Chapter Text
On Saturday morning, Sam wheedles Dean’s new cell number from Bobby and then uses one of the many phones Bobby has lined up in the kitchen to call his brother.
Dean answers on the second ring, sounding distracted but mostly cheerful as he says, “Morning, sunshine.”
Sam has been amping himself up for this conversation all morning, and he thought he was ready to face Dean again, but suddenly all of his carefully planned words are withering in his throat. He swallows a couple of times in an effort to recover while silence stretches out on his end of the line.
“Bobby?” Dean says now, sounding less cheerful and more focused. “You there?”
Sam tries again, opening his mouth, and then wordlessly drops his forehead against the wall. Bobby isn’t actually looking at Sam as he moves around the kitchen putting his breakfast together, but Sam can feel the man’s attention on him as he tightens his grip uselessly on the phone.
After another, longer pause, Dean’s voice comes again: “Sam.”
It isn’t a guess.
As though the sound of his own name has unlocked Sam’s voice, he immediately parts his lips and breathes, “Hey, Dean.”
On the other end of the phone, Dean grunts—a humorless, dull sound. “You know what, dude? Next time you get the urge to call me up and breathe at me, don’t.”
Sam can hear the intent to hang up clearly in his brother’s voice, and he hastens to say, “Wait! Look, I didn’t. I just wanted to check about today.”
“Today?” Dean echoes.
“The, uh, picnic? If I’m still invited?”
“Oh,” Dean says flatly. Nothing else, just that, and Sam’s palms start to sweat.
After a long moment, he shuts his eyes and makes himself say, “If you don’t want me to come, I won’t—”
“I told you I didn’t care,” Dean cuts in. “So if you want to bail, bail. But that’s your call, Sam. You don’t get to blame me for you being too chickenshit to show.”
Sam wants to protest—to say that Dean’s putting words into his mouth, that he isn’t trying to worm his way out of anything—and then lifts his head with a rueful clench of his jaw instead. Dean isn’t going to believe any of that, and besides, Sam didn’t call him up to fight.
“If it’s okay with you, then I’m coming,” he says, trying to keep his voice calm and confident.
“Okay, then,” Dean comes back immediately, his voice curt and dismissive. “Was that it?”
His brother’s attitude is kind of making Sam want to crawl under a rock and come out sometime next year, but he pushes the feeling aside to say, “No, I wanted to ask about meeting you at your place.”
Dean is silent on the other end of the line.
After almost a minute of waiting, Sam clears his throat and continues, “When you were here on Tuesday, I mentioned maybe I could head over there early. We could drive over together?”
There’s a beat of hesitation, during which Sam is certain Dean still isn’t going to answer, and then his brother says, “Be here by one or I’m leaving your ass behind.” He’s gone before Sam can confirm or thank him, Bobby’s phone immediately registering the disconnect with a click and a long, jarring tone.
As Sam hangs up the phone with a grimace, Bobby looks up from the counter where he’s been standing and shoveling cereal into his mouth and says, “So?”
Sam offers the man a weak grin as he runs his hand through his hair. “Guess I’m going to a picnic.”
The Impala isn’t anywhere to be seen when Sam pulls up in front of Dean’s house at half past noon. He was planning on just driving around the block a couple (dozen) times until one o’clock rolled around, but he pulls over immediately now, heart beating more quickly than before and stomach twisting nervously.
As he puts the truck in park, Dean’s garage door rolls up to reveal a black Hyundai Tucson and a wall lined with tools. Sam turns off the engine, slightly cheered by the sign of life (even if the Dean he remembers would have had a fit at the prospect of housing his baby so close to an SUV), and starts to unfold himself from the truck.
And then freezes with one foot on the pavement and the other on the running board when the front door opens and Erica bustles out with a stack of red Tupperware in her arms.
She spots him almost immediately—he’s hard to miss parked out in front like he is—and her steps falter. She recovers in the next instant, though, looking away from him and moving toward the garage a little more quickly than before.
Knowing that Dean isn’t dating her should probably make Sam more comfortable about interacting with the woman, but he doesn’t actually feel any more confident than he did last week. Maybe the situation would sit easier with him if he knew what she is to Dean. Still, he can't hide out here forever, so after taking a couple of calming, deep breaths, Sam gets out of the truck and shuts the door behind him.
He didn't take all that long deciding what to do, but Erica wasn't dawdling herself and by the time Sam slowly begins to advance up the driveway, she has the Tucson loaded up and is already hurrying back toward the house.
“Hey,” he calls, lifting one hand in greeting. “Erica, right?”
Erica flicks her eyes at him and then disappears inside without responding. The door shuts behind her—not violently, but with a firmness that’s almost as good as a slam—and Sam drops his hand back to his side. After a moment, he shoves both hands into his pockets—he doesn’t know what else to do with them—and scuffs his foot against the driveway while glancing indecisively up and down the street.
Dean’s car is missing, which seems to indicate that he isn’t home. But Dean told Sam to meet him here, and anyway Sam has no clue where this picnic thing is. Bobby probably knows, but Bobby got called out on a hunt about half an hour before Sam left, and Sam knows better than to bother the man about something as trivial as directions right now.
And Dean said one o’clock. He said one, so he ... if he isn’t here now, then he must be coming back. Maybe he had to pick something up at the store?
When Erica reemerges from the house, this time carrying two oversized paper bags bulging with what seems to be chips, Sam is still standing at the foot of the driveway. She doesn’t look at him with a deliberate air that tells him she’s avoiding him, and in his uncertain state the snub hits harder than it should. He hasn’t felt like this much of an asshole since ... well, since he faced Dean down in Bobby’s kitchen on Tuesday.
Actually, he's starting to get used to the feeling.
“So, uh,” Sam calls, making himself move further up the driveway toward the garage. “I’m supposed to be meeting Dean here for this picnic thing. Is he home?”
Erica tosses the bags into the backseat of the SUV and then turns to face him, one hand resting on the open door. “He got a call from Bob Brighton over at Park and Rec,” she announces. “Had to go over early.” While Sam frowns, wondering why Dean didn’t call Bobby’s to let him know, Erica adds, “He said that if you showed up I was supposed to give you directions.”
If Sam showed up.
Off the sudden, burning suspicion in his stomach, Sam asks, “When exactly did Bob call?”
Something in the way Erica is looking at Sam tells him she knows why he’s asking, but she meets his gaze unabashedly as she answers, “Around seven.”
Sam called his brother a quarter after nine. Which means that Dean already knew damned well that he wasn’t going to be here when he told Sam to come over.
Sam isn’t sure what his face looks like as he struggles to digest that nugget of information, but it must be pretty pitiful because Erica’s expression thaws slightly and she offers, “I’m heading over now. You can follow me if you want.”
“Uh, sure. That’d be great.”
Only ‘great’ isn’t the word for it. Seriously, what’s the point of trying if Dean’s going to fuck with him like this?
“Are you going to follow me over?”
Sam refocuses his attention outward again to find Erica watching him doubtfully. There’s more knowledge in her eyes than he wants there, and more uneasiness, and as Sam’s stomach pulls tight with shame, he wonders again how much Dean told her. How much she knows about him. About them.
Then Erica lifts her chin and says, “If you’re just jerking him around again, you better leave now.”
The shame in his stomach immediately chars into righteous anger—this woman doesn’t know him, no matter what Dean might have said—and Sam feels his jaw muscle twitching as he repeats, “I’ll follow you.”
He turns away without waiting for a response and walks back to his truck. He’s unable to keep his anger out of his stride as he goes, which leaves his gait choppy and stiff. When he climbs back into the cab, he slams the door behind him before shooting a glance up the drive. Erica was watching him, but she gives a little flinch as he turns his head to look at her, then drops her chin and hurries back into the house.
Three trips out to the car later, she’s ready to leave and Sam is just as angry as ever—angrier, actually. But the target of his fury has shifted—first from Erica to Dean, but it has finally settled where it belongs, on himself. Everything that’s happening now, as maddening and frustrating and hurtful as it is, is his own fault.
Sam’s clearly the one at fault here. He took advantage of Dean, fucked him up worse than the demon ever did, and then he just—he bailed. He had reasons for going—good ones—but he knows how it must have looked to his brother. He knows that it must have felt like being rejected and discarded. And Sam probably could have fixed that—or at least alleviated it—with the phone call he never managed to make.
He had reasons for that as well, of course—too frightened of being drawn back at first, and then too full of self-loathing, and then too far gone beneath the alluring thrum of power, and then back to being afraid again. None of those reasons are good enough to justify what he put Dean through, though, and as he follows Erica’s Tucson across town, Sam reminds himself again that he deserves this.
He deserves everything Dean and those close to Dean can dish out, and he’s going to stay here and take it if it kills him.
Humboldt Park is bigger than Sam expected it to be—large enough to contain a baseball diamond, a small wading pool for kids, a pond with a wooden diving float, and a picnicking area dotted with picnic tables, barbeque pits, and towering evergreens for shade. The parking lot is already jammed full of cars, and Sam looks around for the Impala as he pulls in but can’t find her familiar lines anywhere.
That doesn’t mean anything, though: the local vehicles tend toward the tall and hulking—SUVs and pick-up trucks that make Sam’s own ride seem like a go-kart—and the Impala, distinctive as she is, is also short enough to get lost in the shuffle.
There are people everywhere as Sam searches for a space—a great number of them wearing patriot-themed t-shirts or carrying miniature American flags—and Sam realizes with a start that it must be July 4th, or close enough for town planning purposes. He glances down at himself quickly—jeans, scuffed shoes—and thanks whoever was looking out for him this morning for making him choose the white t-shirt instead of the grey. At least now he has a chance of blending in with the crowd—and crowd is the only word for it. Humboldt’s entire population must be here right now, and some of the surrounding farmers as well.
Sam eventually finds a space just a few spots down from where Erica is parking and steps out onto the pavement in time to duck a low-flying Frisbee. The kids playing with it—high schoolers, Sam guesses—shout out an apology as they sprint past in pursuit. Sam watches as the kids narrowly avoid the Dodge Caravan edging down the aisle and then waits for it to finish nosing past his space before stepping out himself.
He doesn’t actually need Erica’s guidance anymore now that he’s here, but after a brief hesitation he heads over to her Tucson anyway. Dean might not be dating the woman, but he’s still living with her. And it’s obvious, from seeing them together last week, that Dean cares about her.
If there’s going to be room in Dean’s life for Sam, then Sam is going to have to at least get along with Erica. He hasn’t made a great start in that department, but there’s no time like the present to try and fix things.
“Can I help?” he asks, coming up alongside her just as she’s pulling the back door open.
Erica gives him a quick, searching glance, but after a moment of consideration—he can practically see her calculating how long it would take her to unload on her own—she nods curtly. “Hold out your hands,” she orders, and then starts piling him high with Tupperware and plastic bags.
As Sam obediently juggles his load, he clears his throat and offers, “So, where’d you meet Dean?”
“Hospital,” Erica answers, reaching deeper into the backseat for another container. Her voice is casual, the word thrown away like it doesn’t mean anything, but Sam’s skin goes cold despite the heat. He was sweating a moment ago, but the air feels frozen now, and his insides are a hard, congealed mess.
“When was he in the hospital?”
The question comes out as a croaked whisper, almost too soft to be heard, but Sam can’t manage more than that. He’s too busy riffling through possibilities in his head, and craning his neck around in search of Dean.
Whatever Erica is talking about is long in the past, Sam knows that, but it doesn’t feel like history to him. It feels like the immediate present, like Dean is in trouble and needs him—like he needs to get to Dean now and make sure he’s okay. Sam is pretty sure his brother won’t look too kindly on being patted down and felt up in the middle of a Fourth of July picnic, which means they have a problem because right now he doesn’t know that he’ll be able to help himself.
A hospital. What the fuck could have been bad enough to drive Dean back to one of those?
The sound of the door shutting snaps Sam’s attention back down and he finds Erica looking up at him. Her expression isn’t any warmer than it was back at the house, despite his attempts to be helpful. When she sees she has his attention, she sniffs and pushes past him, holding tight to her own load. The answer she throws over her shoulder as she goes is as much an accusation as anything else, and it drives the breath from Sam’s lungs, the strength from his hands.
“When you weren’t here.”
Sam is still shaken half an hour later as he winds his way through the crowds in search of his brother. Everyone here seems to know everyone else, which is way too Leave It To Beaver for Sam’s comfort, and all the bright colors and smiles are giving the day a surreal tint. This kind of small town Americana shouldn’t exist, Sam thinks. Not in the same world where Dean could have been so thoroughly broken. Not in the same world where there are demons and ghosts and bloody, mauled corpses.
This isn’t the world Sam knows, isn’t one he’s at all familiar with. And yet as he searches for his brother, he’s shaken by the increasingly vivid sensation that it’s his own life that doesn’t belong. This is real, here and now, and everything that came before—everything Sam is and knows—is nothing more than a bad dream.
Worse, Sam is sure that everyone can see it on him, as though all of the blood and gunpowder is staining his face and hands. It feels like everyone's staring at the switchblade in his back pocket and the larger hunting knife strapped to the inside of his ankle—should have left them at home, or at least in the truck, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to do so. And then there are the more ephemeral taints he knows he carries, the demon blood and the blind, all-consuming hunger for Dean, and they see that as well, they know, and Sam has never felt his size so conspicuously before.
It’s almost enough to make him wish he’d stuck close to Erica, despite the hostility she was radiating toward him as he helped her set the food up on one of the picnic tables. He considers turning back to find her, considers turning tail and fleeing. Or at least closing himself back up in his truck until he’s calmed down again.
For the first time in years, the meditative calm he’s held deep within himself is slipping, and he’s sure that he’s going to do something stupid. He’s going to slip up, fall off the wagon and—
And then, unexpectedly, a clump of people shift in front of him and there’s Dean.
Dean may be sitting on a rock, but now that Sam has caught sight of him, he doesn’t understand how it took him this long to locate his brother. Dean’s the only person Sam has seen all day not wearing anything patriotic—no flags; no red, white or blue; no plastic star necklace that a couple of older ladies are passing out to everyone with a pulse.
Instead, Dean is dressed in jeans and a plain black t-shirt. He’s wearing his sunglasses again, and there’s that glint of silver around his neck—the St. George medal, Sam guesses. His shoes are the clunky half-boots Sam remembers his brother preferring when they were hunting together, and when you add in the leather cuffs, Dean looks a little too rough and dangerous to fit comfortably with this gathering.
Except Dean is grinning in that disarming way he has, and casually gesturing with a can of beer as an older man with a potbelly and a receding hairline pokes at some meat cooking in a grill pit at their feet. It’s clear at once that Dean is offering advice, because Pot Belly is nodding and when Dean leans to one side and comes up with what looks like a vinegar bottle, Pot Belly accepts it without hesitation and upends it over the grill.
There’s a whooshing sound as the flames shoot up and Dean leans away from the fire, laughing and waving a hand to shoo away the smoke. His gaze moves casually over the crowd as he relaxes again. Sam can’t see his brother’s eyes behind the shades, but he knows exactly when they land on him because Dean goes still. The smile on his brother’s face first stiffens and then fades. All of the easy-going exuberance he was radiating a moment ago is gone, locked away behind high, protective walls.
Sam’s insides go cold and hard as he realizes that this is what Dad warned him about. This is him being here and taking away Dean’s stability and happiness, and he should go. He should just leave and not come back—for real, this time. If he stays, he’s just going to fuck this up for his brother.
But he can’t move with Dean’s gaze pinning him like that, and after a few shallow, painful breaths, he comes face to face with the uncomfortable realization that he can’t run anymore. Dean can send him away if he wants—and if Dean gives him a direct order, Sam will leave without any argument or hesitation—but when it comes to taking the initiative, Sam is done. If things fail between them, it won’t be because he gave up too soon.
Still looking in Sam’s direction, Dean murmurs something to Pot Belly and then pushes to his feet. Beer in hand, he heads toward Sam with measured, careful steps. It can’t be more than five or six yards, but it takes a while for Dean to make the trip because people keep stopping him. Sam can’t make out any of those conversations past the roaring in his ears—can’t tear his eyes from the slight, private smile his brother wears as he responds.
He wonders if he’ll ever get used to seeing Dean. If being in his brother’s presence is ever going to stop hitting him like a train wreck. He wonders if the wretched, sore hole in his chest is ever going to fill when Dean looks at him, instead of emptying further.
Finally, Dean is standing in front of him. He’s a foot away from Sam now, eyes still concealed behind his sunglasses, but Sam can feel his brother’s gaze darting up and down his body—Dean looking for something out of place, for some reason to tell Sam to leave, that he doesn’t belong.
Or maybe it’s Sam searching for the reason, because he knows he should leave. But he won't. He can't.
“So,” Dean says after too long of a pause. “You decided to show.”
The faint pulse of anger that flickers to life in Sam’s stomach surprises him—after a week of putting up with Bobby’s needling, as well as his own dark thoughts, Sam’s not used to feeling anything but guilt. But he’s also getting pretty tired of people thinking every word out of his mouth is a lie.
And Dean deliberately set him up today, telling Sam to meet him at the house when he knew full well he wouldn’t be there. When he had to know Sam would feel awkward and uncomfortable talking with Erica. Plus, Dean knows how Sam feels about being around so many strangers at once—he reassured Sam often enough when they were about to start classes at a new school.
It’s almost enough to make him think Dean’s setting him up to fail.
But Dean wants Sam to lose his cool—Sam can tell from the expectant tilt of his brother’s head—so he clenches his jaw shut on the frustrated recriminations that want to come tumbling out. After a few seconds of struggle, he manages a nod and then goes back to waiting.
Dean turns away—no welcome, no instruction given. There’s no telling whether he wants Sam to follow or not, but Sam isn’t about to let his brother ditch him here—and besides, Dean hasn’t told him to get lost—so he lurches forward, taking a couple of hurried steps to catch up.
Without glancing over, Dean lifts the can of beer to his mouth and tips it back. Sam can’t help but watch the way his brother’s lower lip catches on the edge of the can, the way Dean’s throat works as he swallows. There’s sweat in his hair, and this close Sam can smell him—still achingly familiar, even without the usual hints of leather and gun oil.
“You want a beer?” Dean asks as he lowers the can again.
Sam shakes his head, realizes that he doesn’t know whether Dean’s paying enough attention to have caught the motion in his peripheral vision (the old Dean would have, but Sam’s on shaky ground with this new version of his brother), and says, “I don’t drink anymore.”
“Yeah, I heard that.”
It’s said just as coolly and impersonally as everything else, Dean’s defenses running at full speed and strength, and Sam wonders whether his brother is lying now or if his earlier question was some kind of test. He doesn’t get a chance to ask, though, because a middle-aged woman with a bad perm and about fifty extra pounds on her hurries over. She’s wearing a blue t-shirt and red shorts, with one of those plastic star necklaces around her throat, and she doesn’t hesitate before putting a hand on Dean’s arm.
Sam tenses, alarmed on his brother’s behalf, but Dean doesn’t look frightened. He does stop, halted by the touch, but there isn’t anything but casual curiosity on his face as he looks down at the woman.
“Dean,” she says, sounding out of breath and panicked. “Randy can’t find the list.”
Dean’s brow furrows. “What, for the show?” When the woman nods quickly, he eases his arm from her grasp so he can pat his back jeans pocket. “Got it covered. After last year, I kept a spare. Tell him to find me after dinner. I’m not giving it to him before then.”
“Oh, bless you,” the woman replies with a sigh of relief. Crisis averted, she finally turns her attention to Sam. An appreciative smile curves her lips as she looks over his chest and up to his face. “Who’s your friend?”
“Don’t get any ideas, Frannie,” Dean says dryly. “He’s just passing through.” Taking another sip from his beer, he slants a glance sideways at Sam. The smile glinting around the edges of the can is aluminum sharp.
This time, the burn of anger in Sam's gut is stronger and he forces a wide grin on his own face while stepping forward and sticking out his hand.
“Actually, I just moved here,” he corrects. “Bobby Singer’s renting me a room.” He hesitates, struck by the realization that he doesn’t know what alias Dean is using (or whether he wants to link their surnames together), and then simply says, “I’m Sam.”
“Frannie Rusch,” the woman replies, taking his hand and giving it three or four enthusiastic pumps. “I must say, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
The familiar, knowing look that she shoots in Dean’s direction strikes Sam as odd until he recognizes it from the time Jess introduced him to her family. They were just friends then, nothing official yet, but Jess’ mom spent most of the evening looking back and forth between them with the same pleased smile Frannie’s wearing now. Finding that smile here is disorienting—more because Frannie clearly thinks Dean is gay than because she’s assuming they’re together.
Sam glances sideways, wondering how his brother is taking this new development and hoping, with a nervous flutter, that there’ll be some faint indication of warmth in his response. Dean’s expression is impossible to read behind the sunglasses, but his caustic snort isn’t.
“Sam and I used to hunt together,” he says, his voice deceptively light. “And that’s it.” He gestures at Frannie with the beer, pointer finger wagging a reprimand. “So keep your dirty thoughts to yourself.”
Frannie laughs. “Can’t blame me for trying, love. You know everyone would love to see you settled down. You and Erica both.”
“Erica and I are doing pretty good as we are,” Dean replies. His voice is sharp suddenly, the light-hearted mask from a moment before discarded, and Frannie’s eyebrows start to draw together in concern. Dean ducks his head, mouth pursing in a way that tells Sam he’s annoyed with himself for the slip, and then shifts the beer to his other hand so that he can grab Sam’s elbow.
“Anyway,” he says. “I’ve got to introduce Sam to the guys. Don’t forget to tell Randy to come see me when he’s ready to set up.”
Frannie opens her mouth to respond, but Dean is already steering Sam away through the crowd. Sam can tell that his brother’s on edge—a muscle in Dean’s jaw is jumping and the stiff lines of his shoulders are radiating tension—and he casts his mind around for a way to pull Dean back. Something trivial that he can say to diffuse at least a little of the awkwardness.
After a few seconds, he comes up with, “Sorry—I didn’t think about how I should introduce myself. What name are you using?”
It seems like a harmless enough question, but Dean’s grip tightens on Sam’s arm, and he jerks him harshly to one side. They’re pushing out of the crowd now, Dean ignoring all the friendly greetings directed his way, and Sam stumbles a little as he’s dragged toward an isolated stand of trees. Dean tosses his beer into a trash barrel as they pass it, and then they’re on the other side of the trees and Dean turns, shoving Sam up against one of the trunks.
Sam grunts at the impact—Dean wasn’t exactly being gentle—but doesn’t move away as Dean steps in close and growls, “I don’t give a shit what name you use. You’re not gonna be around long enough for anyone to worry about it.”
“I am—Dean, I told you, I—”
“Dean Dean Dean!” Something waist-high and brightly dressed—a kid, Sam understands belatedly—barrels into Dean suddenly from the side.
Dean lets the impact drive him a couple of steps back, putting some distance between himself and Sam, and then grunts as a second boy collides with his legs from the other direction. The new boy doesn’t hesitate before trying to climb up Dean’s body, and as Sam watches with wide eyes, Dean crouches and lets the boy scramble up onto his back.
“Dean!” the first boy says again, tugging at Dean’s cuff-clad wrist. “Mommy said we could go swim if someone watches us, and you said you’d show us how to cannonball.”
“You sure I said that?” Dean asks, contorting a hand behind him to steady the boy clambering up onto his shoulders. “Cause I seem to remember saying I’d use you as a cannonball. Fire you right up over the treeline—kapow!”
“Please?” the second boy begs as Dean straightens again. He has his hands twisted in Dean’s hair, hanging on, and Sam knows they’re just kids, can’t be registering as any kind of threat, but it still makes his eyes tear to see Dean clearly having no problem whatsoever with so much contact.
Dean doesn’t look back at Sam, all of his focus on the boys as he says, “Isn’t Hank on lifeguard duty? Why don’t you ask him?”
“Hank’s a son of a bitch,” the boy on Dean’s shoulders replies, and even before his brother’s flush registers, Sam knows from the way that the kid says the words just who he learned them from.
“You better not be using that language around your mom,” Dean mutters.
“I’m not stupid,” the boy answers indignantly.
“Jacob! Kyle!” That’s a woman’s voice, and Sam turns to see a younger woman with long ginger hair running toward them. The boy on Dean’s back hunches over, clearly doing his best to be inconspicuous, but boy hanging onto Dean’s hand just offers the woman a huge smile and waves.
“Hi, mom!” he calls. “We found him!”
“I can see that,” the woman replies, and then lifts her gaze to Dean with an apologetic smile. “Sorry. They were off before I could tell them not to bother you.”
“Don’t worry about it, Susan,” Dean says, but he crouches and reaches up to give the boy on his shoulders a tap on one hip. The boy makes a disappointed noise, but climbs off without any further protest.
The woman—Susan—shoots Sam a quick look while gathering her kids up. “Frannie told me you had company,” she says, and that—that was fast.
Dean’s smile has gone stiff again. “He’s just a hunting buddy.”
But Susan is already moving toward Sam, one hand extended and the other holding onto her boys, and she has the same pleased, knowing look on her face that Frannie did. “I’m Susan McAffry. We live down the street from Dean.”
“Sam,” Sam says, giving her hand a quick shake. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Likewise,” Susan answers, and then gives Dean a poorly concealed thumbs up and a wink. Turning back to Sam and regaining her grip on her boys, she smiles and says, “Well, we’re going to get going. Enjoy the picnic!”
Sam watches Susan head back toward the crowd for a minute before chancing a glance back at his brother. Dean is standing stiffly, both hands clenched into fists. Sam isn’t sure what’s keeping him from hauling off and punching something (Sam, probably).
“So,” Sam says after a few moments. “They seem nice.”
Dean gives his head a shake and snorts, pushing two fingers up beneath his glasses to rub at the bridge of his nose. His mouth is twisted into an expression that makes Sam’s stomach contort unhappily.
“Do you—” Sam hesitates—this offer didn’t go over well when he made it this morning—and then finishes, “I can go.”
“Yeah, cause that’s going to convince everyone we’re not fucking,” Dean says bitterly, and then shakes his head again when Sam tries to apologize. “Come on. Said I’d introduce you to the guys, didn’t I?”
‘The guys’ turn out to be the group of men around the grill. Dean trots out the old ‘hunting buddies’ line as soon as they get there and then, when the men start quizzing Sam about what kind of ammunition he prefers, Dean slips away and disappears into the crowd.
Sam sees his brother maybe twice over the next four hours, and always at a distance. He isn’t given time to fret about that, though, because as soon as Dean is out of sight, it turns into open season on Sam. Everyone seems desperate to pick Sam’s brain about Dean’s sketchy past and, as far as the women are concerned, their supposed love life.
Sam spends the first few hours doing everything he can to convince Dean’s friends and neighbors that he isn’t dating Dean (although the temptation to let that assumption ride is almost overwhelming), and eventually people seem to get the picture and stop hinting. Once that problem has been addressed, it’s easy enough for Sam to turn the locals’ clumsy interrogations around and compile some of his own information on his brother’s new life.
By the time they’re all sitting down to eat—Dean next to Erica at the picnic table furthest from where Sam ends up sitting—Sam has a thumbnail sketch of Dean Singer, Bobby’s nephew. He’s a military brat, which isn’t too far from the truth. He’s an excellent cook and has a reputation for being able to fix just about anything mechanical that isn’t working right. He has quite a few friends in town, is generally well-liked, but there’s no one he’s particularly close to, except for Erica. More than a few of the women are carrying a torch for him, despite the fact that everyone is convinced he’s playing for the other team.
The day Dean Singer turned eighteen, or so the story runs, he joined the Rangers for a tour in the Middle East. He was a couple weeks away from coming home when his unit came under heavy fire and he ended up as a POW for seven months. The story has Bobby written all over it, and Sam has to hand it to the man—it’s the perfect cover to explain away Dean’s scars and behavioral quirks.
The gay thing is ... odd. Not just because Dean hasn’t ever shown any interest in any males who weren’t Sam. It’s the level of acceptance that really throws him—in such a small, conservative town, Sam expects hatred and disgust, but instead the worst he finds is mild discomfort. He guesses that some of that acceptance stems from Dean’s apparent celibacy—it’s easier to be tolerant when the object of your prejudice is kept out of sight—but a lot of it has to do with last year’s flood, and the way Dean risked his own life to save a group of local children from drowning. It’s hard to be disgusted by a local hero.
That particular act of heroism landed Dean in the hospital for a few days—hypothermia, pneumonia and, as if that weren’t already enough, a pretty bad concussion—and Sam wonders if that’s when he met Erica.
He tries to ask Dean about it after dinner, but before he can get close enough to do more than say his brother’s name, Dean is moving away with a group of men for an impromptu baseball game. Seeing Dean with a bat in his hands brings back unpleasant memories of that night in Alexandria—scent of the demon in Sam’s mouth, heat of flames on his face—but Sam is able to push them away with a little bit of effort.
Dean was never into sports when they were growing up, but it turns out he’s as good at this as he is at everything he tries his hand at. Sam watches his brother from the sidelines and tries to find any signs of lingering weakness from the crash or the demon’s attacks, and he can’t. Dean is moving just as easily as he always has, sprinting halfway across the field to get to a fly ball just in time and stealing third base when the opposing team’s pitcher isn’t looking.
The sun has set by the time the game ends (Sam isn’t sure who won, or whether anyone was even bothering to keep score), and then there are fireworks—the show Dean mentioned earlier, probably—and Sam stands in the middle of the crowd and tries to enjoy it. But he feels too alone in the quiet sea of shadowy figures, and he can’t help scanning the upturned faces for his brother.
When he finally locates Dean, he wishes he hadn’t.
Dean is sitting on top of a picnic table with Erica leaning back between his legs and resting against his chest. Dean has his arms around her, holding her loosely around her waist. His mouth is near her ear as he murmurs something while red and blue flowers appear in the sky above. The colors catch in Dean’s hair, painting it with surreal, flickering color, and Sam’s hands clench reflexively with the desire to rip Erica away from his brother and pull Dean into his arms instead. Where he belongs, damn it.
As though he can feel Sam’s gaze, Dean’s head comes up and his face turns in Sam’s direction. The sunglasses are gone—have been for some time—but the muted illumination from the fireworks isn’t enough for Sam to read any emotion in his brother’s expression, and besides, Dean’s too far away to make out any details. The moment drags out, Dean’s gaze remaining steady and unwavering—challenging, Sam thinks—and finally Sam can’t take it anymore. Eyes stinging and too wet, he turns his face away and crosses one arm over his stomach, as though that will calm the unhappy, anxious fluttering in his gut.
For what has to be the hundredth time today, he tells himself that he shouldn’t be here. Dean very obviously doesn’t want him around. Sam can’t even figure out why his brother invited him, unless this is Dean’s way of getting back at him—of hurting Sam by rubbing his nose in just how much Dean has moved on, how little he needs Sam.
“Enjoying the fireworks?”
Sam jerks his head to the side, too startled by the nearness of his brother’s voice to even consider hiding the tear tracks on his cheeks. Dean notices, of course, his gaze flicking quickly across Sam’s face before returning to his eyes. But there’s no hint of emotion in his expression—nothing to indicate whether the effect he’s having is making him happy or if it still bothers him to see Sam upset.
It’s yet another indication of the distance between them, and Sam sucks in a shaky breath and looks away, up toward the sky. Dean can probably see the fresh moisture on his face even more clearly like this, but Sam feels less conspicuous with his own eyes fixed on the vivid blooms of color exploding above the pond. His body is shaking—minute tremors running through his muscles that he hopes it’s too dark for Dean to catch.
Thoughts of running return, but they’re nothing but wistful daydreams. Sam just doesn’t have the strength to escape his brother’s orbit again, no matter how much it hurts to stay close. No matter how quickly he’s being burnt by Dean’s newfound light.
“They’re nice,” he rasps as another blossom—this one gold mingled with green—flares to life. “You designed them?”
It’s less of a guess than a request for confirmation. There have been too many hints in that direction today—the phone call this morning, Dean’s conversation with Frannie, stray snatches of speculation he overheard about Singer’s Show. And it might just be wishful thinking, but Sam thinks he can catch a glimpse of the brother he knew in the pyrotechnics above—Dean putting Dad’s explosives training to use.
“Bobby helped,” Dean replies, which means that, yes, he did. Bobby maybe sat with Dean and helped package the rockets, measured out the powders and cut the fuses to the right lengths, but Bobby just doesn’t have the creative reach for the impossible streaks of color exploding overhead.
There’s a moment of silence where Sam is hyper aware of how close Dean is standing, of how little he’d have to move to brush their shoulders together, and then Dean says, “I thought you’d have left by now.”
“Sorry to disappoint you.” Sam doesn’t say it with any bitterness—it isn’t an attack, isn’t even a complaint. It’s just an attempt to get some kind of response from Dean—some clue as to what his brother is thinking. What he wants.
But Dean’s quiet again.
Sam chances a glance, and Dean isn’t watching the fireworks. He’s staring at Sam, his own face still and unreadable. Sam shifts under the scrutiny, wiping at his eyes and cheeks with one arm. When he looks back over, Dean is walking away, heading for the parking lot.
Pain shoots through Sam’s chest—fresh wounds from yet another rejection—but before he can finish processing what just happened, Dean tosses a glance over his shoulder. There’s more of the brother Sam remembers there than Sam has seen since he came back, and he’s moving before he knows he means to, easing his way through the crowd in Dean’s wake. He catches up to his brother at the edge of the parking lot and cautiously falls into step beside him. When Dean doesn’t snap at him to back off, some of the nervous tension in Sam’s muscles eases, letting him straighten for the first time in hours.
He isn’t surprised when Dean’s trajectory takes them to the Impala.
The car is hidden between two oversized pick-ups, just as Sam suspected it might be, and Dean eels his way between his baby and one of the trucks without slowing. Sam follows, surreptitiously letting his fingers brush the Impala’s smooth side, and comes to a stop next to his brother. Dean sits on the hood, his back turned on the show behind them, and trains his eyes on the flat, dark roll of land to the east.
They’ve had so many conversations like this—just the two of them and the car, which has heard so many secrets over the years—and Sam, standing with one hand shoved into his pocket, feels comforted enough by the familiarity of the moment to offer, “I’m glad you asked me to come.”
The look Dean gives him in return is incredulous, like he knows exactly how much fun Sam had at the Humboldt Fourth of July Picnic. Sam guesses that he probably does. Dean was always good at tailing people. He could have been keeping tabs on Sam the whole time without Sam realizing. It both hurts and reassures, the thought of Dean watching him from a distance throughout the day. Evaluating his performance. Judging him.
Waiting for him to fuck up.
“What do you want here, Sam?” Dean asks now. He asked the same question at Bobby’s last Tuesday, but it sounds different tonight, and Sam understands that this time his brother actually wants an answer.
“I want us to be brothers again,” he answers softly. It’s half the truth, anyway.
But Dean narrows his eyes, distrustful, and presses, “That’s it? Just brothers?”
Sam drops his own gaze, knowing that he won’t be able to manage the lie and meet his brother’s eyes at the same time. He opens his mouth to agree—just brothers, that’s all he wants from Dean—and the words stick in his throat. He thinks about trying to force them out anyway—they’d sound funny, but Dean might be willing to buy it—and then realizes that he doesn’t want to. He’s through dwelling in the deceitful shades of grey that have always clung to both their lives. He’s done trying to fool himself and everyone around him about his heart and intentions.
There have been more than enough lies and half-truths between him and Dean. It’s time to clear the air.
“No,” Sam says, and now that he’s confessing, the words come out easy and clean. “I still want you. I’m still in love with you.”
“You don’t even know me, Sam.”
It hurts worse than anything that’s come before, that statement, and Sam’s head comes up with a jerk.
“Of course I know—”
“I’m not that guy anymore,” Dean interrupts.
His face is as empty as ever, but for the first time, Sam can hear something other than anger or apathy in his brother’s voice. For the first time, there’s a husk of some deeper, rawer emotion. Something like pain.
“That guy you ditched?” Dean continues bitterly. “The one who was too pathetic and broken for you to deal with? He’s dead. I salted and burned the fucker’s corpse.”
Sam can’t deny that his brother has changed, but he doesn’t think Dean has it right either. Sam has seen glimpses of his brother in the man beside him—heard about him in some of the stories the townspeople told him today. No, Dean is still here. The brother Sam fell in love with is still here.
But if it makes Dean feel better to think that other man is gone, then Sam isn’t going to upset him by arguing the point. Instead he says, “That’s not why I left.”
Dean turns his head further away, lifting one hand in a half-hearted waving gesture to dismiss the protest. “Whatever you’re looking for,” he says. “Whatever you want. You’re not gonna find it here.”
Sam studies the line of his brother’s jaw in the final, vivid plume of color overhead, and as the last of the fireworks fades amidst the clapping and cheering from the gathered crowd, he whispers, “I’m just looking for you, Dean. And you can—you can punish me all you want, man, but if you want me to leave then you’re going to have to say it, because otherwise I’m staying.”
Dean’s quiet for a long moment, watching over his shoulder as his friends and neighbors begin to filter back toward the cars. Finally, when the sounds of shouting kids and slamming doors come to them, he gives himself a little shake and straightens.
“We’ll see,” he rasps, pushing off the hood and moving around to the driver’s side. He jerks the driver’s side door open, not looking at Sam, and slides behind the wheel.
Sam wants to run around and put himself in the shotgun seat where he belongs, but he resists the impulse. As Dean starts the engine, he steps back instead, going up onto the grassy margin and giving his brother space.
The knowledge that it’s the right thing to do doesn’t help the broken ache in his chest as he watches Dean back out and drive away.