The smirk on Ruby's face when she saw Dean Winchester at her door was one worthy of Satan himself. It made him so incredibly enraged to see her standing there like the smug bitch she was when Sam was at home and probably silently suffering to memories of her.
Her smirk faded and she took up an irritated expression. "What do you want?"
"I want my brother's stuff," Dean replied through clenched teeth.
She rolled her eyes. "Sam's an adult now, Dean. He can come break up with me himself if he thinks he can live without me."
Dean clenched his fist until his nails dug painfully into his palm. He probably would have punched her if he hadn't noticed the other man sitting just a few feet away at the kitchen table.
"You move on fast," he commented, eyes on the dark-haired man.
"He's nobody," Ruby muttered.
The man chuckled. "Nobody? Is that who I am now?" He stood up and approached Dean, not bothering to extend his hand like he usually would. "Name's Crowley. I'm a friend."
Dean said nothing but his clenched jaw told Crowley all he needed to know.
"How do you know Sam?"
Dean's expression faltered. He took a step forward and surveyed the room quickly, spotting no other possible enemies or useable weapons. "He's my brother. Now how the fuck do you know him?"
Crowley chuckled again and Dean was reaching his limit for this utter and absolute nonsense. "I'm a friend of his. Ruby introduced us, actually."
Ruby glared at the English man before returning her attention to the Winchester at the door. "Aren't you here for his stuff? It's all packed up. I didn't want his trash taking up space."
She pointed back to her bedroom, mentioning the box to be there and at the end of the bed. Dean brushed past her and into the room, looking over everything to be sure she wasn't trying to hide something of Sam's for herself. He couldn't spot anything that was obviously not hers and stopped at the box to open it and inspect it.
Inside were few items—Sam didn't own much and most of what he did have was shared with Ruby or destroyed. It did have the only pictures Sam owned of his late parents and his diploma from high school and his degree from college. Most of it was nerdy books or little items he would pick up on trips with Dean.
Dean closed the box and lifted it up into one arm before leaving the apartment without exchanging any more words or looks. As far as he was concerned Ruby and Crowley could fall off the face of the earth. In fact, he would be pleased for that to happen.
He loaded the box into the back of the Impala and started the engine. Now he had one less thing to do, replaced by a new concern: who the hell is Crowley and why does he know Sam?
He returned to his house and, against his better judgement, reached into the glovebox for Sam's long dead phone. Those words rung in his head: Sam's an adult. It seemed wrong to have to watch out for Sam in such obvious ways—keeping him away from his bullies. Keeping him from running back to what caused him so much pain. But that was Dean's life: ever since he was young he was watching out for his brother. He would intimidate bullies at school, go without lunch to pay for some boring field trip to the local museum, and even stole his dad's car to pick up Sam from a sleepover that was cancelled.
It stung to know how his baby brother, who he spent most of his life protecting in some way or another, was now desperate to lose his protection. He was desperate to be hurt again. Worst of all: he was so mixed up that he truly believed Dean was the cause of his current confusion and pain.
Dean placed the cracked cell phone on top of the box from Ruby's and locked his car. He debated going back and re-hiding the phone but shook his head. It was time to give it back and, as Charlie would have said, to allow Sam to make his own mistakes and feel trusted… even if Dean felt Sam could be trusted as much as a parolee.
It was a nuisance to balance the box on his hip as he fished out his keys to unlock the front door. When he entered he was surprised to see Sam, fully awake, drinking from a glass of water in the living area. Sam had an eyebrow quirked at the sight of the box before he recognized the phone sitting on top.
Dean approached him and placed the items on the coffee table. He gave a small nod when he saw Sam hesitantly reach for the phone and stop.
"Just… don't do anything stupid," Dean said gruffly. "And, uh, here's your stuff." He motioned to the box.
"My stuff?"
Sam opened the top tabs and took in the sight of his things. He was glad to have them back, it was a comfort to see them again. For weeks he had been surviving on what he had brought in his backpack when he left Ruby on that particularly bad night. It had all been clothes, the little that Sam actually owned, and nothing personal but his phone that he'd had confiscated. The relief to have his material possessions back faded when he put together why he had them.
"Did you see Ruby?"
Dean winced. "Yeah, Sam. I did."
Sam felt his hands quiver and he clenched his fists in an attempt to prevent his anger making him shake. He turned his head, jaw clenched, and paced away before turning back. "You had no right. I didn't ask you to do that, Dean!"
Dean kept a straight face despite his own competing indignation. "Yeah, well, I didn't ask you to show up at my door drenched and beaten!"
Sam was taken aback.
"This is how it's gonna be, Sammy. You came to me for help. I'm helping whether you like it or not! I'm not going to let my brother go out and get himself hurt even more! I should have been there to protect you the first time and I'm not going to let there be a second time, you hear me? You don't know what's wrong and right so I'm telling you; don't go back to her. Don't talk to her. You're going to avoid her and see her for the bitch she is or so help me!"
Dean hadn't realized when he began yelling until he heard a small noise from Sam's throat. His brother no longer looked mad at him, but scared. Sam had been backing away during the tirade and was still shaking—though it wasn't from heated rage. His eyes were wide and Dean knew he had fucked up once again.
"Sammy," he finally said, voice calmer.
Sam stood still, afraid of an attack. His eyes darted around and stopped on everything within Dean's reach that could be thrown. He swallowed hard and looked back to his older brother.
Dean was washed over with guilt. "I didn't mean to yell, Sammy."
Sam didn't say anything. The situation was a lost cause and trying to convince Sam he wasn't the enemy—and wasn't going to do what Ruby did—felt impossible. Instead, Dean took a breath and turned back to the door. The best thing he could do was leave—that way he wasn't there to scare Sam more.
"I'm… I'm going out for a bit."
The door shut quietly behind the elder brother but Sam didn't feel like he could breathe again until he heard the engine of the Impala kicking on. A hand found its way to his chest, feeling the quickened beating of his heart against his palm.
All interest in his phone or box was gone. Sam slid to the floor, knees pulled to his chest. He stared forward and closed his eyes hard, trying to shake the way he felt. He knew, deep down, Dean didn't mean to scare him. He hesitated even coming to Dean that night knowing how his brother's temper got.
Sam reached the fingers of his right hand to his left palm and slowly dragged the nails across the soft skin. He stopped to dig them in, craving reality to come back. He began to disassociate when Dean's voice changed from irritation to yelling. He knew the feeling well—sometimes he had a similar feeling when he was high. He felt light, outside of his own body, floating. He lost reality, where he was, how to feel like himself and not a ghost.
It was only a few more deepening scratches across his palm before he could look up from the ground and feel like his soul had returned to his body and he was Sam again. He took a shuddering breath before retreating back to Dean's bedroom.
Sam haphazardly flung the last remaining pills from the orange bottle across the nightstand beside Dean's bed. He couldn't find the will to care that he would likely damage the wood when he slammed his drinking glass from the night before down on the pills. He was frantically trying to crush them and felt beyond stupid halfway through the process when he realized it would have been easier to chew them or even swallow them whole.
There was a startling noise behind him. Sam jumped and turned around, eyes wide and focused on the closed bedroom door. He could hear a car engine shutting off and the front door opening.
Shit, shit, shit, Dean was already back?! Sam felt heavy waves of nausea and anxiety smash into him when he sees the clearly unlocked doorknob to the bedroom. Dean would surely come straight to the room to see him and he would surely open up to find his brother standing there with a few broken up OxyContins and a deer-in-headlights expression.
Sam did the only thing he could think of to cover his tracks—he brushed the powder and pill bits into his hand, off the nightstand, and quickly thrust it all into his mouth. He swallowed what he could and sat on the bed, trying his best to look natural and not guilty.
"Sam?" He heard Dean's voice call. There was a light knock on the door before his brother stepped in. "We should talk."
Sam swallowed back his fears and clenched his hands tight to alleviate a fraction of his worries.
"Look, man. It was wrong of me to just take off like that… But you gotta understand, I don't know what I'm doing here. I thought leaving might make you feel better but I couldn't stop thinking of how scared you looked." Dean reached out to place his hand on Sam's shoulder, silently grateful that his brother didn't flinch away like he had feared. "This is a safe place and I'm not going to ever hurt you like she did. I'm your brother and I'm going to protect you no matter what, okay? I'm… sorry. I'm sorry I scared you, Sammy."
Sam only nodded. He felt almost relieved.
Dean nodded back and tried to conceal how awkward he felt giving into "chick-flick moments." He had called Charlie as he drove away, needing to get advice he knew Bobby would be just as clueless about. He hadn't been gone more than fifteen minutes, thankfully
"You need to be there, Dean. He's still recovering from an abusive relationship and the last thing he needs is his own brother adding to his stress."
There wasn't much else to do with Sam not speaking, so Dean left with the intent to call Charlie back. With the room finally empty again, Sam laid back onto the bed with a content sigh. The high had set in.
"What do you mean no?" Sam hissed into his cellphone, anxiously pacing Dean's bedroom. "I have money! I can pay!"
"Can you, Moose?" The cocky voice of Crowley's filled Sam's ears. "Because last I heard, you're living with your brother now and the last thing I need is that macho twit barging into my fine establishment. He seems the type to take out his anger for you on me."
"Don't do this," Sam said, his tone a mixture of anger and growing desperation. "I just ran out and I—I—"
"—Am a junkie? Does that fit?"
"Shut your fucking mouth."
"I wouldn't take that tone if I were you. You do want more, don't you?"
Sam groaned and stopped his movement to tap his forehead against the wall. "Crowley, stop messing around. Will you fucking sell to me or not?"
There was a chuckle at the other end. "I always love when a customer officially becomes loyal. Come by tomorrow and we can make a deal. Keep this between you and me or I'll make sure no dealer this side of the country will ever do business with a Winchester again."
A/N: I look like I'm on drugs with all the googling I'm doing on Oxy. (I will admit, I'm not sure how much he would need to take to get high and all that, so feel free to tell me how wrong I'm writing him if you know.)
Sam might seem OOC, but part of his actions is the withdrawal (which can set in like hours, as Google told me) and the mental issues from leaving an abusive home. Sam can't help but want to go back to both.