As some some of you may know from reading my bio, I tend to write fanfiction when I'm stressed. Yesterday was a perfectly wretched piece of work, so here ya go. My apologies to Sam and Dean for this one.

I don't own Supernatural. If I did, I would kick Sam's butt for the way he treated Dean at the start of Season 8. Which reminds me, this is rated T for swearing.

"Dean, my eye feels funny." Little Sammy Winchester stood near the woodpile, rubbing one eye with his grubby fist.

Eleven-year-old Dean regarded his younger brother with a scowl. "You're always bitching about something, Sammy." But he set aside the rake and peered into Sam's hazel eyes anyway. "Looks fine to me."

Sam jutted out his chin and frowned. "You're not supposed to say that word."

"What word? Sammy?" The older brother chuckled. "C'mon, we need to get this yardwork done before Dad gets back."

"But my eye -"

"- is fine," Dean finished. "Probably got some dirt in it or something."

"It stings!"

Dean huffed. With an exaggerated sigh, he wet the hem of his T-shirt with water from their canteen. "Bend down." His little brother obliged and Dean wiped the dirt from Sam's face. "Better?"

Sam nodded. "A little."

Dean handed him the rake. "Get back to work."

The next hour passed quietly. Sam raked the back yard while Dean trimmed bushes in the front. It was rare for the brothers to spend so long in one town, but the location was central to several cases that John was currently working and the school district had a good reputation. The Winchesters were renting a small, two-bedroom house on the edge of town. The owner had taken one look at the two boys with John and dropped the rental price by half. Seeing Dean's protective arm around the little boy with the floppy hair and puppy dog eyes tended to have that effect on people.

Dean wiped the sweat from his face with the sleeve of his jacket and leaned the hedge clippers against the side of the house. "Sammy," he called. "I'm going in to make lunch. You almost done?"

A little voice piped up from around the corner. "I didn't do the side yard yet."

Dean sighed. Sam could take forever to do a job. His little brother was easily distracted. He liked to study bugs and plants and rocks. "Get it all raked up and then you can eat."

Dean rolled his shoulders as he walked up the back steps of the little house, trying to loosen his sore muscles. The hedge clippers were heavier than he had realized, and his arms had begun to ache.

"My eyes hurt," Sammy whined. "I wanna go inside."

Dean rolled his own eyes. "Rake the leaves and then I'll let you in."

There was a hefty sigh. "Okay, Dean."

Twenty minutes later, Dean had two bowls of Campbell's chicken noodle soup and a half of a grilled cheese sandwich set aside for each of them on the small kitchen table. Not for the first time, Dean was thankful that their rental house came furnished. It was one less thing he had to worry about. He walked out the back door and called for Sam.

No answer.

"Sammy! Lunch!" Hearing a sniff, Dean began to walk toward the sound, his heart rate picking up with each step. "Sammy?"

"Dee?" Sam stood with his head bowed in the middle of the leaf-strewn side yard. Only a portion of the grass was free of leaves, the rake still in Sam's hands. "I'm not done yet." His little brother's voice quivered beneath his mop of hair.

Dean tamped down his feelings of frustration. "Sammy, what's wrong?"

Sam lifted his head and Dean felt his knees buckle. His brother's right eye was nearly swollen shut, the lower right cheek up to his eyebrow bright red and taut. His left eye, while not as bad, was puffy too. A tear slid down his face. "I can't do it all, Dee. There's too many leaves. I'm sorry." He scrubbed hard at his eyes.

Dean swallowed the sob that was threatening to overtake him. "It's okay, Sammy," he said, taking the rake from his brother. "You did a good job. We're going to go in now." He forced a smile while trying to keep his voice level. "There's nothing to be sorry about. Did you hit your eye?" He was rambling, he knew he was rambling, but Winchester men didn't ramble. Winchesters held their shit together while everyone else lost it.

Sam shook his head. "It just started stinging."

I have to keep it together. I have to keep it together for Sam. Dean gave himself a pep talk while guiding his brother into the house.

"My eyes hurt, Dee," Sammy said, sniffing.

Dean mentally worked his way through triage. A, B, C. Airways, breathing, circulation. Or is it C, A, B? Compression, airways, breathing? Where are eyes on that list? Dean wished he had paid more attention to John's first aid lectures.

"I know they do, buddy. I'm sorry I didn't listen before. I'm gonna make it better, okay?"

Sam nodded as Dean pushed him into a kitchen chair. He scrambled around for a flashlight before pulling over the second chair.

"I'm hungry," Sam whined, eying the place settings of soup and sandwiches.

"First things first," Dean said. "Are you having trouble breathing?"

Sam shook his head.

"No asthma? No noise when you breathe?" He put his ear on his brother's chest and grabbed the kid by the wrist to check his pulse.

Sam tried to wiggle away. "I'm hungry, Dee. Lemme eat!"

"No!" Dean kept his brother's wrist pinned until he had what he wanted. Pulse fine, breathing fine, maybe a tiny bit wheezy. He put the inside of his wrist on his brother's forehead. No fever.

"How do you feel?" he asked Sam, shining the flashlight into his left eye. Pupil reactive to light. He pried the other eye open and Sam wailed, breaking away. "I'm sorry, Sammy, I gotta look." Whimpering, Sam stilled as Dean tried again.

Okay, the eye seems okay. Just swollen. Really fucking swollen. Dean chewed his lower lip. Is this an emergency? Sam's conscious, he can breathe, nothing's broken. But his eye. It's still swelling up. Maybe something got on him?

"Sammy, you're going to take a shower now, okay?" He helped his brother up the stairs and into the bathtub. Once the water was warm and Sam was standing directly under the spray, Dean ran to the bedroom he shared with his brother, opened the night stand, and retrieved the emergency cell phone that Dad had left for them. With trembling fingers, he hit speed-dial one.

"This is John Winchester. I can't be reached -"

Dean swore. He ended the call, tears in his eyes, and fought a strong desire to fling the phone across the room. He fumbled around for speed-dial two.

"Dean? Is that you, kid? What's going on?"

"Uncle Bobby!" Dean heard the panic in his own voice. "Sorry to bother you -"

"Boy, you ain't never been a bother," Bobby's gruff voice replied. "What's wrong?"

"It's Sammy! We were working in the yard and Sam said his eyes hurt and I made him keep working and I'm so sorry, Uncle Bobby, I didn't know -"

"Dean! Son, you need to calm down. Where is Sam now?"

"He's taking a shower."

"Okay, so he's upright and breathing. That's good. You said something's wrong with his eyes?"

Dean nodded, momentarily forgetting that Bobby couldn't see him. "His right eye's swollen shut and the left one doesn't look much better. I'm scared, Uncle Bobby," Dean admitted. He began to pace around the bedroom. "It all happened so fast. I looked at his eyes when he first complained and they looked fine. He's always whining about something. I didn't see a bug bite and he was a little dirty but no more so than usual and I didn't think anything was wrong and I don't know what happened, Uncle Bobby! I don't want him to go blind."

"Dean, slow down. Breathe with me. Good. I need you to focus. Any cold spots? Lights flickering? Anything your Dad's been working on that coulda followed him home?"

"No sir. I kept the salt lines up."

"Good. We can rule out anything supernatural. Can he see? Did you look in his eyes? Are they bloodshot?"

"He can see but he says his eyes hurt. The white part is mostly white."

"I think he's having an allergic reaction to something. Maybe he got stung. All right, here's what we're gonna do. You got any Benadryl in the house?"

"In the first aid kit."

"Good. Give him a dose and a half of that. Every six hours. Do it based on weight, not age. Shower's a good idea. If it's something airborne, he'll have washed it off by now. Now, this is important, son. I need you to get a marker. You need to mark off where the rash is now."

"The rash?"

"Anything swollen or red is part of the allergic reaction. Give him the Benadryl first and then mark up his face. You gotta make sure that rash isn't getting any bigger. If it gets larger than where you've marked, you call 911."

"But -"

"I'll deal with your father on this, you hear me, boy? You take care of Sam."

"Yes, sir. Thanks, Uncle Bobby."

"Any time, Dean."

Dean walked back down the hall to find Sam yelling for him. From the hoarseness of his voice, he had apparently been calling for some time.

"I'm here, Sam. What'cha need?"

"Water's cold, Dee."

Dean turned off the tap. "You could have turned it off yourself, you know," he chided.

The look Sammy gave him, even with his swollen eyes, was one of complete trust. "You told me to stay in the shower."

There was a lump in Dean's throat when he replied. "Your eyes feel any better?"

Sam shrugged as Dean wrapped a towel around him. "No worse."

He started to rub his eyes but Dean caught his hand. "No rubbing." He helped Sam into a clean T-shirt and handed him underwear and a pair of sweats.

"Did you talk to Dad? Is he coming home?" Sam asked as he wiggled into his clothes.

Dean shrugged away the uncomfortable notion that his seven-year-old brother could read him that easily. "I talked to Uncle Bobby. He said you're gonna be fine. I just gotta get some medicine in you."

Sam turned his puppy dog eyes on Dean, an odd effect with his eyes so puffy and swollen. He resembled a Shar-Pei. "Dean, when is Dad coming back?"

Dean swallowed a rising sense of panic. "I don't know, Sammy." He took a deep breath and thought through the steps Bobby have given him. He held up a marker. "Uncle Bobby said I gotta draw on your face."

Sam wrinkled his brows. "He did not!"

"He did too! I promise!"

"Why?"

Dean opened the drawer beneath the bathroom sink and pulled out the first aid kit. "'Cause you're having an allergic reaction." Grabbing the liquid Benadryl, he poured Sam a healthy dose. "Drink this." When Sam obliged, he answered his brother. "I need to make sure the swelling goes down or we have to go to the hospital."

Sam paled. "No hospital. I'm fine, Dean. Really."

Dean gave a humorless chuckle as he marked dots around his brother's swollen eyes. "You look like a mutant."

"I do not! You take that back!"

Finally, Dean was finished. The boys admired Dean's handiwork in the bathroom mirror. "Okay, Sammy, go get your blanket and pillow. I need to do the dishes and you can make a nest on the sofa and watch TV."

As Sam wandered down the hall, Dean sighed. A shudder ran through him. The adrenaline was wearing off, to be replaced by bone-weary exhaustion. Dad's supposed to come home tonight, but when does he ever get home on time? At least we have food. Food and electricity, medicine and Uncle Bobby. It would have to be enough.

Dean had just put the first aid kit away when he saw Sam in the hall, sans blanket and pillow. "Where's your stuff?"

Sam bit his lip. "You're ... you're not going to leave me, are you Dean?"

The older brother frowned. "No. That's crazy talk. Where'd you get a stupid idea like that, Sammy?"

His brother spoke to the floor. "If we go to the hospital, Dad said they'll take you away from me. He told me I can't get hurt or sick when you're in charge." Fat tears rolled down Sam's cheeks. "I'm sorry, Dee. Please don't leave me."

Dean battled back the raging fury he felt at his father. "C'mere." He wrapped his arms around his little brother. "No one is ever taking me away from you, you hear me? I promise you, Sammy. I will never leave you. Dad doesn't know what the hell he's talking about."

"Thanks, Dean," Sam whispered.

Dean rested his chin on the top of Sam's head and stroked his brother's back. "It's okay, Sammy. We're gonna get through this."