For his whole life he will be given over to the LORD. (1 Samuel, 1:26)
When he came back, it was raining.
He just lay there for a long time, letting it fall on his face and in his eyes and slide up into his nostrils, the back of his shirt wicking up moisture from the damp, cold ground. He could smell the earth and hear the low sound of thunder in the distance.
He was whole and corporeal, which he figured was pretty good, all things considered. It could have been much worse. He took his time stumbling to his feet, the rain soaking slowly down into his scalp. His head spun a little when he straightened, but it passed quickly.
He set off for the road. Dean, was his first thought, but he went the other way, toward North Dakota. He hoped he knew where to find his brother, but who knew how long it'd been or if (please god) he'd kept his promise.
Bobby wouldn't be there, but his library still would be, probably, unless it really had been that long.
As filthy and ragged as he must have looked, it wasn't any wonder that it took a long time for anyone to pick him up, even once he did reach the side of the highway. He didn't go into Lawrence – didn't want to. He'd been here long enough. Finally, a middle aged woman in a pickup took pity on him. He apologized for the mud and she gave him a towel. His stomach growled against his will and she gave him her sandwich. He tried to turn it down, but she'd given him a stare that reminded him painfully of Ellen and he ate it with his head down, answered her questions with monosyllables.
She didn't seem to mind too much, turned on the radio. It was AC/DC and Sam's chest ached with nostalgia.
She took him all the way to Sioux Falls and dropped him off on a back road, and he managed a smile at her, even if he was already starting to feel the itch under his skin of needing to be gone.
He walked to Bobby's without passing through the town, worried that some of them might remember him, and tried the door. It was locked, and he stepped back to look for the key when he heard the rattle of a chain inside.
He tensed, but then the door opened a crack and Bobby was staring out at him, eyes narrowed. He felt a rush of relief. "Thank god," he said, "Bobby, you're alive," and then realized that it wasn't with disbelief that Bobby was looking at him. It was incomprehension.
Like he didn't know who he was looking at.
"…Bobby?"
"Who're you?" said the man who'd more than replaced his father, gruffly. Sam managed to find a smile, edgily. Something was very wrong here.
"Bobby, you know me. It's Sam. Sam Winchester, I'm – back."
"Winchester?" Bobby frowned, eyebrows pulling together. Sam hurried on. Maybe something had messed with Bobby's memories and he just didn't realize it.
"Yeah – Dean's brother, remember? We – stopped the apocalypse, god, I don't know how long ago, what day is it," but Bobby's eyes had gone fierce and angry and Sam almost stepped back.
"Look here, you son of a bitch, I've got wards on this house that'll drop just about anything that tries to come in, and I'm not an idgit. Dean Winchester ain't got a brother."
"Bobby," Sam said, feeling his stomach plummet, but then there was a sawed off shoved through the crack in the door and the blast of rock salt just barely only scraped his side, stinging violently. "The next one'll be silver," Bobby snarled, and Sam stepped back quickly, holding up his hands.
"Look – don't, I don't know what you're talking about. I'm going, I – guess there's been a misunderstanding." The gun lowered, barely. Sam gave his best placating smile. "Really. I just – screwed up. Sorry."
Bobby's eyes dropped to Sam's side. He looked too, and discovered that he was bleeding a little. Close range, rock salt apparently did some damage. Come on, Sam willed, it's not bothering me. I'm not a demon, I'm not a spirit. Just…
But Bobby didn't apologize or invite him in, just closed the door. Probably hoping that Sam would just think he was a reactionary crazy.
He walked until he was out of sight of Bobby's house and then sat down hard, his eyes burning and his side stinging like a bitch. Bobby had just been cursed or something, didn't remember him. All he had to do was figure out what it was and fix it without Bobby realizing what he was doing.
Maybe he should have gone to Dean first.
He found a credit card in his back pocket and held his breath while he checked in at a motel, but it still worked. He checked the date on the newspapers by the check-in desk. It'd only been a month.
Only. A month was apparently long enough.
He took a long, hot shower, spent a half an hour picking bits of rock salt out of his skin, and then got back into his filthy clothes. Grimacing at his appearance, Sam went to a library. Who knew where his laptop was, and their computers thankfully had internet and were free of charge. Everyone looked at him a little funny, still in his mud-caked clothes and probably looking like death warmed over even after his shower, which was about how he felt anyway.
He looked up Lisa Braeden on an online phonebook, and dialed the number on a payphone outside. He called Dean's cell phone first, but the number was out of service. The area code matched Indiana, just where he remembered.
The phone rang three times before someone picked up.
"Hello this is the Braeden residence how may I help you?"
Sam smiled, just a little. That had to be Ben. "Hey, can you get your – uh, dad for me?"
Ben sounded immediately suspicious. "Are you selling something?"
"No, I'm not selling anything." He hesitated, and then said, "It's Sam."
"Okay," said Ben, and there was silence for a moment. Then a click, a sound of a throat clearing, and Sam held his breath.
"Hello?"
Dean. Sam breathed out in a whoosh. "Dean, thank god. I don't-"
"There isn't a Dean living here," said his brother, suddenly sharp, "I think you have the wrong number." Click.
The dial tone in his ear. Sam blinked. Maybe his voice sounded different? Dean had always been able to recognize him on the phone, but – it was possible. Of course it was possible.
Dean Winchester doesn't have a brother. Sam felt sick. He needed a car. He needed to fix Bobby and he needed to go see his brother. He tried calling the number again, but no one picked up.
He was worried about Bobby, but Dean won out.
It was too late to get far, though, and he was already feeling exhausted. Tomorrow he could steal a car and take off for Indiana and his brother.
Sam dreamed of nothingness and a voice whispering Samuel, Samuel.
~.~
He stole a BMW because it would have pissed Dean off, and hit the highway. He listened to NPR for three hours straight and only pulled off the road to buy some clothes because the mud was drying and starting to itch.
He didn't speed, he kept his lights on, and he checked the lanes before he changed. The last thing he wanted was to get pulled over now, when he kept thinking about Bobby and whatever might be wrong with him, and the harsh note of Dean's voice on the phone.
He made it halfway before he had to pull off the road and curl up in the car to sleep. He didn't want to risk the credit card bouncing and drawing attention to himself.
Sam closed his eyes slowly. As his eyelashes drifted down he thought he heard a whisper, right next to his ear. Samuel.
He was asleep in moments, though, and when he woke up it was only a dream.
Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and trying to straighten the new kinks in his spine, Sam sat bolt upright with a sudden thought. He didn't have to leave Bobby alone. There was someone else who might look after him. He closed his eyes and tried to settle his thoughts. All right, so he'd been dead before, but maybe God had brought him back again, right?
"Cas? I – need a favor. If you could just take a minute, Bobby, Bobby Singer? he needs some help. He's in trouble."
"Who are you?"
That was unnerving. Also unexpected. Sam stared at Castiel, now in the passenger seat of his car and looking as Jimmy Novak as ever, and was relieved all over again. "—hey, Cas. Little warning next time, maybe-"
"Who are you?"
Sam felt an uncomfortable sense of déjà-vu, his heart somewhere in his stomach. "Come on, Cas. I know you must've been heavening it up or something, but seriously. Bobby-"
"Robert Singer is fine. I just checked on him a few moments ago. Who are you to address me by name so?"
"I'm – Sam," Sam said, hesitantly. "Dean's brother? Uh…Lucifer's vessel?"
Castiel stared at him. "I would have heard your name if such a thing were true. I have not. Why do you know these things?"
Sam felt like his spine were trying to crawl out of his skin. "Cas, this isn't-" and then there were angel fingers on his forehead, and Sam felt like all of him were trying to crawl out of his skin.
Castiel pulled back a moment later, seeming perplexed. "This is not possible," he said, "Excuse me," and vanished.
Sam stared at the passenger seat. Robert Singer is fine, the angel had said, but then Cas hadn't seemed all there either.
No, he corrected himself. Cas seemed fine. Even Bobby seemed fine, mostly. It was him that was the problem, in both cases. Maybe dying and coming back had screwed something up? But God – and that had to be God – wouldn't do something like that. Wouldn't wipe Sam off the face of the earth.
Not unless he had a very good reason.
What, like starting the apocalypse?
But he'd come back, hadn't he? That meant forgiveness, didn't it?
Maybe he'd gotten it wrong and this was hell.
Dean, he thought urgently. I have to see Dean.
~.~
He drove nonstop the rest of the way, stopping for coffee and energy drinks and anything that could keep him going. By the time he got to Indiana he was shaking almost too hard to hold the wheel, and he stopped in at a motel where the owner must have taken him for a friggin junkie because his hands trembled so hard that he could hardly sign David Gindelbrant's signature.
The credit card didn't bounce.
He dragged his ass into room 23 and fell onto the bed, put his head on his arms and fell asleep. He dreamed he was chasing after Dean, who kept running away, as a voice behind him whispered SamuelSamuelSamuel like some kind of bizarre litany.
Sam woke up groggy, his head throbbing like a bad hangover, and almost considered staying another night to get some strength back, to not feel so completely insane when he faced Dean.
But this was Dean. Dean would remember him even if no one else would.
He didn't wait.
His new clothes now smelled like sweat and sleep and other things, so he sprang for a new set; as close as he could get to what he'd been wearing when he – fell. He could feel his heart thudding in his ribcage, the nervousness or energy drinks making his stomach roil.
He checked the directory for Lisa's address, grateful that they weren't unlisted – if surprised that Dean hadn't insisted, but maybe there hadn't been time – and drove his stolen BMW out to the neighborhood. He took a couple hard, deep breaths before stepping out and starting down the sidewalk.
He found the house – number 618 – and stood at the bottom of the driveway for – minutes.
He thought he heard a whisper behind him, Samuel, but when he turned there was nothing there, and he walked.
He rang the doorbell once, exactly, listened to it echo and waited. It was Lisa who opened the door and looked up at him, seeming surprised. "Hello?" she said, and he felt the sinking sense of despair at the lack of recognition in her voice. He tried anyway. It had been a little while.
"Hi, I'm – Sam. Dean's brother?"
She blinked, and then frowned. "Dean never said he had a brother," she said, and her voice was deceptively mild. Sam could hear the suspicion in it, and he felt a pang. He'd liked Lisa. And it – was strange to think that Dean wasn't talking about him.
"Yeah," he said, and tried for his best smile, "Well, we haven't seen each other in a while. Kind of lost touch." He glanced at her hand and added, "And I heard he got engaged and thought I'd just – drop by. Is he here?"
Lisa seemed to relax. "No, not right now, but he should be in soon. Dean never talks about his family, I didn't even know he'd told anyone…it was just a few days ago." She smiled, looking suddenly younger, and Sam thought suddenly and achingly of Jess for the first time in years.
"Congratulations," he said, wondering if he should feel impressed that his brother had moved on so well, or bitter. "I hope you'll be very happy."
"Go on," she said, waving at a side room, "Sit down. He'll be here any minute."
Sam sat, even though he didn't want to. He could have worn tracks in the floor, determined not to listen to the little nagging voice in his head. Or the one outside; Samuel, Samuel.
He heard a car pull up – not the Impala, and Sam felt another twinge – and Lisa, who had been standing awkwardly between the sitting room and the kitchen (God, Dean lived in a house with a sitting-room) smiled at him and waved toward the driveway. "See? There he is."
Sam held his breath as he heard the car door open, then slam. The sound of the garage opening and then closing, and then the door down the hall opening and closing. Lisa disappeared and he listened hungrily for Dean's voice.
"You did what?" He heard, and Dean sounded worried, stressed. "Didn't I tell you – no, never mind, I'll take care of it. Go find Ben."
He leaned back and half closed his eyes, taking a deep breath before opening them again. In a minute it was all going to be all right. He and Dean could figure out what was wrong with Bobby and Castiel and Lisa, why it was that everyone seemed to have forgotten him.
Dean walked in.
Sam drank in the sight of him, slightly filled out, color in his face and no dark circles around his eyes. His expression was dark at the moment, but it was still a face that could smile, not iron hard. He looked good.
And then his brother stopped. "Get up," he said, coldly, "And get out."
Sam felt something stick in his throat. "—what?" Dean had moved on, but not that much, surely-
"I don't know what you're playing at but it can stop right now," said Dean. "Whatever you're after, you seriously don't want to take me on."
"Dean," Sam said, choked.
"How do you know my name?"
Everything lurched sideways. Everything. It wasn't like the world moving, either; more like there was suddenly no world to stand on. He stared at Dean in horror, his stomach not roiling because it was gone, his head not aching because it was gone, nothing feeling because he was just – gone.
"…I'm your brother," Sam said, whispered, his voice breaking, because that was it, that was just it. "Come on, Dean, you know me. Remember."
"I've never had a brother," said Dean, and the words cut deep, like knives.
"You stopped the apocalypse with me. A month ago, god, it was only a month. What can go wrong in a month?"
Dean's face scrunched up like it did when he was thinking. But he didn't look like relaxing. "I don't have a brother," he said again. "You're insane. Get the fuck out of my house."
"Dean. Please, remember."
"Get out or I'm calling the fucking cops!"
Sam backed off. He stood up and hesitantly moved toward the door, not taking his eyes off Dean. "I'm going to figure out what's wrong," he said. "I don't know what it is, something's happened. But you're my brother. I'll fix it."
"If you come back here again I'll shoot you," said Dean, and Sam just felt sick.
"Please," Sam said, and Dean reached for the phone.
Sam went, although it occurred to him once he was back in the car that this probably meant his record was clean.
He bent double over his knees and laughed as tears streamed down his face.
~.~
He searched through book after book after book, but everything he found wasn't – total. Limited to one person, one specific memory, limited. Not like this.
After hesitating for a long time, he did look himself up on the internet, and – nothing. He found the Supernatural fansite and clicked through it, but he wasn't mentioned once. He checked the headlines, wondering if this was some kind of alternate universe, but he found the trouble in Detroit when Death had been there, but it was as if he'd just been collectively and completely forgotten.
It was as if he'd never existed at all.
Samuel. Samuel.
He shook his head, like trying to clear water out of his ears. And there was that whisper, persistent, in his ears every hour of the day, when he went to sleep and dreamed of endless nothingness.
Samuel.
He thought about going back to Bobby, but the scabs on his side were enough to dissuade him from that. Not until he found an answer. He half hoped that Castiel would come back with one, but even though he prayed again, every day, no one ever answered. Not Castiel, and certainly not God.
Samuel.
"God, just leave me alone!" He yelled, clutching at his head.
The patrons in the library turned and stared at him pointedly, and Sam hurried out, abandoning his useless books, his head pounding. He found the nearest bar and drank hard and fast, but it was still there. Samuel.
He needed Dean.
He was nearly falling down when he staggered out of the bar and walked the three miles to Dean's house, drunk the whole way. He knocked on the door, half falling against the frame. "Dean," he mumbled, "I need Dean."
The door opened, and light spilled out. He stared up at his brother – up, for the first time since sixth grade – from where he'd slipped to the ground at some point. "Make it stop, Dean," he pleaded, "Please. Make it stop. If you'd just remember-"
"Jesus Christ," said his brother, "What the hell is the matter with you?"
Samuel.
"I dunno," Sam slurred. "I dunno. I don't exist. I'm Sam Winchester and I started the end of the world and I don't exist. God-" And he sniffed, but there was snot dripping out of his nose anyway and God if Dean would just remember everything would be Samuel okay.
"How much did you drink, man? I'm calling the cops."
"No," Sam Samuel said, "No, don't. Got a clean record now. Don't wanna – don't wanna ruin it. Deeeean." He reached for Dean and clutched his jacket in two fists. "Come on. Just remember me. All you have to do is remember me. Your shit little brother. Come on."
"If I had a little brother he probably would be a crazy drunk," Dean muttered.
"M'not drunk," Sam said. "Just – just can't listen. There's someone – saying my name." Dean tried to pull away, but Sam held on. "Hell," Sam said. "This is Hell. It has to be."
He saw Dean's mouth tighten. So that still happened. Everything still happened. "Nope, pretty sure this ain't."
"You'd – know," Sam managed, though his tongue was starting to feel thicker and even more unwieldy. Samuel. Sam flinched. "Why'd – you go there. Come on. Remember."
Dean hesitated. Sam held his breath. "Get the fuck out," his brother said, finally, "It's not literal. Hell's not a real place. Come on."
Sam groaned and leaned over and (Samuel) vomited on Dean's shoes.
It didn't make him feel any better. It just made him feel about a thousand times worse, especially when he heard the sirens coming.
"Jerk," he slurred, and Dean just stared at him with hard and wary eyes and didn't answer.
Samuel.
~.~
They decided he wasn't going to die of alcohol poisoning and left him in a cell without even bothering to take his prints. He curled up in a corner of it and rocked hopelessly back and forth. He threw up a few more times but didn't pass out until later.
Samuel. Samuel. Samuel.
The voice whispering, always whispering, incessant now. His name no longer sounded real. He wondered if he were delirious, or insane, or dead without realizing it. He curled his hands into fists and let his nails bite into the meat of his hands.
He was so lonely. Dean didn't know him, Bobby didn't know him. Cas didn't answer. He had no home, no money, no friends. He didn't exist. He was Samuel nothing.
Sam didn't know why he thought of it, but he heard himself laughing, suddenly, and it built up, ribs shaking, lungs aching, until it burst out of him in howls.
"First Samuel, chapter 3, verse four through ten," he said, and couldn't stop laughing.
Samuel, whispered the voice.
Time to start listening, Sam thought, and tilted his head back, his face sticky wet and he wasn't sure if he cried because he laughed or just cried. "Speak, Lord," he said, desperately, "Your servant is listening."
Then the LORD called Samuel. (1 Samuel, 3:4)