#sam:jack

Then I will fight for him. I’ll do what I always have, show him he has a choice. In the end, Jack isn’t a monster. Whatever is going on, he’s strong enough to fight it. 

And if he isn’t, then we’ll lock him up until we find a cure. 

No one is hurting him. No one. 

SIX The Musical Sentence Starters | Not Accepting

Jack didn’t eat much. Not by basic human standards, and by Dean Winchester measurement, he starved. Typically, it was a bowl of cereal in the morning, maybe chicken fingers and fries at night when they all sat for dinner. Though, Sam was never sure if Jack was hungry again or he just wanted be a part of the communal act of family dinner. Often, when he watched Jack mechanically place a fry into ketchup (or honey mustard after Sam told him it was his favorite, and his heart swelled and he swallowed the lump in his throat because little brothers never had someone mimic them. This was foreign and flattering and he loved this kid so much), he sort of gathered that it was definitely more about joining in than satiation. Jack ate like it was autopilot; like he was copying the action based of what he saw Sam and Dean do, or people on TV, and not on any sort of instinctual need to feed. So, as it was, Jack didn’t eat much. Because he was half angel.

Jack also didn’t sleep much. He’d go to his room when they all separated to their own corners for the night, sensing that soft lull of an evening winding down. He’d been living with them for years now, he was picking up on the social ques of daily happenings. Sam knew he didn’t fall asleep then, though, could hear him making noise in the other room or occasionally reading a book aloud. Jack was noisy, because Jack was a child, Sam often found he had to keep reminding himself of that. (He was also quiet and sullen and introspective and unanswered and unheard. And Sam was sorry he hadn’t listened more for every noise. Responded to every muffled call.) The kid only slept a few hours, maybe two or three, and that seemed to be more than enough - and Sam envied him - before he was wide awake and asking questions and absorbing information and learning, learning, always learning. Because he was half angel.

In the recesses of his mind, Sam longed for the clichés of fatherhood. For a son to be preoccupied with a book, or game, or something else so mundane but all-consuming, that when Sam called him for dinner he would chirp back with “five more minutes?” And Sam would feign annoyance, but oblige, because nothing made him happier than when his kid’s eyes danced with fully engrossed passion.

For a Wednesday morning to find him inside his boy’s room, nothing discernible but a lump covered by blankets (maybe a wayward foot peeking out the edge, a tuft of hair somehow on the bottom of the bed. Like the teen had flipped in the night). Sam would wake him up the same way he had woken his big brother for decades before in crappy motels across the country, and his son would reply in the same drawn out whine as Dean, “five more minuuuuutes.”

But Jack didn’t eat much anyway.Jack didn’t sleep much. He never had to request another five minutes.

But he was Sam’s son.And he was half human, too.

He remembers the first time Jack died. Blood pouring from his mouth, staining the bunker’s sheets in a macabre mosaic. Somehow grotesque enough to make Sam gag, but beautiful enough that for a fleeting moment he wanted to hang the stain glass in a church. To revere and pray for and idolize his fallen son; because Jack was half angel. He was half human.

He held Jack’s hand when he died. There was no one else in the room and selfishly he treasured it. He was the first one Jack ever saw on Earth, and the last. Sam might just be blessed. Tears clogged his throat and constricted his airway, he couldn’t speak until his kid had already passed, missing the opportunity to tell him how he was proud and he had never doubted him. It wasn’t until Jack’s lips took a grey twinge that Sam managed to stutter out, “five more minutes…”

“Five more minutes…”“Huh?”

Sam shook his head, blinking at the burning stinging wetness he was going to ignore that was building in his eyes.

Jack didn’t remember him here. Just when Sam thought the universe had run out of ways to flip him the bird they had handed him Jack 2.0: DC Edition. He faltered, forgetting what had triggered that memory in the first place. Right. He’d asked when the next bus was coming. It was so plaintive. So formal and distant and dissociative. He smiled, hand aching to cup Jack’s shoulder, but he took pause and knew had to take it slow; rebuild their relationship from the ground up. “Yeah, right, sorry. Thanks, appreciate it.”

It didn’t matter how long it took for Jack to see him as a mentor, or father, or friend again.

Eggs? Check. Milk? Check. Six pack of Budweiser? Check. Those really weird shrimp flavored puffed doodle snacks that Dean pretends he doesn’t like but he ate the entire bag in an hour? Check, and also, ew. Sam glanced back down at the crumpled list in his hand, written on a hastily torn legal pad page; the yellow paper stained with something Sam didn’t want to even try to identify, but it smelled, for the record. Dean’s fingerprints splattered the edges haphazardly in what resembled burger grease, covering up the last half of “microwavable burritos”, so it read “microwavable burr.” Sam figured Dean didn’t want a ready-to-eat version of the third vice president of the US, so he filled in the blanks and headed to the frozen food aisle.

The brother’s personalities showed through nearly every aspect of their lives; each little, trivial thing they did punctuating their differences and nuances. Sam’s own handwriting sitting perfectly on each page line, sprawling and wide loops, but orderly like soldiers. Dean’s scrawl jumping between gaps as if doing it just to be defiant, somehow managing to be sloppy and neat at the same time. Lines thicker in some places than others. His requests for artery clogging junk, Sam’s for the basics every kitchen needs, as well as some protein powder for the shakes he makes in the morning when he’s too nauseous to eat (which, hey, keep that between us, yeah? He doesn’t need Dean mother-henning him every morning and forcing fatty bacon down his throat.)

Shoving the list back into his front pocket, he scanned the wall of freezers for Dean’s preferred brand of burrito. He’d tried a generic brand once, when they were laying low somewhere in Montana and the mom & pop general store only carried six things, and had to live with that mistake or the rest of the night. Never again. Stupid older brothers and their stupid superiority and why doesn’t Dean just do the shopping then?

He wasn’t used to these large shops, navigating aisles with a cart instead of a small basket. Usually they just needed some basics to fill a motel room’s mini fridge, or replenish the usually fairly stocked Bunker shelves. The mundanity of weekly grocery shopping used to be soothing in a ‘so this is normal’ way, but now it just grated on Sam’s nerves. A constant reminder of ‘yup, you’re still stuck here.’

Just as he closed the glass door with a soft suction sound, a familiar voice caught his attention. A year here and reunited with, well, anyone, really, still caught him by surprise. He had yet to get used to the lose your breath, heart stopping combination of awe and panic and thank god. He spun around in the direction of the voice so fast he left a breeze in his wake, his neck aching. Akin to a fish out of water, his mouth opened and closed, gaping. Disbelief clear on his features, but also a relief that left him breathless. “Jack,” He breathed.

He abandoned his cart in favor of walking towards him, smile wide and stretching toward his ears, dimples on full display. “God, Jack, when-how-? How long have you been here? I--jeez, you don’t know how happy I am to see you.”

Soft Sentence Starters || NOT ACCEPTING || @graveycrds​

Deja vú all over again. His first reaction was to scoff, and he just might have, if not for the sincere curve of Jack’s lip and the vacant blink of his eyes that said ‘no strings.’ 

This. This right here is how Dean Winchester must have felt for 36 years of his life; following a younger brother who wanted nothing more than to see his older brother happy. The disconnect near palpable - each not seeing the other’s side. I just need you to be happy versus I just need you safe.

Realizing sooner or later he was going to echo Dean paternally, considering the ferocious protectiveness and love he felt for Jack, Sam bit the bullet and said, “I’m always going to worry about you. Have you met me?”