Archive of Our Own ^beta

The call itself was the easy part. It was the waiting, the driving and sitting and staring at the horizon, that got to Dean.

After Dean hung up with Sam, Castiel did a complicated and unpleasant series of zaps to get Dean and all his things back to the same place. He wound up sending it all to a completely different motel – no Zacariah, which was always a plus, but stuff from Dean's bags was scattered across the new room like he'd actually stayed there. The car sat gleaming and whole in the parking lot, and Dean had sidetracked to check under the hood for a moment, to smell the familiar scent of regularly scheduled care and maintenance, before heading inside and tossing his things together. Castiel hovered for a few minutes just inside the door, trying to change the ringtone on his cell, but he disappeared sometime between when Dean ducked into the bathroom and when he came back out, Dopp kit in hand.

Hey, let's meet up after all, and that was all well and good except that the two of them were still miles, hours apart. Sam's name sat back at the top of Dean's recent calls, just where it belonged, and Dean called him again, right away. He didn't get around to second-guessing himself until the phone was already ringing in his ear, and there was no point in hanging up now when he'd already started this. His name would be shining across the screen of Sam's phone right now, maybe sitting in his lap or maybe riding shotgun, and nothing short of ditching the phone for a new number would keep Sam from calling right back.

"Hey," Sam said. Dean counted four rings before he answered, like Sam had needed to reach for the phone before he could pick up, or like he'd stared at it before deciding to answer.

"Hey," Dean answered. He hefted his bag onto his shoulder and glanced around the room one last time. Castiel had done some hand-trick to open the door, instead of providing a key, and Dean didn't want to bother with picking the lock if he needed to get back in. "I'm actually about a hundred miles east of where I said I was, so I'll be there sooner than I thought."

"Oh," Sam said. "That's cool."

There was a pause. Dean let the door slam behind him as he headed to the parking lot and opened the trunk.

"Yeah," he said eventually. "Cas did his whole relocation routine again, and –"

"Man, I know it's been a while since we talked, but I seriously don't want to hear about it," Sam said. Dean could hear him smiling. "Eat some leafy greens or something, don't share with the class."

Dean grinned and got behind the wheel, then started the engine. She turned over perfectly, giving him the kind of performance that meant she'd never be left to rust in favor of some yuppie's weekend-mobile. He patted the dashboard and ran his hands carefully over the steering wheel while he had a moment to himself, then smiled and put her into gear.

"If you're old enough to do it, you should be old enough to talk about it," Dean said.

Sam snorted in his ear. "Yeah, except there wouldn't be a need to talk about it at all if you'd keep it to yourself."

"Man, it's keeping it to myself that's the problem."

"So, we shouldn't have any contact, but I can still hear about bowel problems you haven't even started having yet."

"Oh, I'm pretty sure they've started already. I'm just not having to deal with it yet." He sidestepped the meat of Sam's issue, and Sam let him.

"Uh huh," he said.

Dean rolled his eyes and got on with it. "Anyway, since I'm closer, do you want to meet up somewhere else, closer to you?"

"Uh." He could imagine Sam frowning a little as he thought. "Nah, not really. It took us long enough to figure that place out that we might as well stick with it."

"You'll be driving longer than you need to."

"You said what, a hundred miles? That's not too long."

Dean remembered when Sam would have pulled over and made it into a word problem, some complicated game of which train'll reach the station first if one of them hits a flock of birds and the other's almost out of coal. He thought about forcing the issue – he could just pick a new spot on his own and call Sam when he reached it – but then wondered if Sam might want the extra time. He'd said he still needed to call in and quit his job, and maybe he wanted to stall. That extra hundred miles translated into about an hour of not knowing what Dean was going to say. Sam was likely to think the worst, not that Dean blamed him much, but it was a stretch of road where Sam could also hope, and Dean'd give him that.

"Well, I'll see you then, then," Dean said.

"Sure thing," Sam said. His voice came through quieter. Dean didn't know if it was a reception issue or not. "Bye, Dean."

"Yeah," Dean said. "Yeah, Sammy."

The Impala had cooled completely by the time Sam pulled up. The sun was just starting to edge over the horizon, waking all sorts of animals in the brush and setting them to chirping and squeaking, and Dean had already cleared the trash out of the foot wells and the back seat. He was working on a mental list of parts they could cannibalize Sam's car for – they could siphon the gas, at the very least – when he heard the engine. Sam came rumbling down the path, slow and careful over the grass, and Dean just listened for a moment, arms crossed over his chest and one ankle kicked over the other, before he looked up and saw his brother coming, driving straight to him.