Supernatural: Cradlesong [Pilot]
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PILOT
It’s hardly past seven in the morning the first time Jess meets Dean Winchester. The sky is still bright pink, the sun is breaking in through the window, and she can just hardly make out the dark outline of a man, rummaging through the letters on the table. She can’t tell who it is, just knows it isn’t Sam from the way he’s standing, and she’s every bit as scared as she should be.
She tries not to let him hear her, starts planning the ways she’ll get to her phone and call the cops before he knows she’s awake. Somehow, the stranger senses she’s watching and immediately stands up straighter.
He turns, his movement slightly frantic. “Sammy?”
His voice is wet and Jess can tell he’s been drinking, but it’s more than that. He sounds lost.
“Who the hell are you?” she asks, though she already has a feeling she knows.
The guy smirks when he sees her, flips the lights on, and looks her up and down unapologetically before talking again. She wonders if she imagined how fragile he’d been a second ago.
“Sam, you old dog,” he says proudly. “He finally learned a thing or two about picking up chicks, huh? He never would have scored a girl like you back in the day.”
Jess arches an eyebrow. “I’m flattered. Now tell me who you are and what the hell you’re doing here.”
“I, uh. Is Sam here?”
“What’s it to you?”
The man snickers. “Not much, I guess.” He stays quiet for a long time, then shrugs, like he’s decided he might as well just go for something he knows he won’t get. “He’s my brother, all right?”
“Dean.” Jess nods. “I had a feeling.”
He meets her eyes, making a visible effort not to look too excited. “He told you about me?”
All the time, Jess thinks, but she doesn’t say it out loud. From what she knows about Sam’s brother, he has one of those egos people are constantly warned not to encourage.
“Look, can I see him or not?”
Jess bites her bottom lip. “I’m really sorry. He’s not here this weekend.”
“Oh,” Dean says, like it doesn’t matter to him. Jess doesn’t miss the way his body tenses. “Oh well.”
“But he’ll be back on Monday,” she tries.
“I’ll be gone on Monday,” Dean replies. “Thanks for your help. Sorry if I woke you. Didn’t realize he lived with someone.”
“Wait.” Jess steps forward, about to grab him and pull him back, then stops halfway. Dean doesn’t seem like the kind of person you can push around, but he pauses and turns to look at her anyway.
“Yeah?”
“If you call him and tell him you’re here, I’m sure he’ll come back.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Dean replies, letting his unhappiness show for the first time.
“He’d want to see you, I know he would. Won’t ever forgive myself if I let you leave because you didn’t want to interrupt his hunting.” Jess laughs but Dean’s face immediately blanches.
“He’s hunting?”
“Yeah, I was surprised, too. He never really struck me as the kind of guy who likes shooting things for fun.”
“He never really was,” Dean says, sounding weirdly put out about it.
“He said it was important, though. He went with a friend of your dad’s, maybe nine or ten hours ago.”
“Caleb?”
“That could have been it.”
Dean nods. “It was.”
“You’re welcome to stay here until he gets back,” Jess says. “The couch is more comfortable than the bed most nights.”
Dean smiles. “Appreciate that, but, uh. Shouldn’t be here to begin with, so. I’ll just go.”
Jess doesn’t know why it’s so important to her that she not let him leave, but she can see the look on Sam’s face if he ever found out he missed a chance to see Dean, and she’s not up to dealing with it.
“You have to stay.”
“Wow, you two must have a lot of fun bossing each other around.” Dean smiles to himself, and, to his credit, he looks genuinely happy for a moment. “It was nice meeting you.”
“Jess.”
“Huh?”
“‘It was nice meeting you, Jess.’ You didn’t even ask my name.”
Dean makes a face that clearly says he thinks her etiquette lessons are a joke. “All right, sweetheart,” he replies, grinning when Jess grimaces at the epithet. “It was nice meeting you. I’m leaving now.”
She watches him until the door is open and then gets really desperate. “He misses you.”
Dean stops as predicted, but doesn’t seem to waver on his intention to leave. “He left messages,” Dean says, as if to himself. “I came because he said…but then most of them are old anyway. He doesn’t call as much since,” he turns to look at her, “you met him in November, huh?”
Jess nods.
“Yeah, I guess that explains a lot.” Dean’s lips turn down. “Don’t tell him I was here, okay?”
“You’re exhausted,” Jess says. “You drove all night to see him, didn’t you?”
Dean rolls his eyes. “I came to help Caleb. Just figured I might as well drive the extra few hours when I heard he’d found someone else for the job. Guess I should have figured it out, but I didn’t. But I didn’t really go out of my way, either.”
“Just stay one night. He might come back tomorrow and you’re going to need to sleep soon, anyway.”
“I’ve got somewhere to be,” Dean says without conviction. “Need to get going as soon as possible.”
“You’re scared to see him. So why’d you come at all?”
“Scared of Sammy? That’s a joke,” he says, not meeting Jess’s eyes. “I told you, I was nearby, figured what the hell. I’m not gonna wait around for him.”
“He wants to see you, Dean. I promise he wants to see you.”
“Yeah, well. It’s best if he doesn’t.” Dean looks at her closely. “He’s taken care of. I guess that’s all I wanted to know.”
“You’re sleeping here,” Jess says, no nonsense. “If you really want, you can leave before he comes back. I won’t call him unless you want me to. But you’re not driving any more until you’ve had some sleep.”
Surprisingly, Dean immediately buckles under the mommy act. He nods and lets her get a pillow and some sheets for him and even says thank you before preparing the couch and settling in for the night.
_______________________________________________________________
Jess more or less tricks Dean into staying the next day. She’s already got breakfast spread when he wakes up and as much as his eyes dodge to the door, he can’t bring himself to say no.
It’s not entirely selfless, Jess probably doesn’t have the stamina to keep Dean here until Sam can see him, even if that is one of the major reasons she wants him here. No, Jess has her own agenda.
Sam doesn’t let her in. Jess can’t blame him, especially now that she’s seen Dean. There’s always been something about Sam that breaks her heart, she never understood it, but it was there. She doesn’t understand it now, either. Dean doesn’t bring immediate answers, but she sees it in him, too. Something went terribly, terribly wrong for them, and Jess can’t fault Sam for wanting to hide it from her, for trying to leave it behind. She does idly wonder how he could leave Dean with it, why Dean hasn’t tried to lose it like Sam has.
Dean is something Jess is never supposed to understand about Sam. He doesn’t say anything about their lives as kids, hardly mentions their dad, but Sam can’t keep Dean’s name in his mouth most days, no matter how hard he tries. Whatever it is, whatever caused it, Jess needs to understand it, because she’ll never understand Sam until she at least has some idea of what their relationship was like.
Jess knows it’s not safe-she’s seen Sam’s eyes go dark when he lets himself talk about Dean without the muzzle on. He only jokes about his brother when he’s in control: snide comments about girls Dean would like, weird habits of Sam’s that he blames on his brother’s eccentricities, or funny stories about the trouble Dean would get into. It’s only when he’s drunk or tired or sick that Jess hears just how reverential the name really is to him, and Jess has heard enough slurred memories to read the way Dean’s fingers tremble now, despite the tough act he’s putting on. Jess needs to know exactly what it is they’re both so scared of, why they both choose to be apart when it’s obvious they care about each other this much.
She plays dirty once she’s got him stuck, because there’s just one thing she knows for sure about Dean, one thing she knows would be true about Sam if the situation were reversed: he won’t leave when she’s telling him about his brother.
It only takes five minutes, four pieces of toast, three scrambled eggs, two cups of coffee, and one drop of Sam’s name for Dean’s guard to come crashing down. He starts asking questions. She gives the longest answers she can formulate and it’s not long before she’s the one feeling trapped. Dean forgets that he wanted to leave, forgets everything, spends most of the day sitting on the couch listening to Jess talk about Sam.
It takes her a long time to catch on to exactly what she’s been picking up on for the last year. It’s obvious once the thought strikes her, but it’s not the kind of conclusion anyone is supposed to jump to. It’s five hours before she puts together just how close they were.
She’s telling him about some party they went to the previous spring, says way more than she means to about how grabby Sam had gotten at the end of the night. It’s not until Dean’s body goes still and he pulls into himself that she realizes who she’s talking to. She tries to apologize, thinks Dean is uncomfortable with the over share, but then he licks his lips and looks away and tells her it’s okay-that’s when Jess realizes he’s not uncomfortable at all. He wanted to hear more.
Jess doesn’t know what the hell drives her in that moment, but she can’t help delivering. She knows it’s wrong-wrong for Dean to want Sam, wrong for Jess to be okay with it, wrong for her to try to excuse what she does by telling herself it’s what Sam would want. But she can’t shake that thought, can’t stop believing that Sam would never forgive her for leaving his brother unsatisfied.
She pushes closer to him on the couch, feels him trying to shift away. So she reaches out for him, takes his hand and places it on her thigh.
“You know what he did to me then?”
Dean still isn’t looking at her. He tries to pull his hand back, but Jess holds firm, and he gives it up when she starts talking again.
“He brought me back here, laid me out on this couch, right where you’re sitting.”
Dean shakes his head. “Why are you…?” He swallows hard. “I should go.”
“He took care of me, Dean. That’s what he called it.” She slides his hand further up her legs and Dean lets out a hurt sound. “You used to take care of him, didn’t you?”
Dean really does take his hand back then, shoves her away. “Not like that,” he says heatedly. “Never like that.”
Jess’s instinct is to not believe him, she knows they want each other, she’s seen it in both of their eyes. But she sees something else in Dean’s eyes, under all the guilt and fear and lust there’s regret. And Jess doesn’t want to think about what kind of person it makes her, but she feels sick and wrong knowing that neither of them has ever gotten what they needed from each other. She wants to fix it.
“Why?” she asks, before she can stop herself.
Dean’s face screws up, like he thinks she’s crazy for asking. Maybe she is. “He’s my brother. My full-blooded little brother.”
“But you wanted to.”
Dean wipes his hand over his mouth and shrugs.
“He wants you, too.”
“No, he doesn’t.”
Jess crawls back towards Dean and puts her lips against his ear. “The way he talks about you, Dean. I couldn't help falling a little in love.”
She turns his face towards hers and kisses him; his lips only return the pressure for a few seconds before he breaks away, shaking.
“You’re his,” he says. “I couldn’t ever do that to him. I can’t. I don’t even want to.”
“Dean,” Jess says, still close enough to his face to feel his breath. “I…I know this is going to sound insane, but…I really think he would want-”
Dean shakes his head and just keeps shaking it, but he doesn’t get up like he should, or call Jess out on how awful what she’s doing is.
“I miss him, too, Dean,” she says. In a moment of daring, she moves to straddle. He gasps and puts his hands on her hips, grasp tight. She can tell he has every intention of pushing her off, but he doesn’t and Jess can feel him getting hard. “If he were here, he’d show you how much he’d want this. He’s so good to me. Always takes care of me.” She lowers herself again and whispers against his neck, “He fucked me before he left. Came inside of me, too.”
Dean thrusts up, his hands moving to cup her breasts. Jess bites her lip and moans lightly against his skin.
“You mean he…”
“Started the pill last month,” Jess explains.
Dean loses what little control he had then, flips her off him but doesn’t storm off or yell. He trails his hand down her chest until his fingers are right over her clit and he rubs against the fabric covering her up.
“Please,” she begs. “Do it for Sam.”
Dean snickers. “That’s so fucked up,” he says. He sounds like he’s talking to himself instead of Jess. “So fucked up,” he repeats.
His hands don’t seem to agree with him. His fingers gently dip under the elastic of the pajama shorts she never got around to changing out of and he draws them down slowly, eyes locked on hers.
Jess takes a shaky breath and leads his hands back up. Dean pushes under the cotton of her t-shirt and he swipes his thumb over one nipple as he licks his lips and looks back down.
“Can I?” he asks.
Jess doesn’t know why he’s bothering to get permission at this stage, but she nods anyway, kicks her foot into the side of the couch trying to spread herself wider for him. Dean’s face moves down until his lips are brushing her stomach. She can feel that he’s still trembling, still terrified, but he keeps going anyway.
He lowers himself from the couch once he’s gotten past the tan line of her bikini and kneels on the floor beside it, face level with her cunt. He wraps his right hand around her leg, holding her open and steadying himself, and she’s almost positive she hears him whisper his brother’s name before his tongue teases her open.
Jess gasps when his lips meet hers and he licks into her, tongue trying to reach every part of her, like he’s desperate to make sure he’s tasting anything that might still have Sam’s mark on it. Jess’s body arches into his mouth, but he burrows deeper, eating her out like his life depends on making her feel good.
“Oh God,” she groans. “I can’t. Oh my God.”
Dean shushes her and brushes his fingers on her thigh in a soft rhythm that instantly produces a calming effect. Jess’s eyes roll back in her head and her cries die down. She has a feeling Dean has plenty of experience, not just giving head, but soothing, as well, and she gets a dirty thrill imagining how many times those fingers have moved on Sam’s skin exactly the same way, trying to lull him away from nightmares or thunderstorms.
Dean pulls away, his tongue darting out for a few more thirsty licks before he sucks her clit into his mouth and Jess is practically screaming it feels so good. He brings his free hand up, fingers pressing into her and coming away wet, and then he lets his tongue play into her again. Dean’s face is filthy when he pulls away, she can see the shine from her orgasm where the light hits his chin. He licks his lips greedily a few times, then passes his sleeve over his mouth to clean off her come. Despite how much he’s got on him, Jess is still dripping onto the couch, and she doesn’t think even Sam’s ever made her come like that.
Jess sits up, tries to bring that mouth that just fucked her down for a kiss, but Dean suddenly decides to be modest and turns away. Jess’s stomach plummets when she realizes why. Regret is written all over his features.
“Dean?”
“I couldn’t help it,” he says defensively. “I just wanted. I. Sammy.”
“Dean, it’s okay,” she says, laying a hand on his shoulder, but Dean shrugs her away.
“It’s not okay. Nothing about it is.”
“He wouldn’t be upset,” Jess says with conviction.
Dean laughs bitterly. “He would hate me.” His hand reaches out to cup her face, brushes the sweat-slicked hair sticking to her cheek away. “He would hate you, too.”
Jess’s eyes drop to Dean’s crotch. He’s still hard and she figures there’s one way to take his mind off the guilt trip, and maybe he’ll see things a little clearer when he’s not wound up like a cheap alarm clock. She reaches out to pull him close again, tugs on the top of his jeans. “Dean, let me-”
He stands up too quickly and looks down at her sadly. “He deserves better than us.”
Dean wastes no time after that. He’s thrown the few things he brought in his duffel back together and slams the door behind him within a few minutes. He doesn’t even let himself get off before he’s gone.
_______________________________________________________________
Jess showers three times the next day and spends the rest of the time she’s alone pacing the apartment, making sure everything is in order. Dean didn’t stay long, didn’t get much of a chance to leave behind a trace, but Jess can only focus on her reading, television, the other hundred mundane tasks she invents to try to keep herself from worrying for minutes at a time before she’s double checking again.
Sam gets home long after dark, looking exhausted and happy to see her, and renders all of her effort worthless in five minutes. As soon as his eyes land on the table, his face freezes and he steps closer with caution, like the letters might jump up and bite him. Jess doesn’t see anything special in the way they’re spread out, but she does remember seeing Dean rummaging through them the day before when she’d caught him.
Sam’s fingers trail the edge of one of the envelopes and then his head snaps up, almost the exact expression of desperate hope that had been on Dean’s face.
“Dean?” he says, looking around the room wildly. It’s not until his eyes land on Jess that his face falls. “He’s not here.”
Jess shakes her head apologetically.
“But he was.”
“Yes.”
Sam stares at her for the longest minute of her life and says in a calm, thin voice, “You fucked him.”
Her immediate thought is “actually, he fucked me,” but Jess doesn’t think there’s much of a point in making the distinction. She bites her lip and feels her eyes begin to sting with tears, but she doesn’t deny it.
Sam swallows hard, steadies his hands on the dining room table, and then nods, slow and deliberate.
“Sam, I can explain.”
“I wish you wouldn’t,” he says, passing her on the way to their room. He shuts-does not slam-the door behind him.
Jess lets him have the room to himself for as long as she can stand before she knocks and opens it without waiting for a response. Sam is sitting at the edge of the bed with his head in his hands, but he looks up at her when she comes in. His hair obscures too much of his face for her to know just how much trouble she’s in.
“Sam.”
Sam stands up and closes in on her, wrapping his arms around her middle and kissing her. Jess can’t help being a little scared of it, of how hard he’s kissing, but she’s even more afraid of cutting it short, of the possibility that Sam will never kiss her again.
When he finally ends it, he undoes her jeans in one quick movement and Jess bends down to pull them off, obeying the unspoken instructions. He pulls her shirt over her head and smoothes one big hand on her back, slipping it under her bra and unhooking it easily. His face burrows into the hollow of her neck and as his hands continue to touch her, he whispers, “You fucked my brother.”
“I’m sorry.”
He grabs her wrist and pushes her towards the bed. “Lay back, Jess.”
Again, she does as she’s told. Sam strips his clothes off and surprises her by heading for the nightstand, pulling up the bottle of lube they rarely ever have to use. He drips it onto his fingers and positions himself between her legs.
One finger begins to tease at her hole and she gasps. No one’s ever fucked her from behind, but Jess figures Sam knows that and is trying to make a point. It’s an ugly punishment, but probably not worse than Jess deserves, and Sam’s always known how to fight dirty. If she acted like a whore, she’s willing to let Sam treat her like it-the problem is Jess really thought she was doing the right thing.
“Tell me what he did to you,” Sam demands, pressing into her and beginning to work her open.
Jess decides to draw the line there. Sam can torture her for it, but she’s not about to let him torture himself. “Sam, don’t make me say it.”
He makes a hurt sound that goes straight to Jess’s heart, but his response is nothing like what she’s expecting. It’s soft. “Please, Jess. Please, tell me what he did.”
“He ate me out,” she admits.
Sam laughs lightly into her neck. “Bet he did,” he says, pulling his finger out and pushing two in. “God, he always loved eating pussy.”
Jess groans as Sam’s other hand begins to massage her clit.
“It was good, too, wasn’t it? I remember how those girls used to look when he was done with them,” Sam thrusts against Jess’s leg. “Tell me.”
“It was,” Jess breathes hard, “It was the best I’ve ever been fucked in my life, Sam.”
Sam’s moan shakes the entire bed. “Jess.”
“He was everything you ever said. I’m sorry, I couldn’t-”
“Shh.” Sam kisses her, then pulls back looking dangerous again. “Turn over for me.”
“Sam, if you hurt me, you’re going to regret it.”
“Wouldn’t,” he murmurs. “I’ll never hurt you, Jess. Please, let me have this.”
Jess obeys, gets on all fours and braces herself for what she expects to be rough and angry and maybe even hateful. Sam pushes into her gently and instead of speeding up, he makes an effort to keep his pace slow and measured. It hurts only because it’s the first time, and Sam pushes his fingers through her hair and whispers encouragement when the pain makes her cry out.
“Do you want me to stop?” he asks, sounding crestfallen.
Jess shakes her head, turns it enough for him to kiss her if he wants. He does, and Jess feels like he’s accepting an apology instead of just another kiss amongst thousands they’ve shared.
He makes love to her so tenderly Jess almost wants to cry, and even though she knows it’s not her he’s thinking of, Jess has never felt so close to Sam in her life.
Sam doesn’t last long. When he comes, he collapses on top of her, and Jess lets her body drop to the mattress under his weight. He lies on top of her, kissing the back of her neck, breathing quietly. He doesn’t let her turn back over and look at him, and she understands why when he finally speaks.
“I don’t want you to be sorry, baby. I’m not mad,” he says, voice shaking and it’s obvious he’s either crying or just hardly managing not to.
“Sam-”
“I would have done the same thing.” Jess knows instinctively that he’s never said it out loud, maybe never even admitted it to himself until now.
He arranges her on her side then and grabs her into his arms, holding her like a child would a teddy bear, as if she’s the only thing that can protect him from some unknown threat. His hand ghosts down her side and one finger traces her hips. When he finally makes his way between her legs, his fingers move inside of her exactly the way she likes it, and she rolls her hips onto him until her breath leaves in one long moan and his fingers pull back from her orgasm.
“I’m sorry,” Sam says, when they’re drifting off to sleep.
Jess can’t fight the curiosity, has to know what the hell he has to be sorry about. “Why are you sorry?”
“You shouldn’t have to be a part of this,” Sam says. “I’m so sorry we dragged you into this.”
Jess tangles her fingers in his and brings them up to her lips, kissing them. She doesn’t know how to tell Sam that she wants nothing in the world more than to be a part of what he and Dean share. She can’t shake the worry that he wouldn’t believe her.
_______________________________________________________________
When Jess gets home from class the next day, Sam is sitting on the couch with his phone pressed to his ear. He doesn’t seem to notice her entering, so she stands and waits for him to finish.
“Don’t be a coward, man. Answer your goddamn phone already,” he says, angrily. Then his tone softens, turns so vulnerable Jess’s heart feels heavy in her chest. “Dean, please. I know you’re getting these calls. Answer the phone. You at least owe me that much.” He sits silently, letting the message run and at the last moment he adds, “I know about Jess.”
The phone snaps shut and lands on the other side of the couch when Sam tosses it. Jess closes the door behind her, content to let it seem like she just walked in, and Sam turns and smiles with as much genuine enthusiasm as he can manage.
“Hey.”
Jess considers asking about the call but decides not to push unless Sam wants to talk about it. “Hey.”
“How were classes?”
“Oh, you know. The usual.”
“Managed to stay awake in Psych?”
“Just barely,” Jess says, smiling at the surprisingly easy conversation. “How’d you do on your paper?”
Sam shrugs dismissively, which generally means he got an A+ and a marriage proposal from his professor in the margins, but he’s too damn modest to brag about it like a normal person.
“Any plans for dinner or should I make-?”
“Jess,” Sam interrupts. “I called Dean. I asked him to come back. So we can talk about,” Sam shrugs, “I’m sure you can guess what we need to talk about. I don’t know if he’s coming. But if he does, you don’t have to stay if it makes you-”
Jess walks over and puts a hand on Sam’s shoulder over the couch. “Or we could always order something instead?”
Sam turns and rests his face on Jess’s hand. “I love you,” he says.
“I know,” she replies, fingers scratching his scalp lightly. “I love you, too.”
_______________________________________________________________
Whatever his faults are, Dean is no coward. He shows up on their doorstep at half-past midnight, when Sam and Jess were already giving up hope on him and settling for bed, but at least he shows.
Sam answers the door. Jess is sitting on the couch and can’t see either of their expressions, but she’s not entirely sure she’s equipped to handle them, anyway.
“Sammy,” is all she hears for a long time.
She’s not surprised when she turns around and finds them staring at each other, just as unsure of what the next step is as she would be. Dean is caught somewhere between cowering away from Sam and throwing himself into the other man and Sam stands statue still, eyes serious.
“You gonna invite him in?” Jess asks, hoping to move things along. They both jolt a little and look in her direction and suddenly seem to remember where they are and what’s going on.
“I, yeah. Sorry. Dean, come in.”
Dean looks suspiciously from Sam to Jess and back to his brother, shrugs, and follows him inside.
“Do you wanna sit down?” Sam asks awkwardly.
Dean laughs. “Look, man, I drove all the way back here and I didn’t even get drunk enough to numb it. Can we skip the formalities? If you’re gonna kick my ass, let’s get on with it. God knows I’m not gonna stop you.”
“I don’t want to fight,” Sam says, though he sounds annoyed enough for Jess to understand why Dean doesn’t look convinced.
Dean looks up at him and replies in an acidic tone, “Oh, that’s right. You’re so fucking superior, I’m sure you don’t need violence to solve your problems.”
“Don’t be a child, Dean.”
Dean replies by crossing his arms over his chest, and Jess almost wants to laugh, because she’s pretty sure between that and Sam’s pouting, they couldn’t look more petulant if they were children.
“What do you want me to do, Sam? I fucked up. I’m sorry. You can’t imagine how sorry I am.”
“You don’t need to apologize.”
“You know it was all me, right? I pretty much made her do it. You know how I am around pretty girls, Sammy.” Dean struts into the room and drops onto the couch, giving Jess a cocky grin as he takes his place next to her.
Jess doesn’t get a chance to call him out on his lie. Sam’s already laughing before the words are properly out of Dean’s mouth. “Okay, first of all: we’re not here to point fingers. And secondly, don’t act like I don’t know you, Dean. It’s condescending and it makes you look like a moron when everyone in the room knows you’re lying.”
“Just don’t hate her for it, Sammy. She really does care about you.”
Jess realizes Dean’s trying to make Sam hate him, trying to drive him away and back into the normal Jess offers, even when she knows that in reality, Dean doesn’t think she loves his brother enough. Jess has only known Dean for three days and she’s already sick and tired of him making everything his fault.
“Nobody hates anyone, okay? I’m glad she did it, Dean.”
Dean arches an eyebrow. “That’s your business, Sam. What’d you call me all the way back here for?”
“Think we have some things to talk about, don’t you?”
Dean’s eyes dart to Jess, then down at his lap. Jess sees him begin to pick at a loose thread as if it’s the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen. Dean, Jess is beginning to suspect, just isn’t the type of guy who ‘talks about it’.
“Dean,” Sam says, voice hot. “Why’d you do it?”
Dean looks up, shakes his head. “Man, you don’t want to know.”
“I think I already do,” Sam says. He looks to Jess and inclines his head in a way that means he wants her to come closer. She walks up to his side and he turns her around to face Dean, pressing his entire body against her back.
He moves the hair on her neck to the side and begins kissing her skin, one hand slipping into her shirt and cupping her breast. The other slides down, into her boy shorts, and in just a few seconds, Jess is standing there with her boyfriend’s fingers inside of her, watching his brother’s eyes glaze over. It should probably make her uncomfortable that Sam is using her to seduce Dean, but it really, really doesn’t.
Dean shifts in front of her, his arousal obvious, and Sam must see it, too, because she feels his erection pushing into her back as soon as Dean is hard. Jess moans as Sam takes his fingers out of her and brings them up to her lips. Jess sucks on them, watching Dean as she does it. The way she sees it, she still owes him, and whatever his reservations, he wants it, no point denying it.
“Jess,” Sam whispers into her ear. “Get on your knees for my big brother.”
Jess nods and takes one long stride, kneeling in front of Dean, right on the couch where he’d done this to her. Sam sits next to him, Jess and Dean’s eyes both trained on him.
He reaches out, his hand shaking violently, and begins to struggle with getting Dean’s jeans open. Dean’s breath starts coming hard and fast as soon as Sam’s wrist brushes the denim on his crotch.
“Relax, Dean. It’s okay. It’s okay, I promise.”
Dean closes his eyes, pain etched onto his features, and he shakes his head. After a few minutes of clumsy fumbling, Sam manages to get Dean’s dick out. He stares at it with wide eyes, like he’s never seen one before, and then he reaches his hand out to brush Jess’s cheek, thumb tracing her bottom lip.
“Do it, Jess. Before I fucking-come on, suck him.”
Jess doesn’t have to be told twice. She licks up Dean’s shaft, feeling him out, getting as taste of what he likes. It’s mostly pointless, since Jess is pretty sure Dean will like anything that involves getting his dick sucked while his brother sits right there watching, but Jess wants to make it perfect for him.
She takes him in slowly, lips only wrapping around his head at first, her tongue swirling and making Dean groan. Then she starts to take him as far as she can go, until something forces her down even farther.
She feels long familiar fingers tangle in her hair-it’s not Dean pushing her down. She moans and Sam lets her pull up and off of Dean’s cock. She looks up at her boyfriend, knows her lips are glistening with spit and his brother’s precome, and Sam smiles. “Can I help you?”
She nods, prepared for Sam’s guidance this time. Now that’s she’s not taken by surprise, she can keep up with the pace Sam sets. She grips the cushion with one hand and rubs herself through the thin fabric of her shorts with the other. She listens to Sam’s lips sucking at Dean’s neck and Dean actually whimpers.
“That’s me, Dean,” Sam says once he has Jess going at a set pace. His hands continue to rest on her head, but he’s no longer applying any pressure, just riding out the way she takes Dean down. “Those are my lips sucking you. Tell me it’s good for you, I want to make you feel so good, you have no idea.”
Dean cries out, “Sammy,” and Jess doesn’t really mind that she gets no warning, because she knows what’s coming. Dean comes down her throat and she swallows some, saves the rest of it. Unsurprisingly, Sam tugs her up by the hair, lips greedy to share it with her.
They pass Dean’s come between then and Sam brings Jess up to sit on his lap. He fucks up into her, and even through the denim of Sam’s jeans, it’s enough friction to bring them both off almost instantaneously. Dean is still breathing hard and watching them when Jess regains the ability to think. Sam is staring right back at him. The way they look at each other in that moment is probably the most beautiful thing Jess has ever seen and, twisted as it is, she thinks giving them this might be the best thing she’s ever done.
“Dean,” Sam says under his breath, almost like he doesn’t really want his brother to hear, like he has to find a compromise between being too scared of rejection to ask and not being able to live with knowing he didn’t try. “Can I kiss you?”
Dean surges forward, wraps his hand around the back of Sam’s neck, and kisses him wide open, throwing his entire body into it. Sam kisses back in kind, licking deeper and deeper and neither of them seems to know how to break it for longer than Jess has ever seen anyone kiss. Her heart sinks when she realizes why they’re cramming so much into it. It’s a goodbye.
“Dean,” Sam finally gasps when they separate. He smiles, intoxicated and mindlessly happy, and tries to rush forward for another kiss, but Dean stands up and leans back uncomfortably on the balls of his feet.
“It’s bedtime, Sammy,” Dean says, pointing towards the bedroom. He smiles at Sam in a private, inside joke way. “It’s a school night.”
Sam sits for a few seconds before looking over to Jess, taking her hands and standing. He takes Dean’s hand, too, and tugs at his fingers like Dean’s a puppy he can lead around. He looks surprised when Dean doesn’t move.
“Dean?”
“I’ll sleep on the couch.”
Sam frowns. “But you’ll be here tomorrow?”
“Yeah, sure. If that’s where you want me.”
“Dean.”
“I promise, okay? I’ll be right here.”
Reluctantly he nods and heads to bed. Jess stands and watches Dean for a few seconds before she follows. Dean wipes a hand over his mouth and looks guilty, and Jess realizes that he has no intention of keeping his promise.
She wakes up in the middle of the night; the clock on her nightstand tells her that it’s 5:13. There are hushed voices coming from the living room, the door is wide open, and Jess figures that’s what woke her up. She approaches the door and peeks out.
Dean has his bag thrown over one shoulder and Sam is reclining against the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, eyes narrowed to slits.
“Man, come on. Just move.”
Sam shakes his head. “Did you really think I wasn’t going to see through your bullshit? You really think I’m just gonna do as you ask when you promised me-”
“Give it a break. Promises never meant much between us, did they?”
Sam steps forward heatedly. “I never lied to you.”
Dean shrugs. “Felt about the same.”
Sam’s eyes go wide and Dean relents. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. You didn’t do anything wrong.” He looks to the ground. “What do you want me hanging around another day for, anyway?”
“We have things to talk about.”
“I’ve done all the talking I can handle.”
“That wasn’t talking, Dean,” Sam says, almost smirking.
“That was your choice, Sammy. I came back to let you say your part and whether you said it or not, you made your point. Now I’m making mine. Let me go.”
“Why won’t you just hear me out?”
Dean shifts. Sam moves forward, reaches out to brush his brother’s cheek with his fingers. His voice lowers to a whisper, “Is it because you know you won’t leave if I kiss you again?”
Dean recoils from the touch. “Fuck off.”
“This isn’t just what I need and we both know it. I’ve got the drunk voice messages saved, man. Don’t pretend you don’t miss me. That’ll work with anyone else, even dad, but not with me. I know you.”
“Fuck off,” Dean repeats. “And get out of my way.”
“So you’re just going to keep on the way you’ve been going indefinitely? Just to spite me?”
“You know I don’t want to spite you. You made it pretty obvious that this is what you want, I’m just trying not to get in the way.”
“You were never the one in my way.”
“Even if that’s the case, I would be this time.”
“Not necessarily. Dean, everything isn’t one way or the other, there is such thing as compromise.”
“Where’s the compromise between being normal and fucking your brother?”
“Dean-”
“I want you to be happy, Sam. You’ve got everything here. Just…take care of her and, I don’t know, work hard. You won’t even notice…” Dean stops and rubs the back of his neck, licks his lips and laughs as he says, “Hey, if I’m the only thing missing, that’s a pretty sweet deal, right?”
No, Jess wants to shout, but she loses her voice when she sees the way Sam’s face crumples. All the childish hope in his expression gets replaced with something ugly, and he surprises Jess by stepping out of his brother’s way.
“If you’re gonna leave, fucking do it already.” Sam marches out of the room and nearly collides with Jess when he gets to the bedroom. He grabs her shoulders to steady himself, looks down like he hadn’t seen her despite walking straight in her direction as he crossed the entire room. Both of their eyes move immediately to the door and Jess just hardly sees the end of Dean’s duffle as the it closes behind him.
Sam wraps his arms around her middle, buries his face in her neck, and silently cries for his brother.
_______________________________________________________________
They don’t talk about Dean. It’s not just Sam keeping a secret anymore, Jess now knows on a personal level why the subject of Sam’s brother is off-limits. He’s always hanging in the air between them, they’ll share a look and the same shiver will shoot down both of their spines, but neither of them says it. Sam is wrecked after Dean leaves, misses him more than before, and Jess longs just as hard for Dean to come back, just so she can see the smile that had been on Sam’s face in those seconds after they’d kissed.
Sharing Dean brings them closer, and Jess is grateful for it, even though it leaves a good part of her feeling slightly sour. Sam finally tells Jess about their lives, the truth this time instead of the lies that he used to feed her.
By the time he’s done, Jess wishes he hadn’t. Before she’d wondered what could have broken the brothers to the extent their childhood obviously had. When it’s finally revealed to her, she ends up wondering how they made it out at all.
True, she hadn’t been as bothered as she probably should have by what she did with them at the time, but in retrospect, she just wonders why the hell they waited for her to tell them it was okay. Sam and Dean needed each other, and now that she knows that, Jess can’t look at Sam standing around at a party or sitting on the couch reading alone without thinking he looks off somehow. Incomplete.
Jess can tell instinctively when Sam is thinking about him, knows how to treat him when he’s in those moods. Sam begins to cling to the little comfort she can offer like it’s his only lifeline. It makes Jess feel irreplaceable and inadequate all at once.
Sam knows when she’s thinking of Dean, too. She thinks about him more often than she should. She’s only spent a few collective hours with him, but she knows everything Sam can possibly communicate about him, and Sam is not lacking in knowledge about his brother. Jess knows Dean is the only reason Sam ever made it to her. Jess feels like she owes Dean her life, knows that the only thing he would ever want that she has is Sam. Jess used to be the jealous type, but she feels more betrayed not sharing Sam than she would if Dean would just come back for him.
And then one night, with just as little warning as before, Dean does come back for Sam. Sam’s already downstairs bickering with his brother when she gets the lights on and sees who he’s talking to.
Dean plays the part of a stranger, acts like he’s never seen Jess before, like he couldn’t care less about Sam. Dean does an admirable job pretending, looks Jess up and down in the slimy way Sam had once told her he would if they ever met. Sam half goes along with it-doesn’t introduce Jess or pretend she’s never gotten on her knees for Dean, but definitely doesn’t call his brother out.
Jess listens for as long as she can before she decides she’s not having any of it.
“What are you doing here?” Sam asks, coming to stand next to Jess and putting an arm around her waist. To an outsider, it might look like Sam is claiming his own, responding to Dean’s appraising looks. Jess, who can feel his fingers trembling as they squeeze her side for support, knows better.
“Look, we should talk in private.”
“No. Whatever you have to say, it’s Jess’s business, too.”
“It’s not about any of that, Sam. It’s about Dad. Not her problem.”
Sam doesn’t waver. Jess knows he wants her there more for his sake than hers, so she doesn’t even consider giving Dean the privacy he asks for.
“Okay, whatever. Dad’s missing and you need to quit playing house and help me, because I think he’s in trouble.”
“Dad’s never in trouble.”
Dean’s eyes dart to Jess for a second before they fix on Sam again. “He working.”
“On a hunt?” Jess says, inserting herself and making it clear she knows what they’re talking about, so Dean can stop beating around the bush already.
“You told her?”
“Some people know how to hold a conversation,” Sam replies with a bitchy smile.
“Yes,” Dean says to Jess, ignoring Sam’s response entirely. “He’s on a hunt and I can’t get in touch with him, and I’m starting to wor-I’m just starting to think he might need some backup. More than I can give him alone.”
“I don’t see what this has to do with me.”
“Sam,” Jess says, a little shocked. “He’s your father.”
“He’s fine,” says Sam, turning to look at her with an acidic smile. “He’s probably just having the longest hangover of his life.”
“Don’t talk about him like that,” Dean snaps.
“Sorry. How should I be talking about him?”
“With a little respect. He taught you everything you know, you owe it to him to-”
“Not anymore, Dean. I don’t need or want to know those things. Anyway, I can’t help you. I have an interview on Monday. I need to focus on that. My life isn’t about chasing after Dad’s benders anymore.”
Dean’s eyes narrow. “This is serious, Sam. He could be in trouble.”
“Since when was Dad ever so good at keeping in touch that a few days is something to freak out about?”
“Since you ditched us.”
Silence stretches out across the room then, Sam and Dean glare at each other, almost looking like they’ll come to blows. Jess steps between them.
“I think we should go with him, Sam.”
Both of the brothers turn to look at her like she’s not quite right in the head. “We?” Dean asks, raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah. He needs more help than you can offer, right? Three people are better than two, and we can get the job done faster, so Sam can get back for his interview.”
“No,” they both say at once, and Jess congratulates herself on at least getting them to agree on something.
“Why not?”
“This is serious,” Dean says. “It’s not a game and there won’t be time to teach you how to defend yourself. The last thing I need is for this to get more dangerous.”
“I’m not going,” Sam replies at the same time, continuing over his brother so that they’re both lecturing and neither of them seems to notice the other. “It’s not my life anymore and I’ll be damned before I go back to it, let alone drag you there with me.”
“I’m not stupid. I can take care of myself. I’ll stay out of the way if it gets dangerous. I need to see it, Sam. It’s a part of who you are, whether you like it or not.”
“I’m not going, Jess.”
“And I’m not taking you.”
“Well, then. You have fun trying to convince your stubborn brother to go without my help and you have fun trying to get laid without your girlfriend on board.”
Sam rolls his eyes. “Yeah, like you can go that long without sex.”
Dean shifts from one foot to the other, swallows hard. “I don’t wanna know about it, man.”
Jess knows better than to call him on the lie.
“Sam, it’s Dad.”
“The answer is no,” Sam starts, but he stops when he sees Dean’s face, sees how much more worried he is than he’s letting on.
“Please.”
Jess stands on tippy-toe and whispers into Sam’s ear, “Don’t do it for your dad, Sam. Look at him. He needs you.”
Sam sighs. “Alright, Dean. If we can find him and get the hunt done before Monday, I’ll help.” Dean starts to smile, but Sam interrupts him. “But Jess is coming.”
Jess smiles and draws closer to him.
“Absolutely not.”
“Yes, or I’m not going.”
Jess gets why Sam thinks he needs a barrier between himself and his brother, even if she doesn’t entirely agree, and it’s getting her what she wants, so she doesn’t argue.
“She’ll get hurt.”
“I won’t let her.”
“Sam, you can’t-”
Sam smiles thinly at his brother, but Jess doesn’t miss the warmth in his eyes. “I know how to protect her, Dean. I learned from the best.”
Dean shakes his head for a few seconds, then bites his lip. He looks over to the door, but obviously didn’t come all this way just to walk away from his brother half an hour later.
“Yeah, alright, Sammy. You win.”
_______________________________________________________________
For the first day or so, Jess doesn’t really see what all the fuss was about. In fact, she’s a little disappointed by just how dangerous hunting isn’t. Until they meet Constance instead of just reading about her. Seeing her face to face brings it home to Jess that this isn’t something Sam made up. Constance is an actual, real life ghost, staring at Jess in the rearview mirror. And maybe Jess really did get in over her head.
Sam and Jess are driving back to Dean after interviewing the husband when she finds them. She must know they’ve been hunting her, because she shows up without warning in the back seat of Dean’s car. She asks to be taken home, just like all the evidence said she would, and somehow Jess is still chilled when she hears it firsthand.
“No,” Sam answers firmly.
The woman’s face contorts with rage and in the blink of an eye, she’s straddling Sam and looking down at him, the threat clear in her expression.
“You can’t hurt me,” Sam says, smug smile on his face. “I’m not unfaithful. I’ve never been unfaithful.”
Constance laughs darkly and pulls away from him. “Maybe not,” she says cheerfully. “But she has.”
Jess doesn’t even get a chance to panic before the cold body is straddling her instead of Sam.
“No,” Sam cries. He tries to grab at the ghost and throw her off, even though Jess knows that he won’t be able to. “It doesn’t count. She wasn’t unfaithful. She wasn’t. I’m the one she-I’m telling you it doesn’t count.”
Constance’s lips trail Jess’s neck. She whispers ugly things about Jess, but her words only half register in Jess’s mind. All she can really take note of is the sharp pain as the dead woman’s nails sink into her.
There’s a loud shattering sound and the pain stops. Jess feels glass rain over the seat and Sam jumps to shield her from it. As soon as the pieces are done falling, Sam turns back to the steering wheel and presses hard on the gas, crashing the car right into what was once Constance’s living room.
The job pretty much finishes itself after that, or at least that’s how it feels for Jess. Sam gets out of the car; Jess hears shouts and furniture flying and finally gets a quick glimpse of the ghosts of two children as they pay their mother back for what she did to them. She takes deep breaths and waits for the pain to dull as the doors open.
“I’ll kill you if you hurt my car.” The voice picks her up and places her gingerly in the back seat.
“Shut up about the car, Dean. Is Jess okay?”
“Yeah, man, she’ll be perfectly fine after a few hours of sleep. Now you see why I didn’t want to bring her.”
Sam doesn’t answer, just slides into the side of the car where Jess’s head is resting and places it on his thigh.
“I know,” Sam says, sounding sorry. She feels a hand gently thread into her hair. “I wish I hadn’t.”
Jess opens her eyes just long enough to tell him it was the most exciting night of her life and get laughed at before she drifts off.
_______________________________________________________________
“You don’t have to go, you know.” Jess hears it through a haze, just hardly conscious that there are warm hands shaking her awake. They freeze at Dean’s words.
“Don’t do this to me.”
“We’re still so good together,” Dean says, like those words mean more than anything he’s ever said before. “I mean, we make a good team.”
Sam doesn’t answer, starts shaking Jess again. Slowly she opens her eyes and he’s looking down at her, smile much more strained than he intends. “Hey, babe. Time to get up. We’re home.”
Jess sits up, looks out the window, and is struck by the fact that she’ll be going to class tomorrow, same as every other Monday, after everything that’s just happened. She touches her chest where the ghost had split it just to make sure she didn’t dream all of this up and finds that somewhere along the road, Sam took care of the cut.
“Come on,” he says again, stepping out of the door and tugging her urgently. “We need to get to bed.”
Jess doesn’t let herself get a look at Dean as she follows her boyfriend out of the car and back to the apartment.
There’s a light on in the kitchen when they get inside. Jess tells Sam to go ahead to bed since she’s the one who left it on, and gets herself a glass of water before turning it off. It’s not until she’s turning from the refrigerator that she notices the man standing at the other side of the room. His eyes are bright yellow and Jess screams and feels the splash of water and glass breaking on the floor for only a few seconds before he smiles and her entire body is tugged into the opposite wall.
Jess doesn’t get the chance to focus on the pain. The terror dulls it. She’s going to die, she realizes it when whatever the thing is begins to lift her up and she remembers this is how Sam lost his mother, too. She is going to die, and Sam is going to make it downstairs just in time to see it.
Jess hears a gunshot and someone cries her name. The invisible force teasing her upwards lets go without warning, and she slides down to the floor too quickly. She feels the pain then, but only for a moment. Someone wraps arms around her and pulls her into them.
“Jess, look at me. Are you okay?”
Jess nods as quickly as she can and hears Dean let out a relieved breath. He pulls her face into his shoulder and tangles his fingers in her hair.
“Thank God,” he says. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”
“Jess?” Sam asks from the doorway. His hair is wildly in his eyes and his cheeks are pink. Jess can tell he ran as soon as the water dropped and she sobs deeply knowing that she should have been dead by now.
Sam hurries across the room, ignoring the fractured glass, and kneels next to Dean. Dean lets go of her so Sam can take over, but Sam grabs his arm and holds him in place.
“Thank you,” Sam says.
“Not here,” Dean replies. “We’ve got to get out of here, fast.”
Jess wonders why, but Sam’s face clouds over with understanding. He picks her up then, and Jess feels the jostling as one foot quickly follows the other out the door. It all clicks into place when they’re escaping into the night air and Jess feels hot flames beginning to lick at them from the walls.
They make it out alive.
_______________________________________________________________
Sam stares at his hamburger without saying a word. Jess grabs a fry with trembling fingers and makes a show of eating it in front of him, hoping to get a rise, but he stays impassive.
“What we need to know now is why it came after you,” Dean says.
Jess nods.
“Do you guys have somewhere to go tonight?”
Jess shakes her head. They can probably stay with Brady, but Jess doesn’t think she’ll feel safe tonight without Dean watching over them.
“We’ll get a room, then. You guys can decide what to do from there.”
“I want you to teach me,” Jess says. “It obviously came for me. I want to know how to defend myself.”
Dean shrugs. “That’s between you and Sam. I’m back on the road tomorrow and you two can argue over whether or not you’re bringing guns into your white-picket-fence home.”
Jess looks to Sam for support but he’s still quietly staring at the table. He doesn’t say another word for all of dinner, and Jess is beginning to worry it might be permanent until they get to the motel. As soon as the door closes behind them, Sam turns on Dean, shoves him into the door and starts kissing him forcefully.
Dean moans and kisses back until he’s able to separate himself from his brother.
“What are you doing, Sammy?” he asks, trying to keep his voice even.
Sam’s fingers tangle in Dean’s shirt and he tries to go back in for his brother’s mouth, but Dean turns away, forcing Sam to answer the question. Sam buries his face in Dean’s neck.
“You saved her. You saved her. She would have died. You saved her.” Sam kisses him again, then presses his forehead against Dean’s and smiles weakly. “I don’t know what I would have done. But you saved her.”
Dean smoothes his hand over his little brother’s cheek. “Shh, it’s all right.”
“Not all right,” Sam says. “She would have died because of me. I couldn’t even make it in time. But you could. You always did.”
Sam turns to look at Jess with wet eyes. “He always did,” Sam explains with a slightly hysterical edge. “And I left him anyway. I left him to come put you in danger. And he still saved you.”
Jess nods, a little confused by the way Sam’s justifying himself to her.
“I can’t go back with you, Jess. Whatever it is will just try to hurt you again. I have to stay with Dean. Because he’ll help me kill it. And…I can’t go back with you and put you in danger again.”
“Sam,” Dean says, like the words hurt him. “Go back with her. I’m gonna get it for you.”
“Not alone, Dean.” Sam kisses him and whispers so softly, Jess really thinks she isn’t supposed to hear. “Never alone again.”
Dean lets out a strangled sob. “Don’t say that to me. I know better but I still…” Dean shrugs and, for the first time since Jess has known him, says exactly what he means, “I’ll go crazy pretending that’s true, Sammy.”
“It’s true,” Jess says, watching the way Sam clings to his brother. He’s not letting go again, Jess can’t pretend otherwise.
“Jess, I love you. But, I…”
Dean pushes Sam aside and steps up to take Jess’s hand in his. “Come with us.”
“What?”
“You said you wanted to learn, right? To protect yourself? You’re obviously not safe here, not now anyway. Come with us, just until you’ll be safe on your own and then you can both come back and finish school and I’ll…” Dean licks his lips. “Whatever.”
Jess braces herself, anticipating Sam’s protest, but he reaches out and takes her other hand and squeezes it instead.
_______________________________________________________________
That was two years ago, and Jess hasn't thought of Palo Alto since.
BACK TO MASTERPOST
or
ON TO PART ONE OF HALF A WORLD AWAY
(timestamp set between the Pilot and Part One of Cradlesong)
or
ON TO PART ONE OF CRADLESONG
PILOT
It’s hardly past seven in the morning the first time Jess meets Dean Winchester. The sky is still bright pink, the sun is breaking in through the window, and she can just hardly make out the dark outline of a man, rummaging through the letters on the table. She can’t tell who it is, just knows it isn’t Sam from the way he’s standing, and she’s every bit as scared as she should be.
She tries not to let him hear her, starts planning the ways she’ll get to her phone and call the cops before he knows she’s awake. Somehow, the stranger senses she’s watching and immediately stands up straighter.
He turns, his movement slightly frantic. “Sammy?”
His voice is wet and Jess can tell he’s been drinking, but it’s more than that. He sounds lost.
“Who the hell are you?” she asks, though she already has a feeling she knows.
The guy smirks when he sees her, flips the lights on, and looks her up and down unapologetically before talking again. She wonders if she imagined how fragile he’d been a second ago.
“Sam, you old dog,” he says proudly. “He finally learned a thing or two about picking up chicks, huh? He never would have scored a girl like you back in the day.”
Jess arches an eyebrow. “I’m flattered. Now tell me who you are and what the hell you’re doing here.”
“I, uh. Is Sam here?”
“What’s it to you?”
The man snickers. “Not much, I guess.” He stays quiet for a long time, then shrugs, like he’s decided he might as well just go for something he knows he won’t get. “He’s my brother, all right?”
“Dean.” Jess nods. “I had a feeling.”
He meets her eyes, making a visible effort not to look too excited. “He told you about me?”
All the time, Jess thinks, but she doesn’t say it out loud. From what she knows about Sam’s brother, he has one of those egos people are constantly warned not to encourage.
“Look, can I see him or not?”
Jess bites her bottom lip. “I’m really sorry. He’s not here this weekend.”
“Oh,” Dean says, like it doesn’t matter to him. Jess doesn’t miss the way his body tenses. “Oh well.”
“But he’ll be back on Monday,” she tries.
“I’ll be gone on Monday,” Dean replies. “Thanks for your help. Sorry if I woke you. Didn’t realize he lived with someone.”
“Wait.” Jess steps forward, about to grab him and pull him back, then stops halfway. Dean doesn’t seem like the kind of person you can push around, but he pauses and turns to look at her anyway.
“Yeah?”
“If you call him and tell him you’re here, I’m sure he’ll come back.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Dean replies, letting his unhappiness show for the first time.
“He’d want to see you, I know he would. Won’t ever forgive myself if I let you leave because you didn’t want to interrupt his hunting.” Jess laughs but Dean’s face immediately blanches.
“He’s hunting?”
“Yeah, I was surprised, too. He never really struck me as the kind of guy who likes shooting things for fun.”
“He never really was,” Dean says, sounding weirdly put out about it.
“He said it was important, though. He went with a friend of your dad’s, maybe nine or ten hours ago.”
“Caleb?”
“That could have been it.”
Dean nods. “It was.”
“You’re welcome to stay here until he gets back,” Jess says. “The couch is more comfortable than the bed most nights.”
Dean smiles. “Appreciate that, but, uh. Shouldn’t be here to begin with, so. I’ll just go.”
Jess doesn’t know why it’s so important to her that she not let him leave, but she can see the look on Sam’s face if he ever found out he missed a chance to see Dean, and she’s not up to dealing with it.
“You have to stay.”
“Wow, you two must have a lot of fun bossing each other around.” Dean smiles to himself, and, to his credit, he looks genuinely happy for a moment. “It was nice meeting you.”
“Jess.”
“Huh?”
“‘It was nice meeting you, Jess.’ You didn’t even ask my name.”
Dean makes a face that clearly says he thinks her etiquette lessons are a joke. “All right, sweetheart,” he replies, grinning when Jess grimaces at the epithet. “It was nice meeting you. I’m leaving now.”
She watches him until the door is open and then gets really desperate. “He misses you.”
Dean stops as predicted, but doesn’t seem to waver on his intention to leave. “He left messages,” Dean says, as if to himself. “I came because he said…but then most of them are old anyway. He doesn’t call as much since,” he turns to look at her, “you met him in November, huh?”
Jess nods.
“Yeah, I guess that explains a lot.” Dean’s lips turn down. “Don’t tell him I was here, okay?”
“You’re exhausted,” Jess says. “You drove all night to see him, didn’t you?”
Dean rolls his eyes. “I came to help Caleb. Just figured I might as well drive the extra few hours when I heard he’d found someone else for the job. Guess I should have figured it out, but I didn’t. But I didn’t really go out of my way, either.”
“Just stay one night. He might come back tomorrow and you’re going to need to sleep soon, anyway.”
“I’ve got somewhere to be,” Dean says without conviction. “Need to get going as soon as possible.”
“You’re scared to see him. So why’d you come at all?”
“Scared of Sammy? That’s a joke,” he says, not meeting Jess’s eyes. “I told you, I was nearby, figured what the hell. I’m not gonna wait around for him.”
“He wants to see you, Dean. I promise he wants to see you.”
“Yeah, well. It’s best if he doesn’t.” Dean looks at her closely. “He’s taken care of. I guess that’s all I wanted to know.”
“You’re sleeping here,” Jess says, no nonsense. “If you really want, you can leave before he comes back. I won’t call him unless you want me to. But you’re not driving any more until you’ve had some sleep.”
Surprisingly, Dean immediately buckles under the mommy act. He nods and lets her get a pillow and some sheets for him and even says thank you before preparing the couch and settling in for the night.
_______________________________________________________________
Jess more or less tricks Dean into staying the next day. She’s already got breakfast spread when he wakes up and as much as his eyes dodge to the door, he can’t bring himself to say no.
It’s not entirely selfless, Jess probably doesn’t have the stamina to keep Dean here until Sam can see him, even if that is one of the major reasons she wants him here. No, Jess has her own agenda.
Sam doesn’t let her in. Jess can’t blame him, especially now that she’s seen Dean. There’s always been something about Sam that breaks her heart, she never understood it, but it was there. She doesn’t understand it now, either. Dean doesn’t bring immediate answers, but she sees it in him, too. Something went terribly, terribly wrong for them, and Jess can’t fault Sam for wanting to hide it from her, for trying to leave it behind. She does idly wonder how he could leave Dean with it, why Dean hasn’t tried to lose it like Sam has.
Dean is something Jess is never supposed to understand about Sam. He doesn’t say anything about their lives as kids, hardly mentions their dad, but Sam can’t keep Dean’s name in his mouth most days, no matter how hard he tries. Whatever it is, whatever caused it, Jess needs to understand it, because she’ll never understand Sam until she at least has some idea of what their relationship was like.
Jess knows it’s not safe-she’s seen Sam’s eyes go dark when he lets himself talk about Dean without the muzzle on. He only jokes about his brother when he’s in control: snide comments about girls Dean would like, weird habits of Sam’s that he blames on his brother’s eccentricities, or funny stories about the trouble Dean would get into. It’s only when he’s drunk or tired or sick that Jess hears just how reverential the name really is to him, and Jess has heard enough slurred memories to read the way Dean’s fingers tremble now, despite the tough act he’s putting on. Jess needs to know exactly what it is they’re both so scared of, why they both choose to be apart when it’s obvious they care about each other this much.
She plays dirty once she’s got him stuck, because there’s just one thing she knows for sure about Dean, one thing she knows would be true about Sam if the situation were reversed: he won’t leave when she’s telling him about his brother.
It only takes five minutes, four pieces of toast, three scrambled eggs, two cups of coffee, and one drop of Sam’s name for Dean’s guard to come crashing down. He starts asking questions. She gives the longest answers she can formulate and it’s not long before she’s the one feeling trapped. Dean forgets that he wanted to leave, forgets everything, spends most of the day sitting on the couch listening to Jess talk about Sam.
It takes her a long time to catch on to exactly what she’s been picking up on for the last year. It’s obvious once the thought strikes her, but it’s not the kind of conclusion anyone is supposed to jump to. It’s five hours before she puts together just how close they were.
She’s telling him about some party they went to the previous spring, says way more than she means to about how grabby Sam had gotten at the end of the night. It’s not until Dean’s body goes still and he pulls into himself that she realizes who she’s talking to. She tries to apologize, thinks Dean is uncomfortable with the over share, but then he licks his lips and looks away and tells her it’s okay-that’s when Jess realizes he’s not uncomfortable at all. He wanted to hear more.
Jess doesn’t know what the hell drives her in that moment, but she can’t help delivering. She knows it’s wrong-wrong for Dean to want Sam, wrong for Jess to be okay with it, wrong for her to try to excuse what she does by telling herself it’s what Sam would want. But she can’t shake that thought, can’t stop believing that Sam would never forgive her for leaving his brother unsatisfied.
She pushes closer to him on the couch, feels him trying to shift away. So she reaches out for him, takes his hand and places it on her thigh.
“You know what he did to me then?”
Dean still isn’t looking at her. He tries to pull his hand back, but Jess holds firm, and he gives it up when she starts talking again.
“He brought me back here, laid me out on this couch, right where you’re sitting.”
Dean shakes his head. “Why are you…?” He swallows hard. “I should go.”
“He took care of me, Dean. That’s what he called it.” She slides his hand further up her legs and Dean lets out a hurt sound. “You used to take care of him, didn’t you?”
Dean really does take his hand back then, shoves her away. “Not like that,” he says heatedly. “Never like that.”
Jess’s instinct is to not believe him, she knows they want each other, she’s seen it in both of their eyes. But she sees something else in Dean’s eyes, under all the guilt and fear and lust there’s regret. And Jess doesn’t want to think about what kind of person it makes her, but she feels sick and wrong knowing that neither of them has ever gotten what they needed from each other. She wants to fix it.
“Why?” she asks, before she can stop herself.
Dean’s face screws up, like he thinks she’s crazy for asking. Maybe she is. “He’s my brother. My full-blooded little brother.”
“But you wanted to.”
Dean wipes his hand over his mouth and shrugs.
“He wants you, too.”
“No, he doesn’t.”
Jess crawls back towards Dean and puts her lips against his ear. “The way he talks about you, Dean. I couldn't help falling a little in love.”
She turns his face towards hers and kisses him; his lips only return the pressure for a few seconds before he breaks away, shaking.
“You’re his,” he says. “I couldn’t ever do that to him. I can’t. I don’t even want to.”
“Dean,” Jess says, still close enough to his face to feel his breath. “I…I know this is going to sound insane, but…I really think he would want-”
Dean shakes his head and just keeps shaking it, but he doesn’t get up like he should, or call Jess out on how awful what she’s doing is.
“I miss him, too, Dean,” she says. In a moment of daring, she moves to straddle. He gasps and puts his hands on her hips, grasp tight. She can tell he has every intention of pushing her off, but he doesn’t and Jess can feel him getting hard. “If he were here, he’d show you how much he’d want this. He’s so good to me. Always takes care of me.” She lowers herself again and whispers against his neck, “He fucked me before he left. Came inside of me, too.”
Dean thrusts up, his hands moving to cup her breasts. Jess bites her lip and moans lightly against his skin.
“You mean he…”
“Started the pill last month,” Jess explains.
Dean loses what little control he had then, flips her off him but doesn’t storm off or yell. He trails his hand down her chest until his fingers are right over her clit and he rubs against the fabric covering her up.
“Please,” she begs. “Do it for Sam.”
Dean snickers. “That’s so fucked up,” he says. He sounds like he’s talking to himself instead of Jess. “So fucked up,” he repeats.
His hands don’t seem to agree with him. His fingers gently dip under the elastic of the pajama shorts she never got around to changing out of and he draws them down slowly, eyes locked on hers.
Jess takes a shaky breath and leads his hands back up. Dean pushes under the cotton of her t-shirt and he swipes his thumb over one nipple as he licks his lips and looks back down.
“Can I?” he asks.
Jess doesn’t know why he’s bothering to get permission at this stage, but she nods anyway, kicks her foot into the side of the couch trying to spread herself wider for him. Dean’s face moves down until his lips are brushing her stomach. She can feel that he’s still trembling, still terrified, but he keeps going anyway.
He lowers himself from the couch once he’s gotten past the tan line of her bikini and kneels on the floor beside it, face level with her cunt. He wraps his right hand around her leg, holding her open and steadying himself, and she’s almost positive she hears him whisper his brother’s name before his tongue teases her open.
Jess gasps when his lips meet hers and he licks into her, tongue trying to reach every part of her, like he’s desperate to make sure he’s tasting anything that might still have Sam’s mark on it. Jess’s body arches into his mouth, but he burrows deeper, eating her out like his life depends on making her feel good.
“Oh God,” she groans. “I can’t. Oh my God.”
Dean shushes her and brushes his fingers on her thigh in a soft rhythm that instantly produces a calming effect. Jess’s eyes roll back in her head and her cries die down. She has a feeling Dean has plenty of experience, not just giving head, but soothing, as well, and she gets a dirty thrill imagining how many times those fingers have moved on Sam’s skin exactly the same way, trying to lull him away from nightmares or thunderstorms.
Dean pulls away, his tongue darting out for a few more thirsty licks before he sucks her clit into his mouth and Jess is practically screaming it feels so good. He brings his free hand up, fingers pressing into her and coming away wet, and then he lets his tongue play into her again. Dean’s face is filthy when he pulls away, she can see the shine from her orgasm where the light hits his chin. He licks his lips greedily a few times, then passes his sleeve over his mouth to clean off her come. Despite how much he’s got on him, Jess is still dripping onto the couch, and she doesn’t think even Sam’s ever made her come like that.
Jess sits up, tries to bring that mouth that just fucked her down for a kiss, but Dean suddenly decides to be modest and turns away. Jess’s stomach plummets when she realizes why. Regret is written all over his features.
“Dean?”
“I couldn’t help it,” he says defensively. “I just wanted. I. Sammy.”
“Dean, it’s okay,” she says, laying a hand on his shoulder, but Dean shrugs her away.
“It’s not okay. Nothing about it is.”
“He wouldn’t be upset,” Jess says with conviction.
Dean laughs bitterly. “He would hate me.” His hand reaches out to cup her face, brushes the sweat-slicked hair sticking to her cheek away. “He would hate you, too.”
Jess’s eyes drop to Dean’s crotch. He’s still hard and she figures there’s one way to take his mind off the guilt trip, and maybe he’ll see things a little clearer when he’s not wound up like a cheap alarm clock. She reaches out to pull him close again, tugs on the top of his jeans. “Dean, let me-”
He stands up too quickly and looks down at her sadly. “He deserves better than us.”
Dean wastes no time after that. He’s thrown the few things he brought in his duffel back together and slams the door behind him within a few minutes. He doesn’t even let himself get off before he’s gone.
_______________________________________________________________
Jess showers three times the next day and spends the rest of the time she’s alone pacing the apartment, making sure everything is in order. Dean didn’t stay long, didn’t get much of a chance to leave behind a trace, but Jess can only focus on her reading, television, the other hundred mundane tasks she invents to try to keep herself from worrying for minutes at a time before she’s double checking again.
Sam gets home long after dark, looking exhausted and happy to see her, and renders all of her effort worthless in five minutes. As soon as his eyes land on the table, his face freezes and he steps closer with caution, like the letters might jump up and bite him. Jess doesn’t see anything special in the way they’re spread out, but she does remember seeing Dean rummaging through them the day before when she’d caught him.
Sam’s fingers trail the edge of one of the envelopes and then his head snaps up, almost the exact expression of desperate hope that had been on Dean’s face.
“Dean?” he says, looking around the room wildly. It’s not until his eyes land on Jess that his face falls. “He’s not here.”
Jess shakes her head apologetically.
“But he was.”
“Yes.”
Sam stares at her for the longest minute of her life and says in a calm, thin voice, “You fucked him.”
Her immediate thought is “actually, he fucked me,” but Jess doesn’t think there’s much of a point in making the distinction. She bites her lip and feels her eyes begin to sting with tears, but she doesn’t deny it.
Sam swallows hard, steadies his hands on the dining room table, and then nods, slow and deliberate.
“Sam, I can explain.”
“I wish you wouldn’t,” he says, passing her on the way to their room. He shuts-does not slam-the door behind him.
Jess lets him have the room to himself for as long as she can stand before she knocks and opens it without waiting for a response. Sam is sitting at the edge of the bed with his head in his hands, but he looks up at her when she comes in. His hair obscures too much of his face for her to know just how much trouble she’s in.
“Sam.”
Sam stands up and closes in on her, wrapping his arms around her middle and kissing her. Jess can’t help being a little scared of it, of how hard he’s kissing, but she’s even more afraid of cutting it short, of the possibility that Sam will never kiss her again.
When he finally ends it, he undoes her jeans in one quick movement and Jess bends down to pull them off, obeying the unspoken instructions. He pulls her shirt over her head and smoothes one big hand on her back, slipping it under her bra and unhooking it easily. His face burrows into the hollow of her neck and as his hands continue to touch her, he whispers, “You fucked my brother.”
“I’m sorry.”
He grabs her wrist and pushes her towards the bed. “Lay back, Jess.”
Again, she does as she’s told. Sam strips his clothes off and surprises her by heading for the nightstand, pulling up the bottle of lube they rarely ever have to use. He drips it onto his fingers and positions himself between her legs.
One finger begins to tease at her hole and she gasps. No one’s ever fucked her from behind, but Jess figures Sam knows that and is trying to make a point. It’s an ugly punishment, but probably not worse than Jess deserves, and Sam’s always known how to fight dirty. If she acted like a whore, she’s willing to let Sam treat her like it-the problem is Jess really thought she was doing the right thing.
“Tell me what he did to you,” Sam demands, pressing into her and beginning to work her open.
Jess decides to draw the line there. Sam can torture her for it, but she’s not about to let him torture himself. “Sam, don’t make me say it.”
He makes a hurt sound that goes straight to Jess’s heart, but his response is nothing like what she’s expecting. It’s soft. “Please, Jess. Please, tell me what he did.”
“He ate me out,” she admits.
Sam laughs lightly into her neck. “Bet he did,” he says, pulling his finger out and pushing two in. “God, he always loved eating pussy.”
Jess groans as Sam’s other hand begins to massage her clit.
“It was good, too, wasn’t it? I remember how those girls used to look when he was done with them,” Sam thrusts against Jess’s leg. “Tell me.”
“It was,” Jess breathes hard, “It was the best I’ve ever been fucked in my life, Sam.”
Sam’s moan shakes the entire bed. “Jess.”
“He was everything you ever said. I’m sorry, I couldn’t-”
“Shh.” Sam kisses her, then pulls back looking dangerous again. “Turn over for me.”
“Sam, if you hurt me, you’re going to regret it.”
“Wouldn’t,” he murmurs. “I’ll never hurt you, Jess. Please, let me have this.”
Jess obeys, gets on all fours and braces herself for what she expects to be rough and angry and maybe even hateful. Sam pushes into her gently and instead of speeding up, he makes an effort to keep his pace slow and measured. It hurts only because it’s the first time, and Sam pushes his fingers through her hair and whispers encouragement when the pain makes her cry out.
“Do you want me to stop?” he asks, sounding crestfallen.
Jess shakes her head, turns it enough for him to kiss her if he wants. He does, and Jess feels like he’s accepting an apology instead of just another kiss amongst thousands they’ve shared.
He makes love to her so tenderly Jess almost wants to cry, and even though she knows it’s not her he’s thinking of, Jess has never felt so close to Sam in her life.
Sam doesn’t last long. When he comes, he collapses on top of her, and Jess lets her body drop to the mattress under his weight. He lies on top of her, kissing the back of her neck, breathing quietly. He doesn’t let her turn back over and look at him, and she understands why when he finally speaks.
“I don’t want you to be sorry, baby. I’m not mad,” he says, voice shaking and it’s obvious he’s either crying or just hardly managing not to.
“Sam-”
“I would have done the same thing.” Jess knows instinctively that he’s never said it out loud, maybe never even admitted it to himself until now.
He arranges her on her side then and grabs her into his arms, holding her like a child would a teddy bear, as if she’s the only thing that can protect him from some unknown threat. His hand ghosts down her side and one finger traces her hips. When he finally makes his way between her legs, his fingers move inside of her exactly the way she likes it, and she rolls her hips onto him until her breath leaves in one long moan and his fingers pull back from her orgasm.
“I’m sorry,” Sam says, when they’re drifting off to sleep.
Jess can’t fight the curiosity, has to know what the hell he has to be sorry about. “Why are you sorry?”
“You shouldn’t have to be a part of this,” Sam says. “I’m so sorry we dragged you into this.”
Jess tangles her fingers in his and brings them up to her lips, kissing them. She doesn’t know how to tell Sam that she wants nothing in the world more than to be a part of what he and Dean share. She can’t shake the worry that he wouldn’t believe her.
_______________________________________________________________
When Jess gets home from class the next day, Sam is sitting on the couch with his phone pressed to his ear. He doesn’t seem to notice her entering, so she stands and waits for him to finish.
“Don’t be a coward, man. Answer your goddamn phone already,” he says, angrily. Then his tone softens, turns so vulnerable Jess’s heart feels heavy in her chest. “Dean, please. I know you’re getting these calls. Answer the phone. You at least owe me that much.” He sits silently, letting the message run and at the last moment he adds, “I know about Jess.”
The phone snaps shut and lands on the other side of the couch when Sam tosses it. Jess closes the door behind her, content to let it seem like she just walked in, and Sam turns and smiles with as much genuine enthusiasm as he can manage.
“Hey.”
Jess considers asking about the call but decides not to push unless Sam wants to talk about it. “Hey.”
“How were classes?”
“Oh, you know. The usual.”
“Managed to stay awake in Psych?”
“Just barely,” Jess says, smiling at the surprisingly easy conversation. “How’d you do on your paper?”
Sam shrugs dismissively, which generally means he got an A+ and a marriage proposal from his professor in the margins, but he’s too damn modest to brag about it like a normal person.
“Any plans for dinner or should I make-?”
“Jess,” Sam interrupts. “I called Dean. I asked him to come back. So we can talk about,” Sam shrugs, “I’m sure you can guess what we need to talk about. I don’t know if he’s coming. But if he does, you don’t have to stay if it makes you-”
Jess walks over and puts a hand on Sam’s shoulder over the couch. “Or we could always order something instead?”
Sam turns and rests his face on Jess’s hand. “I love you,” he says.
“I know,” she replies, fingers scratching his scalp lightly. “I love you, too.”
_______________________________________________________________
Whatever his faults are, Dean is no coward. He shows up on their doorstep at half-past midnight, when Sam and Jess were already giving up hope on him and settling for bed, but at least he shows.
Sam answers the door. Jess is sitting on the couch and can’t see either of their expressions, but she’s not entirely sure she’s equipped to handle them, anyway.
“Sammy,” is all she hears for a long time.
She’s not surprised when she turns around and finds them staring at each other, just as unsure of what the next step is as she would be. Dean is caught somewhere between cowering away from Sam and throwing himself into the other man and Sam stands statue still, eyes serious.
“You gonna invite him in?” Jess asks, hoping to move things along. They both jolt a little and look in her direction and suddenly seem to remember where they are and what’s going on.
“I, yeah. Sorry. Dean, come in.”
Dean looks suspiciously from Sam to Jess and back to his brother, shrugs, and follows him inside.
“Do you wanna sit down?” Sam asks awkwardly.
Dean laughs. “Look, man, I drove all the way back here and I didn’t even get drunk enough to numb it. Can we skip the formalities? If you’re gonna kick my ass, let’s get on with it. God knows I’m not gonna stop you.”
“I don’t want to fight,” Sam says, though he sounds annoyed enough for Jess to understand why Dean doesn’t look convinced.
Dean looks up at him and replies in an acidic tone, “Oh, that’s right. You’re so fucking superior, I’m sure you don’t need violence to solve your problems.”
“Don’t be a child, Dean.”
Dean replies by crossing his arms over his chest, and Jess almost wants to laugh, because she’s pretty sure between that and Sam’s pouting, they couldn’t look more petulant if they were children.
“What do you want me to do, Sam? I fucked up. I’m sorry. You can’t imagine how sorry I am.”
“You don’t need to apologize.”
“You know it was all me, right? I pretty much made her do it. You know how I am around pretty girls, Sammy.” Dean struts into the room and drops onto the couch, giving Jess a cocky grin as he takes his place next to her.
Jess doesn’t get a chance to call him out on his lie. Sam’s already laughing before the words are properly out of Dean’s mouth. “Okay, first of all: we’re not here to point fingers. And secondly, don’t act like I don’t know you, Dean. It’s condescending and it makes you look like a moron when everyone in the room knows you’re lying.”
“Just don’t hate her for it, Sammy. She really does care about you.”
Jess realizes Dean’s trying to make Sam hate him, trying to drive him away and back into the normal Jess offers, even when she knows that in reality, Dean doesn’t think she loves his brother enough. Jess has only known Dean for three days and she’s already sick and tired of him making everything his fault.
“Nobody hates anyone, okay? I’m glad she did it, Dean.”
Dean arches an eyebrow. “That’s your business, Sam. What’d you call me all the way back here for?”
“Think we have some things to talk about, don’t you?”
Dean’s eyes dart to Jess, then down at his lap. Jess sees him begin to pick at a loose thread as if it’s the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen. Dean, Jess is beginning to suspect, just isn’t the type of guy who ‘talks about it’.
“Dean,” Sam says, voice hot. “Why’d you do it?”
Dean looks up, shakes his head. “Man, you don’t want to know.”
“I think I already do,” Sam says. He looks to Jess and inclines his head in a way that means he wants her to come closer. She walks up to his side and he turns her around to face Dean, pressing his entire body against her back.
He moves the hair on her neck to the side and begins kissing her skin, one hand slipping into her shirt and cupping her breast. The other slides down, into her boy shorts, and in just a few seconds, Jess is standing there with her boyfriend’s fingers inside of her, watching his brother’s eyes glaze over. It should probably make her uncomfortable that Sam is using her to seduce Dean, but it really, really doesn’t.
Dean shifts in front of her, his arousal obvious, and Sam must see it, too, because she feels his erection pushing into her back as soon as Dean is hard. Jess moans as Sam takes his fingers out of her and brings them up to her lips. Jess sucks on them, watching Dean as she does it. The way she sees it, she still owes him, and whatever his reservations, he wants it, no point denying it.
“Jess,” Sam whispers into her ear. “Get on your knees for my big brother.”
Jess nods and takes one long stride, kneeling in front of Dean, right on the couch where he’d done this to her. Sam sits next to him, Jess and Dean’s eyes both trained on him.
He reaches out, his hand shaking violently, and begins to struggle with getting Dean’s jeans open. Dean’s breath starts coming hard and fast as soon as Sam’s wrist brushes the denim on his crotch.
“Relax, Dean. It’s okay. It’s okay, I promise.”
Dean closes his eyes, pain etched onto his features, and he shakes his head. After a few minutes of clumsy fumbling, Sam manages to get Dean’s dick out. He stares at it with wide eyes, like he’s never seen one before, and then he reaches his hand out to brush Jess’s cheek, thumb tracing her bottom lip.
“Do it, Jess. Before I fucking-come on, suck him.”
Jess doesn’t have to be told twice. She licks up Dean’s shaft, feeling him out, getting as taste of what he likes. It’s mostly pointless, since Jess is pretty sure Dean will like anything that involves getting his dick sucked while his brother sits right there watching, but Jess wants to make it perfect for him.
She takes him in slowly, lips only wrapping around his head at first, her tongue swirling and making Dean groan. Then she starts to take him as far as she can go, until something forces her down even farther.
She feels long familiar fingers tangle in her hair-it’s not Dean pushing her down. She moans and Sam lets her pull up and off of Dean’s cock. She looks up at her boyfriend, knows her lips are glistening with spit and his brother’s precome, and Sam smiles. “Can I help you?”
She nods, prepared for Sam’s guidance this time. Now that’s she’s not taken by surprise, she can keep up with the pace Sam sets. She grips the cushion with one hand and rubs herself through the thin fabric of her shorts with the other. She listens to Sam’s lips sucking at Dean’s neck and Dean actually whimpers.
“That’s me, Dean,” Sam says once he has Jess going at a set pace. His hands continue to rest on her head, but he’s no longer applying any pressure, just riding out the way she takes Dean down. “Those are my lips sucking you. Tell me it’s good for you, I want to make you feel so good, you have no idea.”
Dean cries out, “Sammy,” and Jess doesn’t really mind that she gets no warning, because she knows what’s coming. Dean comes down her throat and she swallows some, saves the rest of it. Unsurprisingly, Sam tugs her up by the hair, lips greedy to share it with her.
They pass Dean’s come between then and Sam brings Jess up to sit on his lap. He fucks up into her, and even through the denim of Sam’s jeans, it’s enough friction to bring them both off almost instantaneously. Dean is still breathing hard and watching them when Jess regains the ability to think. Sam is staring right back at him. The way they look at each other in that moment is probably the most beautiful thing Jess has ever seen and, twisted as it is, she thinks giving them this might be the best thing she’s ever done.
“Dean,” Sam says under his breath, almost like he doesn’t really want his brother to hear, like he has to find a compromise between being too scared of rejection to ask and not being able to live with knowing he didn’t try. “Can I kiss you?”
Dean surges forward, wraps his hand around the back of Sam’s neck, and kisses him wide open, throwing his entire body into it. Sam kisses back in kind, licking deeper and deeper and neither of them seems to know how to break it for longer than Jess has ever seen anyone kiss. Her heart sinks when she realizes why they’re cramming so much into it. It’s a goodbye.
“Dean,” Sam finally gasps when they separate. He smiles, intoxicated and mindlessly happy, and tries to rush forward for another kiss, but Dean stands up and leans back uncomfortably on the balls of his feet.
“It’s bedtime, Sammy,” Dean says, pointing towards the bedroom. He smiles at Sam in a private, inside joke way. “It’s a school night.”
Sam sits for a few seconds before looking over to Jess, taking her hands and standing. He takes Dean’s hand, too, and tugs at his fingers like Dean’s a puppy he can lead around. He looks surprised when Dean doesn’t move.
“Dean?”
“I’ll sleep on the couch.”
Sam frowns. “But you’ll be here tomorrow?”
“Yeah, sure. If that’s where you want me.”
“Dean.”
“I promise, okay? I’ll be right here.”
Reluctantly he nods and heads to bed. Jess stands and watches Dean for a few seconds before she follows. Dean wipes a hand over his mouth and looks guilty, and Jess realizes that he has no intention of keeping his promise.
She wakes up in the middle of the night; the clock on her nightstand tells her that it’s 5:13. There are hushed voices coming from the living room, the door is wide open, and Jess figures that’s what woke her up. She approaches the door and peeks out.
Dean has his bag thrown over one shoulder and Sam is reclining against the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, eyes narrowed to slits.
“Man, come on. Just move.”
Sam shakes his head. “Did you really think I wasn’t going to see through your bullshit? You really think I’m just gonna do as you ask when you promised me-”
“Give it a break. Promises never meant much between us, did they?”
Sam steps forward heatedly. “I never lied to you.”
Dean shrugs. “Felt about the same.”
Sam’s eyes go wide and Dean relents. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. You didn’t do anything wrong.” He looks to the ground. “What do you want me hanging around another day for, anyway?”
“We have things to talk about.”
“I’ve done all the talking I can handle.”
“That wasn’t talking, Dean,” Sam says, almost smirking.
“That was your choice, Sammy. I came back to let you say your part and whether you said it or not, you made your point. Now I’m making mine. Let me go.”
“Why won’t you just hear me out?”
Dean shifts. Sam moves forward, reaches out to brush his brother’s cheek with his fingers. His voice lowers to a whisper, “Is it because you know you won’t leave if I kiss you again?”
Dean recoils from the touch. “Fuck off.”
“This isn’t just what I need and we both know it. I’ve got the drunk voice messages saved, man. Don’t pretend you don’t miss me. That’ll work with anyone else, even dad, but not with me. I know you.”
“Fuck off,” Dean repeats. “And get out of my way.”
“So you’re just going to keep on the way you’ve been going indefinitely? Just to spite me?”
“You know I don’t want to spite you. You made it pretty obvious that this is what you want, I’m just trying not to get in the way.”
“You were never the one in my way.”
“Even if that’s the case, I would be this time.”
“Not necessarily. Dean, everything isn’t one way or the other, there is such thing as compromise.”
“Where’s the compromise between being normal and fucking your brother?”
“Dean-”
“I want you to be happy, Sam. You’ve got everything here. Just…take care of her and, I don’t know, work hard. You won’t even notice…” Dean stops and rubs the back of his neck, licks his lips and laughs as he says, “Hey, if I’m the only thing missing, that’s a pretty sweet deal, right?”
No, Jess wants to shout, but she loses her voice when she sees the way Sam’s face crumples. All the childish hope in his expression gets replaced with something ugly, and he surprises Jess by stepping out of his brother’s way.
“If you’re gonna leave, fucking do it already.” Sam marches out of the room and nearly collides with Jess when he gets to the bedroom. He grabs her shoulders to steady himself, looks down like he hadn’t seen her despite walking straight in her direction as he crossed the entire room. Both of their eyes move immediately to the door and Jess just hardly sees the end of Dean’s duffle as the it closes behind him.
Sam wraps his arms around her middle, buries his face in her neck, and silently cries for his brother.
_______________________________________________________________
They don’t talk about Dean. It’s not just Sam keeping a secret anymore, Jess now knows on a personal level why the subject of Sam’s brother is off-limits. He’s always hanging in the air between them, they’ll share a look and the same shiver will shoot down both of their spines, but neither of them says it. Sam is wrecked after Dean leaves, misses him more than before, and Jess longs just as hard for Dean to come back, just so she can see the smile that had been on Sam’s face in those seconds after they’d kissed.
Sharing Dean brings them closer, and Jess is grateful for it, even though it leaves a good part of her feeling slightly sour. Sam finally tells Jess about their lives, the truth this time instead of the lies that he used to feed her.
By the time he’s done, Jess wishes he hadn’t. Before she’d wondered what could have broken the brothers to the extent their childhood obviously had. When it’s finally revealed to her, she ends up wondering how they made it out at all.
True, she hadn’t been as bothered as she probably should have by what she did with them at the time, but in retrospect, she just wonders why the hell they waited for her to tell them it was okay. Sam and Dean needed each other, and now that she knows that, Jess can’t look at Sam standing around at a party or sitting on the couch reading alone without thinking he looks off somehow. Incomplete.
Jess can tell instinctively when Sam is thinking about him, knows how to treat him when he’s in those moods. Sam begins to cling to the little comfort she can offer like it’s his only lifeline. It makes Jess feel irreplaceable and inadequate all at once.
Sam knows when she’s thinking of Dean, too. She thinks about him more often than she should. She’s only spent a few collective hours with him, but she knows everything Sam can possibly communicate about him, and Sam is not lacking in knowledge about his brother. Jess knows Dean is the only reason Sam ever made it to her. Jess feels like she owes Dean her life, knows that the only thing he would ever want that she has is Sam. Jess used to be the jealous type, but she feels more betrayed not sharing Sam than she would if Dean would just come back for him.
And then one night, with just as little warning as before, Dean does come back for Sam. Sam’s already downstairs bickering with his brother when she gets the lights on and sees who he’s talking to.
Dean plays the part of a stranger, acts like he’s never seen Jess before, like he couldn’t care less about Sam. Dean does an admirable job pretending, looks Jess up and down in the slimy way Sam had once told her he would if they ever met. Sam half goes along with it-doesn’t introduce Jess or pretend she’s never gotten on her knees for Dean, but definitely doesn’t call his brother out.
Jess listens for as long as she can before she decides she’s not having any of it.
“What are you doing here?” Sam asks, coming to stand next to Jess and putting an arm around her waist. To an outsider, it might look like Sam is claiming his own, responding to Dean’s appraising looks. Jess, who can feel his fingers trembling as they squeeze her side for support, knows better.
“Look, we should talk in private.”
“No. Whatever you have to say, it’s Jess’s business, too.”
“It’s not about any of that, Sam. It’s about Dad. Not her problem.”
Sam doesn’t waver. Jess knows he wants her there more for his sake than hers, so she doesn’t even consider giving Dean the privacy he asks for.
“Okay, whatever. Dad’s missing and you need to quit playing house and help me, because I think he’s in trouble.”
“Dad’s never in trouble.”
Dean’s eyes dart to Jess for a second before they fix on Sam again. “He working.”
“On a hunt?” Jess says, inserting herself and making it clear she knows what they’re talking about, so Dean can stop beating around the bush already.
“You told her?”
“Some people know how to hold a conversation,” Sam replies with a bitchy smile.
“Yes,” Dean says to Jess, ignoring Sam’s response entirely. “He’s on a hunt and I can’t get in touch with him, and I’m starting to wor-I’m just starting to think he might need some backup. More than I can give him alone.”
“I don’t see what this has to do with me.”
“Sam,” Jess says, a little shocked. “He’s your father.”
“He’s fine,” says Sam, turning to look at her with an acidic smile. “He’s probably just having the longest hangover of his life.”
“Don’t talk about him like that,” Dean snaps.
“Sorry. How should I be talking about him?”
“With a little respect. He taught you everything you know, you owe it to him to-”
“Not anymore, Dean. I don’t need or want to know those things. Anyway, I can’t help you. I have an interview on Monday. I need to focus on that. My life isn’t about chasing after Dad’s benders anymore.”
Dean’s eyes narrow. “This is serious, Sam. He could be in trouble.”
“Since when was Dad ever so good at keeping in touch that a few days is something to freak out about?”
“Since you ditched us.”
Silence stretches out across the room then, Sam and Dean glare at each other, almost looking like they’ll come to blows. Jess steps between them.
“I think we should go with him, Sam.”
Both of the brothers turn to look at her like she’s not quite right in the head. “We?” Dean asks, raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah. He needs more help than you can offer, right? Three people are better than two, and we can get the job done faster, so Sam can get back for his interview.”
“No,” they both say at once, and Jess congratulates herself on at least getting them to agree on something.
“Why not?”
“This is serious,” Dean says. “It’s not a game and there won’t be time to teach you how to defend yourself. The last thing I need is for this to get more dangerous.”
“I’m not going,” Sam replies at the same time, continuing over his brother so that they’re both lecturing and neither of them seems to notice the other. “It’s not my life anymore and I’ll be damned before I go back to it, let alone drag you there with me.”
“I’m not stupid. I can take care of myself. I’ll stay out of the way if it gets dangerous. I need to see it, Sam. It’s a part of who you are, whether you like it or not.”
“I’m not going, Jess.”
“And I’m not taking you.”
“Well, then. You have fun trying to convince your stubborn brother to go without my help and you have fun trying to get laid without your girlfriend on board.”
Sam rolls his eyes. “Yeah, like you can go that long without sex.”
Dean shifts from one foot to the other, swallows hard. “I don’t wanna know about it, man.”
Jess knows better than to call him on the lie.
“Sam, it’s Dad.”
“The answer is no,” Sam starts, but he stops when he sees Dean’s face, sees how much more worried he is than he’s letting on.
“Please.”
Jess stands on tippy-toe and whispers into Sam’s ear, “Don’t do it for your dad, Sam. Look at him. He needs you.”
Sam sighs. “Alright, Dean. If we can find him and get the hunt done before Monday, I’ll help.” Dean starts to smile, but Sam interrupts him. “But Jess is coming.”
Jess smiles and draws closer to him.
“Absolutely not.”
“Yes, or I’m not going.”
Jess gets why Sam thinks he needs a barrier between himself and his brother, even if she doesn’t entirely agree, and it’s getting her what she wants, so she doesn’t argue.
“She’ll get hurt.”
“I won’t let her.”
“Sam, you can’t-”
Sam smiles thinly at his brother, but Jess doesn’t miss the warmth in his eyes. “I know how to protect her, Dean. I learned from the best.”
Dean shakes his head for a few seconds, then bites his lip. He looks over to the door, but obviously didn’t come all this way just to walk away from his brother half an hour later.
“Yeah, alright, Sammy. You win.”
_______________________________________________________________
For the first day or so, Jess doesn’t really see what all the fuss was about. In fact, she’s a little disappointed by just how dangerous hunting isn’t. Until they meet Constance instead of just reading about her. Seeing her face to face brings it home to Jess that this isn’t something Sam made up. Constance is an actual, real life ghost, staring at Jess in the rearview mirror. And maybe Jess really did get in over her head.
Sam and Jess are driving back to Dean after interviewing the husband when she finds them. She must know they’ve been hunting her, because she shows up without warning in the back seat of Dean’s car. She asks to be taken home, just like all the evidence said she would, and somehow Jess is still chilled when she hears it firsthand.
“No,” Sam answers firmly.
The woman’s face contorts with rage and in the blink of an eye, she’s straddling Sam and looking down at him, the threat clear in her expression.
“You can’t hurt me,” Sam says, smug smile on his face. “I’m not unfaithful. I’ve never been unfaithful.”
Constance laughs darkly and pulls away from him. “Maybe not,” she says cheerfully. “But she has.”
Jess doesn’t even get a chance to panic before the cold body is straddling her instead of Sam.
“No,” Sam cries. He tries to grab at the ghost and throw her off, even though Jess knows that he won’t be able to. “It doesn’t count. She wasn’t unfaithful. She wasn’t. I’m the one she-I’m telling you it doesn’t count.”
Constance’s lips trail Jess’s neck. She whispers ugly things about Jess, but her words only half register in Jess’s mind. All she can really take note of is the sharp pain as the dead woman’s nails sink into her.
There’s a loud shattering sound and the pain stops. Jess feels glass rain over the seat and Sam jumps to shield her from it. As soon as the pieces are done falling, Sam turns back to the steering wheel and presses hard on the gas, crashing the car right into what was once Constance’s living room.
The job pretty much finishes itself after that, or at least that’s how it feels for Jess. Sam gets out of the car; Jess hears shouts and furniture flying and finally gets a quick glimpse of the ghosts of two children as they pay their mother back for what she did to them. She takes deep breaths and waits for the pain to dull as the doors open.
“I’ll kill you if you hurt my car.” The voice picks her up and places her gingerly in the back seat.
“Shut up about the car, Dean. Is Jess okay?”
“Yeah, man, she’ll be perfectly fine after a few hours of sleep. Now you see why I didn’t want to bring her.”
Sam doesn’t answer, just slides into the side of the car where Jess’s head is resting and places it on his thigh.
“I know,” Sam says, sounding sorry. She feels a hand gently thread into her hair. “I wish I hadn’t.”
Jess opens her eyes just long enough to tell him it was the most exciting night of her life and get laughed at before she drifts off.
_______________________________________________________________
“You don’t have to go, you know.” Jess hears it through a haze, just hardly conscious that there are warm hands shaking her awake. They freeze at Dean’s words.
“Don’t do this to me.”
“We’re still so good together,” Dean says, like those words mean more than anything he’s ever said before. “I mean, we make a good team.”
Sam doesn’t answer, starts shaking Jess again. Slowly she opens her eyes and he’s looking down at her, smile much more strained than he intends. “Hey, babe. Time to get up. We’re home.”
Jess sits up, looks out the window, and is struck by the fact that she’ll be going to class tomorrow, same as every other Monday, after everything that’s just happened. She touches her chest where the ghost had split it just to make sure she didn’t dream all of this up and finds that somewhere along the road, Sam took care of the cut.
“Come on,” he says again, stepping out of the door and tugging her urgently. “We need to get to bed.”
Jess doesn’t let herself get a look at Dean as she follows her boyfriend out of the car and back to the apartment.
There’s a light on in the kitchen when they get inside. Jess tells Sam to go ahead to bed since she’s the one who left it on, and gets herself a glass of water before turning it off. It’s not until she’s turning from the refrigerator that she notices the man standing at the other side of the room. His eyes are bright yellow and Jess screams and feels the splash of water and glass breaking on the floor for only a few seconds before he smiles and her entire body is tugged into the opposite wall.
Jess doesn’t get the chance to focus on the pain. The terror dulls it. She’s going to die, she realizes it when whatever the thing is begins to lift her up and she remembers this is how Sam lost his mother, too. She is going to die, and Sam is going to make it downstairs just in time to see it.
Jess hears a gunshot and someone cries her name. The invisible force teasing her upwards lets go without warning, and she slides down to the floor too quickly. She feels the pain then, but only for a moment. Someone wraps arms around her and pulls her into them.
“Jess, look at me. Are you okay?”
Jess nods as quickly as she can and hears Dean let out a relieved breath. He pulls her face into his shoulder and tangles his fingers in her hair.
“Thank God,” he says. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”
“Jess?” Sam asks from the doorway. His hair is wildly in his eyes and his cheeks are pink. Jess can tell he ran as soon as the water dropped and she sobs deeply knowing that she should have been dead by now.
Sam hurries across the room, ignoring the fractured glass, and kneels next to Dean. Dean lets go of her so Sam can take over, but Sam grabs his arm and holds him in place.
“Thank you,” Sam says.
“Not here,” Dean replies. “We’ve got to get out of here, fast.”
Jess wonders why, but Sam’s face clouds over with understanding. He picks her up then, and Jess feels the jostling as one foot quickly follows the other out the door. It all clicks into place when they’re escaping into the night air and Jess feels hot flames beginning to lick at them from the walls.
They make it out alive.
_______________________________________________________________
Sam stares at his hamburger without saying a word. Jess grabs a fry with trembling fingers and makes a show of eating it in front of him, hoping to get a rise, but he stays impassive.
“What we need to know now is why it came after you,” Dean says.
Jess nods.
“Do you guys have somewhere to go tonight?”
Jess shakes her head. They can probably stay with Brady, but Jess doesn’t think she’ll feel safe tonight without Dean watching over them.
“We’ll get a room, then. You guys can decide what to do from there.”
“I want you to teach me,” Jess says. “It obviously came for me. I want to know how to defend myself.”
Dean shrugs. “That’s between you and Sam. I’m back on the road tomorrow and you two can argue over whether or not you’re bringing guns into your white-picket-fence home.”
Jess looks to Sam for support but he’s still quietly staring at the table. He doesn’t say another word for all of dinner, and Jess is beginning to worry it might be permanent until they get to the motel. As soon as the door closes behind them, Sam turns on Dean, shoves him into the door and starts kissing him forcefully.
Dean moans and kisses back until he’s able to separate himself from his brother.
“What are you doing, Sammy?” he asks, trying to keep his voice even.
Sam’s fingers tangle in Dean’s shirt and he tries to go back in for his brother’s mouth, but Dean turns away, forcing Sam to answer the question. Sam buries his face in Dean’s neck.
“You saved her. You saved her. She would have died. You saved her.” Sam kisses him again, then presses his forehead against Dean’s and smiles weakly. “I don’t know what I would have done. But you saved her.”
Dean smoothes his hand over his little brother’s cheek. “Shh, it’s all right.”
“Not all right,” Sam says. “She would have died because of me. I couldn’t even make it in time. But you could. You always did.”
Sam turns to look at Jess with wet eyes. “He always did,” Sam explains with a slightly hysterical edge. “And I left him anyway. I left him to come put you in danger. And he still saved you.”
Jess nods, a little confused by the way Sam’s justifying himself to her.
“I can’t go back with you, Jess. Whatever it is will just try to hurt you again. I have to stay with Dean. Because he’ll help me kill it. And…I can’t go back with you and put you in danger again.”
“Sam,” Dean says, like the words hurt him. “Go back with her. I’m gonna get it for you.”
“Not alone, Dean.” Sam kisses him and whispers so softly, Jess really thinks she isn’t supposed to hear. “Never alone again.”
Dean lets out a strangled sob. “Don’t say that to me. I know better but I still…” Dean shrugs and, for the first time since Jess has known him, says exactly what he means, “I’ll go crazy pretending that’s true, Sammy.”
“It’s true,” Jess says, watching the way Sam clings to his brother. He’s not letting go again, Jess can’t pretend otherwise.
“Jess, I love you. But, I…”
Dean pushes Sam aside and steps up to take Jess’s hand in his. “Come with us.”
“What?”
“You said you wanted to learn, right? To protect yourself? You’re obviously not safe here, not now anyway. Come with us, just until you’ll be safe on your own and then you can both come back and finish school and I’ll…” Dean licks his lips. “Whatever.”
Jess braces herself, anticipating Sam’s protest, but he reaches out and takes her other hand and squeezes it instead.
_______________________________________________________________
That was two years ago, and Jess hasn't thought of Palo Alto since.
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