Disclaimer: Supernatural isn't mine.
A/N: I don't really have much to say. Ummm... I guess... I wrote this when I was sad?
Grief is a bastard.
It's this cold, terrible thing that digs into your stomach, rotten and foul.
When you lose someone, when you are losing someone, it's not as simple as being sad.
Nobody tells you about how ugly it is.
You lose your mother and grief comes to you as this selfish, needy thing.
Grief should be sitting pretty, tears falling down your face. But it's not. You feel the same, except her death makes things hard for you.
You want to be tucked in and sang to. You want to be played with and not have to tiptoe around your father.
Some nights, you lie in bed and think about how sad you should be. And then you can't fall asleep because it eats away at you. You're only four years old, but everyone looks at you with all these expectation.
Your mother is dead and your father's a zombie, so it's not enough to be quiet. You have to grieve- you have to look the part.
You can't get bored, even when you've been sitting on the couch for hours doing nothing. You can't turn on the TV or read a book, because you're grieving. You have to go days without eating because grief should be all encompassing. Even when you're tired, you have to make the tears come- it doesn't matter that you hate crying, hate the way they make your eyes swell and leave a sticky feeling where they dry.
You need to fill in the lines, hit every mark and then people will look at you like they get it.
And maybe sometimes this cage of grief is so demanding, so exhausting, that you go to your little brother. You almost forget about him, except that you don't have to pretend when you're with him. When you're with him, it's okay to play and giggle and jump around- everyone thinks you're being strong for him.
So you pass the early years of your life learning the cues and eventually you find that sadness you needed all those years ago.
And when you look back, you remember how tragic it was. Because your mother was dead and you mourn for her.
Your father dies for you.
You're sad and you just want to hug him one last time. But you can't.
And you want think about how empty everything is because you're down two family members and there's only you and your brother.
You want see your father's death as tragic and keep your brother close because he's the only one left. But you can't.
You're glad you're alive, but that's wrong. That's selfish and it revolts you. So you change all that tangled up, gnarly fear of death and misery of loss into something else.
You're angry.
It's your fault. It's Sam's fault. It's the demon's fault. You all helped kill your father and you want to gut someone.
You tell Sam he was a horrible son. You list out every flaw because it's so justified now that your father is on death's pedestal.
You are angry (lost, scared, and you're not ready to take the lead but your father is gone and you're his piss poor substitute), so you hunt and smash and kill.
That vamp deserves to die because your father didn't deserve it.
Sam deserves a punch to the face because he's so goddamn calculating. Why can he still function and show compassion when the world is falling apart?
Youfeel bad, so everyone else suffers and you can't help yourself.
Your brother dies and it's all over.
He has been the baby in your arms and the child you stood in front of and the adult you couldn't accept.
You watched him fall, saw as the knife drilled into his back and collapsed into your arms. And he leaned so heavily against you and you swear he was still breathing, but when you pull away, his eyes are open and sightless.
But you don't believe it, because you were there. He's in your arms, you're holding him; there's no way- he can't die when you're right beside him, because if you're there, you can hold him together, keep him whole.
The two of you stay there for eternity, second by second. Sam and you. That's all there is to it.
xXx
You feel cold.
So cold, as if Sam stole your breathe and your soul and dragged it to the sun and back again, burying it deep in the confines of frigid soil, singed and gone.
xXx
When you come back to yourself, you're sitting in a chair, watching your brother's stretched out form sink into the only bed in the room. He stays on that bed, because his body deserves rest and comfort and a coffin is no place for your brother.
You see his face, over and over and over again. When you close your eyes, when you open them.
He's not dead, you can still see him right there, in front of you. As long as you can touch him, you can keep him.
And days pass; sleepless, breathless days.
You will him to move and when you call out, "Sammy," in the voice he has never been able to ignore, you almost think he will.
Even as you watch Sam, you can feel your eyes begin to droop, feeling so heavy they must be sinking off your face. And you can feel the rough surface of film on your teeth. And you can't touch your skin without itching away dead skin. And you are disgusting, but you can't do anything about because who will watch Sammy?
If you believe hard enough, maybe the chemicals in your brain can send a message through Sam's nerves, gripping him in spasms until he moves again.
If you look hard enough, maybe the scene spread out in front of you will change, because nothing can stay the same forever.
If you pray hard enough, maybe the God you don't believe in will dig his way through the trenches of monsters and demons to save the only person in the world worth a damn.
And grief is all there is.
Because your love, your nostalgia, every part of you is a build up to the end.
And this is your end, because Sam was it.
And this ugly, raging thing that moves through your bones and feels like flames licking across your skin all over again, compels you.
This is heavy, surreal grief. This is unbearable, so you make the deal.