fic: Beggars Would Ride: Epilogue: 5/5 (Supernatural; Dean/girl!Sam; AU)
Beggars Would Ride
Epilogue
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Epilogue | Notes
Or you can read it in one long chunk here.
*
Epilogue
April 2006
"I can't believe you fucking shot me," he mutters, and then hisses in pain as she digs out bits of rock salt from his skin with the tweezers. And it wasn't just the once, either--she pulled the trigger four times. He doesn't mention that, though.
"I said I was sorry!" Her voice is shrill and hurts his ears, but her hands are gentle.
He takes another sip of bourbon, closes his eyes and tips his head back in exhaustion, trying to ignore the pain. "Just forget it."
"Dean--"
"I said, forget it. It wasn't you; it was Ellicott's ghost. I understand." And he means it, mostly. He just wants to fall into bed and forget the whole thing ever happened, erase the image of her standing over him and pulling the trigger again and again, angry sneer on her bloodied face, the sound of her voice saying hateful things. "Are you done?"
She jerks her hands away. "Yeah, I guess."
"I'm gonna go take a shower." He heaves himself up out of the chair, feeling a million years old, weary down to his bones. She looks like he just kicked her puppy, and he brushes a hand through his hair, shakes his head. "It's okay, Sam. Go to bed. Everything will be fine in the morning." It's not a lie if he believes it, right?
He drags his ass into the shower, lets the hot water ease some of the ache in his muscles, wash away the smell of smoke and dirt and rotted flesh, lets the water drown out the things she said, daddy's little soldier, can't think for yourself, pathetic. He'd never thought she'd hated him that much, but given some of his fuck-ups, he can't really blame her. And she knows exactly which words to use to hurt him--that's one thing that hasn't changed at all. He leans his forehead against the cool tile, forces himself to think of anything and everything except what actually happened.
When he comes out of the bathroom, she's asleep--or doing a damn fine job of faking it--curled up in a ball under the covers of the bed nearest the windows. He stumbles to the other bed, which is closest to the bathroom, and collapses into it. They've been sleeping in the same bed since St. Louis ("I knew it wasn't you," she'd repeated over and over, fingers curled in his t-shirt, thumb rubbing over his amulet as if for luck; he'd held her close and whispered that everything was going to be all right, that nothing was going to hurt her while he was around--it worked when she was two and it works now that she's twenty-two, and he'll believe it as long as she does, knows she sleeps better when he's right there to soothe her after her nightmares, that she always has), but he feels the need for space tonight, doesn't want to fight her for the covers and take an elbow to his already sore chest. Feels like redrawing some of the lines they've started erasing since she's been back, needs the clarity of being on one side while she's on the other.
He falls asleep to the sound of her breathing, and wakes to the sound of her on the phone. The tone of her voice confirms who it is even before she says the word, "Dad."
There's no reasoning with her after that, nothing in her head but the need to get to California, to avenge Jess, and it's like dealing with Dad all over again.
They're nearly to Burkitsville when she turns to him and says, "Dean, if this demon killed Mom and Jess, and Dad's closing in, we've gotta be there. We've gotta help."
"Dad doesn't want our help."
"I don't care."
"He's given us an order." He doesn't know why he says it--Sam hasn't cared about following Dad's orders since she was twelve.
"We don't always have to do what he says."
He tightens his hands on the steering wheel, skin pulling white over the knuckles, then forces himself to unclench, tries to sound reasonable. They're both adults, right? Should be able to have a reasonable conversation. "Sam, Dad is asking us to work jobs, to save lives. It's important."
"I understand. Believe me, I understand." She shifts to face him, folds one long leg up underneath her. "But I'm talking one week here, man. To get answers. To get revenge."
Dean shakes his head, because as much as she seems to have changed, she really hasn't. "You're a selfish bitch, you know that? You just do whatever you want. Don't care what anybody thinks."
She sucks in a breath, nods, and looks away for a second. "That's what you really think?"
The words are out before he can stop them. "Yes, it is."
"Well, then, this selfish bitch is going to California."
He flashes a nervous, cajoling grin at her. "Come on, you're not serious."
"I am serious."
"It's the middle of the night! In the middle of nowhere!" She just stares at him, jaw set mulishly, until he breaks. "Fine. But I'm taking you to the nearest bus station." Because there's no way in hell he's leaving her in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night, no matter what she thinks or says. "Don't thank me," he mutters.
Her mouth quirks into a half-grin now that she's got her way. "I wasn't planning to."
"I want you to make sure Dad knows I had nothing to do with this brilliant plan."
"I'm sure he'll know without my telling him."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Dean, the day you don't follow that man's orders is the day the world ends."
His hands tighten on the steering wheel again, but all he says is, "Whatever. It's your ass on the line," and turns up the radio.
He thinks he should be used to her leaving by now, but it stings worse than a blast of rock salt to the chest, which, also thanks to her, he now knows stings like a motherfucker. At least last time, he'd known it was coming; this time, it's like a sucker punch to a barely healed wound. In the six months they've been on the road together, he'd started to relax, get comfortable, started to think she was going to stay. It was a mistake, and this is why.
He heads to Burkitsville anyway, holding onto the job because it's the only thing he has left, but he's gotten used to having her with him again, and now it's weird that she's gone. He's off his game and he knows it--he's always been at his best as part of a team; when she was at school, and he'd started hunting alone, he'd had to recalibrate his timing, his reactions, had to learn to focus, to not always be keeping track of exactly where Sam was and how quickly he could get to her if she wasn't where she was supposed to be. Since she's been back, he's fallen into older, more comfortable habits, and it's startling to be alone again. But he can actually help these people in a way he hasn't been able to help her at all, since Jess died.
At first, she'd locked herself in the bathroom every night and cried. He doesn't know if she'd thought he couldn't hear, or what, but it made him feel like something inside him was breaking every time she did it, because it's the one thing he can't fix--he can't bring Jess back, can't kill the thing that killed her, couldn't even find Dad to figure out what it was until he called.
All he could do was keep searching, keep hunting, and keep Sam safe with him, and now that's gone too. And if she and Dad kill this demon, she'll be gone as well, back to school, and away from this life for good. He knows he should want that for her--has always wanted that for her--but now that he's got her back, he doesn't know if he can take losing her a second time.
Because he loves having her with him, even though she makes him crazy sometimes, with her bitching about his food and his music, about the girls he hooks up with (and he's not thinking about her, he's not; that's over and done, and she acts like it never even happened, so he does, too; never mind the way he wakes up hard and aching in the morning, her body soft and warm and familiar against him) and the hunts he finds.
Her absence keeps him awake, even after the adrenaline rush of the night's work subsides; he's gotten used to having her in the bed with him again, used to the sound of her breath in his ears and the beat of her heart beneath his hand, and sleep is a long time coming.
When she was away at Stanford, he'd never stopped feeling like a piece of him was missing, never stopped expecting her to be there in the room when he came back with coffee (always two or three cups, never just the one, and he always ended up drinking it himself, even if he'd already doctored hers up with milk and sugar), and it was weeks before he'd stopped telling her things she wasn't there to hear, months before he stopped dialing her number and then tossing the phone onto the passenger seat without pressing the 'talk' button.
He can't do that again.
He thinks about the ways she's changed in the time she was away, and the ways she's just the same. She insists on being called Sam now, instead of Sammy, and he knows names have power, and in naming herself, it's like she's trying to banish the chubby twelve-year-old she used to be, her life as a hunter, the girl he'd known before she left. And as stupid as it sounds, he feels like he's just getting to know her again, know Sam instead of Sammy, now that she's coming out of her mourning for Jess and letting him see who she's become--in whispered conversations in the warm darkness of their bed, as much as in the way she laughs at his lame jokes and mocks his music, and the way they stand shoulder to shoulder when they hunt. She's softer in some ways, more brittle in others, strange and familiar all at the same time, but still and always his sister, the girl he loves the most. Not that he'd ever tell her that. He used to think she knew, but he can't tell anymore.
He doesn't want to lose her for good, even if she does go back to school. The first time he'd gone out to California to check up on her, he'd seen how happy she was, how she'd found whatever normal she'd been looking for and made it her own. And he wants to be part of that this time around, wants to be able to show up and crash on her couch, threaten her boyfriends with his shotgun and ogle her girlfriends, convince her that rare cheeseburgers at three am is the food of the gods, and that there has never been anything finer than Led Zeppelin on the stereo and the wind in their hair as they fly down the highway in the Impala.
He starts to dial once, twice, three times, before he decides to man up and just do it. He can picture her face, frowning at first, ready to argue, and then when he tells her he's proud of her, has always admired the way she stands up to Dad, he can hear the smile in her voice, and it makes him feel good.
Later, when he's tied up in the orchard with no rescue plan in sight, waiting for that fugly-ass scarecrow to come and get him and Emily, he's especially glad he did it.
And then Sam shows up to save the day. Relief stronger than fear floods him, though he plays it off; he knows she isn't buying his nonchalance, but that's okay, too, because she's here and she's safe, and she stopped being fooled by him when she was sixteen.
There isn't a lot of time to stand around shooting the shit, though, until after they set the tree on fire and put Emily on a bus out of town.
As they walk back to the car, he turns to Sam and says, "So, you gonna buy yourself a ticket? Or can I drop you off somewhere?"
"No, I think you're stuck with me." She rests a hand on the roof of the car, long fingers winter-pale against the shiny black paint.
He breathes out in relief, thankful for the reprieve and trying to hide it. "What made you change your mind?"
"I didn't. I still wanna find Dad. And you're still a pain in the ass." Dean nods and snorts, not disagreeing. "But, Jess and Mom--they're both gone. Dad is God knows where. You and me--we're all that's left. So, if we're gonna see this through, we're gonna do it together."
It's not a promise to stay forever, but it's more than she's given him before, and he'll take it happily.
They drive for a few hours, Sam drowsing in the passenger seat as Dean drums along with Keith Moon, relaxing into the rightness of things. There's nothing like the buzz of a successful hunt, and it's even better now with Sam beside him, now that she's going to stay.
It's early afternoon when he pulls off the interstate and into the parking lot of a Motel 6, tired and dirty and ready for a shower and a nap.
They rarely unpack--they almost never stay anywhere long enough to make it worth the effort--but Sam always manages to clutter up whatever counter space is available in the bathroom with her stuff, stuff he hasn't bought in the past three and a half years, but which he buys now without even thinking about it--a bottle of Johnson's baby lotion, a tube of Noxzema, some kind of spray-in conditioner, a card of black bands for her hair--falling back into the habits of a lifetime of grocery shopping.
She lets him have the shower first--he stinks of rank sweat and dirt and smoke from the fire--and he's using her shampoo instead of the stuff the motel provided, when she says, "Hey," and pushes the curtain aside to climb in with him.
"Sam--"
She gives him a smile he can't quite decipher, and reaches up to scrub her fingers through his soapy hair, then trail her thumb over his cheek and down his nose. He rinses his face to avoid a mouthful of shampoo.
"You could have died last night."
"Part of the job, Sammy. You know that."
"Yeah, but if I'd been there--" She looks away, grabs the soap, starts lathering him up.
"Sam, don't--" He's not sure if he means the way she's touching him or what she's saying.
"I can't, I can't lose you, too," she says, spreading soap over his chest and shoulders. He tries to keep his cock from reacting, but he can't, even though her touches aren't particularly sexual. It's been so long, and he's pretended he doesn't want her like this anymore, but his body doesn't lie.
She washes him gently, thoroughly, and then hands him the soap and lets him do the same for her. When he smoothes his hands over her belly, she quivers, puts her hands on his shoulders.
"Dean," she says, and slides her hands up into his hair, draws his head down for a kiss. She smells of soap and water, and tastes of heat and hope. He closes his eyes and drinks her in.
She breaks away, rinses off, and steps out again, as easily as she'd stepped in. He follows, and she dries him off with one of the threadbare white motel towels, rough against his skin but gentle in her hands. He does the same for her, every touch careful, caring, easy in a way it never is with anyone else.
He thinks about how they're back where they started, him and her and no one else, and how maybe it's wrong, but it's what he'd choose every time if given the choice. How he'd tried with Cassie, and been rejected. How she'd tried with Jess, and lost everything. How it didn't matter that she'd lied and he'd told the truth--there would never be anyone else in this the way they were, and that, in the end, that would be okay.
He reaches for his underwear but she shakes her head, draws him back into the bedroom and down onto the bed, clean sheets and a mattress that for once doesn't sag or creak when they sink into it.
Her breasts are a little fuller and softer than he remembers, so he spends some time getting reacquainted with them, using his hands and mouth to make her gasp and stutter. Her hips are curvier, too--she's lost the awkward coltishness she had at sixteen, has a confidence in her body that he's tried not to notice, and it takes his breath away. He slides his hands up her legs, strong and sleek, the soft, rough brush of stubble tickling his palms, and he's reminded of that night in the car, the humid summer air and the lazy way she'd kissed him, like they had all the time in the world and no one else existed, how the leather of the car seat stuck to his skin, and how he didn't care, because it felt so good to be so close to her.
"Open up, Sammy, come on. Lemme in," he whispers and she spreads her legs for him, lets him in the way she always does; the way she opens up for him breaks him open, as well. He'd taught her to pick locks when she was ten, and she's only gotten better at it over the years, until there isn't anyplace inside him he can keep her out of, and now she's returning the favor for the first time in years. He settles between her thighs, reveling in the soft give of her body beneath him as they kiss and touch, his fingers finding the slick, wet heat of her cunt like a compass finding north.
He's got some new scars, and she catalogues them with fingers and lips, maps the constellations of his freckles with her tongue and the shivery wet brush of her hair.
They go slow, no worries about being interrupted or caught (nobody here knows them, anyway), and it's been so long. He wants to relearn everything, the ticklish spots behind her knees, the way the insides of her elbows smell, the soap-and-salt taste of her skin, smooth against his tongue, and the soft-warm-wet feel of her tongue against his skin, making him shiver as she rediscovers him.
He's trembling a little when he rolls the condom on, tight ache in his cock nearly painful. She slides her fingers over her slick, pink pussy and then into his mouth; he licks them clean, hungry for the taste of her, and presses forward so he's cradled between her thighs, head of his cock nudging at her cunt, then slowly pressing in, perfect fit, like chambering a bullet.
She wraps her legs around his hips, locks her ankles around the small of his back, heels pressing down into his ass, and pushes up.
"Come on, Dean," she says, smiling in a way he hasn't seen in years. "Fuck me." And then she tightens her muscles around him, laughing.
He fucks her with long, slow strokes, eyes open and trained on her face, watching as her eyes, pupils dark and deep enough to drown in, irises just a thin ring of hazel around them, flutter closed, as she meets him thrust for thrust. He leans in, sucks her lower lip between his, then licks into her mouth, warm and home and everything he needs to keep him going. Need and heat roll through his blood, and he picks up his pace. Close, so close now, baby, he whispers into her ear, and she responds with a breathless, God, Dean.
She reaches down between them to circle her clit, body arching and bowing beneath him as she strains for release, and comes with a low, shuddering moan, her cunt clenching tight around him like a fist, nails digging into his shoulder.
He doesn't last long after that, thrusting in short, jerky motions until he's coming, everything else dropping away as pleasure rushes through him in waves, and her body's the shore he washes up on.
"Sam? Sammy?" he says when he can talk again. "You okay?"
"Dude," she answers breathlessly. "Yeah." She cups his cheek, runs her thumb over his lower lip, and draws him down for another kiss, letting him tell her everything he feels without ever making him say the words.
She rearranges the sheets to cover them, then curls up against him, already drifting off to sleep, a soft, satisfied smile on her face.
Dean lies awake, thinking. He let her go, and this time, she came back. And though he doesn't believe in wishing, he hopes that this time, she'll stay.
end
~*~
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Epilogue | Notes
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Thanks for reading. Feedback would mean more to me than I can possibly say.
I can't believe it's done.
*collapses*
~*~
Epilogue
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Epilogue | Notes
Or you can read it in one long chunk here.
*
Epilogue
April 2006
"I can't believe you fucking shot me," he mutters, and then hisses in pain as she digs out bits of rock salt from his skin with the tweezers. And it wasn't just the once, either--she pulled the trigger four times. He doesn't mention that, though.
"I said I was sorry!" Her voice is shrill and hurts his ears, but her hands are gentle.
He takes another sip of bourbon, closes his eyes and tips his head back in exhaustion, trying to ignore the pain. "Just forget it."
"Dean--"
"I said, forget it. It wasn't you; it was Ellicott's ghost. I understand." And he means it, mostly. He just wants to fall into bed and forget the whole thing ever happened, erase the image of her standing over him and pulling the trigger again and again, angry sneer on her bloodied face, the sound of her voice saying hateful things. "Are you done?"
She jerks her hands away. "Yeah, I guess."
"I'm gonna go take a shower." He heaves himself up out of the chair, feeling a million years old, weary down to his bones. She looks like he just kicked her puppy, and he brushes a hand through his hair, shakes his head. "It's okay, Sam. Go to bed. Everything will be fine in the morning." It's not a lie if he believes it, right?
He drags his ass into the shower, lets the hot water ease some of the ache in his muscles, wash away the smell of smoke and dirt and rotted flesh, lets the water drown out the things she said, daddy's little soldier, can't think for yourself, pathetic. He'd never thought she'd hated him that much, but given some of his fuck-ups, he can't really blame her. And she knows exactly which words to use to hurt him--that's one thing that hasn't changed at all. He leans his forehead against the cool tile, forces himself to think of anything and everything except what actually happened.
When he comes out of the bathroom, she's asleep--or doing a damn fine job of faking it--curled up in a ball under the covers of the bed nearest the windows. He stumbles to the other bed, which is closest to the bathroom, and collapses into it. They've been sleeping in the same bed since St. Louis ("I knew it wasn't you," she'd repeated over and over, fingers curled in his t-shirt, thumb rubbing over his amulet as if for luck; he'd held her close and whispered that everything was going to be all right, that nothing was going to hurt her while he was around--it worked when she was two and it works now that she's twenty-two, and he'll believe it as long as she does, knows she sleeps better when he's right there to soothe her after her nightmares, that she always has), but he feels the need for space tonight, doesn't want to fight her for the covers and take an elbow to his already sore chest. Feels like redrawing some of the lines they've started erasing since she's been back, needs the clarity of being on one side while she's on the other.
He falls asleep to the sound of her breathing, and wakes to the sound of her on the phone. The tone of her voice confirms who it is even before she says the word, "Dad."
There's no reasoning with her after that, nothing in her head but the need to get to California, to avenge Jess, and it's like dealing with Dad all over again.
They're nearly to Burkitsville when she turns to him and says, "Dean, if this demon killed Mom and Jess, and Dad's closing in, we've gotta be there. We've gotta help."
"Dad doesn't want our help."
"I don't care."
"He's given us an order." He doesn't know why he says it--Sam hasn't cared about following Dad's orders since she was twelve.
"We don't always have to do what he says."
He tightens his hands on the steering wheel, skin pulling white over the knuckles, then forces himself to unclench, tries to sound reasonable. They're both adults, right? Should be able to have a reasonable conversation. "Sam, Dad is asking us to work jobs, to save lives. It's important."
"I understand. Believe me, I understand." She shifts to face him, folds one long leg up underneath her. "But I'm talking one week here, man. To get answers. To get revenge."
Dean shakes his head, because as much as she seems to have changed, she really hasn't. "You're a selfish bitch, you know that? You just do whatever you want. Don't care what anybody thinks."
She sucks in a breath, nods, and looks away for a second. "That's what you really think?"
The words are out before he can stop them. "Yes, it is."
"Well, then, this selfish bitch is going to California."
He flashes a nervous, cajoling grin at her. "Come on, you're not serious."
"I am serious."
"It's the middle of the night! In the middle of nowhere!" She just stares at him, jaw set mulishly, until he breaks. "Fine. But I'm taking you to the nearest bus station." Because there's no way in hell he's leaving her in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night, no matter what she thinks or says. "Don't thank me," he mutters.
Her mouth quirks into a half-grin now that she's got her way. "I wasn't planning to."
"I want you to make sure Dad knows I had nothing to do with this brilliant plan."
"I'm sure he'll know without my telling him."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Dean, the day you don't follow that man's orders is the day the world ends."
His hands tighten on the steering wheel again, but all he says is, "Whatever. It's your ass on the line," and turns up the radio.
He thinks he should be used to her leaving by now, but it stings worse than a blast of rock salt to the chest, which, also thanks to her, he now knows stings like a motherfucker. At least last time, he'd known it was coming; this time, it's like a sucker punch to a barely healed wound. In the six months they've been on the road together, he'd started to relax, get comfortable, started to think she was going to stay. It was a mistake, and this is why.
He heads to Burkitsville anyway, holding onto the job because it's the only thing he has left, but he's gotten used to having her with him again, and now it's weird that she's gone. He's off his game and he knows it--he's always been at his best as part of a team; when she was at school, and he'd started hunting alone, he'd had to recalibrate his timing, his reactions, had to learn to focus, to not always be keeping track of exactly where Sam was and how quickly he could get to her if she wasn't where she was supposed to be. Since she's been back, he's fallen into older, more comfortable habits, and it's startling to be alone again. But he can actually help these people in a way he hasn't been able to help her at all, since Jess died.
At first, she'd locked herself in the bathroom every night and cried. He doesn't know if she'd thought he couldn't hear, or what, but it made him feel like something inside him was breaking every time she did it, because it's the one thing he can't fix--he can't bring Jess back, can't kill the thing that killed her, couldn't even find Dad to figure out what it was until he called.
All he could do was keep searching, keep hunting, and keep Sam safe with him, and now that's gone too. And if she and Dad kill this demon, she'll be gone as well, back to school, and away from this life for good. He knows he should want that for her--has always wanted that for her--but now that he's got her back, he doesn't know if he can take losing her a second time.
Because he loves having her with him, even though she makes him crazy sometimes, with her bitching about his food and his music, about the girls he hooks up with (and he's not thinking about her, he's not; that's over and done, and she acts like it never even happened, so he does, too; never mind the way he wakes up hard and aching in the morning, her body soft and warm and familiar against him) and the hunts he finds.
Her absence keeps him awake, even after the adrenaline rush of the night's work subsides; he's gotten used to having her in the bed with him again, used to the sound of her breath in his ears and the beat of her heart beneath his hand, and sleep is a long time coming.
When she was away at Stanford, he'd never stopped feeling like a piece of him was missing, never stopped expecting her to be there in the room when he came back with coffee (always two or three cups, never just the one, and he always ended up drinking it himself, even if he'd already doctored hers up with milk and sugar), and it was weeks before he'd stopped telling her things she wasn't there to hear, months before he stopped dialing her number and then tossing the phone onto the passenger seat without pressing the 'talk' button.
He can't do that again.
He thinks about the ways she's changed in the time she was away, and the ways she's just the same. She insists on being called Sam now, instead of Sammy, and he knows names have power, and in naming herself, it's like she's trying to banish the chubby twelve-year-old she used to be, her life as a hunter, the girl he'd known before she left. And as stupid as it sounds, he feels like he's just getting to know her again, know Sam instead of Sammy, now that she's coming out of her mourning for Jess and letting him see who she's become--in whispered conversations in the warm darkness of their bed, as much as in the way she laughs at his lame jokes and mocks his music, and the way they stand shoulder to shoulder when they hunt. She's softer in some ways, more brittle in others, strange and familiar all at the same time, but still and always his sister, the girl he loves the most. Not that he'd ever tell her that. He used to think she knew, but he can't tell anymore.
He doesn't want to lose her for good, even if she does go back to school. The first time he'd gone out to California to check up on her, he'd seen how happy she was, how she'd found whatever normal she'd been looking for and made it her own. And he wants to be part of that this time around, wants to be able to show up and crash on her couch, threaten her boyfriends with his shotgun and ogle her girlfriends, convince her that rare cheeseburgers at three am is the food of the gods, and that there has never been anything finer than Led Zeppelin on the stereo and the wind in their hair as they fly down the highway in the Impala.
He starts to dial once, twice, three times, before he decides to man up and just do it. He can picture her face, frowning at first, ready to argue, and then when he tells her he's proud of her, has always admired the way she stands up to Dad, he can hear the smile in her voice, and it makes him feel good.
Later, when he's tied up in the orchard with no rescue plan in sight, waiting for that fugly-ass scarecrow to come and get him and Emily, he's especially glad he did it.
And then Sam shows up to save the day. Relief stronger than fear floods him, though he plays it off; he knows she isn't buying his nonchalance, but that's okay, too, because she's here and she's safe, and she stopped being fooled by him when she was sixteen.
There isn't a lot of time to stand around shooting the shit, though, until after they set the tree on fire and put Emily on a bus out of town.
As they walk back to the car, he turns to Sam and says, "So, you gonna buy yourself a ticket? Or can I drop you off somewhere?"
"No, I think you're stuck with me." She rests a hand on the roof of the car, long fingers winter-pale against the shiny black paint.
He breathes out in relief, thankful for the reprieve and trying to hide it. "What made you change your mind?"
"I didn't. I still wanna find Dad. And you're still a pain in the ass." Dean nods and snorts, not disagreeing. "But, Jess and Mom--they're both gone. Dad is God knows where. You and me--we're all that's left. So, if we're gonna see this through, we're gonna do it together."
It's not a promise to stay forever, but it's more than she's given him before, and he'll take it happily.
They drive for a few hours, Sam drowsing in the passenger seat as Dean drums along with Keith Moon, relaxing into the rightness of things. There's nothing like the buzz of a successful hunt, and it's even better now with Sam beside him, now that she's going to stay.
It's early afternoon when he pulls off the interstate and into the parking lot of a Motel 6, tired and dirty and ready for a shower and a nap.
They rarely unpack--they almost never stay anywhere long enough to make it worth the effort--but Sam always manages to clutter up whatever counter space is available in the bathroom with her stuff, stuff he hasn't bought in the past three and a half years, but which he buys now without even thinking about it--a bottle of Johnson's baby lotion, a tube of Noxzema, some kind of spray-in conditioner, a card of black bands for her hair--falling back into the habits of a lifetime of grocery shopping.
She lets him have the shower first--he stinks of rank sweat and dirt and smoke from the fire--and he's using her shampoo instead of the stuff the motel provided, when she says, "Hey," and pushes the curtain aside to climb in with him.
"Sam--"
She gives him a smile he can't quite decipher, and reaches up to scrub her fingers through his soapy hair, then trail her thumb over his cheek and down his nose. He rinses his face to avoid a mouthful of shampoo.
"You could have died last night."
"Part of the job, Sammy. You know that."
"Yeah, but if I'd been there--" She looks away, grabs the soap, starts lathering him up.
"Sam, don't--" He's not sure if he means the way she's touching him or what she's saying.
"I can't, I can't lose you, too," she says, spreading soap over his chest and shoulders. He tries to keep his cock from reacting, but he can't, even though her touches aren't particularly sexual. It's been so long, and he's pretended he doesn't want her like this anymore, but his body doesn't lie.
She washes him gently, thoroughly, and then hands him the soap and lets him do the same for her. When he smoothes his hands over her belly, she quivers, puts her hands on his shoulders.
"Dean," she says, and slides her hands up into his hair, draws his head down for a kiss. She smells of soap and water, and tastes of heat and hope. He closes his eyes and drinks her in.
She breaks away, rinses off, and steps out again, as easily as she'd stepped in. He follows, and she dries him off with one of the threadbare white motel towels, rough against his skin but gentle in her hands. He does the same for her, every touch careful, caring, easy in a way it never is with anyone else.
He thinks about how they're back where they started, him and her and no one else, and how maybe it's wrong, but it's what he'd choose every time if given the choice. How he'd tried with Cassie, and been rejected. How she'd tried with Jess, and lost everything. How it didn't matter that she'd lied and he'd told the truth--there would never be anyone else in this the way they were, and that, in the end, that would be okay.
He reaches for his underwear but she shakes her head, draws him back into the bedroom and down onto the bed, clean sheets and a mattress that for once doesn't sag or creak when they sink into it.
Her breasts are a little fuller and softer than he remembers, so he spends some time getting reacquainted with them, using his hands and mouth to make her gasp and stutter. Her hips are curvier, too--she's lost the awkward coltishness she had at sixteen, has a confidence in her body that he's tried not to notice, and it takes his breath away. He slides his hands up her legs, strong and sleek, the soft, rough brush of stubble tickling his palms, and he's reminded of that night in the car, the humid summer air and the lazy way she'd kissed him, like they had all the time in the world and no one else existed, how the leather of the car seat stuck to his skin, and how he didn't care, because it felt so good to be so close to her.
"Open up, Sammy, come on. Lemme in," he whispers and she spreads her legs for him, lets him in the way she always does; the way she opens up for him breaks him open, as well. He'd taught her to pick locks when she was ten, and she's only gotten better at it over the years, until there isn't anyplace inside him he can keep her out of, and now she's returning the favor for the first time in years. He settles between her thighs, reveling in the soft give of her body beneath him as they kiss and touch, his fingers finding the slick, wet heat of her cunt like a compass finding north.
He's got some new scars, and she catalogues them with fingers and lips, maps the constellations of his freckles with her tongue and the shivery wet brush of her hair.
They go slow, no worries about being interrupted or caught (nobody here knows them, anyway), and it's been so long. He wants to relearn everything, the ticklish spots behind her knees, the way the insides of her elbows smell, the soap-and-salt taste of her skin, smooth against his tongue, and the soft-warm-wet feel of her tongue against his skin, making him shiver as she rediscovers him.
He's trembling a little when he rolls the condom on, tight ache in his cock nearly painful. She slides her fingers over her slick, pink pussy and then into his mouth; he licks them clean, hungry for the taste of her, and presses forward so he's cradled between her thighs, head of his cock nudging at her cunt, then slowly pressing in, perfect fit, like chambering a bullet.
She wraps her legs around his hips, locks her ankles around the small of his back, heels pressing down into his ass, and pushes up.
"Come on, Dean," she says, smiling in a way he hasn't seen in years. "Fuck me." And then she tightens her muscles around him, laughing.
He fucks her with long, slow strokes, eyes open and trained on her face, watching as her eyes, pupils dark and deep enough to drown in, irises just a thin ring of hazel around them, flutter closed, as she meets him thrust for thrust. He leans in, sucks her lower lip between his, then licks into her mouth, warm and home and everything he needs to keep him going. Need and heat roll through his blood, and he picks up his pace. Close, so close now, baby, he whispers into her ear, and she responds with a breathless, God, Dean.
She reaches down between them to circle her clit, body arching and bowing beneath him as she strains for release, and comes with a low, shuddering moan, her cunt clenching tight around him like a fist, nails digging into his shoulder.
He doesn't last long after that, thrusting in short, jerky motions until he's coming, everything else dropping away as pleasure rushes through him in waves, and her body's the shore he washes up on.
"Sam? Sammy?" he says when he can talk again. "You okay?"
"Dude," she answers breathlessly. "Yeah." She cups his cheek, runs her thumb over his lower lip, and draws him down for another kiss, letting him tell her everything he feels without ever making him say the words.
She rearranges the sheets to cover them, then curls up against him, already drifting off to sleep, a soft, satisfied smile on her face.
Dean lies awake, thinking. He let her go, and this time, she came back. And though he doesn't believe in wishing, he hopes that this time, she'll stay.
end
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Epilogue | Notes
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Thanks for reading. Feedback would mean more to me than I can possibly say.
I can't believe it's done.
*collapses*
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