The World's a Small Child in the Dark

 

Sam finds it about three weeks after they kill the demon (nineteen days subtracted from three hundred sixty-five is three hundred forty-six). Since the gate to Hell opened, they've been performing exorcism after exorcism in the immediate vicinity, trying to get as much as they can before it all spreads too far. Ellen and Bobby travel in Bobby's old pickup truck; the four of them ("Horsemen of the anti-Apocalypse," Dean anoints their divided quartet), spiral outward on the heels of demons, chasing the forces of Hell.

 

Well, not so much chasing as trying to pick them off one at a time. It's not enough, but it's all they can do. Every couple of days they meet up in diners and on roadsides; Bobby and Ellen wear the same weary determination in their faces that Sam feels every time he wakes up in the passenger seat of the Impala, like a cowboy sleeping in the saddle.

 

Dean, on the other hand, seems cheerful, upbeat, almost giddy. At first Sam attributed it to killing the demon.

 

Then he's in a smelly rest stop bathroom, changing his shirt for the first time in a week. The shirt he pulls over his head is too small by half: it's tight across the chest and the sleeve-holes cut into the tender skin of his armpits. Sam groans and hauls the shirt back off, hearing the fabric stretch and a few seams tear. There's not much else in the duffel bag, but Sam paws through it anyway, hoping to find a cheap wifebeater or something else that Dean won't mind if he stretches out.

 

What he finds is a white piece of paper, folded up. It's a cheap diner menu, with misspelled foodstuffs on one side and Dean's chicken scratch on the other.

 

1. kill the Demon
2. go to Disneyland
3. twins
4. pay back Bobby
5. go to top of Sears Tower
6. drink sake
7. see Old Faithful erupt

 

They had stopped by Old Faithful three nights ago. "It's on our way," Dean had said, shrugging. "I hear it's cool." Sam had been tired enough at the time to go along; he can't remember much of it, just standing next to Dean as the geyser went off into the moonlit sky, half-asleep on his feet and only waking when Dean had nudged him and said, "Okay. We can go."

 

Sam imagines Dean scrawling this list down in a diner somewhere, sitting alone at the table while Sam was outside or in the bathroom or something, just a quick pit stop between a dozen or so exorcisms and crappy food and the physical ache of car seats. He suddenly feels sick, goes into a bathroom stall and leans over the stained toilet there, his mouth hanging open and his eyes watering. Instead of puking, though, he starts choking up, suppressed sobs jerking his diaphragm but never quite making it past his chest.

 

He's going to fix this. He has to. He sets aside the urge to flush the List down the toilet and instead puts it carefully back inside Dean's duffel, yanks the shirt back on in a flurry of torn hems, and goes back to the car.

 

Dean is out there already, sipping down a steaming cup of coffee and practically swimming in one of Sam's shirts. "Dude, you grabbed my bag, dumbass."

 

Sam had never really thought about it, but Dean is so much smaller than he is; he swallows and yanks open the back door.

 

"Hey, you alright?" Dean ducks his head, looking in through the window as Sam drops down into the backseat.

 

"Yeah," Sam croaks back. He will fix this. "Just tired, is all." He pivots sideways, kicking his legs up on the seat and jamming his feet in the window. "You mind if I sleep back here for a bit? You okay to drive?"

 

Dean's face relaxes, and he reaches in to pat Sam's ankle. "I'm good, Sammy."

 

When he gets in, Sam stares hard at the back of his brother's head, the curl of his ears, listens to Dean as he sings along softly to the same old tunes.

 

-o-

 

After that Sam starts to look for it. Tries to catch Dean at it… not to say anything, he knows from bitter experience that if Sam charges him head-on Dean will snap shut like a bear trap and not let anything else out. He just… he wants to know. Dean sold his soul for this, for Sam's heartbeat and breath and muscle aches and everything else contained in the cage of his body, and so far he's seemed pretty cheerful about the whole thing.

 

It doesn't take long for the demons to spread out, make themselves at home. The fight goes outside the close quarters of Wyoming, and Sam is secretly, deeply grateful. They've barely had time to shower in a month (one month gone).

 

He'd never thought that he'd be grateful for a return to pattern… find a hunt, drive overnight, land in the freakiest motel Dean can find (he's become something of a collector over the years), snoop around, nail the bastard, lather, rinse, repeat. It gives them time to breathe, though, a few gasps between plunges.

 

It's not enough. Not with eleven months to go.

 

In Montana, they handle five demons in as many days, a whole family of them. The bodies don't survive and they burn the house to cover their tracks. Watching the flames reach for the stars, Sam gathers his courage and nudges Dean gently. "You wanna take a break?"

 

Dean stares at the burning house for so long that Sam thinks he didn't hear, and nudges him again. That elicits a grunt and a swatting hand. "Alright, Jeez. Sure, fine. We'll take a break." He manages to sound indignant about the whole thing.

 

They meet up with Bobby and Ellen in Butte (which Dean keeps calling "Butt," right in front of the locals) Ellen nods when they tell her. "Think we could all use a break. Get some rest, come back swingin'."

 

Bobby doesn't say anything, just meets Sam's eyes.

 

Sam steers them towards Chicago. "One night in a decent goddamned hotel, that's all I ask – Dean, we've been sleeping in the car for a month!"

 

 "God, fine, whatever." Dean kicks his legs out, disrupting the thick layer of trash – scribbled maps, fast food wrappers – that covers the Impala's floor; it gives Sam the willies to imagine what might be living down there. "I hate Chicago."

 

He sleeps fourteen hours the first night, though, slowly curling himself tighter and tighter in the sheets. Sam tiptoes around the room, ducking out for a few minutes to get deli-made sandwiches, turkey and ham and three different kinds of cheese, all toasted and melted. He can already imagine Dean eating his, happy grunts and bulging cheeks. Growing up on the road taught Dean devour any and all free food like a ravenous wolf. Sam had never learned to do the same – Dean had always made sure to grab enough for two.

 

When he comes back, Dean's still asleep; he's close to falling off the bed, one arm dangling and his face smooshed. Sam gingerly lifts his arm by the wrist, tucking it into the bed beside Dean's hip. It makes him feel weird and tight inside, and he lingers there, fussing with the sheets until even he gets sick of himself and lies down in the other bed.

 

He's awakened an indeterminate time later by hands on his shoulders, sour breath on his face, and Dean's frantic voice. "Sam! Sammy, Sammy, please wake up, please Sam – "

 

"Wha?" He flails, grabbing Dean's wrist. Dean hovers over him, a knee digging into Sam's side. "Dean, what – what is it?"

 

Dean stares at him, and now Sam can see the glassiness in his eyes, the openness of sleep still lingering. It only lasts a minute and then he leans back, shaking himself all the way awake, and the tumblers fall into place on the locks. "Dude. It's like–" He casts around, sees the clock between the beds. "3 pm! You gonna sleep your life away?"

 

Sam falls back in the bed. Dean thumps his stomach. "C'mon, man, I'm starved."

 

"There are sandwiches," Sam murmurs, uncertain, too shaken by the naked panic he'd seen on Dean's face at first. "I got them a couple hours ago – they might still be warm."

 

"Aw, sweet!" Dean stops halfway to the table, though, and turns around slowly with his eyes narrowed. "Wait. You went out and got sandwiches? Alone?"

 

"Yeah." Storm clouds gather and Sam rushes on. "I had a gun with me. Dean, it's just around the corner. Relax."

 

Dean hovers, clearly torn between getting angry at Sam and the presence of food; food wins out, but he still grumbles, "Wake me up next time, alright?"

 

"Okay," Sam says, remembering how Dean had curled in on himself in his sleep, eyebrows drawn together.

 

-o-

 

The elevator ride up to the deck of the Sears Tower is long enough that Sam gets twitchy: he's not so good in enclosed spaces. Dean notices, of course, and frowns. "You want to – "

 

"Naw, I'm good," Sam says quickly. He takes a few deep breaths, thinks about trees swaying in the breeze and water flowing over rocks.

 

Dean pokes him. "You're doing that Zen thing again, aren't you? It's such bullshit."

 

Sam scowls and elbows him roughly into the wall. The elevator operator, a stern black woman with corn rows, gives him a dirty look. Dean snickers.

 

The observation deck looks out at blue sky in every direction. Their tour guide yells at Dean twice for climbing up on the supports and leaning his forehead against the glass to look down on the city. Sam hauls him down. "You're like a little kid, you know that?"

 

"You're a little kid. Hey, look, souvenirs."

 

Sam patiently holds a basket while Dean throws shit into it; he waits until Dean's back is turned before putting most of the stupid little figurines back on the shelves. Occasionally it helps that Dean has the attention span of a gnat.

 

He's also got his hand curled on Sam's back, fist resting right atop the first knob of spine. He does that a lot lately, weird little touches that he doesn't seem to notice: hooking two fingers in the back of Sam's belt while they're waiting in line at McDonald's, resting his thumb against Sam's elbow while he reads the computer over his shoulder.

 

The cashier stares at them, nose wrinkling. Sam blinks and shifts away from Dean a little… doesn't say anything, just moves until Dean's hand slides out of his hair. Dean doesn't even notice; he's too busy rummaging through the tote bags looking for one that he could use for a new ammo pouch. Sam stands next to him, stomach tight with what feels like guilt.

 

-o-

 

They're in Arizona and Sam finds the List again. It looks more official now, on pages taken from Dad's journal, and most importantly it has new additions.

 

8. Go to an actual donkey show
9. Whale-watching
10. Orgy
11. Make Sam skinny-dip

 

Sam cringes in varying degrees and shoves the list back in the glove compartment when Dean comes back with their coffee.

 

He still goes along, though, slipping over the border into Mexico like reverse illegals. Sam feels sick with dread, and isn't disappointed: he spends the entire time trying to plug his ears and cover his eyes at the same time, hands spread over his face. He can still hear the donkey's brays, and Dean's periodic exclamations of "Oh my God" in a mix of amazement and horror.

 

"I can't believe you made me go to that," he tells Dean sternly as they stumble back across the border. "You suck."

 

"Yeah, that was kind of awful," Dean admits, but doesn't sound like he believes it. "Dude, you're the one who wanted to come along! You didn't even watch it."

 

"Shut up," Sam grumbles, but it makes him shiver to think about Dean walking back home through the night, alone.

 

They left the Impala in a state park just on the Arizona side. There's a lake there, shrunken down in the summer heat, and Sam really should have been expecting it. "C'mon," Dean says suddenly, just as Sam is opening his car door. "Let's go for a swim."

 

Sam stares at him. "What?"

 

Dean peels his sweat-damp shirt away from his body, over his head, and throws it into the car. He goes to work on his belt. "C'mon, man. Shut your door, you'll let the bugs in."

 

Sam closes the door, but doesn't budge on the disbelief. "Yeah, and they won't chew us up if we go swimming? What about the leeches?"

 

"Fine, whatever," Dean scoffs. "Princess." His belt makes a faint metallic chink as he drops it to the pavement, and when he straightens Sam can see moonlight gleaming on his bare shoulders.

 

Sam thinks about the List and groans inwardly. This had better qualify him for sainthood. "All right."

 

There aren't any leeches, but there are plenty of mosquitoes. Sam submerges to avoid them, and the water feels like cool heaven a few feet below. The surface is still bathwater-warm, and Dean floats along it on his back. Sam bobs up beside him. "Aren't they biting you?"

 

"Naw, they don't like me much. You remember Alaska?"

 

God, did Sam ever. They'd stayed up in the frozen state for a whole summer while Dad researched Sasquatch legends. Between the constant sunlight, the plague of mosquitoes, and a vicious growth spurt, Sam had occasionally been driven to humiliating tears at the already-awkward age of 14. "They loved me up there."

 

"Yeah, man. I dunno, man, you must just taste good to mosquitoes." Dean snickers a little, clumsily bumps a hand against Sam's collarbone.

 

Sam pulls a breath into the bottom of his lungs and rises to float beside Dean. They drift together, lazy with tequila, silent under the stars.

 

-o-

 

After they waste a poltergeist in Memphis, Dean tracks down a bonafide porn star (#21). She's got E-sized tits – natural, for Chrissake – and a little sister; Dean pushes for a double feature, but Sam politely declines and extracts himself from the sister's long-nailed grasp.

 

Walking back to the motel is as familiar as anything, as the sound a shotgun makes when it loads, and the curl of God in Latin. Sam's grateful for the distraction: it gives him time to work alone. The crossroads demon had known exactly where to hit Dean – Sam's life as the sword of Damocles dangling on a thread. Dean hasn't looked for a way out, has even forbidden Sam from trying on the off chance that she'll hold Sam to the same demand.

 

Sam has refrained from pointing out what Dean would be doing right now if their positions were reversed… or what it would take to reverse their positions. It's certainly crossed his mind; but it has to stop somewhere. Someone's got to put an end to the great Winchester tradition of 'I'd die for you,' and Sam's always been the rulebreaker in the family.

 

He's not sure if that makes him feel proud, or unbelievably selfish.

 

It turns out, he gets more than enough time for his research. Dean doesn't show up until 6 am the next morning, just as Sam's almost convinced himself to go out looking. The key turns in the lock and the door swings inward; Dean staggers, gripping the doorknob to keep himself upright. "Jesus," he slurs, and goes straight into the bathroom to puke.

 

Sam rolls over and pulls the sheets up. If Dean wants to waste the time he's got left – but that thought trails away, as it always does, and Sam mentally runs through all the research again, the old texts that he's got hidden away, the emails from Bobby.

 

Dean vomits pretty steadily for five minutes, then spits, flushes, fiddles around in the bathroom a bit, and staggers back out to roll-flop on the other bed. Sam lies there awake, listening, then slides quietly out of bed.

 

The crumpled List sits beside the sink, one corner damp with what Sam hopes is just water. Numbers 23, 26, 14, 18, 21, 10, and 21 have all been scratched out… as well as a new addition that Sam hadn't noticed the last time he'd snuck a peak.

 

28. Fuck a guy.

 

Sam flushes hot, wondering about the porn star, or maybe the sister. Or maybe someone else, a complete stranger along the line of debauched party-going.

 

Dean's voice drifts in from the bedroom. "You could just ask."

 

Sam twitches guiltily, but doesn't drop the paper. "I just hope you used protection, man. I'm the one that's gotta share a toilet seat with you." And now that he thinks about it, Dean probably hadn't: he's been so goddamned careless with his body lately, flinging it into fights with demons and redneck bartenders, fucking anything in a skirt (or pants now, too, apparently).

 

Which… actually doesn't sound that different from Dean on a normal day. Sam's stomach aches again; he'll probably develop an ulcer before the year is over.

 

-o-

 

At the four-month mark, the List changes. Maybe the passage of time weighs on Dean, too, or maybe he's just run out of sexual experiments and drugs to try – he's already gone through E, cocaine, 'shrooms, and was planning to try meth before Sam catches on and busts him. Dean stays pissy for a week, addressing him as "Narc" until Sam's patience snaps.

 

"It's like you don't even fucking care," he screams, voice snuffed out by the thick layer of snow on the parking lot. Christ, it's already winter.

 

Snow clings to the tips of Dean's hair; it's gotten long, curling a bit around his ears. "Maybe I don't, Sam. I mean, what's the fucking point?  Eight months and it'll all be over anyway."

 

The words go straight through Sam like an electric shock. He stands there for a few seconds then turns and wades through the snow back to the motel.

 

Dean stays out for another two hours then comes in smelling like the bar's floor after happy hour. Sam supposes that he should feel grateful that it's not the rancid smoke of a lab. "Sam?" Christ, Dean's voice sounds wrecked. "Hey, Sam."

 

It's been a rough week, picking Dean up from bars, peeling him out of sweat-stained clothes, the stench of sex and alcohol and drugs sharp in Sam's nose. Depending on what he's taken and how much, Dean usually stays unconscious through it all; it hurts to feel the loose weight of this body that means so much to Sam, and nothing to Dean.

 

That's why Sam doesn't open his eyes, just lies there as still as he can. That's why.

 

"Sam? Wake up." Dean shuffles across the room, toes catching on the carpet, to stand right over Sam's bed. "Sammy?" His voice cracks on the last syllable and his hand closes on Sam's shoulder, shakes him roughly.

 

The panic in Dean's voice teases the edge of memory, those last few moments of consciousness (of life) when they had knelt in the mud, Dean gripping him and pleading. Echoes of it rebound with every one of Dean's nightmares, only expressed in moments of weakness when he reaches for Sam like he did then.

 

Sam opens his eyes and stares up without apology. Even through the haze of drunkenness, Dean reads it for what it is; his own face twists for a moment with anger and recrimination, but it washes back out of him like a wave receding.

 

For a moment, Dean hangs above him, slowly drooping as if his own grip on Sam's shoulder has pulled him off-balance; Sam can feel the cold air that Dean has carried into the room with him and the stench of cigarette smoke fills his nostrils. Then Dean twists around to sit on the edge of the bed.

 

"Sam," he says, the one syllable wobbling.

 

"Don't say it." Sam curled up on his side, knees and elbows on either side of Dean's back.

 

"You gotta let me go."

 

"No." He closed his eyes against it, shuts the thought out completely. "You didn't let me go."

 

"That's different. That was – "

 

When he doesn't finish, Sam murmurs, "The only person that thinks I'm worth more than you is you, Dean."

 

"Man," Dean groans meanly, audibly trying to gather himself, "there's just no satisfying you, huh? What's a guy gotta do to get some love around here?"

 

Sam bites at his lower lip, feels himself shake. "So what am I supposed to do?" he whispers. "Just go on? After Mom and Jess and Dad – and you… what am I supposed to do?"

 

"Sammy," Dean grunts, stricken, and reaches for him. It's more than Sam can bear and he twists away lightning-quick, throat closed up.

 

He still manages to choke, "I won't, I won't. I'm sick of hoping for things and you don't even try." His own voice breaks embarrassingly and Sam rolls over, puts his back to Dean.

 

"Sammy." Dean slides down behind him, palm rubbing Sam's back. "It's okay. You'll be okay, you gotta be."

 

Sam wants to pull away, yell at him some more, but doesn't have the strength to stand tall in the face of this. And Dean's a strong weight against his back for all that he still smells terrible. It's enough to melt Sam's anger, make him lean back against the comforting touch; after a moment, he reaches behind him and grabs Dean's arm, drags it around to his own chest.

 

"Hey," Dean says, voice soft and uncertain. His other arm is wedged awkwardly between his chest and Sam's back; his whole body tenses up, like he'll spring away at any second.

 

Sam does what he always does: he holds on tight and doesn't let Dean go.

 

-o-

 

32. Find Sam a girlfriend/boyfriend/donkey/whatever.

 

It actually manages to make Sam laugh, at first. Then he gets angry enough to take it out on the reasonably nice girls (and a few experimental guys) that Dean casually steers him towards.

 

Not that he doesn't find most of them attractive, and the fact that Dean knows his exact type utterly fails to surprise Sam.

 

He starts to plead off going along to bars; at six months down, Dean's past the self-destructive phase. Beside, Sam has work to do: there are things older than demons in the world. There are no texts on this, no guidelines or rituals, just the oral histories of toothless men on mountaintops who whisper of voices in the wind and faces in the water.

 

If Sam fucks up, he has no idea what will happen to him, but he doubts that it would be pleasant.

 

Frozen dinners from the local grocery store have become Sam's regular dinner. He's got one dangling in a bag from his arm, and he juggles with the coffee he needs to stay awake and the keys to the motel room for a minute before he realizes that the door is cracked open.

 

His computer's on the floor, a tangled mess of wires and shards of plastic; his backup memory stick sits beside it, equally smashed to bits. Sam stands in the doorway and stares at it. He must have left the screen up with all of his research; he hadn't been expecting Dean to come back tonight.

 

The TV plays and Sam finally drags his eyes to where Dean sits with his back to the headboard, legs kicked out in front of him. Dean flips through the channels methodically, one after another, his eyes trained to the screen.

 

He doesn't look up, but Sam feels his attention all the same. The air's practically unbreathable, full of silent rage and desperation.

 

Finally, Dean speaks. "Thought we could do somethin' tonight, maybe go see a movie or… I dunno, do something together." His eyes stay on the television. "Guess you don't want to now, huh?"

 

Carefully, slowly, thinking about every individual action, Sam puts his food down on the floor. Straightens, slowly, carefully. Steps outside and shuts the door.

 

The Impala's parked across the lot. Sam goes to it and slides down into the passenger seat. His backup backup memory stick is still tucked safely underneath the seat and Sam's shoulders unwind. Only 6 hours of work lost, not the end of the world. He can remember most of tonight's research, anyway.

 

Dean doesn't follow him into the parking lot, and Sam doesn't trust himself to go back inside right now. A 24-hour diner affords him the opportunity to gorge himself, and a bit of human conversation: Bonnie the middle-aged waitress with the crow's feet and the recently-empty ring finger sits with him for hours. They share cautiously, leaving out details but telling more than they tell family. It must be why people go into therapy, Sam realizes suddenly. Talking to a complete stranger is somehow, strangely freeing.

 

As the sun pulls itself up along the horizon, Bonnie says, "In the end, you always gotta ask y'self if it's worth it, hunny." She slides a callused, weathered hand across to grip Sam's fingers, her cracked lips pulling into a smile. Sam smiles back and thanks her, leaves her as big a tip as he can afford.

 

It's another few hours until the stores open. Once they do, Sam buys himself a new laptop.

 

When he gets back to the motel, his frozen dinner and coffee still sit on the floor, and Dean's curled up on his bed, knees to his chest. The room stinks of cigarette smoke and the butts swim, bloated, in a cup of water beside the bed. Dean's flask sits beside it. Sam doesn't need to pick it up to know it's empty.

 

He stands over Dean for a long moment, big laptop box heavy under one arm. Shadows have rubbed themselves into Dean's face and Sam thinks about the other people who made deals; he wonders if Dean is hearing howls in the night.

 

Without thinking, he bends down. Dean's skull curves against his palm and he kisses his brother once, on the temple.

 

Dean doesn't move. He's awake and they both know it, and they both know that they both know it. Sam tucks the laptop safely on the other side of his own bed, and goes to sleep with one hand pressed protectively over it.

 

-o-

 

#42 on the List is something of a mystery to Sam: JUST DO IT ALREADY. Which bothers Sam on two points: one, it's too vague for him to lay plans for, and two, that's basically the whole point of the List.

 

"What's It?" he finally asks Dean. They're in a rest stop in Colorado, pine trees pungent in the air.

 

Dean's leaning out of the Impala's open car door, brushing his teeth. He spits on the pavement, wipes his mouth and swings his feet into the car. "What's what?"

 

"'Just do it already.' In caps. What's 'it.'" Sam looks at Dean; Dean looks out the front of the car, at the men's restroom. "Dean?"

 

"Quite pestering me," Dean says, almost automatically. "It's personal." He tucks his toothbrush in the sun visor, pinning it right to the roof.

 

Sam pulls a face. "Blech. That's so unhygienic."

 

"Hey, not gonna be around for the bugs to get me." Dean slides his sunglasses on and tosses Sam a smirk. It pisses Sam off just as much as Dean knew it would, and for a while he forgets all about the mystery of #42.

 

When 'It' finally happens, they're in, of all places, a Costco. They're stocking up on a few bulk necessities: shampoo, peanut M&Ms, salt... or at least, Sam is. Dean's mostly wandering around in search of more free samples in the food department.

 

Sam beats him to the free s'mores in the candy aisle, though, and gobbles half of them on irritated principle alone until the sample lady starts glaring. By the time Dean shows up, he's got stickiness smeared across half his face and his stomach aches. He still grins at Dean, defiant.

 

Dean stares at him, slowly going pink, and Sam's smile drops. "They, uh, they got free s'mores." He doesn't recognize this look, and that makes him fidget, conscious of the sample lady's stream of Spanish curses. "What?"

 

Dean scrubs a hand across his face and sighs. Then he fists his hands in the front of Sam's shirt, pulls him around the corner into a deserted part of electronics. 'It' happens right there, with Sam's shoulder squishing against the packages, making the styrofoam squeak: Dean reaches up and drags his head down with both hands, then proceeds to lick all the chocolate off his face and mouth, and then from the INSIDE of his mouth, starting just at his lips and getting deeper every time, sliding in with grim determination. It goes on and on for a while, until Dean has his whole head cocked sideways so that he can meet Sam's mouth at an angle and fit them together just so, fingers pressed hard into Sam's jaw to hold him open, to hold him still. Dean explores Sam's mouth long after any sweet dark taste has evaporated, until it's just the two of them meeting and grinding together.

 

Abruptly he lets Sam go, wipes the spit from his mouth, and ducks away to the frozen foods section.

 

Sam stumbles after him, dizzy and frightened, and finds Dean scowling at a bag of corn on the cob. He looks up when Sam approaches and scowls deeper. "It's not that weird. It's NOT, Sam."

 

"Um," Sam says, his heart thundering. His mouth feels hot.

 

"Where's the cart?" Dean snaps. "You left it back in the candies, didn't you?"

 

"Yeah," Sam says. "Dean – "

 

"It's not that weird. Jesus, when you think about how we grew up – "

 

"Right," Sam says, blank.

 

"Oh my God, shut up," Dean exclaims, desperate, and takes off again.

 

Sam closes his mouth and trails after.

 

-o-

 

By the 9-month mark, they're not even hunting anymore. If something flings itself in their path, they'll smoke it and move on; but for the most part, they just drive, stopping here and there like collectors of random moments. Like men on a mission that they can't recall.

 

They arrive in the French Quarter of New Orleans just in time for Mardi Gras (#33), whereupon Dean strips down and spends most of the weekend buck naked. He absolutely refuses to put clothes on, and winds up with two city citations for indecent exposure, a full-body sunburn, and about six hundred beaded necklaces that he wears all at once, along with his boots and sunglasses. And nothing else.

 

"Oh my God," Sam moans, his hand over his eyes. A carload of college-aged girl passing on the street has spotted Dean; he responds to their whoops by standing up on his chair and shaking his ass at them. The enormous, kindly owner of this outdoor café watches from nearby, her hand on her hip and an indulgent smile on her face. This is by no means the weirdest thing she's ever seen in this town.

 

"C'mon, Sam!" Dean drops down into his seat and shovels donuts in his mouth. He's started eating terribly, all saturated fats and sugar. "Y'can't keep the stick up your ass, not here. Somebody'll yank it out and beat you with it."

 

"I'll keep my ass to myself, thanks. Unlike some people."

 

Dean flicks frosting at him. "Christ. You're no fun, y'know that? It's like you've forgotten how."

 

Sam straightens. "I can have fun."

 

"Yeah, right." Dean jerks a thumb over his shoulder at the café owner, who's chatting up a trio of drag queens. "Granny over there is more exciting than you."

 

Sam pouts into his oatmeal and side of fruit.

 

That's how, later that night, he finds himself looking through the front window of a souvenir shop. Dean's getting his dick sucked by a chick right there in the street, barely hidden from the crowd by the edge of a parade float. Sam's getting tired of being second fiddle, hanging back while Dean barrels ahead and leaves him behind. So Sam ducks into the shop.

 

The blow job's done by the time Sam gets out, and Dean stands in the street looking around him, his bare shoulders hunched and scared. When he spots Sam, the tension breaks like a rubber band, and Sam's heart thumps against his ribs in a way he doesn't quite understand.

 

"Where the fuck'd you go?" Dean snaps, taking the small plastic bag that Sam shoves at him. "What's this?"

 

Sam pins his own plastic bag delicately between his knees and hauls his shirt off over his head. "I hate you."

 

Dean pauses in the act of taking his forest green and silver mask out of the bag; he stares at Sam. "What're you doing."

 

Sam's heart thumps again and he pauses for a moment, uncertain and confused, remembering the Costco. Then a female voice shouts, "Hot guy!" When Sam looks up, she's leaning over the balcony above, her full tits swinging; she grins at him and throws some beads.

 

They sting Sam's hand a little when he catches them, but all he feels is triumph. He loops them around his neck and undoes his pants. Dean's eyes are wide, torn between alarm and delight. "How fun am I now?" Sam asks, adrenaline making his voice rough.

 

Dean catches on and grins wolfish. "Dare you to run bare-ass through the whole parade."

 

Sam groans, but shucks the rest of his clothes and leaves them on the street; he slides his red and gold mask on. "You're on."

 

They get chased by cops at some point and Sam's momentarily afraid that they'll get hauled back before Hendrickson wearing only their sequined masks and boots; but he hears Dean's laughter chasing him, too, and that's more than enough to keep him going, dodging through the multi-colored whirl of beads and flashing lights.

 

-o-

 

Month ten dawns sober and dark, after the ball. It's Spring and rainy, and Dean stops them dead in Wisconsin. "You can go on if you want," he tells Sam. "I'm stickin' around for a bit."

 

Put like that, Sam has to stay. He's been waiting for #48, anxious and a little eager, hopeful for something he's not sure he even wants.

 

They get an apartment, a one-bedroom place off the main drag of a town called Babcock; Sam's pretty sure that Dean chose just for the name. They head out armed with fake IDs: Dean gets a job at an auto supply store, pulling used parts off derelict cars to be reused; Sam finds work in a lamp store, tending the cashier and assisting old ladies among a sea of light bulbs. It does weird things to his eyes and mood, makes him happy and listless by turns. "I think it's like seasonal affective disorder," he tells Dean over their microwaved dinners. A table and two chairs came with the apartment; Sam bought the microwave on his way home.

 

Dean grunts noncommittally, poking at his fettuccini.

 

They sleep on their old camping pads and sleeping bags in the bare bedroom. When Sam gets his first paycheck he turns right around and puts half of it back into the store; he carries the three lamps home with him, shoulders aching by the time he staggers through the door.

 

By the time Dean's home he's got them positioned and switched on. It's amazing how much they change the apartment, smoothing the stark lines.

 

Dean stands in the doorway, looking around him cautiously before meeting Sam's eyes. "I bought a couch."

 

It's a loveseat, actually, and Sam has no idea how he managed to fit it in the Impala's back seat. Together they wrestle it out and up the stairs. There's a TV, too, a small one with a built-in VCR and antennae: Sam positions it atop the kitchen counter and they squish together on the loveseat with dinner, watching fuzzy reception of The Simpsons.

 

Dean's got spaghetti, and he slurps it loudly, staining his lips red. "How's your chicken, Francis?"

 

"'S good." Sam wipes his mouth and leans back, stretches his legs out. There's not much room to maneuver and he's pressed hip-to-hip with Dean. "This reminds me of college – freshmen year."

 

Dean cocks his head sideways, cautious but interested. "Oh, yeah? You share an apartment like this?"

 

"Yeah, but it wasn't an apartment. Dorm rooms, they're probably – " He cuts the apartment in half with his hand. "This big. And we didn't have our own bathroom, we had to share with the whole floor."

 

Dean wrinkles his nose. "Nasty."

 

"Yeah," Sam chuckles, scooping up gravy with a chunk of chicken. "It could get pretty bad."

 

"You liked it, though, right? I mean, you stuck it out."

 

Sam pokes at his limp green beans. He can feel Dean watching him, expecting an answer. "Not always. Not at first. I'd never worked before that, so I didn't know how to get a job… I didn't have any money for that first year, just whatever you sent me. I – " He breaks off, torn. "I called you, at the end of freshmen year. I wanted you to come pick me up. You didn't answer."

 

"You're shitting me." When Sam doesn't answer, Dean puts down his fork. "Sam? Tell me you're shitting me."

 

"I'm not." Sam sighs and leans his head back against the loveseat's cushion. "I got a job a week after that, in the college housing department. Man, that was nasty – they had rats and roaches in the ceiling. It got me through the summer, though."

 

Dean says nothing.

 

They spend the month like that, slowly accumulating things. Sam gets paid at the end of every week, Dean every other. By silent agreement they don't use any fake credit cards, none of Dean's pool money that Sam knows he's got rat-holed away, just what they earn in Babcock. Sam puts up a shower curtain, Dean gets a nudie-girl wall clock. They get posters of Pamela Anderson and Picasso, and find a takeout place in town that they can both agree on. On the weekends they go for jogs, feet slapping on the rough pavement.

 

They have neighbors. A sweet-eyed woman named Missy lives next door with her mom, who's got Alzheimer's and the shakes. Missy makes them casseroles and brownies sometimes, clucking her tongue at their haphazard apartment, and after Dean changes the antifreeze in her car she looks at him like a golden god. Dean flirts back a little, weirdly reluctant.

 

When Sam nudges him on it, Dean licks pudding off his plastic spoon and shrugs. "Not gonna be around long enough, Sammy. No point in getting her hopes up."

 

He's right: repetition, day in day out, makes the month fly by. At the end of it, Dean stands in the middle of their little apartment, his fists in his jacket pockets. He looks around at their loveseat, their little television, the stacks of paper plates and plastic spoons, says, "Huh," and walks out.

 

It takes Sam a little longer to leave, turning the lights off one at a time. Finally he stands in the living room, thinking about all the things he's ever wanted: stability, safety, a home.

 

It's almost time now. He's ready, he's laid his preparations, and there's nothing for it but to open his mouth and speak the words. If he's wrong, then at least he won't have to live on alone after all this death. If he's right, then the future of his life is downstairs behind the Impala's wheel, not here.

 

Sam switches off the last light and tapes a note on the door for poor Missy, leaving her all of their things.

 

-o-

 

In the first week of the last month, Dean drives them all the way to the East coast, like there's some metaphor to be found about the ocean and the land. The end of the world, maybe. They check into a bed and breakfast right along the beach, with a sliding glass door that looks out on the ocean and a couple of wooden steps leading down onto soft pale sand. There's only one bed, not that it matters: they've been in each other's space for so long, this whole last year like a blur around them, that Sam's forgotten how to breathe air that Dean didn't exhale.

 

The old guy running the bed and breakfast leaves them a plate of muffins, and doesn't seem put out that Dean eats them all within a few hours.

 

Their first night, Dean has the worst nightmare that Sam can recall, even from his own. It takes him five minutes just to stop Dean from clawing his way up the walls, and all he can do is pull Dean down and pin him to the mattress. "Dean," he says, and Dean bucks against him, breath fast. Sam swallows. "Dean, wake up. Come on."

 

"Sammy?" All of the short hairs on Sam's neck stand up in a wave. He has Dean's wrists in his hands, spread eagled, and lets go slowly. Dean reaches up, finger fumbling on Sam's face. "Sam."

 

His hands leave wet trails. Sam curses and grabs at Dean's wrists again, sees the dark smears. "Shit. Come on."

 

In the bathroom light, he can see the strips of wallpaper lodged deep underneath Dean's nails, blood already welling. Dean's oblivious, jittering under Sam's hands and so pale his freckles look drawn on with pencil; he keeps reaching for Sam. "Dean, stop, okay, your hands are messed up."

 

"Your face is messed up," Dean says, his mouth forming the words automatically. He gets his arms around Sam's neck, holds him with his elbows.

 

Sam bends, hands pressed flat to the counter on either side of Dean's hips; he leans his face against the side of Dean's. "Okay," he whispers, as much to himself as to Dean. "Okay."

 

Finding Dean's mouth with his own should feel monumental, but it's an almost gentle transition. It's the last little push from familiar ground, shoving away from land into the sea. Dean groans and presses needy, sucking kisses to Sam's mouth; Sam steadies him with both hands on Dean's back and opens up to it. Lets it happen.

 

When Dean has stopped shaking so hard Sam puts his damp mouth beside Dean's ear. "Let me fix your hands, man."

 

It takes tweezers to get all the little pieces and once Dean wakes up all the way he bitches like a little girl until Sam feeds him a Vicodin, finishes wrapping his hands, and leads him, stumbling, back to bed.

 

Dean lies back with his bandaged hands held to his chest. A ray of dawn peeks on the ocean and cuts across their bed, and Dean looks up at him uncertainly. "Sam…"

 

"Move over, man." Sam peels his bloodstained shirt off and eases down beside Dean. They tuck in with Dean's arms crossed across his ribs and his head tucked under Sam's chin, breath hot on his bare shoulder and neck.

 

"I worry about you," Dean whispers suddenly. "You don't – you hardly talk to anyone. You act like you're not going back to school or anything."

 

Sam's been so focused on Dean, on the time they have left, and finding a way to fix it; but now, he realizes Dean's right. He can't remember the last time that he talked to anyone longer than a few sentence, except Dean. Probably Bonnie, but that was months ago in his moment of doubt. Maybe it should bother him, but it doesn't. "I'm fine, Dean. Seriously."

 

His reassurance isn't enough. Dean presses an arm across Sam's chest, the bones of his forearm and elbow digging in. "Promise me you're not gonna do anything stupid, Sam. Promise me."

 

Sam looks up at the ceiling, where shadows run in spidery patterns. It's raining outside and the window's streaked. "I promise."

 

There's a difference between doing something stupid and doing something crazy. Dean will probably still call him a liar… but if he's still around to say so, then it will have worked and nothing else will matter.

 

Sam can feel the whole length of Dean against him, from the soft hair tickling his cheek to the cold toes that drowsily, greedily rub against his own. He breathes it in and thinks, Please.

 

-o-

 

Neither of them has had a haircut in longer than Sam can remember. On him, it's not that weird: defying his father's Marine buzz cut was the starting point of his whole revolution as a teenager, and he still clings to it with a fondness. Dean, though, has always kept it short and tight, and teased Sam mercilessly about barrettes.

 

So when Dean drags rough fingers through his hair, wincing, and pulls it back into a paintbrush-short ponytail, Sam can only stare. Dean catches him looking, frowns. "Shut up, Sam."

 

"It looks good."

 

"Shut up."

 

Dean signs them up for surfing, #54. It's almost the end of the season; the kid in the shop scoffs. "The waves are shite, man. Keep your money, come back next June."

 

Sam shoves a wad of bills forward. "We'll do that." Behind him, he can sense Dean's full-body twitch and suspicious glare. Sam doesn't look.

 

They find an instructor, Mick… an old timer with skin sun-worn to the color and texture of leather, a shock of white hair, and a huge grin. On the first day he doesn't even let them go near the water, just sets their rented longboards side by side on the sand; they spend two hours learning to pop up, scrambling from their stomachs to wide-legged standing while Mick circles them. It's harder than it looks, finding their balance and stance.

 

Sam is a 'goofy foot,' whatever that means. "'Goofy foot'?" Dean crows later, like it's his birthday. Just off the beach is an open-air restaurant. They have their feet propped up on chairs, lazy with food and a day of physical exertion; Dean's burned across the nose, bright red that will melt into freckles, and the part of Sam's scalp hurts.

 

Dean leans forward to poke through the battlefield-remains of their dinner. "Man," he groans, "I love lobster."

 

"You just like the idea of beating dinner into submission with a hammer."

 

"Hell yes." Dean scrapes a bit more meat from the shell with a fingernail, sucks at it happily. It catches Sam in between breaths and tugs at that alien part of himself that's been digging its roots in ever since Dean kissed him.

 

Of course Dean catches him looking; pauses, slows, licks all of his fingers clean one after the other, pushing them into his mouth and dragging them back out with a faint pop. Sam flushes underneath his sunburn and lunges for his beer, downs half of it. "You're a friggin' jerk," he mutters when moisture returns to his throat. Then, suddenly, "Are you happy?"

 

Dean's grin falters a moment, but just barely. "Yeah."

 

Doubt and disbelief cling to Sam. "Totally? You're just fine with – with dying?"

 

They never name it. Dean shifts in his chair, smile slipping away. "Jesus, Sam, way to be a buzz kill."

 

"Please, Dean." He watches his brother's face, the way Dean tilts his head back to rest on his chair, his deep sigh as he gazes half-lidded out at the ocean.

 

"Right now?" Dean says presently. "In this minute, yeah. I'm happy, Sam."

 

That, Sam believes. Dean's always been the live wire, the flash of lightning, here and gone in an instant but capable of splitting the Earth in two for just that heartbeat. He thinks about what he has planned, the two weeks left on Dean's sentence.

 

Sam reaches out and grips the back leg of Dean's chair, clumsy with alcohol. It only scoots an inch and he curses, flushing again. "Goddammit. C'mere."

 

Dean whoops, head tossed back. It bares his throat and Sam groans, lunging up out of his chair to lean over Dean, bent nearly double to kiss his mouth. Luckily, it's not very far back to the bed and breakfast. They go slow, languid, like they have all the time in the world, stumbling through the little white gate out front with Sam's hand curled under Dean's shirt, feeling the powerful twitch of the muscles in his back. Up the front walk and Dean sucks on his lower lip. Through the front door and Sam pushes too hard, too eager; Dean's heel catches on a step and he tumbles backward onto the stairs. Sam catches him around the waist and they laugh together, breathless and whispering.

 

"You dipshit," Dean murmurs against his mouth, syllables pouring into Sam.

 

"Shut up." Sam eases down, mindful of the uneven stairs underneath Dean's back but needing to be close. Always needing to be close, both of them, from Dean's little touches to Sam curling up like an octopus in bed. They've been so close to this for so long, waking up hard with arms curled around each other but slipping apart to take care of it separately… like there is any 'separate' anymore.

 

Dean's hand slides up to his face, cups Sam's jaw. "Like a teenager," he whispers, teasing. The backs of his fingers brush against Sam as they work on his own fly and Sam actually gasps, twitching at the contact. It's been so long… Madison in San Francisco, so long since anyone's touched him like this and he suddenly feels insane with need, roughly grinding his hips down against Dean's. It's Dean's turn to gasp and his head thumps loud on the wooden stair as he arches. "Ow."

 

Sam gulps, reeling himself in. "C'mon. Just – come on, fuckssake."

 

They make it up the stairs, movements awkward with darkness, alcohol, and the confines of denim stretched tight. Then they're inside the enveloping darkness of their room, the sound of ocean in their ears.

 

"You remember that house in Texas?" Dean pulls Sam's shirt up, nudges his arms to lead and follow. "Right on the Gulf?"

 

Sam does. Mostly he remembers fights with Dad, being too hot all the time, and the agonizing confusion of girls that overwhelmed his teenaged mind. Dean, though, clearly remembers it differently, because his voice is soft with reverence. "We had that house by the ocean. Went barefoot all through the streets and you – you hardly wore a shirt all summer."

 

His tone catches at Sam, makes him pause and draw back to stare at the dark outline of Dean's face. "Back then? Really?"

 

"Yeah. I didn't… really know." Dean sounds almost shy, even as he slides a hand down into Sam's boxers. "Not 'til you came back from college lookin' like the freakin' Jolly Green Giant."

 

The laugh in Sam's throat changes to a moan as Dean's fingers close around him. Dean pants in time with him, breathing the same air into Sam's mouth. "Whaddyou like?" Sam asks in a rush, suddenly uncertain. Christ, Dean's been to porn star orgies, and had a thousand women in every state. He's been around.

 

Dean chuckles, warm and dark. "Sam, Sam… try the neck."

 

Sam obeys, rubbing a thumb from Dean's jaw down to his collarbone, and following with his mouth. Dean wasn't lying: he arches immediately. The feel of it, of Dean losing control, is enough to keep Sam sucking and biting and licking until Dean moves against him helplessly, involuntary.

 

With effort, Dean pushes him back. "Okay. Your turn."

 

Sam doesn't even hesitate: he reaches back and roughly yanks Dean's hair out of its ponytail. Dean yelps, startled and a little pained. Then he laughs as Sam shoves a hand into the long strands, gripping it and yanking Dean's head back on his neck.

 

-o-

 

With a week left to go, Dean comes out onto the little deck where Sam sits with a book spread over his lap and drops the Impala keys down in the middle of the pages.

 

Sam stares at them, his heart kicking up. "You better take good care of her," Dean tells him sternly, "or I swear to God, I'll find a way to come back and kick your ass."

 

It's tempting to threaten a bubble-gum pink paintjob, just to get a rise out of Dean. As it is, Sam only picks the keys up and turns them over and over in his hands.

 

Dean pulls a chair over. "There's money in a safety deposit box in California… 'bout $50,000. No questions allowed, just take it. Name's Humphrey McHumper." Sam does laugh at that, and Dean manages a thin smile. He kills it in the next second. "We know where I'm going, so don't worry about salting and burning me, alright? Leave me someplace the FBI can find me."

 

Sam's fingers curl involuntarily, squeezing the key into his palm. Dean barrels onward. "Y'should probably lay low for a while anyway. Go back and stay with Bobby, alright? Sam? You go back and rent a place out from Bobby for a while, just until the FBI lays off. All they've got on you is accomplice in the bank robbery and accessory after the fact to murder – still not great, but not on the top 10." He laughs once, harshly, at odds with the sun-gold world around them. "'Cept, that's right, you never were. Fuckin' pansy, you're not a real man until you make it into the FBI's most wanted. Anyway – would you fucking say something?"

 

Sam stirs and relaxes his grip. There are angry red lines in his palm. "What am I supposed to say, Dean?"

 

"I don't know," Dean says, and his voice breaks. "Something?"

 

The keys weigh in Sam's hand. He stares at them, silent, until Dean leaves, gets his board and heads out across the sand. Sam watches his retreating square shoulders and narrow hips until Dean is doll-sized with distance. In the last three weeks Dean has spent more time dancing on the waves than on land; he's gotten good, can stay up even on the bigger waves – not that there's many of those. The waves really are shite this late in the year (three hundred sixty-five days minus three-hundred fifty-nine is six), but Dean applies himself to the task with the same steady, stern determination that he always has, when he had to learn to shoot or to stitch his father's skin. Dean brings grace to any physical act, heightens it to the level of a symphony of motion, and surfing is no exception: he's bought a wetsuit and Sam likes to sit on the shore, sand up his ass, just to watch Dean's muscles power him along, shifting to keep his balance. Just to see Dean's face, turned so far inward that he can't remember to hide himself, utterly focused.

 

Next year, Sam'll take him to California, or Hawa'i if he can coax Dean onto a plane. They'll find somewhere with huge waves that Dean can conquer and claim.

 

For now, though, he contents himself with watching Dean paddle and rise and fall, too far away. He's always too far away, and moving further like a riptide.

 

That's all right. It's Sam's job to hold on, and he will.

 

-o-

 

On the morning of the last day, Sam wakes up handcuffed to the bed. It completely fails to surprise him. "Is this on the List?" he asks Dean, who sits in the wicker chair by the window, a blanket wrapped close around his naked body.

 

"No," Dean answers quietly. He's pale, shadowed. "Just don't want you doin' something stupid."

 

Crazy, not stupid, Sam thinks, but doesn't say it out loud. He lies still, staring back at Dean until his brother gets up and shuffles barefoot to the open door. It's cloudy today, as if the universe wants to clearly announce the absolute end of the season – no more beyond this. There's a chill in the air, breeze strong enough to raise goosebumps on Sam's bare skin.

 

Dean stands for a moment in the doorway, looking out. Then a hand extends out from the blanket to pull the door shut. The sound of waves cuts off and it's an instant auditory relief: Sam doesn't love the ocean quite like Dean, has never gotten accustomed to the constant hiss and rush.

 

They'll have to find a place with double-thick windows and doors, close enough to the water that Dean can run out anytime he wants, but far enough away that Sam doesn't have to walk around with ear plugs all day…

 

That's for later. Right now, Sam lets Dean crawl back into bed – well, there's not a whole lot of 'letting', not when he's chained in place – and spread the blanket out over them both. Dean settles half on top of Sam, leg thrown over his hips and arm across his chest; he speaks into Sam's shoulder. "I couldn't think of anything else, Sam. I'm sorry – you know I had to do this, right?"

 

Sam sighs, feels the tightness behind his eyes that will be tears later. "Yeah. I do."

 

"It's not even love," Dean goes on, almost to himself. "It's like – you're in my head and my chest and everything else, and when you were gone it felt like – like somebody had pulled the plug on me."

 

"I know." And Sam does. He can feel how tenuous his own connection is to this life, held in place with determination and Dean; he can't help but say, "Did you ever once think that I felt the same way about you?"

 

"Don't say that. You'll be okay, right?" he asks, leaning back to search Sam's face anxiously, trying to paste over his fear with a smile. "C'mon man, somebody's gotta live through this. Out of this whole shitfest – you're stronger than me. Tell me you'll be okay."

 

Either way, it won't matter. Sam meets his brother's bright, red-rimmed eyes and says gently, "Yeah, I'll be okay."

 

Dean still crumbles, shaking. "I don't wanna die, Sam. I don't."

 

With his hands immobilized, all Sam can do is curl his ankle behind Dean's knee and pull him close until they're fit together. Dean does the rest, tucking himself in all the spaces of Sam's body and letting Sam into his own.

 

-o-

 

A few hours before dawn, Dean lays salt lines and sigils on all the doorways and windows, then goes beyond them onto the beach. He takes his surfboard, like he's determined to go out fighting, even if they're not fighting anymore. There's money on the table, all that they've got left after the month-long stay in this cozy little room; the fridge has been stocked. A box of tissues sits beside the handcuffs' key, a lamp's on, and Dean has called Bobby to come unlock Sam and take him away from here.

 

It's awful in its quiet simplicity and Sam cries for Dean a little, for how alone and scared and brave Dean is, out there on his surfboard under the clouds.

 

Then Sam rolls sideways and busily wipes his nose and face on the sheets. The hellhounds will come calling sometime around 4 am, exactly one year sharp after Dean made his deal. So, it's time to undo it all. Sam focuses and finds his center, breathing deep.

 

The handcuffs click open. It startles him a little: the more delicate stuff usually takes him longer, but then again, Sam's always been good at lockpicking, even using just his mind. There's been plenty of time to practice while Dean was out banging porn stars. Sam sits up, rubbing his wrists. It doesn't really matter: it's not like handcuffs or anything like that will change a damned thing, but he still feels better.

 

A fine rain has started to fall outside, mixing with the distant sound of the ocean. Sam watches it, instinctively concentrating on the flow of water from the sky to the land to the sea to the sky. The water cycle, old as Earth itself… yet in the galaxy, still a child, and the galaxy in the Milky Way in the universe, like one of those Russian dolls with him in the center, tiny.

 

Sam opens his mouth and says a word. A name.

 

Rain patters down on the roof for two seconds, three, and Sam panics, thinking that he got it wrong, that he's failed.

 

"What do you want?"

 

Sam blinks. A person – or what has taken the shape of a person – sits in the wicker chair. It wasn't there a moment ago, yet Sam can't say that it has 'appeared'; in his mind, it's been there all along.

 

"Well?" it asks mildly, unhurried but communicating impatience all the same. It has a man's voice, deep and rough, but most of its face is hidden by a brown cowl; the only visible signs of humanity are a thin mouth surrounded by lines and a pair of thin arms that hold the great red book in its lap.

 

The book.

 

Sam forces his tongue to move and his throat to open. "You have something that I need."

 

The cowl moves slightly, cocking an ear towards him; it's blind, Sam realizes. "Not need, son of Eve and Lilith. You need water, air, food, sleep, a constant body temperature, occasional trips to the bathroom."

 

"You have something that I want," Sam whispers.

 

"And you hope for me to give it to you," it prompts. One of its long fingers taps against the side of the book and there's the faint chink of metal. "Why would I do so?"

 

"Because," Sam breathes. He thinks of Dean, running through the Mardi Gras parade, wearing his mask and holding his dick to keep it from bouncing too bad. Standing astride a wave, gasping Sam's name, laughing, driving the Impala, singing off key, fighting like a caged animal. The smell of him, the loose gait of his legs, all the secretive delight and mischief and insecurity and deep, deep love.

 

"Do you think," it interrupts, impatience stronger in its voice, "that you are the first person to ask this of me? The world's history is full of suffering, the breadth and depth of which you cannot know. Be thankful that yours is not so great."

 

Sam wets his lips. "It's not, I know. I know I have no right to ask, and – I have nothing to give in return that you would want. But will you do it?"

 

"No," it says immediately. "Do not be absurd. All creatures in the world are bound to this book," it lifts its arm to display the long, black links that chain its wrist to the book, "even those that are not bound by it. To change the fate you seek would be to alter a single drop." It gesture out the window to the rain, the sea.

 

"Then why not do it? If it's so small, why not – "

 

"You are bound," it overrides him, thunder in its tone even though it hasn't changed its monotone since it first spoke. "All things in the world are bound."

 

"You've done it before," Sam says desperately. "I know you have."

 

It hesitates and the pressure in the air eases a bit. "Indeed," it admits. "I have. But only when the price of not interceding would be a drought, or a deluge."

 

Sam swings his legs out of bed. "It is."

 

It remains unmoved, cold. "Whatever he is in your mind, he is not to the world. He is a drop – "

 

The temperature in the room plummets so fast the windows crack, ice freezing to the outsides. All the heat from every corner, from the walls themselves, flies to hover above Sam's hand, setting the air itself on fire.

 

"I'm not," Sam hisses. Power lances up his spine, prickling along his scalp. Little tongues of flame dance above his fingers and he moves them around, playing with them; the feeling is intoxicating as a lover's caress, something so safe and comforting. With an effort, he pulls his mind back around to focus on the Endless. He can see it now, the flames in his hand driving shadows away to reveal milky eyes. "I am a child of Lilith and Eve," Sam says, his body surging and blood pounding in his ears.

 

"And still a child, with all your petulance and selfishness" it says, unmoved. "You cannot harm me, whatever your mother's parentage."

 

"No," Sam concedes, and laughs. It bubbles up under his skin, tickling him into delight. "Turn the next page in your book."

 

It watches him for a moment – Sam doesn't believe for a second that it can't see him just fine, better than eyes ever could. Then slowly, carefully, it shifts its huge red book. Sam can see the huge clasp on the side, holding it shut; the dark power inside of him crackles, longing to strike, but he tamps it down furiously. The lock clunks open without being touched, and it spreads the book open on its lap.

 

Whatever page it opened to must be the right one, because its lips go white.

 

When Sam feels its attention return to him, he chokes around the horrible thing rising up his throat. "I'll do it. I'll turn sand to glass, boil the oceans. Break bones for my meals, tear open throats." He laughs. "Maybe kill all the first-borns in North America to get the ball rolling. Then burn all the crops, kill the animals – turn people into cannibals. I bet it wouldn't be all that hard. How long do you think, huh, how long would it take for Mommy to start looking at little Ralph like a – "

 

"You make your point," it says, as mild and calm as ever. "However melodramatically. Do you mind?" it adds, indicating his burning hand.

 

Sam closes his fist, puts the flames out. Like oxygen out of a room, it yanks all the energy from his center, leaving him hollow; he sits down hard on the side of the bed, misses it, and slides down to huddle on the floor.

 

When Sam has stopped panting, it says, "By this action, you vow to never misuse your bloodlines?"

 

"He wouldn't let me," Sam gasps, the room spinning around him. "He's a better person than I am."

 

"I could simply kill you where you are. Undo your existence."

 

Sam slumps against the bed, eyes closed. "Yeah, you could. Give a life or take a life, your choice."

 

A long moment of silence stretches out. Sam strains to catch any howling snarl of dogs outside.

 

Instead, he hears the rip of paper. His eyes snap open to see a single ancient page, folded in half, flutter past his face to rest in his lap.

 

It shuts its book, lock falling into place. Sam feels its cold regard on him, searching him. "I will not wish you well, son of Lilith," it says, and Sam shivers, drawing away. "You have your son of Eve. I would kindly ask you not to misplace him again."

 

Then it's gone.

 

-o-

 

The page burns easily. Sam holds it into the stovetop's blue-bright flames until heat scorches his fingers; then he drops it into the sink and watches the rest of it twist like a dying worm, then shrivel to black ash particles that scatter when he blows on them.

 

Breakdown is absolutely unavoidable after that, and Sam gives in to it: he curls on the kitchenette's floor and sobs until he gags. Relief and the release of tension crush on his chest so hard that it might as well be grief, and there's a little bit of that, too: grief for the person that he had been only a few hours ago.

 

He'd meant every word of what he'd said.

 

After a while he remembers that he's alone inside this big empty kitchen, and crawls to the back door. Outside the light rain has stopped, but the little wooden porch is still covered with droplets; they soak through Sam's pants as he hauls himself over to sit on the top step. It's the first rain they've had all month and the air holds the smell of wet dust.

 

Dean's standing in the sand, surfboard at his hip and one hand absently peeling off the wet suit. He has his back to the house, but Sam can see him turn his head slowly from side to side, looking along the whole beach. Sam traces Dean's whole body with his eyes, the V of his torso, the bowed space between his legs, his bare, sand-covered feet.

 

Then Dean turns and sees him, and Sam cringes back against the small banister. Dean's on him in an instant, dropping his board and sprinting across the sand. He hits Sam, leaning over him with a hand twisted in his hair, punching his cheek, his mouth.

 

"What did you do?" Dean screams, over and over, as his fist connects. Sam feels his lip split, the inside of his cheek tear. He shoves Dean backwards onto his ass in the sand, then scrambles back inside like a drunk, knocking his shoulder into the wall.

 

It's not a reprieve: Dean piledrives him from behind, tackling him roughly to the ground and pinning him there with a hard forearm on the back of his neck. "Tell me what you did, Sam."

 

"I'm a bad person," Sam whispers into the carpet.

 

Dean's half insane, desperate. He grabs Sam's hair, yanks his head up and slams it back down into the carpet. "What? Did you make a deal? Did you make a deal?"

 

There's blood underneath Sam's mouth, his nose. "No!" he yells, sounding congested. "Fuuuck… I didn't hurt anyone, I didn't – I didn't sell myself, Dean."

 

Dean's straddling his hips from behind and the dampness seeps through Sam's boxers. With an abrupt swear, Dean throws himself sideways and starts stripping the wetsuit off the rest of the way. Sam curls up on his side, blinking through the blur of tears. The suits get stiff and awkward only a few minutes after leaving the water; it's instinct to get them off in a hurry.

 

"Dean," he says, lips aching around the cuts where Dean's ring split the skin.

 

"Shit!" Dean kicks at the wetsuit's leg, getting himself free. His knuckles are bloody.

 

He gets it stripped off the rest of the way and lies there naked on his back, panting, next to Sam.

 

"Dean," Sam whispers, needing.

 

"Yeah." Dean stares up at the ceiling. "You didn't – "

 

"I didn' trade m'self. I didn' hurt 'nyone else.

 

Dean grunts, rising to his knees and then rocking back onto his feet with a smoothness that he never had before. His body's changed, too, muscle mass growing longer and leaner, more equalized all over, under every inch of living, beautiful skin.

 

The suit's got to be washed, gotta get the salt out; but Sam grabs his ankle. Hobbled and hopping, Dean glares down at him. His eyes are wild. "You do not want me comin' back down there, Sammy."

 

Sam grins up at him, bloody and exhilarated and shaking all over. "Yes, I do." He slides one hand up into the crook of Dean’s knee.

 

Dean swears and then he's on Sam again, rough hands pushing him onto his back, ripping his boxers down. “Come on,” Sam gasps. The whole expanse of Dean’s chest hangs above him, silvery in the early light, and Sam lunges for him, desperate to get Dean near him.

 

“You stupid shit,” Dean says between his teeth, and he bites Sam’s neck, his shoulder. He licks his way down Sam’s chest, sets his teeth on one hip bone. “God – Sam.”

 

Sam starts to rise up on his elbows expecting a mouth on his cock, but what he gets a hard shove that rattles his brain against the floor and two saliva-slicked fingers pushing inside him. He can't help but twist away, startled, his thumping heart picking up a notch. "Shit – shiiit, Dean, wait – " They haven't done this before and it takes Dean's hand planted in the middle of his chest to keep him down. "Dean, wait."

 

Dean twists his fingers. Sam's limbs spasm and still. There's a satisfied gleam in Dean's eye, mixed in with all the anger. "Hold still," he says, voice cracked from all the shouting. "Just hold still and open up, okay?"

 

Sam shudders and obeys, blood on his tongue. The hand holding his chest down slides up into his hair, pulls his head sideways so that it drips onto the floor instead. "Just – " Dean groans, his fingers working back and forth. "Fuck. Come on, Sammy. It’s okay."

 

"It's okay," Sam echoes stupidly, grunting when Dean bends one knee up, pushing it into Sam’s chest. "I didn't," he pants, hand catching his own thigh instinctively, "I didn't do it. It's okay. You're okay. Dean?"

 

"Yeah. Shit. Just hold still a second." He yanks his fingers out and Sam lies there with his eyes closed, spread out and exposed and his nose still bleeding a little, while Dean rummages around the room.

 

It slides into his head, unavoidable: what that thing had seen in the book, what he would have become. For Dean. Without Dean. A sob claws out of his throat. "Dean," he barks, teeth chattering. "Please just – just fuck me."

 

The floor beside his head shakes and he can see Dean's feet through the blur of eyelashes, walking back to him. "Shut up, Sam,” Dean grunts, but his fingers touch Sam’s jaw briefly.

 

Even with the better stuff that Dean brings back with him, it's not easy: Dean's still too freaked out to even think about going slowly or being careful. He just fucks straight into Sam, grunting and screwing himself in. It's okay, though. They're okay. Sam clings to the thought and lets it carry him along until it starts getting good again and then holy God, it's so good that he's dragging at Dean's hips, trying to hold him in.

 

Dean growls and knocks his hand away, pinning his wrist down and snapping his hips forward. It drives an involuntary noise from Sam and he reaches up, touches Dean's face; something about it breaks the wave they're riding and Dean comes, straining deep.

 

Sam thinks about him there, inside his body, and falls after him.

 

When Dean can finally speak, he mutters, "Shit," and goes to get a washcloth. He straddles Sam, cupping his skull and wiping blood from his face. Sam's left eye is already swelling; he'll have a shiner tomorrow.

 

"You suck," he murmurs, wincing as Dean dabs at a cut. "What's a guy gotta do to get some love around here?"

 

Dean laughs thickly and bends low, pressing his wet face against Sam's cheek.

 

-o-

 

 

 

 

Epilogue

 

They end up staying another week, if only because Sam feels guilty about leaving bloodstains in the carpet and wants to rent a cleaner. Dean calls him an idiot and spends most of the week on the beach. It's too late for surfing, but he wades and swims and lies in the sand for hours.

 

He has a million freckles now. It makes Sam so goddamned hard sometimes, whenever he catches a glimpse of Dean’s speckled back. When he finally – finally – fucks Dean, he slides into him from behind and spreads wide hands over his shoulder blades. Freckles peek shyly from between his fingers and Sam loses it every time, just fucks him and fucks him until they're both clutching at the sheets.

 

That night, with Dean sprawled out, loose-limbed and brown against the white sheets, Sam eases out from beside him and finds the List. He's been saving it, tucked into his duffel like a refugee of Dean's wild and wanton youth. Most of the numbers from 1 to 56 have been marked off, but there are still a few that linger; they'll get to them later.

 

At the moment, Sam flips over the last page and jots a few things down. It takes him a while, dredging up old knowledge from his college days and listening to Dean's stories. He leaves it on the bed next to Dean and trudges outside into the sand.

 

Dean is alive, Sam's alive, and he didn't actually do anything. They've cheated death and hell, and Sam has met Destiny, though Dean has yet to hear the full story about that and Sam has no intention of telling him. They'll meet up with Bobby and Ellen in Cincinnati (Bobby and Ellen, who are together together now, as Bobby shyly explained on the phone, Ellen laughing at him in the background), and decide their next move from there. Sam thinks about Babcock sometimes, but doubts that they'll go back to a life so ordinary.

 

Sam, though… he has things to make up for. In another life he would have laid waste to all this, and he shivers in the cool breeze, wrapping his arms tighter around himself. Behind him in the house, Dean's laughter breaks out. Sam loves that sound most of all in the world.

 

The screen slides open and Dean pads out, naked. "Dude," he exclaims, waving the paper at Sam. "What the fuck is this?"

 

"I'd think that would be obvious," Sam tells him primly.

 

Dean barks with laughter, reading the list over again. "Sammy, do you even know what some of these things mean? Dude, felching?"

 

A blush grows up Sam's throat. "Are you gonna tell me?"

 

It sends Dean into near hysterics, eyes dancing. "Oh, Sammy." He strikes a teacherly pose. "Felching is when one partner comes in the other partner's ass, then sucks the come back out – "

 

"Oh, god," Sam blurts, and claps his hands over his ears. "Stop talking. We won't do that one, just please, god, stop."

 

He waits until Dean's mouth ceases moving then cautiously peels his hands away.

 

" – andthenhekissestheotherguyandputsitinhismouth," Dean finishes all in a rush before Sam can stuff his fingers back in his ears, and runs inside, whooping, when Sam gives chase.

 

-o-

 

Sam cuts his hair. Dean doesn’t, just shows up in Cincinnati with a ponytail, wearing his leather jacket and surfer’s tan. Bobby stares at him like he’s an alien and Sam laughs, hugs Ellen to his chest.

 

They both know; they have to. After all her years as a bartender, Ellen’s a whip-quick judge of people, and Bobby knows the Winchesters better than anyone not their own blood. Sam has his hand on Dean’s back, just below his neck, and Dean sprawls his knees to bump against Sam’s. Whatever Ellen and Bobby know, they keep to themselves.

 

There’s no question of hiding, even if they wanted to: they can’t keep their hands off each other. They’ve fought too hard for this, the two of them alive and sitting side-by-side in a cheap diner talking about how best to lay siege on a demonic-possessed monastery. And that’s all it was ever about anyway, both of them reaching and holding and trying to keep.

 

-o-

 

Somewhere in hell, an angry demon wonders how her air-tight deal fell apart. And nowhere in the world, a page in a book re-writes itself; it rests beside the jagged tear of another page that’s gone forever.