3R

It's like Sam is leaving for work and Dean is waiting for the goodbye kiss

On summer nights spent on endless highways, Sam would sit in the Impala's passenger seat wearing nothing but a tank top, visibly wilting from the heat.

Dean was close to him.

Too close.

And the heat wasn't helping.

Dean was more beautiful than what Sam could handle, and the Impala's cabin was small enough that, even though they both took every opportunity they could find to cool off under a cold shower, the air inside was still filled with the mingled scent of their skin, layered with the faint notes of sun-baked leather and heated metal.

But Sam wasn't alone on this sweet torture.

Dean as well noticed every breath Sam took.

Each one seemed to pass straight through his heart, his lungs, his stomach, sinking all the way into his bones.

Sometimes Sam would shift in his seat and struggle for a deeper breath against the suffocating heat.

And Dean would do the only thing he could.

Everything about Season 8 takes my breath away. Everything. Its angst, its beginning, its ending...

And I always felt like I owed something to that season. Owed something to the complicated emotions it managed to hold.

To the fact that Dean wanted to do the Trials himself because he wanted Sam to have a long life, and Sam refused.

"I have to do this, Dean. Because unlike you, I want to live."

And then, in those final moments in the church, Dean finally breaks when he tells Sam that if he keeps going, he's going to die.

And Sam, pale and drenched in sweat, with pain written across every inch of his face, just looks at him and says:

"So?"

That scene in the church—the things Sam says, the fear in Dean's eyes, everything that passes between them in those few minutes—takes my breath away every single time.

And do you know what haunts me most of all?

Time.

The time that had passed. The years that went by while everyone assumed Sam had forgotten, that whatever happened was four or five years behind him now. Like that phone call never happened. Like Sam hadn't lived to believe he's a disappointment to his older brother. Like it wasn't his greatest sin he'd confessed to be finally clean. For a person who'd been struggling with demon blood and guilt for a long time, it's a lot to think he would come clean if only his older brother forgave him from repeated disappointments.

And there he is, pale, sweating, barely holding himself together, after days of coughing up blood, running fevers, barely eating, barely sleeping, carrying damage so severe that even an angel couldn't heal it.

And in that moment of unimaginable vulnerability, he tears the wound open in front of everyone.

A wound we thought had long since scarred over.

A wound that never healed at all.

As they tumble down, Sam's hand finds Dean's shoulder from behind. It's an unconscious gesture, as though he isn't even thinking about where is Dean landing(obviously a soft bed) but only focusing on the "landing" part which should be prevented, eliminated or minimized regarding possible injuries and all. Sam's just acting on instinct, trying to shield him from the force of the fall.

But then again. Life's hard. So should be exams.

The way he was looking at Sam.