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[ Doesn't take an emotional genius to see that Sam's having trouble wrapping his head around this, and for a second Dean thinks his brother might turn around and walk out again. Hell, he'd probably walk away if it was him. But that's the difference between them. He walks away, Sam deals with it head on, doesn't matter how hard it is.

So he waits, brows furrowed but the anger he can feel gives way to a very real, intense kind of sorrow. Sam's spent the last five years thinking that voicemail was from him? ]

It sounds like me. But I swear to you, man, that's not the voicemail I left.

[ He doesn't know what Sam's talking about when it comes to the panic room, but it's not like the guy was in the best way after he and Bobby locked him up in there. Detox. That's what it had been for. Detox and because he had no idea what else to do, or how else to help his brother. ]

The panic room? What? What do you think I said in the panic room?

[He rubs a hand over his face, looking anywhere but Dean.]

You said we weren't... the same species. That I always knew that I didn't belong with you and Dad. [He looks up, shamefaced.] That it was all just... pretend. Make-believe. Us. Me, you, Dad. I wasn't...

[He laughs, and runs both hands over his face, through his hair, and sinks into the kitchen chair in defeat. He still can't look at Dean, because he's always been nervous about what he'll see there; if there's anyone he's been scared to look into the eyes of and see judgement... see disdain or fear or doubt in what Sam is...

He breathes out, shaky, his hands wringing together under the table.]

All just me, I guess.

[ Fresh hurt and guilt, but not because he said what Sam thinks he said. Because Sam's been living with this for years and at any freaking point they could have had this conversation and cleared all of this up.

Rolling his bottom lip into his mouth, he bites down on it hard and frowns in a way that leaves little to the imagination over how much that idea affects him. ]

You were strung out. And I didn't know how else to help you outside of the panic room. Where I stayed.

I didn't know you uh--

No, that wasn't me, Sam.

[Sam closes his eyes softly, and smiles — a disgusted, bitter smile.

Honestly, he just — hates himself. So much.

Fucking freak.]

... Figures.

[Too late. It's too late, anyway. Can't undo the mad ramblings of a spun-out, demonic brother. Now he's just got another layer of crazy, and he's not sure how to fix it. The world's biggest chump apparently does a good job at chumping himself. The long con, from childhood, all the way to this kitchen chair.]

Just forget it. All of it. It doesn't matter.

I was hallucinating a lot back then. Should've known better.

I don't think that's how hallucinations work, man.

[ He hates the way his voice comes out, mostly because he feels useless in this situation, without a way to make this better or fix it. Eyes dropping to the counter top, he purses his lips and only looks up again after a few long moments of contemplation. ]

It matters. It matters that you know I don't think that. About you.

... I know. It did matter, what you thought. It mattered a lot to me.

[He reaches out, slides the phone over to sit in front of him. He clasps it in one hand tightly.]

I nudged at you all the time, tried to see if you'd admit there was something just — wrong with me, like I thought there was. Like I knew there was, since... god, I can't even remember when I started feeling it. And every time I poked and prodded and pissed you off, you'd say something that made me second-guess the crap I felt about myself, despite everything I seemed to be.

[He breathes out, rapping his fingers on the table top.]

I guess at some point, I just gave in to what I thought, instead.

[ There's always going to be this guilt hanging heavy around his neck. That he never did a good enough job with Sam. He was responsible for his younger brother from a young age, only a kid himself, but it makes no damn difference. His one job in life, the most important one, was to look out for Sam. And he'd failed in so many different ways he can't even count on both hands just how wrong he got it.

Not for the first time the urge to call up the younger version of himself and tell him not to make the same mistakes he did flares up, and it takes him a moment to settle back into this moment.

It's a hard moment. But as hard as it is, Sam needs to know how it really is. ]

I guess sometimes we're not what we think we are.

[ Which he can admit is a lot easier said than done. What he believes of himself? Nobody's going to tell him any different. So there's a moment where he knows damn well he's being a hypocrite. But that's how it always is, and will always will be. One rule for him to hold himself up against, another for everybody else. ]

What're you gonna do with the voicemail?

[He shakes his head with a sigh, knowing just where Dean's head is at.]

... It's not your fault, Dean. You did what you could with what you had. It's not like anyone expects their siblings to end up that far off the reservation. Or even before that — it's not like I told you how I felt every day. Our lives growing up, and afterward — it wasn't exactly Dr. Phil, remember?

[They were all fucked up. He knows. He's always known that, even when things were bad. Dean had just gotten out of Hell, and Sam couldn't possibly comprehend that kind of trauma, even after burying his brother twice. Even after — everything. It's not exactly the goddamn pain olympics, but... he gets it.

He would've done anything, to take that from Dean. To trade places. He'd almost done just that. Would have, if the demons didn't know about some higher plan he wasn't allowed to screw with.]

Don't feel like any of this is on you.

[It was on me, is the unspoken, equally hypocritical thought that goes unspoken. But as he looks at the phone gripped in his hand, he looks... a little unsure.]

... I held onto this for so long, I...

[He trails off.

Every day here is a lot. Good and bad, but a lot. So much to learn, so many mistakes to comprehend. So many tricks pulled, lives fucked up. It's easier and easier to see the carefully laid trail that the brothers had been put on, like a gameboard with only one destination.

After sitting for a moment, he flips the phone back open. Punches some buttons with his thumb until the automated system's voice plays; feels like some of the nights he'd spent sitting in his newest motel room, revisiting. Reliving that feeling he'd felt when he put the phone away and walked into that church.

He goes still for a moment, before selecting delete.

The little voice says with some finality, Saved message, deleted. End of saved messages.]

Edited (its 4 am lemme edit 2045 times) 2020-12-08 12:05 (UTC)

[ The expression that ghosts across his features is doubt. He doubts that it's not on him, just like he doubts his ability to actually protect Sam when he most needs it. Not like his track record has ever been awesome, and that started a long ass time ago. Sometimes he still remembers the way dad looked at him, spoke to him, after Sam almost got his freaking life force sucked out by that shtriga. Like he'll ever forget how small, how useless he felt after dad was done with him.

He'd resolved to do better, but he never had. This is just another example of that. And he can resolve to do better all he wants, but he knows deep down that this won't be the last time he fails Sam.

Eyes flicking up to the phone as the automated voice confirms the message has been deleted, something loosens in his gut all the same. Relief, maybe. Relief that Sam had believed him, even when they both know he still said those things in that motel room. That he'll take responsibility for, but not some messed up message that wasn't even him.

If only it was that easy to delete that moment too, in the motel. ]

Thanks. For believing that wasn't me, even though I've said some shitty things to you in the past.

[He closes his eyes softly, shakes his head as he grips the phone, holds it against his chest. Maybe there's a weight lifting off him, too. He's not quite sure yet, not when so much confusion and doubt and guilt is eating away at him, too. He breathes out, opens his eyes.]

... Sometimes benefit of the doubt's important.

After all, you gave me benefit of the doubt more times than I can count, before I screwed up. That I wasn't... someone who deserved to be hunted, or put down. From people like Gordon, or Kubrick.

... I think... Jack should be given the same.

[He holds up a hand, just in case Dean's about to so much as growl.]

You wanted to talk about Jack? I'll tell you this much:

I was made by the devil, too. Just in a different way than him.

I won't say he should be around us. Around me. I know it's not safe, not when we're unsure of everything about Lucifer... but just... cut him some slack, okay? Don't get a trigger finger. I get it, okay, I do. I hate Lucifer as much as anyone. Just... Imagine it's me, if you have to.

[Looking down, he swallows hard, and says-]

... He's just a kid. He didn't ask for it. And he just —

wants to prove he's more than Lucifer.

[ He did want to talk about Jack, and then all this happened and honestly? For a while there he forgot the kid even existed. The memory comes back along with a lurch in his stomach. Right. Lucifer's kid. Fixing Sam with a look that's one part irritated to one part frustrated, his mouth flattens into a thin line briefly before he speaks. ]

I'm not gonna gank him, if that's what you mean.

[ Though without other Sam's insistence Jack's family, he might have. But he doesn't want to just pretend like everything's okay with that whole situation. It's not. Benefit of the doubt in this situation is the fact that he hasn't killed the nephilim yet. ]

I'm just trying to protect you. We don't know what would happen if Lucifer found out. Or what he'd try to do.

And no, maybe he didn't ask for it, but we have no idea what he's gonna turn into. You're not a monster, man, and yeah, okay, maybe he isn't either. But I know you. I don't know him at all. So if it's all the same? I'm gonna not drop my guard just because he acts like a friggen puppy. Just because he doesn't bite now doesn't mean he's not gonna learn how and we gotta be ready for that.

[Sam shrugs, having expected the response. And honestly, he had faith that Dean would at the very least not go trying to kill the kid — especially not if the other Sam had asked him. Even if they're not the exact same people as those they share names and faces with, it's hard to deny there's a sense of obligation to them.

Well, for Sam, anyway. Sue him, he's a bleeding heart.]

... You know how this place works. You know we might not have any choice, in Lucifer finding out. It might not even be a matter of if, but when. If the town interrupts, and there's even just a crack in that door that I can't...

[He runs a hand down his face, looking - unsurprisingly - exhausted.]

I don't bite now either, you know.

[The implication's there:

But I could bite. I could be a bigger threat than the kid.

Dean's protecting Sam, but who is protecting them from Sam?

It's a real concern, in Sam's eyes.]

Just... try to let the kid down gently — a little sympathy for the devil's kids.

... Our dad was a patron saint of fatherhood in comparison.

[ Honestly, he hates every part of this. That Sam's being his usual bleeding heart self. And he already knows that because Sam's asked him this much - both Sams have asked him this much - he's not got a choice but to fall in line. It smarts in a way that he wants to explain, but he doesn't have the words for how he feels. Instead of saying anything at all he grunts his frustration and drags a hand over his face. ]

Fine.

[ The comment about dad just twists him up a little tighter, insides pretzel-like and he doesn't feel better anymore. Thinking about dad is always complicated. This far out from his death and Dean's had a lot of time to think over what happened to them growing up. That he'd been almost in his 30s before he ever actually picked Sam's side over their dad's.

Rolling his bottom lip into his mouth, it's almost like he's trying to keep the words he's got circling his brain inside of him. It doesn't work. ]

I still hear him, sometimes. Not hear him hear him. But the kinda shit he woulda said when I fucked up.

[ Those words have been loud lately. ]

[It's bittersweet o'clock, isn't it? Sam just smiles, but there's a wince to it. It's weird — years ago, Dad being mentioned would cause a terrible silence, or an awkward lull. They'd never really had a chance to get over it. To have his death turn into wistful recollections of life. Dad died... and then a year later, Dean died. Sam never knew how to cope with any of it.

Now, in the hushed silence of Deerington's momentary reprieve, before shit hit the walls again? It's something that feels weirdly easy to talk about. Five years apart, thinking too much, finding distance between them and their father's last day on earth... maybe it made something about it... more palatable.]

... Yeah. I do, too.

[Dean took John's admonishments with an overwhelming sense of self-burden, but Sam didn't exactly get away from them easy, either, despite how hard he'd tried to make it seem like they bounced off him in his teenaged years; those words were barbed, hurt him more than he'd been too stubborn to show. It's taken... a lot of time to remember the smaller, easier moments in-between the fighting, in-between a dad who had forgotten that they were his sons first, and not his subordinates.

Sam clings to those few and far moments a lot, these days.

Wonders if things would have been different, if John had survived long enough to do what he'd passed on to Dean.

... It was unfair of him. Unfair of him to put that on his son's shoulders.

But nothing in life is that fair, in retrospect.

... But... Sensing Dean's discomfort, Sam fights to fling all that off his shoulders, tries to ignore the icy burn in his stomach or the emotion swirling in his head at the thought of John Winchester and of how much he's let him down as he is now.]

... He was a real dick sometimes. Total stick up the ass. Terrible choice in cars.

[Sam smiles slightly.]

[ For a moment, the silence between them actually speaks volumes. Heavy and thick with all the things they both remember, and there's no actual need to say them out loud because they were both there for some of it. After Sam had gone off to college, things weren't all that different outside of he got chewed out less for failing Sam directly.

There were some conversations though where dad had definitely almost said something about the fact that Sam had left the family business. Like he wanted to lay the blame somewhere at Dean's feet. At least that's the way it felt, and all it did was drive him harder into becoming the best damn hunter he could be. Anything to stop the judgement, the holes picked in his skills.

He regrets not having Sam's back when it came to dad sooner. ]

Leave Baby outta this. She never did you wrong.

[ Dean did her wrong, and the reasons are both complicated and simple all at once. It's never long though after he's thinking about Dad that he thinks of Mom too. Back at camp there were some nights he wondered what she'd think about what he'd become. What he let happen to Sam. Those were the longest nights, when dawn seemed like it was never going to come. When the world was nothing but darkness and it matched everything he thought about himself. Still thinks about himself if he's given too much time to himself. ]

Our childhood wasn't a childhood. But if there's one thing I know? Nobody kicked ass like we did under the age of 10.

I don't know, I was pretty shrimpy at 10. [A small, wistful smile pulls at his lips.] ... Totally knew how to use every weapon in the trunk by then, though.

[Their childhood fucking sucked. Some part of Sam hates that it was also the happiest time in his life, outside of Stanford; he was miserable through huge swaths of it, and yet it was better days.

... How fucked is that?

He seems to hesitate, though, like he's not sure what he's allowed to talk about. Like he's not sure what Dean's response would be; once upon a time, certain things spoken would end in Dean storming off at best, a split lip at worst, because Dad and Mom and particular mechanics of their screwed up childhoods was off limits. It took him a long time to get answers to his outpouring of questions as a kid, anyway.

One thing John and Dean had in common.

But there's a reason he always drifted to Dean, and not Dad. A lot of reasons, some as obvious as the nose on his face. So maybe Dean's capacity to — to listen... it turns Sam into that 18-year-old trying to convince Dean all over again, albeit with a little less heat and indignation—]

I thought a lot about it.

I mean, I did nothing but thinking. For years.

The way Dad put things on you... The way Dad dumped me in your lap to take care of until I was old enough to — I don't know — hold a gun. It wasn't fair to you.

So, uh... I'm sorry if I ever made things harder.

... Is what I wish I'd have said sooner.

Edited 2020-12-13 13:34 (UTC)

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