DEAN

Canada was boring, he thought to himself, watching out the dirt streaked windshield of the Impala as a lanky teen pulled his younger brother across the street, tugging the poor damn kid so hard the littler one was tripping over himself in an attempt to keep up. Brothers, Dean thought. The word brother whispered into his skull, snaking around his gray matter, making him shake his head unconsciously, trying to dislodge the word from taking root in his mind. It wasn't an effective measure, particularly when Dean sat waiting for his own brother to shake his ass out of the grimy gas station bathroom so they could get back on the road.

Shake his ass, he had thought that by accident, and now he shoved down the images that clawed up at him from the inside of his mind, ripping small holes into his already fractured, twisted head. He wouldn't, couldn't, shouldn't be thinking that kind of shit anymore, not about Sam. Not after the hundreds of shots of whiskey, and just as many whores he tried to lose himself in daily, just to erase the sick images he constantly had in his equally sick mind about his little brother.

But idle time was Dean's enemy, always had been. Too much time meant too much self destruction, self flagellation, self loathing and generally, too much thinking. God, he hated thinking, he thought as he rested his forehead on the steering wheel, feeling the angry divets poking into his skull, and wishing fervently they could give him the brain cleansing, bleaching he so badly needed.

The passenger door wrenching open flustered him upright, and he watched from the corner of his eye as his brother folded himself into the shotgun seat. Always from the corner, never dead on stares, have to be careful, can't let him see, can't let him know, can't let him guess. The rules chanted in his mind incessantly whenever Sam came near him, because Dean was careful, had to be. Sam sent him a sidelong glance, and spoke in his deep voice, "Dude, lets go."

That voice should not sound like angels singing in his head, and should not propel him into action like it does, but Dean is so fucked in the head, he barely registers himself moving. He starts the car, and pulls onto the blacktop. So many blacktops, he thinks dully, so many truckstops, so many motels, so many hunts, so many moments.

That angels are singing again, well it is actually just Sam speaking , but its all the same for Dean, who is so twisted, he barely even looks in the mirror anymore. He jerks his eyes sideways *never dead on, remember* at his brother and see his mouth moving. For a second, he forgets the rules, just for a millisecond and watches Sam's mouth, not hearing a fucking word the kid is saying. Sam's mouth is wide and pink, bottom heavy with a slash of white, perfect, if slightly crooked teeth. One smile is all it ever takes to wreck Dean inside. The urge to press his tongue against those lips hits him so quickly and it's so strong, that Dean feels the need to physically hold himself in place, gripping the steering wheel so hard, his knuckles turn a ghostly shade of white. He jerks his eyes away from Sam like flames are shooting at him. In a way they are, flames of hell, licking at him constantly, whenever he forgets a rule, whenever he slips, the flames grasp at him, trying to gain a fiery permanent hold on him forever. He battles the flames almost every second of every day, and they never ease up, they never shimmer out of sight, or lose their bright focus. The second he slips, they will grab him in their tight grip and pull him down forever. Dean knows this, but he forgets once in a while, like when he slips and looks at Sam's mouth.

Dean didn't always feel this way about Sam, but he can't remember not feeling this way, so it doesn't really matter.

He had always loved his brother. That much he could remember. From the time Sam was placed in his care permanently, Dean being 8 years old, and Sam being 4, Dean has known that he loved the kid. So the love thing, that isn't shocking.

He fixed the meals, made Sam brush his teeth, nagged him about sitting too close to motel room TV's and gave him the ever incessant wedgies and noogies that seem to define every brother to brother relationship.

He remembered lazy summer days of hanging out, plunking quarters in pinball machines, while his sticky with spilled soda little brother watches him with wide open adoring eyes, and Dean tilts the machine just to make the kid clap his hands in delight. He liked the kid too. Liked his company, liked the way Sam looked up to him.

He watched over him as he grew from a geeky kid to a tall, strong, almost man, not quite filled out to his potential, but it was there, on the horizon. Dean helped train him up, get ready for the fight. He pretended not to notice that Sam's mind seemed somewhere else at times, not quite on par with his or his fathers. He pretended he didn't notice Sam staring out the window too much, looks of longing and desperation ghosting across the kid's expression as he watched mile after mile pass by.

When Sam left for Stanford after the blowout with their Dad, Dean knew he felt sad, knew he missed his brother, knew something was fundamentally missing without Sam with him, but he went on, only letting Sam ghost into his thoughts during too drunk moments, adrenaline after the hunt moments, and of course, his feverish dreams.

Dean told himself going to get Sam when Dad went missing was a necessity and he almost believed it. Sure, seeing the man Sam had turned into during the two years apart had jarred him, opened up a weird knot in his chest, cramped his stomach in a strange way Dean didn't have a word for, but they were close. They had been close anyhow. Totally normal for him to feel relief to have the kid back. Maybe it wasn't normal to be so happy about it, like the fire that took Jessica from Sam was a sign that they were destined to be together. When he had THAT thought the first time, he didn't talk to Sam for three days, instead he climbed into a whiskey bottle, and fucked three different nameless, faceless women, just to prove he could, to prove he wasn't really thinking star crossed lover shit about his own brother.

Days fell into weeks, weeks into months, and as a year back together yawned in the distance, Dean felt the change in himself. He caught himself too often to keep letting things slide in his own mind.

It happened in steps for Dean, because that's the way his mind works. Step by step. Hunting, eating, driving, drinking, fucking, Dean does everything in steps. Falling in love was no different.

Step one.

Dean looked at his brother constantly, I mean, they spent every fucking second together, so it was natural to look at the person. He admired his brother in a far off, dim way that never really registered. Like, he saw the kid had a nice, strong frame, broad shouldered, trim waisted, and covered in sinewy muscles. He thought his brother was cute, hell maybe even handsome, with a square jaw and eyes that changed from flinty gray to grassy green with the change of a t-shirt or a mood. And he even admitted that Sam's hair, grown out and careless was pretty cool looking, suited his face. So, he noticed the kid. He just didn't notice him.

Until the fucking motel in Butte, Montana.

It was the same motel room they had stayed in so many times, in so many towns, so generic it reeked of low class mediocrity. Two queen beds with a nightstand separating them, covered in garish flowered comforters that itched against his skin, a beaten up TV off to the corner, and a small, rickety, scarred wooden table with two equally rickety chairs hiked up to it.

Dean and Sam had entered the room and done the usual, claim a bed, throw off their boots, and turn on the TV in hopes of a bad movie or a good football game. One of the two six packs they had brought with them got cracked unceremoniously open and a grease-stained pizza box sat on the table, tiny cheese remants stuck sadly to the bottom of the now empty box. Dean and Sam sat on opposite beds, munching pizza, swigging beer, and watching a rerun of Good times. Exceptionally normal for them.

Pizza demolished and two beers in, Sam removes his flannel shirt complaining that the room is hot, and Dean glances at him in annoyance, but doesn't really think too much about it.

Good times rolls into Family Feud, which morphs into some 70's horror movie they are both pretty sure they've seen but can't remember. Sam announces he is going to take a shower and Dean at that point is still of mind to lob a snide comment at him. "Thanks for the update, Howard Cosell," he calls to his brother's retreating back, and then sniggers a little into his open beer can.

So, you can understand why what happened next rocked Dean to his absolute core, why the memory of it simultaneously makes bile rise in the back of his throat and lust ripple through him like dogs racing down a track, first one to the end gets the bone on the stick.

Sam opens the bathroom door and a puff of steam poofs out in relief, like it can't stand to be locked into the confining bathroom for one second longer. The mild scents of beer, pizza, cheap hotel shampoo and mint toothpaste assault Dean's senses strongly enough for him to notice that Sam is entering the room again.

Only, its not Sam that comes out of the bathroom. Not his little geeky brother that he wedgied, teased, cared for, cleaned the scrapes of, made mac and cheese for and cheated at cards with until Sam was 13 and caught on, repaying Dean with a cut lip from a too big hand attached to a long skinny arm.

The person who enters the room is a stranger to Dean, only because Dean is seeing him for the first time. Despite looking at the kid constantly, he had ever seen him until that moment, in that wretched motel room.

Sam body is still gleaming from the shower and his muscles are flexed, hard looking, menacing in a way that Dean doesn't understand. His longish hair is slicked back from his face, still wet. The too small towel is knotted at his impossibly trim waist, covering almost nothing of him. The guy is huge, and he is suddenly everywhere, and as he bends over his bag to get out fresh clothes, Dean feels himself jerk up off the bed forcefully, taking one stumbling step towards this Godlike creature, before his head catches up to his body and he stops, panicked thoughts twisting in his head like wisps of smoke.

Sam's own head jerks up and his eyes find his brothers, concern coloring them as he registers Dean's stricken, panicked expression.

"Dean, you ok?" he asks, straightening up, walking towards Dean, the towel around his waist flaring a bit from his large stride, and Dean is backing up, towards the door, stumbling over himself in his fevered rush to just GET AWAY from this stranger in front of him. Mumbling something about the pizza being rancid, Dean throws himself out door, slamming it behind him and vomits into the nearest bushes. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and his eyes jerk reflexively to the motel room door, and he sees the curtain in the window flick, and knows Sam is watching him, and worried.

Dean breathes in a out for a lot of minutes, willing his heartbeat to slow, willing his head to just fucking let the image of Sam in that towel go, but it won't, so he just sits on damp pavement in the parking lot, until Sam opens the door to the room and calls to him. Dean doesn't know what is happening to him, not yet, but he knows down deep that he can't ever let Sam know about any of this, so he gets up, and heads back to the room, eyes downcast. He grabs his beer, washing the puke taste out of his mouth and falls onto his bed facedown, so he doesn't have to see Sam anymore. Because in his head, it's already two Sams. He just doesn't understand why.

Rule one actually writes itself on day two, horrible motel room in Butte, Montana.

Dean woke up to a sour mouth, and a pounding at his skull, both registering in his foggy mind at the same time. He rolls over with a groan, throwing his arm over his eyes to block out the morning sun, and the slow re emergence of the previous night. Details of Sam's almost naked body fly in front of his closed eyes like an old picture show, and Dean gulps convulsively against the dryness in his throat, willing his brain to be normal. Please, just be fucking Winchester normal, at least, he begs his own brain. His brain is suspiciously silent during his pleas.

He hears movement in the other bed, and tries not to picture Sam's bare chest as he hears Sam step out of the bed. Each padded step Sam takes is like a drum crashing inside Dean's head because he knows the kid is moving towards him.

He forces himself to right himself, throwing his arm off his eyes and jerking into a sitting position like he has a coiled spring instead of a spine up his back. It's the only thing he can think of to do that will stop Sam from coming up to him, because Dean just can't fucking take that, not right this second.

"Mornin' Sammy," he calls out as he pushes himself off the bed towards the bathroom, and wills Sam silently to think his voice is normal, not shaky, not weak, not needy.

"You feeling ok, man?" Sam is calling after him and Dean waves a hand behind him, in the universal yeah yeah gesture, and says, "Feel fine, that pizza must have screwed up my stomach last night."

He reaches the bathroom without further conversation, clicks the door shut behind himself, rests his hands on either side of the stained, porcelain sink, taking a mental victory lap that he made it through approximately 10 seconds of normal with Sam.

He looks in the dingy mirror and tries to find himself in his own reflection, but can't spot any of the old Dean there. Instead, he has been replaced with a wild eyed, panting stranger with hair sticking up and perspiration beading on his forehead like he ran a 100 yard dash instead of walking 8 feet into the bathroom. He runs the water as cold as it will get, and splashes his face over and over again. He brushes his teeth three times, but his mouth doesn't feel any cleaner. He turns on the shower and jumps into blistering hot water, and scrubs himself almost raw, trying to cleanse his own essence out of his skin, but when he turns off the shower, he is still all there, and he feels vaguely disappointed.

Stepping out onto to the frayed bathmat, Dean's heart lodges in his throat when he realizes he has nothing to put on. Normally, he wouldn't bother, could care less, throw a towel around his hips and go hunt up some clean clothes out of his duffel, but now, he can't wrap his mind around taking that course of action. He has an internal argument with himself about throwing on his clothes from the night before, wondering if that will cast suspicion on him in Sam's eyes. He decides to throw his jeans on, drape a towel around his neck, and make a run for his bag. He ticks off ten seconds in his own mind, and opens the door.

He leaves the bathroom, eyes intently focused on his duffel bag that is at the end of his bed, feet moving faster than normal in an attempt to just get there and feels Sam's gaze on him, and his mind eye picks out the proper expression for the mood he feels in the air, but he doesn't check Sam's face to see if he is right. His brother is silent, but Dean can feel his stare like it's a gun cocked to his fucking skull.

He gets to his bag and roots around for a fresh shirt, humming mindlessly to himself to keep the clattering sounds in his brain at a minimum. He hears Sam weight shift from the bed and catches his legs in his peripheral vision, but keeps his head bowed while he attempts to sidestep Sam and go back into the bathroom.

Sam seems like a great oak planted in front of him and Deans muttered, "Get outta the way," doesn't move him and Dean realizes Sam isn't going to let him past, and so he stops short before he runs headlong into the kid.

Sam's voice is low and Dean is trying to not think it reminds him of a cat purr, as he tries to register what Sam is actually saying to him.

"Dean, seriously man, you are freaking me out, what the hell is wrong with you?" Sam's question is justified, but the panic rears up in Dean's head suddenly, and a hysterical laugh,cry,sob that he catches and holds in his mouth by biting down on his own tongue.

Then it happens. For whatever reason his brain came up with, Dean looks up into Sam's eyes for the first time since the night before. He sees the concern, the worry, the fragment of hurt caused by Sam's confusion, and he gets it. He does. But instead of thinking of those emotions playing on his brother's face, instead of thinking of what he should be saying to Sam at this moment to reassure him, Dean is dumbstruck by Sam.

It's the first time he really saw Sam's face, although he has been staring at the kid for years. The deep set soulful eyes, the hard jaw, the hint of color on freshly shaven cheeks and that mouth. That goddamn mouth that Dean's eyes keep slipping down to stare at accidentally, and even though he knows he should be talking, saying anything to make Sam think everything was ok, all Dean can do is hold himself physically back from the primal urge rising in him. That urge wants him to grab Sam and crush his lips into his until they are both battered and bloody.

Instead, Dean calls on every ounce of will power he has ever had, every moment where if he didn't tow the fucking line or carry out an order, he could have been dead, and reels himself in slowly. He takes an extra second, and he knows Sam feels that second tick in the air just like he does, but he needs it.

He lifts his eyes off of that beautiful mouth and fixes his gaze somewhere on Sam's forehead, and manages to say in an almost normal voice. "Nothing, kid, lets get some breakfast."

He scoots past Sam to the bathroom, takes the towel off his shoulders and puts on the fresh t-shirt that it feels like he traversed a mind field for.

Rule number one writes itself inside his skittering skull. Don't ever look at Sam straight on. Ever.