11
Everything is different, but on a moment to moment level, nothing is at all. Dean brings home dinner for them and they eat in front of Sam’s computer, which he uses to stream football and soccer games for them to watch. On good nights, he keeps his food down. On bad nights, he at least keeps quiet about it. A few times Dean does catch him heaving and coughing blood and it’s ten minutes of why the fuck are you hiding from me and three hours of lying in bed while his brother fusses and makes tea and checks him for fevers and doesn’t understand.
They prank each other. Sam, bored one day while Dean is napping, forges a handful of parking tickets and leaves them on the car. Dean retaliates by taping the error-message sound from Sam’s computer on his phone and playing it ant intervals, which freaks the hell out of Sam until he figures out what’s going on, and then he steals Dean’s phone and throws it out the window, which makes Dean curse at him, and they both laugh because it’s just been too damn long since something was funny. They declare a truce and open some beers and flip through online videos until their search takes them to porn, and then it’s time for bed.
They fall asleep in their own rooms, but they rarely wake up that way. When the nightmares are bad (the nightmares are a part of life now, there’s no point in pretending otherwise), they creep in and don’t wake each other and nest in blankets on the floor or at the foot of the bed. More than once, Sam’s awoken to a foot in his face and a cursing, stumbling brother. The closeness helps, though, and Dean puts up with it, probably because Sam puts up with him and reaches down to tickle his scalp when he finds his brother asleep on his own floor. They get each other through it.
And on the nights when it’s bad, when Sam can’t breathe for coughing and can’t think through the fear, they don’t go to their rooms at all. They fall asleep with their heads on the kitchen table after their ninth cup of tea, gripping each other’s wrists like they’re keeping themselves together.
There’s a good stretch, a whole week of days when nothing dramatic happens at all. Garth calls and Dean actually stays on the phone with him for more than thirty seconds, and Sam listens to the reassuring rumble of his brother giving advice and sounding like his old self. Later, they build a fire in the fireplace (they have a fireplace, Dean) and Sam reads Les Miserables and Dean whittles the pegs for the foosball table he’s building.
It feels, honestly, like the regular fucking normal life Sam’s always fantasized about and never believed in.
Dean whistles while he works. Seriously.
A few hours later, Sam wakes up (in his own room, alone) and his chest hurts so much he might literally be dying.
They prank each other. Sam, bored one day while Dean is napping, forges a handful of parking tickets and leaves them on the car. Dean retaliates by taping the error-message sound from Sam’s computer on his phone and playing it ant intervals, which freaks the hell out of Sam until he figures out what’s going on, and then he steals Dean’s phone and throws it out the window, which makes Dean curse at him, and they both laugh because it’s just been too damn long since something was funny. They declare a truce and open some beers and flip through online videos until their search takes them to porn, and then it’s time for bed.
They fall asleep in their own rooms, but they rarely wake up that way. When the nightmares are bad (the nightmares are a part of life now, there’s no point in pretending otherwise), they creep in and don’t wake each other and nest in blankets on the floor or at the foot of the bed. More than once, Sam’s awoken to a foot in his face and a cursing, stumbling brother. The closeness helps, though, and Dean puts up with it, probably because Sam puts up with him and reaches down to tickle his scalp when he finds his brother asleep on his own floor. They get each other through it.
And on the nights when it’s bad, when Sam can’t breathe for coughing and can’t think through the fear, they don’t go to their rooms at all. They fall asleep with their heads on the kitchen table after their ninth cup of tea, gripping each other’s wrists like they’re keeping themselves together.
There’s a good stretch, a whole week of days when nothing dramatic happens at all. Garth calls and Dean actually stays on the phone with him for more than thirty seconds, and Sam listens to the reassuring rumble of his brother giving advice and sounding like his old self. Later, they build a fire in the fireplace (they have a fireplace, Dean) and Sam reads Les Miserables and Dean whittles the pegs for the foosball table he’s building.
It feels, honestly, like the regular fucking normal life Sam’s always fantasized about and never believed in.
Dean whistles while he works. Seriously.
A few hours later, Sam wakes up (in his own room, alone) and his chest hurts so much he might literally be dying.