My evil muse/plot bunny amde me write this. Don't ask why. Just read and review.
Title: What Dreams May Come
Summary: Forced to share a bed with his brother, Sam discovers something about Dean that he never knew. Something that shakes him to his very core. One-shot. Post-AHBL2.
Warning: Oh, the brotherly love that abounds in this story. Watch out. It'll hurt you if you're not prepared.
Disclaimer: The show and its characters are not mine. They belong to an evil genius named Mr. Kripke.
What Dreams May Come
It wasn't the most comfortable of situations. The only way that Sam even got himself through it all was by repeatedly whispering that it was a routine hunt. It wouldn't take long. Maybe only a couple of days. A week, tops.
He was lucky it was only a run-of-the-mill graveyard haunting with a ghost that only hung around its own grave. He wouldn't be able to take more than a couple of days like this. Thank goodness for idiotic spirits. The only reason they were even going after it was that it liked to push people during the day and the violence might escalate.
Simple salt and burn. They didn't even really have to hunt for the thing.
It wasn't the hunt that was the problem, though. It was the current living arrangement. Apparently, the small town the graveyard was in was the only one for miles around and was holding some sort of festival. All of their motels were booked. All but one, and it only had one room available. Lucky them.
The bed was a king. Just one. Not two. Only one. And it wasn't nearly big enough.
Dean had offered to sleep on the floor, but Sam wouldn't let him. The floor was dirty. Dean definitely didn't need a motel-room-floor bug crawling into his brain and laying its eggs there to hatch at a later date and kill him, especially if said eggs hatched before his final year was up. Sam had pointed out that siblings shared beds on vacations all the time. No big deal, right?
Very big deal.
Sam sighed, gazing up at the ceiling as shadows danced across the darkened room. He regretted never paying attention to Dean's sleeping habits before, because his brother was currently sprawled across the bed, his hand lying limply across Sam's chest.
Dean also believed that the room they'd rented was incredibly hot, and was sleeping in only his boxers, sweating all over his little brother.
He talked in his sleep, too. Things that would make sailors and their hookers blush. Disgusting things that Sam would like to tell him about in the morning, but was too disturbed by to speak aloud.
And then Dean rolled over. Sam let out a sigh of relief and laced his fingers together behind his head, scooting over a little to fill some of the space that Dean had stolen from him and, by rolling away, left.
As long as his brother stayed on his own side of the bed, Sam figured he could tolerate it. At least, for a couple of nights.
As soon as the thought had finished racing through his mind, Dean's hand flew over and smacked him in the face. Moaning, Sam pushed his brother's hand away, only to find the older man on top of him again. He tried to push Dean off, and the elder rolled away.
Great, Sam thought, not only does he sprawl and talk, he tosses and turns, too. Just what I need this week.
His brother was back on him again, leaning into his side, wrapping strong arms around him, making Sam thoroughly uncomfortable. Then he felt the shaking.
At first he thought that the room they were in was haunted and that a homophobic ghost was trying to break up Dean's unconscious love-fest. But then he realized that Isaiah Washington was still alive, so that couldn't be the case. Besides, the shaking wasn't coming from the bed. It was coming from Dean.
He looked over at his brother, suddenly concerned, and saw that the color had drained from his body. He was coated in a cold sweat, shivering even though he'd complained about the room being too hot.
And then the second realization of the night hit him. Dean wasn't shivering. He was trembling.
Sam pulled back, scooting away from his brother, and took a good look at him. Sweat ran down his body in tiny rivulets, nearly covering up the fact that water was leaking from his tightly closed eyes. He was trembling and clutching the sheets with enough force to turn his knuckles white. His mouth was working, as if he was trying to speak, but no sound was coming out.
"Dean?" Sammy whispered, growing concerned. It looked like his brother was having some sort of nightmare, but that wasn't possible. Dean didn't have nightmares. Sam did.
"Dean?" he asked again, moving a little farther away, considering waking the older man up from what was obviously a very fitful sleep, "you ok?"
He was answered by a string of frantically muttered words and a vice-like grip on his wrist. Startled, Sam tried to pull away. As if in response to his actions, Dean's mumblings got louder until they were clearly understandable.
"Don't leave… please… I'll be good."
"What?" Sam asked, stopping his struggling.
"Promise," Dean whispered, "be good… don't go… again."
Eyes wide, Sam settled back into the bed. "What?" he asked again, this time in a low whisper.
"Dead," Dean responded, curling up against his brother's side as he finally took his hand from Sam's wrist, "gone… school… it's dead."
"What?" Sammy asked once more. Had it not been nearly three in the morning, he might have been able to place the disjointed words together, but it was late and he was sleep-deprived. It was going to take a while.
"Come back," Dean whimpered and Sam felt a chill run down his spine. He'd never heard his brother sound so broken, so weak, so pathetic.
And then it hit him. Don't leave. I'll be good. Don't go again. It's dead. School. Two years on the road with his brother and he'd never thought about it, never wondered how Dean handled all the abandonment, all the threats of leaving, all the running away in the middle of the night. He usually just cracked a joke and went on with his life. Obviously, it was bugging him.
"It's ok," Sam said softly, wondering just how often his brother had the obviously terrifying nightmare, "I'm not going anywhere."
"Don't go," Dean whispered again, wrapping his arms tightly around his brother, as if to hold him there, "I'm sorry."
Sam blinked, staring up at the ceiling, wondering what he should do. There was such sincerity in his brother's voice, such a sense of longing, of needing. He wondered again how often Dean had the dream, how many times he'd woken from it to find himself alone.
He realized suddenly that his brother hardly ever slept. He was often the last one to bed and the first to rise. Sometimes he was even up in the middle of the night when Sam woke from his own horrible dreams, waiting with warm hands and wide eyes and a comforting voice to make the bad things go away.
As Dean's sobs and shudders died down beside him, even though his grip remained firm as steel, Sam figured out what he had to do.
o0o0o0o0o
"How'd you sleep last night?" Dean asked as soon as he noticed his brother's eyes opening.
Sam stared at him, wondering if he remembered, if he'd woken up in some kind of compromising position. "Ok," he shrugged, "you?"
"Same as always." And Sam had his answer.
o0o0o0o0o
It was pretty easy for Sammy to convince his brother to fall asleep first. The salt and burn had gone off without a hitch, and the younger man offered to look for a new job while his brother slept.
So, Sam fired up the laptop, waiting for his brother to nod off. He searched without really finding anything for a little over an hour before he heard the first moan. He turned around in his chair to find Dean stretching his arm out over the bed, apparently looking for something.
"Dean?" Sam asked, slowly rising from his chair, "you asleep?"
"Gone," Dean whispered, still searching with his hand.
"It's ok," Sam replied softly, sitting on the bed beside his brother, "I'm right here." He reached out his hand and set it lightly on top of Dean's. "See? Right here."
That seemed to calm him considerably, as his hand stopped wandering over the covers and just lay there under Sam's. "Sorry."
"I know you are. But it's ok. I promise." He swung his legs up onto the bed, moving his hand so that he wouldn't sit on it and feeling guilty about it as he saw his brother pale. "It's ok, it's ok," he said quickly, placing a hand on Dean's head, "I'm still here. I didn't leave."
"Said…"
"That was a long time ago," Sammy whispered, "I'm not going anywhere."
"Hell… alone…"
It took Sam a moment to decipher, to put two and two together to make an eternity alone. Dean was headed to Hell at the end of the year, all because he couldn't stand to be alone. Back when he'd made the deal, their father had still been trapped down there, meaning that Dean would have a welcoming committee when he reached fire and brimstone. Then their father had moved on to a better place, leaving Dean to face Hell by himself.
"I'm gonna save you," Sam said, sliding down a little farther in the bed and smiling as Dean curled up against him again, wrapping strong arms around his middle and pulling him close, "I promise."
Dean nodded, sniffling as he buried his face in his brother's shirt and finally calmed down, slipping farther into sleep. Sam stayed up with him the rest of the night, alert, waiting for the nightmare to come back. Dean rolled away from him twice in the darkness before the shuddering and mumbling started again, and both times Sam was there to comfort him, hoping to keep the nightmares at bay for as long as he could.
o0o0o0o0o
Starting at about five in the morning, Sam feigned sleep, not wanting to embarrass his older brother when he woke up. Dean was, after all, still wrapped around him tightly, hanging on for dear life.
He felt his brother start to stir around six. Dean got up half an hour later, groaning softly as he disentangled himself from his younger sibling. "Again?" he whispered to himself, "maybe Sammy's not the gay one."
Sam opened his eyes a few minutes after his brother walked away from the bed. "Morning."
"Morning," Dean said, flashing a sheepish grin, "how'd you sleep?"
"Fine," Sam yawned, rubbing at his eyes. "You?"
Dean shrugged. "You know, I actually slept all right. Best night's sleep I've had in a while, I guess. Must be the cramped quarters."
"Yeah," Sammy smiled, "must be."
The End. So, any comments? I love it when people review!