam's on oxygen and he has his IV but they don't have any beds, so he's still on that gurney and he's uncomfortable and upset so John climbs up and sits behind him and props him up, strokes his hair, is gentle and soft the way he always is when Sam is so sick. Sam rubs his eyes and he's just watching Dean, so Dean fingerspells out dirty jokes which takes for fucking ever but it's worth it for Sam grinning and rolling his eyes.
Sam falls asleep the second they get him into a room, and Dean is glued to his fucking side, watching his chest rise up and fall down and John writes him a note that says I have a lead and he's out the door. He's just gone. The way he always is when someone else is here to fix Sam.
It's okay. Dean isn't going anywhere.
When John comes back, he's so dirty there's practically smoke coming after him, but he writes Dean a note and says, killed the bitch. Curse is broken. It's gradual. Harder we fight, faster it'll come off. One of us by one.
Dean is fighting so fucking hard. No way he'll be waiting more than an hour or two. He lays his head next to Sam's sleeping shoulder. A few more hours and everything will be fine. He'll be able to take care of Sam.
**
John's hearing comes back first. John is a fucking warrior. John kills demons.
If the doctors are totally confused by John deaf in the morning and hearing by the afternoon, they cover it well enough. John demands names and dosages. He nags the doctors by Sam's window so Sam can see, so Sam can feel safe.
Sam is too busy watching Dean.
**
Sam's hearing comes back next, and Dean can't even believe it, this fucking sick kid in a bed hears faster than he does?
He seems more scared than he was before. His eyes are going wide when he breathes out, and he tugs John's sleeve and says things to him and then a doctor's here and Sam's talking to him, Sam's gesturing towards his throat.
Dean signs OK OK OK OK into Sam's palm, and Sam strokes his hair, comforts him, but Sam is the one who looks terrified. Sam is the one looking at Dean's ears like they're never going to work again and Christ, Sam, don't. You can hear. You don't need Dean at all.
**
The first thing he hears is Sam's breathing.
Whistling, tight, forced. Breathing.
He looks up at Sam, says, “Hi.”
Sam gets this slow, enormous smile. “Hi.”
Dean rests his ear on Sam's chest. It makes some monitor beep and fuck if he cares.
It's Sammy. It's really Sammy.
Every single fucking sound of this kid's breathing, every single fucking one of them. Jesus. Jesus, Sam.
“It's going to be okay,” Sam says. “It's all going to be fine now. I'm not worried anymore.”
Dean's hand fucking betrays him and almost makes the fucking 'I love you' sign, Jesus fucking Christ (and why should that be such a problem, why does Dean ever say it, why can John and Sam say it but not him) but Sam grabs his fingers and twists them up in his. He doesn't make him do it.
And they are quiet because they want to be.