Another day, another night, another tense ride.

"Uh - so - did you want t'get dinner?" Dean asked. It was the first either of them had said a word in three hours, since they finished their soda pop and got back on the road.

"If you do." Sam said. But when Dean didn't answer right away, he added, "But not if you don't want to. I'm not - I could -." He gave up with a sigh. "Whatever."

"Yeah."

So they drove and didn't stop for dinner and found a motel while the sun was still up. As Sam hefted his backpack and turned to go into the room, he saw a church steeple a few blocks away.

"I'm gonna take a walk." He said after he set his pack on the bed. Dean gave him a look, a 'tell me another one' look, and Sam thought of the times Dean had accused him of hiding things, times that had nothing to do with the siren. He probably thought Sam was going to meet up with Ruby.

After what Sam accused Dean of, even if it was the siren making him say it, he still said it. And even though Dean said they were good, Sam felt like he needed to give him something, even if it was just the smallest bit of absolute truth.

"There's a church, I think it's a church anyway, I can see the steeple over there. I was gonna - go - pray."

"Oh." Dean sounded surprised and maybe a little disbelieving.

"I won't be long. I just - I won't be long."

Dean shrugged and turned to his bed and his duffel and Sam left and shut the door behind himself.

He found St. Patrick's church a half a mile away. The massive oak doors opened onto a dim, cool space. The pews were empty and Sam took a slow walk up the aisle, looking around at the stained glass windows and statues, and the scenes from religious life painted on the walls and ceiling. Some people would call it admiring artwork; Sam always thought of it as research. You never knew what clue you might find hidden in the jewel tones and gold leaf.

A statue near the front of the church made him stop and he stared at it. The Virgin Mary stood on a cloud, one hand holding the baby Jesus, the other hand reaching down to people who were surrounded by flames. Hell, Sam thought. It wasn't hell, he knew that. It was meant to represent Purgatory, but his mind only registered 'hell'. The faces of the people deepest in the fire were masks of agony and despair.

Hell, Sam's mind insisted. Dean was in agony, Dean was in hell.

He turned away from the statue. He'd have his talk with God and then head back to the motel. Dean was alive and at the motel. Even though things were rough between them, Sam would feel better being near Dean.

At the front of the church on the center aisle was a pew with no kneeler and Sam said a quick but sincere 'thank you' to the person who put handicapped pews in. He could sit without feeling folded up like origami.

He'd only just sat down when his eyes fell on the full-size crucifix over the altar. The corpus was life-like, with the marks of torture painted realistically and graphically.

Hell, Sam's brain kept on. Hell is real and Dean was in hell. Slice and dice, Dean was in agony. Dean was in hell. Hell is real and Dean was in hell...

Sam felt panic growing in his chest. He had a sudden image of hell: ravenous flames and suffocating heat and dark endless caverns built only tall enough for evil dwarves, the ceiling inexorably crushing down from the weight of the world on top of it.

I have to find Dean.

It was more of a feeling than a coherent thought; Sam had to get to Dean. He fled the church and started running. He knew Dean was at the motel, but he had to go prove it to himself.

I have to find Dean.

Though they referred to hell as 'downstairs' or 'down under', Sam knew it wasn't an actual location, geographically or otherwise. And though Sam knew hell wasn't really underground, he felt like he'd have to claw the earth with his hands to reach Dean, the way he'd been tempted repeatedly to dig out Dean's grave with his bare hands, just in case he'd brought him back but had buried him too deep to let him get out.

Hell is real. Dean was in hell. I have to find Dean.

The car was parked outside the motel but the room was empty when Sam burst inside. He didn't even wait to have a quick look around.

"DEAN?"

"Yeah?" Dean came out of the bathroom drying his hands on a towel. He sounded disinterested, but Sam felt as relieved and as drained as when he first realized Dean was safe from hell and standing right in front of him. Some part of his mind told him Dean was going to hate it, going to push him away, but Sam went to Dean and hugged him.

Dean was here, Dean was alive, Dean already hated him, so he could really hate him now. Sam didn't care. Dean was alive.

Dean didn't react. He didn't pull away or push away or respond at all, except to sigh dramatically.

"What day is it?" He asked. He sounded annoyed, like he was being asked to guess an obscure holiday.

"Thursday." Sam said. He didn't let go. He could feel Dean's heart beating. Dean was alive.

Another sigh.

"How many Thursdays have you been through?"

"One - why?" Then Sam realized - Dean thought he'd been through Ground Hog Day again. "No, not that. One. Just one Thursday."

"Okay. Good. So why are we standing here, um, bonding?"

"Because." That was all Sam could come up with.

"Because?"

"Because."

"Great. Okay. Got it."

Sam knew that was his cue to let go, move off, stop. But he couldn't -

"Sam?"

- he just gripped Dean's shirt tighter in his fingers and held Dean tighter in his arms.

"Earth to Sam?"

Finally though, finally Dean understood or empathized or just gave in. He put his arms around Sam and with one hand stroked his back.

"All right Sam, it's all right."

No matter what else happened in their lives, no matter how angry they got at each other, how bad they fought, how much they misunderstood each other, or maybe how much they really did understand, no matter what happened whenever they clashed, Sam knew that the brother who loved him and protected him and stood up for him even if he didn't trust him or believe him was still there. That wasn't the voice of someone who hated him, who'd had enough and would never forgive him. It wasn't the voice of Sam's nightmares or his self-recriminations; it was the voice that brought him out of his nightmares, the words that made everything all right again. This was the brother who gave up Anna to protect him, the brother who only a couple weeks before had threatened to rip the lungs out of a ghost because the ghost had hurt Sam. Maybe Sam had forgotten how to be a little brother, but Dean was still his big brother. Maybe things wouldn't be perfect, but Sam believed they would be okay.

The End