13

The next day was Monday, so Sam had to work. Before he left he opened Dean's door to take a quick peek inside, his brother was sound asleep. Sam tucked him in and left a note saying "breakfast is on the table", he thought for a moment and then took out Dean's phone, wanting to put himself on the emergency contact list. He discovered there was already an emergency contact in the phone, B, and suddenly he felt a surge of panic. Their separation was never a one-way thing, Dean had been absent from his life for so long that he too held no place in the past five years in Dean's life.

Sam put in three digits and his own number popped out, it was already in the phone and named "DO NOT CALL".

Sam renamed it to "CALL THIS—Sammy" and set it as the emergency contact.

After he dropped Amelia off to work he came to the firm before he was late.

His colleagues gathered around him and were all genuinely concerned about his disappearance at the engagement ceremony, Sam explained: "There was a bit of accident, don't worry, I really got it all fixed."

As the crowd dispersed he stopped Lindsey: "Wait a sec, do you know a person called 'Dean'?"

Lindsey shot him a strange look: "Since when do I have to report my hookups to you?"

"Did you meet last night?"

Lindsey was defensive: "Yes. We met. That's all you need to know."

"It's nothing like that." Sam found the fact that someone else was nervously sticking up for Dean really amusing, "You know he's still under surveillance right? And I'm his guardian?"

"So what? You're getting engaged, there has to be one cute guy with green eyes in the whole world who's for me right?" Lindsey ran her hand through her hair, "He told me about his connection with you, and if you ask me, that guy's quite lucky, he's a fan of yours and now you're his guardian. Poor Dean, who just happened to walk into the wrong house at the wrong time, but he's actually a nice person. I can live with that, and I hope you won't have any prejudice against him either. "

"My... fan?" Sam was interested, "Did he tell you about his job?"

"He fixes cars." Lindsey said with a bright smile: "I don't need some Wolf from Wall Street, muscular, brawny macho's more of my type."

Sam whistled: "Good for you."

That casual atmosphere was only temporary, Sam thought about that patch of blood on Dean's leg and how Dean had looked down on him, Dean thought he would be too dull to notice the details due to dim lighting or his long times away from battlefield. Sam knew that Dean didn't want him to put himself at risk again, of course he doesn't want to put himself at risk, nobody likes it, but what he needed more was to make sure that Dean was safe. Dean had never learned to put himself in Sam's shoes, he guessed that the only things in Dean's brain were "Sammy" and "sex".

The first thing Sam did was to hack into the surveillance camera in the police station, yesterday he had forgotten to delete the footage where he and Dean met, which was a terrible blunder. He and Dean should have been two ordinary people whose lives never cross before and the closest emotion they could have developed was that of one skilled person to another who had stopped the same robbery, which was nothing close to what they had shown. What could he have done, how could he just stay all calm and emotionless when a living Dean appeared before him. He couldn't, because his soul was right there lying inside his body.

Sam had wanted to delete that video, but after playing it on loop and watching it with obsession for three whole minutes, he carefully saved the file into his phone.

Dean started to stay out all nights, Amelia hardly had the chance to see him and except the constantly reducing number of beers in the fridge there were no signs telling her that there was a third person staying here. On the rare occasions they did meet Dean would just grin and say "thanks for your pie" or "I'll be there for your next engagement party", and if Sam hadn't interrupted in their conversation it looked like that Dean couldn't resist to throw a slumber party with Amelia or offer his advice on their engagement ceremony.

Sam knew that Dean was secretly following up on a case, but he ran through all the news and New York was just her usual self, he was baffled. Dean's anklet showed that he never left his radius, he even went to Lindsey's twice a week like clockwork, which was also validated by Lindsey herself. From the beginning where Sam would ask about Dean, to now where Lindsey couldn't stop showing Dean off to him whenever she saw Sam, the glow on Lindsey's face was growing more vivid each day that Sam had this vague thought that Dean was getting ready to settle down. He even thought to himself: Dean and Lindsey, it's not bad, at least they'll live close enough to each other, which is definitely way better than that "brothers at Christmas" plan of Dean's.

Sometimes Dean would come home wounded, he would hide from Sam but Sam just knew it. Dean wouldn't let Sam tend to his wounds, fortunately they were all just flesh wounds. Sam began to keep an eye on the first-aid kit at home, he put a lot of new salves and bandages in it.

Dean never drove the Impala, as if that would somehow cover up the fact that he was still hunting.

On the seventeenth day where Sam was preoccupied because of the continuously-appearing wounds on Dean's body, he decided to ask his boss for leave. His employer had always liked Sam, he was his star attorney with an exceptional success rate. But Sam was kind of strange this time, he couldn't even give an exact date of his return from leave. The boss asked him: "Are you not happy with your salary? We can talk into the details about getting you a raise."

"No, sir."

"Then you're taking some time off to prepare for your wedding?"

"No." In fact, Sam had almost forgotten that it was not long since he had proposed to Amelia, but now he can't even settle down to have sex with her. Every night Dean was away, and at the thought of him being out there alone and facing all the dangers he felt that even his erection was a sin.

"Were you poached by another firm?"

"No."

Boss paused for a moment: "Mr. Wesson, you know that I have always valued you, but this is New York, and I'm not wasting my money on idlers. You want your indefinite leave, that's fine, but you're also facing the risk of losing your job."

"Need I hand in my resignation?"

His employer hadn't expected him to be so decisive: "I rather hope that you'll be back, unless a better candidate shows up."

Sam had a lot on his mind, he signed without hesitation: "Thank you, sir. If I come back to being a lawyer, I won't go to any other firm."

His boss was liberal: "Whatever is it that you're going to do, good luck, Sam."

During daytime Dean would sleep inside the house, and Sam still went out in his car to avoid any suspicions. He would park around any street corner and begin his investigation and take a nap whenever he felt tired. For him, the Impala would always be one of the best beds in the world to get a good night's sleep on. At night he would start following Dean around. He discovered that Dean had a close relationship with a man, they were meeting at random locations within Dean's radius and were smart enough to make it seem like Dean was just running around like a headless chicken, changing the site of hookup aimlessly, devoted to set foot on each and every bar, diner and cafe within the three-mile radius.

He obviously trusted that man very much. When Dean talked with Sam he was always laughing airily, but at this man's presence he was able to express his pain and show him his wounds with grimace on his face.

On the fifth day, when Dean's injuries were mostly healed, Sam finally saw the monster Dean was hunting.

They looked just like any other man or woman, except that they didn't bleed and that they seemed immune to almost any form of harm. Fighting them was like playing a game in endless mode. Dean acted like he didn't know what discouragement was and kept on swinging his machete tirelessly, Sam realized he wasn't trying to kill those monsters, he was just keeping them here with him for the night. Several times Sam nearly rushed over but he didn't want to distract Dean, he saw that Dean's companion was a vampire and he was helping Dean.

When dawn came, the fight ended.