The apartment is old and messy but he's had worse, far worse and it is at least waterproof and workable. He gives the old lady a false ID, false bank details and payment on a counterfeit card. She is sweet and trusting and she takes them all with a gummy smile. He makes himself feel better by helping carry her groceries up the rickety stairs and petting her mangy cat. He considers the skinny ginger bundle of sparse fur and wonders about getting a pet. At least, he muses, it will be someone to talk to.
He paints the walls white and buys red drapes; he can afford a TV and a small CD player. He gets discount cable so he has some sort of connection and several free channels. He hasn't quite learned watching TV yet but he is sure he can get into the habit. He buys fresh salad and fruit from the market and dressing from the local store. The town is small; population about 300 (plus one!). He kinda likes it, kinda likes the quiet and the intimacy. There is a bar and grill and the food is high-quality and the beer cheap. He doesn't socialise much but it doesn't matter. He isn't totally alone and it is all good.
He gets a job; it falls into his lap but he doesn't look a gift horse in the mouth. A farm needed a labourer and the woman who ran it took one look at his muscles and smiled. He works long hours from dawn till dusk and falls into his bed aching all over. At least it helps him sleep better and he can pay his rent on time. It is a long way from what he did what he has done and he tries not to think too deeply.
Time passes as it is wont to do and he watches the seasons turn; the harvest is done and the bales long gone but there is still work to be done. There are cider apples to pick and horses to stable. He sits in the woman's kitchen and eats home baked bread whilst she talks to him about her plans for Christmas. Her eyes are always on him but he won't give anymore of himself than is necessary and she soon gives up on asking preferring just to look.
He turns thirty-five and no one knows; it doesn't matter because it wasn't as if he ever really celebrated his birthday anyway. At least now he was replete with food and beer, a tiny bit wasted if truth be known and staggering home in the darkness, one foot dragging in front of the other, a stupid smile on his face that no one would see.
He knows, years of instinct trumping the two pitchers of beer, that there is someone in his apartment. The window is slightly ajar and the drapes are open. Normal people wouldn't notice but he has never been normal – even when he wanted it desperately – so he creeps in as quiet as he can, breathing controlled, eyes wide open.
A hand on his shoulder makes him jump; even though it has been years he is still well-trained, ready. He whirls around and takes his attacker down; trouble is his attacker seems to know what he is about to do and gets a leg underneath his calve. They both go down and he can hear ragged panting in his ear. He swallows hard and fast and goes for an elbow in the solar plexus; his attacker grabs the offending arm and yanks it hard.
"What are you?" An odd question, whispered close to his ear, "Christo."
"Sam?" A voice from his past ignored for three long years, a pretence that it didn't really matter, that he was keeping a promise.
"Fuck Dean," his brother sounded like he might cry; congested, angry, "fuck Dean."
He feels Sam let go of his arm and hears a huge intake of breath. He knows that Sam is crying in earnest now, he can hear the wet sobs, feel his brother's body vibrate beside him.
"When you weren't with Lisa I thought you were dead."
"I thought you were in hell."
"We were both wrong then."
He turns on the light and gets the first good look at a brother he thought was long dead. Sam is still huge, still has stupid emo hair, big hands and is still wearing plaid shirts. There are shadows under his eyes and a smear of blood on his chin but he looks like – he looks like Sam and Dean just wants to hold him.
"I couldn't do it," Dean says, finally, "it just didn't work out but – but I said I wouldn't go back to hunting and I didn't," he rubs his hair, longer now but nowhere near as long as Sam's, "just made myself a life here."
"It's nice," Sam's smile is small, wet, but there, "you've got a nice place here."
"There's room for two," he says; there will be time later to ask where his brother has been, to ask what he has seen and to find out how the fuck Sam found him here in the middle of nowhere but now it is his birthday and he feels that he has been given the best present of all.
"Yeah," Sam's smile is getting wider and his eyes are saying Thank you in so many ways that Dean feels dizzy with it.
"Shall we get it over with?" He asks finally and Sam frowns until Dean comes forward, slow and steady and draws him into a hug so tight they are both breathless from it.
"By the way," he says, much later, over more beer, "I hope you like cats…"
End