Remember When

Dean doesn't remember a lot of it.

He can remember most of how it started. He remembers waking up the morning after he and Sam finished a hunt with a headache and a cough, and Sam making him take some of their cough syrup and some Tylenol. He remembers suddenly getting dizzy at lunch and then vomiting in the diner bathroom while Sam hovered outside the door asking him endless questions about how he felt until he wanted to scream. He remembers Sam dragging him back to their motel and then coming at him with a thermometer, and that he gave up after only a few minutes because it hurt too much to fight Sam any longer. He remembers Sam peering at the readout and getting that serious line between his eyebrows before announcing that he had a pretty high fever and forcing more Tylenol on him.

He even remembers when he realized that his neck wasn't working right, was all stiff or something. He remembers that Sam made him turn his head back and forth and up and down (that one he couldn't do at all) and side to side until Dean had ended up getting fucking seasick and throwing up again in the garbage can.

Sam had then yanked up his shirt with another incredibly serious expression Dean had wanted to make fun of, but he just didn't have the energy to. He remembers turning his head to the side in order to look down (it still hurt) and seeing that he had some sort of weird purplish rash splotching all over his abdomen, and trying to ask Sam what the hell that was but not managing to get the words out.

He definitely remembers Sam's face going white.

But he doesn't remember what happened after that.

o

The next thing he remembers is waking up in the hospital.

He was positioned on his side, his whole body aching, and there were people hovering all around him and talking through masks but none of them was Sammy. "Sammy?" he croaked, and a nurse appeared in his line of vision, or what he thought was a nurse. He wasn't entirely sure, as she was covered head to toe in scrubs and a mask and a hat and even goggles

"Who's Sammy?" she asked him, gently, and he remembers trying to explain but not being able to get the words out, and finally just giving up with a sob he couldn't hold back. The nurse reached out and gently laid a gloved hand on his shoulder and explained something about spinal fluid and needles and holding very still, and he tried to move his head to look around the room more properly, to see if Sam was maybe sitting over in a corner out of the way.

But he couldn't move his neck at all. So all he could see was the nurse right in front of him, and what looked like another nurse moving around purposefully in the background, and the IV stand hooked up to his upper arm. "Sammy," he remembers mouthing, and then he felt something, low on his back, and then everything was gone again.

o

The next time he came to, no one else was there.

He remembers seeing nothing but a haze and blinking a few times until his vision finally cleared. Then he looked for Sam, but he couldn't see much of anything other than blank walls. He tried to call his brother's name, but only ended up coughing.

A nurse materialized by his side, also wearing a hat and a face mask and gloves, but no goggles so he could see her eyes. They were a warm hazel, and he relaxed a little and reached out towards her, only then noticing that he was still attached to the IV.

"Where's Sammy?" he rasped.

"Is that your brother?" she asked him. She reached down as she talked, started doing something to his stomach, changing bandages or something, but he didn't care what she was doing. He wanted to know where Sam was.

He tried to nod, but that hurt, so instead he whispered, "Yes." Another breath, and then, "Where is he?"

She finished whatever she was doing and stood back. "We're taking care of him," she told him, and he nearly stopped breathing.

Sammy? Sammy was in the hospital too?

"What's wrong? Where is he?" he asked her, almost choking on the words. An obnoxious beeping started up somewhere behind him, and the nurse looked up from checking his IV fluids with alarm.

"He's fine," she hastened to reassure him. "We're just putting him through a round of antibiotics because he's been exposed to you. It's a preventative treatment." She fiddled with something behind him and the beeping stopped. She kept talking, so fast he almost couldn't follow her. "But he's fine, I promise. Don't worry. We'll let him in to visit you as soon as you can be moved out of isolation."

Relief flooded him. Sammy was okay. Sammy was nearby. Not close enough – he wouldn't be close enough until Dean could see him and make absolutely certain he was all right – but he trusted this nurse and her warm hazel eyes. Sammy was fine.

Dean tried to smile at her (she was kind of cute, the little he could see of her) but his lips barely twitched. He concentrated on breathing instead, watching her through a sort of fog as she efficiently checked a few more of the tubes and machines hooked up to him and then paused to look at him.

"What's wrong with me?" he finally got out.

But he doesn't remember whether or not she answered.

o

When he woke up the next time, he was in a different place. The room was smaller, the walls painted yellow, and there was a window on the far wall. He remembers blinking at it, momentarily confused, and then a new nurse bustled in wearing the usual scrubs (no hats or masks or goggles anywhere) and brandishing a needle. "Good morning," she said cheerfully.

"Where's Sam?" Dean asked her.

"Is that your brother's name?" the nurse asked as she swiftly prepped his arm and then drew a vial of blood.

He nodded, found that it didn't hurt so much to do that, but that wasn't important right now. "I haven't seen him at all," he told her, not even caring that he sounded like Sammy at his whiny best. "Where is he?"

The nurse glanced at his face, then smiled a little and said, "You just got moved out of isolation. I'm sure as soon as your brother knows, he'll be here."

"Tell him to hurry," Dean whispered, and fell asleep again.

o

Sam was there the next time he opened his eyes.

Dean tried to sit up but only managed to twitch upwards a little before falling back on the pillow, breathing hard. Sam, who was slumped over in a chair next to the bed, sat up straight. "Dean?" he asked, and Dean nearly cried at the sound of his baby brother's voice. "Dean, hey, it's okay. I'm here." He felt both of Sam's hands cover his.

Dean took a deep breath and managed to quirk his lips into a good approximation of a smirk. "Where have you been?" he rasped, then added, "Bitch."

Sam looked surprised, then annoyed, then overjoyed. "You were in isolation, jerk," he said, trying to sound irritated, but Dean could hear the relief in his voice. "They wouldn't let me in to see you. I just found out you'd been moved here."

Dean turned his head enough to look directly at Sam. "Sam," he said. His voice still sounded like he'd just gotten over losing it, rough and scratchy, but it was easier to talk now, easier to get the breath to do it. "Sammy, what's wrong with me?"

Sam opened his mouth.

A nurse came in then, a tall man wearing scrubs. He looked surprised to see Sam. "When did you get here?" he asked, voice a deep rumble, then added before either of them could answer, "Are you Sammy, by any chance?"

"It's Sam," Sam replied. Typical. "But yes."

The nurse grinned. "Thank god," he said. "You don't know how many times he's asked for you. It's been driving the poor ICU nurses crazy for days."

"I can imagine," Sam said dryly. Dean tried to get embarrassed or irritated but he still didn't have the energy for anything other than sheer euphoria at the fact that Sam was here. Sam was with him, and Sam was fine, and so Dean was going to be fine now too.

So he didn't bother with saying anything, even a protest that he didn't really remember asking so much that it would drive anyone crazy. He just let the nurse draw another vial of blood from his arm and congratulate him on staying awake this time before whisking off somewhere with it.

"I look like a heroin addict," Dean said to Sam after the nurse had left, lifting his arm up a little to show off the needle marks, and Sam laughed, sounding surprised. Dean's lips curved into a smile, and yeah, he had enough energy for that too.

"They have to test your blood every couple days," Sam explained. "It's to check the level of the antibiotics you're on, make sure it's okay." He gestured to the IV stand. "They had to put you on vancomycin. It's pretty powerful stuff."

Dean didn't bother looking. He already knew he was attached to an IV. What he didn't know was why. "What's wrong with me?" he asked again. Sam was here now. Sam would tell him.

Sam's eyes hooded over. "Bacterial meningitis," he said. "Specifically, meningococcal meningitis. It's caused by—"

Dean coughed. "Back up, Sammy," he grated out. His voice was still threatening to go out entirely, but he had to know. "What the hell is meningitis, exactly?" He had heard the word before, even had a vague notion that it was bad, but he didn't know (or couldn't remember) exactly what it was.

"Inflammation of the tissues surrounding the brain and spinal cord," Sam promptly replied, sounding, as usual, as if he'd managed to swallow a medical textbook. Dean thought back, remembered the nurse's comment about 'days', and figured that maybe Sam had. Not literally. But he'd had time to read everything he could get his hands on while waiting for Dean, if it had really been days. Sam probably knew about as much as the doctors did by now.

Sam kept talking. "It's serious, Dean, especially if you don't get treated right away. But," he hesitated, then barreled on, "one of my friends at Stanford had meningitis my junior year, so I recognized it and got you here right away. I told the triage nurse your symptoms, and—"

"How long have I been here?" Dean asked, cutting Sam off.

Sam reached up with one hand and pushed his hair out of his face, and Dean noticed that he had dark circles under both eyes. A thread of protective irritation ran through him. Just like Sammy not to sleep when he was worried. The idiot probably had barely eaten, too. "Almost three days now," Sam replied. "What do you remember?"

"Not much," Dean admitted, trying and failing to stifle a yawn. "You were looking at that rash and then I woke up and you weren't there." Black spots washed over his vision, and he closed his eyes, just for a minute, so they could clear.

o

When he opened them again Sam was asleep, his arms crossed on the bed and his head propped on them. His hair was flopping down over his eyes, hiding the dark circles, and he looked younger, like the baby brother Dean had protected all his life.

Dean reached out for him, moved his hand just enough to touch Sam's elbow.

Sam woke up with a start. "You're awake," he exclaimed, then yawned, arching his back and stretching his arms up. His hair was an absolute mess, curls and wings sticking out every which way, and Dean actually laughed, a rough laugh that almost hurt, but felt good just the same. Sam looked down at him, eyebrows raised. "What?" he asked.

"You need to cut your hair, dude," Dean managed, and Sam looked torn between giving him a bitchface and laughing. As a result his face scrunched up and his lips twitched spasmodically, and Dean laughed again. "Dork," he gasped, "you should see your face," and then Sam was laughing too.

Dean's head swam and he had to stop laughing in order to breathe, and then he noticed that Sam wasn't laughing anymore either. Sam was crying now, face buried in his arms and his shoulders shaking, and Dean mustered the strength to touch the top of his brother's head with his hand. "You're such a chick," he mumbled.

"You nearly died," Sam gasped out, not even bothering to look up. "You were comatose, Dean, and your fever was nearly a hundred and fucking five by the time I got you here, and they wouldn't even let me see you—" He broke off, sobs hitching in his throat, and Dean awkwardly – the angle was all wrong – patted his baby brother's enormous, stupid head.

Sam quieted then, let Dean stroke his hair. "It just keeps happening," Sam finally murmured into his arms. "You've gotta stop doing this to me, man."

Dean's own eyes were threatening to spill, but he didn't want to break down, not in front of Sam. Sam didn't need that. Instead he patted Sam's head one last time and whispered, "Princess," to him.

A nurse came in then, an older woman practically oozing efficiency. Sam jerked away, lifting red-rimmed eyes up to the nurse, who just shook her head as she set about messing around with something Dean eventually figured out was the bag attached to his catheter. Dean wondered how he had missed that before, but he wasn't especially concerned; he had had catheters before. It would come out eventually.

"What time is it?" Dean asked her when she'd finished.

"About midnight," she replied, and then, after a quick adjustment of his IV – which had fewer bags on it, he noted – she was gone.

"Shouldn't you be in bed?" Dean said to Sam.

Sam shrugged and replied, "I had to wait almost three days to see you, Dean. You really think I'm going to leave you now?"

Tears pricked at Dean's eyelids again, and he looked away from Sam, breathing slowly. "It's gonna suck sleeping in that chair," he said finally, his voice even rougher than it had been.

"I'll manage," Sam said, then yawned. "Dean Hepworth, by the way. And his brother Samuel. I figured we should keep the same first names again. Good thing too, apparently."

"Better than the last name you stuck me with," Dean mumbled as he fell asleep again.

o

He remembers the next couple of days mostly as a blur of nurses and doctors and sleeping and Sam, always in the room if not in the chair. The first time he left, it was to go to the cafeteria after a nurse threatened to make security drag him there if he didn't go himself. Dean stayed awake the whole time Sam was gone, but he reappeared before too long, and his hands weren't shaking anymore so Dean figured it was worth it.

Not long after that Dean started drinking and then eating again too, just little bits at first, mostly things like soup and popsicles, but it meant another IV bag disappeared. "You were on fluids," Sam told him around a mouthful of the popsicle Dean had cajoled a nurse into giving him. Sam had become a fount of useless medical knowledge since Dean had woken up, and it was hard to shut him up when he got going. "You had thrown up so much, and it wasn't like you could drink while in a coma."

"Yeah, I figured that, Sammy," Dean muttered, but he wasn't really annoyed.

Not long after he started eating again he was liberated from the catheter. The nurse who took it out told him he would be using a portable urinal instead. "Just till you're strong enough to make it to the bathroom unassisted," she added, and Dean right there resolved to be strong enough to make it to the damn toilet by himself as soon as possible. Until then, Sam wasn't allowed to stay in the room whenever Dean had to answer the call of nature. Dean made him go to the cafeteria instead.

His vital signs were checked nigh constantly, it seemed. Half the time Dean woke up to find some nurse messing around with a thermometer in his ear ("Tympanic," Sam said) or a blood pressure cuff on his arm ("Sphygmomanometer," according to Sam). When Dean bitched about the constant blood pressure readings, Sam looked up from the book a sympathetic nurse's aide had given him and offered, "It's because low blood pressure is a real problem with meningococcal meningitis. Yours was too low when you were first brought in. They're making sure it's staying steady." Dean rolled his eyes and escaped into sleep.

Sam actually hugged the nurse who, two days later, announced that Dean's temperature had finally gone back to normal. "Fever's gone," she chirped, then let out a breath as Sam nearly smothered her in a hug. Dean made a face at him (she was kind of hot, even if her hair was in an unflattering bun), but Sam just released her and sat back down, grinning. The nurse laughed a little self-consciously and took more of Dean's blood before skittering off with it. Dean fell asleep again.

After he woke up they did another spinal tap on him ("Lumbar puncture," Sam said) and this time Sam was with him, talking softly to him while the doctor slid a needle into his back and drew fluid.

He remembers going through a few other tests, blood cultures and scans, and sleeping in shifts and then waking up to be told some medical mumbo-jumbo that basically translated to, 'You're getting better even if you keep sleeping all the damn time and are still too weak to get up to take a piss unattended.'

The final IV, the antibiotics, was taken off a day after the spinal tap, and with it went the IV port in his arm. "Bacteria's gone," the doctor told them, which earned her another Sam-hug for her troubles. "We'd like to keep him a few more days for observation and to continue building his strength," she added once Sam had let her go.

To celebrate, Dean got up to go to the toilet by himself for the first time since he'd woken up. Though Sam had to help him to and from the bathroom, he did the actual bathroom part unattended, so he counted that as a victory.

"So can we go now?" Dean asked Sam once they were alone again. "I can eat, I can drink, I don't need that fucking IV stand anymore, and you need to sleep in a goddamn bed."

Sam looked awful, kind of pale except under his eyes, which were smudged with shadow. His hair was a greasy mess now, and his hands were shaking, which meant that Sam had forgotten to eat again. Dean made a mental note to shove a couple burgers down his throat at the earliest opportunity.

But Sam shook his head. "You should stay until they release you," he argued.

"Hell no," Dean said, watching Sam's hands. "I just need rest now, right? That's what Doctor What's-her-face said. Rest and recuperation and proper nutrition, and I can get all of that in a motel. Better, even, since no one will be waking me up to stick metal things in my ear every two hours. And," he couldn't resist adding, "if we stay here much longer you're going to end up permanently crippled from sleeping in that fucking chair."

Sam tried to argue that if they left now it would be Against Medical Advice, like Dean hadn't checked out AMA several times before. Dean argued back that he had had enough of this place and the longer they stayed, the more they risked the insurance fraud coming to light. He didn't use his real argument, which was that Sam needed to get out of there much more than Dean needed to stay. Sam needed a bed and food and rest and he wasn't going to get it as long as they were in the hospital. But if he framed it like that, Sam would just get stubborn and start up with the looming and the hovering.

They spent the next hour Dean could actually stay awake arguing in circles. But, in the end, Dean's superior wisdom convinced him. Sammy should know better than to argue with his awesome older brother, Dean thought, just before falling asleep again.

A few hours later he filled out the AMA paperwork despite dour glances from nurses and the doctor alike. "If you start running a fever again, come straight back here," the doctor said severely, fixing him with a glare. "Any signs of fainting or dizziness, get him checked out," she added to Sam, as if sensing that he was really the one to give instructions to.

"I will," Sam promised. "I'll watch him. I'll make sure he does everything."

Dean got into the wheelchair they provided for his exit himself, even if he had hoped never to have to sit in one of the fucking things ever again. Pivoting himself into it nearly took all his strength, but he didn't let it show. Instead he just poked Sam in the thigh and said, "Let's go, bitch," and let Sam wheel him out of the hospital and into the parking lot to his baby.

"Hey, girl," he said softly, running his hand down her flank before deigning to let Sam help him into the passenger seat. He knew better than to try it himself after his attempt to get into the wheelchair, and if he collapsed right outside the hospital Sam would just wheel him right back in. He couldn't let that happen. Sam needed him to stay out.

o

He remembers falling asleep on the drive to the motel, and waking up when Sam gently shook him. "C'mon, it's on the ground floor," Sam said, offering Dean his arm. Dean took it, warily, and let Sam help him through a door and down a hall.

"Wait a minute," Dean said as Sam unlocked a door with 107 on it in tarnished brass numbers. Sam ignored him and led him inside, panting from the effort of supporting him. Dean pushed away from him and leaned against the wall. Sam banged back out the door, presumably to go get Dean's bag.

This, Dean thought as he took everything in, was most definitely not a motel room.

"Where are we?" he asked when Sam came back inside.

"It's an apartment," Sam said, tossing the duffel down and then pulling Dean's arm over one of his shoulders. "C'mon, bedroom's this way."

"I can see that it's an apartment," Dean growled as Sam helped him down a hallway, past a tiny kitchen and breakfast nook complete with small wooden table and two chairs, past a cluttered living room decorated with throw pillows and rugs on the walls – who hangs rugs on walls? – and into a surprisingly large bedroom dominated by a king-sized bed sporting a rumpled flowered coverlet and skewed pillows.

That cinched it. "Why the fuck are we in someone else's apartment?" Dean demanded as Sam unwound his arm from around Dean's waist.

"I rented it," Sam said, pushing Dean down onto the bed and then disappearing through another door that presumably led to a bathroom. His theory was confirmed when he heard water start running.

Sam kept talking, raising his voice so Dean could hear him over the water. "I found the listing on the internet. The people who live here just left on this month-long backpack tour of Europe and wanted someone to sublet while they're gone. They were starting to think they wouldn't get anyone when I called, so I got it the same day. They only wanted me to pay them a month's rent, and it's cheaper than a month in a motel."

"And you paid them how?" Dean challenged.

Sam reappeared and leaned against the doorframe. "Cash. From the stash hidden in the trunk," he said, giving Dean his goddamn puppy eyes. Even with the circles under his eyes, they were still pretty damn effective. Dean cursed inwardly. "Come on, man, it's perfect. This way we've got a kitchen and a refrigerator and a stove so we don't have to eat takeout all the time, and no one will bother us. And there's cable."

And I don't have to leave you to get food or anything, Sam wasn't saying, but Dean heard it anyway. He groaned inwardly. It always happened eventually, whenever Dean was sick or injured badly; Sammy started hovering.

But he did have a point. An apartment would be a better place to convalesce than a motel, and if it made Sammy happy, well, Sam needed to rest too. So, grudgingly, he said, "Cable's good."

Sam flashed him a dimpled grin and went back in the bathroom. The water shut off. "I ran you a bath," Sam said, coming back out.

Dean rolled his eyes. "You need a shower more than I need a bath, dude. At least I got sponge baths." He made a face. "Too bad the nurse who did them was a guy."

"I'll take one after dinner," Sam said. "Bath's already run, man. Come on." He held out his hands.

Dean waved away Sam's offer of help and slowly got up off the bed and shuffled into the bathroom by himself. Sam hovered in the doorway, watching him with that stupid anxious expression he got, but Dean shut the door in his face. "I can do this myself," he yelled through the wood.

"You sure?" Sam sounded worried.

"I'm fine, Sammy," Dean called back, and he wasn't even lying. His limbs shook with exhaustion as he pulled off his clothes and eased into the water, but his vision stayed clear and his breathing stayed even. The water was just the right temperature, hot enough to relax but not hot enough to burn, and Dean leaned back, closed his eyes, and luxuriated.

Hot baths after a week in the hospital, Dean decided, were awesome.

"I'm going to go make dinner while you're in there," Sam's voice said suddenly, and Dean cracked one eye open. Sam was still out there?

"There's food?" he roused himself enough to shout back.

"I bought groceries," Sam admitted. "While you were in isolation. I stocked up a couple weeks' worth. I got some movies too. We can watch something tomorrow, maybe."

Dean closed his eye again. On one hand, he wanted Sam to go the fuck to bed already and stop his hovering act, especially as Dean wasn't really sick anymore, just weak. On the other, if he let Sam make food, then Sam would eat. "Fine. Just don't make spaghetti, dude."

Sam snorted. "Hey, some of us learn from our mistakes."

By the time Dean had come up with a good comeback to that, he could hear Sam's footsteps padding away from the bathroom door. With a sigh, he slid back up into a sitting position. The rash on his stomach was pretty much gone, he noted. That had to be a good sign.

Then he grabbed the soap and got to work.

o

By the time he was done he was nearly asleep, his energy drained just from the effort of washing himself clean. Breathing deeply, he leaned his head against the cool tiles and closed his eyes for a minute, gathering the strength to push himself up and onto his feet so he could towel off and get dressed before Sam finished ruining whatever he was trying to make in the kitchen.

Sam had brought all of their stuff into the bedroom, so once he was dry he pawed through his own bag for some sweats and then stole one of Sam's hoodies. Sam's hoodies were the best thing to wear when he felt like this, all big and soft and warm and comfortable.

He had just finished getting dressed and was seriously considering screwing dinner and collapsing on the bed when Sam came into the bedroom. "Dinner's ready," he said, stifling a yawn, and Dean was too drained to even get indignant when Sam just (without even asking) seized Dean around the waist and dragged him to the kitchen.

Dinner was scrambled eggs and cheese, which even Sam couldn't ruin. Dean ate his eggs in a fog of exhaustion, barely even tasting then. He was half asleep when Sam pulled him up out of the chair and practically carried him back to the bedroom.

Once there, Sam eased him down onto the bed and started to make motions like he was going to take the hoodie off, but Dean shoved his hands away. "No," he mumbled, wrapping his arms around himself. Sam just shrugged and backed off.

Dean lay back, managed to pull the covers up over himself while Sam was turning off the overhead light. Then there was darkness – real darkness, not what they called darkness at the hospital but what was actually just a dimmer version of its usual glaring light.

Dean sighed, stretched out, appreciating an actual good mattress for once. Maybe Sam had had the right idea, renting an apartment, he thought drowsily.

"I'm going to take a shower, okay?" Sam whispered. Dean just grunted and burrowed under the covers.

He remembers not waking up until he heard Sam moving around in the bedroom, pulling on clothes and messing with the pillows on the other side of the bed. Then he registered that Sam was moving away from him, towards the bedroom door, and he sat up. "No," he said, forcing his tongue to work again.

"I'm just going to sleep on the couch," Sam started, but Dean interrupted him.

"No. You're sleeping in the bed."

"But—"

"Get in the goddamn bed, Sammy."

Sam didn't move for a second. Then he felt the mattress dip next to him, the covers rustling as Sam climbed under them. Dean lay back again, tucked the covers around his shoulders, and finally fell into sleep.

o

He remembers waking to the sound of Sam coughing.

His eyes blinked open, and for a moment he was completely confused. Then he remembered; they were in an apartment, sharing the bed, and he was out of the hospital. Light was making the edges of the curtains over the windows glow, so it was probably morning.

Sam coughed again.

Dean rolled over to see that his baby brother was huddled under the blankets, shivering, hair straggling over a face shiny with a sheen of sweat. Alarm trickled through the haze of sleep still on him, and Dean thrashed forward until he could touch Sam's face.

Sam was burning up.

Dean threw back the covers and struggled to his feet. Sam had brought everything inside in preparation for their stay, he thought, searching the room. The first aid kit had to be nearby. Sam was an annoying looming bitch when Dean was sick and would have made sure he could get to it in a second. So where—

Dean stumbled into the bathroom and found it sitting on the counter, next to Sam's razor. Breathing hard, he popped it open and grabbed the thermometer. Then he went back to the bed.

Sam was still wrapped up in the covers, body curled up into a bow and quaking slightly. Dean forced the covers away from Sam's face, shook him gently until his eyes fluttered open. Sam whimpered and clutched at the covers even more tightly. "Dean?" he whispered.

"Open your mouth," Dean told him.

"You're Dean," Sam murmured in response, but he let Dean slip the thermometer under his tongue. Dean laid a hand on Sam's forehead as he waited, holding the thermometer steady with his other hand, until the thermometer beeped.

102.4 F.

"Goddamnit," Dean whispered. He set the thermometer down on the bedside table and brushed Sam's hair off his forehead, thinking. Sam's fever was high, but not dangerously high, he told himself as he eased himself down on the bed so he was sitting next to Sam, who had wrapped himself back up in the covers and was now shivering violently. He was probably just sick with some run-of-the-mill virus brought on by worry and tension and sleeping in a chair for three days. Most likely it wasn't serious.

But Dean had to check.

"Sammy," he said, touching his brother's hot face again. "Come on, Sammy, wake up." Sam moaned but opened his eyes again. "Move your head," Dean told him.

"I'm Sam," Sam mumbled. "I am, right?"

"Yes, Sammy," Dean said patiently. "Now move your head for me. Up and down." Slowly, Sam's chin tipped up, then down towards his chest. "Back and forth now," Dean said, watching carefully as Sam twisted his head to one side and back. "Down again." Sam bowed his head until his chin was touching his chest.

Dean let out a sigh of relief.

"Dean," Sam whispered. "I'm cold, Dean."

"I know," Dean said, dragging himself back to his feet. He was starting to get tired already, which was fucking ridiculous. He didn't have time for that right now. "I'll get you something to help."

Sam nodded and pulled the covers up over his face.

Dean remembers going back to the bathroom and getting the Tylenol. He remembers giving Sam a few pills chased down with cough syrup, and then wrestling him out from under the covers and laying cold wet washcloths on his bare skin while Sam coughed and whimpered and pleaded for the covers back. There wasn't a rash on Sam's stomach either, further proof that Sam hadn't gotten Dean's meningitis, but even so Dean vowed to figure out a way to get Sam back to the hospital if he couldn't get the fever down. He already knew he couldn't risk driving.

But when he took Sam's temperature again after drying him off and letting him wrap back up in the blankets, it had dropped to 101.2 F.

Dean let out a breath, leaned his head into his hands. He was already shaking with exhaustion himself, but he was also hungry and Sam needed food and water as well as rest. So Dean forced himself back onto his feet and shuffled down the hall into the kitchen.

He remembers rifling through the cabinets, his head pounding, until he found all the dishes he needed. Then he went through the supplies Sam had bought, got everything prepped, chopped and diced and cooked, saving boiling the macaroni for last.

While he was waiting for the water to heat up, he staggered, and his legs nearly gave out.

"Fuck that," he muttered out loud. He debated dragging a chair over to the stove so he could sit, but that would take more effort than it was worth, and he had to make sure he stayed awake until the food was done. So he slid his ass onto the counter next to the stove instead. Letting his legs dangle, he leaned his head back until it was resting against the overhead cabinets, and listened to the water.

o

He remembers that Sam was coughing when he came to get him for breakfast. Dean had already eaten his share, since he suspected he would need the fuel to deal with getting Sam to the kitchen. It seemed to help, as he was able to make it to the bedroom without incident.

"Dean?" Sam whispered through coughs when he opened the door. "Is that you, Dean?"

"It's me," Dean answered as he leaned against the doorframe for a minute, breath hitching. Maybe the food hadn't given him that much energy.

"And I'm Sam?" Sam sounded young, almost like they were kids again and Dean was taking care of his baby brother, home sick from school.

"You're Sam," Dean confirmed, and made himself go over to the bed. Sam's eyes were open, glassy and bright with fever, and Dean laid his hand on his forehead again. He was still hot, still fevered, but not as hot as he'd been when he'd woken up.

Sam reached up, clutched at Dean's hand. Dean turned his hand so his palm faced up, let Sam squeeze his fingers. "I keep thinking things," Sam whispered. "I keep thinking that I'm supposed to be somewhere else, but then I think that I'm not, I'm here, and—" He broke off, coughing.

Dean waited it out. As soon as Sam had quieted, he used his free hand to pull the covers back. Sam whimpered and shook his head, but he didn't let go of Dean's hand. Which, really, was starting to get annoying instead of cute. Typical Sam.

"Time to get up," Dean told him, wrenching his hand free and grabbing his brother around the shoulders. Sam sat up easily enough, even if he was still making obnoxious whimpering noises, but he balked when Dean tried to get him to his feet.

"I need to do something," he panted before dissolving into another coughing fit.

"Yeah," Dean agreed. "You need to eat."

o

Sam took the blanket with him to the kitchen. Since it got his brother to agree to move his own enormous ass instead of Dean having to do it, Dean didn't mind. He remembers practically falling into his own chair at the table and laying his head on the scarred wood, just breathing as his vision swam.

"Hey," Sam said, still in that young voice. Dean blinked and looked up at him. Sam was swathed in the blanket and looking down at his food with surprise. "You made hot-dog-a-roni," he pronounced, sounding as old as he had been when he'd first called the classy dish of macaroni and cheese with cut up hot dogs that only Dean could make (not Dad, Dad didn't do it right) 'hot-dog-a-roni.'

At least Sam was being coherent now. "So I did." Dean let his eyes fall shut.

"I love hot-dog-a-roni," Sam said softly. "I tried to make it a couple times at Stanford, but it never tasted like it did when you made it."

"That's because you suck at cooking," Dean answered without opening his eyes.

"No, man, I had Jess do it once," Sam argued, coughing. "It still wasn't right."

"Sam," Dean muttered, "shut up and eat."

Sam must have actually listened to him, because the next thing Dean heard was the sound of a fork scraping against a bowl. He remembers listening to Sam eat while his own brain drifted in a sort of fog, his whole body weighing him down like it was made of lead. He didn't rouse until Sam touched him on the shoulder and told him he was done.

"Great," Dean mumbled, pushing at the table until he was sitting upright. Sam started coughing again, his shoulders shaking under the blanket, and Dean lurched to his feet and got Sam to his too, and then he dragged himself, Sam, and the blanket all back to the bedroom, where all three of them collapsed onto the bed and slept.

o

"What do you remember?" Sam asks him, blowing on the mug of tea he's clutching at with both hands.

They're both crammed together on the single couch their rented apartment has, wrapped in blankets. Sam's still flushed, still coughing occasionally, but he's almost well, which means Dean can stop worrying so damn much and concentrate on getting his own strength back. Mostly this has meant sleeping more hours than he's awake and watching movies on the couch with Sam. Often it also involves tea, as Sam insists that it will help them recover. Dean drinks it just to shut him up.

"About what?" Dean asks. "Dude, where's mine?"

"Being sick," Sam answers. "And it's on the table right in front of you. And no, I didn't sweeten it," he adds before Dean can make sure.

"You mean the hospital?" Dean frees an arm from the blanket and snags his own mug.

"Yeah," Sam says after taking a sip. "I mean, your fever was so high – I mostly remember being confused about who I was, and I know your fever was a lot higher. So. What do you remember?"

Dean pauses.

What does he remember?

Sam waits patiently, taking sips from his mug. Dean looks at him, and remembers a nurse with hazel eyes, and an alarm going off, and Sam's hands covering his the first time he really woke up.

He remembers what he always remembers: what he needs to.

"I remember looking for your sorry ass," he says finally.