Part Four

[mickeym]

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Chapter Five

"We really should clean out Mom and Dad's room," is how Dean greets Sam when he picks him up from school, the first day back after break. "It's been…long enough, now."

"You think so?" Sam pulls the car door shut, maybe a little more forcefully than is strictly necessary. Dean makes an effort not to say anything. "I don't think it's been all that long."

"Can't be scared to go in there for forever." Dean winces even as the words leave his mouth, because that really came out a lot more callous than he meant for it to.

"I'm not scared to go in there—there's just been no reason to go. It's not like that's the only bed we could sleep in."

"Dammit, Sam—"

"Dean—SHIT!" Sam kind of screams the word, and Dean slams on the brakes. It's a replay of that day they went to the garage, though at least this time Sam doesn't break down into a full-on panic attack. He's still deathly pale, eyes big in his face, but he's not freaking out. Much. Mostly. "Jesus. Jesus, Dean, don't—you, I can't lose you too, God, please—"

Or, well. Maybe he is. Dean double-checks that no other cars are coming before pulling out onto the street. Beside him, Sam is a twitching, shivering mess, and Dean kind of wants to put his fist through another wall. How is that the one thing he wants to do above all else – protect Sam – is the one thing he keeps screwing up beyond belief? He reaches out his hand and tries not to take it personally when Sam flinches away at first. Then Sam's grabbing onto his hand, twining their fingers together, all the while his breathing shallow and ragged.

"Sammy. Sam. We're okay. It's all right. Take some deep breaths, you're hyperventilating—" He glances over and shakes their joined hands. "Sam. Breathe, dude. Nice and slow, yeah, like that, c'mon, just breathe—"

He talks Sam through the breathing until he can pull off into a Burger King parking lot and let Sam have a few minutes to finish calming down. Afterward, Dean gets them both chocolate shakes, and drops the subject of cleaning out their parents' room. Something to talk about later. In a week or two.

~~~~~

It takes Dean another full month to convince Sam that yeah, they really do need to go through Mom and Dad's stuff.

"It seems intrusive," is the first objection Sam makes, and when Dean grits his teeth and says, "they're dead, Sam, how intrusive can it be?" Sam doesn't speak to him for three days.

"It's going to be weird. We might find, I dunno, sex toys. Or tapes. Or something," is Sam's next main objection, and okay, he has a point with that. Dean's not overly eager to imagine their parents having a sex life, period – actually, he doesn't even like to consider the words 'parents' and 'sex' in the same sentence – but once it's done it'll be done. When he tells Sam this, Sam just pretends not to hear him.

They have an all-out shouting match when Dean finally snaps and says he's going to go in there and start sorting shit, and if Sam wants to be a prissy little bitch about it and make him do all the work, then fine.

Dean's actually kind of impressed with the vocabulary Sam has, when it comes to insults and name-calling. He's a little less impressed with the volume both of them apparently can produce when Mr. Dawson from next door comes round knocking, asking if they're both okay, and does he need to call the police? They both apologize to Mr. Dawson, and then to each other, and then Sam distracts Dean completely after the door's closed by dropping to his knees and blowing Dean – and his mind, whoa – right there in the living room.

Dean waits until they're in bed to bring it up again, and this time he does it the way he should've done it to begin with: gently. Sam in his arms, Dean combing his fingers through Sam's hair, soothing him.

"If we make it the project for this weekend, we can get everything sorted out and then we'll be done with it, Sam. It won't be hanging over our heads – and you have to agree, it's gotta be done. It's not going to be fun; I figure it's gonna hurt like a bitch. But we need to do it."

"I know," Sam says, voice so low Dean can hardly hear it. "But it's—that's the last link, Dean. We go through and clean out their stuff, and they're…gone. For real. Forever."

He hears the hitch in Sam's breathing, and doesn't need to look to know his brother's crying. Dean pulls him closer and holds him while he cries, his own eyes burning with unshed tears.

~~~~~

"Okay, so we have, what, three piles? Salvation Army, keep, and trash?" Sam's frowning at the pile of clothes on the bed.

"Yeah. I don't think we're probably going to keep much in the way of their clothes—are we?" Dean doesn't have the faintest idea why they would keep any of Mom's clothes. Dad's they might be able to wear, but women's things? "We can just toss the underwear and stuff, right? Goodwill, or wherever, they don't take those, do they?"

Sam shakes his head. "I have no idea. Probably not—would you want to buy someone's used underwear?"

"I don't want to borrow someone's used underwear, so, no."

"You've borrowed mine before."

"Once! Because mine were all dirty, because somebody didn't do laundry like he promised."

"That was right after I got home from the hospital, and you told me not to worry about it." Sam shakes open a trash bag. "I'll hold, you want to just toss?"

No, he really doesn't. Dean might be sleeping with his brother, but even the thought of touching his mother's underwear skeeves him like nothing else ever has. "Sure. Um. Do we have any of those latex gloves mom used to wear when she was cleaning?"

"Oh, for God's sake." Sam shoves the trash bag at him, and pushes around Dean to open the first drawer. "Which one of us is the adult in this family?" He tosses a handful of pale pastel fabric into the trash bag.

"Not me," Dean says, tugging on Sam's hair.

"Ow! No kidding." Sam swats at Dean's hand, then rubs his head. "Jerk."

"Cut your hair, and I won't have such a good target to tempt me." Dean tugs again, and ends up with a bra draped over his head.

"Do that again, and it's going to be panties," Sam warns. Dean narrows his eyes, but he's not willing to risk it. That would just be too gross.

Once they're done with the underwear – which included Dad's underwear drawer, and ended up scarring both of them when they found a satiny black thong, obviously for a guy, with a tiny pair of decorative handcuffs on the front – they take a break and call for pizza. Dean rummages around in the old fridge down in the basement until he finds a six-pack of Budweiser stashed in the back behind three cases of Pepsi.

"I can't deal with any more shocks without a little alcohol," he tells Sam when he brings the beer upstairs.

They eat pizza and drink beer, and Dean gets a kick out of watching Sam get his buzz on. His brother's always been the prim-and-proper one, not smoking any weed or getting drunk at friends' parties. Of course that's probably because most of Sam's friends are just as geeky as Sam is.

In any case, two beers make his brother a lot more mellow and relaxed, and Dean wonders why he didn't think to get him drunk sooner. Although, he's done enough corrupting with the whole having-sex-with-his-brother-the-minor thing. Probably not the best plan to add much else into the mix.

They finish cleaning out Mom and Dad's dressers, and their closet, and holy shit Mom had a lot of shoes. "Who the hell needs this many pairs of shoes?" Dean mutters as he tosses three more pairs of sandals into a bag. Sam just shrugs. "I think it's a girl thing."

"Must be. Dad doesn't have nearly this many pairs. Hell, I'm not sure you, me and Dad together have as many pairs as Mom had."

Once the clothes are all gathered and bundled into the Impala, Sam brings Mom's jewelry box down to the kitchen table. Dean sits down beside him and opens another beer.

"I want to keep their wedding rings," Sam tells him.

"Yeah. I kind of figured we would." Dean frowns down into the box. "And the emerald pendant Dad gave Mom for their twentieth anniversary."

"Okay." Sam sets that aside, along with the rings. "What're we going to do with the stuff we decide not to keep? Sell it?"

Dean watches Sam pull out a gold bracelet. "I guess? I don't know. What do you think we should do with it?"

"Is there some sort of charity thing we could donate it to?" Sam rolls the bracelet between his hands, and Dean swallows against the warm feeling he gets down low, when he's given a visual reminder of how big Sam's hands are.

"Didn't Mom do some work with, I don't know, March of Dimes or something?" Dean reaches out and plucks the bracelet from Sam's hand. It's just too visually distracting to watch him playing with it. Dean needs to be able to focus on the job at hand.

"Yeah. She did. I'll call 'em Monday and tell them what we have, and what we'd like to do."

"Okay. So now we just need to sort through this, to decide what's going."

Sam takes the bracelet back, and steals Dean's beer for a quick swig. "Yep."

"Awesome." This whole day has been one huge mindfuck, and even knowing it needed to be done doesn't detract from the mindfuckery. Dean's gonna be glad when they're finished with it.

"Are we going to sleep in there?"

Dean's just taken a swallow of his beer, and he chokes and spits it out on the table at Sam's question. "What?"

"Mom and Dad's room. Are we gonna sleep in there?" Sam makes an Ew face, and tosses his napkin toward Dean. "Gross."

Gross. Like it's Dean's fault? "Uh—I don't—do you want to?" Mostly he wants to ask Sam where the hell did that come from?

"Not really." Sam shrugs and picks up the bracelet to fiddle with again. "Just wondered."

"Maybe eventually," Dean says cautiously. "But not right now. Stuff's too—it's too soon." Privately he's not sure it won't ever stop being too soon, but that's a worry for a different night.

"Okay. Yeah." Sam rolls the bracelet around the table, then gives Dean a small smile. "Let's get this finished up."

~~~~~

Before his parents died, Dean had entertained thoughts of a career in law enforcement, or possibly as a firefighter. For one fanciful moment he'd even considered the Air Force, until he decided he wasn't that keen on being deployed thousands of miles away from his family. He wanted something that would keep him here, where his family was.

Now the only family he has is his younger brother, and Dean's been trying to decide what careers he might pursue that won't put him in the line of fire, or in potentially life-threatening situations on at least a semi-regular basis. Sure, there could be another car accident, or he could get hit by lightning, or a million other things could happen, but there's a difference between accidents and purposefully putting yourself in harm's way.

After thinking about it a lot and talking with one of the career counselors at the community college, he decides on nursing. He can do it as a two-year or a four-year degree, he'll probably be able to find a job pretty much anywhere, he'll still be providing a valuable service, and he won't be nearly as likely to leave Sam completely alone as a cop or firefighting gig might.

He and Sam fall into a routine of school, homework, assorted doctor appointments, and learning their way around housework and household chores. Yeah, their folks had done a pretty good job of teaching them the basics – but it didn't take them long to figure out that being assigned chores on a weekly basis wasn't anything like the reality of keeping up a house and yard.

They get tired really fast of macaroni and cheese from a box, bologna sandwiches, and frozen chicken patties. Dean tells Sam he's happy eating pizza or take-out, but Sam gives him a scowl and buys a cookbook off Amazon.com before Dean can even blink.

"Cooking can't be that difficult," Sam tells him, when the book arrives. "It's just combining different things, and using heat – it's like chemistry."

"Whatever," he mutters, going back to his homework. "Just, when you blow up the kitchen, I get to say 'told you so'."

"I'm not going to blow up the kitchen."

He doesn't, either. He does manage to make a pretty huge mess, but the Shepherd's Pie is tasty enough Dean volunteers to clean up afterward, and makes a note to buy Sam a ruffled, frilly apron at the first chance he gets. Just because.

So Sam does most of the cooking, but Dean reads through the cookbook, too, and then starts poking around online for recipes. He decides if nothing else, he's going to learn how to make pie because Sam won't – he says Dean doesn't need to eat pie all the time, usually with a condescending little pat to Dean's belly, which is still flat and toned, thank you very much. Anyway, the point is that Dean does some experimenting on the days he doesn't have class, while Sam's at school, and it's worth all the times he had to clean up spills or burned stuff when Sam comes home one day to find Dean pulling a perfect peach pie out of the oven.

"It tastes as good as Mom's," Sam tells him quietly, after taking a couple of bites. "It's really good."

There is no higher praise Dean could receive, and he spends the rest of the afternoon and evening grinning like an idiot, feeling the warmth of that mingling with the now-familiar missing-Mom-and-Dad, soothing it a little.
 
Epilogue


Eric's barely stopped before Sam's fumbling with the door to open it. The Impala's in the driveway, which means Dean's home, and that makes his already good mood soar a little higher.

He calls, "Thanks for the ride," over his shoulder, and wonders in passing who the little green Hyundai parked on the street belongs to.

Dean's had the night shift for the last couple of weeks, and while they've still had cuddle time, there hasn't been as much of it. Sam misses his brother. He drops his backpack on the floor beside the hall tree, and tosses his jacket in the general direction, then calls out, "Honey, I'm home," even as he's heading for the kitchen.

He stops dead in his tracks in the doorway, anything else he was about to say dying before it gets past his lips.

"Hello, Sam. It's good to see you again." Evelyn smiles politely at him.

"Evelyn. Hi." His first reaction is to back up and run away; his second is to demand what the hell she's doing here. He settles on, "Didn't expect to see you here."

"No, I don't imagine you did." She toys with the delicate gold necklace she's wearing, and Sam resolutely keeps his eyes on her face, rather than letting them drift to her cleavage, as he knows she's expecting him to do. "I hadn't heard from Dean in awhile, and wondered how he was doing, so I drove down to see him."

Not for the first time Sam wonders why Evelyn even still tries. She and Dean had a brief -- very brief -- thing back when Dean was still at UofK. But he's been gone from there for nearly two years, and yet here's Evelyn, turning up like a bad penny every time they're least expecting it.

"So, um. Where's Dean?"

"Oh, I expect he's showering and getting dressed. He was in a state of, uh, disrobe when I got here." She flashes a thousand-watt smile at him, and Sam squashes down the urge to smash his fist into those teeth just because. His parents raised him better than that.

"Right. Okay, I'll just, be right back."

So much for good moods. Sam backs out of the kitchen and heads for the stairs, stopping when Evelyn calls out, "You can't keep him forever, you know."

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me. You can't keep him forever."

"I'm not—he's my brother, Evelyn."

"I know. And you should remember that."

"Uh. Sure." So, now he's confused and upset, and dammit. He's 18, he's almost done with school, he's received an awesome college offer to show to Dean, and their future is just waiting for them to discover it. So of course he should've expected this.

Dean's in their room pulling on his jeans, water droplets still clinging to his shoulders. "Didn't do a very good job of drying off," Sam says, leaning in to suck a couple up. "Might mess with your oh-so-sensitive skin."

"Funny." Dean pulls him close for a quick, hard kiss, then releases Sam to go look for a shirt. "I take it you've seen our guest?"

"Oh, yeah." Sam sits down on the edge of the bed. "She told me I can't keep you forever."

"Huh?" Dean freezes in place, then shakes himself. "Seriously?"

"Yeah." Sam reaches out and hooks a finger into one of Dean's belt loops; tugs him close enough to fasten the still-undone button. "So, whatcha think? You want to trade me in for her?"

Dean laughs. "Sure, Sammy. How about, oh, when Hell freezes over?"

"Sounds good to me." He tips his head back to look at Dean. "Do you think she knows? For real."

Dean sighs and sits down beside Sam. "I've asked myself that before, and I don't…I don't know how she could. She only shows up every once in a while, and Hell, Eric is over here practically every other day—and I know he doesn't know." He sounds certain, but Sam hears the question there just the same, and shakes his head.

"No, he doesn't. Like I told you before, I won't be telling anyone. It's between you and me."

"So unless she's psychic, there's no way she could know."

"Pretty much." Sam takes Dean's hand. "So make her go away, so we can talk. I have some good news to tell you. For us."

"Yeah?" Dean brightens. "What kind of good news?"

"The kind that's good, that I'm not going to tell you until she's gone. It might require some spontaneous celebrating."

"Ah. That kind of news, huh?"

"Yep. So go, get rid of her." Sam makes shooing motions, and ignores Dean's eye roll.

"Not coming with me?"

"Do you really want me to?" Sam raised an eyebrow, his last meeting with Evelyn still clear in his mind.

It's obviously still clear in Dean's mind as well. "Guess not. It would suck to have the cops called. That would definitely cut down on the whole spontaneous celebrating thing."

"Yes it would. So go."

Dean gives him one more kiss, this one slow and sweet, tongue stroking and teasing until all Sam wants to do is pull him down to the bed and undress him, then fuck him until they're both too worn out to remember their names. In the end he lets go of Dean, but it's a near thing.

~~~~~

He doesn't listen in, exactly; he'd have to be downstairs to actually hear anything like words. But even from the office – formerly his bedroom – Sam can hear Evelyn's voice rising. Whatever Dean's telling her, she doesn't like it and she's letting him know it—loudly.

It culminates in the sound of the front door slamming, followed by tires squealing just a bit, and Sam winces. It's quiet for a few minutes, and then Sam hears Dean's footsteps as he comes up the stairs.

"She's gone," is all he says, throwing himself into his desk chair. "Hopefully for good."

"Probably. She can't drop in to visit if she doesn't know where we're living, can she?" Sam raises an eyebrow and gives Dean a smile. Dean returns it, but rolls his eyes at Sam.

"We're not going into hiding over her, dude."

Now he rolls his eyes. For someone who's pretty damn smart, his brother can be so obtuse at times that it drives Sam nuts. "No, idiot. We're going to move because I got awarded a full scholarship—" He pauses, feeling the same pride well up that he'd felt earlier when opening the letter. "Based entirely on academic merit."

"You did?" Dean busts out a grin. "Way to go, Sammy, you brainiac!" Dean noogies him, then pulls him in for a hug. "Where to?"

"Our first choice. Also, ow." Noogies hurt, and now his whole scalp is burning.

"Wuss." Dean drops a quick kiss onto Sam's head. "There, all better. So--Stanford? Seriously?"

"Yup. California, here we come." Sam smiles. "As long as you're sure you want to go west? I can go to school anywhere, Dean. It doesn't have to be there."

"Better to go where it's being paid for by someone else." Dean scoots his chair the four feet over to Sam's, and pulls him in for a kiss. "Right?"

"Sounds like sound financial sense to me," Sam breathes, biting down on Dean's lower lip. He tastes blood, and sucks hard.

"Ow—no biting that hard, Jesus. Don't we feed you enough?" But Dean's grinning when he pulls away, and he brings a hand up to rub his thumb across lip. "Damn, you drew blood."

"Mmm." Sam kisses him again, lapping at the tiny bit of blood still oozing up.

They jostle and push each other out of the office and across the hall to their bedroom, trading kisses in between, with Sam getting as many nips and bites in as possible.

"Man, whatever happened to that sweet, innocent kid who seduced me?" Dean raises his arms up for Sam to pull his shirt up and over his head. Sam laughs as he tosses it aside.

"He grew up."

"Boy, did he ever." Dean's pretty much leering at him, and Sam pulls his own shirt up and off, enjoying Dean's eyes on him.

He does a little shimmy as he's undoing his belt and the button of his jeans, and Dean's leering turns into hot eyes scorching up and down the length of Sam's body. "Like what you see?"

"Oh, yeah." Dean's shoving his own jeans down, and Sam kicks at his, then drops to his knees. Dean's half-hard, cock thickening, plumping up, and Sam helps it along with licks and kisses before nuzzling into Dean, breathing in his scent, clean and soapy, just a tang of sweat and natural body odor. He sucks a mark into Dean's upper thigh, and smiles when Dean swears. "I'm not the first course on a dinner buffet, Sam."

"Wanna bet?" Sam bites again, teeth pinching the tender, thin skin of Dean's inner thigh. His brother yelps and smacks at his head.

"If you wanna blow me, then blow me. But quit biting."

Yeah, that's never gonna happen. But Sam laps at the bites, then shifts to lick at Dean's balls, teasing his tongue over the creased skin until Dean winds his fingers into Sam's hair and tugs gently.

"Bed," he says hoarsely, and Sam moves just enough for Dean to back up until he can sit on the bed. He spreads his legs wide and Sam leans back in, sucking on first one ball, then the other, drawing them gently into his mouth and tonguing them to feel them shifting inside Dean's sac. He follows the seam with his tongue, up to the base of Dean's dick, then licks upward, following the now-throbbing vein.

He swipes his tongue over the head, gathering the droplets of pre-come there, then tips his head back. "Wanna fuck me?"

"Jesus." Dean's dick throbs against Sam's cheek. "Yes. Yeah. C'mon up here."

Sam kisses his way up his brother's body and settles over him, rolling his hips downward so their dicks rub against each other. Over and over, his dick leaking trails of moisture over Dean's balls and dick; Dean's pressing back against his. Dean has lube ready, fingers cool and slick when they slide up between Sam's asscheeks. He rubs and teases Sam's hole, pressing, but not pushing in, until Sam's shivering and rocking backward, trying to get those fingers inside him. The first breach makes him groan out loud, Dean's fingers opening him, stretching him.

"Now," Sam whispers, trying to twist down and get the fingers deeper, harder, faster. "Come on, man, do it." He drags himself forward, backward, hungry for as much skin-on-skin as he can get.

"Impatient little bitch." But Dean's slicking up his cock, holding himself steady for Sam to lower down onto.

It feels fucking awesome to slide down, his body opening, taking Dean inside. The burn of stretching – because two fingers aren't the same as a dick – ripples through him, giving him goosebumps. Sam rocks into it, lazy at first, his own arousal at a slow burn right now. Dean stares up at him, eyes dark, hot, promising. The kind of promises Sam knows he'll keep. He rocks faster, and Dean grunts, pushing up to meet him, before settling his hands on Sam's hips to balance him.

"Jack yourself?" Dean grunts the words, but Sam shakes his head.

"Gonna fuck you after you've come."

He feels the hard throb deep inside him; feels Dean shudder beneath him. Oh, yeah. Dean likes that idea.

The tempo changes, Dean fucking up into Sam, harder, faster, and it's an effort not to come, with so much hard heat pounding into him, nailing his prostate over and over. Sam's grabbing for his dick to hold it, hold back coming, and then Dean's fingers are biting into his hips as he strains up, up, up into Sam. He comes with a long, low groan, and Sam feels each pulse, squeezes down around him, milking him.

Dean's barely caught his breath before Sam's pulling off and rolling him, grabbing for the lube. He slicks his dick and thrusts forward, Dean jerking beneath him, opening as Sam sheathes himself.

"God," Dean growls, and then he's clenching down around Sam, and that's enough to make the top of Sam's head feel like it's coming off. He backs up and pulls Dean up onto his knees, chest still down against the bed, and fucks into him hard and fast. No lingering, no finesse, Sam's too wound up now for that. The whole day's been one long adrenaline-filled ride, and Sam needs to let go and let it go.

His orgasm starts as an tingling and spreads out, gaining heat and momentum as it spirals through him and ripples down along his nerve endings. He thrusts hard and fast, fucking until it's too much, friction against hyper-sensitive skin. He holds there, flush up against Dean, rocking forward just a little as he empties into him.

They sink down to the bed and Sam rolls them, still joined, so he's spooning Dean, and twines their fingers together. Coming down is slow and easy, bodies relaxing together. Dean's already half-asleep, his breathing slow and deep, and Sam knows he's not far behind. He presses gentle kisses to Dean's shoulder and neck and breathes in the rich sweat-sex smell. His breaths get longer and slower, and he falls asleep curled in on Dean, their arms and legs tangled together.

~~~~~

"So we have, what, about three months to sell the house?" Dean sets the table while Sam dishes up the chili. He hands the bowls off, and reaches up into the cupboard for the tortilla chips.

"Yeah, about. But we don't have to sell it—we could try renting it out."

Dean shakes his head. "I think that would be way more headache than it'd be worth."

"Maybe. Probably." Sam concedes with a nod. "Yeah, because then we'd have to have a property management agent and all that crap. You don't happen to know anyone at work who might want to buy a house, do you?"

Dean sprinkles cheese on his chili, than passes it to Sam. "Not offhand, but I could post a notice on the hospital bulletin board."

"That's a good idea." Sam looks around the kitchen. "We're gonna have to sort through everything again."

"At least this time, there's no one else's underwear involved." Dean takes a long swallow of his beer and sticks his tongue out when Sam laughs.

"We need to think seriously about downsizing, though." Sam waves his hand to indicate the house in general. "We have got a whole bunch of crap – and a lot of it is stuff we won't even need if we get an apartment."

"Like?"

"Well, the lawnmower, to start with."

"Okay, point." Dean nods. "So, not only sorting and cleaning out the house, but the shed and garage, too."

"Yeah. And we'll have to decide what to do about the car—"

"We'll be driving her to California," Dean says, and there's something in his voice that warns Sam to just back down from that one.

"Right. Well, we could tow it, if we get a U-Haul."

"We're gonna have go out there and find a place before September." Dean looks thoughtful. "We could roadtrip for your graduation."

"Or we could fly, and be there and back in a weekend. You still have to work, you know."

"Fly? Nah. I can take time off. It'd be fun. Hotels, the open road, just you and me—"

"Dean."

"I don't like to fly. You know that."

"You've been on an airplane once."

"And I hated every minute of it."

"Well, man up, because if we're going to sort through everything in the house and garage, have a yard sale, pack and drive to California – all while you're still working – then we don't have time to take a roadtrip right now. We fly out, spend a weekend, fly back. Done."

Dean stares at him, then smiles slowly. "Wow. When did you get to be so bossy?"

Sam snorts. "You say bossy, I say organized."

"I'm thinking 'controlling', maybe."

"Organized. So, when do you want to fly out?"

"Half past never—but in lieu of that, we could go the weekend after graduation. I'm already off – they posted the schedule yesterday – so we wouldn't have to worry about that."

Sam nods. "I'll make our reservations for that weekend, then. Are you off that Friday or Monday? We could make it a long weekend. Check out the campus and the area."

"Both, I think, but I'll double check. If I'm not, I can probably find someone to take my shift. I don't know too many nurses that turn down OT."

"So we're really going to do this." Sam feels an almost overwhelming sense of excitement building in him. New place to live, new school, new life. Just him and Dean, living somewhere they don't have to hide. Where they don't have to keep a second bedroom made up for show.

"It kind of sounds like we are."

"And you're sure." It's been a concern of Sam's almost since the first time he kissed Dean, that he suggests something and his brother does it out of some sense of obligation. He knows Dean worried – probably still does, actually – that he was pressuring Sam, but Sam knows if anyone's doing any pressuring, even unintentionally, it's him pressuring Dean.

"I'm absolutely positive." Dean tips his beer bottle in Sam's direction. "I knew we weren't going to stay here forever, Sammy. We've just been in a holding pattern so you could finish up high school."

And that's only been about a year and a half. Maybe a little bit longer. It's hard to believe so much has happened in such a short time. There are days Sam feels like he's decades older than he is. There were a lot of days for a while when he felt centuries old, and not in a good, wise-all-knowing sort of way, just in a shit-how-much-more-can-go-wrong sort of way.

"You're gonna be giving up everything," Sam says. Dean loves his job, and he's good at it. He might laugh at the notion, but he's definitely a care-taker, someone who was born to help people.

"Sam. I'm a nurse. I have experience as an ER nurse. I'll probably be able to find a job before you, no matter how many degrees you might eventually hold. I can be a nurse anywhere—and where I want to be is wherever you are, okay? So would you please get your head out of your ass, accept that I'm fine with this – other than the flying part – and deal, so we can move ahead?"

"Wow. And with a speech like that, who says romance is dead?" Sam nods. "Okay. So, paraphrasing, you and me, wherever, forever."

"You're gonna want to get matching rings, aren't you?" Dean grumbles as he gets up to dish up more chili. "I can see it now. You're gonna have me jewelry shopping the minute we get out there."

Sam just smiles at him.

~fin~




On to Author's Notes

Comments

[nilequeenpatty.livejournal.com]

I really enjoyed this, well done:)