Drowning in It
Sam was tired of watching his brother slowly drown in a malodorous pool of liquor. As a hunter, it was almost a rule that they drank as a way to balance the insanity that came with the job. And, sure, most hunters had a tolerance that would kill normal people, but even with that being said, Dean was taking it too far.
It began when they were teenagers, a beer here and there after a particularly tough hunt. As they aged, they graduated up to the harder liquor of vodka or gin. It burned more, and left a much more satisfactory afterglow behind. Even as their consumption grew, there was always a limit, a stopping point that they didn't cross as their attention always needed to be focused just in case there was something coming for them this time as did tend to happen as the body count around you rose.
Sam and Dean had both lived close to that line, but rarely passed it until recently. One beer or a shot had turned into swigs from the bottle even during jobs. Dean was always drinking if not straight from the source then from a silver flask that he kept ready and waiting in his pocket.
While he pretended that nothing was wrong, Sam grew used to the scent of alcohol in the Impala as they rode down the road with it lingering in a thick miasma around their faces. "Dean…" he began so many times, wanting to say something, but the haunted, hollow look in his brother's green eyes always brought him up short, always choked the words and pushed them down into his throat.
It wasn't supposed to be like this. Dean had always been the big brother, the one who held it all together, so what was Sam supposed to do now that he was falling apart? No amount of words or shoulder clasps would bring him back to the person that he had been. In fact, his younger brother secretly feared that he had lost him forever to a bottle of Jack Daniels.
He hated to think about it, but he'd seen this before. Disallusioned hunters who drank themselves to death either through liver failure or through carelessness. Because above all else, diminished reactions were fatal in their line of work, and death was imminent for those who spent too much time impaired. And Sam knew that he couldn't take his brother dying again. The first time he'd almost fallen apart, hunting and silently hoping for death. So, he knew that a second time would destroy him and break the dam that was pushing away the madness and preserving what little was left of his sanity.
"Dean," he murmured from the door of the bar where his brother was already six shots into the wind.
That night, he escorted him back to the house, his weight leaning against the larger man. "I can't take it anymore, Sam," he said, his eyes full of tears. "I hate this. I hate everything, even you, even me." With his inhibitions gone, the older brother was finally being honest.
"Dean, you can't give up," Sam murmured. "You have to-"
"I already gave up. I just don't care anymore, Sammy. We lost Cas, I've lost you, I've lost everything. There's no point anymore." The older hunter quickly collapsed back onto the makeshift pallet, now snoring and exhaling in a foul puff of air that would be especially rank in the morning.
"You still care," he murmured. "And there's always a point, always someone that needs to be saved. We'll save them, Dean. I promise we will, and then we'll save you too. I won't let you fall like this, Dean. I just won't, not after you've saved me. Damn it, this won't be the end for us." And he meant that. He knew that they could get past the alcohol, that they could move through Dean's problems and his own insanity, and move to the end, stopping the Leviathans, and saving the world like they always did. Because, at the end of the day, that's what they had to do and no one else would do it for them.
A/N:
Whoo! Another Supernatural story down! I've been cranking them out, though this one is a bit subpar, I hope you at least kind of like it.
Anyway, thanks for reading all of this. Tell me what you think about it! Remember, reviews feed me and I'm not afraid of the flames.
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Yours truly, madly, and deeply,
Einstinette