Five Times Dean Was An Awesome Brother
Title: Five Times Dean Was An Awesome Brother
Rating: PG
Characters: Sam, Dean
Summary: I think the title says it all. Five short stories, one from each season, starting with the most obvious (title story) from S1.
1. Tired
“Don’t let me fall asleep,” Sam mumbles as he stretches out onto the bed.
Honestly, if he didn’t want-scratch that-need to fall asleep, he wouldn’t have reclined to begin with.
But Dean nods, agrees with what might appear to be absentmindedness. In reality, he just doesn’t want to make any promises he has no intention of keeping.
He won’t pretend to fully understand what’s going on in that messed up head of his brother’s, and he isn’t about to pry because that won’t get him anywhere, but one look at Sam’s half-mast, bloodshot eyes and he knows he can’t agree to keep him from what he needs most.
Sam needs to sleep.
It’s only a matter of time, Dean figures. Until then, Bloody Mary it is.
“What am I even looking for?” Dean asks, flipping through the pages faster than he can even scan them. God, he hates this part of their job. Got something that needs to be stabbed, shot or burned? He’s your man. Going through stack after stack of old newspapers and struggling to find the right “keywords” for a Google search? So not his thing.
“Start with ‘Mary’ and ‘mirror’ and ‘suicide’ and narrow it down from there,” Sam suggests. It comes out sounding like one big word, everything blending together. Dean glances up without moving his head, sees that Sam’s eyes are now officially shut. He has been so fucking tired for the last few days that, at times, he sounds like he’s speaking another language.
So Dean pretends he knows what he’s doing, and tries to do it quietly. He actually gets kind of into it and digs up some relevant information, but nothing that’s going to help them figure out this case. It couldn’t have been more than 15 minutes since Sam fell asleep when he gasps awake with a jolt.
So much for that.
Not that Dean’s surprised. There’s a very obvious reason behind why Sam wants to stay awake. Still, there’s a sinking feeling in Dean’s chest as he watches his brother blink tiredly at the ceiling.
“Why’d you let me fall asleep?” Sam asks wearily.
Dean can think of a million answers to that question, but the most obvious and least obtrusive is simply, “Because I’m an awesome brother.”
***
2. Sad
Five minutes.
Five minutes pass before Sam emerges from the room. He walks past Dean and out into the hall, arms hanging limply at his sides. Methodical, one foot in front of the other, eyes cast low.
Dean follows at a respectful distance, doesn’t even have to tell Sam to take the fire escape-he’s already heading in that direction. They’ve done this before.
They’ve never done this before.
Sam keeps his head down in the passenger seat on the way back to the motel. When he gets out of the car, Dean stays back, gives Sam a five second head start, allows his brother to show as much emotion as he wants to without being seen. It’s the least Dean can do, because nothing he can think of saying or doing is going to make this any better-any easier.
Under the motel’s parking lot spotlights, Dean thinks he sees glitter on Sam’s shoulder and back. And that’s just...not right. On so many levels.
Dean lengthens his stride, gets a bit closer, feels like he has been punched in the gut when he realizes Sam’s covered in blood, a fine spray of wet droplets all over his shoulder and part of his back. Dean follows the trail down Sam’s jeans and onto his shoes. Jerks his head up when Sam stops to open the motel room door.
If Sam doesn’t know already, he certainly doesn’t need to.
The room is hot, really hot. Dean curses, kicks at the radiator with his toe. His suave mechanical skills failing, he opts for opening the stiff windows instead.
Sam stands in the middle of the room, blank-faced, stone-still. Empty.
“Why don’t you go take a shower?” Dean suggests. Upon hearing the words, Sam’s watery pupils retract and pull into focus.
Dean lifts his chin towards the bathroom. Sam blinks, reaches up with a shaky hand and pushes his hair back off his forehead while slowly moving towards the bathroom.
Dean waits until he hears the water running, then calls out, “Sam, leave the door unlocked, okay?”
There’s a popping sound as the lock is released, which is answer enough. After a minute, Dean quietly opens the door, the pounding of the water drowning out the sound. He scoops the clothes and shoes up off the floor, grabs one of the towels from the rack above the toilet and heads out.
****
The Laundromat is surprisingly busy. There are a couple of hot girls who look like they might be mildly drunk. The blonde smiles at Dean, keeps smiling until her gaze drifts from his face down to his hands, and then goes white and wide-eyed. She blindly grabs at her friend’s arm and pulls her away.
Dean glances down, notices he’s still holding Sam’s shoes. Sam’s bloody shoes.
So much for that.
The clothes come out clean; the shoes come out in a hundred pieces, clogging up the drain from the machine much to the large Indian lady’s dismay.
“Shoes?!” she yells at Dean, waving her arms in disgust, forcing him backwards. He grabs Sam’s clothes, spins and gets out of there before she throws down.
Okay, so Dean has clean clothes...he’ll have to find somewhere to get Sam another pair of shoes. Unfortunately, not too many shoe stores are open 24/7. He asks the drunk-ish girls-who have taken to waiting outside and get all stiff and uncomfortable when he approaches. They point dumbly to the Wal Mart across the street.
Dean picks up the only pair of shoes they have in Sam’s size-he’s not going to win any style awards, but it’s better than the alternative...which, given the shoe/washing machine fiasco, is barefoot.
Shoes are joined by M&M’s, disinfectant spray, and Sleep Eze on the moving checkout belt. Only the necessities.
Satisfied, he returns to the car and takes care of the final order of business. He sprays the passenger seat with the disinfectant and scrubs at the material with the motel towel until his shoulder aches, tosses the pink-stained rag into the nearest garbage.
During the drive back to the motel, he receives a text from Sam.
Where r u?
Dean manages to respond, only swerving onto the dusty shoulder once.
Back in 5.
He runs a questionable amber/red light and makes it back in four and a half.
***
When Dean enters the room again, it’s much cooler and darker.
Sam looks to be asleep. It would be so easy for Dean to buy in, crawl into his own bed and drop off until morning.
The good thing about hunting with your brother is you know everything about him. The bad thing about hunting with your brother is that you know everything about him. Dean knows all of his brother’s tells.
And Sam is definitely not asleep.
Dean drops the clean clothes on the edge of his own bed, removes the candy and shoes from the plastic bag, drops them on top of the mound. He pockets the Sleep-Eze.
When Dean looks up, Sam’s slotted eyes stare back.
Dean pauses, really looks at his brother, feels it’s finally time to ask, “You okay?”
The eyes drown, lids slip shut, wetness seeps out onto lashes.
Dean sits down on the bed near Sam’s head. He doesn’t know why, but he thinks it might help.
Sam draws a shaky breath, exhales a breathy, “Thanks.”
Dean places a hand on Sam’s shoulder and gives a quick squeeze.
He can’t do or say anything to make it better. But it’s sure as hell not going to keep him from trying.
Because that’s what they do. It’s what they’ve always done.
Five minutes.
It takes five minutes for Sam’s breathing to even out. Dean removes his hand from his brother’s shoulder, arranges a pillow against the headboard and leans back, engages in the mighty fight to keep his eyes open.
When Sam jerks awake five minutes later, Dean’s still there, Sleep Eze in hand.
***
3. Mad
Sam is edgy. Sam is irritable. Sam is downright pissy.
Dean never thought that his last few months before hell would be spent putting up with little brother’s miserable sulking.
At least it had been sulking, until yesterday. Whatever happened to Sam with that crossroads demon had really jacked him up. Instead of the usual pouting, he was practically vibrating with anger and frustration. Yesterday morning, he’d thrown his shoe across the motel room-breaking a lamp in the process-when he couldn’t undo a knot in the lace. Last night, he’d thrown a punch at another hunter when they’d shown up at the same gig and the guy had made the mistake of asking whether they had notes from their parents to be out of school.
Dean drew the line when Sam slammed the passenger-side door after losing an argument about where they’d eat lunch. “Hey!” Dean had warned, but Sam had stalked off into the restaurant without a glance back.
Dean figures it’s only a matter of time before Sam self destructs-takes matters into his own hands and does something stupid.
Dean abruptly pulls off onto a rough, un-kept road.
Sam splays a hand on the dash as the car dips and sways. “Where the hell are we going?”
Pissy. Always so pissy. Dean knows his shit-eating smile isn’t helping any, but hey, what are brothers for?
“Dean?!”
“Don’t get your panties in a knot,” Dean growls, then slams the car into park when they reach the clearing.
He reaches back and grabs two baseball bats from the backseat of the Impala, gets out of the car, and starts walking. With a huff, Sam follows him to the edge of the woods.
Dean stops in front of the trees he had selected for this mission earlier in the morning when Sam was holed up in the library.
“What the fuck is this?”
Pissy. Pissy. Pissy.
Dean smirks, tosses a bat in Sam’s direction which his brother catches effortlessly without breaking eye contact.
Dean arranges his grip on his bat before answering, “Anger management.”
Sam eyes the selected trees with a mixture of irritation and amusement. “Bubble wrap?”
“More satisfying,” Dean explains. Not to mention not so jarring, but he leaves that part out.
To demonstrate, he swings his baseball bat, and when contact is made, it’s rapid-fire of air pockets exploding.
He grins widely. Yeah, he’s proud of himself.
But Sam has to be a fucking killjoy. “You want me to beat the shit out of some trees?”
Dean swings around, faces his brother with his chest pushed out. “Yes. You got a problem with that?”
The antagonistic approach takes all of two seconds to work, and Sam lays his bat into the trunk of the bubble-wrapped tree with such force that hundreds of red leaves at the top of the tall maple drift to the ground.
Dean laughs, really laughs, as he watches Sam go again and again and again, until the explosive popping ceases. Sam doesn’t let that stop him, though. Without missing a beat, he takes a step to his left and starts to go at Dean’s tree with just as much force.
Dean steps back, now just smiling and shaking his head, letting Sam do his thing. The wailing continues long after all of the bubble wrap has met its demise; the popping turns into the dull thwack of wood on wood. Dean’s about to say something but Sam is still a little too wild for intervention-and Dean prefers to live out his remaining few months without brain damage. When the bat eventually gives, splitting in half, Sam steps back and whips it into the forest with all his weight, spinning a full circle with inertia before coming to a stop, chest heaving, panting loudly.
His eyes are wide-wild. Dean thinks for a second that he can see Sam’s heart beating through his pupils.
After half a minute or so, Sam takes a deep breath, pushes his hair back off his face and appears to snap out of his trance and take in his surroundings.
Dean rolls his bat in his palm, leaves crunching beneath his feet as he walks up to examine the beaten trees. He rips what’s left of the bubble wrap from the trunks, says, “Huh,” taken aback by the large, bat-shaped gashes in the hard wood.
He balls up the evidence, and walks back towards the car, poking Sam in the shoulder with his bat as he passes. “You better stretch that out or you’re going to be hurting tomorrow.”
Sam follows behind, swinging his arm like a windmill.
They get back into the car and onto the main road without another word. Dean rolls down his window, lets his hand hang out in the cold air. He feels good. Really good. He wishes he could convince his brother to feel the same way, but knows it’s a lost cause. He understands...to a point.
When Dean’s hand is numb from the wind and the sun starts to dip below the horizon, he decides that it’s probably about time he teases Sam about being pouty again. It should really be done every few hours for consistency purposes. “You gonna sulk all night or do you want join me at a bar?”
Sam moves his jaw, and wait...is that a smile? “Yeah,” Sam says quietly. “Why not.”
Dean cranks up the music, notices that Sam sinks a little further into his seat, head bobbing with the beat.
Who needs yuppie therapy when you have a baseball bat and some bubble wrap?
4. Hurt
They can’t go to a hospital.
It’s the first thing that comes to Dean’s mind, and the first thing he immediately dismisses.
Sam’s wrists are slashed. They’d put him in a padded room faster than they could say “crazy son of a bitch.”
Still, Dean knows it’s his duty to push for it anyway. It’s the sane option-the normal route. He says the word softly on the way back to the motel, as if trying it on for size, an implied question mark tagged on the end. There’s no reason to believe that Sam’s even listening, slumped like death in the passenger seat, but the proposal is predictably written off with a strangled, “No.”
Of course not.
They speed through a cluster of bugs. Dean flips on the wipers, curses out loud when their carcasses smear grey sludge across the windshield. Sam’s breath hitches, seems to catch twice in rapid succession, his chest pops out, then air resumes the natural flow and he settles back into his seat again.
Dean steps harder onto the gas. Fuck, he thinks. Because…well…fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Almost there, he assures himself. Then he can get a better look and figure out exactly what they’re dealing with. Sam should be fine until then.
Sam should be fine…
Dean’s pretty sure he stopped the bleeding at the scene. He’d raided the Milligan house for something, anything, and came away with plastic wrap and cayenne pepper. Sam held his arms out in front of him without argument, jaw clenched tight, appeared to be drawing his strength from the ceiling while Dean packed the wounds with the pepper, wrapped Sam’s arms in the plastic wrap. A little trick Pastor Jim shared with them while seasoning a turkey one Thanksgiving. Dean’s sure as hell thankful now.
Back at the motel, Dean dumps Sam on the closest bed and rocks back on his heels, trying to figure out what to do first. Sam’s a sweaty, shaky mess. Tremors are wracking through his tense body like a never ending earthquake. He’s not bleeding anymore, Dean made sure of that back at the house, but the wound in Sam’s side is different, more complicated.
Digging through the first aid kit, Dean finds some sterilized gauze packs that are so old the print has faded completely, but the packaging is intact, so he stuffs a couple squares into the finger-shaped hole in his brother’s side.
God, I hope it wasn’t actually a finger that…
He shakes his head, tossing the disturbing thought to the side for the time being.
Sam tilts his head back into the pillow, air sawing quickly in and out of flared nostrils, the occasional grunt coming from low in his throat.
“Sorry,” Dean says automatically. And he is, even if it’s not his fault.
He takes the opportunity to get a closer look at Sam’s arms, determines he can probably stitch the gashes. The problem is in the last half an hour since they left the scene, Sam has gone from shivering to shaking so hard that if the bed were on wheels, it would be moving across the floor like an unbalanced laundry machine.
They try alcohol. Dean holds the bottle of Jack to Sam’s lips. Sam willingly sucks back two big gulps, then chokes and gags, barely containing the hard liquor.
So much for that.
“It’s pissed,” Sam mumbles once he gets his breath back.
Dean looks around the room in alert confusion. “What’s pissed?”
“M’body,” Sam replies in all seriousness.
Dean would laugh if it weren’t so true. “Yeah, well, I think you’re going to need more than just a buzz anyway.”
In the bathroom, Dean rifles through their dwindling stash of drugs, but they haven’t had the opportunity to source any new painkillers in months and all he finds is…
“Fuck.”
Sam had sworn off this drug last year when it made him so sick he practically snapped the cracked rib he’d been trying to medicate.
“All we’ve got left is oxycontin,” Dean calls out from the doorway. He holds out the bottle, which is pointless because Sam keeps his eyes closed when he shakes his head quickly, now puffing from the pain.
Dean drops his hand to his side; the four remaining pills rattle around in the small amber bottle when it hits his thigh. God, he hates feeling so useless
Just pass out.
It would make this a hell of a lot easier. On both of them.
He tosses the bottle back into the bag and approaches Sam from the side, sits cautiously on the edge of the mattress. “I can’t stitch you if you’re shaking this hard,” Dean admits with a resigned sigh.
Glazed eyes peek out at him, offering nothing more than a blank stare. Hardly a solution to their problem.
“Sam, you’re in agony,” Dean tries to reason.
“I’d rather…be in…agony than puking…my guts out.” This is followed by a sharp groan and even shorter breaths.
“You keep this up we’ll be at this all night.” Dean waits for some sort of rebuttal, but Sam’s too busy trying not to shake out of his skin to argue back. Dean rubs his fingers hard into his forehead, then drops the hand into his lap.
Sam's struggle seems to be gaining momentum; Dean knows it's anxiety snowballing the pain. “Slow down, Sammy,” he tries, but to no avail.
“Hit me…over the head…or something.”
And that’s it. He has had enough.
Sam’s had enough.
Dean rises from the edge of the bed and heads for the bathroom, shutting the door behind him.
***
He emerges a couple minutes later, a glass of water in hand.
“You’re going to have to sit up.”
No acknowledgment. Dean sets the glass on the table, slides an arm under each of his brother’s armpits and nearly gets a hernia trying to haul the upper body up against the headboard.
Satisfied, Dean reaches back to grab the glass of water. When he turns around, Sam’s starting to lilt forward, ready to face plant into his own knees.
Dean pushes Sam back upright with a hand to the shoulder, then holds the glass to his brother’s lips.
“Drink,” he orders. Uncompromising. Like Dad would. Daring to disobey.
Fortunately, Sam’s altered state doesn’t allow him to fully process the situation, and he does exactly as he’s told.
Unlike the hard liquor, the water goes down without a hitch.
Sam’s chin falls against his chest when the empty glass is pulled away. Dean keeps Sam propped up with his right hand, lifts his left hand and checks his watch.
Twenty minutes later, he pulls a much looser Sam by the ankles until he’s once again lying flat on his back.
Dean threads the needle he had sterilized earlier and gets down to business.
****
“I hate you.”
Sam’s lying on his stomach, body stretched out across the short side of the bed. His head’s hanging slackly over the edge, positioned directly over top of the trash can Dean had brought out from the bathroom.
Dean rolls his eyes, turns his attention back to sharpening his knife.
Another five minutes pass before Sam gags again, bringing up a whole lot of nothing.
“Hate,” Sam says again, apparently too wiped to include the first and last words to the statement he has made…oh…at least seven or eight times now.
“Yeah, I’ve got it,” Dean growls back. “You hate me.”
Sam grunts, spits into the garbage can. He must feel like he has officially thrown up everything in his body because he gingerly rolls onto his back, shifts down a foot or so until his head rests on the mattress. His legs hang limply off the other side of the bed at his knees.
“I said no,” Sam grumbles. He rearranges his arms like they each weigh a thousand pounds, gives up when they’re only halfway onto the pillows Dean had previously placed on either side of Sam’s torso.
“Yeah, and when those open wounds got infected, that wouldn’t have made you sick at all, right?”
Sam lets out a long, slow breath, painkillers obviously still jogging through his system. “You drug raped me.”
Dean freezes mid-sharpening, lets out a choked laugh. “That so?”
Sam nods, swallows, groans deeply and rolls over again. He uses his knees instead of his arms to push his head over the edge of the bed again.
It’s no surprise when the heaving yields no results. Even less surprising when Sam says, “I hate you,” afterwards.
Dean doesn’t offer a counter argument or insult. They’ve been going around in circles for the past hour and frankly he’s getting tired of it. If he were as high as Sam right now, he’d probably be more easily amused.
In this particular case, it’s a short turnover. Sam’s hate will fade in a couple of hours. Hell, he’ll probably even thank Dean later.
Not that Dean cares one way or the other. It really doesn’t matter. He isn’t going to let a little hate stand in the way of doing what’s best for his brother.
Never has.
Never will.
***
5. Sick
It’s not a noise that wakes Dean, rather it’s the silence. His first instinct is to steal a glance at the alarm clock.
Three in the morning? Three in the morning. Three in the morning...
His sleep-slowed brain chugs it over. It takes him about 10 seconds to match the information with the uneasy feeling.
He has been asleep for three hours straight. That hasn’t happened for...at least a week and a half. Because Sam...
He glances past the alarm clock and takes in the empty bed for the first time.
Where’s Sam?
His heart rate doubles in seconds flat. Then he hears it. The familiar yet muffled sound of coughing from...somewhere. Somewhere not in this room.
The same coughing that’s been keeping him awake for the past two weeks-keeping them both awake.
But the bathroom’s dark and empty, and Sam’s...Sam’s...outside?
“What the fuck...” Dean groans to himself, slides off the bed. Shuffling towards the door, he grabs his jacket and tries to negotiate the armholes, blindly lets his feet wiggle their way into his loosely tied shoes.
Sam’s sitting on the curb that separates the motel’s sidewalk from the parking lot, staring out at pretty much nothing. He jumps, startled, when Dean opens the door behind him. Glancing over his shoulder, he meets his brother with guilty eyes.
The moron doesn’t even have a jacket on, just a worn-thin hoodie that should have probably been replaced a couple of years ago if the holey elbows are any indication.
“What the fuck, Sam?”
Sam stares back with drunk-looking eyes, blinks once. “Sorry,” he says hoarsely, clears his throat. “Did I wake you?”
“No!” Dean answers angrily. A cold wind blows some loose snow from the bank at the edge of the lot right into his eyes.
Great.
Sam’s brow furrows, an unspoken, “And that makes you mad because...?” on his face.
Dean wraps his arms around his middle, lets out a sigh that physically transforms into a white cloud in the frigid night. This is so not what he wants to be doing at three in the freaking morning.
Before he can yell at his brother for being such a fucking moron-which he is-Sam turns back towards the parking lot, starts to cough wetly into the arms propped up on his knees.
Dean bites his tongue, comes up beside Sam, sits down on the cold cement and waits for the terrible coughing to end. The curb must be covered in a thin layer of ice because, within seconds, Dean’s ass is wet through his sweats.
Awesome.
As soon as Sam is quiet, Dean asks, “So are you going to tell me what the fuck you’re doing out here?”
Sam pulls the sleeves of his hoodie further over his hands, shrugs and like it’s the most obvious answer in the world, says, “I didn’t want to keep you awake.”
What? Since when?
“Yeah, well you gave me a freaking heart attack.”
“Oh,” Sam says, realization crossing his features. “Sorry. Just figured there was no point in us both not sleeping.”
And then Dean knows where it’s coming from. They’ve both been walking zombies for days. And last night, when he couldn’t seem to put a gun back together after cleaning it, Sam made some comment about how he’s losing his touch and in his frustration, Dean had snapped, “Maybe if I could get some decent sleep I wouldn’t be finding this quite so difficult.”
He meant it; he just didn’t think Sam would care. Since when do they feel guilty about things they have no control over? They’ve got enough to apologize for without that being the case.
“So you thought freezing your ass off all night would be a good idea?”
Sam’s eyes are closed now, his chin propped up on his forearms. “You have a better idea?” he challenges lazily, then drops his face into his elbow and coughs a few more times, and for a second Dean thinks it sounds like there’s more crap than air coming out of Sam’s lungs.
Dean accepts the challenge, jumps to his feet, starts walking down the sidewalk while Sam’s still too busy to ask where the hell he’s going.
*****
“Where’d you go?” Sam asks in a broken voice as soon as Dean’s back in sight.
Dean doesn’t answer, instead he crosses the remaining ground that separates them and holds out his offering.
Sam hesitantly pulls his hands out of his sleeves and reaches out to accept the paper bag and the key being forced on him.
“What is this?” he asks.
Dean rolls his eyes. “Don’t be nervous, Sam. It’s not a time bomb.”
Sam doesn’t bother to examine the two objects he’s now clutching, instead he holds Dean’s gaze. He still looks drunk, but that can’t be right. Fever’s a more probable explanation, though it’s hard to believe anybody could be anything but hypothermic in this weather.
Dean lets out an exaggerated sigh. “It’s cough syrup and a room key,” he explains sharply.
Sam flips the key over in his hand. “You got me my own room?” he asks, confused.
Dean holds his arms out at his sides. “Well you’re not going to sleep out here!”
Sam stares at the key, smiles and shakes his head. “All right. Whatever.”
You’re welcome, Jerk, Dean wants to say, but doesn’t because Sam’s apparently taking things far too personally these days. And clearly, they’re not quite there yet.
Dean makes a move back towards his room, opens his door before he realizes Sam’s still sitting on the curb.
He barks a quick, “Sam!”
Sam grumbles, “Yeah, going,” under his breath, stands and straightens slowly, grimacing like his ginormous body is frozen in that hunched position, which, hey, it probably is.
“’Night,” Dean says as he ducks into his room. Sam gets a nod in before the door closes.
Dean leans back against the wall of the motel, waits until he hears the door to the next room squeak open. He almost laughs at how clear the sound is through the paper thin walls.
He doesn’t, though. Laugh, that is. Not out loud. Because Sam would surely hear him, and Sam would realize that if he can hear Dean, Dean can surely hear him too.
And Dean’s not interested in any further arctic adventures this evening.
He is careful not to make any noise as he slips out of his jacket and shoes. He dives under the covers, curses the thin blankets. Ten minutes out there and he’s a freaking popsicle...
Through the wall, he can hear Sam unwrapping the bottle of cough syrup, smirks when his brother curses at what must be the worst tasting shit in the world.
The worse it tastes, the better it works, Dad used to say.
There’s bed springs squealing, a light switch clicking off, and, of course, the damnable coughing that persists on and off for the remaining hours until morning.
Dean doesn’t get any more sleep than he has any other night in the last couple weeks, he no longer has any cash left for breakfast in the morning, and his ass stays frozen from that stupid icy curb for way too long.
But, hey, at least his brother won’t feel compelled to make himself sicker than he already is by sitting outside all night in the dead of winter.
In the morning, he’ll fight to get Sam to go to the clinic. An argument Dean will probably lose and he’ll spend the rest of the day with high blood-pressure and the urge to rip something’s head off.
But he’ll do it anyway. Because as much as things have changed between them, some things will always stay the same.
Yeah, I’m an awesome brother.
*
Sam doesn’t feel good. No surprise there; Sam hasn’t felt good for well over a year.
But the pretty-damn-shitty feeling that has been accompanying this cough/cold/flu/whatever the fuck he has had for the past couple of weeks is really starting to piss him off.
He’s tired of the yo-yoing fever, tight muscles, relentless cough that barely does anything to ease the ache in his chest. But most of all, he’s tired of not sleeping-or tired because he’s not sleeping. If he were sleeping he could probably distinguish between the two, but he’s not so he doesn’t even bother trying.
He knows Dean’s just as frustrated, and Sam can’t really blame him. They’ve been chasing distractions for weeks, with no plan and no real goal to speak of, so they don’t speak of it because what would be the point? At least Dean’s anger has simmered. He no longer looks at Sam like it’s his fault the world is coming to an end. Which it is, but hey, save the accusing glares because Sam’s well aware of his degree of fault.
So when, the previous evening, Sam teases his brother for his lack of coordination-justly so, Dean had fumbled the gun five times already-and receives an equally just and accusing comment in return, Sam’s stomach clenches with the familiar guilt that had up to this point, slowly tapered off to a more manageable level.
When he wakes up coughing yet again, he decides it would probably be best to clear the room, let Dean get at least one solid night’s sleep to, if nothing else, keep his irritability from escalating into accusations that would do more than make Sam’s stomach clench.
Sam silently slides out of bed, slips on his shoes, grabs his hoodie from the back of a chair and quietly steps out the door.
And...shit. It’s fucking freezing.
When did that happen?
He had found it almost warm when they’d arrived at the motel yesterday, warm enough to walk around outside in a single layer, but that was probably just the fever messing with him because now that he thinks about it, Dean was most definitely wearing two layers and a jacket.
He’s definitely feeling the temperature now. He barely has a chance to get the zipper on his hoodie pulled up before the cold air irritates his lungs. He settles onto the curb and lets the coughing roll out of him unabated. It actually feels good not to try to hold it in like he has been doing every night for the past couple of weeks. Dean, to his credit, has pretended not to be bothered-usually just rolls over without a word.
Even a few nights ago, when a particularly ruthless fit forced Sam out of bed and into the bathroom (just in case), the cold bottle of water sitting on the nightstand upon Sam’s return was the only indication that Dean had actually gotten out of bed. Sam whispered his thanks as he peeled off the lid and drank, a grunt from the sleeping back on the bed across from him was the only response.
Eventually, he numbs out and doesn’t feel the sting of the cold wind anymore. He passes the time between coughing fits by counting the cars on the highway in the distance-absently wonders where all the normal people in the world are going at two in the morning.
He’s momentarily distracted when a car pulls up down the lane, and a man emerges with what can only be described as a two dollar hooker. Sam makes sure he meets the guy’s eyes, because what’s the point of being cold and miserable if you can’t have a little fun at someone else’s expense? The guy looks like a deer caught in headlights, seems to be debating whether to run or go through with it. If Sam had one of his fake I.D.s handy, he would have busted the guy. Just for kicks.
When they’ve nervously run out from under the street light and into their room, Sam laughs to himself, coughs (as punishment, he’s sure), buries his face in his arms and closes his eyes. He’s actually somewhat close to sleep when a noise behind him makes him jump.
“What the fuck, Sam?”
A glance over his shoulder reveals a disheveled and fairly pissed-off looking Dean. Sam’s stomach resumes its clench.
“Sorry,” he says hoarsely. “Did I wake you?”
“No!” Dean answers angrily.
Sam’s pretty sure that’s a good thing. Dean’s body language is saying something entirely different.
But Sam’s tired and, as a result, kind of slow; he mentally blames his fatigue for not being able to figure out why his brother looks like he wants to drop kick him across the parking lot.
Dean pulls his jacket tightly around him, lets out a frustrated sigh.
Sam’s getting a crick in his neck, so he turns back to face the bland parking lot, starts to cough again into his sleeve. He’s vaguely aware of Dean taking a seat next to him.
When Sam’s got himself under control, Dean asks, “So are you going to tell me what the fuck you’re doing out here?”
Sam feels his body becoming defensive; he’d sit up straighter if he had the energy.
What does he think I’m doing out here?
Something horrible, of course. But, hey, precedent speaks for itself.
He tries to stretch the hoodie a little further over his numb fingers. “I didn’t want to keep you awake,” he responds honestly.
Dean mutters something about Sam giving him a heart attack.
“Oh...” And then Sam realizes that Dean doesn’t think he’s out making deals with demons or other unfavorable activities Sam has been known to partake in in the past. He’s just...worried? “Sorry. Just figured there was no point in us both not sleeping.”
It’s as if the word alone compounds his exhaustion. His eyes slips shut on their own accord, his chin resting heavily on his forearm.
Dean shakes his head. “So you thought freezing your ass off all night would be a good idea?”
“You have a better idea?” he asks in his best smart ass voice, which would have been a lot more effective if he didn’t start coughing roughly afterwards. He can feel Dean staring at him but at this point, Sam doesn’t care, just keeps coughing until his lungs are satisfied they’ve tortured him enough. When he finally opens his eyes again, Dean’s gone.
Sam’s suddenly positive he has gone crazy.
Was that a...hallucination?
He glances right, then left, and sure enough, he can make out the dim silhouette of his brother marching down the sidewalk. If Sam’s feet and ass weren’t iced to the pavement, he might have tried to follow him.
*****
Sam stares blankly in the direction Dean disappeared until, 15 minutes later, his brother reappears from around the corner. “Where’d you go?” Sam asks when Dean’s close enough to hear his cracked voice.
Dean doesn’t answer, instead he crosses the remaining ground that separates them and holds out his offering.
Sam hesitantly pulls his hands out of his sleeves and reaches out to accept what appears to be a paper bag and a key on the end of a bright red key chain.
“What is this?” he asks, thoroughly confused and, frankly, a little worried.
Is that for a car?
How would Dean get a key at three in the morning? More importantly, why?
Dean rolls his eyes. “Don’t be nervous, Sam. It’s not a time bomb.”
Sam holds Dean’s gaze, his heart beating just a little bit faster than it probably should.
Dean lets out another exaggerated sigh. “It’s cough syrup and a room key,” he explains sharply.
Sam flips the key over in his hand, noticed the large “7” drawn on both sides. “You got me my own room?” he asks, confused.
Dean holds his arms out at his sides. “Well you’re not going to sleep out here!”
Huh. Sam wants to laugh, a little at his own ridiculousness, a little at his brother’s. They maxed out their last card last night, and it’s not like they’re pulling in enough cash right now to justify separate rooms. Dean probably blew what was left of their meager food money on this. But Sam’s not going to call him on it.
He doesn’t laugh, but he does smile a little bit. “All right. Whatever.”
Seemingly satisfied, Dean walks towards their...his room. There’s a second or two of silence and then, “Sam!”
Sam grumbles, “Yeah, going.” Every muscle in his body screams when he tries to stand. He grunts and arches his back in a painful stretch.
“’Night,” Dean says as he ducks into his room. Sam manages to nod back before the door closes in his face.
Room seven is, conveniently, only five steps to Sam’s right. His fingers are being stubborn and won’t cooperate-slow and sluggish from lack of blood flow. On the third try he gets the key in the hole, can barely convince his hand to close over the doorknob and turn.
The warm air makes his face flush, toes burn as they begin to thaw.
He kicks off his shoes in the middle of the floor, flicks on a light, then opens up the paper bag Dean gave him.
He recognizes the cough syrup from when they were kids. They feared getting sick because at the first sign of illness-any illness-their dad would force this awful tasting shit down their throats. Appropriate or not.
Sam’s eyes water as he downs the small cupful of thick syrup. “Fuck,” he groans when it stings his throat like peroxide in an open wound.
He leaves the bottle on the nightstand, drops onto the squeaky bed with a sigh and turns off the light. He doesn’t bother taking off his hoodie or getting under the covers-all energy spent. Instead he curls up onto his side, relieved that he can let down his guard and cough without restriction. Sleep pulls at the edges of his mind almost immediately.
In the morning, he’ll thank Dean. Or maybe not.
Yeah, probably not.
Some things just go without saying.
***