A/N: This is a silly little plot bunny on the loose. I decided to follow down the rabbit hole, and this thing came out. Thank to angeltrap (angeltrap dot livejournal dot com) for making this readable. :) Hope you'll enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or any of the characters presented in this story. I'm not making any money on this, and I don't mean any harm.

Thou shalt not steal

Michigan, 2007

It was a sound as if someone broke a twig, overstretched a rubber elastic band and snapped their fingers all at once. Then a moment of silence, the world standing still and dust dancing in the weak sunlight from the grimy windows before sound rushed back. The old man before him sneered at him, his hair (the little he had left) fluffy and electric around his head like he'd rubbed it against the carpet floor. There was a large suspicious-looking stain visible right through him on the floor, spreading up the dusty old recliner sitting in the middle of a mountain of crap. He could see where the body had been decomposing, where the flesh had turned to jelly and where flies had hatched in the juices left to soak into the fabric of the chair cushions.

There was a split second of time standing still, the kind where your brain scrambles for the right thing to focus on. The kind of moment you have right before you freak out and your body saturates you with even more adrenaline, even if you already feel on edge and wired and like a character from the Matrix.

Sam's brain spent it worrying about Dean, who was spread-eagled on the floor with his mouth wide open and the whites of his eyes showing in slits.

And so the old man pounced. There was no more time to think about Dean, because he was too busy reloading the shot gun to watch his own back and simultaneously completing his task of burning the silver coated watch the man had been wearing. The glass on it was almost matted with use, and the silver worn through in places to show the cheap golden metal underneath. One hand hung listlessly down with gravity, showing no time at all. Certainly not worn for its value.

He threw the zippo – Dean's – into the bowl, took aim and fired.

Had the man not been standing at the mouth of the gun he was pretty sure he would've missed.

He reappeared, his hair still a sad show of age and dementia and carpet-rubbing, (and) his face a confused and angry grimace, right on the brown spot in the carpet, next to the rickety old arm chair with the little table next to it, wobbling with newspapers and cigarette butts. Like he was re-enacting his own death. His mouth hung open just a little bit, the way it does when there's no one inside to keep it closed, and Sam watched as see-through limbs caught fire and disappeared.

And then all that was left was the sizzling of lighter fluid, the pungent smell of decomposing human flesh that had alerted the neighbors, the buzz of flies on the windows and Dean.

Dean's whuffling, snorting breaths as he tried to regain consciousness. Sam fell to his knees next to him, one hand splayed on his chest to keep his brother down when he tried to lurch upwards, the other hovering worriedly over the twisted right leg halfway trapped underneath what must have been a several feet high stack of newspapers before Dean hit it on his way down, still tangled in the table he went down over.

Fucking hoarders.

It's not until he's in the car that Dean manages to open his eyes properly, and even then they're unseeing and wild. They roam around the car, seeing things galaxies away for all that they focus on anything closer to home. His face is drawn tight with confusion which has Sam worried even more than the pain twisting over his brow. He starts sweating at some point, his forehead beading up and his breath coming faster and faster every time he inhales like he's trying to breathe through it. Sam throws a look back every ten seconds, his hands turning the wheel like he's the get-away driver in an old movie, barely avoiding oncoming traffic as Dean grunts in pain, his head bouncing off the window with every bump in the road. Like Sam's Mr. White, driving and assuring and promising that "everything will be all right" while Mr. Orange slowly bleeds to death in the back seat.

The hospital isn't particularly impressed with his driving, either. He parks in front of the hospital entrance, and even as an overweight and angry security guard tries to get him to move the thing he's hauling Dean out of the car and out onto the dry pavement out front.

"Get a fucking doctor" he says, as Dean's fingers twitch into the fabric of his shirt like it's the only thing keeping him tethered to earth. Sam knows how he feels.

He's breathing through his nose now, his forehead wrinkled and his eyes squeezed tightly together.

"You're okay, man. You're okay."

He says it again and again, fingers going through Dean's hair before he tries to get his brother halfway upright so he can lift him up, entirely too aware that he's wrong.

He's really not okay.

Nurses run towards them while they sit there, Dean leaning back against his chest as he tries to keep him awake and alert. Dean doesn't respond in words, and he doesn't calm down or give any kind of response that tells Sam that his constant stream of assurances are getting to him, but he keeps going anyway. He stops several times, roots through his head for something that will help more, will help that pained expression on Dean's semi-conscious face smooth out, but there's nothing.

And so he starts again.

"You're okay. We're okay, you're going to be fine. I gotcha."

The three women who have come out to help lower the gurney until all they have to do is lift Dean carefully, one simply supporting the leg Sam's shouting about, loud and echoing against the dark walls of the hospital.

He stands in the doorway while the nurses and a doctor work on his brother, scissoring his jeans off and leaving him completely naked on the examination table, snapping gloves and inserting tubes, measuring and taking stats until he feels dizzy watching Dean's face and chest under that too bright light.

Some system seems to form in the chaos after a short while, and they push him aside as they wheel Dean, now covered in a white sheet with an IV fastened to his hand and his face lax and smooth with morphine through the double doors.

"Where.." he croaks, and clears his throat. "Where are you taking him?"

"X-ray," one of the women call to him as they hurry down the hallway. Sam can see Dean's toes disappearing off in the distance just as a small, warm hand closes on his shoulder.

"Let me show you to the waiting room, sir. You can sit there until we get more information on your brother, all right?"

And with that he's shoved into a little box with a dozen other people with red-rimmed eyes and sweaty hands, with eyes that refuse to meet his and pretend they didn't when they do, glued instead to magazines they're not actually reading. There's a girl of five or so playing with the legos in the corner, her mother a frenetic mess of hands in her mouth and in her hair, her legs bouncing on the linoleum.

Sam's feet are still, his boots still covered in grains of salt. He smells of something heavy and musky, of a flat that hasn't been aired out and where the plumbing hasn't worked, where a body has been decomposing in that pungent way decaying flesh favors.

He thinks about the old man for a moment, his mind desperate for anything, anything, else.

Wonders what it takes for a man to be so alone he lives in a flat filled from floor to ceiling in papers and trash.

And he'd dredge up some sympathy, sure, but he can't for the life of him understand why it's fair that Dean had to go down under every single copy of whatever-the-fuck-it-was when all he was trying to do was give the fucker some peace.

Fucking hoarders.

He can hear the scramble of tiny wheels screaming for oil and a tinny voice from a speaker out in the hallway, and settles in for a long wait in the oppressive mood in the tiny waiting room while strangers put Humpty-Dumpty back together again.

Then.

Dean could (still can) steal with the best of them. He'd stand right in front of you and suddenly have his hand full of your personal belongings without you ever noticing his hands in your pockets. Sam's seen it. Seen it and practiced it in their various motel rooms, in the car, wherever, but his long fingers never seemed to have the lightness of Dean's shorter ones.

"Dude, you have to be careful not to actually touch whoever you're stealing from."

"I didn't, Dean! You moved!"

"Yeah, I'll just find you someone to rob who'll stay perfectly still, huh?"

The difference between the two of them, Sam thinks, is that he didn't particularly enjoy stealing. He truly didn't. Doesn't. Sure, he's done it now and again. When he was a kid with his new friends at whatever school he was in at the time, twizzlers and m&m's. Desperate for new friends and at the same time perfectly aware that he'd never be around for longer than a few months.

One time he nicked some Tylenol off the shelf when Dean was sick and Dad gone. He still feels a cold wrench in his stomach when he thinks of that time, how incredibly Dickensian that particular week was. Snow, Christmas, their dad gone and the youngest boy stealing medicine for his sick older brother. Tiny Tim staring through the window just down the street, wishing with all his heart that Mr. Scrooge would turn the Impala towards home.

To be fair, Sam loved his family a great deal. Like any other kid out there, he thought his Dad the coolest and most awesome man in the world, and couldn't wait to grow up to be exactly like his brother. Almost exactly.

When they spent time with Pastor Jim Sam sat quietly through the Sunday service, listened carefully to the words Jim doled out without any of the scorch that so often accompanied a sermon. Soaked it up like a sponge while Dean sat on the side looking defiant and grumpy, refusing to fold his hands for prayer and pretending he didn't know the words to any of the psalms.

Sam learned the ten commandments, and like any other law-abiding eight year old out there he did his best to follow them. Dean told him he'd never covet his neighbors donkey anyway, and pretended to enjoy the cigarette Paul next door had given him in exchange for a shot of whiskey from the bottle Dad had left behind.

Really, they were just two very different kids.

While Sam tried not to lie or steal or cheat even when Dean hid cards up his sleeve, Dean would steal whatever he could get his hands on, cheat his way out of bets and brag about it to anyone who'd listen, and when he didn't Sam would rat him out like the good little brother he was. As the years went by the clumsiness of youth gave way to hard won experience, and Dean became proficient at stealing. Did it with ease, even tried to eject some humor into it. A bit of fun. Make it into a game for his younger brother who struggled with breaking the rules when their entire lives were coloring outside the lines.

("Hey, look at this, Princess. Grabbed you some magazines so you can finally become a man.")

They'd come out of Dean's coat, twisted round and folded into three against his chest where he'd hidden them from employees with eyes in the backs of their necks, the bottoms stuck into the waistline of his jeans. Bare breasted girls grinning at him through Dean's fist before he slammed the thing down on the table in front of Sam and dug around for the cigarettes in his pocket.

Sam couldn't stop the stealing, but he did his best to soak his brother's cigarettes in the kitchen sink with all their dirtiest socks whenever he got the opportunity.

Bottles of whiskey, cigarettes. Keys, wallets, whatever. Oh, Dean didn't do identity theft("Not real people, come on, man."), but he did empty credit cards. Pocketed cash before throwing the wallets, mostly containing gym memberships and family photos, back on the street.

"It's not stealing," he'd explain patiently, again and again as if trying to make himself believe it. "Not really, because I'm not stealing from real people."

He'd cut the debit cards in two, then count the money he'd extracted from them before the owners even knew they were gone. Sam used to wish with every fibre of his being that Dad would just leave a little more food money. Just a little. Just enough that Dean hadn't developed a whole career-worth of skills to keep them both fed and clothed and out of the hands of the CPS.

"They'll get their money back you see, because the card got stolen."

But Sam was there the first time Dean nicked anything, and remembers the pale white face of his brother as he slipped a bag of crackers under his jacket. Remembers Dean's desperate babbling on the way back and the way his hands trembled and how he didn't calm down until Sam promised him he could have every single elephant in the box.

When it's Dean's turn to hustle he comes back with pockets full of cash. Not because he's such a fantastic player, Sam can beat him hands down any day of the week, but because he's such a good little criminal.

Sam only ever stole for the sake of it that one time.

The smell of canned peaches and lysol, slightly stale air and cabbage still makes his gut churn with guilt.

Michigan, 2007

Once he's awake he can't remember why. Why would he ever want to wake up when wherever he was before was quiet and pain free and dark, and waking up is painful and confusing? He doesn't know where he is or what's happened, or even if Sam is there or Dad or... The world tilts and whirls, the bed suddenly tipping to the side even though his body stays glued to the surface. He twists to the side to vomit, and finds there's already an emesis basin under his chin.

A nurse tries to talk to him and make him respond, some kind of test to see if he's up yet. If he's awake at all, cognizant and conscious.

He decides he's not. Not quite yet. Slips off for another moment.

When he comes back around time is still relative and fluid, and Sam is there. Sitting next to his bed looking for all the world like he's waiting for the bus, his eyes fastened on the oatmeal colored walls. Hands in his pocket, leaning back with his legs stretched out in front of him. His hair looks greasy and he hasn't shaved in a while, but Dean doesn't notice that.
Wants something to take away the sour taste of stale vomit in his mouth.

He must make a noise, because Sam turns and shows him a face so relieved and pleased Dean can't help but grin back, even though he doesn't have a clue why he's here or what they've been doing.

"We get it?" he croaks, because with the way drugs are swimming in his veins there must be an it somewhere.

"Yeah" Sam croaks. "Yeah, we got it, man. But your... Your knee, man."

He clears his throat, and looks amazingly uncomfortable. "Your knee got kinda messed up."

It's exactly the kind of awkward way the Winchesters favor when they have to tell each other uncomfortable things. Sam rocks it.

Dean grimaces. "The right one?"

Sam nods, his face tight as it looks down towards the floor for a moment.

"Yeah. The... The right one."

"Fuck."

"Yeah."

"Bad?"

Sam nods, looks on the verge of tears. Dean is right there with him. His eyes stray down to the mess of white bandages and cushions that's his leg at the moment, the only flesh visible being the toes sticking out of the mass of white at the end, and they could belong to anyone for all Dean knows and feels. His toes, that is, because the rest of the mess underneath those deceptively white bandages is burning red hot.

"They did some surgery to... To try to get things back in place, but they're saying you're gonna need some reconstructive work later on."

"Some?" Dean asks finally, feeling groggy and nauseous now he's seen the damage.

"Um. Yeah, a lot."

"Fuck."

"Yeah."

They sit in silence for about ten seconds until Dean's stomach makes a wild leap for his throat, his thoughts caught somewhere between fear of permanent injuries and insurance frauds and what the fuck they're gonna do. Bile seems to pour through his lips about the same time as a basin smacks into his chin and Sam puts his hand behind his head to keep him from puking all over himself.

He sobs out a breath as he finishes, tears somehow having escaped his eyes without him noticing.

Natural reaction, he tells himself. Blinks heavy eyes. Can't imagine himself on a leg that doesn't work, hobbling around on crutches or... Worse.

"I'll fix it," Sam says suddenly, his eyes steely and serious. Dean blinks against sleep, still drugged and fresh out of surgery. He hasn't had the time to sink deep into their situation like Sam has. Hasn't fully considered the difficulties of hunting with a bum leg. A nurse comes in to check his vitals, scurries around while they keep silent, pretending not to watch her every move. She doesn't seem perturbed, and with a final smile she disappears off with a promise to be right there if Dean needs anything.

"We'll figure something out. Right?"

Dean shrugs. Knows they wont, has no faith in the two of them to scrape together enough money to get him on his feet. He's already thinking through solutions and scenarios – none of them anything like what he wants. His mind is running, panicked and hurried – maybe he can get a job or get some PT or fight ghosts with a cane and...

"Dean." His brother interrupts him, sounding certain and strong. "We'll figure this out. All right?"

It's not, but he nods anyway, and slips off to sleep without really noticing.

Wyoming, 1997

It was that summer when his pants were always too short, no matter how many new pairs they bought. When he couldn't sleep because his legs cramped and his back bucked and it throbbed from inside him so bad he'd swear he wasn't just growing. He was exploding. Slowly, steadily, like one of those films of plants with a picture taken on intervals, where the plant burst out of the ground like it was trying to reach the sky by the afternoon.

Dean got their food money by hustling and stealing, his leather coat conspicuous in the summer sun. Did all the little things that Sam had known most of his life, from the times Dad would leave them in their dingy motel rooms to go do the hustling himself, while Sam still sat in his little carrier on the floor and Dean made the couch cushions into race car tracks for his matchbox cars.

He still didn't like the way Dean's eyes went vacant and thoughtful before he left, like he was trying to pull up courage and just the right amount of fuck you-attitude to meet the adult world like the 20 year old he was and make money on those older and wiser than himself and get away with it without feeling like a dick.

Sam preferred to get his money the honest way, when he could. He'd walk from door to door, and with his huge dimples and floppy hair, pants short enough to show much too much ankle, it wasn't too difficult.

He painted garages and fences, cut grass and walked dogs.

Sometimes he'd go shopping, sometimes he'd babysit and wonder who the hell felt safe enough to leave their kid with a stranger.

One afternoon he taped up windows to be painted, old wood underneath crackled paint, flaking off with the slightest touch.

He brushed it off with a wire metal brush with a red handle that dug into his palm while Mrs. Hansen sat in her flowered chair, wearing the kind of high-waisted pants old women favor, shiny white belt matching the white sneakers on her feet while she chattered animatedly at the young man sweating on her windowsill.

She was the kind of old woman who dyed her hair that unfathomable shade of blueish purple, thinking it would somehow make her look fresh and... Whatever, he doesn't know where she wanted it to go. He never asked.

She wore a little rain scarf of see-through plastic tied neatly over it when she ventured out in bad weather, pulling a little blue shopping cart after her that made an obnoxious squeaking noise. There was a cat around, fat and grumpy and mean, and she fed it boiled fish and chicken like it was something precious, and let it sleep in the best chair by the window where there was sun all afternoon.

Some days he didn't work much. They looked at albums. Of her, when she was young. She insisted she was beautiful, but Sam could only see the old woman's haircut on a young person. She had a husband once, and a dog. The man was balding and pudgy, dark haired with thick eyebrows and pants cinched tight right underneath his armpits. They went on holidays and to parties, and she wore dresses. Nice dresses, she insisted, but Sam only saw old lady-fashion on a young woman, big glasses and curtain-patterned fabric.

Her husband faded out at the end of the line of black, glossy photo albums. He wasn't around anymore, but "he's not dead", she said. She never did have kids, but she had other things, she said. Again and again, "I had other things, you know."

She shows him older albums, with thick leather bindings and yellowing pages. Of sisters and picnics and parents, of little boys with neatly slicked hair and shorts in the middle of the winter.

When they've run out of albums and Sam's made a permanent scuffle mark on the windowsill with his shoes that she'll never see because her eyes are shining grey with cataract, she starts him in on her belongings. Knick knacks and trophies and heirlooms.

The paintbrush dried in the sun one afternoon, the crooked handle slick with paint that dribbled down his hand. The open windows let in a breeze, soft and warm against their skin as he sat in her home, breathing in cat hair and lysol and cabbage, listening to her tell him stories that made her feel good and made him hope he'd never grow old.

He'd never had a grandparent, and didn't know the charm of old people. And he was 16, so he judged her harshly one moment and smiled at her the next, his eyes glued to the droopy skin on her cheek and the pigment spots on her hands even while she served him icy cold (slightly stale) lemonade.

After two weeks, while Dean was struck out in a post-drunk nightmare of bruised knuckles and swollen eyes, fifteen stitches to various bottle cuts, Mrs. Hansen showed Sam her treasure.

Sam doesn't think he's seen anything more beautiful in his life.

Michigan, 2007

Dean is in the hospital for four days, until he's able to get out of bed and jump around on a pair of forearm crutches on his own. He's already pissed off at the sight of his new invalid crutches, but his shoulder, the one that pops out whenever someone looks at it the wrong way doesn't like the regular ones. At all. It's all pretty par for the course, the way it goes down when he takes a tumble bad enough that Sam has to take him to the hospital. The way it goes down when Sam does and roles are reversed.

He shuffles to the bathroom and back, dark blue boxers with little stars on them visible through the back of his gown, his entire right leg held stiff and completely straight out in front of him.

"See? I'm fine. Let's go, Sam."

"Wait, Dean... Come on, man, we haven't even..."

Dean's doctor interrupts, a yellow folder in his arms. "I've got here the names of a few orthopedic surgeons in your area, Mr. White. I suggest you go seek one out the moment you get back to get fitted for a proper brace, that one is just temporary. You'll need to have that surgery performed sooner rather than later, and have PT arranged to work up mobility as soon as possible after that."

Dean's doctor has this look, his icy blue eyes staring right through the both of them like he knows exactly what they're up to. "Dean, this isn't optional. This needs to be done, or you're not walking on that leg again."

Dean looks ready to boil over and tell the doctor he's wrong and to fuck off or kiss his ass or whatever, so Sam takes the yellow folder and smiles disarmingly. "His prescriptions?"

"All in there" the doctor says, tapping the folder. "Though I must say it's far too soon to send him home, he should at least stay until we..."
"Not a chance, Doc," Dean argues, sitting on the edge of the bed and trying to wrestle a pair of giant sweats on over the brace, failing miserably and still cheerful because he's nicely drugged and humming with vicodin, and he'll be out of here in the next twenty minutes even if he has to jump through a window.

Sam bends down to help, his eyes still on the doctor.

"I'll take care of him, we'll be fine."

"Just be careful," the man sighs, and leaves the room looking like he's not entirely certain why he ever thought this career was a good choice.

Sam wheels Dean out to the car, crutches held between his legs as they go, his right leg held uncomfortably straight in front of him.

"Man, you have the worst luck," he grunts, holding Dean by the armpits and trying to wrestle him into the car without jarring the leg with two breaks and snapped tendons more than he has to. Dean's face is pale and clammy, his eyes shut tightly by the time he's leaning back against the door, his leg stretched out in front of him.

"God," he moans. "This fucking sucks."

"Yeah," Sam agrees, throwing himself into the driver's seat. "You're due for your meds in twenty minutes, think you can wait until we hit a pharmacy?"

"Like there's a choice," Dean moans, sweat beading his upper lip.

Sam smiles crookedly at him in the mirror. Stops at the pharmacy to pick up Dean's pills, borrows his crutches to make it look like they're his and not Dean's, because Dean is crashed out in the back and not mobile and Sam can't imagine anything he wants less than to poke a sleeping injured bear and make it do all the things it doesn't want to, and has them both on their way to Bobby's within the hour.

It's quiet in the car when Dean's drugged. Quiet and dark and silent, and he keeps his eyes open by promising himself he'll stop for a nap by the next takeoff. Then the next, and the next, a living poster child to the commercials that tell you that falling asleep in the car is dangerous.

The steady thunk-a-thunk-a-thunk-a of the side of the road wakes him up three times before they make it to Bobby's house. Dean's lost three painkillers down between the seat cushions and left a greasy stain on the window from his hair, and there's a steady rattle under one seat where a pill jar has lodged itself firmly underneath a floor mat.

Sioux Falls, 2007

It takes Sam and Dean about twenty minutes to wrestle the older brother inside. His leg isn't cooperating with the rest of his body which isn't cooperating with his brain, and by the time they've made it out of the car Bobby's had to come out and help.

They work to get over to the house together, Dean hanging like a limp noodle (breathing like a killer whale) between them when Bobby finally walks off to the enormous shed over by the junkyard. He comes back moments later with the saddest looking wheelchair Sam has ever seen, but he notices Dean eyeing it with not a little relief on his sweaty, blotchy face. The fact that there is no arguing to get him into it says all it needs to, and together they manage to pull the thing up the few steps to the entrance of Bobby's house.

"Hey," Sam sighs, when Dean is finally sitting between them, looking drained and sickly, but finally indoors.

"Boys," Bobby says, his eyes flickering to Sam before fastening on Dean.

"That looks bad, son."

Dean blushes while Sam pulls out the folder the doctor gave him. He hands it over.

"I'll go get our bags," he says as Bobby settles at the kitchen table and Dean follows on screaming wheels.

"Get the oil, will ya?" Dean shouts after him as the door bangs shut.

It doesn't take him long to dig up the key. It's buried right by the second pole from the entrance of the garage, underneath two little pebbles he's glued to the metal wall. The key is only a couple of inches down, hidden in a little velvet pouch that originally came with little pretend coins in a toy pirate chest. The thread has almost rotted through, but the little pouch is whole. Dirty and soggy, but whole.

The key weighs heavily in his hand, but it doesn't suck all the oxygen out of the air like it used to.

This way it's kind of like he stole it to sell it for Dean. Right?

Right.

When he gets back inside Dean's in the kitchen with Bobby, and they're talking in low voices. Dean is looking serious and chastised, and Sam gathers that Bobby's been telling him to get a move on and get his leg fixed up properly.

"...funds," he hears Dean mumble, flushing bright red.

"Can't go with the fake insurance," Sam supplies, "because he'll need follow ups and PT and possibly more than one surgery."

Bobby nods, like this isn't the first time he's heard of this.

"I have a guy who owes me a favor. Let me try to set something up, all right? And we'll see about that leg."

His hand hovers in the air for a moment, like he was about to pat the knee sticking out straight, parallel to the kitchen table. It lands on Dean's shoulder.

Sam watches his brother wince as he's jostled.

Wonders how far he can get before they notice he's gone.

Part 2

Wyoming, 1997

Neither one of them were strangers to the post-hunt John Winchester. He was usually drunk, almost always loud, but for the most part happy (if slightly manic) in that kind of grim faced, stoic way that only he seemed able to pull off. There were about three weeks left of their summer holiday when the black car rolled back around to the front of their rented little house, where Dean was still heavily asleep on the couch in front of a TV now showing ads for a silver cleaning kit and Sam was tying his shoes to go over to Mrs. Hansen's to remove the last strips of tape from the finally finished windows and get the last of his pay.

"Sammy," John said, already staggering a little even though one hand was tight against the wooden door frame. "We're leaving in half an hour. Get your brother." ("getchurbruthr")

Something tightened in his chest, an anger he felt fully entitled to, and that seemed to ease that itchy feeling inside him, sending adrenaline soaking through his muscles in the way that made his fists clench while his brain prepared for every single thing John could say in return.

"Can't. Got plans."

"Sammy. You better listen to me, boy. We're leaving. In. Half. An. Hour. Got it?"

He could feel his lips tighten even as his neck bent, his t-shirt riding up in the back where it was too short.

"I can't. I'll be back in two hours."

His voice rose to a shout.

He could see a storm brewing over John's face, and bent his head to slide his too thin, stretched body underneath John's arm so he could make a run for it.

"Don't think so, Sammy" John said, voice dark and angry from being disobeyed so directly. A hand clamped around his arm tight enough that it was actually painful, and Sam felt his mouth opening as if a stranger did it for him, shouting obscenities and words he couldn't take back at his father.

As his feet in their too small sneakers pounded the pavement and the door in the tiny house he'd just left behind smacked closed, he excused himself from all blame (you're sixteen, it's just hormones, he knows you didn't mean it, he knows you love him, he knows, he's dad, he knows, must know, probably doesn't remember anyway, right?).

"Why should I listen to you, huh? You're a lousy fucking drunk, and you don't give a crap about us. I wish you'd just disappear and not come back! We don't need you! Fuck off, loser!"

It was childish and petty, and he could still picture the hurt in his father's eyes as he slipped away, Dean rubbing his sleep-mussed hair with a red spot the shape of the TV-remote on his bare stomach, looking worried and curious at the commotion.

When he finally got to Mrs. Hansen's, with the door to the patio out back open and her asleep in the spot of sun peeking through the dingy wind covers in front of her, the fat cat sunbathing on her lap, it was far too easy to let the anger still soaking through his veins take control.

The folder was where she'd put it away three days previously, dark blue in a 70's marble-pattern with worn corners and a thick rubber band wrapped around it. The plastic of the preserving bag inside peeked out one side, and he made sure not to snag it more than he had to when he stuffed it underneath his t-shirt. "Audit 1972" it said in a blue pen on the front, crossed out by a black pen in a stronger ink.

He carried it home on trembling legs. Almost turned back three times, decided against it. ("I just found this on the street, Mrs. Hansen, thought I'd best bring it back straight away, know it's important to you 'n all")

The folder burned in the bottom of his duffle for the longest time before he finally, finally, got a bank deposit box for it.

Not to keep it safe.

Just to keep it out of the way, so he didn't have to look at it and feel his stomach churning and his head boil hot with blood and guilt so thick he could have carved it with a knife.

It wasn't a graceful, artistic theft by any means. It was clumsy and cruel, to steal the only treasure an elderly lady owned. Had kept safe for decades and cherished more than the kids she'd never had and the husband that had left her. That she'd finally shown to the kind, quiet boy who came to work at her house every day during the summer when her mind swam with confusion and time seemed liquid and lumpy, pushed through a tea strainer.

He wondered sometimes what she'd thought of him after he'd gone, his too small sneakers pounding the pavement in reverse. If she was too lost to truly notice it was gone and go looking for it, to connect the dots to the boy she'd never seen again, who hadn't been paid for the work he'd done on the windows in her living room. If she'd wondered where he went or why he'd come in the first place.

He told himself she hadn't. She probably didn't even remember anyway.

John was quiet when he came back, brooding at the kitchen table, his broad back turned against the room. Sam snuck off to hide the folder, still feeling sick with tendrils of a guilty conscience pulling at him.

He stood in the middle of a room for a while. John got up after a bit, and Sam kept his face straight from the wince it wanted to pull out when a large hand clamped on his shoulder briefly, squeezed, and let go.

They left half an hour later. Dean drove. Sam pretended to sleep, and Dad picked the music.

Sioux Falls, 2007

He can see Dean through the windows, even if they're almost brown with dirt and grime. There's a fly crawling on the glass just where the top of his head is, leaning back against the dingy couch cushions as he flicks through the channels on the tiny TV in front of him. His right leg is elevated on a stack of books with a cushion on top, his left bent obscenely so the knee rests on the living room table and the foot is neatly tucked into the brace on his right leg.

Sam watches him shift a little, sees his eyes close tightly against the pain as the movement jostles his leg.

It's been almost two weeks since they arrived. Three days since their appointment with an orthopedic surgeon, almost a week since Bobby heard back from his insurance-guy that "owes him one".

He didn't owe him enough.

He can see Bobby, too, from where he's standing with his hands tucked into the pockets of his jeans. Can see the bald patch at the back of his head gleaming with sweat if he looks closely enough. Can see the pinched expression on his face when he turns around. They're both worried about Dean, about how he doesn't sleep unless they give him more pills than they should and how he keeps his mouth shut tight against the pain so he doesn't call out.

He knows how much it takes for Dean to lose face like when he came into the living room this morning and found his brother shaking with sobs on the couch.

Dean didn't even try to hide it, and while Dog the Bounty Hunter hunted down a junkie on the old TV in the corner Sam sat on the arm of the couch with one hand on Dean's clammy shoulder until he'd pulled himself together.

When he turns back he can see Dean struggling to get upright. It involves a lot of shuffling around, a lot of little shifts and then long waits before his equilibrium straightens out. He's thinner now, a little smaller than usual. His pupils are tiny, eyes almost too green in his face.

He's through the door before he can think, has his arms under Dean's shoulder until Dean can manage to keep upright on his own, right leg held just a little bent in the thick, black brace the doctor strapped on last week.

Underneath it are bone pipes trying to fuse back together into an imitation of health. Sam knows they can't do it on their own, that there are screws and bolts and plates enough to make any man feel a little faint. That the tendons still need to be repaired if Dean's ever going to have a functional knee again, and that the cartilage they had to remove from the wreck that was his knee means he'll need a total knee replacement sometime in the not too distant future unless he wants to walk around (when the bone pipes are fused and things sewn neatly back together) on bone grinding against bone like two sets of teeth chomping away at sensitive nerves.

He also knows what it'll cost them.

And he knows what he has to do. It's almost a relief to get rid of it, if he's honest with himself, but it's still a crime. A serious crime, unnecessary and inexcusable.

He really had hoped to just leave it there until it rotted away, and now he has to go back and check the authenticity papers and get someone to buy it off him instead. Spend time on it. With it.

It really is a bitch.

Dean breathes like oxygen is going out of style. Like he's hoping it'll ease the pain and let him sleep for a while. When his eyes are open they roll, confused and pained and unseeing.

It's all Bobby can do to keep his hands from stroking back the hair falling over his face, whisper assurances that 'it's all right, son', and 'I'm right here'.

It's not him Dean wants. He's the wrong man sitting here, about a foot short, a bear gut too much and half a head of hair wrong. He's got the flannel and the ripe smell of a man that doesn't do enough laundry, but the similarities stop there.

And Dean knows it, even if he's barely conscious and twisting the blue blanket over his chest like he's trying to crush it.

"Half an hour, son" he mumbles, keeping Dean's hand from cutting off his oxygen supply with his twist of the fleece fabric over his neck. "Half an hour, and you can have more. I promise."

Dean sobs out a breath, stares over at him with wild eyes and goes back to twisting the fabric violently. Desperately. His back bucks up off the couch and Bobby puts a broad hand to hold it back down so he doesn't fall off the narrow couch. The boy's face has tear tracks all the way down to his ears.

Bobby sighs and goes to re-fill the water jug. Might as well be ready when the half hour is up.

He moves the crutches and the wheelchair a little further from the couch. Just in case Dean decides he's better again and tries to make it to the bathroom on his own. Again.

Arizona, 1998

"Dude, come on. I just wanted to borrow a pair of socks, for fucks sake! What the hell are you trying to hide? I know you've got your tampons in there, Samantha. You don't have to be embarrassed, it's only natural."

Dean looks flustered and not a little snippy, his wet hair standing on end in that ridiculous haircut that only looks good if he combs it just right and spends an hour in the bathroom and walks around with a comb in his back pocket like he's John fucking Travolta.

"Stay the fuck away from my stuff, Dean! I don't go through your stuff, do I?"

That's not entirely true, but Sam is angry enough to ignore the fact that he knows what Dean keeps in the right bottom pocket of the fake Nike bag he's using at the moment, even though he knows it'll be useful for blackmail some day. There's some shuffling out in the kitchen, pans clanking against a counter.

"It's just socks, Sammy. God, what crawled up your ass and died? No, wait, don't answer that."

"Fuck you, Dean. My stuff, okay? Out of bounds to you. Get your own fucking socks."

Dean watches him for a moment, looking disconcerted and slightly shocked at the stern reaction, and Sam knows it's a matter of hours until Dean's back going through his stuff to figure out what he's hiding. He's never been clever enough to think these things through. Should've let him take a pair of socks, probably, but his heart jumped into his chest the moment he saw his brother bent over his own familiar blue duffle, rifling through it. Closer and closer to the blue marble folder at the bottom, held stiff and safe between the cardboard he put underneath it and the harder bottom of the bag. It's not perfect. The folder is several inches thick, ungainly and the wrong size for the bag. He's stuffed it out with several books to make it look right, but it's still lumpy and ungainly.

"Whatever, man. God, get laid, will ya?"

He watches Dean stomp off towards the kitchen. To steal socks from Dad, no doubt.

That night he goes out on his own in the Impala, having borrowed it from Dad who's home for the weekend. They're leaving again in the morning, next town over, probably. Black... Something or other. Dog or woman or house or what-the-fuck-ever.

He hasn't been allowed to drive alone for very long, his brother and father equally worried about his less than stellar driving prowess, but he steers himself downtown well enough.

"I'd like to open a safety deposit box, please."

He fastens the key to the underside of the drivers seat in the Impala, plans to bury it when he gets to Uncle Bobby's or Pastor Jim's. When he comes back the zipper on his bag is an inch more open than it was when he left, and he breathes a sigh of relief and frustration all at once.

"Dean!"

Arizona, 2007

The man behind the counter looks like Christmas came early to make love to his birthday when Sam makes his departure, safe in the knowledge that it will go into a private collection, escaping the watchful eye of the government and anyone else.

And if he's got a bit less money for it, well, he can't really complain. People will buy anything if it's special enough.

Sam doesn't feel better, though. He feels slightly ill, his stomach churning with that same particular brand of guilt that almost swallowed him whole that night when he was sixteen and they left with his bag full of stolen goods. His father and brother never even knew they were driving the getaway-car, and he never told them.

Never will, either. Will never, ever tell Dean how he pulled this off. How he can have his leg fixed all of a sudden, cash, no problem, no need to give your real name, even.

The Impala purrs as he turns her around, heads to Bobby's.

"Dean? Yeah. Yeah, it's me. I'm on my way now, jerk. I'll be there in like.. Uh. How about I let you know when I'm close, okay? No, it went fine. No, I didn't need any stitches, Deanna. Seriously, I'm fine."

...

"Are you high? What do you mean 'Bobby upped your prescription', he's not a doctor!

...no, man, that's just not..."

He can hear himself laughing at the molasses slow voice of his brother at the other end of the line, sounding as relaxed as Dean ever gets these days, but it sounds like someone else. Like his voice is far away, and he's hiding behind a closed door only vaguely paying attention to what his body does and what his mouth says.

He pushes the accelerator. Wonders what made Bobby push even more pills.

Minnesota, 1998

Behind him he can hear Dean sliding up the isle of the church on his socked feet, like a gigantic five year old with facial hair and a gun.

"C'mon, Sammy! You gotta try this, man."

He laughs, loud and obnoxious and sweet like a huge puppy.

Pastor Jim's face has one of those patient little smiles on it again, the one that says "I do love that rascal of a brother you've got" on the surface but is secretly bubbling with annoyance that Dean can't respect his church enough to not make it into a playground right under his nose.

Sam reaches out a hand to touch the wrinkled and thin, yellowed pages of the bible in front of him when Pastor Jim catches his hand on the way.

"Wouldn't touch that if I were you," he says happily, the washcloth in his hand abandoned on the glass casing that's normally on over the book.

"Most expensive touch you've ever had, my boy."

Sam swallows and looks down at the greying hair next to him, easily spotted from his vantage point way above the little man.

"Why... Why is that, Pastor Jim?"

There's a chuckle before there's an answer.

"This here is a first edition King James bible. It's incredibly rare, you wouldn't find it anywhere else, almost. We're very lucky to borrow it, but it needs to be preserved and protected now. It can't take much oxygen. We've just about filled the quota for this year, I should think."

He resettles the glass top over it and seals it closed. The book lies open on a random page, the paper whispery thin. The writing is black and clunky, almost impossible to read.

While Pastor Jim lies to Dean and explains that the organ doesn't work because most of the pipes are off being cleaned, Sam swallows down bile and guilt as he continues to stare at the book in front of him. His neck feels sweaty, his hands too big for his body.

Sam Winchester, art thief extraordinaire.

Sioux Falls, 2007

"You get it?" is the first thing Bobby says when he bursts through the door. He nods, then catches himself.

"You knew!?"

"Boy, when you hide a key in my back yard you can't expect me not to find out, now can you? Did you get it done?"

"Yeah."

"Good. He puked all over the couch. It's your turn to clean it up. Might want to stop giving him so many pills all at once, think they're makin' him sick."

Pukey kitchen wipes in one hand and a firm grip on the couch in the other, he realizes the death grip Mrs. Hansen's had on his gut the past decade has loosened a little bit. It's like he's been carrying around a heavy backpack for a long, long time, and now that he's taken it off he feels lighter and free. Like he could fly, if only his feet weren't glued to the ground. Which is ridiculous, he tells himself. You're still a criminal.

But then again they both are. He decides he's paid enough for this particular crime and that the outcome was worth it in the end, and sends a last, fleeting "sorry" to the ceiling before he turns back to the dirty job at hand with a smile on his lips.

Because it is kind of funny, he decides.

Dean Winchester; healed by Bible. Saved by Jesus and Sam Winchester's sticky fingers alike.

He can't wait to tell him.

-fin-