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At the end of the day
When there are no friends
When there are no lovers
Who are you going to call for?
What do you have to change?
Familiar face, foreign place,
I’ll forget your name
I’d like it here if I could leave
and see you from a long way away
—R.E.M., “Good Advices”
*****
“Screw you. I get to decide who I really am.” Dean narrows his eyes at this newest specimen of angelic douchebaggery. “Why the hell are you toying with us? I don’t believe in destiny. If there is such a thing, why bother with all this movie-of-the-week crap?” He turns and glares at the stupid yuppie trappings of his—no, Dean Smith’s—office. “Life sucks for everybody, in some way. I’m not special. You’re just wasting your time, and mine, and I got things to do.”
“Dean, quit fooling yourself,” says Zachariah with an infuriating smirk. “You’re a good soldier. Stubborn as hell, but in the end, you’re desperate to fit in—to belong. High school, Hell, Sandover, wherever. And you do it so well. We didn’t give you a marketing degree from Stanford, Dean. We just blocked some of your memories and rearranged the rest. When you’re given a role to play, you play it, and it’s all you.”
“You bastard!” Dean shouts. “Where’s Sam?”
“Sam Wesson is about two minutes away from being escorted out by security—possibly arrested; I don’t know. Better go find him.”
“Wait, you’re just going to leave him as Sam Wesson? How do I get the real Sam back?”
“You’re smart, Dean. You’ll figure out how to snap him out of it. Don’t worry, he won’t remember any of this. It doesn’t matter. I don’t care about him, Dean. This was your lesson.” And with that, Zachariah is gone.
Dean fumes for a moment, only refraining from throwing the jackass knick-knacks from his desk against the windows because it occurs to him that it would be inconvenient if they were both arrested. He storms down to the IT department and finds it in chaos, but Sam is not there anymore. Cornering one of Sam’s wretched-looking co-workers, he hides his smile as she recounts the phone-smashing incident in subdued and anxious tones. “Did he take the poker with him?” he asks brightly at the end, and takes her bewildered stare as his cue to leave.
*****
“This isn’t you. I know you.” Sam Wesson’s bright, appealing eyes fix on Dean earnestly.
The sudden rush of fury surprises him. “You don’t know me, pal,” he snaps. How dare he say that. No one knows him. My God, he thinks. The nerve of this guy, a complete stranger. Why did he have to be named Sam? And why the hell had Dean called him “Sammy”? This isn’t Sammy. Sammy is his little brother, his baby brother who died in a fire twenty-five years ago.
Twenty-five years is not long enough to wipe out the traumatic memory of the heat, the weight in his arms, the blinding smoke, tripping, falling, dropping. Screaming. This is his last memory of his brother, relived in nightmares that continue to plague him.
You don’t know me. I don’t dream, and if I did, I wouldn’t dream of you, buddy.
My little brother wouldn’t have been anything like you.
Dean knows exactly how his Sammy would be. He’d be joyous, charming, carefree. He’d laugh at Dean’s jokes and sing along to Dean’s music in the car. He’d be boastful and boisterous, trading wisecracks at the speed of light, bright as a star, smart as a whip, and all the while he’d be looking up at his big brother with undisguised admiration. Literally looking up because no way would his little brother be taller than him like that Paul Bunyan of a Sam Wesson.
Dean knows all this as surely as he remembers his baby brother’s dimpled smile and tiny plump hands that clutched at the football Dean held out to him. When will he be big enough to play with me, Dad? Soon, son, soon enough.
Never. Dean will never teach him to throw a football. Never read to him from a battered Classics Illustrated comic book. Never watch him, from the back of a dingy auditorium, receive his high school diploma and flourish it outward as a salute to his older brother.
Dean is running with a great weight in his arms. It’s too heavy and he knows it. He topples, stumbling, falling, and it’s his fault, and nothing, nothing can ever change it.
When Zachariah zaps his memories back into him, it’s like waking gasping from a nightmare, from the nightmare. As usual, the thorny jab of suspicion mingles with the balm of relief. It’s not true (isn’t it?). Sam’s not dead (isn’t he?).
Sam’s still with me.
Isn’t he?
*****
Dean spots Sam first, then the Impala, in quick succession as he makes his way down the street from the Sandover building. Sam is seated at an outdoor table of a Starbucks on the corner, staring down at his cup, and the car is parked on the same side of the street just beyond him. Dean fishes in his pocket and finds, to his profound relief, the familiar shape of the Impala key. Almost there, he thinks. Just get Sammy back to normal, and I can forget this ever happened.
Sam Wesson, at a distance, looks exactly like his brother, and the Impala looks exactly like he remembers it. Dean realizes that he’d seen the car during the past three weeks, two or three times in passing on the street, and it had never elicited any response from his soul, not even a brief, idle moment of admiration. It was just another car. Sam was just another guy.
He had not recognized either of them. Dean pauses now to look at them both. Something in Sam’s posture brings up a lump in his throat. He can always tell when his brother has been crying.
Dean’s waiting to cross the street at the corner opposite the coffee shop when Sam lifts his head and their eyes meet. Dean knows instantly that the angel spell has not been broken. Sam Wesson stares at him unbelievingly, the same way his brother had stared when he had seen Dean seated in the audience of that school production of “Our Town” so many years ago.
They had never discussed it beyond Dean’s remarks at the time—“My God, that was boring, and you sucked, dude.” But Dean had always cherished that very brief look of delighted surprise on Sam’s face, and now he’s seeing it again. Sam’s clearly not just another guy. Why couldn’t Dean Smith recognize him?
*****
“Hey,” he begins inanely.
Sam’s answering smile is unfamiliar—a quick dimple accompanying a shy dip of his head. Dean ends a moment of awkward silence by indicating the empty chair at the little table, “Can I? For a minute?”
“Yeah, sure,” Sam replies.
“I, uh, heard about your…” Dean mimes an ax blow. Sam laughs into his coffee cup.
“My phone-smashing meltdown?”
“Yeah, it was awesome. I went down to see—the whole place was freaking out. Some guy thought he was having a heart attack. They had the paramedics in and everything.”
Sam frowns worriedly. “Oh, he’s fine,” Dean continues. “But I think you bailed just in time.”
Sam snorts. “Yeah, I bet.”
“So, burning your bridges and all that?” Dean remarks. How long is this going to last, he wonders. I can’t make small talk with my brother-who’s-not-really-my-brother forever. Do I just tell him—you were right and your dreams were true? Will he freak out and run?
Sam fiddles with his coffee cup, gazing back toward the Sandover building. “Yeah,” he sighs. “I got a temper. But I’m glad, really.”
“Yeah, me too,” Dean replies, and Sam gazes at him wide-eyed.
“Wait, you don’t mean…”
“Yeah, I quit too.” Dean darts a quick, embarrassed smile across the table. Sam laughs, a real, true, toothy Sam Winchester-style laugh, and Dean is sure that he’s got his memory back, until the laugh trails into a grin and Sam Wesson says “You’re full of surprises, Smith.”
“I guess maybe you know me better than I thought,” Dean says by way of apology. The question “Was it because of me?” hangs unspoken in the air between them, and Dean is glad that he is able to lie with no more than a dissembling shrug, when in truth he’d have to say, “Sorry, Sammy, but you know, I wasn’t thinking of you at all.”
“Hey,” he says instead, “I know it’s kinda early, but I’m starving. You want to go somewhere and grab some lunch?”
“Sounds good,” says Sam. “There’s a little place just up the block here.”
As they pass the Impala, an idea occurs to Dean. “Wait a sec, I need to get something out of my car.” Sam stands by at a polite distance while he opens the door and roots around in the glove compartment. Just as he hoped, his phone is in there, his real phone, and he turns it on and finds Sam’s name. He is disappointed to hear, faintly, his brother’s phone ringing somewhere in the trunk. Well, that was a bust. Worth a try, though, he thinks. “Sorry,” he calls to Sam as he closes the door.
“I thought you had a Prius,” Sam remarks.
“Yeah, well,” says Dean, recalling the way the Prius drove with a little pang of regret—and boy, that thought—I drove a Prius and I kinda liked it—is going to be buried right next to the Rhonda Hurley incident in his mind. “This is my real car—my baby,” he beams. “Sixty-seven Impala. I’ve had it forever; used to be my dad’s.”
A reminiscent look blooms on Sam’s face, and Dean thinks triumphantly, That’s it. That’s done it. He’s back.
But then Sam speaks. “My brother would have loved it. He was crazy about classic cars.”
Was. Was. The word echoes in Dean’s head. Damn you, Zachariah, he thinks. Out loud he says, “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” The answer is low, hoarse, almost a whisper. “He—he’s dead.” Sam pulls himself away from the lamppost he has been leaning against and looks Dean in the eye as he says, “He was killed in a car accident a few years ago. I was driving.”
Oh. Dean is not sure if he has actually spoken the word out loud. “I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “Were you, um, close?” he asks after a pause. Because he’s a sucker for punishment.
“Hell, no, I couldn’t stand him.”
“Not really, though he probably thought so, the pathetic dumb shit.”
“Nah—he was okay, I guess, but we had nothing in common.”
Dean is grateful Sam doesn’t seem to notice that Dean is biting his lip hard. Or the tiny noise he makes when he exhales upon hearing the answer, “Yeah. Yeah, we were. I really miss him.”
Sam sighs. “I’m sorry. It’s probably why I latched onto you. He was all I had. We were raised in foster homes together.”
“Sounds rough,” Dean manages to get out. Don’t you dare hug him, his brain warns.
Sam shrugs. “Yeah, anyway. I won’t bore you with my sob story.” He smiles the shy dimpled smile again. “Don’t want to overshare,” he continues, with not a hint of Sam’s usual sarcasm.
“I don’t mind,” Dean replies, and to his surprise, it isn’t awkward. It isn’t awkward at all.
*****
They don’t speak much during their lunch, but the atmosphere is not unpleasant, unlike the prickly silences that had been growing common between Dean and his brother. Dean notices Sam Wesson’s polite demeanor—sitting up straight, making eye contact, keeping his unwieldy elbows under careful control. Sammy’s company manners, he thinks with amusement. Appetite assuaged by an excellent cheeseburger and a pile of steak fries, Dean is happy and relaxed until, toward the end of their meal, he suddenly wonders inwardly if he has any money on him. What if that douchebag angel’s left them high and dry? Dean’s done some vile things in his time, but he hopes he won’t have to stoop to pulling a dine-and-dash.
He finds four credit cards in Dean Smith’s name in his wallet, and when the check arrives, he pulls out the gaudiest one, waving away Sam’s “Hey, let me…” It’s accepted without comment, and he grins as he signs the receipt with a flourish. We’d better act fast before the angel pulls the plug on this, he thinks. How big of a shopping spree could they get out of it before then? Dammit, Sammy, how do I get you back to normal?
Dean has tried everything he could think of to snap Sam out of his amnesia-ridden fake persona. He’s clapped him on the upper arm, kicked him “accidentally” under the table, dropped any number of verbal hints including “John Winchester,” “Lawrence, Kansas,” “Bobby Singer,” and even “Ruby,” to no avail. He quashes the thought of fairy-tale frogs—I am not doing that; I’ll take Sam Wesson forever before that. The idea of having Sam Wesson at his side is not without its appeal, though. Dean’s tired of the sullenness and the furtive emo-kid shenanigans, and he misses the sound of his brother’s laugh. Wesson’s could be an adequate substitute.
They have been lingering at their table for far too long; any longer and it will feel weird. Dean is just going to have to tell him straight out. He sighs and prepares to start the awkward conversation that begins “So, about that hunting together thing…”
Not here in the restaurant though, he thinks. I’ll get him in the car and do it. “So,” he says. “Can I give you a ride anywhere?”
“Oh,” Sam returns, with a hint of kicked puppy in his eyes. “Uh, yeah, sure. Beats riding the bus.”
As they walk back to the Impala, Dean rehearses his opening lines: Okay, Sam, look here. Yeah, this is gonna sounds crazy—but you sounded crazy yesterday, so don’t give me that look. All right, now, listen up: you’re not Sam goddamn Wesson, your name is Sam Winchester and you’re my little brother and I’m not dead, okay, jeez, that wasn’t your fault anyway, why are you so hung up about it? Yeah, I know, pot, kettle, but I was a little kid, man, of course that would mess me up. What? Anyway, you’ve been touched by an angel—not Cas, a different one, he’s a douchebag though—Mr. Adler, did you know him?—and that’s why your brain is screwed up. And yeah, your weird vampire-fighting dreams were all true.
That should clear things up.
They reach the car, and Dean opens his door and removes his jacket. He leans across the seat to unlock the passenger door for Sam. Tossing the jacket into the back seat, he watches Sam open his door and clamber awkwardly into the seat. Sam leans out to grab the door handle, and when he yanks the door closed he smacks his head hard on the top of the door frame.
“Ow,” Dean exclaims sympathetically. “Man, graceful you are not. You okay?”
Sam turns to him, his hand pressed against his head. “Dean?” he says, staring.
Dean holds his breath. Sam’s eyes travel from Dean’s face down to his feet and back up again. His mouth twitches. “Are you wearing suspenders?” he asks incredulously, his voice half an octave higher than normal.
Dean exhales. “Sammy, thank God. I was starting to worry.” He bites back a comment on Sam’s yellow Sandover polo, and decides that he’s not going to tell his brother about the espresso machine, the “Master Cleanse,” and especially not the Prius.
*****
“So you really don’t remember anything?”
“No,” Sam sounds troubled. “Not a thing.” He glances over at his brother, a solicitous frown on his face, and asks, “Was it really bad?”
Dean knows that he means the separation, the loss, the longing that he had not felt. He reddens a little as he mutters, “Eh, coulda been worse,” and keeps his eyes on the road.
Sam sits quietly for a long time before he resumes, “Did you say I told you I had dreams about vampires?”
“Yeah,” Dean replies.
“Did I say—what kind of dreams?”
Dean shoots his brother a look of confusion. “I mean, like what I was doing?” Sam continues.
“I dunno, man, the usual, I guess. You just said you were fighting them.”
Sam’s brow clears a little. Dean thinks about joking, What the hell, man, did you think you were having sexy time with Gordon or something? But the set of his brother’s mouth looks as though it could turn sulky in a moment, and Dean is no mood for that shit right now.
“Let’s go shopping,” he suggests cheerfully, which makes Sam laugh. “What? We got four credit cards with sky-high limits, and it ain’t gonna last. Zach owes us some new underwear at least.” And Dean drives towards the suburbs to find the nearest mall.
*****
“Did you spend all your time in the candy store?” Sam asks as he glances over Dean’s purchases. “What is this, like five hundred bucks’ worth of gummi worms and salt water taffy?” They are seated at a grubby table in the food court, and though they look like their real selves again, down to their clothing, Dean still feels antsy and slightly uneasy.
“Hey, it’s for the road,” he protests around a mouthful of pretzel. “You know you’ll eat half of it, anyway; don’t pretend you won’t.”
Sam smiles remotely as he rummages in a bag. “Why’d you get a football?”
Dean swallows and brushes the salt from his hands. “I thought we’d take it somewhere and toss it around,” he ventures. “When was the last time we did that, eh, Sammy?”
“God, I can’t even remember,” Sam says.
“Me neither.” Dean’s memories of this cozy, apple-pie boyhood pastime are hazy and warmly lit and probably not even real.
“I remember learning how to throw, though,” Sam continues. “I was like, four? And the ball was huge in my hands. We might have been at Pastor Jim’s—I remember the smell of the grass, and the noise of cicadas. And you.”
Dean blinks. “You sure it wasn’t Dad?”
“No, I remember,” Sam says easily. “It was you.”
*****
The small neighborhood park that Dean finds is deserted except for a couple of kids scuffling around a basketball hoop. Low in the sky, the sun casts a strong but unfelt glow over them. Dean watches his brother’s back as Sam trots away from him down the grassy expanse.
“I don’t want to go home!” howls one of the kids suddenly. Sam turns back to face Dean, and Dean throws the football in a lazy arc. Sam fires it back at him, calling, “Come on, you old man!” and Dean laughs. It feels good to run, to stretch his muscles, and best of all, not to think. Not of demons, or angels, or a looming apocalypse. Not of invoices, or meetings, or investment portfolios. The memories of the past three weeks, each day like a dud Polaroid that failed to develop, already feel surreal and fragmented. The other stuff, Dean reasons, can wait, if only for one chill but warm-colored afternoon.
They toss the ball around until the light fades, running, diving, yelling, and laughing. Dean is exhilarated beyond measure, and he ignores Sam’s protests that it’s getting too dark to see. “One more,” he shouts. “Come on, Sammy, go long.” And he continues to throw, aiming for that familiar voice, until he has convinced himself that he can find his brother, every time, even in the dark.