Summary: When Sam notices Dean keeping something from him, tension flares in the midst of the boys' newly formed relationship. Sam struggles to figure out what's wrong with Dean, and when he does, he finds an interesting way to confront the problem. Wincest. General time. Established relationship. Angst & fluff galore.
Disclaimer: Supernatural and the boys do not belong to me.
Warnings: M/M mature content
Shoving the door open, Sam lumbered across the motel threshold, balancing a pizza box in one hand and a six-pack in the other. After the day they'd had, the Winchester brothers needed a relaxing evening and Sam had volunteered to go get the necessary provisions. All Sam wanted at this point was to settle into the couch and watch mindless T.V. with his brother at his side. Maybe Dean would even permit them to sit close enough to each other to allow for a little making out. He was never sure about how Dean would respond to him, but Sam licked his lips at the thought and moved to set the food and drinks down on the table.
As he toed off his boots and dropped his jacket on the back of a chair, Sam registered the sound of the shower running and smirked. This could just turn out to be the perfect ending to an exhausting day. Eagerly, Sam stripped down to his boxers and entered the bathroom as quietly as possible, sliding out of his underwear just as he reached to pull the curtain aside. No more than two rings had coasted across the bar before Dean's soapy fingers curled around the flimsy plastic and stopped the motion. "What are you doing?" His voice rang out through the room, the words sounding slightly too high-pitched.
Sam's brows drew together, though he left the curtain alone. "I was getting in with you. What's the problem?" Silence answered him. Sam waited a few beats and tried again. "Dean? What's going on?"
"Nothing!" he shot back too quickly. "I'm fine. I'm getting out though, so the shower's yours in a minute."
Sam ignored him. He knew something wasn't right. "Are you hurt?" Dean had told him earlier that he wasn't injured but Sam had a hard time believing that assessment most of the time. His brother had been trained early on to ignore his own pain and had downplayed his wounds so many times through the years that Sam was hard-pressed to believe him. He mentally cursed their father. It was because of John that Dean so often felt the need to hide how he was really feeling.
"I'm not hurt. Please just leave. I'll be out in a minute." Sam's eyebrows shot up. He earned a please and a dismissal all in one go causing an unpleasant feeling to start churning in his gut, a twisting, writhing feeling that told him something was very wrong, something that had his hair standing on end and all of his muscles tensing under his skin.
"Dean," he said insistently, knowing his tone would imply the tumble of emotions he was feeling.
"I'm fine Sammy. Just…go." The words were the same, but this time there was a hint of desperation behind them.
Sam gritted his teeth. "Fine," he grudgingly agreed. He wouldn't push it right now, but he would find out what was wrong. There was no question; if something was wrong with his brother, he needed to know. Dean was a stubborn man, hardheaded and cocky, but he was still Sam's brother and his partner in more ways than one, and Sam loved him.
He was about to lift Dean's clothes off the countertop and take them with him so he could confront Dean when he got out of the bathroom, when his brother's voice sounded behind him. "Leave the clothes, Sam." Sam spun around, startled. Dean's head was poking around the curtain, an angry glare in his eyes.
Sam glared right back. "Why can't you just tell me what's wrong?" he nearly shouted, features settling into their classic bitch-face.
"Nothing's wrong! Just get out Sam!" His gaze was livid and unrelenting.
Sam threw his hands into the air. "Sometimes I just don't understand you! Whatever. I'm leaving. Enjoy your shower," he bit out, nearly able to taste the acid dripping from his words. He turned and slammed out of the bathroom, the door rattling in its frame.
Only five minutes later, Dean stepped out of the steam-filled room wearing a pair of sweats and a t-shirt, his bare feet padding against the rough carpet. Sam heard him open the pizza box, lift a bottle off the table, and start heading his way, but he continued to stare at the television screen, barely blinking, and refusing to acknowledge his brother. He knew he was being stupid, petty like a snubbed teenaged girl, but he hated that Dean didn't trust him or feel like he could share with him. No matter how often he tried to get the older man to open up to him, Dean rarely allowed it to happen, and even when it did, he would snap his walls back up so fast afterwards that Sam often felt like he walked into them headfirst and left the conversations feeling pained and cold.
Strangely, Dean sat down close to him on the couch, seemingly unaware of the tension that raged between them only minutes before. "What're we watching?" he asked around a bite of saucy, cheesy dough. Sam didn't answer, just stared straight ahead, and even knowing Dean could tell he wasn't actually watching, he refused to break. He saw Dean swallow and duck his head in his peripheral vision, turning his face slightly away so Sam couldn't make out his expression.
Time passed in a crawl, like it had slowed down just to prolong the awkwardness of the evening, and Sam was becoming more and more irritated with each passing minute. He couldn't understand how Dean could be so contradicting; it was exhausting for Sam, and he was just the unlucky bystander caught in the middle of his brother's swirling emotions. What must it be like to be Dean and bounce between emotions and attitudes so quickly? Sam really didn't want to know and if he was being completely honest, he didn't think Dean liked it either.
"Sam?" Dean's questioning voice broke the thick silence, the word catching in his throat.
The taller man gave into the need to see his brother's expression. "Are you gonna tell me what's going on with you?"
"Sammy," Dean sighed, pulling his hand down across his mouth.
"Never mind," Sam responded caustically, lurching his large frame up off the stooped couch and going to his side of the bed, back turned to Dean as he pulled back the covers and slid beneath them still facing away. He blinked back the tears that rose unbidden behind his eyes and stared unseeingly at the wall, listening as his brother cleaned up from their dinner and eventually climbed into his own side, staying as far away from Sam as possible, and snapping off the light. Even in the dark, the tension was thick between them, and Sam forced his body to unwind, focusing on one muscle group at a time until he felt he had a chance of falling asleep. That hope was dashed when he heard the near silent whispered apology fall from Dean's lips, "M' sorry Sammy." Sam had to force his body to stay relaxed, even as his fingers curled into a fist by his pillow because he knew Dean thought he was asleep and it was these rare moments where Sam was sometimes able to find out more about his brother, the quiet moments when Dean thought he was asleep that he revealed more about himself than Sam would ever get when awake. He knew it wasn't fair to Dean, and not honest either, but if it helped him understand his brother, even a little bit more, Sam considered the slight deception worth it. Breathing as steadily and deeply as possible to feign sleep, Sam waited, listening as his brother adjusted himself on the mattress and his breathing finally evened out. Slowly, Sam turned over and settled in to watch Dean, smiling when Dean's nose scrunched up adorably – almost as if he were being tickled, and fought the temptation to reach out and wrap an arm around his partner's middle as he so often did at night. Closing his eyes against the pain of rejection and tension between them, Sam fell asleep.
As the light of early morning filtered through the dingy, off-white curtains in their latest motel room, Sam sighed and curled closer to the heat next to him. With a deep sigh, he stretched his arm out to curl his bed partner's body against his chest and nuzzled into his hair. As he blinked his eyes open, Sam pressed a kiss to Dean's head and slid his hand beneath the fabric of his shirt, relishing in the heat of his skin, stopping to finger a now old and puckered scar that decorated the skin alongside Dean's lower spine. It stretched about an inch to the right of the delicate bones and Sam never failed to brush his fingers over it when he could, saying a mental prayer of thanks each time he remembered just how close he'd come to once-again losing his brother. Even as that same prayer flashed through Sam's thoughts, the memory of the night before resurfaced and Sam retracted his hand and rolled away, clenching his jaw in pain.
Sam was well aware of how frequently the brothers fought, knew firsthand how easily they riled each other and how quickly they sometimes came to blows. The difference this time was that he really didn't have a clue what Dean was angry about. It seemed like he was hiding something but at the same time, Sam wasn't familiar with the way Dean was acting. The older man had hidden a great number of things from him over the years and though parts of Dean's reaction were similar, Sam felt something about this time was different – and he was desperate to know what it was. He hoped that with a little time and patience, Dean would feel comfortable enough to share with him and that it wasn't something Dean felt he had to protect Sam from because Sam knew those secrets were what often got them into the most trouble with each other.
Now sitting facing away from his brother on the edge of the bed, Sam dragged a hand through his hair and stood, trudging into the bathroom to take the shower he'd abandoned in anger the night before. At the threshold, he stopped and turned back towards his still-sleeping brother. Dean was curled on his left side, body covered up to his shoulders in a sheet. Just as he was turning away, Sam saw him reach out to Sam's side of the bed, fingers curling over nothing before he reached up and dragged Sam's abandoned but still sleep-warm pillow into his arm.
Sam wanted so badly to go back to that bed, to climb back in and drag his stubborn brother into his arms, to press warm wet kisses all over his brother's face, and to stroke his fingers up and down his sensitive sides. However much he wanted it, Sam knew it wasn't a good idea right now. They'd gone to bed angry at each other and to jump right back to sex would signal to Dean that all was forgotten – and it wasn't, Sam knew that, but it didn't make the situation any easier. With a sigh, Sam turned away and went to take his shower, hoping he'd get out to buy breakfast before his brother woke.
An hour later Sam walked back inside the motel room with coffee and food in hand. He locked the door behind him and was just moving to place everything down on the table when Dean walked out of the bathroom.
"Heya Sammy!" he greeted with a wide grin. Dean grabbed for his coffee and leaned into Sam, pressing up on his toes to land a kiss on Sam's lips. Sam was all kinds of confused, but he kissed his lover and wrapped his arms around him, pulling away after a long minute only to press their foreheads together. He couldn't help but smile at Dean, his brother's grin was infectious, but Sam also couldn't stop the twinge of worry that flared every time he thought of the night before.
"Hi," he breathed back, kissing Dean's lips one more time and then pulling back to start packing. "We've got a half hour before we have to be out of here. Bobby called while I was out, said we should check out a possible haunting in Clarksdale, Missouri. I told him we'd be on the road soon so we'd arrive by this evening." Sam threw his clothes from the day before into his duffle and zipped it up, moving around the bed to gather up the explosion of Dean's clothes around his brother's duffle bag and sliding his knife out from its customary place under Dean's pillow. He stuffed everything into the bag and handed the knife to Dean.
Within twenty minutes the two brothers had packed the car and were pulling out of the lot, Dean behind the wheel and already bobbing his head to the strains of AC/DC. Sam simply smiled and consulted his map, directing his brother in the direction they needed.
AN: This is the first of 6 chapters. I will have the second chapter up soon. Hope you enjoyed & let me know what you think so far!
also: I tried to keep my characterization in line with the show, but admittedly the boys seem to resemble their more emotional sides at the ends of the episodes. But everyone loves those parts anyway...so hopefully I did okay :)