Don't watch Heart late at night while you're in a weird mood.
In the valley of the shadow
(Sam/Jess/Madison/Dean and variations thereof, 1012 words, nc-17, warning for zombies)
Their voices are pitched too low for Dean to catch the words but he figures it’s just girl-talk interspersed with the occasional soft, throaty giggle. He doesn’t think there’s enough in their heads for them to be saying anything important. Probably just dust and maggots.
They’re sitting cross-legged on Sam’s bed and Jess is plaiting Madison’s hair. Her slim tanned fingers wriggle through the glossy darkness of Madison’s hair like worms going through freshly-turned dirt. Jess’s mouth is the colour of cotton-candy and it flutters as she murmurs something to Madison that makes her smile. Madison’s lips are darker, more red than pink, crushed raspberries and vintage wine.
Gorgeous, golden Jess and the shadows and translucence of Madison. No wonder Sam couldn’t bear to let them go.
:::
It’s not moonlight. Not when they touch silver or when you say the name of God to them. It’s not that their complexions are pallid or that they have patches of discoloration where decomposition has set in. Jess doesn’t stink of charred flesh and there’s no crinkly, silver scar of an old bullet wound anywhere on Madison.
If you cut them they bleed. If you fuck them they come. If Sam comes into the room they smile with genuine pleasure.
Dean doesn’t know how he knows what they are, aside from the fact he knows they both died a long time ago. He thinks that maybe it’s the stillness that comes over them sometimes. A few seconds when their souls, bodies, whatever remember that they died. And then the spark Sam put inside them flares up, the cogs start turning once more and the moment’s gone. The dolls are set in motion again.
And sometimes, if Dean watches them long enough, stares good and hard without blinking, he can see the wrongness of them.
:::
Night has fallen and they are all waiting for Sam.
Jess has taken her t-shirt off and is watching Madison, whose fingers are spidering over her breasts. She strokes and pets and rubs the heavy fullness of flesh until Jess’s nipples are stiff, pink-caramel peaks. Jess lets out a little gasp as if she’s surprised, which perhaps she is, and looks over at Dean. Curling an arm around Jess’s waist, Madison follows her gaze and tilts her head at him, eyes smooth and dark as the kind of chocolate that’s so rich it makes your belly ache.
Their bodies are not cold. Dean knows this from the many nights Sam has refused to hear him saying ‘no’ and Dean has ended up in their bed with them. He’s spent nights pressed between and pillowed on warm, sweet-smelling bodies, with Madison’s breast beneath his cheek and Jess’s thigh draped over his and Sam the only living thing in the bed.
He turns his face to the wall and ignores the slippery sound of Jess’s mouth on Madison’s.
:::
“I can send them away if you want,” Sam says in between kisses laid along Dean’s collarbone.
They like to watch when Sam and Dean fuck. Both of them are too anxious about upsetting Sam to try to join in unless expressly invited but they watch all the same. Hands at each other’s cunts, but their gazes never leaving Sam and Dean. They sit on the end of the bed and watch like goddamn puppies, fucking themselves on each other’s fingers, while Sam sinks his cock into Dean’s ass so slow and so deep it reduces him to breathless begging.
“If they’re gonna distract you,” says Sam, “I’ll send ‘em away.”
It’s not about being distracted. It’s about revulsion and horror. For Dean. It’s about those things for Dean. Countless times, Dean’s watched Sam spread one of them wide for his cock and fuck her before he seemingly gives in to the desperate pleading of the other and rolls over to fuck her.
“Won’t you get distracted by having ‘em here?” he says.
Sam cradles Dean’s face in his two huge, competent hands and lays a kiss on the cheekbone just below each eye.
“Nothing’s gonna distract me from you.”
Something unknots inside Dean, something gives.
“Get rid of ‘em.”
:::
Whatever Sam’s doing these days, sometimes it means he doesn’t come home. It will be just Jess and Madison, and Dean.
They will prepare meals together, which they will eat all sitting around a small wooden table. There will be fresh, crisp salad leaves and steak cooked tender and aromatic and frothy desserts of sugar and cream. Dean will drink beer and sometimes Jess and Madison will too, but usually they prefer wine or fruit juice.
Dean has adapted to life with Madison and Jess. Everything is fragrant and beautiful and calm.
When Sam is not around, Dean sleeps in his own bed in his own room with the door between him and them locked and bolted.
:::
“How did you get their bodies back?” Dean asks one day, when he can no longer help himself.
Sam is reading one of his books. This one is held together by strips of dry brown tape and its pages crinkle like fallen leaves when Sam turns them. He looks up at Dean and no matter how long Dean stares at him or what Sam must be doing when he’s away in the world, Dean never sees anything wrong with him. Sam is living, breathing perfection.
“I guess it’s one of those switches that got flicked in my brain.” There’s a rustle of Fall as he slaps the book shut. “You find them creepy, don’t you?”
It takes a moment for Dean to dare to nod. Sam sighs at this response but then he nods as well.
“I guess they are. They didn’t come back exactly as I remembered them.”
Rising from his chair, Sam walks through the watery light of the afternoon to Dean. He lays a fingertip on Dean’s mouth and traces the curves of Dean’s lips.
“Practice makes perfect,” he tells Dean.
:::
Dean stands before the mirror and searches the reflection of his face until he sees what’s wrong.
~end