More of that thing with the ptsd...'Conscience Wide as Hell'
Ah, yes. More. When the bunny bites, it bites hard. Stupid bunny. I promise that 'Treadmill' will be updated soonest. But this is just *here*, and wanting out, so...
Again, most effusive praise to darkhavens for her wonderful beta skills, and sweptawaybayou for always cheering me on and making it all worth while. :)
Title - and quote - is from 'The Life of King Henry the Fifth' by Shakespeare.
Canon 'verse would probably confuse people.... Grrrrrr. Aftermath, i suppose. The first part is The Canon's Mouth.
The gates of mercy shall be all shut up,
And the flesh’d soldier, rough and hard of heart,
In liberty of bloody hand shall range
With conscience wide as hell, mowing like grass
Your fresh-fair virgins and your flowering infants.
Duncannon was three days in their rearview before Dean would talk about it, and then it was only to shout Sam down - tell him to shut up. Tell him that Sam should try four months in Hell; see if he did any better. Three hours later, Dean came back from wherever he'd been, stinking drunk. Telling Sam he was sorry, didn't mean it, sorry, sorry. Over and over, his voice thick with tears and his hand knotted in Sam's shirt. Not letting go until Sam said it was okay - they were okay.
Dean fell asleep like a cried-out kid, face still wet and his chest hitching unevenly, curled tight into the nest of sheet, blanket, comforter. He woke up screaming before dawn and they were, Sam thought, right back where they started.
"So, I'm thinkin' vengeful spirit," Dean said, handing the paper across the gap between the beds.
Sam took it and skimmed the article that Dean had marked. "'Nine die over seven year period at sight of police stand-off'. Maybe. Or maybe it's just..."
"Vengeful spirit, Sam."
Sam sighed - tossed the paper back at Dean, who batted it away. "Yeah, okay. Maybe. But I was thinking -"
"And that's your problem. You think too much." Dean bounced to his feet and paced across the room to the window, twitching the curtain aside so he could stare distractedly out the gap. "C'mon, Sam! It's been two straight weeks of sittin' around!"
"It's only been thirteen days and you slept through three of them."
Dean pulled the curtain shut and turned around, a look of exasperation on his face. "Dude, whatever. It's time to get back in the game."
Sam stood up and went around the end of the bed, trying to ignore the fact that Dean immediately pushed past him, unwilling to let himself be trapped in the narrow space between wall, bed and Sam. "Dean, look -"
"Sam." Dean's voice was raw and strained and just this side of a snarl. A clear indication that Dean was at the very ragged edge and Sam backed off; lifted his hands and physically removed himself to the table by the door. Watched Dean breathe - watched him smooth the newspaper and put it back together and then go wash newsprint off his fingers. Meticulously. One finger at a time.
And then Sam watched Dean try to open the dresser-drawer so he could get at the phone book. The dresser was warped and sticky with grime, the drawer wedged crookedly and in about one minute Dean went from swearing and jerking at the pull to full-on steel-toed kicks and stomps. Sam was - very slightly, through his daze of Jesus fucking Christ - proud of the fact that he didn't so much as flinch as Dean reduced about eighty pounds of pressboard and peeling veneer to kindling.
"So, I guess we'll hit the library, huh?" Sam said blandly, into the haze of dust and wood chips. Dean, panting, gave him a look that could flay a man alive and retreated into the bathroom. He just missed slamming the door hard enough to knock it off the hinges. Sam stared at the wreck of the dresser until Dean came out again, the tips of his hair wet and his cuffs damp.
"Think they'll notice?"
"We'll put a sheet over it," Sam said, straight faced, and was totally unprepared for the snort of shocked laughter from Dean. He couldn't help grinning in response. After a moment, Dean rubbed his hand over his face -back through his hair - and sighed.
"Fuck, Sam. I just wanna do something. I can't take this...sitting around. I know I'm fucked up but I'm not useless, okay? I'm still a hunter."
"I know you are," Sam said softly. He stood up and retrieved the newspaper - skimmed through the article again. "I wasn't kidding about the library, you know," he said, tossing the paper down. "We've gotta look up the original incident, all the subsequent deaths -"
Dean was already pulling on his jacket - checking to be sure that his knife and gun and other knife were secure in their places at hip, back and inner pocket. "Wouldn't have it any other way, Sammy." He grabbed the car keys off the top of the TV, tossing and catching them. "Let's get to work."
The library was quiet, at least, though that didn't seem to help. Dean's leg jiggled under the table so hard the microfiche machine wobbled, and every time someone moved, or coughed, or turned a page he twitched. After an hour, Sam was twitching right along with him, sympathetic nerves and every instinct their dad had trained into them coming to heart-pounding life. If Dean was wary then Sam had to be, and his body didn't know any better even if his brain told him to calm the hell down.
"Okay, fuck it, I'm done." Sam shuffled together photocopied county records and the notes he'd taken and Dean looked over at him, eyebrows going up.
"You got everything already?"
"No, I don't, but you're giving me a headache." Sam got up, hitching his messenger bag over his shoulder, shoving pens and pencil away and pushing his chair back under the table. Dean just sat there, glaring at the table top. "Dude, c'mon."
"We've got a job to do, Sam -"
"And we'll do it at the motel." Sam looked at Dean's hunched shoulders and white knuckles and wanted to kick himself. "These chairs are killing my back, man. I've got enough stuff here to get started, okay?"
"Yeah, whatever." Dean shoved to his feet, ignoring his chair when it toppled over, and stalked toward the exit. Sam dithered for half a heartbeat and then followed him. Angry at himself, and angry at Dean for being so damn...sensitive and then angry at himself all over again because, hello, four months in Hell.
Dean could walk damn fast when he wanted to and it took a little effort for Sam to catch up. Once outside, Dean went straight for his car and wrenched the door open. "I'll be back in a little while."
"Dean, listen, I'm sorry -"
"Nothin' to be sorry for," he said, not even looking at Sam. He got in, revved the engine and drove away with a snarl of tires on asphalt. Sam just stood there, watching the car turn a corner - gone - heart pounding and feeling like he might actually be sick.
*Fuck, he left, he actually...left, Jesus...* The motel was about a mile away and Sam headed there fast, hoping. But the parking lot was empty of all but two cars, neither one of them the right one, and Sam let himself into their room and slung his bag down. Took out his phone and stared at it, then scrolled to Dean's number.
"What'd'ya want, Sam?"
"What the hell, Dean? Where are you?"
"None of your business."
"What? What does that mean?"
"It means 'none of your business'. I'm just gonna get a drink."
"It's three in the afternoon, Dean."
"Like that matters. Don't wait up, Sammy."
The line went dead, then, and Sam clicked his phone shut a little harder than necessary. *Fucking Dean and his fucking lame-ass ways of dealing and his totally fucking lame-ass inability to realize that I'm pretty fucking close to panicking right about now.* Sam crushed the other voice in his head that primly pointed out that Dean wasn't exactly in his right mind and maybe Sam should be a little more worried about that than about how this all affected him. Grimly, Sam dragged the phone book out of the rubble of the dresser and looked up bars. There were only four, and he got his laptop booted up and Google Mapped them. Three were clustered near the east edge of town - one was on the far north. None were close, and Sam considered a taxi.
Considered just sitting there and letting Dean get drunk and find his own way home, but the image of him in Duncannon, knife out and lips rolled back in a desperate snarl, made him ditch that idea pretty fast. He checked his wallet and tucked a gun into the small of his back - made sure the room was secure and left, heading east.
Of course Dean was in the last bar Sam checked, the one to the north, and Sam's ears and nose and fingers were burning with cold by the time he got there. He was pissed off and freaked out and shivering and he pushed through the door a little harder than necessary, making the bartender look up fast, scowling.
The sun was sliding westward, and the sky was clotting with dull-violet clouds, and the bar was half-empty. It smelled of smoke and beer and peanuts and must, and Sam sneezed and rubbed his wrist under his nose - looked around. Looked for Dean with his heart in his throat but... There - right there in the far corner, back wedged against the wall and every exit covered.
The bottle sitting on the scarred table was half empty and Dean's shoulders were hunched, his head down, a squat, thick-rimmed glass cradled in both hands. Sam took a long, hard breath and tried to make his heart slow down - tried to batten down every emotion and just be...calm. Be fucking neutral even though he wanted to give his brother a shake and yell at him - handcuff them wrist to wrist and just keep him there, right in Sam's sight and hearing and fucking personal bubble 24/7.
*Imagine the disaster of epic proportion that that would be.* Sam lifted his hand to the still-scowling bartender, trying to convey that everything was fine. Just fine. Then he walked over to Dean and pulled out a chair. Settled carefully, not reaching to grab the bottle or to smack his brother or to start babbling out apologies and questions and demands.
"The cat came back," Dean muttered, and Sam huffed a tiny laugh.
"'Fraid so," Sam said, and Dean reached out and picked up the bottle. Poured a couple inches of whiskey into his glass and set the bottle back down. Deliberate - slow. Showing Sam rather pointedly that he wasn't sloppy-drunk or shaking apart. "You mind?"
"We're not joined at the hip, Sam."
*We would be if Dad could have figured out how.* "No. But you just...left, man. That's not cool."
Dean snorted - picked up his glass and drank, tipping the glass up and over with a stiff wrist, bolting the whisky down in one long swallow. "I'm a big boy, Sam. I can go out for a drink by myself if I want."
"Sure," Sam agreed. Ran his fingertips along the worn-smooth edge of the table. "But maybe right now you should -"
"Don't tell me what I 'should', Sam." Dean looked up finally, his jaw set and his eyes narrowed - cold anger molding his features into a mask. "Don't even start with that shit. I'll do whatever the fucking hell I wanna do."
"Yeah? And what if what you wanna do is pull a knife on a crowd of innocent people? Or maybe a gun, huh? What if -"
"Shut up, Sam," Dean said.
His voice was toneless - flat and not even very loud, a warning klaxon that Sam should have heard and obeyed but he was cold, and tired, and pissed off at the both of them and didn't care. "No, Dean! I get that you're...that this is fucked up, okay? I understand, but -"
"Shut. Up." Dean's fist was tight around the glass, knuckles white and his teeth clenched and Sam sat up straighter in his chair.
"You can't do this, Dean. You can't just run off and...and get drunk and -"
"Jesus Christ!" Dean's voice was a cracked roar and he stood up fast, caching the edge of the table and flinging it sideways, away from them both. He took two fast steps forward and grabbed a double handful of Sam's shirts - hauled him bodily up and around and crack, straight into a wall. Sam's breath wheezed out of his lungs from the force of the blow and he clung to Dean's wrists, momentarily dazed.
"Dean -"
"You shut up and you listen to me," Dean growled, lifting Sam and slamming him back into the wall. "I'm me, I'm the same person I was, I'm not up in a fucking bell tower or at the fucking Mall of America," - two more lifts and slams and Sam was starting to get a little winded - "shooting little old fucking ladies and kids in strollers, okay?"
"Okay, sure, Dean -"
"So don't follow me around like a God-damn overgrown fucking puppy trying to make sure I'm playing nice with the fucking civilians 'cause it's really starting to piss me off, Sammy, it's really, really starting to piss me off."
Sam was getting tired of being shaken like a rag-doll so he stiff-armed Dean away from him, scowling. Dean staggered back a few steps and stood there, breathing hard. "You're not exactly the poster child for rational right now, Dean! I told you, I understand -"
"Fuck, you understand?" Dean was right back up in his face - his space - Sam's jacket twisted in his fist and his forearm across Sam's throat, pushing. "You understand shit. You need to back the fuck off, Sam, before -"
"Before what? Before you hurt me? Before you hurt somebody else?" Sam rabbit-punched Dean right in the ribs and Dean wheezed, his grip slacking. Sam pushed him away again but this time Dean didn't shove back - this time he lifted his fist and punched, hard. Right in the jaw and Sam felt his head snap back and hit the wall - felt his teeth click shut on the tip of his tongue. Burst of white-hot pain and a flood of salt-iron through his mouth and then Dean's forearm was across Sam's throat again. This time, though, he was pressing down in earnest, cutting off Sam's air as Sam clawed at the slick sleeve of Dean's jacket. "D-Dean -"
"I'm trying to figure this shit out, okay? I'm trying to figure it out and I'm trying to make it - everything's so fucking bright and I'm trying to - Sam, you don't fucking get it, you don't -"
"You need to get the hell out of my bar," somebody said, loud through the rushing roar of blood in Sam's ears, and the pressure across his throat disappeared.
"You need to shut the fuck up," Dean growled, and Sam blinked and then gaped in horror, because Dean had his 9mm out and jammed right into the soft part of the bartender's cheek, pulling the man's mouth up crooked on that side.
"Dean, Jesus -"
"Just g-get outta here. I wu-won't call the cops, just g-get out."
"Dean, stop, c'mon, please -" Sam didn't move - didn't want to breathe but he had to talk. Had to say something - do something because the look on Dean's face wasn't rational. He looked, in fact, pretty much like he'd looked when he was confronting Meg, tied up in Bobby's sitting room and calmly telling them John Winchester was dead. "Dean, let's just - leave, Dean, let's just -"
"Get away from me." Dean jerked the barrel of the gun away from the bartender - took one step backward, letting go of Sam's jacket and casting one wild look over the rest of the bar, where three or four other patrons were standing, staring. "Just leave me the fuck alone, all of you." He turned abruptly and stalked out, shoving the gun away and Sam sagged against the wall. Pulling in a shaky couple of breaths and then digging into his pocket for the fifty bucks he'd stuck in there. He crumpled it into the bartender's hand.
"I'm sorry, he's...he really wouldn't hurt anybody, he's just -"
"Get out," the man snapped, jerking away, and Sam just stood there for a moment. Then he turned and ran after Dean. Again.
"Dean? Jesus, come on, Dean, where are you!" The car was still sitting there in front of the bar, crookedly across two parking slots. Sam stood there, fists jammed into his pockets and his nose running again, stinging from the cold. Wisconsin was at least twenty degrees colder than Pennsylvania had been, and there was a stiff breeze coming in from the north. The Sand Crane, it seemed, was right on the lakeshore and Sam looked past the weathered boards of the building to the gentle slope of the shore beyond. To the slate-blue waters of the lake itself, choppy with little white-caps, chilly looking.
*Please don't be in the fucking water. Or near the water. Fuck, Dean...* Sam trudged across the parking lot and past the bar - kicked through knee-high weeds. Down near the lake there were the remnants of an old dock and some kind of boat house, listing sideways into the tawny-grey winter sedge. Sam sighed, and headed that way.
Dean was sitting on the edge of the dock, hidden behind the shed. Sitting with the gun in his lap, his chin tucked down. Watching the water, or maybe the gun. Maybe his own hand, that had a flush of red across the knuckles. Sam walked across the spongy ground and stepped onto the grey boards of the dock. They shifted, creaking faintly, and Dean half-smiled.
"You gonna keep following me everywhere I go?" Dean asked.
Sam stood there for a moment, looking down at the bowed curve of Dean's neck - the longer-than-usual tufts of his hair that were sticking up every which way. "You gonna keep running away from me?"
"Give it a rest, Sam."
Sam sighed again - folded down cross legged next to Dean, elbows on his knees. "I'm never not going to..."
"To what?" Dean looked over at Sam, mouth turned down. "To help? I don't think you can help, Sam."
"How in hell would you know?" The tip of Sam's tongue throbbed, stinging. "Not like you're really giving me a chance, here."
"Exactly how are you gonna fix this, Sam?" Dean shook his head, looking back out over the water. "You and I both know -"
"Know? What do we know, Dean, except that you won't talk about anything, you won't say anything -"
"Oh, fuck you, Sam," Dean said, and his voice sounded - so damn tired. Just...scraped thin and gone and Sam shut up. "What do you want me to say, huh? Want me to say it was horrible? Want me to say I fucking screamed? I begged? 'Cause I did, Sam. I did. All that and more." Dean rubbed the back of his wrist along his cheekbone, gun in the same hand. Gun too close to his face and Sam saw the silver sheen of moisture, smeared along his skin. "And you know the worst...the worst thing?" Dean's voice caught - broke - and he took a shuddering breath.
"Dean -"
"The worst thing was, I kept thinkin'...if only Dad were still there. If Dad were there, maybe I could...stand it. Maybe I could...t-take...it -" Dean turned away, pulling his dangling feet up and putting his forehead onto his knees, arms locked tight around his shins. His shoulders heaved, and Sam knew he was crying. Crying, and trying to muffle it just like he always did when he was a kid; curling up tight and half-smothering himself so no one - so Dad - wouldn't hear.
*Fuck, oh, fuck...* Sam reached out, hesitant, and laid his hand on Dean's back, flat between his shoulder blades and Dean flinched hard, jerking away. One leg falling, knee to the dock and his palm as he wrenched himself away, the gun hitting the rotting deck with a hollow thunk.
"Don't." It was a plea, agonized and desperate, and Sam snatched his hand away.
And then swallowed a mouthful of blood and spit and scooted closer - wound his arms around Dean's shoulders and curled himself down over his brother. Touch, protection - connection.
"Ssam -" Dean's bitten-down nails scrubbed bluntly at Sam's wrists and Sam just held on tighter - got one leg crooked around Dean's, thigh to thigh and Dean's knee in the hollow of his own.
"Not gonna leave you alone, Dean, not gonna leave, I just...just let me, Dean, please, just...let me...let me...."
Dean struggled on - three, four, five minutes. And then he stopped, all at once. Stopped and went limp, panting softly. Cold drops spattering down on Sam's fingers where they were locked across Dean's chest and Sam just tugged him closer and held on, until the sky and the water and the sedge all blurred into a violet-grey softness.
Continued in Mad Blood Stirring.
Again, most effusive praise to darkhavens for her wonderful beta skills, and sweptawaybayou for always cheering me on and making it all worth while. :)
Title - and quote - is from 'The Life of King Henry the Fifth' by Shakespeare.
Canon 'verse would probably confuse people.... Grrrrrr. Aftermath, i suppose. The first part is The Canon's Mouth.
The gates of mercy shall be all shut up,
And the flesh’d soldier, rough and hard of heart,
In liberty of bloody hand shall range
With conscience wide as hell, mowing like grass
Your fresh-fair virgins and your flowering infants.
Duncannon was three days in their rearview before Dean would talk about it, and then it was only to shout Sam down - tell him to shut up. Tell him that Sam should try four months in Hell; see if he did any better. Three hours later, Dean came back from wherever he'd been, stinking drunk. Telling Sam he was sorry, didn't mean it, sorry, sorry. Over and over, his voice thick with tears and his hand knotted in Sam's shirt. Not letting go until Sam said it was okay - they were okay.
Dean fell asleep like a cried-out kid, face still wet and his chest hitching unevenly, curled tight into the nest of sheet, blanket, comforter. He woke up screaming before dawn and they were, Sam thought, right back where they started.
"So, I'm thinkin' vengeful spirit," Dean said, handing the paper across the gap between the beds.
Sam took it and skimmed the article that Dean had marked. "'Nine die over seven year period at sight of police stand-off'. Maybe. Or maybe it's just..."
"Vengeful spirit, Sam."
Sam sighed - tossed the paper back at Dean, who batted it away. "Yeah, okay. Maybe. But I was thinking -"
"And that's your problem. You think too much." Dean bounced to his feet and paced across the room to the window, twitching the curtain aside so he could stare distractedly out the gap. "C'mon, Sam! It's been two straight weeks of sittin' around!"
"It's only been thirteen days and you slept through three of them."
Dean pulled the curtain shut and turned around, a look of exasperation on his face. "Dude, whatever. It's time to get back in the game."
Sam stood up and went around the end of the bed, trying to ignore the fact that Dean immediately pushed past him, unwilling to let himself be trapped in the narrow space between wall, bed and Sam. "Dean, look -"
"Sam." Dean's voice was raw and strained and just this side of a snarl. A clear indication that Dean was at the very ragged edge and Sam backed off; lifted his hands and physically removed himself to the table by the door. Watched Dean breathe - watched him smooth the newspaper and put it back together and then go wash newsprint off his fingers. Meticulously. One finger at a time.
And then Sam watched Dean try to open the dresser-drawer so he could get at the phone book. The dresser was warped and sticky with grime, the drawer wedged crookedly and in about one minute Dean went from swearing and jerking at the pull to full-on steel-toed kicks and stomps. Sam was - very slightly, through his daze of Jesus fucking Christ - proud of the fact that he didn't so much as flinch as Dean reduced about eighty pounds of pressboard and peeling veneer to kindling.
"So, I guess we'll hit the library, huh?" Sam said blandly, into the haze of dust and wood chips. Dean, panting, gave him a look that could flay a man alive and retreated into the bathroom. He just missed slamming the door hard enough to knock it off the hinges. Sam stared at the wreck of the dresser until Dean came out again, the tips of his hair wet and his cuffs damp.
"Think they'll notice?"
"We'll put a sheet over it," Sam said, straight faced, and was totally unprepared for the snort of shocked laughter from Dean. He couldn't help grinning in response. After a moment, Dean rubbed his hand over his face -back through his hair - and sighed.
"Fuck, Sam. I just wanna do something. I can't take this...sitting around. I know I'm fucked up but I'm not useless, okay? I'm still a hunter."
"I know you are," Sam said softly. He stood up and retrieved the newspaper - skimmed through the article again. "I wasn't kidding about the library, you know," he said, tossing the paper down. "We've gotta look up the original incident, all the subsequent deaths -"
Dean was already pulling on his jacket - checking to be sure that his knife and gun and other knife were secure in their places at hip, back and inner pocket. "Wouldn't have it any other way, Sammy." He grabbed the car keys off the top of the TV, tossing and catching them. "Let's get to work."
The library was quiet, at least, though that didn't seem to help. Dean's leg jiggled under the table so hard the microfiche machine wobbled, and every time someone moved, or coughed, or turned a page he twitched. After an hour, Sam was twitching right along with him, sympathetic nerves and every instinct their dad had trained into them coming to heart-pounding life. If Dean was wary then Sam had to be, and his body didn't know any better even if his brain told him to calm the hell down.
"Okay, fuck it, I'm done." Sam shuffled together photocopied county records and the notes he'd taken and Dean looked over at him, eyebrows going up.
"You got everything already?"
"No, I don't, but you're giving me a headache." Sam got up, hitching his messenger bag over his shoulder, shoving pens and pencil away and pushing his chair back under the table. Dean just sat there, glaring at the table top. "Dude, c'mon."
"We've got a job to do, Sam -"
"And we'll do it at the motel." Sam looked at Dean's hunched shoulders and white knuckles and wanted to kick himself. "These chairs are killing my back, man. I've got enough stuff here to get started, okay?"
"Yeah, whatever." Dean shoved to his feet, ignoring his chair when it toppled over, and stalked toward the exit. Sam dithered for half a heartbeat and then followed him. Angry at himself, and angry at Dean for being so damn...sensitive and then angry at himself all over again because, hello, four months in Hell.
Dean could walk damn fast when he wanted to and it took a little effort for Sam to catch up. Once outside, Dean went straight for his car and wrenched the door open. "I'll be back in a little while."
"Dean, listen, I'm sorry -"
"Nothin' to be sorry for," he said, not even looking at Sam. He got in, revved the engine and drove away with a snarl of tires on asphalt. Sam just stood there, watching the car turn a corner - gone - heart pounding and feeling like he might actually be sick.
*Fuck, he left, he actually...left, Jesus...* The motel was about a mile away and Sam headed there fast, hoping. But the parking lot was empty of all but two cars, neither one of them the right one, and Sam let himself into their room and slung his bag down. Took out his phone and stared at it, then scrolled to Dean's number.
"What'd'ya want, Sam?"
"What the hell, Dean? Where are you?"
"None of your business."
"What? What does that mean?"
"It means 'none of your business'. I'm just gonna get a drink."
"It's three in the afternoon, Dean."
"Like that matters. Don't wait up, Sammy."
The line went dead, then, and Sam clicked his phone shut a little harder than necessary. *Fucking Dean and his fucking lame-ass ways of dealing and his totally fucking lame-ass inability to realize that I'm pretty fucking close to panicking right about now.* Sam crushed the other voice in his head that primly pointed out that Dean wasn't exactly in his right mind and maybe Sam should be a little more worried about that than about how this all affected him. Grimly, Sam dragged the phone book out of the rubble of the dresser and looked up bars. There were only four, and he got his laptop booted up and Google Mapped them. Three were clustered near the east edge of town - one was on the far north. None were close, and Sam considered a taxi.
Considered just sitting there and letting Dean get drunk and find his own way home, but the image of him in Duncannon, knife out and lips rolled back in a desperate snarl, made him ditch that idea pretty fast. He checked his wallet and tucked a gun into the small of his back - made sure the room was secure and left, heading east.
Of course Dean was in the last bar Sam checked, the one to the north, and Sam's ears and nose and fingers were burning with cold by the time he got there. He was pissed off and freaked out and shivering and he pushed through the door a little harder than necessary, making the bartender look up fast, scowling.
The sun was sliding westward, and the sky was clotting with dull-violet clouds, and the bar was half-empty. It smelled of smoke and beer and peanuts and must, and Sam sneezed and rubbed his wrist under his nose - looked around. Looked for Dean with his heart in his throat but... There - right there in the far corner, back wedged against the wall and every exit covered.
The bottle sitting on the scarred table was half empty and Dean's shoulders were hunched, his head down, a squat, thick-rimmed glass cradled in both hands. Sam took a long, hard breath and tried to make his heart slow down - tried to batten down every emotion and just be...calm. Be fucking neutral even though he wanted to give his brother a shake and yell at him - handcuff them wrist to wrist and just keep him there, right in Sam's sight and hearing and fucking personal bubble 24/7.
*Imagine the disaster of epic proportion that that would be.* Sam lifted his hand to the still-scowling bartender, trying to convey that everything was fine. Just fine. Then he walked over to Dean and pulled out a chair. Settled carefully, not reaching to grab the bottle or to smack his brother or to start babbling out apologies and questions and demands.
"The cat came back," Dean muttered, and Sam huffed a tiny laugh.
"'Fraid so," Sam said, and Dean reached out and picked up the bottle. Poured a couple inches of whiskey into his glass and set the bottle back down. Deliberate - slow. Showing Sam rather pointedly that he wasn't sloppy-drunk or shaking apart. "You mind?"
"We're not joined at the hip, Sam."
*We would be if Dad could have figured out how.* "No. But you just...left, man. That's not cool."
Dean snorted - picked up his glass and drank, tipping the glass up and over with a stiff wrist, bolting the whisky down in one long swallow. "I'm a big boy, Sam. I can go out for a drink by myself if I want."
"Sure," Sam agreed. Ran his fingertips along the worn-smooth edge of the table. "But maybe right now you should -"
"Don't tell me what I 'should', Sam." Dean looked up finally, his jaw set and his eyes narrowed - cold anger molding his features into a mask. "Don't even start with that shit. I'll do whatever the fucking hell I wanna do."
"Yeah? And what if what you wanna do is pull a knife on a crowd of innocent people? Or maybe a gun, huh? What if -"
"Shut up, Sam," Dean said.
His voice was toneless - flat and not even very loud, a warning klaxon that Sam should have heard and obeyed but he was cold, and tired, and pissed off at the both of them and didn't care. "No, Dean! I get that you're...that this is fucked up, okay? I understand, but -"
"Shut. Up." Dean's fist was tight around the glass, knuckles white and his teeth clenched and Sam sat up straighter in his chair.
"You can't do this, Dean. You can't just run off and...and get drunk and -"
"Jesus Christ!" Dean's voice was a cracked roar and he stood up fast, caching the edge of the table and flinging it sideways, away from them both. He took two fast steps forward and grabbed a double handful of Sam's shirts - hauled him bodily up and around and crack, straight into a wall. Sam's breath wheezed out of his lungs from the force of the blow and he clung to Dean's wrists, momentarily dazed.
"Dean -"
"You shut up and you listen to me," Dean growled, lifting Sam and slamming him back into the wall. "I'm me, I'm the same person I was, I'm not up in a fucking bell tower or at the fucking Mall of America," - two more lifts and slams and Sam was starting to get a little winded - "shooting little old fucking ladies and kids in strollers, okay?"
"Okay, sure, Dean -"
"So don't follow me around like a God-damn overgrown fucking puppy trying to make sure I'm playing nice with the fucking civilians 'cause it's really starting to piss me off, Sammy, it's really, really starting to piss me off."
Sam was getting tired of being shaken like a rag-doll so he stiff-armed Dean away from him, scowling. Dean staggered back a few steps and stood there, breathing hard. "You're not exactly the poster child for rational right now, Dean! I told you, I understand -"
"Fuck, you understand?" Dean was right back up in his face - his space - Sam's jacket twisted in his fist and his forearm across Sam's throat, pushing. "You understand shit. You need to back the fuck off, Sam, before -"
"Before what? Before you hurt me? Before you hurt somebody else?" Sam rabbit-punched Dean right in the ribs and Dean wheezed, his grip slacking. Sam pushed him away again but this time Dean didn't shove back - this time he lifted his fist and punched, hard. Right in the jaw and Sam felt his head snap back and hit the wall - felt his teeth click shut on the tip of his tongue. Burst of white-hot pain and a flood of salt-iron through his mouth and then Dean's forearm was across Sam's throat again. This time, though, he was pressing down in earnest, cutting off Sam's air as Sam clawed at the slick sleeve of Dean's jacket. "D-Dean -"
"I'm trying to figure this shit out, okay? I'm trying to figure it out and I'm trying to make it - everything's so fucking bright and I'm trying to - Sam, you don't fucking get it, you don't -"
"You need to get the hell out of my bar," somebody said, loud through the rushing roar of blood in Sam's ears, and the pressure across his throat disappeared.
"You need to shut the fuck up," Dean growled, and Sam blinked and then gaped in horror, because Dean had his 9mm out and jammed right into the soft part of the bartender's cheek, pulling the man's mouth up crooked on that side.
"Dean, Jesus -"
"Just g-get outta here. I wu-won't call the cops, just g-get out."
"Dean, stop, c'mon, please -" Sam didn't move - didn't want to breathe but he had to talk. Had to say something - do something because the look on Dean's face wasn't rational. He looked, in fact, pretty much like he'd looked when he was confronting Meg, tied up in Bobby's sitting room and calmly telling them John Winchester was dead. "Dean, let's just - leave, Dean, let's just -"
"Get away from me." Dean jerked the barrel of the gun away from the bartender - took one step backward, letting go of Sam's jacket and casting one wild look over the rest of the bar, where three or four other patrons were standing, staring. "Just leave me the fuck alone, all of you." He turned abruptly and stalked out, shoving the gun away and Sam sagged against the wall. Pulling in a shaky couple of breaths and then digging into his pocket for the fifty bucks he'd stuck in there. He crumpled it into the bartender's hand.
"I'm sorry, he's...he really wouldn't hurt anybody, he's just -"
"Get out," the man snapped, jerking away, and Sam just stood there for a moment. Then he turned and ran after Dean. Again.
"Dean? Jesus, come on, Dean, where are you!" The car was still sitting there in front of the bar, crookedly across two parking slots. Sam stood there, fists jammed into his pockets and his nose running again, stinging from the cold. Wisconsin was at least twenty degrees colder than Pennsylvania had been, and there was a stiff breeze coming in from the north. The Sand Crane, it seemed, was right on the lakeshore and Sam looked past the weathered boards of the building to the gentle slope of the shore beyond. To the slate-blue waters of the lake itself, choppy with little white-caps, chilly looking.
*Please don't be in the fucking water. Or near the water. Fuck, Dean...* Sam trudged across the parking lot and past the bar - kicked through knee-high weeds. Down near the lake there were the remnants of an old dock and some kind of boat house, listing sideways into the tawny-grey winter sedge. Sam sighed, and headed that way.
Dean was sitting on the edge of the dock, hidden behind the shed. Sitting with the gun in his lap, his chin tucked down. Watching the water, or maybe the gun. Maybe his own hand, that had a flush of red across the knuckles. Sam walked across the spongy ground and stepped onto the grey boards of the dock. They shifted, creaking faintly, and Dean half-smiled.
"You gonna keep following me everywhere I go?" Dean asked.
Sam stood there for a moment, looking down at the bowed curve of Dean's neck - the longer-than-usual tufts of his hair that were sticking up every which way. "You gonna keep running away from me?"
"Give it a rest, Sam."
Sam sighed again - folded down cross legged next to Dean, elbows on his knees. "I'm never not going to..."
"To what?" Dean looked over at Sam, mouth turned down. "To help? I don't think you can help, Sam."
"How in hell would you know?" The tip of Sam's tongue throbbed, stinging. "Not like you're really giving me a chance, here."
"Exactly how are you gonna fix this, Sam?" Dean shook his head, looking back out over the water. "You and I both know -"
"Know? What do we know, Dean, except that you won't talk about anything, you won't say anything -"
"Oh, fuck you, Sam," Dean said, and his voice sounded - so damn tired. Just...scraped thin and gone and Sam shut up. "What do you want me to say, huh? Want me to say it was horrible? Want me to say I fucking screamed? I begged? 'Cause I did, Sam. I did. All that and more." Dean rubbed the back of his wrist along his cheekbone, gun in the same hand. Gun too close to his face and Sam saw the silver sheen of moisture, smeared along his skin. "And you know the worst...the worst thing?" Dean's voice caught - broke - and he took a shuddering breath.
"Dean -"
"The worst thing was, I kept thinkin'...if only Dad were still there. If Dad were there, maybe I could...stand it. Maybe I could...t-take...it -" Dean turned away, pulling his dangling feet up and putting his forehead onto his knees, arms locked tight around his shins. His shoulders heaved, and Sam knew he was crying. Crying, and trying to muffle it just like he always did when he was a kid; curling up tight and half-smothering himself so no one - so Dad - wouldn't hear.
*Fuck, oh, fuck...* Sam reached out, hesitant, and laid his hand on Dean's back, flat between his shoulder blades and Dean flinched hard, jerking away. One leg falling, knee to the dock and his palm as he wrenched himself away, the gun hitting the rotting deck with a hollow thunk.
"Don't." It was a plea, agonized and desperate, and Sam snatched his hand away.
And then swallowed a mouthful of blood and spit and scooted closer - wound his arms around Dean's shoulders and curled himself down over his brother. Touch, protection - connection.
"Ssam -" Dean's bitten-down nails scrubbed bluntly at Sam's wrists and Sam just held on tighter - got one leg crooked around Dean's, thigh to thigh and Dean's knee in the hollow of his own.
"Not gonna leave you alone, Dean, not gonna leave, I just...just let me, Dean, please, just...let me...let me...."
Dean struggled on - three, four, five minutes. And then he stopped, all at once. Stopped and went limp, panting softly. Cold drops spattering down on Sam's fingers where they were locked across Dean's chest and Sam just tugged him closer and held on, until the sky and the water and the sedge all blurred into a violet-grey softness.
Continued in Mad Blood Stirring.