Twenty years.
For twenty years, I always thought I was the one taking care of Sam. Ever since that fire, I was the one looking out for him, the one that kept him alive and kicking. I was all he had. He needed me. And why not? I'm an awesome brother, and I've always done everything I could for him. For twenty years, I thought he was the one that needed me. It wasn't until the day he left that I realized I had it all wrong.
He didn't need me. I needed him.
He gave me direction, drive, a reason to fight. And damn if I wasn't lost without him. So when I finally got him back four years later, it was like I had been saved. Like I'd been missing a chunk of me and was suddenly whole again. Hell if I was gonna let him get hurt. Hell if I was gonna lose him again. I didn't care what piece of shit we went up against; I wasn't letting it take a bite out of my baby brother.
I needed him.
One day, down in South Creek, we were looking into a series of arson cases with one common link: each one had only one vic, and each one bruised and broken in all the same places, despite being alone in locked houses with no signs of forced entry. Sounded like our kind of haunt, so we checked into local records and found one lead from about seven years back.
Ricardo Thompson, a 23 year old male whose house was mysteriously burnt down one night. His body was thought to have burned away in the fire but we suspected otherwise so we decided to go pay make a house visit. Put poor old Ricky to rest.
There wasn't too much left of the house left when we got there. Blackned frames of what was probably once a pretty sweet bachelor's pad gone wrong. The place was trashed and weathered and it was a wonder how anyone didn't think it was haunted. Just more blind ignorance of this our great society.
"Dude, this place is a dump. How the hell are we supposed to find his body in all this junk?" Sam gave a helpful shrug, flashing his light around what was left of the walls, "Well, in all of the more recent fires, the victims were found crammed into small spaces. Closets, cupboards, behind bookshelves, things like that. My guess? Ricardo was hidden in some small area the cops couldn't find."
"Oh, fun. Hide and go seek with Casper the homicidal ghost. Maybe while we're at it, we can play Extreme Makeover and Ricky'll be so grateful he just leaves on his own." All that was left in the house were the scraps of plaster that'd fallen from the roof and walls and charred pieces of furniture. Any hope of remodeling that place was lost seven years ago, which was why it was left standing. But yanking Sammy's chain was just too easy. Had to keep him on his toes.
He sighed as we walked into what was once the bedroom, "Just look, Dean. We gotta find him eventually." "Well, we better find him quick. This place gives me the creeps." "Dude, what's going on with you? We've been in places a thousand times creepier than this. It's just another ghost case." "Yeah, well, I don't like it. Let's just hurry up and burn the bones."
Truth is, I was scared. Not like piss your pants, shaking in terror, scared. There's next to nothin' that'll get me that bad. But fires just hit too close to home. They're wild, unpredictable, and eat up everything without restraint. Lost my mother to a fire and pulled my brother out of two of them. I don't like 'em, never have, never will. And it's the last thing I wanted to lose someone to again.
Which is why this next part of the story sucked ass for both of us.
Our next breath was a cold one and Rick was on our balls before we could say "oh shit". Or rather, he was on my balls. At least he had taste and went after the good looking brother, but I was feeling the love a little too literally when I was thrown across the room like a rag doll. "Dean!" Man, I hate hearing that kid scream. And he would've been at my side hovering over me like a friggin' mother hen if Rick hadn't chosen that exact moment to show up right in front of me - and set the place on fire.
It happened like a strike of lightning, fast and bright, and in less than a second, the whole place was lit up like a Christmas tree. Only this time there was a lot less to burn and it started falling apart instantly. I saw the panic spread across Sam's face and I would've been pulling him out of the building in a heartbeat if I hadn't heard a really disturbing crack come from me left arm.
I screamed.
I couldn't help it. That fucking ghost broke my goddamn arm. I understood where the bruising on the other vics came from after that; whoever killed Ricardo Thompson took the liberty of beating him half to death with what felt like a metal bat first. Sam yelled my name again but there was no way he was getting to me unless he wanted to run through a wall of fire and falling debris.
"Just find the bones, Sammy!" "But-" "Go, dammit!" He didn't wait for me to tell him a third time and took off running out of the room. Rick watched him leave then looked back down at where I was crumpled on the floor. Smug sunnova bitch. He wanted to watch me burn. "I gotta say, Ricky, you throw one helluva party. Can't say I agree with the theme, though. A little to 'Dante' for me." I got a smart mouth but at least it's a pretty one. Pretty enough to keep Rick's attention on me instead of my brother.
Unfortunately, his attention involved all the pain of someone playing pinata with your face.
He never actually moved but he didn't need to; I felt it just the same. And I didn't need to feel it to know what was breaking. Two ribs on the right side, just like every other vic, and God did it hurt. Not only was Rick going to watch me burn but he was going to break me to pieces first. "Ahahahow, fuck you too, asshole." As much as I'd like to pretend I wasn't scared then, I was honestly terrified. The fire was so goddamn hot and if I wasn't on the floor, the thick ass clouds of black smoke would've been trashing my lungs too much for me to make my wise ass remarks. But when I looked up at my douche bag host, I could see that he was scared too. The fire wasn't his act of revenge; it was his cry for help, for someone to come and free him from the fires that took his life. Which immediately made me think of Sam.
I said there are few things I fear more than fire and one of those things, probably even the top of those things, is losing Sammy again. And when I thought of all this smoke, of the framework falling in on itself while he desperately looked for this guy's charred remains - of him being trapped in a sea of fire to burn alive - I realized again just how much I needed him. How much I didn't want to die there, just because it meant Sam would have to go on without me. He'd be strong enough to do it, but I wouldn't. I needed him. And I wasn't gonna let go of him unless I absolutely had to.
Barely holding myself together at the seams, I looked back up at Ricky just in time to see a wave of relief pass over his face and then, just like the rest of the house was trying to do, he burst into flames and disappeared from existence. Sam got the job done. I heard him calling my name again between coughs and even though that meant he'd been inhaling smoke, it was just about one of the most damn reassuring sounds in the world.
"Over here," I croaked, sounding a damn sight worse for wear, but the smoke was really thick by that time and I couldn't even see the bedroom door frame anymore. I heard it, though. Heard it crashing to the ground in what could've been mistaken for an explosion. The place was crumbling in on itself. I remember thinking "This is is. I'm gonna die here, swallowed up in a fire, just like Mom. And Sammy's gonna be the survivor, gonna have to live with it just like last time Except I won't be around to help him cope, to shake him out of the nightmares or tell him everything's gonna be alright. This is it. Sunnova bitch." But when I closed my eyes and expected everything to fade away, I heard Sam yell my name one more time and felt him hanging over me. Mother hen-ing, just like I said he would. I opened my eyesand t was the damnedest thing.
He was smiling. Happy, relieved, like he was the one that had been saved.
That was when I realized I was wrong, again. Sam needed me just as much as I needed him. There was no making it out of this fire if it wasn't with me. It was damn near enough to make me cry. Y'know, if I had a vagina. "You always grinning like that when I get my ass beat to all Hell?" "Shut up, you friggin' jerk. We need to get you to a hospital." He threw my right arm over his shoulders and helped me to my feet, knowing all too well tht my bones were broken and doing everything he could to keep the pressure off of them. I knew that if I kept talking, there was a good chance of puncturing a lung and then I really wouldn't have made it out but I had to let him know I was okay. Had to reassure him that I was right there next to him. Because he needed me. And I needed him. We both had to be sure we were gonna make it out of this. So I managed to cough out the single most reassuring thing I could think of on the spot.
"Bitch."
