Blood, Sweat, and Sam: For Soncnica's birthday. Which was last month. But here we are. Please check for more Blood, Sweat, and Sam stories over the next few days from, in no particular order: Mad Server, Enkidu07, Sidjack, NewspaperTaxis, and Miyo86.

Beta'd by the ever patient NewspaperTaxis.

"Dean, stop!" Sam breathed heavily into the pillow, back muscles bunching, eyes squeezed shut. "That's enough."

The cloth went back in the bowl of warm water, now pink with blood, and wrung out. "Sammy, hold still. I'm almost done." Dean poured a drop of rubbing alcohol on the cloth, nose wrinkling at the acrid smell, and carefully cleaned another patch of flayed skin. Sam hissed in pain, trying to twist away. Dean winced in sympathy, pulling back the cloth and giving Sam's good shoulder a gentle pat. "You sure you don't want to go to the ER?"

"No. Nothing broken."

The impact with the pavement had scraped Sam's entire left side, removing skin and grinding gravel and dirt into his flesh. Sam was down to his boxers and socks, bruises blooming from his knee to his shoulder blade. It was meticulous work, and painful to remove the grit and clean the bloody skin. Even though Dean was working quickly, minute tremors started rippling up Sam's sweat slick back. "Another few minutes."

Sam groaned, and lifted his head from the pillow. "Shit." Sam sucked air through his teeth. "Dean. Leave it."

"Leave it? What part of this," gesturing broadly toward Sam's side, "is it?" Tsking to himself, Dean bent over Sam's shoulder blade, gently wiping a bloody patch clean before applying antibiotic cream and a patch of gauze. Blood continued to seep slowly, spotting the gauze with dark red spots.

More alcohol, another gentle wipe and Sam's arm suddenly swung around to push Dean's hands away. "I said enough. Goddamn it, Dean, what part of enough, stop, leave it alone, don't you get?"

Dean stood, taking a few steps back, and held out his hands, palms up. "Okay, okay." He turned to his duffel and pulled out a pill bottle. "Take some Vicodin and I'll finish when you're too zonked to give a damn."

"I don't want Vicodin. Or Jim. Or José, or whatever other booze you've got stashed away in there." Sam stood suddenly, looking anywhere but at his brother.

Eyebrows rising, Dean stepped in front of him. "Fine. I'll get the booze out of your duffel. Bottle of Jack Daniels, right?"

"No.!" Sam took a shaky step to slowly sit back down on the bed, shoulders slumping.

"No, you don't have any, or no… Sam, what do you want?"

"Nothing. I don't want anything." He lowered himself onto his good side, gingerly moving until his head was on a pillow, facing away from his brother. "I'll take care of the rest myself."

Dean snorted in frustration, sitting on the opposite bed. "What do you expect me to do? Toss you a box of band-aids and go to a bar?"

Sam muttered "Yeah," before pulling a second pillow over his head. "Band-aids. Toss."

Dean scrubbed his hands through this hair before leaning forward, elbows on knees, to stare at his brother's raw back. "Sam. This wasn't your fault. We were both there. If anything, the fault is both of ours."

A muffled growl and the pillow raised an inch. "I don't wanna talk about it."

"You? Not wanting to talk? C'mon Sam, that's not natural. The one thing you always wanted to do was talk. And talk. And talk." Dean picked at a lose thread on the blanket. "We can't save them all, Sam, no matter how good, or how careful we are." When his brother didn't reply, Dean pulled a bottle of bourbon out of his duffel and took a swig before standing up. "Gonna take a shower. Maybe when I come out, you'll have stopped sulking."

It wasn't loud, but the pillow definitely said "Fuck you."

It was so immediately reminiscent of a much younger and equally sullen little brother that Dean couldn't help smiling as he closed the bathroom door behind him. The shakes didn't start until he was in the shower, hot water beating on his back and shoulders. Snaking a hand behind the curtain, he groped around until his hand closed on the bourbon. Bottle in hand, he lifted it in a toast toward the room, and took a deep swallow. His brother had saved his life, almost at the expense of his own. It had terrified him.

It had taken too long to find the unmarked grave. They hadn't been in time to save a man's life. And Sam had taken it hard, harder than Dean could remember his brother taking a death. He was morose, withdrawn…not too unusual for Emo-Boy, but the tension? Sam'd been anxious. Jumping at noises. They'd stopped for lunch but Sam wouldn't eat. Just disappeared into the men's room.

After fifteen minutes, Dean had gone looking for him, and walked in on Sam making a call to Bobby. At least he said it was Bobby, but when Dean went to take the phone to say something rude to the old man, Sam had disconnected and stalked out, shouldering Dean to one side.

Dean couldn't make heads or tails of it. Instead, he took a drink of bourbon and shampooed his hair.

When he'd left the diner, he found Sam behind the wheel of the Impala, clutching his phone, and doing a thousand-yard stare at the coffee shop across the street.

Dean leaned on the window frame, poked his brother's shoulder. "Sam. I'm going to get some decent coffee for the road. Want one of your half-caff, pansy assed butter pecan frappacrappos?" Sam's eyes cut over to him for a second, and Dean thought there was a nod somewhere in there. He crossed the street. At least, he got half way across before his Mack truck of a brother slammed into his back, throwing him onto the shoulder and out of the way of an oncoming car. Only to leave himself in its path.

Bourbon and shower finished, Dean toweled off, dressed in sweats, and padded into the room. His brother hadn't moved, hadn't even relaxed.

"Sam. I get that you were protecting me. And I'm… hell, I'm sorry, okay, I'm sorry I yelled at you, but man, you can't do that again. You just can't."

Sam pushed himself up on one arm and twisted around to face Dean. His voice, when he spoke, was anguished. "Can't do what? Protect you? Save your life?"

"Don't throw yourself on the grenade. Not for me."

"So I should have let the car hit you?"

"Better me than you!"

"Goddamn it! It wouldn't have been better. You're my brother, Dean. I'm not losing you again."

"You think I can watch you die a second time?" Dean sat heavily, making the springs on his bed squeak in protest.

"I didn't die."

"You could've. That car…"

"Still here."

"Too close."

"Scraped up. Sore. All in a day's work."

"I wanted to kill that driver." The earlier rage returned, ricocheting around his nerve endings. One of his legs started to bounce. "I still want to kill him. You should'a let me kill him. He was driving a Pinto, for god's sake. We're lucky it didn't burst into fuckin' flames."

"I know." Sam swung his legs around and sat, mirroring Dean's slumped posture across from him. "But I'm okay."

"Yeah." Dean straightened up and stretched, sucking in a huge breath. "You want me to finish your back now?"

Sam narrowed his eyes briefly, considering. He nodded. "Okay. Hurts like a bitch."

"Want a Vicodin? Jim? Jack?" He remembered the empty bottle in the bathroom. "No Jim. Not too late to get some." The silence stretched out long enough for Dean to regret asking. "Never mind. I'll just…"

"Jack. Couple of shots." A hesitant smile played across Sam's mouth.

Dean knew a peace offering when he saw it. He handed Sam the bottle, and got a fresh bowl of water. "Let's see how bad it looks now."

The next morning, Dean roused his brother long enough to change the gauze pads and wipe down the worst of the bruising with witch hazel. He also bullied him into taking a pair of Vicodin with a glass of Gatorade before pulling up the covers and letting Sam pass out.

Sam rolled out of bed with a groan hours later, as the motel's windows darkened with the setting sun. He devoured two slightly stale ham and cheese sandwiches, two dill pickles, and a large bag of barbeque chips, with most of a liter of Pepsi. Convinced Sam was on the mend, Dean removed the gauze, humming tunelessly as he inspected the forming scabs. "These look better. Go ahead and take a shower. I'll check them again in a couple of hours."

Clean, dry, and dosed with Advil, Sam slowly settled himself at the room's table and turned on the laptop, looking up when Dean pulled on his leather coat and flipped the collar.

"Going somewhere?"

"Gotta date with the hot girl at the deli. We're meeting at the bar right across the street." Dean looked speculatively at his little brother. "You want to come?"

Sam cocked his head, eyebrows up. "You're kidding."

"You could learn something." Dean waggled his eyebrows. The look of horror on Sam' face was classic little brother. It felt good after the last couple of days.

"No. I'm going to stay in."

"Suit yourself. Oh. Forgot something." He tossed a small box at Sam, watching as it bounced off the table and onto the keyboard. "Band-aids."

The welcome sound of Sam laughing followed Dean out of the room.

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