Hello lovely people *waves happily* Hope you've all had a good week. I have. I saw Kansas in concert Thursday night… Yes! The Kansas. They played Carry On Wayward Son and I died a little.
Chapter Nine
He was there. He was actually there. Dean could see him.
He looked like hell.
He was wearing the clothes he'd been wearing when Dean last saw him in the chapel. His eyes were shadowed and his skin pale, but he was there. Dean didn't think he had ever appreciated sight more.
"Dude, curtain," Sam said.
Curtain? Of all the things they had to say to each other, Sam wanted to talk about curtains! Was he screwing with Dean, or had his marbles been shaken a little by death?
A towel flew through the air and landed on Dean's face.
"If you're not closing the curtain, at least use a towel," Sam said.
"What?"
"Cover up!" Sam snapped.
It took a couple seconds—because, hello, dead brother—but Sam's message sank in and Dean snatched the towel from his face and wrapped it around his waist.
"I can see you."
Sam nodded solemnly and then grinned. "I figured. I've been… Dude, hold the damn towel together."
Dean cinched the towel a little closer and laughed. "Okay, man, you can stop clutching at your pearls now. I'm covered."
Sam turned his eyes from the ceiling and smiled.
"So, how long have you been able to do this?" Dean asked.
Sam looked thoughtful. "Probably about five minutes. I've been trying forever, but I guess today's the day it actually worked."
Dean was trying to wrap his brain around it all. He'd been waiting for this since the moment Castiel told him Sam was still there. Judging from their experience with Kevin, he'd thought it would take at least another few weeks. In hindsight, he realized he should have known Sam would kick ass at being a ghost, overachieving smartass that he was.
Embarrassingly, Dean felt himself getting a little choked up. It wasn't just the fact it was Sam he was seeing; it was the reminder, in his pale skin and shadowed eyes, of what he was. He could see Sam now, but he still couldn't hug him or even slap him around for putting Dean through it all, because he wasn't really there. He was dead.
"How about you finish cleaning up and we'll talk," Sam said.
Screw that, Dean thought. Showering could wait. He had his brother to talk to. He started to step out of the shower, but Sam laughed. "Dean, you still have shampoo in your hair. Finish up. I'm not going far. We can talk after."
Dean nodded. "Okay. I won't be…" He trailed off as Sam flickered and disappeared.
Sighing to himself, Dean tested the temperature of the water. It had gone back to steaming hot. He didn't know how he'd done it, but he was sure Sam had something to do with the sudden ice wash.
He stepped under the spray again and raked his hands through his hair. The water streamed down his face and mixed with the tears he didn't feel falling. His fisted hand pressed against the white tile, and he shook his head. No one was there to see him cry and he had good reason for the tears; he had his brother back.
Showering didn't take long. Managing his emotions so he didn't go to Sam looking like someone had just killed his puppy—though that would have been easier to handle—was harder. By the time he looked and felt like himself again, Kevin and Mrs. Tran had arrived and were deciphering the tablet and doing a crossword respectively. Castiel was in the kitchen, fiddling with the coffee machine, and Sam was nowhere in sight.
After checking the bedrooms and other main rooms of the bunker, he was starting to worry. Sam couldn't go far, but he could go invisible. The new, snarkier Sam would probably get a kick out of watching Dean trail around the bunker looking for him.
"You looking for Sam?" Kevin asked as he made his third pass through the room.
"Yeah. I can see him again," Dean said, proud to show his brother's achievement.
"He told me," Kevin said, sounding only half interested. "Try the garage. He likes to hang out there."
How did Kevin know that and not Dean? When did their friend start knowing more about Sam's likes and habits than his own brother?
Since he died, a voice whispered to Dean.
"Thanks, Kev," Dean said distractedly.
He didn't run through the halls to the garage, he was certain, but he did reach it at a speed usually saved for chasing fuglys. No one could see him though, he hoped, so he figured he had a pass.
Sam was leaning against the hood of the Impala. All that was missing was a beer in his hand and the open road and it could have been any of a hundred times they'd stopped at the end of a case for a little downtime.
He looked up as Dean strolled in—he'd marshaled control of his speed now—and grinned.
Dean stood beside him, leaning against his baby, and looked out over the rows of other cars parked in their bays.
"So…" he said awkwardly. "You okay?"
Sam turned to him and raised an eyebrow. "I'm fine."
Dean believed that about as much as he believed in unicorns and happy endings. Sam was not remotely fine. He was dead. That was screwing Dean over in all kinds of new and wonderful ways. It had to be doing a number on Sam even more.
"You're a ghost, Sam."
"Yeah, I'm a ghost. I'm not sleep deprived and on my way out the door. I'm not hallucinating Lucifer. I'm not sipping down demon blood. I'm not having skull cracking visions. Hell, I'm not in the cage. I've been plenty worse before. This is nothing."
Dean couldn't argue that Sam had been through a lot, more than anyone should have to deal with really, but he didn't buy this act his brother was putting out. This was not nothing. This was death. He knew his brother was okay with that—and didn't Dean just hate that knowledge—as he had been when he was walking off with Death in that damn cabin, but Sam wasn't only dead, he was trapped, too. He was not fine with that. He couldn't be.
He tried a change of tack. "What's ghostly life like?"
Sam shrugged. "It's okay. Can be fun sometimes. Kevin is a riot, and spending all that time with Cas is good."
"What do you do?"
"Mostly, what you'd think. Watch Kevin working on the tablet. Talk to you. Research Heaven in hopes of finding a way of cracking it open."
That was all stuff Dean knew about. That was what happened during the day. What was happening when Dean was sleeping—or attempting to sleep? "And at night? What do you and Cas do when you're not fighting prophets?"
Sam grinned. "We mostly watch you sleep."
"Dude!" Dean gasped. "Tell me you're kidding!"
Sam laughed raucously. "I'm kidding. At night we practice. Kevin's teaching me the finer aspects of being a ghost, like manipulating the elements and fighting."
"Yeah, I saw that. Looked like you were having your ass kicked."
Sam grimaced. "I was. Kevin can really pack a punch for a little, dead guy, and he's been doing this longer than me. I'm still trying to master it all. It's harder than you'd think."
There was something more than amusement in Sam's expression now. He looked frustrated and Dean thought maybe it was the first glimpse of genuine real emotion he'd seen so far. He knew his brother, and now he could see him again, he could tell Sam wasn't remotely the snarky, laugh-a-minute guy he'd been acting through Castiel and Kevin. He was struggling with something, and Dean thought he knew what it was.
"You know," he said, drawing a deep breath, "I owe you an ass kicking, right?"
Sam looked amused. "It was just a cold shower. Besides, you can't kick my ass. Ghost, remember?"
Dean shook his head slowly. "That's not what I'm talking about, and you know it. Damn, Sammy, we've got to talk about this."
Sam looked away. "There's nothing to talk about."
"I say there is!" Dean resisted the urge to try and shake Sam. It would do no good. It would only wreck him to see his hands move through Sam as if he wasn't there, and it might hurt Sam to see the same. For all his pretence that it was okay and that being a ghost was a laugh a minute, he couldn't really be feeling that. It was an act. Dean just wished he knew why he was acting, then he could make him stop.
Sam flickered and Dean's anger rose. If he thought he could just disappear and that conversation would be over, he had another think coming. "Don't you dare, Sam," he said. "Flicker out on me now and the next time you appear I'll trap you in a salt circle and blast you with a shotgun for good measure."
"Fine," Sam snapped. "What do you want to talk about?"
"You're dead," Dean said harshly. "How about we talk about that!"
Sam nodded. "Yeah, I'm dead."
"Why?" Dean asked, mortified to hear that he couldn't keep the quaver from his voice. Perhaps it was better though, that Sam hear it and realize that Dean needed him to be serious for a moment, because this act, and that was what it was, was hurting him.
Sam pushed away from the car and paced back and forth in front of Dean. Dean let him, he didn't try to stop him, as he knew this was what Sam did when he was working through things.
"I had to," he said eventually. "It was the right thing to do?"
"Right for who?" Dean asked, aware that he was echoing Mrs. Tran's question to Kevin. It seemed being the ones left behind made you ask the same questions.
"For Mom," Sam said harshly. "For Dad and Jess, for Meg and the poor girls she possessed, and every other person Crowley and his bastards hurt. And for you!" He was shouting now. His hands came up to grip Dean's collar. "For you, Dean. For what happened to you. Crowley did this. He got you the blade and made you what you were! I did this for you!"
Dean swallowed thickly. Him. This was all because of him. He'd guessed Sam would use Jess and their parents as a reason, but he'd not thought of himself being a part of it. He saw it now as clearly as if it was spread before him on paper. Sam was dead because of him. He'd done this. He'd killed his brother. How was he supposed to live with that knowledge? Sam was still there, for now, but sooner or later, they would reopen Heaven, and he would be gone. How could Dean bear that? He couldn't. How could Sam do this to him?
"Don't you think I'd have preferred you alive?" he asked angrily. "I told you, there is no me if there ain't no you. Why didn't you listen?"
"I listened," Sam said. "I know that's what you think, but you're wrong. You can do this without me. I'll make sure of it. I won't go anywhere until you're ready."
"Ready?" Dean laughed mirthlessly. "You think I'm ever going to be ready for that?"
"You will be one day," Sam said serenely.
Then the meaning of Sam's words filtered into Dean's mind, and he fought back a shudder. He would stay until Dean could let him go, which could be never. He would stay trapped on the earth, denied peace, because of him. As if it wasn't enough that he'd given his life for Dean, he was sacrificing his afterlife, too.
"You'll stay?" he asked, and he cursed the fact he sounded almost hopeful.
"Of course," Sam said with a smile. "That's what we do."
Dean closed his eyes and willed himself to remain in control, to not lose himself to emotion. What had he done to his brother that he believed this was even an option? How had Sam decided this was what he needed. What he wanted was his brother alive. That ship had sailed. What he needed now was for his brother to be at peace. But he was blocking that himself. Sam was as stubborn as a mule, just like their father; how was he supposed to make him see that he needed Sam to have what he needed more than what Dean needed himself.
"Sam," he said, "I'm sorry."
Sam shrugged. "It's okay, Dean. It's not so bad, being dead. I have all the free time I want and I don't need to sleep anymore, so no more nightmares." He laughed. "And there's ample opportunity to screw with Cas, though I guess that's over now you can see me. I'll find a new way to… What's wrong?"
Dean's fury had reached a new peak. Sam was lying to him. He was lying for Dean's benefit, but lying nonetheless. Being a ghost wasn't a trip to a theme park. It wasn't fun. It sucked ass for all of them.
"Quit lying!" he snapped. "I'm not buying what you're selling. You're not happy, Sam. I can read you like no one else. Quit pretending. Just… tell me the truth, please."
Sam stared into his eyes for a long moment, and Dean could almost see the cogs whirring. Sam was deciding how much to tell him, how honest to be. He opened his mouth, but whatever he was going to say was lost as Castiel burst into the room, looking wired and worried.
"What's wrong?" Sam asked.
"Metatron, he has escaped!"
So… Who wants to slug me for cutting that conversation off where I did? Like I've said before, form an orderly queue and you'll all get a chance. The action is about to pick up now as we're heading to the end of the story. I will post again as soon as I can.
Until next time…
Clowns or Midgets xxx