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You don’t know what you have until it’s gone. That saying applied to countless aspects of Sam’s life, but for a while, he’d felt that way about being soulless. It was something he could never utter aloud--no one would understand him--but it wasn’t like hiding his freakish nature was anything new for Sam.
Yes, of course, Sam knew that he had done terrible things while he’d been soulless. He’d been a terrible person overall–if you could have even called him a person, that is. Really, all he’d been was a robot primed for hunting and hunting only. There’d been no humanity within his flesh and bones, the one thing that had really separated him from all the monsters he and Dean fought.
Being soulless wasn’t something he’d miss, per say. It was more so the effects of being soulless that he found himself longing for.
Even when he’d been soulless he knew that having a soul, having emotions, would be hard. Why bother when he could do everything normal Sam could do but without worrying about feelings getting in the way?
All his life he’d trained to be the best hunter he could be, and then he was. It’d been so easy .
But then there was Dean. He’d been so adamant about Sam getting his soul back, and Dean usually knew what was best, so . . . Sam relented.
And then he’d changed his mind just as quickly.
Not having to deal with the burden of emotions was nice when your life was full of nothing but the bad ones. Add the threat of terrible memories rushing in from his time in Lucifer’s cage and Sam was simply being a logical human acting out of basic self-preservation.
As usual, though, Sam’s say had no weight. The soul that had been separated from him had been thrust back in against his will, and his autonomy juggled around like it was a toy.
When Sam woke, he’d shot upright with a sharp gasp. One moment he was falling into the cage, and the next, he was in Bobby’s panic room. He probably spent an hour staring at the ceiling, wondering if this was real life.
It didn’t take him long to notice something was wrong. Dean claimed that he got Death to bring Sam back, but that didn’t sit right with Sam. Why had he been put in the panic room, then? The last time he’d been there . . . Well, he wouldn’t linger on that now.
Everyone acted like everything was alright, but deep down inside, Sam knew better. Something was in him, wrong in the way a popcorn kernel stuck in your teeth was wrong. Subtle but persistent.
Sam had just come back from Hell, though. Of course he’d feel off. Maybe everything was fine. He suppressed his doubts, even as Dean and Bobby acted strange.
And then the memories started to pour in. Sam realized he’d been missing his soul not too long ago. With the flashbacks hitting at him randomly, he began to remember what it was like being soulless. He shuddered and tried to keep it to himself, but Sam found himself living in two worlds. The present and the past. Soulful and soulless. Full of feeling and numb.
One night at a motel, Dean made a harmless comment that Sam would normally find funny. This time, for some reason, it rubbed off Sam the wrong way and suddenly Sam was storming into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him to take in deep breaths as he controlled the sudden surge of anger.
“Ate one too many tacos there, Sammy?” Dean called from outside the bathroom.
Sam braced himself onto the sink and stared down his own reflection. He let out the best laugh he could to console Dean. “Yeah, guess so.”
Sam’s eyes looked back at him with worry. Why’d he get so worked up over a small remark? It was like he couldn’t control himself for a second there.
What was wrong with him?
Next thing he knew, every little thing was pissing Sam off. It was like a switch had been turned on and wouldn’t turn off. Dean thought Sam was just being a jerk.
At least Sam could work through the anger. It could even help him when hunting. The fear was much worse.
It struck Sam out of nowhere, and only then did Sam realize that he hadn’t felt fear since he’d fallen into the cage. They were tracking down vampires when Sam’s limbs froze.
The sharp teeth. The corpses. The Blood. The death. Death. Death. Death.
“Sam!” Dean shouted, shaking Sam out of his spell. Sam threw himself to the side, narrowly avoiding an attack that would have killed him on the spot.
Dean cut off the vampire’s head seconds later. The head rolled away and away and away, the blood trailing behind it and etching its color into Sam’s brain–
“What’s wrong with you?” Dean asked. He kneeled down and met Sam’s wide eyes. “Are you . . . are you shaking? ”
“No,” Sam said, then winced at the high pitch of his voice.
Yes. Yes, he was shaking. Yes, he was paralyzed with fear. Yes, he was . . . He was scared. No. Mortified.
He didn’t want to die, he realized. The primal urge to live in a world that wanted him dead seized him so abruptly that he didn’t know what to do with himself but freeze up.
It didn’t make sense for him to be so scared. He did stuff like this all the time! Logically, he knew he was fine, but–
“Hey, hey now,” Dean said as Sam’s trembling only got worse. “It’s okay. You’re okay. Just relax for me, okay?”
Dean looked so out of his depth that Sam would have found it funny if he could get enough oxygen in his lungs.
Oh.
He was hyperventilating. When did he start doing that?
It wasn’t long before Sam knocked himself out, Dean’s concerned shouts echoing into his brain as everything went black.
Bobby and Dean had their theories about what was happening to Sam.
“I mean, of course there’s something wrong, but I don’t think it has anything to do with your soul,” Dean said. “What if this is just regular trauma stuff?”
Both Sam and Bobby gave Dean an unconvinced look. Dean looked away, licking his lips, and muttered, “Alright, fine.”
“Look, you said that you hadn’t felt fear since yesterday?” Bobby asked. “None at all?”
Sam nodded.
“Then, don’t you think that maybe your body is just trying to catch up with your brain? It’s making up for all the emotions you didn’t process when you were soulless,” Bobby theorized.
Dean shook his head. “What? No. That doesn’t make sense.”
Sam shrugged. “It’s the best guess we got.”
“Think about it, idjit,” Bobby grumbled. “He went a year without real emotions and now, poof! They're suddenly back all at once. His body is probably going into shock.”
“First, I kept getting angry at small things and now I’m getting scared of my own shadow,” Sam added. “I went from logical but emotionless to emotional and illogical. Great. Where’s the balance? I thought getting my soul back was supposed to make me normal again?”
As normal as Sam Winchester could be, anyway.
“You are normal!” Dean argued. “Let’s say this frickin’ theory is right. Then, it means this is happening because you’re normal, Sammy. You’re just not used to it yet. You just need time to adapt, okay? You’re gonna be fine, got that?”
From then on, Sam wasn’t allowed to go on hunts until he could handle the struggle of everyday life first. It made sense; Sam was a liability to himself and others, but as time went on, his emotions only continued to get more out of whack. He couldn’t walk across the road without his heart racing so fast that it felt like it’d pound through ribs and he couldn’t even go out to eat without tripping all over his words and stifling his shaky breath. He spent all day indoors, isolating himself. There were too many dangers out there.
Then, when the fear finally subsided, the anger returned. It was a torturous cycle that seemed to go on for eternity.
Sam couldn’t live like this. He just couldn’t.
That was it. He needed his soul gone.
Once it was gone, he’d be okay again. He’d never have to feel fear or anger or anything, and it would be bliss.
Unfortunately his brother knew him too well. Sam drove to a crossroads and began preparing to make a deal with a demon, but Dean had followed him and said, “Really?”
Sam flinched, but was too desperate to feel much shame. He continued his preparations.
“After everything I did to get you your soul back, you’re just going to trade it away? ” Dean demanded.
“You knew there would be risks,” Sam hissed. “And me living like an animal, controlled by my emotions, is not one I signed up for. Oh, wait. I didn’t agree to this at all. I never wanted my soul back! ”
Dean sharply inhaled and wore that expression he always did when he was hiding guilt behind anger. He walked up to Sam and put a hand on his shoulder. Before Dean could get another word out, Sam threw a punch right to his face.
Dean stumbled back, shock written all over his face.
Yeah, of course he’d be shocked. Dean was the one always hitting Sam, using him as a punching bag. He wasn’t used to this side of Sam. Well, too bad. He created this Sam, so he’d suffer the consequences of it. Sam snarled as he went in for another punch and Dean narrowly avoided it, but Sam just kept swinging, seeking a release for the pain that’d never end. The fury made him dangerous, but also sloppy. It wasn’t long until Dean, realizing that Sam wasn’t going to stop until one of them dropped, managed to pin Sam down.
“Just let me do it!” Sam roared. “Let me get rid of my soul!”
“No,” Dean said, infuriatingly calm now. “You don’t mean it.”
“Of course I mean it,” Sam insisted. “You don’t know what it’s like. This is all your fault! ”
“I don’t know what it’s like having a soul?” Dean questioned through pants as he held Sam down. Sam was bigger than Dean. He could throw Dean off if he could just get out of this grip.
“No,” Sam said, correcting himself. “You don’t know what it’s like coming back wrong.” There was a burning sensation around Sam’s eyes. Maybe he had gotten injured there. “I’m not the same as before and I never will be. It’s like all the bad stuff came back and none of the good. Cas should’ve . . . he should’ve just–just left me there. If he wasn’t going to do it right the first time.”
Sam could’ve died a hero. Everyone would’ve remembered him for fixing his wrongdoings and taking down Lucifer. Now he was broken, and everyone knew it.
It wasn’t fair. Nothing in his life was. It just wasn’t fair!
There was a droplet that fell down onto Sam’s cheek. He looked up at the sky and was met with brightness. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky.
It wasn’t raining.
Sam’s throat was tight and his nose was runny. The anger in him drained away like dirty water in a clogged up sink. His limbs grew ten pounds heavier. All he wanted to do was lie down and cry.
Oh.
That was it. He was crying.
Dean hesitantly loosened his grip on Sam. “Sammy?”
The temperature all around him seemed to go down a hundred degrees. Sam snatched his hands out of Dean’s grip and brought it to his face as sobs began to wrack his entire body.
When was the last time he’d cried? He couldn’t remember. It was definitely before he’d gone into the cage. Long before that, even.
Crying was terrible. It was wet and gross and so human. The despair was all encompassing, making it hard to breathe. Sam was drowning. He was sinking. He was surrounded by darkness and alone. He longed for the warmth of a hand, even if it was from Death himself. Especially if it was from Death.
But Death didn’t come for him. Instead, the arms that circled around him were mortal and familiar. Dean.
“It’s okay,” Dean murmured. “You can cry. I won’t tell anybody.”
With that, Sam let the dam loose and poured out everything. Memories of all kinds flashed through his mind. Some things were from when he was soulless and others were before he’d fallen into the cage. They were all things he hadn’t taken time to process and they were back with a vengeance, hitting him at full force.
He and Dean stayed there until Sam had no more tears left to cry. When Sam was done, he pulled away and didn’t know what to say.
“I hope you know that you just used up, like, a lifetime’s worth of hugs,” Dean said jokingly, because, naturally, he didn’t do well with touchy feelings, and yet he’d been there the entire time without a single complaint. “Are you feeling . . . better?”
Sam searched deep within. He didn’t feel that uncomfortable kernel anymore. Instead, there was a soft warmth, and it felt right.
Sam tentatively nodded.
Later, in the impala, he realized that, sure, it had been nice being soulless because he hadn’t needed to suffer the painful emotions that came with the human experience, but there had been something missing.
Happiness.
He’d never once smiled when he’d been soulless. Not unless it’d been for show.
And even now, Sam, with his soul, still hadn’t felt it yet. That happiness. A part of him wondered if he ever would feel it again. If he even deserved it.
But every emotion had come at its own pace, and the only thing Sam could do was be hopeful that the good ones would show themselves when they were ready.
It was worth waiting for, wasn’t it? What was the point of life if you couldn’t experience joy, laughter, and love?
Sam spared Dean a glance and watched him turn on the radio. Dean grinned the moment he tuned in on the song.
“Hey, you like this one, right?” Dean asked. Before Sam could answer, Dean put up the volume and let the music spill out of the car.
At that moment, on the road with his older brother, Sam knew that things would be okay. He turned his head and looked out the window to watch the street lights as one of his favorite songs filled the silence.
Sam caught his own reflection on the window, the corners of his lips quirked up just the slightest bit.