Title: The Ghost in Sam's Wallet
Author: AlexJanna
Fandom: Supernatural;
Pairing: Sam/Dean (hinted at past/possible future), Sam/Jess (non-explicit)
Rating: PG
Genre: AU-Pilot
Word Count: 2,924
Warnings: wincest
Disclaimer: Supernatural is not mine. The plot to this fic is, though.
Summary: Jess finds a ghost wrapped in leather, but the dead don't always stay dead.
Jess found the photo in Sam's wallet one hot summer day while sitting under a shade tree in the park. Sam's head was resting on her lap and he was nearly asleep, she could tell. The boy was an enigma, a bag full of secrets and mysteries in a cat proof bag. She kind of loved and hated that about him.
The picture was old. That much she could tell right off the bat. It was yellowed and faded and crinkled from being sat on for God only knows how long. In other words it was well loved. It made her grin a bit to think of Sam's fingers running over the picture with a tiny nostalgic smile on his face, perhaps remembering good things from back home.
It made her smile too, at least until she actually looked at the subject of the photo.
Her smile disappeared to be replaced by questions and an ache in her heart she didn't know what to make of.
Inside the picture was a car, a long black tank of a car. It looked indestructible, dangerous, amazing. The kind of car that growled and took care of its own; that Bon Jovi sang about; that had a soul, a spirit all its own.
And leaning against the car was a man. He wore a worn leather jacket with cracks and patches of ware, the collar popped up. On anyone else, Jess would have said that alone made him look like a tool, but no, on him it looked… mysterious, a little bit forbidden.
He wore faded blue jeans with holes in the knees and broken-in leather boots crossed at the ankle as he lounged back against black paint covering the car. His hands were shoved in the pockets of his jacket and his head was turned to the side, eyes staring intently at something the camera hadn't captured.
Jess couldn't tell what color his eyes were, but she could tell his short cropped hair was light brown, nearly dark blond in the sunlight and his skin was tanned. Maybe he had freckles, she mused with a numb sort of curiosity.
As she stared at this man in the photo she knew two things: this guy, this man, was unbelievably hot. And this was a photo taken with love. The kind of love spent lounging sleepily in the shade on a sunny day, love shared over secretive smiles, chased and frantic kisses. Whoever this guy was, he'd been buried in Sam's heart far longer than Jess had held her place with Sam.
It may have been masochistic, or just plain curiosity, but she wanted to ask Sam who he was. Why Sam still carried his photo around in his wallet when he didn't even have a picture of his family. Why Sam hadn't mentioned he liked guys too.
"Hey, Sam." Jess nudged Sam's dozing head with her knee. He grumbled and frowned, but didn't open his eyes. She rolled her eyes and nudged him again.
He growled playfully and pinched her thigh. "What, Jess? I was napping."
She giggled at him and nudged him again for good measure. "Who's this guy?" She asked, suddenly way too curious to stand it. She wanted to know everything about the guy she loved. She wanted to know all his deep dark secrets. She didn't care if he liked guys too, or if this guy had been the first great love of Sam's life, she just wanted Sam to tell her about it.
She wanted him to tell her something about his life before Stanford.
"Who?" Sam frowned slightly and opened is eyes to see his wallet in one of her hands and the old, worn picture in the other. A look crossed his face for a split second before it was gone.
But the second that look had been on her boyfriend's face, Jess had felt her heart pound in fear. She had overstepped her bounds; she had seen it in his eyes before he'd hidden it. She'd poked her nose in unwelcome places. He was not happy.
"You looked in my wallet." He said as he straightened from his lounge on her lap. She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out. "You looked in my wallet and pulled that picture out of it."
It was accusing and hurt and angry and Jess's heart was pounding faster. She tired to play it off. "I was just looking." She smiled, shakily. "Who is he anyway?" She asked as neutrally and calmly as possible.
It didn't work. He's face clouded over even more and he took both the wallet and the picture from her hands without a word. She watched him slip the picture back into its hiding place before he closed the wallet with finality and put it back in his pocket. All lightness from the afternoon had vanished and Jess felt distinctly cold in the face of Sam's silent fury.
She'd never seen him look like that before. It scared her and he didn't seem to care that he was scaring her.
"Jess, please don't look through my stuff without asking again." Was all he said before he scooted away from her and leaned back against the tree a half of a foot away. He wasn't touching her. The space felt like a mile.
"I'm sorry." Came out of her in a whisper. It was choked and frightened. "Did you love him?" Popped out a second later and then she'd wished she'd just cut out her own tongue.
Sam turned his dark hazel eyes on her, looked at her with a deadened blank stare that sent the hairs on the back of her neck standing on end. He didn't answer her question and she didn't ask again.
She may not have asked about the man in the photo again, but that didn't mean she wasn't curious; that she hadn't thought about it.
He was important to Sam that much was obvious. He was special in a way that Jess was quite able to be. Oh, Sam loved her; she was in no doubt, but the guy in the picture? He owned Sam, knew Sam in a way she couldn't ever achieve. And it was mostly Sam's fault.
Jess was sure that Sam was -had been- in love with the guy in the picture. No one could look so lost and hurting from just a picture if the subject of it hadn't filled their heart tom bursting at one point.
She could say she wasn't jealous of a ghost in a picture, but she would be lying. She knew Sam never looked at it, but that didn't help assuage her. It didn't matter if he never looked at it, he still kept it.
Often times, she would wonder what had happened between them. Had the guy broken Sam's heart? Had they separated amicably? Had Sam broken it off when he left for college? Had the man… died?
It might seem strange, but Jess hoped he hadn't died. It was easier to battle a ghost if they weren't actually dead. She knew that. At least then Sam would know that the guy had a life of his own to move on with. That way Sam would eventually move on too.
She didn't fool herself into thinking that Sam was completely over this guy, either. You didn't hide someone you were over and done with.
Then again, Sam hid everything, from his parents and family to his childhood. Perhaps this silence was normal for him.
But still, Jess wondered about the guy in the picture… that is, until he appeared in her living room.
Later she wouldn't be able to say what had woken her, just that when she had opened her eyes Sam was gone from bed and there were voices in the apartment. She wasn't afraid of a break in, Sam was there to protect her, but still she was curious.
She hadn't even bothered to put on a pair of pajama pants, just wandered out of bed and down the hall toward the voices. It struck her as odd that none of the lights were on. Who exactly was Sam talking to that they didn't need the lights to see each other?
"What are you doing here, Dean?" Sam asked the other voice Jess had heard as she reached the living room.
"I was looking for a beer." The other voice, a guy, Dean, said with an audible grin and a good deal of either bravery or stupidity. Jess knew that tone of Sam's voice. This guy was skating on thin ice. The thought almost made her smile.
"What are you doing here?" Sam asked again, his annoyance and impatience showing through.
"We need to talk, Sammy." The guy, Dean, said, his voice going serious.
Jess frowned at that. Surely this guy knew that no one called Sam that. Not even her. He was going to get himself punched if he kept on pushing Sam's buttons. She should probably save him from his own stupidity.
She turned on the light and all three of them blinked away from the brightness until they could see. That's when Jess nearly had a heart attack.
The guy, Dean, that had dared to tease Sam when he was very visibly in no mood to be teased, that had called him Sammy, was the guy in the picture. The guy that owned a peace of Sam that Jess couldn't ever buy back.
She felt her heart start to pound with a million questions and thoughts in the three seconds she spent staring at the guy in her living room.
What was he doing here? How had he gotten in? Why were they talking in the dark? God, he looked just like in the picture, collar popped leather jacket and all. He was even hotter in person. Why hadn't Sam told him to not call him Sammy?
"Sam?" Her voice was dry and more uncertain than she would have liked. Here was the ghost she knew she couldn't win against, standing not ten feet from her. Her boyfriend didn't seem to notice that however. He was busy looking petulant and put upon. That made her frown not quite understanding.
The guy, Dean, grinned like a kid at Christmas, but Jess could see a shadow in his deep green eyes. God, he looked gorgeous, didn't he? "Damn, Sammy! Is this your girlfriend? Cause I gotta tell you, man, she is way out of your league."
Sam sighed tiredly and practiced as if he'd done the same move millions of times before, a reluctant, very reluctant amusement warring with aggravation.
Something wasn't adding up about Dean and about Sam, but for the life of her Jess couldn't figure it out.
"Dean, this is Jessica, my girlfriend." Sam introduced sounding like he wished he was doing something else. Jess didn't know if she should be insulted or not. "Jess, this is Dean. My brother."
"Your brother?" Jess stared at him with shock and incomprehension. Dean was Sam's brother? She looked at them again looking for any kind of family resemblance, thinking Sam was just trying to deny that…
There is was. It wasn't any one thing, wasn't their noses, their mouths, chins, or even their eyes that said family. It was the way they stood. Comfortable in each other's presence and sure of themselves. It was the way their bodies tried to look innocuous, but just ended up looking like a wolf in sheep's clothing. They were both predators cut from the same cloth and it made Jess's stomach roll and her heart pound.
Sam was… in love with his brother. There was no need to even think it wasn't the truth. She wouldn't try and blind herself to it. She'd lived with his heart mostly taken by a ghost in a picture and she wouldn't lie to herself when that ghost was standing right in front of her alive and in the flesh.
Dean had raised an expressive eyebrow at her tone and shot an unreadable glance in Sam's direction. She didn't have time to decipher it before it was gone and he had turned his eyes wholly on Sam once again. When their eyes met she might as well have not even been in the room.
"We need to talk, Sam." Dean repeated, his voice losing its teasing lilt of only minutes before. She could see it now. He was the big brother. Teasing, infinitely teasing, but in control and always taking care of business. "Alone." He finished with a meaningful flick of the eyes toward her.
"No," Sam said just as decisively before he strode over to Jess and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Anything you want to say you can say in front of Jess."
And Sam was the little brother. Rebellious and headstrong that worshiped the ground his big brother walked on. Jess's heart was starting to hurt the more she understood.
Dean looked dubious at Sam's declaration and Jess couldn't blame him. She felt reluctant about the situation as well.
"Okay." He relented, just the tone of his voice told the world he knew he was right. "Dad hasn't been home in a few days."
"So." Sam shrugged as if that information didn't worry him. "I'm sure he's just been working overtime on a Miller Time shift. He'll stumble back in sooner or later."
Jess wondered at this. Sam's indifference reeked of bitterness. Apparently Sam and Dean's dad wasn't known for sticking around a lot.
Dean looked like he wanted to rub the bridge of his nose -God, he did have freckles- in frustration. Like he knew exactly how stubborn Sam was, like he knew Sam so very well.
"Dad's on a hunting trip," he said again as if that meant something different, "and he hasn't been home in a few days."
And apparently he was right, because Sam went rigid next to her and before she knew it she was relegated back to the bedroom leaving Sam and Dean to talk privately in the living room.
By the time she'd gone and got dressed and snuck her way back down the hall to listen at the living room door they'd apparently stopped talking about their father. Instead their voices were hushed and quiet and she had to strain to hear them.
She wasn't proud of it, but she thought she deserved a little slack. She'd just realized her boyfriend was in gay incestuous love with his brother. She deserved eavesdrop in on their conversations.
"Dean, do you really need my help on this?" Sam asked, his voice sounding tired and dubious, but still intense.
Dean sighed. "No. Honestly I can do this one on my own, but… I want you with me on this." He admitted and it was easy to tell that the confession hadn't come lightly.
"Dean…"
"I know, Sammy." Dean cut him off, again using the dreaded nick name without raising a single hackle on Sam's back. That rankled with Jess a bit. "I know, and I won't bother you again, but it's Dad."
"Dad's not what this is about." Sam said, relentless and unmerciful as ever. It made her smile a little.
Dean huffed out a breath that sounded slightly defeated. "Sam, you got on that bus and didn't even bother looking back. Did you really think you wouldn't have been… that I wouldn't have welcomed you back?"
Sam was silent for a moment. "You never called." It sounded quiet and hurt.
"Neither did you, dude." Dean returned tiredly sounding just as hurt and quiet. "It goes both ways. Dad didn't mean it, you know that. And I never wanted that from you. I never wanted you to just leave m-us and never come back."
"I know." Sam breathed, years of history and knowing in his voice. To which statement it was said, Jess didn't know and she had a suspicion that Sam didn't know either.
Listening to this was painful. She wanted to stop, wanted to turn back around and climb in her bed and pretend she'd never gotten out of it, pretend she'd never opened Sam's wallet in the first place.
Both men were quiet for a time and it was heavy and laden with memories and secrets and things Sam had never even let Jess have a glimpse at.
"Alright." Sam finally said. "But I have to be back on Monday, I have an interview."
Jess watched them drive off in that big black car that growled like a beast. She watched and knew that no matter how much Sam denied it, how far he ran, how silent he was on the subject, that the ghost of Dean would never leave him.
That Dean would always have every part of Sam that Jess could never even guess at.
And she was strangely okay with that. It was an odd comfort to her that someone cared so much for Sam that they would love him anyway they could without any… boundaries. And she was in no doubt that Dean did. How could he not?
As she turned back into the apartment a strange feeling past over her and she shivered. She looked back over her shoulder and just caught the red tail lights of Dean's car disappear around a corner.
"Take care of him." She whispered into the dark, before she closed the door behind her and tired to forget the ache that had started up where Sam used to be.
End.