Warnings: swearing, language, homophobic language, mention and references to character deaths

Chapitre 16: Shelter

It was the last show, the one that wasn't always special, but should always be. Castiel knew the signs of a great show for having already seen them in some rare occasions. The way Charlie clenched her hair in her hands, the dimples of Sam and the number of sticks that he had already lost behind the scenes (one day one would have to hire someone to pick them up after him. One day.).

Castiel could above all see it in Dean's eyes, in his smile and the door he had left ajar in order to hear the noise of the crowd that was gathering in the hall while they were both changing.

They had arrived almost late and had been caught in the middle of the hallway by Bobby enjoining Dean to get changed and rewarding him in passing with a tap on the back of the head that absolutely not dented the singer's exitement. They had thrown their bags on the floor and exchanged a last kiss before undressing quickly, looking at both of them strip clothe by clothe of a facet of their lives. Castiel's sweatshirt fell down, taking with it the last hope to see him well coiffed and Dean had to resist the urge to run his hand in his black hair to accentuate the disheveled effect. The concert would take care of it. He got rid of his too worn jeans to put on leather pants. The cold clothing made him briefly grit his teeth and Castiel let out an appreciative click of the tongue to which he replied with a wink while the young man pulled on the jeans of the singer. They were too big for him, and fell on his hips suggestively. Dean looked away before needing to delay the concert of a good half hour and caught a white shirt in his bag before putting on a leather jacket that he wouldn't keep more than three songs.

Castiel was still barefoot when Sam entered without knocking and all the drummer saw at first sight was the back of the accountant, kneeling by the couch, busy outlining of black the eyes of his lover.

"We're shooting a porn here?" He joked.

"That could come." Castiel said deadpan with a shrug to readjust his too big tank top without shaking his hand. He bit his lip when Dean opened his eyes smiling. Each time he did this, he wondered what good he could have done to deserve this vision?

Charlie and Kevin arrived at full throttle, pursuing each other in the corridors, and stumbled over one another when the bassist bumped against Sam still on the doorstep.

Castiel knew the signs and with Charlie they resulted in a certain inability to speak otherwise than with her hands as if the excitation cut off her voice. She authoritatively handed to Sam the big box in which they kept their jewelry scene and ordered him to get ready.

"But I'm ready!" He protested, nevertheless letting her strap studded wristbands on his wrists. He did the same for her and motioned for Kevin to change his piercings. "More conspicuous Kev. Tonight is a big night!"

Castiel sat on the edge of the sofa, Dean's arm around the waist to observe them just a few moments before joining the pit. He leaned to kiss the singer one last time singer and left on a sign of encouragement to the attention of his friends. He took advantage of the very relative calm of the backstage to call Dorothy and recommend her to come and attend the concert with Madison.

"It'll be worth it." He promised, showing his badge to the security guard who let him pass between the barriers separating him from the pit. People looked at him curiously, talked on his way.

Castiel the accountant would have lowered his head and pretended to not see anything. But the Castiel he was at that moment smiled and walked down the barriers, settling at the third or fourth row of spectators between a handmade flag with the emblem of the group and a few words of "Hellhound" and a group of girls speaking in a language he didn't know. He had his camera around his neck and his phone buzzed deep in the pocket of the too big jeans he was wearing.

He hadn't received any message from Brooklyn for so long that he had a moment of incomprehension when seeing her ID on the screen.

"Looks like it'll be a great show."

So she was in the hall. By reflex, Castiel looked around for her but he knew he had almost no chance of finding her in the crowd. But he smiled anyway while Madison and Dorothy joined him and quickly answered.

"Especially for you."

He promised himself to check in with her after the concert, but he was already smiling knowing the involuntary surprise Dean reserved for the girl. He had read the scrawled lyrics in the notebook and knew Dean was waiting for a special occasion to sing that song. A particular audience receptive enough to offer him this gift. He didn't even need to wait for Dean's response to the message he immediately sent him, he knew exactly with which song he would start the acoustic session that night, and to who he would dedicate it.

Castiel knew the signs of a very good show, with him it meant an incandescent excitement, like a million bubbles in his chest that made him bounce up and down and smile big enough to worry Dorothy.

The lights went out. It was hot, the crowd screamed. Castiel was feeling at home.

Sam had thrown himself on stage, instinctively finding his place on his seat, the sticks already in hand, his arms finding on their own the way to the drum kit of which he barely discerned the shape in the darkness. The first stroke on the snare, the beat all in offbeat of the opening sequence tuned directly with the beat of his heart. By the time Kevin and Charlie were on stage, he was already sweaty, his white tank top stuck to his back, his ears ringing despite the protections... He caught the eye of the bassist at the moment when Dean took the stage, and he gave her a smile while his brother placed himself in the center of the stage, waving to the crowd, clutching his microphone.

Everything was perfect.

Kevin saw the crowd moving to the rhythm of the music that squizzed his stomach and made him smile, concentrating hard on his melodic line. He loved watching people, always amazed that they came, that music could bring this feeling to them. The classical music he had studied his entire youth produced more profound effects, quieter, like an inner peace that wasn't to share. Rock required to share. It was as if the music itself ordered the audience to sing louder than Dean, to beat time faster than Sam, to swing to the rhythm of the bass and to close their eyes along the bars of the strings he rubbed.

The heat of the crowd was overwhelming, almost terrifying, people were pressing themselves against Dorothy, pushing her, walking on her feet, screaming. Nobody could like that. She was about to retreat when Castiel's hand sought hers, it was already sweaty and the group was only beginning the second track. There was too much noise for her to hear what he was saying and he just covered her eyes with his free hand. "Just go with the flow." He shouted in her ear.

Was this his way of doing? Just go with the crowd? Obviously yes. It was a strange feeling to be thus buffeted by strangers on a vibrating floor, like in those dreams where you fall and of which you wake up screaming. But that left more room for music, more room for the lyrics and the emotion.

Castiel knew the signs of an incredible concert and was every time delighted to participate in. Later in the night, when the sound had begun to make his ears buzz, when he seemed to be more drunk with music and life than he had been for a long time, he began to photograph the group. The photos would be for the most blurry or poorly framed, but one or two of them would be perfect, an accurate representation of the punctual happiness Free Will could bring to their fans. He had a whole file of it in his computer that Dean sometimes watched in days of discouragement.

He also took a picture of the profiles of Dothy and Madison singing along a song in chorus, each with the same expression of joyful abandonment on the face. He'd probably print it and frame it.

When Sam finally stopped beating on the cymbals and the calm slowly returned in the pit and on stage, Castiel quickly corrected the camera settings to adjust them to the calm of the acoustic session which was to come. There would be videos of the song that Dean, now alone on stage was going to burst. Castiel, him, wanted to photograph his lips on the edge of the microphone and the brightness of his piercings in the pink and violet light. He wanted to photograph the curvature of the tattooed rose on his wrist flexed around the neck of the guitar, and his fingers clutching the strings. More than all the rest, those little things gave reality to the moment of amazed wavering that Castiel would try to remember later without being able to find the exact sensation.

A picture, a second one, then a larger shot of the scene, then a final of Kevin bent over his cello and Castiel dropped the camera against his stomach to listen to the song. He hoped that the videos he would find later on the internet would start early enough to hear Dean lean over his microphone and whisper "This one is for Brooklyn."

"We've been through much you and I,

I believed in you like you believed in me too

You couldn't make it, I don't know why.

Why wasn't I able to save you?"

##

Castiel's cooking had something miraculous. First because it was atrocious. Second because it had brought him to the ripe age of twenty six years old which, in Dean's opinion, fell within daily divine intervention. If he avoided thinking about Castiel's diet when he was too far away to remedy the situation, he had quickly got used to proclaim the kitchen of the young man as his own territory when he was in town, and tonight was no exception to the rule. He had disappeared after signing autographs and taking pictures with fans and had taken byroads to shake off anyone who could possibly follow him to the accountant's apartment.

He found Castiel in the kitchen in the process of carefully cutting carrots in slices of all exactly the same thickness. The concepts of cooking time and seasoning remained unknown to him, but his attention to detail and his concern for a job well done made him a particularly effective commis chef for lack of being speed.

They couldn't really consider their lives as routine, Dean moved way too much for it. But they had their little rituals, including the first dinner after the last concert. They cooked in silence, one slicing thinly the food, the other baking them bit by bit until a soft simmered dish smell invades the small white and blue apartment of Castiel.

The feeling of coming home and not having to move was still strange after so much time spent on roads. Dean had a little feeling of floating in an exhausted stupor since the day before.

Knowing that he wouldn't have to leave a few hours later hadn't decreased their ardor, quite the opposite. They had nearly been late for the concert and had been greeted by conniving glances to which they hadn't paid attention. Even while cooking they found a way to gently brush each other, knowing that they wouldn't sleep much that night either. A jazz tune filled the apartment, barely drowning out the noise of the knife on cutting board. It was the quietest atmosphere in which Dean had been for months despite his ringing ears from the concert that had just ended and the residual clenching of his fingers. He caught himself smiling at his sauce reducing.

"You know." He said thoughtfully. "It'd be easier if everyone knew for us. I wouldn't have to hide to come and cook for you."

He felt Castiel tense next to him just before responding "No." with the same firm tone he would have used to decline a threesome with Hitler's corpse. He had laid his knife and was looking at the leek he'd been cutting as if it had just personally affronted him. Dean knew it was only to not turn this look on him. It was a discussion, or rather an argument they had had many times already and he blamed himself for having broached the subject. He honestly didn't know what had got into him, he hadn't had the conscious intention to do it. It was just the calm atmosphere, the prospect of being settled down for some time that had led him to that thought he had expressed aloud. And now Castiel was throwing a death stare at a vegetable, teeth clenched to not say anything he would regret later. Dean turned off the heat under the pan.

"Sorry." He said. "I just thought..."

"We had this conversation before." Castiel cut him off.

"I know. And I'm still not satisfied with how it turns every time."

"Then why do you always bring it back up?" The young man lost his temper. "There is no question of revealing our relationship! It's too dangerous!"

Dean rolled his eyes. "Don't be stupid. We won't be shot in the public square!"

"Almost." Castiel grumbled, pointing his knife at Dean. He put it down on as soon as he realized it and crossed his arms, leaning against the work plan, the leek abandoned for now. "It already cost you your career once and your father into the bargain. There is no question for us to jeopardize the future of Free Will just because you'd find it comfortable to not have to hide!"

"It wouldn't fucking jeopardize anything!" Dean also lost his temper. "It won't change anything to my music!"

Castiel snorted. "But darling, if it was the music that mattered in this business, we would know."

Dean noticeably turned pale. "And what does that mean exactly?" He hissed. He knew he shouldn't have been so angry, after all, he knew perfectly the position of the young man on the subject. But Castiel had deliberately pressed right where it hurt.

"It's not the music that sells your discs Dean. If you still believe that you bury your head in the sand. How do you think your fans will react when they discover that fantasize about you is useless since you're no longer single? How do you think everyone will react by learning that on top of that you sleep with a guy?"

"I don't fucking care!" Dean yelled. "I quit the army because I refused to lie and hide, and my father despises me for it! And now you ask me to do the same! For years Cas! You think if I wanted to live a lie I'd have chosen this life?"

Castiel pursed his lips hard and shook his head.

"Not now!" He said a little more quietly. "Not now that your record company starts to trust you. It's too risky Dean. There is too much at stake, your career, your income. Did you think about what's going to happen if you reveal this, if it causes a scandal and the record company drops you? Did you think about Sam Charlie and Kevin?"

"Of course I think about them. I only think about them. I've always thought about them otherwise I wouldn't have signed that damn contract. You think it's fun for me to be Crowley's bitch? You think I like that, seeing my music liquidized so I can sell it?"

Castiel shook his head, looking sheepish.

"It's not worth ruining it all just to avoid having to hide. We're fine like that, right?"

"No." Dean ran his hands on his face, shaking with anger or disappointment he wasn't sure which. "No I'm not fine Cas. I was fine before you. Before you come and make me want things for myself. When I only had Sam's welfare in mind everything was easier. And now I want things for myself. I want... I want to hold you against me in the street, I want us to live together, I want everyone to know what you mean to me and people to stop to present girls to me. It's unfair to hide like that when I'm happy and I want everyone to know." His wrath had subsided with his words and now he wanted to cry. He expected Castiel to come and touche him but he didn't.

"I refuse." The young man said. "You know how much I love you. But this, this is out of question. I won't let you take that risk, not before you're all well settled in the milieu."

Dean sneered. "Why the only time you get reasonable has to be to deny me the only thing close to my heart?"

Castiel didn't answer until Dean sigh and storm out of the kitchen.

"Where are you going?" The accountant shouted in his back. Only the slamming of the front door answered him.

He finished cutting the leek, as if it was important, and reserved the preparation in the refrigerator. They had already gotten the plates out and he suddenly had a violent desire to break one. Or both, or even all those he had. He had already done that, it would only earn him a momentary satisfaction without solving the problem. He stacked one upon the other to store them.

Fuck it.

He violently thrown them to the ground where they exploded with a satisfactory noise of broken porcelain. The white pieces contrasted sharply with the blue tiles. He didn't feel better.

He went to bed, appetite ruined by the argument. He was sure that Dean wouldn't return for the night and that himself wouldn't get to sleep. Yet it was the sound of the singer's keys in the lock that woke him several hours later, triggering a headache that would only worsen over hours. He winced when he heard the screeching door of the closet in the entrance where Dean was putting away his jacket, and the sound of his shoes falling to the ground when he removed them. The corridor light came through the ajar door and he sat up in bed, rubbing his eyes to see Dean hesitantly stepping in the room.

"May I?" He asked, voice barely above a whisper.

Castiel nodded and slightly pushed the corner of the blanket away from the usual place of his lover to show him his permission. Dean sighed in relief and slid into the bed next to him, his arms automatically wrapped around the torso of Castiel who sighed in turn. He felt like he hadn't breathed since he had left. Despite the frequency of their disputes, they both hated them.

"I'm sorry." Castiel whispered, placing his forehead against Dean's. The other nodded slowly without replying. "I promise we'll do it. When things have changed, we will."

"Don't make promises that you won't have to keep, they have no value." Dean grumbled. Castiel slightly pulled his hair by way of interrogation. "We'll be dead or separated before times change. So we'll stay like that and stop arguing on the subject. It's not important."

A his tone, Castiel knew that yes, it was important, but Dean would never mention the issue again unless he was forced to. Like his father, like the army, like all the things he kept for himself by claiming that it didn't bother him. It wasn't the goal, but Castiel felt guilty.

"I'm sorry."

Dean laid a light kiss on his mouth and then on his forehead, wrapped his arms tighter around him.

"Don't be, now sleep."

"If angels are supposed to be guardians,

Ask them to forgive me, for I couldn't shelter you,

Tell them I wish circumstances were different,

And I'm sorry for what you've been through"

##

"You didn't think you deserved to be saved,

What we did, what we became,

I'm afraid it might kill me too,

I lost everything for nothing

I hope paradise has a place for me and you."

Once the hall empty and the lights dimmed, Sam began to feel cold because of the sweat that stuck his tank top to the skin. He knew that despite the Californian climate, the night was too far advanced for him to get out arms bare without diying of cold. He had let the others slip away to enjoy the tiny bathroom of their dressing room and let the warm water erase some of the throbbing pain in his shoulders and arms. It had been an absolutely wonderful concert and as always, he knew he would wake up with aches that would make him wince. He could still feel the energy that was bubbling under his skin, the excitement that still surrounded his belly and he hummed to himself in the shower, still swaying from one foot to the other while getting dressed again, a silly smile on the lips. Tomorrow he would feel empty, tired and lost. Months on the roads and the road had become like a bad habit that would be difficult to get rid of. They would all have two quiet days before their appointment with Crowley to establish what would follow. In the entertainment business, they had learned it harshly enough, vacation didn't exist. You had to constantly feed the public, give them something, occupy the media scene to not be forgotten, to continue to yield enough money to the record company so that the said compagny supports them during the time it would take to release a new album.

Sam really loved his life, but that aspect, he hated it. It didn't make much difference with what he had fled by going to Stanford. He always had someone on the back to tell him what to do, what not to do and if required, what to think. But he decided to put those worries off until later. For now he wanted to enjoy the joy bubbling in him, ideally by getting hold of Madison and a drink or two. His jacket in hand he went back to the hall where the roadies finished cleaning the stage for the last time. There were already cases of beer in the middle of the deserted pit and Kevin was bringing a big tray of sandwiches he placed in balance on one of the crates.

Madison was labelling a part of what would get to the recording studio placed at their disposal to store, among others, Sam's drums in it. She hadn't seen him, muttering to herself a code that would have eluded to anyone not working with them by checking items on a list that was in her hand. Sam sat next to Kevin and reached for a sandwich but remained suspended on the move, realizing he had a silly smile on his lips but not because of the excitement of the concert anymore. He was smiling precisely because it had just left him, leaving him pleasantly exhausted and happy. And it had happened by looking at Madison crumple her now useless list and wince when drawing herself up from the crouched position in which she was.

Sam felt calm, which rarely happened, and it was because of a girl he had known for two months.

Kevin nudged him. "You take that thing or you keep drooling?"

He took the sandwich but put it down on his knee without biting into it while the roadies were shouting out to each others across the room to gather around them.

"We lost a few on the way?" Bobby asked, sitting on a crate near Sam with a grunt.

Kevin nodded. "Dean is at Castiel's and I think I don't want to know where Charlie and Dorothy are."

"Those two made up?" The old manager asked, biting into a sandwich, holding the other hand to be given a beer. Sam handed him a can, nodding.

"Apparently."

They were all too tired for the after party to linger. An hour and three beers later, Sam and Madison were leaving the hall by the stage door, she slightly drunker than him, the arms of the drummer passed around her shoulders. They were about to skirt the building when someone came out of the shadows and Sam felt instantly sober while Madison, who was laughing at something he had said, paused suddenly.

"Good evening Sammy."

She felt the arm around her shoulders tense. By reflex she tightened the arm she had passed around the waist of Sam as she stared at the man who had just talked. He looked tired, was one full head taller than her (like most of the rest of the world), his beard was carefully maintained, his hair graying at the temples. She knew, without asking that she was standing in front of John Winchester.

"Dad." Sam greeted him.

They stared stonily at each other for a short time before John spoke again.

"Your brother's not here?"

Sam shook his head. "He left early. And if he were here he wouldn't want to see you. Me neither by the way."

"You don't have to directly start the fight."

"I don't have to be friendly, either." Sam mumbled. John frowned before turning to Madison, giving her an inquiring look.

"Good evening." She said. Greeting him seemed the best thing to do. She held out her free hand to the man who shook it. "My name is Madison."

"John Winchester." He looked at his son. "Glad to see that at least one of you has a normal relationship."

Sam frowned. "Dean has a normal relationship. He and Castiel are much more... a couple than us." He said, squeezing Madison's shoulder.

"Not a normal couple." John retorted. "I haven't raised my son to be..." He paused as if the word hurt him as much to say as it would hurt to hear it.

"Gay?" am offered with a wicked smile. "Of course not, because it never occured to you that your sons may have a free will and possibly different opinions from yours. It didn't come to your mind when I left for Stanford and you still hadn't understood when Dean returned from..."

"DON'T SPEAK OF THAT!" John lost his temper. "He could have been... You could have been men. But you preferred to avoid your responsibilities and Dean..."

"Dean did what you wanted." Sam said quietly. "He walked in your footsteps, he did exactly what you asked him and everything you taught him. If you dislike the result you can only blame yourself. You shouldn't have taught us to be honest, nor make us believe that there is only one way and one truth. Now your sons don't want to talk to you anymore and one of them rejected you so much that he became everything you loathe. Instead of training us to be mini you, you should have taught us to be ourselves. That's what real fathers do."

He was holding Madison so tight she could barely breathe and John had lowered his head, fists clenched at his sides.

"Try to understand Sam, it's hard to see his children take the wrong path!"

"What wrong path dad? I wanted to be a lawyer. Dean wanted to be you. And what are our crimes? Me to refuse to make war? And Dean to have been banned to do it because he didn't like the right people? Where did we screw up more than you dad? We didn't hurt anyone while you..."

His voice was stuck in his throat and he eventually loosened his grip on Madison shoulders, gently pushing her towards the corner of the building and turning his back on his father.

"Sam!"

His call went unanswered. He didn't follow them.

When jumping into a taxi a few minutes later they silently questionned each other on the address to give.

"If I go home, can you promise to not drink through doing something stupid?" Madison asked in hushed tones as he settled next to her. He shook his head with a sigh. She slipped back an arm around his waist and didn't let go during all the ride to the apartment of the Winchester, even after he had stopped trembling with rage. She wasn't immediately shocked by the lack of decoration. The place was clean even though it still smelled stale after remaining unoccupied for months. A very thin layer of dust covered just about everything except the coffee table where Sam certainly had eaten dinner the day before upon returning from the tour. Madison didn't know where he had found the time to fill the fridge, hers was still completely empty and she had only taken the time to plug it back that very morning after having been happily reunited with her own bed. He handed her an open beer that she began to sip while going around the kitchen and living room. Identifiaction tags were lying in a trinket bowl on the dresser and she grabbed them mechanically, brushing her thumb on one of them to dust it.

"Dean was in the army?" She asked, surprised, to Sam. He nodded. "Why did he stop?"

Sam let out a shrill laugh. "He didn't. He was dismissed during my first year at Stanford."

"Why?"

She immediately realized the idiocy of her question. Sam sighed and put his beer on the dresser before perching on it as if it was a wooden seat.

"Our father was a marines. You saw him he kept some characteristics. Among other things, he thinks the soldiers are all heroes, that they contribute to the safety of the American people, that they save lives every day."

"He's not entirely wrong."

"In a way." The young man agreed. "I've never really liked the idea of having to shoot someone who hasn't done anything to me just because I was given the order. I wanted to be a lawyer to change and move things up a bit but for my father lawyers and judges are only useless wankers living at taxpayer expense. It didn't go very well when I left home. At this time, Dean had already done two years in the Marines. He was good, really good, about to become officer. I still don't know if he did it to get the approval of our father or if he really thought he'd find meaning to his life into it... Anyway, I don't know the details, but it eventually was known that he didn't like girls. I guess someone reported him because in general soldiers prefer to ignore this stuff. He was fired and it went awfully bad when he returned home."

"How much time was it before the fire?" Madison asked, putting down the tags in their bowl.

"A few months. Dad must have gone too far and Dean left. The rest was a series of muddles... I know he accepted my idea of doing music just to keep me busy after the death of Jess. He always said it was better for me to hit on drums rather than on people. I wonder to what extent he might have thrown himself into it just to find anything to not think of what he could have been." He reached out to take the tags and examine them before putting them down. "I think he will always blame himself for not having been the son that dad wanted. Not having been a palliative for my insubordination."

Madison smiled. "Insubordination?"

Sam nodded. "That's what my father said."

"Sounds like you."

A comfortable silence settled while they finished their beers and Sam realized he was calm again, almost serene. The happiness and excitement of the concert were gone, but the presence of Madison was significantly alleviating the unpleasant sensation left by the visit of his father. He took out his MP3 player from the pocket of his jeans to go plug it into the speaker at the other end of the living room while Madison was throwing their empty bottles.

"You actually have a playlist called "Sex"?" She mocked, watching him scrolling through the songs in search of one that would suit them.

"I have a playlist for everything." He answered. He was squatting in front of the lower cabinet on which were posed the speakers and for once, Madison was tall enough to be able to put her chin on his shoulder if she sat up on her knees.

"I almost don't know any of these songs." Dit elle.

"That's the idea. You do not want hyper-known songs in a playlist for sex. First, it distracts while you just want set the mood. Then, if sex is bad, you don't want it to ruin your favorite song. What would that do to you if you were listening to "You Give Love A Bad Name" while you're bored in bed?"

Madison burst into a laugh. "I guess I would never hear it again without wincing."

"Exactly."

"Hey I like this one!" She said, pointing to a title that Sam had long forgotten it was part of this playlist. He pressed the button and the music surrounded them almost instantly.

"So we'll try not to ruin it." He said just before turning his head toward her to kiss her on the cheek. Her skin was soft and her eyelashes tickled him as he felt her fingers hold onto his hair. It was strange but not difficult to smile, kissing her, taking her in his arms and guiding her to the bed. It was natural and soothing.

"You can never go back

To the things that once were

But there's always a place

Where you can go seek shelter"

Sam had often heard that after the death of their mother, Dean carried his little brother in his bed at night and would lie near him, his forehead against the baby's cheek, his arms gingerly wrapped around him. He had gotten over it fast enough, probably more for fear of choking him than because he really had gotten over. Then Sam had grown up and everyone had remained in his own bed until the death of Jess. That day, they had wandered between the police station and the rubble of the apartment, Sam with a blank expression, Dean with fists clenched.

That night for the first and only time in his life, Sam had slipped into the bed of his brother, curled up against his chest and wept, his hands clinging to the old Metallica shirt. And Dean, who hadn't known what to do to soothe him all day did what he had always done. He held him tight against himself, laid his cheek against his own and rocked him, as long as needed, never stopping to repeat "It's going to be okay Sammy, I promise it'll be."

Sam remembered the warmth, the heart of Dean who beat against his own all night, as if it gave him a pace to follow, as if it obliged him to live. As strange and impossible it may seem, Dean had kept his promise, and things had been okay.

He remembered it by waking up alongside Madison the next morning. She was shorter than Jess, didn't have the same scent and her skin hadn't the same texture. But the heat, the beating heart, her breath on his neck were the same and for a moment, just a tiny little moment, Sam closed his eyes and began to imagine that nothing had ever happened. That he was still little and that nothing had happened. Neither his mother, nor Jess, nor the rest.

But he was an adult now. He gently disengaged from Madison's embrace without waking her and pulled the covers over her, moving her hair aside from her face now buried in the pillow to tuck her. He put the first t-shirt that came to hand, smiling at the contact with the cotton so worn that it had become what was softer in the largely common wardrobe of the two brothers. The Metallica logo was almost erased by the successive laundries and he was pretty sure their smell were fixed into it forever. It was reassuring and comforting even in days like this where everything was fine.

He went into the kitchen to let the coffee drip while looking at the sky through the window. Contrary to popular belief there was sometimes an unpleasant weather in Los Angeles and for now the sky was a gray uniform not dark enough for the brightness to blind his tired eyes. He was still yawning when the phone rang.

"Yup?"

The coffee had just filtered, spreading its good smell in the kitchen and he vaguely heard Madison get out of bed, probably awakened by the ring tone or hunger.

"Sammy..."

Sam knew every inflection of the voice of his brother. He hadn't heard this one for a very long time and he clenched his hand around the cup he had just brought out of the cupboard while Madison entered the kitchen.

"Dad is in hospital."

The cup smashed on the floor, startling Madison.

"I watched over you since we were kids,

I'll take the pain and the guilt

If there's anything dying for, this is it

I just wanted to say I'm sorry it ended like this"