Chapter 7: Say Something

Say something, I'm giving up on you.

I'll be the one if you want me to.

Anywhere I would've followed you.

Say something, I'm giving up on you.

- A Great Big World feat. Christina Aguilera

"Oh, Shelby." Sam breathed out. She was asleep on the crisp hospital bed. There were cuts and bruises all over her exposed skin. Her lip was busted up pretty good, and her eyes were still a little swollen. Her nose had a butterfly bandage and stitches over it. The bastard. Sam clenched his jaw and walked up to her. Hearing his soft voice among the beeping machines pulled her out of whatever dream she had been having.

"Sam?" She said. Her voice was hoarse from screaming. She had woken up halfway through the drive to the hospital and had a panic attack; they had to subdue her with a shot. She tried sitting up in bed. No good, the wires and her own weakness prevented it. Her body screamed in pure agony as she let herself fall down onto the white sheets once more. Sam rushed over to her and sat next to her on the bed; he grabbed her right hand softly within his own. Sam couldn't tell if it was Shelby's hand or his own that was sweating. He swallowed audibly before speaking.

"Shelby, what happened? Who found you? Dean and I came up after we lost the trail and there were a bunch of cops everywhere. They had already taken you here. I checked out the motel room. Dean had to go to Bobby's to avoid the police. He'll be waiting for us when we get you out of here." Sam said gently. He didn't want to overwhelm Shelby. She closed her eyes. She was trying to remember everything clearly.

"The cops found me. Someone reported hearing a gunshot apparently, from where I shot him. They, uh… They broke the door open as he was um… He had just started to..." She opened her dull green eyes and looked at Sam hard. Tears were beginning to fall down her bruised face. Sam didn't say anything. He knew to let Shelby talk if she needed to. She wasn't one for sharing, so when she opened the door, Sam never shut it. He took in a shaky breath, not sure if she was going to continue. He wanted to kill the bastard all over again when he saw him in the body bag with his pants down.

"Sam, I don't know if I want to go to Bobby's." Sam could tell it was hard for her to confess that to him. Her voice cracked a few times. He sighed and released her hand, grabbing a chair from across the room and sitting more comfortably in it.

"Shelby, before too long, they're going to run fingerprints on you. We can't let that happen." Shelby looked at Sam sadly and nodded.

"I'm scared Sam. I just... Don't know if I can look at him right now." Sam's eyes got wide at what Shelby said. That skin-walker must have really messed with her mind. What would Dean think? How was he even going to tell his older brother that the love of his life didn't want to look at him. Screw Dean. Shelby needs you. Be there for her. Sam smiled softly and grabbed her hand again.

"Well, we can hole up somewhere until you're ready, okay?" Shelby smiled softly at the youngest Winchester brother and laid her head back down on the soft white pillow. She let her eyes drift shut, all the while thinking of how safe she felt while Sam was sitting over her. When Shelby had finally fallen into a deep sleep, Sam took out his phone and dialed Dean's back-up number. It rang once.

"How is she Sam? Is she okay? Can I come get you guys now?" Dean's voice was low and worry seeped through the receiver into Sam's ear. He sighed. Again. Even though some part of him was happy Shelby didn't want to see Dean, he didn't like the circumstances.

"Dean, listen. That monster, it looked like you. It tortured Shelby. Bad. She's beat up. That's physically, I don't know what's going on in her head. She won't tell me much about what happened. But Dean, she did-"

"I'm turning around. She needs me. I should be there with her! Not you!" Sam pulled the phone back from his ear at Dean's shouting.

"Dean, she doesn't want to see you right now." Silence. Sam waited a second before clearing his throat.

"Dean? Are you still-"

"Yeah. Call me when she gets out."

"Okay. Bye Dean." Sam pulled the phone away from his ear, going to hang up.

"Sammy?"

"Yeah?"

"Tell her I love her. Tell her I'll be waiting for her. Tell her to be strong for me, because I need her. More than anything." Sam could hear his brothers tears through the phone. He took a long pause before replying.

"Yeah, okay. Call you later." Sam shoved the phone back into his pocket. He looked at the sleeping woman one last time before pulling the covers up more over her thin frame. He told himself he didn't want to wake her; not for Dean's message. He stood up and headed to the reception desk to start the discharge paperwork. He was going to try and pull her as an FBI suspect. Hopefully it would work.

-TOL-

Three days later they were on the road. Zach and the other charged man were released, the Dean Look-A-Like was charged with all three counts of torture. Case closed. Sam still hadn't spoken to Shelby about his conversation with Dean. He was going to enjoy this time with her, even after what happened. He wasn't going to watch her spiral if he mentioned his brothers name. They holed up in a tiny motel room a few towns away from Bobby's. Shelby spent most of the time sleeping or watching Three's Company re-runs. Sam spent most of the time watching her. On the sixth day, Sam was sleeping in his bed, the sun hadn't woken him up yet. He felt a now familiar weight on the bed as Shelby crawled in next to him. He put his arm around her and started rubbing lightly on her back.

"Hey." He breathed out. Shelby snuggled into the crook of his shoulder more. It was comfortable, but it wasn't Dean's body she was curled into. It didn't feel natural. It felt safe. That's what she needed right now. To feel safe. Dean's face flashed through her mind again and she started crying, not out of fear. She was mad at herself for being so scared. The man waiting for her at Bobby's was not the same man who did this to her. Yet she couldn't get that through her brain. She hated herself. Would Dean understand? She wasn't sure she would if the rolls were reversed. She also wasn't sure if she should be asking this question to Sam. But she didn't really have anyone else to talk to.

"You ever think about if Dean and I hadn't been together?" Sam smirked lightly, although a small frown graced his forehead. He had definitely thought about it. A million times.

"What?"

"I mean, if Dean and I weren't a thing, I don't think I'd be so messed up from this. Ya know?" Shelby turned her almost healed face up towards the man in bed with her. Wrong brother. She blinked a few times. Stupid heart. Stupid head. Stupid her. Sam took a big breath in, his big chest pushing against Shelby.

"Sorry, I'm just thinking out loud... Never mind." Shelby sat up in the bed, before she could get out, Sam bolted up and kissed her. Shelby was so stunned, she couldn't move. Her eyes were still open, looking at Sam's face. She pulled back gently and put her hands on his chest.

"Sam... I think you took that whole conversation the wrong way..." She wasn't mad at him. She felt so bad for him. This wasn't fair to Sam. Her clinging onto him for comfort. That's your boyfriend's job, dipshit. Shelby didn't want to string him along. She hadn't realized she was until the moment his soft lips met her still swollen ones.

"I'm sorry." He was suddenly very interested in getting a manicure. Shelby sat there, waiting to see if that was all he had to say.

"I just, hate seeing you like this Shelby. I want to comfort you and be here for you. It's just hard not to feel these things when I'm around you. Especially when Dean's not here." Shelby looked at the youngest brother softly before grabbing his face with her hands. She leaned in and placed a soft, chaste kiss onto his cheek.

"Sam, I love you, very much. I would do anything for you. Hell, I'd take a bullet for you. And I will never be able to repay you for what you've been helping me with these past few days. But I think it's time I buck up and face my fears…" She paused to take in a shaky breath.

"I miss him, Sam. So much. I'm mad at myself for being so scared. And I think being here with you is only keeping me scared, because I feel so safe here with you, like I never have to see him again. But my heart aches so bad. I love him so much. I don't know what to do anymore." Shelby had started crying halfway through the first sentence. She clenched her chest. When she said her heart hurt, she wasn't lying. The longer she was away from Dean under these circumstances, the more her body physically hurt. She was making herself sick. She wiped her eyes with her hands and looked up into Sam's hazel eyes. With the look Sam gave her, she knew he didn't take her telling him she loved him wrong. Good. Because she did love him, he was her family.

"Okay. Okay so, we just need to get packed up. I can have us back at Bobby's in about 5 hours." Sam got up out of bed quickly and started packing his things. Shelby took a deep breath. She had a burst of courage about facing Dean again. But she had a feeling that might change when she actually saw him again. She needed to do this though. She would never get better if she didn't face her fear.

-TOL-

Almost a month had passed and Dean was heartbroken. Shelby would barely talk to him. When she did, it was about the current hunt they were on that week. He knew that skin-walker had messed her up, but he didn't think it would take this long for her to deal with it. He wanted to hold her so badly it made him sick. He heard her crying at night and saying his name in her dreams. The first night they returned, a week after the accident, she had been having a nightmare. Dean got up from the couch where he was sleeping and crawled into bed next to her. It felt so right.

She had bolted awake and screamed bloody murder to his face, scrambling away, falling backwards off the bed. Sam jumped out of his bed and scooped her up in his arms. She calmed down immediately. Dean watched as his brother put his girlfriend down on the other bed. Sam glanced over to Dean. He had been expecting something close to a punch in the face, or gut. Maybe a bullet to the head? He was not expecting a pair of red-rimmed green eyes with tears falling out of them. Dean didn't say a word. Just grabbed his jacket and gun and walked out. Sam could hear the Impala's engine roar to life and tires peeling out of the parking lot. Shelby hadn't said a word the next morning as Dean came stumbling in, still drunk, and grumbled about the case.

Dean hadn't tried to help Shelby with her nightmares since then. He knew they were about him. He could hear Shelby talking to Sam about them sometimes when they thought he was asleep. He was ready to give up. He wanted to give up on her. It was breaking his heart seeing the scared and pained look in her eyes every time she looked at him. It wasn't fair to her when she saw him looking at her with longing. Dean would do anything for this girl. If she wanted him, then he would be there. He would follow her anywhere, to the ends of the oceans. She just wouldn't talk to him. He needed her to talk to him.

Shelby, on the other hand, was fighting with herself every day. She could barely talk to Dean. It was easy to talk business. Her mindset changed when she thought about killing monsters. It was talking about other things that made her want to combust. She was so angry and sad when she saw how Dean looked at her. She wasn't being fair to him. She needed to say something before he gave up.

It was a bright and sunny morning when Dean was woken up by a gentle shaking of his shoulder. He slowly opened his eyes and turned over. He came face-to-face with Shelby. A pleasant surprise.

"Good morning, Pr- Is everything okay?" Dean stopped himself from calling her Princess. He was trying not to trigger anything. This was the first time she had reached out to him in any way. She looked at Sam, still asleep in his own bed, and nodded towards the door. Dean raised his eyebrows but followed the beauty outside.

He leaned on the railing of the small motel porch they were on. Blood red clouds filled the morning sky, fading into dark blues the further away from the sunrise. He let his eyes drift over Shelby. She was drowning in one of his old, faded Metallica band shirts and a pair of her pajama shorts, almost invisible under the hem of his shirt. Her long brown hair was pulled messily up in a huge bun, hanging sideways off her head, and her eyes were puffy from crying. Dean didn't speak. He was too scared. Even though he had a million things he wanted to say, Shelby needed to engage him first. He heard her take a deep breath and turn her head towards him. He jolted his eyes back up the the clouds so as not to freak Shelby out.

"Beautiful, huh?" Shelby said, looking at the red sunrise. Dean tore his eyes away from the clouds, towards Shelby.

"Yeah. Sure as hell is." He said softly. Shelby didn't meet his eyes. He turned back out to the water.

"Red sky at night, sailors' delight-"

"Red sky at morning, sailor take warning.." Dean finished the little saying, still looking out at the horizon. Seagulls flew over the sparkling water. They could hear the noises of the sleepy sea-side town starting to wake up. Boat engines were roaring to life, Captains shouted orders at their fishermen. Dogs barking, children playing happily, waiting for the bus to take them to school. Shelby's mind went to a different time and place.

-TOL-

Shelby sat about ten feet behind Dean, who had a chair planted right at the edge of the water. His bare feet were mushed down in the sand, toes wiggling every time a wave him them. She was watching him cast out a fishing pole over the crystal blue water of the bay.

"You can come closer, nothing will get you. I promise. Besides, you can see the bottom of the ocean for miles out. It's why they call it Clearwater." Dean had a slight smirk on his face. Shelby sighed and scooted her chair closer to the teenage boy. She was rigid in her beach chair, with a wary glare at the ocean water. Once she was satisfied that nothing could sneak up on her, she moved her green eyes to the horizon. She smiled.

"It's gorgeous. I've never been to the ocean before. I think this has to be the most beautiful sunset I've ever seen." Dean agreed with her. The crimson sky was a sharp contrast to the dark water further out in the ocean. Rich violets and indigos blended together in the evening sky.

"You know, there's a saying my mom used to tell me when we came here before Sam was born. See, I would always ask her and my dad if we could go out on this fishing boat my dad used to rent. She got so tired of telling me yes or no every day." Dean laughed along with Shelby. She could see that happening.

"Red sky at night, sailors' delight. Red sky at morning, sailor take warning."

"That's beautiful." Dean nodded in agreement and turned back to his pole.

"Yeah, I used to think she made it up herself, until we ate at the local restaurant a week later and I saw the saying on the wall behind her chair." Shelby smiled even brighter than she already was. There was a pregnant pause between the two.

"I could probably stay here forever. Watching the sun rise and set. Right here in this spot." Shelby sighed comfortably. Dean reeled his line back in and put more bait on it. He threw the line back out and set the pole down over a crudely made holder and stared at Shelby. She was wearing dark blue jean shorts and a white tank top. She had her mom's rose earrings on, as well as the black rose and diamond ring. Her long brown hair was in a loose braid off the side of her neck. The sunset wasn't the prettiest thing here tonight, Dean decided.

"You know, the view from the town is great at night, all the lights shining off the bay. But there's a spot about a mile out that my dad used to take us to on clear nights, we would sleep on the boat, watch the sunset. The lights would come on shortly after. The town's lights from out there, it's so beautiful, I used to think there was nothing to compare it to. Then in the morning, the fog horns would wake us up just in time to see the sunrise." Shelby smiled.

"That sounds amazing." She hesitated.

"One day, when we get you comfortable in the water, I'm taking you to my family's old spot. I promise."

"And what if I never get over this fear?"

"I'll make sure of it."

"Okay."

"Okay. Now, does the Princess wanna learn how to throw a proper line out?"

-TOL-

She finally raised her eyes to his.

"Do you remember Clearwater?" She asked timidly. Dean smiled softly and looked back out at the water. She had looked so beautiful that day. The sun shining on her sun-bleached hair, her dark tanned skin against that white tank top.

"Yeah."

"Dean, I... I'm sorry. I don't know what's wrong with me. But I do know that it's been killing you. This isn't fair. I don't know how to fix it." A lone tear broke out from her green eyes as she finished speaking. Dean took in a sharp breath. He didn't want to fuck this up.

"Shelby. I love you. I always will. No matter what. I'll be here for you. The only thing that is killing me is watching you suffer and I can't do a damn thing about it. I have to watch... I have to watch my brother comfort you. That's supposed to be my job." Dean tried to hold back the tears that were threatening to fall. He stepped closer to her. He could see her body tense at the small movement. Say something, damn it.

"I love you, too. I miss you. I hate this. I just, don't know how to overcome it. I know it wasn't you. Not really you at least, that did this to me." Shelby stepped closer to Dean, her body still tense. She looked up at him, searching for some kind of answer to help her through this.

"I can help you. You just have to let me in. That's all. Please." Shelby stared hard at Dean. She was shaking so hard, being this close to him. It brought up so many memories. She bit her bottom lip, then sucked in a breath when her teeth hit a cut that hadn't healed all the way. She looked up at Dean's face.

"I feel so many emotions around you. Most of them are the good ones. But the bad ones, from that monster; he just, trumps them all. I just can't seem to shake him." She rested her forehead on his chest, seeming to relax a bit. She was having the biggest internal battle she could remember having. She knew that it wasn't Dean that did this to her. She still loved him and missed his touch every day.

"You gotta talk to me. I can't help you unless you tell me what's going through that pretty little head of yours." Shelby smiled softly, remembering her twentieth birthday. The night Dean told her he loved her. Her smile got a bit bigger before it fell again. She took a deep breath and really thought about why she was such a mess. Was the anger she was feeling directed towards the beast that did this? Or was it at herself for letting it get to her? dean waited patiently for a few minutes before shuffling his feet, slightly impatient, but trying to be understanding. The slight movement brought Shelby out of her thought and back to what she wanted to say.

"I guess the biggest reason I'm still a mess is because I'm mad at myself. I'm mad because I haven't let you in yet. I'm mad because I got so weak… in front of him. I'm mad because I'm hurting you. I'm mad because I'm letting some fucking monster ruin my life. I don't want to be that kind of person Dean." Dean thought for a heartbeat about what to say. Should he be soft towards her? Would she be soft towards him? He decided to say exactly what he was thinking, which some people would think of as slightly harsh, but he knew from experience that was how Shelby got through things the best.

"Well, Shelby. You have to let it go. Let your anger go. The bastard's dead. There's no need for him to be ruining you anymore. You're the strongest person I know." Dean smiled when the girl in front of him wrapped her arms around his chest. She didn't give up on him. He felt guilty for wanting to give up on her. He hugged her so tight, like he would never let go. He lowered his head and dug his face into the crook of her shoulder, trying not to let any tears fall, but failing after a few moments. He could still feel how tense she was, but the important part was that he was touching her. She was letting him touch her. His heart felt like it was bursting.

Shelby felt so relieved. She tried to tell her body to relax. This is Dean. Her Dean. The one that had always been there for her. The one who would never, in a million years, lay a hand on her. She started to relax her body, letting herself sink into her man's arms. She let go. Of everything. She let go of the anger towards the skin-walker, she let go of the anger towards herself. She let go of it all. Once she felt her shoulder sleeve getting slightly wet, her own tears streamed freely down her face, soaking Dean's white shirt. He held onto her hard, letting her know he would never let her go.

"Dean. I'm so sorry."

"It's okay, Princess."

"Say it again." Dean was confused slightly.

"It's okay. Everything will be fine. I'm here now." He stroked the back of her head with his hand. The other still gripped tightly around her waist.

"No..."

"Princess?"

"He never said it. He called me so many things. But he never uttered that word. That's what kept me hanging on." Dean's heart broke all over again. His poor baby girl. All he knew is he needed to hold her. Tell her everything would be alright, even if he wasn't sure it would be. They stayed like that, Dean leaning backwards on the porch railing with Shelby wrapped tightly in his arms, softly breathing into his chest, for a long while before Sam busted through the motel door. Dean held on tightly to Shelby when she jumped at the commotion.

Sam just stared at the couple. He didn't have anything to say. He knew this time would come. He just wished it would never have come, that she would never build up the courage to do what she had said she needed to almost a month ago. Who was he kidding? Shelby was the strongest person he knew.

"Guys, uh. I need to talk to you." Shelby pulled away from Dean reluctantly. She walked past Sam into the low lit hotel room to sit and wait for whatever research Sam had gathered on their current case. Dean walked toward the open motel door before Sam shoved a large hand in his brother's chest.

"I'm happy for you guys. I've never seen her so miserable without you." Dean didn't make eye contact with his younger brother, just nodded once and pushed past the hand into the room.

-TOL-

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