They sit on the brick steps of the church while Sam haltingly explains what Yellow Eyes and Meg told him last night and what he suspects that their mom and Sarah Boeffel have done, exactly what they both agreed to. He picks nervously at the little weeds that are springing up between the bricks. His eyes trace the irregular smudges of masonry, the cracks running through the sidewalk, the scuffs on the toes of his shoes as he talks, unable to meet Pastor Jim's gaze.
Sam can't tell how much Dad told him. Pastor Jim listens carefully, thoughtfully, never passing judgment, just like he always has, and if he interrupts, it's only to ask for more information.
Sam's throat draws tight when he describes the awful, blood-stained vision of the future that Yellow Eyes showed him. He doesn't smooth over the painful, jagged edges of the truth, about what he can do, about who he is, no matter how much he wants to. Pastor Jim deserves to know what he's dealing with.
Sam owes him that much.
"So, that's it. That's the whole story," he finishes lamely, flopping a hand in front of him, the gesture somehow supposed to encompass his soul being spoken for before he was even conceived, his blood being as black and tainted as any of the evil, awful things they've battled over the years, his destiny being nothing but death and destruction and the end of everything and everyone he's ever loved.
Pastor Jim sighs.
"Oh, Sam," he murmurs softly. "I'm so sorry."
He sounds so very, sincerely sympathetic that Sam wants to cry again. He presses his fists tight against his eyes, tamps it down, holds tight because if he starts there is a very real, very immediate chance that he might never stop.
"Are you going to be okay?" Jim asks, a warm, comforting hand coming up to rest on Sam's shoulder.
Sam knows he's just asking that because it's what people say when someone gets awful, life-shattering news. He already knows the answer, and anyway, Sam can't bring himself to lie.
"No," he chokes out, voice tilting up at the end as he suppresses a sob. "I don't think I am."
Pastor Jim makes a soothing noise, hand on Sam's back traveling in slow, soothing circles, just like he used to do when Sam was a kid. Sam breathes deep, collects himself.
"I don't know what to do," he admits. "I just…"
He trails off, tries to take the fear and panic and determination that they get to the bottom of this, that they get answers and justice and that Melissa Boeffel, that sweet, innocent baby girl in the soft pink onesie, never has to know a life haunted by nursery fires and twisted, evil yellow eyes, never has to know that she is empty inside, empty and black and wrong and make it, all of it, into words, but he just- he can't, can't do anything but breathe through the pain and swallow back tears at the memory of the shock on Dean's face, the hollow, awful crash of their father hitting that cabin wall.
Pastor Jim waits patiently, just sits and waits and makes those same slow, soothing circles on Sam's back.
"Just breathe, Sam," he murmurs. "We'll get through this."
"It's like…" Sam starts, scrubbing a hand over his eyes. "You remember when I was fifteen and Dad dropped me off here for a month? Right after I ran away to Flagstaff?"
Pastor Jim smiles a little at the memory.
"You were pretty upset then, too," he recalls.
"Upset? Probably more like unbearable," Sam snorts bitterly. "I kept expecting you to treat me like a prisoner, like they'd been doing. But you didn't. You acted like you trusted me."
"I did trust you," the other man says easily.
"You shouldn't have," Sam tells him with a tight, sad smile. "I must have walked up and down the highway a dozen times planning on hitching a ride. I stole money out of your jacket pocket one day when you were down at the hospital. Got all the way to the bus station. I even bought the ticket."
"But you didn't leave," Pastor Jim points out.
"Only because I didn't have anywhere to go," Sam sighs. "I was standing there in line with everything I owned in a duffel bag, and then all of a sudden, I thought, 'What's the point?' Dad was just going to track me down and drag me back in, anyway. I remember, I walked all the way back to the church and you were waiting right here on the steps. You left the lights on for me, like you knew I'd come back."
Pastor Jim smiles.
"I didn't know," he admits, "but I hoped you would. And I knew if I tried to force you to, you'd never open up to me again. Thought it was worth taking the chance."
"If I hadn't come back, my dad would have made you regret that," Sam says wryly.
"Your faith in me isn't something I'd be willing to sacrifice for John's notoriously fragile good opinion. Your safety, on the other hand? Well," he grins, "I'm a hunter, Sam, and Blue Earth isn't exactly a big town. I knew exactly where you were. I would've gotten a call the second you set foot on that bus."
Sam is startled into a laugh.
"What, you put an APB out on me to all your blue-haired church ladies?"
"I said I trusted you, not that I was an idiot," Pastor Jim jokes. "Anyway, it was just insurance. You may have been angry and hurting, but you were a good kid, Sam. I always knew that."
"Yeah, that's what you told me then, too," Sam says. "You were the only person who talked to me about why I ran away. You were the only one who tried to understand. Dad and Dean just… yelled at me about it."
"They were scared," Jim tells him.
"I know," Sam nods, "and I'm not blaming them. I'm just saying… You listened. I don't know if I ever thanked you for that. For everything you did."
For being willing to talk to Sam about colleges, for sending off his transcripts, and answering Sam's furtive calls to tell him about every acceptance letter and scholarship offer. For passing along notes between him and Dean in those two years before they let that one stupid fight drive them apart. For letting Sam be Sam and never once making him feel like he was wrong for it.
"Do you remember what I told you that night?" Sam asks quietly, eyes back on his shoes like they're the most interesting thing he's ever seen. "How I said I'd always felt wrong on the inside? Like there was something about me that was broken and twisted, something I just couldn't fix? I'd never told anyone that. But you- you said there wasn't anything wrong with me. You said I was kind and smart and that, even when I made mistakes, God still loved me. That I was good. I wanted to believe you. I really, really did."
He laughs bitterly.
"But turns out, I was right. There really is something wrong with me."
"Sam…" Pastor Jim starts gently.
"It all makes sense now," Sam interrupts, his words tumbling out in an angry rush. "Why I always felt like I didn't belong anywhere. Why I couldn't be like Dad or Dean no matter how hard I tried. I was fighting against nature. I was never meant to be a hunter. I'm one of the monsters."
Pastor Jim sighs deeply, shifting closer to him on the steps.
"Maybe you aren't what you thought you were," Jim begins, "but you want to know the big secret, Sam? We've all got monsters inside of us. We've all got our darkness. That doesn't mean we're not good people. It doesn't mean God doesn't love us. And it doesn't mean that we can't be saved, Sam. Salvation? It was made for—"
"'For sinners,'" Sam finishes with a heavy nod, hands shoving through his hair. "Yeah, I remember. I do. But- but what if I can't be saved? What if I can't fight it? What if—?"
He breaks off the thought, running his palms down the thighs of his jeans.
"What if what, Sam?" Jim prompts.
Sam clenches his jaw, meets his eyes.
"What if this is my destiny? What if I become the monster they say I am?"
Jim is quiet for a moment.
"Well, I don't know about destiny," he says finally, "but I do know this: You're not alone here, Sam. And if you can't fight this, we'll fight for you."
"I'm scared," Sam admits softly. "I don't want to hurt anyone."
Pastor Jim's palm rests warm and solid on his back.
"You won't," he promises.
