And the Devil Makes Three

What is past is not dead; it is not even past.
We cut ourselves off from it. We pretend to be strangers.

Patterns of Childhood : Christa Wolf

* * *

And the Devil Makes Three

They kept the lights dimmed in the neo-natal ward, but Dean could still make out the scrawl of the nurse's handwriting on the tiny plastic bracelet: Winchester, Katherine M. It occurred to him that he'd probably still have that little piece of plastic fifty years from now. He didn't think he'd ever get tired of looking at it.

He straightened the bracelet with the tip of a finger, and kept his voice low. "So? What do you think?"

Sam stirred beside him, and answered in the same low tone. "I think you and Julie do some pretty good work, that's what I think."

"Pretty good? Dude, look at her. She's perfect. She's the best looking kid in here."

"All right, I'll admit, she is pretty adorable." He gave Dean a sidelong, assessing look, then shrugged. "I mean, considering."

Dean socked him in the arm with his free hand, not bothering to dignify that.

"Ow, hey," Sam protested, but he was laughing.

Dean felt like laughing, too, but he couldn't find breath for it. He stared down at his little girl, and it hit him hard, cold vertigo in the pit of his stomach. "God, Sammy, what the hell have I done?"

Sam shook his head and nudged an elbow into Dean's side. "No panicking. Panicking's for sissies, remember?"

"Yeah, I remember." Dean traced the perfect shape of Katie's arm, then lifted her hand and balanced her tiny fingers against one of his. After a minute, he glanced at Sam and withdrew his hand. "You want to get in here, or what?"

Sam moved closer and put his hand, scrubbed pink, into the ventilator. With infinite gentleness, he brushed his fingers over Katie's hair, dark like her mom's. Dean watched his brother trace over his baby girl's nose, her lips, with the same reverence he felt. Somehow, against whatever crazy odds, they'd made it alive and in one piece to this day, to this little person with their mom's middle name. Three weeks early, but healthy, breathing on her own. No complications the doctors could find. A freaking miracle, that's what she was, and Sam knew it as well as he did.

Sam cleared his throat softly. "How's Jules?" he asked, never taking his eyes off Katie. The tip of his finger smoothed the little frown between her eyes, and it looked to Dean like she gave a soft sigh of approval.

"She's good, mostly. They want to keep her a couple of nights for observation. They said Katie might be able to go home in a week or so."

Katie reached up and latched onto Sam's finger as if she didn't plan to let go any time soon. A grin broke over Sam's face like he couldn't help it, wondering and awed. It lit him up, made the tired line between his eyebrows fade. "That's some grip she's got there."

Dean let out a breath halfway between a laugh and something else. "Jeez, man. Pinch me or somethin', wouldya?"

Sam kept his hand where it was and didn't look at him, just reached out and looped an arm around Dean's neck and rested his head against Dean's. Dean leaned into him before he knew he meant to. He decided that for a minute, he'd put up with it, even though he could tell without looking that Sam was about as close to tears as Dean felt, and if Sam lost it, there was no way in hell Dean was keeping it together.

Katie finally let go, and Sam touched her forehead again, then withdrew his hand. She looked up at them with this solemn, intent look, like she was sussing them out. "Man," Dean cracked, a little desperate, "she already looks smarter than me. I'm so screwed."

Sam laughed, but it had a suspiciously watery sound to it; before Dean could react, Sam turned and pressed his face against Dean's. He breathed in and then stilled. It lasted only a second before Sam's breath hitched and he breathed out against Dean's neck, then let go so fast it threw Dean's equilibrium off.

Sam cleared his throat, a short, sharp sound, and put some distance between them. He rubbed a hand against the back of his neck. "Man, I don't know about you, but I am wiped. It's been a long three days. I think I'm gonna head home, get some sleep. You want me to bring you anything before I go?"

"No, I'm good." Dean shook off the weird, intense moment. They were punchy, that's all. Tired, like Sam said. "I told you, you should crash at our place. I know it's tight quarters, but it's not like I'll be doing anything but passing out there for the next few days."

"No offense, dude, but last time I tried to sleep on that couch? I thought I was gonna need a month in rehab." At Dean's look, Sam's expression softened. "Don't worry, okay? I can afford a motel for a couple days. I'm not desperate or anything."

"Yeah," Dean grouched, "that's why you look like you haven't had a decent meal in a month."

"Dean." Sam smiled a little and hunched his shoulders, putting his hands in his pockets. He jerked his chin in Katie's direction. "You got enough to worry about. Don't waste it on me, Dad."

The D-word was still enough of a head trip that it threw him. Seeing it, Sam grinned and clapped him once on the shoulder. Before Dean knew it, he was gone, and it was only as the door closed behind him that Dean remembered the oddly intimate ghost-echo of Sam's face against his.

Two days passed in which Sam didn't call and didn't show up at the hospital. Dean thought at first maybe he was worn out; he'd been on the road for the better part of a week before Dean's panicked phone call, and he'd flown five hours to stay with Dean every minute of the thirty-four stressful hours Jules was in labor. The guy deserved to face-plant for a couple days.

"Must've turned his phone off," Dean said, as he drove Jules home the second night. Traffic was sparse; it was after ten, and they sailed through green lights along the main road. He hit the button and cut off Sam's recorded voice telling him to leave a message.

Jules was wiped and out of sorts from the aftereffects of the anesthetic, but that didn't stop her from picking up on the unease that lay under Dean's casual tone. "Why don't you go over there?" she suggested. "The second I get in my own bed I'm not moving anyway. I'll be fine."

"Nah, I'm sure it's nothing," Dean said, telling himself he believed it.

"Uh huh, I'm sure you're right. So go over there, and make sure."

Dean shot her a sidelong glance, wry. She knew him too well. She'd known the truth about what he and Sam did for a living from the day they'd met, and she'd never once asked him to sugarcoat it, or pretend he was like other guys. In the year they'd been together, he'd done everything he could to put that life behind him, but she never treated him like he was crazy for worrying about things normal guys would laugh at. And she'd never once acted like there was anything wrong with the way things were between him and Sam. She'd accepted it from the beginning.

He's all the family you've got, she'd said once, back when they first started getting serious, like that was enough and he didn't have to explain any more. You've been through hell together, more than once. You think I'd try to get in the way of that? You think I'd want to?

"Sam's a big boy," he said, saying it to convince himself as much as anything. "It'll keep." He reached out and stroked her hair back, touch light. "How about you, huh? How you doin'?"

She sighed, leaning into the touch. "I'm fine. I'll live, anyway. I just... I hate leaving her, you know?"

"Yeah, I know. But, hey, just a couple days, and she's all ours. Think we can handle it?"

Her eyes met his, tiredness melting away as she smiled. "I can if you can."

"I think we'll do fine, that's what I think."

She closed her eyes, but the smile lingered. "Keep talking, babe. It sounds more convincing every time you say it."

It was after eleven when Dean's phone buzzed on the night stand. He frowned, untangling himself from Jules, who was mostly out thanks to the painkillers. "I got it." He fumbled for the phone, and saw Sam's name on the screen.

"Where the hell you been?" He kept his voice low, but his heart kicked, pumping the first shot of adrenalin readiness through his body.

"I'm sorry, man. I know it's late."

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I've been fighting a cold or something. I was afraid I'd give it to Katie, or to you guys. Thought I'd rest up and try to kick it, but I think it's getting the better of me."

Dean swallowed, his fingers tightening on the phone. Annoyance spiked through him, replacing the low-level worry he'd been fighting for two days. "Dude, try pickin' up the phone next time, huh? You know how I get."

He tried to keep it light, to make a joke of it, but after the last few days, everything was a little too close to the surface. Sam's voice came gentle, contrite. "Yeah, I'm sorry. Figured you'd have your phone off at the hospital anyway."

Dean rubbed a hand over his eyes. "Forget it. So you're still sick?" He did sound a little congested.

"Just a cold. I'm sure I'll be over it in a day or two." There came a pause, and then Sam said, "Dean, listen. There's something else."

"Oh, yeah? What?"

Sam cleared his throat. Dean heard him swallow like he was drinking something. Tea, maybe -- he'd started drinking all kinds of herbal shit for his headaches a few years back. "There's a job," Sam said at last. "In Arizona. Looks like it should be pretty easy, just a salt and burn, but I think it has to be soon."

For a second, Dean almost said, when do we leave? Then he remembered, and something heavy came to rest in his chest. "How soon? You see something?"

Sam hesitated, then admitted, "Yeah. A woman, maybe thirty-five. I think she's been seeing her dead husband. Looks like she kills herself... drives her car into a canyon, I think, or he makes her do it. Not sure."

Soon. He meant tomorrow, Dean realized.

He smiled a little then, getting it. "You were just gonna go, weren't you? You weren't even gonna tell me."

"Dude, I did tell you. I'm telling you right now."

"Yeah, but you had to think about it."

Sam didn't answer right away, and it was as good as a confession. At last he said, "Dean, you have a family now. They need you."

Dean thought, you're my family. But it wasn't the whole truth, not any more. "Beside the point," he said gruffly, feeling like he was losing hold of something he'd thought inviolable.

Sam was saying, "I can do this one in my sleep, you know I can. I'll be back before you know it."

Dean closed his eyes, listening to something between and around Sam's words that he wanted to pretend he couldn't hear. Maybe he should have seen it coming. It was just that of all the ways he'd imagined things would work out, he'd never expected to be the one on this end of a phone call like this.

At last, voice rough, he said, "Call me, okay? As soon as it's done. Don't make me come out there."

"I will, I promise. Hey, don't worry, all right?"

"Like that's gonna happen," Dean said, and let him go.

Sam kept his promise. He left voice mail.

Dean had the sneaking suspicion that Sam had used some kind of psychic mojo to figure out when Dean was on a surveillance assignment and had his phone turned off. In the message, it was obvious he was doing the best he could to make it sound like the job had been the easiest thing he'd ever done, like it was a cakewalk, and that alone was enough to make Dean worry. He called Sam and got voice mail himself, listening all the way through Sam's generic, overly polite message before hanging up.

Over the next few months, he heard from Sam every couple days, mostly e-mails. Sometimes there were pictures or videos attached, stupid stuff he thought Dean would appreciate: a kitschy diner in Texas with a huge pig mascot on the roof; a sidewalk artist in Key West with an impressive talent for drawing curvy women in bikinis; a roadrunner, the real kind, looking startled by the edge of a highway. Sam said he wasn't hunting, except when the visions forced the issue -- he just needed some time off, needed to figure out what he wanted to do with the rest of his life. He kept telling Dean not to worry.

Dean had his hands full with his family and trying to deal with all the weird, mundane shit that came along with trying to lead a normal life, but somewhere along the line, it started to sink in that Sam wasn't planning to come back. Dean's idea of Sam settling down in the same town, finding a nice girl and having kids of his own, was a pipe dream -- maybe always had been. Maybe they'd been joined at the hip so long, Sam needed a break. Dean couldn't blame him.

In December, when Katie was two months old, Dean and Jules moved out of their tiny apartment and into a two-bedroom, two-bath house with a garage, a bird bath, and a deck out back that overlooked a yard gone to seed and a patch of pine woods in the back. The deer had eaten everything in the flower beds, and mole runs criss-crossed the grass, but Jules pronounced it salvageable. The payment fell within their budget, barely. Jules was starting a new job in January, and Dean had saved enough from his P.I. work to buy a new crib and pictures and stuff for the nursery. He and Jules spent one Sunday painting the room periwinkle blue, and made love on the floor when they were finished. Katie slept, oblivious, in the same dresser drawer she'd used as her baby bed since they'd brought her home from the hospital.

After New Year's, Sam called to say he was taking off somewhere warm for a while -- Mexico, maybe -- and promptly dropped off the map for three weeks. It was the longest they'd been out of touch since Dean picked him up at Stanford. Dean put out feelers to see what Sam was hunting, and that was when he found out he wasn't the only one Sam had on radio silence, that neither Bobby nor any of their old contacts had heard a peep from him.

That night, when Jules came home from work, Dean ended up in a shouting match with her over stupid crap that didn't matter. It wasn't the first time they'd argued, but it had never been like this, both of them furious and frustrated and saying shit they didn't mean. Afterwards, Dean sat at the kitchen table with his head in his hands and tried to figure out what the hell they'd even been fighting about.

Sam rang the bell and waited on the tiny front porch, shifting nervously and feeling stupid about it. He ran a hand through his hair, conscious of how badly he needed a cut. He knew he was too thin, and his clothes looked pretty worse for wear -- Dean was gonna give him crap for it, no question. That was nothing to the crap he'd probably get for the disappearing act he'd pulled, but that, he figured he deserved.

He'd put up with whatever he had to. Dean's daughter would be six months old in two days, and it didn't matter that he had no real reason to think anything would happen, Sam wasn't going anywhere until they were all safe on the other side.

The door swung open. Dean stood there for a long second, giving him a once-over Sam was too wound up to return; all Sam had time to register was Dean before a grin split his brother's face and he stepped forward and threw his arms around Sam, thumped him between the shoulder blades, then grabbed hold and shook him, laughing. "Sammy, goddamn, it is good to see you."

"Good to see you, too, man." Sam sounded a little breathless, even to his own ears. Dean's hands were warm on his shoulders, and all Sam wanted to do was stand there and look at him for about half a day. His face hurt from the smile he couldn't hold back. "You look good."

"Yeah, well, you look like crap, but I won't hold it against you. Get in here, before I clock you one for being such a goddamned stranger."

Sam came into the front hall. The late afternoon sun streamed in through the living room windows. Katie was playing on a blanket, the sun catching on dust motes and shining on her soft dark hair; she looked up when they came inside, and a huge smile lit her face. She laughed and bounced a little, banging a stuffed rabbit that made musical noises. Her eyes were wide and mahogany brown, fringed with long lashes.

"God, she's beautiful," Sam said, feeling like the breath had been knocked out of him.

He couldn't take his eyes off her. Chest tight, he went in and sat down cross-legged on the floor; she offered her rabbit, and watched intently when he pressed its belly and music came out. He was vaguely aware that Dean left the room, came back with two beers and put one on the coffee table, then sat in a chair nearby, watching them.

In coloring, she looked more like Jules than like Dean, but as Sam played with her, he realized she had Dean's eyebrows and his smile. He shook his head, dazed. "Dean, Jesus, you're gonna have to lock her up when she hits puberty."

"Yeah, I know, tell me about it."

The rabbit had other settings, but she liked the music best. "What do you think, Katie? Gonna be a rock star? Get your dad into all the killer shows?"

Dean chuckled. "You are so gone."

"Shut up, like you're not."

"I never said that." Dean watched them for a minute. "Dude, you look like some kind of native guide, or something."

Sam felt his face warm. "Yeah, I kind of gave up on the sunscreen after a while."

Dean snorted. "Haircuts, too, but that's not new." He took a deep pull of his beer, gaze assessing over the top of it. "So tell me what the hell you've been up to, man. You barely tell me anything these days."

Sam shrugged, turning his attention back to Katie. "Just been traveling. Checking things out down south. Never thought I'd have the chance, you know? Costa Rica was cool, except for the mud." He risked a glance at his brother, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. "I did spend some time up in the mountains near Oaxaca, hunting a basilisk."

"A basilisk? You serious?" Sam could tell Dean was torn between wanting to hear more and wanting to yell at Sam for taking the thing on by himself. Curiosity won out. "Can they really kill a person just by looking at them?"

A little jolt of pride threaded through Sam's belly, and he felt a grin break over his face. "Yeah, turns out that's true. So's the part about the mirror."

Dean was grinning, too. "Shit, man, that's cool."

"Gotta admit, it kinda was." He reached out and took a deep swig of the beer Dean had brought him, unfolding his legs and leaning on one hand. "How are things with you and Jules?"

Dean shrugged and sat back, propping his beer between his thighs. "Good," he said. "Things are good."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, you know. She thinks I should do something useful with my life, but otherwise, we're pretty happy."

Sam nodded. "And what do you think?"

Dean shrugged again, one side of his mouth quirking up. "She's probably right. But I'm kinda more into taking things one day at a time these days, you know?"

"Yeah, I hear you," Sam said, getting it. He felt something click into place between them, something that had been missing a long time.

Dean looked back at him like he knew exactly what Sam was thinking, like he felt it, too. "So, what's the deal, Sammy? You planning to stick around a while?"

Dean's eyes were in shadow, but Sam could see the hope there he couldn't hide.

Sam told himself it was a bad idea. Dean knew why he was here -- neither of them had to say it, not with Katie right there between them. Sam hadn't planned on staying more than a few days. But now, being here after too many months apart, he drew a breath and said, "Yeah, I guess so."

"Got an extra room we built out over the garage," Dean said with the same casualness. "Separate entrance and everything."

Sam nodded and said, "Sure," like it was nothing. Like he'd planned it that way all along.

"Excuse me for saying this," Jules said later in the kitchen, while Sam tried his best to get Katie to eat pureed green beans, "but you do know you're kind of an idiot, right?"

Sam laughed and looked up. "Oh, yeah? What makes you say that?" Katie pushed his hand away, and he couldn't blame her; the stuff didn't exactly make him want to eat it, either.

Jules wiped her hands on a towel and came to rescue him, taking over spoon duties. She gave him a look, pointed and knowing. "Sam, don't be a douche. What do you think?"

Sam opened his mouth, then closed it again. He felt his face warm. "Is he mad at me?"

She smiled. "Is he mad at you? No, Sam, he's not mad at you. He doesn't know what the hell he did wrong, but he's not mad at you."

Sam's stomach knotted, a pang of guilt flushing through him. "You serious? He thinks that he-- that I'm pissed at him or something?"

"Well, what do you expect?"

Sam stared at her; she looked back, gaze steady, with that same no-bullshit look that Sam suspected had drawn Dean to her in the first place.

He got up, pacing a little in the space between the kitchen table and the island. Through the window, he could see Dean still out by the shed, pulling bags of mulch out of the back of the Jeep. "I thought-- I wanted him to have some time, you know? I wasn't sure if--" He glanced at Jules, uncertain how much he should say. He'd gotten the idea that things were a little rocky between her and Dean these days, and the last thing he wanted was to make things worse.

"You weren't sure if what?"

Sam looked at Dean again, watching the careful way he dealt with the heavy bags, the slow deliberation he'd had to learn. "When he got hurt, I didn't know how he was going to handle it. Hunting was all he ever wanted. He was born to it, you know that. You saw what he was like."

"I remember." She wiped Katie's face and got up, taking things to the sink.

"So, I thought... I don't know, it would be easier this way, I guess. I wasn't ready to give it up. I don't think either of us ever counted on that." It wasn't the whole truth, but it was true enough as far as it went.

Jules turned and leaned against the counter, folding her arms. "Okay, I get that. I get that maybe you needed a little space, after everything you guys went through. What I don't get is why you had to cut him off completely."

Sam blinked, then frowned. "What?" He shook his head, a cold ball of dismay gathering in his belly. "That's not what I was doing."

"Oh, no? Because that's what it feels like to him."

"Did he say that?"

She canted her head, expression wry. "What, you mean like with actual words? This is your brother we're talking about, of course he didn't say that. I know him, that's all. I've watched him swallow it and push it away ever since you left, but I know him. And it's killing him, what you're doing."

Katie started banging on her high chair wanting to get out, and Jules sighed and went to get her. "Look, Sam, I'm not trying to tell you what to do. I'm just telling you, he's not okay with this, no matter what he says. So fix it, all right? And don't tell him you're sticking around unless you mean it."

Sam swallowed, eyes straying to his brother's silhouette at the window. Dean had finished with the mulch and was closing up the shed; he'd be back inside in a minute. "I will," Sam said, watching as Dean came toward the house. "I'll fix it."

"Come on, baby girl," Jules said, bringing Katie over to kiss Sam on the cheek. "Say goodnight to your uncle Sammy, who's mean and makes you eat green beans."

Katie's kiss was wet, feather-light. Jules wiped it with her thumb, then stood on tiptoes and gave Sam a kiss of her own in the same spot, ruffling his hair. "Hopeless. Both of you."

Sam couldn't argue.

Tuesday night, the night Katie turned six months old, Jules put her in her swing and played with her in the living room while Sam and Dean drew salt lines across every door and window. They hadn't done that in years -- hadn't needed to. They were pretty sure they didn't need to now. They did it anyway, not talking.

In the morning, the sun broke across Jules's face where she'd fallen asleep on the couch, Katie conked out on her chest. Dean and Sam were awake to greet her. She took Dean's gun out of his hands and put his daughter in his arms, kissed him on the forehead, then went to make them coffee and blueberry pancakes.

The next night, while Jules was putting Katie down, Dean grabbed a six pack from the fridge and they went out back. Sam saw he'd snagged a football, of all things, from somewhere.

"I got it for Katie," he said, like it was some kind of explanation. At Sam's look, his eyebrows quirked. "Why you looking at me like that? Girls can't play football?"

"Dean. You do remember she can't actually walk, yet, right?"

Dean chuckled. "Yeah, man. Got it as a joke, to make Jules make that face she makes."

Sam turned to lean against the deck railing. "At least you didn't buy her a gun."

"My words exactly, as I recall." Dean opened his beer and tossed the cap into the recycling. He lobbed the football underhanded to Sam, who caught it easily, and cracked open another beer, passing it to him. "We're thinking about trying again," he confessed.

"Trying what again?"

Dean took a long drink of his beer, and grinned.

Sam got it. Whatever the pang was that echoed hollowly inside him, he put it down mercilessly with the skill of long practice and let a genuine smile break over his face. "Dude, seriously?"

"Why not? Katie turned out okay."

"Dean, that's great! That's so great, man. Good for you." He reached across and touched his bottle to Dean's in salute. Saying it made it true, and he felt a wave of honest gladness touched by a soft note of regret. He couldn't help thinking about their dad, wishing he could have stuck around to see Dean's kids. "So, you starting right away, or what?"

"Well, no, I thought we'd throw the football around a little first, maybe drink a couple of these beers--"

Sam started to laugh. "Dickhead."

The sun had sunk low behind the trees, and the first fireflies were starting to blink out over the grass; Dean set his mostly empty bottle aside and shoved an elbow into Sam's midsection, stealing the football and nudging him away from the railing. "Come on, Sasquatch, show me what you got."

He jumped down from the deck and started running backwards, and it was on. Dean had something to prove, that much was obvious; maybe his back would never be what it once was, maybe he had to be careful lifting stuff and couldn't bounce back from a fight the way he once had, but he could still move when he wanted to, and that's what this was about. Sam got the message. He grinned, all too glad to play along.

They ran down toward the woods, tossing the ball back and forth, giving each other a hard time. Neither one of them had ever played much football when they were growing up. Sam's thing had been soccer, and Dean had always been more of a baseball kind of guy.

That didn't mean, of course, that Dean was above mocking Sam's technique. He danced out of Sam's reach a few times, talking enough crap to get Sam good and riled.

Sam finally stripped the ball out of his hands and dodged away. For a second they stopped, out of breath, Sam grinning at the look of determination on Dean's face. Try it, Dean's expression said, and Sam's said back, Watch me, and then Sam took off running.

Sam was fast, long legs an advantage on flat ground, but this wasn't flat ground and Dean had turnover and maneuverability on his side, Sam's big feet a liability on rough terrain. Dean would probably pay hell for it later, but typical Dean, he didn't give a crap about that -- just put everything into it and gave chase.

Sam flew. They ran down into the woods, toward the creek, and then they were in the trees, flying fast over the pine needles and dirt. Sam tried to jump the creek but he stumbled on the far side; Dean timed his jump better and made up ground, almost on him as Sam got to the top, feet slipping.

He saw the rock in the same moment that he felt Dean barrel headfirst at him and tackle him into a thick bed of needles. It was only thanks to long-honed reflexes combined with dumbest luck that he was able to react at all, and for a second he was sure he wasn't going to be able to stop it. The ball flew out of Sam's grasp, forgotten, and he grabbed on to Dean and used his weight. That's when Dean saw it, too. "Oh, sh--" Sam felt him tense, but too late to stop his inertia.

Sam rolled them and his hand came up, protecting Dean's head. The pale, jagged edge of the hidden rock took a piece out of the back of his hand, but they landed in a heap, safe and sweaty in the pine needles.

Sam felt himself shaking. It would be just like Dean, to survive this long only to get taken out by a frigging rock. Then he was shaking because he was laughing, not making a sound, and for a minute he held on, his hands on Dean's back and the back of his neck and Dean's heart beating wild and fast against him. Weirdly, for once, Dean seemed okay with that. Maybe his head was sort of resting on Sam's shoulder, and maybe his hand lay flat against Sam's heart, but even Dean could chalk that up to an accident of gravity. He'd say it was the way they fell.

It was then that Dean, heavy and warm against him, thought, God, Sammy, I missed you, a thought so strong that Sam felt it slide in under all his uncertain edges, felt it sweet and heady and inescapable. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that he was touching Dean when it happened, but he didn't just get the thought -- he got the feeling that came with it, a deep underground river welling up. His breath caught.

Sam's hand stung. The scent of pine needles was sharp and fragrant in his senses, and adrenalin pumped itself out through his veins. He didn't mean to, he really didn't. It was just that he'd missed Dean, too, more than he'd dared admit to himself, and the thought came through like clear, uninterrupted signal, straight from the source.

Before he could think, he'd pulled Dean in, pulled him close. Dean made a surprised little huff but didn't fight him; he must've been further off his game than either of them knew, because for a second he let Sam hold him there, one arm looped helplessly around Dean's waist, let Sam slip one hand into his short, soft hair.

Let Sam sigh out and kiss him, the press of their mouths sending a bright, unsteady spiral of heat curling down through Sam's center.

What the--

Dean was up so fast his head spun. He got his feet under him, backed away and tripped, catching himself on a tree.

Sam jerked up onto his elbows, looking as dazed as Dean felt. They stared at each other for long, awful seconds, and Dean tried to make sense of what had happened, tried to make it into some kind of joke or misunderstanding. His lips were wet, tingling, belying the excuses his brain tried to make. He could still feel the heat of Sam's body against his. Sam had leaves in his hair.

The look on Sam's face said it was no joke, not even close, and right then, Dean was so furious at him for not fucking lying through his teeth about it, he was shaking.

Seeing it in his eyes, Sam scrambled to his feet, took a hesitant half-step closer. "Dean, I'm sorry, I never meant-- It won't happen again, okay? I swear. God--" His voice caught, a look of pure anguish twisting his face. "Please don't look at me like that."

Something heavy settled in Dean's gut. "How long?" he demanded, fighting to keep it together.

"Dean."

"How long, Sam?"

Sam wrapped his arms around himself, hands tucked under his arms, misery written all over him. "I don't know. A long time. Look, what does it matter? I'll go, all right? I'll go, and we never have to talk about it again."

Dean fought down a wordless panic. "Like that's gonna fix anything!" he said before he could think.

It hurt Sam like a knife wound, his distress a flinch Dean read easily even in the gathering dark. "No. No, okay? It won't fix anything. But it's the only thing I can do. I never wanted this." His voice broke. "You were never supposed to know."

Dean turned away, unable to look at him any more. Sick realization came over him in a wave. Sam had been keeping this from him all this time. Pretending--

"Hell of a thing to keep locked up in that crazy head of yours," he managed.

"I know," Sam whispered. "I'm sorry."

It dawned on Dean then, comprehension a weight against his heart. "This why you left?"

Sam laughed, the sound bleak. "Which time?"

He meant Stanford, Dean realized. The weight sank lower and gathered hot in his belly, a feeling like falling.

A whippoorwill called somewhere in the gathering dark as the last of the setting sun bled out of the day. Dean let out an unsteady breath, tense and uneasy, and started to pace.

"Sam, this is messed up, man."

"You think I don't know that?" The bitter anger in his voice made Dean's head come up; Sam had turned away, shoulders set, and it hit Dean hard that Sam would leave again, that he might not come back this time. It was only then that he understood how badly he might have fucked this up.

His head cleared, and he took an involuntary step toward Sam. "Hey. Hey! Listen to me. We gotta deal with it, that's all."

Sam turned on him, self-loathing clear in his expression, the tense line of his body. "Oh, yeah? How are we supposed to do that?"

"I don't know. We just will, that's all. You're still my brother."

"Some brother I turned out to be."

"Shut up, okay? Don't do this to yourself." Sam's expression didn't change. Dean wished for about the millionth time that he had a magic button he could push when Sam got stubborn like this, that he could reach out and zap Sam with a dose of common sense to break him out of the dark places his own head took him.

Impatient, Dean closed the distance between them. A cool wind rustled in the pine boughs overhead. "Sammy, c'mon--" he tried, feeling a little desperate. "The things we've been through, the things we've seen? We can make it through that, we can make it through anything."

He said it like he could will it to be true, but Sam shook his head, anger bleeding away to sick despair. "Dean, you don't understand. It hurts to be around you." The words came rough, sounding like they cost him, and Dean felt their impact low in his gut. Sam swallowed, made a helpless gesture. "I look at Katie, and I look at Julie, and I feel like there's this... poison inside me, like if I let it, it'll eat away everything you fought so hard for. Everything that's good between us."

Dean had no fucking clue what to say to that. He ached with it; everything in him demanded that he find some way to fix it, but how?

Sam gave a little laugh, as if he read the thought. "It didn't used to be like this, you know? I used to be able to lie to myself about it, make myself forget most of the time."

That didn't exactly make Dean feel better about it. "What changed?" he managed, not sure he wanted to know.

"I don't know. Maybe it was seeing you with Katie. Seeing how happy you were. I just-- I wanted that for myself, I guess. With you." Sam ran his hands through his hair, turning away. "God, I say it and I feel sick to my stomach. This is so messed up."

"Sam--"

Sam closed his eyes, fingers gripping in his hair; he let go, taking two steps away. "Look, I gotta-- I can't stay here tonight. There's just no way."

Harsh now, Dean reached out, grabbed his arm. "Sam, listen to me. We'll work this out."

"Tell me how, Dean," Sam whispered. "Because I sure as hell can't see it."

"I don't know, but we will. Promise me you won't split on me." At the look on Sam's face, he held on harder. "Sam, please. I'm begging you."

Looking at him like he wanted to hit him, Sam finally said, "Okay. All right, I won't, okay?" He trembled under Dean's grip, but didn't try to pull away.

"Okay," Dean echoed, relieved. He didn't even know what that word meant any more. But if Sam was willing to give them a chance to make it through this, it was all he could ask for.

The walk back to the house felt like a death march. Dean's head was a mess, and Sam wouldn't even look at him. Dean watched Sam go upstairs to get his stuff and all he could think about was Sam at eighteen, so angry all the time. He couldn't help wondering if this had underlined every fight with Dad and driven Sam away from them. He knew it wasn't the only thing, but maybe it was part of it. Sam had almost admitted as much, and it was a fucking kick in the head, is what it was -- he felt like he didn't even know which direction was up any more, like the one thing he'd counted on in the world was falling apart. Like it had been for a long time, and he'd been too stupid to see it.

Sam came downstairs, and Dean would have given pretty much anything not to have to feel the way he felt when Sam finally did look at him. Dean tried to tell himself it wasn't as bad as it seemed. "You don't have to go," he said in a rush, hating how he sounded.

Sam smiled a little. "Yes, I do."

Then Sam swallowed, like he was trying to keep it together, and took a small step back.

They went out the kitchen door and stood in the carport, moths flickering against the light. "Sam, listen to me," Dean said before Sam could walk away. "I'm not mad at you, okay? This isn't your fault."

Sam turned back, hands clenched tight on the strap of his bag like he didn't trust himself. "Dean, I'm not a kid any more." At Dean's confused look, he said, "That's what you used to say to me when I was little, and I spilled juice or something all over the floor."

A soft, surprised laugh escaped Dean. "You remember that?"

"Yeah," Sam said, and a little of the tension went out of him. "Dean, listen. It's not your fault, either, okay? It's not. I'll get over it. I just-- I need some time, all right?"

"We talkin' days, here, or we talkin' more on the geological scale?"

That painful smile surfaced again, a little brighter this time. "Answer cloudy, ask again later?"

Dean nodded. His throat ached. "Yeah, okay."

He watched Sam get in his car and pull out into the street, watched his taillights until they turned at the corner and disappeared. The second they were out of sight, Dean thought of a hundred things he should have said or done differently. There'd been a time when he and Sam were so in tune they were practically one person, and he'd never believed they'd ever lose that.

The next day, he was restless, snapping at Jules, his mood rubbing off on Katie and making them all miserable. He kept thinking about all the reasons this had happened, how they didn't have anyone else growing up, how he'd gone from girl to girl but Sam had never been wired like that, had never been able to separate sex from the way he felt about someone.

Dean wondered if he'd figured it out sooner, whether he could have changed anything. As far as he knew, Sam had never showed the slightest sign that he swung that way. On the other hand, it wasn't like everybody and his grandma hadn't pegged them as gay, and maybe there was a reason for that. Maybe Dean was the only one who didn't see it.

Maybe he'd only seen what he wanted to see.

He had a surveillance job that night. It was a workman's comp thing, mostly sitting on his ass, and he made it about an hour in before he was pulling out his phone, calling Sam's cell. When Sam picked up on the fourth ring, he closed his eyes.

"Hey," he said, trying his best to sound normal.

"Hey, Dean." Sam's voice was low, intimate in his ear, and hearing it made Dean feel about a thousand percent better.

"Where are you?"

"Motel out on twenty-eight. Same place I stayed before."

Still here, then. Dean felt his heart beating too hard, like there wasn't enough air in the car.

"You doin' okay?"

"Yeah, I guess so." Sam hesitated, then said, "How about you? You all right?"

"Yeah, I'm all right," Dean said, even though he wasn't sure if it was true. "I'm good." An awkward silence followed; desperate for something normal to hold on to, he said, "You shoulda heard Katie today. It was like she decided today was the day she was gonna start talking, like she had it marked on her calendar or something. She started at breakfast and that was it, running commentary on everything."

"Yeah? What'd she have to say?"

"Hell if I know, man. I think it was Latin."

Sam laughed, and it eased the pressure in Dean's chest. "Listen," Dean said at last. "I want us to talk, okay? Come by the house tomorrow for dinner. Julie's got yoga, she won't be back till nine."

"Okay," Sam agreed, sounding relieved. There was a pause. "Hey, am I hearing things, or did you just say--"

Dean made a face. "Dude, shut up. Don't even start with me."

"Sure, man, whatever you say." Dean could practically hear his smirk over the phone. "Guess you wait long enough, you hear everything."

"You are a pain in my ass, you know that?"

"So you've said."

"So, you comin' or what?"

"I'll be there," Sam said, and it sounded like he meant it.

Dean had to swallow. He pressed the phone to his ear a little too hard. "I'm hanging up now," he said, trying to keep it together.

"Bye, jerkwad."

He didn't have to see Sam's answering smile to feel it like a touch.

It was well after midnight by the time he got home and climbed into bed. Jules was warm and sleepy, stirring awake when he wrapped an arm around her waist and put his hand against her belly. "You and Sam kiss and make up?" she asked, her tone halfway between a shot over the bow and a ceasefire.

Feeling better than he had all day, Dean nuzzled into the warm curve of her neck. "You are so sexy when you're pissed at me, you know that?"

He could practically hear her eyes roll, but she didn't resist, just tilted her head to give him room. Her hand came up and curved around his head. "Does this mean you're going to be a normal human again?"

Dean pulled her in against him and kissed the soft spot behind her ear. "Where would you like me to start apologizing?"

By seven fifteen the next night, Dean had picked up the phone a dozen times, thumb hovering over Sam's number on the speed dial. He'd called himself a frigging idiot more times than he could count, going back and forth between thinking Sam had split town, or something had happened to him -- an accident or something worse. Something kept stopping him from calling, from picking up Katie and going over there, some instinct that fought with his deep-seated watch out for Sammy imperative. Wait, it kept telling him. Give him room. Don't fucking freak out on him, not now, or you're gonna lose him for good.

He'd already fed Katie and gotten her down by the time the phone rang. He was at the sink downstairs, washing up; Sam's number came up on the display, and the wave of relief Dean felt made him sit down hard on the kitchen stool. No accident, then, just Dean's pain in the ass little brother taking years off his life, as usual. On the other hand, he was pretty sure he didn't want to have this freaking conversation, ever.

Wiping soapy water on his jeans, Dean answered on the second ring.

"What happened, you forget where I live?"

"No, man-- Look, I'm sorry."

If he wasn't gone already, he had one foot out the door; Dean could hear it in his voice, and give him room went pretty much to hell. He shifted the phone to the other hand. "Dude, this has got to stop. I'm sick of it, and it's crap, you hear me?"

"Dean, I know. Listen, I'm really sorry. Something came up."

Angry words welled up; Dean bit them back. He closed his eyes and made himself take a deep breath, get a grip. "Talk to me, Sammy. Tell me what the hell's goin' on. This is me, remember?"

"I know it is. I know, okay? I'm trying to tell you, I got a call today from Henriksen."

Apprehension sent a needle of cold down the back of Dean's neck. "What did he want?"

"Nothing like that. Relax, all right? He called me about a case. Missing persons in Tennessee. Said he thought it might be our kind of thing. I've been checking into it, and I think he might be right."

Dean leaned forward, rubbing at the bridge of his nose. Henriksen's timing, as usual, left a lot to be desired. "What did you find?"

"All the disappearances happened within half a mile or so of an old cemetery. I found records of a church fire on the grounds, people hearing strange sounds at night, finding graves disturbed, the works. Twenty-two people have gone missing all together, and no bodies were ever found."

"So, what are you thinking?"

"I don't know. Could be a lot of things, but I thought I better go and at least check it out. The last disappearance was three days ago, two teenage girls." Sam hesitated. "I'm sorry I didn't call earlier, I got kind of caught up in it."

Dean smiled a little, picturing Sam bent over his computer, line of concentration drawn deep between his eyebrows. "Whatever, man. I get it." He coughed to clear his throat. "So you heading out tonight?"

"In the morning. I'm still working on a list of possible candidates in the angry spirit department. I figure if I leave early, I can get there and catch a few hours sleep before the sun goes down." He paused, then added, "You mind if we take a rain check?"

Dean fought the need to swallow. "Yeah, sure, man." There was a heaviness in his chest, an ache he was starting to think might never completely go away. The last thing he wanted was to make this harder on Sam, but he couldn't help feeling like this was the same shit all over again, Sam running away from him like he had after Katie was born.

Sam's voice came hoarse in his ear, rough with apology. "Look, maybe it's for the best. Give us some room to think, huh?"

"If you say so," Dean said, and it was hard to get the words out. "I'll be here."

"Yeah, I know you will," Sam said, low and grateful, and Dean couldn't say anything after that. "It's okay," Sam said then, like he knew. "I'll call you, okay? Night, Dean."

Later, Dean lay in bed and stared at the ceiling. He couldn't get rid of the weird feeling that he was two people -- the guy who'd gotten married and had a daughter and lived a normal life, in a normal house, and the real Dean Winchester, the fugitive, the hunter. He felt itchy in his skin and too alert, felt like he wanted to kill some evil sons of bitches tonight, like he needed to fight to hold on to the person he was supposed to be. Sam had reminded him that there were people getting hurt, dying out in the world when he could be stopping it. Jules was right. He'd been living in a cocoon, hibernating. It was only being around Sam again that he'd started to wake up.

Lying there in the dark, he finally put it together, remembering with a jolt that it was Sam who'd pushed him and Jules together, realizing only now that maybe it had been Sam's way of letting go. It was months after he'd met her; they'd been passing through western Pennsylvania again and Sam had detoured them through the town where she lived. Dean woke up, and there they were.

He looked at Jules, sweet-faced and asleep beside him and felt the same weird disconnect, only stronger this time, like she was a stranger. Like he'd been living in some kind of alternate reality. He loved her, he did, but it suddenly hit him what price he'd paid for making this life with her.

And thinking that, the years opened up inside him, and he saw what it would be like if he didn't do something. Sam would try his best, for Dean's sake, would try to pretend everything was okay and do his best to make it true. He'd call when he could, when he could force himself to put on a good enough game face. He'd send funny emails and postcards and maybe every few years he'd come by for a day or two to see Katie, to share a beer and a laugh and let Dean hold on to him in some small way. Maybe he'd make a life for himself somewhere far away from here, find some girl who wasn't Jessica, or hell, some guy who wasn't his brother, who didn't know a thing about the life he'd once led. Maybe pretending is all they'd ever have, and the last few years would be like a bad dream they never talked about.

Dean imagined it, seeing it for the truth that it was, and the absence of Sam hurt more in those few moments than it had in months: a heavy, twisting thing inside him that made it hard to breathe. A hundred memories came flooding back to him, a hundred moments when they didn't have anyone but each other, a hundred times when he'd looked up and Sam was there, solid, the two of them so in tune they were practically extensions of each other. He thought about lying with Sam in the pine needles, the way Sam had cradled his head to protect him from the rock. How right it had felt just to have him there and close again.

Five years together, keeping each other alive and sane every minute of every day. Five years, and Dean had let him go like it was nothing, had gone on living his life like he wasn't missing a limb.

He got up, heart pounding. He didn't know what he could say to make Sam stop running, to make this better. All he knew was, he couldn't just let go, not after everything, not like this. He'd held on to Sam so hard for so long, and now all he could feel was a sudden panic, like he'd fallen asleep holding Katie and woken up to find her slipping out of his grasp.

When the banging came at the door, Sam was so deeply engrossed in the newspaper archives that he jumped and almost knocked over his cold cup of takeout coffee.

He righted it, pushing it further toward the middle of the tiny table, and blinked at the door for a second. Dean, he thought, and then he remembered, and his stomach clenched. He ran a hand through his hair and made himself get up, made himself go and open the door.

The second it was unlatched, Dean pushed his way into the room, jaw set and a determined light in his eyes. Sam fell back, one hand still on the door.

"Dean, what--?"

"I'm not letting you do this."

"Excuse me?"

"I'm not letting you walk away from me, not this time. We didn't come this far to give up without a fight. We'll make it work. Whatever it takes."

"Whatever it takes?" Sam laughed. "Are you nuts?"

"Maybe."

God, Sam wasn't up to this, he really wasn't. He shut the door like an afterthought and paced a few steps away, trying to put some distance between them, between his thinking brain and the knot of panic pressing at his breastbone.

"Dean, this isn't something you can get rid of with a shotgun and some rock salt."

Dean gave a short, breathless laugh. "You think I don't know that?"

Sam looked at him. He knew the expression in Dean's face too well; he read the dare in every challenging line of his brother's body. It made his heart beat faster, and he tried hard to keep a grip. With effort, he kept his tone even, reasonable. "I'm not walking away from you, okay? That's not what this is about. It's just a job, that's all."

Dean grinned, showing teeth. "Right, fine, whatever. It's just a job. So then you won't mind if I go with you."

"What?"

"You heard me."

Sam stared at him for long seconds. It came home to him that Dean was serious, and he wanted to let himself want it -- it almost knocked him over, how much he wanted to say, yes, come with me. He clamped down hard on the hope he felt, trying to keep it off his face, but he suspected Dean read him like a neon sign.

"You serious?" Sam asked at last.

"Hell, yes, I'm serious. I need a little vacation anyway."

Sam's lips twitched. "Some vacation. Only you, man."

"What, so I'm a freak, now?"

Sam couldn't help it. He smiled for real, something letting go in his chest. It hurt, but it felt good, too -- better than anything had felt in a long time. He didn't have to say the words. They hung in the air, memory and affection and Winchester truth combined.

Dean took a step closer, plainly sensing victory. "I'll be careful. I won't even get out of the car if that'll make you feel better."

Sam snorted. "Yeah, sure you won't."

"Scout's honor, I swear. You can even call the shots if you want."

Sam knew he should say no way, not a chance. There was a reason Dean didn't hunt any more, and Sam didn't trust him for a second when it came to remembering his limits. Worse, he didn't trust himself. The last thing he needed right now was a living, breathing reminder of everything they'd given up, everything he'd lost.

Dean's face was open, a kid hoping for a trip to Disney World. "Come on, Sammy. Just this once, what do you say?"

Sam caved, helpless to do anything else. "Yeah, man, what the hell." Then he broke into a grin, knowing he was buying himself a fuckload of crap for at least the first two hundred miles. "But you fall and break a hip or something, I am so leaving your ass."

They were on the road in under an hour, Dean behind the wheel, and he'd never been so glad that he'd kept the Impala in perfect condition. Sam smirked at him when he slid in his ancient and battered copy of Highway to Hell, but even Sam's cultural deficiencies couldn't spoil his mood, not tonight. The road slipped away beneath them in a smooth ribbon, and with a hunt in front of them and Sam beside him, Dean felt like he could take on every evil thing in the world and still have juice for more.

It must have been catching, because Sam started chuckling to himself two miles down the road. "You know, for what this is gonna cost us in gas, we could probably pay Katie's way through college."

Dean laughed, and gunned the engine. "Come on, Sammy, loosen up. Live a little." He felt the weight of Sam's gaze, and flashed him a look. "Dude, what?"

"Nothing. Just... You sure this is okay?"

"Yeah, man, it's cool. Jules said she was fine to work at home for a day or two. No big deal." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sam shift a little, like he wanted to say something else. Like maybe he was having second thoughts. Dean headed that off at the pass. "So, let's have it. What d'you got?"

After a long moment, Sam sat back and pulled out his handheld, scrolling through his notes. "It looks like the disappearances go back to fifty-nine. One or two people at a time, once every three or four years or so. No correlation on dates that I could find."

"And they all vanished in that same one-mile radius?"

"Pretty much. Most of the victims were young, a lot of them teenagers, a lot of them girls. Not all, though."

"So not much of a pattern."

"Not that I could find. If it's a spirit, it's not exactly big on keeping a schedule."

"And no bodies, either." Dean turned that over, thinking about it. "Sounds like it's a patient son of a bitch, whatever it is."

"What makes you say that?"

"Random disappearances every couple years, all in a localized area, mostly teenagers? It's probably waiting for easy opportunity. Kids in a small town in Tennessee, there's not much to do on a Friday night, so you go down to the creepy old cemetery, light candles, hold seances and crap like that."

Sam nodded. "And it waits long enough between victims that people get careless, start to think the other disappearances are just stories."

"Exactly." Dean drummed absently on the steering wheel. "You said the church burned down?"

"In nineteen sixty-eight. Hit by lightning."

"Huh. That's weird-- after people started going missing. Any fatalities?"

"One." Sam looked up. "The local minister."

Dean started to grin. "Any chance he was buried in the church cemetery?"

"I'd say it's worth finding out." He paused, then said, "You know, it's a little scary how much fun you're having right now."

"What? A guy can't look forward to a little exercise in the moonlight?"

"You're just saying that because you know I'm gonna be the one digging this guy up."

"Damn right I am. Sucks to be so young and healthy, don't it?"

"Yeah, I'll remember that when I'm visiting you in the nursing home."

Sam dozed off outside Summersville, and Dean was left with his own thoughts.

The kick in the pants of being on the road hadn't worn off, but the rest of it had come back to rest heavy inside of him, filling the space between him and Sam every time they stopped talking long enough to let it. He wasn't sure, but he thought Sam might have gone to sleep in self-defense.

Dean tried to keep his mind on the case, but it kept circling back around on him. He couldn't stop thinking about the year after they'd killed the demon, about Sam and how he'd held it together, held onto everything that was good in him against all odds. Dean hadn't expected to see daylight when that year was up, but Sam was the one who'd paid the price for Dean's choices in blood, in fear, in grief. And still he'd kept the truth about how he felt locked up inside him, paying a different price -- one that hurt Dean to think about.

There was nothing he wouldn't do for Sam. That was the most true thing in his life, always had been, and he'd long ago stopped fooling himself that there were any limits on that. Fact was, it wasn't such a stretch to imagine letting Sam have what he wanted. He and Sam had been tangled up with each other so closely for so long, he was pretty sure crossing this last line between them would be worth it if it meant Sam wouldn't hurt so much, if it meant Sam could have some happiness.

Dean thought it should have been a bigger shock than it was to admit how far he was willing to go with this thing. But that was less troubling than the way he couldn't seem to forget the way Sam's mouth had felt against his. He hadn't been able to get it out of his head.

They pulled into town just after sunup, and it was like old times, so familiar it felt like they'd never left this life. Sam found them a place to grab some breakfast. After, they did recon on the cemetery and the area surrounding it, then headed over to the library to look up the dead preacher. Around lunchtime, they hit the local high school and talked to friends of the missing girls.

"So, our good minister moved here in nineteen fifty-eight," Dean said, pulling in to a motor court outside of town. "Six months later, we get the first disappearance."

"Looks like it," Sam said, reading the library printout.

"What do you figure? Davies was some kind of psycho when he was alive, and he kept right on doing his thing after he died?"

"It's possible. Whatever the deal is, it seems pretty damn likely he's our guy."

Dean turned the car off and rubbed a hand over his chin, thinking. "Think there's any chance those girls are still alive?"

Sam sighed, flipping the printout back to the first page. "Your guess is as good as mine." He laced his fingers together and stretched his arms out in front of him, shoulders popping. "It's weird, that they've never found any of the bodies. I wonder what he's doing with them?"

"Guess we'll find out." On that cheery thought, Dean looked over toward the motel office, and tossed the keys to Sam. Thunderclouds had started to pile up to the west. It was just after two; they had time to grab a good five hours shuteye before the sun went down. "Get the bags. I'll go get us a room."

He felt Sam's eyes on him, but he wasn't about to discuss anything stupid, like them getting separate rooms or some crap like that; ignoring the sudden uncomfortable flush he felt, Dean got out and strode across the parking lot, not looking back.

The job went like clockwork, right up until the point when everything went to hell.

They found Davies right where he was supposed to be, under a nice, neat, granite grave marker a hundred feet or so from the charred foundation of the church. A quick consultation, and they decided to err on the side of caution and burn the preacher's bones before they searched the grounds. Sam had a hole cleared to his coffin inside an hour and a half, egged on by Dean's helpful commentary.

A little lighter fluid, a dropped match, the bones caught -- and that's when things started to get hinky.

First, the skies chose exactly that moment to open up. The downpour snuffed out the fire with the old preacher's bones half-burned, and judging by the smackdown Sam got against a nearby dogwood tree, Davies was none too happy about their attempt to reacquaint him with the whole death-by-fire thing. Dean narrowly dodged the shovel aimed at his head, and his back gave a twinge he felt into next month.

Lightning flashed close and violent, and for those two seconds Davies was standing right there in the rain, clear as anything; his hands and white suit were streaked slick with blood, and any doubts Dean had about whether he'd been your normal, friendly, neighborhood preacher-type were laid to rest. "Sam!" he yelled, and hunkered down behind a headstone, raising the shotgun. His left hand trembled with the strain, shredded tendons and ligaments protesting; he braced the gun against his shoulder and did his best to compensate.

"Here," Sam called back, voice faint over the crash of thunder, but Dean saw him roll to his feet, ostensibly intact. He still had the lighter fluid.

"Get the bones!" Dean ordered, blasting a round of salt at the space where Davies had been. "I'll hold him off -- burn 'em in the shed!"

They'd passed the groundskeeper's tool shed on the way in; it was maybe three hundred yards back along the road. Sam jumped down into the hole, disappearing from view, and Dean felt the adrenalin spike like a jolt of raw current. He scrambled forward and ducked behind another headstone, closing the distance between them. Rain sheeted against his face, and he cursed; it was going to make reloading a bitch. Water and salt rounds didn't exactly mix.

After what felt like an eternity, Sam reappeared, vaulting out of the grave with the charred bones bundled in his shirt. The rain plastered his hair to his forehead and he swiped it out of his face as his eyes found Dean, crouched with the shotgun. "Go, move it!" Dean ordered, and Sam took off like a shot, Dean launching himself after him.

They ran through the downpour, feet slipping on wet asphalt and lilac blossoms; they'd gone maybe fifty yards when a thick, jagged finger of lightning flashed down from the sky and Davies was on them, scarily silent but wielding the shovel like a fighting axe. Sam barely missed getting his head taken off. He took the brunt of the bastard's swing against his shoulder, going down hard. Dean snarled and fired, the boom of the shotgun swallowed up in the thunder that followed. He hit Davies full on this time, the ghost disintegrating into salt and smoke.

Dean grabbed Sam and hauled him up, pushing him forward. Somehow, Sam kept his grip on the ragged bundle in his hands. "Keep moving!"

"Dean, the lightning--"

"Yeah, I know, I saw." Sam had said the church was hit by lightning, and it looked like the storm was giving Davies power. Dean reloaded the shotgun as he ran, willing his left hand to cooperate, trying to keep the salt shells dry. He hoped like hell they wouldn't crap out on him.

The whole thing might have lasted fifteen minutes from start to finish. The psychotic bastard's remains burned like anybody else's, once they busted their way into the tool shed and emptied the lighter fluid over them. Even soaking wet, covered in mud, cursing a blue streak and scrambling for cover to try and get a clean shot, Dean felt the thrill and the rightness of it singing through him, pure and heady and better than just about anything he knew. He and Sam still had it, still worked together like a well-oiled machine, rolling with the punches and getting the job done.

When it was all over, Sam reached down and grabbed Dean's hand, pulled him to his feet, balancing him; they were standing in the rain, soaked to the bone and muddy and grinning, and Dean had missed this, so much it hurt.

"You all right?" Sam asked, breathless.

"Yeah," Dean said, not caring if it was a hundred percent true. Better than sex, he thought, and then flushed with sudden awareness. Sam's hand was warm, solid where it gripped his, and Dean hadn't let go.

Like it was yesterday, he remembered them coming home from a hunt when Sam was fifteen, high on adrenalin and arms slung around each other. They'd saved a bunch of kids that night; nobody'd died except the rawhead they'd been after. Dad had given them each a good swig of Jack, he remembered, and Sam had been buzzed to hell and back, giddy with it.

They'd gone into the bathroom and stripped down together, laughing; Dean had rubbed mud off the back of Sam's neck with a towel, and Sam had pressed up against him and tried to kiss him. Right there in the bathroom, Dad not thirty feet away down the hall. He'd laughed it off a second later, made it into a joke -- how the hell had Dean forgotten that? He met Sam's eyes, the memory tight and close in his chest.

"Dean?"

"Shut up, Sam," he said absently, like he was trying to hear something far off.

Sam's breath caught. He was trembling under Dean's grip. "Dean, don't."

"I said shut up."

And Dean stepped into him, pulled his head down and kissed him right there in the rain, in the mud, tasting both on Sam's mouth right before Sam swayed into him and he tasted the heat inside.

It went on for long, dizzying seconds before Sam stumbled back, made a half-gesture like he wanted to wipe away the kiss. His hand shook.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"What does it look like?" Breathless and reckless with it, Dean stepped closer, his heart pounding. But Sam took a half-step backward and closed his eyes.

"Don't do this," he said, voice rough and harsh with a plea that sounded like it tore something out of him.

"Sam, wait--" Sam jerked away, out of his reach, and Dean froze, confusion hot within him. "All right! I heard you, Jesus."

Sam turned away and closed up tight, impenetrable. "Look, forget it. We still got work to do. Can we just do it?"

Dean watched him walk away, back rigid. Kicking himself, he cursed under his breath. Sam was right. What the hell did he think he was doing?

But he'd meant it, was the thing. He'd fucking meant every second of it, and it hadn't just been about Sam. Not completely.

They found what they were looking for in the basement of the burned out church. It took the better part of a miserable two hours in the downpour to hack their way through the tangled old forsythia and charred debris that blocked the steps and the hidden door; Sam insisted on wielding the axe, and he was staggering with exhaustion by the time they finally got the door open. Dean went in first, so he was the one who got hit first with the smell.

He gagged, and came close to losing it -- he hadn't been hit with a smell like that in a while, and he had to put his arm over his nose and mouth and fight with the urge to throw his guts up right there in the doorway. "Goddammit," he swore, when he could. "Sam, get me a light."

In the end, they torched the place, using all the accelerant they'd brought, making do with old, rotting books for tinder and the busted up pieces of an ancient desk for kindling and fuel. They worked in silence, but Dean knew Sam was counting, doing his best to guess age and sex and clothing styles, matching up each body they found to the list of names he'd probably memorized. They'd call the cops when they were long gone, do the best they could to help identify the victims.

When they came out into the gray, pre-dawn quiet, the rain had finally let up.

Dean didn't ask, just drove them back to the motel. He offered Sam the first shower with a grunt and a lift of his chin; Sam took it, not about to argue. He had to get out halfway through it and hang his head over the cracked toilet, but there wasn't much in his stomach to come up. He wasn't even sure which part of the last forty-eight hours he was trying to puke out of him. Eventually, he gave up and climbed back in, washing off the mud and thorn scratches and gore with grim concentration.

When Dean was done doing the same, they got back in the car and drove.

They'd gone maybe twenty miles on the state highway when Sam felt the car slow. He let himself look at Dean for the first time in hours, watching as his brother pulled the car over onto the shoulder and turned off the engine.

Dean sat back and rubbed his hands over his thighs like he was nervous; he looked quickly at Sam, then away, and Sam's stomach turned over.

Dean cleared his throat, a sound halfway between a cough and a laugh. "Look, it's just-- I can't stop thinking about it. Power of suggestion or somethin'. Ever since the other night, I-- hell, I don't know, man. Maybe it's not just you."

Sam blinked at him. "You're joking, right?"

Dean looked at him then, letting Sam see how badly shaken he was. "Does it look like I'm joking?"

Sam's face heated. He shoved the memory of Dean's mouth on his away, refusing to let it take hold. "Dean," he said, as carefully as he knew how. "You can't be serious. You never wanted this."

"You sure about that? I mean, I been thinkin'."

Sam wanted to laugh, but it stuck in his throat. "Come on, you can't tell me you've ever even seriously considered sex with a guy before. I know you. And whatever that was back there, it sure as hell wasn't you."

Dean's expression turned stubborn. "So?"

"So, what the hell, man? You think -- what? That you should take one for the team? Forget about your wife, and your family, and have sex with your fucked up little brother, if that's what he needs? Never mind what you want?" He bit off a bitter laugh. "That's it, isn't it. Boy, that is just like you."

He yanked the door handle and was out of the car before Dean could stop him. The cool, wet morning enveloped him in fog and green smells. Sam strode away from the car, his gait stiff, a sick feeling in his stomach.

He heard Dean's door open behind him. "Sam, wait--" Dean's boots crunched on the wet gravel, coming fast after him. "Dammit, come back here!"

Faint thunder rolled in the distance. For a second, Sam was torn between the need to keep moving and the sudden urge to turn on Dean and take a swing. Dean probably wouldn't care if he did -- in Dean language, throwing a punch was probably better than talking.

"Sam, come on," Dean pleaded, close behind him. "Don't walk away from me."

After a few more steps, Sam stopped. His shoulders hunched and he turned, anger hot inside him. Dean saw it and stopped a few feet away, spreading his hands.

"Look, man." He let the plea show naked in his face, his voice. "I love my little girl, I do. I love her more than life itself. I love my wife, and I love having a family. But I need you in it, or none of it means anything, don't you get that?"

And Sam did get it. He did, and he couldn't help how good it felt to hear it. But he'd stopped fooling himself that he could let himself hope. He'd tried that the last couple of days, tried pretending to himself that there was some chance, some future he could stand where things would be different. But when it came down to imagining the fallout, he couldn't live with it. He couldn't live with himself. He'd move to Timbuktu before he'd jeopardize what Dean had.

"I can't," he rasped. "I can't let you do this." At Dean's expression, he swallowed, fighting the urge to close the distance between them. "Dean, we'll always be family, no matter what. You know that. But you can't-- You can't mess with my head like this. You gotta give me some time."

Dean looked he wanted to argue, like he wanted to take the world apart and remake it with his bare hands. Sam softened his expression, wishing he could erase the last two days.

It had been good, hunting with Dean again. Better than good. But it had just made everything worse.

"Just give me some time, okay?" he said, as gently as he knew how.

At last, the stubbornness melted out of Dean's expression, ran out of his body in a wave. His hands clenched into fists, like he was trying to hold on to something that eluded his grasp. "God, I freaking hate this."

Sam's lips turned up despite himself. "Yeah."

There wasn't enough time in the world, and they both knew it. But after everything Dean had sacrificed for him, everything he'd given, this one thing, he could do.

They didn't talk much on the way home. Dean drove; Sam slept a little, but mostly he leaned against the window and watched the miles go by.

Seven hours later, under a soft, gray drizzle, they pulled into the parking lot of Sam's motel. To Dean's surprise, Sam reached out, put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed like Dean was the one who needed it. His expression hurt to look at.

"Take care of yourself, Sammy," Dean said, gruff.

"Yeah, you too. I'll see you," Sam said, and Dean felt like fucking crying as he watched Sam get out of the car and cross the parking lot, watched him let himself into his motel room, head bent and shoulders hunched against the rain. Dean could still feel the imprint of Sam's lips against his, and he wished he could take so many things back.

It was almost a year before he saw his brother again. In some ways, it was better than the months after Katie was born. Sam called a little more often, and still sent email every few days. Mostly, it was better because Dean understood why this time. He wanted to be angry about it -- some part of him felt like he should be pissed as hell -- but he understood.

A few weeks after Sam left, Dean gave up the P.I. jobs and went to work part time as a counselor at a group home for high-risk boys. He worked weekends mostly, and some evenings; it was challenging, but he found he loved it, and despite the fact that he was home less, things got better with Jules.

At the same time, he started tracking hunts again on the side, putting together files. They were fewer these days, demon activity practically nil, but there was still enough action out there to keep the hunters he knew busy. Once in a while, he'd send one to Sam, and it killed him, not having Sam's back on those hunts, but there was no point pretending he wasn't back in the game. If he had a certain tendency to pick the easy ones to slide Sam's way, it was a compromise Sam allowed.

One day in early August, Dean surprised him, emailing him a painstakingly transcribed copy of everything in their dad's journal in portable handheld format. Sam called him, grateful and surprised and a little choked up, and before they were done talking, Sam had sent him copies of everything on his working hard drive and promised to send more. That was how it started. By the time Katie's first birthday rolled around, Dean had Bobby and Joshua in on the deal, and they'd started putting together a real hunter's resource database, with Jules designing the database structure and setting up the logistics of managing the thing.

Not long before Christmas, she told him she was pregnant again. That night, after they celebrated several times with considerable enthusiasm, Dean left Sam a voice message with the news and asked when he was coming home.

"You could go, you know," Jules said one Saturday morning in February, a gray rain falling steadily against the bedroom windows.

Dean paused in the middle of shaving, meeting her eyes in the mirror. "Okay, random."

"Down to Texas. If you wanted to." She leaned against the doorjamb behind him, arms folded beneath her breasts. "Maybe spend a little time down there, just the two of you. If Mohammad won't come to the mountain..."

Dean's eyes slid back to his reflection. He drew another careful stripe through the white lather, then rinsed the blade. "He's busy, hon. Grad school stuff."

"Even grad students get a week off for spring break. That's like two weeks from now."

He chuckled. "Yeah, and knowing Sam, he's already planned some kind of marathon study session where he locks himself in the library the whole time."

She didn't say anything to that. His eyes flicked to hers for a second before he finished with the razor and set it down, grabbing a towel. He patted his face dry, and she was still watching him in the mirror.

He tossed the towel on the counter and went past her into the bedroom, slanting a grin over his shoulder. "You trying to get rid of me, is that it? You found some young stud who's into pregnant chicks, and you want me outta here so you can do the nasty on the kitchen table?"

Her mouth twitched. She turned, watching him pull out a T-shirt and put it on. "Yes, that's it, exactly. You found me out. All my careful ploys are for naught."

Dean started to laugh. "Did you just say 'for naught'?"

"Did you just say 'do the nasty'?" she shot back.

He slipped one hand around her waist and gave her a winning smile. "Maybe, but you can't prove it."

"That's what you think. And that doesn't count as changing the subject."

He rolled his eyes. "Babe--"

"What? I'm serious."

"So am I." He let out a sigh, and let her go. He paced away, trying to figure out how to make her understand. "Look, we got a lotta history, me and Sam. There's things you don't know about. You're gonna have to trust me when I say, if he wanted me around right now, he'd tell me."

She nodded. "Okay. But that's crap."

"No, it's not."

Jules came over and touched his shoulder, drawing him down to sit on the bed beside her. "Look, maybe I don't know what's going on between you two, but I know you, and I know Sam. Both of you have this thing, this Winchester thing. You guys take self-sacrifice to a whole new level, and it's like you don't even know you're doing it."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. We goin' all Dr. Freud, now?"

"Trust me, it doesn't take a psychoanalyst to see it."

"So, what's your point?"

She brushed the hair at his temple. "My point is, you both spend so much time trying to make things easier on each other, you completely miss the obvious."

"Which is?"

But between one breath and the next, Dean remembered that day by the side of the road like it was yesterday. Sam saying, I can't let you do this. And then asking Dean for time, knowing full well Dean would never deny him.

Jules's mouth quirked. Her eyes on his were wide and dark, gentle as a kiss. "You tell me."

Dean studied her face. His gaze came back to hers, and he kissed her, the feeling warm in his stomach. "You think you're pretty smart, don't you?"

She shrugged. "I have my moments."

Dean laid his hand against her belly, suddenly wishing he didn't have to be at work in half an hour. "I guess I'll keep you around, then, huh?"

"Eh, might as well," she said.

"Uh huh," said Dean, and set about making the most of the time he did have.

Dean getting the picture didn't make Sam any less stubborn, of course. He deflected the idea of Dean coming down to Austin, pleading exams and papers just like Dean had expected him to; Dean deflected right back, saying he understood, that they'd see Sam as soon as the semester was up. Two could play at that game.

It was May before Sam showed up on their doorstep, looking tired and worn around the edges, but settled, at peace with himself in a way Dean hadn't seen in a long time. He'd finished his M.A. like he'd planned; he was still thinking of teaching, he said. Dean didn't like how pale he was, or the way the skin around his eyes looked too tight, but he was too busy drinking in the sight of him to think about it too much.

He was thirty now, Dean realized. They'd missed his birthday. Julie was six months pregnant; Katie was going on two. Dean watched Sam scoop Katie up in his arms and bury his face in her neck, and came dangerously close to embarrassing himself. He kept it together with an effort of will, knowing Sam and Jules would never let him hear the end of it.

They ate supper in the kitchen, then took Katie upstairs after -- he and Sam together, Jules watching from the doorway. Sam was forced to sit in the rocking chair and read One Fish, Two Fish twice all the way through before Katie was satisfied, and Dean was pretty sure he'd never forget the unholy glee with which Sam intoned, "Look what we found, in the park, in the dark." ("She's supposed to be going to sleep," Jules reminded him, laughing, when his scary voice made Katie squeal. Sam waggled his eyebrows at Katie and dropped into an even lower register. "We will take him home. We will call him Clark.")

As he was winding down, Dean slipped out into the hall and put an arm around Jules's middle, kissing the back of her neck. "Mind if I stay up for a while?" he whispered.

She laced her fingers with his, then reached up and drew his head down, turning her head to brush his lips with hers. "I don't mind, babe. Wake me up when you come to bed."

He was out on the deck, beer in hand and another already waiting when Sam came to find him. "You got stuff to bring in?" Dean asked, making it as casual as he could.

Sam folded himself into the other chair. "Nah, man, figured I'd get a place. Didn't want to push my luck with the pregnant lady."

Dean laughed. "You kiddin' me? She loves you better than she loves me."

"Yeah, I know," Sam said with a grin. "That's exactly why I don't want to push my luck."

Dean sobered, letting himself really look at Sam for the first time since he'd come through the front door. "What's goin' on with you, huh? You look like you been sleepin' in the car for three days."

Sam snorted faintly, his eyebrows twitching as he raised the beer to his lips. "More like three years, it feels like."

"Yeah, and whose fault is that?" When Sam didn't answer that, Dean pushed a little harder. "Seriously, what's up?" Sam shrugged, looking like he was suddenly sorry he'd said anything, and Dean felt something cold settle in his stomach. "Aw, man. Really? I thought you said they were tapering off."

"Yeah, well, I thought they were." At Dean's expression, he gave a soft, uncomfortable laugh. "Don't make a big deal of it, all right? It's not like it's new."

When Dean frowned like he would push the issue, Sam looked away and changed the subject. "Anyway, tell me about this new job of yours."

So, Dean told him. They sat and they talked, until the moon was high overhead and Sam said, like it was nothing much, "You know, there's a house for rent a few blocks from here."

Dean blinked. There was a sudden rushing in his ears. He pushed it away, but he could still feel his heart speeding up beyond his ability to stop it. He looked at Sam; Sam looked back, expectant, like he was waiting for some kind of signal.

"You're serious," Dean said at last.

"Yeah, I kind of am." Sam's lips twitched, fighting a smile. "And I kind of might have signed a lease already, so I hope it's okay with you."

"Dude." Dean felt the grin slowly take over his face.

Sam started to laugh. "I'll take that as a yes, then."

Dean reached out and shoved his shoulder, hard. "You asshole. You better not be fucking me with me."

Sam shoved him back almost as hard. "I'm not fucking with you. And just for that, jerkwad, you're buying me a plant."

The house Sam had rented came already furnished, and he didn't have much, so moving in took all of about half an hour. Dean insisted on helping anyway, which mostly meant looking in every cabinet and drawer and going through Sam's stuff, making fun of his taste in clothes, his taste in music, everything short of his taste in toothpaste. If Dean's mood had been any better, Sam wasn't sure he could have dealt with it.

It was nothing to the look on his face when Sam asked if they had any job openings for teachers at the Center. He started two days later.

A month went by, and the relief Sam felt that he could do this, that he could have this, made it worth any price. He hadn't been sure if it would work, but the year they'd been apart was enough, and he found he could be around Dean again, could fit himself into the Sam-shaped space Dean had kept open for him. Sometimes he would feel a wave of homesickness for something no one else would recognize as home: a shitty motel room, crappy food, both of them torn up and exhausted and scared and pretending they weren't so far inside each other's space, each other's skins, that they couldn't remember what it was like to be any other way. But most of the time he could get up in the mornings and be that Sam -- the one he needed to be.

They worked together, they spoiled Katie and argued and went running together in the mornings, and it was enough. It's hard, sometimes, he wanted to say, when Dean would look at him like he might disappear any day. It's hard, but it's worth it. You know what I mean? He was pretty sure Dean did know, so he didn't say it, just let the days spool out one into the other, glad for every one of them.

The third week of June, Dean made a birthday dinner for a very pregnant Jules -- grilled steaks and corn on the cob. Sam made cupcakes in honor of the occasion, and Katie took one huge bite out of four different ones because she liked the icing best.

The next morning dawned warm and humid, and Dean took off early for Sam's, hoping to get a decent run in before it got too hot. Sam seemed a little quieter than usual, but he never had been big on talking much first thing in the morning. It wasn't until Dean got home and went to the fridge for water that his eyes fell on the calendar, and he realized what day it was: six years to the day since they'd killed the demon.

Five years to the day since Dean had walked away from a crossroads with his life and his soul intact, thanks to Sam.

Dean leaned over the sink and poured some of the water over his head, his chest tight with the memory. He glanced at the phone, thinking about calling Sam. He'd be in the shower, probably, and what the hell would Dean say? He'd been watching Sam out of the corner of his eye for weeks, and Sam seemed like he'd made his peace with things, like he'd finally found some answer he could live with. The last thing he needed was Dean getting emotional on him, dragging all that crap up again. The fact that they'd made it out in one piece, that Sam was back in their lives where he belonged -- that was what mattered.

The house was quiet; Jules had left a note stuck to the fridge that she'd taken Katie for a play date at the park. Dean grabbed a shower, then went downstairs to check his email. There wasn't much, just a note from Bobby asking if he'd heard anything about a mothman sighting in Colorado. Dean read the links he'd sent, and wrote back saying he'd pass word along to Jo to check it out. Then he added an entry in the online journal, two sentences and a question mark, the location and the date.

The database he'd built was pretty all-inclusive, but he kept a second one that only he and Sam and Bobby had access to. They called it their "need to know" file, and most of what it contained was dormant information, stuff that had directly to do with the yellow-eyed demon and that they hoped never to need again.

He couldn't have said what, exactly, made him pull it up now, when he hadn't looked at any of it in almost a year. Seeing it all again after so long -- the places and dates, the sigils, the lists of names -- he scrolled through it, memory opening up like a door he'd shut long ago, rushing over him in a steady flood. Even after all this time, it was still hard to believe. We did it, Dad, he thought. You and me and Sammy, we nailed that son of a bitch.

An old, faded photo of the roadhouse caught him, and despite the ache in his throat he grinned a little, remembering Ash, the first time they'd met. The casualties hadn't started or ended there. His eyes skimmed over more names: Max Miller, Ava Wilson, Andy Gallagher -- poor Andy, who'd never been cut out for any of it.

Below Andy's name was Jake Talley's, the last of the psychic kids to die. Dean still wished he could have had the satisfaction of killing that bastard himself, preferably with his bare hands. Six years wasn't enough time to forgive what he'd done; in fact, sixty years down the road, Dean was pretty sure he'd still want to kill him.

There was another list at the end of the file, one that only the three of them knew about. Sam's name was at the bottom of it; there were twelve names in all, twelve psychics born in eighty-three who had survived. Eleven of them were lucky enough to have missed out on the demon's twisted version of Mortal Kombat, their abilities weaker than the others, slower to develop. Sam's visions had led him to each of them in turn in the year after the demon died, and he and Dean had intended to keep track, keep an eye on them.

Had Sam? Dean wondered, realizing it was years now since he'd even given them a passing thought. He probably had, knowing Sam -- hell, he probably had some kind of psychic hot line set up, in case anybody felt the sudden urge to go all firestarter or something.

Before he even thought about it, he'd launched one of the P.I. database services he used to check backgrounds, and was typing in the first name on the list. It was curiosity, that's all. When the record came up, his eyes skimmed over the basic stuff, property ownership, marriage record, car registrations, nothing that cried out The Bad Seed -- not even so much as a misdemeanor. It was so normal that he didn't register at first what he was seeing.

When he did, Dean felt a jab of uneasiness. It made it hard to swallow all of a sudden, and he was too aware of his heartbeat in the quiet house, of the whir of the fan and the soft breeze it raised against the hairs at the back of his neck.

It didn't necessarily mean anything. People died every day, and if anyone ought to know that, it was him. Yeah, but when they're thirty? What are the odds of that?

The date of death was four months before; the last address shown was Kansas City. Dean looked up the obit, and found it in about a minute: Amber St. John died suddenly of a brain aneurysm on Monday, February 18, 2013. She was survived by her loving husband and two children.

It wasn't until Dean looked up the second name that he felt his insides go cold.

"What the hell?" he murmured, frowning at the screen as if he could make it say something different. But the facts were there in stark letters, inescapable: Leon Porter, Los Angeles, California -- also dead at thirty, less than two months before. Also, his obituary confirmed, of a catastrophic brain aneurysm.

Dean swallowed hard. The cold feeling sank deeper into him, feeling like it spread through his bones. He made himself look up the third name, trying not to let his hands shake. The results were the same. Just over a week ago this time. The same day, Dean realized sickly, that Sam had stumbled during their morning run. He'd said it was nothing, a headache, too much sun over the weekend -- and Dean, goddammit, had believed him.

He held himself still, trying to process it. The names blurred, but it didn't matter, he didn't need to look up the rest; he already knew. This was who Sam had been having visions about. This was whose deaths he'd been seeing. Sam knew. He knew all along and he--

Sudden adrenalin surged through Dean and he stood up, unsteady, everything inside him turned to ice. "Jesus," he heard himself say, in a voice hoarse with denial. He took a step back from the computer, and his legs didn't want to hold him. "No, no, no, no, no--" The names still stared back at him from the screen, Sam's at the bottom of the list.

"No, goddammit!" Without thought, he kicked his chair so violently into the desk that the noise was like a shotgun blast in the quiet house. It tore gouges out of the laminate and ripped the carpet, and Dean didn't even feel the shock of impact.

He slammed out of the house, barely aware of getting from there to Sam's. Next thing he knew he was pounding on Sam's door so hard it might have broken something in his hand, and he couldn't have cared less.

"Sam! Goddammit, open up!"

He shoved inside the second the deadbolt clicked. Sam stepped back in his wake, and Dean kicked the door shut and turned on him, so furious he couldn't see straight. "Were you ever gonna tell me? Huh?"

Understanding flickered over Sam's face, and if Dean hadn't already believed it, the bleak resignation that settled in Sam's expression was confirmation enough. Sam held up his hands, placating. "Dean. Hey, calm down, all right?"

"Calm down? Oh, that's good. That's hilarious, is what that is. No, I will not freaking calm down!"

"Dean, it's all right."

"How, Sammy? How is this all right? You tell me how the hell you dying is ever supposed to be all right!"

"I was gonna tell you. I swear. I just-- Dean, man, I'm sorry, all right? I'm sorry."

"Don't, okay? Just don't fucking lie to me." Dean paced back and forth, unable to look at him. "I wondered what was going on with you. I couldn't figure it out. But now I get it. You think you get to-- to check out on everything, just leave me here and it'll be fine, it'll be sunshine and roses for me, is that it?"

"No, of course not--"

Dean grabbed him, slammed him back against the wall. His chest ached like a gunshot wound and he was trembling so hard he could barely get words out. "Don't you fucking leave me again, you son of a bitch. Don't you dare--"

"Dean." Sam's hand came up and cupped his head, protective, like that day in the woods. Dean choked out a sob, and Sam grabbed onto him hard and folded him up in his arms, held on tight.

Dean just-- he couldn't. He couldn't do this again. Everything in him said no, and I can't, and all he wanted was to hold on to Sam and keep him safe and never have to face what came after.

He stopped functioning for a while then, so he wasn't fully aware of it when Sam pulled him stumbling into the bedroom, pulled him down on the bed and wrapped him up in his arms. He fell into a kind of numb denial, and thought he might keep on falling.

The sun was bright outside, little dots of light peeking around the edges of the blinds, blinding him. It felt like when they were kids, when Sam would wake up from a nightmare and Dean would climb in the bed with him, would tell him stories and calm him down.

So long since it had been just the two of them. The sudden quiet wrapped them up in a cocoon, the traffic noise and the sprinklers next door, the distant sound of a lawnmower. Dean listened to his brother's heart, holding on to Sam so hard he thought he'd never let go, never let anything take him. His fingers slid under Sam's shirt and pressed against the scar in the center of his back like he could stop the bleeding six years after the fact.

"I waited," he choked at last. "I waited like you told me to."

"I know. I know you did." Sam sounded like he was crying.

"You don't get to ditch me, goddammit. Not now, not after everything."

"I don't want to."

"It almost killed me, Sammy."

Sam held on tight, hand warm and steady at the back of Dean's neck. But Dean knew. He knew what it was like to live in a world with no Sam. He felt himself shaking, the fear endless inside him, uncontrollable.

"You hear me? I can't do this without you."

And Sam didn't tell him, yes, you can, didn't offer him lies or worthless reassurances, just the warmth of his body, his head resting against Dean's.

Dean let out a long, unsteady breath, fist knotting in Sam's shirt. And then he hauled himself up, turned his face into Sam's neck and closed his eyes, pressing his lips to the warm, steady pulse underneath Sam's jaw.

Sam went still. Dean breathed him in, getting shampoo and warm skin and Sam, all the scents that he knew so well. Feeling shaky, he opened his mouth and pressed another kiss to Sam's neck, just below the first.

Sam's breath hitched. For a second, Dean thought Sam was going to push him away, make him stop. Please, he wanted to say. Let me. And maybe some part of him thought that if he did this, if he bound them together like this, the only way that was left, Sam wouldn't have to go. He'd be Dean's, once and for all.

"Dean--"

Dean touched his mouth, shushed him, then let his hand brush Sam's face. Their eyes met. Sam nodded at last like something was breaking inside him, and Dean's fingers spread against his face, holding him still. He closed his eyes and guided their mouths together and it felt like coming home, like the easiest and most important thing in the world to kiss him, sweet and hot and painfully good, Sam's lips parting to let him in.

He could feel Sam trembling. Sam's hands came up and cradled his head as if he was afraid Dean would stop too soon, but Dean didn't think he could stop if he wanted to. Kissing Sam was like nothing he'd ever felt. It had been true the first two times, too, but this time was a whole different ballgame. If it was intense -- and intensely weird -- before, that was magnified by about a factor of a hundred, doing this with Sam stretched out warm and solid underneath him, when all he could feel and smell and taste was Sam, when there was already something wild and reckless and grieving inside him. It ran through him like a live wire, coiling tighter and tighter with each touch of Sam's tongue, each tentative answer his mouth gave Dean's, until Dean was shaking and tasted salt and knew it was his, tears spilling fresh and wetting Sam's face as the love Dean felt for him spilled and broke over them in bitter waves.

"Dean. Shh. It's okay. You don't have to."

"Shut up, just shut up." Dean heard the naked grief in his voice and couldn't care, couldn't waste time on it. "Come here." He pulled Sam's shirt off, then his own, awkward and clumsy with it, blind. Skin on skin was better, was-- God, he felt like it laid him open and drew deep cuts in his exposed heart, feeling Sam against him like that, but it was good. It was better than good. His hands clutched at warm skin, feeling the solid strength of him. He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against Sam's shoulder, helpless. "God, Sam. Just-- come here, okay?"

"I'm here."

Sam did the rest, got his jeans off and Dean's sweats, then pulled him in close, cradled Dean naked between his thighs. It ran through Dean like a shock; they were both hard. His insides knotted up and he tensed, ready to run or fight, but Sam's arms held him fast, made him feel like he was coming apart and it was okay, like they'd been headed here all their lives. Like nothing mattered except him and Sam, holding on to each other for dear life. He drew a deep, unsteady breath and tilted his head up, and then they were kissing shakily and rocking together in a slow, unsteady rhythm.

It felt like it went on forever like that. The world went away; everything went away except the way it felt to move like they were one person, a warm, safe circle of two, waves of heady pleasure and heat and yes, like that, yes. Their tongues met and mated, sending tiny jolts of intense shock through him one after the other. Sam touched him all over, hands restless like he wanted to learn Dean by feel. It was all Dean could do to hold on.

It was Sam who came apart first, choking back a curse and spilling hot against Dean's stomach, the sweat-slick crease of his thigh; Dean held him through it, then felt Sam's hand close around him, rough and warm. His pulse leapt and Sam coaxed him up and over the edge like it was nothing, like it wasn't going to kill him. Sparks of heat cascaded through him in a ragged rush, release singing in every nerve of his body with a power that threatened to shake him apart. He panted through it, helpless to stop the flood.

The aftershocks left him reeling, numb. Numb was good. Numb was a relief so profound, he closed his eyes and sank down into the wet, sticky heat of his brother's body under his, of Sam's arms, feeling like he'd been given a powerful shot of some drug too good to be real. He never wanted to move. Never wanted to have to think another thought, to be anywhere but right here. Please, anything, he prayed, to a God he'd never really believed could hear him. I'll give anything.

They stayed like that for a while. Sam held on, the only thing he could do; his thoughts scattered like dust in a beam of sunlight when he tried to make sense of them, when he tried to get a grip on what had just happened. His heart felt like it was broken open inside him, like everything he'd ever wanted, everything he'd ever believed about himself, about Dean, was spilled out and bleeding through his veins, hot and overwhelming. He didn't know how he was ever going to be able to close it back up again.

"How many?" Dean asked hoarsely, at last.

"What?"

"How many have you seen?" It came out harsh, the sound Sam recognized as Dean, scared to death and trying not to show it. He heard the question Dean didn't ask: How many are left?

Sam swallowed. He closed his eyes, seeing their deaths, a film loop stuck on repeat. "Eight, so far."

"Have you seen--" Dean stopped. "Do you know when it happens?"

Sam let out a breath, and shook his head. "I don't think it works that way."

Dean pushed himself up at that, air rushing in between their bodies, their skins wet and sticky. "But if it did, you'd tell me, right?" When Sam didn't say anything, Dean shook him, made Sam look at him. "Sam. Promise me. You have to."

Sam wanted to flinch away from what he saw in Dean's face. He'd been so scared of telling him, but the reality was so much worse. Right then he would have said anything to make that look go away.

"Dean, I promise, if I see anything, I'll tell you, all right?"

It helped; at least, it lessened the awfulness in Dean's eyes a little. Dean drew a quick breath, brow knotting. "Maybe it won't happen to you. I mean, maybe--" He untangled from Sam and sat up. "None of those others went through what you did, that whole 'there can be only one' bullshit. You were the one that son of a bitch chose. So you could be immune or something, right?"

Sam's chest hurt, seeing Dean trying so hard to find some hope he could hold on to. "Yeah," he said, putting all the conviction he could into it. "Maybe. It's possible." He laid a hand on Dean's thigh, not really meaning to; his awareness of their nakedness was suddenly acute, but he couldn't stem the instinctive need to keep him close. It rested like a stone in his gut, what they'd done, what it would mean -- and still he ached to keep reality at bay a little longer. He couldn't have this. He knew that. But he didn't know how to let go.

A stillness came over Dean, the same awareness hitting him. "Sam, don't."

Sam let him go as if burned. "I'm sorry--"

"No," Dean interrupted, harsh, and grabbed his hand before he could pull it away. "I mean, don't blame yourself. Don't be sorry. I'm not."

Sam's breath caught at that; it was unexpected, and squeezed tight inside him, making it suddenly hard to think. A tremor ran through him, and he clamped down on it as hard as he could.

He sat up. The smell of sex was heady between them, Dean's body warm and close and real, his grip strong around Sam's wrist. He was beautiful, like always, the pure lines of his shoulders and throat and the clean, familiar angles of his face, his full mouth and arching brows and the play of freckles across his strong nose. Sam had kissed that mouth, had touched him into orgasm and listened to the sounds he made, and hearing him say he wasn't sorry, the reality of it hit Sam low in the gut, like he hadn't been able to let it do before. "Dean," he said, helpless. He was afraid.

Dean let go of his wrist, touched his shoulder, hand warm as it slipped around to hold Sam gently at the back of the neck. His eyes drank in Sam's face, his body, and Sam didn't know what to call the look that came over him. It was bitter and tender and hard all at once, and it made Sam's stomach flip over, made him reach up and slide his hand over Dean's at his neck, holding on.

Dean let himself look his fill, unable to name all the feelings that rushed up, so strong they felt like they pounded hot in his blood, welled deep under his skin. None of them were what he was supposed to feel, and all he could think was, God, how can I?

Sam held still, letting Dean touch him. "You know how crazy this is, right?" he asked at last, his voice thick with it. Dean saw him try to smile, but he didn't quite make it.

"Yeah, I know," Dean said, like it made perfect sense. He nodded. Then his mouth trembled and a soft breath escaped him in a rush. "I know."

And then it was worse, his body and his whole heart answering the unspoken hunger he saw in Sam's eyes -- a hot, sinking feeling Dean couldn't control. He leaned forward without thinking and kissed him. Sam's mouth opened under his with a soft, surprised sound; his hands came up to rest against Dean's throat, fingers spreading to angle Dean's head so he could deepen the kiss. Heart pounding, Dean pushed him back and lay down with him, one hungry touch of their mouths turning into the next with barely space to breathe.

Somehow, it was scarier this time, the knowledge full and real between them, but that did nothing to lessen the shock of arousal when their bodies met, when Sam slipped one long thigh between his and Dean felt Sam slide against him, satiny and hard, rising eagerly to meet Dean's own stiffening erection. Awareness of what they were doing just made Dean want it more.

"Sam," he gasped, breaking away. He could feel Sam shaking, the little thrusts of his hips and the way his pulse raced under Dean's thumb. "Can we--"

"Anything," Sam said in a rush. "Anything, I don't care." He turned his face into Dean's throat and mouthed the dip of his collarbone, hands spreading warm and rough against the small of Dean's back. With easy strength, he turned and pulled Dean on top of him again, covering himself with Dean's body.

"I want you inside me," Dean said, voice breaking with how much he wanted it. "Sam, please. I don't care about anything else. Just--"

Sam went still under him, breath caught in his throat. His arms tightened. "Okay," he whispered, the word small and fragile. "Okay. Jesus, Dean, are you--"

Dean kissed him, came up to his knees and straddled Sam's hips. He cradled Sam's face in his hands, made himself look him in the eyes. "Please, okay?"

Sam nodded wordlessly, eyes wide. Color flushed his cheeks, spread down over his chest. "I don't have anything," he said, a little desperate.

Dean felt the heat in his own face. He pushed himself up without another word, left Sam on the bed while he went into the bathroom, came back with a bottle of hair conditioner. "Use this," he ordered. He pushed it at Sam, who managed to look panicked and turned on at the same time, then climbed back on the bed.

Sam's hands shook so badly getting the cap open, Dean had to help him. They spread the slippery fluid over Sam together, and a thrill of fear knotted up tight in Dean's chest. Sam was big, painfully ready, a pearl of fluid leaking from the head, a shudder running through him when Dean touched him. He made a soft, pained sound when their hands slid down over him, and Dean could feel him trembling. "It's okay," Dean said without thinking. "I got you."

"Dean--"

"It's okay." Dean swung himself over Sam's hips, sucking in a sharp breath as Sam's dick brushed against his, silky-wet and hot. Sam's head fell back; his eyes closed, his lips parting in a soft groan. His hands found Dean's hips and gripped hard, his fingers slippery.

Any doubt Dean had over whether Sam had done this before vanished when Sam helped him lean forward, braced him and then reached around, sliding slick fingertips against Dean's opening, stretching him gently. Dean shuddered and let out a breath; he wanted to close his eyes but he found himself watching Sam, his face. As if he sensed Dean's eyes on him, Sam opened his and met his gaze, held it.

Jesus Christ, Dean had no words for this. The need to have Sam inside him overcame anything else, and he reached for Sam and gripped him, pressed him inside.

He'd done this more than a few times with women, with their fingers, with strap-ons sometimes, if they were into it -- Dean loved sex, and he didn't have too many limits when it came to trying things that felt good. But this, Sam's eyes on his and Sam naked and firm and pushing into him-- this was a whole different country, the landscape strange and raw and completely new.

It hurt like hell. No two ways about that -- Sam was big and Dean didn't want to go slow, so it hurt. Sam tried to make it better, tried to ease him into it with hands braced against his hips and small, gradual strokes; after a while it was better, Dean's body remembering how to give in the ways it needed to, but it didn't matter. What mattered was that he could feel Sam with him, inside him, could feel his heartbeat and the way Sam shook for him, the fine tremors that flooded Sam's body as Dean rocked against him as slowly as he could. Dean's thigh muscles worked and he trembled too from the strain, but then Sam gave a soft gasp and shuddered, eyes fluttering; he choked on it and thrust harder, spread one hand against Dean's belly. "Dean. God-- oh, God."

"It's okay," Dean said again, voice rough with everything he felt, a lifetime of wanting to keep Sam close and safe. "It's okay, Sammy."

Sam sobbed and turned his head, squeezing his eyes shut at last; his fingers seized on Dean's hips and he spasmed gently inside Dean, came with a low cry that Dean felt all the way through him. Without thinking he grabbed Sam's hand, wrapped it around himself. It didn't take much. With Sam still pulsing inside him, Dean let the wave of his own need overcome him, gave himself to it without hesitation and came in slow, powerful jolts of release. His come painted Sam's stomach and chest and he shook with it, watched it happen, breath coming in harsh pants and the anchors of his world slipping.

It changed everything, except the one thing that counted.

Outside, the sprinklers had shut off. Late afternoon sunlight slipped past the edges of the blinds, sparkled in Dean's peripheral vision. He sat on the edge of the bed and braced his elbows against his knees, fighting the panic and rage that threatened to overwhelm him.

"You know, all I ever wanted was to take care of you. It's the only thing I ever really cared about. But it's like no matter what I do--" He stopped.

Sam's voice came low, so gentle it hurt. "Dean, don't. None of this is your fault."

Dean's chest hitched and a soft breath escaped him, not really a laugh.

Sam shifted closer, knee pressing against his thigh. "Hey."

Reluctantly, Dean looked up.

Sam's wide-set eyes shone, too bright to look at. Like a confession, he said roughly, "I'm okay. No matter what happens. Nothing you could do could hurt me." Dean's throat closed; he started to speak, but Sam shook his head and went on. "You've given up so much for me, I can't even think about it, or I start to go crazy, you know? But Dean, not this time. You deserve to live your own life. Nobody deserves it more than you."

Dean swallowed hard. Mouth unsteady, he reached out and touched Sam's face, stroked his hair back off his forehead. He wanted to say, it was worth it, you were always worth it, but if he said that out loud he was gonna lose it.

"Bitch," he said instead, all he could manage.

Sam's lips turned up, though he looked no better off. "Yeah," he whispered. He nodded as if to himself, then reached out and pulled Dean down into his arms.

Dean had nothing left in him to fight it. All the violent emotion had exhausted him, and the warmth of Sam's body lulled him, wrapped him up in the illusion of safety. Just for a little while, he told himself, and let the world go away.

Sam woke to soft shadows and blurry shapes, the indistinct outlines of his bedroom barely visible in the deep twilight. Dean was a heavy heat in his arms. Sam's nose itched where it was buried in the soft hair at the back of his brother's neck.

Reality filtered in. They'd slept for hours; it was almost dark outside, and it was summer, which meant it had to be after eight. Sam's stomach tightened.

"Dean."

Dean stirred. "Mmf," he said, and rubbed his face against Sam's outstretched arm. Sam realized he'd lost most of the feeling in it. He flexed his hand, trying to get the blood flowing.

"Dean," he said again, more urgently. "Wake up."

Dean wiped a hand over his face and stretched, blinking. He stilled as he came into contact with Sam's nakedness, registered his own. "What time is it?"

"I don't know. After eight, I think. You're laying on my watch hand."

"Oh, crap," Dean said, and sat up. He grabbed Sam's wrist, looked at the time. "Dammit."

Sam sat up, an uneasy feeling in his gut. "Dean, I'm sorry--"

"Forget it. Not your fault." Dean got up, searching for his clothes. He pulled his old, worn T-shirt over his head, making his hair stick up; it took him three tries to get the sweatpants on, his coordination shot to hell. "Didn't bring my phone," he said, fumbling in the pockets and coming up empty.

Sam ran a hand through his hair and checked the message light on his phone. It was dark. "She'd call here, right? If anything happened?"

Dean sat down heavily, Sam's question making his pregnant wife and daughter a reality again between one breath and the next. "Christ, I didn't even leave a note."

Sam got up on autopilot, finding his jeans and pulling them on. By the time he'd gotten them fastened, Dean was up again, splashing water over his face in the bathroom, rinsing his mouth. Sam watched him smooth down his hair with a kind of numb detachment, and tried not to let himself think.

"I look okay?" Dean asked, sounding as wrecked as Sam felt.

"Yeah, you're okay," Sam said, not even sure if it was true. God, he smelled like Dean -- he had Dean all over his skin, and Dean had to be in the same boat.

"I gotta--" Dean said, apology thick in his voice, and Sam nodded.

"Yeah, I know." He tried to smile, to make light of it, but who was he kidding? "It's okay," he said, and that, at least, he could make true. Or at least, as true as he knew how.

Dean made it as far as the front hall, and then couldn't make himself leave. It was written all over him, in the tense set of his shoulders and the helpless way he braced himself against the kitchen doorway. His head was bowed and Sam couldn't see his face, but he touched the back of Dean's neck, let himself wrap his arms around Dean from behind. He felt Dean lean into it like all the will to move had gone out of him; Sam laid his face against the strong curve of his neck, holding on.

At last, he let go. "Call me tomorrow," he said. "I'm not going anywhere."

Dean nodded. He took two steps, then stopped with his hand on the doorknob and turned back; Sam drank him in like it was going to have to last him a long time.

"I'll call you," Dean said.

Sam leaned against the wall when he'd gone, feet and chest bare and heart not much better.

Dean walked home in a daze. He couldn't even think. He ached where Sam had been inside him, and he never wanted that feeling to go away; he wanted to hold onto it and keep it close. It physically hurt, separating himself from Sam, when every instinct was telling him to grab on and hold on for all he was worth.

They hadn't really talked about anything. The soft summer air and the smell of cut grass were thick in his senses and Sam was gonna die, and he couldn't stop it. There was nothing he could hunt or kill.

The last block or so, he did the best he could to get himself together. In three years, he'd never once seriously thought about another woman, and he didn't begin to know what you called it when you betrayed your wife with your own brother. It didn't feel anything like he thought it should. He should feel lower than dirt, after what he'd done, but it didn't feel like being unfaithful, not when it was Sam. And how fucked up was that?

He let himself in the kitchen door, hoping against hope that he looked a lot less messed up than he felt. The house was quiet, dark except for the light over the sink; Katie's dishes and cup were out on the counter, the stroller left in the corner. It didn't look like Jules had even made dinner. Her keys and stuff were on the table.

Dean went upstairs. A quick glance into the bedroom revealed Jules asleep in her clothes on top of the covers, like she'd come in and passed out there. Her hand rested on the swell of her belly; her face was drawn, a little frown between her dark eyebrows. Dean rested a hand against the doorjamb and leaned against it for a minute, watching her, sick relief washing over him.

"Daddy?" Katie called, her voice carrying down the hall.

Dean pushed himself away from the wall and went to her. She was standing up in her crib, wide awake in her frog PJs.

"Hey, you," he said, tousling her hair. They didn't usually pick her up once she'd been put down for the night, but this time he didn't hesitate, just let down the side and wrapped her up in a bear hug. She put an arm around his neck and held on, sturdy legs braced against his chest, sucking her thumb. Dean put his face into her neck and closed his eyes, breathing her in.

He couldn't help remembering Sammy at that age, squirmy and curious and unfailingly sunny, probably the last time in his life he'd been that way. He'd been the sweetest kid, and Dean had loved him with his whole heart and every fiber of his six-year-old body. Some things didn't change.

He held on until Katie protested, pushing him away with a frown. "Why are you sad?"

"Why" was a new thing for her. She already talked more at this age than Sam ever had. Dean wiped his face with one hand, made himself smile for her. "Because you haven't hugged me enough today. I'm workin' on a hug deficit."

She thought about that, then grabbed him around the neck again. Dean huffed a laugh, the air squeezed out of him.

His arms tightened; feeling her restless energy, it hit him like a kick to the head, flooded his whole body with a wave of bone-deep denial. He'd already started giving up on Sam. Well, screw that. What the hell was wrong with him? He was never giving up on Sam, not as long as there was breath in his body.

"Daddy, you're squishing me."

Dean let out a shaky breath and let her go with a damp, unsteady chuckle.

"Come on, munchkin, time to say good night. Sleep time."

He got her down, kissed her forehead and left her playing with her fish crib toy. Shutting off the hall light, he went back into the bedroom and laid a matching kiss on Jules's cheek. She stirred, blinking awake. "Hey," she said sleepily, pushing her hair out of her face.

"Hey, babe. You doin' okay?" He went to the closet and toed off his shoes, then came back and sat on the end of the bed, pulling her feet into his lap.

"Yeah, I think so. What time is it?"

"Going on nine."

"Shit, I just meant to lay down for a minute. Guess I crashed, huh?"

"Looks like it. How was your day?" He started to massage her instep, and she shifted to give him better access.

"God, that feels good." She closed her eyes, and some of the tension in her face melted away. "You don't even want to know about my day, trust me."

"That bad, huh?"

Her mouth quirked. "Pretty much. And apparently, they did some work on the roof at the Safeway yesterday, so guess who got two flat tires out of the deal?"

Guilt curled through Dean. "Aw, shit, baby. Did you try to call me? I forgot my phone."

"I did, but it's okay. We lived. Just by the time we got home, I couldn't even face heating up soup. I gave Katie supper and put her to bed and that was it, I was done."

"That sucks out loud, babe. I'm really sorry."

"Don't worry about it." She stretched, awkward with the weight of the baby, and gave him the other foot to rub. "Where were you? I was worried."

"Spent the day over at Sam's. We kinda lost track of time." He kept his focus on what he was doing, knowing full well how much he sucked at lying to her. Shit, he was gonna have to get better at it, fast.

She was quiet a second too long, and he could practically hear the alarm bells going off. "You find something?" she asked. "Is it a hunt?"

Surprised into looking up, he met her eyes. "No, well, I mean--" come on, Dean, get a grip "--not really. Not yet, anyway. Could be, though."

She nodded, but the concern in her expression deepened. "Babe, you okay? You don't look so hot."

The wave of love he felt for her in that moment was so strong, he couldn't breathe. "Yeah, I'm fine," he said, forcing as much of a smile as he could manage. "I'm good." He patted her foot and got up; the shape he was in, if he let her see how untrue that was, he was gonna come apart and tell her everything. "Think I'm gonna take a rinse-off, though. I never did get a shower this morning."

"Good idea," she said, nudging his ass with her toe as he headed toward the bathroom. "At least one person in this bed will appreciate it."

In the bathroom, Dean leaned against the counter and closed his eyes.

His shirt smelled like him and Sam. When he pulled it over his head, the faint musky scent hit him hard, and he had to sit down on the lid of the john. God, what the hell was he doing? He didn't even know any more. This morning the world had made sense; now Sam was gonna die and Dean had forced his way across a line that never should have been crossed. Everything was screwed to hell.

He didn't know how to begin to deal with what had happened between him and Sam. The echoes of it still ached in his body, a soreness that made it all too real. Maybe it was always going to happen sooner or later; maybe they'd been too close for too long to know where the lines even were any more. He should have been freaked by the gay thing, never mind the part about being gay for his brother, but all he could think about was how much it terrified him, the idea of going through this again. How little he trusted himself. Six years ago, he'd sold the only thing he had rather than live in a world where Sam was gone. What the hell was he supposed to sell this time?

Under the spray, Dean buried his face in his arms and tried not to think about tomorrow.

The first gray light of morning had barely crept in at the windows when a familiar pounding shook Sam's front door. He closed his eyes, letting out a sigh, and flattened himself to the bed for a second before pushing himself up and going to answer it. What the hell, it wasn't like he'd been sleeping, anyway. It wasn't like he was ever going to be ready to face Dean after last night.

Even knowing that, it still hit him somewhere south of his heart to see Dean on his doorstep, looking like he'd gotten about as much sleep as Sam had. He was dressed for running and the sheen of sweat, the flush in his cheeks said he'd been at it for a while, but under it he looked tired and pale, his freckles and the green of his eyes standing out in sharp contrast. "Hey," he said, a little breathless, his voice gravelly, like it always got when he was short on sleep.

"Hey," Sam said, heart beating a fast rhythm against his chest.

They stood there for what felt like too long. Sam tried to find something to say to break the awkward moment, but words deserted him; he was afraid to open his mouth for fear he'd reach out and haul Dean against him and not let go. A tiny rivulet of perspiration ran down Dean's jaw, gathering in the hollow of his throat, and Sam's mouth went dry. "Everything okay?" he managed at last. It sounded a little strangled.

Dean's face quirked in a complicated, eloquent twist of expression that said, you kidding me? He gave a soft, choked laugh and scratched the back of his head. "Honestly? Couldn't tell you."

Sam let out a pained laugh of his own. "I hear that." He swallowed, shifting his feet. "You want to-- you want to come in?"

"Can't," Dean said too quickly.

"Sure, yeah," Sam said, nodding. Unconsciously, he braced a hand against the doorframe.

"No, it's just-- Jules has a doctor's appointment. I've only got a few minutes before I have to get back."

"It's okay," Sam said. It was, he reminded himself. "So," he said at last, and managed the ghost of a smile.

"Yeah, so." Dean smiled too, his eyes tracing Sam's face like it did him good to see for himself, like it was all he'd come for.

Sam felt something inside him let go, relaxing under the familiar, comforting weight of Dean's concern. Sometimes it was exhausting, carrying that weight, but right then, it settled over him like a favorite shirt worn soft by the years. "It's okay," he said again, and this time he meant it.

Dean gave a soft, helpless laugh. "No, it's really not."

"Yeah," Sam said, a whisper all he could manage. Timbuktu was starting to look like the only viable option. "Dean, you should--"

"I will, okay?" Dean cut in. "I will, I just, I need to say something. We are not giving up on this thing, I don't care what it takes. I need you to know that. Nobody's dyin', here."

"Dean--"

Dean shook his head, and the words rushed out of him like life's blood. "No, hear me out, Sammy. There's one more thing. You and me-- I'll do whatever you want, okay? Whatever you need me to do. Tell me, and I'll do it."

Sam's stomach gave a little lurch, and he tightened his grip on the doorframe. "Don't. Dean, don't say that."

Dean looked back at him and didn't say anything, his face open and raw, the truth of it written all over him. Sam felt the world tilt, vertigo sick and scary within him, and even that couldn't touch the quiet spark it lit deep inside him, the sudden, steady flame of knowing Dean had made his choice, and he'd chosen Sam, again, always.

A soft, choked sob caught in his throat. He wanted to say, no, Dean, don't be stupid, you can't -- but it would have been a lie, and he wasn't strong enough to say it and mean it.

Instead, he held on to the door and said, "Okay," the word choked and rough, and Dean said, "Okay," and smiled, unsteady.

Sam couldn't have said how long they stood there before Dean nodded, took two steps backward, then turned and started jogging slowly toward home. Sam let him go because it was the best he could do.

Dean moved through the day on autopilot, numb to the point of exhaustion. He'd barely slept, and the reality started hitting him somewhere between the doctor's waiting room and the long drive home, Jules giving him long, worried looks he didn't know how to deal with. He'd have to tell her something sooner or later, but he didn't think he could right now -- not without breaking down -- and if he did that, he didn't know how he'd pull himself back together.

He was washing up from dinner, gaze somewhere between the kitchen window and the moonlit outlines of the trees out back, when Sam knocked on the kitchen door. Dean looked up and saw him through the glass, and the next breath he took felt like the first real one he'd taken all day.

"Can I--?" Sam said, uncertain, when Dean opened the door. "Is this okay?"

"Get in here," Dean said, pulling him inside without ceremony.

"I wasn't sure if I should come."

Dean shut the door; he glanced toward the living room, then back at Sam, letting himself look his fill. "Yeah, well, thank God you did. I've been going batshit crazy over here."

Sam's lips canted. "Yeah, that's what Jules said."

Dean blinked. "What?"

"She called me. Said something was up with you, and I should come over and see if I could get you to talk about it."

Dean choked out a laugh. "You serious?" He saw Sam was, and started to pace, scrubbing a hand through his hair. "Man. I don't even know what to tell her. I mean, what am I supposed to say? Hey, babe, listen, we think Sam's brain's on some kind of self-destruct countdown, so--" He broke off and stopped, back to Sam, a shudder running through him.

"Dean. Hey."

Shaky, Dean went and sat down at the kitchen table. He spread his hand flat against the wood, wishing he could lie down and close his eyes and wake up in a world that made some kind of sense. "M'sorry. The last thing you need is me freaking out on you. I know that, man. I just-- I don't even know where to start."

Sam didn't answer that. He went to the fridge instead, pulling out two beers and plunking one down in front of Dean, twisting the top off the second. Dean scowled at him.

"Should you be drinking that?

Sam leaned against the counter, eyebrows raised. "No way, dude, you are not gonna start nursemaiding me now. I'm too old for that crap." With that, he drank deeply, watching Dean over the rim as if daring him to say anything. "And don't look at me like that."

"Have you even gone to see a doctor?"

"Went to see a neurologist in Houston. All the tests came back normal."

"Well, maybe you should think about gettin' a second opinion."

"Dean, he's good. One of the best in the country."

"Still. Can't hurt to be sure."

Sam met his look for a long moment, then finally nodded.

Somewhat appeased, Dean slouched back in his chair and picked up the bottle. He rolled it back and forth between his hands, condensation slicking his palms, then started to pick at the label. "What about Missouri? If this is some kind of a psychic thing, maybe she knows somebody."

"That's where I went over spring break. We practiced this visualization technique, every day for over a week."

"And?"

"And you know how my hand used to hurt whenever it rained? It doesn't do that any more." He gave Dean a look like he was supposed to think that was funny; when Dean didn't laugh, he grimaced a little. "I don't think it's a psychic thing, exactly. I think... maybe we're just not built for the long haul, you know?"

Dean's brows drew together. "I told you, we're not givin' up on this thing, Sam."

"Hey, trust me, nobody's giving up. Somebody's got to watch out for your dumb ass, remember?"

There was something different in his voice when he said it, a hope that had been missing yesterday. "Yeah," Dean managed, feeling it like a kick to the heart.

"Come on," Sam said, pushing himself away from the counter. He snagged the rest of the six pack from the fridge, then pulled Dean to his feet and tugged him toward the hallway. "Enough thinking for one day."

"Where we goin'?" Dean asked, not resisting.

"To drink the rest of your beer and watch something stupid and mindless on TV until we pass out."

They stayed up watching Indiana Jones in the finished basement, Dean's wife and little girl sleeping somewhere above them, and it came home to Dean with quiet enormity that he'd made his choice and nothing had ended, because the people he loved didn't see it as a choice at all. They'd both been telling him that for years.

"You okay?" Sam said, and Dean realized he must have made some sound.

He swallowed and managed a nod. He couldn't move, couldn't look at Sam.

"Yeah."

In Dean's peripheral vision, Sam looked at him then, the light from the screen flickering over his face in the dark. After a long moment, his hand came up to rest against the back of Dean's neck, warm and startlingly intimate. His thumb rubbed gently at the join of Dean's neck and shoulder, and he went back to watching the movie.

Dean dozed off first, his feet tucked under Sam's thighs. He was dimly aware of Sam shifting him, maneuvering him so his head was in Sam's lap and the blanket was over him; he wanted to protest, but Sam's fingers stroked gently through his hair, and he was asleep again before he could muster the strength.

Sam was gone in the morning. He left a note on Dean's desk: Going in to work. Call me later?

Dean, who had woken up with his eyes wide open and his head clear, sat down at his computer. It was time to make all that typing count for something.

Dean was waiting in Sam's driveway when Sam got home, list in hand. He slapped the printout up against the windshield of Sam's car: the names and places, cities and states scattered all over the country, took up two columns on the page.

Bemused, Sam climbed out, taking it from him. "What's this? Your report card?"

"No, dumbass. It's a list of contacts. Everyone I could find with some kind of expertise in hoodoo, mystical protection, Native American spirit medicine, you name it. There's even a couple of faith healers on there -- the real deal, before you give me a hard time about it. I checked them out."

Sam looked at him like he'd lost it. "Faith healing, Dean? Are you nuts?"

Scowling under that look, Dean turned and started for the house. "Shut up, we're doing this. Somebody somewhere owes us a miracle, and I for one plan to collect."

After a long moment, Sam followed. He caught up to Dean at the front step, reaching out to stop him.

"Dean, how are we supposed to check all these out? You can't go on the road, not now."

"Who says I can't? I told Jules what's going on."

Sam paled, and his hand fell. "You what?"

"With the other psychics," Dean clarified, feeling his face warm. His gaze faltered, but he made himself look up again, meeting Sam's eyes. "I told her what happened to them. I showed her the list. You know what she said? She said, go. She called her mom and asked her if she could come up and stay with her until the baby comes."

He watched Sam digest that, watched him turn and hike himself up to sit on the porch railing. He looked a little shell-shocked, like he didn't quite know whether or not to let himself be persuaded.

"That's more than two months, Sammy. We'll go, hit as many of these guys as we can, then circle back around when it gets to be that time."

Sam leaned forward and braced his elbows on his knees, keys still dangling from his fingers. "You know, babies are kind of notorious for following their own schedule when it comes to being born. Katie being a perfect example."

"Sam."

At his tone, Sam looked up. Dean didn't hide anything. He was doing this, with or without Sam.

They looked at each other for a long time before Sam finally relented. He took a deep breath and let it out. "Okay, fine, all right. So, when do we leave?"

Relief opened up in Dean's chest, a sudden lightness that made him want to sit down, or maybe do something a lot more stupid than that. He slapped Sam on the knee, trying not to let it show. "Tomorrow, bright and early, sunshine. Think you can remember how to read a map?"

"I think I can manage." Sam's half-smile faded, and he hesitated then, shaky. His eyes fell, looking at his hands. "Dean, are we okay?"

Dean forced a laugh. "Sammy, come on. You gotta ask me that?"

"It's just, I don't even know what to think any more."

"Yeah, Sam. We're okay." At the pained twitch of Sam's expression, he frowned. "What?" Still Sam didn't answer, and Dean shifted his weight, wishing desperately that he was better at this. "Come on, man, what's goin' on in that crazy head of yours?"

At that, Sam gave a painful, wry smile. "Don't joke, I'm starting to wonder." He looked away, swallowing. "I just-- What you said yesterday."

"I meant it," Dean said, unhesitating.

And Sam looked up, heart in his eyes, a look so unguarded it made Dean's chest hurt. "That's what scares me, Dean. I need you to know, what happened between us-- I don't expect it to happen again."

Color flushed Sam's cheeks as he said it, and Dean's body ached with the sudden memory of Sam inside him, Sam spread out under him with that expression of awe and wonder Dean could hardly stand, his eyes soft and hot with a love that ran so deep, Dean knew he'd never touch bottom. It should have felt sick and wrong, remembering that, but it didn't -- it felt sacred, like a memory he wanted to wrap up and keep close and never let go, like a holy ritual that could bind Sam to him and keep him safe.

Dean's throat closed. "Sam--" Without thinking, he closed the distance between them.

But Sam plunged ahead, like if he didn't get the words out, he never would. "You weren't yourself. I know that. And I don't want you thinking I want anything from you that you don't want to give. You're my brother, and that's more than enough. The rest of it... I'll live." He tried to manage a smile. "It hasn't killed me yet, right?"

Dean didn't know how to answer that. His emotions had been running so high, he was long past exhausted. It was taking all his reserves to hold on to the idea that they were going to find an answer somewhere out there, that there was a miracle to be had, even though he'd never a day in his life believed miracles existed, not without one hell of a price tag.

It would kill him to lose Katie, and he hated the thought of hurting Jules, but he'd let Sam walk away from him one too many times, and enough was enough. "Sam, look. I don't know what the hell we're gonna do. All I know is, I'm not losing you again. Not as long as I'm still breathing. You got that?"

"Dean, I'm sorry, man." Sam ducked his head, misery written all over him. "If I could change things--"

"Hey," Dean cut in, his voice rough. "No regrets, okay? We take it one day at a time. You and me, like always."

Sam swallowed hard and looked away, tearing up. His hands locked around the railing, like he was afraid that if he let himself reach out, he'd fuck something up.

Dean stepped between his legs and grabbed the back of his neck and held on. "No way, man," he said, and leaned his head against Sam's. "Not happening."

After a long moment, one of Sam's hands came up, fisted in his shirt and held him close.

Epilogue

Jules lay in the chaise lounge out back, listening to Katie hum to herself as she made bowls of "salad" out of dandelion leaves and marigold petals. She kept one eye cracked to make sure none of it actually ended up in Katie's mouth.

Despite the sprinkler Mom had dragged over to spray her feet, she felt hot and utterly miserable. The first week of September had rolled around with no sign of a break in the heat wave, and it was too hot to think about anything except that she was so, so ready to not be pregnant any more.

Mom asked her if she wanted a lemonade, and Jules dragged herself out of her sweltering semi-coma to ask Katie if she wanted one, too. Katie bounced her head yes.

"Two, please, Momma, thank you," Jules said, grateful.

"Mommy, does the baby want one?" Katie asked, abandoning her culinary adventures to climb up on the edge of Jules's chaise.

"I don't know, sweetheart, why don't you ask him?"

Jules took her daughter's grubby hand and laid it on her belly, waiting for John-John to kick. It didn't take much to get him moving around these days -- but Katie had seen something up near the house, and wasn't listening any more.

"Daddy!"

A car door slammed. Jules pushed herself up; the hydro was there in the driveway, half-brown with mud. Dean got out, looking exactly the way he had the day she'd first laid eyes on him, that same tall, trim silhouette and unmistakable swagger. Sam was behind him, one hand on the Jeep's door.

"Honey, we're home," Dean called out.

He'd told her days ago he was pretty sure they'd found what they were looking for. But it wasn't until Jules saw his face, his clear-eyed grin and the easy way he strode down the hill, that she knew everything was going to be all right.

The End

If you made it all the way to the end of this, thank you for reading it. I really appreciate it. killa@slashcity.com

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