Pure Heart and Good Intention
Chapter Three
Dean awoke early the next morning, showered and dressed before anyone else was up. Despite his best efforts, he'd had a fitful night's sleep, barely getting an hour or two at best after saying good night to Esperanza. He'd left Sam still sleeping. It was one of the few times that he had seen him undisturbed by nightmares, and he needed the rest. He looked around the kitchen, and found some coffee and the coffee maker so he decided to brew a pot for everyone. After it was finished, he took a cup for himself. That was when the pain started. It was a lot stronger than the others he'd experienced, so much so, his hand trembled and he dropped the cup he was holding. It shattered on the kitchen floor, spilling the coffee. The pain was so intense he was drawn down to his knees. He tried to breathe short breaths to keep it under control and to keep him from groaning, but a soft grunt escaped.
Esperanza walked in on him when she heard the crash and immediately rushed to his side. She helped him into a nearby chair and kept holding his hand.
"Are you all right?" She asked, her own voice shaking with concern as she felt the muted intensity of the pain that was cutting through him. It amazed her that even diluted through her psychic touch, the pain felt sharp like a knife slicing through her chest. She couldn't even imagine what Dean was feeling, and how he was managing to keep from crying out.
Dean kept breathing erratically, long grunts filtering through, beads of sweat dotting his face and throughout his body, causing him to shiver involuntarily. Esperanza kept holding his hand. She was hoping to absorb some of his pain, or at the very least, provide any small amount of comfort to him. She felt a rush of sadness and frustration as Dean fought. It brought tears to her eyes. She was not only feeling his sadness, but her own intermingled with it. Even though she had only known the men for just a day, she felt herself connected to them deeply. Their emotions became her emotions, and feeling Dean in so much pain made her feel like a mother would for a seriously ill child. She felt like she was losing her own son.
Finally, his breathing eased as the pain dissipated. He closed his eyes, feeling suddenly exhausted. Esperanza went over to the sink and wet a clean dishtowel. She handed it to him and he took it gratefully.
"Thanks," he rasped out with a shaky smile.
"Are you sure you're okay?"
"Never better," he joked as he grimaced.
"I felt its intensity, and it was filtered when it got to me. How can you stand it without medication?" Esperanza wondered.
"I guess you could say, it comes with the job," he said. "Just have a high threshold for pain."
Esperanza felt the double meaning with his words.
"I see that," she acknowledged.
She felt Dean's worry and placed a comforting hand on his arm.
"I know you're worried about talking to Sam, telling him everything, but you have to, for his sake."
"I know," Dean said. "If something should go wrong during the healing, I need to know that Sam will be able to survive it. I know that you said last night that if something ever happened to me, Sam would be lost. Nothing scares me more than not being there for him, but I can't believe that I'm the only one who can protect him. I just won't believe that."
Dean took in a long breath to wash away the remaining pain. "I have to believe that Sam can be safe without me."
He looked imploringly into her eyes for confirmation.
"I don't have the answer to that, Dean. Not even your mother knows. All I can tell you is that Sam, as he is now, will not survive your death. He will become like Max and no one will be able to stop it, not even your father and your mother's voice won't be able to penetrate either. That is a certainty. What I can tell you is that if his condition changes, if we can make him see his own worthiness, bring back his confidence, his belief in his ability to control the direction of his life, then he will survive. The only person who can answer that is Sam."
Dean nodded. "Guess I have to bite the bullet then and talk to him, tell him everything."
oooo
About 30 minutes later, Sam had gotten up and found Dean in the living room.
"How are you feeling?" Dean asked.
"A little better."
"Did you get a good night's sleep for a change?"
"Yeh, yeh, I did," Sam said sounding surprised and relieved.
Dean swallowed hard, "Sammy, we have to talk."
"About what?" He asked as he walked over to join his brother on the couch.
Esperanza stood nearby in the kitchen, wanting to stay close in case Dean needed her.
"There are some things I need to tell you, that you need to know. Esperanza and I talked last night and she can definitely help, but you need to hear the whole story and it should come from me."
"Dean, you're scaring me," Sam said with trepidation in his voice.
"I'm not the confessional type so cut me some slack here, okay?" He joked. "When the demon attacked us –"
Dean saw Sam stiffen at the mention of the demon and the memory that went with it.
"I don't want to talk about –" Sam resisted.
"Well, you're going to have to. Sooner or later you're going to have to face up to what happened. You can't run away from it, believe me, I've tried, but I can't anymore and neither can you. You're letting it kill you piece by piece and it's gotta stop."
Sam sat silently though Dean wasn't sure if he was listening.
"When the demon attacked us –"
"Attacked you, you mean," Sam interrupted bitterly.
"No, Sam, I mean us. It tried to destroy our family that night, almost did, but it failed."
"No, I failed."
"You didn't fail, Sam. How can I get through to that thick head of yours that what happened wasn't your fault? Hell, you want to know the truth? I brought it on myself. I baited it."
"Yeh, I know, to save me, to keep it from me," Sam said angrily.
"Yeh? And what's wrong with that? I would do again in a second."
"I know that, don't you see, that's the problem. You were able to save me from it, keep me from getting hurt, nearly getting yourself killed in the process, but when you needed me to save you, I couldn't. I didn't!" Sam yelled.
"Sam, listen to me and listen good, all right? Would it have made any difference if you didn't know you had psychic abilities?"
"What? I don't understand–" Sam asked, confused.
"If it were just the demon and us, no special powers, nothing, would it have made a difference if it attacked me?"
Sam had to think for a second.
"No, I guess not."
"So, because you feel you have these gifts it should have made a difference, that you should have saved me?"
"Yes," Sam said softly, hating to be reminded that he had failed.
"That's a load of crap, Sam," Dean said strongly, so strongly that Sam looked up at him, surprised. "If it had been us against the demon, just like any other demon we've faced together, with nothing more than our skills as hunters, I would have been attacked anyway. Hell, who's to say that I would have been lucky enough to get the demon to focus on me at all? It still could have gotten to you. Do you get me now?"
Sam's eyes cleared in a way that he hadn't seen in a long time and it gave him the strength to keep going because the last bit of news could send Sam back down again.
"The other reason you're making this different is because it's not about just any demon. It's about THE demon, the one that killed mom and Jess. You wanted to kill it for what it did to them, but you couldn't because it would have meant killing our father. There is nothing wrong with that. That isn't failure, Sam. That shows humanity. Revenge and vengeance never will give you what you need. Look at what it's doing to you now."
Dean's determined face and posture was solid and firm. His belief in him was unquestioning and absolute.
"You have to get past this, if not for me, then for yourself. No more excuses."
"It's just that not knowing what these powers mean…"
"For a college boy, you have a real problem with patience, you know that? Yeh, we don't know what it all means, not yet, anyway, but I know you will someday and when you do, you'll be the most powerful son-of-a-bitch on this planet. But you need to know that I'd still be proud of you even if you just stayed my geek brother."
Sam laughed and it was the most beautiful noise Dean could have ever hoped to hear. Sam grew serious again.
"Dean, there's something you need to know. I've been keeping it from you because I haven't even wanted to think about it, but after all you just said, I think maybe we can fight this thing together." Sam paused. "I've been having visions…" He said, his voice trembling a little, "about you dying."
Dean felt a relief wash over him for the first time in 5 months. It seemed like they were finally making progress. His only worry now was how Sam would take learning about his injuries. Dean hoped that since he had just told him about the visions, Sam would focus on fighting them together instead of fighting against him like he had been.
"Sam, you're not the only one who's been holding something back. I've been doing the same thing because of the way you were feeling about what happened with the demon. I just didn't want to put you through anymore. You'd been through so much already, but now, you need to know everything," Dean struggled for the right words. "The injuries…they were…my heart…Damn it!"
Dean swore. He didn't want to sound weak, but he couldn't stop stumbling over his words because he didn't want to say the wrong thing.
Suddenly the kitchen door swung into the room and Esperanza stood there. They both stood and turned to face her.
"His heart was damaged by the demon. He's dying." Esperanza had spoken bluntly to help Dean. She believed that they couldn't sugarcoat things for Sam anymore.
"Thanks," Dean said softly.
Sam turned back to look at Dean. His face was beginning to crumble with lines of distress, as Dean had feared.
"Sam, take a hold of yourself," Esperanza urged, as he looked at her. "You can't lose control now. Don't waste the strength that Dean just gave you, by giving into fear."
"But my visions…" He uttered.
"Sam, look at me!" Dean demanded.
He did.
"Don't you give up on me!" Dean said firmly. "No matter what happens to me, you are NOT going to fall apart and let the bad guys win, you got me? It's not who we are, we weren't raised to be quitters. I know it's been hard, and I would give anything if I could change everything starting from when mom died so that you could have that storybook life you want so much, but I can't, no one can. We faced that demon, and as far as I'm concerned, we won. I don't give a rat's ass about not killing it. What I do care about is that we faced it and walked away, we lived, Sam. I got hurt, yeh, but Esperanza thinks that she can help with that. But before I even let her try, I HAVE to know from you and be sure in my gut, that if something does go wrong and I don't make it, or even if somewhere down in the future some evil gets me and I bite it that way, you WILL go on. You already know that as long as I'm around, I will be there for you, but YOU need to know that your life doesn't depend on me, dad, or anyone else. It can't because we're not forever, no one is. Live for the here and now, Sam, not in the past or future. I want to see that pain-in-the-ass little brother who defied everyone about what he could or could not do."
Esperanza was moved by Dean's inspiration. He had found the strength and the words he was so afraid he was incapable of finding. Nothing she could have said to Sam would have had the impact that his words had. She looked over at Sam and found his spirit solid again, no longer crumbling into an abyss of despair. It was a beautiful sight to behold.
Suddenly, though, the moment was broken as she saw Dean's knees buckling as if to pray, but there were no words of prayer on his lips, just an agonized grunt, he then placed his hands on the floor to brace himself from collapsing entirely, still struggling to breathe, and only producing groans from what little air he could get in and out of his lungs.
"Dean!" Sam cried out as he went down and reached for him.
"Sam, help me lay him on the couch," Esperanza said.
He did, but panic was etched on his face. "Oh, God," was all he could say.
"Dean?" She called, "Dean? Can you hear me?"
Dean's head turned to look at her. "Bad…not easing up…like usual…" he grunted.
"Where are your medications?"
"Don't need them…it'll pass eventually…"
"Stop being brave for a second and tell us where those medications are," Esperanza demanded softly.
Dean didn't have the strength to argue with her, and even he was beginning to realize that maybe this time he was going to need some help.
"In…duffel bag…"
"Sam, go up to the room and get them, please, now!"
Sam ran up the stairs to their room.
"I'm trying," Esperanza said to seemingly no one.
"W..what?" Dean asked, confused.
"Your mother's here. She's afraid for you. She's telling me not to let you die."
"Maybe…it's…better…said…what I needed…rest is up to Sam…"
"Dean Winchester, don't you dare let go, not now. This is not your time. Your job is not done, do you hear me!" She said firmly.
Dean nodded. "Yes…ma'am," he said with a shaky smile.
Esperanza smiled too, but she also found her cheeks wet with tears. She had never wanted someone to live more than Dean. It was as if his presence in this world was vital to her as well.
"Now show me that will to live," she said with a croak.
Sam had come down the stairs with several bottles. He handed her the one he read was for pain then got some water in a glass from the kitchen. Esperanza was about to lift Dean up to give him the pill, but Sam stopped her.
"Let me do it. Please?"
She smiled and took a breath, "there it is," she whispered so softly that only their mom could hear.
Sam went over and put his arm underneath Dean's head and neck then lifted him upright. Dean grimaced and groaned. She opened the bottle and handed Sam a pill. With his shaky hand, Sam gently popped it into Dean's mouth. He fed him the water slowly from the glass. Sam then laid him back down.
"If you ever…mention this moment again…I will kill you…" Dean joked despite the pain.
Sam just smiled, "Jerk."
"Bitch…" Dean smiled himself.
Esperanza's hope soared feeling the barrier between them finally fall away.
To Be Continued….