Mad World

Chapter Six: Going nowhere, going nowhere

Sam had made the decision - to tell Dean the truth.

Somewhere in-between busting walls looking for the spirit of a pissed off serial killer, and watching his brother have a mild panic attack over leaving Jo alone and her getting captured.

Because Dean treated Jo... Well, Dean treated Jo a lot like he treated Sam. Or, rather, how he'd treated Sam before he'd left for Stanford - back when he was still trying to protect him from everything. Back when Sam was still kind of letting him.

It didn't exactly make him feel all warm and fuzzy inside, and he batted about the phrase emotional substitution more than once in his contemplations. He had no idea what went on in his big brother's head, but he could guess. He had to guess.

I don't want to go back to school. I was a freak with a knife collection.

Jo's words from that afternoon stayed in the back of his mind as he thought about it. There were so many connections - parallels to be made. And the one conclusion that Sam kept coming to with all of them was - If I don't warn him now, it's going to kill him.

So Sam was going to tell Dean.

As soon as this hunt was over.

Sam was going to tell his big brother that he was dying.

Sam sat a bar with a beer and a sour attitude.

He was more than a little pissed off at the women of the Roadhouse, and for so much more than anyone would ever know.

"We don't even know what happened," he tried to comfort his big brother, who was next to him and on his fourth or fifth beer. "Neither do they. For all any of us know it was him who messed up that gig - not dad. For all we know, it was no one's fault and whatever they were hunting just got the better of him."

"Maybe," Dean agreed lacklusterly, "But we're never gonna know," he took another swig of carbonated alcohol, sinking further and further into his inebriated depression.

"We could talk to them," Sam tried.

"You really see Ellen debating the what's and why's of this with us, Sammy?" Dean snorted, too close to shit-face drunk to hide his cynicism. Too far away from it to cut his little brother off completely - lest Sam provide the miracle solution.

"Alright," Sam sighed, agreeing easily, thinking of the stubborn woman, "But Jo..."

"Jo," Dean started, and there was lost emotion there that Sam couldn't place. "Jo loved her dad. She went hunting for him, to be close to him. She remembers..." he broke off, shaking his head, "I mean, can you imagine if dad had died when we were that young? And someone told us whose fault it was? What would we do, Sammy?"

And the younger brother could offer no rebuttal. Dean had cut the situation to the quick, stripping it of all its false hopes. Just as he always did. Just as he always would. Sam swallowed thickly.

"I'm sorry, man," he said heavily, when there was nothing else to say. And he pretended he was only talking about Jo.

"Yeah," Dean curved a little farther around his drink. "Well, people leave," he shrugged. "You want another beer?"

Sam of less than a month ago would have said, 'Nah,' and shrugged it off. He would have spent the rest of the night keeping an eye on Dean, dragging him out of the bar when he got too drunk, taking him back to the motel, and not mocking his hangover in the morning.

Because his brother's heart had been broken yet again, and he was dealing with that pain exactly how he'd been taught to.

But this Sam - this new Sam with a giant secret and a thirst for life - this Sam was grieving too. Because he was going to tell his brother. He had just started planning the speech, considered it from every angle, debated every which way Dean might react. And he had been ready and prepared to deal with however he may have responded.

But now this night of grieving was about Dena's loss - not Sam's impending one.

So this Sam just smiled sadly and nodded, the lure of oblivion just too tantalizing to resist.

They got their bottles and - in a bittersweet motion - raised them, simultaneously clinking them together.

'Congratulations,' said that somehow muddled sound sarcastically,

'We lost another ali.' Said that first long swig.

'Jo, Ellen, Dad, Caleb, Pastor Jim, Jessica, Mom.' Their beers hit the counter with a thick thud. 'Everyone leaves. Everyone dies.'

They kept drinking, and that's all this Sam remembers.

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A/N: Shorter than usual, I know - sorry. But I want to get this where it's going, and I feel like it's dragging a bit much. Or maybe it's not - maybe I'm just anxious to get back to the other two stories I'm writing. You tell me.