Chapter Seven
The Hours After
Time slipped, slithered, and crawled. Dean helped Lisa have the conversation with Morgan, who begged to talk to her parents. Sam stepped outside and talked to her, ending the conversation by promising again that they were coming home soon and they'd bring Savannah home with them. She wanted to talk to Jess, but Sam told her Jess was asleep and she'd have to wait until later. After hanging up with Morgan, Dean waited for Sam to go back in the room with Jess, but he didn't. He handed Dean his cell phone and leaned against the railing. Dean took the opportunity to really look at Sam. There seemed to be nothing left of him. He was only going through the motions now. Dean wondered if he was thinking about suicide and if Jess and Morgan were the only reason he didn't. That thought actually scared Dean in a way that a lot of things didn't, so he finally spoke up.
"Talk to me, man. What's up with you?"
Sam swallowed. "Jess is asleep."
"I'm talking about you. What's up with you?" Dean repeated.
"I can't…" Sam said, then stopped, taking a deep breath to stop the sharp pain going through his chest. "I can't think of me right now."
"Why not?" Dean asked.
"Because if I do, it'll kill me." Sam said.
"What do you mean?" Dean asked, trying hard to get Sam talking.
Sam was fighting tears all over again. He closed his eyes exhaled hard, then pointed to his chest and said to Dean, "This hurts, man."
Dean nodded.
"It hurts, and I can't…Damn it, Dean, I'll take a bullet, a ghost, a werewolf, any of that right now. This…This hurts like hell, Dean. I feel like half my heart's been ripped out of my chest. I can't breathe, I can't think…" Sam said. "How can we move on from here?"
"Sam?"
Sam turned and saw Jess in the doorway. Dean had thought Sam looked bad, but Jess looked close to a breakdown. She was pale and still shaking. Sam got up and walked over to her, trying to give her a hug. For the first time in the decades that Dean had known Jess, Jess didn't respond to Sam's touch. She didn't stiffen up and walk away or lean into him at all, she just stood there and stared out into the parking lot like she was waiting on something. Once Sam realized he wasn't going to get anywhere trying to get Jess to talk right then, he followed her back inside the room. Dean was lost as to what to do now. He felt intrusive walking in on the two of them, but he also felt bad leaving them alone. Despite both Sam and Jess saying they weren't hungry, Dean left to get the three of them food. Once he was gone, Sam stood against the wall and cautiously tried to talk again.
"Morgan wants to talk to you."
Jess chuckled bitterly. "Well, I guess I'm gonna have to let her down too."
The tone of her voice made Sam think to himself Is she trying to start a fight? "What does that mean?" Sam asked.
Jess's head snapped up and she looked at Sam with a fierce anger that jarred him. Gone was the shocked, catatonic Jess of earlier, to be replaced with the angry, bitter person in front of him. But this anger was different than any he'd ever seen from her. Sam had seen Jess lose her patience with the girls on occasion, but this anger was venomous and directed at him.
"Isn't that what we do? Let our kids down?"
"Look, I know we messed up with Savannah, but she knew we loved her…" Sam said, wishing that he actually believed what he was telling her.
Jess scoffed. "She knew? Really? Because this" Jess pulled Savannah's note out from her pocket, "says differently, Sam!"
"I know." Sam said, looking down at the floor. "I know."
"We screwed up. We screwed up so bad. And we can't fix it now." Jess said. "We're out of chances."
Finally Sam felt his own temper flare. "Don't you think I know that?! 'I should hate you for this, but I don't. I love you guys more than anything. I just wish you felt the same about me?' Do you think I don't realize my own part in this?"
"It's not all your fault…"
"The hell it isn't, Jess! It was my stupid mistake that made Savannah leave and get on that plane…" Sam argued.
"I'm glad you didn't."
Sam stopped, the momentum of his argument leaving him immediately. "What?"
"I'm glad you didn't get on that plane. Don't you realize if you had…?"
"But Savannah died alone." Sam said.
"And if you had gotten on that plane, you'd be dead too." Jess said. "I hate the fact that she was alone, and I'll blame myself for that till the day I die, but if you had been on that plane, and I'd lost both of you…" Jess stopped, her hands flying to her mouth as she realized what she was saying. "God, I'm the worst mother in the world."
"No." Sam said, finally moving from the wall and taking a seat next to Jess. "No, you're not. We both made a mistake."
"A mistake?" Jess said. The emotional walls she'd tried to build up were coming down, and she was crying more. When she calmed a little, she continued. "You know, I used to think that the worst thing that could happen to us was losing one of the girls."
"Feels like the worst to me right now."
"No. No, you know what's worse? Our baby died thinking that we don't care about her. That was the last thing she was thinking. That's worse to me." Jess said. "And now we won't even get to tell her that when we should have been helping her get to school, we were talking about her the entire time."
Sam was silent; he couldn't really argue with her.
Suddenly Jess started to hyperventilate. "Oh my God, Sam, what have we done?"
"Hey, hey." Sam said, reaching over to hold her.
Jess sobbed bitterly into Sam's shoulder. "She's gone, Sam." She got out through her cries. "What are we gonna do now?"
Sam didn't answer her right away, but finally said, "We'll do better. We'll take Morgan and make sure we don't make the same mistakes with her."
Jess didn't answer, just held on to Sam as if he'd float away. When she was down to only the occasional sniffle, Sam decided to broach the subject of going to see Savannah again. He wouldn't be able to make all the decisions they needed to make by himself. He knew Dean would help, up to and including making every decision for him if Sam asked, but Sam knew if they didn't do this themselves they'd eventually regret it.
"Babe, we need to…"
Agent Malone ran across the street as fast as he could. He'd gone through the hospital looking for the Winchesters with a fury he'd never felt before. Agent Malone had, more than once, had to inform parents that their children were dead. But this was a first, and he was glad to take it. He'd finally tracked the Winchesters to the motel across the street, and he eagerly ran to the room they were staying in. Just as he was about to bang on the door, the brother, Dean, was coming up the walk with a bag of food in his hand.
"Agent?"
"Is your brother in the room?" Agent Malone asked. "I have to see him."
"He should be…"
Agent Malone didn't let Dean answer, just proceeded to bang three quick times on the door. "Mr. Winchester! It's agent Malone! I have to talk to you!"
Sam quickly came to the door. "Agent Malone?"
"Yes. Please let me in. I have to talk to you and your wife."
Sam stepped away from the door and the agent walked in. Dean followed, both of them not sure what to make of the smile on agent Malone's face. Dean placed the bag of food on the table and asked,
"Is this about the crash?"
"Yes. I have news. Do you remember the couple that left the waiting room right before the doctor came to tell you guys about Savannah?" Agent Malone asked. "The Lucases?"
"Yes." Sam said simply.
"There was some kind of mix up. Rachel, their daughter, had to be sent into surgery when she got to Duke, so they didn't get to see her right away. When they were finally allowed to go see her, they said that she wasn't their daughter."
"What does that mean?" Jess asked, but Sam and Dean were putting the picture together at virtually the same time.
"Wait, didn't you say the girl that was picked up was sitting next to Savannah?" Dean asked.
"That's what we thought." Agent Malone said.
"So…" Sam asked, running his hand through his hair, "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"
"I've got a chopper waiting for you at the hospital. I can't confirm until you two get to Duke and positively ID her. But I think Savannah's alive."
