A necessary conversation; set during the Pilot timeline.
"So. You seem… good."
Dean doesn't look at Sam as he speaks. It's the first thing he's said in nearly an hour of driving, and the quiet focus on the highway stretching out ahead has lulled Sam into a familiar reverie.
"I am," Sam says. "I'm really good."
"That Jessica Moore girl," Dean says, and he does look at Sam then. "Guess it worked out for you guys, huh?"
Sam can't help the smile that spreads across his face at the thought of her. "Yeah," he agrees. "Jess is… she's amazing."
Dean's got that familiar half-smile on his face when Sam looks up again, that smirky expression that on Dean can express anything from smugness to disappointment. Sam shakes off the flicker of unease that comes with realizing he can't recognize what's hiding behind it now.
"I love her," he says, after a beat.
The smile's gone, then, and Dean's looking thoughtfully over at Sam again. "That right," he says, and it's not a question, but Sam nods along anyhow.
"Well," Dean says, turning back to the road, "I'm glad you've found someone that makes you happy."
Sam's knee-jerk reaction is to check to see if Dean's being passive aggressive, but there's nothing insincere in his expression.
"Yeah," he says, honestly. "Yeah, me too."
They fall into silence for a few minutes. A large green sign pronounces them 10 miles outside of Dixon.
"Hey, so." Dean's tone is decidedly casual. "How's your thing? Episodes been down?"
Of course that's what he wants to talk about. Sam frowns down at his hands in his lap. Sometimes it seems like there are two Sams: one that's interviewing for law school and living with the girl he loves, and one that wants his big brother every time the world goes cold and trembly around him. Dean only cares about the second one, apparently.
"They're fine," Sam replies, voice clipped. And then, because he feels like he owes it to Dean to be a little more specific, he adds, "I've had two. But Jess is- she has a cousin who had seizures, and she's learned a lot about them since you came, so. We get along fine."
"Two?" Dean repeats. "You mark down the dates? Were they both-"
"Dean," Sam says sharply, cutting him off. Dean lifts one hand off the steering wheel, making a placatory gesture.
"Hey, I'm just making sure you're keeping track," he says appeasingly.
"Well, I am." Sam grits his teeth together, frustrated. "I'm not a kid anymore, Dean. I can take care of myself."
Dean looks at him for a long moment, expression indecipherable.
"Yeah, I know you can," he says finally.
Sacramento flies past them.
Sam fakes a call to 911 to get Dean out of a sticky spot, and feels a rush of something high and sweet under his sternum when it works. He drives the Impala through the side of a ruined house and sends a vengeful spirit to rest, and when it's finished he there's a sense of deep satisfaction running through him, like he's stretching a muscle he'd forgotten he had. Dean watches him with an oddly thrilling mixture of pride and fear all night.
Then all at once they're back on the road again, and it's as if none of it happened at all.
They're two miles out of Palo Alto when Sam finally gets the nerve to say what's on his mind.
"Dean, the stuff I said the other night-" he stops. He can feel Dean's eyes on him, but he doesn't look up.
"About the seizures," he clarifies, even though he knows it's unnecessary. Dean gives a little hum of acknowledgment.
"I didn't mean that-" he breaks off again. Everything he wanted to say has gotten jumbled up somewhere between his brain and his mouth. "It's still better when you're there," he says. "I just- I can't-" I can't afford to need you that much. He can't quite say it.
"Sammy, hey, I get it, okay?"
Sam looks up from his hands. Dean is smiling at him, looking very fond.
"You're growing up," he says, giving Sam a playful smack on the shoulder. "I know that. I mean, look at you. College, girlfriend, law school." He says the last part like it's absurd. "You're doing things I would never have thought one of us could do. Big, real world, no-monsters-involved crap." He gives the steering wheel a punctuating slap.
Dean goes quiet for a long minute, and when he speaks again, his voice is more sober. "I'm proud of you, Sammy. I think you're gonna do great things, you know?"
Sam swallows hard.
"Here's the thing," Dean says. "I know for a fact that even hotshot lawyers are allowed to need their families sometimes, okay?" He looks over at Sam again. "So if you ever need anything-" he shapes his right hand into the mimicry of a phone, thumb and pinky extended. "-I'm right on the other end of that line."
Sam looks down at the bracelet around his left wrist, runs his thumb over the letters etched into it. "Yeah," he says, "I know you are."
"I mean it," Dean says, still solemn. "Doesn't have to be about the epilepsy."
Sam glances up at him, startled by the use of the word they never out loud, maybe even by the sentiment behind the statement.
"Whatever you wanna tell me about, Sammy," Dean is saying. "Hard day, good sex, lose a sock in the dryer…"
Sam knows he's meant to laugh, but he's feeling suddenly overwhelmed. He clears his throat. "Thanks, Dean."
Dean meets his eyes, gaze intense and scrutinizing, just long enough to make Sam remember the speed with which they're hurtling down the freeway. He turns back to the road before Sam can say anything, switching lanes to take the turnoff Sam's momentarily forgotten about.
They don't speak again until Dean pulls up in front of Sam's apartment, and Sam has the fleeting thought, as he opens the door, that he misses that kind of silence most of all. A heavy, molasses ache settles in his chest as he watches Dean drive off.
At two fifty, just minutes after Sam has set the Impala and all the possible futures it carries behind him, his world falls apart, and for once, it has nothing to do with the glitch in his brain.