Warning: Very mild, vague description of two teenagers engaging in a sex act. Mentions of alcohol abuse and a dysfunctional family dynamic.

Lawrence, Kansas
Two years ago

It feels weird to know that Dean isn't in the house. It's not scary, exactly—though Sam is nervous about handling his dad the next time he gets in one of his "moods"—but it is definitely weird. Dean doesn't normally make a ton of noise or anything, but in his absence the house feels quieter. It puts an empty, squeamish feeling in the pit of Sam's stomach, but he's trying to ignore it. Dean's barely been gone an hour, and Sam would rather die than admit that sixty measly minutes without his brother has him feeling what he can only describe as homesick.

He hears feet pounding on the stairs, and for a second he thinks Dean changed his mind, he's coming back. But the footsteps are too light and quick to be his brother's, and a moment later a head of long, dark hair pokes itself into his room, followed by the slight body of his best friend.

"Up 'n at 'em, Sammy," she crows, bouncing into the room and plopping down on the other side of the bed. Sam doesn't bother moving as she settles in beside him, curls onto her side, and fixes him with big eyes. He's determined she isn't going to get anything out of him, but he really ought to know better. Ruby's known him longer than anyone but Dean, and she always knows when something is bothering him. One look at her big, sad eyes and she'll have it out of him, and Sam knows it. He figures he doesn't have to make it easy for her, though. He rolls away from her to face the wall.

"Oh c'mon, Sam. Don't be such a persqueiter. Dean'll be back before you know it. I came to cheer you up."

"'M fine," he mumbles, hoping she'll leave it be. He really, really ought to know better.

"Damn straight, but that's beside the point. Now stop moping. You have had sixty—" she pauses to look at her watch, "—seven minutes to mope so far. That is sixty-two minutes too long. Now let's get up and go do something. It's summer! The night is young! It's Baby Sammy's first flight from the nest without Surrogate Daddy Dean to hold his feathers. 'Bout time you shed the training wings anyway, if you ask me."

"That's why I never ask you," Sam retorts. Ruby is the only person outside of his immediate family that he talks to about what his home life is like, and normally she's the only person who can get away with any kind of commentary on the subject. Today though, even Ruby is on thin ice. More than anything, Sam just doesn't want to think about his brother being gone, or examine how much that freaks him out.

He feels a hand on his shoulder, warm, firm comfort. When Ruby speaks again her voice has lost its brash, tough-love edge.

"Hey, I get it. You miss Dean. It's okay to miss him. But don't let it ruin your whole summer, okay? You wouldn't stick me with nobody but Rachel for company all summer, wouldya Sammy?"

Then again, there's a very good reason Ruby is his best friend. He rolls back over and surrenders to the big, sad eyes of doom and open secrets, trying to keep his face neutral as he spills his guts.

"Dean's always been there, y'know? If I ever get in trouble or get hurt or lost or scared…Dean's always there to fix it somehow. Even if I made the mess myself, he never makes me clean it up alone. He's the best big brother in the world and yeah, he is kinda like a…a dad. In a way. And now I'm on my own for the first time, and…" Sam stops, takes a deep breath. He feels the tears welling up behind his eyes and he doesn't want them, doesn't want to let Ruby see him cry.

But Ruby's eyes are dark pools of sympathy, and the warm hand on his shoulder slides around to his back, pulls him in to rest against her shoulders. She rubs soothing circles into the space between his shoulder blades as he feels the tears begin to fall. He's glad he managed to keep himself together until Dean left. If he saw Sam like this, he'd never have left no matter how badly he needs a vacation. Sam doesn't want to be the thing always holding his brother back, so he's glad it's Ruby and not Dean that holds him while he cries like a baby.

She doesn't tease him about it later. In fact they never mention it again. Sam falls a little bit in love with her for that.

Sam's summer runs together, blazing hot days into cool, windy nights into more days of sunshine and more nights of clear, open skies full of stars. He spends every second of it with Ruby, hitching rides into town with older friends of hers and moving from park to library to convenience store and back to park, wiling away hours on dares and inside jokes and more secrets shared. Ruby talks Sam into his first cigarette and his first drink in the same night, and Sam talks her into reading The Lord of the Rings and all the Harry Potter books.

They go to a party one night with Ruby's older sister Lilith, who's home from college for the summer, and get fed brownies that taste weird and have Sam on his back, laughing like a hyena, within half an hour. Lilith takes them both back to her place and puts Sam up in Ruby's room. He sleeps curled up on her beanbag chair in the corner and sneaks out before sunrise so her mom won't find him and raise holy hell over it.

John has been hitting the bottle pretty hard again, so he doesn't notice that Sam forgets to come home more than three or four nights a week. Sam relishes the freedom even as he feels guilty for the cause of it. While his dad drinks for oblivion in the musty darkness of their house, Sam drinks for the feeling of looser limbs and a lighter head. He sleeps at Ruby's most of the time.

One night they spend hours passing a bottle back and forth across the grass, telling each other increasingly stupid secrets about things they've never done.

"I've never driven a car."

"I've never danced topless."

"Does the shower count? I've never eaten cold French fries."

"I've never thrown away perfectly good food."

"I've never had a sex dream about Bill Clinton."

"That was one time! I never sucked a guy's dick."

"Neither have I!"

They fall asleep in that field and wake up cold and stiff, grousing at each other the whole way back into town. He gets home around noon and tumbles into bed aching all over, vowing to never let Ruby talk him into that particular drink again—something rich and deep red that goes down like honey and hits the brain like an iron hammer.

He knows Dean has never really liked Ruby or approved of Sam spending so much time with her, but for this one summer he puts it out of his head. Dean isn't around, and whatever else he might say about Ruby, she never leaves Sam alone. He has to acknowledge that she gets him into way more trouble than he'd probably ever find on his own, but she sticks around to get him out of it, too. Anyway, he likes to think of it as life experience.

It's a hot night in late June when Sam adds "first kiss" to the list of life experiences he can chalk up to Ruby. They're sitting outside in her back yard, just far enough into the line of trees that the deep shadows hide them from any prying eyes peeking out of nearby windows. Ruby's on her back, hair rippling around her, dark and heavy like molasses spilled over the ground. Sam is propped up on his elbows beside her, and they're supposed to be watching the stars but Sam can't bring himself to look away from her face. Wide, black-brown eyes and full lips parted in a kind of awed smile as she stares up at the night sky. He thinks this is the best summer of his life, and also the loneliest, even though he's never alone. She's laying there, right beside him, close enough that he can feel her body heat radiating off the bare, sunburned shoulder close to his, a hair's breadth away from skin brushing skin. And yet he's lonely.

He thinks about how stupid that is, about how Ruby would laugh at him if she knew. Or maybe she'd get mad, since the whole point of this crazy summer—a new adventure night after night—has been to keep Sam from getting lonely with his brother away. Yet there's a hole in his chest and a twist in his gut when he looks at her lately, both heavy and hollow, making him feel like an empty rubber tube being tied in a knot.

Then Ruby's eyes flick away from the sky to land on him instead, and her smile widens. Her fist comes out to give a light, playful punch to his stomach, and that brief touch of knuckles to his thin cotton t-shirt turns him to muscles and bones and sinew once more, solidifies him and fills him with a heat he doesn't understand…except that he kind of does. Sam may be inexperienced, but he's not stupid. His heart starts pounding in his ears.

"I wonder if the stars look the same on the other side of the world," she says. Sam leans down and kisses her instead of answering.

He half expects to get laughed at. Or maybe bitten. Ruby can be rough around the edges that way. But tonight she's just soft, warm and oh, so willing. Her lips give him what he wants while her hands find things to do that he didn't ask for but doesn't make any attempt at stopping, until a first kiss has turned into other firsts, right on the grass in her back yard under the trees with her mother cooking dinner behind a wall just a few yards away. It's hushed, secret and too hot…and strangely beautiful because of all that.

After that night the "just for this summer" part of the equation becomes difficult for Sam to stick to. Dean is still coming back in a few weeks, Sam's dad is still a drunk, and Ruby is still a bad influence. Dean will disapprove, and Sam is supposed to be the good kid who stays out of trouble, who does what he's told and tries so hard not to be a burden to his father or brother who have more than enough problems of their own without his adding to them. But a part of him feels like he's torn up that old contract and signed another one in furtive groping and stolen kisses, and his stomach twists angrily every time he thinks of going back to the way things were when Dean gets home.

If Ruby senses any of his inner turmoil, she keeps her own counsel. She doesn't ask where this is going or exact any promises from him about the future. But sometimes he'll catch her looking at him when she doesn't think he's paying attention. She looks worried in those moments, sad and a little wistful. It's the only time she looks as young as she is, as uncertain as Sam feels. He hates knowing he's the reason, but that doesn't make the solution to his problem any clearer.

Two weeks before Dean's supposed to be coming home, everything goes straight to hell.

It sounds really dramatic when he thinks of it that way, but that's what happens. One day they're dumb kids running off together to do dumb things in the middle of the night…the next, Ruby is gone and whatever they are—were—is over.

Ruby never knocks. She doesn't have to. Usually she just lets herself in and comes bounding up the stairs, making a ridiculous amount of noise for someone so tiny. Her timing is almost never convenient, or even decent. So at first, Sam isn't even surprised to wake up at the ass crack of dawn to find her crawling through his bedroom window.

The room is full of deep purple-gray shadows when he opens his eyes to a soft thud and a whispered "fuck." He turns over slowly and blinks into the near-dark.

"Ruby? The hell—"

"Shhhhh!" She crawls up the bed to settle over him and puts a finger to his lips. "Don't wake Papa Bear," she breathes. Sam smells alcohol on her and raises an eyebrow.

"Started the party without me?"

"If we all waited for you, Sammy, the party would never get started," she says, and it should be a joke but it's not. There's a smile in her voice, but a current of bitterness underneath it. Sam pushes himself into a sitting position and reaches for the lamp on his night stand, groping for the switch. Ruby's hand stops his fumbling.

"Don't turn on the light," she says, like a plea. "We don't need it."

"Ruby?" Sam is concerned now. She's not really acting like herself. There's a waver in her voice that sounds suspiciously like suppressed tears. "What's wrong?"

Her laugh is hard, and half a sob.

"What's wrong." She pushes herself up and off him, flopping onto her back with her head on the other pillow. Sam reaches for the light again, and finds the switch this time.

In the dim yellow glow he can tell she's definitely been crying. He props himself up on an elbow, leaning closer to her without actually touching.

"Ruby…what's wrong? You can tell me."

"Yeah," she sighs, staring up at the ceiling rather than looking directly at him. "I know I can. I can sit here like an episode of Dawson's Creek and we can analyze my angst."

She doesn't sound like she finds the idea at all appealing, but Sam can't help but smile.

"Well, you did just climb through my window. Wait…you watch Dawson's Creek?"

"Shut up," Ruby snaps, rolling over to face away from him. His smile fades. He doesn't know what to say…he's never seen her like this. It's not just anger; she's been plenty angry before, at him even. He thinks it's scary, and a little bit hot…but mostly scary. But this is just…flat. Her voice is flat. And bleak. Sam's afraid if he tries to talk, he'll say the wrong thing. So he says nothing, only waits.

"My cousin," she says finally. "Michael. He…"

Her voice cracks. Sam doesn't ask her to finish. He doesn't need to.

"I'm so sorry," he says quietly. "Ruby…"

"Shut up," she says again, dully. "Don't tell me you're sorry."

"Okay." He doesn't want to fight with her right now. Maybe she wants a fight, but he's determined not to be the one to give it to her. He wants so badly to say or do something that will make it hurt less, but he knows he can't. She rolls over and looks at him.

"Okay? Okay? C'mon Sam, is that all you got?" She shoves him, not hard. He lets her, which seems to make her mad.

"What? Got nothing to say? Or are you practicing ignoring me for when Daddy Junior gets back from Alabama?"

Sam's mouth falls open at that. He sits up.

"What?"

"You heard me." Ruby stands and heads for the door, throwing words over her shoulder at him as she goes. "It's fine, Sam. Don't worry about it, I'll save you the trouble."

It takes Sam a few seconds after she disappears from his bedroom doorway to figure out what the hell just happened. When he does, he's out of bed and chasing after her, bounding down the stairs without even thinking of whether his footsteps might wake his dad up or not.

"Ruby! Wait." She doesn't. She's out the front door and striding across his yard without a backward glance.

"Ruby!" He catches up with her and puts a hand out to stop her, and she rounds on him so fast he has to backpedal several steps.

"Why are you coming after me? I gave you an out!"

"Who says I wanted an out!" They're both shouting and it's definitely going to wake someone up. Sam doesn't care. He doesn't understand, and it's early, and he's suddenly angry.

"You just decide for the both of us that I wanna ditch you, so you save me the trouble?"

"Well someone had to make up your mind, and you weren't gonna do it. How was it gonna go, Sam? Huh? Dean comes back and what, you're good little Sammy again, who never does anything or goes anywhere? You stay home and decide to start your summer reading list, and we just never have time to hang out until school starts, and then we're both just so busy with homework that we slowly drift apart?"

"I…"

"No thanks," she barrels right over him. "I don't need you to let me down easy, Sam. You know why? Because I don't need you. You were bored and alone and I felt bad for you. Now Dean's coming home. I'm done. Charity project completed."

"That's not true and you know it," Sam says, voice choked. He wants to cry. He feels like a stupid kid. "Ruby, you've been my best friend my whole life! I just…"

"Don't think Dean would be as indulgent about your trash girlfriend as he would about your trash bestie?" She's up in his space, jaw clenched, a challenge in her voice. Sam doesn't even stumble over the word girlfriend. It's pretty much true, in everything but name. It's the other part that takes him by surprise.

"Dean doesn't think of you as trash, Ruby. Neither do I. That's horrible."

"You may not," Ruby says bitterly. "But I know exactly how Dean thinks of me. He can't wait to ship you off to some college somewhere so you and me'll never see each other again."

Sam takes her by the shoulders firmly, leaning down a little to look her full in the face.

"Listen to me," he begs. "I am not gonna let that happen."

"You won't be able to help it, Sam. We're seniors. This time next year, we won't go to the same school anymore. We won't be the same people. We won't be living in the same town much longer. And eventually we'll forget about each other. I'm just starting us off a little early, that's all."

She steps back, out of his arm's reach. Sam lets his hands fall uselessly to his sides. He wants to argue with her. He wants to follow her all the way back to her house, arguing the whole way until he makes her see that she's wrong,that it's not going to happen that way. He wants to rewind to the start of the summer, to stolen kisses, to hiding out in the woods passing a bottle back and forth while reading Lord of the Rings aloud to each other. Having the choice made for him, Sam realizes there was never any choice at all. He should've stood up to his brother about Ruby years ago, should have found a way to let her know that this was permanent, that he wasn't going to forget about her the second Dean came back home.

But now she's walking away, and when he calls her name she doesn't turn, and Sam knows her well enough to know he isn't going to change her mind today. If he wants to convince her, he's going to have to do it every day, until she admits she was wrong.

Sam turns and goes back into the house. He crawls back into bed and sleeps a few more hours. When he gets up, he doesn't call Ruby. He figures he'll give it a day or two. She has other stuff on her mind anyway. Her cousin just died, and she's upset. Maybe she just wanted someone to take it out on. She's done that before.

But the next day he's so lonely and bored that he can't help it. He does call. And he gets the voicemail, telling him they've all gone to Alabama and won't be back at least for a week.

He's afraid of that week. Afraid of seven long days stretching out ahead of him, to be stuck in the house with only his own thoughts and the vaguely ominous sounds of his father shuffling around beyond his bedroom door. John isn't bad, really, at least not at the moment. He's not drinking a lot, at least not for him. But Sam lives with the knowledge that he could dive right back in at any minute. He doesn't know what to do if that happens.

When Dean calls that night from a payphone to say he's on his way home early, Sam has never been so relieved at the prospect of seeing his brother.

Author's Notes: I'd like to apologize for this chapter. First of all, because it took so damn long to put it up here. Secondly, because those of you who have waited this long probably didn't wait for a random throwback from Sammy's POV (but I felt it was important to gain some understanding of Sam and the Winchester family dynamic before we eventually bring him into the story). Third and finally, because despite the COUNTLESS read-throughs and edits this chapter has undergone, I am still not completely satisfied with it. I hope you'll like it better than I did.