Work Text:
"Hey Sam, when did you get home?"
Sam opens his eyes and lifts his head from its rest against the wainscoting. Emma looks like a ghost in the hallway's dimness, pale skin, pale hair and her long, white-flowered robe. He smiles at her and she takes it as an invitation to sit next to him. Sam moves his duffle to his other side and Emma settles in its place.
"Little while ago," he answers finally, in answer to her question. He's still mostly listening to the golden-mellow guitar music coming from behind the pocket doors to their suite. Unlike most people, Emma doesn't take that as an invitation to start chattering at him, content to just hang out and be quiet. He's always appreciated that about her.
"That's not a recording." Emma says after a minute, when the refrain stumbles and then starts again. "Is that…? Is that Dean?" Her head tilts, eyes gleaming in the semi-gloom.
"Yeah." Sam smiles again, feeling warm and lazy under the spell of the music, even though the hardwood floor is kind of cold and uncomfortable under his ass. "He… Ever since he lost that piece of his finger, he won't let me listen to him play anymore. He'll only play when he thinks I'm not around."
Emma nods her understanding and then leans her head back against the wall, as well, closing her eyes.
For a long time, Dean wouldn't touch the guitar at all, grumbling about carting it from place to place, making vague noises about throwing it away—or selling it—which Sam was never going to let happen. There was a lot of distraction sex, whenever the topic came up. Which Sam wasn't going to complain about.
But. Even if Dean never laid a hand on the guitar again, it's Dean's, one of the few things in the world Dean can claim as his own and Sam would rather sell off one of his own kidneys than let Dean get rid of it in a fit of pique. He's already sacrificed too much as it is. Besides, it was a gift. From Sam.
Sam remembers seeing it in the shop window and knowing, bone deep, that it was for Dean. Dappled, honey-brown and just as sweet… It was money they really hadn't had to spend and more than a few candy bar dinners for Sam, but it was worth it.
It was all worth it.
"He's not bad," Emma says, sounding surprised. "I mean, he's never gonna go platinum or anything, but…it's nice."
"Yeah." Sam smiles.
"You really love him, don't you?"
Sam rolls his head on his neck to look at Emma, seeing nothing in her expression but the same wondering avidness that's always there, since she figured out about him and Dean.
Teach me how you kept people from knowing.
Help me—help us—figure out how to do what you and Dean did.
He looks away again, focusing on his hands dangling limp between his upturned knees. It's surprisingly hard to talk about Dean…not that he's ever really had the opportunity. His throat still sticks a little as he says softly, "As much as it's possible to love another person."
Emma doesn't say anything and her views on affection are positively Winchester-esque but her shoulder sits solidly against his and Sam takes that for what it's worth.
The music goes on.
Sam's not asleep, exactly, when the doors shove open suddenly, spilling blinding white light into the darkness. Sam puts one hand up to shield his eyes, but the other fumbles in his pocket.
"You gonna sit out here all night freezing your ass off or you comin' in?" Dean growls. He doesn't sound any more irritated than usual. "Because I do have a vested interest in that ass. And you—shouldn't you be in bed?"
"Who can sleep with all this noise?" After saying it, Emma claps her hand over her mouth and giggles. It's a strange sound, mostly because Sam doesn't ever remember hearing it before.
Sam flicks the wheel on his lighter and raises it above his head. "Play some Freebird, man."
Dean's cane whacks into the bottom of Sam's boot, stinging even through the thick sole. "Ass."
"Jerk." Sam holds out his hand. "Help me up."
"You're getting feeble in your old age."
"But I'll always be younger than you." Sam's grinning harder than he has in days and Dean's got one to match as Sam backs him slowly and deliberately into the doorjamb. Sam darts a glance over his shoulder. "You. Emma. Off to bed now." It's on the tip of his tongue to say Say hi to Deacon, but that would be too much like approval and he's not there. Not yet.
"Yes, Sam," Emma answers with mock meekness, going to far as to bob a curtsey before she scampers out of sight, laughing again.
Dean's hand is on Sam's belt loop, tugging him forward into the warm solidity of Dean's body.
Sam has been dreaming about this body.
"So are you coming in, or what?" Dean tilts his head back so he can look Sam in the eyes.
"I don’t know." Sam's thumb finds the hem of Dean's tee-shirt and wiggles its way underneath to brush smooth, firm skin. "You gonna play me a song?"
Dean's mouth twists. "Yeah, smartass. I'll play you a song. A love song. And I'll use your ass for percussion." He whacks Sam hard and open handed on one cheek then twists away with surprising speed and dexterity for a guy with a bum leg and a cane.
"Is that a threat or a promise?" Sam laughs and closes the doors.