Big Bang 2010 Supernatural Fanfic: I Touch the Place Where I'd Find Your Face (2/3)
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
:::
Without the burden of the Impala bearing down on him, Sam seemed freer, like he was carrying less weight and could breathe a little easier. It made Dean happy to see his little brother acting like his old self again, even if he only did it when no one else was around - Sam still never opened up around Bobby - and only Dean could see. It was the best Dean had felt since dying, seeing his Sammy toss smiles into the wind without realizing and not immediately covering them with a double-dose of grief.
But the best moment was when Bobby mentioned a hunt during breakfast, and Sam accepted.
“Heard about a case in Medford needs lookin’ into,” Bobby said casually as he bit into his eggs. “Families being killed in their beds with the kids left alive.” He looked up at Sam from beneath the rim of his cap. “Interested?”
Sam’s head lifted from his plate and his rounded shoulders adjusted slightly as he sat up straight and tall. He’d done the same thing with Dad until he was about twelve, sitting up and listening, trying to prove that he could be as good a hunter as Dad or Dean.
Dean smiled and shook his head at the memory - that was a lifetime ago now, back when Sam still worshipped him. Oh, how times had changed.
“Yeah,” Sam answered, hazel eyes sparkling with the dim light of the room and all the earnestness he could muster. “Yeah, I can check that out.”
Bobby pushed away from the table and sifted through his piles for a moment, came back to the table with what looked like an old day-planner in his hands. Dean looked ungracefully - invisibly - over his shoulder and saw dozens of names, maybe a hundred or more, along with phone numbers and addresses and other important information scribbled in its pages.
“You ain’t never been on a hunt alone before,” Bobby murmured as he flipped the pages faster than Dean could read, “so I’m gonna send you on over to Harvelle’s in Nebraska before you take off. They should have some more details about the case for ya there, too.”
Sam’s eyebrows lifted and he nearly snorted. “Bobby? I’ve been hunting since I was nine. I think I can figure it out.”
Bobby let the book fall heavily beside Sam’s plate. “I’m not about to let another Winchester’s death be on my head,” he said, eyes flashing. “You go to Harvelle’s and pick up what they got, or I ain’t lendin’ you the car you’ll need to get you there.” He raised his eyebrows and cocked his head to the side. “How’s that sound, princess?”
Sam shrank a little in his chair, looking humbled but still sure.
“Yes, sir,” Sam breathed, and Bobby got up to wash his plate. Dean watched Bobby’s retreating gait then grinned smarmily at his brother.
“Dude, you just got fuckin’ owned,” he said, voice all jovial with happy memories.
Sam shifted uncomfortably, unhearing, then retrieved his cell phone from his pocket and dialed the number.
:::
The car Bobby wound up lending to Sam was a beat up Dodge Caravan, and Dean winced as he settled into the passenger seat.
“I feel like a freaking soccer mom,” he whined, wishing Sam could hear his brilliantly witty commentary, but really just trying to stave off the sadness of being in a car other than his beloved Chevy. After Sam told Bobby to sell her parts for scrap, Dean had been pointedly avoiding going out into the yard, knowing not seeing the Impala out there would only make him feel heavy where his heart used to beat, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what it felt like to cry as a goddamn ghost.
But when Sam looped the chord of his necklace around the rearview mirror, letting it dangle and swing there as they drove, the heaviness turned into a watery heat that threatened to spill over his cheeks.
It was only after Sam pulled the Dodge into the Roadhouse parking lot that Dean remembered he probably couldn’t actually cry - not having a body, he probably didn’t have any moisture in him to pour out. The thought was oddly comforting.
:::
It was late, the whole place was lit only with a few old, yellow lights above the bar - which provided not only atmosphere, but ample privacy for the small number of hunters gathered together to clean their guns in relative peace. The only sounds other than the scraping of metal were the clinking of glasses and the classic rock coiling out of a jukebox in the corner.
Sam and Dean walked up to the bar - shoulder to shoulder though no one else could see - and Sam sat on a barstool, looking from the young blonde thing pouring and passing out beers and the sexy brunette handling tequila and whiskey like he wasn’t sure whom to approach. Dean shook his head and cast his gaze about the room instead.
“So what’ll it be, handsome?” the blonde one asked Sam, and Dean turned around. She was hot, but total jailbait, even if not on paper. Totally his type once, especially considering the way she angled her hips toward Sam but kept her shoulders back, her chest on display even in her conservative black tank top. Feisty. Dean had liked that. Once.
Sam stammered a little and Dean scrubbed his own face with his hand in embarrassment. “Uh, actually I’m looking for someone.” Sam’s eyes darted around at the hunters dotting the room, then asked, “Can I please speak to Harvelle? It’s for a case.”
The blonde’s eyebrows went high and her eyes half-lidded, like she was looking at an idiot - little did she know how much she looked like one, or how much a quickly-angering spirit really wanted to sock her in the face - then she looked away from Sammy and called, “Mom!”
Sam and Dean both looked up, startled, and watched as the sexy brunette made her way over, skillful fingers settling her assorted bottles on their shelves. She looked to the blonde, who nodded to Sam and smiled before walking away with an exaggerated swish-swish of her tiny hips. The brunette turned to Sam, obviously sizing him up, then asked, “Sam Winchester?”
Sam straightened on the too-small barstool, flustered, and nodded once before extending his hand. “Nice to meet you.” He pursed his lips for a moment, then asked, “Harvelle?”
“Ellen,” the woman answered as she shook Sam’s hand, a warm smile on her face. She looked weathered, but strong and sure in ways that would have made Dean stand up and notice. Once. “Ellen Harvelle. Used to run the place with my husband, and now it’s just me and my daughter Jo.” She smiled again as she released Sam’s hand and leaned her weight on the counter. “It’s a common mistake.”
Sam’s eyebrows shot up through his bangs at her words, his face as innocent as he could make it. “What is?”
“Expecting a man,” Ellen said coolly, that smile firmly in place. It was genuine, the joy of watching a newbie take his first steps. She’d been around for a while, seen this a lot, and she was fond of it. Dean approved.
“I’m sorry,” Sam apologized earnestly. “I just wasn’t told.” She waved a hand, her smile becoming a smirk as she assured him not to worry. Sam laughed with her nervously, and Dean couldn’t place the hint of emotion in his lower stomach as he watched.
Ellen’s face turned somber then, and she looked Sam hard in the eye suddenly, her deep brown eyes wanting to swallow his. “Winchester…” she breathed, then added, “I’m so sorry for your loss. John was like family once.” Once. “We were all sorry to hear he passed.”
Sam’s eyes fell to his hands on the counter for a moment, and Dean reached out for his shoulder. He passed through it like smoke, and Sam twitched a little with the cold.
“And your brother, right?” Ellen asked quietly, knowing she was on delicate ground. “Dean?”
Sam stiffened a little, but he straightened at the sound of Dean’s name. “Thank you,” he said, eyes bright again, though maybe a little manic. Dean fought the urge to really try to touch him. “Really. It’s good to know they’re missed. They were damn good hunters.”
Dean watched as Ellen registered the look in Sam’s eyes, saw her brow crease and her lips tighten, but she never said anything. And as glad as Dean couldn’t help being that Sam was still safe, he was also a little pissed that the bitch hadn’t bothered to say something. Maybe they’d just met, and maybe she didn’t think it was her place to say, but in this line of work, you don’t just ignore signs like the ones Sam was giving.
At least, you don’t ignore signs like that and then hand them a case file.
“Medford, Wisconsin,” she said, retrieving a manila folder from behind the liquor bottles and slipping it into Sam’s hand. “Series of murders in which families are killed in their beds - ”
“But the kids are left unharmed,” Sam finished, opening the folder right there on the bar and leafing through the papers inside. “Who put this file together?”
“I did,” Ellen said simply, her eyebrows rising when Sam looked up at her skeptically. “My husband was a hunter way back when, and I grew up around it. Don’t look so damn surprised.”
Sam smiled, wincing. “Sorry.” He read through a few of the papers, then stopped and looked back at Ellen incredulously. “Wait…they’re saying it’s a killer clown?”
Dean barked a laugh he couldn’t hold in, and tried not to feel too bad when the roadhouse door suddenly slammed shut.
:::
Sam killed the evil clown - turned out to be a Rakshasa, which Dean now officially wished he didn’t know - and damn it if Dean wasn’t proud of him. Sammy was a full-fledged hunter, now, taking on and solving his first case. He sincerely wished he could buy his little brother a beer, but hey, the limitations of spirithood were many.
But God, Dean had hated watching Sam work. He’d done everything just like he would have had Dean or Dad been there to guide him, and Dean knew he’d handled himself and the fucking Rakshasa the way any skilled hunter hoped to be able to. He was strong, smart, and agile - a capable hunter.
But he was Dean’s little brother, and Dean was a motherfucking ghost with absolutely no way to save him if something happened to him. And Dean hated it.
They drove back to Bobby’s that night, and Dean watched Sam sleep harder than he’d slept since Dean died. Dean paced around the room, occasionally tried to touch things properly, and watched Sam. Finally, after four hours of no nightmares, Dean sat on the bed, watched Sammy some more, then gave in and lay down with him. He didn’t get close enough to touch - last thing he wanted was to startle Sam awake with cold all down his back - but as close as he could get. Dean had to protect him. It was his job, his only job - especially now, when he had no excuse to be doing anything but.
Dean sighed as he tried to settle his metaphysical ass into Bobby’s guest bed. He had always known he’d have to let Sammy grow up - and knowing the life they led, he’d also known it wouldn’t be easy - but fuck, he’d never expected to be sitting on the sidelines, forced to watch him sink or swim and powerless to help him. This was supposed to be their war now - looking for Dad and fighting, with or without him, for answers, for good.
They were brothers, they were hunters, and they were becoming equals. Dean should be there to guide him, not just lying here, cold and worthless, trying his best not to wake his baby brother.
Sam shifted in his sleep. Sammy stabbed a beastie in its heart today with a brass pipe, all by himself. His baby brother…who wasn’t a baby anymore.
Dean spent the night memorizing the patterns and curls in Sam’s hair.
:::
That morning, when Sam got in the shower and Dean convinced himself nothing bad would happen to him in there either, he tried to pick up the book Sammy had left by the bed the night before they left for Medford.
It worked.
He couldn’t feel the book in his hand, couldn’t feel the rough texture of the cover between his fingers. He only felt that buzzing, pulsating energy he’d felt when he’d touched the Ouija board indicator - something almost magnetic in his touch, tingling and warm like electricity as it flowed through him and into the book.
Dean stared at it for a long time. He hadn’t expected it to work, hadn’t really been trying after so many failed attempts, and frankly he was a little scared. What if he could only throw it now? Not only would Sammy kill him for hurting his book (funny how you don’t think about how stupid phrases like that sound when you’re alive), but it might just prove…
Dean concentrated with all his might on the book in his hand, on the nightstand four inches below it, trying to gently replace it. The moment his fingers made contact with the surface, the book fell with a thump - but it was less than half an inch from the table by then, anyway.
“Son of a bitch,” Dean whispered to himself, an incredulous smile spreading on his face. It was a fucking start.
:::
Sam kept hunting, taking a running car from Bobby’s yard and crossing the country to the next case. And every time, Dean would climb into the seat next to him, and while they travelled Dean would practice. After so much discouragement early on, he’d been starting to worry that the only way he would ever progress was by becoming violent, and Dean would rather be useless than become a monster. But since lifting the book almost without effort, he knew he could do it with just a little good, old-fashioned training.
He spent hours during a trip to Montana trying to get his fingers around the latch to the glove box, and once he got it open (on the way back), he used another several hours lifting the ID box out of it. He twirled each fake in his fingers, relearning the dexterity hunting had taught him. You’d think almost twenty years of training would fucking cross over into the afterlife with you, but this was apparently a whole different ballgame.
Dean knew it was freaking Sam out a little, watching things float and fall and spin in the passenger seat seemingly by themselves. It wasn’t like Sam didn’t know Dean was there, but was hard to ignore the incredulous, sometimes watery stares from the driver’s seat - and even harder to repress the sinking feeling of guilt every time he noticed it. Dean needed to feel the pride swelling in his chest (and know it was well-deserved) just to keep trying. It would all be worth it eventually.
:::
The four books and glass of water piled neatly in Dean’s hands crashed to the floor when Sammy started to thrash, entangling sheets in his long legs and throwing pillows as he moaned with pain. This wasn’t like the other nightmares; this was something else, something more sinister than guilt manifested in dreams.
“Sammy!” Dean called, reaching out unthinkingly to shake him awake. “Sammy, wake up! Wake up!”
He only remembered that he couldn’t actually touch him when he could feel the skin of Sam’s bare shoulder between his fingers.
Before Dean could really start to take in the implications of the touch, Sam was awake and staring around the room, fear and confusion evident in his eyes and not only from the dream. He looked down at his shoulder with wide, wet eyes, apparently feeling Dean’s hand there as much as Dean did. There was still that barrier of ghostly electricity pulsing just a fraction of an inch from Dean’s fingers preventing Dean from feeling the warmth and life of Sam’s heartbeat, but it was solid and unmistakably real. Dean squeezed gently, and Sam visibly relaxed under his fingers.
“Dean…” he whispered, like he knew there would be no response and was dreading the impending silence.
“I’m here, Sammy,” Dean said, voice as firm and clear as he could make it, praying Sam might hear. But Sam just deflated a little and leaned into Dean’s hand.
“I had another vision, Dean. I…I think we need help.”
:::
The road whizzed by as another of Bobby’s cars - a ’71 Chevelle this time, usually Bobby’s own - sped down the highway, Sam at the wheel. Bobby had suggested they go to the Roadhouse to see Ellen’s friend Ash, who was apparently a genius at tracking demons, to figure out where the hell Sam’s dream was trying to lead him. It was worth a shot, considering all he had to work with on his own was a gun store murder-suicide and a bus company logo.
But they’d gotten on the road as soon as he’d settled down after his vision, so Sam’s eyes were burning and heavy as the sun started to rise over the Nebraska horizon. Sam scrubbed at his face and tried to open his eyes wider at the road. He’d never had to drive right after a premonition before. Dean had always insisted, letting Sam relax and talk - but partly, Sam knew, because it gave Dean a sense of control in an out-of-control situation.
Sam’s head gave an angry throb, and as he threw his head back into the headrest, his eyes fell on Dean’s amulet, vibrating and swaying softly with the motion of the car. God, it would have been nice to let Dean take the wheel from him right now, telling him how it wasn’t safe.
Sam’s gaze flickered to the passenger seat (where, thankfully, nothing was floating - he was glad Dean was learning, but it didn’t make it any easier to watch things flying about the cab) and his mind wandered away from his nightmare…and his stomach clenched suddenly, making him feel a little nauseous and grip the steering wheel a little harder.
He’d been deliberately trying not to think about the few moments after his premonition, before Bobby came in and set him on the road. He’d seen Bobby notice the well-removed pile of fallen books as he came in, felt his wrinkled old-man hand tighten around his bicep and banish the tingling sensation from his shoulder, watched Bobby’s body shiver and his eyes dart around.
Because Dean had been there. Sam had felt Dean’s hand on his shoulder before Bobby ever got there, the vague outline of fingers where no skin was touching him, that weird pins-and-needles sensation you get when your leg falls asleep pressed into his flesh with such urgency and fear that it couldn’t have been anyone else. And frightened as he’d been of the nightmare - of gunfire and blood on the walls - he had felt instantly safe and protected when he felt Dean’s presence.
He sighed tiredly, clutching the unfamiliar steering wheel and feeling a sudden pang of longing for the Impala. His brother’s baby, a family heirloom he wished to God he could have fixed and kept with him as this journey continued.
“It feels weird,” Sam said to the windshield, glancing to the vacant passenger seat, “driving another Chevy. The Impala…she was one of a kind. She was ours.” He smiled sadly and reflected on all the years they’d spent in the damn thing, wishing for the umpteenth time that he could remember the six months of his infancy before the fire.
But mostly, he waited for a response from Dean. Because he couldn’t see him, Sam was never officially certain that Dean was even there - for all he knew, Dean might have freaked and decided to sit this one out - and he forced himself not to hold his breath.
When met with silence, Sam sighed again and leaned back heavily in his seat, disappointed, one hand dropping from the wheel and flopping into his lap, trying to keep his heavy eyelids from falling shut and getting him killed.
A loud, sudden sound burst into Sam’s drowsy head, and he grabbed at the wheel with both hands, correcting the swerve that would have killed any cars also travelling this early. He searched the cab for the noise, confused and panting heavily, and realized it was the radio.
The radio erratically scanning stations.
The radio that had turned on all by itself.
The radio that had now stopped on a station playing the last verse of “Achilles Last Stand.”
Sam choked back tears as he tightened his grip on the steering wheel, long fingers curling around far enough to cut his fingernails into his palm around it. And he smiled.
“I hear you, Dean,” he said. “I hear you.”
:::
Ash tracked the bus logo Sam drew for him with some kind of crazy computer software Dean had trouble even looking at and told them to go to Guthrie, Oklahoma. There, Sam tracked down a guy - Andy Gallagher - who could manipulate people into doing anything he wanted, just by asking. Dean didn’t like it, knew he should have felt his trigger finger twitching as soon as he saw him, but…Andy was such a goddamn good guy, Dean just didn’t have it in him to hate him.
Sam went to the gun store and managed to keep the gunman out of it, then watched him answer the phone and promptly step in front of a bus. Dean held onto Sammy as the ambulance took the body away, let him rock and cry and feel guilty regardless that it wasn’t his fault.
As bad as Dean felt for the guy, the only thing he could focus on was the fact that he was holding Sam, arms wrapped around his shoulders and chest pressed flush against Sam’s back. Protecting him, keeping him safe, just like he should be. And although he couldn’t quite feel Sam’s clothes or skin or tears through the otherworldly electrical field separating them, it made him feel safe, too.
Sam had another vision, a lady this time, dousing herself with gasoline before touching her car’s cigarette lighter to her coat. Sam couldn’t get to her in time - showed up to the scene at the same time as the fire trucks - but Dean knew he saw the pattern: Sam said both victims had received phone calls only moments before their deaths and were told to kill themselves. It could only be Andy.
And Sam - Dean’s geek brother Sammy, who’d cried over clowns and made Dean double check his closets and under his beds until he was twelve - walked straight up to Andy’s sweet-ass van, yanked open the door, and put two bullets in his head. The little pothead probably hadn’t been able to see more than an outline of Sam through the smoke.
Dean couldn’t remember having ever been afraid of his brother. But they say there’s a first time for everything.
:::
Sam had another vision, a girl in a nightgown leaping off the edge of a dam. Some frenzied digging proved Andy had a twin named Anson Weems and that he also apparently had a keen knowledge of the Force. Sam sniped him and saved the girl from jumping, and they left town at breakneck speed, never pausing to figure out a goddamn thing.
:::
Dean shouted and screamed until he had run out of ideas how to get Sam’s attention.
“What the fuck, Sam? That was a human being back there!”
Sam never took his eyes from the road, either because Dean was a motherfucking ghost and couldn’t talk or because Sam was a stubborn bastard and refused to listen.
“This isn’t like you, man.”
The first was far more likely, but Dean suspected the latter nonetheless.
“You talked to Max Miller, gave him like three second chances, but you blow this guy away?”
The funny thing was, he used to tell Sam to save his breath.
“What the hell happened back there, Sam?”
Luckily, Dean had no breath to waste.
“Sammy! Fucking answer me man!”
Sam stared out at the road.
Frustrated and incredibly scared, Dean grabbed for the glove box and yanked it open viciously, nearly wrenching the door from its hinges. He reached inside and just started slashing at the contents, all the badges and ID cards falling out of their box and through his lap onto the seat, onto the floor through his feet. Then he grabbed at the hard plastic of the dash and did his best to rip it from its place and throw it across the car.
He saw the way Sam jumped, how he stared with wide, deer-in-headlights eyes at what must have looked to him like a sudden explosion and cascade of laminated paper and receipts, felt the car slow to a stop in the middle of the road - and he did not fucking care. Sam was allowed to just do what he wanted and not give a shit? Then so could Dean. Who could reprimand him now, where he was, anyway?
This? This was rage. Dean had known rage precious few times in his life, and he’d never snapped like this before (maybe because before he’d always been driving his own fucking car, and he’d never have done anything to hurt her, but that was obviously beside the point). The kind of energy humming within him every time he’d gotten a little angry since he’d died was nothing compared to the thrumming, pulsating power in him now.
And honestly? It felt fucking fantastic.
“Dean?”
Sam’s voice was so small, not twenty-three but maybe eight, and it pierced right through all Dean’s anger and violence and fear. He turned his head and looked at Sam, panting purely out of habit, half expecting a child to be sitting in the driver’s seat beside him. His little brother’s face was crestfallen, slack with guilt and sadness and shock, and Dean - nearly literally - deflated. He felt empty, vacant inside, the intense energy from before vanished, leaving a hole.
Dean’s chest swelled and his stomach hurt, and if he’d been able tears would have streamed down his face. But all he could do was heave his shoulders and gasp for air he didn’t need. He hung his head and saw the fake IDs strewn on the floor, passing through him like nothing, a glaring reminder of what he’d done.
He looked back up at Sam, and whispered, “Sammy…Sammy I…”
And Sam sat up a little straighter, tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. Then his eyes flew wide and he leapt back in his seat, slamming into the door and cracking his knee on the steering wheel.
Dean’s brow furrowed as he looked at him, confusion a moment’s respite from the shame. “Sammy, what’s wrong?” he whispered, forgetting again that Sam wouldn’t hear.
But Sam answered.
“Dean…” His voice was trembling, still childlike but tinged now with the weight of having seen too much. “Dean, I…I can see you!”
Dean’s eyes widened and he looked down at himself like an idiot, not thinking about the fact that he’d always been able to see himself. But when he stared down at his hands, his legs, his chest, he saw that Sam was right. He was visible now. He couldn’t have described the difference if he’d tried, but he felt it - an intangible something that meant that yes, he was visible, maybe even solid.
He lifted his head and fixed his eyes on Sammy’s, which had lost all traces of fear and been filled instead with what Dean could only have called longing.
“Sammy?”
“Dean.” Sam’s voice was a sigh, and his lips pulled into a small smile. His shoulders relaxed and he seemed to melt a little into the cracked leather seat, content to just stare at Dean’s face. There was a time, before, when Dean would have blanched at this much eye contact, declared it a chick-flick moment and teased Sammy until he sulked out the window again.
But this wasn’t before. This was a completely new and different time, and Dean had gone months now without being seen - hell, with hardly any acknowledgement - and having Sam’s hazel eyes actually focused on him was making him feel more real and important than he’d felt in…
Well, probably years, actually.
Sam lifted a tentative hand in question, and Dean just nodded. He didn’t know what would happen, how he had become visible or how he was maintaining it, but if he was solid, even for a moment, all he wanted was to feel Sam’s touch. Sam reached forward, stretching his arm slowly toward Dean’s face - Dean tracking his long, callused fingers as they approached - and brushed Dean’s cheek.
Or rather, brushed the air just beyond Dean’s cheek.
Dean could have died all over again for all the disappointment crashing down on him as he felt Sam pass through him. But Sam’s face was intrigued - though now streaked with a few rogue tears - as his fingers turned and twisted through Dean’s face, and Dean couldn’t fight a smirk at that, no matter how wobbly it was. Sammy was doing his geek thing, analyzing a ghost.
“It’s so weird…” he muttered, eyes raking over Dean’s eyebrows and nose, fingers sliding through the ozone that was Dean’s cheek, neck, shoulder. “It’s cold, but…there’s like, static.” He pulled his fingers free and looked at them like they weren’t his anymore, flexed them, then looked past them at Dean’s face. “What the hell are you made of?”
Dean shrugged and, voice cracking, answered, “Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails?”
Sam huffed a laugh, caught off guard. “Right,” he said, little boy grin on his face, white teeth all gleaming in the fading afternoon light. At that moment, Dean could have argued that face to be the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, as long as it was directed at him.
Then Sam pressed his lips together, smile tight now as his eyes turned sad. “God, I’ve missed you, Dean.”
Dean felt pressure under his eyes and in his throat, the closest he got to actual tears anymore. “I’ve been right here, Sammy. I never went anywhere.”
Sam’s smile widened for just a moment before it fell completely. “Dean?” he asked, eyes frantically searching Dean’s eyes. “Dean!”
“What is it, Sam?” Dean asked, but he knew Sam couldn’t hear him. He felt himself flickering, losing whatever it was that made him visible, and when he looked down at his legs he actually saw them disappearing. He looked back up at Sam, searching for his gaze, but his eyes were darting all over Dean’s side of the car. Unseeing.
“No…” Sam sounded broken. “No, don’t you leave me again!”
“I’m right here, Sammy,” Dean tried to reassure him. “I’m right here.”
Sam turned away, folded his arms over the steering wheel, and cried.
:::
New hunt, angry spirit killing off blonde girls in Philadelphia. Sam was still driving Bobby’s Chevelle, having been loaned it indefinitely after a number of hunts kept him too far from South Dakota to bother bringing it back every time. Sam also suspected Bobby knew about Dean, and that giving him the car and the means to get out was his way of telling him he didn’t want any part of it. It hurt, feeling like he’d been cut off, but the words had never actually been said and Sam had decided not to buy into all that wordless-understanding bullshit from Bobby. So he’d just driven away, Dean’s necklace a permanent fixture on the mirror now, waving to Bobby and promising he’d return.
Sam pulled into a motel parking lot and paid for a room with money he’d earned from Bobby at the yard (plus a little he’d hustled, he wasn’t proud of it), hauled his duffel and a box of library records to the room and walked inside - stomach pulling at the sight of the single king in the middle of the room - to settle in for research. He knew the ghost’s MO, he just needed to figure out who he was.
But as Sam searched death records and town history, he started to think about Dean. About his face, his hair, his everything…how he’d looked exactly the same as he’d looked before he died. Sam had almost forgotten how green his eyes were, how many freckles splashed across his nose, how soft and round and red his lips looked against his pale skin.
His stomach churned in punishment - how could he have already started to forget?
But thoughts of Dean’s face were interrupted by just how angry his brother had gotten after Guthrie. The cardboard box they kept the IDs in now was a replacement of the wooden box Dad had given them, which Dean had actually broken; he’d nearly torn the glove box apart, and the hinges were bent, but Sam had managed to make it close properly before they got back to Bobby’s - and he’d nearly cried in relief when Bobby basically told him the Chevelle was his, because it meant Bobby wouldn’t see the damage.
Not that Sam could really blame him - Sam had pretty much wanted to kill himself after he found out he’d shot the wrong man, couldn’t believe he’d detached himself so much that he hadn’t even tried talking to the guy, just up and shot him. He tried to tell himself it was the dreams, they had been so violent and horrific he’d just taken action without thinking, but he knew the truth. He was losing touch, falling away from who he had been just like he had after Jessica.
The truth was, the only thing grounding him, keeping him from letting his own anger and obsession fly off the deep end, had been Dean. And being without him all this time - not seeing him, feeling him - had made him lose sight of the person he wanted to be. The good person he was with Dean.
But as much as Sam was relieved that Dean was learning - evolving - and wanted to believe that Dean wasn’t malevolent, he couldn’t ignore that Dean was obviously getting stronger. Just like what they’d hunted before. And knowing that was starting to weigh on Sam’s conscience.
Sam stared at the pointless painting of a log cabin on the opposite wall, dropping all pretense of research, and thought of all the spirits he’d put down in his life: all the women in white, so haunted by betrayal and tragedy; the people murdered and cursed to seek justice or revenge; the parents and children, the evildoers and saints he’d been thrown around and pinned to walls by, grabbed and choked and hurt by…
And they were all people once too. People who had lived lives, who had hobbies, interests, goals, ideas. People who had been loved.
Dean had wanted to do right by his mom and obey his dad. He’d lived the life of a hunter and a soldier, a son and a brother. Dean had been loved by Mary, by Dad, in his way, and by Sam. And he’d always, always, protected Sam, no matter what. And that kind of devotion…that doesn’t just go away. No one just stops caring, and Dean certainly wouldn’t.
So Dean had gotten angry and taken out a glove box. Sam had lost sight of himself and killed an innocent man.
They weren’t even, not by a long shot. But, Sam figured as he returned to his files, it was as good a place as any for a fresh start.
:::
Jo Harvelle showed up in Philadelphia looking for the same angry spirit as Sam (who had turned out to be H.H. Holmes, America’s first multi-murderer). Sam used her trim waist and blonde hair as bait for the damn thing and almost got her killed. Dean dashed in at the last moment and fought the thing back - just as he’d fought Tessa in the hospital before he knew who she was - while Sam and Jo set salt lines to keep him locked in his basement of horrors. Sam sent Jo on ahead before very carefully breaking the line to let Dean out. Dean was sure Jo noticed something, but she never said a word.
It left them both uneasy. Dean could tell Sam was worried they might be found out, that Jo might go tell her mother and alert the whole hunting community that Sam Winchester was hunting with a ghost. They’d be hunted themselves if the word got out, Dean’s remains would be found and burned, Sam would be killed and so might Bobby. There was definite cause for concern, but shaky ground was no reason to cause more trouble if they’d actually gotten lucky.
Dean was freaking out on a completely different level. He’d been fighting a spirit - one of his own, as far as any hunter was concerned - and had been trapped by a ring of salt. In all his years hunting things, he’d been the one laying the salt line, grinning as some unsuspecting ghost or demon tried to cross and was halted in its tracks, watching it writhe or grimace or sometimes even burn. He’d packed salt rounds into shotguns, and though Sam had hit him with one once, he knew that pain wouldn’t be anything like being hit with one now. He’d officially joined the ranks of the undead. And it sucked.
:::
In Greenwood, Mississippi, four people struck deals with a crossroads demon ten years ago, and now it was sending hellhounds to collect their souls.
“My wife.”
Evan Hudson, a lonely man in an office, hearing barking when there was nothing there.
“I was desperate.”
Sam talked to the man, Dean stared out the window.
“Julie was dying.”
Dean could see the hellhounds from the window, barking and clawing at the house, not quite free to attack yet.
“She had cancer, they’d stopped treatment, they were moving her into hospice, they kept saying...a matter of days.”
They were hideous, those things. Snarling teeth, huge red eyes just like the crossroads demon’s, mottled black skin and no fur. They looked charred, beaten, tortured into a mindless ball of hatred and evil on four legs.
“So yeah, I made the deal. And I’d do it again. I’d have died for her on the spot.”
“Did you think of her in any of this?” Dean whispered as he stared through his self-imposed reflection at the hellhounds. “You selfish bastard, did you even consider that she would have to live without you now?”
Sam spoke to Evan, told him he’d do his best to save him, but Dean could see his bluff. There was nothing Sam could do to save him, short of killing every hellhound that ever tried to collect on Evan’s soul. But they had no weapons they knew would work on a hellhound, and even if they did, Sam couldn’t see the hounds and neither Evan nor Dean could handle a weapon.
Dean watched Sam pour salt and Goofer dust lines in front of the doors and windows, stood beside Sam and in front of Evan as they made their stand against the hounds, but in the end it didn’t matter.
Evan Hudson was puppy chow, it was his own fault, and they couldn’t have done anything about it.
And Dean? He didn’t see Evan Hudson lying there, torn to pieces in a pool of his own blood. He saw his father, gasping as his heart gave out, writhing on the hospital floor. Screaming about a cheat.
:::
“This is about Dad, isn’t it?” Sam asked the still air around him in his motel room.
They left Mississippi as soon as Evan was dead; Sam hadn’t been able to bear the sight of him. He’d stopped the car in Texarkana, Texas, after driving for five hours to clear his head made him almost crash into a pole, but now that he was settled he found he couldn’t sleep. Not without seeing Evan Hudson’s blank eyes and bloody chest in his head, without wishing he could have done more to save him or get rid of the demon, without thinking of Dean’s complete silence the whole drive here - he didn’t even fiddle with the radio when Sam offered it.
And now all he could think of was Dad, dead in a hallway in a hospital in South Dakota. Dad dead of a heart attack when he was healthy as a horse. Dad screaming about a cheat just before he collapsed, an altar in the boiler room and the Colt missing.
“You think maybe Dad made one of these deals?” he asked the ceiling. “That he was dealing with the Demon for your life when he died?”
The room was quiet, wind outside and nothing but his breathing inside. Sam sighed, tried to get comfortable on the bed.
“He did the right thing, you know,” Sam said as he closed his eyes. The nightmare images in his head flashed again, but he stared past them at the swirls of dark and color inside his eyelids, seeking out sleep like he’d needed for days.
“Dad was too obsessed, too consumed with hunting. He was losing sight of what mattered. He tried to give his life for yours because he knew you’d hold our family together like he never could.”
Sam felt himself drifting off to sleep finally, but forced his eyes open. “I miss the hell out of him, Dean. I really do.” He propped himself up on his elbows, shoulders shrugged up by his ears, looking into the darkness at nothing in particular. “But…I’m really glad you’re with me.”
At the corner of the bed, where Sam’s feet were burrowed into the sheets, Sam felt a warm blanket of electrical current cover his ankle. He stared at where Dean was making contact, half a sleepy smile on his lips, and as he watched Dean started to appear. It wasn’t a shock like before, when he’d just suddenly appeared - it was like he faded backwards, materialized like they used to on the Enterprise - so Sam stayed put and just watched, took his brother in.
And maybe it was just because Sam hadn’t seen Dean properly in months, but…Dean looked beautiful.
His head was bowed, staring at his hand where it rested on Sam, green eyes hidden behind long eyelashes. A small expanse of his neck was visible before it was covered by the upturned collar of Dad’s old jacket, shining and pale against the weathered leather and sprinkled with stray hairs his razor never reached.
Sam pulled himself into a more upright position and reached for Dean, remembering the cold electricity that had swallowed his fingers the last time he’d touched him and craving it. It wasn’t how Dean normally would have felt - Sam knew every curve and contour of his brother’s body from having stitched it back together so many times - but he needed the direct contact, no however alien it felt.
Dean raised his head and tightened his grip on Sam’s ankle, and Sam suddenly remembered spraining that same ankle playing soccer when he was fourteen. Dad had gotten pissed and forced Dean to stay home and take care of Sam instead of letting either of them hunt, and Dean had gotten bored enough that he’d let Sam have his first beer. It was a great weekend.
Expecting a shivering charge, Sam’s heart pounded when his fingers collided with cool leather. His eyes snapped to Dean’s, met the bright green of them with surprise and anticipation, and realized that Dean’s hand on his ankle didn’t feel like pins and needles anymore: it felt like a hand.
:::
“Dean…”
Dean leaned closer to Sammy, lifting himself from where he sat on the bed to embrace him. It was taking all the concentration he could muster to keep himself solid, he didn’t know how long it would last and wasn’t sure if he could talk, but he’d take whatever he could.
“Oh God, Dean!” Sammy gasped as he grabbed Dean tightly and held him close. “God, I’ve missed you, man…”
It was probably the most intimate contact they’d had since they were kids, Dean draped awkwardly over Sammy’s chest and lap, molding into him like this, but neither of them cared, so starved for each other over the last few months. Dean let his eyes drop closed and just let the feel and smell of Sammy fill him up where his breath should have been, deep inside where he could feel the last sensations of pins-and-needles tingling at him, reminding him how short this moment could be.
He pulled away, smiling when he felt Sammy resist and keep his hand determinedly resting on his hip, and looked up at his brother, desperately searching his face, trying to communicate. He was terrified to speak, afraid his solid body and image would fall apart the moment he opened his mouth, but…he’d already wasted one opportunity to speak to his brother, and who knew when he might get the chance to be this real again? Dean licked his top lip carefully, mustering courage, and started off easy.
“Sammy?”
Sam released a breath he must have been holding, watery smile on his face. “Dean…you can talk again.”
Dean nodded and replied, “I don’t know for how long. It’s…it takes a lot of concentration, you know? And if I overdo it I’ll pay for it later, so…”
“Pay for it?” Sam asked urgently, eyes wide in concern and that intense, Sammy-style curiosity. “What do you - ?”
“Just,” Dean interrupted, feeling himself going static-y inside and knowing he was pushing it, “let me talk, okay? I promise I’ll explain when I can.”
Sam swallowed and nodded, and Dean nearly laughed when he saw a flash of his brother’s angry stubbornness in his eyes before he fought it back.
Dean took a big breath - he’d managed to stop bothering when he was invisible, but being physically relevant seemed to be bringing back unnecessary habits - and grasped Sam’s wrist. For some reason, now he was here, this was turning into the hardest thing he’d ever had to say.
“Sammy…” Dean began, starting somewhere familiar. “God, I wish I could have been here all this time. I could have protected you. I should have protected you.” He buried his face in the crook of Sam’s neck, taking in Sam’s smell and muscle and strength. “I’m so sorry.”
“For what?” Sam asked. “For dying? Dean, no one could have helped that, no one…Jesus, Dean,
“Sammy, I…” He stared at the sheets for a moment, rumpled in Sam’s lap, before looking back up and directly into Sam’s eyes. “I need you to know something, okay? I…”
“Dean?” That wasn’t Sam’s active-listening voice. “Dean, I can’t hear you.”
Something twisted hard and fast in Dean’s chest, something that tasted like panic. “Sammy?” he called, trying to raise his voice in every way he knew how, straining against Sam as he shouted. He couldn’t let Sam go now, couldn’t bear him not to hear…
But Sam lifted the hand he’d kept on Dean’s hip and pressed it against Dean’s shoulder instead, not holding him back but anchoring and soothing him. “Dean, it’s okay. I…I’d love to hear you talk some more, but I’d rather you just be here, okay? So if you have to be quiet to stick around and be visible for me, I…I’ll take it.”
Dean nodded, eyes leaving Sam’s for a moment to berate himself before lifting again. Those goddamn puppy dog eyes were going to be the death of him. (Oh, wait…)
God, Sammy… he thought, hoping maybe his psychic bullshit would somehow let him hear it this way. I just need you to hear…I don’t care if I sound like a chick, I fucking love you, Sammy. Why can’t you hear me?
Dean pressed himself closer, trying to figure out how to project what he was thinking into Sammy’s giant head. Can you hear me, Sam? Failing that, desperation building in him, he tried to speak again. “Sammy?” But he didn’t hear his own voice either anymore.
“Dean, stop,” Sam said, consoling and concerned as he kneaded Dean’s shoulder. “It’s okay, Dean, it’s okay…”
“No it’s not fucking okay!” Dean insisted in silence. He wondered what the hell he must look like, mouth working and illusory vocal chords pulled tight with no sound, and it only made him push harder to speak.
He knew Sammy knew what he wanted to say, knew it had gone without saying their whole lives, but something had shifted in him over the last several months and he was starting to feel real fear that something could happen to him or to Sam any day now and Sam would have never heard him actually say it. And right now, staring into Sam’s anxious eyes while his voice betrayed him, he squeezed Sam’s wrist tighter, feeling the skin there, and lunged forward.
And pressed his lips against Sam’s.
He felt Sam’s startled breath puff against his cheek and nose, felt Sam recoil slightly and followed him, pouring all the words he literally couldn’t say into this one, desperate act. He didn’t know how Sam was going to react - for all he knew, he’d pull away and Sam would be wiping at his mouth and clawing at his phone to tell Bobby everything and burn his bones. But in lieu of his traitorous, veil-crossing voice, he had this, and he couldn’t think about consequences right now. It was the most real and pure thing he had that he could give to Sam. And God or whoever knew he would have - hell, had - given more in the past.
He felt Sam relax against him, felt his lips soften and receive the kiss rather than holding tight against it. His hand slid from where it had gone lax against his shoulder to grip the back of his neck and hold them together. It was completely unlike any kiss Dean had ever experienced - no one moved, no one’s mouth opened or even readjusted - they just sat and took each other in. And it made Dean swell to bursting inside, some space where his lungs had been once burning with happiness. They were sharing each other, that was all.
And they were speaking more clearly than either of them had ever done with words.
:::
Sam felt Dean’s lips finally pull away, skin sticking just a little as he did, and when he opened his eyes, Dean was gone.
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