This story is disclaimed.
AN: Warnings for cussing, over-use of italics, and the longest speech Dean has ever made, on screen or in fanfic. Such is my belief, anyway. Title from Byron.
And love itself have rest
Sam had been expecting Dean to be confused. Surprised, maybe a bit angry. Relieved, above all. He really hadn't been expecting him to be furious.
"You selfish, double-crossing, reckless sonovabitch!" Dean yelled before he'd even gotten all the way into the motel room.
Sam barely managed a "What?"
"You heard me." Dean was seething. "What did you do? I told you, Sam. I told you, and I told you, no weaseling, no welching, but you never listen, do you?"
Now Sam was pissed right back.
"I didn't do anything you wouldn't have!" he shouted. "I saved your sorry ass, you frickin' jerk. I stopped you from spending eternity in Hell! And you're pissed at me?"
"You had no right to make that decision for me!"
"And you had no right to bring me back! But you know what? Too bad, man. Too fucking bad. I'm here, and so are you, and you're just gonna have to learn to put up with it. For decades!"
"Decades," Dean snorted, not amused in the least, but speechless with fury, with the need to make Sam understand but not knowing how to without destroying all the walls he'd built around himself, against this very situation.
"Yes, decades!" Sam yelled. "Decades, Dean. You and me. For good. You're stuck with me. So. Are we done with this? Or are we gonna fight about for the rest of our lives?"
He could see something inside his brother shatter as he spoke. Some wall, some defense, he wasn't sure. But the strain of the last few weeks – the last few years! – the effort it had taken Dean to walk so calmly to his own doom earlier in the day, the fury coursing through him now, the worry for Sam on the way back from the crossroads, all came together and snapped the last of his iron self-control.
"Are we done? We? What 'we', Sam? There hasn't been a 'we' to this for years, not since Dad dropped you into my arms and told me take you outside, as fast as I could, and not look back, while he ran back into the fire for Mom. There hasn't been a 'we' to this since you started junior high and overnight turned into some selfish sullen teenager I didn't even recognise, because, you know, I'm the dumb schmuck who puts up with all your crap, no matter how bad, 'cause for whatever fucked-up reason I have the patience of a saint when it comes to this – this train wreck of a family, but it's too much now, Sam. It's too much. I can't keep doing this, all of this, and the job as well, I can't. I can't keep coming back to this, over and over! I'm not that strong, damn you! So the question, Samuel Benjamin Winchester, is not 'are we done', but 'are you done'? Because I am, Sammy. I am."
The silence that filled the motel room after Dean had stopped shouting was full of broken promises and shattered dreams and the echoes of another argument seven years ago, of phone calls gone unanswered and emails unread, of bitter recriminations Sam had never truly meant and four years worth of Christmases and birthdays spent apart, and the only word Sam could get out past the ache in his throat and the tears, God, the tears in Dean's eyes was "Yes."