A/N: Just had a hankering for some Sammy-angst... Haven't decided yet if it'll be a oneshot or not.
Disclaimer: Sadly, I own nothing pertaining to Supernatural.
Enjoy.
Growing up without a mother hadn't been so bad.
When you didn't know someone to begin with; didn't know their voice or how they smelled, or what it felt like to be kissed by them, what was there to miss? A face? A face from a picture almost too wrinkled to recognize anymore?
Sam Winchester never intended to think of those sorts of things when he went to bed at night. But then again, Sam Winchester never intended to watch his father self-destruct. And Sam Winchester never intended to watch his brother be brutally killed by Hell hounds.
"Sam?"
"Yeah."
"I've been doing some thinking… And… Well, see, the thing is… I don't wanna die. I don't wanna go to hell."
"Alright, yeah... We'll find a way to save you."
He'd promised. Hadn't he promised? How many times… how many things had Dean sacrificed to keep him safe? How many cuts and bruises had he been rewarded with for saving his little brother's ass? How many of life's precious moments had he been denied?
"Don't! Dean, I'm not gonna let you go to hell!"
"Yes you are! …Yes you are."
And he had.
"I'm sorry. I mean, this is all my fault. And I know that. But what you're doing, it's not gonna save me. It's only gonna kill you."
"Then what am I supposed to do?"
"Keep fighting… Take care of my wheels… Sam, you remember what dad taught you. 'Kay? And remember what I taught you."
Like how to make a pretty decent sawed-off. How to drive. How not to drive… How to keep going. No matter how hard it got, or how much it hurt. How to laugh, and be laughed at, and get revenge for being laughed at. How not to pick-up chicks. How to stop caring about the world, for just a little while. How to break out of jail. How to sing, and not give a damn if the sound was enough to shatter a pane of glass.
But there was one thing Dean Winchester had failed to teach his younger brother.
How to let go.
"Did I die?"
"Oh, come on."
"Did you sell your soul for me, like Dad did for you?"
"Oh, come on! No!"
"Tell me the truth… Dean, tell me the truth."
"Sam..."
"How long'd you get?"
"One year. I got one year."
"You shouldn't have done that. How could you do that?"
"Don't get mad at me. Don't you do that. I had to. I had to look out for you. That's my job."
"And what do you think my job is?"
The words startled Sam into wakefulness, and for a full minute he wasn't sure whether he'd said them aloud or not.
Dreams had a funny way of doing that. Tangling themselves so badly with your reality that it became hard to differentiate… Sam's dreams had a funny way of doing that.
He got up from the bed, and the ancient springs groaned their relief. Packing was a quick affair when you'd never unpacked to begin with.
A muffled ringing from somewhere inside his duffle bag managed to catch his attention. But only after he'd waited sufficiently long to ensure it couldn't be anyone else but Bobby.
"Yeah?"
"Sam? Where are you at?"
"I'm in Lawrence, Bobby."
"I thought you were coming out here, Sam? Isn't that what you told me? Look, if you need more time, just say the-"
"I'm coming. I'm on my way."
"Are you sure about this?"
"I'll call you. I'll call you, Bobby."
"Alright, but Sa-"
There was something satisfying in being able to hang up. To just stop whatever was coming. Not deal with it. Not until he was good and ready.
Nostalgia. That was what he experienced every time he sat behind the Impala's wheel. Every time he rifled through Dean's cassettes. And every time he listened to Achilles' Last Stand. Because as long as he had those tapes, and that car… some little part of his brother survived. And it was to that part, he clung. Painstakingly, day in and day out.
Never loosening his grip.
Because Sam Winchester didn't know how to let go.