Chapter Text
"Listen, that night that, uh, you know, we went our separate ways..."
"You mean the night you split?"
Because that's what had happened. Sam had needed his brother, no matter how angry he was at him, and Dean bailed for his own selfish, self-pitying reasons. Just like always.
Dean nodded. "Fair enough." He hesitated for a moment. "I was messed up, man. Kevin was dead and I... I don't know what I was."
Oh, so we're playing the pity card, are we?
Sam nodded. "Okay."
"Hell, maybe I still don't. But, uh, I know I took a piece of you in the process and for that..." Dean looked Sam in the eye, clearly trying to convey his apology without actually saying it. That's all you're sorry for?
"Somebody changed the playbook man, you know? It's like what's right is wrong, and what's wrong is more wrong, and... I just know that when...when we rode together..."
"Split the crappiness."
"Yeah. So..." Dean tilted his head toward the car without making eye contact.
In that moment, Sam felt a flash of sympathy and concern for his brother. He did know what it was like to feel like the rules had been flipped on you. Sam could see how desperate Dean was, how he was teetering just on the edge of depression. Sam didn't want to be the one to push him in, but he needed Dean to see. To understand how far he'd gone this time.
"Okay."
Dean raised his eyes to Sam's. "Okay."
"But something's broken here, Dean."
Dean shook his head. "I'm not saying that it's not, I... I'm just saying maybe we need to put a couple of W's on the board and we can get past all this."
Sam felt a rush of anger. He was done pulling his punches. "I don't think so. No, I wish, but... We don't see things the same way anymore. Our roles in this whole thing. Back in that church? Talking me out of boarding up hell? Or tricking me into letting Gadreel possess me? I can't trust you. Not the way I thought I could. Not the way I should be able to."
Dean looked away and released an artificial breath of laughter before looking back at Sam. "Okay, look. Whatever happened, we are family, okay?"
Sam looked at him in disbelief. "You say that like it's some sort of cure-all. Like it can change the fact that everything that has ever gone wrong between us has been because we're family."
"So what, we're not family anymore?"
"I'm saying you want to work? Let's work. If you want to be brothers..."
For a moment, the exposed, shattered man Sam saw in Dean's eyes made him want to take it all back. Then Dean's shields came back up, and Sam buried his empathy. Dean needed to understand.
"Well, those are my terms."
Dean nodded, and turned towards the impala. There was a slump to his shoulders that hadn't been there before, but in the moment, Sam didn't care.
Dean needed to understand.