(no subject)

[whereupon]

This one's kind of experimental. Slightly more than usual, I mean.

Love Letter
by whereupon
Sam/Dean, first season, nc-17, 4,849 words.
It's almost fall and Sam hasn't said anything about leaving.



Two hours out of the city and Dean's driving for the pure exhilarating hell of it, giddy on the wide sweeping turns and endless flat roads built for speeding, no one around but the occasional battered pickup headed in the opposite direction. They were in the city too long, shadowed alleys and rusty fire escapes and no-parking zones, and Dean can still feel it, subdermal creep like he's being watched from further up the street or from one of the windows looking out high above from the glass-fronted buildings.

But there's nothing watching him now, nothing for as far as he can see, empty rolling fields out his window and trees outside Sam's. It's a world entirely familiar, no places to hide that he couldn't find, nothing lurking that he couldn't track, and they've escaped once again. It's not even like Dean will have to pay the ticket (which was the least of their worries anyway), it's not like he even cares, but it's annoying all the same, somebody punishing his car just because he and Sam were too busy trying to save somebody's life to drive around the block looking for a meter.

Two hours out of the city and nobody around, not really, nobody but Sam. Sam asleep in the shotgun seat, Sam who saved the girl this time, who caught the beast in the chest with a bolt from the crossbow while Dean kicked over the altar and smashed the butt of his gun against the warlock's skull.

Dean could have done it all by himself, but it was a hell of a lot easier with Sam at his back. It felt a hell of a lot more right, like that was how it was meant to be all along. And that's kind of fucking terrifying, because the minute Dean lets his guard down, Sam's gonna leave again, and the thing is, he thinks he might have already done that. Gotten used to it. Gotten used to the idea of Sam being around forever, no matter what he says.

He's gotten used to it, but then, Sam hasn't said anything at all about leaving.

It's almost fall and Sam hasn't said anything about going back to school.

Speaking of Sam, he's meant to be navigating, or at least finding them a hunt, but he's not doing either. He crashed out an hour ago, crashed out in the shotgun seat with his face turned towards the unrolled window and his hands splayed across his thighs. Dean was in the middle of explaining something to him, the evolution of the British blues or how to recognize a succubus from across a crowded bar, something he should have known already, and all of a sudden Sam wasn't even pretending to listen anymore, wasn't even pointedly ignoring him, was making these bizarre snoring noises instead.

Dean would have started to wonder if he was alive over there, if maybe he was choking on his tongue or something dumb like that, but his fingers twitch every once in awhile, so it's okay, so he's just being weird. Being himself, because weird and Sam are pretty much inseparable, synonymous.

Dean could take it personally, Sam falling asleep in the middle of his discussion, but he's decided to think that Sam's just tired, tired and probably a little hungover, as that will save Dean from having to kick his ass or something, which seems like a lot of effort. It's too goddamn hot for effort, it really is.

Two hours on the road, no one around and nowhere in particular they have to be, so after another couple of miles, Dean eases the car onto the side of the road. The sun's at the wrong angle for the trees to offer any shadows, any shade, any sanctuary, but he stops the car all the same. Hot blue swath of sky through the windshield, swelter seeping in when he stops, the engine ticking as it cools. The little fluffy clouds that were unraveling across the morning sky have disappeared, dissipated in the heat.

Sam mumbles something, but he doesn't move, doesn't wake up, and Dean rolls his eyes. Jesus Christ, Sam can sleep through anything, he'd probably sleep through the apocalypse, he deserves so much worse than the occasional unflattering cell phone photo or Sharpie'd mustache. So much worse than Dean intercepting the woman who was making a beeline for him at the bar last night, but see, if Sam knew how to recognize a succubus in the first place, Dean wouldn't have had to get there first to make sure he didn't get himself into any kind of dumbass situation from which Dean would inevitably have to rescue him.

So Dean introduced himself and escorted the woman to the door and then out into the alley, because what kind of gentleman lets a lady (especially a lady like that) go off on her own in the dark, and then Sam was slamming out of the door after them, and Dean nearly tripped, startled by Sam's dramatic entrance and because his balance wasn't that great to begin with, as he had a hand around the woman's -- and her name was Bethany, he thinks, or something like that, but he's pretty sure it was Bethany. Anyway, he had a hand around her waist and maybe another one up her shirt and what the fuck, Sam?

It's possible that the woman fled shortly thereafter because she was a succubus, but it's probably more likely that she was just a human, a normal person with at least a little common sense, because Sam can be kind of intimidating when he's pissed off or scared out of his mind or otherwise not paying attention, and the way he was holding the Beretta, Dean kind of wanted to flee, himself.

He didn't, of course. He stood his ground and when Sam got close enough, he tried to explain his intentions, because Sam was a reasonable guy most of the time and Dean only had his brother's welfare in mind, after all.

"I've known how to recognize a succubus since I was twelve, Dean," Sam said.

"And then you went off and learned about all kinds of dumb lawyer shit, how'm I supposed to know what you remembered?" Dean said. And then, "And seriously, dude, law school? You tryin' to make up for Dad and me or something?"

At which point Sam had swallowed and gotten this look on his face, this look that made Dean think maybe he'd gone a little too far with that last part. Sam hadn't said anything, though. He stayed quiet the whole way back to the motel and then he went into the bathroom and closed the door so he could do his freaky half-hour oral hygiene routine (the kid's devotion to his teeth is kind of astonishing; sometimes Dean thinks he might have, like, imprinted on a vampire or something), and Dean thought about what he was going to say when Sam came out (like how it was Sam's fault they went to the bar in the first place, because after saving the girl, they went back to the motel room, where Sam used up all the shampoo trying to wash the viscous yellow blood out of his hair and Dean said that he smelled like a funeral home and Sam threw a towel at his head and then Dean said he could use a drink, how 'bout it, and Sam agreed), but Sam was taking forever, maybe he was giving himself a goddamn manicure or something, so Dean closed his eyes and then it was morning and Sam was snoring in the other bed.

Dean gets out of the car, doesn't quite slam his door, and Sam doesn't even so much as twitch. Whatever. He's gonna wake up with a neckache and bitch about it the rest of the way, but Dean tried to wake him up, he really did, so it's Sam's own goddamn fault. If he wants to fall asleep halfway through one of Dean's life lessons, miss out on something that might have otherwise have saved his life some day, he's gonna have to live with the consequences. Like how there's only one beer left in the trunk cooler, sloshing lukewarm in a pool of what used to be ice, and now it's Dean's.

On the other hand, the scenery's kind of dull, the same repetitious landscape of field and forest that Dean's seen all his life, and he can only stare at the sky for so long before blindness threatens. Plus the peanut M&Ms he keeps in the pocket of his duffel are starting to melt in the same humid air that's making his shirt cling to his back, making his hair start to go flat. When he scratches his head, his hand comes away sticky, gel-scented. He wipes his palm on his jeans and leans against the hood.

Spare change in his pocket, spare change left over from the bar before last. A nickel and a quarter he was gonna use to play one more song until Sam grabbed him by his collar and pointed out that their target was getting away. Dean considers throwing one of the coins, or both of the coins, at Sam, but he decides on an M&M in the end, because he's feeling nice and because Sam would look stupid with a quarter-sized bruise in the center of his forehead and Sam's got a rough life, he doesn't need Dean to go around making it rougher. Sometimes.

The blue M&M hits Sam on the cheek, disappears from view, and Dean immediately shoves his hand into his pocket again, watches his brother out of the corner of his eye. Sam twitches, throws an arm across his eyes and yawns, pushes himself up. "Dude, don't throw food at me," he says drowsily, blinking at Dean, and then he opens the door and gets out. Faded worn-soft grey of his t-shirt vibrant against the sky, like he's backlit by the entire world.

"You musta been dreaming," Dean says. "Nightmare, huh? Was it clowns?"

Sam gives him a dirty look, reaches to take his beer, and Dean lets it go. It's warm, anyway. Sam takes a swallow and grimaces, hands the bottle back to him. "Why'd we stop?" he asks.

"Didn't know where the hell we were going," Dean says.

"That's never stopped you before," Sam says, leaning next to him against the car.

"You have somewhere to be?" Dean asks. "'Cause you coulda mentioned that before you conked out on me."

Sam shrugs. "I miss anything?"

"Road," Dean says. "Road and sky and not a goddamn meter maid fuckin' anywhere."

Sam makes a noise that might be a laugh, half-amused, half-exasperated. "She was just doing her job, Dean. You were in a no-parking zone. And it's not like you're even gonna pay the fine."

"It's the principle of the thing," Dean says. "We were saving people. There oughtta be an exception for that. Like fire trucks, you know?"

"Get some flashing lights," Sam says. "Mount 'em on the roof. That might work."

"You wanna fuck up somebody's car, get your own."

"It would probably have air conditioning," Sam says. Dean glares at him. "I'm just saying."

Dean gives the bottle back to Sam, wipes a hand across his face. "It's too hot to argue, Sammy, so just stop it already. You got us a hunt?"

"There might be a vampire in Dallas and maybe a ghost in Tennessee," Sam says. "And, uh, somebody saw Bigfoot again in Montana."

"Any of 'em real?"

Sam shrugs. "Probably not."

"Huh."

"Yeah." He sighs. "You could, uh, keep driving. We gotta hit another town eventually."

"Finding a town's not the problem," Dean says. "It's what we're gonna do when we get there." Hours doing nothing, wasting time, means maybe Sam will have time to think, maybe to think that Dean might not need him after all, that he could head back to school, never look back and not feel guilty in the slightest.

"You're actually complaining about having to take the night off?" Sam asks. "Wow. That's a first. You think you might have heatstroke?"

"Funny," Dean says sourly.

Sam shrugs. He doesn't answer. Dean glances over at him, at the pulse skittering in his throat. They're pinned in, the trees on one side and the car on the other. Open sky at their backs, anything could sneak up on them, but they'll hear it coming from miles away.

There's this thought, see, this thought Dean's had once or twice, maybe a couple of times, generally when Sam's offering him a hand up or is asleep in the other bed or grinning at him with his stupid hair all windblown and the sun half-blinding through the windshield, Dean's whole world compressed into the shotgun seat of his car, and it kind of makes Dean's stomach clench and his heart hurt more than a little.

And this other time, when the engine had been sounding wrong for days and Dean hadn't had the time to care of her properly because there was a demon in Tallahassee and then a werewolf all the way up in New Jersey and then this thing that Sam says was a ghoul in some nameless Nebraska town. And then they finally had some downtime, finally had some time to breathe, and Dean found a place to stop, some parking lot with a car wash next door. Sam was wearing that absurd shirt with, what was it, like, a unicorn on it or something, and Dean had the hood up and Sam came over to stand next to him, to peer over his shoulder. And then he reached in like he was going to touch something, prod at Dean's car, and Dean slapped his hand away instinctively, because a) internal combustion means the engine's fucking hot, moron, and b) it was Dean's car, and c) maybe there were better things Sam could do with his hands. And then Dean panicked, because what the fuck, Dean, where did that thought even come from, and even though he was kind of freaking the fuck out, just a little, he thought he covered pretty well. He narrowed his eyes and told Sam to get him a beer, bitch, and Sam heaved a sigh and wandered away.

And that's how it is, usually. That's all it is. Fleeting, temporary insanity. Something wired wrong in his brain, obviously, but every man's got a few of those, right? Right.

But right now Sam is biting his lip and staring at the trees like maybe the secrets of the universe or an explanation for their history of family tragedy (and why does all the bad shit happen to Sam, anyway, he's the best person Dean knows and he doesn't deserve fuckin' any of it), maybe world peace or a cure for cancer is encoded in the pattern of the branches, the skeleton veins of the leaves.

It's the best day they've had in a long time and Sam might be thinking about leaving and there's no one around to see, to hold Dean to anything, so Dean leans over

He kind of expects to stop himself, kind of expects sanity to take over, offer a last-minute reprieve, but it doesn't. Something lets go, some kamikaze signal makes it through, and instead he presses his mouth awkwardly against the side of Sam's, closes his eyes against the hot yellow flare of sunlight and hears the beer bottle slip out of Sam's hand and hit the ground.

Sam shifts, fractionally, minutely, just enough for Dean's mouth to be pressed fully against his. This instant of full contact and the immensity is fucking overwhelming, lighting every cell in his goddamn body, and Dean is kissing his brother, Jesus Christ. And something in his mind snaps down like a blade, cutting off that thought, decapitating the idea before it goes any further.

Dean pulls back. Away. Frantically, like skydiving in reverse.

Heatstroke, he thinks. Sam was right, he has heatstroke, and Sam is looking at him and there's nowhere to run, so he does the next logical thing. He punches the car, the hot metal of the hood, and for a second he doesn't feel anything, and then his hand is on fucking fire and his eyes are watering. "Motherfucking sonuvabitch," he snarls, a half-second away from kicking the fucking car, but the car didn't do anything to him, his car doesn't deserve it, and he probably does deserve it, deserve the way his hand is maybe broken, because what the fuck, he just kissed Sam out of, like.

Out of something he maybe doesn't want to think about right now, with Sam so close, Sam saying, "Dean, hey, man," all calm, deliberately, tauntingly calm. Because that's what he does, he puts Dean on edge, gets him all worked up, and then pretends like he didn't do anything, like none of it is his fault when usually pretty much everything is.

Dean stares at the liquid black of the car, trying to think of a way out of this, trying to think about nothing at all. He's fairly certain he can't blame this on the succubus, what with Bethany not actually being a succubus in the first place.

After a moment, he hears Sam move, hears Sam shift, and then Sam puts a hand on his shoulder and rotates him slowly so that he's looking at Sam's chest, looking up at Sam. Sam, at very close range, who smells of hot leather, the interior of the car, of dust and sleep and the tang of sweat and whose mouth looks kind of red, dark, like Dean scraped him raw.

"Did you break anything?" Sam asks, his face screwed up with concern, and then he pokes one of Dean's knuckles.

Dean yelps, yanks his injured hand out of Sam's reach. "What the fuck," he snarls. "You couldn't wait for me to answer?"

And Sam doesn't completely deserve that, doesn't deserve his wrath, because Dean's the one who fucked up here, but it's not like Dean has a choice. Not like he can do anything about how he's panicking, how it seems entirely conceivable that his heart might explode any second now, and anyway, that fucking hurt.

"Sorry," Sam says, and he kisses Dean, which is a little surprising. That's probably why Dean's mouth opens, his jaw dropping in shock and all of that. It's probably why Dean doesn't push him back; he's too busy being stunned.

Obviously.

Sam has all the subtlety of a shotgun blast to the chest sometimes, and Dean would know. Not that he's complaining, exactly.

And Sam is still kissing him, Sam's tongue is pushing inside of his mouth, Sam's hand is slipping down to the small of Dean's back like Dean's the girl here. And there's no way in hell that's true, so it's not like Dean has a choice, not like there's anything he can do but swipe his tongue across Sam's lips, work his uninjured hand around Sam's neck, the knob of Sam's spine brushing briefly against Dean's palm as he pushes Sam's hair up, off his neck. Sam's hair slipping between Dean's fingers as he gets a better grip, and Sam makes this noise, a noise dangerously close to a moan, to something incredibly obscene.

Dean gets one leg in between Sam's own and pushes Sam back flat against the shotgun-side door. Instant of broken contact, Sam's mouth slipping off of Dean's, and one of them gasps. And then Sam's hands are worked around Dean's neck, his sweat-slick palms skidding across the damp of Dean's skin as he pulls Dean closer.

Making out with Sam. Dean is making out with Sam. It's amazing how his mind refuses to react to the thought, to do anything but repeat it, run it over and over again, reduce it to broken-record background, to the white hum left behind when a record ends. It's amazing how he's not doing anything about it but kissing Sam back, worked up so close to his brother that there might not be any air between them at all.

Sam breaks away, finally. Breaks the kiss, if that's what it was, a sloppy, vaguely pornographic kiss that extended to necks and jaws and the soft space beneath Dean's ear and where the fuck did his brother learn to do that, does he do it to everybody or did he just know what it would do to Dean, and that's a disturbing thought, that Sam knew. That Sam thought about it.

That this was, like, premeditated, goddamn malice aforethought. Though that might not work, seeing as Dean's the one who kissed him first and all.

And Dean has this thought, suddenly (which is kind of remarkable in and of itself, the able-to-think thing). This thought that maybe Sam came after him at the bar not because he was scared, because he thought it really was a succubus, and maybe not because he was pissed off 'cause Dean stole the girl, but maybe, just maybe, because he was jealous.

And how long has that been an issue?

Dean blinks. He's not sure when they got turned around, how Sam managed to flip them around, push him up against the door instead, all without his knowing, and that's disconcerting, that's really fucking disconcerting.

How he's pretty sure he would let Sam do anything to him right now. How he might not even notice, the way Sam's undoing him, breaking him down, breaking him into his most basic elements.

Sam's breathing hard. They both are. Sam is blushing. Dean's pretty sure that he is, too. He'd kill for some shade right about now. Or ice. Ice would be excellent.

"Sam," Dean says. It takes an impossible amount force to lift his head, to meet his brother's eyes and to not look away.

"What," Sam says. He looks almost calm, except for how his hands are clenched into fists at his sides, his fingers bloodless-white. His hair's in his face and his adam's apple's moving convulsively and Dean kind of wants to claim this as a victory, now that he's made Sam panic, too, but he thinks there might be larger issues at hand.

"You're not, you know," Dean says. His throat is oddly constricted, his voice wracked and rasping. He clears his throat, tries again. "You're not."

"What," Sam says. "Freaked? Are you?"

Dean bites his lip. He thinks that the answer should probably be yes. He should probably say, yes, I'm freaked, I just made out with you, sorry about that, man, it was nothing. Which would be a lie, of course, but probably safer than the alternative.

He looks past his brother at the trees, glances back at Sam. "Not if, uh. Not if you're not."

"I'm not," Sam says.

"Okay," Dean says.

"Okay?" Sam echoes, a little disbelievingly.

"Okay!" Dean snaps.

"Seriously, Dean, you're freaked," Sam says, exasperated. His nostrils flare and he crosses his arms.

"No, I'm not," Dean says, and then he narrows his eyes. "What the hell do you mean, I'm freaked? You're not?"

"No," Sam says plainly.

Dean stares at him. "Oh." He's not sure what that means, exactly. What Sam is trying to tell him. He suspects that it might be something worldshaking, something mindblowing.

"Oh god," Sam says, his shoulders slumping, his face falling, crushed, anguished. "You're freaked." He looks bullet-grazed, wounded. And then the faintest ghost of a smile on his face, like acceptance, like he thinks it's just him, thinks it was maybe that whole temporary insanity thing on Dean's part. Like he's so used to being a freak that he doesn't even question it and Jesus, Sam.

"I'm not freaked, goddamnit," Dean says. "So stop fuckin' saying I am unless you want me to be, because if you keep saying it, I will be."

"Really?" Sam says.

"Really," Dean says. "Ask me again and I'll kill you."

Sam's laugh is half-hysterical, half-smothered against Dean, smothered by Dean's mouth, and oh, god, Sam is shaking, Sam's heart must have stopped as surely as Dean's own did, waiting, and now it's making up for lost time, this ridiculous frenetic pace. Sam's fingers twist in the hem of Dean's t-shirt and Dean is rendered off-balance, has no choice but to tip his head back, lean in against Sam. He kisses the edge of Sam's jaw, the tender places of his throat, his fingers dipping beneath the hem of Sam's shirt and lifting it up, lifting it so that he can touch Sam's skin, grab hold of his waist, because the thought of losing contact for one goddamn second sets him reeling with terror.

It seems entirely possible that he might not be able to survive the sheer trauma of such an event, which is weird considering that he's gone his whole life without ever once needing Sam like this, needing Sam right here and right now, his mouth against Dean's, the pads of his fingers skidding across Dean's stomach.

Dean feels volatile, unhinged in some soul-consuming way. His mind is racing, but his thoughts keep getting blotted out, shorted out, by what Sam is doing, by the fact that it is Sam doing these things. That Sam is doing this with him, to him, that they're shaking on the side of the road and there's a bruise on the side of Sam's neck, a bruise Dean put there himself, his tongue skipping hot across the artery beat and pulse.

Sam's hand skims the inside of his thigh, lingering on the inseam, and Dean swallows. "Yeah," he says, answer to the unspoken question, like there was ever any question at all. This is insanity, clearly, but if Sam is synonymous with weird, surely Dean Winchester is synonymous with crazy.

"You're good?" Sam asks. His eyes are dilated, dark and huge and Dean thinks of gasoline, of arson. Guilty plunge in his stomach, the way he's setting his brother on fire, but it's only fair, the way Sam's doing it to him, too. The way Sam's been doing it to him his whole life, in only a slightly less dramatic fashion, making him do the most fucked-up things, take the stupidest risks, run into burning buildings and jump off of cliffs, that kind of thing.

"Said I'd, oh fuck, kill you," Dean reminds him, pressing his face against Sam's shoulder, his voice going low and choked and not threatening at all, goddamnit.

"Yeah, I guess you did," Sam says. "You, uh. You wanna go through with that?" and the bastard is grinning. His eyes are dark, his face flushed, and Dean is going to kill him.

"Oh, motherfucking, Sammy," Dean says. "Backseat, backseat now."

This awful painful second in which the door handle slides in his palm and he can't get the door to fucking open, and then it does. He manages to get into the backseat, but Sam isn't following him, isn't sliding in after him. Sam is going to his knees on the ground and Dean isn't sure what he's doing anymore, isn't sure about anything.

Maybe this is some kind of fever dream after all, some heat-induced hallucination, Sam's eyes shining and his hands trembling as he unzips Dean's jeans and Dean watches him with something a little like apprehension.

And then Sam adjusts his balance, or maybe loses his balance, one hand sweeping out and connecting with Dean's knuckles, Dean's bruised and injured knuckles, and Dean doesn't howl. He just makes Sam aware of his presence, is all. Kind of loudly. He flails out reflexively and catches himself at the last minute, his fist a breath away from colliding with Sam's cheek.

He blinks. He lowers his fist.

"Sorry," Sam says. "I forgot, sorry, is it okay, are you," his words spilling out, tumbling over each other, his hair pressed sweat-sticky to his forehead, and he is so goddamn ridiculous, Dean loves him so fucking much, and Dean snakes his good hand around Sam's neck, pulls him up. Kisses him, breathless and reckless and wrecked, just for an instant. Because it's Sam, it's Sam and it's okay, it's good.

It's better than good.

The car door is open and Sam is on his knees, peeling Dean's jeans open as Dean drags in a breath and waits. The air is muggy, muggy with heat, with Old Spice-scent and sweat and salt, and in the distance there might be clouds, thunderheads on the horizon, but Sam lowers his face to Dean's stomach and none of it matters. Nothing more than them, Sam and Dean beneath that heat-dull blue sky and the metal shimmer of the car and the way they shiver, the way they move, as though they were built for this, as though all of this was designed for them, as though there is no other way this could have happened, and Dean breathes out.

--

end