Cleaning Up
He didn't know for how long he sat there, or when he fell asleep, but Sam woke up as the early morning rays lightened the sky. He was covered with a thick blanket and there was a rolled up sheet cradling his head.
He sat up from the park bench, silently thanking whoever put the covers over him. he would have frozen solid if not.
Slowly, he got up, still wrapped in the blanket and made his way back into the hospital. When he got to the nurse's station, he saw Nurse Annie coming out from a room in a coat and sneakers.
"Oh, you're up," she exclaimed, smiling and patting Sam's arm. "Thank goodness."
Finding his voice, Sam stuttered, "Yuh-you p-put the b-blanket on m-me?" he said, realizing he was colder than he thought he was.
"Honey, you're freezing!" she said and turned a little, putting a hand on the small of Sam's back and said softly, "come with me."
She led him to a cafeteria and made him sit down in one of the plastic chairs. Sam sat in the chair, feeling himself shiver a little. He looked up and saw Nurse Annie bringing back two steaming hot cups and when she set it down, Sam smelt the warm, sweet aroma of hot chocolate.
He took the cup in both his hands and blew it a little before tasting it.
Although it was just cafeteria chocolate, it tasted like heaven going down his throat, warming his hands and feet gradually. But nothing helped with the ice in his heart.
Not the hot chocolate, not Nurse Annie talking to him, trying to distract him.
He smiled and answered her politely, but he wasn't really there, and she could see that.
After a while, she said that she needed to go, and that he should go home and get a bag together with Dean, that he should go home and get washed up.
She left him sitting there, staring at the swirls of vapor wafting up from the liquid. Nurse Annie left, telling Sam that she would be back in the evening to see them again.
She turned to go, a sad smile playing on her lips when she heard a small whisper, "Thank you."
Sam didn't know how or why, but he found himself going home an hour later, sitting in the back seat of a cab, passing by the streets that he knew so well.
He saw some couples walking on the street hand in hand, laughing and talking. He passed by the park where he and Dean would go sometimes. He passed the bar near the apartment. And silently, tears came flowing down.
As he unlocked the door to their apartment, he stopped and looked at the door.
No one had cleaned up the mess. No one had been there to clean. He braced himself.
Going into the apartment, he looked at the mess that was there. An overturned chair, the sheets of the bed messed up, some on the floor. A broken pill bottle, tablets strewn on the floor. And dried vomit. Dean's vomit.
Sam didn't bother with any of the mess. He just stripped down and stepped into the shower.
He let the hot water run over him, washing away the icy feeling. He bowed his head and leaned it against the bathroom wall.
Tears and hot water.
He came out from the shower, and wiped himself down. Changed his clothes and sat on the bed.
Sam looked around, then looked down and sighed, closing his eyes and he pinched the bridge of his nose with his index finger and thumb.
He got up and looked around the apartment and clenched his fist.
He walked over to the windows and threw them all open. He took the dirty sheets off the bed and threw them into the washer and changed the sheets. He straightened the chairs and the bathroom. He swept up the bottle and the pills. He got to the pool of dried vomit.
Sam knelt down, looking at the stain, holding a sponge in his hand, bucket at his side.
Dean falling. Dean laying there. Dean retching. Dean looking at the bathroom door. Dean losing consciousness.
Dean.
The stain gone, the floor dotted with teardrops.
Sam curled up on the floor, sobbing.
