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Dad’s been gone for a week, and Sammy’s not eating again. He pushes fries around his paper plate like he can make them go away by sheer force of will, stares at them like it’ll make him digest them without actually having to put them in his mouth.
It’s selfish and it’s stupid of Sam to act this petty when Dean always has a hell of a hard time getting food for them in the first place, but somehow Dean can’t muster up the energy to be angry about it. Dad would be angry—doesn’t really take much, especially with Sam—but Dad’s not here. So Dean just pretends not to notice, doesn’t want to make it worse, keeps serving up the same reheated fries. If Sam would eat more than a couple bites, he’d notice they were soggy and cold and dried-up, oven-fresh three days ago and now barely edible. But he doesn’t.
Dean keeps waiting for him to say something, complain about the food, ask for something stupid he likes to eat, one of those ridiculous dishes he’s started liking since that girl back in Oregon; quinoa and cottage cheese and too many fucking leaves. Dean’d get him it, at this point, even though there’s no money left and that shit’s expensive .
He’d drive around until he found one of the health food stores a couple hundred miles out of town, hang around the aisles awkwardly and slip some packet of low-calorie, low-carb, low-everything and entirely insubstantial konjac noodles in his sleeves. Or else he’d rifle through the Walmart shelves and dump low-fat yogurts and big green smoothies and bags of mixed vegetables in a shopping bag and walk out with it before anyone clocked what was going on.
After the peanut butter incident, Dean hasn’t liked stealing, has resorted to other methods with less risk of discovery. But he’d do it for this. Or, at least, he’d get some more cash and order Sam exactly whatever the hell he asked for, if only Sam would just ask for something. But he keeps pushing fries around, keeps insisting he’s not hungry, keeps refilling cups of water and drinking them like he’s read it keeps spirits away. Keeps not eating.
Whatever. Sam can do what he likes, he’s old enough, and it’s not like the way he eats seems to have much impact on him, hasn’t stopped him from growing taller than Dean was at his age or from being ten times smarter than his older brother in pretty much every possible way. And it’s not like it’s a problem, Sam isn’t anorexic-thin and he’s no teenage girl puking in the school bathroom, just a little skinny round the edges and sort-of attention seeking and mildly disconnected from the more physical aspects of life.
Dean knew a girl worse than this once, just wouldn’t eat and didn’t want to, always needed to sit down when they made out because she felt dizzy standing too long. They’d go out to diners and he’d buy her a burger and she’d feed it to him, pretending it was cute, but he’d notice the fear in her eyes if he tried to do the same to her. Sam isn’t like that. The idea is ridiculous. He’s sensitive, sure, but he’s not a girl, or a model. He’s just— a picky eater.
He’s always been a picky eater. It’s just that these days picky eating is nibbling on anything that will occupy his mouth without filling him up, not eating huge bowls of Lucky Charms three times a day. It’s just that now if Dean asks what Sam wants for dinner he goes why don’t you make something you want and quit hovering around me all the time? and does Dad ask what you feed me? Have you ever noticed you eat exactly like him, Dean? And Dean goes what, like a normal person?, and Sam replies dismissively it’s perfectly normal not to want to stuff yourself with heart-disease causing cheeseburgers every meal, which, yeah, sure, is true.
But Dean doesn’t think it’s that normal to avoid them like the plague, either, not just the meat and the cheese but the bread, too—Sam hasn’t eaten bread in weeks and he doesn’t eat peanut butter anymore. But Dean doesn’t want to say that in response because then it all starts to feel a little too real and, besides, Sam would just storm off.
Dean can’t make him eat, much as he wishes he could. Guilt-tripping won’t work, doesn’t work, never has before, because Sam just says he never asked Dean to buy food for him, and anyway how can Dean talk when he knows Dean used to skip meals when they were younger to save food for Sam? The latter of which is is true, and not something Dean really likes remembering that Sam knows about, so he tends to shut up. Sam wins.
Getting angry doesn’t work; Sam just digs his heels in, it becomes a point of principle; fuck you, I do what I want, eat when I want . Threatening to tell Dad doesn’t work; Sam knows Dean wouldn’t risk it, cause even if Dad got Sam to eat like a normal person it’d just be through yelling at him or forcing him, which would stop working the second Dad left again. Anyway, it’s more likely Dad would just dismiss it as Sam being ridiculous and thinking he’s better than them and get mad at Dean for tolerating it, maybe blame him for letting it go on this long, the latter which would, awfully, probably be justified. Even though nothing works . Even though he can’t make Sam stop it.
The only thing Dean hasn’t tried, up until this point, is entirely, blatantly, ignoring. So that’s what he’s doing.
Nevermind the fact that it’s definitely not normal to just stop eating almost entirely for days at a time; what about their family even is normal? Nevermind the fact that it destroys Dean to watch his fifteen year old baby brother refusing the most basic tenants of human need and survival, his fifteen year old baby brother trying to waste away because Dad’s doing what he always does and hasn’t been home in a week.
They sit down for dinner and Sam stares at the floor and at his food and nibbles on carrot sticks and puts them down half-bitten into. Dean checks the motel answering machine and hears the tone of nothing every time. Sam gets up and drinks coffee while Dean fries sausages.
There’s something so awful about eating when Sam isn’t; Dean feels like such a failure, like at least if his brother’s starving himself he should too. But if they have food, they better fucking eat it before it goes off, and Dean’s still hoping that one of these days Sam will just start eating when Dean offers him food. Back to normal, even though normal Sam still eats weirdly. He’d take it. He’d be happy with it.
Tuesday turns into Wednesday turns into Thursday. Everything Sam eats all together adds up to something that’d fill Dean’s stomach for about two hours. He doesn’t know what to do .
He brings it up. Twice. Sam is unimpressed, Sam doesn’t see the problem. “I’m just not that hungry at the moment.” Or Sam lies. “I ate at school, I’m telling you.” Or Sam gets annoyed. “Stop acting like I have a problem or something, I’m completely fine .”
Dean doesn’t know what to do. Sam’s in denial and they can’t continue like this; can they? The girl Dean knew told him once she’d been to hospital because her potassium levels were dangerously low, that eating less than you need shrinks the brain, weakens the heart. For someone who likes to talk about health so much, Sam sure as fuck isn’t being very healthy.
Dad gets home on the 15th. He’s in a good mood; comes bearing Chinese takeout and a six pack of beers he hasn’t already gotten through half of. Sam doesn’t drink the beer and pokes at the noodles and nibbles at spring rolls until Dad says Sam, why are you eating like a rabbit? Are you full or are you sick? What’s Dean been feeding you ?
Dean laughs, awkwardly. Sam folds his arms, irritated, and Dean senses some retort on the tip of his tongue, like this stuff is so greasy is it any surprise I don’t want to eat it , or, worse, do you know how many calories are in the oil alone on these —which, come on, Sam, could you sound any more like an insecure cheerleader—but it never comes. Whatever it is, he doesn’t say it. He shuts his mouth and eats a spring roll, delicately. Then another one.
Then he inches over, opens the carton of hoisin duck, eats; still quietly, bit by bit. There’s no indication this is the first proper meal he’s had all week, no sign that he should be devouring this like it’s the best thing he’s ever tasted; Dean knows what hunger feels like and he knows how good that first-meal-in-a-while feels.
Dean’s watching him carefully, waiting for the crisis point, when Sam will inevitably decide enough is enough after a few mouthfuls and put the chopsticks down, but he doesn’t. He keeps eating. Sam doesn’t meet Dean’s eyes, just looks at Dad and at the food and even cracks a smile as Dad says something Dean can’t focus on, but he keeps eating, slowly, methodically. It should feel like a victory. Sam’s eating. Sam’s eating .
It doesn’t.
Dad leaves again two days later. Dean spends the last of the money on Chinese. It goes untouched.