fic: Missing You
Title: Missing You
Author: wolfish_willow
Recipient: jenab
Rating: PG-13
Genre and/or Pairing: Angst // Sam/Gabriel
Spoilers: The whole of season 5, specifically 5x19 and on.
Warnings: Canon character death, tweaking canon to suit my needs.
Word Count: 3,456
Beta: insertcode11, who totally rocks.
Notes/Prompts: For jenab's prompt: What happens to the one left behind in a bonded/mated relationship when the other dies.
Notes 2: Written for team_free_love's Secret Lover's Exchange.
Summary: Dean looks pained with deep lines crinkling his brow and his lips turned down at the corners. It's the face he wears when he wants to hold back and protect his little brother from whatever he has to say but knows there isn't any other choice.
***
First there's a searing pain stabbing through his stomach and tearing its way up his chest until all he can see is white, all he can hear is a whining keen that he doesn't recognize. He doesn't know what it is, doesn't know what anything is because he can't think beyond the tearing of flesh and muscle. Something tugs harshly at his arm, gripping tighter but it's barely a pinprick compared to the fire burning through him, bright white of grace that he's become so intimately familiar with rising and exploding out of him with the force of a tsunami.
Then it's gone and the world is dark around him, no longer moving beneath him. The grip on his arm tightens and his face is wet and nothing makes sense because something's missing. Something is gone, not where it should be and he needs it back but he can't move. He doesn't even realize the world is dark because his eyes are closed until calloused fingers grab his face and shake him, prying his eyelids open.
"Dean?"
It isn't the name he's thinking of, though. His lips move without conscious effort, taking in the familiar features of his brother's face; green eyes squinted and strained in determined concentration. Lips thinned in worry he refuses to acknowledge until he has to because Dean can't let himself freak out until his little brother is safe and okay. But Sam isn't okay because something is still missing. Something he can't think of while his ears ring in the wake of all that pain being suddenly wrenched away, and Dean's voice buzzing around his head: SammySamComeonHeySammyLookatme.
Flames erupt behind them and he flinches in Dean's grip, peripherally aware that it must mean Kali's no longer in the back seat of the Impala but that's not important, doesn't matter. Nothing matters besides finding what's wrong and fixing it because Sam knows he can't live with this new, empty, darkness inside him. So close to what he felt when Dean was dead and he no longer had anyone or anything to turn to but alcohol and worse. But different. That was soul-deep, but this goes further and Sam doesn't know how that can be possible, but it is, and it's missing.
One of Dean's hands slides up, soothing through his hair and he tries to focus on the calming, familiar motion and tickling sensation of fingertips against his scalp. It's just enough to let his exhausted body relax into the seat where he's leaning against the door, breath steadying. His thoughts calm, stop whirling around just enough that the exhaustion caused by the sudden onslaught of pain, and just as sudden absence of it, drags him slowly into sleep. The last thing he sees is the worry in his brother's eyes, but can't focus on what it means.
-----
Sunlight flickering in his eyes is enough to drag Sam from restless sleep, and he tries to shut his eyes tighter against the blinding rays. His whole body is sore but he stretches long arms up above his head and his legs out as far as they can go in the hope that it'll loosen some of the tension he can feel built up. There's a quiet rustling sound coming from his left, creak of an old chair no longer in its prime. It's a familiar sound and he wonders what caused his brother to stay awake all night in one of the motel provided chairs to keep watch over him this time, running through what could have happened in the past day.
The memories come to him slowly, jagged around the edges and fuzzy like he tried forgetting them and it didn't take. Something he's become familiar with, since he was a teenager trying to erase the images of burning corpses and screeching ghosts out of his mind.
Hotel Hell, full of Gods and scattered memories of Lucifer, circle around in his head and Sam opens his eyes to rid himself of them, like they've been burned into his eyelids. Deep worry lines etching Dean's face, aging him further than even the stress from the past two years have managed to do, don't quell the feeling of wrongness welling up inside of Sam, even as he tries to force it away like he's done - had to do - after every single problem they've faced since before he sprung Lucifer from his cage. There isn't a muscle in Dean's body that's relaxed, shoulders and back straight, legs tense and ready to hold him up in a moment but he hasn't said anything, hasn't asked if Sam's alright and Sam doesn't know what to make of any of this.
He sits up, pressing his palms down onto the scratchy sheets provided by the motel to take on some of his weight when it hits him.
The bed is the same as every other motel bed they've ever slept in, the sheets scratchy and worn and not uncomfortable, but nothing to write home about either. They haven't slept in anything but the best since Gabriel showed up not weeks after Dean left him soaking in an old warehouse, exclaiming they were interesting and he might as well see how this whole Apocalypse thing plays out with him on their side. The hedonistic Archangel wouldn't settle for anything less than the best, having to compromise only changing the sheets and the mattresses rather than the whole motel room because Dean wouldn't take it on principle -
"You're ruining the best part of having an awesome, giving, and generous Archangel on your team, Dean-o," Gabriel powers through Dean's disbelieving scoff and continues with a smirk lighting up his face. "What's the point of keeping me around if you won't take advantage of me?"
Sam reaches out and grabs Gabriel, wrapping long arms around his angel's waist while he tries - and fails - to scowl through his grin. He settles for a possessive growl, a smirk of his own forming on his face at the shiver he feels run through Gabriel's body - Sam learned after that first kiss they shared after Sam almost got killed again that Gabriel's a big fan of Sam's possessive side. He opens his mouth to speak, but Dean beats him to it, his big brother shuddering with an exaggerated grimace of disgust. "Sasquatch over there's got that covered enough for both of us."
- Even when Gabriel is gone for days at a time, no matter where they shack up for the night they always find the beds much more extravagant than they'd paid for.
But that doesn't mean anything. Not really. He's probably just messing with them; there's no taking the Trickster out of the Archangel and they wouldn't have him any other way. Soon enough he'll pop in with a triumphant I got you good smirk, some sort of candy occupying his mouth until he drags Sam down for a kiss just to rile Dean up. That new cold spot somewhere deep is just leftover nerves from being in the room with Lucifer last night.
Nothing more.
He doesn't realize he's shaking his head until Dean's right there in front of him, large rough hands coming down on his shoulders and pulling him in for a hug. But that's not right and Sam pulls roughly away because they only ever hug when one of them has died and Gabriel is one of them now and it's not right because he's not dead. Just in witness protection again until Lucifer's off his tail, until he's in the clear.
Water fills his eyes, blurring his vision when he stomps into the bathroom and away from Dean's words, I'msorrySammyI'mreallysorryIt'llbeokayWe'llgetthroughthis. There's no reason for them and Sam blinks the tears away, refuses to break down into a sniffling, sobbing wreck when they've got an Apocalypse to stop and his angel is fine.
When he strips down, nearly tearing his clothes in his haste to get them off, Sam's eyes catch on the mark burned right over the jut of his left hipbone. It's his weak spot, where he's most sensitive, and Gabriel didn't hesitate to sear his handprint right over it so the angel could drive him crazy with the barest of touches. -
"Feel that, Sammy?" Gabriel whispers into the skin of his neck, grin as obvious in his voice as it is against Sam's throat. He trails soft fingertips tickle-light over the new, angry-red mark. Dizzying circles drive Sam crazy and it's all he can do to answer with a moan, arching into the maddening touch and gripping Gabriel's arms and sides and shoulders and everywhere he can reach between shaking hands. Warmth pours through his body, echoes of emotions that aren't his own but mirror every thought and feeling he has for the angel on top of him flood in his mind, through every limb and clear even past the blood rushing in his ears.
"Love this, can't get enough of you… Can never get enough."
- The small room becomes almost stifling with tension when he presses his hand over it, traces his fingertips to trail each imprinted finger.
If it doesn't send warmth through him this time, it's only because Gabriel's got to cover his tracks and he's not doing it right if he's left the evidence of their bond so plain on Sam.
-----
It's the next day when Dean approaches him, Casa Erotica DVD case in his hands and Sam had almost forgotten how Gabriel pressed it into his brother's hands with the warning to guard it with their lives. He'd been more focused on the private look they'd shared as he and Dean and Kali shuffled out of there. When Gabriel turned to look over his shoulder and their eyes met for a brief moment that lasted years and seconds. Amber eyes that Sam had fallen so hard for, that he loves staring into, had looked at him with not even a hint of mischief. They shone with determination and love and a ferocity that he wore well, but Sam had never seen from him before.
But green eyes superimpose over glowing amber and Sam blinks back to the present, where Dean's still standing in front of him holding the DVD case and looking hesitant and concerned and so unlike the hard-as-nails older brother he's had around since the angels and the apocalypse came knocking at his door. He wasn't even like this back when Jess… But Gabriel isn't dead so Dean can take his unnecessary concern and shove it where the sun doesn't shine because Sam is fine and they've got more important things to worry about than him. Like the apocalypse he helped jump start and the Devil he popped out of the pit.
Dean looks pained with deep lines crinkling his brow and his lips turned down at the corners. It's the face he wears when he wants to hold back and protect his little brother from whatever he has to say but knows there isn't any other choice. Sam almost feels something like worry or anxiousness or fear ripple through him in small waves but it barely lasts a second before that new cold spot taking up residence somewhere deep inside swallows it whole. He still shakes his head, as unconscious a move as it had been the morning after Motel Hell, and grabs the stuff he'd been busy packing for the drive out. In a minute he's waiting in the passenger seat for Dean, arms crossed in front of his chest while he slouches in a familiar attempt to get smaller, maybe disappear. Fade away until he's as empty as that hole inside him and everyone else can get on with their lives without him there to screw up again.
-----
They speed along the highway, Dean looking a bit more comfortable in his skin now that he's got a new mission - even if it is picking up a fallen Castiel from some hospital hundreds of miles away. The sun is bright in Sam's eyes and he shuts them against it. There's nothing they can do until they get to Castiel and even the small itch of worry he'd felt earlier doesn't surface again.
Leaning his head with a dull thunk on the window, he focuses on the familiar rumble of the Impala's engine just discernable through the AC/DC blasting from the speakers. He doesn't even notice that he's dozed until the rumbling stops and the music shuts off, jolting him up in his seat at the sudden silence.
There's nothing around when he looks outside, no sign of a gas station and no hospital in sight and Sam turns a confused look at Dean, starting when he's faced with an empty seat. Eyebrows turning down, he whips his head around and only relaxes when he sees his brother in the reflection of the Impala's side mirror on the driver's side.
Sam unfolds himself from the car and shuffles around to Dean, unsurprised when stretching doesn't loosen any of the kinks he assumes are from the hours-long car ride in a seat that hasn't been quite large enough for him since his last growth spurt before Stanford.
The lack of any reassurance or warmth causes him to stumble, tripping over his own feet clumsily and it takes him by surprise. It's the first time in… since… It's the first time since Gabriel seared his handprint into Sam's hip that he's had a thought of Stanford and the fights with his dad that there hasn't been a rush of something from his lover on the other end of the bond, making him feel light, like things aren't quite as bad as he thinks they are. And he doesn't like how obvious that cold spot inside him is, how impossible to ignore, in the wake of his realization.
But there's nothing he can do about it now beyond waiting for Gabriel to come back and fix it because he has to. Determined to ignore it and find out why Dean pulled over to the side of the road, Sam stops next to his brother and looks up just in time for him to press play on the laptop balanced on top of the car.
-----
Watching the DVD is a new torture in and of itself, worse than anything Lucifer has used against him in his dreams. Seeing Gabriel walk into the room with a cheesy mustache and cheesier dialogue is just so Gabriel that Sam feels the corners of his lips twitch upwards, ready to roll his eyes in fond exasperation at his angel. It's been too long since he's been able to look at that familiar smirk and listen to his voice and he just wants Gabriel to snap in any time now, mock Dean for being caught watching a porno starring their favorite archangel.
But then the damn angel says he's dead and Sam's hands ball into fists. His whole body feels like it will come apart with his shaking, holding back the urge to smash his fists into the Impala and the laptop and Gabriel's serious, knowing face looking up at him through the computer screen even though it won't do anything but make him bleed.
He wants to tell himself it isn't true. Wants to believe that Gabriel is lying, that he really is just back in his own personal Witness Protection program all over again. Even if it means that he will never see his angel again, at least Gabriel would be alive and out there somewhere. Not gone, burnt out with an excruciating explosion of grace courtesy of his fallen brother.
His hand unconsciously smoothes over his angel's mark; the last thing he has of Gabriel besides this DVD. It's not surprising that nothing happens, even when his fingers slip beneath his shirt just enough to feel the rough edges of skin under his fingertips, but it still hits him like a physical blow that knocks the wind out of his lungs just as effectively as if he'd been punched in the gut.
Gabriel isn't coming back.
-----
When he's not busy coming up with new strategies with Bobby and Castiel, Dean keeps looking at Sam like he is going to break. Even when Castiel is busy trying to take care of Dean as best he can now that he's essentially powerless - pouring the alcohol before Dean's even mentioned needing another drink, giving the man his full and undivided attention, like Sam's older brother is the center of the angel's world - Dean's eyes stray to Sam.
Almost how he'd watched Sam after Jess, only more intense, coiled tight and waiting for the moment when the emotions will become too much for his little brother to take and turn him into the sobbing mess only Sam can manage to be. It doesn't quite rankle the way it had back then. Doesn't make him feel stifled and claustrophobic or even like a failure for being expected to turn into a wreck.
He doesn't feel much of anything. His body is tired, something inside him still trying to reach for the bond - a string of light no longer there - and its absence echoes in fatigued limbs and occasionally bloodshot eyes. But a cup or three of coffee and his legs feel slightly less leaden, his feet more solid beneath him. It doesn't quite taste the same as it used to and he thinks he might have been worried about that at any other point in his life. As it is, he remembers long conversations with Gabriel while they'd curled up together as close as they could get and his angel insisted he know exactly what he was getting himself into - what he was asking for - when he expressed his desire to be more. Permanent. Conversations that consisted of just how dangerous it is for the one left behind if their bond mate dies. -
"It's like the world has fallen away around you. There's nothing… no one left to live for if your bond mate dies, Sammy."
They're curled up together on an extra large bed, opulent where the room is average. Sam wraps his arm tighter around Gabriel's chest, pulling his angel as close as they can possibly get to each other. "I still want to do it."
Gabriel sighs and shakes his head, eyes meeting Sam's across their shared stack of pillows. "It's a pretty big risk to take. Especially right now."
Sam smiles softly and leans forward to press a soft kiss to his angel's frowning lips. "Getting to have you, getting to be yours. It's worth the risk. You're worth the risk."
- Sam knows the only reason he hasn't let himself waste away - why he eats everything Dean puts in front of him and focuses his energy on their cases and fighting the angels when he wants nothing more than to just lay down and not get up ever again - is because he has Dean. And he knows he could never just give up, not while his brother is still alive and trying to keep him alive. Not when their souls and destinies are so intertwined that they share a heaven and are more connected than even Gabriel and he could be.
But he'd known that going in when he told his angel what he wanted.
So when Dean keeps staring at him in concern, Sam musters up a small smile. When Dean brings him back a salad shaker and laments his little brother's love of rabbit food, he gives the appropriate chuckle and tries desperately not to think about how often Gabriel mocked him for the very same thing. It doesn't get much easier as time keeps moving forward; the food is still nearly tasteless and the coffee is never quite the same. But his brother is still here. With him. He's still got a friend in Castiel and a surrogate father in Bobby.
If Dean refuses to give up on him, there's nothing in Heaven, Hell or everything in between that will make him disappoint his brother again. If Castiel will continue to put his faith in the Winchesters, Sam refuses to give him another reason that he shouldn't.
He knows Gabriel believed they could make it through this and it's just the incentive he needs to keep going. Maybe he'll even start to believe it again one of these days.
END
Author: wolfish_willow
Recipient: jenab
Rating: PG-13
Genre and/or Pairing: Angst // Sam/Gabriel
Spoilers: The whole of season 5, specifically 5x19 and on.
Warnings: Canon character death, tweaking canon to suit my needs.
Word Count: 3,456
Beta: insertcode11, who totally rocks.
Notes/Prompts: For jenab's prompt: What happens to the one left behind in a bonded/mated relationship when the other dies.
Notes 2: Written for team_free_love's Secret Lover's Exchange.
Summary: Dean looks pained with deep lines crinkling his brow and his lips turned down at the corners. It's the face he wears when he wants to hold back and protect his little brother from whatever he has to say but knows there isn't any other choice.
***
First there's a searing pain stabbing through his stomach and tearing its way up his chest until all he can see is white, all he can hear is a whining keen that he doesn't recognize. He doesn't know what it is, doesn't know what anything is because he can't think beyond the tearing of flesh and muscle. Something tugs harshly at his arm, gripping tighter but it's barely a pinprick compared to the fire burning through him, bright white of grace that he's become so intimately familiar with rising and exploding out of him with the force of a tsunami.
Then it's gone and the world is dark around him, no longer moving beneath him. The grip on his arm tightens and his face is wet and nothing makes sense because something's missing. Something is gone, not where it should be and he needs it back but he can't move. He doesn't even realize the world is dark because his eyes are closed until calloused fingers grab his face and shake him, prying his eyelids open.
"Dean?"
It isn't the name he's thinking of, though. His lips move without conscious effort, taking in the familiar features of his brother's face; green eyes squinted and strained in determined concentration. Lips thinned in worry he refuses to acknowledge until he has to because Dean can't let himself freak out until his little brother is safe and okay. But Sam isn't okay because something is still missing. Something he can't think of while his ears ring in the wake of all that pain being suddenly wrenched away, and Dean's voice buzzing around his head: SammySamComeonHeySammyLookatme.
Flames erupt behind them and he flinches in Dean's grip, peripherally aware that it must mean Kali's no longer in the back seat of the Impala but that's not important, doesn't matter. Nothing matters besides finding what's wrong and fixing it because Sam knows he can't live with this new, empty, darkness inside him. So close to what he felt when Dean was dead and he no longer had anyone or anything to turn to but alcohol and worse. But different. That was soul-deep, but this goes further and Sam doesn't know how that can be possible, but it is, and it's missing.
One of Dean's hands slides up, soothing through his hair and he tries to focus on the calming, familiar motion and tickling sensation of fingertips against his scalp. It's just enough to let his exhausted body relax into the seat where he's leaning against the door, breath steadying. His thoughts calm, stop whirling around just enough that the exhaustion caused by the sudden onslaught of pain, and just as sudden absence of it, drags him slowly into sleep. The last thing he sees is the worry in his brother's eyes, but can't focus on what it means.
-----
Sunlight flickering in his eyes is enough to drag Sam from restless sleep, and he tries to shut his eyes tighter against the blinding rays. His whole body is sore but he stretches long arms up above his head and his legs out as far as they can go in the hope that it'll loosen some of the tension he can feel built up. There's a quiet rustling sound coming from his left, creak of an old chair no longer in its prime. It's a familiar sound and he wonders what caused his brother to stay awake all night in one of the motel provided chairs to keep watch over him this time, running through what could have happened in the past day.
The memories come to him slowly, jagged around the edges and fuzzy like he tried forgetting them and it didn't take. Something he's become familiar with, since he was a teenager trying to erase the images of burning corpses and screeching ghosts out of his mind.
Hotel Hell, full of Gods and scattered memories of Lucifer, circle around in his head and Sam opens his eyes to rid himself of them, like they've been burned into his eyelids. Deep worry lines etching Dean's face, aging him further than even the stress from the past two years have managed to do, don't quell the feeling of wrongness welling up inside of Sam, even as he tries to force it away like he's done - had to do - after every single problem they've faced since before he sprung Lucifer from his cage. There isn't a muscle in Dean's body that's relaxed, shoulders and back straight, legs tense and ready to hold him up in a moment but he hasn't said anything, hasn't asked if Sam's alright and Sam doesn't know what to make of any of this.
He sits up, pressing his palms down onto the scratchy sheets provided by the motel to take on some of his weight when it hits him.
The bed is the same as every other motel bed they've ever slept in, the sheets scratchy and worn and not uncomfortable, but nothing to write home about either. They haven't slept in anything but the best since Gabriel showed up not weeks after Dean left him soaking in an old warehouse, exclaiming they were interesting and he might as well see how this whole Apocalypse thing plays out with him on their side. The hedonistic Archangel wouldn't settle for anything less than the best, having to compromise only changing the sheets and the mattresses rather than the whole motel room because Dean wouldn't take it on principle -
"You're ruining the best part of having an awesome, giving, and generous Archangel on your team, Dean-o," Gabriel powers through Dean's disbelieving scoff and continues with a smirk lighting up his face. "What's the point of keeping me around if you won't take advantage of me?"
Sam reaches out and grabs Gabriel, wrapping long arms around his angel's waist while he tries - and fails - to scowl through his grin. He settles for a possessive growl, a smirk of his own forming on his face at the shiver he feels run through Gabriel's body - Sam learned after that first kiss they shared after Sam almost got killed again that Gabriel's a big fan of Sam's possessive side. He opens his mouth to speak, but Dean beats him to it, his big brother shuddering with an exaggerated grimace of disgust. "Sasquatch over there's got that covered enough for both of us."
- Even when Gabriel is gone for days at a time, no matter where they shack up for the night they always find the beds much more extravagant than they'd paid for.
But that doesn't mean anything. Not really. He's probably just messing with them; there's no taking the Trickster out of the Archangel and they wouldn't have him any other way. Soon enough he'll pop in with a triumphant I got you good smirk, some sort of candy occupying his mouth until he drags Sam down for a kiss just to rile Dean up. That new cold spot somewhere deep is just leftover nerves from being in the room with Lucifer last night.
Nothing more.
He doesn't realize he's shaking his head until Dean's right there in front of him, large rough hands coming down on his shoulders and pulling him in for a hug. But that's not right and Sam pulls roughly away because they only ever hug when one of them has died and Gabriel is one of them now and it's not right because he's not dead. Just in witness protection again until Lucifer's off his tail, until he's in the clear.
Water fills his eyes, blurring his vision when he stomps into the bathroom and away from Dean's words, I'msorrySammyI'mreallysorryIt'llbeokayWe'llgetthroughthis. There's no reason for them and Sam blinks the tears away, refuses to break down into a sniffling, sobbing wreck when they've got an Apocalypse to stop and his angel is fine.
When he strips down, nearly tearing his clothes in his haste to get them off, Sam's eyes catch on the mark burned right over the jut of his left hipbone. It's his weak spot, where he's most sensitive, and Gabriel didn't hesitate to sear his handprint right over it so the angel could drive him crazy with the barest of touches. -
"Feel that, Sammy?" Gabriel whispers into the skin of his neck, grin as obvious in his voice as it is against Sam's throat. He trails soft fingertips tickle-light over the new, angry-red mark. Dizzying circles drive Sam crazy and it's all he can do to answer with a moan, arching into the maddening touch and gripping Gabriel's arms and sides and shoulders and everywhere he can reach between shaking hands. Warmth pours through his body, echoes of emotions that aren't his own but mirror every thought and feeling he has for the angel on top of him flood in his mind, through every limb and clear even past the blood rushing in his ears.
"Love this, can't get enough of you… Can never get enough."
- The small room becomes almost stifling with tension when he presses his hand over it, traces his fingertips to trail each imprinted finger.
If it doesn't send warmth through him this time, it's only because Gabriel's got to cover his tracks and he's not doing it right if he's left the evidence of their bond so plain on Sam.
-----
It's the next day when Dean approaches him, Casa Erotica DVD case in his hands and Sam had almost forgotten how Gabriel pressed it into his brother's hands with the warning to guard it with their lives. He'd been more focused on the private look they'd shared as he and Dean and Kali shuffled out of there. When Gabriel turned to look over his shoulder and their eyes met for a brief moment that lasted years and seconds. Amber eyes that Sam had fallen so hard for, that he loves staring into, had looked at him with not even a hint of mischief. They shone with determination and love and a ferocity that he wore well, but Sam had never seen from him before.
But green eyes superimpose over glowing amber and Sam blinks back to the present, where Dean's still standing in front of him holding the DVD case and looking hesitant and concerned and so unlike the hard-as-nails older brother he's had around since the angels and the apocalypse came knocking at his door. He wasn't even like this back when Jess… But Gabriel isn't dead so Dean can take his unnecessary concern and shove it where the sun doesn't shine because Sam is fine and they've got more important things to worry about than him. Like the apocalypse he helped jump start and the Devil he popped out of the pit.
Dean looks pained with deep lines crinkling his brow and his lips turned down at the corners. It's the face he wears when he wants to hold back and protect his little brother from whatever he has to say but knows there isn't any other choice. Sam almost feels something like worry or anxiousness or fear ripple through him in small waves but it barely lasts a second before that new cold spot taking up residence somewhere deep inside swallows it whole. He still shakes his head, as unconscious a move as it had been the morning after Motel Hell, and grabs the stuff he'd been busy packing for the drive out. In a minute he's waiting in the passenger seat for Dean, arms crossed in front of his chest while he slouches in a familiar attempt to get smaller, maybe disappear. Fade away until he's as empty as that hole inside him and everyone else can get on with their lives without him there to screw up again.
-----
They speed along the highway, Dean looking a bit more comfortable in his skin now that he's got a new mission - even if it is picking up a fallen Castiel from some hospital hundreds of miles away. The sun is bright in Sam's eyes and he shuts them against it. There's nothing they can do until they get to Castiel and even the small itch of worry he'd felt earlier doesn't surface again.
Leaning his head with a dull thunk on the window, he focuses on the familiar rumble of the Impala's engine just discernable through the AC/DC blasting from the speakers. He doesn't even notice that he's dozed until the rumbling stops and the music shuts off, jolting him up in his seat at the sudden silence.
There's nothing around when he looks outside, no sign of a gas station and no hospital in sight and Sam turns a confused look at Dean, starting when he's faced with an empty seat. Eyebrows turning down, he whips his head around and only relaxes when he sees his brother in the reflection of the Impala's side mirror on the driver's side.
Sam unfolds himself from the car and shuffles around to Dean, unsurprised when stretching doesn't loosen any of the kinks he assumes are from the hours-long car ride in a seat that hasn't been quite large enough for him since his last growth spurt before Stanford.
The lack of any reassurance or warmth causes him to stumble, tripping over his own feet clumsily and it takes him by surprise. It's the first time in… since… It's the first time since Gabriel seared his handprint into Sam's hip that he's had a thought of Stanford and the fights with his dad that there hasn't been a rush of something from his lover on the other end of the bond, making him feel light, like things aren't quite as bad as he thinks they are. And he doesn't like how obvious that cold spot inside him is, how impossible to ignore, in the wake of his realization.
But there's nothing he can do about it now beyond waiting for Gabriel to come back and fix it because he has to. Determined to ignore it and find out why Dean pulled over to the side of the road, Sam stops next to his brother and looks up just in time for him to press play on the laptop balanced on top of the car.
-----
Watching the DVD is a new torture in and of itself, worse than anything Lucifer has used against him in his dreams. Seeing Gabriel walk into the room with a cheesy mustache and cheesier dialogue is just so Gabriel that Sam feels the corners of his lips twitch upwards, ready to roll his eyes in fond exasperation at his angel. It's been too long since he's been able to look at that familiar smirk and listen to his voice and he just wants Gabriel to snap in any time now, mock Dean for being caught watching a porno starring their favorite archangel.
But then the damn angel says he's dead and Sam's hands ball into fists. His whole body feels like it will come apart with his shaking, holding back the urge to smash his fists into the Impala and the laptop and Gabriel's serious, knowing face looking up at him through the computer screen even though it won't do anything but make him bleed.
He wants to tell himself it isn't true. Wants to believe that Gabriel is lying, that he really is just back in his own personal Witness Protection program all over again. Even if it means that he will never see his angel again, at least Gabriel would be alive and out there somewhere. Not gone, burnt out with an excruciating explosion of grace courtesy of his fallen brother.
His hand unconsciously smoothes over his angel's mark; the last thing he has of Gabriel besides this DVD. It's not surprising that nothing happens, even when his fingers slip beneath his shirt just enough to feel the rough edges of skin under his fingertips, but it still hits him like a physical blow that knocks the wind out of his lungs just as effectively as if he'd been punched in the gut.
Gabriel isn't coming back.
-----
When he's not busy coming up with new strategies with Bobby and Castiel, Dean keeps looking at Sam like he is going to break. Even when Castiel is busy trying to take care of Dean as best he can now that he's essentially powerless - pouring the alcohol before Dean's even mentioned needing another drink, giving the man his full and undivided attention, like Sam's older brother is the center of the angel's world - Dean's eyes stray to Sam.
Almost how he'd watched Sam after Jess, only more intense, coiled tight and waiting for the moment when the emotions will become too much for his little brother to take and turn him into the sobbing mess only Sam can manage to be. It doesn't quite rankle the way it had back then. Doesn't make him feel stifled and claustrophobic or even like a failure for being expected to turn into a wreck.
He doesn't feel much of anything. His body is tired, something inside him still trying to reach for the bond - a string of light no longer there - and its absence echoes in fatigued limbs and occasionally bloodshot eyes. But a cup or three of coffee and his legs feel slightly less leaden, his feet more solid beneath him. It doesn't quite taste the same as it used to and he thinks he might have been worried about that at any other point in his life. As it is, he remembers long conversations with Gabriel while they'd curled up together as close as they could get and his angel insisted he know exactly what he was getting himself into - what he was asking for - when he expressed his desire to be more. Permanent. Conversations that consisted of just how dangerous it is for the one left behind if their bond mate dies. -
"It's like the world has fallen away around you. There's nothing… no one left to live for if your bond mate dies, Sammy."
They're curled up together on an extra large bed, opulent where the room is average. Sam wraps his arm tighter around Gabriel's chest, pulling his angel as close as they can possibly get to each other. "I still want to do it."
Gabriel sighs and shakes his head, eyes meeting Sam's across their shared stack of pillows. "It's a pretty big risk to take. Especially right now."
Sam smiles softly and leans forward to press a soft kiss to his angel's frowning lips. "Getting to have you, getting to be yours. It's worth the risk. You're worth the risk."
- Sam knows the only reason he hasn't let himself waste away - why he eats everything Dean puts in front of him and focuses his energy on their cases and fighting the angels when he wants nothing more than to just lay down and not get up ever again - is because he has Dean. And he knows he could never just give up, not while his brother is still alive and trying to keep him alive. Not when their souls and destinies are so intertwined that they share a heaven and are more connected than even Gabriel and he could be.
But he'd known that going in when he told his angel what he wanted.
So when Dean keeps staring at him in concern, Sam musters up a small smile. When Dean brings him back a salad shaker and laments his little brother's love of rabbit food, he gives the appropriate chuckle and tries desperately not to think about how often Gabriel mocked him for the very same thing. It doesn't get much easier as time keeps moving forward; the food is still nearly tasteless and the coffee is never quite the same. But his brother is still here. With him. He's still got a friend in Castiel and a surrogate father in Bobby.
If Dean refuses to give up on him, there's nothing in Heaven, Hell or everything in between that will make him disappoint his brother again. If Castiel will continue to put his faith in the Winchesters, Sam refuses to give him another reason that he shouldn't.
He knows Gabriel believed they could make it through this and it's just the incentive he needs to keep going. Maybe he'll even start to believe it again one of these days.
END