weary_head | (no subject)

Dean's body ached from the inside out, every last part of it wound so tight it was a wonder he had any strength left for walking, but walk Dean did. His feet had carried him to every part of the island at least twice, and now they'd brought him to the tree Sam had taken from the jungle and planted the last time Dean disappeared.

What, you made me into Arbor Day?

Sam hadn't smiled then, and Dean didn't smile now. Between Sam's screaming absence and Castiel's news, Dean wasn't sure he'd ever smile again. Not once, back home, not once had he taken Sam for granted, and on the island it'd taken all of a year to relax his guard, let himself reach for things that made him happy, and now his little brother was gone. Back to the worst of all possible futures, and Dean was as powerless to save him as a child.

He pushed his fingers over his eyes, holding back the panic as best he could. Sam was out there, fighting Lilith with only Ruby at his side, and Dean was in fucking Margaritaville. With a grunt of dissent, Dean walked forward, head shaking angrily from side to side. They hadn't been through all of this to be separated now.

The fistful of leaves tore easily away from the branch. Dean stalked north with his prize, to the place where the path split four ways. In times past, a left would have taken them to the baseball field where the both of them had played in a way they'd never been able to as children.

He punched rather than dug the hole in the ground.

When the last leaf was buried in the ground, Dean sat back on his haunches and waited. He didn't have anything left to barter with, even if a demon did come, but he had to know.

He had to know if this was truly done.

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"Fuck no," I answer simply, and just to prove he's not gonna change my mind, I drop into a crouch across from him. Fuckin' digging my heels in. Just try and make me go.

"What are you expectin' to happen?" I ask, arching a brow. Whatever it is, maybe I'm too stupid and too damn stubborn to be worried. Maybe I just can't leave him like this.

"Look around you, Neil." He didn't want to admit to it, as much for the folly of it as for the shame, but Dean knew Neil would work it out on his own.

"This is a crossroads. If there's a way to get him back, this is it."

It doesn't take long to figure it out. When I do, my jaw clinches and I just look at him for a moment or two, until I can keep myself from saying something stupid. Something I'll regret.

Eventually, though, I can't keep quiet. "What the fuck are you plannin' on trading?"

"I don't know," said Dean honestly. They'd taken the terms right out of his hands the last time, he suspected it'd be exactly the same today if anyone turned up.

"Thought I'd see what was on the table and go from there."

"Do you think it'd really work?" I ask quietly, shifting to sit down indian-style in the dirt. I think about all the people I've lost here, all the people I could lose, and I dunno what I would trade to keep 'em here, if I was given the choice.

I think maybe I'd trade myself if it meant the girls could have their mother.

Dean shook his head. "Nothing else I've tried has yet, but why not? There's evil here as much as anywhere, and look at this place. Half the people here are better off for having gotten here. As much as people here have got to lose...any demon would be jonesing for a pot like that. Especially the bitch that's holding mine."

"I like Sam, you know I do, but you go tradin' yourself for him, again, I'm gonna kick your fuckin' ass. I'll find a way," I say fiercely, and it's an empty fuckin' threat, but it's no less honest. I mean it, I'm not watching something like that happen.

I never had a brother to lose, but I lost the closest thing to it, and I probably would've done anything to keep her here. It's hard for me to find fault with this, even if I think he's fuckin' crazy.

Dean huffed out a small, unhappy laugh. "Hard enough to get them to take me the first time," he muttered, looking across the hole in the ground to find Neil staring at him, eyes burning.

"I'm sorry," he said softly. It hadn't escaped him that they were still alone. "Didn't work, anyway."

Nodding slowly, I look down at the mound in the earth, and there's a tiny, morbidly curious part of me that's itching to see it. To see the demon. To see how it works... how exactly he sold his soul that first time.

"'m sorry," I echo, forcing myself to look up at him, shifting awkwardly against the wrenching ache in my chest, "Dean... I know you think you gotta look after... everybody, but back home, you're still there. He's not the one that's alone, now. And, man, neither are you."

"I know." There'd been a lot of people searching, and Dean had felt some of their eyes on him as often as on the trees around them. That didn't mean he was ready to trade, though, not a life with Sam for a life with everyone else. Maybe it was too much, but Dean wanted both. He needed both.

"But things are bad back home. Even by our standards." Dean swallowed. "He isn't safe. I'm here and he isn't safe."

"I know," I murmur quietly, fighting the urge to shift over closer. Fighting it, because the line here seems to be drawn at pats on the back and a few awkward hugs. Stubbornly avoided talks about feelings, emotions covered with grunts and thinly veiled threats of bodily harm. It's a boundary I'm still learning how to navigate -- a dynamic I've never really experienced before. Never had a brother, not even a guy friend growing up...

Preston doesn't count.

So, in other words, sometimes I feel like a giant dick around him. I just gotta get used to it.

"I guess you knew," said Dean, eyes flicking towards Neil's feet but no further. "That we wouldn't find anything. Thanks for coming anyway."

Dean sighed, looking at the useful mound of earth between them. "He liked you."

"I've been here a long time, man. After a while you just sorta... know," I say, then, coughing out a bitter laugh, "Last couple times, I haven't even really looked. How fucked up is that?"

Another strained cough of laughter and I say, "Anyway, I think he pretty much just put up with me."

"N'aw." Dean shook his head, a sad smile on his face. "I know him when he's just tolerating. He liked you. Didn't always get you, but he liked you."

"Nobody gets me," I say with a crooked smile, trying not to think about how fucking weird it is to be talking about him in the past tense. It's the first real admission that he's actually gone. And here we are at the fucking crossroads and the world didn't end.

"How's Jessica?" I ask after a moment, not really sure if I should, but I can't really stop myself.

"'bout the same as me," Dean replied, "without the crossroads. I don't even know if she knows how to do that." Better if she didn't, even better that it hadn't worked if she did.

"I don't think she believes it yet."

"He could come back," I say, and it's a longshot, but it's true. "You did. Twice, right?" My lips twitch into a smile, but it's a fucking weak one at best.

They were getting married for chrissakes. It's not fuckin' fair.