(no subject)
Head On
by whereupon
Sam/Dean, R, no spoilers, 8,283 words.
And then, just like that, Dean falls.
Dean slams the door hard enough that the stained yellow curtains tied up around the window with the view of the parking lot come loose and drift across Sam's bed-slanted view of that dirty white sky, the stretch of cracked asphalt and the unlit neon sign shaped like a giant arrow on the building across the street.
It's sort of fitting, since this started when Sam got out of the car and slammed the door a little harder than Dean thought was necessary, which he wouldn't shut up about, what the fuck you do that for, hope you wanna start walking everywhere 'cause you're not getting back in my car until you say you're sorry, until Sam snapped, I'm not apologizing to the goddamn car, Dean, and they started shouting.
But Dean's only going to the laundromat, he'll be back in two hours, maybe three, and anyway this can't be over because Sam's still so fucking angry. Because he didn't doanything to begin with and maybe because Dean got out first, Dean grabbed the dirty laundry duffel and said he'd be back and it would be great if Sam could try not to destroy anything while he was gone, and then he left like he couldn't be bothered to deal with his brother anymore. And now Sam's alone in the room like he's sulking, which he isn't, and in a couple of hours, Dean'll come back and say, you feel better now, huh, you done being pissed, which, even if Sam is, will start the whole thing over again.
Sam knows exactly how he'll win the argument, one of these times, and that's what scares him. How hard it was not to shut Dean up by pinning him down, holding him still. He's not sure how far Dean will be able to push him before Sam does give in, finds out how much Dean will give, sees how far he can get before Dean pushes him away.
See if Dean will push him away at all or if Sam's right about that, about this thing that he tries not to let himself think about, not consciously, doesn't let himself imagine.
Dean's already got everything else of his, all of his waking hours and all of his heart and everything that word doesn't even begin to encompass. Everything but this one last thing, untouched boundary, and there's a fucking good reason for that. Because it's wrong, this dark, sibilant little word twisting at the back of his brain, secret burn beneath his skin, and if Dean hears it, too, if they're the same in this as they are in everything else, Sam thinks it might be the death of them both.
The curtains are grimy and vaguely sticky against Sam's fingers. He ties them back and hates Dean a little for making him touch them, who knows what's living on them, all kinds of previously undiscovered microbes. Since he's right there already, he watches Dean walk away, the determined set of Dean's shoulders like he knows he's being watched, the perfect swagger that makes Sam roll his eyes even though no one's around to see.
Through the window, Sam watches as Dean stumbles. Staggers. Misses a step.
It's so incredibly random, so incredibly unexpected, that Sam thinks maybe he imagined it or maybe Dean did it because he knows Sam's watching him, the way he always knows. Dean turns around and his eyes meet Sam's through the impossibly thick pane of glass which doesn't manage to dull the electric crackle at all. Even miles away, Sam would recognize that expression, the worldshaking glint of panic and terror, both of which Dean swears he's never felt, swears he never feels.
And then, just like that, Dean falls.
One hand reaching out, touching for an instant the smooth black of the car, and Sam doesn't see what happens next because he's not by the window anymore, he's by the door and the doorknob is turning, twisting greasy-slick in his palm. When he throws open the door, he has this godawful thought, this idea that Dean's been shot, that he blinked or looked away right before the bullet hit. That it was a vigilante with a gun and a badge and his brother is bleeding out and they can't go to the hospital because they're still wanted for murder a county away and he didn't even see the shot that took Dean down, didn't even bear witness.
Dean's on the ground by the driver's side of the car, this crumpled shape by the laundry duffel which has clothes spilling out of it, Dean's second-favorite shirt and one of Sam's socks rendered vivid-real, hysterically clear. There's nobody around, no getaway car or flashing lights or goddamn anything. Sam drops to his knees, his hands skating across Dean's neck, across his chest. Dean's still breathing and his pulse flickers against Sam's thumb, but his eyes are closed and he's not moving.
The asphalt sparks like stars, like diamonds or tears, and there's no blood anywhere. Not where it counts, just these raw places scraped red on Dean's hands from when he tried to catch himself, from where he fell, right after Sam looked away.
"Dean," Sam says and Dean twitches, slight movement, his neck pressed against Sam's palm, but that's it. Sam grits his teeth (Dean's alive, that's something, Sam's heart is pounding so fast, what if this is the result of twenty-odd years of concussions, of never learning to duck, he's never gonna forgive Dean if that's the case, never gonna let him live it down) and lets go of his brother in order to cram the spilled clothes back into the duffel, because Dean's going to be pissed when he wakes up and finds out that Sam was too busy being such a goddamn girl that he let their bag get stolen, let somebody walk off with a week's worth of nearly ruined shirts and jeans that are hardly salvageable anyway.
Sam slings the duffel over one shoulder and gets his arms around Dean, pulling him up, hoping to god he's not going to make it worse because they can't risk a hospital right now. One more consequence of this fugitive lifestyle and one of these days it's going to kill them but not today, please, not today.
Dean doesn't shove him away, doesn't tell Sam to get his fuckin' hands off him, he can walk fine, and that, that is somehow more terrifying than everything else. Dean's head slumping forward and his feet dragging and it takes so long to get out of the sunlight, get back to the room, where there are walls, where they're not so exposed.
Sam drops the bag when they get inside, kicks it out of the way, and Dean doesn't move, out cold, doesn't even stir when Sam lowers him onto the bed.
"Christo," Sam says, just in case, and Dean doesn't so much as flinch. "Jesus Christ, christo, Dean, wake the fuck up right now. This isn't funny anymore, man. I totaled your car, I shredded your tapes, I gave your jacket to the homeless guy across the street, I, I, haven't yet but I'm going to if you don't wake up right fucking now, Dean, Dean," and he hears the way he's repeating his brother's name over and over again, the desperate fraying edge to his voice, and he stops.
This silence, his breath and Dean's and nothing beyond that, and Dean was fine a minute ago, was fine when he was swearing at Sam and stomping out the door.
Sam thinks about saying I'm leaving, because that might work, might get Dean to snap out of this, jerk awake and say something equally cruel, say anything at all. But Sam doesn't think it would, not really, because he knows that Dean wouldn't do this to him if he had a choice. Dean's not nearly that much of an asshole, no matter how much he pretends otherwise, and Sam's not sure if Dean can hear him. If Dean would hear him and just lie there, trapped and still and screaming, and Sam can't do that to him. Won't, can't risk it.
The EMF meter is buried at the bottom of Dean's pack, beneath Dad's journal, three more shirts and a pair of shorts, a half-empty Mountain Dew bottle, a spare clip, a dented rosary. Sam has half of the contents of the bag strewn across the floor and Dean should be threatening him, unless you wanna lose your hands, keep 'em offa my stuff, but he's not. He's just lying there, and with every second in which he does not move, doesn't move for no reason, no reason that Sam can see, can understand, this freezing, horrified feeling in Sam's stomach intensifies. Cold dread twining around his spine, tighter and tighter until he wants to scream.
He aims the EMF meter at the bed, at his brother. The lights flash on, alien green, and it begins to whine. Sam lets out a shaky breath as he sets the meter back down, places it gently back in Dean's bag, relief-giddy because it's supernatural, this thing that happened to Dean, it's something he knows, something he can fix.
There's always a way out, always a way back. The right words in some dead language or a blade razor-sharp and dipped in salt or failing that, enough ammo. This isn't the end, not this, Sam telling Dean that he could go screw himself, or better yet, the car, and Dean grabbing the bag and the door slamming behind him.
On the bed, Dean's hands tighten into fists.
"Dean?" Sam says, wary and hopeful and Dean's going to laugh at him, going to call him a pussy and freak out about Sam touching his stuff, he is, but he doesn't. He doesn't move at all.
Sam swallows.
Their last hunt was a ghost, easy, nothing that should be able to do this. A spirit bound to one physical location, to that abandoned graffiti'd amusement park, clowns with dead-painted eyes everywhere Sam looked and Dean snickering but not getting out of his range of vision, not leaving him alone.
This image Sam's not ever going to forget, Dean climbing up the side of the roller coaster, pulling himself up onto the track, shotgun in hand while Sam stood at the bottom, shaking his head and waiting for him to fall. The night was windless and quiet and Dean didn't even have to shout when he reached the top, looked down at Sam, wicked curve of his mouth and slice of his eyes when he said, "King of the hill, Sammy, unless you wanna try to dethrone me."
"Get the hell down before you fall," Sam said, biting back a grin. "I'm not driving you to the ER and no ambulance's gonna come this far for your sorry ass."
"You would," Dean said. "Bet if I jumped right now you'd have the car pulled up before I hit the ground."
"Yeah?" Sam said. "Wanna find out?" He was a little afraid that Dean would, but Dean only rolled his shoulders, cracked his neck and stared down at him until Sam sighed and said, "Yeah, okay, I would, will you come down already?"
Dean grinned and climbed down and they dug up the bones that were buried at the base of the Ferris wheel, salted them and watched them burn. It was normal, what passes for normal in the freak show that Sam's life has become (or has always been, depending on his mood), nothing out of the ordinary at all, nothing that should have caused this, whatever it is. Nothing that could have caused it.
All the same. Sam has the notes about the case, the history of the park, the history of the town, the names of the people who died there (though as it turned out, the one haunting the park wasn't on the list) in his bag and it has to be that, has to be the ghost, because there's nothing else it could be.
He shoves his hand into the pocket where his papers are, the pocket where he keeps the important things, notes about the hunt they're on, a picture of Jess, the pictures he kept after that time they went back to Lawrence. He touches something cold, not paper at all, a brush of metal against his fingers.
A silver charm, maybe an amulet, etched with the sigil of a saint that the Catholics never recognized. Protection, precieux sang, a man strung up in the darkened highland forests for the crime of sparing his family, sending them far away long before anyone should have known that war was coming, before anyone could have seen that bloody sunrise.
Dean never could keep his goddamn hands to himself.
"Sammy," Dean says, and Sam turns, overjoyed. But Dean's eyes are still closed, even as his mouth moves, as he says, "No, no, you shot me" and Sam freezes. Dean says something else, unintelligible sleep-mumble, and goes silent.
Sam takes a step forward, puts his hand on Dean's shoulder, and Dean flinches away. It's a small thing, such a small thing, but it ricochets through Sam's palm, through his entire body. But it was nothing, a response to an image in some dream, some nightmare, and the charm is heavy in Sam's other hand.
He's seen it before. He saw it today, this morning, in the shop where they'd stopped to restock. It was a magic shop, sure, but the address was from Dad's journal, which meant that it was the real thing, fewer tourists and so much more dangerous. Sam was looking for the wolfsbane and Dean was at his side, elbowing him, picking things up and shoving them at him, saying, "Hey, look at this, hey, you think it actually works?"
Sam glanced down, squinted. "What the hell do you need an aphrodisiac for?" he asked, unthinking, irritable because the incense or whatever was being burnt in the name of atmosphere made his eyes water, was giving him a headache.
"Yeah, good point," Dean said. "I am kinda irresistible, huh? And it's not like I need any, you know, help."
He grinned at Sam, one eyebrow raised like he was waiting for Sam to laugh or to blush, until Sam said, "Dude, how about I find the wolfsbane and you go look over there?" There being the general direction of anywhere else. Dean looked hurt for a second, but only for a second, before shrugging and wandering off.
Sam found him later in the back, by the rows of charms and amulets and other bits of metal hanging from cords of leather that Sam thought might have been made from human skin. "You ready to go?" Sam asked.
"If you're done picking out the ingredients for your bitches' brew," Dean said. "Parsley, sage, rosemary and whatever the hell that other one was."
"I thought you hated Simon and Garfunkel."
"Yeah, so? You got a point, there, Sammy, or do you just get off on telling me things I already know?"
Sam shrugged. "Just that you're a fucking jerk, really. Same as always."
Dean bit his lip, stared at Sam and then smirked. "Let me know when you come up with something new, man, okay?"
Dean could have pocketed the charm at any time during that conversation, when Sam was busy rolling his eyes or looking heavenward in exasperation, or he could have done it later, when Sam turned away towards the counter. Sam knows Dean didn't pay for it, because he didn't see it when they went up to the counter, and it's not like Dean could have gone back without him to buy it, because Dean hasn't left him alone for more than five minutes today. Or yesterday. Or in as long as Sam can remember.
This sinking feeling in Sam's stomach, nausea-burn of guilt, because he's started to figure it out, what's going on, why this is happening, and the hell of it is he's pretty sure it's his fault in some twisted way: Dean did it for him, Dean shoved it into his bag and didn't tell him about it. It's not the first time. When Sam was eighteen, after he got on that first bus heading west, he put his hand into the front pocket of his bag and found an envelope that, upon examination, contained five hundred dollars in worn twenties and tens. Dean was the only one who could have put it there, who would have put it there, and Sam's never said anything about it, never known where to start.
Sam still has no idea where Dean got the money, because it wasn't like they were exactly flush, crowded into that one-bedroom apartment Dad rented on the edge of the city, with the roof that leaked whether or not it was raining and the broken locks on every door, and Dean working, actually holding down a job, keeping them fed on bread and peanut butter until Dad could walk again and they could move on.
Which Sam did, before Dean and Dad had the chance, and he never asked how much longer they stayed in that apartment after he left.
The car keys are in Dean's pocket. Dean flinches again when Sam touches him and Sam winces, snatches the keys as quickly as he can. He looks away from his brother for a second to let himself breathe, looks back and Dean's curled in on himself, his eyes moving frantic and fast beneath his eyelids. Sam thinks about tying him there, just to be safe, because god knows the damage Dean's capable of inflicting upon himself when he's conscious. The thought only lasts an instant, is too fucked-up, too impossible, to consider, the way Dean keeps flinching away from him already. And it's not like Dean's moved at all so far, not like he's even tried.
"I'll be back as soon as I can," Sam says. He puts another line of salt down in front of the door and the windows, just in case, and he looks at Dean one more time, and then he locks the door and leaves.
The music clicks on when he starts the engine, and maybe that's how it started, really, that's why he slammed the door. Because he was so fucking tired of hearing that Buzzcocks tape over and over again, tired of Dean singing along with it, and Sam nearly bruises his knuckles on the dashboard trying to get it to stop playing.
Sam has a gun on his hip and murder on his mind when he parks in front of the nondescript little building, which looks more like it should house an accountant than a purveyor of dark magick or whatever it says on the door.
The air in the shop tastes like autumn, burning leaves and the instant before the dreadful fall into bleak grey winter. The woman looks up from behind the counter, the black hulk of the cash register. There are no other customers. Sam's not sure whether to chalk that up to coincidence or to something more, but it doesn't matter. The woman crosses her arms, black lines of her tattoos sliding out from beneath the sleeves of her sweater. Sam wonders how much power she has, because she made the pages of Dad's journal, but he doesn't have time to worry about it. Won't have to worry about it, if things go well.
"My brother and I were here earlier," Sam says. "This morning, I don't know if you remember us."
"I do," she says.
"Okay, um. The thing is, something happened to my brother and I was wondering if maybe you knew why."
"Don't play games with me," she says. "You're here to accuse me of something and you're right. Your brother took something from me, so I took something from him."
Sam takes the charm out of his pocket, puts it on the counter. "And now you've got it back."
"Forty-nine ninety-five," she says. "Plus tax. It's no good to me used."
Sam stares at her. He takes out his wallet and flips through his credit cards. They're all in fake names, the stupid rock-star aliases Dean picked out. He pays with cash because he's not sure what she'd do if she found out, what kind of curse she'd put on him, or on both of them.
She gives him his change, brush of her cold fingertips against his palm, and smiles. It's not a nice smile. "It'll be over at midnight," she says. "There's nothing I can do to make it sooner."
"You don't think this is overkill," Sam says. Right now, he is the most dangerous person in the entire world, but he marvels at how close his tone is to bland, to conversational, to harmless. The bills crumple in his fist, the coins sliding together with a click like cocking a gun, that breathless trigger pull.
"Bad things happen to bad boys," she says. "He got what he deserved and he'll think twice next time."
"Dean's not a bad person," Sam says. "He's the best person I know."
"Then I would suggest meeting more people," she says.
The coins hit the counter, rattle and roll off the edge. This instant of perfect clarity and the woman's eyes go wide and Sam exhales. Slowly. Through gritted teeth. "I'm going now," he says. He pockets the charm again. "I paid you, we're even, don't fucking touch him again. Don't fucking touch either of us."
She doesn't respond. He turns around, feels her watching him all the way to the door.
He goes back out to the car, starts the engine and waits for his hands to stop shaking. The arsenic sky is laced with contrails. His hands are still shaking when he starts to drive, but he can't wait any longer because Dean is alone in the motel room.
Dean is, of course, still there when Sam gets back. Sam doesn't think he's moved at all.
"I'm back," Sam says. He puts his gun down on the table , draws the curtains and sits down on the other bed.
Six hours until midnight and what if she was lying, what if Dean doesn't wake up, what if Dean never--
It's funny, Dean sleeps all the time, sleeps through those long nights when Sam's awake the whole time, waiting for dawn and staring at the static flicker of the television set, staring at the shape of the shadows on the ceiling or the headlights cutting through the curtains. All that time and Sam never realized how incredibly quiet Dean is when he's not awake.
Sam turns the television on and tries not to look over at Dean, tells himself that he won't, but he ends up staring, because Dean's not going to tell him to knock it the hell off. Maybe that's taking advantage of the situation, but Sam doesn't have a choice. He'll go insane if he doesn't, doesn't keep watch, because anything less feels like a betrayal, breaking a promise, leaving Dean alone to the wretched solitary roil of dreams.
Sam watches the way Dean's amulet is caught up in the folds of his shirt, the patch of skin visible on the side of his knee where the denim of his jeans is wearing out, the way his feet twitch, and then Sam stops himself. He gets to his feet, goes outside in his socks and stares out at the parking lot. The dead, blank headlights of the Impala stare back and after a second, Sam turns around and goes back inside, because it's not like there's anything he can do, anything he can do but wait, and watch, but if something happens, he can at least try.
He falls asleep himself after a little while, wakes panicking and Dean's still there, still breathing.
It's the longest six hours of Sam's life.
At midnight, Dean opens his eyes. He rubs a hand across his face, scratches his head and sits up, and Sam could weep with joy.
Dean looks over, his eyes lighting into Sam, this clean blade paring him to the soul, and he says, "Sammy?"
"Yeah, Dean," Sam says. "Yeah."
"What the fuck was, was that?" He looks shell-shocked, milk-pale, these charcoal smears beneath his eyes. Sam swallows.
"The witch from before," he says. "The one with the shop, you pissed her off."
"Oh," Dean says, sounding a little lost, a little unsure. Then, like he's remembering something, he says, "Fuckin' witches. You kick her ass?"
"You woke up, didn't you?" Sam says.
"Thanks," Dean says.
"Yeah, anytime," Sam says absurdly. He doesn't say he knows what Dean did, doesn't say he knows why she cursed him. He's not sure whether to say thank you or to call Dean a fucking idiot. He's not even sure what the gesture meant, other than that Dean has issues, which he already knew.
Dean narrows his eyes at Sam. "You should, uh, you should get some sleep yourself. You look like crap. Were you staring at me the whole time?"
"No, I got bored and left you here after the first ten minutes," Sam says. "Your snoring was giving me a headache."
"Liar," Dean says. He gets up, joints cracking when he stretches. His shirt rises up when he lifts his arms, bare strip of skin above his jeans, and his back's to Sam, so Sam doesn't have to worry about staring. "You make a sleeping beauty joke, I'll kill you," Dean says. He goes over to the sink, makes a face at himself in the mirror and then starts the faucet, and Sam lets out a breath, this shuddering breath that he thinks maybe he's been holding since Dean fell.
Dean takes a swallow of water from the chipped plastic mug that was on the counter when they checked in (and Sam doesn't want to know where it's been, if it's been washed since the previous guest checked out of this room), wipes his mouth with his sleeve and meets Sam's eyes in the reflection. "I'm hungry," he announces. "You eat anything all day?"
"No," Sam says. "Food, food would be great."
It's dark outside, which Sam didn't expect. He forgot to watch the light, forgot to think about anything but Dean, to think of time as signifying anything other than when Dean would wake up.
Maybe he should find that more frightening, more disturbing, than he does.
There's a Denny's a few blocks away. It's late enough, or early enough, or the town's not big enough, that the parking lot's deserted, that there's only one other customer in the building. They sit at the bar where they've got an okay view of the door and they're close enough to hear the swearing and the sizzle of frying eggs and bacon from the kitchen.
Dean gets coffee, which isn't food at all, but Sam's too happy that he's awake to point that out, to start another argument. He orders coffee, too, and the waitress hikes up her skirt and pretends not to notice (or maybe she just doesn't care) when Dean doses their mugs with whiskey.
"I miss anything?" Dean asks, and his eyes over the rim of the coffee mug are sharp and strained.
"No, the whole world stopped while you were out," Sam says and Dean smirks like he thinks Sam's joking. The lighting is a shade reminiscent of dirty coins, old nickels, the dim bulbs made greyer with age and dust, and Sam is suddenly tired, more tired than he's been all day. The tide of panic finally receding, leaving bare this dull skeleton plain.
Dean doesn't say anything after that, doesn't push, and Sam wonders how bad the nightmares were, wonders what he saw. He could ask, could make an issue of it, but he won't. He's just happy to be here with his brother in the middle of the night, side by side to see the things the rest of the world's sleeping through.
"Should find another haunted amusement park next," Sam says. "The days of your reign are seriously numbered."
"Right," Dean says. "Yeah, I can just see that happening. Somebody'd mistake you for King Kong and call in a goddamn airstrike."
"You realize that makes you Fay Wray," Sam says.
Dean purses his lips. "Fay Wray was hot," he says. "I'd'a grabbed her, too."
Sam rolls his eyes. He thinks about saying something else, but Dean seems content to just sit, to be awake. He's not flinching anymore, he's letting Sam bump his shoulder every so often like a reassurance, though whether it's for Sam's benefit or his own, Sam's not sure.
It seems a little ridiculous now, in the light of the restaurant with the short-order cook having given up and come out to sit a few feet away, read the newspaper, and the waitress sighing at the other end of the bar. A little ridiculous, how scared he was, when Dean is so obviously fine now. Sam lets himself stop paying attention, lets the waitress come by and Dean refill his mug and the minutes unfold, lets himself slide into a gradual warmth that's partly the coffee-and-whiskey burn (more alcohol than caffeine, that burn, because Dean's always sucked at proportions), mostly the knowledge that for once they're okay, that he saved Dean, maybe saved both of them, that this time they got away unscathed.
It's starting to snow a little, he thinks, but then it's just that the windows are dirty, smudged with fingerprints and breath and years.
The waitress comes by again, and again, half-asleep and moving out of habit. The short-order cook gives up on the newspaper, folds it back up with a sigh and sets it on the bar, retreats back into the kitchen.
The guy on the other side of the room is talking to the waitress, doing a monologue Sam's pretty sure he stole from a Tarantino movie, and the waitress keeps rolling her eyes and saying uh-huh. Sam looks at Dean and thinks that you'd have to be crazy to be here, to be here right now, and it's a good thing that's what they both are.
Dean smirks a little like he knows what Sam's thinking. "Okay," he says. "You ready to go?"
"Sure," Sam says. "Yeah, okay."
Dean gets up, goes over to pay the check. The same gunslinger swagger as ever, but it's truth, Sam thinks, it's true where it counts, not tinny bravado at all.
The quarter moon's rippling behind thin clouds when they get outside and Sam's a little surprised by the chill, by the wrecked sailor-stumble of his feet as he falls against Dean.
"You got me kinda drunk," he says, more observation than accusation. Dean glances over at him, moonlit and fey. "A little trashed," he clarifies, because Dean likes colloquialisms.
"Least I could do," Dean says. "'sides, it's not my fault you're a lightweight."
"It's not my fault your whiskey's, like, five hundred proof," Sam counters. He's fairly certain that makes sense.
"Sure," Dean says. "Yeah, Sam, that's it," and he claps a hand onto Sam's shoulder, guides him towards the car. He's okay, and Sam's okay, and they're both alive, and Sam grins.
The night like a green light, nobody's going to stop them for miles, forever, and Sam can't get this stupid sloppy smile off of his face. He knows that Dean's going to laugh at him, but miracle of miracles, Dean doesn't. Instead, his eyes keep cutting away from Sam, the way they always do when he's planning something or when he's trying to lie. Sam has this paranoid thought that Dean's going to wait until he's asleep and then go kill the witch, who doesn't even matter anymore because Dean's okay, Q.E.D.
"You're gonna stay here," Sam says when they get back to the motel. "Swear you're not gonna go anywhere."
"I'm not going anywhere, okay," Dean says, and that's good enough for Sam, because Dean can't lie to him. He's like Dean's kryptonite or something.
The room rolls slightly at the corners of Sam's vision when he sits down on the edge of the bed, shadows approaching and retreating. He says, because it seems very important that Dean knows, that Dean understands, "I was gonna shoot her if she didn't give you back."
"You're too good to me," Dean says, leaning over to turn off the bedside lamp. Impossibly close and Sam takes advantage, leans in and presses his face against Dean's shoulder. Aftershave and sweat and skin, an infinitely familiar scent, and he opens his mouth against Dean's neck.
"Hey, Sam, go to sleep, huh?" Dean says. He sounds sort of freaked, so Sam pretends that he already is, lets himself fall back and pretends that it was nothing, nothing at all. An accident. Subterranean impulse, no more than that, another reassurance, and already the earth is reaching up to claim him.
When he opens his eyes, the room's still dark. It's either still early enough to qualify as night or he managed to sleep all the way through the day. He thinks it's the former, because he's still (at least) a little drunk, the edges of the room refusing to come into focus no matter how hard he squints, eyes them suspiciously. "Time's it?" he asks, pushing himself up.
"Late," Dean says, and then, "Early, hell if I know, do I look like a goddamn clock." His words are edged with a slur that sounds like the slush beneath the Impala's tires in the rain, which reminds Sam of the dream he was having. They were in the car, maybe driving to Lawrence, maybe driving nowhere in particular. It was raining, the windshield wipers moving slow and sluggish as the water came up past the windows, and he kept trying to get Dean to see it, but Dean kept driving, wouldn't look over.
Dean sounds half-asleep, but when Sam looks over, he's still dressed, on the other bed with his knees drawn up and the sprawl of his legs vaguely obscene. His eyes gleam wetly, his profile silhouetted against the blue light filtering in around the edges of the curtains, the blue light from the sign across the street advertising real nude girls in flickering capital letters. The light slips through the glass of the bottle on the bedside table, slides across the floor.
"I guess you're not tired," Sam says, slow and unsure. He thinks that he's missing something. These little pieces crashing together in his mind, scattering upon impact and not making any kind of sense.
Dean shakes his head. "Thing is, I sleep again, who knows what I'm gonna see, you know?"
"What'd you see last time?" Sam asks. He's drunk enough to ask, but not drunk enough to not immediately regret it, and he almost hopes that Dean won't answer. Almost.
Dean huffs, this weary noise that isn't a laugh at all, that reminds Sam of Dad. "All kinds'a messed-up shit we see every damn day and you gotta ask?"
Sam steals the bottle from the table between the bed, takes a swig to wash away the taste of the rain, the taste like futility and desperation and how Dean wouldn't listen when he said that they were going to drown, that they were already drowning. "I was so fuckin' scared you weren't gonna," he says. "That you weren't gonna ever wake up."
He puts the bottle down and Dean reclaims it, wraps his hands around the neck. Sam is entranced by Dean's thumbnails scratching at the label, hypnotized by the sticky paper peeling off in shadowy streaks, by the way he imagines Dean's blunt nails would feel pressed against his skin. "Saw you," Dean says. "And Dad. You and Dad and you kept, like, dying. Or killing me. Or this one time I killed both of you and you, you kept asking me why. Blood all over my goddamn hands and I didn't even know."
Sam's not sure what to say to that. Not sure he trusts himself to say anything, but he has to say something, can't leave that confession lingering, hanging, growing heavy and portentous.
"I can take care of myself," he says. "You didn't have to, to steal it. 'Sides, you got my back, right? And I got yours. 'm not going anywhere, I'll here when you wake up."
Dean raises one shoulder in something that might be a shrug, but doesn't look at Sam, doesn't even make some crack about how much lamer could Sam possibly get. That scares Sam, like maybe Dean doesn't believe him, maybe Dean thinks he's planning to light out the first time Dean lets him out of his sight. And then it occurs to him that Dean's in the same bed where he was sleeping before, where he had nightmares, had that one long nightmare, and maybe that's why he's scared to sleep. Maybe that's why he's trying to drink himself to sleep, maybe it's as simple as that.
"C'mere," Sam says. "Come over here," and Dean puts the bottle down on the table again, a little too hard, the clunk of glass against wood, but he doesn't get up. Sam pushes himself to his feet, staggers a little and puts a hand down on Dean's bed to catch his balance. "You callin' me a liar?" he says vaguely and Dean's mouth twitches like he was going to smile but forgot how at the last moment.
"You're not gonna, after," Dean says.
"After what?"
Dean blinks. "Nothin'," he says. "Go away, go back to sleep." He turns his face away, but Sam only sits down on the edge of the bed, pushes closer, gets a hand on Dean's neck. He's fairly certain he's just trying to get Dean to look at him, that's all, but Dean twists away, knocking him off balance. This sloppy, clumsy little wrestling match, Sam clinging to his brother and Dean saying, a little too loud, a little too close to Sam's ear, hot breath on Sam's face, "Jesus, you're a grabby drunk, bet you were a hit with those college girls."
But neither of them are really struggling, neither of them mean it (all Dean has to do is move his leg a little and Sam will pitch off the edge of the bed, fall flat on his back on the floor), and when Dean's hands lock tight around Sam's wrists, Sam is momentarily confused, unsure whether Dean's pushing him away or pulling him close, refusing to let him go.
Sam's foot brushes against the bottle and the bottle hits the floor, but it was mostly empty anyway. Dean flinches at the noise and Sam uses the opportunity to break free. He gets his hands on either side of Dean's head, his weight settled on Dean's legs, and Dean, motionless on his back, his hair sticking up in weird sweaty spikes against the pillow, looks suddenly like he's panicking, like he's afraid to meet Sam's eyes. "Nothin'," Dean repeats, his eyes darting from side to side, looking anywhere but at Sam.
"Nothin' what," Sam says. He's not entirely sure what he was asking in the first place. His heart is pounding and this gradual realization is cutting through the alcohol-cobwebs, the quicksand pull and sink of his thoughts. This revelation that his brother is hard beneath him, that his brother wants him, that he was right.
Dean blinks again, rapidly like he's trying to focus. When he does, his eyes lock onto Sam's like he's drowning (this time for real, not a dream at all), like Sam is land, is shore, salvation. Sam is paralyzed, couldn't move even if he wanted to. These things he's not meant to think about, the maelstrom of his thoughts, are printed, branded, stained red onto his skin, set alight by the tinder of Dean's eyes.
"'m so fucked up over you," Sam admits, slurred confession in the safety and heat of the dark. Dean says something in response, but Sam's distracted by the dark of his eyes. He only catches the word mutual, and that's enough.
Dean doesn't push him away and Sam thinks that he's luckier than he's ever been, so lucky that instead of shoving him back, Dean's leaning up to bite at his neck, to grab and claw at his hair until Sam's eyes water. So lucky that one of them is, or both of them are, muttering these half-lost phrases, syllables half-lost into the crush between them. Slurred directions, imperatives, and noises that were never even almost-words, were born as gasps and chokes and spitslick sounds instead. It's so good already, this grappling burn, and Sam wishes that they'd done this sooner, but all things in time, after all.
Their hands bump, catch. All of these buttons and zippers and belts are proving to be too much and Sam's not gonna stop, slow down, take it easy, in order to work them out, because what if they can't start again, what if they lose this momentum? He can't remember ever being this scared, being so scared of losing anything. The dragging wet noise of a kiss, crush of mouths like crumpling metal, and stubble scraping across Sam's chin as they jerk together, slide together into this unrelenting build. Dean's knuckles tight against his cheek, Dean holding him so close that Sam's not sure he's breathing anymore, thinks Dean might be breathing for both of them or maybe he's just going to die like this, oxygen-starved and these sparks glittering at the back of his mind.
Dean holds him close, throws a leg across the back of Sam's knee, and Sam works his hands between them, this sweet friction, breathless grind. He's already falling away, already beginning to lose this, lose track, shuddering against his brother while his brother slurs his name like a curse.
Dean mumbles something that Sam's still too far out, lost in this torrential comedown, to catch. He rolls over, the button of his jeans still undone and his hand on Sam's stomach, and he doesn't move again. Sam doesn't think he's asleep, but he might be almost there, pulled down deep enough for it to be quiet, for it to be safe.
Sam lets out a deep breath, rush of air through his lungs, and marvels at how right it feels. All of his fears laid to rest in the pale light flickering in from the strip club sign, and Dean's breathing evening out, finally.
When Dean's asleep, when Sam's sure he's finally asleep, Sam heaves himself to his feet, shuffles over to the other bed and collapses. He hasn't woken up in the same bed as Dean since he was six and he's not ready to start again, not yet, this thing so new and raw.
Dean is up and dressed when Sam wakes from a dream, all recollection of which is impossible as soon as he opens his eyes. Sam thinks about going back to sleep, but he doesn't close his eyes. Instead, he stares at the ceiling and watches Dean in his peripheral vision, Dean standing in front of the window, the apricot glow of daylight like a mirage through the curtains.
When Dean finally realizes that he's awake, when Dean turns to look at him, Sam sits up, says again, "I'm not going anywhere."
On the television, the Weather Channel is playing on mute, these images of waves crashing and tornados touching down, silent natural disasters, and Sam thinks about how happy they're gonna be, elation bubbling wicked in his veins. This road-movie life of cars and guns and booze and the shade of Dean's eyes in the sunlight.
"Yeah," Dean says. There are rings around his eyes like there were yesterday, the same charcoal smears, and Sam frowns.
"What's wrong," he says, but maybe he knows already. He shouldn't have fallen asleep, should have stayed up and watched Dean, maybe that would have made it okay. Because now Dean doesn't believe him, doesn't believe that Sam will always have his back or something stupid and worldbreaking like that.
"I'm sorry," Dean says and there's no question about that for which he's apologizing, this ragged look on his face like he thinks it was his fault, like he thinks it's something for which he has to apologize, and Sam never quite knew the meaning of obliteration until right now.
And then Sam gets it. It's just Dean being dense, Dean refusing to see the obvious, Dean refusing to believe that they're broken in the same way. Because he thinks he's fucked up, always has been, this off-kilter criminal life he never escaped, and he's still hellbent on believing that Sam is different, that Sam is somehow better, that Sam will get away. This dark thing that he'll never believe Sam wants, too, just as he'll never believe he's good enough for Sam. He's so fucking stupid sometimes, Sam thinks, so incredibly blind.
"Look, man," Dean says, taking Sam's silence as fear or condemnation. "It's okay, we were both wasted, right, we. Fuck. It was a fuckin' spell, gotta be, that vindictive bitch, I mean." He's spitting out the words like they're gravel, like they hurt, tearing at his throat, like he has to get them out before Sam stops him, before Sam leaves.
Sam has the power to destroy everything, to tear him to foundations, but that's nothing new.
Dean's blushing, his eyes are blown, panic-wide, and he keeps glancing at Sam, glancing back down at the floor. Sam wonders how long he's been awake, how long he's been planning this, pacing the floor and waiting for Sam to wake up. "It wasn't," Dean says. "We're good, right."
"Yeah," Sam says automatically. He's not awake enough for this conversation. Maybe he sat up too fast, headache starting to pound like surf against his skull, but he's reeling, gutshot. Any minute he's going to start bleeding all over the place and his hands won't be enough to keep the blood in, to keep him alive. "We're good. I thought, I thought it was, I thought we were--"
Dean's head jerks up again. "No," he says. "You don't have to say anything. You don't gotta make this better, okay. It's not, it's, I'm. It's okay." He swallows and Sam wants to cry at the bloodstained banner of his words, the awful significance, at the look on his face, stuttering and pale and so goddamn scared. Part of Sam, some cold and distant and curious part, wants to ask if this is worse than how he looked like the day after Sam left for Stanford, but the rest of Sam doesn't think he could ever stand to find out.
"I'll be in the car, okay. I'll just, I'll be in the car," Dean says and leaves Sam alone in the wreck of the room.
This time, he doesn't slam the door.
Sam presses his thumbs against his temples, squeezes his eyes shut and hopes for an instant that he might still be dreaming, that this might be nothing more than a nightmare, that he'll wake when his feet touch the floor.
He gets up, gets out of bed, and nothing happens.
The possibility slowly dawning that Dean could be telling the truth, that he didn't mean it, that it's just Sam, Sam alone in this, even though Sam doesn't think either of them were far enough gone to let that happen. (This one part of his mind screaming wishful thinking, screaming mistake like a death knell, executioner's blade, grief-aching requiem.) If Sam finds out for certain, if he says something, offers this raw and open and bleeding thing, it might fuck them up for good. This traitorous admission that he can't expect Dean to live with.
If he says something else, if he says that Dean's lying (which he has to be), and it's true, it's true and Dean just doesn't want to let himself believe it, won't let himself fall that far out of some idea about what Sam wants, about what they should be, this idea he's built up about what is right and what he has to do, Sam might ruin even this, might shatter everything else Dean's willing to give. He might drive Dean away, doom Sam to a life's worth of empty motel rooms, bleak silences and this gnawing sensation in the pit of his stomach, this saltwater burn in his throat.
And Dean is in the car, is waiting, but Sam doesn't know for how long, doesn't how much time Dean will give him. So Sam moves. Abruptly, mechanically, because he's not quite ready to be any more awake yet, for this to be any more real. When he gets dressed, pulls on his last clean shirt like a shield or a bandage, like it might hide this thing breaking apart in his chest, he slips the charm, that fucking charm, into the pocket of his jeans once more. He picks up the laundry duffel that Dean left next to the door, that Dean either forgot or was too busy fleeing, getting the hell away from Sam, to grab.
Sam goes outside and in the brief time it takes to get to the car, he tries to think of what he'll say, if there's anything he can say at all.
The sunlight pierces his eyes when he opens the car door, just as Dean turns to look at him. For a split-second, blinded by the sun, Sam can't see the expression on Dean's face, and he lets himself hope.
--
end
by whereupon
Sam/Dean, R, no spoilers, 8,283 words.
And then, just like that, Dean falls.
Dean slams the door hard enough that the stained yellow curtains tied up around the window with the view of the parking lot come loose and drift across Sam's bed-slanted view of that dirty white sky, the stretch of cracked asphalt and the unlit neon sign shaped like a giant arrow on the building across the street.
It's sort of fitting, since this started when Sam got out of the car and slammed the door a little harder than Dean thought was necessary, which he wouldn't shut up about, what the fuck you do that for, hope you wanna start walking everywhere 'cause you're not getting back in my car until you say you're sorry, until Sam snapped, I'm not apologizing to the goddamn car, Dean, and they started shouting.
But Dean's only going to the laundromat, he'll be back in two hours, maybe three, and anyway this can't be over because Sam's still so fucking angry. Because he didn't doanything to begin with and maybe because Dean got out first, Dean grabbed the dirty laundry duffel and said he'd be back and it would be great if Sam could try not to destroy anything while he was gone, and then he left like he couldn't be bothered to deal with his brother anymore. And now Sam's alone in the room like he's sulking, which he isn't, and in a couple of hours, Dean'll come back and say, you feel better now, huh, you done being pissed, which, even if Sam is, will start the whole thing over again.
Sam knows exactly how he'll win the argument, one of these times, and that's what scares him. How hard it was not to shut Dean up by pinning him down, holding him still. He's not sure how far Dean will be able to push him before Sam does give in, finds out how much Dean will give, sees how far he can get before Dean pushes him away.
See if Dean will push him away at all or if Sam's right about that, about this thing that he tries not to let himself think about, not consciously, doesn't let himself imagine.
Dean's already got everything else of his, all of his waking hours and all of his heart and everything that word doesn't even begin to encompass. Everything but this one last thing, untouched boundary, and there's a fucking good reason for that. Because it's wrong, this dark, sibilant little word twisting at the back of his brain, secret burn beneath his skin, and if Dean hears it, too, if they're the same in this as they are in everything else, Sam thinks it might be the death of them both.
The curtains are grimy and vaguely sticky against Sam's fingers. He ties them back and hates Dean a little for making him touch them, who knows what's living on them, all kinds of previously undiscovered microbes. Since he's right there already, he watches Dean walk away, the determined set of Dean's shoulders like he knows he's being watched, the perfect swagger that makes Sam roll his eyes even though no one's around to see.
Through the window, Sam watches as Dean stumbles. Staggers. Misses a step.
It's so incredibly random, so incredibly unexpected, that Sam thinks maybe he imagined it or maybe Dean did it because he knows Sam's watching him, the way he always knows. Dean turns around and his eyes meet Sam's through the impossibly thick pane of glass which doesn't manage to dull the electric crackle at all. Even miles away, Sam would recognize that expression, the worldshaking glint of panic and terror, both of which Dean swears he's never felt, swears he never feels.
And then, just like that, Dean falls.
One hand reaching out, touching for an instant the smooth black of the car, and Sam doesn't see what happens next because he's not by the window anymore, he's by the door and the doorknob is turning, twisting greasy-slick in his palm. When he throws open the door, he has this godawful thought, this idea that Dean's been shot, that he blinked or looked away right before the bullet hit. That it was a vigilante with a gun and a badge and his brother is bleeding out and they can't go to the hospital because they're still wanted for murder a county away and he didn't even see the shot that took Dean down, didn't even bear witness.
Dean's on the ground by the driver's side of the car, this crumpled shape by the laundry duffel which has clothes spilling out of it, Dean's second-favorite shirt and one of Sam's socks rendered vivid-real, hysterically clear. There's nobody around, no getaway car or flashing lights or goddamn anything. Sam drops to his knees, his hands skating across Dean's neck, across his chest. Dean's still breathing and his pulse flickers against Sam's thumb, but his eyes are closed and he's not moving.
The asphalt sparks like stars, like diamonds or tears, and there's no blood anywhere. Not where it counts, just these raw places scraped red on Dean's hands from when he tried to catch himself, from where he fell, right after Sam looked away.
"Dean," Sam says and Dean twitches, slight movement, his neck pressed against Sam's palm, but that's it. Sam grits his teeth (Dean's alive, that's something, Sam's heart is pounding so fast, what if this is the result of twenty-odd years of concussions, of never learning to duck, he's never gonna forgive Dean if that's the case, never gonna let him live it down) and lets go of his brother in order to cram the spilled clothes back into the duffel, because Dean's going to be pissed when he wakes up and finds out that Sam was too busy being such a goddamn girl that he let their bag get stolen, let somebody walk off with a week's worth of nearly ruined shirts and jeans that are hardly salvageable anyway.
Sam slings the duffel over one shoulder and gets his arms around Dean, pulling him up, hoping to god he's not going to make it worse because they can't risk a hospital right now. One more consequence of this fugitive lifestyle and one of these days it's going to kill them but not today, please, not today.
Dean doesn't shove him away, doesn't tell Sam to get his fuckin' hands off him, he can walk fine, and that, that is somehow more terrifying than everything else. Dean's head slumping forward and his feet dragging and it takes so long to get out of the sunlight, get back to the room, where there are walls, where they're not so exposed.
Sam drops the bag when they get inside, kicks it out of the way, and Dean doesn't move, out cold, doesn't even stir when Sam lowers him onto the bed.
"Christo," Sam says, just in case, and Dean doesn't so much as flinch. "Jesus Christ, christo, Dean, wake the fuck up right now. This isn't funny anymore, man. I totaled your car, I shredded your tapes, I gave your jacket to the homeless guy across the street, I, I, haven't yet but I'm going to if you don't wake up right fucking now, Dean, Dean," and he hears the way he's repeating his brother's name over and over again, the desperate fraying edge to his voice, and he stops.
This silence, his breath and Dean's and nothing beyond that, and Dean was fine a minute ago, was fine when he was swearing at Sam and stomping out the door.
Sam thinks about saying I'm leaving, because that might work, might get Dean to snap out of this, jerk awake and say something equally cruel, say anything at all. But Sam doesn't think it would, not really, because he knows that Dean wouldn't do this to him if he had a choice. Dean's not nearly that much of an asshole, no matter how much he pretends otherwise, and Sam's not sure if Dean can hear him. If Dean would hear him and just lie there, trapped and still and screaming, and Sam can't do that to him. Won't, can't risk it.
The EMF meter is buried at the bottom of Dean's pack, beneath Dad's journal, three more shirts and a pair of shorts, a half-empty Mountain Dew bottle, a spare clip, a dented rosary. Sam has half of the contents of the bag strewn across the floor and Dean should be threatening him, unless you wanna lose your hands, keep 'em offa my stuff, but he's not. He's just lying there, and with every second in which he does not move, doesn't move for no reason, no reason that Sam can see, can understand, this freezing, horrified feeling in Sam's stomach intensifies. Cold dread twining around his spine, tighter and tighter until he wants to scream.
He aims the EMF meter at the bed, at his brother. The lights flash on, alien green, and it begins to whine. Sam lets out a shaky breath as he sets the meter back down, places it gently back in Dean's bag, relief-giddy because it's supernatural, this thing that happened to Dean, it's something he knows, something he can fix.
There's always a way out, always a way back. The right words in some dead language or a blade razor-sharp and dipped in salt or failing that, enough ammo. This isn't the end, not this, Sam telling Dean that he could go screw himself, or better yet, the car, and Dean grabbing the bag and the door slamming behind him.
On the bed, Dean's hands tighten into fists.
"Dean?" Sam says, wary and hopeful and Dean's going to laugh at him, going to call him a pussy and freak out about Sam touching his stuff, he is, but he doesn't. He doesn't move at all.
Sam swallows.
Their last hunt was a ghost, easy, nothing that should be able to do this. A spirit bound to one physical location, to that abandoned graffiti'd amusement park, clowns with dead-painted eyes everywhere Sam looked and Dean snickering but not getting out of his range of vision, not leaving him alone.
This image Sam's not ever going to forget, Dean climbing up the side of the roller coaster, pulling himself up onto the track, shotgun in hand while Sam stood at the bottom, shaking his head and waiting for him to fall. The night was windless and quiet and Dean didn't even have to shout when he reached the top, looked down at Sam, wicked curve of his mouth and slice of his eyes when he said, "King of the hill, Sammy, unless you wanna try to dethrone me."
"Get the hell down before you fall," Sam said, biting back a grin. "I'm not driving you to the ER and no ambulance's gonna come this far for your sorry ass."
"You would," Dean said. "Bet if I jumped right now you'd have the car pulled up before I hit the ground."
"Yeah?" Sam said. "Wanna find out?" He was a little afraid that Dean would, but Dean only rolled his shoulders, cracked his neck and stared down at him until Sam sighed and said, "Yeah, okay, I would, will you come down already?"
Dean grinned and climbed down and they dug up the bones that were buried at the base of the Ferris wheel, salted them and watched them burn. It was normal, what passes for normal in the freak show that Sam's life has become (or has always been, depending on his mood), nothing out of the ordinary at all, nothing that should have caused this, whatever it is. Nothing that could have caused it.
All the same. Sam has the notes about the case, the history of the park, the history of the town, the names of the people who died there (though as it turned out, the one haunting the park wasn't on the list) in his bag and it has to be that, has to be the ghost, because there's nothing else it could be.
He shoves his hand into the pocket where his papers are, the pocket where he keeps the important things, notes about the hunt they're on, a picture of Jess, the pictures he kept after that time they went back to Lawrence. He touches something cold, not paper at all, a brush of metal against his fingers.
A silver charm, maybe an amulet, etched with the sigil of a saint that the Catholics never recognized. Protection, precieux sang, a man strung up in the darkened highland forests for the crime of sparing his family, sending them far away long before anyone should have known that war was coming, before anyone could have seen that bloody sunrise.
Dean never could keep his goddamn hands to himself.
"Sammy," Dean says, and Sam turns, overjoyed. But Dean's eyes are still closed, even as his mouth moves, as he says, "No, no, you shot me" and Sam freezes. Dean says something else, unintelligible sleep-mumble, and goes silent.
Sam takes a step forward, puts his hand on Dean's shoulder, and Dean flinches away. It's a small thing, such a small thing, but it ricochets through Sam's palm, through his entire body. But it was nothing, a response to an image in some dream, some nightmare, and the charm is heavy in Sam's other hand.
He's seen it before. He saw it today, this morning, in the shop where they'd stopped to restock. It was a magic shop, sure, but the address was from Dad's journal, which meant that it was the real thing, fewer tourists and so much more dangerous. Sam was looking for the wolfsbane and Dean was at his side, elbowing him, picking things up and shoving them at him, saying, "Hey, look at this, hey, you think it actually works?"
Sam glanced down, squinted. "What the hell do you need an aphrodisiac for?" he asked, unthinking, irritable because the incense or whatever was being burnt in the name of atmosphere made his eyes water, was giving him a headache.
"Yeah, good point," Dean said. "I am kinda irresistible, huh? And it's not like I need any, you know, help."
He grinned at Sam, one eyebrow raised like he was waiting for Sam to laugh or to blush, until Sam said, "Dude, how about I find the wolfsbane and you go look over there?" There being the general direction of anywhere else. Dean looked hurt for a second, but only for a second, before shrugging and wandering off.
Sam found him later in the back, by the rows of charms and amulets and other bits of metal hanging from cords of leather that Sam thought might have been made from human skin. "You ready to go?" Sam asked.
"If you're done picking out the ingredients for your bitches' brew," Dean said. "Parsley, sage, rosemary and whatever the hell that other one was."
"I thought you hated Simon and Garfunkel."
"Yeah, so? You got a point, there, Sammy, or do you just get off on telling me things I already know?"
Sam shrugged. "Just that you're a fucking jerk, really. Same as always."
Dean bit his lip, stared at Sam and then smirked. "Let me know when you come up with something new, man, okay?"
Dean could have pocketed the charm at any time during that conversation, when Sam was busy rolling his eyes or looking heavenward in exasperation, or he could have done it later, when Sam turned away towards the counter. Sam knows Dean didn't pay for it, because he didn't see it when they went up to the counter, and it's not like Dean could have gone back without him to buy it, because Dean hasn't left him alone for more than five minutes today. Or yesterday. Or in as long as Sam can remember.
This sinking feeling in Sam's stomach, nausea-burn of guilt, because he's started to figure it out, what's going on, why this is happening, and the hell of it is he's pretty sure it's his fault in some twisted way: Dean did it for him, Dean shoved it into his bag and didn't tell him about it. It's not the first time. When Sam was eighteen, after he got on that first bus heading west, he put his hand into the front pocket of his bag and found an envelope that, upon examination, contained five hundred dollars in worn twenties and tens. Dean was the only one who could have put it there, who would have put it there, and Sam's never said anything about it, never known where to start.
Sam still has no idea where Dean got the money, because it wasn't like they were exactly flush, crowded into that one-bedroom apartment Dad rented on the edge of the city, with the roof that leaked whether or not it was raining and the broken locks on every door, and Dean working, actually holding down a job, keeping them fed on bread and peanut butter until Dad could walk again and they could move on.
Which Sam did, before Dean and Dad had the chance, and he never asked how much longer they stayed in that apartment after he left.
The car keys are in Dean's pocket. Dean flinches again when Sam touches him and Sam winces, snatches the keys as quickly as he can. He looks away from his brother for a second to let himself breathe, looks back and Dean's curled in on himself, his eyes moving frantic and fast beneath his eyelids. Sam thinks about tying him there, just to be safe, because god knows the damage Dean's capable of inflicting upon himself when he's conscious. The thought only lasts an instant, is too fucked-up, too impossible, to consider, the way Dean keeps flinching away from him already. And it's not like Dean's moved at all so far, not like he's even tried.
"I'll be back as soon as I can," Sam says. He puts another line of salt down in front of the door and the windows, just in case, and he looks at Dean one more time, and then he locks the door and leaves.
The music clicks on when he starts the engine, and maybe that's how it started, really, that's why he slammed the door. Because he was so fucking tired of hearing that Buzzcocks tape over and over again, tired of Dean singing along with it, and Sam nearly bruises his knuckles on the dashboard trying to get it to stop playing.
Sam has a gun on his hip and murder on his mind when he parks in front of the nondescript little building, which looks more like it should house an accountant than a purveyor of dark magick or whatever it says on the door.
The air in the shop tastes like autumn, burning leaves and the instant before the dreadful fall into bleak grey winter. The woman looks up from behind the counter, the black hulk of the cash register. There are no other customers. Sam's not sure whether to chalk that up to coincidence or to something more, but it doesn't matter. The woman crosses her arms, black lines of her tattoos sliding out from beneath the sleeves of her sweater. Sam wonders how much power she has, because she made the pages of Dad's journal, but he doesn't have time to worry about it. Won't have to worry about it, if things go well.
"My brother and I were here earlier," Sam says. "This morning, I don't know if you remember us."
"I do," she says.
"Okay, um. The thing is, something happened to my brother and I was wondering if maybe you knew why."
"Don't play games with me," she says. "You're here to accuse me of something and you're right. Your brother took something from me, so I took something from him."
Sam takes the charm out of his pocket, puts it on the counter. "And now you've got it back."
"Forty-nine ninety-five," she says. "Plus tax. It's no good to me used."
Sam stares at her. He takes out his wallet and flips through his credit cards. They're all in fake names, the stupid rock-star aliases Dean picked out. He pays with cash because he's not sure what she'd do if she found out, what kind of curse she'd put on him, or on both of them.
She gives him his change, brush of her cold fingertips against his palm, and smiles. It's not a nice smile. "It'll be over at midnight," she says. "There's nothing I can do to make it sooner."
"You don't think this is overkill," Sam says. Right now, he is the most dangerous person in the entire world, but he marvels at how close his tone is to bland, to conversational, to harmless. The bills crumple in his fist, the coins sliding together with a click like cocking a gun, that breathless trigger pull.
"Bad things happen to bad boys," she says. "He got what he deserved and he'll think twice next time."
"Dean's not a bad person," Sam says. "He's the best person I know."
"Then I would suggest meeting more people," she says.
The coins hit the counter, rattle and roll off the edge. This instant of perfect clarity and the woman's eyes go wide and Sam exhales. Slowly. Through gritted teeth. "I'm going now," he says. He pockets the charm again. "I paid you, we're even, don't fucking touch him again. Don't fucking touch either of us."
She doesn't respond. He turns around, feels her watching him all the way to the door.
He goes back out to the car, starts the engine and waits for his hands to stop shaking. The arsenic sky is laced with contrails. His hands are still shaking when he starts to drive, but he can't wait any longer because Dean is alone in the motel room.
Dean is, of course, still there when Sam gets back. Sam doesn't think he's moved at all.
"I'm back," Sam says. He puts his gun down on the table , draws the curtains and sits down on the other bed.
Six hours until midnight and what if she was lying, what if Dean doesn't wake up, what if Dean never--
It's funny, Dean sleeps all the time, sleeps through those long nights when Sam's awake the whole time, waiting for dawn and staring at the static flicker of the television set, staring at the shape of the shadows on the ceiling or the headlights cutting through the curtains. All that time and Sam never realized how incredibly quiet Dean is when he's not awake.
Sam turns the television on and tries not to look over at Dean, tells himself that he won't, but he ends up staring, because Dean's not going to tell him to knock it the hell off. Maybe that's taking advantage of the situation, but Sam doesn't have a choice. He'll go insane if he doesn't, doesn't keep watch, because anything less feels like a betrayal, breaking a promise, leaving Dean alone to the wretched solitary roil of dreams.
Sam watches the way Dean's amulet is caught up in the folds of his shirt, the patch of skin visible on the side of his knee where the denim of his jeans is wearing out, the way his feet twitch, and then Sam stops himself. He gets to his feet, goes outside in his socks and stares out at the parking lot. The dead, blank headlights of the Impala stare back and after a second, Sam turns around and goes back inside, because it's not like there's anything he can do, anything he can do but wait, and watch, but if something happens, he can at least try.
He falls asleep himself after a little while, wakes panicking and Dean's still there, still breathing.
It's the longest six hours of Sam's life.
At midnight, Dean opens his eyes. He rubs a hand across his face, scratches his head and sits up, and Sam could weep with joy.
Dean looks over, his eyes lighting into Sam, this clean blade paring him to the soul, and he says, "Sammy?"
"Yeah, Dean," Sam says. "Yeah."
"What the fuck was, was that?" He looks shell-shocked, milk-pale, these charcoal smears beneath his eyes. Sam swallows.
"The witch from before," he says. "The one with the shop, you pissed her off."
"Oh," Dean says, sounding a little lost, a little unsure. Then, like he's remembering something, he says, "Fuckin' witches. You kick her ass?"
"You woke up, didn't you?" Sam says.
"Thanks," Dean says.
"Yeah, anytime," Sam says absurdly. He doesn't say he knows what Dean did, doesn't say he knows why she cursed him. He's not sure whether to say thank you or to call Dean a fucking idiot. He's not even sure what the gesture meant, other than that Dean has issues, which he already knew.
Dean narrows his eyes at Sam. "You should, uh, you should get some sleep yourself. You look like crap. Were you staring at me the whole time?"
"No, I got bored and left you here after the first ten minutes," Sam says. "Your snoring was giving me a headache."
"Liar," Dean says. He gets up, joints cracking when he stretches. His shirt rises up when he lifts his arms, bare strip of skin above his jeans, and his back's to Sam, so Sam doesn't have to worry about staring. "You make a sleeping beauty joke, I'll kill you," Dean says. He goes over to the sink, makes a face at himself in the mirror and then starts the faucet, and Sam lets out a breath, this shuddering breath that he thinks maybe he's been holding since Dean fell.
Dean takes a swallow of water from the chipped plastic mug that was on the counter when they checked in (and Sam doesn't want to know where it's been, if it's been washed since the previous guest checked out of this room), wipes his mouth with his sleeve and meets Sam's eyes in the reflection. "I'm hungry," he announces. "You eat anything all day?"
"No," Sam says. "Food, food would be great."
It's dark outside, which Sam didn't expect. He forgot to watch the light, forgot to think about anything but Dean, to think of time as signifying anything other than when Dean would wake up.
Maybe he should find that more frightening, more disturbing, than he does.
There's a Denny's a few blocks away. It's late enough, or early enough, or the town's not big enough, that the parking lot's deserted, that there's only one other customer in the building. They sit at the bar where they've got an okay view of the door and they're close enough to hear the swearing and the sizzle of frying eggs and bacon from the kitchen.
Dean gets coffee, which isn't food at all, but Sam's too happy that he's awake to point that out, to start another argument. He orders coffee, too, and the waitress hikes up her skirt and pretends not to notice (or maybe she just doesn't care) when Dean doses their mugs with whiskey.
"I miss anything?" Dean asks, and his eyes over the rim of the coffee mug are sharp and strained.
"No, the whole world stopped while you were out," Sam says and Dean smirks like he thinks Sam's joking. The lighting is a shade reminiscent of dirty coins, old nickels, the dim bulbs made greyer with age and dust, and Sam is suddenly tired, more tired than he's been all day. The tide of panic finally receding, leaving bare this dull skeleton plain.
Dean doesn't say anything after that, doesn't push, and Sam wonders how bad the nightmares were, wonders what he saw. He could ask, could make an issue of it, but he won't. He's just happy to be here with his brother in the middle of the night, side by side to see the things the rest of the world's sleeping through.
"Should find another haunted amusement park next," Sam says. "The days of your reign are seriously numbered."
"Right," Dean says. "Yeah, I can just see that happening. Somebody'd mistake you for King Kong and call in a goddamn airstrike."
"You realize that makes you Fay Wray," Sam says.
Dean purses his lips. "Fay Wray was hot," he says. "I'd'a grabbed her, too."
Sam rolls his eyes. He thinks about saying something else, but Dean seems content to just sit, to be awake. He's not flinching anymore, he's letting Sam bump his shoulder every so often like a reassurance, though whether it's for Sam's benefit or his own, Sam's not sure.
It seems a little ridiculous now, in the light of the restaurant with the short-order cook having given up and come out to sit a few feet away, read the newspaper, and the waitress sighing at the other end of the bar. A little ridiculous, how scared he was, when Dean is so obviously fine now. Sam lets himself stop paying attention, lets the waitress come by and Dean refill his mug and the minutes unfold, lets himself slide into a gradual warmth that's partly the coffee-and-whiskey burn (more alcohol than caffeine, that burn, because Dean's always sucked at proportions), mostly the knowledge that for once they're okay, that he saved Dean, maybe saved both of them, that this time they got away unscathed.
It's starting to snow a little, he thinks, but then it's just that the windows are dirty, smudged with fingerprints and breath and years.
The waitress comes by again, and again, half-asleep and moving out of habit. The short-order cook gives up on the newspaper, folds it back up with a sigh and sets it on the bar, retreats back into the kitchen.
The guy on the other side of the room is talking to the waitress, doing a monologue Sam's pretty sure he stole from a Tarantino movie, and the waitress keeps rolling her eyes and saying uh-huh. Sam looks at Dean and thinks that you'd have to be crazy to be here, to be here right now, and it's a good thing that's what they both are.
Dean smirks a little like he knows what Sam's thinking. "Okay," he says. "You ready to go?"
"Sure," Sam says. "Yeah, okay."
Dean gets up, goes over to pay the check. The same gunslinger swagger as ever, but it's truth, Sam thinks, it's true where it counts, not tinny bravado at all.
The quarter moon's rippling behind thin clouds when they get outside and Sam's a little surprised by the chill, by the wrecked sailor-stumble of his feet as he falls against Dean.
"You got me kinda drunk," he says, more observation than accusation. Dean glances over at him, moonlit and fey. "A little trashed," he clarifies, because Dean likes colloquialisms.
"Least I could do," Dean says. "'sides, it's not my fault you're a lightweight."
"It's not my fault your whiskey's, like, five hundred proof," Sam counters. He's fairly certain that makes sense.
"Sure," Dean says. "Yeah, Sam, that's it," and he claps a hand onto Sam's shoulder, guides him towards the car. He's okay, and Sam's okay, and they're both alive, and Sam grins.
The night like a green light, nobody's going to stop them for miles, forever, and Sam can't get this stupid sloppy smile off of his face. He knows that Dean's going to laugh at him, but miracle of miracles, Dean doesn't. Instead, his eyes keep cutting away from Sam, the way they always do when he's planning something or when he's trying to lie. Sam has this paranoid thought that Dean's going to wait until he's asleep and then go kill the witch, who doesn't even matter anymore because Dean's okay, Q.E.D.
"You're gonna stay here," Sam says when they get back to the motel. "Swear you're not gonna go anywhere."
"I'm not going anywhere, okay," Dean says, and that's good enough for Sam, because Dean can't lie to him. He's like Dean's kryptonite or something.
The room rolls slightly at the corners of Sam's vision when he sits down on the edge of the bed, shadows approaching and retreating. He says, because it seems very important that Dean knows, that Dean understands, "I was gonna shoot her if she didn't give you back."
"You're too good to me," Dean says, leaning over to turn off the bedside lamp. Impossibly close and Sam takes advantage, leans in and presses his face against Dean's shoulder. Aftershave and sweat and skin, an infinitely familiar scent, and he opens his mouth against Dean's neck.
"Hey, Sam, go to sleep, huh?" Dean says. He sounds sort of freaked, so Sam pretends that he already is, lets himself fall back and pretends that it was nothing, nothing at all. An accident. Subterranean impulse, no more than that, another reassurance, and already the earth is reaching up to claim him.
When he opens his eyes, the room's still dark. It's either still early enough to qualify as night or he managed to sleep all the way through the day. He thinks it's the former, because he's still (at least) a little drunk, the edges of the room refusing to come into focus no matter how hard he squints, eyes them suspiciously. "Time's it?" he asks, pushing himself up.
"Late," Dean says, and then, "Early, hell if I know, do I look like a goddamn clock." His words are edged with a slur that sounds like the slush beneath the Impala's tires in the rain, which reminds Sam of the dream he was having. They were in the car, maybe driving to Lawrence, maybe driving nowhere in particular. It was raining, the windshield wipers moving slow and sluggish as the water came up past the windows, and he kept trying to get Dean to see it, but Dean kept driving, wouldn't look over.
Dean sounds half-asleep, but when Sam looks over, he's still dressed, on the other bed with his knees drawn up and the sprawl of his legs vaguely obscene. His eyes gleam wetly, his profile silhouetted against the blue light filtering in around the edges of the curtains, the blue light from the sign across the street advertising real nude girls in flickering capital letters. The light slips through the glass of the bottle on the bedside table, slides across the floor.
"I guess you're not tired," Sam says, slow and unsure. He thinks that he's missing something. These little pieces crashing together in his mind, scattering upon impact and not making any kind of sense.
Dean shakes his head. "Thing is, I sleep again, who knows what I'm gonna see, you know?"
"What'd you see last time?" Sam asks. He's drunk enough to ask, but not drunk enough to not immediately regret it, and he almost hopes that Dean won't answer. Almost.
Dean huffs, this weary noise that isn't a laugh at all, that reminds Sam of Dad. "All kinds'a messed-up shit we see every damn day and you gotta ask?"
Sam steals the bottle from the table between the bed, takes a swig to wash away the taste of the rain, the taste like futility and desperation and how Dean wouldn't listen when he said that they were going to drown, that they were already drowning. "I was so fuckin' scared you weren't gonna," he says. "That you weren't gonna ever wake up."
He puts the bottle down and Dean reclaims it, wraps his hands around the neck. Sam is entranced by Dean's thumbnails scratching at the label, hypnotized by the sticky paper peeling off in shadowy streaks, by the way he imagines Dean's blunt nails would feel pressed against his skin. "Saw you," Dean says. "And Dad. You and Dad and you kept, like, dying. Or killing me. Or this one time I killed both of you and you, you kept asking me why. Blood all over my goddamn hands and I didn't even know."
Sam's not sure what to say to that. Not sure he trusts himself to say anything, but he has to say something, can't leave that confession lingering, hanging, growing heavy and portentous.
"I can take care of myself," he says. "You didn't have to, to steal it. 'Sides, you got my back, right? And I got yours. 'm not going anywhere, I'll here when you wake up."
Dean raises one shoulder in something that might be a shrug, but doesn't look at Sam, doesn't even make some crack about how much lamer could Sam possibly get. That scares Sam, like maybe Dean doesn't believe him, maybe Dean thinks he's planning to light out the first time Dean lets him out of his sight. And then it occurs to him that Dean's in the same bed where he was sleeping before, where he had nightmares, had that one long nightmare, and maybe that's why he's scared to sleep. Maybe that's why he's trying to drink himself to sleep, maybe it's as simple as that.
"C'mere," Sam says. "Come over here," and Dean puts the bottle down on the table again, a little too hard, the clunk of glass against wood, but he doesn't get up. Sam pushes himself to his feet, staggers a little and puts a hand down on Dean's bed to catch his balance. "You callin' me a liar?" he says vaguely and Dean's mouth twitches like he was going to smile but forgot how at the last moment.
"You're not gonna, after," Dean says.
"After what?"
Dean blinks. "Nothin'," he says. "Go away, go back to sleep." He turns his face away, but Sam only sits down on the edge of the bed, pushes closer, gets a hand on Dean's neck. He's fairly certain he's just trying to get Dean to look at him, that's all, but Dean twists away, knocking him off balance. This sloppy, clumsy little wrestling match, Sam clinging to his brother and Dean saying, a little too loud, a little too close to Sam's ear, hot breath on Sam's face, "Jesus, you're a grabby drunk, bet you were a hit with those college girls."
But neither of them are really struggling, neither of them mean it (all Dean has to do is move his leg a little and Sam will pitch off the edge of the bed, fall flat on his back on the floor), and when Dean's hands lock tight around Sam's wrists, Sam is momentarily confused, unsure whether Dean's pushing him away or pulling him close, refusing to let him go.
Sam's foot brushes against the bottle and the bottle hits the floor, but it was mostly empty anyway. Dean flinches at the noise and Sam uses the opportunity to break free. He gets his hands on either side of Dean's head, his weight settled on Dean's legs, and Dean, motionless on his back, his hair sticking up in weird sweaty spikes against the pillow, looks suddenly like he's panicking, like he's afraid to meet Sam's eyes. "Nothin'," Dean repeats, his eyes darting from side to side, looking anywhere but at Sam.
"Nothin' what," Sam says. He's not entirely sure what he was asking in the first place. His heart is pounding and this gradual realization is cutting through the alcohol-cobwebs, the quicksand pull and sink of his thoughts. This revelation that his brother is hard beneath him, that his brother wants him, that he was right.
Dean blinks again, rapidly like he's trying to focus. When he does, his eyes lock onto Sam's like he's drowning (this time for real, not a dream at all), like Sam is land, is shore, salvation. Sam is paralyzed, couldn't move even if he wanted to. These things he's not meant to think about, the maelstrom of his thoughts, are printed, branded, stained red onto his skin, set alight by the tinder of Dean's eyes.
"'m so fucked up over you," Sam admits, slurred confession in the safety and heat of the dark. Dean says something in response, but Sam's distracted by the dark of his eyes. He only catches the word mutual, and that's enough.
Dean doesn't push him away and Sam thinks that he's luckier than he's ever been, so lucky that instead of shoving him back, Dean's leaning up to bite at his neck, to grab and claw at his hair until Sam's eyes water. So lucky that one of them is, or both of them are, muttering these half-lost phrases, syllables half-lost into the crush between them. Slurred directions, imperatives, and noises that were never even almost-words, were born as gasps and chokes and spitslick sounds instead. It's so good already, this grappling burn, and Sam wishes that they'd done this sooner, but all things in time, after all.
Their hands bump, catch. All of these buttons and zippers and belts are proving to be too much and Sam's not gonna stop, slow down, take it easy, in order to work them out, because what if they can't start again, what if they lose this momentum? He can't remember ever being this scared, being so scared of losing anything. The dragging wet noise of a kiss, crush of mouths like crumpling metal, and stubble scraping across Sam's chin as they jerk together, slide together into this unrelenting build. Dean's knuckles tight against his cheek, Dean holding him so close that Sam's not sure he's breathing anymore, thinks Dean might be breathing for both of them or maybe he's just going to die like this, oxygen-starved and these sparks glittering at the back of his mind.
Dean holds him close, throws a leg across the back of Sam's knee, and Sam works his hands between them, this sweet friction, breathless grind. He's already falling away, already beginning to lose this, lose track, shuddering against his brother while his brother slurs his name like a curse.
Dean mumbles something that Sam's still too far out, lost in this torrential comedown, to catch. He rolls over, the button of his jeans still undone and his hand on Sam's stomach, and he doesn't move again. Sam doesn't think he's asleep, but he might be almost there, pulled down deep enough for it to be quiet, for it to be safe.
Sam lets out a deep breath, rush of air through his lungs, and marvels at how right it feels. All of his fears laid to rest in the pale light flickering in from the strip club sign, and Dean's breathing evening out, finally.
When Dean's asleep, when Sam's sure he's finally asleep, Sam heaves himself to his feet, shuffles over to the other bed and collapses. He hasn't woken up in the same bed as Dean since he was six and he's not ready to start again, not yet, this thing so new and raw.
Dean is up and dressed when Sam wakes from a dream, all recollection of which is impossible as soon as he opens his eyes. Sam thinks about going back to sleep, but he doesn't close his eyes. Instead, he stares at the ceiling and watches Dean in his peripheral vision, Dean standing in front of the window, the apricot glow of daylight like a mirage through the curtains.
When Dean finally realizes that he's awake, when Dean turns to look at him, Sam sits up, says again, "I'm not going anywhere."
On the television, the Weather Channel is playing on mute, these images of waves crashing and tornados touching down, silent natural disasters, and Sam thinks about how happy they're gonna be, elation bubbling wicked in his veins. This road-movie life of cars and guns and booze and the shade of Dean's eyes in the sunlight.
"Yeah," Dean says. There are rings around his eyes like there were yesterday, the same charcoal smears, and Sam frowns.
"What's wrong," he says, but maybe he knows already. He shouldn't have fallen asleep, should have stayed up and watched Dean, maybe that would have made it okay. Because now Dean doesn't believe him, doesn't believe that Sam will always have his back or something stupid and worldbreaking like that.
"I'm sorry," Dean says and there's no question about that for which he's apologizing, this ragged look on his face like he thinks it was his fault, like he thinks it's something for which he has to apologize, and Sam never quite knew the meaning of obliteration until right now.
And then Sam gets it. It's just Dean being dense, Dean refusing to see the obvious, Dean refusing to believe that they're broken in the same way. Because he thinks he's fucked up, always has been, this off-kilter criminal life he never escaped, and he's still hellbent on believing that Sam is different, that Sam is somehow better, that Sam will get away. This dark thing that he'll never believe Sam wants, too, just as he'll never believe he's good enough for Sam. He's so fucking stupid sometimes, Sam thinks, so incredibly blind.
"Look, man," Dean says, taking Sam's silence as fear or condemnation. "It's okay, we were both wasted, right, we. Fuck. It was a fuckin' spell, gotta be, that vindictive bitch, I mean." He's spitting out the words like they're gravel, like they hurt, tearing at his throat, like he has to get them out before Sam stops him, before Sam leaves.
Sam has the power to destroy everything, to tear him to foundations, but that's nothing new.
Dean's blushing, his eyes are blown, panic-wide, and he keeps glancing at Sam, glancing back down at the floor. Sam wonders how long he's been awake, how long he's been planning this, pacing the floor and waiting for Sam to wake up. "It wasn't," Dean says. "We're good, right."
"Yeah," Sam says automatically. He's not awake enough for this conversation. Maybe he sat up too fast, headache starting to pound like surf against his skull, but he's reeling, gutshot. Any minute he's going to start bleeding all over the place and his hands won't be enough to keep the blood in, to keep him alive. "We're good. I thought, I thought it was, I thought we were--"
Dean's head jerks up again. "No," he says. "You don't have to say anything. You don't gotta make this better, okay. It's not, it's, I'm. It's okay." He swallows and Sam wants to cry at the bloodstained banner of his words, the awful significance, at the look on his face, stuttering and pale and so goddamn scared. Part of Sam, some cold and distant and curious part, wants to ask if this is worse than how he looked like the day after Sam left for Stanford, but the rest of Sam doesn't think he could ever stand to find out.
"I'll be in the car, okay. I'll just, I'll be in the car," Dean says and leaves Sam alone in the wreck of the room.
This time, he doesn't slam the door.
Sam presses his thumbs against his temples, squeezes his eyes shut and hopes for an instant that he might still be dreaming, that this might be nothing more than a nightmare, that he'll wake when his feet touch the floor.
He gets up, gets out of bed, and nothing happens.
The possibility slowly dawning that Dean could be telling the truth, that he didn't mean it, that it's just Sam, Sam alone in this, even though Sam doesn't think either of them were far enough gone to let that happen. (This one part of his mind screaming wishful thinking, screaming mistake like a death knell, executioner's blade, grief-aching requiem.) If Sam finds out for certain, if he says something, offers this raw and open and bleeding thing, it might fuck them up for good. This traitorous admission that he can't expect Dean to live with.
If he says something else, if he says that Dean's lying (which he has to be), and it's true, it's true and Dean just doesn't want to let himself believe it, won't let himself fall that far out of some idea about what Sam wants, about what they should be, this idea he's built up about what is right and what he has to do, Sam might ruin even this, might shatter everything else Dean's willing to give. He might drive Dean away, doom Sam to a life's worth of empty motel rooms, bleak silences and this gnawing sensation in the pit of his stomach, this saltwater burn in his throat.
And Dean is in the car, is waiting, but Sam doesn't know for how long, doesn't how much time Dean will give him. So Sam moves. Abruptly, mechanically, because he's not quite ready to be any more awake yet, for this to be any more real. When he gets dressed, pulls on his last clean shirt like a shield or a bandage, like it might hide this thing breaking apart in his chest, he slips the charm, that fucking charm, into the pocket of his jeans once more. He picks up the laundry duffel that Dean left next to the door, that Dean either forgot or was too busy fleeing, getting the hell away from Sam, to grab.
Sam goes outside and in the brief time it takes to get to the car, he tries to think of what he'll say, if there's anything he can say at all.
The sunlight pierces his eyes when he opens the car door, just as Dean turns to look at him. For a split-second, blinded by the sun, Sam can't see the expression on Dean's face, and he lets himself hope.
--
end