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“Close your eyes,” Dean instructs, his elbow propped on the pillow and his head resting in his palm.
“Why?” Sam asks from beside him, tucked beneath the blankets. His cheeks are red with the fever, and the curls of hair around his ears are damp with sweat, but he's smiling sleepily. He's been in bed for three days straight now, and he'd been in a foul mood both from the flu, and the fact that he had missed three whole days worth of Mrs. Flannigan's dinosaur curriculum. Dean, though, read the signs of an upset little brother, and had read him a book. Sam's hanging on the edge of sleep now, surprisingly content.
“Just do it,” Dean says, rolling his eyes. Sam stares up at his brother suspiciously, wondering if this is going to turn into another surprise tickle fight—though, tickle fights aren't usually unwelcomed by six-year olds—but he eventually does as he's told, letting his lids fall shut. He worms his way closer to his brother, and rubs his nose against Dean's shirt. He imagines Dean making a face.
Dean is quiet for a long minute, but Sam doesn't open his eyes; just waits patiently, hands balled up in the blankets. Eventually, Dean starts humming, the sound low and soothing despite the fact that he's reproducing the tune of an AC/DC track. Sam doesn't know that, even if Dean has been adamant about starting Sam's musical education early, but it doesn't matter either way. He's focused on the sound of Dean's voice, and he shuffles a little closer, just enough to not only hear but feel the vibrations in Dean's chest as the song goes on. There are flickers of light across Sam's eyelids as the curtains move and the leaves outside stir the light, but he's only thinking about Dean's voice—warm honey and grit—as he slides into sleep.
-
“Hey, take it easy, take it easy,” comes Dean's voice, hurried and strained with exhaustion and adrenaline. His arm is braced under Sam's back, the other tugging at the ripped seam of Sam's pant leg. John crouches next to him, shining a flashlight down onto the gash, the blood, the chipped bone just barely visible under so much red. John reaches out to hold his knee, trying to steady him, and Sam's whole body shudders.
“How bad?” Dean asks, Sam's head cradled against his arm.
“We need a hospital,” John says, feigning calm. He stands, picking up the fallen knives as he does. “I'll bring the car.” He tosses the flashlight to Dean and disappears into the wall of black foliage. Dean redirects the light, letting it fall over the wound again. His mouth twists along with his stomach.
“Dean...” Sam manages through clenched teeth, trying to lift his head, trying to get a better look at his mangled skin.
“Close your eyes,” Dean says. He puts a hand against Sam's chest, encouraging him to lie still, be quiet. “Just close your eyes. You don't have to see.”
“How bad?” Sam echoes the question, squeezing his eyes shut.
“It'll be fine,” Dean says, and Sam believes him.
-
Sam flips through the dessert menu, pausing when he hits the list of available pies. He turns the menu so Dean can see it from the other side of the booth.
“What're you getting?” Sam asks, tired. He didn't sleep well last night, already dreading tomorrow. He's turning fourteen, and their mom would be turning forty-two. Dean glances at the laminated page and puckers his lips. He drops a shoulder in a half-shrug.
“Nothing,” he says, and Sam raises an eyebrow.
“You're not getting anything?” he asks.
“Not hungry,” Dean shrugs again, and Sam realizes that he's distracted, staring over Sam's shoulder rather than at him. Sam glances back, then turns and leans into Dean's line of vision.
“What?” Sam asks, and Dean snaps out of it.
“What?” he says, and yet his eyes move from Sam's and up over his head. Sam's about to glance when Dean grabs his wrist, tugs him back.
“Hey, close your eyes.” Dean's smiling, one sharp canine peeking out from between his lips. Sam's brow furrows, head cocked to the side. “No peeking,” Dean reminds him as he closes his eyes, feeling Dean's palm glide over his hand as he lets go.
Sam can smell the cake and melting candles before the waitress even sets it down in front of him.
-
“Where've you been?” Sam asks when the door opens, not lifting his eyes from the book spread open on the motel's small, round table. It's one a.m., and Sam should be drinking beer at a dorm party, not scouring piles of books for ways to kill an unfamiliar flavor of undead. His Stanford application is tucked away in a bag, only half-finished.
Sam glances up when the door closes again, and Dean is leaning his shoulder against the frame, hair untidy and jacket tied around his hips. Sam can tell he's drunk, and it's not even the flask dangling from his fingers that gives it away, but the way the shell of his ear is flushed red, and the starry look in his down-turned eyes.
“Dude,” Sam huffs, chair scraping against the wood floor as he stands. Dean turns to him, offering a loose-lipped smile as he pushes off from the door.
“Heya, Sammy,” he says, and Sam's surprised to see him looking so pleased with himself. He's used to Dean being a brooding drunk rather than a cheerful one.
“You didn't tell me were going to a bar,” Sam says, frowning as they draw closer to each other. Dean is walking with this kind of fumbling grace, movements slow and heavy but smooth. He wipes at his mouth, setting the flask down on the table as he approaches it, then fixes Sam with another smile.
“Sorry,” he says, but he sounds more amused than apologetic. He surprises Sam by reaching out and holding his shoulders, tilting his head back farther than he needs to to look up at Sam. Sam figures he's still not used to having to do that, and the alcohol isn't helping. “How're you doing, little brother?”
Sam's tempted to shrug off Dean's hands, but doesn't. “Great,” he grumbles.
“Good.” Dean seems convinced, squeezing Sam's shoulders affectionately. “Hey, close your eyes.”
“Dean,” Sam rolls his eyes, and now he does pull back. Dean's hands fall from his shoulders but catch in the front of Sam's shirt, curling easily into the fabric. He tugs Sam gently back.
“Come on,” Dean says, laughing a little. “Close your eyes.” Sam's trying to hold onto the annoyance he's supposed to feel toward his brother, but it's hard when Dean is smiling like that. He hesitates, a laugh gusting out of him, and then shakes his head in surrender, marveling at the ridiculousness that is drunk Dean.
“Alright, fine,” Sam says as he closes his eyes, blocking out the yellow light. Dean's fingers are still wrapped in his shirt, grip loose but determined, and Sam wonders what this is, if Dean is planning to tackle him or draw on his face or just leave him standing there with his eyes closed.
Dean's hands don't move, but breath ghosts over Sam's face and he almost draws back, surprised by the sudden warmth. He holds his ground though, pulse jumping in his throat, and Dean's mouth grazes his cheek, just slides against the corner of his mouth. Sam doesn't open his eyes, doesn't move until Dean's hands fall away and he takes a step back.
When Sam's eyes flutter open, breath quickened and brows knitted, Dean is looking at him, still smiling.
“I missed,” Dean admits. He looks away and laughs, fingers finding the knot tied with the sleeves of his jacket and undoing it. He tosses the jacket on the chair and walks by Sam, leaning so their shoulders touch, and smiles his way into the bathroom.
Sam's back hits the wall as the door closes.
-
“Don't look at me like that,” Dean says, pushing past Sam as he heads for the impala. There's a cut running across half of his forehead, blood leaking down the side of his face and over his eye.
“You shouldn't have done that,” Sam says, trying to catch Dean's elbow. Dean avoids the touch and rounds the car, pulling out the keys with one bloody-knuckled hand. “I could have handled it. You had the matches in your hand,” Sam continues, moving to the passenger side but staring Dean down.
“Well, it's ganked now, so forget it, alright? Beer and bandages on me,” Dean says as he yanks the car down open and clambers in. Sam grits his teeth and follows Dean's lead. Dean starts the engine and Sam glances over at him, biting the inside of his lip as another droplet of blood curves around the socket of his brother's eye. Dean wipes at it with the back of his hand with a murmured “fuck.”
“Dean,” Sam says, and it's softer than he expected. He's supposed to be pissed. “You look awful.”
“Then, close your eyes,” Dean says, and Sam leans his head against the window and closes his eyes.
-
Dean is holding him in his arms, his chin on Sam's shoulder, his arms and hands a shield. Sam is crying, because this all went wrong. Everything goes wrong. Dean somehow pulls him closer.
“It's okay,” he says, quiet, steady when Sam is shaking. “Easy, Sam. Easy.”
Sam swallows, focuses on the musty smell of leather and dust, the chill and Dean's warmth fighting with each other, the ache in his head and his arms replaced by something gentler, something his brother has put there without even meaning to.
“Just close your eyes,” he half-whispers, and Sam does, feeling instead of seeing. The church is gone, the burning light in his arms with it.
-
“Close your eyes.”
Sam stares at his brother, at the last thing he'll ever see, at the last thing he wants to see. Dean's eyes are blank, heavy. He swallows, and his mouth twitches, but he doesn't move. Just looks at Sam because maybe he's the last thing that Dean wants to see, too.
“Sammy, close your eyes.” Dean says, and Sam can't believe how still he is, how still they both are when Death is hovering in the corner but the scythe is in Dean's hands. Sam keeps staring, keeps looking at Dean until he's sure that the image won't fade before the steel hits his skin. He closes his eyes, sees his brother on his eyelids, and waits.
Dean misses.