A/N: This was kinda me experimenting with something, so I'm not going to hedge--it's a tear-jerker. (So if you don't cry, I'm going to be sad. Hahah. Just kidding.)

Thank you to clair beaubien because I didn't know how to express the idea until I read her fanfic, "No Prayer In Vain."

Spoilers: Might be stuff all the way up to "I Know What You Did Last Summer." :D This is set somewhere in the middle of the flashbacks in that ep. It's kinda AU, also. Sorry. ^-^;;

- - -

"Floodgate"

He had to cry.

He knew he had to cry. He knew he had to make himself cry, or he wasn't going to be able to breathe. He wasn't going to be able to live. But the tears stuck somewhere in his throat and wouldn't come out.

"Just... God," he prayed, "Just... kill me. I want to die, okay? I don't want to go to hell, so I can't kill myself, so just... take me. All right? Please. Please, God... please..."

It wasn't happening. It wasn't working. The tears weren't coming, they couldn't cleanse, they couldn't heal. They couldn't, even if they came.

'What am I doing?' he asked himself. He paced toward the mirror, gazed at his drawn face, at his tired and darkened eyes. He wanted to just lay down and never wake up. For it all to be over, all the pain... everything.

He'd drunk until his lips were numb, but nothing could numb this horrible... this ache, this wanting to crawl out of himself and... nothing could fix it. Nothing could make him better. Nothing.

"God..." he cried out again, but since there was no answer, he spoke to the self he saw before him.

"Sam, you've got to pull it together. Dean is gone. He's not coming back. You're not gonna find a way to save him. Heck, you've tried, Sam, there's no way. It's not happening. He's gone. Sam, listen to me! He's dead. Dean is dead. Your brother is dead. Your only brother. Just let it go already!"

He hit the mirror, and the pieces sliced jaggedly into his knuckles. He grabbed the sink and bowed his head. His head throbbed... blood dripped into the sink.

The practicing... but the stress too. Sometimes it did it on its own, without him practicing. He figured--a combination of drinking, stress, poor diet... it ganged up on him.

"Sam," he said again, voice trembling. He was that close. He swore at himself. "Sam, you listen to me." His father's voice, Dean's voice, all syncing up in his mind, taunting him out of the past.

"Don't you dare feel sorry for yourself, you hear? Don't you dare!" There was a pounding on the floor above him. His neighbor didn't like the yelling. Sam swore at him too. "Samuel Winchester! Just stop it! Just stop!

"Whether you want to or not, every morning, you'll wake up, just like the rest. And just like the rest, you'll drag yourself out of bed, and you'll keep living. You'll keep subsisting, so just quit it! Quit feeling sorry for yourself."

He couldn't... He swallowed, and turned away, ready to go and pick out the shards from his knuckles.

He stopped in the middle of the room. "Sammy, stop doing this to yourself, man," he said, imitating his brother's voice the best he could. Maybe it was out of some sick-minded desire to just hear him again. He didn't know. He didn't stop to think about it.

"You've gotta let me go, okay? You've gotta keep going, no matter what. You know I don't want this for you. You know Dad wouldn't have wanted it. You know Mom wouldn't have. So why are you standing here... hating yourself?"

"I don't know, Dean," he replied to the voice in his head, "I just... I can't. God, Dean... I need you. And you're not here. Tell me what to do. Tell me how to keep going. Please... Please, Dean. Please... Please come bac--"

The first sob came, the first tears. And they didn't stop.

He fell by his bed, sobbing into the mattress. More than prayer, more than crying... Somewhere in between. Something close to hope.

- end -