28
The night is tranquil. The Hudson River kept the city at a faraway distance, and only the densely built-up silhouette of Manhattan was in sight like the fine teeth of a gigantic shark. The night mist pulled heaven and earth closer, a deep shade of blue filled the air, the heavy clouds had obscured the moonlight that should have been there and thus all lights left seemed to be covered in a hazy veil. Gravestones too numerous to count were scattered on the ground, here and there grew a few trees with branches already dead, short grasses of wintertime withered, revealing small patches of bare earth. Not long ago there was a snowfall here, and now the melted snow had frozen into a thin and crisp layer of ice that crunched when stepped onto. The headlights of the Impala lit up only the field in front of them, the brothers stumbled through the graveyard carrying heavy weight and stopped beside the gravestone of one of them.
"Hurry up." Sam urged. They lay something that was wrapped in black cloth on the ground, unpackaged it, and stopped simultaneously. Dean flinched a little at what he saw, he stammered: "I gotta say, man, this is weird, even for us."
On the ground lay two lifeless bodies, they had the brothers' exact same faces.
Sam concentrated on putting the cloth away: "Don't look at him."
"Him?" Dean cried in disbelief, "It's it! All the twigs and twine dolls are 'it', not to mention some... half-doll that can't even move."
"If you ease up a bit and shut up we can get out of here sooner."
"You sure these things won't come to life?"
"I'm sure. It's not like they have our hearts." Sam said, "I've been researching on the witchcraft of making twigs and twine dolls for a month, but you, I can't believe you didn't even think to take a look at the most basic spells."
"That's your job."
"...Yeah, so glad to hear you say that."
Dean lay down behind Dean-clone and tried to find an appropriate position, his head rested on one of his hands and he put his other hand on his stomach. Apparently he liked it, so he placed his clones hands to the same position and asked Sam in excitement: "How about this?"
Sam sank his head into his hands, this felt even worse than when he managed to ditch two police cars following him, he looked down at his big brother lying across before him: "Dean?"
"So?" God he's actually asking for advice.
"You're dying, not shooting for a porno magazine." He said through gritted teeth, "I think we're fine just lying flat."
"They."
"They're fine just lying flat."
"But we're felons on the run, there's no evil we won't do, only our tragic death would be convincing enough."
"The police, or the FBI, all those people who are hunting us down, they won't care how we died as long as we are dead. After all a pair of brothers who died three times is a scandal to anyone."
"You're my little genius. Whatever you say." Dean obeyed. He got up from the ground and walked to Sam's side.
Sam looked at the Winchesters on the ground, their hands were layered on top of each other. He decided that his big brother was having too much fun with this whole matter of faking their deaths. He snorted: "You're so childish."
"Really? Last time I checked I'm four years more mature than you." Dean raised his eyebrows and laughed like an idiot. Sam looked at him disapprovingly, "You should be glad that I'm mature enough not to continue this topic."
Dean suddenly turned his face away, his shoulders trembled slightly.
"...Dean?"
"I just... You know how long has it been since we last talked and laughed like this. God, you know hoe much I miss this?"
His eyes were shining with tears.
Sam bowed his head and kissed him on the forehead, he said: "I know."
This wasn't what being on the run supposed to look like. They should get in the car and leave here immediately, they should run as far away as possible, but instead, they just stood there. The world furled its vastness for them, it assumed the form of a human being: just this tall, no more than 6'4''.
Silence.
Then, a voice said: "Say something, Sammy."
"...You really don't know how to appreciate the good things." Sam commented.
"Not this, say something else."
"What do you want to hear? I thought I said enough."
Dean hemmed and hawed for a while: "Tell me what you buried."
"Fine." Sam agreed without hesitation, "You write me a letter back first."
"Writing a letter—" He was clearly reluctant and told Sam with that you-know-me expression, "it's not something I would do."
"You've already written. I saw it, on the back of the envelope." Sam showed no mercy, "Seriously? Notepaper is that precious in jail?"
"You answer me first." Dean bit the bullet and added a threat that was not so threatening, "Or I'll burn my letter."
Sam nodded, he raised his hand and pointed to that gravestone: "Look there." Then he asked, "What do you see?"
"My gravestone."
Dean was lost, he turned down the corners of his mouth, but what Sam said next seized him.
"No, it's ours."
Sam said.
Suddenly everything became clear for Dean. His name wasn't engraved out of place, it was right at its most suitable place, waiting for the day for his little brother to come here, to die here.
Their names would be engraved together.
HERE LIES SAM AND DEAN WINCHESTER.
Dean gave himself a little shake and gazed at that part left blank on the gravestone. He whispered: "It's you."
In his deafening heartbeat, Sam confirmed: "It's me."
What Sam said was true, their arrest warrants were removed even faster than when they were issued. No one would ever doubt real bodies.
"This is a miracle." Dean nodded his head up and down, "There's actually perks for us in this job. I mean, hunting, can you believe it, for once we finally benefit from it."
"Yeah, perhaps the supernatural is not as bad as we thought." Sam never thought that one day he himself would say something like this, the way he looks at things had changed drastically over the years. "A lot of things are not as bad as we thought."
"You're referring to something in particular."
"For example, it wouldn't hurt to let me take a look at what you wrote."
"That again." An unnatural blush appeared on Dean's cheeks, "Wait til we actually find a motel. We've driven across five states without getting even one decent sleep, it's inhuman."
Sam stuck his head out from the backseat as he rubbed his back which got stiff from sleeping: "Did you propose to me in the letter? What's in there you dared to write it but don't dare to admit it now?"
Dean pretended not to hear that: "You sure these credit cards are safe? You have laundered all of Sam Wesson's savings?"
"I'm no worse gambler than you. All the cash Wesson had withdrawn was replaced, I promise." Sam lay back down and put his forearm on his forehead, he said with certainty, "You will show me one day."
Dean's reply was delivered to Sam on the morning of Valentine's Day. They used this period of time to get rid of a ghost of level one difficulty and a lone werewolf, they wanted to take things slowly. When Sam woke up in the morning in Minnesota, the bed next to him was empty, he was terrified and immediately jumped out of bed and began to search for Dean wildly. It was not until he ran to the door dressed only in his underwear and his hand was already on the doorknob did he realize what had flashed through in sight. A little, white square piece of paper, lying on the table.
He took a deep breath before he walked over, he picked up the note beside it first, Dean wrote in all caps: "DON'T EVER BRING IT UP AGAIN. YOU CANYOU'D BETTER BURN IT."
Sam laughed out loud, he returned to his bedside with this hard-won letter in hand and put on his trousers. Then he saw the date on his phone, he found out that today was Valentines Day. His smile widened.
Dean's letter was written on the back of the envelope. In fact, he was still in jail when he wrote this, and he thought that he would never see Sam Winchester again in his life, he wasn't expecting this to be read at all. So he wrote most sincerely and fervently, he used his laps as a desk and just kept on writing with his trembling pen, because he didn't know when he would be taken away, he left his heart on this envelope.
The words were scribbled down untidily, but it was enough for Sam to recognize what he had written.
He began reading it with cherish.
"Sammy,
I've been thinking about what you said, and I try to understand love. Of course I love you, I love you as your big brother, but do I love you just as a person spending the rest of his life with you, I don't know, Sam, I've found out that I never even loved any person. This is just so ridiculous isn't it? I've had sex with many women and I never loved any one of them, that makes me happy, but that's just physical pleasure, I've never thought about developing a relationship with any of them, I've always known that I won't have a healthy family life. I never loved anybody seriously anyways.
Except for you, Sam, you're the only person I love, I don't know what kind of love this is, but I know for sure I love you, and only you, I can give you my everything. But you've always been running away from me—I'm talking about this again—and I can't blame you for that, you're so good, smart, brave, upright, and kind, while I'm just...me.
For a time I thought you care about me as much as I love you, but you said you wouldn't do the same things for me, and only at that moment did I realize how funny I was. I'm not so important to you, there are things more right that come before me in line. For me, saving people, hunting things, family business, all that stuff to make the world a better place, I do them so that you can live in a better world. Without you, the whole world is just nothing to me and it isn't worth it anymore.
I don't like Amelia. Of course I don't like the woman you're marrying, she doesn't deserve you, god, no one deserves you. But you can get anything you want. Whatever it is that you want, I'm willing to help you get it. I want you to be happy, to find happiness, you can go seek everything you want. So, of course, I love you. I've loved you since the day you were born, I don't know what's the better way to treat you.
The back of the envelope was full of writing. Sam swallowed, he paused a moment before flipping the envelope over. The words on this side was clearly written more hastily, Dean's handwriting wrapped his, sentences were clustered thickly together.
I've always thought that love is about enjoyment, about indulgence, that love is comforting. But when we were together you were always mentally nervous, you were fatigued, fragile, even hurt, we gave each other hard times. I thought that was because of me, I couldn't protect you, we lied to each other—for good reasons, but that hurts nevertheless. I thought that wasn't love, at least not good love. And you should deserve the best love, you should have soft and sweet kissed, not blood and wounds. I didn't have the courage to have you to myself, because I knew you deserve better. What I didn't know is that true love can sometimes be just painful, and it's even dearer than the ones with only laughter, it has made us one. I seek in the arms of others pleasure, momentary indulgence and moments when I could be carefree, but when facing you I realize that there is pain but still want to come closer. I'd rather transfer all your anguish to me, I long to soothe your sorrows, I'm willing to stand behind you so that I could give up my everything when you need me. When you're in battle, I'll be your armor; when you're in sorrow, I'll be your sugar. I know the easier way to live, but I must come to you and wait in the endless pain, because when you look at me I know that I have my use, this is my greatest honor. I draw out my blood and my bone from my body as offerings to you, because I—turns out that I—love you so. I collapse at your feet, I become nothing in front of you, I can't even believe that I'm loving you so humbly like this. But it turns out, you love me too? You're as painful as I am, you've endured suffering and surmised, and when you hold your heart carefully in your hands you still fear that your love is not enough, is not good enough."
It stopped here, there were no more spaces left on the envelope. Sam held that letter in his hand and placed a gentle kiss on it.
And that's the end of chapter 9 in the original work.
ANOTHER beautiful section that challenges my translation skills [cry]
Also guys, I know that I've been updating once a day up to this time but the last two sections are not only long but extremely well written. I really want my translation to have an ending that I'm satisfied with, not a sloppy one. Also my job's getting busier so I don't think I'll have ample time to make sure I update every day like before. So please bear with me if I won't post the next section until days later:) I promise I'll finish it!(Maybe just a bit late though) Again a big thanks to all of you who have read this far.