Into The Black.
Disclaimer: I own nothing
One shot set early S7.
" Once you're gone you can't come back, when you're out of the blue, and into the black"
Neil Young.
Sam Winchester had always been afraid of monsters. Even before he knew they were real.
As a very small child he hated free standing beds. He preferred the blocky kind that went all the way to the floor. When he was four or five they had stayed a while in a room with separate beds. He sensed something in the shadows underneath, lurking in the gap between mattress and floor, waiting to reach out and grab little feet.
For two months he wet the bed rather than braving the run to the bathroom. His dad thought he was regressing, racked his brains to think of a reason, even stayed in one place for a while to try and settle him.
He'd bury his head under the covers and try to ignore it but It just got worse. His imagination conjuring a voice for the thing, it would whisper to him, horrible things.
He'd dream of flying across the room, above the dreaded gap. He'd fly to Dean's bed where it was safe. After the others were asleep He'd stare into the darkness at the shadow of Dean under his covers. And try and be brave, he'd grit his teeth and try and tough it out, but invariably he'd hear a hiss or a whisper or sometimes, to his horror, a soft laugh from under the bed and then, yes, he would fly across the room. Fear made him levitate onto Dean's bed, landing like a missile beside his sleeping brother.
"Not again!" Dean would mumble, falling back to sleep even as he threw the covers back for Sam to get in beside him. He never once told Sam to go back to his own bed. Sam would feel bad about it, taking up space in the already small area, and sleep right on the edge. He'd stare out from the edge of the mattress into oblivion.
Weather John had realised at some point that his youngest was unduly tired during the day and put two and two together himself. Or if Dean had told him, Sam never knew. One day, when Dean was at school, he heard the sound of work upstairs. His Dad's whistle and jaunty footsteps indicating some kind of DIY afoot. He rushed upstairs to 'help.'
When he ran into the room he saw that the beds were pushed together against the wall, and dad was pushing something underneath. John smiled " Hey Sammy!" he greeted him, I'm just fixing your beds for ya!"
"Fixing them?" Sam asked. "What was broken?"
"Well... " John replied, "seems you had a big gap underneath, so I put some cinder blocks under there to stop anything from getting in." He didn't say what 'anything' might be. He patted Sam's head in that distant, yet affectionate, way of his. "Better together aren't they Sammy?"
They only stayed in that house another couple of weeks. But it mattered, later, that John had done that. Sam never forgot it.
He'd never forgotten the fear either. Later, the creatures that his mind conjured took on grotesque forms. Gibbering delirious faces, masks, clowns. But there was nothing as frightening as the unknown blackness.
Now that unknown space was wide open to him and he knew that if he stared for long enough he would disappear right into it
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He's washing his hands again. That old OCD streak making an appearance once more. Stressful times, thinks Dean, still, there are worse things he could be doing. He Shudders at the recent memory of finding his brother in the car, outside the cabin, burning his arm over and over with the cigarette lighter. The round scars are still visible, and probably wont ever fade entirely.
A part of Dean had really wanted to talk about it. Hell. But when he tried he found his mouth dried up, because the memories would flood back, yes, and he could almost deal with that, except now it wasn't just him burning and bleeding and screaming for mercy, it was Sam in his minds eye. His baby brother, who once sat in Dean's lap on the sidewalk, crying because he'd tripped over his shoelaces. It had hurt then and it hurt now. It broke his heart to see Sam in pain.
That's why this is so hard, pain is the anchor after all. Pain was the key he had found to keep himself sane after his own return from the pit.
'Sane' is a relative term. He thinks.
They say "Pinch yourself." If you think you might be dreaming, because dreams don't hurt like life does. On the other side of the veil it's reversed. What Dean had called "Pain" when he was alive was an echo, a dream version of the real thing, real, soul pain.
And the idea that Sammy had understood that, with such clarity in the warehouse turned Dean's stomach. Because he should never have had to.
I knew that pain, and let him jump.
"Should have handcuffed you to the radiator and let the world end," he mutters. As Sam continues to scrub at his hands.
"Hey Sammy?" He calls. "Remember when you were about eleven, and you used to always wash your drinking glass out before you filled it?"
Sam doesn't reply, focussed on the nail brush and soap.
"Then, you started washing it twice, the three times and eventually you were rinsing the damn glass ten times and I had to forbid you from getting your own water for a while?"
No reply, the brush is bloody now, from his shredded cuticles.
"Well I think this might be one of those times." Dean sighs, getting up and grabbing Sam's wrist, pulling the brush out of his hand.
"That's enough."
Sam jumps as though he's been stuck with a cattle prod, and yelps. Staring wildly for a moment before he focusses on his brother. His breath coming in gasps.
Dean grabs his shoulder and gave him a gentle shake. "Sam? You hear me?"
"Y...Yeah!" He looks around the room as though he's seeing it for the first time. "Yeah...Sorry...Sorry...I..."
Dean nods. " I know bro. It's ok." He slaps Sam on the back lightly and retreats back to the table, he can tell that being touched is making Sam uncomfortable. He stands by the sink, Clearly trying not to look at something, hanging in the air between Dean and himself.
"Is it him?" Dean asks outright.
"Yeah." Sam clenches his jaw. Pointedly looking away from Dean.
Dean bites the bullet "What's he doing?' He asks.
"He's just standing there, Watching."
"Watching you scrub your hands bloody?"
"No." Sam swallows. "He was standing behind me then." His eyes flicker up to meet his brother's for a moment.
Standing real close.
"Whispering things."
So close to my ear I could feel his breath.
"Sorry Dean". He shakes his head. " I'm ok now. Really."
An attempted smile to smooth things over, Dean nods and smiles back. " Ok Sammy." Yeah, lets just say you are for the moment.
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Later they're watching the old TV. The evening passing without incident. . Sam is sprawled on the couch and Deans still at the table. Sam's dropping off to sleep, his eyes at half mast. Dean dares to hope. Maybe he'll sleep tonight. Without nightmares.
Last night he'd screamed for their father in his sleep.
The sound is on low, some black and white romance from the 50's comes on. A man in a safari suit is arguing with a woman in a straw hat and a pointy bra. She slaps him. He grabs her wrist and he dips her backwards. He Kisses her on the mouth.
Dean jumps as Sam catapults off the couch, his hand over his mouth, staring, horrified, at the screen, as though it just exploded. He backs up, staggering across the floor.
Dean is out of his chair in an instant and the TV is off.
"Sam?" He says cautiously, his hands up, placating. "Sammy?"
Sam is frozen, he's still watching the blank screen.
"Screw this!" Dean mutters and closes the gap between them, slapping Sam sharply across the face.
It does the trick, and he snaps out of it with a start. Flinching away, putting a palm to his cheek.
"Dean?" He says shakily. "I... I..." He gulps down the lump in his throat, tears in his eyes. "I ... He... Um..." He blinks hurriedly, looking at his feet and shakes his head slowly.
"I know." Dean says. forcing the words off his tongue, they feel like they should be shredding his throat.
"I know Sammy." I can't talk about it either.
At that Sam looks at him and nods once. Then turns and walks, on shaky legs, into the darkness of the bedroom.
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Sam's standing between the two single beds when Dean walks in. He watches silently as Sam's eyes wander around the room, across the oak boards, resting on the space between his bed and the floor.
Something in Sam's face hardens, and he suddenly advances on the bed as though he's going to attack it. He pulls it away from the wall with one arm. Then he gets behind it and pushes the beds together. Then Sam stands back and sighs.
It sounds almost like relief...Almost.
AN: So... That was depressing. I'm not sure where that came from. I was thinking of my own brother when I wrote it. The flashback was definitely us