Sam remembered when he was a kid how Dean used to dress him and get him ready for school. Sometimes Sam had thought that Dean was more than just four years older than him. Dean was always so self sufficient. He never needed anyone to help him get ready for school, make dinner or breakfast for him, or even make sure he went to bed at a reasonable time.
Now, while Dean was still self sufficient, he seemed to need to be reminded to do the little things in life; things like eating, bathing, shaving (something he still hadn't gotten Dean to do despite the fact that he had been back for over a year), or sleeping.
Sleeping was something that Dean never had had trouble coming by. He could sleep in the car, in the car parked, hell he could sleep on the hood of the car. Once, Sam had seen him sleep against a tree in a park while he had been waiting for Sam to return from a school outing. Sleep had never ever been something that had eluded Dean Winchester. However, now, well, that was something else entirely. The first week, Sam was fairly certain that Dean didn't close his eyes longer than a mere millisecond, much less long enough to sleep eight hours. The second week, Sam bought sleep aids and drugged his big brother into sleep. Sam was so exhausted when Dean finally closed his eyes and fell into a normal sleep rhythm that he had practically fallen where he stood. Still, even with the drugs in his system, Dean didn't sleep more than three or four hours at a time. Now with over a year gone in this manner, Dean's eyes looked bruised underneath his large round eyes, and his eyes looked sunk in, hollow. Sometimes he wondered, as he watched his brother sleep for those few hours, if it really and truly was a good thing that he had retrieved his brother from the pit.
Next to sleep, eating was Dean's favorite pastime. While at Stanford he had forgotten just how much his big brother could consume, and just how uncouth he was when eating. He had forgotten the large bites that filled his cheeks like a hamster filling its cheeks with bedding. He had forgotten how his brother talked with his mouth full, laughed with it full too, spitting little pieces of masticated cow all over who ever was sitting in front of him. He had been so angry and so mortified when they were out in public. Now, he would give just about anything to have Dean take a huge bite of a burger, with extra onion, and spit half of it at him while he talked. Now, he practically had to beg his brother to eat something.
The first day back he had bought his brother his favorite fast food and even some pie for dessert. Dean's eyes had widened in horror and pushed the offending food away. Sam never understood. He didn't try to. He simply did everything he could to find something his brother would eat. Carrot sticks were pretty much the only thing he could force down Dean's throat anymore. Once in a while a bowl of soup and some carrot sticks, but that was only after he hadn't been able to get Dean to eat for a couple of days. Water was the only thing he would drink, and he would drink it in large child like gulps, watching Sam over the top of the glass like he was expecting him to take it away from him at any second. Dean also never made any effort to procure food for himself, he always waited until Sam gave it to him. Dean had lost a lot of weight. His clothes hardly fit him anymore. He seemed dwarfed sometimes in them. As a matter of fact Sam had lost a lot of weight as well, beer was filling for breakfast, but it didn't exactly help to keep you fit and in shape.
Sam looked up when he heard Dean turn off the water in the shower. He had forced him inside and turned on the water demanding that he take a shower. Sam now took to sitting against the door of the bathroom waiting for his brother to finish. Dean had a tendency to let the water run and not take a shower if Sam wasn't inside of the bathroom watching and waiting.
Sam handed his skinny, shaggy brother a towel and turned as he wrapped it around his waist and stepped out of the shower. Sam stood and left his brother allowing him privacy. Another swig of Jack made him almost forget he just had to watch to make sure his big brother, the man who had taught him how to tie his shoes, the man who had made his breakfasts, the man who had read him bed time stories, took a shower and washed himself. The memories dulled but didn't disappear. He took one more swig just for good measure.