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“Stop tossing and turning Sam, I’m trying to sleep.”
It was late, and Sam couldn't sleep, hadn’t been able to for days. Even with the bedside lamp he insisted on keeping lit (Michael had looked at him a little sadly then), he couldn't help but see monsters in the shadows. Grandpa's creepy house didn't help, they kept finding new and weirder taxidermied animals in the strangest places, somehow.
Grandpa’s creepy town that had been infested by vampires until a couple of days ago didn’t help either.
Still you'd think being a badass vampire killer would have made him less scared of the dark…
“You're tossing and turning,” Sam retorted, very intelligently. (Well, he was. Apparently Sam wasn’t the only one with sudden vampire-induced insomnia.)
After a pause he added, more hesitantly: “Mike?”
“Yeah?”
“Could I…”
When he was younger and he’d had a nightmare, he'd sneak into his brother's room and climb in with him without even asking. Even when he was small he’d know his parents’ room wasn’t an option. Sometimes Michael would pretend to sleep and let him without a word, other times he'd complain and tell Sam he had his own room and to stop being such a baby, but he'd always relent and move over to let him. But that was years ago (at least three years alright), and Sam didn't think he could bear being called a baby right now, so he didn’t finish his sentence.
Mike just sighed, a little theatrically like was putting on a show of annoyance, and shifted a bit in his bed.
“Come on then Sammy.”
Apparently having to fight literal monsters gave him a pass. He got up and climbed into the other bed, feeling immediately a little calmer. It was a relief, after everything, after Michael running after him in their house with a face distorted by hunger, that this still felt like safety.
Or maybe, that it felt life safety once more. So, of course, he had to immediately ruin it.
“Aw, and you're not even calling me soft about it.”
Beside him Mike started like he'd been hit.
“I didn't mean to say that!” The words were coming out of Sam's mouth so quickly they almost blurred together, like that could erase what he just said. He had aimed for a joke, to lighten whatever weirdness had settled between them after last week, and he chose the absolutely worst thing he could have said.
Sam Emerson can’t you shut your fucking mouth for once.
“No, Sammy,” Michael whispered, a little hoarse. He’d turned toward Sam, propped on his elbow. “I am so sorry I ever said that...”
“I know! It’s fine, Mike, I wasn’t trying to…” They were talking over each other, quiet but insistent.
“I keep seeing you flinching away from me Sammy, running away from me like I was…”
Dad. Neither of them needed to say it. In the half light he thought we could see tears in his brother's eyes, which was not supposed to be possible. His big brother. But many impossible things had happened the last few days.
“The shit I said about him, and in front of mom… I was being a brat,” Sam answered in a hushed voice, desperately trying to stop what he’d started.
“Yeah, you sure were, and that’s not an excuse.” Michael’s voice was tight with suppressed anger, but Sam knew it wasn’t directed at him this time. He still couldn’t bear it though, so he held out his hand like he was offering him a deal.
“Well, I'll forgive you if you forgive me.” This was silly, they’d forgiven each other already, that night before things went down with David, and Max.
“Yeah,” Michael's little sigh half sounded like a sob. “Yeah, ok.”
On second thought… Sam took his hand back and added: “Also you're not allowed to be mad at me for like, a year.”
“Sammy,” Michael answered earnestly, meeting his eyes in the half darkness, “I don't think there's a chance in hell I can do a year.”
(In a year Mike would be eighteen, probably ready to leave their home. Sam decided not to think about that.)
“Six months?” Sam counter-offered.
“I can maybe do a month,” and you could hear the beginning of a grin in his voice, which Sam took as victory.
“Two and a half and that's my final offer.”
“Deal.”
They exchanged a clumsy but solemn handshake over the blankets, and Michael laid down on his back once again.
“Plus I think wasting a hundred year old vampire to protect us means you get all your big brother points back automatically,” Sam added, basking a little in the pride of their unlikely survival.
Michael didn't say anything, but his hand went up to play with his earring, a nervous habit he had taken up lately. The tiny blade caught some moonlight and glinted obnoxiously at Sam.
“That earring still looks stupid by the way. Are you gonna keep that, now that you’re not half a creature of the night anymore?”
Michael let go of the little dagger like it had burned him, and while this might be hard to tell, with only a bedside lamp and three quarters of a full moon, Sam was pretty sure his brother was… blushing?
“Mike?” Maybe Star had given him the earring, and Sam had just stepped into something, again.
The silence stretched a little more before Michael answered: “It was David's."
He’d said it so quietly Sam wasn’t sure he’d heard him correctly at first. Uh.
“All the more reason to take it off then! And why on earth were you wearing it in the first place?” He didn't think vampirism came with sharing jewellery as well as blood. Did the whole band exchange friendship bracelets too?
Michael groaned and put his hands in front of his face, which Sam took as a confirmation that he was blushing. Which, wait, why would he be?
“Oh my god, Michael Emerson, did you get your ear pierced to impress the local bad boy?” he exclaimed, propping himself on an elbow to try and see his brother’s face better. This was either the best news or the worst one, Sam couldn’t decide.
“I’ll have you know I had my ear pierced to impress the local cool girl, actually,” Michael grumbled, muffled behind his hands, but his voice warming a little as he mentioned Star. “But…” And he went quiet again for a little while. “David gave me the earring.”
“And then you put it on to impress him?” Sam demanded, trying to figure out how the puzzle pieces of Michael’s strange words fitted together.
“He put it on for me,” Michael admitted in a breath. One of his hands left his face and went to cover his ear protectively.
Sam's first thought was, “Mom is going to be so mad”, like Mike’s reasons for his recent fashion choices mattered at all at this point.
His second thought was, “Wait, what?”
“Mike,” Sam heard himself ask in a strangled voice, “you didn’t have a thing for the crazy murdery vampire who tried to kill us all, did you?” Surely not.
Michael made a sound like he’d just choked on something. Then, a very long uncomfortable silence that made Sam feel like he might be sick a little. The thing was, this made absolutely no sense. David had been a villain, right? Not to mention, Sam was the one…
“You said you wouldn't be mad,” he pleaded, to finally break the quiet.
“Not mad Sammy, just…” Mike started in a hushed, almost timid voice.
Sam might pride himself on his sense of observation, but that he hadn’t seen coming. After all, there was a girl sleeping on their sofa who he was pretty sure wasn’t “just a friend” to Michael. And neither of them had mentioned David much since that night. Which… Well.
“Mike,” Sam stammered as his mouth caught up to his mind, “I didn’t know.. I didn’t think you liked...” Guys, he couldn’t quite say. It’s not like Michael was the one who had spent the past year having an identity crisis in the privacy of his own poster-covered bedroom.
Sam still felt like he was going to throw up, except, now, maybe, in a good way?
“Crazy murdery vampires?” Michael joked half-heartedly. “I didn’t have a thing for…”
He was pressing the heels of his hands on his eyes again, frustrated.
“Not that... Well, before I knew about vampires, he was… Well, a bit of a dick, but he was also... I don’t know…”
“Kinda handsome?” Sam interjected despite himself. Well, he had eyes. The blood-sucking asshole had been really hot. Michael looked at him sideways.
“Noticed that, uh? I was going to say intense, and strangely… caring? At times. Well I thought so at least. I felt like he was actually…” He was stammering, a little breathless, like the words were fighting him as he said them.
“Mike,” Sam interrupted gently, cautiously, “I think you had a thing for the crazy murdery vampire that almost killed us all.”
“Oh, fucking hell Sammy, I think I might have had about five different things for him.” Michael groaned, grabbed his pillow from under his head and smushed it on his face like he was trying to smother his unhelpful brain. Sam could relate to that manoeuvre.
“Sam, please shut up,” he whined from behind his pillow.
“You promised you wouldn’t be mad!”
“I’m not mad!”
Sam flopped back down on his back, looking up at the ceiling. That was… a lot. His brother had maybe liked a boy. And then he had had to kill that boy, or helped to, at the very least. And he wanted to keep wearing the earring that boy had given him, despite everything.
Sam was feeling a million things, surprised, nervous, a little excited, his hands were trembling, his heart was so full it threatened to come out of his mouth in a disgusting splatter. (That would definitely make Mike angry, it was his bed after all.) He felt sad for his brother, and a little proud too, and a little closer to him, even if he didn’t know exactly what it all meant.
“But…” he hesitated, “ok, I did so note you telling me to shut up, but what about Star?”
Sam had mixed feelings about Star, as he had a sense she had been somewhat instrumental in Mike becoming a half-fucking-vampire, but she had also not hesitated to step in to save Sam and the Frogs, twice. So all in all, he was mostly on her side there.
Michael pressed the pillow tighter against his face and groaned again, then lowered it.
“Yes, Star. I don’t know Sammy, does it have to be one thing or the other?”
What did Sam know, he had never been able to talk about any of this with anyone before. Still, he wasn't going to leave Mike hanging.
“No, I guess not. Shit. You had a week, uh.”
“You can say that again.”
Sam took a breath, “Mike.”
“Please stop.” It came out as a whine like he was expecting Sam to ask him another excruciating question.
“I think it’s just the one thing for me,” Sam whispered instead, a little unsteadily.
Michael stilled at that, then turned back toward him.
“Yeah?” he asked softly. Sam nodded, his eyes were starting to sting.
“I think there’s a word for that, Sammy,” Mike added carefully.
“There’s plenty of words and believe me I have heard them all,” Sam tried to scoff, but it came out a little strangled.
Michael shuffled until he could get an arm around his shoulder to ruffle his hair, and Sam remembered to breathe again.
“Not all of them bad though, yeah?”
“Yeah.” His voice was shaking.
“Aw, Sammy”. This time Michael reached over and folded him fully into his arms. “It’s alright.”
“Is it?” Sam let himself get tucked in, safe, his face against his brother’s shirt.
“Yeah. Thanks for telling me. Is there… anyone in particular?”
Sam sniffled, “Nah.”
“Just Rob Lowe then.”
“Shut up Michael.”