Chapter 4
When Dean got back the motel room a couple of hours later, Sam was in the shower. He was relieved to see Jackson's clothes were gone and Sam's were piled up on the floor at the end of his bed - it was safe to assume he was alone in there, then.
Thank Christ for that. Dean sighed, and put two bottles in brown paper bags down on the table. He'd stopped off at a liquor store on the way to Michelle's place, and between them they'd finished off most of a bottle of bourbon. Dean was trying to forget about Jackson, but Michelle thought they were just having a good time. And when she finally got Dean into bed, with his inhibitions sufficiently alcohol-dampened and fuelled by mental images of Sam, she had such a good time that she didn't want to let him go.
That hadn't stopped him taking off, though, or picking up a fresh bottle of bourbon on the way home. Having noticed it was much easier to deal with his drama when he drowned it in alcohol, Dean was taking one more swig from the open bottle when Sam came out of the bathroom.
"Hey - thought you'd be curled up somewhere with one of those college girls. Even both." Sam greeted him goodnaturedly, but Dean didn't smile back. He was too busy trying not to look - Sam had come out of the bathroom to get his clothes, and was only wearing a little motel towel around his waist. Dean didn't want to see the droplets of water that covered his baby brother's chest like tiny specks of glitter, or the way his damp hair curled invitingly at the ends…
Jesus, Dean, get a grip!
"Didn't work out for you, huh?" Sam went on, grabbing some fresh clothes out of his bag and thinking how amusing it would be if he'd gotten laid when Dean had struck out. He didn't notice the metaphorical thundercloud hanging over his big brother's head.
"Oh, it worked out fine. Spent the last couple of hours at her place." Dean replied, trying not to sound as tense as he felt. He failed miserably.
His tone wasn't lost on Sam - the youngest Winchester quirked an eyebrow, but didn't say anything. Irrational irritability wasn't exactly unusual in Dean, but Sam couldn't for the life of him understand what the problem was. He just got lucky with a pretty girl, after all, and that usually put him in a good mood for days.
He was curious as hell, but Sam didn't poke the beehive right away. He got dressed first, thinking it over while Dean escaped into the bathroom for a shower of his own.
Despite Dean's best efforts to hide it, Sam had noticed lately that something was eating at his big brother - he just didn't know exactly what. At least not for sure, anyway. But he was starting to think the odds were pretty good the problem stemmed from his confession after their night at the Roosevelt Asylum.
He didn't blame Dean, really - it couldn't have been easy to have your baby brother quite deliberately try and shoot you with your own gun, then confess he's been in love with you for nearly ten years. Dean was allowed to be tense. Sam just wanted him to say so.
"So you wanna tell me what's up?" he asked, when Dean finally emerged from the bathroom.
"What makes you think something's up?" Dean dumped his armful of dirty laundry at the foot of his own bed, trying to sound nonchalant. The way every muscle in his body tensed gave him away, though.
"Something's wrong, Dean. I can see that. And it's been wrong for a while now." Sam pressed, frowning as he watched Dean grab the open bottle of bourbon on his way over to the couch. He collapsed down onto it with a sigh, feet and head on the armrests, and stayed stubbornly silent. He evidently didn't want to talk, but Sam wasn't going to let him get away with that.
"I knew I shouldn't have said anything back in Rockford. Look, if you've changed your mind and you don't feel comfortable-" he began, but Dean cut him off.
"No, Sam - it's not that." Even as frustrated and wound up as Dean was, he didn't want Sam to think his big brother's personal dramas were on him. It wasn't the kid's fault Dean was in love with him.
"Really?" Sam didn't sound at all convinced.
"Really. It's not." Dean took another swig of bourbon, grimacing as it scorched his throat on the way down. It wasn't exactly top-shelf stuff, and he wrinkled his nose as set it on the coffee table.
"So what is it?" Sam sat on the end of his bed, looking intently across the five feet of carpet to his big brother. "Talk to me, Dean. This isn't going to work if we can't talk."
Dean groaned, searching the peeling paint on the roof for an answer. "I don't know, Sam - just seeing you with that guy tonight, man..." He didn't even know how to put this feeling into words. The word that fit best was 'jealousy', really, but he couldn't tell Sam that…
"Jackson?" Sam frowned, confused. "You didn't even see anything. We went outside before we…" He trailed off, and his eyes widened as he put the pieces together. "You came by here earlier, didn't you? I thought I heard the Impala, but I was - distracted - at the time." Sam said, mentally going over his time with Jackson. He'd heard that engine when he shoved Jackson up against the wall…
Oh God. That's what he saw.
"Yeah - 'distracted' is the word." Dean sniffed.
"What exactly did you think I meant when I said I was bi, Dean? That I was with these other guys for the hand-holding?" Sam asked stiffly. He wasn't actually sure why he was the one feeling embarrassed; it was Dean's problem, not his. And quite honestly, after how well the whole "I'm bisexual" conversation had gone, he expected better.
Dean looked at him witheringly. "I'm under no illusions about that - believe me - but I just never expected to see it." He winced even as the words came out of his mouth, quite sure he'd somehow just made things worse but drunk enough that it took him a couple of seconds to figure out exactly how.
Sam just stared at him for a second, absorbing that, and when he finally spoke his voice was noticeably harder. "So it's okay as long as you don't see it?"
Dean groaned, looking back up at the ceiling. You're really screwing this up - get your foot out of your mouth…!
"Sam, that's not what I meant-"
"'Cause you made it pretty damn clear you didn't want me." There was heat in Sam's voice now, and the glass of water fell from his hand as he suddenly stood up.
"No, Sam - for Christ sakes, it's not that I don't want you..." Dean got up off the couch to face his baby brother, hands held up with palms out in a placating gesture. It was very much like the one he'd used that day he found out Sam was bi.
"Well what then?" Sam demanded, but Dean didn't answer him right away. He stood there, thinking, his bottom lip caught between his teeth.
Just say it, Dean: 'I love you'. What was so Goddamn hard about that?
"Dean, you told me-" Sam started to go on, but Dean cut him off.
"Will you shut up and let me finish?"
Sam closed his mouth and just glared, waiting, while Dean hesitated. It wasn't because he had to consider these words before he said them - he'd imagined it so many times that, for once, he knew exactly what to say. He just needed a second to scrounge up the balls to do it.
When he spoke again, his voice was softer and more measured. "It hit a nerve when I saw you with him, because ever since we were teenagers, I've wanted to do that to you."
Dean watched as Sam opened his mouth to fire back with a prepared response to what he expected to hear, and then pause as his mind registered what had actually come out of his brother's mouth.
"So… then… why…?" he whispered, utterly confused.
"Why did I tell you we couldn't?" Dean supplied, noticing that Sam didn't look like he was capable of forming whole sentences just yet. Sam just nodded, his hazel eyes gone as wide as dinner plates.
"'Cause brothers aren't supposed to do that, Sam. You're supposed to chase anything with a pulse and, as the big brother, I'm supposed to tell you to use protection and keep you away from jailbait and stuff. You should be out flirting with waitresses with daddy issues, not in bed with your big brother." There was a pang in Dean's chest as he said the words. He wanted to be in bed with Sam - so much - but he could do better. Should do better.
Sam saw the pain on Dean's face, and his look of surprise slowly started to become one of apprehension, and then realisation as he worked out where this was going. "Look, Dean, I've felt this way for years. That's not changing. But you obviously feel it too, and I don't understand why we can't do this if we both feel that way!" Sam was trying to keep a lid on it, but his voice was tight and there were tears welling up in his eyes.
"You can do better than me, Sam. I don't want you to get stuck in this life." Dean told him, trying real hard not to listen to that little voice inside his head that told him he was a jackass for doing this to his baby brother.
"God, Dean, will you stop being practical and heroic and just listen to me?" Sam demanded, then paused and made a visible effort to get himself under control. He dropped his head and took a few deep breaths, and when he looked up again the expression of pain and desperation on his face nearly broke the last lingering thread of Dean's resolve.
"I don't want to do better. I don't want to date waitresses or receptionists, or freaking dental hygienists, Dean. I want you." Sam tried to keep it together, but his voice cracked and the tears spilled over, and Dean almost gave in then. Almost.
"What if it doesn't work, Sam?" he asked, as gently as he could. "What if we try this, and it falls apart? We couldn't just go back to the way we were." He didn't actually say the words, but Sam understood exactly what Dean meant: I love you, and I want to be with you, but I won't. It's for your own good.
Sam stared him in shock for a long moment, tears streaming down his cheeks, not quite able to believe what his big brother was doing to him. Dean couldn't have hurt him more, short of actually physically tearing his freshly-broken heart from his chest.
He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it again. He caught his bottom lip between his teeth and looked away from Dean, and his eyes went out of focus as he thought. Then he turned slowly, with a resigned look on his face that made Dean suddenly uneasy, and knelt down to start packing up his clothes into his duffel.
It took Dean's bourbon-soaked brain a second to realise what was going on in his little brother's head, but when he did, that feeling of unease threatened to turn into full-blown panic. "Sam - wait." Dean reached out and laid a hand on Sam's shoulder, but he immediately shrugged it off.
"No. We're through the looking glass already. There's only one way this can end now." Sam didn't turn to face Dean, but his voice was tight as he kept stuffing clothes into his bag. "If you don't want to be with me, I can't stay; I can't ride around the country with you in the Impala, staying in these tiny motel rooms. I can't pretend I don't know how Goddamn close I came to having the only thing I ever really wanted."
"Christ, Sam - you don't have to leave!" Dean's heart started pounding like a jackhammer in his chest as the reality of the situation hit home. The only person he had left in the world was about to walk out the door, and Dean was going to fucking let him.
Sam stood and looked him straight in the eye with such intensity that Dean thought he was about to hit him. "I don't want to leave, Dean, but I can't hide how I feel anymore and I can't pretend we didn't have this conversation." Sam stared for a few seconds more, waiting for him to reply.
Although Dean knew exactly what to say to stop him going, he couldn't bring himself to say the words. "We just can't." Dean told him, quietly. Sam deserved better than what Dean could give him, and if that meant he had to leave, then...
Sam gave him a sad little smile, his eyes still shining with tears. He tried to blink them away, but Dean heard the catch in his voice as he bent down to pick up his duffel and backpack. "If you loved me, you wouldn't let me go." Sam told him, as he shrugged into the backpack and hoisted the duffel over his shoulder. He didn't sound angry, or bitter - just sad. As far as Dean was concerned, sad was worse.
"I'm sorry, Sam. I wish I could give you what you want." he said, as Sam walked past him to the kitchen table and picked up the unopened bottle of bourbon Dean had brought home with him.
"Yeah, me too." Sam sighed, and tucked the bottle into his duffel. "So, I'm going to go and get a room for the night and try and hitch a ride tomorrow morning." He paused, looking at Dean, hoping for a last-minute change of heart. He didn't get it.
Dean didn't stop Sam leaving. He let him walk right out the door into the cold Illinois night.
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Dean closed the door and went over to the coffee table to retrieve the half-empty bottle of bourbon. There was still plenty left to drink himself into a nice, comfortable stupor, and he poured a good three-fingers worth into a relatively clean-looking motel glass, trying to ignore his shaking hands.
He downed half the glass in one shot, then went over to the window and pushed the curtain aside with a finger. It was a cold, misty night out there, but he watched through the haze as Sam opened the door to his new room. It was down the other end of the complex, as far away from Dean as he could get.
Dean left the window and sat heavily back on the couch. His throat was still burning, so he took a shot at putting out the fire with what was left in his glass.
As he sat there on the couch in the silence and semi-darkness, working his way slowly through the rest of the bottle in two-and three-finger increments, Dean tried to convince himself it was because he loved Sam that he let him walk. 'If you love something, set it free' and all that crap.
But, deep down, he knew Sam didn't want to be free. He didn't want to pick up women in bars and coffee shops. Sam had known all along what he wanted.
And when he finally worked up the courage to say it out loud, you shot him down.
It's gotta hurt to be rejected by your own brother like that.
Dean poured himself another drink. He downed it in one shot with a grimace, and tried to convince himself his eyes were watering only because of the bourbon, which was clearly rocket fuel in disguise.
"It's for his own good." Dean reasoned, out loud. His voice was rough, and entirely unconvincing even to his own ear.
Sam could do better. He'd almost managed it at Stanford - he found the right girl, had one of the best law schools in the country handed to him on a silver platter… before Dean darkened his doorstep, Sam had built a nice life for himself.
He should have another shot at normal, and that's not going to happen if he hitches his wagon to yours.
Even as he was thinking it, Dean knew that was bullshit too. Sam had risked everything to tell him what he wanted - he'd made up his mind. He was sure. And Dean wanted it too, just as much.
"So what are you afraid of, Dean? That you'll lose him? 'Cause you did a bang-up job of that all on your own." he growled at himself. Every fibre of his being was aching to get up off the couch and go and tell Sam he'd fucked up, and he wanted to give it a shot. After all, how much worse could things possibly get? Sam was already spending the night in another room and, come morning, Dean was sure he was going to follow through on his promise.
He'll hitch a ride with God-knows-who to God-knows-where, and that glimpse through the window might be the last time you ever see him.
That thought was more than Dean could bear. He actually felt his chest tighten, and his stomach started tying itself in knots as he pulled his phone out of his pocket.
It was just after 1am when Dean called to apologise, but the younger Winchester didn't answer. It went straight to voicemail.
Dean went over to the window and looked out into the misty night, frowning and tapping his phone absently against his palm. The light was still on in Sam's room, so he was still up - so why wasn't he answering his phone? Had he turned it off deliberately?
Dean's stomach tied itself up even tighter as he thought about that. Had he really fucked this up so badly that Sam wouldn't even speak to him…?
"He's just across the frigging parking lot. Go and knock on the door, and if he doesn't want to see you, he'll just clock you one." Dean told himself, trying to sound positive. It wasn't convincing. "And besides, how could I possibly screw this up any more than I already have?" he sighed, shoving his phone into his pocket and trying not to think too hard about that.
He shrugged into his coat and went outside into the biting cold of the Illinois night. His boots crunched in the frosty gravel as he walked quickly across the carpark, and his heart rate rose a little with every step. He walked up to the battered green door of Sam's room, and paused for one last deep breath before he knocked.
Dean was surprised when he didn't get an answer to that either. There was still a light on inside, and he could hear the TV. And he seriously doubted Sam could sleep after what had happened earlier.
"Sam?" he called, and knocked again - harder this time. Still no answer. "Dammit, Sam, answer your frigging door." Dean grumbled, pulling his phone out of his pocket. He hit Sam's number on the speed dial, and frowned when it rang out again. He could hear the phone plain as day, chirping away inside Sam's room, but still didn't see any trace of him.
He stood there silently on the doorstep for a long moment, while every instinct he had screamed at him that something wasn't right. Even given his current state of intoxication it didn't take him long to pick the old lock, and he had the door open after only a handful of seconds. His stomach turned as he tasted a familiar, unmistakable metallic tang on the air: blood.
"Sam?" Dean called warily, stepping inside. The room was dim, the only light coming from the TV and a bedside lamp, and he had to flick on the light switch by the front door before he saw Sam's phone on the kitchen table next to a half-finished bottle of bourbon - the one he'd taken with him as he left. His heart leapt up into his throat when he noticed the little orange prescription bottle laying on its side nearby.
Dean recognised the pill bottle. It was his, and had contained the remains of the Percocet he'd been prescribed after a mishap on a hunt about six months back. There had been five left in the bottle, which Dean was saving for his next episode of hurts-like-hell, but it was empty now. The pain those pills were intended for had been no joke, and the maximum dose was supposed to be 6 tablets per day. On their own, not enough for an overdose. But, with half a bottle of bourbon for them to swim in…
Dean remembered that look of finality and resignation on Sam's face when he'd walked out earlier, and his stomach started tying itself in knots all over again. He walked further into the room, but there was no sign of Sam - or, more worryingly, of his silver Taurus.
You would've heard a gunshot-
Dean slammed the door on that line of thought almost before he was finished thinking it. He refused to even consider that Sam had shot himself, because that would be game over. He wouldn't screw that up, and that thought scared the hell out of Dean - mostly, because it wasn't that far-fetched.
The kid had no-one left. Their mom was dead, as was Jess, and John was in the wind…
You're it, Dean - you're all he's got. Well, all he had.
An icy little shiver ran down his spine as he looked around Sam's deathly quiet motel room, thinking that over. Then his gaze settled on the bathroom, and the bottom fell out of his stomach. The light was on inside, and the door was open just enough for him to see an ankle and its accompanying size 14 sneaker lying on the tiled floor.
"Sam!" Dean ran for the bathroom, but the second he shoved the door open and took a running step inside, his feet went out from under him. He grabbed for the doorframe, but his bourbon-dulled reflexes weren't quick enough and he landed hard on the tiled bathroom floor, his left side taking the brunt of the impact. It drove the air from his lungs as his head bounced off the floor and then everything went dark, like someone had flipped a switch and turned the lights out.
Dean lay there on the cold floor, winded and very confused. It was a good twenty seconds before he could open his eyes, and he rolled onto his back with a groan, wincing as his left shoulder blossomed into agony. He could see a towel rack on the wall above him and briefly considered pulling himself up with it, but he was seeing two of them, and they were swimming around most disconcertingly. So Dean struggled up into a sitting position on his own, very slowly, and propped himself up on his right arm as he held his left close to his body.
When his vision cleared enough that he was finally able to take a look around, he forgot all about his shoulder.
Sam was on the floor, slumped in the corner where the bath met the wall. His eyes were closed, legs stretched out in front of him and his arms hung limply at his sides. There were two long gashes on the inside of both his forearms, and an old, razor-sharp Bowie knife lay on the floor beside him. The youngest Winchester was as white as the wall tiles, and the floor was scarlet - Dean was horrified to realise he had slipped over in a pool of his brother's blood.
Dean made a little choking noise and scrambled across the slippery floor to kneel beside his brother, jeans soaking in the warm, red pool on the floor around him. He pressed two fingers to Sam's neck, searching desperately for a pulse, but his own heart pounding like a jackhammer made it hard.
"Where the fuck is it?" Dean swore, trying not to panic. He knew exactly where that pulse should be, but he couldn't fucking feel it and he was trying really, really hard not to notice how cold and white Sam's skin was.
He repositioned his fingers once, and again, then blew out a little sigh of relief when he found it. He had a pulse. Sam had a pulse. It was slow and thready, but it was there, and that meant there was still time.
Dean pulled out his phone and dialled 911, then put it on speaker and set it on the edge of the sink. The operator answered as he tore two starchy white motel towels from that rack on the wall, wrenching it almost completely off the tiles, and he gave her all the information she asked for while he wrapped his little brother's wounded arms tight, grimacing as he got a close-up look at Sam's handiwork.
People called it 'cutting your wrists', but that didn't do this justice. These weren't shallow scratches done by an angsty schoolgirl with the compass from her pencil case. Sam had carved open the inside of both forearms, wrist to elbow on the left and half that on the right. Every beat of his heart sent fresh blood spilling from the clean, straight edges of the wounds, like little scarlet waterfalls.
"Dammit, Sam, what the hell were you thinking?" Dean tore his belt out of his jeans and tied off the towel on Sam's right arm as best he could. He undid Sam's belt too and used that to bind the towel to his left arm, then crossed his arms over his chest and held them there. The cuts looked deep, and the towels were turning red at an alarming rate. The ambulance was coming, so the 911 operator had said, but as far as Dean was concerned it wasn't coming fast enough.
"It figures that I have my frigging epiphany, and then come over here and find this." Dean sat on the floor, bracing himself against the bath. He watched Sam's chest rise and fall slowly, an eternity between each breath, and wiped beads of sweat from his forehead with the back of his shaking left hand.
"You know I was coming to tell you I changed my mind, right?" Dean said softly, even though he was pretty sure Sam couldn't hear him. He leaned over and took his pulse again - it was still weak, but it was there.
"Don't you dare die on me, Sam. Not now. Not before I get a chance to fix this." Dean told him, as the sound of approaching sirens reached his ears.
