The Only Thing That's Real
Title: The Only Thing That's Real
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 1500
Disclaimer: Not my boys. Kripke broke them long before I ever got to them.
Summary: Sam watches Dean's relationship with fire over the years.
Warning: Self Harm, broken!Dean
Written for 'Self Harm' for the Dean focused h/c Tags Challenge on hoodie_time and 'Burns' on myhc_bingo card.
Dean is scared of fire.
He is. Sam knows because every time they do a salt'n'burn Dean insists on being the one who lights the match and burns the bones and he gets real mad whenever Dad hands him the salt-can instead.
Sometimes when they were little Sam would wake up in the middle of the night and find Dean on top of the covers, playing with one of Dad's lighters. He never burned anything, just kept staring into the flame until his hands stopped shivering and the tears stopped running down his cheeks.
Now, when Sam wakes up, Dean has locked himself in the bathroom and Sam never asks about the warm flicker he can see under the door.
It's the precarious balance of painfearpaniccontrol that has your heart racing every single time. One second too long, one push too deep and the equation tips, blind panic takes over. That hasn't happened in a long time though. It almost never scars anymore.
It's the spring when Sam is thirteen - almost fourteen when Alice Miller stops coming to school one day.
Sam never really talked to Alice - she was kinda scary with her low-cut tops and the dark eyeliner and crazy, tangled orange hair, though Sam'd rather bite off his own tongue than admit as much.
The kids come up with all kinds of nasty rumors.
"She tried to hitch a ride to Atlantic City," they whisper while Sam tries to concentrate on the math problems he couldn't get to last night because Dad made him do research on wraiths.
"Yeah, and the guy banged her and left her in a gas station with her throat slit."
"Well, I heard she slit his throat and stole the truck."
"Get this: Caleb said he saw her snort something behind the dumpsters yesterday, just before she disappeared."
They call her a freak. Sam supposes they kinda have a point. He still doesn't like it when people use that word though.
Ms. Eigemann tells them to put their homework away and spends the entire lesson talking about depression and stress and she asks them if any of them ever think about hurting themselves and to please to talk to a teacher if they know someone who does, so Sam figures that's probably what happened to Alice. He wonders if he should've said something last week when one of her baggy sleeves slid back and he got a small glimpse of those deep, angry scars.
He mentions the whole thing that night when they're eating dinner. Dad shakes his head. He gets that dark smile on his face where you can almost make out the dimples under his heavy stubble. "Well, all I gotta say is I'm glad I had sons," he says and shoves another slice of pizza into his mouth.
"What do you mean?" Sam asks. He's pretty sure he's doing that face that always gets under Dad's skin, because that vein on his temple is starting to pulse and he's rubbing his eyes all tired and exasperated.
"He means he's glad he doesn't have to deal with any girly, princess emo crap," Dean growls before Dad has a chance to smack Sam upside the head. He looks weird when he forces down the last of his pizza, grease sliding down his hands. "I'm going out for a run."
It's easy. The fire licks up your arm, curls around your fingers. Pain rushes to your head, blinding white and roaring loud until you can curl up in it, until it's warm and soothing, stroking, petting. It wraps itself around you until the rest of the world disappears.
It starts a couple of weeks after Dad...went away- Sam can't bring himself to even think the word dead. Dad went someplace else, like he always does and when he's found what he's looking for he'll come back for them, battered and bruised and asking for a fifth of whiskey stat and Sam will go back to bitching about their father's drinking habits.
"Dude, what the hell?" Sam just about manages to grab the back of his brother's shirt and yank him back from the flames shooting out of the grave, before Dean takes another step forward and stumbles into the fiery pit.
Dean stares at him. His eyes huge and red-rimmed, shining like he's buried somewhere deep down inside his own head.
"Nothin'" he mumbles after a long pause, his arms still outstretched towards the fire. He starts to shift under Sam's gaze, forces his arms back in line with his body.
Dean's hand disappears inside the pocket of his leather coat.
The zippo clicks, faint under the roar of the flames behind them.
Dean has a thick bandage wrapped around his left palm the next morning.
It hurts. The first time. When you're four and you're running - bare feet on white-hot, biting ash. Daddy says the scars will fade. It still hurts, even when you aren't four and the small flame from Pastor Jim's fireplace bites your arm. The tiny patch of flesh tunes bright pink and for days all you have to do is dig your fingers into the dark scurf and you can feel Mom's soft voice in your mind again.
Sam finds his brother on the bathroom floor, sitting in a cooling puddle of shower water. His eyes fever bright, staring up at Sam, unseeing before they flicker back to the zippo in his hands.
"Dean?" Sam tries. He takes a step closer when he doesn't get a reaction. "Dean, what's wrong?"
"'sokayS'mmy," Dean slurs. He doesn't look up, just keeps sliding his thumb over the wet lighter. "Ya don' hafta stay."
Sam feels his hand twitch reflexively towards the cellphone in his pocket. I want to stay, he wants to say, but he can hear Ruby laughing in the back of his head. Flat out lie, Sam-I-Am, she says Sam feels a cold rock settle in his gut.
"What's wrong?" he repeats. His voice sounds rough, too loud in the crammy, flooded bathroom. He folds his long legs in between the bathtub and his brother. His bad knee gives a loud plop.
Dean shoots him a look, thin green rings around two huge pools of black. He holds up his left arm, his lips moving, silently forming words. Sam can feel the heat radiating off of Dean's pale skin.
"What?" he asks. He tries to take the zippo from his brother's other hand. Dean scoots back, a strangled cry escaping his lips. "You're not in hell," Sam tries and Dean growls.
Sam holds up his open palms in surrender, settles back against the tub. "It's okay," he whispers, his heart going a million miles an hour. Dean's fingers are cramping reflexively around the cool metal. Sam is just glad Dean didn't grab a gun in his fever dream.
Dean sucks his lips in between his teeth and slowly returns his attention to the lighter in his hand. Every now and then the sparks fly, but they flicker and die long before they can grow into a full flame, no matter how much Dean curses and pleads under his breath.
"He took 'em, Sammy," Dean mumbles later. His head tilts to the side, almost rests on Sam's shoulder, his fingers are still tightly wrapped around the lighter.
"Huh?"
"He took 'em."
Sam awkwardly works his arm around Dean's shoulder, pats the sweat-soaked shirt once, before he lets his hand fall away again. "Let's get you back to bed, okay?"
Dean nods solemnly, dead weight against Sam's shoulder. "You gotta help me get 'em back," he whispers while Sam fists his hands in his brother's shirt and pushes both of them to their feet. "Promise Sammy, you gotta promise."
Sam sighs, tightens his hold around Dean's shoulders. "Sure," he says and drags Dean another two steps towards the nearest bed. "Sure, I'll help you." Dean fixes an unsteady gaze on Sam, his lower lip is trembling slightly. "I promise," Sam adds and Dean slides off his shoulder, onto his tangled, still-soaked sheets.
He took them away. Castiel went and wiped all the little teardrop shaped scars off of your skin. The faded ones Azazel put there way back when, the ones you put next to them to help you remember. Castiel took all of them and no matter how many times you push your fingernails into the unmarred skin on your palm and in the crook of your arm where the secret scars are supposed to be, you can't ever make yourself hear her voice.
Castiel took them, but it's okay. Sammy promised. You push the lighter into his hand.
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 1500
Disclaimer: Not my boys. Kripke broke them long before I ever got to them.
Summary: Sam watches Dean's relationship with fire over the years.
Warning: Self Harm, broken!Dean
Written for 'Self Harm' for the Dean focused h/c Tags Challenge on hoodie_time and 'Burns' on myhc_bingo card.
Dean is scared of fire.
He is. Sam knows because every time they do a salt'n'burn Dean insists on being the one who lights the match and burns the bones and he gets real mad whenever Dad hands him the salt-can instead.
Sometimes when they were little Sam would wake up in the middle of the night and find Dean on top of the covers, playing with one of Dad's lighters. He never burned anything, just kept staring into the flame until his hands stopped shivering and the tears stopped running down his cheeks.
Now, when Sam wakes up, Dean has locked himself in the bathroom and Sam never asks about the warm flicker he can see under the door.
It's the precarious balance of painfearpaniccontrol that has your heart racing every single time. One second too long, one push too deep and the equation tips, blind panic takes over. That hasn't happened in a long time though. It almost never scars anymore.
It's the spring when Sam is thirteen - almost fourteen when Alice Miller stops coming to school one day.
Sam never really talked to Alice - she was kinda scary with her low-cut tops and the dark eyeliner and crazy, tangled orange hair, though Sam'd rather bite off his own tongue than admit as much.
The kids come up with all kinds of nasty rumors.
"She tried to hitch a ride to Atlantic City," they whisper while Sam tries to concentrate on the math problems he couldn't get to last night because Dad made him do research on wraiths.
"Yeah, and the guy banged her and left her in a gas station with her throat slit."
"Well, I heard she slit his throat and stole the truck."
"Get this: Caleb said he saw her snort something behind the dumpsters yesterday, just before she disappeared."
They call her a freak. Sam supposes they kinda have a point. He still doesn't like it when people use that word though.
Ms. Eigemann tells them to put their homework away and spends the entire lesson talking about depression and stress and she asks them if any of them ever think about hurting themselves and to please to talk to a teacher if they know someone who does, so Sam figures that's probably what happened to Alice. He wonders if he should've said something last week when one of her baggy sleeves slid back and he got a small glimpse of those deep, angry scars.
He mentions the whole thing that night when they're eating dinner. Dad shakes his head. He gets that dark smile on his face where you can almost make out the dimples under his heavy stubble. "Well, all I gotta say is I'm glad I had sons," he says and shoves another slice of pizza into his mouth.
"What do you mean?" Sam asks. He's pretty sure he's doing that face that always gets under Dad's skin, because that vein on his temple is starting to pulse and he's rubbing his eyes all tired and exasperated.
"He means he's glad he doesn't have to deal with any girly, princess emo crap," Dean growls before Dad has a chance to smack Sam upside the head. He looks weird when he forces down the last of his pizza, grease sliding down his hands. "I'm going out for a run."
It's easy. The fire licks up your arm, curls around your fingers. Pain rushes to your head, blinding white and roaring loud until you can curl up in it, until it's warm and soothing, stroking, petting. It wraps itself around you until the rest of the world disappears.
It starts a couple of weeks after Dad...went away- Sam can't bring himself to even think the word dead. Dad went someplace else, like he always does and when he's found what he's looking for he'll come back for them, battered and bruised and asking for a fifth of whiskey stat and Sam will go back to bitching about their father's drinking habits.
"Dude, what the hell?" Sam just about manages to grab the back of his brother's shirt and yank him back from the flames shooting out of the grave, before Dean takes another step forward and stumbles into the fiery pit.
Dean stares at him. His eyes huge and red-rimmed, shining like he's buried somewhere deep down inside his own head.
"Nothin'" he mumbles after a long pause, his arms still outstretched towards the fire. He starts to shift under Sam's gaze, forces his arms back in line with his body.
Dean's hand disappears inside the pocket of his leather coat.
The zippo clicks, faint under the roar of the flames behind them.
Dean has a thick bandage wrapped around his left palm the next morning.
It hurts. The first time. When you're four and you're running - bare feet on white-hot, biting ash. Daddy says the scars will fade. It still hurts, even when you aren't four and the small flame from Pastor Jim's fireplace bites your arm. The tiny patch of flesh tunes bright pink and for days all you have to do is dig your fingers into the dark scurf and you can feel Mom's soft voice in your mind again.
Sam finds his brother on the bathroom floor, sitting in a cooling puddle of shower water. His eyes fever bright, staring up at Sam, unseeing before they flicker back to the zippo in his hands.
"Dean?" Sam tries. He takes a step closer when he doesn't get a reaction. "Dean, what's wrong?"
"'sokayS'mmy," Dean slurs. He doesn't look up, just keeps sliding his thumb over the wet lighter. "Ya don' hafta stay."
Sam feels his hand twitch reflexively towards the cellphone in his pocket. I want to stay, he wants to say, but he can hear Ruby laughing in the back of his head. Flat out lie, Sam-I-Am, she says Sam feels a cold rock settle in his gut.
"What's wrong?" he repeats. His voice sounds rough, too loud in the crammy, flooded bathroom. He folds his long legs in between the bathtub and his brother. His bad knee gives a loud plop.
Dean shoots him a look, thin green rings around two huge pools of black. He holds up his left arm, his lips moving, silently forming words. Sam can feel the heat radiating off of Dean's pale skin.
"What?" he asks. He tries to take the zippo from his brother's other hand. Dean scoots back, a strangled cry escaping his lips. "You're not in hell," Sam tries and Dean growls.
Sam holds up his open palms in surrender, settles back against the tub. "It's okay," he whispers, his heart going a million miles an hour. Dean's fingers are cramping reflexively around the cool metal. Sam is just glad Dean didn't grab a gun in his fever dream.
Dean sucks his lips in between his teeth and slowly returns his attention to the lighter in his hand. Every now and then the sparks fly, but they flicker and die long before they can grow into a full flame, no matter how much Dean curses and pleads under his breath.
"He took 'em, Sammy," Dean mumbles later. His head tilts to the side, almost rests on Sam's shoulder, his fingers are still tightly wrapped around the lighter.
"Huh?"
"He took 'em."
Sam awkwardly works his arm around Dean's shoulder, pats the sweat-soaked shirt once, before he lets his hand fall away again. "Let's get you back to bed, okay?"
Dean nods solemnly, dead weight against Sam's shoulder. "You gotta help me get 'em back," he whispers while Sam fists his hands in his brother's shirt and pushes both of them to their feet. "Promise Sammy, you gotta promise."
Sam sighs, tightens his hold around Dean's shoulders. "Sure," he says and drags Dean another two steps towards the nearest bed. "Sure, I'll help you." Dean fixes an unsteady gaze on Sam, his lower lip is trembling slightly. "I promise," Sam adds and Dean slides off his shoulder, onto his tangled, still-soaked sheets.
He took them away. Castiel went and wiped all the little teardrop shaped scars off of your skin. The faded ones Azazel put there way back when, the ones you put next to them to help you remember. Castiel took all of them and no matter how many times you push your fingernails into the unmarred skin on your palm and in the crook of your arm where the secret scars are supposed to be, you can't ever make yourself hear her voice.
Castiel took them, but it's okay. Sammy promised. You push the lighter into his hand.