Crush - sonofabiscuit77 - Supernatural [Archive of Our Own] (2024)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

January 2013

All the things you are about to read are true. Everything written down here is true, it's not based on a true story, it is a true story.

Man, I have always wanted to write that.

My name’s Derek Ancona, and I guess everything I’m going to write about here – my big true story - all started because my mom decided I had to get myself a proper job, so yeah, everything here… pretty much all her fault.

Anyway, it was January of 2013, I’d graduated high school about 6 months ago, and I was still trying to figure out what the f*ck I wanted to do with my life. My mom was not that patient though, and she decided that I should go work at the garage alongside my Uncle Lou to “get a taste of what a real job is” (her words). Little did she know that was not the only thing I was going to get a taste for…

My uncle gave me a ride on my first morning, lecturing me about how I ought to f*cking appreciate what he’d done for me in getting me this job. Jesus, it wasn’t like I even wanted it, though of course, I didn’t tell him that, just nodded and grunted and tried to ignore him as he swerved the truck into the parking lot behind the main building. There were two other cars there already: some banged up old truck, even older than Uncle Lou's sh*theap, and a totally sweet muscle car, black and shiny and just all kinds of awesome. I stared at it in appreciation for a moment while Uncle Lou slammed the driver’s side.

“That belongs to the boss," he grunted out. “You’d better come meet him.”

The first thing I ever noticed about the boss was the seriously badass looking scar on his face. It started high up his forehead by his hairline, skewering through his eyebrow and across his left cheek, sort of distorting and stretching the skin around his temple. That wasn’t the only scar he had, there was another on the back of his left hand: the skin twisted in this weird and strange way, like nothing I'd ever seen before, sort of purple and mottled, in the shape of an inverted question mark, as if he'd had some sort of weird symbol burned directly into his skin.

I felt a stab of sympathy at first for him - he’d obviously been through a lot to carry these sort of scars, maybe some terrible childhood fire, or hell, even a truck bombing (he totally looked like the sort of guy who could’ve been military) - but when he straightened up to greet us, he gave us both a look that made the sympathy immediately wither and die… Soooo not the sort of guy you’d ever dare feel sorry for.

“So, this is Derek, huh?”

“Um, yeah, hi.” I held out my hand to him.

He nodded at me and wiped his hands on an oily rag, looking down at my hand, but not taking it. Feeling like a moron, I jerked it back, and stuffed both hands into the pockets of my jeans, wondering if I’d just violated some major-ass rule of the code for dudes who work in garages.

Uncle Lou cleared his throat, like, yeah, subtle, dude, so I stammered out something like: "Oh, uh, nice to meet you, Mr. Cooper," just remembering his name at the last minute.

“I’m gonna get goin’ – I got that Chevy to work on.” Uncle Lou shuffled his feet together, looking shifty and nervous (nothing like I was used to).

The boss nodded, all cool and flinty-eyed. “Yeah, gotta be done by eleven, Lou.”

“I’m on it.” He bowed his head and left, looking completely whipped, it was pretty awesome.

The boss turned back to me, and his expression suddenly got much friendlier.

"You want coffee, Derek?"

“Uh, yeah, thanks, um, Mr. Cooper.”

“Dude, call me Dean.”

Apart from Uncle Lou and Dean, there were two other guys who worked at the garage: Gabe and Tim, and of course, there was Dougal, Dean’s dog. Dougal was like the place’s mascot, and he followed Dean around, like, all the time, watching him, even if he was working on cars, begging food off him if he was having a snack. I didn’t usually like dogs; my best friend Evan had one that slobbered everywhere, seriously, the thing had about a pint of drool hanging from its mouth all the freaking time, totally gross. Dougal was alright though, he had big intelligent dog eyes and he’d watch you from his dog basket in the office or from his spot by whatever car Dean was working on, tracking your every movement and bristling to his feet if anyone came close to Dean. The customers loved him, lots of them stopping to pet him and shoot the sh*t with Dean.

I sort of knew Gabe already cause he’d gone to high school with my dad, like a lot of people around here. On my first day, he said something to me about what a great guy my Dad had been, as if they were totally f*cking close, or some such sh*t. I used to get that kinda crap all the freaking time. So many people had their little stories and memories about Dad, and they totally never seem to get that I just didn’t want to hear them. But Gabe was a talker. He’d been working at the garage since he quit high school; in his own words, he'd been there forever.

“From before Dean took over,” he told me on that first day while scoffing down a donut, like, way to be a stereotype, dude. “He’s been here over two years now, just turned up and bought it one day. The guy who had it before – McGregor, you remember him, Lou?” Uncle Lou nodded slowly. “It was weird – he just upped and left. Not that we were complaining. Guy was a douche. Dean’s alright, though.” Lou snorted at that and Gabe sent him a look, “Jesus, Lou, get outta the f*ckin’ dark ages.”

Tim was only a couple of years older than me. He rode a bicycle to work, sat at the front desk for most of the day where he was supposed to answer the phone and deal with “the paperwork sh*t”. He only worked three days, the rest of the week he took part time courses in engineering at the community college.

He showed me around on my first day, taking me into the office, which was small and really really cluttered, like, worse than our garage at home, with stacks of paper on filing cabinets, the desk, hell, even the floor. “It’s, like, my job to deal with this paperwork sh*t, but fuuuuck man, there’s so freakin’ much of it. I guess Dean’ll want you to help me out,” he groaned. There were skin-mag pictures on the wall above the desk, crinkled and torn at the corners; they looked ancient, like, from the 90’s at least. “They were there before me, hell; I think they’ve been there forever. They’re kinda like antiques. Cool, huh.” Yeah, whatever, lameass.

I followed him out the room and into the kitchen, where he showed me how to use the modern coffee machine Dean had used before, it looked way out of place among the crappy cupboards and stained sink. Half-way through filtering the water, he turned to me and lowered his voice in this serious, confidential way.

“Look, man, there’s somethin’ you should, like, know about Dean, if you’re gonna work here.” He paused dramatically, and I nodded at him to continue, like, spit it out already, dude. “He doesn’t like being touched, like, ever. Like, no brushin’ up against him, even by accident, no shaking hands, and if you hand him sh*t – then just be careful that your fingers don’t, you know, graze his or something. He gets, like, well, I just hope you don’t get to see it, cause, dude: totally f*ckin’ out of it weird. Got it?”

“Okaaay,” I said. “But, uh, why would he –“

“f*ck knows,” he interrupted. “But, I reckon, my theory, like, is that he was in the army? Like, Iraq or Afghanistan? He coulda gotten the scar there too – you know, the one on his face. Makes sense, right, man?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

It kinda did make sense. I’d totally gotten the military vibe from Dean and I sort of knew military. My mom’s little brother, my Uncle Randy, had done two tours in Iraq. He was a real weird guy; I always got nervous when we went to visit him and my Aunt Charlene. My Mom said it was the war that had made him that way; apparently he’d had PTSD, anyway, she always said it like he’d never been the same afterwards, like the war had f*cked him up that way.

Tim took me to the front waiting area next. It smelled of stale coffee and oil and had uncomfortable plastic chairs, two loudly buzzing vending machines and a crummy looking speaker set in one of the corners next to a rubber plant which right then was blasting Don’t Stop Believin’ by Journey (yeah, yeah, I know, but my Mom was a fan). I could hear someone’s voice floating through the open door from the shop, singing along really f*cking loudly: “Strangers, WAIT-ing, up and down the BOU-levard… da, da, da…in the night… STREET-lights, PEO-ple, livin’ just to find emotion…”

I turned and raised an eyebrow at Tim, like, what the f*ck; he shrugged and rolled his eyes.

“Dude, get used to it. He’s like this all the freakin’ time.”

“Oh, you mean, uh, Mr. Cooper, Dean?”

“Yeah, man, Dean. I’ve told him, but he doesn’t listen, thinks he’s, like, this awesome singer, so freakin’ deluded. I told him we should get a TV instead of the radio, give our goddamn ears a break, but he f*ckin’ loves all this lame, classic rock sh*t.”

“Hey – it’s classic and it rocks. Better than that emo crap you listen to," Dean interrupted us, the song had stopped and he was leaning up against the door to the shop. “And, like I told Timmy here, you got a problem with my singin’, dude; you might as well walk your ass on out of here now.” He smirked, the cheerful look on his face taking the edge of his words.

“Man, Dean, I told you, no one listens to emo anymore.”

“Whatever, point holds. This is an emo-free zone. Got it?” He turned to look at me, eyebrows raised.

I nodded and gulped. “Uh, yeah, yeah, okay.”

“Good, s’long as that’s clear. So, tell me, kid, how much d’you know about engines?”

It turned out not a lot was the answer, which Uncle Lou should've told him in the first place, useless f*cker. Dean was alright about it though, hiding any annoyance at my general uselessness. He made a good show of trying to point out what each part did, gesturing with a screwdriver, sleeves of his boiler suit rolled up past his forearms. I couldn’t stop myself from staring at the scar on the back of his hand: it was longer than it first appeared, twisting up over his wrist, purple and mottled, edged silver. I couldn’t take my eyes off of it, it was nothing like any scar I’d ever seen before, and at the risk of coming across as a complete wuss, it kinda gave me the creeps.

Unfortunately, Dean totally noticed me staring at his hand, it was hard not to. “Dude, what?”

“That’s a – your scar, it’s uh, looks bad.”

He was silent for a moment, and I thought about Tim’s theory, about my Uncle Randy and his time in Iraq. Then Dean shrugged and non-answered, “Yeah. Was bad.”

On my third day, Dean took off on some mysterious errand, leaving me in charge of the phones. I sat at the front desk, shut the door to the workshop behind me, and turned off the speakers. I took out my Ipod and turned it up loud. Oh yeah, I was totally rocking this proper job sh*t.

"Hey."

I jumped halfway out my seat and yanked the earbuds out with a guilty tug, quickly covering the magazine I was reading with my arms. A guy in a suit was leaning against the desk, staring down at me with a look that was a strange cross between brooding and amused.

"You must be Derek," he said after a moment.

"Uh, yeah... I mean, that's right. How can I help you?"

I blinked for a second and scrambled to my feet. He was still staring at me, and it was seriously unnerving. From the way he loomed over the desk, I could tell that he was pretty f*cking tall; I was just over six foot myself and this guy had at least another four inches on me. He was well built too, with shoulders like a freaking Mack truck.

He smiled at me, suddenly becoming all friendly, and held out his hand. “Welcome to the team, Derek. Finally, someone with a two syllable name.”

Huh? What kind of dorky thing was that to say? I was about to take his hand when I stopped…

He had a scar on the back of his hand: purple, in the shape of an inverted question mark, and it was exactly the same as the one on Dean’s hand…

For a second, I stared, not sure if I was imagining it, because that… that was weird. I blinked and stared again: no, it was definitely… the color, the way it snaked over his wrist and disappeared under his jacket sleeve… Identical.

I could feel his eyes on me, all ice cool and judgmental, so I forced myself to take his hand, trying my hardest not to flinch as his long fingers wrapped around mine, squeezing hard. He must’ve noticed something was up because he let my hand go quickly with a smile that made chills run up my spine.

"Dean's not here?" he asked.

I fumbled over my words, unable to stop staring at that mark on his hand. "Uh, no, he um, had to go run some errands. That's what he said."

"Did he tell you where he went?"

"No, sorry, man. He just, uh, left."

"Right, and he's not answering his cell." He sighed irritably and pressed his lips together. "Well, thanks, Derek. I'll guess I'll see you again soon."

"Um, yeah, right."

I watched him leave, very pleased to see the back of him. He crossed the room in a couple of enormous, long-legged strides and raised his hand to push the door open, even from this distance I could see the scar.

I tried to go back to work, but I felt strange, like… kinda unnerved and creeped out, and I knew it was the guy and the weird scar thing that was bothering me, but I didn’t know why exactly. It was just… something was just… weird.

The next day, Tim was back, so I asked him about the guy as soon as I got a chance alone with him.

“So, this guy came by yesterday. He was really tall, like, majorly tall, with, uh, dark weird hair -”

“Oh, you must mean Sam,” Tim interrupted.

"He, uh, had this scar across his hand, exactly like Dean's."

Tim nodded and glanced at the paper in his hand. We were in the middle of categorizing invoices; apparently, there was some sort of logging system, but half the sheets of paper made him raise his eyebrows in surprise and toss into the growing “MISCELLANEOUS” pile, so yeah, system, my ass.

"Yeah, that's right. That's Sam. Where's the R's go?"

"Here." I waved a hand at a pile by my foot. "So, uh, who's Sam? He seemed to know who I was."

"Well of course he did, dude, he knows everything that goes on here." I looked at him blankly, and he snorted and said, "He's Dean’s better half.”

“What?”

“Yeah, you know, life partner, boyfriend, lover, significant other, whatever the f*ck you call it.”

"Back up a minute… is Dean, uh. Dean’s gay?”

“Well, duh, yeah. He and Sam wouldn’t be a couple if they weren’t.” He smirked and leaned over to drop the invoice onto the R pile. “That’s how it works, man.”

I gaped at him, like, seriously… Dean was gay? Dean? No f*cking way.

“But - he - I've seen him flirt with women. That hot one yesterday – with the Nissan...”

“Yeah, and?” He looked at me as if I was some sort of moron. “Don’t mean nothing. He was just spreadin’ the love; Dean’s, like, an equal opportunities kinda guy. But whatever, you know.” He paused and his eyes narrowed, “Hey – you’re not, like, hom*ophobic are you? Because, Lou can be all kindsa weird about it and he’s your uncle. But you gotta know, dude, that’s so not cool –“

“No! No, course I’m not. I’m not like him.” Jesus, no way was I like that redneck asshole. He looked at me suspiciously for a moment then nodded, as if satisfied.

I couldn’t process this, trying to get my head over and around the fact that Dean, Dean, was gay. And he had a boyfriend. That creepy, tall guy was his boyfriend? Jesus. Maybe that was what the weird-ass matching scars were all about? f*ck. That couldn’t be right. But, what about the not-touching thing? Like, how did they have sex, if Dean couldn’t touch anyone? The whole thing just made f*ck-all sense.

"So, uh, does, like, everyone know about Dean and that guy being like -"

"A couple?"

"Yeah. Is it, like, common knowledge?"

"Well he don't hide it none. He's not, like, in the closet or nothin’."

"But he – uh, when he flirts with chicks, then is he, uh, like, pretending?"

Tim shrugged. "Like I’m sayin’, man, people ain't all that easy to categorize. You gotta widen your horizons, Derek. You never met any gay folk before?"

He shook his head at me, at my apparent lack of worldly knowledge; but the thing was, I didn't know any gay people - not properly, not, like, personally. Course there’d been Jeffy Harris at school, he was gay, everyone had known that, he was totally gay: he used to hang around with girls and he looked like he wore make-up, it was way obvious. And everyone used to say that Brad Collins on the football team had had a thing with that senior guy, Peter Falconio, but that’d just been rumors; I'd never really believed it, though my best friend Evan had thought it was f*cking hilarious at the time, which, okay, it kinda was.

Dean though… he was nothing like them. He owned a garage, for Christ's sake, he liked lame rock music and cars and he didn’t wear make-up and he’d probably been in the army. I'd never given much thought to his personal situation, but he didn't wear a wedding band, so I'd always just assumed he was single, he certainly acted like he did, flirting with all the hot women who came by. Apart from his embarrassing singing and sh*tty taste in music, he was kinda cool, him being gay was… well, it was… it just didn’t, like, fit.

I couldn’t stop myself from watching Dean for the next couple of days. I wanted to see it: the gestures, the way he spoke, just that something that was supposed to signal to us: yeah, I’m gay, I f*ck men, I suck co*ck, I’ve got an enormous boyfriend... but he acted exactly like he had in all the previous days I'd worked there, and I ended up feeling like I was the butt of some big joke.

I watched him flirt with the hot Nissan-owner when she came back to pick up her car, checking out her ass when she lowered herself into the driver’s side. She was playing up to it - skirt riding up her thighs as she adjusted the mirrors, leaning out the window and smiling at him. She didn’t seem to care about the scar on his face; hell, she was a chick, she probably dug it, thought it was manly or some such sh*t. I wanted to go on out there and tell her, warn her: you're barking up the wrong tree, lady, he doesn't play for your team, but I didn’t, I just watched.

On Friday, Dean went out for the afternoon. When he came back, he was carrying two six-packs and wearing normal clean clothes: scruffy torn jeans, a tight, white t-shirt under a flannel shirt, the amulet necklace thing he always wore over the t-shirt. He set up a few chairs outside in the back lot and called all of us out; he’d set up a cooler full of cold beers too, and he nodded at us to take one, looking very pleased with himself.

It was a warm day for the end of January, like, seventy degrees, and I remember that the radio was playing Hotel California as we sat about sipping our beers. Dougal lay between Dean’s legs, head draped over Dean’s old, scuffed boots, and it felt like we’d just been given an unexpected holiday. Dean turned to grin at me: queer, I thought, like I couldn’t help it, it was just still… it bothered me. But having Dean’s attention on you was intense, like being under a spotlight, and I couldn’t stop myself from grinning back at him despite everything, trying to push the thoughts (queer) away. As he bent to pick up another beer, his collar flipped open, and I noticed a mark on his neck, a mouth-shaped, purple-red bruise. A hickey.

I stared, and then, oh just f*cking great… started to blush, cause obviously there was someone who could touch Dean, who could touch him and kiss him and bite him. It had to be Sam - that strange, tall guy I’d met the other day – he was probably the one who’d given it to him, who’d put his lips on Dean’s neck and sucked at his skin. I’d given hickeys, I’d gotten them too – my ex, Lucinda, had a real thing about it – but for one guy to do it to another, that was just… I mean, I know guys did that, and being gay and sh*t, it was not something you could help, (whatever Uncle Lou said). But still, the thought of that guy Sam, (Dean's f*cking boyfriend) doing it to him, it just… it was like I could picture it in my head: Sam lowering his mouth to Dean's shoulder, lips wrapping around the golden-colored skin at Dean's neck, mouthing at the stubble on his jaw... f*ck, I blushed harder than ever, and quickly ducked my head, trying to hide it.

Luckily for me, Dean seemed to not have noticed anything. He raised his beer: "To Derek's first coupla weeks. You done good, kiddo. Consider yourself a permanent employee."

We all clinked and drank; Dean tilted his head back and drained half his bottle in one long pull. I sipped my own more slowly, trying to get myself under control while pretending to enjoy the beer.

"Hey, so this is where y’all are."

The voice sounded familiar and when I twisted around in my chair, I saw Sam leant up against the back door, just as tall and intimidating as I remembered, but this time dressed in jeans and an old flannel shirt instead of a suit. I stared at him and then oh God, started to blush again, cause I couldn’t stop thinking of his lips, licking... sucking... that bruise into Dean's neck. I quickly stole a glance at Dean; he was watching Sam pull up a chair with this fond, affectionate look on his face. He bent to pick up another bottle and held it out to Sam as he sat down.

"Finished up early, thought I’d see if you wanted a beer, but I see y’all way ahead of me."

“As usual,” said Dean with a smirk.

Sam snorted, and bent over to pet Dougal who’d gotten up from his seat under Dean’s chair to greet Sam. Dean immediately launched into telling a story of a customer who’d been by that morning, his voice gruff and sarcastic, everyone listening to him. My Dad used to be great at telling stories, "I should've been on the stage," he used to say with this mocking, overdramatic voice he'd sometimes put on, and Mom would watch him and roll her eyes with a soft look on her face. I stole a quick glance at Sam; he was looking at Dean with the exact same expression. It was weird; a guy looking at a guy in that way, and it made me feel strange, like, I didn’t know what I was supposed to think.

Dean finished the story with one of his sharp laughs; his hand came out and squeezed Sam’s shoulder still with that familiar, affectionate sort of way. It was the first time I’d seen Dean ever touch anyone, and that pretty much sealed it for me: all of Tim’s bullsh*t about them being a couple obviously was true because they were a couple, just a regular couple, like my Mom and Dad used to be. And it was… it was weird, and yet, they seemed so normal together, so natural, like it was totally no big deal, like everything should just fit.

I stared at Dean’s hand where it rested on Sam’s arm – his scarred hand – the scar looking even more like something branded into his skin than I remembered, like the imprint an iron makes if you leave it too long. I looked away, feeling suddenly sick.

When I tuned back into the conversation, they were all talking about hunting. So, Dean and Sam went hunting? Two gay guys hunting? That was strange. Not that they seemed to act anything like the gay guys you saw on network TV: I couldn't imagine Dean ever once worrying that his shoes didn’t match his pants, fact was, the only shoes I’d ever seen him wear were those clumpy biker boots.

"Where do you, uh, go hunting?" I blurted out, interrupting Dean half-way through another story. He paused, surprised by my sudden return to the conversation and shrugged.

"All over.”

"That's right; y'all were in Virginia, last time, right? Coupla months ago?" Gabe said. "sh*t, that must've been right about the same time they caught that psycho guy. The sick freak that was diggin' up all those poor, dead girls. That was some nasty sh*t, I remember seein’ it on TV and thinking y'all must've been there right about that time."

"Nah, don't think so," Dean answered quickly. He fell silent for a moment and exchanged a quick look with Sam. "Think we were there before that sh*t went down." He snapped the cap on another beer and handed it to Sam before gathering himself another, "Sides, we were holed up in this cabin right out in the woods whole time we were there - very isolated. Just the two of us. Remember, Sammy?" He raised an eyebrow, giving Sam an openly dirty look. Sam rolled his eyes, and Dean's tongue pressed in the corner of his cheek, like they were sharing some private joke. I felt myself go red again, and for a moment, I hated the two of them.

I wasn’t the only one feeling uncomfortable, cause at that moment, Uncle Lou cleared his throat in a totally obvious way. Dean turned to look at him and asked, "Yeah, Lou?" all low and dangerous.

We all looked between them; Dean staring at Uncle Lou with a kind of challenge in his face, the atmosphere getting really tense, and God I hated him, my stupid, hick, redneck uncle.

"Got that Civic to finish," he said finally, getting to his feet. He didn’t look at Dean, didn’t look at anyone, but I could hear the disgust in his voice, I knew it too well not to.

"Right. You do that." Dean's voice was like steel as he watched Uncle Lou slouch back into the shop.

It all went silent and awkward again, and I heard myself babbling, trying to break it: "So, uh, what d'you guys hunt?"

"Big game, deer," said Sam.

"So, like, uh, at the beginning of The Deer Hunter?"

"Oh, man, awesome movie," Dean groaned out, all trace of tension vanishing. He mimicked holding a gun, squinting his eyes half-shut: "A deer's gotta be taken with one shot; one shot's what it's all about..."

"You need to work on your de Niro impression," said Sam dryly.

"Aw, Sammy, always saltin’ my game! Seriously, my impressions rock."

Tim laughed, saying, "Nah, you suck, man."

Dean laughed out loud, a glint of white teeth in the afternoon sun, laughter lines dimpling at the edges of his mouth. I stared at him, disarmed for a second, before I forced myself to look away.

Later that night, as I lay in bed, about to go to sleep, I pictured him again: grinning, lips shiny with beer, the winter sun pink on his cheeks… the image spinning through my head like the imprint of a camera flash. It was a long time before I managed to get to sleep.

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

January 2013

Sam stands by the upstairs window in the master bedroom. It’s dusk and the light is grey, faint and long-shadowed, the porch light already on. He leans his forehead against the cold glass, breath fogging the dirty pane as he watches Dean return from his run. Dean’s sprinting through the fields surrounding their property, Dougal barking and snapping deliriously in circles around him. He hears Dean call out, sees him vault over the wooden fence, clearing it effortlessly, the dog follows; slipping a lot less effortlessly underneath, paws burrowing furiously at the dirt. He emerges behind Dean, and Sam hears his brother’s voice rise in a half-laugh, half-pant as he bends at the waist to ruffle his dirty muzzle and filthy, floppy ears. Dean straightens up and looks up towards the house, raising his hand in greeting when he spots Sam.

Sam closes the window, hears the wrench of the back screen door, the thump of Dean’s sneakers on the bare wood stairs, the rattle of the bathroom door, everything loud and noisy and unrestrained. He moves to lean against the bathroom doorframe, unconsciously posing, legs crossed and arms folded as he watches Dean splash cold water over his face, skin flushed and damp from his run. Dean’s t-shirt is stuck to his back with sweat, he peels it off in one sweeping motion; shoulders glistening under the bathroom lights, and just like that Sam's desperate... he needs to get his hands on Dean, needs to touch him, an overwhelming rush of heat to his blood that has him crowding up against his brother, folding into his bodyline, arms encircling his chest. He presses his face into the sweat-damp of Dean's neck, the cord of Dean’s amulet against his cheek, the drum-thump of Dean’s pulse against his lips. Dean stills; mouth shaping his name, "Sam."

He licks a long stripe over the curve of Dean's neck; he tastes salty, tangy, familiar. The first time he kissed Dean he tasted like this: sweat and desire and familiarity, and he wanted to swallow it absolutely, to swallow up Dean, to get to that part of him underneath; to have all of him, to know all of him, to possess all of him. It's the feeling he has every time he touches Dean, as if nothing could be this intimate, no other two people could be this close, no one could love anyone this much.

He pulls Dean hard against him, licks him again, sighs, “You taste amazing. Want to. God. Got to bite you.”

Dean shivers, breathes, “Yeah, Sam, yeah.”

His hand dips under the waistband of Dean’s shorts, grasps his co*ck, already so hard for him, he opens his mouth over one of the tendons in Dean’s neck and bites, teeth sinking into the soft, golden skin. Dean shudders, his hand flutters upwards, fumbles open the bathroom cabinet, lube tumbling into the sink with a startling clatter. Sam raises his head, catches Dean's eyes in the mirror.

"Dude, that's gonna be hard to hide." Dean’s staring at his reflection, at the livid, mouth-shaped mark on his neck. "I'm not wearing no f*ckin' turtlenecks."

"You said I could. Anyway. I know you; you’ll get off on giving everyone an eyeful."

Dean huffs out a laugh and pinches Sam's forearm, "You gonna f*ck me, stud?"

He f*cks Dean over the bathroom sink. Dean's fingers grip the enamel sink surround until they're white, his amulet a dull, brassy contrast to the pink flush on his chest. When he raises his head, Sam sees his brother’s eyes reflected back at him, pupils blown, eyelashes soft, whispery shadows against his cheek. He feels a fierce, terrifying rush of affection, as sharp and complete as any org*sm, and he freezes, lost in it, surrendered to this unconditional desire, this overwhelming completeness of being with Dean, being inside Dean… until Dean brings him back, an impatient, needy growl: “Move Sam, Godammit, f*ckin’ f*ck me already!”

He comes first, mouthing Dean’s name into his neck as his body shudders to a climax. Dean follows a second later, Sam’s hand on his co*ck, shooting and splattering across the toothpaste-streaked sink, panting, “Touchdown!”

Sam laughs shakily, whaps him on the shoulder. “Dork.”

Dean snorts out a choke of laughter, bends away from him to let his co*ck slip out gently, slickly. Dean's face is flushed, beads of sweat collecting just under his hairline and in the short grey hairs around his ears. He grabs Sam's hand in his own and rubs one of Sam's fingers into the smears of come decorating the side of the sink.

"Open up," he tells him. Sam opens his mouth, sucks his finger in. It tastes salty, brackish and with a hint of something that's probably toothpaste or dried soap. He slobbers saliva over his finger, pulls it out with a squelchy, popping sound, reaching to smear the goop over Dean's face, tracing the scar that runs down from his hairline through his eyebrow and across his cheek.

Dean leers at him, face shiny and glistening with spit and sweat and come. Sam feels himself smile, and for a moment, everything’s quietly perfect. Dean rolls his eyes at him, all fond, exasperated affection, muttering, “You’re the dork,” under his breath as he pulls away to climb into the shower.

"Clean that up, would ya?" he says, and swishes the shower curtain closed before Sam can respond.

Sam waits for a couple of minutes; then just as he hears Dean's enthusiastic hum, he twists the hot tap, grinning when there's a strangled yelp from the shower and a shout of: "Motherf*cker! Sam!"

He smiles to himself, turns off the tap, wipes away the traces of sem*n with Dean's facecloth and jerks the shower curtain open.

"Did you say something?"

"Did I say something? Sam - you know I f*ckin' hate cold showers," Dean bitches, emerging from under the water. "You did that on purpose."

Sam grins and pushes his way inside. "Whatever."

"Don’t think you’re bargin’ on in here with your freak-ass ginormo body!"

"Shut up and make some room."

Dean splutters for a minute before begrudgingly moving aside, letting him shoulder his way under the hot water. "Don't you dare steal all the hot water..."

Sam rolls his eyes and reaches for the soap. "If you'll turn around I'll wash your back."

There's a cursory grumbling sound before Dean turns around. “Make it good, bitch.”

Dean fires up the barbecue, and when Sam comes out to give him a beer, he’s whistling happily to himself, squirting accelerant over the coals, the flames whooshing up and barely avoiding singeing off his eyebrows. By Dean’s feet, Dougal barks a warning and scampers away towards the back of the garden, Dean cackles out loud and calls him a big dumb dog.

“Jesus, Dean, you’ll do yourself a f*ckin’ injury,” Sam tells him.

“No I won’t.” He takes a cheerful pull on his beer and drops the meat onto the grill with a satisfying sizzle. "Ahhh, hear that, dude, that's a good sound." He prods at the meat with the fork and throws Sam a smirk over his shoulder. “Awesome.”

Sam shakes his head at him, mouthing “pyro” as he goes back inside.

They go out after dinner. The nearest bar is under a mile from their place, so they leave the car behind, and that more than anything, is proof that their life is different now. Dean would never have left his baby behind in the old days, even for such a short walk as this, but now it’s different - the comfort it provided, the familiarity, the one constant in their f*cked-up lives – they don’t need it so much anymore.

They talk as they walk, and it still amazes Sam that they can do this, even after so many years, hell, their entire f*cking lives in each other’s pockets, they still have sh*t to say to each other. Dean talks about the garage, about a woman who came by that morning: "In a f*cking Nissan. sh*tty car, but man, she was hot. And totally into me. Dude, in the old days, I’d’ve totally hit that."

Sam says nothing, he knows Dean’s doing it deliberately – this typical, big-brother goading - but he’s so f*cking good at it, knows exactly what to say or do to get under Sam’s skin, to make him feel like this – this stupid, irrational jealousy. It’s totally f*cking ridiculous; even if Dean could f*ck any goddamn chick or dude he wanted, it wouldn’t make a difference to their relationship, to what Dean feels for him, what they feel for each other. But still… it rankles with him, and Dean, of course, knows it, loves it, f*cking gets off on it.

“Aw, is Sammy feelin’ jealous?”

“f*ck off.”

“S’not like I could do anything, even if I wanted to.”

“Did you want to?”

Dean shrugs, “If I say yes, does it mean you’re not puttin’ out later?”

Sam presses his lips together, glares at him, that expression on his face that he knows makes him look like a whiny, sullen teenager, he hates looking like that.

“God, you’re such a moron sometimes. Jealous? Jesus.” Dean elbows him, shakes his head in fond exasperation.

“And you’re a f*ckin’ tease!”

Dean chuckles dirtily and grabs his ass, “Whatever. You love it.”

As soon as they get to the bar, a guy, Gary or Matt or something, (Sam doesn’t remember his name, though they’ve probably been introduced at some point) accosts Dean and starts talking at him. He leaves Dean to it, goes on inside to get their drinks. Dean knows a lot of people in town, and their nights out always feature important cameos from various town acquaintances: Bob from the hardware store, Janice from Dean's favorite sandwich deli, Ethan the grocery store delivery boy, bartenders and waitresses, garage customers and garage suppliers, even Frank, the super-friendly mailman.

Sam was worried that Dean would end up resenting him when they first settled here, that Dean would feel out of place and suffocated by the small-town environment. But Dean adapted quickly, even came to like it in his own way. And the locals liked him back, respected him. It makes Sam want to laugh sometimes when he remembers the attitude they both used to get when they were teenagers, the whispers he’d sometimes hear behind his back: God, that new kid’s so weird. Man, yeah, did you see his brother? f*cking psycho, way he was staring at me, Jenna swears she saw him with a knife at recess. Curtis says they’re staying at that roach motel and you know what kinda folk stay there… Someone should call someone and report them; it can’t be right…

It’s quiet as usual inside the bar, it’s generally always quiet, the main reason they come here so often. He orders from Bartender Cliff, sparing a couple of minutes to shoot the sh*t: his wife Wendy's new entrepreneurial venture in the gift basket market, his daughters, Clarice and Stephanie, on their way to junior high now, my, how time does fly. Dean's at their usual table when he turns around, talking to yet another acquaintance, head co*cked back, body carefully angled away from any possible contact. Sam watches the line of Dean's jaw, the curve of his throat as he talks, and he thinks about how his mouth was right there, not four hours ago. The thought grinds him to a halt, a flush of lust spinning out through his body, burst of sweat under his shirt, his fingers suddenly more sensitive as they grip the cold, glass bottles, moisture icy to the touch. He takes a long pull on his beer, forcibly calming himself, making himself drag his eyes away from Dean, from the curve of Dean's throat. It’s crazy how Dean can do this to him, can wreck him so easily, can send him reeling with a tilt of his head, it’s been over five years, but he’s never gotten used to it and he doesn’t think he ever will.

Dean takes the beer from him, purposefully grazing their fingers together, other hand coming out to bracelet Sam's wrist as he pulls up the spare stool. Dean never used to be so tactile in public, but so much has changed between them, and Sam finds it a useful gauge for assessing his brother’s comfort levels: if he’s at ease in a place then he’ll touch Sam willingly, almost thoughtlessly. Here, at Pete's, he's in his comfort zone, thinking nothing of leaving his hand resting on Sam's thigh or his arm hooked around the back of Sam’s chair so his fingers can play with the hair at the nape of Sam’s neck. It's amusing sometimes to watch people's reactions to Dean's little displays of affection, their eyes always drawn irresistibly to the spot where Dean might be massaging Sam's elbow, or resting his hand on his shoulder and occasionally, after a few beers, nuzzling his neck. It's almost as if they're compelled to look while trying to stay cool, attempting to continue the conversation unflustered and unbothered by the "hom*osexuals".

The thing that surprises him about most people in town is that they're more or less cool with him and Dean. Okay, so they’re locally notorious, because let’s face it, there aren’t that many “guys like them” standing up to be counted around here, but their novelty status has pretty much worked in their favor: the locals coming to gawp at one of the town’s token hom*osexuals when they need their car fixing. They could’ve tried to hide, could’ve pretended to be brothers, and that’s got to be about the freakiest thing about this entire situation – pretending to be something they actually are – but he finds it hard to keep his hands off Dean these days, to act around him like he is only his brother, when they’re so much more than that. There’s too much between them, too much they’ve gone through, to not live this life on their own terms, too much that’s still not right, that’s still not perfect, for them not to make the most of what is… and honestly, life’s just too goddamn short and too goddamn dangerous to hide forever.

It seems like a miracle to him, that, here, right now, after everything, they’ve managed to find this: something that’s permanent, something that’s theirs. It’s not exactly what he used to dream of when he was a teenager, but it’s pretty f*cking close.

Dougal launches himself off the front porch to greet them as they scuff up the dusty driveway a couple of hours later. He circles them in a giddy run, panting and barking enthusiastically, Dean bends down to pet him, using that affectionate, dopey tone of voice he reserves especially for the dog:

"How's my big, dumb boy? You been out, dude? You been out showin' the ladies a good time, huh? I betcha have. But listen, boy, shhhh; don't tell Sammy, you know how he gets..."

Sam shakes his head and leaves them to it. He unlocks the door, hears Dean approaching, porch steps creaking as he follows Sam inside, Dougal sneaking in around his legs. Before he's had chance to lock up, Dean's on him, pressing him back against the door, one hand cupped around his jaw.

"Hey," he murmurs, breath warm and whisky-sweet in Sam's face.

"Hey." He can’t stop himself from smiling as he looks into Dean's pink, alcohol-flushed face, his own slu*tty, wanting mouth moving instinctively for his brother’s lips.

Dean sways slightly as he pulls Sam away from the door, directing them towards the den, hands fisted in Sam’s jacket and legs intertwined as they stumble past the coffee table and tumble onto the long worn couch. Sam lets his head fall back over the armrest, and feels Dean’s hands fumble with his fly, popping the buttons open one by one in tortuous, slow motion. He groans out loud when Dean’s hand slides into his boxers to grasp his co*ck, palm sweaty and warm, mouth babbling and moaning incoherent, breathy words.

“Yeah, Sam, God, yeah. So f*ckin’ hot, little brother.”

He arches up into Dean’s thick fingers, the friction so f*cking perfect, Dean’s continued murmurings making his blood swim, his pulse quicken. Dean stares down at him, at his co*ck, tongue swiping soft tracks over his lips, feathery lashes making shadows against the hollows of his face.

“f*ck, Sam, I wanna suck you. Wanna do it so f*ckin’ much. So f*ckin’ amazing.”

He’s drunk, Dean’s like this when he’s drunk, so needy and slu*tty he can’t keep his mouth shut. He’d be embarrassed if he were sober, but he isn’t, and Sam wants him so f*cking much, wants to hear him like this, feel him like this.

"Jesus, Dean. f*ckin’ – yeah. Do it already.”

Dean grins down at him, wide and dazzling, lips smacking together in anticipation. He takes him in, one long swallow, Sam gasps, breath catching, hips jerking up involuntarily, so warm and hot, so sizzling. His eyes lock onto his brother, onto his blood-red co*ck going in and out of Dean’s mouth. Dean angles his head so he can stare back up at him, lowering his lashes in a way that's so provocative and filthy that Sam can practically feel his balls tighten, like it’s too f*cking much, already.

He can’t hold back, never can, not when it’s Dean… and he jerks, shudders, comes with a cry, Dean's palm spread-eagled across his belly, holding him in place as he licks and swallows, moaning and groaning like Sam’s ji*zz is the best kind of vanilla ice cream. Sam heaves out a sigh, long and happy, and watches his big, sticky co*ck slide out of Dean's mouth, slapping wetly against his belly. Dean looms over him, lips red and bruised and sticky slick, Sam cranes his head up, takes his brother’s mouth in a kiss which Dean returns hungrily. His hands frame Dean’s face, thumbs digging into his temples as he devours his brother’s mouth, his shiny, spit-slicked lips. He can taste his own come in Dean’s spit, and he thinks, as he often does, how much it tastes like Dean’s own, the thought strangely comforting.

Dean pulls away, nuzzles at his jaw, “Do me, gotta do me now.” He grabs for Sam’s hand, pulls two of Sam’s fingers into his mouth, slobbering all over them as his lips shape a co*cky smile. “Make it easier for you.”

His sticky, smeared fingers make a quick job of jerking Dean off, quick and furious twists of his wrist, just how Dean likes it: his brother’s mouth against his cheek, pouring out a steady stream of filthy groans that vibrate against the side of Sam’s face.

He falls asleep with Dean on top of him, dimly aware, at the back of his mind, that their pants are still undone, and that Dean’s come is drying, scratchy and flaky, on both their bellies and balls. His last thought as he slides into a thick, alcohol-blurred sleep, is of Dougal, slowly licking the taste of Dean’s come off his fingers as they dangle off the couch.

******************

July 2007

The first time it happened between them it was his fault, his and the goddamn county pageant that meant there were no twin rooms available in a fifty mile radius of where they needed to be. He woke up in the middle of the night to the unmistakable sound of Dean jerking off in bed beside him; because, of course, the lack of twin beds in Fulward County would not dissuade Dean from his regular, masturbation schedule. To give him some credit, Dean was trying to be stealthy, trying to repress the needy moans, the breathy hisses of arousal... sounds that made Sam's co*ck hard, heavy and thick and ruthless in his boxers. Sleep-drunk and horny, only half aware of what he was doing, he rolled over and fumbled into Dean’s space, grabbing onto him with both hands at the exact moment Dean shuddered and came. He can still remember what it felt like to feel his brother’s come splash onto his fingers – hot and sticky and really, really weird.

Sam rolled over and felt Dean leave the bed, heard him pad across the room, bathroom door closing behind him with an air of finality that was like a book thumping closed. End of story. It definitely felt like it should be the end of something – Dean had just shot his load on him – that should mean something… shouldn’t it? He reached down for his discarded shirt and wiped his hands clean, thinking: Did I just do that? Was that really Dean and me? Am I seriously wiping my brother’s ji*zz off my hands with my own shirt? This is so f*cked-up.

He didn’t sleep that night, and Dean didn’t come out of the bathroom until they absolutely had to leave, forcing Sam to take a leak by the dumpsters, it was either that or confront Dean, and anything was preferably to that, even the smell of rotting dumpsters.

The second time he awoke to Dean jerking off, he didn’t hesitate. It was like the first time hadn’t even happened, or maybe, like it had happened, but it had happened differently, less awkwardly, like they’d already come to an agreement without either of them realizing. This time he didn’t think, just rolled over, felt Dean freeze for a second, then suddenly melt and reach out for him with needy, expectant hands.

They carried on that way for a while, a week, maybe two... It was weird. Uncanny how during the day Dean would be Dean, but at night… a whole other story.

What he does remember is being the one to bring it out in the open, to acknowledge it, force it out from under the bedcovers and into the harsh light of day, making them both confront what they were actually doing with each other.

Dean didn’t thank him for it. In fact, Dean took off in the middle of the night, ditching him with all the money he had, ($232), an old Motorhead mix tape and his favorite shotgun. As far as parting gifts went, they pretty much sucked.

In the end, it only took Sam two days to run Dean down. He picked the lock on his motel room and waited for him, perched, ram-rod straight, on the edge of the unoccupied bed. Despite being on his own, Dean had still gotten a room with two queens - a fact Sam found both infuriating and endearing - kinda like Dean himself. Dean unlocked the door, paused in the doorway and groaned out: "Oh, you have got to be kiddin' me! Already? Dude, is this some of your freaky-ass, psychic sh*t?"

He closed the door when Sam didn’t reply; warily taking his cue from Sam's taught-ass, pissed-off body language. He sank down on the other bed and ran an awkward hand through his already mussed hair. He looked debauched, skin pink, eyes bloodshot and mouth puffy, the instantly recognizable twinned smells of sex and booze sliding off him as he shuffled his coat off, unable to meet Sam’s eyes. Sam felt a thick stirring of anger deep down in his belly, resentment and bitterness flaring to the surface… How could he? How f*cking could he? Just – just sit there, stinking of sex and alcohol, with other people’s fingerprints all over him...

"So… uh, how'd you find me?"

Sam couldn’t speak at first, he’d spent the past two days thinking of the many ways he was going to punish Dean for abandoning him like that, thinking of all the nasty sh*t he could say to get under Dean's skin, thinking of how f*cking angry he'd been, how f*cking angry he was right now. He raised his eyes again and stared at Dean, boring his steel-eyed, Dad-like glare into his brother’s face, f*cking showing him, making him realize what he’d done, what he’d put him through.

But Dean wasn’t responding, was taking it as if it were his due, not even putting up a glimmer of a fight and that… that wasn’t what he wanted from Dean right now, not this, this goddamned guilt and the endless f*cking martyrdom…

"Doesn't matter," he muttered finally.

Dean sighed wearily, “Yeah, yeah, okay.” He coughed, spread his arms, “So, I guess you, uh, you wanna take a swing at me. And you know, that’s cool, if you want. I don’t mind. f*ck, Sam, I’d feel the same way in your place.”

Sam didn’t stop to think, just launched himself forward and tackled Dean, wrestling him down to the floor. They rolled across the dirty worn carpet, his arms a bodybind around Dean's torso, furious and tight-skinned and so f*cking angry…. He wanted to punch him, wanted to hit him, to hurt him, but he couldn’t let go, couldn’t release his stranglehold on his brother’s body for long enough to do it. Dean struggled, bucked and twisted under him, trying hopelessly to push him off, but Sam’s fingers were locked too tightly around Dean’s back, not letting go, never letting go.

Dean squirmed and cursed as they collided with the other bed, a bitten off motherf*cking sonofabitch spat into Sam’s ear as Sam’s elbow knocked against the metal frame with a sharp crack of pain. He swore loudly, and released Dean for a second to grab his throbbing elbow; Dean collapsed to the floor under him, chest spasming, and for a moment, Sam was terrified, thinking Dean was having a fit, a heart attack… until he realized Dean was laughing his body shuddering with hysterical, stupid laughter.

Sam felt like cracking then: overwhelmed by the desire to hit him, to hurt him, he couldn’t believe Dean was laughing when he was so mad at him, only Dean, f*cking Dean, could make him feel this f*cking crazy, this f*cking furious. He jerked against him, pinned him to the floor hard, his palms grinding into Dean’s shoulders, his hips flat against Dean's and -

Oh my God... the realization dawned red and hot and oh sh*t no, please no... he was hard, his co*ck, his stiff, throbbing co*ck was pressing down into his brother’s stomach, hard and unmistakable. He closed his eyes and tried, searched, for the courage to open them and look down at Dean...

Dean was staring up at him, all trace of hysterical laughter wiped from his face. His eyes were burning, dark and iridescent, pupils dilated in a way that would later become so familiar, but was now… otherworldy. He shifted under Sam, and Sam felt it then: Dean’s own co*ck… a hard, thick giveaway through the thin, worn denim.

There was nowhere to hide for either of them.

They both went still, deathly, quietly still... then Sam felt his body start to move, his hips jerking, grinding down against Dean’s, getting that beautiful friction, that just-right-just-f*cking-perfect friction against his aching co*ck as Dean met every grind and thrust with a jerk of his own, his own co*ck slotting against Sam’s as they hissed and moaned and panted and arched. Sam buried his face into the crook of Dean's neck, scrunched his eyes tight shut and inhaled the alcohol-sour, sweat-damp scent of his brother's skin. His fingers were crushed under Dean’s back, thighs braced either side of Dean’s body as they thrust and jerked and ground… his one conscious thought to rewrite the patterns on Dean’s skin, to scour away every other person who had ever touched his brother.

It was quick. Ridiculously, embarrassingly quick. Sam came with a full-body spasm, he felt like he was letting something go… releasing something… that incessant, throbbing, never-ending tension, and Jesus f*cking Christ, it felt so good. He felt Dean come seconds later, fingers digging into Sam's waist, thumbs grinding against his hipbones, chest heaving under Sam. Sam shivered, exhaled painfully into Dean's collar, eyes still tight shut, wet patch forming by his panting mouth.

Dean twisted underneath him and shoved him off, eyes wide and panicked.

"Dude, dude, what the f*ck?"

Sam just laughed, jagged and rueful and mostly embarrassed. "Sorry. I didn't - that wasn't supposed to happen."

"You think?" Dean barked out a nerve-ragged laugh and plucked at his pants, disbelief still written large on his flushed face. "I - Jesus Christ, Sam, you made me come in my goddamn pants! I haven't done that since I was sixteen years old! f*ck!"

"I've never done it," he murmured.

"Figures."

They lay there, staring at each other for what felt like an hour, but was probably only a minute, until Dean finally spoke up, "I guess me runnin' away like that didn't work out so good, huh?"

"No. And don't even think about doing it again. Because, seriously, Dean, I will f*ckin' kill you, if you ever do that to me again. I swear to God, because I know I’ve done it to you, but Jesus -” he trailed off; eyes locked on Dean’s, face set and hard.

Dean took a breath, and when he spoke, he sounded resigned: “Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry, I didn’t… I panicked, okay? It was f*ckin’ wrong, dude. Sammy, it was wrong, you’re a guy and you’re – f*ck – not just any guy, you’re you, and what was going on, and I just – I thought I could make it better if I left.”

“Well that succeeded brilliantly.”

Dean snorted humorlessly, pressed the heel of his hand to his eyes, exhaling on a shrug, “Right.”

There was another long moment of silence. Sam stared at a vague point in front of him, noticing the dirt and dust bunnies collecting under Dean’s bed, the cobwebs clinging to the feet. He could sense Dean moving; see him from the corner of his eye, getting slowly to his feet.

“Dean…”

Dean hesitated, angled his head towards Sam.

“Maybe we should, uh, talk about this?”

Dean stiffened. Sam swallowed back the sudden urge to laugh, instead hastily adding: “Or not? I mean, not right now.”

"Oh, thank God," Dean breathed.

He got up, shucking off his shirts as he stalked towards the bathroom. Sam watched him, drinking in his half-nakedness: muscles slick with sweat, his pale, soft skin, the jut of his shoulder blades, curve of his spine and dip of his ass. As Dean slammed the door shut behind him, he realized miserably that he was getting hard again, and that this – this f*cking weirdo attraction he’d suddenly developed for his brother – it was not going anywhere anytime soon.

They packed up the car in silence, pulled out the parking lot in silence, headed for the state highway in silence. Hell, it was exactly like a million other times they’d sat in the car in deathly excruciating silence, except this time, it really, really wasn’t.

Sam had his eyes closed, trying to feign asleep when he was jolted back to reality by Dean pulling the car over and yanking on the parking brake with none of his usual care. He blinked his eyes open and turned to look at Dean: Dean was holding the steering wheel in a death grip, a small muscle at the corner of his mouth twitching as he ground his teeth loud enough for Sam to hear over the cooling engine.

“Okay, okay, so I’ll bite,” Dean muttered at last. He swallowed, his shoulders stiffening further, if that were possible, “Look, dude, Sam. I’m freakin’ lost here. I have no idea what the hell’s goin’ on? You wanna enlighten me?”

“Me?”

“Do you see anyone else around here? Jesus, Sam, of course I mean you!”

“I, uh, I don’t know. I was hopin’ you could tell me.”

“Oh God,” Dean groaned. His grip on the wheel got even tighter, and he bent forward, humping his body over until his forehead was resting on his hands.

Sam stared at him in dismay. “Dean? Are you okay, man?”

“What do you think, genius?” There was a long, loaded silence, then he spoke again, voice cracking over the words: “Everything’s f*cked up, Sammy. I’m sorry, I f*cked everything up. I shouldn’t have left you like that. I should never have –“ he broke off, took a breath, “I’m sorry. For – uh, that… And, uh, everything else…” The words were partly muffled by his hands, but Sam could hear the desolation in Dean’s voice, cutting through to him, through every f*cking layer he had and making his chest ache.

He snapped off his seatbelt and crowded closer to Dean. “No you didn’t. You didn’t f*ck anything up. It doesn’t have to be f*cked up.”

Dean huffed out a pained breath, “Sam –“

“- No! Dean, listen to me! Come on, it’s okay. We’re okay, aren’t we?”

After a long, painful moment, Dean looked up, Sam stared back at him, feeling perversely close to laughing out loud, his brother looked so lost, almost laughably so: eyes scrunched up and eyebrows knotted together.

"Okay? God! This is not okay! We can't - all this sh*t that was happening before... it was wrong. Don’t you get that?"

“No, I don’t. Cause, Dean, please, listen to me, you didn’t take advantage of me. I know you’re panicking about that. But, come on, I’m a grown man, I can take you –“ a snort from Dean, Sam rolled his eyes, “I can so take you. If I thought you were f*ckin’ – I don’t know, forcing me into it – which for the record, you weren’t – but if you were, then I’d’ve pushed you away. You know I would. Give me some credit, man.” He paused, bit his lip; he could feel his face begin to redden, the words forcing themselves out so he was practically whispering, “I didn’t do that. Cause I - I liked it. I was hard,. I wanted it. You.”

“Oh God, Sammy, this is so f*cked up..."

"You were hard too, I felt it.” He needed to get the words out, had to have them out there before he lost the nerve, before he went back to pretending everything was all okay, pretending that what had been going on under cover of darkness for the past few weeks was just some sort of vivid dream. "We got each other off. We made each other come. And, we’ve been doing it for weeks."

Dean made a strangled noise and bent over again, hiding his face in his hands. "I can't talk about this. This is just... wrong."

"It doesn’t have to be." He stretched out a hand, he needed to touch him, calm him, reassure him… but he let it hover there for a moment, unsure what to do. "Dean, I love you. You're all I have, and I love you, and you - you're plannin’ on leaving me here. On my own. And you know, I'm gonna do all I can to not let that happen, but in the meantime," he hesitated, eyes locked on the back of Dean's head, his ear tinged pink, his neck, the short, bristled hairs at his nape, he could feel the tight, burning sting of tears behind his eyes, and when he spoke again, his voice was almost breaking, "I want to get to know you - to get to have all of you..."

“Sam –“

He spoke over Dean’s interruption, voice shaking and tears starting to blur his vision, "Dean, please. I have to – I want to know all of you, like, everything, I want everything, I want the real you, not just some bullsh*t facade..." Dean tried to open his mouth again, but Sam thrust out a hand, cutting him off. "No! Just – just listen to me! If you leave me and I can't save you, for any reason that doesn't work out, then I - I want to know that I knew you, completely and utterly because I love you, man, God, Dean, so f*ckin’ much, and I just want -"

Dean was on him, pressing his lips against his, pushing his tongue into his mouth, teeth clashing at all the wrong angles, noses squashed into cheeks, and lips mashing together with all the finesse of two thirteen year olds. They were kissing. It dawned on Sam slowly, then he realized, they were kissing; he raised his hands, grabbed Dean's head, pulled him closer, chests touching and lips, tongues, exploring and slobbering and… He tasted... it was... God, he was kissing Dean. It was - Christ, unreal. They’d never done this before, in all their previous gropes and jerk-*ffs, it had never been like this, this, this intimate… It seemed to go on forever, but when Dean began to pull away, sucking Sam’s bottom lip between his teeth as he did; it was already too soon.

"Uh, Dean? What just happened?" He gaped at Dean, probably looking like a complete idiot, mouth wide in shock, lips glistening with their shared saliva.

Dean looked stricken for a moment, then he cleared his throat, raised one hand to his jaw, touched his lips, as if he couldn’t quite believe what he’d just done.

"Dude, uh, Sam, that - was okay, wasn't it? You wanted it too?"

He nodded, a hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth, "Yeah. It was - good. Weird. But, good."

"Well, it wasn't any of my best moves." He darted Sam a look, shyness tinged with awkwardness.

"Will I get to experience them?"

Dean laughed, a sharp, ragged sound. "If, uh, you want."

"I do." He felt himself smile, his mouth widening, a sensation of something close to joy began to gather inside him. He reached out to cup Dean's jaw, forced him to look at him. "I do, Dean. Me and you, right?"

It was obviously the right thing to say because Dean nodded, relief beginning to lighten his expression. When his eyes locked with Sam’s, his smile was blinding. "You'd better believe it."

Chapter 3

Chapter Text

February 2013

Over the next few weeks, I worked harder than I ever had before in my life. The garage was busy, popular with the locals and with people passing through. Dean talked with a lot of them, charming and flirting with the women, cool and buddy-buddy with the guys, Mr. Everyman. I watched them and wondered how many of them knew... and if they did, then were they all thinking queer when they looked at him? Or was it just me? Was I the only weird one?

On Wednesday, Dean got me to help out with the Stingray he’d been working on. It was a full day job, though Dean had obviously lied to me about needing help as he seemed to be managing just fine on his own. I watched him work, leaning over the open engine, a streak of grease across one of his cheeks and another across his wrist, almost, but not quite, covering that horrible, purple scar. I stared at his hands as he gestured at something with his screwdriver, telling me what it was – radiator? Spark plugs? I wasn’t really listening, but instead just, like, sort of listening to him talk. He had a nice voice when he wasn’t singing, sort of low and gravelly, but not in the ignorant, jack-ass way like my Uncle Lou, but just, like, kinda nice.

“Uh, wrench?” he demanded, doing the grabby fingers thing.

I startled awake and bent to grab one for him. He wrapped his fingers around the other end, frowning as he buried himself back under the hood. I turned my head to stare down at the engine: it was all still looked like meaningless junk to me, like some sort of hard-ass logic puzzle I was unable to fathom out, dirty bits of metal all jammed together in a way that made everything work, except for now, when it didn’t.

“So, uh, what’s wrong with it?” I asked.

“If I knew that, I would be done by now.”

“Oh, right.” I felt like an idiot.

“Some people, they just don’t have a f*ckin’ clue.” He sighed and straightened up, twisting the wrench between his fingers. “It’s not enough to keep it lookin’ good on the outside, if you’re not gonna look after it on the inside. Cars like this, they need love, they need a little TLC, otherwise, you should just sell it on to someone who’ll give a sh*t. Don’t you agree?”

“Uh, yeah, yeah, definitely.”

He nodded back at me, and I was mesmerized for a moment by the way his lips pursed into a line, sort of pink and fleshy. The fluorescent light in the shop was very bright, and as I stared at the unscarred side of his face, I noticed for the first time that he had freckles across his nose and cheeks the same color as the weak-ass coffee my Mom always insisted on making me, thinking I was still too young to drink it black. He frowned as he turned back to the engine, teeth caught in his lower lip, a wrinkle between his eyebrows, that smudge of grease still on his cheek. I forced myself to look away, feeling strange.

I wasn't sure how much time had passed when he straightened up again and told me to try the gas. This time it worked: the engine sputtering to life with a roar; he laughed out loud, his face all lit up, and I grinned back at him, feeling light-headed.

He left me to clear everything up, pack away tools and give the bodywork a quick shine. I watched him go to the front desk to greet the Stingray's owner: a blond haired dude who looked… well, he looked gay, like what I imagined a gay guy should look like, like they looked on TV. He was wearing tight, stone-washed jeans and a black wifebeater which showed off his super-tanned shoulders and rigid pecs and made him look like some sad-ass boyband reject. Even from this distance, I could tell that he was hitting on Dean, hitting on him in this totally beyond obvious way, like he’d lost his dignity in the same place he’d said goodbye to his fashion sense.

Dean seemed to be lapping it up, though, responding to the guy’s lame innuendos with his own, and I remembered what Tim had said about Dean being an equal opportunities kinda guy, cause, whoa, he was f*cking encouraging this loser, chuckling and smirking in that way that made his teeth glint. He’d pushed his boiler suit down to his waist and I could see the tight, grey t-shirt underneath flecked with dirt and oil, that amulet hanging on his chest as it always did. I was so wrapped up in staring at Dean and the guy, because this… I’d never seen two guys like this before, flirting with each other, and it was… it made me feel odd, like, weird and wrong, though it shouldn’t, because I wasn’t hom*ophobic, no way.

I was concentrating so fiercely on waxing the car and not staring at Dean and his little fanboy that I nearly jumped out my skin when I heard Sam’s voice.

"So you managed to fix it then?"

As f*cking usual, I blushed, feeling as if I'd been caught doing something wrong. I snapped out of it and managed to stutter out, "Uh, yeah. Well, Dean did."

"I'm sure you helped," Sam said, he sounded distracted, and I tracked his gaze to Dean and the gay dude which… uh oh. I stole another glance at Sam; he was watching them with the kind of look on his face that made me worry for Mr. Boyband Reject’s future health.

"Derek, you wanna drive it out of here?" Dean yelled out, not bothering to turn around.

"Sure!" I called back to him and got into the driver's seat. I adjusted the rearview mirror and watched Dean and the guy exchange paperwork, (and probably, if he got his own way, phone numbers).

I pulled the car up out front and handed the keys to the guy. He didn’t even look at me, eyes all for Dean, saying thank you and smirking and simpering at him as he slid into the seat, wiggling his ass and flexing his biceps, it was embarrassing just watching him. Dean leaned down to say something; suddenly, one of the guy’s hands shot out through the window and grabbed onto Dean’s forearm.

It was the wrong move.

Dean yanked his arm out of his grasp and stumbled backwards into the Toyota parked up against the side of the building, sprawling against it, shaking and silent, a horrible, dead blankness in his eyes. I heard the front door crash open, and Sam came out running, grabbing and pulling Dean roughly into his arms, his eyes wild and dark. My heart was hammering so fast I wasn’t sure that I was breathing right and I just… gaped, mouth hanging open, completely in shock. Dean looked... God, he looked - like he’d checked out of his body, he’d gone, like, catatonic…

"Is he - is he okay?"

The gay dude got out the Stingray and stood clutching onto the open door, looking shocked and guilty. He took a step towards them, immediately Sam's head came up, all super-fast reactions, "Don't you f*cking move!" he snarled out, eyes slanted, animalistic, f*cking deadly.

sh*t,, his voice was... it was… terrifying, sending chills all over my skin, the hairs on my arms standing up. I felt a stab of pity for the gay dude, frozen to the spot for a split second before he suddenly recovered and scrambled back into the car, slamming on the gas pedal and peeling outta there with a huge-ass, deafening roar like something out of Grand Theft Auto.

I dragged my eyes slowly back to Sam and Dean, Sam was wrapped around Dean, and he was, f*ck, I knew the guy was big, but he looked huge, like he’d managed to make himself look even bigger, curled around Dean completely, like a massive, protective man-shield. He was whispering something real low, holding tightly onto Dean’s hand. He must've felt me staring because he raised his eyes from Dean and looked at me...

I held my breath, but he didn’t say anything, just stared at me with cold, narrowed eyes, his irises looked so dark it was unnatural, so dark it made every muscle in my body freeze up, a prickle of gooseflesh on the back of my neck. I stayed glued to the spot, too scared to move; finally… thank God… he looked away, back to Dean, still muttering whatever it was under his breath. I couldn’t make it out, but I knew one thing: it wasn’t English, it wasn’t a language I recognized, but something else.

I wanted to get the hell outta there, f*ck did I, but the last thing I wanted was to disturb Sam, make whatever the f*ck was wrong with Dean worse by doing anything. I stayed, frozen to the spot, staring at them, mesmerized by the way Sam’s huge hands were clutching onto Dean, their matching scars…

Holy f*cking sh*t… was that really… f*cking hell, it was - the scars were moving, like really and truly moving, rippling up Dean’s arm like a… like a… snake.

I blinked, not really believing what I was seeing, because that, it was, holy crap, it was just… not possible. Scars, tattoos, burns, whatever the f*ck they were, they didn’t just move on their own.

What the f*ck kind of weird sh*t…

I jumped as Dean made a noise, his breath hitching, like a sob or a hiccup. Sam kissed him gently on his temple before he took a step backwards, letting Dean go.

Dean rolled his shoulders and shook his arms, looking like he’d just woken up from something, like he was coming out of some sort of trance. Slowly, he turned around and noticed Sam.

“Sammy,” he breathed. “Was it – did it?”

“Yes,” said Sam softly.

Dean nodded and groaned, pulling a face, “Man, I’m hungry. You hungry?”

“Yeah.” Sam smiled at him, and he was all puppy-dog, good guy once more, big eyes and big smile and so completely the opposite to what I’d just seen that it gave me the chills.

Dean turned around and saw me. "Oh Derek, there you are, dude. Could ya do me a favor – go fetch Sam and me a coupla burgers? And, uh, fries and sodas. You want anything else, man?”

“Uh, yeah, I could go for some onion rings.”

“That’s my boy.” Dean grinned and pulled his wallet out of his jeans pocket, tossing it my way. I scrambled and caught it clumsily. “And get whatever you want for yourself, my treat. Okay, kiddo?”

"Uh, um, yeah, okay," I stammered, pocketing the wallet.

I watched him turn back to Sam and shove one hand into the back pocket of Sam's pants to cup his ass. Sam looked down at him, still with the same soft, adoring look, as Dean steered him inside, towards the office; the door closing behind them in a final sort of way, as if everything I'd just seen - all that - had not even happened.

As I waited in the queue in Burger King, (I'd so chosen the wrong time, it was full of high-school students buying junk food on their way home), I flipped Dean's wallet open. It was a mess of singles, old torn receipts, at least five credit cards, a couple of stubs of paper with phone numbers scribbled on them and some creased photographs. I pulled them out to take a closer look. Okay, I know I was technically snooping, but I was curious, and after what I’d just seen, who could blame me? I wanted to find... answers? Logical reasons for what the hell kind of weird sh*t I’d just witnessed? Hell, I don’t know. Anyway, it wasn’t like I was doing anything majorly bad, people've done much worse sh*t than sneak a look at their boss’s old photos.

The first photo kinda floored me for a minute. It was old, creased and torn at the edges, like it had been handled a lot. Despite all the creases, I could make out Dean and Sam, much younger versions of Dean and Sam, posed against the hood of Dean's car. Dean had his arm thrown around Sam’s shoulders, pulling him close against his side and they were both grinning for the camera. Sam looked young, about thirteen, fourteen years old, skinny and short and goofy, and nothing at all to make you think he was gonna turn into the enormous, scary, mood-swing guy I'd just seen in action. Dean looked about eighteen and very similar to how he looked now, down to the leather jacket he sometimes wore and the amulet that was always hanging around his neck… except… whoa – there was no scar... no scar on his face. Wow. It was strange seeing him without the scar, he looked so young, sort of naked without it. His face was turned towards Sam, eyes slanting his way as he grinned for the camera, both of them carefree, happy and looking totally together.

Christ, so this meant that they must've been together for freaking ages! Sam looked about thirteen years old for f*ck’s sake. Had they been together since he was thirteen? I’d never even kissed a girl, (Lucinda, my ex, was the first) until I was seventeen. Sam had probably been doing all sorts with Dean for years by the time he was seventeen. Had they met in high school, or hell, before then? I could imagine Dean as a high school senior; he would’ve been popular, a jock, but a cool, non-jackass jock, like Mike Granger from my old school. He was two years ahead of me and everyone had known who he was, he’d been on the swim team, and managed to make it seem even cooler than football in a football crazy town. All the girls in school had been mad about him and he'd dated Shelly Palmer, the prom queen. Dean would've been like that, like Mike Granger.

So where did that leave Sam? What made someone like Dean, who could get just about anyone he wanted, decide to go with some dorky kid who was at least four years younger than him? Did Sam stalk Dean until he gave in? Did they sneak off together during recess, make out in janitor's closets? Had anyone even known that a senior and a freshman of the same sex were dating? Did he wait for Dean after class, get him to drive them places in his cool car? And after Dean graduated, they must’ve stayed together. What the hell had Sam's parents thought of him dating this older guy? What the hell had Dean's parents thought when their son brought home this young, geeky kid instead of the head cheerleader?

Seriously, it was all majorly weird, and kinda icky.

The second photo was of just Sam and the car. He looked a few years older than in the previous one, much taller and filled out some, but with the same haircut. He was sitting on the hood, arms braced behind him, propping him up, feet dangling off the edge of the front bumper, eyes fixed on a faraway point, hair falling into his eyes. He didn't look as if he'd been aware of anyone taking the picture, but then again, he could’ve been posing, it did look a bit like a shot for an album cover. Maybe Dean had made him sit there like that, wanting to get a picture of his boyfriend, perhaps it'd been jerk-*ff material for him, maybe he still jerked off to it. The thought made my face heat up, and I pushed the picture back into the wallet, feeling confused and guilty.

There was one more picture, this one in the see-through flap at the front of the wallet, and it looked much more recent. It was Sam again, sitting on the porch of what must be their house; he was grinning at the camera, wearing a loose, blue t-shirt, his arms long and tan and muscled. Dougal lay between his legs, muzzle resting on Sam's knee, a dopey expression on his face. It was kinda funny that while Sam's face had aged, and his body had filled out from the skinny teenager he'd been to the huge, well-built guy he was now, his hair hadn't changed a bit, still the same messy, dark bangs and crazy curls around his ears.

He looked so harmless in the picture, like the sort of guy your mother wouldn't mind you dating, and it made me think of all that sh*t they said about serial killers, about how they seemed like such nice, quiet boys, the sort of people who wouldn’t hurt a fly. The Sam in this photo, he looked like that, a personality transplant away from the scary freak who’d snarled at me just before, the one who had curled around Dean, protective and possessive and ready to take down anyone who threatened Dean and not think twice about it.

The first photo, the one of Dean and Sam together, was still in my hand and I gave it another long look. I couldn't imagine ever being with someone that long, spending that many years with one person, all that time together. Had they still been together when Sam went to college? Cause Sam was a professor so he’d definitely gone to college at some point. And what about Dean's military background? Had they both been in the army? Thinking of some of the guys I’d known from school who had joined up, Sam was certainly big and tough (and psycho) enough to have been a jarhead, though it was hard to imagine him with a buzzcut. And Dean's - his problems - the touching thing, when had he gotten that? Was it because of PTSD, or was it something else? And there was still the freak-ass, matching, (moving?) scars on their hands - what the f*ck was that about?

God, they were both so weird. Dean was... sometimes he seemed so normal, and yet –

I glanced again at Dean's young, scar-less face before I put the photo away carefully; the last thing I wanted was for him to find out I'd been going through his sh*t.

Tim was in an epic mood when I got back, banging on and on about the last time Dean had “gone psycho like that”.

“It was just the f*ckin’ same, ‘cept Sam wasn't here. Dude, it was f*cked-up. And we didn't have a f*ckin' clue what to do, he was, like, like he'd just checked out, you know, man - out of here," he pressed one finger against his forehead, "and we couldn't touch him, couldn't say anythin' to him. He was all frozen and wasn't listenin' or responding to nothing."

"What did you do?"

"Whatcha think we did, man? We called Sam. He came over, like, straight away - sorta grabbed onto him and started talkin' to him, it was, like, whoa, freakishly intense. And then suddenly, he, like, just chilled out, and it was like nothing had happened.” He broke off for a moment and snatched up some of the extra fries I’d gotten. "Seriously, dude, whatever's wrong with him - it's some f*cked-up sh*t."

"So, does it mean that he can't go out, into crowds?"

"I don’t know, man, cause they do - him and Sam – they go out to bars. I think it, like, depends how people touch him, and it’s, like, better if Sam's with him." He shrugged again. "Whatever. But it's gotta suck for Dean, right?"

"Why?"

"Well, duh, Derek, cause if Sam's, like, the only dude he can touch without freakin' the f*ck out, then he's not gonna be able to, you know, get much on the side." He raised his eyebrows horn-dog style to emphasize the point. "That's gotta be why he flirts so goddamn much."

I frowned. "That doesn't make any sense."

"Does if you think about it, man." He gave me a meaningful look which… what the f*ck? sh*t still made zero sense. Why the hell would Dean want to flirt with anyone when there was no possibility of ever being able to follow through? It would be like watching p*rn and not jacking off.

"Anyway, you've seen him, dude can't help himself. Any remotely nice piece of ass that comes in here and he's all over it. He must've been, like, before all this sh*t, some major f*ckin' player."

I thought about the photographs I’d seen, the ones that proved that Sam and Dean had been together a lot longer than I’d ever thought.

“Hey, dude, which one of them d’you think takes it?”

“Huh? What?”

“C’mon, man, you know. Dean and Sam, what do you think? Which of them takes it and which of them, like, gives it – if you get my drift? Heh, heh.” He raised an eyebrow and smirked again, like, seriously, asteroids orbiting the earth would get his drift. “Dude, there ain’t no freakin’ way you ain’t been thinkin’ about it.”

I ducked my head, blushing furiously, cause I… Christ.

“f*ck’s sake, Tim –“

“My money’s on Sam,” he continued, ignoring me, and thank God, cause I was as red as a f*cking beet. “Guy’s a major control freak; no f*ckin’ way is he givin’ up his ass. Then again,” he paused, snorted, “it’s always the quiet ones, right, man? Maybe he’s, like, a total sub, gets Dean to chain him up and f*ck him, doggy style.”

“Uh, yeah, um, yeah, whatever,” I mumbled, not looking at him.

He gave a filthy laugh and stole another handful of my fries. Thank God the phone went off again, shutting him up. I looked across at the office door, it was still shut – what were they doing in there? Were they having sex? And who was it on top: Dean or Sam? God, the thought was making other parts of my body take an interest… which so not freaking fair. Stupid f*cking Tim and his dirty f*cking mind! How the f*ck was a guy supposed to concentrate on anything – to not get a hard-on - with him banging on about f*cking sex all the goddamn time?

I tossed the remains of my fries into the trash, I didn’t want them now. I adjusted my pants and tried not to look over at that locked door again, maybe they weren’t having sex at all. Maybe they were doing something like what Sam’d been doing to Dean before: the way he’d been speaking under his breath, and that scar… like he was performing some crazy sort of ritual or spell or… f*ck, were they, like, black magic worshippers? Was that what this all was? That made me think of something Tim had told me once about Sam’s job.

“Uh, Tim, what class does Sam teach up at the university?”

He looked at me in surprise for a second, then shrugged and said, “Cultural Anthropology, I think, dude.”

“Huh, what’s that?”

“God, you’re so not a book-learner, huh, Derek?” I scowled at him, and Tim smirked, like engineering was a genius occupation, asshole. “I don’t really know crap about that social sciences sh*t, waste of f*ckin’ time if you ask me, man, but his class is somethin’ to do with witches and, like, urban legends, you know, useless sh*t like that. Guy’s, like, a major expert on the Occult.”

“Really? That’s, uh, that’s pretty weird.”

“Different strokes, dude.”

He shut up as the office door rattled open and went superfast back to his desk, pretending to do something work-related; I picked up the two bags of now cold BK's.

Dean stomped out the office, his hair was mussed and he wasn’t wearing his boiler suit anymore, just that old, grey t-shirt with the amulet he always wore, the same one from the photo, hanging skewed around his neck. I sneaked a look through the half open door and saw Sam standing by the desk, shirt still off, running a hand through his messy hair. I stared for a second… man, for a college professor, that guy was built, like a freaking semi truck, all perfectly chiseled muscles with a strange, black, star-shaped tattoo over one bulging pec. So… they’d been having sex then? f*ck. I gulped and held out the take-out to Dean, not daring to meet his eyes.

“Hey, thanks. Hope you got yourself somethin'."

"Uh, yeah, I did. Thanks."

"Good. You got my wallet there, kiddo?"

I didn't look at it as I threw it back to him, I could feel my face burning up with shame and embarrassment, remembering how I’d looked at his pictures, how I’d gone through his stuff.

That night when I went to sleep, I dreamed about Dean. He was showing me something on the Stingray, both of us leaning over the engine, close together, shoulders grazing. His face was half in shadow, and I could make out the outline of the scar where the puckered skin smoothed into regular skin across his soft, pale cheek. I could count the freckles on his nose, and when Dean looked down, his eyelashes swooped against his cheek like a slow-mo camera shot. He looked up at me, green eyes glinting wickedly, grinning at me with that white-toothed smirk, and he said, "You did good, Derek, you did good,” repeating it over and over like a chant.

When I woke up, my shorts were wet, telltale, damp patch under me, staining the sheets. I pulled the sheets off the bed and felt like crying.

*********************************************************

February 2013

On Sunday, Dean wakes up in a pissy mood. Sam realizes this when he wakes up, makes a grab for Dean’s co*ck and Dean swats his hand away with a grunt.

He sighs and sprawls over the edge of the bed to reach for his shorts. Downstairs, in the kitchen, Dougal regards him with eyes just reproachful enough for Sam to feel a tiny glimmer of guilt, but Jesus, it’s not even 8am. He opens the back door and the dog bounds out, scampering across the collection of weeds, dirt and scrubby grass they call a lawn.

He leans against the back porch and nudges at the dog bowl with his bare foot, trying to bring it inside without having to go to the humongous effort of bending down to pick it up; naturally, it just tilts to one side and spills its gross, half-eaten contents over the wooden slats. He rolls his eyes and lets out a long-suffering sigh as he bends to pick the damned thing up, trying to scoop up the contents with his fingers. He f*cking hates dog food. Blood, guts and ectoplasm he can deal with, a whiff of dog food and his stomach’s heaving. In fact, the whole owning-a-dog thing has definitely turned out to be more of a pain in the ass than he expected it would be, and it doesn’t help that Dougal, treacherous creature that he is, blatantly favors Dean over him, despite the fact he’s the sucker who fills his bowl every morning. He carries the full bowl back outside and watches Dougal come bounding back up the porch steps, paws trailing mud and dirt behind him.

Dean's awake when he heads back upstairs with two cups of coffee. He's doing push-ups on the floor, back gleaming with sweat, breathing hard and ragged with exertion. Sam throws a pile of laundry off the armchair and sinks into it, raising his feet and placing them on the damp curve of Dean's back. Dean pauses and tilts his head sideways to look at him.

"Whatcha doing, Sam?"

"Just making sure you're workin’ for it."

Dean pulls a face and Sam smirks back at him. He makes himself comfortable in the chair, legs rising and falling with the up-down movement of Dean's body. The sun pours in through the half-open curtains on the opposite wall, dappling Dean's body with light as he sinks and rises with each push-up. Sam sits back and admires him, feeling the welcome stirring of early morning lust as he watches his brother work out. Eventually Dean finishes, sinks to the floor and pushes Sam's feet away with a glare. He rolls over into a sitting position and readies himself for crunches, hooking his feet under the bed.

"You want me to hold your feet?" Sam offers, looking at him from over the rim of his coffee cup.

Dean gives him a look. "I know you, you'd just try to jump me and I won't get done."

"Yeah, cause you're so freakin' irresistible."

"I am what I am," Dean says with a smirk as he casts a pointed look at the tented fabric of Sam's shorts.

Sam shrugs. "Whatever, I can wait."

Dean starts his crunches, his face locking into that intent concentration he always gets at these moments. Dean is nothing if not a creature of habit, and working out, training, whatever you want to call it, it's wired into him. Sam places his empty coffee cup on the floor and drops his hands into his lap, his fingers tracing over his erection through his thin, cotton shorts.

He doesn't let Dean get through the rest of his routine, getting up off the chair and moving to straddle his hips before Dean has even reached fifty. Dean stops and gives him a smug look.

"Knew you couldn't resist me."

"Shut up. Do you want me to repay last night's favor or not?"

The smug look turns into a grin as Dean lays back in invitation. "Bring it, bitch."

Later, they go back to bed. It’s Sunday after all, and there’s no madly pressing sh*t to get done, taking time out like this is a luxury, and one of Sam’s favorite things about their new life. He lies on his side and stares at Dean, drinking in the changes in his brother’s face, the undeniable signs of age that have worn into the crinkles around his eyes and the grey hairs at his temples. From this angle, he can see the underside of Dean’s chin, his stubble glinting gold and grey in the midday sunlight.

“You’ve got grey hairs in your stubble, dude.”

He can see Dean’s scowl, even from this strange angle, his mouth pouting into a thin line. “Bullsh*t.”

“Can’t deny the evidence when it’s staring you in the face.”

Dean aims a punch at him with one irritable hand and props himself up on his elbows to glare down at him.

“Whatever. Anyway, I’m not gonna grow a f*ckin’ beard, so what does it matter?” There’s a moment of silence before Dean’s mood turns, and he grins to himself, lewd and amused.

“What?”

“f*ckin' gray stubble. Weak, man. You're so petty when you're jealous, Sammy."

"What? What the f*ck’re you talking about? Jealous of what?"

"That hot nineteen year old the other night. Man, she so wanted in my pants.”

“Jesus, what planet are you livin' on? She was not into you, Dean."

"What the f*ck ever, jealous guy." He lays back down, smirking evilly, hands cradled behind his head. “She wanted my ass, I’m tellin’ you. f*ckin’ nineteen years old.”

“You're so gross, you know that? You’re almost twice her age.”

“Hey, she was nineteen, that’s freakin’ legal, dude. She kinda reminded me of that girl I was seeing in that place in Oregon – you remember her? We were staying in that freaky log cabin, right out in the middle of the backwoods like something outta Twin Peaks. sh*t, what was that chick’s name? She was smokin’.”

“Lila Pigeon,” says Sam after a moment. “That was her name.”

Dean laughs out loud. “Oh God, yeah. Lila Pigeon? How’d I forget that? f*ckin’ – Lila Pigeon.” He snorts, “Was amazing I ever kept a straight face. Christ, what happened to her?”

“You broke up with her.”

Dean frowns, lost in thought, then his hand comes out, patting Sam lightly on the knee in an almost conciliatory gesture.

“Yeah, I remember now, she called you a freak. Bitch didn’t get that I was the only one allowed to say that.”

“Uh, Dean. Actually, that wasn’t true.”

“Huh? What?” Dean sits up and stares at him. His eyes look very green and curiously naked, lashes fluttering as he blinks away the harsh, bright light. Sam stares at him and feels a sudden burst of love, a weight settling over him as he returns his stare.

He remembers Lila Pigeon. Dean had been into her, that much was true, and Sam hadn’t liked her at all. In fact, he’d disliked her so much that he’d made up a story about her with the full intention of breaking her and Dean up. He’d told Dean that she'd called Sam a freak when Dean hadn't been around. Dean had dumped her straight away, his face hard and cold when he’d gotten back from her place. He'd sat out on the porch and downed five beers, one after the other. After a while, Sam'd come out and sat beside him. He'd felt guilty, knowing that Dean was feeling like that because of him, because of his lie. Dean had turned to him and nudged his shoulder, said, "She said you were a liar. She'd called my little brother a liar. And then she said you were a freak. No one does that. No one treats you like that… And if anyone does -" he'd trailed off, his expression fierce and intense. Sam had said nothing, the guilt had still been there, but it had mixed with something else: gratitude, adoration, vindication… and power.

He sometimes thinks that it was even way back then, that things started then, though neither of them had known it. But with hindsight, it’s hard to see it any other way.

He sighs and gives Dean a wry smile, a quirk of his lip. “I made it up. I told you she called me a freak, but she didn’t.”

“Yeah she did, I was there. We had a big f*ck-off fight,” counters Dean with a frown. “That’s when I dumped her ass.”

“Yes, and the reason you went over there to fight with her was because I told you she’d called me a freak. “She didn’t, though, I made it up.”

“Huh. So, you make up a lot of sh*t about my ex-girlfriends?”

“Remember Anna Greenleaf? You were dating her when Dad had us livin’ in that sh*tty motel in Missoula?” Dean nods, eyes narrowing. “I told you I’d seen her making out with some other guy. Was total bullsh*t, I made it up. You broke up with her, though.” He lowers his eyes and grins self-consciously, “So I got what I wanted.”

He darts a quick look at Dean from under his hair; Dean’s staring at him. “Son of a bitch. You really did that?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Man, you were one passive-aggressive, little bitch. I can’t believe you were deliberately co*ck-blockin' me all that time!”

“Dude, I was, like, thirteen.” Sam slides one hand up the side of Dean’s waist. “Anyway, made up for it since, haven’t I?"

***************************************************************

July 2007

He can still remember that day. The day when Dean first kissed him. The way they couldn't stop looking at each other afterwards, taking shy, surreptitious glances when they thought the other wasn't looking, catching each other's eyes and blushing... He and Dean, blushing! He and Dean, for whom the concept of privacy, of personal space, of separate lives, had always been completely foreign. He and Dean, who were the Winchesters, one family, one unit. Raised by their father under the banner of "keeping it in the family", never trusting outsiders, never letting anyone in, just them... and Jesus, if Sam could think about anything apart from how much he wanted Dean to kiss him again, he would've laughed at how ironically prescient Dad's mantra of "keeping it in the family" had turned out to be.

His gaze slid sideways towards Dean. Again. As if he couldn't believe he was still there, as if he couldn't believe that everything that had happened had in fact just happened and was not just some strange, disturbing dream... But Dean was staring straight ahead, looking completely normal, except for the way his hands were gripping the wheel, white-knuckled, and the faint blush on his throat and chest, and God, just thinking about it, just thinking about his brother’s pink, flushed chest, his brother's naked body...

He was allowed to picture it now; he was allowed to see it. Real and there and in the flesh because Dean had kissed him, Dean had agreed that it was "you and me", and he couldn't wait... This new... understanding they'd come to - sealed with a kiss and everything - meant that it didn't have to be shameful anymore, it didn't have to stay under the covers and only at night. It could be here and now, out in the open... and he could see Dean naked and real and touch him and see just how goddamn gorgeous his brother really was, his brother who had always been just another part of the landscape to him, as familiar and fundamental as the car and the disgusting motel rooms and the endless miles of road, his brother, Dean, who was so stupidly beautiful and desirable, and why had he never noticed this before? He’d known that Dean was attractive, they both were, had seen it in the admiring looks tossed their way… but he’d never truly gotten it before, and now…

…now he could touch Dean as much as he wanted, touch him and watch himself touch him… maybe in a really big mirror, or hell, in one of those motel rooms with the ceiling mirrors that Dean was so fond of.

He grinned; a grin so wide and blinding, he almost didn’t recognize himself when he caught a glimpse in the car’s wing mirror. It had been such a long time since he’d smiled so much that his jaw was aching with the effort, but he couldn't stop. God, he couldn't stop, and every time he looked at Dean and thought about him - about it - about them – his grin just got wider. He hadn’t realized how grey everything had been before now, his life just one long, never-ending stretch of making do and getting by and hanging on, and Dean only just barely hanging on alongside. Both of them, laboring under such a monumental weight of depression and responsibility and grief, and not even sure if what they did mattered, or if everything - their whole lives, their whole everything - was, at the end of all things, futile; both of them bound for fates-worse-than-death: hell in Dean’s case, and for Sam, an equal hell without his brother.

Except... he wasn’t going to think about that now, because thinking about that, thinking about Dean leaving him, about Dean going to hell for him… was the only thing that could ruin this perfect happiness thing he had going on right now. So, he wasn’t going to think about that, he was going to repress it all, just good, old-fashioned repressing, and luckily, he pretty much rocked at that.

They got out of the car and Dean stalked around to the passenger side. He hesitated, licked his lips and pushed Sam up against it, gripping onto Sam's flannel with both fists, staring at his mouth, his face, his chest, back to his mouth... licking his lips again, the glazed look not leaving his eyes.

"Kiss me," Dean said, and Sam did. He bent down to meet Dean's mouth. It was their first kiss since the car - their second ever kiss - and it was just as messy and clumsy as the first had been. Dean's arms linked around his neck and his arms went around Dean's back and they pushed against each other, trying for a better grip, trying to get the angle right, the car burning hot through Sam's shirt.

Dean moaned and kissed Sam's chin, his jaw, his cheeks, his temples, muttering his name under his breath, over and over, Sam, Sammy, Sammy, Sam. Sam closed his eyes and felt the slick, slippery sensation of Dean's lips and tongue all over his face, his eyes, his nose, his eyebrows, his sideburns, covering and painting every inch of Sam’s skin, every pore owned and loved and wanted. He cupped Dean's jaw with one hand, brushing his thumb over Dean's cheekbone, and kissed him again.

They went out that evening: eating burgers in McDonalds, and staring at each other under the harsh strip lights. They couldn’t stop staring at each other, both their faces wearing matching expressions of incomprehension and disbelief - disbelief at this - this thing, whatever it was, that had exploded between them. Sam still didn't understand, didn't get it, he'd been looking at Dean's face for so long, been seeing Dean beside him for so long, that he didn't get why he hadn't known... why he’d never thought about it before, why they’d wasted so many years, when it could be, God, when it could be like this.

He hooked his foot around Dean's calf, drove their thighs together. Dean hissed and Sam glanced at him, catching his eyes, wide and dazed and completely fixated on Sam's mouth again, half-eaten burger halfway to his lips.

"Why didn't we?" Sam mumbled. "I don't get - why didn't we realize before -"

Dean shook his head, "I don't know. I just want to -" he trailed off with a gulp, blush beginning to stain his throat again. "God, Sam."

"Yeah," Sam breathed out. "But we gotta - we gotta eat, Dean."

Dean choked out a laugh, picked up a fry. "Okay." Sam nodded, stared at his brother's mouth as he swallowed the fry, mesmerized by the mark on Dean’s neck which he had made only hours before, the scratch on his jaw that had been his own ragged nails grabbing for Dean's face.

When they got back to the motel, it went like this:

Dean unlocking the door, no time to pull off his jacket...

Tackled to the nearest bed, held down...

Staring at his face, at his brother's face, at Dean's face, and wanting, God, so much, needing...

Both fully clothed, kissing, biting, marking, co*cks hard through layers of clothing...

Barely enough time to get them out, before...

Grasping for Dean's co*ck, fumbling his zipper down, ass hanging out his jeans...

One huge hand wrapping around both their erections...

Dean's groan and Sam's whimper and a few tugs and...

Spilling sticky and hot on their bellies and belts, jeans and t-shirts moist with sweat...

Panting and laughing, joy and exhilaration and...

Jesus f*ckin’ Christ, Sammy, I just can't hold it back with you...

I know, God, Dean, yeah, I know...

A week later, and they were lying in bed, facing each other, satiated and lazy. Sam ran his hand up and down Dean's arm, not for any reason, just to touch Dean, because... well, because, hell, he wanted to, and he could now, and he was gonna damn well make the most of it.

"So, I was thinking about blowj*bs?"

Dean raised his eyebrows and chuckled. "I bet you were."

"Well it's the next step, dude."

"Yeah." Dean gave a slow, wicked smile and Sam felt his spent co*ck give an interested twitch. "Yeah, it is."

"Have you ever given one?"

"No. Have you?"

"No."

"Huh."

"What?"

"Dunno, just kinda thought you might've. Bet you'd be a quick learner, though. Feel free to learn on me anytime." He leered and Sam rolled his eyes.

"Well, I was kinda gonna try it - I think we need to do something to improve our... stamina."

“And you think blowj*bs are gonna help with that? Dude, have you never gotten a good blowj*b?”

“f*ck you, course I have. But, Dean, we gotta do something, it’s getting kinda embarrassing.”

Dean raised his eyebrows, mock offended. "Ain't nothin' wrong with my stamina. It's just -" he waved an awkward hand, that pink tinge rising to his cheeks again, "you know, you and me - it's just sometimes too much. Maybe it's cause - the taboo… and hell, Sam, I've always been a kinky f*cker, so I figure -" he broke off and shrugged. "f*ck, I don't know. Cause if anyone’d suggested that you and me would end up doin’ the nasty, well, I'd've wanted to waste the son of a bitch, you know?"

Sam smiled at him, shy and complicit. "Yeah, I know."

They drifted into silence, Dean rolled onto his back, hefted out an enormous sigh. "I know one thing for sure, little brother, if I wasn't going to hell already, I'd definitely be on my way now."

"God, Dean, just don't - don't say that!" He pressed his lips together, something in his chest aching, breaking... "I'm not gonna let that happen. Okay? You are not leaving me!"

Dean turned to look at him. “Sam –“

“No, don’t – don’t say anything. I’m okay,” Sam cut him off immediately. “I don’t wanna talk about it, Dean. I just. Talk about something else.”

“Like, sex?”

He snorted, shook his head, shooting his brother an indulgent look, “Yeah, okay, let’s talk about sex.”

“Hey, we can always do that. So – Sammy, tell me the truth: have you ever gotten a blowj*b from a dude?"

"What? No, no. Have you?"

"Yeah. Few times."

He nodded, unsurprised, knowing Dean's itinerate and opportunistic sexual history.

"How did they compare?"

"Good. Better than most chicks. I guess guys know what works. And best of all," he gave Sam a significant look, "they swallow."

"Dean, if you think I'm gonna swallow your ji*zz..."

"You'll be lovin’ it in no time!"

"Hmm." Sam gave him a dubious look.

Sam was right to be dubious, the first time he gave Dean a blowj*b it was a mixed success. Dean moaned and groaned and generally made what seemed to Sam to be satisfied noises, only occasionally, interrupted by hisses of: "Teeth, Sam, cover your goddamned teeth!" As usual with the two of them, it didn't take long. He pulled away at the right moment, so Dean came over his own belly instead of in Sam’s mouth (he'd promised to warn him, but Sam knew Dean and he was taking no chances).

"Did you like it?" he asked afterwards, watching Dean clean himself up with the roll of scratchy toilet paper.

"You need more practice," Dean replied.

Surprisingly, Sam turned out to be the one with more "gay experience", something he admitted one night, after they'd finished up a job, parked up at a lonely rest-stop, getting ready to sleep in the car. They sat on the end of the trunk and shared a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue, (a gift from a grateful bartender whose bar they had just saved from the spirit of a disgruntled patron).

"I f*ckin' knew it!" Dean crowed, looking smug.

"Shut up.”

Like this, it was easy to tell all to Dean, speaking into the dark, feeling his brother’s warmth all down one side, Dean’s profile made white and gold in the moonlight, the familiar creak of his jacket when he moved.

"He was called Andrew, and he was one of Tony’s friends."

"Who the f*ck was Tony?"

"Oh. My roommate, freshman year. Thought you would've known that, all the checking up on me, you and Dad did."

Dean glanced at him, slight smile grazing his lips. "Anthony Clyde Ridsdale, from San Diego. Right?"

"Right." He caught Dean's eye and huffed out a laugh. At one time, he would've been annoyed by that, anger at Dean and Dad for not letting him go, for insisting on keeping tabs on him, like a useless kid who couldn't look after himself. Now though... he placed a hand on Dean's thigh and squeezed, felt Dean shudder, shift closer to him.

"So, tell me about this guy - this Andrew."

"Uh, God. Well, the first time I met him, we all were drinkin’ daiquiris -"

"Daiquiris?" Dean interrupted. "If I didn't know about your gay tendencies before, Sam, I -"

"You're talkin' yourself into a life of celibacy," he warned and Dean quickly closed his mouth. "Give me that!" He snatched the bottle from Dean and took a long pull. Dean watched him with an amused, fond smile, shaking his head and muttering daiquiris, under his breath.

"Anyway, so Tony eventually passed out -"

"Well, daiquiris are freakin’ hardcore, man."

"Dean."

Dean snigg*red, but finally shut up under the wrath of Sam’s unimpressed glare. "Alright, alright, don't get your panties in a twist. Just get to the sexin’ already."

"Well, after Tony passed out, me and Andrew, we, uh, kinda got to foolin' around..."

"At last, the good stuff. What kinda foolin' around?"

"You know, like, touching each other - each other's dicks... jerking each other off..."

"Did you kiss him?" Dean punctuated the question with a kiss. "Like this?" He kissed him again, sucking at the tender skin under his jaw. Sam shivered, feeling his co*ck start to harden, an automatic reaction to the soft-sweet-sexy of Dean's mouth on his skin.

"Mmm, Dean, no. It was just handjobs."

"That the only time?"

"Um, nooo, not exactly. He'd - he used to visit quite often, and most of the times he did, we'd, uh, get to doin' something. But it was never anything more than handjobs."

Dean pulled away completely, slid off the car and gave him an unreadable look. "Uh-huh. And he was happy with it never being anything more than handjobs?"

Sam paused for a moment, remembering, he hadn't thought about Andrew in years. In truth, it hadn't really been important, after freshman year was over; he'd gotten a new dorm room in a different building and met Jess. He'd never even seen Andrew again, and he'd barely kept in touch with Tony.

"I guess he did want more. He used to say that I was repressed, in the closet." He shrugged, balanced the bottle carefully on the hood. "He was one of those people who think that the minute you mess around with another guy, then that automatically makes you 100% gay, that there are no shades of in between. Hell, I don’t know if that’s true or not, I was usually drunk when it happened."

"What did he look like, was he hot?" Dean came closer and placed his hands on Sam's thighs. He parted them slowly, leaned into the V of his legs.

Sam closed his eyes, drank in his brother's closeness, the two spots of warmth that were Dean’s hands on his thighs. A sudden flash of memory: himself wrapping his fingers around Andrew's co*ck, the flutter of the other boy’s eyelashes, the tight ridges of pale, muscled chest, scattering of freckles across his nose... He opened his eyes, stared at Dean’s face, pale and soft in the starlight, the green gold of his eyes made black in the dark; he huffed out a laugh, short and embarrassed.

"What?"

"I guess he, uh, looked a bit like you."

He could feel Dean's grin against the side of his face, taking the comment as if it was his due. "Course he did."

Chapter 4

Chapter Text

February 2013

When they finally get up, it’s just after midday, and the sun’s at its highest point, or as high as it can manage this time of year. Sam shuffles out the front door in a pair of tattered sneakers and wanders down to the mailbox to retrieve the local news-rag. He stands for a moment in the cold winter light, feeling the sun’s feeble rays on the back of his shoulders through his thin, cotton shirt. He shivers and turns to trudge back towards the house, noticing that the ivy’s started another assault on the north side, already half covering the guest bedroom window, they’ll have to cut it back again soon.

When he gets back inside, Dean’s feeding pieces of his uneaten sausage to Dougal, who’s got his feet propped up on Dean’s thigh, ultra-obedient, begging expression in place.

“You spoil him,” Sam tells him as he pours the coffee.

“Aw, honey, don’t be jealous.”

Sam rolls his eyes and slides onto a stool, flipping the newspaper open.

Dean reaches over to snatch the coffee (the one Sam’s just poured for himself) from Sam’s side of the table and spoons in three heaped spoonfuls of sugar. Sam watches him for a moment, shakes his head and gets up again to fetch another.

“Are you looking for somethin'?" Dean asks when Sam’s reseated.

"No.”

"We haven't been on a hunt for ages.”

It's probably meant to be an observation, but it rings in Sam’s ears as something closer to an accusation. Dean sometimes has these momentary panics about giving up their old life, not that they have given it up, not entirely. The vengeful spirit in Greensboro, NC, a couple of months back and the water spirit in Morristown, NJ, in September would say otherwise. Anything local, in the surrounding states, they're always on it, just from a local base of operations, instead of a seedy motel.

Still, this argument raises its inevitable head regularly, probably every five or six months since they settled here, and they've never yet come to a satisfactory conclusion. Dean makes noises about wanting to get back on the road and Sam counters, not backing down in his fervent desire to stay put. He suspects that deep down Dean's not being completely honest with himself when he argues for going back to the full-time hunting lifestyle, Dean just thinks he should; so many years spent believing that's his job and that's his life, and no matter if it's going to kill him before he gets to thirty (hell, it did kill him before he got to thirty) that was all he needed to aspire to, all he deserved out of life. Sam blames their father for that, not ready to blame Dean himself.

"You miss it?" He tosses the paper aside and looks at Dean, Dean doesn’t meet his eyes. "Cause I don't. I don't miss sewing you up after a spirit's ripped out half your side, cause it’s me that has to patch you up, Dean. No one else can do it. You seem to forget that sometimes.”

“I don’t forget it,” grits out Dean wearily. “Christ, you know that!”

And that’s it: the burning too real fear always present at the back of his mind that their next hunt could be their last hunt. However much Dean protests, Sam doesn’t believe that Dean truly does get it, Dean still believes too much in his own invulnerability, still holds his own life so cheap.

Sam shuts his mouth on the easy retort, clamps down the momentary anger that always sparks so fast these days, he doesn’t want to fight with Dean.

"Whatever, I got papers to grade."

He’s only gotten through four papers by the time he hears the purr, rumble, roar of the Impala backing down the driveway. He sighs and leans back in his chair, feeling the bones in his spine creak as he tries to get comfortable. He needs… more coffee.

The kitchen looks improbably shiny, the yellow, country-kitsch tiles soft and homely in the thin, afternoon sunlight, it’s the only place in the house they ever manage to keep clean, and for that reason, it’s Sam’s favorite room. Dean’s cleaned up this time: dishes stacked, washed and gleaming by the sink, table wiped down and a new pot of coffee on the machine, the smell competing with the lemony aroma of the dishes. He takes a moment to savor it and pours himself a fresh cup. For some reason, Dean has a knack with the coffeemaker that he just doesn't possess, he's not sure if it's something to do with how many spoons of coffee Dean uses, how he filters the water through it once before doing it proper, or if it's just some sort of innate talent, but Dean's coffee always tastes better than his own. He pads back through to the study and sits down once more, gazing forlornly at the undiminishing pile of papers resting by his elbow. He glances at his watch and promises himself another cup if he gets two more done in the next thirty minutes.

He didn't set out to be a professor. Once they settled down, bought the garage and got the house and decided that they were going to stay, he began to realize that spending his days doing home repairs, chasing up the occasional hunt and helping Dean out with the paperwork for the garage, was not going to be as fulfilling as he thought it would, already, the invoices, tax returns and health and safety certifications were giving him brain freeze.

After he fixed the plumbing (kinda), electric (again, kinda), and got the den and kitchen into a livable condition, he started feeling resentful; bored and brain-dead by the endless days of repetitive work. When Dean got home from the garage, whistling and generally acting satisfied with life and himself, he bitched at him, picked fights and moped around, a morose and irritable presence. But he couldn’t say anything out loud, he was the one who’d persuaded Dean that this settling down and staying in one place business was a good idea, and Dean, as he always did, was making the best of it; blithely going about his days making friends and fixing cars and fitting in, while Sam sat out in the middle of nowhere and tried to convince himself that he didn’t miss hunting.

Ironically (or not), it was a hunt that saved him. He was doing research into a haunting the next couple of towns over and managed to score an appointment with Professor Gina Weeks from the local university, an expert in the occult and local rituals and legends. He pretended to interview her, trying to gain information about the legend, but found himself sliding into a debate about myths and different cultures’ relationships with those myths. It was the first, truly intellectual conversation he could remember having since leaving Stanford, and he felt his brain grind slowly open, taking in her arguments, countering them with his own, and actually learning something new that wasn’t engine or home-repair related for the first time in months.

He got up to go, shocked to realize that they’d been talking for over two hours. She looked at him for a moment as they shook goodbye, a cool, appraising glance before she turned and took a piece of paper down from the top of a filing cabinet.

“We’ve got funding for two extra PhD students this coming year, you should give serious thought to the idea of applying, you’re obviously an expert in the area. What school did you say you attended?”

He was pretty sure he hadn’t said anything about having graduated from anywhere, but the implication was flattering, so he said without thinking, “Stanford. But, um, I was Pre-law.” She looked surprised for a moment, before he hastily added, “All this – the occult, myths, urban legends… it’s always been a personal interest of mine.”

“Well for a personal interest, you seem to know more than most of my faculty.” Her voice was dry but with an underlying hint of humor. “Think about it, I’m going to be reviewing the applications myself.”

He nodded at her and dropped the application into his laptop bag along with the pages of research he’d already dug up. He didn’t give it another moment’s thought until he started plowing through the research later that evening, laying out the pages on the kitchen table while Dean made pot roast. He picked up the application, caught between some photocopies of old local newspaper articles and an essay the professor had given him on local magick rites, and placed it carefully to one side.

He sat up in bed that evening with the laptop on his knees and read about the university, its students, its courses, its research expertise. He dreamed about college that night: seeing himself sipping beer in the campus bar, walking from the library to class, weighed down by his books and laptop, his brain helpfully giving him all the good memories he had of college without the guilt-edged, pain-tinged memories of Jess. The next day, he said the words aloud before he really realized what it was he was saying:

“I want to do a PhD.”

Dean did a double take, gaped at him with his mouth full of honey-covered toast. “Dude, random much.”

“I… now that we’re settled here, it feels like a good time to do it.”

Dean swallowed the rest of his toast and reached for his coffee mug, carefully avoiding meeting his gaze.

“Don’t you think?”

Dean raised his eyes reluctantly and shrugged, “If that’s what you want.” But his voice was distant, gaze flat, and it occurred to Sam with a rush of fondness and exasperation that Dean thought he meant going back to Stanford, Dean thought he wanted to leave.

It was official: his brother was an idiot.

“I meant the university here,” he said. “The one I went to the other day. There’s a program I want to apply for. I’ve already spoken to Bobby about faking up the transcripts and references; he said he knows someone who could do it for me no problem.”

Dean’s head came up with a jerk. “But what about Stanford?”

“What about it? Why would I want to move to the other side of the country when we’ve just settled here?”

“Cause it’s a great school. Cause you used to go there. Cause… you’re not happy here?”

“Dean, that’s not true,” he said softly. “Okay, so I’ve been… bored, but I like it here and if you think I’m going anywhere without you then…” he broke off and shook his head. “Idiot.”

Dean rolled his eyes, but he was trying not to smile, so that was okay.

He filled in the application, passed the interview, and only six weeks after meeting Gina for the first time, he found himself a part of the Department of Cultural Anthropology.

He assisted Gina as a higher level TA and helped out in seminars, grading papers and running student research groups. He undertook research for her, in addition to his own, and soon got the reputation among the department of being someone who knew the subject inside out, which of course, was absolutely true.

He got on well with his coworkers, despite some of the bitching about “Gina’s new protégé” from some embittered members of the faculty, fitting so easily into the role of smart, friendly everyman he'd performed back when he'd been at Stanford. He was popular with the students too, very popular, judging by the number of subtle and extremely unsubtle invitations thrown his way by both female and male students alike.

“You should take ‘em up on it,” Dean counseled, “seriously, dude, get some of that co-ed ass. Just cause I can’t do it anymore, don’t mean you should keep it locked up like Fort Knox. Hell, you know I won’t mind.”

“Dean, shut up. I’m not gonna hook up with anyone.”

“Why not? It’s not like we’re exclusive.”

“Yes we are.”

Dean gaped at him, “What? We are? Since when?”

“Since always,” Sam replied matter-of-factly. “You can’t have sex with anybody else, ever. And I don’t want to, so yeah, we’re exclusive.”

“What do you mean you don’t want to? Take it from me, there are a helluva lotta hot chicks out there, you don’t wanna miss out.”

“Dean, listen to me. I know you have this stupid, misguided idea that I’m missin’ out on something by not sleeping with every girl that comes my way, and I get that you have this even stupider, f*cked-up idea that it’s somehow your fault, that you’re holding me back or some such bullsh*t.”

“Sam…”

“I’m not finished. Think about it: before, uh, before us - how often did I use to hook up? What makes you think that’s changed now? When I have sex with someone, I want it to mean something, I want it to be with someone I care about. And I care about you, I love you more than anyone, more than anything, and we have f*ckin’ incredible sex, so why would I want to hook up with anyone else when I could be with you?”

Dean’s mouth worked soundlessly, his expression morphing from disbelief through to extreme discomfort eventually landing up somewhere around smugness.

“Okay, so you’ve got a point about the incredible sex.”

Sam smiled, “I always have a point.”

Two months into his second semester, Gina told him she was recommending him to take over as a junior lecturer on some of the basic freshman courses and electives, “You have a great rapport with the students and you’re young, fresh, dedicated. I can’t think of anyone better. Plus, if you accept, it saves me the considerable trouble and cost of recruiting a new junior professor.”

He did accept, ridiculously flattered that she thought him good enough to take on teaching responsibilities, but she shrugged his thanks off with her customary detachment, saying, “You know the subject better than anyone, Sam, I have absolutely no doubt that you will be amazing.”

Fast forward eighteen months, and he was actually teaching, okay, so he was about the most junior of juniors in the department, he had to share an office with three of his colleagues leading to endless conflicts when it came to scheduling student office hours, and worst of all, he had about zero time for his own research, but despite all that, he loved his job.

Dean gets back a couple of hours later. Sam hears him come in: front door banging open, Dougal barking and Dean talking back at him, the usual endearment-laden, one-sided conversation that makes Sam smile: Hey, dumbass, you want some food? Want some of this super delicious sh*t here? Mmmm, tasty, what’s this then… rabbit? Mmmmm. Lucky bastard, aint’cha, boy? Yeah, there you go, dude, munch on that…

The radio goes on and Sam hears cupboards slam, the puffy, plastic sound of the fridge seal opening and closing, and above it all, Dean whistling along to KWRA’s Rock The Seventies! He can’t concentrate, eyes slanting over and over the same sentence, but it’s so goddamn boring, and the background noise (and Dean) are just too damn distracting.

He’s restless, wants to work it off, a run perhaps, or a session in their garage home-gym, working out side by side with Dean, perhaps even bending him over the exercise bike when he’s done. He smirks to himself, licking his lips, feeling his co*ck start to inevitably harden as he thinks about the last time they “worked out” together, how he licked the beads of sweat from his brother’s asscrack, sucked his warm, sweaty balls into his mouth, Dean coming with a shout in his own sweat-drenched hair…

He tosses the half-read paper to one side, adjusting himself before he gets up. Dean glances at him as he slouches into the kitchen, but goes back to unpacking the groceries without saying anything.

“Did you get –“

“- Yeah, I did, and it cost me six dollars more than the regular stuff. I don’t get it, it’s a freakin’ chicken, it’s gonna get eaten, so who gives a sh*t what kinda life it lived beforehand?”

“I do. Anyway, organic free-range chicken tastes better.”

“Bullsh*t,” scoffs Dean, “that sh*t cost me six f*ckin’ dollars extra! You owe me that money, Sammy!”

“I’ll take it out in trade.”

Dean looks up, his mouth twisting as he huffs out a laugh. “So, you, uh, done with work, whatever?”

“Nah. But I can’t take anymore right now. Was thinking of workin’ out.”

“Working out working out or working out working out?”

“Working out working out,” he answers with a sly smile, advancing slowly on Dean. Dean watches him with his own sly, knowing smile as Sam leans closer, hands braced on the worktop either side of Dean's body, their chests tantalizingly close. “Come work out with me,” he whispers.

Dean swallows, and Sam’s eyes track the ripple of his throat, his co*ck hardening further as he lowers his mouth to Dean’s. The kiss is short and easy, and when Sam pulls away, Dean’s smiling at him, that soft, private, just-for him smile that no one else gets to see.

“Yeah, okay.”

***********************************************

August 2007

All things considered, Dean's first attempt at giving a blowj*b was not much more successful than Sam's, but still… pretty f*cking awesome.

He was determined to outdo Sam, as if this was just another one of their brotherly competitions. He flung himself into it with characteristic enthusiasm, eagerly licking and slobbering at Sam's co*ck, and okay, so he could only fit the head in his mouth comfortably, anymore than that and he was choking and spluttering and bitching about genetic freaks and their monsterco*cks. He finally gave up on being able to deep-throat first time round, instead sticking to swirling his tongue around the head and up and down the shaft which… Jesus f*cking Christ… got the job done in record time.

When Sam came, Dean gamely tried to swallow it all; choking and coughing until there were tears in his eyes. In the end, he just let it collect all over his lips, mouth and chin in white, slimy trails, gathering it up with his fingers and sucking on them with this obscene look on his face. Sam watched him, utterly mesmerized by what he was seeing, feeling like he could come all over again, because this had to be just about the filthiest, most wrong and most amazingly hot thing he'd ever seen in his entire life.

After the blowj*bs, they graduated quickly onto the real, proper sex, or as Dean gleefully called it, “the ass-f*cking!"

Sam wanted to take it slow, he’d read enough horror stories to put them both off for life, but Dean was impatient to get on with things.

“After all, if I’m gonna be havin’ sex with my brother, I wanna do everything. And, dude, it’s not like we’ve got time here.”

It was that ominous reminder that had Sam swallowing back the wedge of grief which seemed to have taken up permanent residence at the back of his throat, and agreeing to speed things up.

They played three rounds of rock paper scissors to see who got to bottom first. It wasn't the most romantic of preludes to a night of "making-love", (not that Sam ever called it that; even in his head he could hear Dean calling him a girl). Dean, of course, had gone with scissors all three times, idiot, and he'd lost, all three times.

They kissed for a while, slowly taking each other’s clothes off, trying to calm each other down, and it felt... good. Not earth-shattering or awesome or amazing or anywhere near as hot as it usually did, both of them too aware of what they were about to do, like a couple of kids after prom, about to "do it" for the very first time.

"We should be wasted for this," groaned Dean when Sam rolled him onto his front and pushed his thighs apart with one knee.

"I won't hurt you," he promised.

Dean twisted around and gave Sam's co*ck a pointed look. "Yeah, sure, cause that thing – goin’ up my ass, oh that's not gonna hurt at all."

Sam smiled smugly and squeezed about half the tube of lube onto his fingers. "Shut up for a minute. I'm uh, I'm going in." And right then and there, he almost called the whole thing off, because Dean started laughing, snigg*ring into the pillow, body quivering as he laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

"Dean! Jesus, get a grip! You wanna get f*cked or not? Cause if you don’t f*ckin’ shut up then…"

Dean immediately stopped, twisting around again and squinting at him. "Just - stick your goddamn fingers in my ass!"

He had to bite his lip himself then to prevent any stray laughter, really, the whole thing was so f*cking weird - how did guys do this? He poked in one finger tentatively, half-shocked when he felt it slide in, easy and sticky; the ton of lube had really helped. Dean gasped and flinched beneath him.

"Does it feel good?"

"Strange."

"Strange, how?" enquired Sam as he attempted to flex the finger. There was another sound from Dean. "You like that?"

"Yeah, do that again."

He did and Dean groaned again, his body giving an imperceptible shudder. Huh, he'd obviously already managed to find the prostate; he was going to be awesome at this. He slid in another finger, that was a bit harder, he had to remember to tell Dean not to wear his ring when he did it to him, because, man, there was no spare room for jewelry up there.

"I'm gonna try and stretch you, okay?"

Dean kinda nodded and he attempted to flex his fingers, turning them around slowly and working them like scissors, just like he’d read. Dean's thighs had started shaking, just small quivering movements betraying nerves, or maybe some sort of automatic muscle reaction to having some guy's fingers up your ass, who the hell even knew? He smoothed his other hand softly down Dean's back, caressing his spine and running his fingers gently over his brother’s shoulder blades. Dean seemed to relax a bit, making those small, whimpering noises he always made when Sam sucked him off. He leaned forward, into Dean, and kissed the small of his back, tonguing at the beads of sweat, tasting the salty tang of Dean's skin.

"You want another finger?"

"I - uh, yeah." Dean's voice was a low hiss, almost a whisper. Sam coated his ring finger with lube, sh*t; the stuff was getting everywhere, his hands, Dean's thighs and ass, the sheets. He twisted his fingers, squeezing the third digit inside Dean, working them gently. He could barely get it in, just the tip of his nail, then slowly, carefully, the first knuckle. He placed his other hand on Dean's shoulders, firm and loving, feeling the trembling of his brother's body through his sweaty palm.

"It's alright, I think, I - I'm gonna f*ck you now." He withdrew his fingers and wiped the stickiness off on the sheets.

"Sam." Dean twisted around, grabbed onto his arm, pulling him down into a kiss. He fell into Dean's body, meeting his lips and kissing him hungrily, eyes open, staring at the blur of Dean's too close skin, his soft freckles and the elegant curve of his cheekbone. Dean let him go and shot him a wry grin. "Make it good, stud."

He smiled back, "Okay, get on your knees."

Dean obeyed as he pulled on the condom, emptying the rest of the lube onto his palm, greasing up his sheathed co*ck. Dean's ass was directly in sight and he stared at it, feeling the breath catch in his chest: it looked... ready, red and sticky and shiny in the low lighting, lube smeared across his brother’s hole, ass cheeks and thighs in thick, slimy clumps. He touched the head of his co*ck through the latex... Jesus, he was hard, he was... thrumming with it, body tight and taut and God, he wanted to be inside Dean, like, now.

He placed his hands on Dean's ass, pulling his ass cheeks apart and lining up the head of his co*ck. He heard Dean make a harsh intake of breath and he thrust in.

Pushing into Dean with his co*ck was a lot harder than it had been with his fingers. It was so… tight, obscenely tight, so tight that it f*cking hurt. And if it was hurting him that much, then Dean must be –

“Dean?” he whispered.

Dean was breathing shallowly beneath him, the muscles in his legs really shaking now, beads of sweat running down his spine. Sam bent over him, bracing himself on his hands, either side of Dean’s body, pressing his chest up against Dean’s back, skin on skin, sweat on sweat, flesh on flesh. He mouthed at the nape of Dean’s neck, ran his tongue down the bumps of his spine, willing him to relax. He felt Dean shudder, and then… slowly, breath by painful breath, relax…

The pressure around his co*ck lessened minutely and he could move again, he pulled back experimentally and thrust back in. Beneath him, he heard Dean hiss; a scrambled, ragged intake of breath, he could feel every shiver and tremor of his body, their skin glued together with their shared sweat.

Sam took a long breath and stilled.

He was finding it hard to breathe, there was something so monumentally life-shattering about this, about being inside Dean; his co*ck was inside Dean,… They were joined together, their bodies fitted together, joined… together… so fundamentally close, so absolutely together, not just their bodies, but their souls too... Dean would laugh at him if he knew Sam was thinking like this, but at this moment, he felt vindicated. This was a whole new level of intimacy, this was something beyond normal, human relationships between regular, normal couples, he and Dean had some of the same genetic code written into every cell of their bodies, they'd shared the same childhood, the same memories, the same values. They'd brought each other back from the dead, saved each other’s lives, been everything to each other, for forever. Dean had sold his soul, given away his future just because he couldn't live without him. This was right, this was meant to be.

He smoothed a hand through Dean’s hair, wet with sweat; he cupped the side of Dean’s face and lowered his mouth into a clumsy, sloppy kiss.

“You okay?”

“f*ck, it – f*cking hurts, Sammy. Just – let’s finish it.”

He pressed a kiss against Dean’s temple and started to thrust again. It was tight and hard and burning hot, but God, he was inside Dean… and he was…

…not gonna last much longer.

He gripped Dean, wrapped an arm around his chest, squeezed him hard with every muscle he possessed, pulling him back onto his co*ck, manhandling him and taking charge, claiming ownership. His blood beat hard in his head, a thump, thump, thump, reverberating throughout every cell like his brother’s name: Dean, Dean, Dean… A litany of love and heat and desire.

He came with a strangled cry, collapsing onto Dean, squashing him flat into the mattress. He pulled his arm out from under Dean, bracing himself on trembling muscles, taking care, being so gentle, when he pulled out of Dean’s ass. His brother’s hole was red, glistening with lube and puffy looking around the edges, like just another wound. He bent over and pressed a kiss to each of Dean’s ass cheeks, feeling Dean wince beneath him, boneless and shaking.

He rolled Dean over gently; his co*ck was half-hard, the head curving up weakly towards his belly. Slowly, he lowered his head, taking it into his mouth, feeling Dean harden almost instantaneously. Dean gasped and writhed, cursing and moaning out Sam’s name as he sucked him to a climax.

He pulled off and licked his lips, meeting Dean’s eyes for the first time since they’d done it. Done it.

Dean’s eyes were hooded as he stared up at Sam, heavy with lust and affection.

“You’ve gotten too good at that,” he told him. “Seriously, we could start charging people. We’d make good money, s’easier than credit card fraud.”

Sam smiled and sank down onto the bed beside him. “I’ll think about it.”

They lay for a few minutes in silence. Dean shifted into a sitting position, wincing again as he did. “sh*t, Dean, are you okay?”

“Feel like I’ve just had a f*ckin’ tent pole shoved up my ass, but apart from that -”

“I was trying to be gentle, sorry.”

“Whatever. First time always sucks. But it’s your turn next, dude.”

“Okay.” He met Dean’s eyes and smiled. “It will get easier. You know, all the stuff I read said it’s just a matter of practice.”

“Like bow-hunting?”

“Like –“ he glanced at Dean who was smirking, Sam rolled his eyes. “Whatever. But, yeah, I guess same idea applies. If you wanna think of it that way.”

Dean nodded, satisfied. “Awesome.”

Chapter 5

Chapter Text

March 2013

A few weeks later, Sam was on Spring break and he was around a lot, supposedly dealing with “the paperwork”. It was kinda annoying having him, like, constantly there, but it did put Dean in a good mood, so there were some upsides.

From my position at the front desk, covering for Tim (he was having a week at his aunt’s place in Florida), I could see Sam as he worked. He worked in long, never-ending periods, (seriously, the guy had some major focus) hunched over his laptop, with his tongue between his teeth and eyes fierce with concentration, an expression that reminded me of the one Dean got when he worked on an engine.

The next call was from some poor bastard broken down on the highway about fifteen miles south. I promised to send someone straight away and the guy hung up. When I looked up from the desk and glanced towards the office, I saw Dean standing over Sam, his fingers resting on Sam’s neck. He was looking down at Sam, at his crazy messy hair, with an expression on his face that made the breath catch in my chest, like I was seeing something I shouldn't. Sam got to his feet, fisted his fingers in Dean’s boiler suit and tugged him into a kiss, his hands wrapped around Dean’s back, pulling him in closer as they kissed harder and harder. Sam spun Dean around and slammed him up against the desk, forcing Dean’s head back and putting his mouth on his throat, licking and sucking and grasping at him… both of them making noises, breathy pants and moans that were better than my most watched p*rno.

I couldn’t look away, frozen to the spot, staring. I’d never seen two men kiss before and I’d never imagined it could be like that; they were properly making out, eating each other’s faces like they were starving for it. It was… God, like nothing I’d ever seen before, dirty and rough and crazy, and I’d never thought before how with two guys, you didn’t have to be gentle, you could be like this. Other couples were not like this, why were they… didn’t they get enough at home? And here and now, in the goddamn workplace, with the f*cking door still open… Did they want to be caught? Or did they really and truly not give a sh*t who saw them? Or… were they just past caring?

I kinda thought it was the last option as I slowly sat back down again, sort of aware, at the back of my mind, in a place I didn’t want to go, that watching them like this was making my dick hard. I tried to swallow, but my throat had dried up, like, I couldn’t talk, and I was still holding the telephone receiver, had it in a f*cking death-grip. I replaced it carefully and stared down at the notes I’d taken, feeling a weird sort of desperation: how was I supposed to go on in there and interrupt that to tell Dean about the poor bastard out on the highway?

I reached blindly for my pen, my stupid elbow knocked against my coffee mug and it spun off the desk, crashing to the floor and smashing. There was a flurry of noise from the office and Dean’s voice blurted out: “What the f*ck was that?”

I jerked my head up and saw Dean pull away from Sam, straightening and scrubbing a hand through his hair, looking really pissed. I felt for a moment like ducking back behind the desk to hide.

“Uh, um, sorry. There was this call -”

“What call?”

“A guy. Stuck out on the highway, about twenty miles, uh, I’ve got it all written down. I said we could probably send someone. That we’d, uh, call back if we could.”

Dean scowled and clomped forward to grab the piece of paper off my desk.

“Right. I’ll go,” he snapped. Close up, I could see how flushed he was, his face and neck all pink, his lips wet and bitten from where Sam had kissed him. I stared, feeling my face start to heat up, unable to take my eyes off him. He yanked open the top drawer of the desk and snatched up the keys to the pick-up. “Call him. Tell him I’m on the way.” And he was gone, stomping out the door, still pissed.

I felt really hurt. I’d seen Dean be hard-edged and cold with Uncle Lou (can’t blame him there) and I’d heard him lay into Tim on a couple of occasions for sh*tty time-keeping and being generally useless, but he'd always been nice to me. I glanced back over at Sam; catching my eye, he smiled back at me, all kind understanding and sympathy. I felt like I wanted to smash something.

That night, I dreamed of Dean again and woke up with wet sheets.

Don’t get the idea that I’m some sort of ignorant slu*t. I’m not f*cking stupid. I know that you don’t just start having wet dreams about someone for no reason. But I didn’t have a crush on Dean. That was f*cking impossible. For a start, I was pretty damn sure I wasn’t gay. I’d definitely have remembered if a guy had ever gotten me hard before, and for the record, that had never happened.

When I was a sophom*ore, when Dad was sick, I’d gotten bullied. There'd been this group of kids in class who'd said things about me, calling me fa*ggot, queer, co*cksucker. I’d been quiet and withdrawn back then, and I’d just missed Dad so f*cking much; missed Dad, the real Dad and not the sick and feeble thing that had taken over the dining room with all his sickroom crap. I’d hardly gone to school some days, not just cause of Dad, but because of them, those kids, those bullies.

Lucinda had saved me. After we'd started dating, it had died down. It was f*cking stupid to call someone a fa*g when they had a girlfriend, and luckily for me, they were too goddamn dumb to think of anything more original to call me. After Lucinda and I’d broken up, well, we'd still been friends so that had been cool. It was better than it always being just me and Evan; extra friends meant extra security.

The thing with Lucinda though, she’d been… well, sh*t had been pretty tame between us, and that had suited me at the time, cause yeah… I was pretty f*cked up. From the way people talked about sex, and from the p*rnos I’d watched, I’d expected it to be more than it was when we’d finally gotten around to doing it, but it had been… disappointing. Watching Sam and Dean this morning, was like… well, I don’t want to say it was a revelation, cause cheesy much? But, man, it was like… could it really be like that between two guys? f*ck.

I went out that evening with Evan. We were meeting up with Lucinda at Pete’s, we didn’t go there very often which meant they didn’t know us, giving us the perfect opportunity to try out our new fake ID’s, except Evan was already totally puss*ing out on me.

“Derek, I can't go order. That dude - he's one of Robert's friends. He knows how old I am."

I groaned and snatched my ID from his fingers. "Fine."

I went on inside and headed for the bar. It wasn't, like, madly busy and there was plenty of space at the bar when I got there. I was leaning on it, my ID resting in a sticky patch of something, attempting to get served, when a familiar voice barked out:

"Hey, let me take a look at that."

An arm came out and snatched up my brand new ID. I jumped and turned to take in the face next to me: the jagged scar running across his forehead, through his eyebrow, the green eyes and pink mouth... Dean.

"Now I know for a fact you aren't twenty-one, Derek. And Jesus... kid, this is some piece of sh*t ID. Where'd you get this?"

"Um, my uh, friend got them," I stammered, not managing to meet his eyes as he turned the ID over in his fingers, shaking his head in disgust.

He looked up and gestured for the bartender. "Whatta you and your friend drinking?"

"Uh, two beers."

He nodded and ordered for me.

"Who was that?" hissed Evan when I managed to escape with the beers. "Did he, like, just order the drinks for you?"

"That's my boss," I told him.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Dean join someone at a table: Sam, of course, not easy to miss. I watched Dean drop beers and shots onto the table between them, Sam's big hand covering Dean's as he took the beer from him, almost masking the bottle completely as he raised it to his lips. I felt myself start to blush, remembering what I’d seen that morning, how Sam’s huge hands had clawed at Dean, how one of them had covered his ass, pulling him in tight…

"Man, that was good of him. We should, like, totally go over and thank him. He paid for them too, right?"

"Uh, yeah? But, no, no, Evan." f*ck! It was too late. Evan was on a mission, already half way towards Dean's table. I watched him with a rising sense of despair, cringing as he leaned over and said something to them; Sam looked over towards me, a slight frown on his face. Evan twisted around and gestured to me, mouthing: C'mon.

Great, just f*cking great, there was no escape now. I sighed and crossed the room.

"Derek, I was just saying to uh – Evan here, you were ripped off with those ID's, dude. If you want some good ones -"

"Dean," interrupted Sam.

"What? They're - what, nineteen?" Evan nodded enthusiastically, eyes fixed on Dean as if he were the answer to some big f*cking prayer. "Yeah, so they can vote, get married, join the army, but they can't have a f*ckin' drink in a bar? Dude, that's f*cked up."

Sam shook his head and gave him an indulgent look. "Doesn't make it any less illegal."

Dean grinned and placed his hand on the back of Sam's neck, fingers brushing against the short hairs at his collar and, oh Jesus, here we go again… I swallowed and looked away, trying to push the memories of this morning from my head, trying to erase those images, those non-stop flashbacks. When I looked back, Dean was talking to Evan, telling him about this guy he knew who could fix us up. "Just tell him it was me who told you." Evan’s eyes were locked on Dean’s, drinking in every word falling from his lips.

"Dude, your boss is awesome," Evan breathed out after Dean and Sam had gotten up to play pool. "He's, like, the coolest guy ever." He stared at the chairs Dean and Sam had vacated with his creepy, fanboy look.

I was sick of Dean. Fed-up and sick and tired, and I didn’t want to think about Dean anymore. I didn’t want to think about Dean and Sam and Sam’s creepy-ass ways and their weirdo, f*cking perfect, gay relationship and the way they kissed each other and how much thinking about it turned me on.

The whole thing made me sick and confused and lost. Ever since I’d started working for Dean, I’d felt uncertain of myself, well, even more than usual, cause it's not like I'd ever known what I was f*cking doing with my life. But now... now I truly felt lost, and what was worse, Evan, my best friend, the person I relied on, was banging on and on about Dean as if the dude was the second coming.

"He's gay," I bit out. I wanted wipe that look off of his face, let him know that he was being pathetic.

"Well, duh.” He took a long pull on his second or third beer (courtesy of the other bartender, Cliff, a friend of Dean's). "Anyone can see that they're a couple."

"Well don't you think that..." I trailed off, confused by Evan's matter-of-fact acceptance.

"Think what?"

I shrugged and tore my beer mat in half. "Doesn't matter. Where's Lucinda? She's late."

"Don't know." Evan shrugged in turn and drained the rest of his beer. "Right, I’m gonna get some more.”

I looked back towards the pool area. Dean and Sam seemed to have beaten their opponents: a couple of drunk, preppy assholes, one of their girlfriends watching from the sidelines with a bored expression. Dean pocketed the bills and smirked at the two guys, smart-assed and cold.

The loser guys and the disgusted girlfriend left, and Sam bent over the table to rack the balls while Dean leaned over, way into his personal space, and said something, lips so close to Sam's face, they were practically touching his lips. I stared at Dean, at the half-shadowed side of his face, watching his lips move. I could feel that hot, prickly feeling fluttering in my chest as I watched him finish up whatever he’d been saying and step away, Sam looking after him with dark, glittering eyes.

"Hey, Derek! Derek Owen Ancona!"

I jumped at the sound, my beer almost overturning; people always seemed to be sneaking up on me these days. I dragged my eyes away from Dean and Sam to see Lucinda leaning over the table.

"Oh, uh, hey, Lucinda."

"You were miles away. Are you okay?"

"Uh, yeah, yeah, course I'm alright. How are you?"

"Good." She sank into the chair beside me as Evan came back with the beers, snagging one for herself.

She started talking about college, but paused halfway through describing her classes and laughed shakily, trying to distract from her red face, before she gabbled out: “…and the professor for this class, Sam Truman, he’s so great and he’s, just… he’s standing over there, you see - the really tall, hot guy?”

We followed where she was pointing, and ohhhhhhh… she was pointing to Sam, Sam who was a college professor. Of course.

"Him over there, by the pool table. That really tall, really hot guy, that's him. His class is awesome and he's just…" she sighed wistfully, "he's, like, so cool and smart? And you know, just, guh, so tall..."

I stared at her and kinda wanted to laugh, because… Lucinda had a crush on Sam? Dean’s Sam? Scarily intense, most definitely gay Sam? Possibly a Satanist, insanely protective Sam?

Wow, she could really pick them.

Evan laughed. "Don't get your hopes up, babe."

"What're you talking about? And don't call me babe."

"You are so S.O.L,” he slurred through more snigg*rs. “He’s totally gay. That guy with him - he's his boyfriend, and uh, Derek's boss."

"What?" she looked at me, her face scrunched up in confusion. "Your boss? The garage guy? You never told me your boss was gay." She said it as if it was, like, the coolest thing in the world, and not as if it meant that her crush on the cool, hot and super smart Professor Truman had not just crashed and burned, not that it had ever stood a chance, Sam never had eyes for anyone who wasn't Dean.

I rolled my eyes at her. Evan was already banging on and on about how and why Dean was "just so awesome". I didn’t want to join in their fan-boying and fan-girling, it was bad enough watching the way Lucinda’s eyes shone when she sneaked looks at Dean and Sam.

"When they finish up their game, d’you think, like, we can talk to them again? sh*t, just wait till I tell Claire, she's got this enormous crush on Sam."

"Not like you then?" I snarked.

She blushed again and elbowed me. "Derek! Be nice. The guy's, like, majorly hot. And smart. He knows so much cool stuff about pagan rituals and witchcraft and old urban legends - some of which are actually true. Some of the stuff we study, it's, like, fascinating. You both so should be taking this class."

For once, I was disappointed when she stopped talking, Sam’s big boner for the occult was something I had my own theories about and I kinda wanted to hear more.

“So how much did you win?” Evan asked Dean and Sam when they came back to the table.

Dean fanned out the money in his hand, "Easy pickings, dude, 250 big bucks on two games. Preppy assholes didn't know what hit them." He grinned evilly and took a pull on his beer, eyes going over us and lingering when they got to Lucinda. "Hey there, sweetheart! So, ain’t you boys gonna introduce us to your charming friend?"

"I'm Lucinda," she said, barely noticing him, instead staring at Sam like he was one of those chocolate sundaes she used to love.

Dean glanced between her and Sam and smirked. "Nice to meet you, Lucinda. I'm Dean and this," he clapped Sam on the shoulder, "this circus freak is Sam."

"I, uh, I know," she said, hesitating before plunging on, still staring at Sam with the worshipful look, "I - I'm in one of your classes. It's Freshman Intro to Cultural Anthropology, and it’s great, it's so great, really fascinating, my favorite class."

Sam looked surprised for a moment, before he smiled and nodded uncomfortably. "Uh, thanks. I try my best to make it not too boring."

"Oh my God, no! It’s not boring at all, it's so interesting... you know, learning everything about what people believe in, what different cultures believe. That lecture you gave last week, about neo-pagan rituals and their relevance to Old Norse mythology, was just amazing…”

I tuned out Sam’s answer, but Lucinda’s voice came back to me a moment later. She was gushing in that way she used to use on me when I told her I wasn’t gonna bother voting when I turned eighteen.

“…I mean, it’s just a different set of beliefs… it doesn’t have to be real, that’s what I’m always telling people – they’re, like, metaphors…”

Evan pulled a face and turned to Dean. “You might wanna warn him, dude, she’ll be like this all night.”

A couple of hours later, the crowd was thinning out, someone had put Bruce Springsteen on the jukebox and a few real drunk couples were dancing badly to Hungry Heart. Lucinda was still bending Sam’s ear about some boring sh*t, though he seemed to be giving as good as he got, and Dean was taking on Evan and me at the pool table. After wiping the floor with us twice in an embarrassingly short time, he’d soon gotten frustrated with our uselessness and started offering us hints which seemed to have led to a full blown coaching session. I leaned on my cue and watched him watch Evan flail around with his cue while he tried to line up a shot.

“Dude, I’ve told you, you’re doin’ it all wrong,” he snapped.

“Wha –“ Evan turned his head to peer up at Dean. “No, I – I’m doin’ like you said, man, gettin’ my sights fixed and…”

Dean sighed, “Here, look.”

He grabbed the cue from Evan, careful to keep about a foot from him, and leaned over the table, sliding the cue between his splayed fingers. I stared at the long line of his body, the way the dim, orange-yellow light hanging low over the table made the soft, downy hair on his arms look golden and fuzzy, the smooth, toned muscles of his arms flexing as he lined up the shot. His black t-shirt was tight across his shoulders and his jeans had eased down his hips, exposing a strip of his white boxer briefs...

A wave of heat tore through me, overwhelming and drowning out everything else...

I felt like I'd been punched, the breath slammed out of me like an elbow to the gut, and the only thing I was aware of was that I was hard... God, I was hard, and the reality… the one, the only thought beating in my head was that I wanted him, I wanted Dean, and I didn't know what I wanted to do with him, but God, I wanted him...

I gulped, trying to find my breath again, air hitching and fluttering in my chest, pulse racing crazily. I stared, stared at him: seeing him lift his beer to his lips, head tilting back and mouth wrapping around the neck, he lowered the bottle, lips moist as he mouthed along to the music, Everybody’s got a hungry heart, lay down your money and you play your part…. God, I wanted to kiss him, wanted to taste the beer on his lips, lick the moisture from his mouth. I wanted it, wanted to sink my teeth into him and taste him, press myself up against him, rub my dumb, hard co*ck up against his ass...

My boss, my f*cking boss, with his huge, overprotective boyfriend… Just… f*ck… What the f*ck was wrong with me? What was happening to me?

The heat welled up again, swooping through my hazy, lost body, and thank f*ck my mom always bought me such huge-ass, way-too-big, XXL size pants...

“Derek, you’re up, man.”

"I've gotta go to the bathroom." I dropped my cue and f*cking bolted.

I didn't look back to see Dean and Evan's faces, I could guess at them anyway - surprise, confusion, what the f*ck? I didn't stop, just dashed for the bathroom. I crashed into one of the stalls and gasped for breath.

I leaned against the stall wall, panting, so f*cking sweaty, my t-shirt damp against my back and my armpits, and my co*ck... Jesus Christ, my co*ck... I jerked at my zipper and pulled it out, banging my head back against the stall wall and screwing my eyes tight shut.

It only took a couple of tugs before I was coming, sticky and gross in my hand. I gave myself thirty seconds, counting them down in my head, concentrating on each number, my stupid body still shaking from my wrung-out org*sm. I opened my eyes and grabbed for some toilet paper to clean up.

I felt exhausted, like I’d just finished a ten mile run, winded and shivering.

Everything had changed.

But I couldn't think about that now. There'd been too much beer, and my friends, and oh God, Dean, and Sam, were out there, and I had to be normal again, had to pretend that my life had not just gone to sh*t.

I slept heavily that night, not remembering any of my dreams when I finally woke up, thank God. I felt like sh*t, my head thick and pounding, my stomach churning, all that f*cking beer. My whole body, tired as hell, and my stupid f*cking dick, aching and hard.

I stumbled into the shower, just standing under the hot water, letting it run over me. I didn’t want to jerk off – I didn’t trust my brain not to play tricks on me, not to bring up things I was trying so hard to repress – but my stupid dick was still throbbing, and goddamnit it had gone past the point where I could just ignore the f*cking thing. I jerked off half-heartedly, using my Mom’s apple scented conditioner. It didn’t take long, I squeezed my eyes shut and tried my best to think about nothing as I felt myself get closer.

It didn’t work.

Dean’s face sprang once again in my head as I came with a long hiss. I couldn’t stop myself from crying then, because this wasn’t fair. This wasn’t goddamned fair. Why did I have to be like this? Wasn’t it enough that I’d already lost my Dad? Hadn’t life sh*tted on me enough?

Because the thing was, like I'd said before, I wasn't f*cking stupid. I knew now what this all was, the way I couldn’t stop thinking about him – about him and Sam – I knew pretty f*cking well exactly what this was… what was making me feel like this.

I was gay. I was a dumb worthless gayboy, and my boss, f*cking Dean Cooper, was to blame for it.

When I eventually got out the shower, Mom was hovering by the bathroom door, looking concerned. The walls in this place are far too f*cking thin.

"Derek, honey. Are you okay?"

I couldn't look her in the eye, but just pushed past her into my room and slammed the bolt home behind me.

**********************************************

March 2013

On Friday, after office hours, Sam stays late to read a book Bobby’s friend sent him. It’s in Sumerian, and although his Sumerian is a lot better now than when they were on the road, it still takes him a long time to decipher through the first few pages. But he’s not going to give up because this could be it: this could hold the answer he’s been searching for.

He’s been reading for fifteen minutes when his phone rings, vibrating its way across a pile of freshman papers with skips and jumps. Dean calling.

“I found us a new hunt,” says Dean, his voice barely holding in his excitement. “In Savannah.”

“Savannah? Let me guess – another haunting?”

“Nah, dude, not this time, this time it sounds like a werewolf. Missing hearts, Sammy!”

Sam resists the urge to smile; really, Dean is the only person who can get excited about missing hearts.

“Uh-huh?”

“Oh yeah. So, I’m thinkin’, we set off tonight, do the research tomorrow and waste the sonofabitch tomorrow night, which happens to be…”

“…first night of the full moon.”

“Yatzhee.”

Sam hesitates for a second, he wants to say no, he’s just started his reading and there’s no way he’s going to be able to do it with Dean around, and this hunt -

“C’mon, Sam, whatcha waiting for? People are dying! Two people last full moon; think how many it can take out this time around? We should hunt this bastard already.”

sh*t. It’s not like he can argue with logic like that, people are dying. They’re not strictly hunters anymore, but now that they know this is happening, they can’t ignore it. Dean’s right, if they don’t get it now, then it’ll kill again, some other poor innocent will suffer, and honestly, the two of them need all the good karma they can get.

“Okay, alright. I’m on my way.”

“Awesome, I’ll be ready.”

Dean hangs up and Sam sits for a moment staring at his cell phone screen. He lets out a frustrated sigh and flips the book closed.

It’s about five hours to Savannah, but Dean makes it in four. He’s in a stupidly good mood, singing along loudly to the music and outlining the more gruesome aspects of the case to Sam with shining eyes. Just outside Savannah he shoves Appetite for Destruction into the tape player and turns to Sam to shriek: You know where you are? You’re in the jungle, baby! You’re gonna die! with the kind of timing that would make W. Axl Rose proud.

“Jesus, sometimes I’m embarrassed to know you, let alone be related to you.”

“Bitch, you love me,” Dean says with a toothy grin.

Sam shakes his head, but he can’t stop smiling.

They pull into a motel just outside the city and Sam’s surprised to find he remembers it from their previous visits, then he remembers that it has both magic fingers and pay per view and he’s no longer surprised.

It’s both strange and oddly familiar to be on a hunt again. Sometimes, he feels as if this is his real life and the time he spends lecturing students and working on his thesis some sort of elaborate dream, because really: he and Dean living the small town lifestyle as a couple, Dean owning his own business and being a pillar of the community: how can that be reality?

The “vicious wild dog” sightings and the police reports of the two murders put the wolf’s hunting ground around one of the city’s oldest cemeteries, so they set up patrol there on the second night in town, the first night of the full moon.

They pad across the cemetery in silence. It’s rained recently and the turf is slick and wet, the air heavy and close. Sam can feel sweat beading under his shirt as he rolls his shoulders, adjusting his grip on his shotgun.

Dean shoots him a look, “You alright?”

“I don’t know, it’s just, I gotta bad feeling about this.”

“Well, that’s specific, Luke.”

Sam rolls his eyes and ignores him.

They pause by a couple of massive family monuments, Dean propping himself up against one of them, eyes squinting half-shut as he stares out across the cemetery.

Sam tracks his gaze and feels the cold prickle of something’s not right down his spine as he spots a dark shadow disappearing between another couple of enormous monuments. Dean immediately springs to his feet, sprinting towards the shape.

“Dean, wait!” he screams as Dean skids to the ground, shotgun raised.

It all happens so fast. Dean takes aim in the split second the creature moves – jumping, springing – one inhuman, animalistic leap and it’s on Dean, the two of them tumbling to the ground. Snarls and growls and Sam’s breath is trapped somewhere in his chest, and it’s like that moment in every Vietnam movie when the grenade explodes and the screen whites out, everyone rendered deaf and mute with shock and fear…

…until he’s moving, training kicking in, synapses and adrenalin firing open as he raises his gun, sites fixed, a ghost of Dad’s voice in his head: that’s right, Sammy, gotta get it right between the crosshairs, son…

He squeezes the trigger.

The thing collapses with a howl of pain that shrieks through every pore in Sam’s body, but he doesn’t care, he’s running to Dean, falling to the ground beside him. Oh God, oh God… You stupid, dumb idiot. Why’d you do that? Why’d you not wait for me?

His brother’s face is deathly pale; completely still, Sam lowers his head, and there – thank God, Jesus, whoever – warm, faint breath of air against his cheek. Dean’s still breathing.

He gets to work automatically, because Dean’s gone: that sickeningly familiar blankness in his brother’s face, that not Dean, empty vessel, everything that’s Dean vanished the moment that creature touched him. He takes a breath and twines their fingers together, lips already shaping the necessary words to bring his brother back.

He feels the familiar tingle of dark nastiness curl awake in his belly as he speaks the words, the matching brands on their hands spidering awake, rippling, bright purple tongues up and over and around their entwined hands and wrists. The words spill off his tongue, lips curling around the evil, grasping consonants as he hears Dean’s breathing quicken, Dean’s soul slowly folding back into place as the black, forbidden power twists alive in his chest…

Dean comes back with gasp, that hiccupping, choking intake of breath that Sam’s heard too many times now. Sleeping Beauty woken by her Handsome Prince, he thinks hysterically as Dean’s eyes flutter open. He curls over Dean, shielding him, holding his hand up by his mouth and kissing his fingertips one by one, tasting the gunpowder and dirt ingrained in Dean’s skin.

“Sam...” Dean exhales.

Sam’s breath hitches, he still feels like he’s choking. It’s harder, tougher, every time he does this to force the darkness back, to tamp it away inside him.

“Give me a minute, Dean.”

Dean squeezes his fingers tight around Sam’s hand, a reassuring pressure; he looks down, Dean’s staring at him, unblinking, resigned.

“It happened again.”

“Yeah, you were gone.”

Dean’s eyes don’t break contact with his as he props himself up on his elbows. “Well… sh*t, I didn’t think, I thought it was only humans who could cause it to,” he waves a hand, eyebrows coming together in a frown, “you know, break?”

“So did I.” He gets to his feet, exhaling heavily, reaching to retrieve his gun. “But werewolves, I guess, they’re people for 20 odd days of the week. They’re pretty close to human.”

Dean nods thoughtfully, “Huh.” He winces as he slowly regains his feet, leans heavily against a gravestone and looks down at the dead animal. “You got it though? Good shot, man.”

“Thanks.” He gives Dean a rueful smile, prods the werewolf carcass with the toe of his boot. “Guess we should burn the body.”

And that’s when the other werewolf arrives.

Chapter 6

Chapter Text

March 2013

I called in sick on Monday. I couldn't face a day in Dean's company, not knowing, realizing what I knew now. So, I called Uncle Lou and told him I was sick. He just grunted and moaned about ungrateful teenagers who didn’t know a good job when they saw one.

My mom was a different matter. Lucky for me, she was going through a busy period at work, so she didn't have time to listen to my description of my fake symptoms; she just gave me Tylenol and told me to drink lots of fluids.

I stayed in bed for an hour after she'd gone, then I got online.

I logged onto Wikipedia and then paused for a minute, feeling kinda dumb, what was I supposed to do: type “gay” into the search box? I stared at the screen, took a breath and typed it. The page that came up was pretty useless, just banged on about the etymological history behind the word, whatever the f*ck that meant, not giving me any life-altering advice or suggestions at all. I couldn’t believe that the mighty Wik was failing me, it had practically gotten me through my finals, despite all that sh*t my teachers had said about the “veracity of its sources”.

I kinda gave up then, I wasn’t gonna work this sh*t out on the f*cking internet, though maybe I could try downloading some gay p*rn, see if that had any effect. I kinda fudged around for the day, trying to strike up the courage to actually go ahead and find some, but in the end, I gave up, too chickensh*t.

What I really needed to do was to just see Dean again, or maybe see Dean and Sam together again, like that time I’d seen them in the office, when Sam had grabbed Dean and pushed him up against the desk and put his mouth on his throat and sucked at -

Oh, there it was… my dick, waking up at long freaking last…

Well, that made that pretty much a done deal: I was gay, or at least, gay for my stupidly hot boss.

On Wednesday, when I finally went into work, Tim told me that Dean hadn't been around the last two days. "He and Sam went off on a huntin' trip somewhere, Savannah, I think. Kinda last minute deal."

I felt so f*cking relieved; I almost wanted to kiss him. I didn't though; however much my stupid-ass libido was f*cked-up these days, it wasn’t that f*cked up.

Gabe got a call at lunchtime; he looked serious when he hung up, coming through to the shop to announce, “That was Sam. He said Dean's been hurt bad. Bear clawed him up, damaged his ribs, got a gash right up the outside of his thigh too from what Sam said. He’s bringin’ him home though, dumb son of a bitch refused to go to hospital.”

"A bear?" said Uncle Lou, looking unimpressed. "First I’ve heard of bears in f*ckin’ Savannah?”

"Hell, I don't know. That's what Sam said. Took some damage by all accounts."

"Jesus," echoed Tim. "They're both f*ckin' crazy. You remember that trip they took last spring? Both of them turned up here, beaten up. f*ckin' black and blue they were, Sam with a broken wrist and a scar right up his side."

I listened to them bang on with their old stories of Dean and Sam’s various injuries, my heart thumping in my chest. I didn't know what to think about this. The idea of Dean being hurt was making something tense in my gut, a heavy sort of feeling that I couldn't quite work out - fear or anxiety, or hell, I don't know... lust? It made as much sense as everything else.

We carried on as normal for the rest of the week. Gabe had regular phone updates from Sam, and told us on Thursday that they'd gotten home safe and sound and that Dean would be back at work soon.

When I got home on Friday night, my Mom was standing by the kitchen table waiting for me, three just-baked pies sitting on the table in front of her. I stared at them and then back at her. Back before my Dad got sick, my mom used to bake a lot; these days, with her job, she didn’t seem to have much time for it, so it was like I’d gone back in time to sixth grade to see her sitting there, surrounded by the fantastic aroma of pie.

“Don’t take your coat off, Derek. We’re going out,” she told me as she wrapped the pies in foil.

"Uh, where?”

“To visit that poor boy, your boss, honey. Lou told me he’d been hurt and I know how much he appreciates a home cooked pie.”

My mouth fell open in panic. We were gonna, like, pay Dean a visit? Me and Mom? Oh God.

“Here.” She handed me a couple of the pies. The tins were still warm and the smell, whoa, the smell amazing. She looked at my face and smiled. “Don’t worry, I’m leaving one here for you and Lou.”

Their place was probably about four miles outside the town limits, down a dirt-track sided by tall bending trees that gave off this eerie, rustling sound. After about a quarter mile, we pulled up into a “driveway” in front of a crummy looking building that looked about 100 years old. The Impala was parked outside, and next to it was the boring looking Buick I’d seen Sam driving. The sound of a dog barking greeted us when Mom killed the engine and I saw Dougal burst out from somewhere, barking madly and nosing around Mom’s car.

The front porch door banged open and I saw the freakishly tall silhouette of Sam come slinking out, leaning against the doorframe and whistling to Dougal. Dougal immediately backed away and scampered back towards the house.

“Hey, what’re y’all doing here?” Sam stepped off the porch, holding out one shovel-like hand in greeting.

“We’ve come to check up on the invalid,” replied mom as she took Sam’s hand. “And, uh, we brought pie.” She waved at the foil-covered plates in my hands.

“Well, then, c’mon in,” answered Sam with one of his eerily big smiles.

I stepped inside, tripping over four pairs of mud-caked boots lying by the front door. Regaining my balance and keeping a safe hand on the pies, I took a long look around…

Inside didn’t look any better than outside. I could see my Mom trying to keep her face from falling into what I privately called her reality TV look, and looking around me, I couldn’t really blame her. I wasn’t, like, a neat freak or anything weird like that, but I always liked to keep my room tidy, and sometimes hated hanging out at Evan’s with his dirty clothes, dishes and mugs all over the place, sh*t was just f*cking unhygienic. This place had the same kinda vibe as Evan’s skan*-ass room, though it wasn’t so much dirty as just really freakin’ untidy, that and the dog hair all over the rugs, wonky pictures on the walls and no curtains at the windows, managed to give it a weird lived-in and unlived-in look at the same time.

The furniture was even worse than ours, (and seriously, that was saying something, Mom had had to sell the best of it off to help cover Dad’s medical fees, even after the insurance finally paid out), it looked like they'd picked it all up at a dollar an item yard sale, and there were books everywhere: on top of every surface and on the floor, all of them really old and dusty, like the sort that usually got stored in a library’s special restricted section to protect them from finger marks and sweaty hands. The few spots that weren’t covered in books were littered with papers, maps, coats, sweaters, socks, even an old pair of jeans. The only decent thing in the room was a cinema sized plasma screen TV looking way out of place amongst the ancient books and crappy furniture.

Dean lay on one of the sh*tty couches, remote in hand, watching the enormous TV which seemed to be showing Quincey or Murder She Wrote - one of those ancient, boring daytime shows. He looked different in a pair of faded, gray sweats that were too long for him and a white t-shirt with a tear around the neckline. His right leg was laid out stiffly in front of him, bandages wrapped around his ankle, and I could see a long, healing scratch on his left arm. He shut off the TV as he saw us.

“Hey, did I hear you say something about pie?”

My stomach did a little flip as he grinned at us, and yeah, that was it, my special, gay crush was definitely up and running. He shifted to wave hello at Mom and I caught a glimpse of a tattoo, the outline just visible through the tear in his t-shirt. I wrenched my eyes away from him and watched Sam clear sh*t off the other couch, throwing three books, The Atlantic, a couple of flannel shirts, Hot Rod, two different colored socks, a Twix wrapper and about seven popsicle sticks onto the floor and motion for us to take a seat. Mom gave the sofa a worried look before sinking into it. I sat next to her, still holding the pies in my hands.

“Here, let me take those.” Sam took the pies from me. “Would you both like anything to drink? Coffee? Water? A beer?”

I felt my Mom hesitate for a moment before replying, and I totally knew that she was weighing up the fear of catching something from any drink prepared in this sh*t-hole against what was correct and appropriate behavior when paying a visit on your son’s injured employer. In the end, her ingrained Carolinian politeness won out.

“Just coffee for me, thanks, Sam.”

Well, if Mom was chancing it…

“Yeah, uh, me too, thanks,” I said.

Sam nodded and disappeared. Dean looked at us and coughed awkwardly. “Look, uh, sorry for the, uh, mess,” he waved his hand – taking in… all of it, “we’re in the middle of doin’ renovations and it, uh, well, with just me and Sam, place don’t get cleaned too much.”

Mom nodded and gave him a rigid smile. “Don’t worry about it none, honey, it doesn’t look that bad.”

Yeah, sure, she was lying through her teeth. I could tell from the stiff way she was holding herself on the couch that she was probably worried about getting fleas, which was not a crazy thought judging from the amount of dog-hair all over it.

Dean smiled at her, and my stomach did that scary, fluttery thing again. He leaned forward and I could make out all of the tattoo now: a black star-shape inked into the perfect flat muscle just above his right nipple... f*ck, exactly the same as the one I'd seen on Sam's chest that one time a few weeks ago... and Jesus, were these two for real? Matching tattoos and matching weird-ass, creepy scars that f*cking moved and guh... matching tattoos that I could imagine them touching when they f*cked, Sam's huge hand spread over Dean's chest and his mouth on that gorgeous curve of Dean's throat... God, I needed to get a f*cking grip. What I was feeling – it was – was just… crazy, I’d never felt like this before, never felt this f*cking attracted to anyone and he was my boss, my goddamn male boss.

“So, how’re you feeling? We heard, about your accident. It sounded terrible,” said Mom with her sympathetic face.

“Oh, I’m good.” He shrugged. “Had much worse. You wanna take a look at the damage?” He raised his eyebrows gleefully and shifted onto his side; taking the hem of his t-shirt between his fingers. I held my breath as he slowly lifted up the shirt; exposing strips of pale, muscled belly and side that made the fluttering sensation in my stomach tighten. Just great… I was half-hard already and the last f*cking thing I wanted was to pop a full grown boner right here, sitting next to my Mom on this gross-ass couch.

“Oh my God,” breathed Mom, and I totally didn’t get what she was freaking out about until I managed to raise my eyes and take in the three gashes on Dean’s side, like someone had gone at him with a giant rusty pitchfork. They’d been sewn up, tiny black stitches like railroad tracks over puffy, sore skin.

Sam came back in then, holding a tray with four cups of coffee. He looked around hopelessly, trying to find somewhere to put it, eventually opting for the floor.

“That was a bear?” asked Mom, still staring at Dean's injuries in disbelief.

“Uh-huh,” said Dean. He lowered his shirt and smirked. “Huge son of a bitch. Sorry,” he gave Mom an apologetic look, “’scuse my language.” She waved her hand and he grinned with another flash of teeth. “Thought I was a goner for a minute, ‘till my trusty side-kick pulled me outta there.” He punched Sam’s shoulder to emphasize the point. “Got my leg too. But somehow, he escaped completely unharmed.”

“Well, I’m not as recklessly stupid as you,” and Sam, handing coffees to me and Mom. “And Dean, there’s no need for a sideshow.”

“Dude, why must you insist on spoiling my fun?”

“Because, retard, it needs to heal.”

Dean rolled his eyes and winked at me. My stomach flipped again and I gripped the coffee mug hard enough to burn, staring at the dirty window ahead, so not trusting myself to look at Dean again.

“So, um, what did the doctor say?” asked Mom.

“What doctor?” said Dean with a shrug. “We didn’t go to a doctor. Magic fingers here fixed it all up. He’s a genius with the suture kit.”

“I have field medic training,” Sam explained to my shocked-looking mother. “And, Dean – well you know how it is… with other people… hospitals can be kinda difficult,” he broke off, pressing his lips together and looking uncomfortable.

It hadn’t occurred to me before, but with Dean’s freak-ass “issues” with touching, they couldn’t have gone to a hospital to get his wounds dressed… so just as well Sam had field training or whatever the f*ck. I guessed that was another point in favor of the both of them being in the army theory. I could see Sam as a field medic; he had the attitude, not to mention the enormous hands that would be useful in battle.

“So, uh, Derek, how have things been, dude?” Dean asked. “No problems? You guys’re managing alright?”

“I’m sure they’re managing fine,” Sam interrupted. "Quit worryin’ about it."

"Sam, jeez, I'm not worried, I'm just askin'." Sam said nothing, his silence pointed. Dean sighed and turned back to me: "But seriously, things've been good, right?"

"Uh, yeah. Things've been fine. We've been busy, but we've managed okay," I answered, not looking at Sam.

"Sweet. I'll be back on Monday, whatever Florence Nightingale here says."

"Well, you'll need a crutch," insisted Sam, "and someone to drive your gimpy ass around."

"Well, that's what I have you for, isn't it?" Dean said and gave him a blinding smile. I could see the stony look on Sam's face melt away as he stared back at Dean, a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. Dean grinned at him again and moved his thigh so it was pressing against the back of Sam's neck, his eyes darkening in this deliberate, predatory way that was just like, guh…

Sam's hand reached up to wrap around Dean’s bare ankle, his tongue coming out to lick his lips, and Jesus... they looked like they were about to jump each other's bones at any minute. My Mom shifted next to me, I darted her a quick glance, terrified for a second that she’d sensed something – what I was feeling – but she was staring at them too, her face slightly pinkish, and... was she - was she blushing? My mom...? And Jesus f*cking Christ on a stick, talk about sh*t I so didn't want to think about.

Thank God, Sam seemed to remember at this point that we were still, you know, actually in the room with them, and that it wasn't a good time for him to start molesting his boyfriend, despite how much I secretly wanted to see them (though, Christ, no, not with my Mom there).

"So, Lois, how're things at the Courthouse? I was reading something recently about Mayor Rawls..."

Mom started talking about work then. She worked as a clerk at the city hall. When Dad was still around, they used to talk local politics for ages. In fact, Dad'd been thinking about running for councilman years ago when I first started high school, Mom had been really enthusiastic about it, but then he'd gotten sick and everything had changed. These days, she didn't get much chance to talk about work or local politics with me or my Uncle Lou for company, so she seemed to be making the most of the opportunity now. Sam and Dean seemed to know quite a lot, which was, like, kinda surprising, but then again, I'd given up on not being surprised by anything relating to the two of them. They were - what was that saying: a riddle wrapped up in an enigma? Well, however it went, that was them.

I finished my coffee and put the mug down on the floor next to the couch. There didn't seem to be a better place to put it. "Can I, uh, use your bathroom?"

"Oh yeah sure. Upstairs, first door on the right. We only got the one," Sam said and waved a hand towards the stairs.

There were three half open doors on the landing, the first one on the right was the bathroom, just like Sam had said; and the one opposite it seemed to be the master bedroom. I paused on the threshold, thinking about what a crazy-ass stalker I was being, this was where Dean slept, where he got naked, where he and Sam had sex, I couldn’t look at it…

Aw f*ck, who was I kidding?

I pushed the door a bit further open and tiptoed inside. It was a mess. The floor was covered in clothes and every surface cluttered with crap, from the saggy-ass armchair in the corner to the chest of drawers with its drawers jammed half way open, dusty top strewn with books, papers, envelopes, half-used bottles of lotion, about four dollars in change and a partly toothless comb. There were also a couple of duffels slung on the floor, one zippered shut and the other half open and spilling dirty laundry. Dirty laundry which looked like it was covered in dirt and… was that blood…? Must be the clothes Dean was wearing when he was mauled by the bear. They hadn’t washed that sh*t yet? Or thrown it in the trash? Or hell, incinerated it? Man, that was gross.

I wrinkled my nose and stared at the bed. It was made, like, perfectly made and that seemed… really weird next to the mess everywhere else. There were nightstands either side of the bed, the near one piled up with books (again), the far one bare except for... holy f*ck... Was that...? I crept around the bed and stared, a chill rippling across my skin. f*ck, it was a gun. And not just a crappy looking pistol, but a looking-at-it-makes-me-want-to-sh*t-my-pants, pearl-handled, silver revolver of the sort I’d only ever seen in the movies or on video games. What the hell was a gun like that doing here, in the bedroom?

All the people I knew who had guns (Uncle Lou for one) kept them in display cabinets or locked up in specially made cases, or in a f*cking safe, definitely not lying out on a nightstand. Which meant… either Dean was some sort of gun obsessed psycho with a major hard on for intruders (and seriously, who was likely to break into this sh*thole and try to steal anything) or there was some other reason the gun was up here, on hand… by the bed… and, oh God, my brain was so going there… Whoa. Jesus, that was freaking… man, that sh*t was kinky.

I could hear sounds coming from downstairs. f*ck, I so needed to get out of here, and I hadn’t even had time to check for any clues to Sam’s possible Satan worship, at least there didn’t seem to be any altars or obvious black magic sh*t in here, no, just that huge, scary-ass gun.

That night, after we'd gotten back home, I jacked off to the memory of Sam’s massive hand curled around Dean’s ankle, to thoughts of him licking over that inky, black tattoo on Dean’s chest. It was one of the best org*sms I’d ever had.

On Monday, Dean was already at work by the time I arrived, sitting in the office with his injured leg resting on another chair, writing something in a notebook and frowning. Dougal lay on the floor by his chair, head pressed up against Dean’s uninjured leg. He must have noticed me as I went past, because a couple of seconds later I heard him call me over.

"Uh, yeah?"

He was sucking on the end of his pen, and he grinned at me as he pulled it out his mouth, tapping it against his lower lip. I stared at his mouth, at his lips, not hearing a word he was saying until he finished up, saying: “You’ll pass that on for me, Derek, won’t ya?”

“I, uh, yeah, sure, Dean, yeah,” I gabbled, not knowing what the f*ck I was supposed to pass on.

“Right, good, good.” He got up from his seat and reached for his crutch. “Gabe's on vacation these next two weeks so you gotta step up. I want you to finish up that Boxster."

"But I don't know what -"

He cut me off with an impatient wave of his hand. "I'll supervise. Don't sh*t it.” He started hobbling towards the shop door, Dougal getting up from his basket to follow. "Well, c'mon then."

I worked as best I could, which turned out to be not very good, like, at all. Not only did I not really know what the hell I was supposed to be doing to fix the thing, but Dean was watching me the entire time, like, watching me. Even if I didn't have a major crush on the guy it would've been off-putting, but taking into account that I did, well, to say it was an entire f*cking waste of time – yeah, understatement. I was even happy to see Sam when he turned up with Dean's lunch.

I ate my own lunch at the front desk. We were allowed to surf online during our break periods and that was the only computer with a decent broadband connection in the place.

"You can look at anything," Dean had told me when I’d first started, "just don't go downloading a f*cking Trojan or whatever the f*ck the things are called. And if you want to watch p*rn – then pay for it yourself. Okay?" I’d kinda choked at that point, sort of disbelieving that he’d actually said that, (that was before I’d gotten to know him).

I'd been half-heartedly surfing for about ten minutes when I heard the sound of raised voices coming from the half-open, office door. I’d been here long enough to totally not be surprised by yet another Dean and Sam fight, they were always bickering with each other, when they weren’t, like, totally all over each other.

The door slammed open and Sam came storming out. I slunk down behind the computer screen, trying to make myself invisible. I didn’t need to worry, though, as he was too busy being angry and red-faced to notice anything except Dean.

He paused for a second, then spun around, his voice going all cracked as he said, “You drive me f*ckin’ crazy, you know that? You just – Jesus, Dean, you have no f*ckin’ idea!” I saw him press one hand against the open door, before he shook his head and said, all softly dramatic: “I’ll be back at five to pick you up.”

Then he turned around and stalked out of there, his usual two or three stilt-man strides to reach the door.

Okaay then.

After a moment, Dean emerged from the office, one hand on his crutch. His eyes skated over me and narrowed.

“Why aren’t you working?”

“I – uh, I’m on a break.”

“Right.” He raised his hand to his face - the one without the scar - and ran it over his chin with a rough, scraping sound. I felt my stomach flutter as I watched him. God, I wanted… wanted to lick him there, press my lips against his face and feel the stubble rough and hairy under my tongue.

After about a minute, he turned around and hobbled back into the office. I logged out the computer and went to the bathroom to jerk off.

*******************************************

Sam hates fighting with Dean, always has, ever since he was old enough to answer back. He and Dean used to fight about everything, bickering with each other was their way of communicating, and most of the time, it was normal, usual. Sometimes, it would be vicious between them, and at those times, it would feel like the end of the world, like he was ripping an enormous band aid off his arm extra slow, the scab underneath coming off too, vulnerable, gritty, bloody flesh being revealed to the world without anything to protect it. He’d try to feign indifference, try to pretend it wasn’t dragging him apart, but it never worked, and when he was a kid, he’d always end up going to Dean with tears in his eyes, Dean turning to look at him with this expression on his face that was relief and love and complete and utter devotion. “Truce, Sammy?” he’d say, cause Dean always said it first, and Sam would nod, give him a watery smile and the world would work again.

They still fight just as much, and it still feels like the end of the world, though it totally shouldn’t, given how much f*cking practice they get at it, how much their relationship seems to thrive on the constant arguments. But this fight grates on him, because it was dumb, because Dean was wrong, so wrong. He needs help with the business while he recovers from his injuries, his only decent worker (Gabe) is on vacation and there is no way Dean’s going to be able to cope if they don’t get someone else in. It makes perfect sense for Bobby, someone they trust and someone who knows what he’s doing with an engine, to come down and lend a hand.

Dean was badly injured, that second f*cking werewolf – what it did – slicing up Dean’s belly with an easy swing of its claw, so much damage taken so quickly – it scared Sam, it truly terrified him. Just another supernatural creature that normally they’d take out without breaking a sweat, but on that night, coming fast on having to speak the ritual, on having to bring Dean back, after all that, to have to take on another f*cking werewolf…

It’s different now. Dean is vulnerable in a way he never used to be. Dean is completely dependent on him, and okay, they’ve always had each other’s backs, they’ve always been dependent on each other, but it is different now. Their roles have been reversed; he’s the older brother, the stronger brother, though, of course Dean doesn’t see it this way, but Dean’s wrong, and it’s Sam’s turn to be the one to take care of Dean. It’s been Sam’s turn ever since Dean got back from hell, ever since he did that f*cking ritual and damned them both…

What matters is that Dean is his responsibility, his and he’s going to do anything and everything he can to make things right, after all, it was him who f*cked everything up in the first place.

When he picks Dean up from the garage, he’s silent, staring out the window, sulking.

“I cleaned up,” he tells Dean.

Dean ignores him.

“Changed the sheets on the guest bed. I’m gonna make lasagna I think, he’ll like that.”

Still nothing.

“Dean, c’mon, man. Bobby’s comin’, he’ll be here in a few hours, so just get over yourself already. This is a good idea.”

Dean turns to look at him and his face is hard, eyes narrowed in irritation. “You should’ve said something to me sooner,” he says.

Sam sighs and indicates to turn into their drive. “Yeah, well, you would’ve tried to stop me.”

Dean takes a seat on the couch as soon as they get back, wincing as he adjusts his position and reaches for the remote. Sam brings him a beer and he grunts out a begrudging thanks.

He watches Dean from the corner of his eye while he makes the lasagna – one of Dean’s recipes – Dean’s sipping his beer slowly, only half watching the TV screen. His eyes are lidded and he looks tired, in pain. Sam finishes up the meal and takes a couple more beers out the refrigerator.

“Hey,” he nudges Dean gently, “did you take your meds?”

Dean shakes his head, Sam huffs out an irritable breath and goes to find them, “You won’t get better if you don’t take them.”

“Thank you, Captain Obvious,” Dean retorts, taking the pills from him.

He swallows the pills as Sam sits on the floor, back against the couch. Dean rests his hand on the back of Sam’s head, idly running his fingers through his hair. He probably doesn't even realize he's doing it, but the gesture makes Sam feel warm, the weight in his chest start to lift.

He tilts his head back to look up at Dean, gives him his most winning smile, “Truce?”

Dean rolls his eyes, “Yeah, alright. Truce.” He tugs at Sam’s hair, “Get your ass up here.”

Sam’s smile widens and he climbs up onto the couch beside Dean, “I know why you don’t want Bobby here.”

“No you don’t.”

“Yeah, I do. You don’t like the way he looks at us, now that he knows about us.” He looks at Dean, but Dean’s refusing to meet his eyes, gazing at the muted TV, not watching it anymore, just staring now, Sam can tell from the way his mouth has set, from the tense line in his jaw. “And I get it, dude, cause I can’t say I like it much either. But we need the help and he’s a good guy, he’ll get over it.”

“We should never have told him. I told you that at the time.”

“Sure we should, it wasn’t fair to keep it a secret, Bobby’s family. He deserved to know.”

They told Bobby about three years ago, just before they decided to settle down here. Bobby had helped them move in, helped them with the paperwork, the legal issues, the forgeries and change of identities. He knew some very useful people, and Sam felt so guilty and grateful to him that he spilled it one night, come out with it, while Dean looked on in mute horror, “Dean and I – we’re, uh, our relationship – it’s more than brotherly, we, uh, we’re, uh, kinda, like, lovers, I guess…” Bobby said nothing for a very long while, until he finally got up and left the room and Dean turned to Sam and spat out: “Lovers? We’re lovers, Sam?” with cold, hard fury in his eyes.

Dean refused to speak to Sam for two days after that, while Bobby just pretended Sam hadn’t said anything at all. The look on Dean’s face when Bobby drove away haunted him for a long time. There were so few people in the world that Dean had ever been able to count on; Bobby was one of those people and Sam just took that away from him.

But he should’ve given Bobby more credit, he came around eventually, unable to break off ties completely, as Sam had feared he might. He sent them details of a hunt in their area and the contact between them renewed stiltedly, nothing like it had once been, and far more awkward even than the days when he’d been addicted to demon blood. The one occasion they met up over the last couple of years, to work a job in Des Moines, it was uncomfortable and painful and every synonym you could think of to mean awkward as hell. This would be only the second time they’ll both have seen him in person since Sam dropped the bomb; it’s not unsurprising, given all that, that Dean was so dead set against this.

However, Dean doesn't know the entire story: Sam's been emailing Bobby secretly for months, finally breaking down about a year ago and enlisting his help with his own private research into the ritual, into ways of "curing" Dean, of fixing what he did to him. Bobby was eager to help him, but then Bobby's always loved Dean, and that's why Sam suggested that he come down now - for Dean's sake - not just for the practical reasons, but because they have to repair the rift that should never have occurred in the first place. It's what Dean needs, this can can only be a good thing.

“It’ll be okay, Dean. I promise.”

Dean says nothing, shrugging and hunching his shoulders. Sam leans over, places his palms on Dean’s cheeks, framing his face. He brushes their lips together, trying for a reassuring smile, Dean’s eyes lock onto his, his gaze uncertain, tentative, and Sam hesitates for a second, teasing and drawing it out, smiling against Dean’s cheek, planting soft kisses along the lines bracketing his mouth.

Dean’s mood snaps, and he’s suddenly chasing after Sam’s lips impatiently, hand going up to cradle his head, hold him in place so he can plant one on him: a sloppy, lip-smacking kiss that’s far too dorky for something that’s simultaneously so crazy-hot.

“You wanna?” Sam breathes.

“Hell yeah,” says Dean with a grin, disarming and pure evil. “C’mon, little brother. Get me naked already.”

Sam doesn’t wait to be told again. He tugs at Dean’s shirt, sleeves catching on Dean’s elbows as he leans to one side to help Sam pull it off. He winces and Sam stills, remembering the injuries, the stitches he sewed into Dean’s belly, the half-healed cut on his arm, his f*cking leg.

“sh*t! Sorry, you okay?”

“S’long as you get your goddamned co*ck up my ass sometime this century!”

It takes longer than usual to strip Dean, and even when he’s naked and Sam’s greasing up his co*ck with the tube of lube they keep in the drawer of the coffee table (and maybe he should think about moving that before Bobby arrives), Sam’s still unsure. Dean’s injuries are new, raw looking, perhaps giving him a good, hard f*cking is not the best method of helping along the healing process.

“Whatcha waitin’ for?” asks Dean, mouth pursed into an impatient line.

“I’m not sure this is a good idea. Dean, you’re still healin’, we don’t want to pop your stitches.”

“Well f*ck me gentle then.”

“Oh yeah, I’ll totally be able to do that. You know what it’s like when I’m in there. I can’t,” he blushes, “you can’t expect me to hold back and do it gently.” Dean raises a smug eyebrow. “Shut up.”

Dean sighs exasperatedly and snatches the lube from him; he squirts a big dollop into Sam’s palm with a pointed look. “Anything we pop, you can sew back up again. Now, get on it.”

“You get on it.”

Dean smirks and climbs into his lap, sinking down onto him with a glorious look on his face, eyes rolling back and lip catching between his teeth, and God, Sam wants him, wants him so f*cking much, and it’s so f*cking crazy how much, how far gone he is for this, for Dean.

“Kiss me, gimme a kiss,” he pleads, cradling Dean’s head with both hands, fingertips meeting at the back of Dean’s skull, thumbs against his cheekbones. “C’mon, Dean, want you.”

Words muffled and indistinct, needy and lost in sharp, biting kisses as their mouths fuse together like steel to a magnet. They kiss and kiss as Dean starts to f*ck himself on Sam’s co*ck, mouths barely coming apart for breath until Dean’s shuddering, muscles fluttering as he comes, shooting up between their bellies, and that’s it… Sam’s done, he can’t hold back any longer, and he’s coming too, twitching and jerking inside Dean as Dean pants and grips him with fingers as hard and obstinate as a wheel clamp.

Sam raises his hand, pushes sweat-damp hair out his eyes, catching the look of sly complicity on Dean’s face. He grins back, his own version of Dean’s trademark leer, and swirls his fingers in the opaque strings of come on Dean’s chest, raising one to his mouth and slurping on it like a f*cked-up popsicle.

“Oh Jesus, hot little brother, ain’tcha? So f*ckin’ hot, Sammy.”

The look of reverent appreciation on Dean’s face is almost enough to get Sam hard again, but his co*ck is spent, giving its final, half-hearted twitches in Dean’s ass, and although there have been plenty of times he’s left it in there, Dean such a slu*t for Sam getting hard inside him, tonight is not going to be one of those nights.

“Hey, stay still.” He presses a gentle finger to the line of stitches in Dean’s side.

“Are they okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, we didn’t pull anything. You feelin’ okay?”

“f*ck, yeah.” He fists a handful of Sam’s hair and pulls him up into another long, sloppy kiss.

They make out, lazy and sated, for a while, the TV still playing in the background. Dean slumps on Sam’s shoulder, looking like he’s about to go to sleep, drooling and scratching the drying come on his belly with grease-stained fingernails.

“Oh sh*t, sh*t, Dean!”

“Huh?” murmurs Dean, blinking his eyes open.

“It’s nine o clock, dude, Bobby’ll be here in an hour.”

Dean grimaces and gets up stiffly from the couch, wincing and holding his ass. Sam smirks and Dean scowls at him, “Don’t say a f*ckin’ word.”

Sam watches him limp towards the stairs, Dean turns around halfway up and flips him off, and Sam laughs out loud. He pulls on his clothes and goes back into the kitchen to check on dinner.

Dean comes downstairs about ten minutes later, dripping from the shower, a towel knotted around his waist, holding something in one hand and looking uncomfortable.

“Sam, uh, dude, d’you mind…?”

Sam’s gaze drops to what he now recognizes as a tub of lotion in Dean’s hand and his eyes widen.

“I, uh, yeah, yeah sure. sh*t, I’m sorry, Dean. Is it – does it hurt? I’m sorry, man, I was tryin’ to be gentle, I thought we were -”

“Hey, shut up, it’s okay, let’s just do this,” interrupts Dean. He sounds annoyed, though Sam knows at least half of it is due to embarrassment, ludicrous given what they were just doing with each other.

He nods and follows Dean upstairs, feeling a twinge of guilt when Dean flops face first onto the bed with another wince. He climbs onto the bed beside him, knees sinking into the mattress as he twists the lid off the lotion and carefully peels back the towel.

Every time they do this, he’s reminded forcibly of those crazy, frantic weeks leading up to Dean’s deadline: the mutual madness, the folie à deux that had overtaken them in those last few weeks: f*cking so hard, slamming into Dean without lube, Dean taking it and taking it and begging and pleading for more, always more, always you, Sam, want you, need you, more, Sam, want more… On one occasion, when he pulled out of Dean, his co*ck was beaded with tiny pinpricks of blood and he felt so guilty and wrong that he barricaded himself in the bathroom, stood under the shower and sobbed, full of vicious, disgusted self-loathing and grief. Dean didn't let him wallow of course; he barged into the room, yelled at him and dragged him out of the shower, tumbling him to the tiled floor where Sam sobbed, wet and pathetic and broken into his brother's chest. Afterwards, when he felt capable of getting up again, they lay on the bed together, Dean silent and docile as he sprawled over his lap, while he rubbed cream delicately into Dean’s asshole.

He spreads Dean’s ass cheeks carefully, his hole does look sore, pink and puffy and used, and he feels another stab of guilt. He leans down and presses a kiss to each cheek, feeling Dean tense up underneath him, then huff out an annoyed breath, the verbal equivalent of an eye roll.

“Sorry.”

“f*ck’s sake, Sam. Nothing to be sorry for. S’probably my fault. I was holding myself wrong, worried about f*ckin’ up the stitches.”

“Oh, right. Well, they look fine.”

“Yeah, s’just my ass.”

Sam represses the urge to smile at Dean’s irritable tone. He really doesn’t mind doing this; in fact, he quite likes it, it’s so unabashedly intimate. Any two strangers can have sex together, it takes real and proper intimacy to rub lotion into your partner’s asshole after you’ve taken him hard and fast, and it takes trust for that person to let you.

He finishes up, wipes his sticky fingers off on the towel and leans over to kiss Dean’s shoulder. “Better?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

He slides one hand down Dean’s back, still slick with lotion. “Get dressed, Bobby’ll be here soon.”

Dean goes to bed early with a glass of Bobby’s home-brew and painkillers. If the painkillers don’t knock him out then Sam knows the home-brew’ll take care of it. He watches TV for a while; unable to concentrate on anything. After an hour he gives up and goes upstairs to check on Dean. His brother’s completely out of it, lying sprawled on his front with one hand tucked under his pillow – his favorite position. Sam stares down at him, brushes his fingers over the exposed side of his face, the scar barely noticeable in the almost dark, but familiar and rough under his fingertips.

Bobby’s got a couple of guns laid out across the kitchen table on newspaper, a glass of the home-brew resting by his elbow. Sam watches him as he descends the stairs, a sudden, vivid memory of Dad springing into his head: sitting at the kitchen table in one of their many awful rental places, guns spread out in front of him, glass of the hard stuff at his elbow, exactly like this. The thought’s grounding, reminding him that this is Bobby: the well-seasoned hunter who taught Dad the best method of cleaning his guns, Uncle Bobby who babysat him and Dean the entire Summer he was eleven and Dean was fifteen while Dad was off chasing down a tribe of kelpies, the demonic expert who introduced him to Latin, the guy who’s come to their rescue more times than he’s been able to count over the years. Bobby’s not just another hunter, he’s family.

Bobby looks up as he approaches, Sam stops, placing his hand on the back of chair opposite. “Can I?”

“It’s your house, Sam.”

“Look, I just. I need to know that you’re okay with us. I know everything I told you about Dean and me, it must’ve come as a shock, but it’s… it’s just if anything were to happen to me…”

“If anythin’ happened to you, then Dean wouldn’t be here, you know that,” Bobby says matter-of-factly. “You knew that when you decided to go through with that damned ritual.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I know, but I’m still. I’m still workin’ on that, I know I can change that. I can make Dean’s link to this reality more permanent, I know I can do that. But that’s not what this is about, Bobby. I need things to be normal between us, I – Dean, he can’t, you can’t act around him like you think we’re disgusting and wrong, and I get that you’re probably right, what Dean and I have, it is wrong, but for his sake, you have to pretend like it’s not that way. Because it…” he pauses, getting his breath back, “it is how it is and it makes sense to us.”

Bobby says nothing for a moment, hands working methodically, then he sighs, sets the barrel and cleaning brush down.

“Sam. I’m only gonna say this once, so listen good.” Sam nods. “I ain’t okay with this. I wasn’t okay with this when you told me and I ain’t okay with it now. And if your daddy were still here…” he breaks off and shakes his head wearily, “Oh boy, if John Winchester were here right now…” Sam flinches despite himself and Bobby’s eyes narrow. “I know. He ain’t, so it don’t matter none. You and Dean… well, there ain’t too many boys like you two around, thank the Lord. And that’s partly your own faults, makin’ deals with demons and gettin’ yourselves killed for nothin’, frickin’ eejits. And partly, it’s your daddy’s fault, and partly, well, it’s just fate. You both got dealt a sh*tty deal, and hell, you’re still here, you made the most of it. And I get that this is your way of copin’, of makin’ the most of what you do have, which is each other.”

“There’s a but though, isn’t there?”

“Hell yeah there is. You’re brothers, and you know damn well what that means.”

“It means everything,” says Sam forcefully. “Dean’s everything. I can’t… when I thought I was going to lose him, when I did lose him…” he breaks off, presses the heels of his hands to his eyes, trying to push away the hot burn of stupid, weak tears, swallow over the tightness in his throat, trying to erase those goddamned memories.

When he manages to raise his eyes, Bobby’s looking at him with a much softer expression. “I know. I was there, son. And that’s why, as far as I’m concerned, nothing’s gonna change. I’ve been livin’ in denial these past few years and this ain’t gonna be any different. And you boys – you just gonna pretend that you ain’t no more than just brothers.”

“I can live with that,” says Sam with a weak smile. “Seriously, if you think you can be cool with –“

“I didn’t say I was cool with it, I just said I was damn good at pretendin’.” Bobby sighs and reaches to refill his glass. He tilts the bottle towards Sam who nods and gets up to fetch his own glass.

They drink in silence for a while, Bobby goes back to cleaning and assembling his guns, Sam watches him, thinking over what he’s said.

“So. Things are good here then? That business of yours makin’ good money?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“And the folks round here, they all think two of you are some sorta couple? Some grand paragon of gay virtue?”

Sam blushes, trying to disguise it with another sip from his glass. “Um, yeah, I guess. I guess that’s how it must look. But, Bobby, please, if it’s going to be difficult for you to keep this a secret -”

“Did I say that?” Bobby interrupts sharply.

“I don’t know.”

“I’ll lie for you, Sam; I’ll keep you boys’ secret.”

“Thanks,” Sam says quietly.

Bobby shrugs. “S’what family’s for.”

Chapter 7

Chapter Text

May 2013

One morning, a couple of months after Dean got injured by the bear, he came into work with an announcement.

“This weekend, me and Sam are throwing a party. For his birthday, f*cker’s turning thirty, if you can believe it. Anyway, y’all invited, it’ll be a cook-out, barbecue thing. Seriously, dudes, you gotta come, otherwise, it’ll just be little ole me and a load of college professors.”

“Sweet,” said Tim, “count me in.”

“Can I bring Deidre?” asked Gabe.

“Oh yeah, sure,” said Dean, “that goes for all of you, significant others, rugrats, whatever.” He smirked and looked at me, “You too, kiddo, bring that cute girlfriend of yours.” He gave me a wink, and invitation issued, stomped off towards the office.

I was about to open my mouth and say: what girlfriend? when it occurred to me that he was talking about Lucinda. They’d met in the bar the fateful night when I’d realized the truth about myself (and yes, in my head that sentence was always written in italics) which seemed ages ago now. So he’d obviously assumed she was my girlfriend, and… that was pretty convenient come to think of it.

Saturday came around far too quickly, and by Saturday afternoon I was standing on Sam and Dean’s lawn holding plates of barbecue and paper cups of beer and making awkward conversation with my Mom, Lucinda and Uncle Lou.

I gnawed at my ribs, carefully sneaking peeks at Dean from over my Mom’s shoulder. He was standing over one of two enormous grills (the other was being manned by Bobby Singer who looked exactly the same as he had done a few weeks ago when I’d first met him) and Dean looked… well, he looked good. Like, hot, mouth-wateringly good, and if I didn’t already have a crush the size of a f*cking tsunami on the guy then seeing him like this would definitely have pushed me over the edge.

He was wearing one of his many faded, tight t-shirts and an old pair of jeans with frayed back pockets, all snug and fitted around his ass. He was concentrating fiercely on the grilling, jabbing at the rows of meat with his tongs, in between sipping his beer and exchanging laughs with Bobby. He looked up as someone called out a greeting and flashed a quick smile in the guy’s direction and I felt my stomach dip, a tight, thick roll of heat and lust that was going straight to my dick. I swallowed and took a long pull on my own beer.

“Don’t mind me, Derek, just stare at him all afternoon, I mean, I’m only your date,” said Lucinda with a snort.

I spluttered, “Er, um, I don’t know what you mean."

“Oh relax. You’re just, like, so obvious. It’s like you have it stamped on your forehead.”

“Really?”

f*ck.

“Uh-huh,” she nodded and smirked. “Anyway, I totally knew you had the major hots for the guy the first time we met him.”

“No you didn’t,” I scoffed. Because… no, there was no way. Hell, I didn’t even know myself.

“Whatever.”

She smirked again and it was pretty annoying so I gave her the stink-eye and went back to watching Dean. I saw Sam emerge from the house and cross the lawn towards Dean, saying hello to a few people. He sidled up behind Dean, standing, like, directly behind him, and reached around him to snag his beer. Dean glanced at him and said something which made Sam grin and place his hands on Dean’s waist, thumbs hooking into his belt loops as he moved his hips like he was trying to slow-dance up against Dean’s ass.

“Whoa, they just don’t give a sh*t, do they?” said Lucinda.

“No,” I said, trying not to sound bitter.

“I think it’s great,” she said, getting that misty-eyed look that made me want to shake her. “That they’re so easy being like… that, with each other. And God, you gotta admit, Derek, it is majorly hot. What I wouldn’t give to be a fly on the wall in their bedroom.”

Oh for f*ck’s sake… Okay, so I’d maybe had the same wish myself on a couple (of thousand) occasions, but did she need to keep going on about it, watching Dean standing there: all sun-soaked and sweaty with Sam grinding up against him was already doing enough to my downstairs brain.

Two hours later, most of the food was gone and everyone was getting louder and drunker. Dean was standing over to one side talking to Gabe and his wife Deirdre, his back to us, giving me ample opportunity to ogle his ass. Yeah, so I’d gotten used to those feelings over the past few weeks, like they were something that was now part of me, something that had become normal, because it wasn’t like I could stop feeling like this. It reminded me of something Lucinda had told me once – that animals and people adapt to new situations so quickly, that something new can easily become part of your status quo when it has to, like inappropriate gay lust for your hot boss. And speaking of Lucinda… where had she even gotten to?

I finally managed to spot her over in the corner talking to Sam, she had him collared cause I recognized that look on her face, and I almost felt sorry for Sam. He was frowning and looking down at her from his giant height, nodding in a wise sort of professor-esque way and hey, when he was quiet and normal like this I could (begrudgingly) see what Dean saw in the guy.

“Hey, hey! Can I have your attention please!”

Dean had moved to stand by the stereo, turning off the lame-ass rock crap he was playing, (Come Sail Away by Styx, and I can’t believe I could even recognize this sh*t now) with a calculating look on his face.

“Hey! Listen up y’all! Speech time!”

Everyone finally shut up and turned around to look at him.

“Sam, get your ass over here!” he called out.

The expression on Sam’s face was somewhere between wary and resigned as he joined Dean in front of the French windows, guests slowly gathering around them in a sort of semicircle.

“Aw, he’s gonna do a speech,” whispered my mom with a sappy look on her face. I repressed the urge to roll my eyes and watched Dean throw his arm around Sam’s shoulders.

“As y’all know, today is a very special person’s birthday,” said Dean. “When I say special person, I mean this gigantic freak of nature here.” He patted Sam’s arm drunkenly. “Cause it’s his 30th birthday and Jesus, that makes me feel so goddamn old.” He made a face, “Anyway, ‘nuff about me. Cause this is all about Sammy.”

Sam looked pained for a second, but didn’t make any move to interrupt him.

“Yeah, so I’m betting that there’s one or two of you out there wondering how we met – how some big geek like Sam managed to hook up with a quality piece of ass like myself. Cause, man, I’m still wondering too!” There were a few snorts of laughter, while Dean took a break to sip his drink and look pleased with himself. “Anyway, so most of y’all know that Sam’s, like, some sort of freaky genius, and a long time ago he got himself into Stanford and hell, that was pretty f*ckin’ cool. And it just so happened that I was workin’ in Palo Alto myself at the time. And the poor kid, well he kept gettin' car trouble. A whole lotta car trouble.”

He broke off for a second and raised his eyebrows in that way of his which had everyone snickering, hanging onto his every word. Hell, I was hanging onto his every word, even Sam seemed to be hanging onto his every word, watching him with this curious, fond look on his face.

“Every damn week, he was coming into the place I was working. This dorky kid – just eighteen years old, and you can imagine him – real tall and skinny, but cute, man, so f*ckin’ cute. And he was coming in, every week and always, always asking for me. Until, must’ve been ‘bout the fifth or sixth time, and I told him: dude, there ain’t nothing wrong with your car and he just grins, all embarrassed and cute like and says, um, yeah, yeah, I know.”

He paused again for effect, and it was working, cause everyone was listening. The thing was we all knew Dean and Sam, except no one really did know them and this was pretty much the first real insight we’d gotten.

“So then he’s, like, yeah, I’m, uh, sorry, but willyoupleasegohavecoffeewithme? All real fast.” Sam shook his head, mouth crooking as he stared at Dean. “And sh*t, I had to say yes, cause, seriously, have you seen him?” He smirked again and groped Sam’s ass. “After I’d figured out he was eighteen and not, you know, jailbait.”

“Jesus,” whispered Uncle Lou disgustedly.

“Shush,” said Mom, she was staring at them with this aww-aren’t-they-cute sort of look, which seemed to be reflected on most of the women’s faces, including (obviously) Lucinda’s.

I looked around, Dean was finishing up now, thanking everyone for coming along and instructing us in raising our glasses to toast to the birthday boy, my eyes fell on Bobby Singer, and he… he didn’t look happy. He was staring at Dean with this strange look on his face, raising his glass, not smiling but his lips thinned in a disapproving line that almost rivaled my sucky Uncle. And that was weird because Bobby was their old friend, and surely, if he’d had problems with Dean and Sam’s relationship (which he’d never shown during the week he’d worked with us at the garage) he must’ve gotten over them by now. So why was he looking like that?

It must’ve been something Dean said.

And then I got it.

The photo in Dean’s wallet, the one I’d seen that time a few months back when he’d sent me to Burger King for him and Sam. I’d snooped into his wallet and I’d seen three photos of Sam, and one of them had been of Dean and Sam and whoa, hold on a minute… in that photo Sam was definitely not eighteen but much younger. So… maybe, perhaps that hadn’t been Sam at all – just some other kid that looked like Sam? Except why would Dean have some other kid’s photo in his wallet when the other two were definitely of Sam? And it had been Sam, I was sure of it, kid had the same f*cking haircut.

So Dean had lied. Just now. He’d lied about how he’d met Sam, because (baring some weird Photoshop possibility) that photo, like, proved they’d known each other years before Sam was old enough to go to Stanford University.

And Bobby knew it. Bobby knew Dean was lying which was why he looked so unhappy right now.

f*ck.

I raised my glass automatically to drink to Sam’s health, all these thoughts swirling around my brain which, let’s face it, wasn’t that used to the workout. I drained my glass after the toast and watched Dean and Sam over by the French windows. Sam was holding out a piece of birthday cake to Dean who was taking huge bites and grinning up at him with this adoring, drunken look, getting frosting and sugar all over his lips and nose while Sam watched him, looking aboutthisclose to licking it all off him.

So, obviously Sam wasn’t that upset by Dean’s lying ways.

“Aw, didn’t you think that story was cute?” Lucinda said as she came bounding up to me.

“Hmmm, yeah, but he was totally lying.”

“Uh. What?”

I told her about the photo, and her eyes widened excitedly. “sh*t, Derek, are you sure? Cause, why would he lie about it?”

“I don’t know! Maybe because if they were banging each other when Sam was fourteen it was pretty gross, and you wouldn’t want anyone to know that.”

She frowned thoughtfully. “Right. Well, it’s obvious what we’ve gotta do!” On my dumb look. “Duh – we’ve gotta find that photo and take another look.”

“Luce – we can’t do that!”

“Oh, please, never stopped you last time.”

“That was an accident,” I said primly.

“Yeah, sure it was.”

I scowled as she led me over towards the house. “Uh, where are we going?”

“To get Dean’s wallet and check out that photo. Like we said. How drunk are you?” She pursed her lips. “Now, if it were me, I’d leave my wallet by my bed. Show me where the bedroom is. Might as well start there.”

“Lucinda, no, we can’t.”

“Quit being such a sad sack, Derek. C’mon, we got work to do.” She grabbed my sleeve and dragged me inside.

Great, just great. I was going back to Dean and Sam’s bedroom. With Lucinda.

Their bedroom door wasn’t locked, but it was closed this time. We sneaked in and closed it, all soft and stealthy. Like the rest of the house, it looked like it had undergone a thorough cleaning since the last time I was there, there was still a bunch of crap on the sides but no dirty clothes or thick layers of dust, and oh yeah… the enormous scary revolver was still in the same place on one of the nightstands.

“Holy f*ck,” breathed Lucinda, noticing it.

“Yeah.”

“My dad’s got an issue one similar to this; he keeps it locked up though. He’d go postal if he knew they were just leaving it lying around.” She shook her head and looked away, “Oh. Hey, look.” She turned around holding a wallet aloft with triumphant look. “Is this the one?”

“Oh, yeah? I guess, I mean, wallets kinda look the same to me.”

“Derek, you are so…” she trailed off, obviously not finding the right insult to describe me. “Wait, yeah, yeah, this is it. This is Dean’s.” She held out the plastic seethrough part at the front with the recent photo of Sam in it. “God, he’s attractive,” she murmured, practically f*cking drooling, really, it was embarrassing. “We were having such a great conversation before…”

“Just find the f*ckin’ photo already.”

“Alright, alright.” She paused, leafing through the bundle of crap inside. “Hey,” she pulled something out of there. “sh*t, sh*t, you’re right.” I peered over at the photo and yes, it was exactly as I remembered: Dean and Sam, the Teenage Years, posed on the hood of the car, Dean’s arm around Sam’s small shoulders.

“f*ck, you’re right, he looks about twelve here, never mind eighteen!”

“And it is him, right? Sam?”

“Oh yeah, definitely, I’d recognize those dimples anywhere,” she sighed.

I pulled a face at her, “Quit pervin’ over a freakin’ twelve year old.”

She spluttered and glared at me and was about to retort when I stilled, suddenly hearing something -

“f*ck, someone’s comin’! C’mon, we gotta move.”

She pulled a face at me and dropped the wallet back onto the nightstand, grabbing onto my arm as I waved at her to be quiet. The person – whoever it was – walked past the room, footsteps heavy on the bare wood landing, a door shut somewhere and we both exhaled in relief.

“We could just say we were going to the bathroom,” she whispered, “if someone catches us.”

“Right, but we’re not in the bathroom right now,” I hissed back. “C’mon.” I opened the door quietly, trying to be uber-stealthy. It wasn’t like I’d had much experience sneaking out of places, my time at school had been pretty boring, I wasn’t the sort of kid who broke curfew and went out to parties all the time, when your dad was dying it seemed like totally the wrong thing to be doing. I pulled her out the room and closed the door behind us; we were almost at the stairs when someone shouted out:

“Hey! You two, what the hell d’ya think you’re doin’?”

We both jumped, spun around.

Bobby Singer was standing by the door to Sam and Dean’s room, staring at us both with narrowed, suspicious eyes.

“Going to the bathroom,” Lucinda muttered quietly.

“The plumbing in this place makes a helluva lotta noise – so why did I hear nothin’?” he demanded and his voice was steely, glare like flint.

f*ck, sh*t, f*ck.

“Uh,” stammered Lucinda, “we, uh, we wanted somewhere to make out.”

It took all my effort not to glare at her in complete disbelief because… what the f*ck? like, of all the lamest excuses she could pick… Seriously? She went with that.

“Uh-huh,” Bobby said and peered at us. “You couldn’t wait until you’d left the party?”

“Well, we, uh, teenagers, you know?” she answered, giving him a big, fake smile. I glanced at her and tried not to laugh, this was like some bad sitcom. Surely he wasn’t buying this crap? “Sorry,” she added, “we’ll, uh, we’ll be going now.”

I nodded and smiled weakly at him as Lucinda hauled me back down the stairs, her fingers clenched in my shirt.

Once outside she turned on me and punched me in the shoulder. “Thanks a f*cking bunch! Way to help me out there!”

“Why did you tell him that?” I demanded, jerking away from her cause – ouch.

She rolled her eyes and glared at me. “Wasn’t like you were coming up with anything better. Like, anything at all!” She pressed her lips together and exhaled. “Great, just great. You’d better just hope he doesn’t say anything to Dean.”

I couldn’t keep still for the rest of the evening, I felt so f*cking worried. I kept trying to tell myself that there was really no reason to panic. So Bobby had found us upstairs – so f*cking what? Okay, he probably didn’t buy the lame excuse Lucinda had come up with, but there was no reason he’d figure out what we were actually doing up there – namely snooping through Dean’s stuff for evidence of… what exactly? That he’d lied about how he’d met Sam? There were probably a million reasons why he’d lie about that, and what did it matter if he did? It was hardly our place to go snooping around and being all judgmental about him banging Sam when he was twelve or thirteen, though, man, that was all kindsa gross.

But what if Bobby did say something to Dean? Or hell, Sam? Sam with the scars that moved and the weird languages, and I’d seen what Sam got like when he was mad and that was not something I ever wanted to see again, like, ever.

Or, even worse, Bobby could tell Dean and Dean could fire me.

f*ck, I never should’ve let Lucinda talk me into it – and okay, so I was being a puss* here – cause it wasn’t like I couldn’t’ve stopped her and just not gone ahead and done it, but still… what was I thinking? I was risking my job, the job where I got to see Dean every day, where I got to be close to him. Oh God, the thought of Dean firing me, the thought of not seeing him every day, of not being able to sneak little glances at him and okay, long, long glances at him when he wasn’t looking, the thought of not hearing his voice and having him tell me: good job, Derek, you did good, dude. The thought of him being disappointed in me… well I just couldn’t think about that.

I was so screwed.

It wasn’t like I didn’t know that this crush was totally hopeless. I knew that. I wasn’t dumb. Even if Dean wasn’t, like, practically married to Sam, if the two of them weren’t totally f*cking crazy about each other and if Sam wasn’t a scary possessive boyfriend who would probably rip the arms off anyone who ever tried to mess with Dean. Even if there wasn’t all that, then it would still be hopeless, because Dean couldn’t even touch anyone who wasn’t Sam – I’d seen it for myself, and I’d seen the way Sam had been with the guy who had touched Dean.

Dean was screwed in the head and f*cked-up way more than any normal person with the scars and the injuries and the obvious, mental trauma. But all that totally didn’t matter because I couldn’t stop thinking about him all the goddamned time, and being able to look at him all day was one of the few things I actually looked forward to when I got up in the morning.

I was so not ready to lose that.

*************************************************************

Sam’s woken up by the sound of Dean’s voice, too f*cking loud, too f*cking happy and too f*cking early, bawling, “Rise and shine, Sammy!”

He groans, but manages to stumble downstairs, still wearing the same shirt and pants from his birthday celebrations. Dean and Bobby are seated at the kitchen table, talking and laughing conspiratorially over something that makes Sam pause by the kitchen door and regard them with suspicion.

“What’s going on?”

Dean jerks around and gives him a blinding smile, all teeth and dimples and unadulterated happiness, and Jesus; it’s like having his heart kick-started with a defibrillator.

“Hey, you’re up,” says Dean and Sam can actually hear the affection in his voice. “C’mere. Sit down.”

He obeys, eyes glued to Dean’s grinning face, to the joy in his brother’s eyes, it’s making him feel lightheaded. It’s at times like these that he truly feels frightened about how much he feels for Dean, how one person can be absolutely everything. Their love is irrational, unnatural, he knows that. They’re brothers who have sex with each other all the f*cking time, they commit incest and they don’t care, they sell their souls for each other and tear down heaven and hell and earth to be with each other.

“Ta-da!”

Dean reveals a heaped plate of bacon, sausages, toast, tomatoes, hash browns and scrambled eggs, not forgetting the princess pink birthday candle jammed into the mound of scrambled eggs.

He looks down at his plate, then up at Dean again.

“Go on, blow it out. You only turn thirty once.”

He leans over, closes his eyes and blows it out in one big exhale. The candle winks out immediately, cotton-candy pink flame imprinting against his irises as he blinks his eyes open once more. He feels overwhelmed, stupidly moved.

“I, thanks, guys. I mean – for all this. Yesterday - the party – it’s all, it’s been awesome.”

Bobby regards him warily, says, “You’re not gonna start blubbin’ now, are you, boy?”

“No, no,” he protests and Dean laughs, loud and throaty, “just eat it up, Sammy, s’gettin’ cold.”

“So, what was the little story you told yesterday all about?” Sam asks as they pick trash up off the lawn.

“Huh?” says Dean. He’s kneeling over a pile of chicken bones, simultaneously attempting to shoo Dougal away and pick them up with his fingertips, a hilarious, squicked out expression on his face. Seriously, the guy deals with blood and guts and monsters all the time, but can’t handle a few chicken bones.

“You know, that little story about how we met.”

Dean tilts his head up and grins smugly. “Oh yeah. You like that?”

“You made me out to be a complete dork.”

“And this is news, how?”

Sam walks past and flicks him on the back of the head.

“Oh c’mon, they all thought it was cute. They were f*ckin’ loving it.”

“You didn’t have to say anything Dean. The more lies we tell, the easier it is to be tripped up on these things later. The bigger hole you end up digging yourself into.”

“Wise words, Murdoch.”

“I’m serious, Dean.”

Dean shrugs and gets back to his feet, pulling a face as he holds the bag of chicken bone trash away from him. “Yeah, yeah.”

Sam goes to take a nap around noon. He barely got any sleep the night before, and he feels exhausted, dehydrated and with a nagging headache that is all about the stupid amounts of beer and vodka and f*cking tequila he drank the day before. He goes out straight away despite the infuriating chink of light sliding through the gap in the curtains.

He’s woken up a couple of hours later by Dean crawling into bed with him.

“Sa-am? Sam-my?”

He’s using that playful, sing-song voice of his which always manages to provoke a special little prickle of irritation at the back of Sam’s head, an annoying buzzing that he can’t get rid of.

“Sam,” says Dean, louder now and definitely not going away. f*ck, he’s going to have to give in, say something.

“Go ‘way.”

There’s the sound of Dean hitching in a breath, a small chuckle, then the sensation of Dean’s hand smoothing down his back, slow and deliberate, caressing his ass.

“Dean, go away.”

“You don’t mean it,” says Dean confidently. He crawls closer, pushes the covers aside, buries his face into the crook of Sam’s neck. “C’mon Sammy. C’mon, quit being such a prissy bitch. I’m so freakin’ horny.”

He lets out a groan and twists onto his back, blinking his eyes open. Dean’s hanging over him, face scrunched up, a smirk playing across his lips. He’s also naked which… okay, makes this slightly less annoying, only slightly though.

“Hey,” Dean says, smiling evilly. “Knew I’d wear you down.”

“You’re f*ckin’ annoying. I’m sleepin’, go ‘way.”

“Nuh-uh, too late now. See, I know you’re awake. And I know,” Dean pauses and sneaks his hand under the covers to grab Sam’s stupid, hard co*ck, “that you want me.”

Sam shudders, arching involuntarily into Dean’s fingers, “Dean...”

“Aw, c’mon, Bobby’s gone out, he took Dougal. It’s just me and you. All alone.”

He raises a pointed eyebrow, giving Sam’s co*ck another squeeze, and Jesus, he’s good at that…

Sam moves, rolling them over until he’s straddling Dean, looming over him, hair falling into his brother’s face. Dean pants and squirms underneath him, his co*ck rock hard, the whites of his eyes gleaming in the shadowed room. He grabs Dean’s hands, bracelets his wrists with strong fingers, yanks them above his head, pinning them down, pinning Dean down, completely at his mercy now.

Dean sighs, “Sam,” and arches up again. His eyes are wide, and God, he’s loving it, so loving it.

Sam stares at him for a long moment, not doing anything, but just holding Dean down, feeling his brother’s chest rise and fall with his short, panted breaths. His co*ck throbs, so thick and heavy with blood that he feels light-headed, weirdly dizzy, probably a hangover from his hangover. Dean stares up at him, lip caught between his teeth, eyes wide with a mixture of confusion and lust.

Sam stares back at him, he feels unreal, unmanned. He has to do something. He ducks his head, holds back a whimper as he goes for that tender spot on Dean’s throat, teeth sinking into the soft, yielding skin until Dean’s crying out in pain, shaking and hissing and cursing beneath him.

“God-f*cking-damnit, you son of a bitch, Sam…”

He breaks away, laughing breathlessly. Dean glares up at him with heat-flushed eyes, livid, purple mark still sticky slick. He feels absurdly proud, a CSI team could take a dental chart from that mark, he thinks, and he wants to laugh again, but Dean’s glaring and pouting and it’s weirdly endearing and he loves his brother so much.

“Hey,” he says, leaning in to kiss him again. He reaches out blindly behind him for the nightstand drawer, retrieving the lube. He pulls back and quirks an eyebrow at Dean. “My turn today.”

Dean is instantly mollified, expression all hell, yeah predictable and Sam has to laugh again cause whilst Dean loves to bottom and can never ever get enough of Sam’s co*ck, he f*cking loves it when he gets to top, and he goes f*cking crazy when Sam rides him.

He releases Dean’s hands and lets Dean hold his hips as he rides him slowly, luxuriously, yellow, orange afternoon light spilling through the gap in the curtains, painting a rectangle of brightness over his back, over Dean’s chest and face, dust mites in the air around them. He rocks himself on his brother’s co*ck, savors every thrust and jilt of Dean’s hips, eyes locked on Dean’s, like green beer bottles, dazzling bright and glassy with heat.

They come within seconds of each other: Dean’s face scrunches up, eyelids flutter, and he gasps, his co*ck twitching and jerking in Sam’s ass, so thick and burning and full inside him. And that’s it for Sam, he’s coming too, Dean’s fingers a vice-like grip slathering spit and leftover lube over the head of his co*ck, thin threads of come splattering the pink, arousal-tinged skin of Dean’s chest and belly.

He eases himself off Dean after they’ve caught their breath, a thick blob of come seeping out his ass and splatting onto the dip of Dean’s stomach. Dean cradles his hands behind his head and looks down at it with a lewd grin, looking absurdly pleased with himself.

“Man, Sammy, I f*ckin’ love having sex with you.”

Sam snorts, trying unsuccessfully to hold back his laughter.

“Hey, quit mockin’ me. I’m tryin’ to be serious here. Me and you - goddamned best sex of my life. Don’t you agree?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“S’f*ckin’ right. Not gonna get any better than this.”

He glances at Dean, he looks so certain, so sure of what he’s saying, and Sam feels a warmth begin to settle in his chest, because Dean’s right. He can’t remember another time when things were this easy between them, when things were this easy all over, and okay, so they still fight (a lot) and there’s still a hell of a lot that’s not right, but… they’re both still here. He made it to thirty, he’s still himself, and he’s still got Dean. That’s a f*cking miracle in itself.

He turns onto his side, propping himself up on one elbow so he can look down at Dean. He reaches out, touches Dean’s temples with soft fingers, the short, grey hairs. Dean looks up at him, eyes wide and startlingly honest, unblinking as he stares back at Sam, smile of satisfaction playing at the corners of his mouth. Sam huffs out a half-smile of his own and smoothes his fingertips over the scar on Dean’s forehead, backs of his knuckles gently stroking over his stubble, thumb tracing the curve of his mouth. So f*cking gorgeous, he thinks, as he lays his palm against Dean’s cheek, so beautiful.

“I never thought we’d get here, you know,” he says quietly, “never thought I’d make it to thirty.”

“I’m gonna make sure you get to forty, and hell, fifty, so don’t be so freakin’ maudlin about it. We’re gonna be around for a while yet.”

“I can’t imagine bein’ fifty.” He removes his hand from Dean’s face, lets it fall to the mattress.

“I can imagine you bein’ fifty,” says Dean. “You’ll look even more like Dad than you do now,” he breaks off for a second, pulls a face, “Jesus, that’s a frightening thought.”

Sam doesn’t think about Dad often, it’s deliberate, a self-preservation mechanism. When he thinks about Dad he gets hit with a rush of guilt so overwhelming that he actually feels terrified for a second, as if Dad’s just standing on the other side of the room, watching them, that look on his face: the judgmental, disappointed, terrifying John Winchester look that would provoke someone as normal and level-headed as Bobby into pulling a shotgun on him. When he thinks about Dad, he understands what people mean when they talk about being crippled with guilt.

“You’re right, we’ll be good, Dean, and I’m gonna make things better for you,” he says, he wants to sound as certain as Dean, because this is something he can do; it’s something he has to do.

“Sam, I told you, you don’t need to –“

He doesn’t let Dean finish the sentence. “No, I am. Just – give me time and everything will be better, I’m gonna fix what I did to you.”

Dean sighs, says, “What if I’m happy as things are? What if I don’t want you to change anything?”

“Dean…”

Dean pulls away from him irritably, sitting up and putting his back to him.

“I don’t like you messin’ with that sh*t. It was bad enough that you did it in the first place.”

“I did it for us! To keep us together! I had to, I couldn’t let -”

“I know. I know, man. I get it, I do. But… no more, okay?”

“Dean, no, listen to me –“

“Sam! I said no!” He jumps to his feet; spinning to turn and glare at Sam, that sudden snap command of his voice that sounds too much like Dad for Sam not to flinch. “I know what you’ve been doin’! I know you’ve been researching it – looking into ways to cure me,” he bites off the word with extra contempt, “but I don’t want you to do this. You don’t need to do this. Why can’t you just… let things be? For once in your life, Sammy, just drop it. Please.”

Sam stares at him, Dean’s eyes are wide open, the whites so clear and stark, even in this shadowed room, Dean’s pleading with him. He swallows over the lump in his throat; he can feel the hot sting of tears threatening. “I, Dean…”

“I know you just want to make sh*t better,” Dean continues and his voice is gentler, wearier. “But you don’t need to.”

“I do,” he insists. “I really do. What I did to you –“

“Sam…”

“I cursed you! I made it so you can only touch me for the rest of your life. What kind of life is that for anyone? I have to make this right! I have to fix this!”

“Like you had to kill Lilith, like you had to get revenge?” snaps Dean. “This is just another one of your goddamn obsessions and I’ve tolerated it, because yeah, I get it, I do. But it’s got to stop…” he trails off, eyes locked with Sam’s.

Sam stares back at him, his mouth is working soundlessly, unhappily, he doesn’t know what to say, Dean’s just not… he’s wrong, so wrong. He doesn’t get it, he’s just so f*cking stubborn, always has been, so f*cking set on what he does and doesn’t like, what he does and doesn’t believe in, forever unwilling to see anything beyond that.

Dean lowers his eyes slowly, shakes his head. He looks tired, the happiness of the morning, the happiness of only ten minutes ago, already wiped away.

“I don’t want to fight about this anymore,” he says quietly.

“Neither do I. But Dean, please, you can’t ask me to give this up. Not when it’s me that caused it, me that’s to blame.”

There’s a long moment of silence before Dean gets up, not looking at Sam. “Do what you want, Sam, you always do.”

“Dean.”

This time Dean ignores him completely, stomping out the room, bathroom door slamming shut behind him.

He hears Dean turn on the shower, five minutes later, the door crashes open again and Dean stomps downstairs. He’s pissed, Sam can read it in every dull thud of his feet on the stairs. He waits for five minutes, then gets up and goes to the bathroom himself.

For once, it looks good, shiny and new and hopeful, tiles scrubbed sparkling clean, no grime and mould caked around the tap fittings, no hair plugs, no nasty, stained shower curtain. He knows they’ll never manage to keep it like this, both of them totally suck at keeping anything that isn’t weapons or books or the Impala in a half decent condition. They never learned how to clean when they were kids, never needed to; living in motels and rental places for six weeks here, three months there, had meant that vacuuming, cleaning bathrooms and mopping floors weren’t ever skills they bothered to learn and Dad never had a f*cking clue. Sure, Dean used to cook and Sam would do the dishes and they both did laundry or took out the trash, but that was it, the grand total of their domestic skills. When Sam lived with Jess, she would clean their apartment every Saturday, shooing him out the house and getting out her dusters and mops and bleach bottles with a fervor that bordered on religious. It kinda drove him mad at the time, but he always appreciated it afterwards.

He tilts the shower head down to clean his asscrack, the seamier, seedier side of gay sex, he thinks wryly. When they first stopped using condoms, it used to bother him a lot, he’d be working a case, interviewing or researching, or hell even fighting for his life and he’d suddenly feel the telltale seep of Dean’s ji*zz in his shorts, reminding him dirty-hard-fast of what they’d just done, what they were doing only twenty minutes, two hours, twenty hours earlier… When he was with Jess, they always used condoms, she was on the pill, but she liked condoms, didn’t like the mess, pulling a face and blushing when she spoke about it, nose in an adorable crinkle that made him feel wrong for suggesting that they might, perhaps, just one time, try it without a condom?

It was pretty sad and very much a statement on his own f*cked-up life that Dean ended up being the first person he f*cked without a condom. Dean, after all, couldn't wait for them to do it raw, summing it up with a lick and a promise: “I can’t f*ckin’ wait to feel your gorgeous co*ck inside me, raw and hot and thick and nothing between us, Sammy, just you and me.”

So, hmmm, yeah, it was all totally worth it, but Jess had not been wrong about the messiness.

He turns off the shower, standing for a moment and letting the water run down his body, hair heavy and slick against his skull, watching the thick, sudsy shampoo languidly circling the plughole. He’s deliberately putting off thinking about their fight, about Dean and his stupid, epic stubbornness. There’s no point trying to think about it now anyway, Bobby’ll be back soon and it’s not like Dean’s going to listen to reason, to really hear Sam’s arguments.

He sighs and pulls back the shower curtain to reach for his usual three towels, one for his hair, one around his waist and one over his shoulders. Three towels, Sam? Who needs three towels? Freakin’ Sasquatch.

He stands in front of the sink, using the corner of one of his towels to wipe the steam off the mirror. He looks tired and hung-over and he needs to shave. Dean always used to tease him about how little he used to need to shave, how he could go for five days and still be relatively baby-faced. It’s different now, he’s hairier all over, not just his chin and face, but his chest and stomach, maybe in ten years, he’ll start growing hair on his back and shoulders like any other middle aged man, hell, he should just say f*ck it and grow a beard.

Like Dad, he thinks with a grimace. Looking more like Dad than you do now, Dean’s words just before, but he can see Dad in his face a lot more clearly now. Not just the five o’clock shadow and dark hair, but the slant of his eyes, the furrow in his forehead and thickening eyebrows, the crinkles at the corners of his mouth and the set of his jaw. Hey there, Dad.

He scrunches up his nose, poking his fingers into the thin, dry skin at the corners of his eyes, the spidering fine lines, not as many as Dean, but still, embedded into his face already, too much squinting into the sun and down the barrel of a shotgun, too much hard living and not enough f*cking moisturizer. He pulls a face at his reflection and reaches for the shaving foam. He’s not growing a beard.

Thirty f*cking years old. Jesus.

He’s thinking about Jessica again before he even realizes it. He’s been doing it a lot recently, and he’s not sure why that is. Maybe it’s the whole turning thirty thing, maybe some sort of residual guilt? After all, back when he and Jess were living together he used to imagine spending all his future birthdays with her, for his thirtieth, they’d have a big house, kids, pets, steady jobs. Isn’t that what he and Dean are doing now, albeit, some half-assed, Winchester-esque version of that?

He rinses his razor off under the tap and empties the sink, carefully placing the razor back into the (newly clean) cabinet alongside the tubes of lube and what Dean calls the ass lotion. He smirks as he looks at them, hoping that Bobby hasn’t had to root around in there for anything, then again, Bobby should know better.

He goes back into the bedroom to throw on some clean jeans and a couple of shirts. Dean must’ve kept on his dirty clothes after his shower. Sam can never understand how his brother finds it acceptable to have a shower and then get back into the same clothes he was wearing before the shower, one of Dean’s (many) quirks that he finds either perversely endearing, downright disgusting or strangely arousing, depending on his mood.

He heads downstairs, stairs creaking forlornly under his bare feet. The backdoor is propped open, and he can hear Bobby and Dean’s voices floating through it, he pauses in the doorway and squints as the full, afternoon light hits his face.

He pads outside, Bobby looks up as his shadow falls over them. “Hey, Sam, welcome back to the land of the livin’.”

“Hey, Bobby. You guys want anything? I’m gonna get myself a beer. Hair of the dog and all that.”

Both of them nod, though Dean doesn’t bother looking up at him, silent treatment in full swing. He goes on back inside, picks up three cold beers from the stock left over from the party and takes them outside, handing Bobby his and dropping Dean’s into his lap with a smirk. Dean jumps and glares at him which just makes Sam smirk harder. He pulls over another lawn chair and sinks into it, his legs sprawl long and loose over the scrubby grass as he tilts his face up towards the sun. He feels sleepy, not tired exactly, but sleepy and lethargic, Dean’s fault, for waking him up earlier. He pops the cap on his beer and takes a long pull, he can feel Dean’s eyes on him, and when he glances up, Dean immediately looks away, face going blank and hard.

He watches Dean as he drinks, feeling the heat blossom in his belly, watching Dean’s lips curl around the neck of the bottle, his Adam’s apple bob up and down as he swallows. Dean’s pissed with him and he’s pissed with Dean, but it makes no difference to his stupid co*ck, it’s been less than an hour since they last f*cked, but he wants him again. If Bobby weren’t here, he’d be acting on it already: tackling Dean off his lawn chair, the two of them f*cking away their frustration with each other. It’s how they usually end up resolving their arguments.

Dean finishes his beer, gets up from his chair; Dougal springs to his feet beside him, looking eager and a hell of a lot more awake than Sam feels.

“I’m gonna take him for a walk,” he says, still not looking at Sam. “Feel kinda restless.”

Sam ignores him while Bobby nods, but he watches Dean’s ass as he sets off, Jesus, but his brother’s got a nice ass.

“I took a look at that book,” says Bobby, breaking Sam out of his impromptu, Dean-inspired daydream.

“Huh?”

“The one you wanted me to take a look at, Sam,” Bobby says, purposefully slowing down his words.

“Oh, right, yeah, yeah.”

He does remember, and all of a sudden, he feels awake again. The book he’d gotten from Bobby’s friend in Portland, the one he still hadn’t had chance to look at properly.

“Did you find anything? Any reference to the ritual?”

Bobby stares at him for a moment, then sighs and removes his hat, passing one hand over his sweaty, grey hair before jamming it back on. He looks torn, hesitant, not a usual Bobby expression and something sets Sam on edge.

“What?” he asks, sitting up straight all of a sudden. “What? You did find something?”

“Now, don’t go gettin’ your hopes up. My Sumerian ain’t what it used to be.”

“Bobby. Please.”

Bobby sighs and tosses the book over to Sam, landing in his lap with a heavy ouf. “You might wanna take a look at chapters 5 and 7. It’s a long shot, but there might be…” he breaks off and takes a pull on his beer, knotting his eyebrows together and frowning. “It makes a reference to the ritual, it’s kinda vague, but it’s there.”

Sam nods, pressing his lips together; he’s unreasonably excited by this, though he’s trying to hold back on it. It’s just a vague reference, he tells himself, he’s seen enough vague references over the past few years; then again, Bobby wouldn’t even mention it if he didn’t think there was some relevance. Bobby’s gotten pretty good at learning how to manage his expectations over the past year; it’s why Sam gave him the book to read in the first place, that and the fact that whatever Bobby says, his Sumerian is still better than Sam's.

“Thanks,” he says gratefully.

“Like I said, son, don’t get your hopes up.”

“I know, believe me, I know. But if I can find a way to anchor Dean completely to this reality - then I just… God, it would be so much better.”

Bobby nods slowly, giving him an appraising look. “Is that what Dean says?”

He flushes, thinking of the fight, says bitterly, “Dean doesn’t know what’s good for him. Never has.”

“Maybe,” says Bobby equably. “But do you think he’d want you to undo it? Truly? Do you think he’d wanna lose that connection? To risk something comin’ undone between the two of you?”

“Bobby, what are you trying to say?”

Bobby takes a long pull on his beer, shrugs. “You’re happy now. I can see the way Dean is now compared to – hell, compared to any freakin’ time in that boy’s life. He’s happy, Sam. And this place,” he waves a hand, “the business, your job, you boys’ve got a sweet setup. Why mess with a good thing?”

Sam hesitates for a second, looking behind them, towards the house, then away into the fields where Dean disappeared, finally, he turns to Bobby, “I need to. I have to make things right. It’s my fault.”

There’s a prolonged moment of silence then Bobby speaks softly, “You do what you gotta do.”

It’s hardly a ringing endorsem*nt, but Bobby knows better than to try and change his mind, to try and change either of their minds.

“Yeah,” he mutters quietly.

There’s another long moment of strained silence before Bobby speaks again: “How about you go on after your brother? I’m not playin’ marriage counselor to you two kids.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t bother tryin’ to fool me, boy. Dean coming out here, face black as thunder and you with your I just got kicked in the balls look. Go on after him and fix whatever stupid-ass thing you boys are fightin’ over this time!”

Sam stares at him for a moment, then shakes his head. “Is that an order?”

“A friendly suggestion. I’m gonna set up the grill anyway, we got a freezer full of meat to use up.”

Sam smiles slowly, turning the book over in his hands. He gets to his feet and drops it back down in Bobby’s lap.

“Okay, okay, I’m going.”

Chapter 8

Chapter Text

April 2009

He found the ritual by accident, though honestly, he wasn’t even sure if he believed in accidents anymore, fate maybe, coincidence no. They’d been sent by the angels to protect some evil Satan worshipping warlock who (according to Castiel) was one of the final seals; all they had to do was stop him from dying and the seal would be saved. For once, they’d actually won the seal and saved the guy’s life, the window of opportunity for when his death would’ve meant a step further to hell on earth passing by with no bloody, gory sacrifice.

“We can’t just leave him,” Dean said after they returned him to his lair, a disappointingly regular two bed apartment in an ordinary and un-atmospheric building in Iowa City. “f*cker’s practicing some seriously bad sh*t in there.”

Sam smirked and pulled out the ancient tome he’d taken from the guy’s apartment before they’d said goodbye.

“Don’t worry, dude, I lifted his demonic handbook, he can’t practice sh*t without it.”

“Nice,” said Dean with an impressed grin. “Very quick-fingered of you.”

Sam shrugged and took the compliment as his due, grateful that Dean’s level of familiarity with demonic artifacts and texts was pretty damn low. He’d recognized it straight away, marveling for a second that such a weak excuse for a warlock (or a human being) had actually managed to get hold of one of the most ancient, most sacred and most sh*t-your-pants terrifying, demonic texts ever written. Still, wasn’t his any longer, was Sam’s now.

He hadn’t been looking for anything in particular, just skimming through the book as background research. But he stumbled across it one night, while Dean slept in his usual fitful way, moaning out loud and bolting awake after scarcely a couple of hours, pushing Sam away as soon as he tried to get close to him, irritated with himself for showing weakness. Sam decided there and then, as he watched his brother scowl at the infomercials on TV, eyes red-rimmed with anxiety and fatigue, to go through with it.

“It will bind us together irreparably,” he told Dean the following night. “So, whatever happens, if you – uh, if your soul goes back to the pit, then mine does too.”

“No,” said Dean immediately, “no f*ckin’ way, Sam. I don’t want this. If I go back then, please, I don’t want you there too. Not that.”

“Dean, I think it’s most likely that I’m headin’ south anyway – demon blood, remember?” He gave Dean an ironic smile, patting his leg reassuringly, “Anyway, it cuts both ways, if one of us stays topside, then the other does too. And of course, if you get some big heavenly reward, then they have to take me along for the ride.”

“Yeah, sure, like that’s gonna happen. Anyway, who wants to go to heaven? Don’t think you get to f*ck your brother in heaven.”

“No, probably not.”

“Exactly. Best we can hope for is that it all ends. That this is it. Nothing else. Two damn lifetimes are enough for me.”

It was a pretty bleak outlook, that after this, all the misery they’d gone through, that there’d be nothing at the end, just blackness, the honest and true End. But Dean had spent forty years in Hell, he’d already lived a lifetime down there. Forty years… it was unfathomable – it was longer than either of them had been alive, longer than they’d known each other… It was something that Sam was never going to come to terms with, something he never wanted to come to terms with: it was one of those immutable truths that drove him, that made him so certain that killing Lilith, that getting his, no, their revenge was the right thing to do.

“Well, if this is all there is, then we just have to make the most of it.”

“Dude, haven’t I been sayin’ that all along? Where d’you wanna go then? Tijuana? Grand Canyon? Disneyworld?”

Sam pulled a face.

“Nah, you’re right, not Disneyworld. How about more sex then?”

“Now that I can get behind.”

“That’s what she said.”

Sam rolled his eyes and punched Dean lightly on the shoulder while Dean snigg*red.

“But, Dean, listen, who knows what’s gonna happen? Point is, if we do this ritual, then whatever does happen, it happens to both of us, at the same time. This means that one of us doesn’t get left behind. That’s what this does.”

“Sam, I don’t know. I don’t like the idea of you messin' with this sort of sh*t.”

“When do you like the idea of me messin' with anything?” he retorted, the words coming out a lot sharper than he’d intended.

He turned away to bash the pillow on his side, hiding his face and slumping back down into the bed, sheets rucking up around his waist. He knew he probably looked like some petulant, little kid whose just been told he couldn’t have an extra hour of computer time, but he couldn’t help it. He chanced a quick look at Dean; he was wearing that look of weary resignation, the one he seemed to be carrying all the damn time these days, that fateful look that made Sam’s chest constrict and the brand around his heart tighten.

He reached out for Dean’s hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze before Dean huffed irritably and snatched it back, murmuring something about chick-flick moments under his breath.

“Dean, you gotta know, I’m gonna do this. I’m not lettin' other people dictate what’s gonna happen to us. I’m sick of us never being in control, of being f*ckin’ pawns in someone else’s game.” He watched Dean’s face closely, seeing his lips press together, a quiet look of determination creeping into Dean’s expression as his words registered. “Listen to me: this way, we can at least control something. We can make sure that we’re together whatever happens. Because I can,” he swallowed, feeling that rising swell of fear in his chest again, “I can take anything, but not that. I’m not lettin’ you go again, I can’t, I can’t do that again, I can’t go through those months of not having you here.” His voice broke over the last few words and he silently cursed himself, taking a deep breath and swallowing hard.

After a few long seconds, he felt Dean shift closer to him, “Hey, look at me.”

He raised his eyes slowly to meet Dean’s, blinking at the inevitable tears. When he looked back at his brother’s face, his expression had softened, as he knew it would, big brother Dean completely unable to withstand the Broken Sammy Pleading Face of Need and Desperation.

“What?”

“I’ll do it. You win, Sammy. I’ll do whatever you want.”

He didn’t tell Dean everything, though Bobby suspected, cornered him, demanding to know his intentions towards Dean, as if Sam was some Regency gentleman requesting Dean’s hand in marriage.

“Do you know what this is? Do you know what kind of power you need to do this?”

“Yes,” he replied flatly, because he did, he knew.

Bobby looked at him, blinking, and for a moment, he looked genuinely terrified, terrified of him.

“Bobby, don’t underestimate what I wouldn’t do to keep Dean safe. I appreciate your input, I do, and I know that you only want what’s best for us. But believe me when I say that there is nothing you can say or do that will stop me from doing this.”

“What about your brother? What about what Dean wants?”

Sam looked at him for a long moment, then said tiredly, “Dean wants what I want. Dean always wants what I want.”

It felt like a fatalistic moment, like a turning point, like the moment he’d first put his hands on Dean, lost in the dark together, daring his brother to push him away, to tell him to stop. He was on the edge of something, teetering over a looming chasm, and he should’ve had a choice, everyone had choices, didn’t they? But no one was stopping him, not Dean, not Bobby, no one was calling his bluff. He raised his eyes to Bobby, daring him to say something else, to pull him back, push him over, just say something, do something… but Bobby said nothing and made no more protests.

Ruby was the next to step up to voice disapproval, “I did not help you become so powerful, I did not feed you my own blood to have you waste it all on this – this ritual,” she spat. “Sam, you can kill Lilith, you can end this! And yet you’re wasting your power, your abilities on this! Do you realize what kind of power this takes? This will drain you. This will leave you weak and helpless, and there are only five seals left!”

“I am well aware of that, Ruby,” he said evenly. “That’s why this needs to be done now.”

She stared at him for a moment, then her face changed; rage vanishing and a cold, sneering contempt flashing over her features.

“This is for Dean, isn’t it?”

“Who else would it be for exactly?”

She laughed nastily, voice going fake sweet. “Oh yes, I get it. You need him, you can’t live without him. Well, that’s beautiful. Really. That’s sweet, Sam. But we have a job to do. We have the scariest bitch of them all to take out, and we can do this, we can win. But not if you waste your power, drain it, on this.”

“I’m not going up against any demons until this is done,” he told her. “You may as well leave already. I’ll call you when I need you again.” It was a dismissal, and it was to her credit that she recognized it as such. However much she didn’t like it, she recognized when she was beaten.

He was grateful to her; she had made him strong enough to do this. If it hadn’t been for her, he would never have been able to channel the kind of power needed, because the ritual was very specific, only a very powerful being, or in the literal translation - one of tainted blood - could carry it out.

He didn’t tell Dean about that part.

They did the ritual on the same night the sixty-second seal fell.

Dean gave up his blood without flinching, holding out his arm for Sam, his eyes locked curiously on the slow, seeping ooze of his blood against Sam’s knife; it looked starkly red against the silver, made unreal in the ritualistic candlelight. Sam’s own blood was the same color, the same absurd red, the same soft ooze as he cut his arm, and that felt wrong. It shouldn’t have looked like that, shouldn’t have looked so clean and innocent next to Dean’s pure human blood, not his tainted blood, it should’ve been darker, more wrong.

He mixed their blood together, thinking of the last time he’d fed from Ruby, the sickly bitter taste, the slimy feel of it going down his throat. The thought of it now made him want to choke, bile and sickness and thick, chunky nausea. He swallowed and raised his head; Dean was staring at him with dark, glittering eyes, his lips shiny where he’d been licking them, where his teeth were worrying the plump flesh. He should reassure him, say something, but before he could think of the words, Dean moved, leaning across the markings on the floor and pulling him into a kiss: brutal, vicious, possessive.

“Whatever happens, Sammy,” he said, eyes wide and burning.

Sam gulped, stared into his brother’s face. “Yes,” he said. Any other words were unnecessary.

And it didn’t work.

Or at least, it didn’t work correctly.

With everything that went on immediately afterwards, with the f*cking war, seals to protect, demons to slaughter, humans to save, he didn’t notice. Neither of them noticed. So, it must’ve been about three weeks, four weeks later, after everything. Both of them were weak, barely standing, recuperating at Bobby’s, until a friend of Bobby’s called, with of all the most random sh*t, a cursed teapot causing havoc to the tourist trade in a small, seaside town in Maine. Bobby sent them off to deal with it, like a parent sending his two kids on a camping trip to cheer them up.

He wanted to kick himself when he finally noticed, chastising himself for being so wrapped up in his own sh*t, so wrapped up in trying to make things better. Too busy thinking of what they could do now that it was over, so obsessed with watching Dean all the goddamn time that he hadn’t even noticed, and what was that cliché about woods and trees, cause sometimes there was a reason why clichés became clichés, because deep down they were true, they meant something. And this time, it was true, because he’d been watching Dean, he was always watching Dean, but he still didn’t notice… something that should’ve been so f*cking obvious and he didn’t notice.

But it hadn’t been obvious. Dean had been fighting demons, touching demons, and nothing had happened to him, apart from the usual cuts and bruises and head-f*cks. He’d been touching Sam, having sex with Sam, almost every night, whenever they could get a moment alone, so terrified that every time was going to be their last. It didn’t occur to them that Sam was the only human Dean had touched since the ritual, after all, how often do you keep track of sh*t like that?

They were in a teashop in Maine, three different types of cake on the table between them, “research” according to Dean, though Sam wasn’t so sure, but his brother was happy, making ridiculous org*sm faces as he licked frosting off his fork, so Sam didn’t say anything, just watched Dean and his uncomplicated, cake-inspired happiness. Sam was staring off into the distance when the overly friendly waitress came over again with yet another slice of cake, leaning over and depositing the plate, her fingers landing deliberately on Dean’s arm in a greedy caress as she did so…

Dean made a noise, a flinching, gasping sound, crowding away from her, back into the booth, eyes wide, tight moment of terror fading abruptly into blankness.

“I – I’m sorry,” she cried, looking stunned, “is he okay? I didn’t mean to – to hurt him, will he be okay?”

Dean wasn’t moving, his eyes hazy and unseeing, body frozen into catatonic submission, slumped into the corner of that stupid, flowery booth.

Panic swirled in Sam’s chest, hopeless desperation, dumb fear; he pushed the waitress aside, not even noticing her, frantic to get to Dean. He fell into the booth beside him, arms reaching, grabbing a fistful of his jacket and hauling him in.

He knew as soon as he touched Dean: Dean wasn’t there.

He couldn’t breathe for a moment, the whole world whitening to nothing, the whole goddamn world just white noise, except him and Dean’s body, frozen in time in this ridiculous teashop in Maine.

He pulled Dean against him, manhandling him hopelessly as he tugged him into a lolling embrace. Dean hated that, hated Sam doing that to him, don’t maul me, Sam bitten out with Dean’s big brother irritation, but Dean wasn’t here now. Dean was gone and Sam just… he needed, wanted… to press his face up against Dean’s cheek, breathe in his skin, swallow him up, absorb every last particle of him.

He smelt the same, flesh warm, pulse hot and rapid under Sam’s lips, chest rising and falling, still breathing while Sam was forgetting, forgetting how to breathe, how to be, what to do… The hot tears already gathering, panic and despair blistering alive, because Dean was gone. This was his body, this was him breathing, but he wasn’t there. He was gone. His soul was gone. Nothing. Except…

From the corner of his eye, a flickering, dark, curling shape… He looked down.

The brands. The soul scars. Coming alive, snakes writhing, black lines spiraling, licking over their entwined fingers, black, demon-smoke shapes. It was coming awake, the power swelling open, the darkness rising inside him. He could feel it now. He could use it. In the same way he’d annihilated demons, the same way he’d taken down everything that stood between him and Dean and hell on earth, he could do it again. He could save Dean, he could bring him back.

He spoke the words, feeling them instinctively; the demonic language falling from his lips like he’d been born to speak it. And people must be staring at them now, the people in the café wondering about the freaks at table four… but he didn’t see them, didn’t see anything but Dean. His eyes were black, but he could feel nothing but Dean, only Dean. Dean’s soul, broken and damaged, lost and scared, as he felt it brush up against his own, clinging to him, all that was overwhelmingly Dean cleaving to him in a surge of unrestrained relief and love and joy at finding him again, (my Sammy) the buzz of Dean in him and around him as Sam claimed him. My Dean… my love, my brother, mine, all this, all you… mine.

Dean recovered with a rush of breath, choking and spluttering, as his fingers curled around Sam’s bicep, the life flaring back into his face, eyes blinking away the dead, blank nothingness. Sam stared at him, drinking him in, he felt incapable of words, all his energy, what was left of him focused on this one thing, on Dean.

“Sam, what, uh,” Dean’s voice was a dry, crackling whisper, “what was that?”

“Dean,” he breathed. His own eyes were burning holes in his skull, he couldn’t blink, terrified that in the millisecond it took his lashes to move, his pupils to contract, his vision to reset, that Dean would be gone again. The blood in his head was thumping so hard, rushing and drowning all thoughts, all brain processes, throbbing bang, bang, bang of insidious demon blood. He felt drained, beyond exhausted, as if just lifting one hand, removing one hand from where it was clutching Dean was too much work.

“You’re shaking,” Dean said quietly. “Sammy, what’s wrong? What the f*ck happened here?”

He felt sick, clammy sweat beading under his armpits, hard, panicked breaths threatening his lungs, incapable of speaking, incapable of looking away from Dean…

“Hey, Sam, hey it’s okay, man, I’m okay, see?”

…blood thumping so hard he couldn’t hear anything else, his heart beating too fast, can’t possibly be really this fast, dark rush of power surging in his chest. He felt sick, sudden terrifying rush of nausea.

“Sammy?” He felt Dean’s hand on the back of his neck.

He flinched at the touch, it felt wrong… bad… Dean shouldn’t be touching him, not when -

He took a breath, tried to shape his lips around the words, “I’m sorry.”

“I, what? What’s going on, Sam? Why – why aren’t you okay?”

He wanted to laugh then, a sick hysterical urge, because this… just f*cking typical. He’d failed Dean, done something to him, and Dean had gone, for those few seconds, his soul had really and truly gone, and now Dean was the one worrying about him, concerned about him.

“I’m okay,” he said finally. He lifted his hand from Dean’s arm, lowered his head to his hand, leaned forward, elbow on the Formica table, in a prickly pool of sugar. “But you’re, you’re not okay, Dean. I’m sorry, I f*cked up.”

“What? Sam, just f*ckin’ tell me already. What’s going on? What happened?”

“You were gone,” he answered softly.

“What? What does that even mean?”

“I don’t know.”

It wasn’t supposed to have happened like that. This wasn’t supposed to have been the outcome.

The ritual was only supposed to bind them together. It definitely wasn’t supposed to do… whatever it had done here: hurt Dean, put him in danger.

It dawned on Sam slowly, inexorably, as Dean drove them out of Maine, back towards South Dakota, back to Bobby’s…

Dean’s soul was hanging by a thread, a thread that linked him to Sam and Sam only. Other people, humans, their touch, their intentions towards Dean - they threatened that, threatened his claim on Dean, threatened his true and total possession of his brother.

It was his fault. His fault. No one else’s. His. He had wanted Dean. Forever. He’d wanted the two of them tied together, jumbled up together. Just the two of them, against everything, no one else coming between them, nothing severing that bond, as it had done over those awful, past months.

No one else was going to come between them now. No one else could. Dean was Sam’s, utterly and completely.

He’d damned his brother.

They went back to Bobby’s, and Sam spent six days solid researching, not sleeping, just reading everything, any reference to the ritual, to the words he’d spoken, scouring Bobby’s library, calling every demon expert he knew.

Bobby helped him and Sam had to give him credit for never once saying I told you so. They’d experimented when they got back, asked Bobby to shake Dean’s hand.

It had the same effect.

The second time, Sam knew what to do, knew how to raise that power, how to bring Dean back.

Dean was fine afterwards, hungry, but fine. Sam watched him munch his way through three slices of pie, the sense of despair rising in him with every moaned-over mouthful.

Dean tossed his fork aside and glared, “Dude, I can’t eat with you watching me like that.”

“Sorry,” he muttered.

Dean sighed, irritation washing slowly away. “S’alright. Don’t want any more, anyway.” He pushed the plate aside then turned to look at Sam, gaze steady and assessing. “So. Not even Bobby, huh? No other human can touch me. Except you.”

Sam nodded, trying uselessly to hold back the tears, unable to look at Dean.

“I’m sorry.”

Dean nodded, swiping his thumb over his lip, collecting up the last crumbs of pie.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know. Something went wrong. I don’t know what… I – it could’ve been anything. f*ck it might’ve just been some sh*tty pronunciation. f*ck! Dean, just – f*ck!”

He got up from the table with a jerk, chair clattering to the floor behind him; he spun around and kicked it viciously. He felt mindless, destructive; wanting, needing to get his hands on something, break something… He thought suddenly of Dean, years earlier, taking a crowbar to the Impala after Dad’s death, beating her relentlessly, his beloved car, until all her windows smashed, bodywork dented, all that work shot to nothing. He could conjure up the look on Dean’s face: the rage and loss and grief, the sense of total and utter despair, because he knew what that was now. He snatched up the chair and smashed it down onto the stone flags, splintering wood and upholstery spilling out across the floor, flimsy frame crumpling pathetically in his hands.

“Hey, hey, Sam!” He could feel Dean close in on him, grab onto his wrist, force him to drop the remnants of the chair until he was just holding one useless stick of splintered wood. He dropped it to the floor in disgust and let Dean pull his hand away. “Don’t take it out on Bobby’s furniture, man. It didn’t do anything to you.”

“f*cking piece of crap!” he bit out, yanking his hand out of Dean’s grasp. He pulled away with a jerk and aimed a kick at the pile of broken chair.

“Yeah, okay. I think you killed it.” He sounded wry and amused, and how could he - how could he sound like that - after… after all this? After what he’d done to him.

“What’s wrong with you? Why the f*ck don’t you hate me?”

“Sam…”

“No! Just. Look what I did to you! You should – you should hate me. Why don’t you? I ruined your life, you stupid jerk! Are you that needy and that pathetic that you can’t – you can’t see what I’ve done to you? What the f*ck is wrong with you?”

Dean looked stricken for a second, then his face set, going immobile and hard, his Dad look.

“Quit actin’ like a spoiled brat, Sam. You know I could never hate you.”

His voice was so steady, so matter of fact, his eyes locked on Sam with the same solid, big brother look that Sam had seen a thousand times before. The taking no sh*t, big brother look that said that it doesn’t matter to me that you can kill demons with your mind or that you can give me the best org*sms of my life or even that you’ve damned my soul for the rest of eternity, I am still your older brother and you’re still my whiny, pain in the ass, kid brother and you will shut the hell up when I tell you to.

They stared at each other, the two of them standing over the remnants of Bobby’s kitchen chair in the middle of Bobby’s kitchen, like a scene from a really bad melodrama. Sam felt his breathing grow calmer, his pulse slowing with each second Dean’s eyes were on him, looking him over with that familiar concern that managed to be both comforting and arousing.

“You know, if you wanted us to be exclusive, dude, you only had to ask, didn’t have to go this far,” Dean said finally. He raised an eyebrow; smirk flitting back into place, and Sam wanted so much to touch him, to trace that smirk with his fingertips.

“I’ll fix it, Dean. I promise.”

“Okay, I’m sure you will. But how’s about you start by fixin’ Bobby’s chair?”

He never figured out exactly what had gone wrong.

Maybe it had been just some sh*tty pronunciation, as he’d said to Dean, or maybe it was it was something more than that?

The criteria for this ritual were specific: the souls had to be predisposed to bind together and they had to be of matching strength. Whilst Sam was certain beyond all doubt that he and Dean qualified for the former, the latter was another matter. Dean’s soul was literally second-hand, torn by hell and resurrected by heaven, weakened through the years of torture at Alistair’s hand. Maybe the only way this ritual could work was for Dean’s poor, perfect, damaged soul to cleave to Sam’s?

But that was just conjecture, for no matter how many times he read over the book he’d stolen from the warlock’s lair, no matter how many other books he consulted or supposed experts (both human and demonic) he spoke to, he never discovered what had gone wrong. For some reason, maybe just their joint sucky karma – the sh*t-ass, sucks beyond the telling Winchester karma – the ritual hadn’t worked for them. And the end result was that the only human being who could touch Dean was Sam.

They learned to deal. Dean could still touch animals, and all of the supernatural things they fought: demons, vampires, ghosts and spirits, all of them were fair game, as they always had been. And really, it was surprising how much you didn’t need to touch other people, particularly when you practically lived in a car and had a hulking, little brother with demonic powers and enormous shoulders who refused to leave your side. Sure, they couldn’t really hang out at crowded bars anymore or ride on public transport, but how often did they do either of those things anyway? The world had grown suspicious over the years, people wary of human contact, retreating behind their windows and doors and reinforced glass, it was easy to avoid touching anybody when you didn’t want to.

Sometimes Sam would catch Dean staring at him with a troubled look in his eyes that he always managed to wipe away as soon as he noticed Sam watching him. Sam knew what his brother was thinking, because truthfully… he sometimes wondered the same thing. Was it really and truly an accident what had happened to them? Or had he somehow meant for everything to go down like this? Was his longing, his compulsive need and overwhelming possessiveness when it came to Dean, the real reason his brother was cursed to only be able to touch him for the rest of his life? It was the reason he’d done the ritual in the first place, the desire and necessity to unite them forever, to have Dean as his own. Had the dark power he’d summoned managed to read his mind, to fathom out his most hidden, most selfish desires, and granted them?

He knew that Dean would never voice this suspicion out loud, but he knew that Dean felt it, that he did suspect, and that made Sam more set on repairing it, on fixing what had gone wrong.

“I’ll fix it, I promise,” he said one night, months later, the two of them huddled on a crusty motel couch, Sam’s face on Dean’s shoulder, voice vibrating against Dean’s chest. “I’ll make it right again, Dean.”

“I told you, you don’t need to,” Dean answered, as he always did, “if this is the price we have to pay for us both still being here and being together, then that’s cool. This is all I want.”

Chapter 9

Chapter Text

May 2013

I went to work on Monday, terrified, the entire time, that Dean would call me into the office and fire me. But he didn’t. Instead, we all talked about the party, Dean telling gruesome stories and ripping into Tim for throwing up on the bathroom floor after Lucinda and I had left.

“Weak, dude, so weak,” Dean said, grinning wickedly, the lines at the corners of his eyes going deeper as he laughed at Tim’s embarrassment. I stared at him and felt sick to the pit of my stomach, my donut tasting like sawdust.

We were pretty quiet that week; it was sometimes like that, some weeks crazy and others just not. One afternoon, Dean decided to close up early and took us all to the bar down the block.

“So, I’d always, like, wanted to know how you got into huntin’?” asked Tim.

Dean looked surprised, shrugged. “My dad taught me, he was ex-military, marines.” He smiled thoughtfully, then thumbed at his mouth, swiping his thumb over his lower lip in a gesture I’d seen him do when he was uncomfortable. “Yeah.”

“And he taught you how to shoot?” pursued Tim, “Cause we all thought you were in the army.”

“The army?” Dean snorted. “f*ck, no. I’ve never been in the army. No, it was… my dad. I guess he used to ride us pretty hard. He’d wake us up at the ass crack of dawn, and make us go on a six mile run before breakfast, then it was thrusts and crunches, sparring and hand to hand. And shooting practice, coupla times a week. And the huntin’, he’d take us out, make us run drills. He was, uh, he was kinda a one-off, my old man.”

“Who’s us?” asked Tim.

Dean hesitated for a tiny moment, then said quickly, “Oh, my, uh, my kid brother.”

“I didn’t know you had a brother,” said Gabe.

Dean nodded abruptly, thumb going up to trace over his bottom lip as he faked a casual sort of shrug, “Yeah, he, uh. Not anymore, he died.”

Huh. I’m sure no one else had noticed anything, but Dean was… Dean was spooked. He was still thumbing at his lip and clutching his beer pretty hard in his other hand – both of those dead Dean giveaways.

“Oh, sorry, sorry, man, I shouldn’t’ve said anything. S’cuse me and my big mouth.”

“S’alright,” said Dean, shrugging again and carefully not looking at anyone. “My dad too, and hey, my mom. But, whatever, it was a long time ago. You get over it.”

f*ck, so Dean had lost his entire family? I thought about all those people who had said to me, over and over again, it’ll get easier… It hadn’t. Not really. And Dean had lost his dad and his mom and his brother… his entire f*cking family. I didn’t know what I’d do if anything ever happened to my Mom… the thought made my throat feel heavy as if I was about to cry, I pushed the feelings away and took a long pull on my beer, talk about the worst f*cking timing.

“At least you have Sam,” said Gabe, aiming for a soothing sort of tone of voice, and seriously, was he auditioning for f*cking grief counseling, because what was with that?

Dean looked like he was about to laugh for a moment, before giving Gabe a bland smile, “Oh, yeah, least I have Sam.”

“So, what was so incredibly important that you couldn’t tell me on the phone?” I hissed when Lucinda answered the door to me and dragged me inside.

“Shush, shut up. C’mon,” she said, directing me up the stairs to her room.

It hadn’t changed much since the last time I’d been there, which was probably back when we were dating. But she still had most of the same posters on her walls, all the same crap on her cork board, except for the color-coded schedule and a couple of photographs of friends I didn’t recognize, obviously college people.

“I found out something, and I’ve gotta show you.”

I glanced at her; she seemed really agitated, practically f*cking vibrating as she shut the door behind her.

“What?”

“Here, sit down.”

She pushed me onto the bed, amongst the mountain of throw pillows. I unzipped my hoodie, might as well get comfortable while I waited for her to indulge her drama queen streak.

She picked a bunch of papers up off her desk and perched on the edge of her desk chair, staring at me and biting her lip.

“You are so gonna freak about this.”

“What are you talking about? And what’s with all the f*ckin’ secrecy sh*t?”

“Okay. But, uh, I think this might be kinda illegal,” she wrinkled her nose, “but I don’t really know, I just. Look, you gotta promise you’re not going to tell my Dad.”

“Why the hell would I tell your Dad anything?”

Seriously, this was getting weird. What the f*ck did her father have anything to do with anything? Lucinda’s father and I had never been exactly best pals. I was pretty sure he’d thought I’d been totally wrong for his daughter when we were going out, which, yeah… maybe he’d had a point, and then there was the whole deal with him being the local sheriff, and well, I’d always tried hard to keep out of his way in the past.

“Well, I kinda used his login and password at work to get some information off the police database.”

“You did what?”

She sighed and gave me one of her stern, librarian looks.

“Derek, calm down. It’s fine, he won’t find out. Anyway, he lets me use his computer all the time at work, and that’s totally not supposed to be allowed, so really, when you think about it, it’s his fault.” She spread her hands, all what can you do? and I remembered Evan’s theory about Lucinda being the secret, love child of Hermione Granger and Lex Luthor, (if they were, like, actually real people and not fictional characters). “Anyway, this is not the point; this is not what I wanted to tell you. What I wanted to tell you about was what I found out.”

I sighed and dropped my head into my hands. I had the very real feeling that I didn’t want to hear any of this, and whatever it was, it was really not going to be good.

“You remember the other weekend, when we went to that barbecue party and that old guy nearly busted us for going through your boss’s stuff?”

Did I remember? Jesus, I hadn’t stopped angsting about it for the past couple of weeks, course I f*cking remembered. I was still half expecting to get fired, panicking that Bobby had told Dean and that Dean was playing me with some sort of long game, letting me sweat for ages while he kept thinking up a long term revenge strategy that ended up with me being fired and never being able to show my face around town, ever again.

“Well, I didn’t tell you this at the time, because we didn’t have time, and I just didn’t think about it, but when I was going through his wallet, I noticed that he had two drivers licenses and one was for Dean Cooper and one was for Dean Winchester and they both had his picture.”

“So? Loads of people have fake ID’s. You have a fake ID.”

“Yeah, I know, but with everything else that was going on, with what you said about him lying about how he and Sam met, I thought it was kinda weird, so I looked up both names on the police database.”

“What did you find out?” I blurted out, trying to keep my voice steady because this… this had to be some big deal. Yeah, okay, I know what she was doing was totally illegal and an invasion of privacy and I shouldn’t be enabling her like this, but, f*ck, I had to know.

She looked conflicted for a moment, then said quickly, “Yeah, there was. And I – I wasn’t sure whether I should tell you, because this is some serious sh*t, Derek.”

“Oh my God, what? Spit it out already!”

“Well, for a start: Dean Cooper doesn’t exist, neither does Sam Truman. But Dean Winchester and Sam Winchester – they exist. They’re their real names.”

“What – they’re, like, married?”

“They’re brothers.”

“What?”

“Here.” She turned around and flicked open the paper folder, sliding out two photocopies of pages that looked like the mugshots you saw pinned up at the station, ones you’d see in cop shows on TV.

“But – they –“

“I know.” She nodded furiously, biting her lip.

“They can’t be –“

“They are, I’m sure of it. Look.”

She thrust the pages at me, and I was right, they were mugshots, FBI mugshots, f*cking FB-f*cking-I mugshots. That was Dean and that was Sam, and yeah, they were obviously taken a few years ago because they looked younger, but it was them. No mistake.

“According to their records, Dean and Sam Winchester are dead. They died in FBI custody five years ago. They were being held for multiple counts of murder, kidnap, bank robbery, grave desecration, credit card fraud… God, loads of sh*t! But there was a big explosion at the station and they died on the scene, along with some deputies, the sheriff and a couple of FBI agents.”

“No, just, no f*ckin’ way, Lucinda.” I thrust the pages away, they slipped off my lap and fell, scattering across the floor, landing on the thick blue carpet, inches from our feet.

“Derek, listen,” she said, leaning forward, her hair falling across her face as her voice got more intense. “It’s all there: they were on the FBI’s most wanted list for a couple of years. They even escaped from prison. But the weird thing is, after all this, after they supposedly died, they were posthumously acquitted of all the charges. And that's weird, that doesn’t happen very often.”

“They were innocent?”

“I don’t know.” I stared at her, at the small crease between her eyebrows, at her usually comforting face, and I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to make her stop telling me this, because I didn’t want to know, I didn’t want to know what crimes Dean had been guilty of, (murder) what he’d done and whether he’d actually done it or not, (murder) and whether – oh God – Sam was really his brother.

I didn’t know what to think. Where the f*ck did you start with this?

“It’s all so… strange,” she said softly, her voice trailing off.

I bent over to pick up the mugshots again, the sheets of text that she’d printed off. Considered armed and extremely dangerous. They kept a huge-ass revolver on the nightstand in their bedroom. I’d seen it myself. That wasn’t normal behavior. Dean wasn’t a saint, I knew he wasn’t. Those things about him, the weird sh*t: the guns and the scars, the hunting and the look he’d sometimes get on his face, he was always… He was different. Dangerous, mysterious, and him and Sam together, they were…

Armed and extremely dangerous.

No way. This couldn’t be real. This was like a soap opera, a bad movie… Not real.

f*ck, they’d fascinated me, for months, all I’d been able to think about was Dean, and when I wasn’t thinking about him, or hell, about him and Sam, remembering that time I’d seen them making out (brothers), I’d be thinking about them, together, jerking off to the pictures and the memories in my head. And when I wasn’t jerking off thinking about Dean, I was thinking about the endless f*cking mysteries: the matching scars on their hands, the weird, touch-phobic thing… And hell, just them, just the two of them, everything about them - so different, so strange, this relationship that was nothing like any I’d seen before amongst the other adults in my life, so freakishly intense, so wrapped up in one another.

Jesus Christ, they were brothers. Brothers who f*cked each other, brothers who kissed and touched and were madly in love with each other, and I’d seen, I’d seen it with my own eyes, I’d seen the way they acted with each other, the way they kissed, I’d f*cking fantasized about it. I’d put myself in Sam’s place, imagined Dean looking at me the way he looked at Sam, and then imagined myself between them, a Dean/Sam sandwich. An incest sandwich.

Was this why they fascinated me so much? Cause they were brothers, cause they were like that…

I wanted to laugh, this couldn’t be real.

Lucinda was talking again, soft and quiet and thoughtful, and I wasn’t really hearing her, (…if they’re brothers then naturally Dean would lie about how they met and the photo would therefore make sense because of course they would’ve known each other when Sam was a teenager…) just her voice going on and on, as if she was presenting a case in Debate class and not talking about my boss – the guy I had a f*cking epic gay crush on – the same one that had been responsible for my sexual identity crisis, and just why he’d been f*cking his brother for f*cking years. Oh yeah, and how he used to be wanted by the FBI for murder.

“God, Lucinda! Please, just… shut up!”

She shut up, her mouth snapping closed immediately and eyes narrowing in on me.

“I’m gonna puke,” I said hopelessly, because I was… my stomach and guts churning and trying to make sense of -

“Tch, please, you’re not going to puke.”

“Lucinda –“

“People always do that on TV, but in real life, it doesn’t happen very often. You’ve got to be seriously in shock to puke.” Her voice was so calm, so matter of fact and scornful. “Just – get it together, Derek. We need to decide what to do about this.”

Why was she so f*cking calm? Why wasn’t she freaking the hell out? I plucked at my t-shirt, I felt gross, rank beads of sweat collecting under my armpits, and it was all reminding me of that night in the bar, the night when I’d realized that the fuzzy, tingling feelings I’d been having every time I looked at my boss were because I was actually queer and had a ginormous gay crush on him.

But I couldn’t think about that now, because this made me just like those sad, lonely freaks who write to death row murderers and then go get married to them without ever knowing anything about them, because I obviously knew nothing about Dean because he’d been on the FBI’s Most Wanted and was crazy in love with his brother.

“What do you mean, do about this?”

“Well… We should go to the police. We should tell someone.”

“Why do we need to tell anyone?”

She gaped at me for a while, stammering out, “Derek, Sam is – he’s one of my teachers. He’s in a position of responsibility; he must’ve lied to get the job, because if the college knew about any of this, then there’s no way he’d ever have gotten the job. So he must’ve got it under false pretences.”

“So? You gonna inform on him? He’ll lose his job, he’ll get run out of town, hell, he might even get arrested. They both might… You’d ruin his f*cking life.”

And then it struck me, what I was saying: they might get arrested; they might get run out of town… They’d leave. Dean would leave, and I wouldn’t work for him every day and I wouldn’t see him every day and that would be it… the end of this – end of all of it, my job, everything –

Whatever the f*ck Dean had done, whether it was all true, or he was or wasn’t guilty, and he’d been pardoned, right? All those charges were dropped. And okay, yeah, so he and Sam weren’t dead and were living under assumed names but… whatever, it all didn’t matter because I still wanted him. I didn’t want him to leave, or f*ck, get put in prison, no… I couldn’t. No. Just. No.

“Lucinda –“

“What?” she snapped. She was worrying her lip between her teeth, a classic Lucinda sign of inner conflict. Good. This meant she hadn’t decided anything yet, there was still time to save this, to figure things out…

“I thought you liked Sam. You told me he was, like, the best professor ever. If you did this, then you’d ruin his life, you’d get him sent to jail. Do you really want to do that? You’d really want to ruin his life?”

“I do like him,” she bit back. “Don’t look at me like that! He’s the best professor I have. He’s, like, miles better than the others, just really damn good, and I just - I don’t know, okay? I’ve been thinking about this ever since I got all this stuff and I… I haven’t decided what to do. I thought you might be able to help, but of course you’re no f*cking use!” She gave me a dirty look which I returned with interest.

“I don’t think we should tell the police or the authorities,” I said forcefully. “Anyway, if we do, they’re gonna want to know how you got the information in the first place, hacking into the police database like that – that’s a crime too.”

“I know that, Jesus, I know that!” She looked pale and anxious, smoothing those f*cking pages over as she replaced them in that folder.

“f*ck’s sake, Lucinda, why’d you have to look in the first place? Why’d you always do this?”

I felt so mad at her, she’d ruined everything. Why’d she have to do it? So what if Dean had made up some bullsh*t story about how he and Sam first met each other? So what if he couldn’t touch people and Sam spoke weird languages and they had tattoos that moved and so f*cking what about all of it…

What did it even matter when they were gonna have to leave? When I wasn’t gonna see him anymore and I’d forget everything: I’d forget how he looked when he was pleased with himself and I’d forget how he’d sing along to those dumb records he liked and how he flirted with all the f*cking women under forty, and hell, over forty, who came around. I’d forget. And that would be it. Over. And what would I do then? I’d go back to lying in bed at night remembering how my Dad looked when he’d gone into that coma for the last time, and I’d be thinking about that again instead of thinking how Dean had winked at me over lunch, and it would be all her fault.

“Maybe you should go now, Derek.”

“Yeah. Maybe I should.” I couldn’t keep the bitterness from my voice and I could see her shoulders tense up at it, but I didn’t care. This was all her fault.

I didn’t sleep that night. I couldn’t. No way. The only thing I could think about was Dean. Dean and Sam. While that was totally not a new thing for me, (I was used to being kept awake with thoughts of Dean and various parts of his body and his voice, and Jesus Christ, his face), I wasn’t used to being kept up with thoughts like these.

I kept seeing Dean and Sam in my head. That time I’d seen them make out, the looks on their faces, the way Sam had smashed Dean up against the desk, the way he’d buried his face into Dean’s neck like he was inhaling him… The countless times I’d seen them exchange quick touches, long, lingering looks, groping each other as if they couldn’t help themselves. And all the time…

Brothers?

I’d never had a brother. I couldn’t imagine what it must be like to want to f*ck your brother. I had a Dad though – I’d had a Dad, and the thought of ever wanting to –

Christ, no, the thought made me so sick, like I was really gonna puke this time, f*ck you, Lucinda.

Dean had mentioned a brother. In the bar the other night: I didn’t know you had a brother… and Dean’s hesitation, his quick answer, which, of course, had been a lie: uh, yeah, he died a long time ago… He was talking about Sam. Sam, his brother. And his Dad, the sh*t he’d said about his Dad – his and Sam’s Dad, because they had the same Dad, because they were brothers.

Jesus.

I guess my Dad used to ride us pretty hard… Cause that – now – that conjured up entirely new images, new thoughts, he was a one-off my old man… Had Dean’s Dad… had Dean and Sam’s Dad…

f*ck. It was well known that kids who went on to be abusers or sexual deviants were often victims of abuse in their childhoods. Lucinda would know, would probably be able to quote some f*cking statistics on it. Had Dean and Sam learned that from their father? Had he been the one who’d started it all?

Or maybe it was just them? Just Dean and Sam and the fact they couldn’t keep their hands off each other, that was the reality I was used to seeing.

I got to work early the next day. I’d been driving myself crazy at home, unable to sleep at all, getting up early to try and watch early morning TV. In the end, I gave in. I had to face Dean at some point, might as well get it over and done with.

The only thing was, I’d gotten to work so early, the place was still shut up. I’d never been there that early, usually Dean or Gabe opened up. This morning, I was forced to sit on the back stoop with a lukewarm bottle of water. I got up to pace around, I was in the middle of staring at the pock marks on the back wall of the lot, when I heard the familiar rumble of the Impala’s engine and the sound of Dean and Sam’s voices.

I froze immediately, my skin popping gooseflesh, despite the warm weather, my stomach starting to churn with the gross-ass water I’d been forcing down. They were getting out their cars, Dean in the Impala, Sam in his car, voices going up and down, teasing each other about something. Brothers, they were brothers. I stared at them as they walked over, trying to see it: the resemblance between them. But I couldn’t see it; it was just the two of them, same as always.

“What you doin’ here so early, kiddo?”

I didn’t know what I said in response, it was as if I wasn’t really there, my ears and eyes and head, groggy and detached, the lack of sleep probably didn’t help. I watched them unlock the back door, Sam coming up behind Dean and resting his hand on the small of Dean’s back, fingers creeping under Dean’s waistband, so normal and possessive and something I’d seen him do a thousand times.

Dean said something to me when we got inside, Sam stomping off to get the coffee machine started.

I nodded blankly and said, “I need to talk to you.”

Dean stopped half way through whatever he was saying and frowned. “Huh?”

“I need to talk to you about something.” I tried to make my voice sound stronger; it was too watery in my ears, too weak. “It’s personal.”

“Well, you can talk to me anytime, dude,” said Dean with a reassuring look. I felt sick to my stomach, and gulped, nodding and trying to look away from him.

“It’s about you. Uh, you and, uh, Sam. I, uh, I know.”

The change on Dean’s face was startling, the reassuring look vanishing like a snap of fingers, replaced by nasty suspicion, his eyes hardening as he gazed at me. He didn’t blink as he opened his mouth to call out: “Sam, get your ass out here!”

“What?” Sam sounded surprised, giving me a half-smile as he came out the kitchen.

When Dean spoke to me, his voice was icy: “Tell me. What do you think you know, Derek?”

I didn’t mean for it to go down like this. I was gonna think about it, plan it, try to make a proper decision. But I should’ve known better, I’d never been able to make a proper decision in my life. So when I’d seen Dean and Sam crossing the parking lot, something cracked, and now, I was here with two pissed off, possibly murderous, wanted felons.

I took a deep breath and spoke quickly, stammering, “I, uh, I know that your real names are Sam and Dean Winchester and that you’re, uh, you’re brothers.”

Sam took a step towards me, his face icy, a matching expression like Dean’s. I wished overwhelmingly that I’d waited, that I’d at least waited for it to just be Dean, because Dean… I could deal with him, but Sam… he was f*cking scary.

“That’s a bunch of crap,” he said, voice frighteningly calm.

I flinched and took a step backwards, away from him. Dean stuck out a hand, as if he was calling Sam off, keeping him away from me, and I felt a sudden burst of gratitude to him.

“It’s not just me,” I blurted out, “I’m not the only one who knows, so if you think you can do something to me –“

Dean interrupted me with his usual bark of a laugh, exchanging an incredulous look with Sam.

“Dude, you think we’re gonna do something to you?”

I hesitated, glancing between them, “I, uh, you have police records, you’ve both, uh, you’ve done some stuff.”

Dean blinked then gave a shaky laugh. “Whatever you think you’ve found out – it’s bullsh*t, Derek. It’s not true.”

Beside him, Sam was nodding, coming forward again until he was level with Dean. I watched his long fingers curl around Dean’s bicep, saw Dean relax into the touch, it was almost imperceptible, but I was used to watching Dean… I knew Dean and I knew then that they were lying. Dean was freaked out and Sam was reassuring him. He was lying and he wasn’t making a good job of it. I steeled myself, slowly raising my head until I was looking Sam in the face.

“You’re Sam Winchester, Sam Truman’s a fake name, and Dean is your brother, Dean Cooper – that’s another fake name. You were both wanted criminals, and then you died and for some reason, all the charges against you were dropped.”

Sam eyes narrowed on me, face blank and devoid of any tells. With Dean – I knew his tells, I’d learned them – with Sam – a whole other matter. I gulped and forced myself to continue.

“We did some diggin' and found it all out. It’s useless denying it. We have pictures, mugshots of the both of you.”

“We?” interrupted Sam, gaze piercing into me. “And who might be your partner in crime?”

“It, uh, it doesn’t matter,” I answered hastily.

Sam looked at me again then shook his head. “It’s Lucinda, isn’t it?”

“His little girlfriend?” said Dean, “f*ck, I knew that girl had a thing for you, Sammy.”

Sam laughed humorlessly. “Never mind that. Her father’s the town sheriff.”

“What?” Dean twisted to look at him. “Ah, great. Just f*cking. Peachy.”

He wrenched his arm out of Sam’s grasp and stalked across the room, fist coming out to thump against the wall. I flinched and Sam bored his eyes into mine.

“So, the question is: what’re you gonna do about it?”

*******************************************************

There’s probably some sort of karma involved in the fact that one of his own students, someone he’s encouraged in good research habits, has found out about him and Dean. Lucinda Croupland is a good student, definitely one of the best in his current freshman class. She’s eager and dedicated, and has one of those minds that just doesn’t quit, insistent on finding out every last detail possible, a true researcher in the making.

Dean’s freaked. He locks up the shop and calls the rest of the guys, saying, “Shop’s closed today,” and, “Yeah, you’ll get paid”. He turns to the kid after he’s done, holds out the receiver and says, “Call your girlfriend.”

The kid – Derek – looks scared. He’s pale and trembling and not bothering to hide it. He sounds terrified on the phone, and who can blame him? The sh*t he must’ve dug up on them… Sam can well imagine what the FBI reports say, the list of their crimes, their previous Most Wanted status. He should’ve known. Things were too good to be true. It couldn’t continue this well, he and Dean never could catch a f*cking break. It was always gonna end up like this.

They have to leave. There really isn’t any other way of getting around this. They have to leave: the house, the garage, his job… f*ck, he doesn’t want to leave his job, he loves his job. For the first time in God knows – f*ck, for the first time ever, they’re happy. And okay, things aren’t perfect- with Dean’s situation, what he did to his brother - things can’t be perfect, but everything else…

“She comin’ over?” Dean asks, when the kid puts down the receiver.

He nods nervously, swallowing and shaking and looking as if he’s about to lose that huge mug of coffee he’s just gulped down.

Dean nods tightly and turns to Sam, “Shoulda known this was all too good to be true. Shoulda known it’ll all come back to bite us in the ass.” He sounds bitter, that resigned, fatalistic look back on his face, the one that makes Sam’s chest ache.

“Hey,” he lays a hand on Dean’s shoulder, squeezes gently, “it’ll be okay. We’ll be alright.”

Dean pulls away from him with a soft snort and stomps off back to the kitchen - to the kid – who’s watching Dean, that half-awestruck, half-infatuated look on his face, as usual. Sam’s caught him staring once too often to not know what’s really going under that dumb, teenage exterior, lips slightly parted and eyes glazed, locked on the spot where Dean might be caressing the nape of Sam’s neck or the spot where he’d placed his hand on Dean’s hip.

It was flattering, seeing this kid and his hopeless pining for Dean, Dean who was Sam’s, utterly and completely, and who would never be anyone else’s. He used to feel sorry for him, it can't be easy being nineteen years old and realizing you like dick, having an impossible crush on your boss. And in a way, it was pretty cool, imagining how he and Dean might appear to outsiders, to messed-up, sexually confused kids like these. Hell, they could even be something of an inspiration, giving them hope and showing them that you didn’t have to conform to some sitcom stereotype to be gay, that you could like cars and rock music and hunting and guns, all that ”real man” bullsh*t, and still like co*ck…

…But it’s his fault – this kid and his stupid obsession with Dean – his fault that they’re here right now, and Sam’s not feeling sympathetic towards him now, not feeling like an inspiration now... He watches Dean take a seat at the kitchen table and motion to the kid to do the same, which he does, clumsily, practically falling into it in his haste to obey Dean. Dean leans forward and starts talking, slowly, seriously, the kid lowers his head, nodding, listening closely to whatever Dean’s saying, fingers twisting anxiously in the too-long sleeves of his hoodie.

Dean’s not giving up, Dean doesn’t give up, and neither does he. Maybe they can salvage something from this, maybe things will be alright, maybe they won’t have to leave after all.

Dean looks up, catches his eye and co*cks his head. Sam walks over and looms over the table, staring down at the kid, from this angle, all he can make out is the top of his head, his messy, dark-blond hair, his pale neck and the strip of vulnerable skin under his hairline. How fragile he looks from up above, how easy it would be to just -

He could do it. Do it to keep him and Dean safe… and he would do it. Do anything to keep Dean safe.

But Dean would never forgive him. Sam’s willing to do anything to save Dean, always has been, and Dean’s just as bad, holds his own life so cheap when it comes to Sam, but murdering innocent boys – Dean would never even consider that. The scary thing is, though, that he’s not even sure that he wouldn’t be capable of it, that he could do it, dispassionate and clinical, do it to keep Dean safe. How far would he go to keep his brother safe? The answer to that is easy; it’s branded into both of their hands, written into his blood. He remembers Dean saying the same thing to him years ago, what I wouldn’t do to protect this family, it scares me sometimes… But Sam’s not scared; he knows he could do it, if he had to.

“Derek and I have been having a little talk,” says Dean. He doesn’t look at Sam, eyes instead fixed on the top of the kid’s head. “He says he’s willing to keep our secret.”

The kid lifts his head up and nods furiously, his eyes look red, watery, the kid’s been f*cking crying. Jesus.

Sam swallows down the tidal wave of revulsion, coarse and acidic in his throat. Was he really thinking… Yes, he was thinking… of killing him, and he would’ve, he could’ve. But f*ck, this is a kid - this is a f*cking kid, a kid called Derek with a stupid crush, and he was seriously considering…

“I won’t tell anyone,” Derek pleads. “Believe me, please. I didn’t want – all this – I didn’t want to find it all out. Lucinda is just,” he breaks off and gives a huge sigh that seems to dwarf his skinny body. “When she gets an idea in her head, she never lets it go. And all this research stuff, she loves it.”

Dean snorts at that, raises his eyes to Sam with an accusing look, “You know this is kinda your fault, dude.”

He snaps back at Dean, absurdly angry, because this – this isn’t a f*cking joke. None of this is a joke.

“Christ, Dean, I was just doing my f*ckin’ job!”

“Oh Lucinda thinks you’re awesome, she’ll kill me for saying this but she’s got this huge crush on you,” says Derek.

“I knew that chick was hot for you,” grunts Dean.

He presses his lips together, willing himself forcibly back to calmness, patience.

“Yeah, okay, Dean, because that’s what’s important here, some girl wantin’ to jump my bones.” He turns to Derek, “Derek. Listen. What you’re agreeing here – you’re agreeing to say nothing. To tell no one about what you and Lucinda have found out. Is that right?”

Derek widens his eyes and nods furiously some more; it makes him look even younger somehow. “Yeah, yeah, I didn’t want to – it wasn’t really me. I didn’t want to know. I don’t want… you shouldn’t leave. There’s no reason for you to leave.”

“Yeah, we’ll see about that,” snaps Dean.

Derek flinches and darts him a look, Sam glares at Dean over the kid’s head, signaling: shut up.

“And Lucinda, will you able to convince her to keep quiet too?”

“I don’t know. She’s uh, with her dad, she can be kinda moral sometimes.”

Dean sighs loudly and slams his fist down on the stained worktop, “f*ck!” He grips the edge, his back to them, as if he’s steeling himself, as if he’s trying to learn how to breathe again. Sam watches him, feels his heart miss a beat as Dean slowly turns around. He looks defeated, painful, bitter amusem*nt written into the lines around his eyes and mouth.

“Okay. So. We need to go. We should leave here, cause, I don’t know about you, Sam, but I’m not takin’ a chance on this chick keepin’ her mouth shut. You and me’ve been through way too much sh*t to spend the rest of our lives in freakin’ jail. I’m just – that’s not happening.”

“No, wait!” interrupts the kid suddenly. He looks distraught, tugging at the sleeves of his hoodie, every possible tick or gesture that signals distraught, lovesick teenager, “Don’t, don’t think about leavin’ just yet. I can talk to her, we can work this out.” He stares up at Dean with a clear, blazing look in his eyes that’s almost reverent. “Dean, I don’t want – please, you shouldn’t think about goin’. We can keep secrets. Lucinda, she’s, uh, she’s kinda been keepin’ a secret for me for a while. She’s pretty good at it.”

Sam narrows his gaze on him, the kid blushes, blinks and ducks his head.

“Derek, listen. We appreciate it, really –“

“Would’ve appreciated it a damn site more if he’d kept his nose outta our f*ckin’ business, in the first place,” bites out Dean. Derek flinches again and Sam represses the urge to sigh out loud in frustration, instead glaring at his brother.

“Derek, we do appreciate your willingness to lie for us. But this is gonna get out. People are going to know, they’ll find out, they always do. And think about what you found out, not just the criminal charges, which, believe me, are not true, but the other stuff,” he pauses, swallows, sets his shoulders, meeting the kid’s eyes: “Yeah, all that is true. Dean is my older brother.”

The kid gapes at the two of them, face red and flushed, his mouth opens and closes silently for a moment, then he licks his lips, fingers twisting together. “But you – I, I’ve seen you together…”

Sam flushes and coughs, looking away, not wanting to meet Dean’s eye, but he can hear his brother’s uncomfortable laugh, see him walking out of the room and disappearing into the shop from the corner of his eye.

“Yeah, it’s, uh, it’s a long story,” he says at last. “There are reasons, personal good reasons, that Dean and I – that we are what we are, and we’re not, we’re not proud of it. But it is what it is and I’m not going to explain any of it right now.” He sighs and sits down at the table, facing the kid. Derek stiffens, frozen in his chair; his hands white knuckled as he grips the table. “We are not the bad guys. What we do together, it’s nobody’s business but ours.”

“I know,” he stutters, “I know that, Sam, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well, too late now.” He leans back in his chair, feeling a sudden burst of vindication when the kid’s face pales.

“Hey, look who I found outside.”

He looks up as Dean strolls back in, grim-faced and grim-voiced, a terrified looking Lucinda trailing after him. She glances at him, face flushing a brilliant red when he meets her eyes. He shakes his head and huffs out a breath.

“Okay, let’s talk.”

Dean goes missing after Lucinda arrives, gets into the car and drives off, leaving it all to him. He talks to the two kids for a while, they both swear, eyes shining and red stains on their cheeks, apologies on their lips and full of ardent promises, they won’t spill, swear to God, they won’t say a word.

Lucinda’s less guarded than Derek, asks him questions, like she’s interviewing him for a thesis, he’s half impressed, hell, normally he would be, gotta admire that kind of academic discipline. But it’s too late now.

He takes his car, Dougal in the backseat and the kid in shotgun with a look of pure terror on his face as he buckles up. But Sam offered and the kid was already too apologetic and sh*t-scared to turn him down. They pull up at the kid’s house and Sam kills the engine. He slowly removes his seatbelt and turns to look at him with a conflicted expression.

“Sam, is it, uh, can I ask you something?”

It’s only just after eleven by the time he gets home. The morning isn’t over yet, and already, their world has been turned upside down. He’s been too occupied to call the department, let them know why he hasn’t shown for the 10am Freshman Introduction to American Folklore study group, and he only remembers as he’s bumping his car up their driveway.

He pulls up at the front and heads around the side of the house. Dean’s out the back, sitting on the grass, arms spread out behind him to take his weight, face upturned towards the sun. Dougal perks up from his spot by Dean and runs up to greet Sam. He bends over and pets him distractedly, eyes only for his brother, for the way the sun dapples his body, for the sweaty gleam of his skin and the blond tinge of his hair. Dean, he thinks, my Dean.

He walks over to join him, drops down to the grass. The ground is prickly through the thin seat of his dress pants, grass sparse and dry.

Dean turns his head, squints at him, there’s a pink tinge to his nose, the sun’s pretty high, gotta be heading towards 90 degrees already, and Dean, the stupid idiot, is already burning.

“Dude, you’re burning up. Put some damn sunscreen on.”

Dean shrugs, ignores the advice. “Nah, s’just a healthy glow.”

Sam snorts, starts to loosen the tie around his neck, undo the top button of his dress shirt, it’s hot out here, he can feel the sweat begin to pool in the dip of his lower back, his armpits and behind his knees.

He watches Dean run his hands over Dougal’s fur; the dog nestled up against Dean’s side, there’s genuine affection in the way Dean’s fingers idle through his ruff, the comforting way he ruffles at Dougal’s ears. Sam thinks of how they first got him: about a year after the ritual, during a hunt in Arkansas. The family he belonged to had been eviscerated by a local coven, their bodies laid out across the kitchen floor in a hideous mockery of a bloody tableau, Dougal left cowering and whimpering in the corner when Sam and Dean burst in, too late to save anybody except the family pet. “We should take him just for the night, Sam, we’ll drop him off at a kennel tomorrow,” Dean said, and Sam didn't have the heart to gainsay him. Four years later, he still doesn't.

“You know he can come with us, Dean. There’s room in the backseat. Be all wrong without him.”

“Damn straight,” says Dean.

He turns his head to look at Sam; he’s squinting still, eyes moss green slits. “How long do you reckon they’ll keep quiet?”

“I don’t know. A week, tops. Probably less.”

“f*ckin’ teenagers.”

He sighs, “Yeah, f*ckin’ teenagers.”

“Guess we should blow this joint then, Sammy.”

“Guess so.”

It’s their cue to move, but neither of them does. Dean twists his head around, peers up at the roof. “I was gonna finish that up this weekend,” he says. “Thinkin’ about starting work on the garden afterwards, hedges need cutting back, pretty f*ckin’ desperately.”

“Yeah,” Sam agrees.

“Guess I don’t need to worry about that anymore.”

Sam turns his head to look at him; Dean looks wistful, lips pursed in that way that means he’s thinking things over, lines in his face more prominent than usual in the harsh sunlight. He was thinking himself of starting a herb garden: belladonna, rosemary, sage, wolfsbane, chamomile, real juicy sh*t, honestly, he can’t believe he didn’t think of it sooner, it seems like such a glaring oversight now. He catches Dean’s eye and feels his heart start to break.

“Dean, I don’t want to leave.” In his own head, he sounds like he’s fourteen again, that same tone of voice he used to try with Dad, Dad, please, I don’t want to leave, not this time. Can’t we stay till the end of the year? Just this time? Please, Dad…

“Sammy, we’ve got no choice.”

He chokes out a laugh, nods his head, hair flying into his eyes. “Right, yeah, yeah. You’re right.”

Neither of them says anything for a moment, then Sam speaks, not bothering to hide the yearning in his voice, the hope: “Do you think we’ll ever find somewhere like this again? That we’ll ever… be able to be, just, in one place? Do you think we’ll ever have that?”

Dean shrugs, when he turns to Sam, he’s looking hopeful, every emotion clear and present on his face, there for Sam to see, nothing hidden, and Sam loves him so, so much. “We can try.”

************************************************

Sam told me not to come into work until he or Dean called, said that the shop would be closed for the rest of the day, but they’d probably be open again tomorrow, said that it would take a couple of days for things to go back to normal. He’d been surprisingly calm in the car, and it made me feel bad for ever thinking of him as some sort of Satan worshipping nutjob, not that being on the run from the FBI and f*cking your brother didn’t make you into a nutjob, because yeah, it did.

“Sam, is it, uh, can I ask you something?” I asked, after we’d pulled up outside my house. He looked surprised, then nodded okay.

“It’s… the scars on your hands, you and Dean, you have matching scars and I’ve always wondered, if they – if they mean anything?”

He looked at me for a long moment, as if thinking deeply about something, before he adjusted his grip on the steering wheel, and said tightly, “Believe me, Derek, you do not want to know about that.”

“Oh, right,” I said lamely. “Uh, sorry.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

I should’ve gotten out of the car right then. The silence was seriously uncomfortable, and he was acting as if he was only just managing to hold himself in check, or hold himself together. I don’t know, it was hard to explain, but it was like there was something broken in my head too, because I didn’t move either. I had this feeling, this gut, deep-down feeling, that this was the last chance I’d have to ever talk to either Sam or Dean, and there was so much, so many things about them that I’d been thinking about and obsessing about for so long.

And today… today had just been so much. When I’d got up this morning, I hadn’t even thought about telling Dean what we’d discovered, still trying to process it all, and now I’d gone and done it, and Sam knew, and Lucinda had been dragged into it, though seriously, whole thing was her f*cking fault, and now... ,

…Now what exactly? What was going to happen next?

“I, I’m sorry. We shouldn’t, you know, we shouldn’t have gone, like, snooping into your backgrounds like that. It was… not right.”

“Doesn’t matter now,” he said tiredly. “Anyway, if you hadn’t, someone else would’ve. We should’ve thought – nothing stays buried forever.”

We were silent for what felt like a long moment, though it probably wasn’t that long at all. I stared at his hands, still on the wheel, still at ten to two, the twisted purple scar. I was never going to know.

“Well, uh, thanks for the ride,” I said at last. “I’ll, uh, see you around.”

I waited at home for the phone call, but none came, and really, I wasn’t surprised. Eventually, Uncle Lou called, sounding gruff and pissed, telling me that they’d left, “f*ckin’ gone for good. I knew there was something wrong with those two fa*ggots.”

I wasn’t surprised about that either.

Bobby Singer turned up a few days later, told us that the business was for sale, that Dean and Sam wouldn’t be back and that whoever bought it would decide whether or not we kept our jobs. In the end, it was bought by Tom Phelan who ran the rival garage at the other end of town, he’d apparently wanted to get a hold of the place back before, when Old Man McGregor had owned it, except Dean and Sam had gotten in first.

I borrowed my Mom’s car and drove to their house on one of the days I knew Bobby’d be there, and sure enough, he was, helping a couple of guys pack their stuff into the back of a truck. The place looked deserted, though it was kinda hard to tell the difference, it had never looked particularly well-looked after.

Bobby saw me and raised his hand in greeting as I pulled up. He was pretty friendly, so either Dean and Sam hadn’t told him about my part in their sudden departure or he just didn’t give a sh*t.

“So, when are you leaving?” I asked.

He shrugged and adjusted his hat. “Soon as I’m done. Tomorrow most likely.”

I nodded, feeling my stomach twist, chest screwing up and getting tight. “And that’s – that’s it. They’re gone? For good?”

Bobby nodded, “That’s right.”

I could feel the tears threatening, my eyes were all hot and damp and burning and I had a huge-ass lump in the back of my throat. I sort of nodded and waved goodbye and got the hell out of there.

After about a mile, I pulled over to search through the box of CD’s in the glove compartment until I found the one I was looking for: Neil Young’s Harvest. We’d played it at my Dad’s funeral, it was his favorite album, he’d loved Neil Young. I hadn’t been able to listen to it since then, but today felt like the right time to start again.

Chapter 10: Epilogue

Chapter Text

November 2017

This isn’t the end of my story/memoir/whatever, because there’s an epilogue I’ve got to include.

After Dean and Sam left things were pretty bad for me for a while. In the end my Mom made me see a therapist, and surprisingly it actually helped me out a lot, because seriously, I had some major f*cking baggage, what with my dad and being gay and in love with a guy who’d been a dead wanted criminal and who was f*cking his brother…

Anyway, sh*t got better eventually and about four years later Evan and I moved to New York. (No, not like that, though Evan did turn out to be bi-sexual – which, so f*cking typical of him - choose already dude). So, we were living in Brooklyn, sharing this unbelievably tiny sh*thole with this other dude called Garry who was a go-go dancer, and I was taking drama and tending bar at this local gay pub to pay my rent. I know, I know, total New York gay stereotype, but it turned out that I was f*cking good at acting. It had kinda saved me during all those awful post-Dean months and I’d had to pass sh*tloads of auditions to get into that school, and let’s face it, there was no way I was ever gonna end up a freaking mechanic.

So I was tending bar one night at the gay pub where I worked, and I kinda stopped in the middle of pouring someone's gin and tonic in shock when the music on the jukebox switched to Don't Stop Believin' by Journey. I think it was probably the first time ever someone had played that freaking song in here and to be honest I hadn't been aware we even had it, and the thing was... it always, always made me think of Dean - of that day when I'd first seen him...

I glanced across at the jukebox and froze.

There was Dean.

It was weird, but kinda not at the same time. From the moment I'd heard that damn song, I'd had this strange feeling of inevitability...

Whatever, he was here now and I was staring in shock over at him and totally screwing up the order I was in the middle of fixing. I finally got myself together, pouring away the botched gin and tonic and reaching to fix another, trying vainly to stop my hands from shaking. I couldn't stop my stomach fluttering and churning though, and it was like no time had passed at all, exactly like it used to be all those years ago…

I watched him approach the bar from the corner of my eye, at which point I fled to the other end and started filling someone else’s order, way too scared to confront him yet. When I finally did turn around, he was not alone. Sam was with him.

“Hey! Can we get some service over here?”

I gulped and slowly approached them, keeping my head ducked as I took their order. I must’ve looked like a complete retard because I was trying not to stare at them while I pulled their beers, the second time I looked up, I noticed them watching me curiously and I flushed and looked away.

“Hey – it’s Derek, isn’t it?” Dean called out.

sh*t.

I set my shoulders and turned around, pasting on a fake smile and nodding dumbly.

“Yeah, man, it is you. I knew it.”

He grinned, and whoa – there it was, my stomach ducking and diving like I remembered. He nudged Sam and said, “Told you. You owe me five bucks Sammy.”

“I’ll take it out in trade,” Sam shrugged.

Dean laughed out loud, and I felt slightly ill. They both looked so much like they used to, older yeah, and with more grey hair, but Sam was still crazily f*cking tall, still built like a linebacker and still with the same dumb haircut and Dean… God he was just as hot as I remembered… fuller in the face, like he’d put on some weight, but that only made him seem even hotter, less godlike and unobtainable than he used to be.

“So you work here?” he asked.

I still hadn’t said anything by this point, still opening and closing my mouth and nodding and smiling like a complete tool. But I finally managed to nod my head and say, “Uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I do.”

Then, suddenly remembering that I was, you know, in the middle of getting their freaking drinks, I turned around and went back to pouring them, trying to stop my dumbass hand from shaking too much. I took a while getting the heads right on their beers, trying to calm myself down while being hit by a rush of memories of everything that had happened in that year, by my realizing that I was gay (which – thanks for that Dean) and by everything that had come out when Lucinda had gone digging into their backgrounds.

People say that you never forget your first love and mine had the added bonus of having freaky touching issues and being an ex-con, supposedly dead and once wanted for murder. Plus, there was the whole thing where Dean was one of the hottest guys I’d ever known, and oh yeah, was in a crazy incestuous relationship with his brother who was also one of the hottest guys I’d ever known.

Pretty f*cking unforgettable.

“Wow, you’re all grown up, huh?” Dean said as I gave them the beers, shooting me a wink which went straight to my co*ck. I saw Sam roll his eyes from the corner of my eye and felt my cheeks start to heat up. “Lookin’ good dude.”

Jesus, I was blushing like it was the best compliment I’d ever been given. It was entirely pathetic. Normally, and I know this is probably hard to believe, but normally, my game was good. Working as a bartender in this place, I’d learned to flirt like it was second nature, and I was used to hooking up at least twice a week. But just that compliment from Dean, and I was a puddle of lame and pathetic goo again, just like the clueless nineteen year old I used to be. It was pitiful.

He beckoned me over when I finished serving another customer.

“So what you doing in the big city? You at school?”

I told them about the school, about the acting, Dean’s eyebrows shot up in disbelief and he actually laughed out loud, “Seriously? You do that?”

“I was not really cut out to be a mechanic.”

Dean snorted, “Yeah, coulda told you that kid.”

I asked them what they were doing, if they’d settled down somewhere else and they didn’t really answer, just said something about a road trip, about Sam doing research for a book. Mysterious to the last.

They finished up their drinks and made as if to go. Sam taking a twenty from his wallet and putting it into my tip jar with a quick smile.

I nodded thanks and then gabbled out, “I, uh, I gotta say – I want to thank you both –“

“For the tip – it’s nothing…”

“No, no,” I cut Sam off, feeling my cheeks starting to burn. “For, uh, you two. Well, Dean, really. You, uh, you made me realize, back before, that I was gay. I, uh,” I chanced a look at Dean who was looking at me curiously, “You were the first guy I ever had a crush on and if it hadn’t been for you then it might’ve taken me years to figure it out. So, I just, I want to say thanks for that.”

“For being so freakin’ irresistible? Hey, it’s a burden I’m well used to.”

Sam rolled his eyes, “Oh God, he’s gonna be unbearable now,” but he was grinning at me, shaking his head at Dean.

“Sorry,” I said.

Sam turned to me to say goodbye, holding out his hand for me to shake, I took it and smiled at him, having a sudden sense memory of the first time I’d seen him, how much he’d freaked me out, how much that scar on his…

Wait a minute…

It wasn’t there. No scar. I dropped his hand with a jolt of surprise.

“Dude, you okay?”

“Your scars, uh, you don’t have the scars anymore,” I stammered out, looking between his and Dean’s hands, because there was nothing on either of Dean’s hands either. No trace of it. Nothing.

They exchanged a quick glance, then Dean gave a dismissive sort of shrug.

“Yeah, we had them removed. Amazing what lasers can do today. Well, uh, we should be goin’, but you take care man.” He held out his hand and I took it, shaking goodbye, still shocked by the lack of scars.

It was only when they were actually walking out of there, door swinging shut behind them, that I realized I’d shaken Dean’s hand.

End

ETA: There's now a timestamp/deleted scene from this universe here