A/N: This story is my 100th Supernatural fanfiction! Hitting such a big milestone means so much to me, and it means the world to have so many caring and amazing readers. It wouldn't feel right if my 100th fic wasn't about Sam. He's the character I fell in love with the moment I first saw him on screen and he said the words, "Do I have to?" He's the character who's helped me through hard times, the character who shows me I can still be good while hurting inside, the character who helps get me out of bed every day. He's the character that sparked my writing, the one who let my abilities flourish, who filled me with inspiration, and the desire to share the stories in my head. He means the world to me. Though he may be fictional, this story is for him.

WARNING: This story contains mentions of rape, and deals with PTSD.

Sam didn't know why he'd decided to start doing it - maybe something Mia Vallens had said a year ago stuck with him - but he started journaling.

At first he didn't know what to write, focused on going through the things that had happened during the day, writing about Dean going to the store to pick up some more beer, writing about Castiel comforting him while they talked about Jack, writing about talking to Jack while he lay in bed slowly dying.

It didn't really seem to scratch the surface, felt more like a chore than anything.

Sometimes he'd just sit in front of his open notebook late at night, using his fidget spinner as he tried to think of what to journal.

Putting it down on paper would make it real.

Sam didn't want to make the things in his head real.

But they already were.

He didn't know where to start. There was so much clutter in his head, so much strife, and pain.

So after a few pages of writing about the days, had had started what felt like a new chapter in his journal, and he began with:

I am Sam Winchester.

He left it like that for awhile, trying to take care of Jack, trying to find a way to make his son better. At night he often stayed up, pacing, listening in to hear if Jack called him from his room just next door. He checked on him every hour he could, careful to make sure he didn't wake him.

Jack was sound asleep, and Castiel had left on another lead. Dean had gone to bed awhile ago, and there wasn't anything he had to do with the hunters from Apocalypse World. They'd all checked in, were all doing great.

So Sam sat his desk, and he stared at those words.

"I am Sam Winchester," he murmured, feeling silly.

But then something tugged at him, in his chest, and he picked up the pen.

Identity. He could write about his identity.

The Boy With the Demon Blood, the Boy King, Lucifer's vessel, a Winchester,, a hunter.

Sam almost crossed out the first few in anger, but then he wrote underneath it:

A WINCHESTER.

A HUNTER.

Then, can idea came to him and he decided to write, making sure to underline it:

A FATHER.

Sam hadn't thought he'd ever be a father. His life wasn't cut out for it. He'd wanted that once, wanted a wife, children, a house to call his own.

While he no longer wished for a romantic partner, was aching too much from all the hurts for that, he realized he had what he'd always wanted.

A home, and a family.

Sam wrote about the bunker, smiling as he did so, finding himself tearing up for some reason. He wrote about Jack, how much he loved him, how much he was being torn apart watching him slowly die, how he cherished every single moment with him.

He had paragraphs on Jack, on how he was doing his best to be a better parent than his father, to pick up the pieces his mother's absence left, to be everything that Jack needed, to work with his brother, and Castiel, to give their son a stable home. Well, as stable as hunters could have.

But he prided himself on the fact that Jack had a bedroom, he had clothes, he had three meals a day.

He had him, and Sam did his best to be there for him, checking up on him, talking to him, teaching him, coming whenever he called.

Loving him.

Sam was a father. A father! And, he decided, he was a good father. He enjoyed it, liked having a child, even if that child had come from the being who'd given him a lifetime of nightmares and flashbacks and body memories and scars.

Jack wasn't that. Jack was Jack. A Kline, a Winchester.

A good son.

That night Sam went to bed feeling comforted, even as grief pulled at his chest. Funny to think he was already grieving for him, missing him even as he lay in the room next door, waiting for him to die, for more pain to take over his life.

Sam wrote again the next night, focusing on some of the other titles and identities he'd been given over the years. He ended up crying, words written in huge, scratchy letters, some of them written over many, many times, until they were as black as the void, permanently etched into the page.

But he had to do it. He had to.

Sam was those things.

He had to face it.

He hadn't faced it.

Running, always running.

The journal wouldn't let him run. And now that he'd started, he couldn't stop, fearing that he'd only bleed from the poorly scabbed over wounds he'd opened up. Those wounds were infected, painful and throbbing and burning, making him feel feverish with longing for some good in his life.

Sam had to cut those wounds, had to drain out the infection.

And he did, bit by bit.

He knew what he really needed was extensive therapy, but that wasn't an option.

So he continued to write, beginning to do it whenever he had a free moment, feeling like he had to get his story out.

Sometimes he focused on a few flashbacks he'd suffered from during the day, trying to keep track of what might've set them off.

At times there didn't seem to be a trigger. His mind just forgot he wasn't in Hell.

In really dark moments, usually all alone and in the middle of the night, Sam found himself thinking he still was.

After all, wasn't it more his home than the bunker?

No. No, that wasn't right.

He found himself writing about that, trying to convince himself that the bunker was his home.

One night he started from the beginning, from when he was six months old, spewing hatred at Azazel. And from there anger poured forth in black, black ink, coating the pages.

Anger at everyone who had ever hurt him, at every demon who had ever laid a hand on him, whose lips and bodies had touched his, at Lucifer.

Sam even wrote about Dean, something that ached and pulsed within him, hot and burning.

Sam wrote about how he saw himself as evil, especially for harboring anger towards his brother.

But through his writing he began to forgive Dean.

He found himself hurting less about his dad, hurting less about his mom.

At times, journaling made things worse, had him spiral down into a sucking abyss in which he no longer wanted to live.

But then he'd see his family, and he'd give them a smile, wanting them to think he was okay.

Every once in awhile those small, half-hearted smiles were real.

He wrote and wrote and wrote.

The Cage was the worst of it. He'd begun to drink more heavily, but when he realized he was becoming addicted, he stopped, cold turkey, fearful that one addiction would lead to another.

That he'd become a monster again.

As he wrote he realized something.

There was evil, and there were times where he'd messed up, but he'd done a lot of good.

People were alive because of him, people would continue to be alive because of him.

He wrote about Apocalypse World, wrote about the blown-out waste that it was, how without him and his brother, their world would look the same.

It was living, thriving, even as the monsters and demons and angels tried to end it, tried to fight back against humanity.

I'm good, Sam wrote. The first time the words were put down tentatively, not yet confident that he was correct.

So he wrote it again. And again, until they resonated with him.

Sam couldn't touch all his hurts. There were centuries worth of those, but he could write about the feelings it'd left him with.

His hatred towards his body was one of the many things he needed help with, and no one else was going to help him but himself.

So Sam wrote about his body, his relationship with it. Wrote about his blood, his capacity for pleasure, the way he looked.

What had been done to him…

Sam wanted to scribble all of it out, not wanting to face that he'd been violated. He knew he had, had hallucinated it, had flashbacks of it, had body memories of being touched, feeling skin flush against his own, of feeling moments of betrayal when the agonies aroused him.

So he didn't cross it out.

Sam stared down his pain, and he came out the other side.

He tried to find things he liked about his physical appearance, things he liked about his body. First it started with his eyes, then his lips (though that was still very difficult since sometimes he felt skin against his lips that wasn't there, tasted evil on his tongue), then his shoulders, his legs.

Maybe Sam was rushing it, forcing himself into this, or maybe he was ready.

Sam was ready to stop hurting.

He was ready for the infection in his soul to bleed out.

He began to write more intimate things about himself, things he despised, things he wanted to work on. And he took the time to work on them, when he was alone, and comfortable, when stress and grief about his son wasn't pulling him down into a pit of despair.

Eventually Sam could write about his pleasure without feeling guilty, without feeling ashamed.

He could write about the memories that attacked his head, taking their chance to go at him at every waking memory. He wrote about what they did to him, how he reacted.

And he stopped hating himself for it.

Sam spent one night, awake, worrying endlessly about Jack, hearing him cough and groan from the other room, and he tried to go back to where he'd started.

I am Sam Winchester, he wrote.

Sam found himself smiling at it, his throat aching, tears pricking at the corners of his eyes before one finally rolled down his cheek.

The next morning, though sleep deprived, he was filled with content when he saw his family in the kitchen. Dean had made Jack homemade waffles and hot chocolate, and their son, though looking incredibly pale and worn out had shuffled out of his room to eat with them. Castiel was back, and all three greeted him with love and warmth.

Dean had just finished serving Jack, who was now absolutely drowning his waffles in maple syrup, and Sam sat down beside him. His brother put a plate in front of him as well.

"Thanks."

When they were all seated, Dean gazed at him, and Sam didn't feel uncomfortable having him study him.

"Something's different about you," Dean surmised.

"Yes, I agree," Castiel chimed in.

Jack just chewed, his mouth full, gazing at him curiously. After he swallowed he asked, "Are you okay?"

Sam gave his family a smile, a genuine one that reached his eyes, and he answered, "Yeah, I'm doing good."

I'm doing good.