Work Text:
Of all the bizarre things he saw as a hunter, this one took the cake. Sure, both his brother and he were brought back from the dead more often than not, and yet somehow, seeing his mother, Mary Winchester in the flesh was a hard pill to swallow.
The moment he saw her being dragged into the dingy basement, his mind was transported to the very first memory he had of her. Back in Lawrence, Kansas, the house he was born in. The nasty poltergeist haunting their childhood home compelled Mary's spirit to interfere. Too less of a time it was for Sam to even see her properly. Fast forward to a few years, Mary's hallucination visited him in his demon-blood-induced state. The brief conversation they had felt more like an exchange between two hunters than a mother and a son. It was only before the apocalypse when both brothers were sent in the past, did Sam finally meet her in person. Sadly, it was the time before they were born and Mary did not recognize them until it was too late.
Now, safely back in the bunker, Sam was lying on the bed thinking about how this was going to play out. The woman at the end of the hallway looked like the mother he saw up growing in pictures but never really got a chance to get to know her. Six months was too natal for him to have remembered her.
Under the pretense of recovering from the injuries inflicted by that crazy Brit lady and her lady friend, Sam avoided Mary for the first few days. Their conversations were limited to quick scrutiny of each other's well-being and ironically but not surprisingly about the weather. Sam noticed her eyes mirror his hesitation as they both avoided directly looking at each other for longer than a fraction of a second. Dean, however, was a lot more at ease around her. Clearly, they both shared common interests: food, music, and Baby topping that list. Unlike Sam whom she knew nothing about, she was confident about Dean's preferences for sandwiches and his undying love for pies.
Often, Sam walked in on their private moments but never interrupted them. Just a day ago, he almost panicked to see the bunker empty only to find them in the garage singing 'Hey Jude'. Out of their line of vision, Sam watched them quietly, feeling a little left out. Dean was polishing the hood and Mary was perched up on a beer cooler, a six-pack resting by her side. They even drank alike.
During meals, Mary tried to mirror what she did for Dean and it hurt Sam to see her smile fade when he mentioned he preferred salads over cheese burgers. Mary was trying, Sam saw that, he appreciated that but it hurt that their bond felt a little forced at times.
In the short amount of time that Sam knew her, he was sure about one thing: Dean reflected ninety percent of Mary's personality. In simpler terms, it was not going to be her to do the talking. Perfect! Just what Sam needed to complicate this further. When Sam and his mom were within the same four walls without Dean to break the ice, they either quickly remembered something that needed to be done in another room or one of them made the air so awkward with their silence that they had to abandon the space.
Sometimes Sam wondered if Dean noticed, noticed how they barely exchanged more than polite greetings, that Sam often left the room when Dean and his mother reminisced childhood memories. Sometimes they mentioned a few months old Sammy but it usually soured the memory the closer the story got to November of 1983.
"Dude, aren't you enjoying your alone time a bit too much?" Dean stopped at the door of Sam's room, a plate of half-eaten PB & J in his hand.
"What?" Sam's face scrunched up, "No! Dean, what the hell?"
"Hey, I'm just asking." Both his hands shot up to his eye level. "I noticed you have been holed up in your room lately."
"I'm fine," Sam reassured but Dean plopped on his bed. Sam placed a bookmark between the pages and waited for his brother to continue.
"Are you sure?" His big brother put down the plate on the bed next to him. He palmed Sam's forehead who backed away.
"Yes!" Sam answered running his hand through his hair.
Dean rose to feet collecting his food. "Alright. I'll take your word for it."
"Do you want a sandwich?" His brother's head poked inside the room again. "Mom's cooking."
"Just the PB & J?"
"Yeah, Sam", Dean scoffed. "Just the PB & J. It's mom, not a Michelin Star chef."
Sam chuckled but politely refused to join. Something inside him twisted a little. His mother knew nothing about him. The last few days were a witness to that. Not that he knew everything there was to know about Mary Winchester, but growing up he had known Mary through different people.
John, when drunk out of his mind, described Mary as a fearless lover. Though oblivious to her hunting past, he always imagined her to be a fierce fighter. Dean remembered Mary as a successful homemaker. A woman who was warm and loving and smelled like sugar and cinnamon because she spent most of her time baking pies for her little Dean. Of course, there were flaws to that image now that both brothers knew she had the cooking range of a child. His own not-so-normal experience of Mary from the past told him she was a devoted lover and a badass fighter. She also longed for a life outside of hunting. And for some odd years, she had that, exactly like Sam until the ugly past caught up.
None of these were his memories of Mary Winchester as a mother. Did that make him jealous? He didn't know but he wouldn't go with the word jealous. Jealousy was too strong of an emotion, too wrong, too negative even. What he felt was emptiness. His childhood was missing 'mom moments'. Dean did his best to fill in for both absent parents but at the end of the day, Dean also was just a child. Even a four-year-old Sam was sensible enough to know that.
Sam failed to understand why he wasn't jealous. It would be a very natural emotion to allow. Yet, lying on his bed, all he felt was bitter-sweet happiness. Having Mary back was the best thing that happened to them and yet there was an emptiness that lingered in the air when she was around. The hole inside his heart left from his parents' absence never seemed to quite fill up no matter what.
"Sammy!" Dean's voice rang through the deserted hallway. On instinct, Sam grabbed the gun and raced to the study following the scream. He exhaled loudly when he saw both of them huddled at a table, empty pizza boxes discarded.
"Woah!" Dean exclaimed, "Sorry to startle you, man. We just found a case." The laptop screen was turned to face Sam. He tucked his gun away and took a seat next to his brother scanning the article on the screen. A vampire hunt. Seemed easy enough.
Dean rose, cocking his gun. A bunch of weapons and syringes filled with dead man's blood were dropped inside the duffel bag. Taking the cue, Mary reached for one of the magazines when Deans stopped, "Woah! Mom, what are you doing?"
Mary looked Dean in the eye as she answered, "We have vamp nest to destroy, don't we?"
"Mom, we just got you back." His brother's words echoed his unsaid ones. "We can't obviously lose you. What if something happened?"
"Dean", his mother assured, "I was raised into this life, okay. I won't be a burden. Plus, did you really think I was going to stay here and play mommy?"
The brothers' faces paled. Though that wasn't the intention, Mary's words cut deep.
"You have to understand, this is just as difficult for me as it is for you boys. For me, my Dean is a four-year old boy and Sammy is a six months old baby." She wiped the runway tear from her eye. "But then, I see you both and realize, I have so much catching up to do. But it would take time. You understand that, don't you?"
A hand rested on her shoulder. It was Sam, " Of course, mom. Take all the time you need."
Dean looked like he wanted to punch something. Sam was upset too but he understood. In these matters, he didn't have the liberty that Dean had. After all, how do you miss someone you have barely known, or hardly spent time with? But you could. Sam knew that because he missed a mother he never knew of even though she was arm's length away.
The nest was small in size, three vampires, one of them female but based on the body count they left, their appetite had to be huge. The Winchester clan, two boys, one resurrected mother, charged in machete swaying. It was an even fight, three against three. They had better luck in the past even when they were outnumbered so this fight was a piece of cake. Bodies dropped quickly and the only ones standing were the Winchesters.
"Help, pls, somebody help me." A woman's voice caught their attention.
Sam followed the direction of the voice and found a dark haired woman, hand tied together and strung to a meat hook. She was pale and judging from the blood dried on her neck, the vampires were milking her dry.
"Sammy?" Dean called, heavy footsteps nearing them.
"We're good, Dean. I'll bring her around." He yelled in Dean's direction.
"Mom and I, we torching the corpses. Meet you near the car!"
"Hey," Sam called softly. The woman was young, mid twenties if he had to guess. How unfortunate of her to cross paths with them. He set down the machete and reached with one arm to lift her off the hook. His other arm was gently wrapped around her mid section. "I'm going to take you down. Hold on to me."
"Help me." She mumbled.
Sam easily lifted her off, supporting all of her weight. He cut off the ropes tying her hands together and draped her arm around his shoulder. Since she was a good one foot shorter than him, he hunkered down to her level letting her body fall on to his.
"I've got you, you are safe now. You're safe." He reassured. The Impala was parked half a mile away from the nest. As they reached the car, Sam tried to help her in the backseat. That's when her eyes flung open, she hissed, pointy teeth springing from behind her lips. By the time his startled mind acknowledged the fact that she was a vampire and possibly a lure for naive rescuers like him, she had pushed the knife hilt-deep into his gut. She then took off, taking the knife with her.
Sam's hands flew to his stomach watching the blood ooze from the cavity. Swaying on his feet, he slid against the side of the Impala. The pain so sharp it took the wind out of his body. "Ugh", the hurtful sound whistled from his lips. "Ah!" He heaved pressing hard against the wound. The pressure inflicting unbearable pain. But it was necessary or he'd bleed out before Dean and Mary returned.
"Sam, Sammy!" A woman called, her voice echoing far away. "Dean!" The same voice called for his brother. He knew that voice. He'd heard it long, long time ago. Or was it a memory? Sam wasn't sure.
"Sam!" Dean was closing in. He sounded worried but Sam couldn't be sure why, because where he was, it was too dark to see.
"He's been stabbed." The woman said. Stabbed? Who?
"Son of a bitch!" Sam didn't need his eyesight to know that was Dean. "The girl, damn it! She was one of them."
Footsteps shuffled around Sam and he felt his body float. The hurt in his abdomen fired up! "Ah!" He tried to put pressure to stop the pain but he couldn't find his hand. Why was it so dark? "Gahh! Stop, please," he begged. Didn't they see they were making it worse?
"Sammy," Dean whispered, "it will be alright." Sam believed him. His voice, the love and affection it held, he couldn't help but trust that voice. Something dug into his stomach which forced a scream out of him. Then everything fell into the abyss.
Two dark blobs filled his vision. It took a minute for the blurriness to clear and his room came into view. Dean and Mary's face were looming over him. The fan overhead was rotating at a laggard speed throwing gentle air around the room. His brother's face broke into a relieved smile and Mary's eyes filled with tears.
"How are you feeling?" Dean asked, eyes searching for any signs of pain.
Sam gave it a thought. How was he feeling? Tired, for one. There was a sharp stinging in his gut every time he tried to breathe. "I'll live," he replied for their benefit.
"That's my champ!" Dean gave his shoulder a squeeze. "I need to run to the med store. Be right back."
Sam nodded. Dean kissed Mary on the head before heading out.
"Hey Mom, you good?" Sam asked. Better to not let the awkwardness make the air heavier. He tried to get up and lean his back on the headboard but the movement elevated the pain making him dizzy.
"Sam, don't," Mary lightly pushed him back on the bed. "And yes, I'm good."
She sat down next him, her warm fingers curled around his cold ones. With her other free hand, she carded her fingers through his hair. Sam closed his eyes savouring the moment. So this is what it felt like to have a mom.
"I'm sorry, Sam." She said, "I'm new at this. Not new at being a mom but new at being your mom. Yours and Dean's."
Sam's vision blurred again but this time it was the moisture in his eyes that did it. "Mom, you don't have to -"
"I know," she cut him off, "but I need to. When I came back, I didn't recognise your brother. I almost tackled him on the ground." That was interesting. He wished he was around to witness a dainty Mary grappling his burly brother. Sam was larger than Dean and at times he had difficulty pinning his brother down. Sam imagined his smiled must have mirrored hers but suddenly, she looked away for a minute and then continued, "My Sammy was a baby the last time I saw him. And when I see you, I realise I have missed out on so many years and so many memories. First tooth, first crawl, first word, highschool crush, first day of college."
"You are here now, Mom, that's what matters." Sam managed to speak despite the lump in his throat.
"Dean told me you got out." The uneasiness on her face told Sam she was wanted to desparately know but was afraid to.
Sam blinked back tears. His return to the family business always opened old wound: Jessica's death. "I, uh, I lost someone. She was taken from me and I couldn't sit there anymore pretend that her death was normal, that I was normal."
"Jessica," Mary mumbled. She must have noticed the confusion flash on his face because she quickly added, "Dean told me. He told me it was like watching Dad lose me all over again. You changed after her death, like John did after mine."
Sam nodded swallowing hard. "Jessica was the love of my life. I wanted to marry her. I imagined a future with her. No one has ever come close to what she meant to me. And then they took her away from me. She was too pure for my life, Mom. She was too pure for me."
"Honey, I'm sure you deserved her just as much as she deserved you." Mary patted his arm lightly.
But Sam, he looked away. "You don't know all the evil I've done."
"You are right, I don't but I wanna change that." Mary said and then added, "If you are willing."
He met her eyes and uttered, "I drank demon blood, Mom. Even after Dean found out and tried to stop me, I didn't listen." Tears were flowing freely from his eyes. Thick sob shaking his body pulling at the injury.
If Mary was disgusted by the disclosure, her face didn't show. "This life, hunter's life, it tests you, makes you do ugly things. But Sam, they don't define you."
Sam's mouth turned downward on its own. Confessing that bitter truth to his mother took some of the burden off that he'd carried for so long.
She let him catch some rest but promised she'd be back to learn more about her boy, Sammy.
Sam Winchester didn't sleep well after that conversation. Part of him worried if his mother was going to eventually hate him once the gravity of his deeds sunk in. The other part of him was sure that she already hated him but was putting on a show like Dean had done ages ago.
Speaking of Dean, he made two trips to Sam's room throughout the afternoon. One was to ask if Sam needed pain killer and other was tell him that the vampire who attacked him was still out in the wind.
Mary didn't return to his room until after dinner. Like Dean, she had changed into a night gown, something Sam could never find comfort in, not after losing two of the important women in his life in those clothes.
"Mind if I come in?" She asked.
"Not at all," Sam kept aside the book that he was reading. "And for the record, you don't have to ask."
"You and Dean, you are close."
Sam smiled. "He's my family. He raised me. I've been looking up to him since..." He paused, ".. well you know."
She nodded. "He was all over you when we found you. Patched you up, didn't even need me around."
"Yeah, that's Dean." Sam patted down his bed hair. "Mom, I do need you. So does Dean. This family has always needed you."
His words had a direct impact on Mary. Teary eyed, she wrapped her arms around Sam who sank into his mother's embrace. There it was, another 'Mom moment' he'd cherish for life.