Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural.

Sam didn't have an appetite for many foods anymore. Most of what he ate didn't taste like anything at all, which made it difficult for him to find the will to shovel one spoonful of cereal into his mouth after the other. No, he spent more time pushing his food around his his bowl than he did eating it.

"You okay, Sam?" Dean asked from across the table.

Sam glanced over at him and nodded.

"You get any sleep?"

"Some," Sam said.

Bobby snorted from behind his newspaper and set it down in favor of his coffee. "Ain't that a load of shit," he said before taking a drink.

Sam shrugged. "I slept a little bit."

"Sam…"

"I'm fine, Dean," Sam said. "I had a hard time sleeping for more than an hour or two."

"Was it because of, well, you know what?"

"I don't know," Sam said. He set his spoon down and pushed his bowl away. "Nothing has flavor anymore."

"Maybe we need to go out and get you something covered in grease," Dean said. "Grease is flavor, you know."

"And heart attack fuel," Sam said.

He meant to make it a joke, but once the words left his mouth, he realized it wouldn't matter. When he made his deal, he'd be numbering the days he had left to live. While ten years might be the standard, and was arguably a long time, it meant that he'd never know how long he was meant to live otherwise.

He wondered how his family was going to take his sudden death in ten years, but he also knew that none of them were guaranteed to last that long. Not with the hunting lifestyle. And then, well, they couldn't rip into him for his choices.

"I don't think you need to worry about having a heart attack anytime soon," Dean said. "But you do need to get some meat on your bones. You look worse than some of the bodies I've torched over the years."

"Is now really the time to worry about that?"

"Do you have a better time in mind?" Dean asked.

"How about after we take care of the demon?"

He wouldn't mind letting Dean fuss over him once it was all said and done, and he owed Dean at least that much for what he was planning.

And he wouldn't be lying if he said that there was a part of him that wanted to spend that time with Dean because he knew he was going to be buying an express ticket to Hell. He'd like some good memories to take with him.

"We have plenty of time right now," Dean said. "I called Dad and told him what you found. He wants us to wait until he's finished checking out his leads on The Colt before we do anything."

"We don't know how long that will take."

"Sam," Bobby said, "I know you want to rush and be done with all of this, but maybe it's time to listen to your daddy and your brother. I don't think the demon will be going anywhere anytime soon. Hell, if anything, he's gonna be looking for you."

Dean nodded at Bobby's words. "See? That's why we need to get your strength back up now."

Sam sunk lower and lower in his chair. Dean, filled with half the items on a diner's menu, would most likely fall into a food coma if they weren't immediately hunting something. Sam didn't understand why Dean's body seemed to know the difference between when Dean stuffed himself for energy and when Dean stuffed himself for the pleasure of eating, but it did.

Dean in a food coma would be easier to slip away from.

So, Sam shrugged. "Later?" he asked.

Dean grinned. "Yeah, sure," he said. "I'll find someplace good for dinner, and you're eating every god damn bite that they put on your plate."

"No promises," Sam said.

"You wanna come along, Bobby?"

Bobby shook his head. "I go along, you're gonna expect me to pay. With the amount you eat, I'll pass."

"Suit yourself," Dean said. "It's enough of a win to get Sammy to go."

After breakfast, Sam felt the hunger for demon blood start gnawing at him again. The knowledge that he'd be meeting with a demon that night didn't help much.

Did he want to take a knife with him for what little self-defense it would offer, or was it because he wanted to slice open the demon unfortunate enough to answer his summon and drink it dry?

"You feeling okay, Sammy?" Dean asked. "You're a bit fidgety."

Sam stopped his tapping hand and his shifting in his seat on the couch, not realizing that he was doing either until Dean pointed it out.

"Sorry."

"You don't have to be sorry for not being able to sit still. I just want to know if you're doing okay."

"How okay can I be?"

"Then, talk to me. C'mon."

Sam tried to distract himself with the generic medical drama Dean had playing on the TV, but he found it especially difficult to concentrate between his body begging for blood and Dean begging for Sam's trust without explicitly stating that was what he wanted.

"I don't know what you want me to say," Sam said, finally snapping after Dean's constant questioning.

"Say what's on your mind," Dean said. "You used to be able to talk to me when something was bothering you."

If Dean wanted to ask what happened to that communication between them, he kept it to himself. Sam was glad for that small mercy. The answer to that question was too complex, and he wasn't sure that he understood the answer himself.

"Yeah, well, back then, the things that bothered me were simple compared to now."

"I don't know about that. I remember how much the things that happened affected you, and I know that none of your recovery from it has been easy."

"At least I was recovering from something almost normal," Sam said. "Do you have any idea what it feels like to crave something you never knew you were addicted to in the first place?"

"Sammy, you know I don't know what that feels like," Dean said. "Sure, I might like alcohol a bit too much, but I know that I'm drinking it. I drink it of my own free will."

"Exactly. Drinking is your choice. I never got a choice in any of this." Sam stood up and started pacing, his voice raising in volume. He didn't know if he was more angry or more upset, he just knew that there were too many emotions he'd bottled away trying to resurface at once.

"I never got a choice," Sam repeated.

Dean put his hands on Sam's shoulders and led him to the couch, forcing him to sit back down. "Take some deep breaths, Sam. In and out. In and out. There you go."

Sam felt like a child with Dean rubbing his arm and coaching him through deep breathing to keep him from spiraling out of control. This was never where he imagined he'd be when he was nineteen. Once upon a time, he had dreams of going to college. He had dreams of doing something more. To make his life revolve around living, not killing.

That almost brought a smile to his face. In a way, he was the opposite of the person he wanted to be before. Back when he was just beginning his teen years and still had a degree of bright-eyed innocence, despite the horrors he'd seen.

"Feeling any better?" Dean asked.

Sam nodded.

"I know that none of this is fair to you, Sam."

"Life hasn't been fair to any of us," he said. He hated how weak and tired he sounded, but his body was still misfiring like crazy as it tried to readjust to normal and it left him easily exhausted.

"Maybe, but not to the same extent."

Sam closed his eyes and dug the heels of his palms into them, the pressure relieving some of the burn that stemmed from his lack of sleep the night before.

"Do you want to try getting some sleep?" Dean asked.

Sam shrugged, but he didn't protest when Dean pulled him up and ushered him to the panic room's cot.

In that moment, he didn't know if his plan should be reaffirmed (he would be lifting a lot of burden from the shoulders of his family) or reconsidered (he knew that Dean cared, maybe too much for his own good).

For the time being, he was happy to slip into sleep, even if he knew the visions that might be waiting for him.

Sam walked down a long, dark hallway. He smelled must and mold and death. While he didn't see any end to the hall or any branching paths, he kept moving forward. He kept splashing through scattered puddles and ignoring the wetness that soaked into his socks. Preventing trench foot wasn't his primary concern.

"Sam…"

His name echoed off the walls, the wispy whisper of a female voice. He tried to follow that voice. He tried to reach the woman calling to him, but he only had two directions to choose from.

He strained to listen for the voice again, hoping that it would give him an indication that he was getting closer to the source.

"Sam!"

He froze. The voice was loud and sharp, the same tone that his father used when he was caught doing something he shouldn't as a child. The same tone his father used when he asked one question too many.

But this time the voice belonged to his mother.

"Mom?" he called. "Mom, where are you?"

"Sammy," she whispered, so close he could have sworn she'd spoken directly into his ear.

He look over his shoulder, but no one else was there.

Sam took a fistful of his hair in each hand and pulled. What the hell was going on?

The hall ended when a wall appeared in front of Sam without warning, and he ran into it, stopping himself from falling backwards by gripping onto the vertical bars making up the wall.

"What the hell?"

It was a prison cell, the kind he'd only seen in books that described the conditions of the worst prisons. The ones that had been closed a long time ago and labeled inhumane.

"That's exactly what this is," a man said, appearing on the other side of the bars with yellow eyes.

His mom appeared next to him, on her knees with tear tracks marking paths through the dirt on her face. She wore a long, white nightgown, but it was torn and a shadow of the gown Sam's hallucination of her wore.

"Sammy," she whispered.

"That's right," Yellow Eyes said. "Your little boy came to visit you in Hell."

"This isn't real," Sam said. "I'm just dreaming."

"What? You don't think that your mother is burning in Hell right now? Because she is."

He took a few steps closer until they were face-to-face between the bars. "I was the one she sold her soul to," he said.

The cell and hallway fell away and Sam saw his mom cradling his dad on the ground in the middle of the night. They were both younger than Sam had seen in any pictures, but he knew that it was them. He could see it.

Yellow Eyes appeared next to him. "I gave her an offer. John got to come back to life, but I got an invitation into her home ten years later. Can you guess the date, Sammy?"

Sam shook his head. "No. It can't be."

"November 2, 1973."

"No."

"Making the ten year mark November 2, 1983."

"That's not… That can't be…"

"The best part," the demon said, "is that I didn't want to kill her."

The area around him shifted again and Sam found himself in the corner of a nursery. The baby in the crib was awake and sounded happy, but there was a shadow looming over him and droplets falling from the shadow's arm into the baby's mouth, barely illuminated by the streetlight seeping in through the window.

It was when his mother burst in through the door that Sam's heart sank.

The scene froze, and Sam couldn't tear his eyes away from the horror on his mom's face.

"She didn't have to die," Yellow Eyes said. "She could have lived a nice long life, but it was like she couldn't wait to get to Hell."

"Why are you showing me this?" Sam asked.

If he didn't feel enough guilt already for his family's situation, he felt worse now. His mother had died because of him, even if he wasn't the one who murdered her.

When his dad doubted him after learning about his powers, he'd been right.

He'd been right.

"I have an offer for you," the demon said. "I know your family is keeping you hidden. Come back to me, and I'll get your mother out of Hell."

Sam tried to run, but the demon grabbed his arm and pulled him back. When he struggled to get away, it all faded.

Dinner went well enough, but Sam knew that Dean had a close watch on him, especially after he refused to talk about what freaked him out during his nap. He ate to appease Dean, but every bite left him nauseated.

All he heard in his mind was a chorus of ' your fault'.

And he didn't have a rebuttal for it this time. There were no truths that he could bend to make himself feel better.

He lasted most of the evening, but it was hard to face Dean. It was hard to talk to him.

He spent some time in his room, slipping a picture of himself into his pocket and the bone that he stole from one of the crazier girls in the day therapy program, a bone from the collection she claimed was of black cat bones. He never fully intended to try summoning a demon, but after reading about it, he couldn't stop himself from taking one when she brought them in like it was demented show-and-tell day at school (and he was lucky to snag one before the workers took them away from her). It was small and unnoticeable in his pocket.

"Dean, I'm going out for a drive," he said once night fell. Forget waiting for Dean to fall asleep and sneaking out, he needed the fresh air now. He needed to do something to get rid of some of the guilt eating at him.

He needed to help avenge his mother. It wasn't just about him anymore.

"Not without me," Dean said. "You aren't going anywhere alone if demons are out looking for you."

"We don't know that they're actively looking for me," Sam said. "Please, Dean. I just want to get out and clear my head. I need the fresh air. I need to think."

Dean stayed silent for so long that Sam was sure he was going to protest again. Instead, he held out the car keys and said, "You get one hour, or I'm coming after you. And when you get back, we're talking about what has you so bothered lately. No dodging, got it?"

Sam nodded, fighting the urge to look overly excited at the fact that Dean was giving him everything he needed, and left before Dean changed his mind.

He started up the Impala, getting the chance to drive it for the first time in a long time. Like Dean, he took a second to appreciate the roar of her engine and the power behind it, but then he hurried onto the roads.

He knew where a few crossroads with Yarrow flowers planted beside them were, and he had one hour to get there, including a few stops to get graveyard dirt and a case to put the items in.

One hour to complete the deal. If Dean came looking for him after that, let him.

Author's Note: As always, thank you for the support for this story! Please take a moment to leave a review.