Sam was fifteen. He was leaning against the wall, seated on the bed on the left side of the motel room that they were currently residing in. Dean was lying in the bed to the right, his back toward Sam, sleeping. Sam watched the muscles in Dean's shoulders ripple under his skin as he stirred. Sam involuntarily licked his lips. Dean moved again. Sam shuddered. Looked away.
"Sammy?" Dean's voice was heavy and low, coated with sleep. "You still awake?"
Sam sighed shakily at the way that Dean's syllables fell before he was fully conscious. "Yeah."
Dean turned to face him, eyes falling on the clock on the nightstand between the two beds. "It's almost four in the morning, man," he stated, pausing to yawn. "You need to get some rest while you can. Tomorrow's sure as hell not gonna be a walk in the park."
Sam sighed again, this time a frustrated, exhausted sound. He was aware that the next day's hunt was going to be a rather grueling one, and that was just if everything went over smoothly. "I know," he assured Dean, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.
Dean propped himself up on his elbow. It was dark in the room, save for the single beam of moonlight pouring in through a small opening in the curtains. It softly illuminated Sam's face, and Dean had caught the familiar action. "You okay?" he asked, his tone softening. "Headache?"
"I'm fine, Dean," Sam weakly assured him. "Just go back to sleep." He hadn't even realized that he was crying until he felt the first tear hit his left hand, which was tucked neatly in his lap.
Dean noticed at exactly the same moment, a new level of concern, almost paternal, sweeping over him. "Sammy, hey, what's the matter?"
Sam shook his head, quickly wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. "Nothing. Just a stupid nightmare. I told you, I'm fine."
Dean pulled himself into a fully upright position. "You're crying, Sam. That isn't fine."
Sam didn't respond, just lowered his face into his hands.
Dean gazed at him sympathetically. He hated seeing Sam like this. Hated that his baby brother wouldn't feel even remotely safe for days after a nightmare like this, hated knowing that it would take him hours to fall asleep every night for at least a week, and hated more than anything that there was nothing he could say to make it any better. Dean's train of thought stopped. Nothing he could say, maybe...
His mind immediately flashed to when they were younger, much younger, and Sam's nightmares had first begun.
Dean was about ten, which would've put Sam at six. Their father was on a hunt – a particularly difficult one, it seemed, because they hadn't heard from him in a couple of days, and he always called when he could. Dean was flipping through what channels the crappy motel TV would pick up, and Sam was already asleep in the bed parallel to his. Dean glanced over at him, taking in the peaceful expression on his face. He felt his lips mold into a small smile. "I love you, my Sammy," he whispered to the sleeping child.
As he started to turn away, he noticed a slight shift in Sam's features. Nothing major, nothing that should have startled him, but it did. At just ten years old, Dean was more attuned to his brother than Sam was to himself. And the face that Sam was making was one that Dean had become all too familiar with.
When you were raised by John Winchester, you weren't afraid, because you couldn't afford to be. There wasn't time to be afraid. You took down the monster, and you pushed it to the back of your mind and suited up for the next kill. Of course, this was all in theory, and Sam... Sam was just a terrified, six-year-old little boy. And the fact that he couldn't let John see that didn't change the truth. So Sam developed a different, much more subdued reaction to fear. But Dean could tell. Because Dean could always tell. So when Sam was afraid, Dean knew.
Before Dean had time to move a muscle, Sam was out from under the covers, thrashing wildly at the air around him, pained whimpers spilling in a chain from between his soft, pink lips.
Dean shot up, immediately at Sam's side, restraining him. "Sammy. Sammy. Shhh. I've got you, baby boy. I'm here."
Sam gasped, his eyes fluttering open. "De?"
"Yeah, Sammy," Dean breathed, relief flooding his voice. "You're okay."
At that moment, Sam began bawling, clinging to the thin fabric of Dean's shirt like Dean might just disappear if he let go.
Dean knew that it had only been a dream. But that didn't make it any less real to the crying, shaking child in his arms, nor did it change the reality that whatever Sam had been dreaming about was almost surely out there, and that John had probably already exposed him to it. Silently cursing their father, Dean scooped up Sam and carried him back across the room to his bed, lying down and curling himself around his brother. "It's okay," Dean repeated. "You're safe. I'm not going anywhere. Just sleep, Sammy. You're safe."
Dean hesitantly pulled back the blankets on his bed and patted the sheets beside him. "Come here, Sam."
Sam lifted his glassy eyes, a tired, seriously? expression on his face. "I'm not ten anymore, Dean. I can handle a damn dream. Just... go back to sleep, okay?"
It was Dean's turn to sigh. "Alright. If you say so." He rolled back over to face the wall, but left the white blankets down around his waist: an open invitation.
Sam waited until Dean's breathing had become slow and even before crawling into bed beside him and pulling the covers up to his chin, pressing his forehead against the smooth skin of Dean's back.
Dean pretended to be every bit as asleep as Sam believed he was.
