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If Sam had to listen to Dean say one more word about Benny, he was going to start throwing punches. A vampire? Seriously? At least when it had been Castiel, it was an angel, and Sam really had done something wrong. How the hell was Sam supposed to know Dean was in Purgatory, in spite of the free pass to Heaven he had? If Dean really had been in Heaven for the past year, and Sam yanked him out, was Dean really going to be grateful for that? Or was he going to be pissed?
Sam would put money on pissed.
The decision to choose life on the road with Dean over staying in Kermit with Amelia should have been a lot easier than it was. Dean was his brother, the love of his life, the one thing about the hunting life he truly loved. Amelia had been a bandaid, the duct tape and safety pins holding him together with Dean dead.
He’d thought Dean would be excited when Sam found the goat and sheep mutilations in New Mexico. Animals drained of blood screamed Chupacabra, and Dean had always liked hunting chupacabras. Sam hadn’t been able even to get the theory out before Dean was in his face, telling him off. “What is it with you and bloodsuckers, man? I told you, Benny’s gone, he’s on his own, but you’re the one who got Martin killed. That ain’t on Benny. Besides, you had no problem with vamps sucking blood when it was Lenore and her gang!” Sam had barely even started to stutter out the protest that this had nothing to do with Benny and he didn’t think it was vampires at all before Dean had grabbed his coat and the keys and taken off.
After some brief deliberation, Sam stole a car. Dean could be pissed at him for leaving later, pissed at him for taking on a Chupacabra alone, but maybe Dean could fucking learn how to listen before jumping to asinine conclusions and storming off. Maybe with practice, Dean would even learn to sit down and listen to Sam’s explanation of everything with Amelia, and leaving Dean in Heaven, and not be a complete jerk about it.
Sleeping with Amelia had been a mistake, Sam could admit that readily enough. She was married and should be happy with her husband. On his end, well… other than that hug when Dean got back, Dean hadn’t even tried to touch Sam. When Sam asked, Dean blew him off. “You abandoned me for a girl, and you think I should just fall right back into your arms? You think it’s that easy?” It didn’t excuse getting involved with a married woman in a closed relationship, but at the very least, Sam hadn’t cheated on Dean. Had he? He certainly had no intention of ever telling Dean what had happened, because Dean was sure to take it as cheating. Not fair, but if Dean had ever been fair when it came to Sam, that had disappeared in Purgatory.
Never mind that Sam’s issues with being touch-starved is how the two of them ended up being lovers in the first place. After losing Jess, after getting used to having someone who would hug him and touch him and make him feel loved, he’d had a bit of a breakdown. Back then, Dean would listen. He shoved aside his discomfort with chick flick moments and promised to hug Sam every once in a while. Touch him when he wasn’t in serious pain or danger of death or dismemberment. One thing had led to another, and by the time they realized just what was happening, the line was so far crossed they couldn’t see it anymore.
The same thing was happening with Amelia, only this time, it was driving Dean and Sam further apart. It wasn’t an excuse for cheating. Sam wouldn’t have accepted it from anyone else. It’s just that Dean had rejected him, so it wasn’t cheating. Right? It was only Dean’s unreasonable attitude that had Sam feeling guilty, like a cheater. Well, that and participating in Amelia cheating.
Driving off alone had been a carefully considered decision. Not calling someone for backup, even just calling Kevin just to make sure someone knew where he was in case things went pear-shaped, that was just Sam being stubborn. He regretted that now. He’d been wrong about the Chupacabra, sort of. A true Chupacabra was an animal. A particularly vicious, nasty, dangerous animal, but an animal.
This thing was smart enough to lay traps. It looked like an abnormally large Chupacabra, and when Sam tried to talk to it, it didn’t respond – but it did appear to understand what Sam had said. Threatening it with Dean Winchester coming for his brother had spooked the thing and caused it to run. Not that Sam could get out of the rock pile, not with both arms and both legs pinned, but at least he didn’t seem to be in any danger of being crushed.
There was no good way to know how long he’d been trapped in there when he heard footsteps. The heavy clomp of boots reassured him – probably not the Chupacabra. Might not be Dean, either; could be a hunter who happened on the same case, but Sam still let himself hope. The gruff “Sammy? Oh, thank god, you giant idiot,” sounded like music.
“Hey, Dean. Little help here?”
“Nah. I got something I need to say, and you’re kind of a captive audience so you’re gonna listen.”
Sam groaned. Being stuck was bad enough, did Dean really have to go making bad puns now? “Whatever. Just talk quickly, that thing might be back any minute.”
“Nah, it’s dead. You couldn’t handle a Chupacabra on your own?”
“Not one that uses traps.”
“Whatever.” Dean came over, squatting beside Sam and using the rocks to prop the flashlight where they could see each other. “When you ran off, I called Jody. She had no idea where you were, but ripped me a new one about how I’ve been treating you, and I had the whole drive out here to think about it and realize she was right. I shoulda at least heard you out about the case here, and I couldn’t even do that much.”
“Yeah. You should’ve listened. You’ll be forgiven if you will get me out of these damn rocks!” Sam snapped.
“But it’s more than that, man. I shouldn’t have lied to you about Benny. Can’t blame you for not trusting him if I can’t trust you to give him a chance for me. Still pissed about your girlfriend, and not looking for me…”
“I thought you were dead. Not blown to Purgatory, dead. You’d have kicked my ass if I’d killed myself or gotten myself killed stupid, so I found a reason to live. First Riot, then Amelia. Maybe you’d have dragged me out of Heaven, and that’s you, but I thought you deserved the goddamn rest.”
“Yeah. I get that. Can’t magically fix the pissed, but I can at least see your side of things and choose to believe that if you’d had even a hint, you’d have come and found me.” Dean started shoving the rocks off of Sam. “Forgiven, behind us, can we be what we were?”
“May take a while to really get over, but yeah. We can work through this.” As soon as he could, Sam started helping shove the rock off. Dean hauled him up into a nice long hug.