My head hurts for four months straight. Without relief or reprieve.
It starts the night we hunt Lilith and she sics her dogs on Dean. He dies with a smile on his face and it's cocky and reassuring, but his eyes go cold and stare unseeing at the ceiling. The world spins as Dean falls, and I don't notice when Bobby stumbles in because Dean's guts are in my hands and I can't hear a thing above the rush of blood in my head.
"Come on, Sam," Bobby says. He lays a hand on my shoulder but the pressure makes the room spin faster and he feels too close, like he's sucking all of my air out of the room, like he's stealing it from me, so I shake him off, and a little bit of the air returns to my lungs. "Let's get Dean out of here," he tries again, and the world, the room, my whole damn life comes to a shattering, shuddering halt. Each one of Bobby's words presses and pushes down against my brain and my head feels like it's going to cave in. Everything is too loud, too bright. Bobby hauls me to my feet and the room tips over, so he puts his arm around my waist and tries to manhandle me out of the house, and I can't feel or see anything now, except my head pounding like something inside it is trying to escape and Dean. But as we keep walking, Dean leaves my sight and a wild spike of panic shoots through my body because last I saw Dean, he was hurt, hurt badly. I whip around, out of Bobby's grasp and make my way back towards Dean. It feels like I'm walking through water that's holding me back, and I've been walking for hours, but Dean is still all the way across the kitchen, laying limp and still and not getting up.
"Sam?" It's Bobby. It must be Bobby because I'm watching Dean and Dean didn't open his mouth to say my name.
"Dean," I tell Bobby, I'm at scream at him. "We have to get him out of here!"
"I'll get him, Sam." Bobby looks like he might be crying, but I don't know why. Bobby can patch Dean up.
"He's hurt, Bobby, be careful," I tell him anyway, but it feels wrong. Something about it sounds wrong. Dean's eyes are open but he's not looking at me or telling me he's fine. Bobby doesn't say anything, hardly moves, except past me to scoop Dean up. Dean's eyes are still open and he doesn't try to push away from Bobby. He's not moving at all. He's not even breathing.
It hits me all over again and it levels me flat that Dean's not getting up, not going to be fine, and not only does it feel like a pound of bricks has landed on my head, but I can't breathe again.
"Go to the car, Sam," says Bobby, staring at me with Dean's head lolling against his chest, Dean's blood coating his shirt, slick and red.
"No." The room is spinning again and Dean is floating in and out of my line of sight. "No." When I find Dean I try to focus on him, but he's so far away from where I am. "Give him to me," I demand suddenly. All of the air in the room is concentrated, like a vacuum, right where Dean is. I need to be near Dean, I'll suffocate if I'm not, but Bobby doesn't seem to understand. He's just looking at me like I've grown an extra head. It feels like I have. "Bobby, give him to me. Give me my brother." I'm inside a vacuum now, a different vacuum, a truly empty vacuum. I'm the only thing inside it and my lips are moving but I can't hear the words coming out of my mouth, or feel anything around me, not the floor, not the blood on my hands.
"Sam…" Bobby says, and that I hear. I hear it like he's yelling into my ears. He's shaking his head and holding Dean close, and my head is pounding and pulsing so hard I think it might explode. I can't see or breathe and I can't understand how Dean's dead. It's been a year coming, but I'm knocked off my feet, because he's dead. For real. Dean is dead and I was supposed to save him. "Alright, fine," says Bobby at last. When he places Dean in my arms, they become the only thing in my whole body I can feel aside from my head. They're tingling with life and grief and they think that if they hold Dean long enough he'll come back to life. When he places Dean into my outstretched arms it's like the vacuum around me disappears and I'm sucked into the one around Dean, just the two of us. I'm able to breathe again, a full, deep breath, but the first thing I smell is Dean's blood, and Dean's blood is all over me and it makes my stomach twist and turn uncomfortably, but I make it to the car before I empty my empty stomach all over the side walk. All over Dean and all over myself.
I'm kneeling in my own sick with my dead brother in my arms, and all I can think about is how much my head hurts.