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Dean looks at the man he just tucked in, this giant, this tiny fragile thing. His little brother.
I did this, he thinks.
You did this to yourself.
He doesn’t want the thought, but the thought comes anyway: so this is how much my forty years in hell were worth to you.
They don’t talk about hell. He doesn’t think about hell. He shoves the thought down.
Sam is calm now, that god-awful wounded noise gone, but it makes him too still. It’s eerie and Dean rests his hand on his brother’s pulse, just to be sure. It’s anchoring and maddening. This had been gone. He’d lost this but it’s back, it’s back, thank whatever the fuck just happened it’s back and he’s warm and relieved and grateful and unbelievably angry.
The anger is still looking for a proper direction, can’t find it, lands on both of them.
I did this.
You did this to yourself.
Sam stirs after who knows how long, Dean sure doesn’t, and the first thing he does when he wakes up is look at that stupid note. It’s the note, more than anything, that clued Dean in. Some unknown attacker wouldn’t have left that, no matter how much Dean wants to tell himself that.
I did this.
You did this to yourself.
Then Sam’s eyes flicker up to his, careful, shameful, and Dean is so goddamned mad he can’t help it, he wants to punch that shame right off his little brother’s face, wants to take it into his hands and caress it and kiss it and say it’s okay and I’m here now and I’m so angry I can barely look at you and I love you. But when his hand comes up, it finds its own way to supporting Sam into sitting upright, then to pulling him into a crushing hug, a fuckyouthankyoustaywithme hug that pushes the breath out of both of them.
They don’t let go for a long time. He can feel that Sam is crying but trying to hide it. He’s never been good at quiet crying. Dean isn’t crying, that one tear is just excessive moisture he’s expelling. Whatever.
“He brought me back”, Sam eventually says. His voice is brittle and scared.
“Lucifer brought me back.”
He stutters on Lucifer’s name, stumbling over it more than anything. Dean finally lets go at that, holding Sam at arm’s length, inspecting him visually.
“Did he hurt you?” His voice comes out all wrong, somewhere between afraid and hopeful. He’s disgusted with himself.
“No, I…”
That wounded sound is slipping in again, taking over and stripping Sam of words. Or maybe he had no words to begin with.
“Okay, alright. Take it easy, man. Just… tell me if you have any wounds that need tending. I have to know that much.”
Sam shakes his head, squeezes his jaw, manages to stop the noise. Good.
Dean lets out a deep sigh.
“You really did that to yourself?”
Sam nods, eyes on his hands.
“Jesus Christ Sammy. How could you do that? After everything, after all I” - no, the thought. He can’t let the thought escape.
They don’t talk about hell. He doesn’t think about hell.
“To thwart him.”
Sam’s voice is barely a whisper but Dean doesn’t miss it, not even close. He tries to catch Sam’s eye, but the kid won’t look up. A shadow crosses his face and for a moment he looks like a man who has more to say, but the moment passes like a trick of the light.
“You don’t think that’s something we oughta do together?”
He knows, of course, by the horrible pit in his stomach what Sam is going to say and he doesn’t want to hear it, doesn’t want this broken bird of a boy sitting here pretending not to cry. He cuts in before Sam can even start.
“This is our problem, Sam. And I’m not saying you’re not to blame, god knows you messed up beyond… but I wasn’t perfect either, okay, and what I saw, I don’t wanna save a world without…” his voice trails off, the words too hard to say, stuck stuck stuck in his useless throat.
“You didn’t know what would happen. It was a stupid risk.”
It’s not the sentence he thought he’d say, but it’s true and he managed to get it out so he can live with that.
“Okay.” A bit of a non-response, but a calm one again, so fine. Neither of them can fucking say what they mean and it’s all fine.
“How did you even get me in this bed?”
Freak adrenaline because I thought you were dead or dying. Your body felt lighter and colder than it ever should. I’m your big brother, I’ll always find a way to carry you.
“Why do you care, Sam.”
It’s a question but it isn’t, it doesn’t quite form.
“You weren’t planning to be around to find out anyway.”
It’s bitter and painful and the wrong thing to say. He tried to be so soft and pliant, a blanket for a broken boy, a kiss for the ache. Well, too bad, the anger is winning now. Except it’s just - empty disappointment, or loss, or grief, who cares.
Sam looks hurt, needs space, and isn’t that just too fucking bad, because Dean will be damned before he gets it. This is Sam’s fault and what Sam doesn’t understand is that makes it Dean’s fault - I did this. You did this to yourself. - , because Sam is Dean’s and he didn’t even ask, didn’t even say goodbye, only had a stupid little note. The who and what and why doesn’t even matter because it’s Dean, Dean, all the way down.
Except that isn’t quite right, because that was the other Dean, the one without his little brother. The one without his humanity. That was Dean all the way down and this Dean never wants to be like that.
“We keep each other human means both of us, Sam. I didn’t just mean…” he gestures at Sam’s note vaguely.
“So don’t… take that away from me, yeah?”
Dean turns his back before he can mess up, show too much emotion, or not enough. This is as close as he’s going to get to explaining it, for now, without punching his idiot of a brother, selfish dick, selfless saint. Brothers all the way down, for everyone’s sake. His hand has found Sam’s pulse again, all on its own. Steady.
“You’re still a little cold. I’ll make you some coffee.”