Sam's not surprised to find his brother breaking into his home in the middle of the night. Looking back, he even expected the punch to the face and the quick jab of a leg that brought both brothers down to the ground. Dean was always quicker – stronger. Every bit the hunter that Sam never wanted to be.
So maybe Sam's still a little surprised at how easy it is to lie to Jessica (but he spills likes like a busted water main). The biggest lie he's ever told: I'm Sam. I grew up in Kansas…there's not much more to it than that. And if he saw a shadow move in the corner of his eye, well, it was just a bird.
Sam was telling the truth though. He meant it when he zipped the bag shut and said, 'I'll be back by Monday.' There was just something in the way that Dean asked Sam to help that he couldn't ignore. So even though he had dozens of reason why he shouldn't go drifting through his head like an assembly line, he agreed to go. It was only three days, he could give Dean that.
.
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The first hunt is followed by a second, then a fifth, and Sam is surprised at the ease of it all. He thinks back to the life he created for himself and vows he'll finish what he started. He wants to live – a real life. But first, he'll track down his father and kill the demon that made blood drip onto his forehead. And in the meantime, if the gun fits perfectly into his hand -aim it higher Sammy boy. You've got to make the shot count- he'll chalk it up to muscle memory and nothing more.
.
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Dean holds their father's journal like a lifeline. The pages flip with an increasing sharpness, like there isn't truth outside the black ink and smudged drawings. And to Dean, there was never, is never, will never be anything outside of that journal. It reminds Sam of times when math books were replaced with encyclopedias of pagan gods, when I want to play soccer was overshadowed by Dean's firm, yes sir. It reminds him of being told never to come back because he wanted something better for himself – a life outside of hunting (even if that meant outside of his family).
And maybe he should just count himself lucky that he got away. Snipped the binds that anchored him to a life of credit card fraud and giving fake names in motel lobbies. But t's not. It's certainly enough to swallow the irritation that sticks in his throat. He tries to understand Dean's devotion to this not-quite-life, to a journal that can banish and kill and heal, a journal that goes back a millennia but can't help them find their father. Tries to empathize, but he comes away empty handed, and reaching for the aspirin.
Loving someone doesn't excuse you from wanting to grab them by their shoulders and yelling until you're red in the face. There's just something about Dean's unyielding faith in their father that balloons in Sam's chest until it's hard to breathe. You're stronger than this, better than this, the words threaten to jump off his tongue, but he finds a sentence that may be the key to laying the ghost to rest, so he lets it be.
"Everything alright there, princess?" Dean's question catches him off guard. (His presence throws Sam's life off of its current projection).
Sam takes a measured breath. "Yeah," he says, ignoring the way his fingers hit the keys of the laptop with the slightest increase of force. "I'm fine." And if he sounds defensive, Dean let's it go with a lingering look and a shrug.
.
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He still doesn't sleep at night. The nightmares crash into him like the four riders of the apocalypse, leaving him shaken until the morning. It was easy to distract himself when he was miles away and the phone was silenced after the first ring. Even easier when the phone calls stopped coming altogether. Distracting yourself at three in the morning with nothing but the moon peering in from a drafty window is a touch more complicated.
Sam watches Dean sleep and feels an ache pulling at his chest. He wasn't there to see the slight worry lines form just under the surface of his brother's skin. Doesn't know what caused the scar to his left knuckle or the one just under his hairline. The truth is, it was always lingering on the outskirts of his mind. Buried, but not quite deep enough to ignore the fact that Dean was being slammed into walls while Sam struggled over theories. But it happened. Dean was hurting and Sam wasn't there. But Sam was hurting, too (he still is).
On nights when he couldn't shake images of his father and Dean standing over weapons, or bandaging themselves after a hunt gone slightly sour, it was all he could do to pull Jessica in close and shut his eyes tight.
Now, morning comes with red eye, three aspirins, and a trip for two cups of coffee. He catches himself sometimes, when he's dragging his hands over his eyes and thinking: You'll get used to it. But he doesn't want to get used to it. He wants it to end. For good. He wants to move on with his life and do what he was meant to do (he drowns out the thought that he's already doing it).
Dean's awake when he gets back to the motel room. His brother looks from the clock to Sam – an increasingly irritating habit. "How much sleep did you get?" It's a standard question with just the right amount of cautious concern.
"Enough." Sam's smile doesn't fool anyone. He takes a sip of his coffee. "We should head to the farm," he says by way of avoidance. "Try to catch this thing before it morphs again. It may be our last chance."
There's an anxiety ridden second where Sam thinks that Dean isn't going to let the subject go. That he's going to press and pull until Sam's knuckles go white because, no, he doesn't want to talk about it. Doesn't know how to talk about it to a brother he hasn't seen in two years. His shoulders relax when he hears, "I'll drive."
.
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The first rebellious thing Sam ever did: tried out for the basketball team. The last: moved to California to go to college. He almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all.
The thing is, Sam knows there's more to life than sleepless nights in an Impala. He wrapped himself around the smooth skin of that life for a year and a half before it ended in blood and fire. How could he be blamed for wanting more? Didn't he owe it to himself to wake up happy in the morning? Didn't Dean?
But Dean gave up on that life long ago-never understood the option between grocery shopping and breaking latches to abandoned asylums. Dean never saw a life for himself outside of his father and if he ever bothered to question everything, well, Dean's never been good and self-analysis past two shots of whiskey.
And the hell of the thing is, watching Dean struggle for their father, Sam's not sure who to pity more. The man who wasted his life chasing a demon around the country, or the son who follows along without a single question or a doubt. Maybe he's been cooped up in the dingy motel room for too long. He lets out a sigh that can only come from the bones and then the phone rings. He doesn't hesitate. "Yeah," he says without breaking a beat, "It's archaic. Belongs to a water God and get this-" and he loses himself in his research because Dean needs him and that's enough, at least for now.
.
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He looks at Dean and says he's fine because he doesn't know how to say anything else. Add a touch of a smile and you get something resembling honesty. So maybe it's easier to lie than to turn things he doesn't understand into words. He says he's okay because it's easier than saying: I want to tear my head open because something is happening to me and I'm scared I'm losing my mind -We won't ever be the family you want us to be. We were never the family you wanted us to be - I'm not sorry.
And Dean scans his face with just the right amount of scrutiny. Dean's been living with shadows under his eyes much longer than Sammy has. He knows the warning signs, can pick them out with every nightmare and detached sigh. "Whatever you say," he says, almost too willing to let it go. "Just don't go loopy on me, I'm counting on you to watch my back."
And Sam tries not to read into Dean's words. Doesn't try to realize that Dean needs Sam to be okay because if Sam's okay then Dean is okay and sometimes, that burden is too much to bear.
And maybe if they were a different family- one that spoke about school instead of hunts, that took vacations to water parks and zoos instead of satanic monuments and haunted ruins in the woods, Sam could sit Dean down and tell him everything he needs to say. Sometimes, Sam looks at Dean with just enough conviction to convince himself that he can start the conversion he's aching to have, but the words stick in his throat until he looks away. There are too many undercurrents, so much water that he can't even see the bridge.
Sam doesn't know how to fix it. He doesn't know if he can.
.
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The ache inside Sam grows, constricting his muscles and making him a little too aware of how his lungs press against his ribcage. He can feel it stretching inside him, burrowing deeper and swelling with every breath he takes. He knows he's allowing his obsession to take control. But Sam needs to find their father. He needs a lead to this demon so he can get his revenge.
.
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It's sleepless nights waved off by finals and a new party. A reoccurring nightmare that left him sweating and shaking in the morning. Sam tried to pass it off as being over-caffeinated or under-caffeinated, sleep deprived and overworked. But Sam knew what could be lingering in the darkness and if he chose to ignore the ominous feeling in the pit of his stomach, then he really doesn't have anyone else to blame but himself.
It's shaking his head on the outskirts of a graveyard. He told them it was stupid, just another ghost story, a waste of time on a Thursday night, but his knee is shaking in anticipation. Oh, Sam did the research. He knows this isn't anything but a hoax, but he also knows what can happen when people start poking around a graveyard in the middle of the night.
Jessica looks at him with bright eyes and laughs. "Sam Winchester, are you afraid of graveyard?"
He's afraid of what could be lurking just out of eyesight. Of what can follow them home. Nothing good comes from tempting the paranormal, if only people would just learn then maybe, maybe he wouldn't have had to grow up in nameless motel rooms.
"I just think it's a bad idea," he says and he means it. "Can we just go back? Please?"
Someone signs and someone else says: You're so lame, Sam. But Sam can let out a sigh of relief when the engine turns on and they head back to campus.
It's finding holy water and salt when he unpacks in the quiet of his dorm because even though Sam walked away, Dean still wasn't going to let go. Three steps from the trash, Sam reconsidered and sticks everything in the back of a drawer. Because even though he walked away, he still can't let go.
It's a hot, searing pain where his head used to be and Sam swears he's going to die here. Here. In some motel that smells too much like peppermint and Lysol - where the receptionist can't even remember his (false) name. He would laugh if he wasn't stopping himself from screaming. He has a fraction of a second to panic. Words string together in a frenzied protest - not here, not like this. We're not even hunting.
The table gives way to floor and breathing becomes a forced effort. Suddenly, there's blue, a haze of a shag carpet and the splintered reflection of a horse in a broken mirror. Another spike of pain and then there's a face. No, a body, crouching in a corner. Something's wrong, so very wrong. Sam screams at the figure but it comes out as a choked gasp.
He's torn from the vision by a solid pressure on both sides of his body before he registers the voice. Dean. His fingers are still dripping from the shower, droplets of water slowly tricking onto Sam's face. "What's wrong? What's going on?" Always there to carry him out of a burning house, to make Spaghetti-o's, and to bring Sam back from the brink of insanity. "What do you see?"
"Something's with him," Sam mumbles. "He's not safe." He pushes himself off the floor and stumbles. "We have to find him. We have to help."
Dean grabs Sam tighter, anchors himself in Sam's presence. "Who's not safe?" He asks and he still doesn't get it. "Talk to be Sammy. Give me something to work with."
And Sam does.
Later, when Dean is searching through apartment listings with shag carpets, Sam watches him with a look that almost resembles affection. He's lost the grip on his old life, but at least he feels like he's finally getting his brother back.
.
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Three packs of Doritos, blue Gatorade, and a box of toothpaste that's crushed at the corner. There was a time when his cart was full of pasta and eggplants and peppers – the yellow ones, not the green ones- Jess always said before he headed to the market. She would cook and he would watch, refusing to think back to canned soup and stale cereal.
"It's pasta, Sam." She shook her head, but the smile reached her eyes. "Didn't your father teach you anything?"
John taught Sam everything and nothing at all. Sam could leave his apartment in the middle of the night and be prepared for anything that might jump at him from the shadows. Sam's a survivor, a lesson Dean would say was the most important of all. But he never learned how to cook a chicken without the middle being raw
Sam shrugged. "I guess he just never had the time." John didn't have the time for much other than hunting Yellow Eyes.
"Well, I guess it's time you learned."
And Sam did learn. Just like he learned to do laundry on a weekly basis and how to handle a part time job. It was perfect, Sam thinks, until it wasn't. It all disappears when a car honks just outside the shop. "Yeah, yeah," he mumbles and heads towards the cashier. He drops the items on the counter and tries to forget about eggplants and homemade pasta sauce.
.
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Was. There was a time when Sam thought he could turn his back on his past and live a normal life- bills, thread counts, and matching towels in the bathroom. Sam lost the moment to wendigos and poltergeists, but he missed that door closing with an audible click. A year passes in what feels like a millisecond and a crawl and he can't quite get everything settled in his head. It started with Jessica and was followed by a plea –We're just starting to be brothers again-and ultimately ends with another body consumed by fire.
It was one of those years when it was too much and not enough all at the same time. When he was cold all the time, even now, as he stands over a fire. Sam feels the ties that bind him to the person he thought he could be burning along with his father. Tomorrow, he will blow the ash off of his skin and move on from that life. There is something so numbingly final about mourning the man that started the hunt that would come to define him and his sons.
John Winchester is unrecognizable –covered in cloth and sage – and Sam is so tired of saying goodbye to people he's not ready to say goodbye to. He has mourned for more people than most people do in a life time, and he feels stretched and raw every time he says goodbye to someone he loved, someone he just couldn't save. There's a large (and growing) part of his mind that tells him this isn't over. This can't be over until everything that has taken mothers and brothers and children away from their families is dead. Maybe Sam couldn't be the son his father wanted him to be when he was alive, but he could make up for it now.
The fire pops and Sam feels something within him snap.
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The biggest lie Sam ever told: I'll be back by Monday.
The truth is: Sam was always, will always, be a hunter.
.fin.
First Supernatural story! (I'm just starting season 2...always jumping on the bandwagon a few years too late). I'm always scared about posting a story in a new fandom. Hopefully this captures Sam (and Dead) correctly. Let me know what you think. Hopefully, people dig it and I'll write more in the future.