A/N: I wrote this for one of my livejournal friends because she stumped me on a fic meme and earned herself a "drabble", which turned into a longer one-shot. And I mostly wrote this at school. So, I hope it is enjoyable, ha. Just make sure to review and tell me what you think!
Disclaimer: I don't own it. I wish that I did, but I don't. All dialogue comes from the episode "What is and What Should Never Be".
Back Through the Looking Glass
The rain drums against the windows of the Impala, obscuring the view of the road from where Dean is slouched in the passenger seat. He wants nothing more than to drive—to feel the wheel under his hands, to control how fast he goes, to have an excuse not to think—but even he knows that he's no condition to do so. Dean barely had the energy to drag himself into the car without Sam's help. (As it turns out, it's not a great idea to carry a girl who is a virtual dead weight when you yourself have been having your blood drained for God knows how long. Go figure.)
Dean's got his head rested against the cool glass of the window, and he's staring down at the white line on the road, which is distorted by raindrops. The white line goes on and on, providing all of the monotony he needs to hear her voice in his head over and over, saying, "We're a family again. Let's go home."
Sam doesn't ask questions, and Dean's grateful for that. But he can tell that Sam's curious, that he wants to know what happened. He gets the distinct impression that Sam's watching him, waiting for a reaction, but keeps looking away every time Dean turns to face him.
Dean isn't really planning on keeping his fantasy world a secret. He knows that eventually he's going to have to come clean. He just can't find the words. He doesn't know how to explain what it feels like to get everything you ever wanted—and then have it torn from beneath your feet.
The rain is letting up now, leaving the wind to move the drops on the window. Dean muses over the fact that he gave up love, comfort, and safety for a reality where he's got no one but Sam, nothing but a car, and nothing but death to look forward to. He wonders what the hell is wrong with him, and then realizes that it doesn't matter because his martyr complex isn't going away any time soon.
He kicks off his boots and falls into his bed at the motel, not bothering with the rest of his clothes. He's face down in the pillow, eyes closed, unable to tear his thought process away from the following: Who lives in motels, anyway? I want to go home. The mattress is hard. The pillow doesn't smell right. I'm alone. He deems himself pathetic—What, a few days in your perfect world and you turn into a bitch boy? Get a grip, Dean—and turns to his side.
One side of his face is pressed against the pillow, and with his eyes closed, he can almost imagine that it's his mother's hand resting on the side of his face. He can almost hear her softly say, "Get some rest." Her voice is both clear and indistinct. He's back to where he's always been, not sure how much of what he hears is her voice and how much is just in his head. The sound of her voice is quickly fading from his memory, separating itself from her words. Her face dances behind his eyes, clear as a photograph, and he prays to the God he doesn't believe in that the image will never fade.
When Dean manages to sleep—more from physical exhaustion than actually wanting to sleep, for once—he dreams of them. He doesn't think that it's real this time—it's not near as vivid—but he also doesn't pull himself away from it.
He sits on his own couch, watching a black and white horror movie on a flat screen that he paid for with the money he'd earned at a real job. Carmen is curled up beside him, head rested on his shoulder. She's half asleep and hasn't yet changed out of her scrubs. He looks down at her and smiles quietly, thinking that she's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. He falls asleep with the light weight of her in his arms.
When he wakes up, it takes him a few moments to snap out of the mindset that Carmen's already gone to work, that she'll be back after her shift at the hospital. He rolls over and stares up at the ceiling, trying to stave off the emptiness that accompanies the thought, It's not real.
It's still dark. Dean can hear Sam's deep breathing coming from the next bed over. He doesn't need to look at the clock to know that he's awake too early. He tries to get back to sleep, but he can't. He can't let go of Carmen—her smile, her laugh, how her dark hair smelled like strawberries, the way she felt permanent. He can't let her go.
Dean closes his eyes when he hears Sam jolt awake from another nightmare. Dean's stopped asking by this point. He knows that Sam won't talk about it. And, right now, asking Sam about his nightmares would mean having to tell Sam about his, and he can't do that.
He hears Sam shove the keys of the Impala into his pocket and leave the room, probably to go get breakfast. He hears the Impala's engine start up, and hears it backing out of the parking space. A few moments after he hears the roar of the engine fade, Dean opens his eyes.
"Why is it our job to save everyone? Haven't we done enough?" The voice in his memory is Sam's, but it's not his Sam. It's the voice of the Sam that was allowed to be happy, the Sam who was engaged, the Sam who didn't have to know about the monsters in the dark. Not his Sam. "I'm begging you. Give me the knife."
Vaguely, Dean wonders if this is what it had been like for Sam when Jess died. This horrible acceptance of the fact that he will never have normal or safe; that he'll never get to have a life. Sam…Sam could've had a life if Dean hadn't pulled him away that weekend. Dean's stopped kidding himself with the idea that he'll ever get to have that. Even after they kill the demon, there will always be one more vengeful spirit, one more shapeshifter, one more evil thing waiting in the dark. He can't have normal because if he doesn't do this, no one will, and all of those people will just keep dying.
And it's then that he realizes that no matter what the cost to him, he'll spend the rest of his life trying to make sure that no one else has to have their families torn apart like his has been. He'll keep going without a home, without a wife, without kids, without even a dog. He'll keep running credit card scams and hustling pool just to have enough cash for gas, chips, and skeevy motels. He'll keep doing this thankless job, coming near death time and time again, and always bouncing back at the last minute.
He'll keep hearing their voices in the back of his mind. He'll keep seeing Sam carefree and happy like he'll never be. He'll keep seeing Jess and his mom, alive instead of casualties to this demonic sonofabitch.
Sam comes back with coffee and bagels, and Dean doesn't pretend to be asleep this time.
Dean tells Sam everything. From waking up next to Carmen to seeing their mom to seeing Sam and Jess. From him and Sam not getting along to Sam and Jess being engaged. From realizing that all the people they'd saved were dead to realizing that none of it was even real. From "Get some rest" to "It's still better than anything you had".
He talks for almost an hour straight. Sam doesn't interrupt him, though his expression grows pained when Dean mentions Jess. He just lets Dean get it out of his system. By the time's he finishes, the coffee is gone and there's only one bagel left.
Sam's cell phone rings, and he takes his phone near the window to get better reception. It sounds as though he's talking to somebody at the hospital—someone who knows about the condition of the other victim of the djinn. Dean, seeing that it's going to be a while, pulls a magazine from the duffle at his feet. He flips through as Sam chats on the phone in a conversational tone. An add for his favorite beer makes him stop—it's the picture of Carmen, the one of her on the beach. Dean can't help but smirk half-heartedly at this, shaking his head. His dream girl was from a beer ad. Yeah, that sounds about right.
"Okay," Sam says into the phone as Dean tries not to think of the girl in the picture. "Thank you so much for the update. Okay, bye." Dean hears the phone click shut. "That was the hospital," Sam says to him. "The girl's been stabilized. Good chance she's gonna pull through."
At least that's one good thing to come out of this nightmare. The girl who cried for her father, the girl who let him in on the fact that it wasn't real. The girl who saved his life and ended it. But at least she would survive. "That's good," Dean says. And he knows that despite everything, he means it.