Moonlight

Author: Cheryl W.

Disclaimer: I do not own Dean, Sam or any rights to Supernatural, nor am I making any profit from this story.

Author's Note: After much delay, here's the end to this tale!

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Chapter 4

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The quiet was breaking Sam. The suffocating quiet that permeated the moonlit bedroom he had been allotted, the bedroom that once belonged to Bobby's youngest son. A bedroom that was like a shrine to the son Bobby rarely spoke of, that still sported posters on the walls of rock bands, whose dresser was still littered with crumpled up movie tickets, a pocketknife and a wrench. Preserved as if Bobby expected his son to show up, wanting to reclaim the room, anxious to play the part of son again. The room was a lie, a lie Sam had sought after his whole life, the sham of normalcy, of some fairytale happiness that he been denied as a child.

It was a bitter shock, this foray into normal, this 'gift' of delusion. He had his own room, his own bedroom in an honest to goodness home. It was what he had always yearned for growing up, fought for, cursed his father for not providing to him, to Dean. A place to belong, a place of separation, a place of identity that was his alone. And now he had it, on a silver platter, for as long as he wanted it, needed it. Except now he didn't want it, at all. Not now! Not when it separated him from what he needed most, who he needed most.

That first night, as he and Dean stumbled into Bobby's house, Dean barely on his feet but too stubborn to accept Sam's aid, and Sam lost amid a torrent of emotions, Bobby had assigned Dean his eldest son's room and Sam his younger son's room. At Bobby's words, something had flickered in Sam, amid his grief, piercing the numbness that he had instinctively tried to cocoon around himself. Unwilling or unable to decipher what that something was, Sam snuffed it out like he was struggling to do to all his other emotions.

However, nothing could suppress the swell of emotions that settled in his chest when he had crossed over his assigned bedroom's threshold. With painful clarity he knew it was wrong, all wrong. There was only one bed and Dean was not at his heels, would not be sharing the room with him, was sequestered down the hall in another room, another brother's room, out of his sight and out of his reach. Sam found he couldn't breathe, couldn't remember how to breathe, blindly he had reached out to grip the doorframe tightly, anchoring himself, steeling himself. And in that moment, he knew that the last thing he could endure was being apart from Dean, being separated from the only family he had left, cut off from the one person that had ever made him feel secure in a world of monsters. A hatred for Bobby sprang to life, because he had immortalized his sons' rooms, because he had not turned the rooms into research areas like he had the rest of the house, because he had offered them his hospitality.

Almost convincing himself to refuse Bobby's hospitality, to insist that he and Dean head to a motel, Sam envisioned gripping Dean by the arm, steering him out to the car…and then it hit him…they had no car, no escape. So he had accepted the hospitality like it was a death sentence, sank down on the bed, pulled the covers up, and taken in the room's contents from his prone position. But sleep had not come to him, not that first night, nor hardly the nights to follow, not in that bedroom, not amid the trappings of normal, not with the silence eating away at his sanity.

No, sleep, peace, had only come to him in the bedroom down the hall, sitting in a hardwood chair, hovering beside the center of his universe, his eyes fixed on the slack, too pale features of his brother. His presence unmarked, Sam had gently brushed his fingers over his brother's cut forehead. Had boldly slipped his hand into his lax brother's hand, squeezed the callused, strong hand, assured that the medication he had demanded Dean take would allow him that liberty without the threat that Dean would wake up. Then, like some thief in the night, Sam melted away by morning, leaving behind no traces that he had been there, had clung desperately to the sight of his brother, had found comfort at each breath Dean took, his grief succored at the tangible feel of his brother's hand in his.

For three nights Sam sat at his brother's side, the connection allowing him to weave his threadbare nerves back together even as he fortified himself against the pain the daylight brought. For in the light, Dean did not welcome his presence, unknowingly taking back what Sam stole from him amid the darkness. On the forth night, when Dean had stopped taking his medication, refused to meld into unconsciousness, to accept any reprieve from his pain, Dean had unsuspectingly severed another tendril of their connection, sentencing Sam to the quiet torment of his own bedroom for the night…for the nights to come…seemingly for eternity.

And it had hurt Sam…worse than any words Dean would have said, any action he would have consciously made. Dean couldn't see that though, didn't want to see it, Sam's pain, Sam's yearning look as he watched Dean head to bed, didn't imagine the way Sam flinched at the sound of the click of the door shutting out the hallway light, shutting him out. Dean might just as well have slammed the door and turned a lock in place. It was all the same. Another wall, another barrier, another 'keep out and stay out' sign, more bitter evidence that Sam was losing his brother.

But this night, Sam's resolve to heed his brother's obvious wishes to be alone was crumbling in boulders and whole walls. The silence was oppressive, the need to slip from the room burned just as brightly as it had those first three nights after his father had died. Once again his eyes stung in the moonlit room, vainly searching across the dark expansion for the sight of Dean sleeping in another bed. His ears rang in protest of the silence, pining for the sounds that he had gone to sleep with for the past year now painfully absent. There was no hum of an air-conditioner or a heater, no sounds of cars driving by, no muffled voices from outside a motel room. But all those sounds had always played backup to the song that fed Sam's soul, night after night, the song that was Dean.

Dean radiated live energy, his coiled alertness always just under the surface of sleep, leaving him poised to react at the first hint of danger. But it wasn't his brother's strength and protection Sam craved, not tonight, not the nights prior. Sam's needs were simpler, more basic. He just wanted to hear the rhythmic lullaby of his brother's breath in the quiet night, the sound that could steady his racing heartbeat after his nightmares, had always been able to loll him to sleep amid his fears, that was his irrefutable proof that Dean wasn't gone. His father was gone but Dean wasn't.

Sam fought to steady his own breathing. The aching absence of Dean's presence was choking him, killing him and none of his self disgust at his weakness was dislodging the panic, the pain he felt. Pushing back the covers, he came to his feet quickly, his mind made up, his incriminations shoved aside leaving him only with the need to see Dean. Padding barefooted across the room, he headed out the bedroom door.

Though the hallway in Bobby's house was pitch black, Sam knew the passageway blindfolded, had traversed the corridor often enough in the daytime and the nighttime to know how to negotiate it without incident. And then he was at his destination. With quiet motions, he turned the door knob and pushed the door open. It was only when his eyes fell on Dean sprawled out on the bed, moonlight illuminating his face, that Sam found the ability to breathe again, the desire to breathe again. Like they had for the past week, tears of relief sprang to Sam's eyes at the sight of his brother. Dean wasn't dead, his brother wasn't dead.

Leaning against the doorframe, Sam recalled too sharply doing the same thing in the hospital, watching as the doctor shocked his brother's body, again and again and again, the merciless sound of the heart monitors flat lining slicing across his soul. And all he had been able to do was stand there, no, lean there against the doorframe, his legs too weak to support him, his soul nearly flickering out. Able to do nothing but pray, plead, scream 'No! Don't take him away from me! Do anything but that! Anything!'

Trembling at the memories, Sam slipped into his brother's room and came to stand beside Dean's head, his eyes on the features he knew so well. It felt like that first night at Bobby's all over again, his heart in his throat, humbled by the gift of his brother's breath slowly breaking the silence he had come to hate. But this night was different. Tonight Dean skimmed the surface of unconsciousness, the doctor's medication mostly having lost its hold over him by now. Sam knew that, if he wasn't careful, his presence would penetrate his brother's awareness, would startle Dean awake and rob his brother of his much needed sleep. So it was with utter silence that Sam sank, not into the chair on the other side of the bed but onto the floor beside Dean's bed, his back resting against the wall, his eyes fixed on Dean's moonlit face.

Inexplicably Sam felt like he was again watching over a comatose Dean, a Dean he couldn't touch. A Dean he didn't dare touch, not when he was terrified that he would hurt Dean, that he would clumsily dislodge the medical equipment that was keeping his brother alive, that his cursed presence would sever the gossamer thread to life that Dean clung to however feebly.

Before logic could stay his hand, before compassion could deter his actions, before he could shut down his fears, Sam lifted his trembling hand toward his brother's as it dangled over the side of the bed. Slipping his hand gently into Dean's, Sam drew in a sharp breath as the older man stirred slightly at the contact.

Stilling a moment later, Dean did not awaken, made no move to disengage his hand from his brother's. Dean's subconscious reaction heartened Sam, told him that as much as Dean was pulling away from him, on some deeper level, Dean still needed him to be there with him, still wanted his brother with him. Freed of some of the burden he bore, Sam smiled, leaned back against the wall, careful to not break the physical connection with his brother, and promptly fell asleep.

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Jolting awake, his heart pounding in his ears, Sam was uncertain what had woken him or where he was. As the moonlit room came into focus, he remembered at least where he was: Bobby's house, Dean's room, middle of the night, a reprieve from the silence. His head snapped to his brother when he heard a low, mournful sound of sorrow, a sound that sliced deftly into his heart. 'Dean!' Surging to his feet, Sam instantly stepped to the bedside.

When Sam saw his brother, a matching moan of despair nearly escaped him. Harsh breaths rattled through the sleeping man's chest, Dean's sweat soaked head tossed from side to side and anguish marred the handsome face. Needing to dissipate whatever torment haunted his brother's sleep, Sam, swallowing down the anguish he felt at his brother's pain, timidly reached for Dean's right cheek. Surprise morphed into shaking fear when the feather light touch of his fingers on Dean's face didn't generate a reaction from his brother.

Settling his now trembling hand against his brother's flushed cheek, Sam leaned down and gently beckoned, "Dean?" the one word filled with fear and pleading. Almost instantly Sam's wrist was crushed in a brutal grip and a hand latched onto his throat. Sam responded to the violence with a smile, relieved, even happy at his brother's act of offensive defense. A fighting Dean he knew what to do with, a submissive, unresponsive Dean…that broke him in every conceivable way possible. But when recognition didn't flicker in Dean's expression, worry diminished Sam's smile. "You alright?" Sam asked, his brother's stranglehold making his voice husky and low but doing nothing to temper his concern.

Blinking away sleep and mentally disengaging from the horrific lingering imprints of his nightmare, Dean tried to get his eyesight to penetrate the darkness which shrouded his "visitor". Releasing his prey from his brutal hold, Dean hazarded, "Sam?" squinting into the inky blackness.

Slipping into the moonlight, Sam claimed a seat on the side of Dean's bed and saw some of the tension ease from Dean's body. Adopting one of his brother's tactics, Sam quirked, hoping to mask his feelings which were running too close to the surface for even his comfort, "Yeah, you know, Sam, your brother," his voice hoarse, tremulous for reasons that had nothing to do with his throat's mistreatment.

With a grimace of pain, Dean scooted up to lean against the headboard and rubbed the fingers of his hand over his burning, tired eyes. Reclaiming his footing in reality, Dean, his brow furrowed, met his brother's eyes brimming with worry that even the little light in the room could not conceal. "Sam? You mean my brother that has a bed next door. That Sam?" Dean lobbed back lightly, his eyebrow raised questioningly.

His eyes never leaving his brother's, Sam quietly answered the question he knew Dean was leveling at him. "Couldn't sleep," ill-equipped to lie to Dean, not now, not here, not when so much already separated them.

"Sorry…" Dean breathed in anguish, seemingly apologizing for having found sleep himself, even if it was plagued by nightmares.

Amazed at his brother's compassion for him, his little brother, even when Dean was in such turmoil himself, Sam shook his head. 'But this isn't about me, Dean. I won't let you make it about me. It's about you.' "You were having a nightmare," Sam stated gently, fulfilling his early pledge by refusing to turn a blind eye to his brother's pain. Bracing himself for the spectrum of Dean's reaction from some smart aleck comeback to an angry retort, Sam knew he would willingly endure either one if it had the power to lessen the burden that overshadowed the light in his brother's eyes.

But Dean did not respond with angry words or glib comebacks. Instead, for the second time that night, silence cut deep furrows into Sam. Watching Dean's jaw clench, his eyes drop to the worn blanket pooled in his lap, Sam felt his own jaw clench, not in anger but despair as a revelation nearly overwhelmed him.

The silence, it had always hurt him the most, scared him the most, not the silence of a night in a solitary bedroom but Dean's silence. The severing silence that fell when he had told Dean he was leaving for college, the choking silence after his murderous actions in that asylum, the devastating silence in Dean's hospital room, the only sound having been made for Dean, the breath that wasn't his, wasn't his doing, maybe wasn't even his idea. And now there was the unrelenting silence Dean had been hiding behind since their father's death,

It felt like a punishment, Dean's silence, a punishment that Sam was crumbling under, his earlier words to Dean taking on more meaning. 'I mean this strong silent thing of yours, its crap. I'm over it.' Now Sam knew what lay under the words he spoke, the desperation, the pain, the suffocating dread. '…this strong silent thing of yours, I hate it, I can't bear it, it's killing me, it's like I need to get out the mystical talking hands again just to talk to you, to get you to talk to me, to 'feel' like you're still here, that you're not gone.'

Silence, it was the worst of everything. All the words Dean didn't say, wouldn't say, couldn't say. It was shutting Sam out better than anything else, hurting him more than Dean's words of accusation of caring about their father's wishes far too little and far too late. It was cutting Sam off from who Dean was, what Dean was, what they were together. Irrefutably it was destroying what Sam would give his life to protect: Dean, always Dean, forever Dean. Dean wasn't supposed to be silent, or still, or broken. Ever. And yet he had been and Sam was so afraid that he would be again that it made every breath burn in his throat.

Raging against anything that dared to come between him and Dean, that would steal his brother from him, Sam broke the quiet abyss that was tearing them apart little by little. "I want you to be you, Dean. Not Dad," he softly confessed, pleading for his brother to understand his words, to know the truth of them, hard pressed to not reach his hand out and initiate some physical link to Dean. If possible, Dean's jaw clenched harder and his head bowed further down, bricking up the wall between them, higher, thicker.

His breath nearly hitching in his throat, Sam swallowed before he spoke again, the emotional edge he was balanced on evident by the quiver in his voice, by the pain in his eyes that couldn't tear their focus from Dean. "I need my brother right now. He's a jerk sometimes," and Sam forced a tired snort from his constricted throat, "wouldn't know a good song if it bit him… but I miss him right now so bad it hurts. See he's been my anchor my whole life. He thinks he's supposed to be my big bad protector but really I just need him to be my best friend, to let me have a place at his shoulder, you know. Not behind him, not sheltered but right there in the thick of it beside him. It's what I grew up fantasizing about. Getting the chance to be worthy to be his partner, reassured that, if I had to take on every evil thing Dad ever talked about, at least I would do it with him, that we would do it together." When Dean's head slowly came up, his pained eyes meeting Sam's, Sam knew that the wall was still there, still intact, besieged, under attack, but still standing.

Drawing in a shaky breath, Sam knew in his gut that he was holding onto his connection with Dean by the barest of threads. "And Dad being gone, it doesn't change who I need you to be, want you to be, Dean," he declared, resolve and truth weaved in every word.

Dean found that he didn't doubt his brother's words, his pledge, his desires. But Sam didn't know, didn't understand, wasn't supposed to understand what stood between them, hidden, concealed, buried. It was Dean's to bear, this guilt, this weight, this duty, his father's sacrifice, his father's last confession, his father's last order, his father's last words to him…ever. "Sam, with Dad gone I have other responsibilities…" Dean gently offered what truth he could, what words he could choke out, trying to mold lies into something he could live with…if only for the moment.

Sam interrupted Dean's denials firmly, his eyes lancing into Dean's in desperation, "We have other responsibilities, Dean. We're in this together, as brothers, as partners. I protect you, you protect me. If you risk your life, then I risk mine. If something wants to hurt you, it has to go through me first. It's the way things should have played out from the start after Stanford but I…I was just so used to you protecting me, comfortable with it, that I let you do it. I let you shove me out of harm's way as you took on Wendigos and Raw Heads and everything else that came down the pike, alone. And I almost lost you Dean," Sam choked on the last sentence, drowning in remembered terror, of loss so narrowly avoided that he had begun stumbling down the dark passages of grief.

Coming off of the bed, Sam crossed to the window, his back to Dean, his hand wiping away tears as his unfocused eyes stared at the outside world. He could stop there, could hope those words were enough, that they would save Dean, would keep Dean with him. 'But only if Dean wants to be saved…wants to stay with me.' And the doubt that sank into Sam's heart felt like a harpoon's shaft, immovable, vast, fatal. He couldn't let his brother's fate lay in the careless hands of hope, he hadn't when Dean had had his heart attack, hadn't wanted to when Dean lay comatose and Sam refused to now, not when Dean's soul lay ravaged, breaking, flickering against the gales of sorrow, anger, guilt and pain.

Turning around, his face in shadows, Sam clearly saw the torment in Dean's pale face, could feel the anguish, the guilt, the sense of worthlessness that radiated from the green eyes that he knew so well. "I don't want Dad to be dead. God knows, I wish Dad wasn't dead but I don't wish it was you, Dean. Not for a second. Please tell me you don't think that I…" but a small sound of anguish escaped Dean, a precursor to something Sam hadn't ever witnessed in his brother. It told Sam all he needed to know and more than he ever wanted to know. Sam's voice was breathless in horror and disbelief, his body shaking as the merciless truth hit home, "You think that, don't you?! That I think you should be dead and Dad alive?! I don't Dean, I swear I don't."

Dean couldn't bear hearing Sam's words, winced at the compassion in Sam's voice, compassion for him, love for him. It was killing him! He was so unworthy…Sam should see that, should know that, apparently had to be shown that. Dean's voice was hoarse, bitter, brittle when he spoke, his eyes haunted, pained, lost. "Sam, miracles in our lives…..they don't come with no strings attached."

Sam's worst fears were confirmed; Dean was bearing the guilt that wasn't his to bear. "Don't Dean," he pleaded, shaking his head, not wanting Dean to say the words, not even wanting his brother to think along those lines.

But Dean was determined that Sam see the light, see what he had cost him, who he had cost him, to know the worst of it. And then Sam would give him what he deserved, even what he craved, Sam's anger, his hatred, his absence, everything that had the power to wound Dean the deepest. Dean called it all down upon his head, upon his soul. It was the least he deserved.

Forcing the words out, steady, resolved, Dean, tracking Sam's every reaction, summoned the reckoning he knew awaited him, "It's what neither one of us wants to say, wants to face. I was dying Sam, a reaper had my number." Swallowing, Dean mourned the imminent loss of everything he and Sam had between them and would never have again. "Dad was fine, was up and around…." A single tear spilled down Dean's cheek, unchecked, unnoted. "I don't know…if he …"

Taking two steps back towards the bed, Sam broke into Dean's words, unable to bear his brother's pain, to let guilt poison the strongest person he knew. "He loved you Dean. He risked his life for strangers! Do you actually think he'd do less for you?"

"Risk?! This was sacrifice, Sam!" Dean growled, shoving the comforter off of him and surging from the bed. Pain awaken in his chest, leaving Dean gulping in a sharp intake of air, his hand flying up to brace the new stitches decorating his chest as the world around him tilted. Stumbling backwards, his back impacted with the wall, his legs crumbling under him.

Leaping across the space that separated him from his brother, Sam gripped onto his brother's shoulders and pinned Dean to the wall, halting the injured man's harsh descent to the floor. It left nothing standing between the two brothers but their besieged emotional fortifications. His eyes fixed on Dean's anguished gaze, his breath ghosting over his brother's face, Sam softly but insistently expressed, "Dad was willing to sacrifice himself to kill what murdered Mom….deep down, we both knew that. But what he was never willing to sacrifice, for any cost, was you, Dean! He told us that, said Mom's death almost killed him, that he couldn't watch his children die, wouldn't watch us die. He couldn't watch you die, Dean, not if there was any way he could save you."

"So what, it's OK that he's dead!?" Dean said darkly, daring Sam to lie, to lie to his face, his hands fisted in his brother's shirt, wanting to draw Sam close, needing to push him away, stalled motionlessly in between both desires.

"No, it's not Ok he's dead…" Sam confessed, his voice shaking, choked. Seeing the recoil in the green eyes, the desire to slip away from him, Sam gripped tighter to Dean, pulled his brother closer. "But there's no better reason for him to die than for you, to save you. And Dad believed that, would never regret the decision he made to save you, no matter the cost of that decision."

"Sam," Dean pleaded brokenly, walls crumbling, wounds bared to the bone, hurt by the truth of the words even as they soothed some of the searing pain in his soul. As he slid down the wall, Sam willingly went down with him, their respective holds on each other never breaking.

Tenderly wrapping his right hand around the side of Dean's neck, Sam declared, kneeling before Dean, his eyes meeting his brother's, "Dean, I don't regret his decision…and neither should you. He did it to save you." Seeing a flare of guilt darken Dean's eyes, Sam added softly, "And he also did it for me because… I need you Dean. Dad knew that."

"You would have had Dad, Sammy," Dean protested, his voice cracking but he didn't allow himself to retreat from whatever emotion would flicker in his brother's eyes, whatever deserved condemnation Sam would level at him. "You could have Dad here with you now." Dean knew that he should release his grip on Sam. Should, in action, show Sam that he was strong enough to face the truth, prove to Sam that he didn't need to shield the truth from him. But Dean couldn't force his hands to loosen, to let Sam's shirt slip from his grasp, to let Sam slip from him.

Sam's eyes dropped a moment, fearing that the truth he next spoke might open more wounds, would incite his brother's protective instincts to flare to live, that Dean would take his father's side …and not his. Shaking his head and gathering his courage, Sam raised his head and revealed, his voice breathless, "It wouldn't have been enough."

"Sam…you don't have to …" Dean began to object, instead of releasing Sam he gripped tighter to his brother's shirt, grateful for Sam's lie but unwilling to let his brother bare the weight of that sin on his soul just to spare his big brother's feelings. The fate of Sam's soul came before Dean's, always had, always would.

Sam softly insisted over his brother's protest as he tightened his hold on Dean's neck, "He just wouldn't have been enough, Dean, not if you had died." His burning eyes fixed on Dean, desperately needing the other man to accept what he was saying, what he was feeling. "By saving you…Dad saved me." Taking a shuddering breath, Sam struggled to get his emotions locked away, to express what was in his heart, had always been in his heart like a dirty little secret he had hid from the light, hid from his father but should have never hid from Dean.

Selflessly, Sam dropped his barriers, knowing that the risk of vulnerability, the sacrifice of the walls to his inner sanctuary were worth it, Dean was worth it. "He didn't raise me, you did, Dean," Sam said softly, without accusation but with love for his brother. "He didn't teach me how to tie my shoes or shave or drive, you did. He didn't sit up with me all night after I had another nightmare about Jess, or come get me when the Benders had me, you did. And he didn't answer my damn phone call when I said you had a heart attack…" the words turned accusing, tortured as they ripped from him, leaving him gasping, struggling to get out the rest amid the lump in his throat, "…that you were dying! He didn't knock on my door, stumble into the room and make jokes…willing to do whatever it took to calm my fears…you did."

Touched by his brother's devotion, by his appreciation, Dean gave a choking, "Sam…" as his eyes filled with tears. He had always been honored to do those things for Sam. Glad that he got to do them, maybe even glad he got to do them instead of their father.

Swallowing, Sam dropped his hands from Dean and sat back on his hunches, resolve settling onto his features. "You want me to say that it's wrong that you're alive. Well, I can't say that, Dean. I wouldn't mean it, anymore than Dad would. He loved you Dean. Loved you! Loved you more than his own life and I know the last thing he'd ever want is for you to be hurt by his choice, by his love for you. He'd want you to live, to be happy, to enjoy the gift he gave you."

His brother's words washed over Dean, soothing his wounded soul, making the hurt lessen, the guilt recede slightly. And then his father's words replayed in his head, "Don't be scared, Dean," words that now, in retrospect, took on another meaning, left Dean able to consider the notion that Sam was right. His father did not want him hurt by his choice, hadn't been scared to trade fates with his son, instead, was at peace with that choice, relieved even. That his father had said those words, used that soothing tone, bestowed that loving look to convey what he couldn't, wouldn't spell out…that Dean should be at peace with his choice, to not be scared at what lay ahead…nor what had fallen behind.

Unsure how to interpret his brother's silence, Sam offered up with a shaky laugh, "I mean, you saw how testy Dad got when you didn't keep the Impala, his gift to you ten years ago, spit shined and in top form. Boy would he be pissed at you for treating his latest gift so crappy…like you didn't even value it."

A sound of half laughter and half sob came from Dean as he bowed his head. Let it up to Sammy to put things into a whole new perspective, warped perspective but then again wasn't that the only perspective Winchesters ever understood. Drawing his knees up to his chest, Dean leaned his head back against the wall and drew in a wobbly breath as he looked to his life line, his anchor amid the worst storm he had ever weathered.

Dean looked so vulnerable, so young, so lost sitting on the floor, moonlight casting a fragile light over him. "I'm scared, Dean," Sam quietly confessed, as Dean's eyes held his, but unlike a thousand times before, no reassurances came from his older brother, painfully making Sam's statement truer. "I'm just so scared for you, scared that you're going to shut me out, going to self destruct, that you're going to leave me. I've dealt with a lot but you being gone, I …I can't take that Dean. You crying, you hurting, you feeling, that I can deal with, but not you gone, never that."

Dean sighed, "I'm not gone, Sammy," his tone leaving Sam in doubt whether it was regret or resolve his brother was emanating.

"But you're not here either," Sam countered with desperation, torn apart that he could see Dean, could touch Dean, but couldn't have him, not the brother he knew, not the person who had always embodied the essence of home, not the other part of his soul. "I need my brother and he's not here. Bring him back, Dean. Please just be him again."

Sam's plea pierced through Dean's wall that served to bottle up his agony instead of ward against it, flew straight into his brotherly heart. Faltering, Dean stammered, "Sam, I can't just ….." ashamed that he was failing Sam, devastated that he was breaking his last promise to his father to take care of Sammy, wishing he could choke out a lie, a 'I'm good, Sammy.' But for all the lies he had told in his life, he couldn't stomach to make any false promises, not to Sam, never to Sam.

Seeing the cost his demand was exacting on Dean, the pain, the defeat that was coiled in his brother's every breath, Sam gently said, praying to assuage the crushing weight he had put upon his brother's already bowed shoulders, "It's alright, Dean. I can wait. I'm not going anywhere."

Surprise and relief shone in Dean's eyes as if he had been given a gift vainly hoped for but rarely granted. His quiet, nearly inaudibly reply confirmed it. "Dad never waited."

Sam took in a sharp intake of air and felt his eyes burn. 'How could I have not seen the faults in Dean's relationship with Dad?! Seen the pain Dean felt, the pain Dad had a way of inflicting on both of his sons?!' The answer was so clear, now, when he could do nothing to mend what was broken. 'I was too busy being jealous of Dean, of the 'good job son' praise he earned, the responsibilities he was granted while I was related to being the protected one. And I never saw the weight Dean bore, the emotions Dad didn't tolerate in Dean, in me, yes, but never in his eldest son. And failing…Dean didn't do it, couldn't do it, was something Dad found totally unacceptable, no matter what. A knife in Dean's leg, Dean being knocked out cold waking up seeing double, John Winchester never thought any of that should prevent a successful hunt. And certainly something as trivial as his son's feelings never came into play, not in the battle plans of General Winchester.' For a moment Sam hated his father brightly, in spite of the guilt the thoughts flared in his chest. Yes, he loved his father, missed him deeply…and still hated the way his Dad had forgotten that he was supposed to be raising two sons that loved him, not two soldiers that feared him.

"I'm not Dad and neither are you. And that's alright with me," Sam said tightly, hoping Dean didn't rally to his father's defense. Because Sam couldn't have bore that, not with the thoughts rattling around in his head, not with Dean looking so much like his younger self, before Dean had mastered his walls, before he had locked away his emotions, when his pain was something Sam could sense and could feel. 'And his pain, when I do feel it, it hits me like it always has, right between the eyes, straight through the heart, as intently as if it were my pain.'

"Yeah, me too," Dean quietly agreed, settling back more firmly against the wall. As his eyes slid from Sam to the window and the nearly full moon beyond, he felt conflicted, both guilty and comforted that the words he spoke were true.

Overwhelmingly relieved at Dean's reply, at his agreement, Sam hung his head, remembering only then to draw air into his chest. When he raised his eyes again to Dean, who sat nearly immobile, his eyes fixed on the moon, Sam realized that his brother had no intention of moving in the near future. Scampering forward, Sam claimed a spot on the floor beside Dean, his shoulder touching his brother's. As they both leaned back against the wall, awash in moonlight, silence fell between them as they looked at the wonder of the lighted sphere in the night sky.

When Sam broke the silence, his voice was soft, full of tender emotions, of sweet memories. "Remember how, in all those motel rooms, we used to huddle together, sleeping wherever the moonlight fell because you told me Dad saw the same moon we did and the moonlight fell on him same as it did us. It always made me feel closer to Dad when he was gone."

"Yeah, I remember. No wonder my back's never been straight, sitting on all those floors to sleep, huddled in corners, letting a perfectly good bed go to waste," Dean groused but his voice was too low, too near the edge to come off light.

"You did it for me, because I was scared," Sam acknowledged thickly before he turned to look at Dean. "Thank you, Dean."

Without breaking his focus on the sky, Dean winced at Sam's gratitude, unworthy of it until he revealing some of his soul. "It might have started for you but…I sometimes needed the reassurance that Dad was still. .." Dean broke off, swallowed hard a few times before he could get sound to come out of his thick throat. " …that if we were in danger he would know, he would come protect us." A moment passed before he confessed, his voice so low and brittle Sam flinched, "I really miss having a cavalry around to come to our rescue, Sammy."

The sentiment caught Sam off guard. It had been a long time since he had thought of his father as the cavalry, ready to ride in and save him. Someone else had filled those shoes in his father's absence…even in his father's presence. It seemed fitting to coin some of that person's words right then. "Well as long as I'm around nothing bad is gonna happen to you," Sam's conviction blazed in each word, in the look he leveled at his brother's profile.

A surprised spurt of laughter erupted from Dean as he turned to look at Sam. "Did it sound that lame when I said it to you?!" he quirked, his lips twisting up into a smile.

Too happy to see the smile tip up his brother's mouth, the light that appeared in the green eyes, to be affronted, Sam bumped his shoulder into Dean's and protested, "No, it was reassuring, you jerk," losing the battle to keep the smile off his own betraying lips.

With matching smirks the brothers looked at one another for a moment before again turning their focus upon the moon visible through the window. To Dean's surprise, grief didn't wash over him at the sight, instead some measure of peace settled in his soul. Unbidden, one of the Bible verses from one of the paintings in the doctor's clinic came to him, 'The sun shall not smite thee by day, not the moon by night.' Dean didn't put it past the good doctor to have said a prayer for him and Sam, for two strangers.

Oddly touched by that thought, Dean knew that he was the last person who could scoff at someone for putting value on strangers. Not when he had been risking his life for strangers since he was six, had wished them well, did everything he could so their futures would be better than his own. And in a life as solitary as his own, strangers were often the closest thing he had to friends, people who had been given a glimpse of the real Dean Winchester, hunter, protector, man.

But today, in a twist of fate, the strangers he had met had turned the tables on him, had cast him in the role of protected, instead of protector. And where shame should have fallen, relief had come, because if Dean Winchester had ever lost his way, had ever needed a light in the darkness it was this day. Clint, by his kindness, his heartfelt concern and honorable advice, had been the light Dean needed, had been his guide back to Sam, to where he belonged. And Ronald, the old man who had lost his son, had opened Dean's eyes to Sam's love for him and had shared his hard won wisdom; that loving someone wasn't something to be ashamed of, hidden, or denied, not when life was so precarious.

Unwilling to abandon that wisdom or lose what was most important to him, Dean knew it was time to bare his soul. Sam had always had his love, but scarcely ever the trust of his soul. Turning to look at Sam, the earnestness in his eyes visible even in the moonlight, Dean declared, "Sam, I…I love you. I know I don't say it enough, or at all but it shouldn't be something you don't know. It shouldn't be something I keep hidden from you. And, no matter what things you said to Dad, Dad loved you, always loved you and he knew you loved him back. You can't doubt that."

Tears sprang to Sam's eyes at his brother's declaration and something burned in his chest, but in an oh so good way. He didn't doubt Dean's love, never had. But hearing Dean say it…it meant more to him than anything else anyone had ever said to him, especially now that Dean was all he had left, that he was all Dean had left. It bonded them together, tighter than before, and he prayed, irrevocably so.

Reacting verbally to his brother's words about their father, Sam said amid his tear clogged throat, "I…I don't doubt Dad's love." But he dropped his eyes as he continued, regret in his tone, "I mean I wish…

Gently Dean interrupted, hating to see Sam suffer, "Look Sam, raised voices and heated words were just how you two said I love you." When Sam's eyes come up to meet his, Dean smiled, "Watching you two go at it was like watching an old married couple."

"Thanks Dean," Sam snorted, his small laugh a soothing sound in the quiet room. Tilting his head to the side as he looked to his brother, Sam easily proclaimed, "And I love you too."

His face scrunching up in mock disgust, Dean dramatically groaned, "Awww?! Don't say that!"

Sam smiled and teased, "What, you can say it but I can't?!" more than happy to indulge in their normal banter, to do something normal again, something that made things seem back on track.

"You already said that you loved me, dude," Dean shot back, feeling lighter in his heart than he had since their father had died.

"What?! When? When I was seven?!" Sam scoffed, raising his eyebrows for effect.

Though the answer came to Dean immediately, he didn't say it aloud. 'No, when you took me to Roy LeGrange, when you bought the mystical talking hands, now, by sitting here with me on this freakin' hard wooden floor in the middle of the night.' He watched Sam's eyes spark with worry at his delay, at the seriousness that surely must have seeped into his face, at the love that he felt surging from everything he was, everything he would ever be, love for the brother that he had been blessed with. "No, when you spared the Impala," he finally verbalized before Sam could turn entirely too serious, could read him like an open text book.

Instead of giving a witty comeback, Sam could only nod his head, the truth too close to the bone, remembering too sharply when he feared that the car was going to be the last link he would have to his brother. Thickly he suggested, "You should go back to your bed," his thoughts dredging up mental pictures of Dean in that hospital bed, unmoving, breath forced from him, of today, the way Dean had leaned against him as they walked back into the house, the feel of his brother's body cradled in his arms as he carried him into this very bedroom. Dean was still fragile, still hurt, seemingly still in jeopardy of being taken away from him.

"Nah, sleep's overrated," Dean mumbled through a yawn, unconsciously bringing his hand to his chest where a twinge of pain flared but he obstinately settled his head back against the wall like it was just the right type of pillow.

Having gone rounds with his stubborn brother a million times before, Sam knew a losing battle when he saw one. Reaching over to the bed, he pulled the blankets down and spread them over Dean, right up to his chin, regardless of the heated glare he received before he settled some of the blanket over himself. Then, just like a hundred nights in their lives, the Winchester brothers stared up at the moon and thought of their Dad.

It didn't take long before Sam felt his brother's weight settle more heavily onto his shoulder, watched as Dean's eyes drifted shut and his head started to tilt toward his. Reaching over and pulling the slipping blanket up to better cover his brother's chest, Sam whispered, "I love you, Dean."

"I heard that," Dean groggily mumbled with mock accusation without opening his eyes as he nestled his head against Sam's shoulder.

Sam didn't fight the happiness that flooded him, didn't let some misplaced guilt make him feel bad about loving his brother, needing his brother, happy to have his brother alive and with him. "Good, cause you were supposed to. Night Dean."

"Night Sam," Dean returned, instantly giving himself up to sleep, reassured that, no matter what dreams came, Sam would be there when he woke up, that he wasn't alone.

With the moon in sight, his brother's reassuring weight beside him, Dean's head resting on his shoulder, Sam felt a comforting measure of peace settle in him. He wasn't naïve enough to think Dean's pain was gone, that his brother's guilt was assuaged, that things in the daylight wouldn't again tilt toward oppressive, but right now, in this moment, Sam had hope that he and Dean would get through this, would help each other deal with their father's death, would again discover that their bond was strong enough to weather even this storm, to weather any storm. That being together, being brothers was enough, maybe had always been enough to see them through the nights.

In the past, all those nights spent in moonlit rooms, it was Dean who had been Sam's light, Dean's shoulder that Sam had laid his head upon, the flesh and blood of Dean's hand that Sam's hand had latched onto for dear life, Dean's strength and courage that eased Sam's fears, gave the younger boy the ability to sleep the sleep of the well protected, the well loved. Now it was heartwarming for Sam to be able to return the favor, to be the brother doing the protecting, blanketing his brother with his love, disarming the power the darkness tried to weld. He would be Dean's moonlight for as long as he needed him to be, as long as he wanted him to be, as long as he allowed him to be. Smiling in the moonlight, Sam rested his cheek against Dean's hair. Some favors were a joy to repay.

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THE END!!!

Psalms 121: 6-7 "The sun shall not smite thee by day, not the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil; He shall preserve thy soul."

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Thank you so much for the overwhelming support for this little tag story!! It was hard and fun and so rewarding to write, to get those emotions out, to be able to put my own sappy, happy spin on the tale. (I would apologize for the sap but you all know I wouldn't mean it!) Thank you for allowing me the chance to distort what was there, and make up what wasn't expressed.

Again, a wonderful heartfelt thanks to Larabiehn and Diane for believing that I could "reveal" those oh so troubled boys' thoughts. Hope I did some justice to your request!

Have a great day!

Cheryl W.

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