Chapter Eight

The view is blocked by scrubs and white coats when he reaches the room. And their heads are all bowed down, and the heart machine's flatlining and Bobby's there in the corner, and his face and his silence is enough.

And all he could think is no no no no this can't be happening this can't be happening it can't be happening not again I can't do this again-

"Sammy?" he whispers.

All heads turn to look at him, but he doesn't look back at any of them, because his eyes are fixed on his little brother lying pale and cold on the bed with a chest too still and a heart machine beside him that doesn't show any signs of life and he can't think of anything else other than the fact that he slipped away from him just like in Cold Oak except this time he's never coming back -

In the next two seconds, he's walking across the room, beside his brother, standing over his body and looking down at him.

And he's wondering why he never let go of his anger for a while and picked up the phone long enough to know. (At least he wouldn't have had to feel this regret and agony crushing his chest of the fact that he's too late and the guilt making his stomach swirl with sickness).

The staff shuffles out of the room behind him, but he doesn't notice. All he can see is Sammy and think of the way he left him again like this.

And now, as he stares down at him through blurred and burning and wide eyes, he sees the face of everything he could have done differently, all the better choices he could have made, all the things he could have changed that didn't lead to where he is standing right now.

Beside a brother whose last wish was to see him, and died without having it.

Beside a brother he never said goodbye to, and was now wishing more than anything that he had.

Most of all, he wished he had just answered the call.

…

"Y'know… I h-h've t'adm't… I-I… I don'… I don' think I w'nna d-die…" Sam gasps out between soft pants, chuckling weakly, mirthlessly. "N-n't b'fore… n't b'fore… I jus' wan'ed t'see him, y'know? One las'… one las' time."

Bobby remembers those words, just before he fell asleep for the last time, and he thinks of them and watches his eldest try not to break over his brother's body, his jaw clenched hard as he silently stares down at his pale face. He sees him swallow and reach out his hand, slow and careful, until it's buried in Sam's hair, his breaths coming out shaky as his features crumple slightly. His lips tremble and his eyes shine with grief and pain and loss and Bobby closes his eyes so he doesn't have to see the reflection of his failure staring him right in the face.

"Sammy…" he hears him whisper, strained and broken, and he doesn't want to open his eyes but he does.

The numbness settles inside Bobby as he watches Dean fall beside his brother's body and gather him into his arms, burying his face into his cold shoulder. His throat bobs as his face scrunches up hard and he closes his eyes and lets the tears fall, and Bobby wishes he had tried harder even though some rational part of him knows he had done everything he could given the situation.

But rationality would also mean accepting that he had lost one of his sons, so he doesn't want to be rational right now. Instead, he lets himself sink into this numbness and the denial that's holding on to the belief that Sam might come back somehow (he's done it before, hasn't he?) because the only other thing left to sink in was that horrible feeling of crippling grief and loss and failure.

He doesn't say anything. Just stays silent and watches.

Dean sobs into his brother's shoulder, all choked up and gasping and hard, all the grief and agony twisted up into that one strangled, inhumane sound. His arms are too tight around him, as if maybe he could make his heart start beating in his chest again if he holds on hard enough.

Then he slowly opens his eyes, sparkling wet with tears, and his gaze drifts over to him, swallowing down his pain enough to talk, and Bobby's sure that he's going to blame him, tell him it's all his fault, tell him that -

"Tell me..." he trails off, takes a deep breath and swallows again and struggles to keep his face from crumpling. "Tell me that he at least knew I was coming?" he whispers, almost breathlessly, with so much desperation and hope inside the choking need in his shaking voice, and Bobby knows he'd take a lie at this moment rather than a no. But he's lied so much this past week and he knows enough now to understand that it leads to nothing but false hope and regrets and a stone of guilt and truth in his stomach that only get heavier and heavier with each day that goes by without being spilled out.

So he says nothing, and lets the silence answer for him instead, because he knows he can't bring himself to be the one to crush the hope of the only comfort he could have now. He's already done enough of that.

Dean squeezes his eyes shut, turns his head away to push his face up against Sam's neck and just lets the tears fall, sucking in a deep breath that quakes from all the sobs held in and the world load of pain inside that he could only hear.

...

What was that Sammy had once told him about small actions and large consequences? For the want of a nail, a shoe was lost...

A choice. A small, unimportant choice of answering the phone or not.

It was never supposed to be a matter of life and death.

Sammy should have gotten out of that hospital weeks later, ignored Dean's calls in vengeance for the next few months, and then they were just supposed to run into each other in some unknown town, in some gas station or grocery store in the middle of nowhere or a hunt or whatever, and he was supposed to give him a pissed-off bitchface number #104 and stomp away like a hormonal teen, expecting Dean to come after him or something and he would have followed him out, offered to buy him his favorite coffee and salad and then everything was just supposed to be okay.

But that wasn't what happened. No.

Instead, Sammy died, and he never said goodbye.

His throat burns with alcohol, but at least it numbs everything else. "You look like someone killed your puppy and made you watch," the bartender says, leaning casually against the counter of a bar two blocks away from the hospital where his brother just died.

"My brother died, and I never said goodbye," Dean replies the same words that have been repeating in his head over and over, smiling sardonically. His red and swollen, world-weary eyes are probably not going with the sarcasm though.

Her features soften. "Death can happen too suddenly and unexpectedly. You couldn't have known," she responds, sympathy in her voice. "You didn't get the time."

"Oh, I did." His voice starts to tremble, the pain in his chest starting to bloom up again, so he drinks the entire glass in one gulp and feels it disappear again. "I had one whole week. Just never picked up the phone."

...

Dean had taken Sam away from the hospital to a motel just near enough because he couldn't bear the idea of them putting him away in some morgue, like another one of their nameless corpses, for any number of time. He had laid him down in the backseat of the Impala, made him as comfortable as possible even though it wouldn't really matter because Sammy wasn't in there anymore to look up at him with his stupid, huge puppy eyes full of gratitude and a sleepy smile that always took him back to when they were four and eight and still believed that they would live together forever.

Dean's forever ended with Sammy's. He knows that. There is life (happiness and hope) in forevers. But there isn't any life for him after Sammy's just ended. Just empty, hopeless existence, trailing after hunts through endless roads after endless roads, wanting instead of fearing that this would be his last.

He leans against the wall, stares silently at Sammy lying lifeless (foreverless) on the motel bed as Bobby does beside him, and wonders how long it'll be before Lucifer chooses this town to burn into ashes.

He hopes it won't be too long, because there's no way he's cremating Sam. Not unless he burns with him soon after.

Author's Note: Hey. Back so soon, eh? I'd apologize, but I feel like it's kind of burning out its meaning. I'd tell you that it was life and everything else, but I feel like it's all getting trite. I suck, and it's only fair I admit that.

I can't even begin to thank you for your patience and loyalty, and for your support and love. All the tags, the reviews, the PMs, and the very fact that you're still here, they never fail to make my day! Thank you so much, you all. I love you! *tackle hugs*

I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. :) Let me know what you thought!